Languages – further clarification needed

you know i think most of you people are missing a REALLY important point

Q: How to characters acquire their starting
languages?
A: Characters start with a number of known languages equal to their passive logic score plus any bonus languages granted by their race. When choosing languages the player must first choose from their nation’s languages. Once all the characters national languages are learned, the player may choose languages from outside his starting nation

ARPG pg 114 under human:
Automatic Language: Native Nation

ARPG120 under val
Automatic Languages: High Coryani, Native Nation

some clarification on what “native nation means in this context” means could use some clarification, however if you take “Native Nation” to mean all of the native national languages then I don’t see any good examples above this.

Now Kio, Ssressen, Dwarves, Elorii might take umbrage at this, but those are the insular, segregated races anyways I think its appropriate for them to have issues learning other languages (and it shouldn’t be that hard for them, as most of their respective nations are fully covered in their racial languages already, sorry ssress you have to learn yhing hir, depending pon how the (mil takara) notation is intrepreted)

some clarification on what “native nation means in this context” means could use some clarification, however if you take “Native Nation” to mean all of the native national languages then I don’t see any good examples above this.

I strongly oppose this. You should only get one ‘Native Language’. Perhaps change to the wording to “Automatic Language: Native Nation (any one from native nation)”
S’okay, I strongly disagree with having to learn all languages of the nation before being able to take additional ones. If the nations were city-states, it would make sense. For regions as large as the Hinterlands, Unsealed Lands, Milandir, etc it just doesn’t make sense. Just because a language is spoken in a country does NOT mean everyone has been exposed to and speaks said language. Does everyone in Yukon speak French? Does everyone in Quebec speak the Aboriginal languages? Hell, Spanish is almost the primary language in Miami and not everyone that lives there speaks it.

Look… I completely understand the need / desire to clarify the starting language issue, but the rule as written in the errata does not make logical sense. It would make IMMENSELY more sense – in my opinion – to designate a common language for each region with multiple languages listed. That is then the national language characters are required to take at creation. Everything beyond that and racial languages is optional.

I think Pedro should make a clarification statement about what “national” means for bonus racial languages

When a race says “National Language” or “Native Language” do you get *all* the languages in your nation’s listing or just 1?

John

For example: “Automatic Languages: High Coryani, Native Nation” in the Hinterlands, where you could choose Milandesian, Erudene, Yhing Hir, etc. for your native language. What some are arguing is that it doesn’t say “only one Native Language”, which means a Val could in theory gain 5 languages because there are 4 ‘native languages’ in the Hinterlands.

I think this is stupid, and that it clearly implies one, but there is JUST ENOUGH leeway that someone could argue otherwise.

I agree it’s not right to assume you get all those languages as free bonus languages. I also think it’s not right to force people to take 5 languages before they get to pick one they want.

John

So, having a Yhing Hir tribesman who can speak Kio makes sense from a game perspective, even though they would have almost no contact with them?
If the backstory for said character is a Yhing hir tribesman that traveled to the Kio lands to improve his sword fighting skills – yes. The system should NOT dictate the role play in such a manner.

While the current errata is restrictive, it makes more sense to me from a realism (both within the universe and without) perspective.

Tell me something Cody, you obviously speak English but do you also speak French and the various Aboriginal languages found in areas of Canada? If you don’t, I guess it would make sense that you’re not allowed to learn German, Latin, Chinese, etc…

Also, the most restrictive would be the Hinterlands, and having to learn Yhing Hir, Milandesian, and Low Coryani seems less of a restriction to me than it does to other people. Those are all very useful languages, so they seem like good ones to choose from anyway.

Just because something is deemed “useful” doesn’t mean it fits the character concept.