There were rumblings about a Prussianian role-playing game back in January, but MuNoWriMo intervened. If you’re still interested, MuseBlog is now ready for you.
RPGs seem limiting, though, with one character to a customer and all the concomitant worries about power-playing. Are you sure you wouldn’t rather have an RRR?
(To help you with research, we’re adding a “Prussiania” subcategory to the list of thread categories.)
I roll 2d6.
Heh.
Uhh, please excuse that. It wasn’t supposed to be posted.
-A
I would love to participate in this. But I don’t really have any ideas about plots….
Hopefully this RRR won’t die.
RRR sounds good. I don’t know why, but Prussiania seems to sound better as a RRR.
Can we go with the original concept of all characters being named after medicines? And possibly center the story around the old heros?
Of course, I believe the old heros chiefly already had stories built up around them. Perhaps these would be the new heros, rising a generation later?
*dramatic voice*
For a generation, heroics and adventure has lain dead in Prussiania. The peasants are content to listen to old tales, retelling the stories of the heros of their early days. Now, a new set of heros arises, a new set of legends. Prussiania reawakens.
*/dramatic voice*
Or something like that.
I would join… just not very often…
I think, to preserve the original intent, we need to make this very bleak. Not totally, otherwise it would be too depressing to read, and give it a quasi-happy ending, but Prussiania is not sweetness and light. We must remember this.
Here’s the original description, by Robert:
The country was called PRUSSIANIA — a floating island about the size of Greenland, ruled by a king and divided into duchies and counties governed by unruly nobles. Did I say “governed� Misgoverned is more like it, because Prussiania was the most messed-up, miserable place we could imagine. It was a feudal tyranny whose human population consisted almost entirely of peasants — stupid, ignorant, and squalid. There was also a sizable nonhuman population of oversized armadillos, somewhat more intelligent than the peasants and capable of interbreeding with them to produce a spectrum of strange pointy-eared hybrids, some with armadillo-like carapaces, others without. (I’ll have to find some pictures of them.)
For the rest, the most economical way to describe it is probably point by point.
Geology and geography: To float, Prussiania must have been composed mostly of some sort of lightweight, pumice-like rock. Its surface features included a Lord of the Rings-like assortment of mountains, rivers, and foetid swamps. (We were all big Tolkien fans and copied his style in drawing our maps.) Subregions of the country were named after diseases and mental conditions such as Diphtheria, Euphoria, and Phantasmagoria.
Currency, weights, and measures: Impossibly impractical and complicated.
Language: Even worse than the currency, weights, and measures. Although we never worked it out in detail, we agreed that every verb was irregular and that Prussianian had more declensions than any other language. Whenever foreigners threatened to master the language, the natives would add even more cases to it just for the sheer pleasure of confusing and ridiculing them.
Transportation: The skies of Prussiania were filled with zeppelins, propelled by sails when traveling downwind and towed upwind by mighty bull-armadillos. Some were also equipped with fanlike air-oars, which were useless for moving the airships but kept the peasant crewmembers busy.
History: An endless series of futile rebellions.
Religion: There were two main deities, a fertility goddess named Athea (whose devotees were known as Atheists) and a storm god named Voltus. Oddly, the two sects coexisted peacefully, without religious warfare — probably because the people were too malnourished to care.
Myths and legends: My friends and I developed a whole cycle of Prussianian sagas centered on heroes named after products we saw in the laxative-and-antacid aisle of the local drugstore. There was Petrogalar the Barbarian, raised by armadillos (a sort of cross between Conan the Cimmerian and Tarzan of the Apes); Romilar, leader of a band of outlaws who lived in the woods and all wore pink; and various wizards, witches, mad scientists, sea monsters, and mythical creatures, some of which resembled MuseBloggers’ descriptions of wungs.
Perhaps Academic Decathlon has overwritten whatever grotesque portion of my brain is responsible for creativity, but this is all reminding me of immediately pre-Revolutionary France. Perhaps we set it during one of the “futile rebellions?” The rebellion will end badly, but the ending will be fairly happy on a personal level- maybe the protagonists find love, money or at the very least a sizable supply of bread that’s only slightly moldy.
