Quote from: The Butcher;929121Some classic fairy tales would make Conan blanch.

Except that most fairy tales I know of retain a strong sense of the good vs. evil... and generally have happy endings for the protagonists, who are portrayed as the 'good' people. It's not that they don't have really dark bits in them, but the characters usually remain on their own side of the dualistic fence.
I might, with my modern sensibilities, see some of the heroes/heroines as gray shaded, but I'm not thinking they're meant that way. Hansel & Gretel pushing the witch in her oven, Snow White making the evil witch dance to death in boots of molten lead... it's all virtue signalling by the heroes that they know what's right and proper. Same as those good folks in Critter Bluffs who turn out to see the hanging.

Quote from: The Butcher;928977Sword-and-sorcery is about building a new world from the ashes of an old one, and defending it from menaces within and without, without utopian delusions.

High fantasy is about restoring the world to its Golden Age template.

I would say it's more about making the world a better place than it was.  Golden Age mentality might have been true, or maybe it never was, but Paladins & Princesses is about making a change for the better and having it mean something.  Have your (The characters) actions make the world that is a happier place.

Quote from: The Butcher;928977Sword-and-sorcery is about building a new world from the ashes of an old one, and defending it from menaces within and without, without utopian delusions.

High fantasy is about restoring the world to its Golden Age template.

I would say it's more about making the world a better place than it was.  Golden Age mentality might have been true, or maybe it never was, but Paladins & Princesses is about making a change for the better and having it mean something.  Have your (The characters) actions make the world that is a happier place.

Quote from: Simlasa;929151Except that most fairy tales I know of retain a strong sense of the good vs. evil... and generally have happy endings for the protagonists, who are portrayed as the 'good' people. It's not that they don't have really dark bits in them, but the characters usually remain on their own side of the dualistic fence.
I might, with my modern sensibilities, see some of the heroes/heroines as gray shaded, but I'm not thinking they're meant that way. Hansel & Gretel pushing the witch in her oven, Snow White making the evil witch dance to death in boots of molten lead... it's all virtue signalling by the heroes that they know what's right and proper. Same as those good folks in Critter Bluffs who turn out to see the hanging.

The original Faery Tales did not typically have happy endings.  Red Riding Hood got eaten and that was the end of her, it was a cautionary tale about being wary of strangers.  It was the Victorian age that soften them.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;929156The original Faery Tales did not typically have happy endings.

I'm no expert of course, but even with the earliest versions of Red Riding Hood there are versions where she tricks the wolf somehow and escapes.
I'm not saying they ALL have happy endings, but the ones most modern people think of when they hear 'fairy tale' do... to where 'fairy tale' has become synonymous with things going blissfully well.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;929156The original Faery Tales did not typically have happy endings.  Red Riding Hood got eaten and that was the end of her, it was a cautionary tale about being wary of strangers.  It was the Victorian age that soften them.

Well we can certainly acknowledge what they used to be. However, I believe that when you say the word "fairy tale" these days the average person immediately thinks of fuzzy family-friendly bed time fare rather than GRR Martin style lead-scorched foot stumps. With that in mind, I would still place fairy tales under the Paladins & Princesses label.

I think the use of the term "Paladins" is confusing the issue; despite being a correct use of the original term, D&D has so mangled the semantics that it's hard to distinguish.

If I were to describe the "P & P" genre, I'd use the phrase "Knights in Shining Armour".  This phrase has a lot of semantic loading to it in English culture, it includes things like Mallory's Arthur, Charlemagne's, er, Paladins, and the Disneyified version of the Grimm fairy tales.

Aside from King Arthur Pendragon, I'm not sure what I would point to as a modern RPG exemplar of the genre.  4-colour superhero RPGs, certainly, Do: Pilgrims of the Flying Temple or Golden Sky Stories are of the same tone and theme, but for the base template?  The closest I can think of is GAZ1: The Grand Duchy of Karameikos, which by virtue of needing to be bowdlerized for 12-year-olds smooths off a lot of the rough edges of D&D's S&S roots.

Although this:

Quote from: CRKruegerSo I see P&P as a type of Utopian fantasy. A place where Honor, Justice, Valor, Love, Compassion are more than just lies we tell children.

...is basically the list of Values for a Cortex Plus Dramatic hack.

Look at you, CRKrueger, making an indie storygame!  I'm so proud.

Quote from: Simlasa;929169I'm no expert of course, but even with the earliest versions of Red Riding Hood there are versions where she tricks the wolf somehow and escapes.
I'm not saying they ALL have happy endings, but the ones most modern people think of when they hear 'fairy tale' do... to where 'fairy tale' has become synonymous with things going blissfully well.

Actually, the earliest version of Red Riding Hood has the wolf eating her, and the cautionary tale was "so young ladies pay attention who you let in your beds, lest it turns out to be a wolf". It's a tale by the financial minister of the Sun-King, told to the somewhat jadeded court ladies, what would you expect:D?
The whole outsmarting only came after that

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;929170Well we can certainly acknowledge what they used to be. However, I believe that when you say the word "fairy tale" these days the average person immediately thinks of fuzzy family-friendly bed time fare rather than GRR Martin style lead-scorched foot stumps. With that in mind, I would still place fairy tales under the Paladins & Princesses label.

