Wednesday, May 16, 2018

[D&D] Flanaess Cuisine

Gary Gygax loved to talk about food and drink. As anyone who participated in the online Q&A sessions with him at places like ENWorld and Dragonsfoot can attest, he would frequently veer off on tangents about those topics, which were clearly more interesting to him than the sorts of D&D rules minutia that the fans wanted to discuss. Therefore, its no surprise that he tended to include detailed descriptions of such matters in both the D&D gamebooks and his later novels - most famously in the description of the Inn of the Welcome Wench in The Village of Hommlet and in chapter 14 of his novel Saga of Old City, in which he devotes several pages to an exacting course-by-course itemization of every item shared by Gord and Gellor at the Horn and Haunch tavern in the city of Stoink. However, those are far from the only mentions of food and drink - Gene Weigel uncovered dozens more, large and small. There are so many references to food and drink in Gary's Greyhawk works that it's possible by combining them all to get a pretty detailed picture of what he imagined the typical diet of that imaginary world's inhabitants to be.

One thing that stands out immediately is that it is strictly medieval, with all "New World" foods such as potatoes, corn, tomatoes, pumpkins, chocolate, vanilla, and tobacco conspicuous by their total absence (at least in all of the references I checked). This is a bit surprising, both because Gary generally wasn't hung up on "anachronism" (and in his later years advocated moving the default technological base of D&D forward to approx. 1650 for everything except gunpowder) and furthermore because he posited a class of cosmopolitan inter-planar travelers with knowledge of other worlds, including modern-day earth, and surely could have brought back such items (similarly to how Gord purchases several bottles of 1947 Chateau Margaux Margaux from a wine merchant in Weird Way), but the consistent absence of such items can only have been deliberate. With that in mind, and aided by several Google searches, I've filled in a few blank spots in the culinary landscape based on typical European medieval cuisine.

Does any of this matter or make a difference when playing D&D? Not really - as long as you know that a "merchant's meal" costs 1 s.p. and a week's supply of rations costs 3 g.p. for "standard" or 5 g.p. for "iron" per the Players Handbook it probably doesn't affect the game to know what exactly they consist of. And yet, added detail can also make the game more immersive, and help the players to picture the imaginary world. Going into exhaustive detail on every meal the characters consume is undoubtedly overkill, and yet the bill of fare at the Inn of the Welcome Wench with its list of exotic wines and brandies is still fondly remembered almost 40 years later as the kind of detail and flavor that made Gary Gygax's version of D&D so evocative.

Breakfast: bread (loaves, rolls, muffins), gruel/porridge (semolina, groat clusters), oat cakes, herbs, berries (whortleberries ("European blueberries"), lingonberries, blackberries, black currants), jellies, honey, cream & butter; herbal tea* or small beer (There's no mention of bacon, eggs, breakfast sausages, or ham - presumably in the Flanaess such hearty breakfast fare is consumed solely by hard-laboring farmers and not by city-dwellers or travelers)

Poor fare: gruel, soups, stews ("slumgullion"), hard black bread; small beer or sour wine

Dinner/supper - common inn and tavern fare: loaves of bread, puddings, soups, stews (ragout), steak and kidney pies (hot at dinner, cold at supper), smoked meat and fish, roasted meat (pork, mutton), roasted fowl (capon), sausages, fresh fruit and nuts**, boiled eggs, cheeses, butter, honey; beer (small beer, ale, stout, milk stout), herbal tea, honey mead, wine, mulled wine

Dinner/supper - rich or elaborate fare: fresh fish (poached salmon, stuffed trout), exotic seafood (smoked eel, boiled crayfish in drawn butter, crayfish soup), roasted venison, roasted or stuffed fowl (squab, pheasant, goose), fresh greens and vegetables (mushrooms and truffles, radishes, pickles, scallions, salads), spices (pepper, saffron, ginger), rare and imported cheeses***, butter and cream, fresh fruits and berries, tarts (berry, nut, mincemeat), iced cakes; rare and imported wines and brandies****, whiskey

Travelers' fare (i.e. "standard rations"): hard sausages, dried fruit, dried fish, wheat loaves, cheese, pickled vegetables and eggs (iron rations = jerky, hard tack, hard cheese, dried nuts)

Regional variances: In Gary's works the menus are mostly the same whether the meals are being served in Stoink, Urnst, Hommlet, Veluna, or Greyhawk City. Some of that is presumably due to the characters typically dining in inns and taverns, which are likely to be more similar to each other than if they were dining in local homes (noble or peasant). Also, those locations are all centrally located along the tributaries of the Nyr Dyv, and had Gary gone into more detail on the cuisine of far-flung locales we might have seen more variety. To step outside of this "canonical" baseline, the notion of Cultural Approximations in Greyhawk suggests some fairly obvious regional specialties - waffles from the Duchy of Urnst, raclette from Perrenland, breaded veal cutlets from Veluna, haggis from Geoff and Sterich, etc.