I’m seeing the armadillos as the closest one can get to an intellectual elite in a dystopia like this. Racism doesn’t seem to be a prominent problem (probably because it’s too much effort to come up with halfway decent slurs, much less beat someone up for looking different, when you’re trying to figure out which fruit’s mold is least likely to make you sick). I wonder if the armadillos have any nobles among their ranks?
Prussiania as it developed in our imaginations was indeed a horrific place, but it’s also true that we played it for laughs. Its ancient heroes were named after laxatives, you know. Of course, that doesn’t mean you all have to write in the same vein.
Speaking of ancient heroes, most of the Prussianian literature we came up with (not all of it actually written down) was mythological — tales and legends set in some misty past, as a backdrop to what I suppose would now be called an RPG. Again, you don’t have to follow the same prescription, but we found that genre useful for introducing an “anything goes” element when we needed it.
I’m happy to answer any questions you might have about Prussiania, though I’ve forgotten a lot and don’t want to constrain you. I also keep hoping one of our old maps might turn up among my juvenilia, but I haven’t seen one yet.
I definitely think that Prussiania isn’t a happy place–everyone’s miserable, naturally–but it is comical. So we shouldn’t put in so much realism that the misery ceases to be funny. What we have to do is exploit the awfulness. Too much or too little realistic misery will kill, or at least sedate, the humor.
I was thinking this would turn into sort of an epic fantasy, horribly cliched, in the LotR vein but much worse. A young armadillo-peasant hybrid as an unlikely hero.
Monstrous Regiment, by Terry Pratchett, confronts the horror of war as well as women’s rights while maintaining a humorous tone, and I rather enjoyed it. I’ll bet my belt someone else around here has read it too. Candide, by Voltaire, also sprang to mind- satire of cruel society in travel-journal form, with outrageous caricatures and subtle philosophic criticism (not that the characters had the luxury to appreciate them.) Reading in French, while suggested, is not mandatory.
I like the idea of an over-cliched story. What would the quest’s goal be?
I think we should work in the Eskimos who were worshiping Frosty the Snowman. (Or something like that….?)
One advantage of a floating island is that it can drift all over the ocean, encountering all sorts of people.
This sounds like somehing I would enjoy participating in.
Maybe the quest would be a search for some legendary, over romanticised jewel that can supposedly save society, but when it is recovered by our daring hero, it isn’t all that great, but our daring hero has learned some great lesson or something that can help improve society a bit.
Feel free to throw this idea out, I just came up with some cliche storyline without a overly happy ending. (this kind of reminds me of ‘Spatula Madness’ in a slightly twisted manner, in the way that altough the inotial problem isn’t solved, it ends on a semi-high note, because at least they’re not French)
I am excited for this. I have never participated in a(n) RRR, but it sou ds fun.
This needs to be a musical.
This would be a highly entertaining musical. If everyone else is up to writing showtunes about despair and corrupted countries in the sky, I’m definately in. Hahaha. Musical. Yes. *grins*
Not in the sky: on the sea. Prussiania floats; it doesn’t fly.
Oops, I thought it was floating in the sky. Sorry.
I can write lyrics; I’m quite good at that. Someone else will have to score it, though, as I can’t write music.
Same with me, except I don’t really know how good I am. I enjoy writing, I write lyrics some of the time, but the tunes I’ve made up consist of about five notes, or a highly repetitive pattern. They amount to exactly two.
We could take a page from Mad Magazine’s “Star Trek Musical” and make every song to the tune of an already existing one.
I can sometimes make up impromptu showtunes when singing to my cats… I like the idea of using prewritten music. If people don’t want to do that or write music, maybe they could just put in lyrics, and the tune is left up to interpretation by the reader. I’m not really sure how we would share music we wrote though…
My avatar changed. That’s odd. I didn’t think I changed my email adress. Hmm.
You left out the last letter before the “@” last time.
Aha. Thank you.
I can write music, I have a program that lets it.
I’d definitely help with that.
Musical- I’ll help!
Story- Could we make a satire over-cliche story?There is a chosen one: a half armadillo peasant, who actually is a hopless klutz, aided by an old wise guy (who was actually dragged along because he lied about being omnescient), an enthusiastic fan who believes in (hero) but hasn’t a clue, and his loyal best friend, who is actually trying to kill him but keeps getting interrupted… they should have a shifting crowd of followers, partly because some always end up getting eaten by savage armadillos (a ‘dark side’ of the order of armadillos or just plain hungry ones), but a few could acidentally come back from the dead (Blast it, I wanted to go to ‘insert Valhalla equivalent’) (perhaps eager guy?)…
These are just a few ideas I’m tossing around, I might just go off and write a fanfic of my own….