The average person is mistaking Disney adaptations for the original. Thing is, an adaptation, by its very name, isn't the original, and probably lacks at least some of its qualities, depending on what it was adapted to do:).
In this case, the adaptations were adapted to be more like high fantasy, but in doing so, they mostly stopped being fairy tales;).

Quote from: daniel_ream;929176I think the use of the term "Paladins" is confusing the issue; despite being a correct use of the original term, D&D has so mangled the semantics that it's hard to distinguish.

If I were to describe the "P & P" genre, I'd use the phrase "Knights in Shining Armour".  This phrase has a lot of semantic loading to it in English culture, it includes things like Mallory's Arthur, Charlemagne's, er, Paladins, and the Disneyified version of the Grimm fairy tales.

  It is probably the best one-line summation of the genre, yes.

Quote from: AsenRG;929201The average person is mistaking Disney adaptations for the original.

So? What I'm trying to say is that, in my opinion, the originals are irrelevant to this discussion. RPGs are designed by modern people with modern mindsets, targeting modern audiences. Fairy tales once meant what you are describing, but now, in the public consciousness, they mean this:



Which I would argue is a totally different feel and genre of fantasy than this (high fantasy):



Paladins & Princesses can easily encompass and merge both these approaches.

Quote from: daniel_ream;929176I think the use of the term "Paladins" is confusing the issue; despite being a correct use of the original term, D&D has so mangled the semantics that it's hard to distinguish.

If I were to describe the "P & P" genre, I'd use the phrase "Knights in Shining Armour".  This phrase has a lot of semantic loading to it in English culture, it includes things like Mallory's Arthur, Charlemagne's, er, Paladins, and the Disneyified version of the Grimm fairy tales.

Aside from King Arthur Pendragon, I'm not sure what I would point to as a modern RPG exemplar of the genre.  4-colour superhero RPGs, certainly, Do: Pilgrims of the Flying Temple or Golden Sky Stories are of the same tone and theme, but for the base template?  The closest I can think of is GAZ1: The Grand Duchy of Karameikos, which by virtue of needing to be bowdlerized for 12-year-olds smooths off a lot of the rough edges of D&D's S&S roots.

Although this:



...is basically the list of Values for a Cortex Plus Dramatic hack.

Look at you, CRKrueger, making an indie storygame!  I'm so proud.

Next thing you know I'll move to G+.

If I did make an Indie Storygame, I'd make a Medieval Catholic WitchHunter Cortex Drama Hack using as Values the Seven Deadly Sins vs. the Seven Heavenly Virtues just to see every storygamer across the world lose their collective shit.

Quote from: CRKrueger;929215Next thing you know I'll move to G+.

If I did make an Indie Storygame, I'd make a Medieval Catholic WitchHunter Cortex Drama Hack using as Values the Seven Deadly Sins vs. the Seven Heavenly Virtues just to see every storygamer across the world lose their collective shit.

You want to really drive them, and especially Cam Banks, up the wall? Do it for Dragonlance...basing it around the Appendix to the hardcover version of Dragons of a Vanished Moon, which mapped the sins and the cardinal and theological virtues to the Krynnish pantheon, and skewed the cosmology away from Balance in a more monotheistic, Good-is-right-Evil-is-wrong direction.

Quote from: CRKrueger;929215Next thing you know I'll move to G+.

If I did make an Indie Storygame, I'd make a Medieval Catholic WitchHunter Cortex Drama Hack using as Values the Seven Deadly Sins vs. the Seven Heavenly Virtues just to see every storygamer across the world lose their collective shit.

Especially when the PC in no armor stands at the gates before the advancing shield wall of goblins with open hands pleading for peace...

And gets the most posthumous xp for inheriting the Earth.

Quote from: daniel_ream;929176If I were to describe the "P & P" genre, I'd use the phrase "Knights in Shining Armour".  This phrase has a lot of semantic loading to it in English culture, it includes things like Mallory's Arthur, Charlemagne's, er, Paladins, and the Disneyified version of the Grimm fairy tales.

La Morte D'Arthur and the chansons de geste were, for the lack of a better word, metal as fuck and definitely not in the same league as Disney's take on fairy tales. Or Dragonlance, for that matter.

To me, Paladins & Princesses (meaning the Zeitgeist of AD&D 2e) = Medieval (or more accurately, Romantic "Medieval") imagery + a universe operating on a High Fantasy logic of clearly demarcated and militant forces of Good and Evil.

Lots of settings have Medieval imagery in spades and wouldn't strike me as P&P at all; ASoIaF/GoT, WFRP, Greyhawk to name a few.

Quote from: Just Another Snake Cult;928927
Three Hearts and Three Lions by Poul Anderson.

The Ur-Text of D&D.

For me, The Princess Bride is the first thing that comes to mind.

Which seems odd to me as it's a movie where a murderous pirate, a Spanish duelist who kills for fun, and a brutal giant, take on a corrupt prince, his torturer, and a professional warmonger, who are granted license by a weak and ineffectual king.

Yes, they step into the expected fairy tale hero roles but they're actually a band of vicious bastards.  Very much like your average band of murder hobos.

La Morte de Arthur features adultery, murderous robber knights, dishonest knights sitting in company with the best knights in Christendom.  The king orders mass infanticide after knocking up his half sister.  Lancelot is mentally unstable and prone to running around naked in the forest, unaware of who he is.  The ladies of the lake are dangerous sorceresses who have their own agendas.  Even TH White deals with the ugly edges of the story.  I often wonder which Arthur people read.