*Tea is mildly anachronistic in comparison to the other mentioned foods (since it wasn't commonly introduced to Europe until the 17th century) but nevertheless Gary mentions it frequently, and even includes a couple of dedicated tea-houses. Characters consume a variety of different herbal teas including alder-root tea, bark tea, blackberry tea, lingonberry tea, and an unspecified "smokey-flavored tea," but never common black or green tea

**based on the list of common trees in the World of Greyhawk Guide pp. 6-7: apple, apricot, cherry, chestnut, fig, galda (Oerth-native), grapefruit, kara (Oerth-native), lemon, lime, mulberry, olive, orange, peach, pear, pine, plum, usk (Oerth-native), walnut, yarpick (Oerth-native)

***Gary describes and named several such cheeses, including smoked Okelard cheese (presumably equivalent to gouda), Kettite goat cheese, Perrenlander cheese (equivalent to Swiss), Wickler from the Yeomanry (a blue cheese), and Djekul - a creamy, smelly cheese from the land of Fruztii (presumably equivalent to something like Pont l'Eveque). Surely there are many more such cheeses in the Flanaess, making this a ripe (ha!) area for further individual development

****A wide variety of wines are named and described, giving us a pretty solid sense of the wine economy of the Flanaess. The Rhennee typically drink a harsh red wine but favor fine wine from Caporna (wherever that may be [EDIT: a town in County Urnst, on the Artonsamay River]). Likewise, the Paynim tribes drink pungent date wine, but value the wine of the Chepnoi people of the Sulhaut mountains. A strange, mildly addictive black wine comes from the Pomarj, but production of it has declined since that land was conquered by humanoids. The major wine-producing areas are Urnst (white wine and special aged brandy) and Keoland (golden wine, amber wine (served chilled), and brandy). Furyondy and Veluna produce comparatively fewer wines, but theirs are among the most celebrated - Furyondian dry white and emerald pale, and Velunan fireamber. However, the rarest and most celebrated wines of the Flanaess are produced by elves - Sunndish elves produce lilac wine, the elves of Celene a ruby wine, emerald wine (served chilled), and nectawine (made from moonberries harvested only when both moons are blue), while the elves of Ulek produce both a heady, sparkling violet wine and their unique "elixir" liqueur. Even the drow produce wine - a black wine with an earthy smell and taste like nothing else that is so strong that consuming a single gill (4 oz.) will make a human tipsy. 

Wednesday, May 9, 2018

AD&D Languages

Another big info-dump post. Here's a list I compiled of all the languages mentioned in the World of Greyhawk set and the various AD&D monster books (where creatures are mentioned as "having their own language"). The initial idea behind this was to come up with a more comprehensive version of the Random Language Determination table on DMG p. 102 but there ended up being so many languages to render that impractical (at least for the moment). So instead of a table I'm just presenting it as a raw list.

Human Languages:
Common
Baklunish (spoken in Ekbir, Ket (alongside Common), Tiger Nomads, Tusmit, Ull, Wolf Nomads, and Zeif)
Flan (spoken in Geoff (alongside Common), Rovers of the Barrens, and Tenh)
Old Oeridian (spoken in Great Kingdom (including Medegia, North Province, Rel Astra, and South Province) and Ratik, generally alongside Common)
Rhennee (spoken by the Rhennee people, alongside Common)

Human Regional Dialects:
Fruz (Suloise/Flan dialect spoken by the Frost, Ice, and Snow Barbarians and in Stonefist - 40% compatible with Suloise and Flan)
Keolandish (Oeridian dialect spoken in Bissel, Gran March, Keoland, Sea Princes, the Ulek States, and the Yeomanry, often alongside Common - 60% compatible with Oeridian and Common)
Lendorian (Suloise dialect spoken alongside Common in the Spindrift Isles - 60% compatible with Suloise and Common)
Nyrondese (Oeridian dialect spoken by peasants and shopkeepers in Almor and Nyrond (alongside Common for learned people) - 60% compatible with Oeridian and Common)
Velondi (Oeridian dialect spoken by rural folk in Furyondy, Veluna, and Verbobonc - 60% compatible with Oeridian)

Archaic Human Languages:
Ancient Baklunish (ancient version of Baklunish still spoken in Plains of the Paynims (alongside Common for traders and educated folk) - 60% compatible with modern Baklunish)
Suloise (dead language now read only by scholars)

Human Foreign Languages:
Changoli
Gondurian
Hepmoni
Jahindi
Mulwari
Olman
High Suhfangese
Low Suhfangese