I like that idea.
Also, I read that as “‘insert Vanilla equivalent'”.
You don’t know what Valhalla is?
Teh wise guy can be a real wise guy! Useless for everything except sarcastic comments at inopportune times, which nonetheless sometimes come in handy. Or uses a lot of situational irony.
eg. “Yes I’m sure that coming across a great big fat whopping canyon with no way to get across will pose no trouble at all to the great hero!”
Klutzy Hero: :”Falls off canyon edge”
Everyone else: “Uh-oh”
Wise guy: “Goodbye, hero. You will be sorely missed…”
*Klutzy hero rises above canyon edge on zeppelin* “TA-DA!”
Everyone else:
And then the ship turns out to be run by a noble who’s been continually opposing them…So they’re across the canyon, but they’re chained to oars in the zeppelin.
Yes, something like that. He should definitely be wise, but not in the ways required and perhaps a little… morally unstable at times.
Hero’s friend: *bla bla bla* and then he can become a hero like in the acient ledgends *wise guy* told us about.
WG: What ancient ledgends?
Hero: The boring ones I always hated and/or fell asleep during.
HF: The great tales of the lords of the armadillos, the battle of Insomnia, …
WG: Oh, the ones I made up. That’s artistic liscense.
Everyone:
And the hero should not want to be one- he’s forced in through peer presure or so…
WG: Okay, for all it matters, here at the final epic battle, I have absolute faith in you.
H: Um, swell. Remind me, which end of the sword am I supposed to hold on to?
General notice: I will not be able to come on MB very often in the near future, and so can’t do anything here. The RRR idea sounds good.
This is based upon my idea, right? I don’t want to get left behind in the action while I’m gone, or prevent you from starting it…
I’m working on an airship-tower marching song titled “Five Hundred Leagues to Diphtheria.” It’s still very much in the concept stage.
Even the title made me giggle.
I’m pretty awful at writing lyrics, but I’ll help with dialogue.
* agrees *
Unless you need something awful that was written by an illiterate peasant…..
In which case I would be great at writing lyrics….
Okay, so shall we start?
I think that we should come up with an outline of a plot before starting, with plot twists allowed if someone has an amazing idea, so this has some sort of a semi-coherent plot and/or length. I know everyone loves the writing games where it just contines on, the plot getting more and more circular until too many people drop out to continue, but I’m not sure how well that would work out with a musical. I like the big showy finish with everyone left alive coming out and singing a great big song together, even if they are killing each other as they go.
Remember, you have no obligation to follow along with this idea, I am just trying to get this idea moving, because I am very excited about it and nobody seems to have done anything for a few days. That’s all.
How are we going to do the Language thing? It’s not like we can come up with every word, make every verb different, etc.
It can be implied. Or we can all use Yoda-speak. Or we can just make up endings for English verbs and assume that everyone will be able to somewhat know what we’re talking about. Or use various verb declensions from foreign languages, in whatever non-English language the Muser happens to know–or not know. Understandek? Or we canna usena a combination of all the above…If Prussianian peasants changeoon the verb endings/beginnings every time a foreigner yacomes close to yamastering it, it can’t be that hard. And it has the advantage of giving it a unique flavor.
I could try to write some form of poetry for Prussiania, I suppose, but it likely to be very bad–the sort of things nobles read to the peasants to torture them a bit more under the guise of ‘patriotism’.
Yes! The Great Ballad of Miralax, played on vanalyas, featuring the vaunted hero (not) Miralax and his comic companions…
We can begin with a preface by the translator, who had to go undercover in Prussiania of all places, master the language without being found out (and having the verb endings changed on him), and then get out of Prussiania.
Or it could be written by someone who was actually there, and then translated. Hey–it could even be written by the Wise guy! Taht would be the perfect excuse for any discontinuity in the narrative, or any random stuff that gets thrown in, or anything at all!
Let’s work out a rough plot outline–All I have at the moment is that we should divide it into stages, like a typical hero story.
