Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 The_White_Sorcerer Sep 12, 2009 7:52:20	I was thinking about expanding the languages of Eberron somewhat but, since I'm no linguist, I decided to look for the wonderful works on Eberron linguistics by Darth Syntax and can't find anything. Anyone able to point me to where I could find it again? All I can find is a cached thread about goblin languages on Google.
#2 Darth_Syntax Sep 13, 2009 21:33:50	Sadly, I lost a good deal of my language building things when my old computer died some time ago and I've not really done much with the Eberron languages since the end of the previous round of discussions alluded to.However, I might be able to recall some of the larger features of the languages I sketched out or, failing that, dream up entierly new and absurd complexities to befuddle the game.  Is there anything in particular that you found interesting that I might be able to recall?
#3 The_White_Sorcerer Sep 14, 2009 12:04:50	Is there anything in particular that you found interesting that I might be able to recall? Well, a list of languages and their families would be a nice start, since my main concern is mostly just making the world a bit more multilingual.
#4 renteria Sep 14, 2009 14:18:50	I have thought about this for on a couple of occassions and thought that a lot of cool stuff could be done. For instance, in a lot of languages in the world, and in remarkably different ways, there are speech levels. In Thai for example, it is obligatory (not just polite but rather the only way to talk) to denote respective social status of someone you are talking to relevant to yourself. A more basic example is the T-V tu-vous, tu-ustedes(vosotros), thee-you informal/formal marker in a lot of romance and indo-european languages. In, I believe, Tibetan, there is an honorific word for every noun in the vocabulary.  So, I was thinking that the Dhakanni Empire, old and structurally rigid might have speech levels and honorifics. For instance, with speech levels,  there could be a class of suffixes at the end of verbs and prefixes for nouns and pronouns that denote social class (goblin, hobgoblin, bugbear). In the past, before the fall of the empire, these inflections were restricted to race, however in the fall of the empire, there have been sociolinguistic shifts such that these index (point out things or beings or qualities) social categories, as the empire has fallen and 'people' find a variety of lifestyles, and can be used as solidarity markers. A hobgoblin could mark a bugbear commander as being a hobgoblin as a sign of respect. Remembering that these different races have proper places in the society lends for interesting usage. A goblin merchant could refer to a drunken goblin  with a bugbear ending. You can see the opportunities. Also, I think it would be really cool to have the secret goblin group have a secret language that would incorporate sounds not present in goblinoid and therefore difficult to master (like an American trying to roll his 'r's). As for honorifics, these could fit in nicely with the goblinoid culture.   Another thought I had was Kobold dialects. Some languages have nouns that are incredibly complicated in terms of the amount of information that they contain depending on their context, in English you can think of how I denotes subject and me denotes direct object. In Hungarian you can literally mark a noun in terms of whether you are on it in it approaching it etc. Imagine if Kobolds spoke in such as way that when one Kobold asked another where is the human? in a system of caves the other one said that the human is THERE. Where there would be marked for 'left'-'fairly long distance'-'right'-'right'-'short distance'-up. That would make there affinity for their tunnels and warrens have a linguistic basis that is also a little scary to think about.   These are just some initial thoughts but if anyone would like to work on some of these ideas further, I am all ears. I didn't have the time to get into it much but anyways, here are some thoughts.
#5 renteria Sep 14, 2009 14:31:37	Also, bugbear dirge singers. So, some Australian languages, like Dyirbal, have special languages for telling mythical stories. Or rather HAD, before they started heading down the road towards extinction. But story tellers would begin speaking in a different register (for example, legal talk is a register, urban slang spoken in high schools and in hip hop etc is a register (or a spectrum of related registers, you could even say fantasy movies have their own register these days) specific and sacred to the occassion. It is cool to think of dirge singers employing these special languages that other goblinoids would have varying degrees of familiarity of depending on how close to their culture they have clung. For instance, a Sharn goblin would recognize but a few words.
#6 MrCelsius Sep 15, 2009 3:46:07	**** THIS ****ING FORUM.  I JUST LOST MY ****ING POST BECAUSE IT KICKED ME BACK TO THE ****ING FIRST ****ING PAGE.  ****! Ahem. When altering the linguistic landscape, be sure to keep an eye toward the Linguist feat.  The more languages you add, the weaker it becomes.  If you end up adding four or more new languages, I'd suggest increasing the feat to five or six languages per go.  It's already pretty weak anyway, and I don't think it'd be terribly game-breaking to make your linguists a bit more cunning.
#7 PJammaGod Sep 15, 2009 10:11:19	It's ultimately up to the DM to balance between a number of languages that helps provide colour and character to the setting without creating a language barrier drain for players. Language is fine and all, but don't let it detract too far from idea of making it easier for players in converse in 4e.
#8 Madfox11 Sep 16, 2009 4:00:07	You could always be generous with Gems of Colleque (sp?) - headband slot item in 4E that provides a +1 to Bluff and Diplomacy and allows the wearer to speak and read one or more languages (number dependend on level of item).
#9 ChrisTheS Sep 16, 2009 12:11:02	Or you could handle languages naturally based on exposure (i.e. appropriate background elements), and make Intelligence checks to try to understand a language that's related to one you already know (with the Linguistics feat giving you a +5 to the check, instead of granting extra languages).
#10 goblin_pride Nov 10, 2009 19:55:01	Somewhere I have Darth_Syntax's original post with a rather healthy vocabulary. It's on my other PC, I think. I'll see if I can repost it.
#11 The_White_Sorcerer Nov 19, 2009 0:01:25	Somewhere I have Darth_Syntax's original post with a rather healthy vocabulary. It's on my other PC, I think. I'll see if I can repost it. I'd appreciate that.