Common Non-human Languages:
Bugbear*
Dwarvish*
Elvish*
Hill Giant*
Gnome*
Goblin*
Halfling*
Hobgoblin*
Kobold*
Lizardman*
Ogrish*
Orcish*

Uncommon Non-human Languages:
(Booka)
Diakk
Black Dragon*
Brass Dragon*
Copper Dragon*
White Dragon*
Gargoyle*
Fire Giant*
Stone Giant*
Gnoll*
(Grimlock)
Jermlaine
Wererat
Werewolf
Manticore*
(Meazel)
Merman
Water Naga*
Merrow (dialect of Ogrish)
(Ophidian)
Otyugh
Sahuagin
Satyr*
(Troglodyte)
Troll*
Xvart

Rare Non-human Languages:
Carnivorous Ape (rudimentary language)
Aspis
Atomie (dialect of Sprite)
Blink Dog
Brownie*
Bullywug
Centaur*
(Crabman)
Dao
Dark Creeper
(Dire Corby)
Blue Dragon*
Bronze Dragon*
Green Dragon*
Red Dragon*
Pan Lung/Shen Lung
Mist Dragon
Giant Eagle
(Firenewt)
Cloud Giant*
Frost Giant*
Storm Giant*
(Grell)
(Grippli)
Harpy
Hippocampus
Hybsil
Lammasu*
Locathah
Werebear
Wereboar
Giant Lynx
Medusian*
Mimic
Mind Flayer
Minotaur*
Moon Dog
Muckdweller
Spirit Naga*
Nixie*
Giant Owl
(Pech)
Peryton
(Qullan)
Salamander*
Shedu*
Sirine
Andro-/Gynosphinx
Criosphinx
Heiracosphinx
Sprite*
Tabaxi
Tasloi
(Thri-kreen)
(Tiger Fly)
Ice Toad
Treant
Triton
Umber Hulk
Unicorn
Worg

Very Rare Non-human Languages:
Aarakocra
Annis
Banderlog
Beholder
Derro
Djinni
Gold Dragon*
Silver Dragon*
Lung Wang
T’ien Lung
Cloud Dragon
Faerie Dragon
Dragon Turtle
Dryad*
Duergar
(Dune Stalker)
(Eblis)
Drow
Ettin*
Firefriend
Foo Creature
Fog Giant
Mountain Giant
(Githyanki)
(Githzerai)
Greenhag (dialect of Annis)
Grig
Invisible Stalker
Ixitxachitl
Ki-rin
Kuo-Toan
Lava Child
Weretiger
Foxwoman
Seawolf
Wereshark
(Meenlock)
(Morkoth)
Guardian Naga*
Nymph*
Ogre Magian*
Phoenix
Pixie*
Quickling
Svirfneblin (dialect of Gnome - 60% compatible)
Sylph*
Titan*
Wemic
Winter Wolf
Xorn*
(Yeti)
Yuan-ti

Other-Planar Languages:
Demonic
Common Tongue of Hades
Modron
Slaad

Secret/Special Languages:
Alignment Languages (nine in total)
Druidic
Ferral (Oeridian dialect now used as a secret code language among officials of the Iron League - 60% compatible with Oeridian)
Subterranean Trade Language (“Undercommon”)
Thieves Cant

Notes:
I drew a distinction between Ancient Baklunish (as described in the WOG Guide p. 16) and modern Baklunish (per the table on the WOG Glossography p. 31).

The "Human Foreign Languages" were all made up by me, based on various off-map lands mentioned in Gary Gygax's Gord novels.

The "common" non-human languages are the nine listed on p. 34 of the Players Handbook plus the three additional languages (bugbear, gnome, hill giant) that have a 2% or higher occurrence on the DMG p. 102 table, which seemed like a reasonable standard. The "uncommon," "rare," and "very rare" lists are based on the monsters' Frequency (with common monsters that don't fit the above criteria included on the uncommon list).

Non-human languages with asterisks are those included in the table on DMG p. 102.

Non-human languages in parentheses are not mentioned in the books but I'm assuming based on the nature of the creatures that they probably have their own language (and note that the DMG p. 102 table includes several monster-languages that aren't mentioned in the Monster Manual: ettin, gargoyle, manticore, naga, salamander, and xorn).

The other-planar languages are mentioned in the books and are not specific to one monster; based on these it can probably be extrapolated that each Outer Plane has its own Common language (that presumably, like the modron language as described on MM2 p. 86, is related to that plane's corresponding Alignment Language(s)).

Various monster descriptions mention the ability to speak with types of animals - burrowing mammals, woodland animals, snakes, birds, fish, etc. I chose not include any of these as languages per se.