Scene I: Hero’s ordinary life, which he is suddenly called away from.
Scene II: He meets up with his companions–I like the ones described in comment 12.
Scene III: First meeting with the forces of evil: could be evil noble, could be evil order of armadillos. Or both. Let’s do both.
And then…Well, they have to start the quest sometimes…
I also have an idea for the characterization of the hero’s devoted fan. I see it as a stereotype of every single useless girl in action movies. I hate it when they’re useless and don’t do anything to help out. So i was thinking that on the surface she is totally devoted to the hero and believes in him and whatnot, so much so that she will help him in any way she can…and is thus responsible for half his victories. (The other half are due to dumb luck) I also think she should be a fervent Atheist.
And the bad guys should have read the Evil Overlord List. And reference it constantly. And still fail, because somehow the hero manages to sneak into the secret base in tailor-fitted, clear-Plexiglas visored, uniforms when the villains specifically took every possible precaution against that.
I… actually am very interested in this so far.
Do you need help writing lyrics? I keep meaning to write some for a musical I’ve got going on in my head, but I sort of lost interest in my own plot, and this sounds far more fun.
*lyrics/music (scores)
So we had this rehearsal for the school fund-raising dinner at school today. It took up two periods, and I don’t even have any roles to rehearse. So to keep this from being a total waste of time, I wrote Prussianian poetry, reproduced here for your convenience. I also made some very very rough sketches of zeppelins, a peasant’s cottage, and jotted down a few ideas for the crest of the Duchy of Malaria. Or Diphtheria. Or perhaps both. I’m planning on drawing the zeppelins bigger and coloring them, but don’t plan on it being soon. In the meantime.
This is a traditional battle song meant to get peasants off their lazy behinds and excited to fight and die. Probably doesn’t work. Done to the accompaniment of battle-drums made from armadillo hide and the sound of breaking vanalya strings. Some of the tune is loosely based off “From Sea to Shining Sea” but…Yeah. Loosely.
________________
(one man, slowly)
In the morning we wake up, to toil in the soil.
In the evening we collapse upon our beds.
Such is the life of a peasant, one bound to land and homesteeeaaad.
(many voices, upbeat)
But when the nobles call
We leave to fight and fall
I the service of our great countreeeee!
Prussainia! Prussiania!
(one man)
Oh cesspit of inequityyyyy!
With armadillos, dodgy fellows
(many voices)
There’s nothing bad you can’t give to meee
(one man, quickly)
Chained to an oar–beaten and abused
(one woman)
Conjugating verbs, so terribly confused…..!
(many voices)
Yet still. We pledge. Our loyalty
To the greaaat countryyyy
of Prussiania! Prussiania!
Because there’s no place like home, in the grand duchy of Ma-la-ri-uuhhh! (Alternatively, Diphtheria or Phantasmagoria)
__________
Comments and constructive criticism appreciated. However, it should also be noted that I have no ear for music and that this was originally meant to be poetry, not a song.
Very stirring indeed. I’d say that lacking an ear for music should be an advantage in Prussiania.
Glorious, FF!
*overflows with patriotic fervor*
I could write a tune for it… but I’d have to make it as dissonant as possible. Which would be fun.
It had exactly the right effect on me: Caused a sneezing attack. Hail Prussiania.
Spontaneous Comment Box Inspiration Attack Syndrome! *aarghaarghaargh*
oh my 
Ahem. To the tune of O Canada:
O Prussania, thou floating isle of gloom,
For any outsider, thy verb tenses spell doom!
With exploding balloons, zeppelins rise, O crowding out the sky!
The armadillos snore in streets, Prussania will never die!
O Prussania, I’m going to bake a pie,
O Prussania, I’m going to
*cue sounds of gagging and people licking whipped cream off their faces*
Brilliant! I particularly like the snoring armadillos.
(It’s spelled Pruss-i-ania, by the way. The first syllable rhymes with “brush,” and the rest rhymes with “Urania” or “pain ya.” Anyone who has been pronouncing it to rhyme with “can ya,” however, may go on doing so. Non-standardization is very Prussianian.)
Rehearsals again today. I wrote the beginning of a bedtime story two peasants by the names of Maalox and Mylanta were telling to their children. It’s not done yet, though.
