Crossroads & Cultures - the Intersection of Cultures in the Aluborg Sagas

 Crossroads & Cultures

The Intersection of Cultures in the Aluborg Sagas

     This is the first in what I hope to make a regular series of notes on the Aluborg Sagas, a campaign setting I created for the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role-Playing Game. The Aluborg Sagas are set in the world of Midhgardhur, which has been the setting for other RPG campaigns (mostly Pathfinder 1E) and I have published a number of stories and books set in that world, so a great deal of the setting is pretty firmly fleshed out going back more than 10 years now. But as a Judge creating a setting for RPG play, I try to be conscious and intentional about the ideas to which I give voice and space. So I wanted to make some notes about "crossroads of cultures," or as I entitled this blog post, "Crossroads & Cultures" (which I admit was because it had a "Dungeons & Dragons," "Tunnels & Trolls," "Castles & Crusades," etc. vibe). 

     The first large-scale campaign world I ever created (for AD&D and then AD&D 2nd edition) focused on a Renaissance-style urban center from which characters could explore the campaign world. Veterans of those campaigns often remarked, "Oh, we're starting in that city again? Every time, eh?" It wasn't really a complaint, as I understood it - just an observation that I strongly preferred to start my campaign there. But why? It was because of the cosmopolitan nature of the city - I had read a phrase about Renaissance cities in Europe being a "crossroads of the world" in some book, and that had captured and fired my imagination. Characters of ANY background could be found drawn to the big city, galleons from an Age of Exploration bringing natives of far-off lands into contact with the "mainstream" culture of the campaign. So it made a good excuse for whatever characters brought to the table. "OK, so we've got a berserk barbarian, a bounty hunter thief, a noble paladin, a dwarf from the mountains, and elf from the forests - well, that's OK, they all met each other in the great cosmopolitan city!" It sounded plausible to me. The Renaissance setting allowed for an intersection of foreign stone-age cultures with everything up to wheel-lock pistols, and I loved it all. But that's not where my games are set now. 

     The world of Midhgardhur doesn't have a Renaissance setting yet - it's in the Dark Ages, roughly 900 C.E. of our world. The world is focused on the Northern, "Viking"-inspired cultures, partly because it's fun (There are always gamers who find Vikings cool!), but partly because of the same thinking about the intersections of cultures. The Vikings - they went almost everywhere. North America, almost 500 years before Columbus failed to discover North America. The rivers of Eurasia, all the way down to Constantinople. The Muslim world. North Africa. And of course, the raids on Europe. Vikings went lots of places and met lots of different kinds of people. Great opportunity for adventure in a fantasy version of their world. I posit that a cultural crossroads presents some of the best opportunities for role-playing imaginable, although it needs to be handled with intention and attention. 

     The Aluborg Sagas are set in the equivalent of Ukraine and Russia in a fantasy version of what happened when the Vikings known as the Vaeringjar and Rus went East into Eurasia instead of West to Europe and North America. I chose this setting because it was a crossroads of cultures, yet again, but of a very different kind from a Renaissance urban center. It is an inherently colonial setting - in the real world, the Norse "Rus" invaded the Slavic lands and set up their own kingdoms there - they traded with Arabic and other Muslim traders who traveled up the same rivers they were sailing down, and interacted with a vast array of indigenous cultures (from Finnic peoples in the north and Slavic peoples throughout to the edges of the steppes where cultures like the Mongols roamed. My setting is similar, with simplifications of the varieties of some of these and the addition of fantasy elements (Norse and Slavic versions of dwarves, elves, halflings, gnomes, trolls, and so forth). 

     The tricky part is, I'm trying to be intentional about how I present this. Just because Aluborg is a Northerner ("Viking") settlement in Vylgar and Kvenir (Slavic and Finnic, respectively) territory, it doesn't mean the colonizers are the heroes and the indigenous peoples are the enemy, or vice versa. They exist in a space created by colonialism, but that doesn't mean colonialism is endorsed - just acknowledged. Playing various cultures as having real differences, and the intersection of their cultures as having real consequences, is part of the story. This can be a delicate balance. Playing the various cultures as having real characteristics worth noting, without them becoming stereotypes, whether negative ("uncivilized, dehumanized Others") or positive ("noble savages" who are inherently good and pure because they are uncivilized) is tough. More so when pointing out that the characters often come from background with these attitudes. 

     An example from actual game play - the party was crossing a wilderness area and ran into the reindeer herds of the Kvenir (essentially a version of certain Finnic nomad groups from northern Eurasia). The Kvenir had knowledge of the area (they were nomadic, but native to the general area), and were wary of the mostly-Northern ("Viking") party, but cautiously willing to interact. The players chose to have their characters treat these indigenous peoples with respect, trade fairly with them, and make treaties of alliance with them. They could have chosen otherwise, and knew that their characters came from backgrounds where "otherwise" was the norm. Later, returning to Aluborg to tell of the treaties made, there was a variety of reactions - some racist NPCs doubted whether any treaty with "savages" could be trusted, some accepted the situation, others wanted to attribute superstitious significance to them (a version of the "noble savage" trope). The players were able to examine a "crossroad of cultures" as characters who viewed that "wilderness" as a "wild frontier," but having met people for whom this was part of their seasonal migration route - not a "frontier" at all. Some of the party might have been playing Kvenir (but I don't think anyone had randomly rolled that background at 0-level, a feature of DCC RPG and this setting), but it might have been even more interesting if members of the party were on both sides of the encounter. 

     Can this lead to problematic situations? It could. The party could embrace racism, colonialism, etc. They could decide to adopt policies of attacking those of different cultures, or trying to take advantage of them . . . and I was glad my players did not choose these options! But they could have . . . and what would have been the result? War with the Kvenir? That was a real possibility, making the setting now colonizers at war with hostile natives who have greater numbers and know the terrain, but less technology . . . but in a fantasy setting, might have other advantages (e.g. magical) that offset technological disadvantage. It would have been OK, in my view, to explore what happens when such a situation exists, where there is an imbalance of power among cultures - as long as it isn't glorifying colonizers exploiting and brutalizing indigenous peoples. We can shine a light on what happens in such situations without approving or endorsing. And I would probably have made that explicit to the players. 

     A crossroads of culture is a great setting for RPGs. A variety of characters of differing backgrounds makes for much more interesting role-playing experiences, in my opinion. Traditional Eurocentric RPG fantasy settings tend to follow Tolkien in this regard - all the "PC" types are roughly homogeneous humans (though there are those of Rohan and Gondor), elves, and dwarves, with some minority groups thrown in (halflings called hobbits, giant eagles, ents, etc.). Villainous NPCs include goblins & orcs of various types, and Easterlings and Southrons are firmly allied with Sauron - not much encountered, and strictly as enemies, for the most part. But I prefer the idea that I can have elves, dwarves, and halfings, but also the equivalent of Norse, Rus, Slavs, Finnic peoples, Mongols. Arabs, etc. all meeting in the same region, and allowing their interactions to fall out as they may. This allows for a wider variety of character types and backgrounds, and yes, some of them might have their own stereotypes and prejudices, but they don't need to indulge this any more than most D&D players feel the need to play up "oh, my character is a dwarf, so he can't stand the elf character." They could, and the consequences of that can be explored in role-playing, but it should be an opportunity for role-playing, not a straitjacket of how the characters must act because of their cultural background.