Maalox and Mylanta: lovely old Prussianian names.
((Let’s not let this thread die before we start writing…
So, maybe we should start writing? This is a musical, right? So are we having mostly music, mostly dialogue, or is is pretty much even? Also, what’s the plot? These seem to be the main suggestions:
-An undercover translator attempts to master the Prussianian language and then escape.
– A hero is suddenly called away from his ordinary life, meets companions, and battles evil forces.
– A half-armadillo peasant (chosen one), an old wise man, and a double-agent friend have a shifting crowd of followers, who sometimes get eaten by armadillos.
– A mythical jewel is rescued by a hero, who then realizes that the jewel is useless but still changes society.
Sorry if I totally mangled anyone’s idea when I paraphrased them, and for the bad grammar.))
I believe that the newest Time Capsule thread suggested that it be a tale of the tragic union of Diphtheria and Malaria into the larger province of Phantasmagoria.
Oh yeah, I forgot that. So, how did that happen? (This was probably explained in the latest Prussiania thread……) * pays fine for semi PoPo*
From Fantasy Fan, drawings of Prussianian zeppelins (her description follows):
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The first zeppelin is the personal flagship of the Duke of Malaria. Note the bright colors, the pennant flying from the tail, the double banks of useless oars, the coat of arms ( of a mosquito rampant over infected blood cells, what else?), the large cabin–it was made for nobility. Nobility being more concerned with how things look than how they actually function, however, the zeppelin has few fins, leading to reduced steering ability, and few rib supports for its weight, making it likely to collapse. One tragic battle, inherent design flaws came back to bite. Surrounded on all sides, the flagship had no room to maneuver. It crashed to the ground in a big, beautiful, explosion, killing everyone on board, including the Duke of Malaria.’Twas a great victory for Diphtheria that day; what did they care if they’d lost a fleet of their own ships as well?
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The inset in the upper corner depicts traditional zeppelin fighting strategy. One ship tries to reach a height higher than the other ship, partially by releasing ballast in the form of peasants. Once a suitable height has been achieved, more peasants are dropped, with crude farming implements (nobles don’t trust them with weapons), to attempt to puncture the balloon and make the zeppelin sink.
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The second zepplin is a scarred survior of many battles. It actually survives the fights it gets into, and is noticeably dented, torn, beaten, and patched up. It’s also rather drab, to blend in with teh Prussianina sky. Remember the color of the other ship? No one in Prussiania actually believes the sky is blue, you know…Part of the reason this ship has survived is because it was designed by armadillos. More fins, more support, more blades on the propellers, smaller size…The armadillo shaped cabin is obviously a homage to its designers, and no doubt some armadillos yet serve on the ship.
Teh Prussianian sky? Please tell me that’s a typo. But don’t fix it.
It’s a typo…What can I say? I was typing quickly and my computer doesn’t catch that particular spelling mistake?
Also, the second zeppelin is sideways. Tilt your head when you look at it. I probably should have rotated it but…I forgot. It happens. Like spelling mistakes.
What is the correct orientation? I thought I had fixed it in Photobucket, but it still looks sideways on this computer. I thought it might have been a cache-clearing issue.
Confession: I repaired a couple of typos but left “teh” as it was. It just seemed right somehow.
Just rotate it 90 degrees to teh right, so teh propeller is facing the same way as teh other zeppelin.
That’s what I thought. Photobucket must not have saved the correction. I’ll fix it when I get home.
Teh. Teh. Teh.
*doesn’t know why is laughing*
I have a distinct dislike of the word “teh”.
Wait, Fantasy Fan’s a her?!
I’m sorry, that’s embarrassing. I have no idea why I thought you were a he. Wow.
Well, you know, en will do quite nicely for all the times when you don’t quite know what gender to use…
But I’ve given up on guessing most other MBer’s genders.
It does fit, somehow.
-A
(25) FantasyFan: Your zeppelin drawings are beautiful. They bring back old memories: the creak of the air-oars in the oarlocks; the rush of the breeze blowing in from the distant plains of Hypoglycemia; from far below, the bellow of the ‘dillo team towing the mighty vessel into the wind…
Why thank you!
havi’n fun,
posting on unused threads,
ain’t i annoying,
i got NO RESPECT for da deadz