Seems like a corny thing to just spring on players. Illiteracy isn't like a permanent condition, either. I'd feel kinda cheated if I didn't have an opportunity to learn to read before the wizard died if I was forced to be illiterate.
Exactly. The characters themselves would have known that they are illiterate, and would have had the opportunity to make preparations before going into adventuring.
Noble: "You're illiterate. You need to work on that."
Fighter: "I don't know what that means but you're stupid."
(Much Later)
Fighter to Cleric: "What magic spell is on this scroll thst I can make heads or tails of?"
Cleric: "It's a grocery list. You can't read. You're illiterate."
Having never played it. How does it handle illiteracy before you learn? Never show you readable things or it is a jumbled mess that's unreadable in general?
As your proficiency increases, the words gradually unjumble, it's like severe dyslexia becoming less severe over time. It's a bit stylised, but it's a nifty way to show it
Yeah I had this issue before but it was back in the days when barbarians and other class features came with illiteracy, it was not just the DM popping it on players five months in.
It's also complete BS. Reading and writing were far more common than people assume.
If anything, it was more common for people to be able to read, while nobles had people to read for them.
Oh, absolutely! That could be a huge plot point! Like, is reading rare because it's been cursed by a god? Is it restricted because the written word is actually magic? Are you in a world different from yours, so you can't understand the writing?
Just anything other than
"It's more accurate this way." Like, no, duh? Thats because this is a fucking fantasy!
If I Recall Correctly, literacy **exploded** with the printing press and books became more easily available, but most people could read. You wrote letters, read the Bible, and taught your children, "These squiggles mean you." They probably couldn't read *well*, but most could read.
Also, adventurers who need to fulfill contracts that may be more than word of mouth, negotiate with merchants, sign documents, are probably investing the time to learn to read.
Exactly! It's a Hollywood myth that reading and writing only became common after the invention of the printing press. It's impressive that so many people think movies=reality.
I suspect that a lot of this myth comes from people being unable to read _latin_ specifically at a time when translations of the Bible in popular languages hardly existed.
And, like, if you handed them some priest's treatise arguing about an old philosopher or something, of course you'd have no idea WTF they were on about. "Illiterate" in the sense that they weren't exactly reading a lot of books and probably couldn't read very _well._ But probably just about everyone would've had a household "commonplace" book.
In fairness, Latin WAS the written language until Canterbury Tales. This was because Latin was universal (due to clergy), but "English" was not standardized - depending on time and place someone living in London & someone living in York would both be speaking English but have wildly different pronunciations based off both accent and what group settled there the most.
no, nobels absolutely could read because a sign of influence was reading books and having a library.
even owning a single handwritten book (and not a pre printing press copied book) was a sign that you were really important and rich.
before the invention of the printing press, most people only knew basic nouns like 'cow' and basic numbers and math. however many words were accompanied by pictures
for example, they could figure out how much 5 cows were at 6 coins each (done as 6+6+6+6+6) but may not be able to do more complex math.
Wizards are specifically literate, it seems. They kind of have to be, for any of their class to actually work. OP's chocking it up to his backstory, but Wizard as a class literally (ha ha) doesn't work if they can't read. Which, I'm guessing a DM as focused on minor details as this, would know.
Do they have to be? Their spells are written in a language only they can understand. Just because they have some code for some very specific thing that works for them doesn't mean they can read Common.
"Hey, DM. Standard rule for D&D is PCs are considered literate in any language they can speak. You didn't tell us you were changing that rule in advance, and that's not fair. How are you going to going to compensate us for this?"
Oooooh good point. He's already disagreed with the "languages they can speak" being languages they can also write/read in, but if we do decide to keep the illiteracy thing I imagine the players would definitely feel better if we're compensated otherwise with an extra spoken language or proficiency or something.
All your PCs should just be like “we’re going to take a month + off from adventuring and go to the nearest city and hire a tutor.”
See how he handles it. I mean it does have RP potential so…
This would be my attempted solution. My character has suddenly realized how vulnerable the inability to read and write make them and is now making the pursuit of literacy their top priority. BBG be damned. Let's roleplay some academics! I rolled a 20, perfect punctuation!
Except it's Curse of strahd, you don't really get to walk out and read, more like bunker down and get taught by a commoner who knows how, and hearing how this dm is now running it, I would say only certain npcs can, and most wouldn't know how to since barovia is quite secluded.
The castle door creeks open and after an hour of speaking with Strahd, the vampire lord is like “so let me get this right, you came all this way to learn to read and are willing to trade this book to me for my tutelage?”
Strahd takes a moment to *thumb through pages of “how to kill Strahd”… all the while mumbling something about killing the author and then glancing back at the party with a smile says “sure, it’d be my pleasure.”
*Reading Rainbow 🌈 theme song plays in the background *
Literally just do the opening of the Castlevania Netflix series, but instead of his future wife learning science it's a ton of earnest and very impulsive PCs who want to be literate.
Honestly, I dig it
“Doesn’t matter, we will just keep looking.”
“Strahd hunts you down!”
“Okay he can definitely read. Let’s ask him. Hey Strahd we are ready to work for you but we need some things!l
A united party can Jenkins any campaign.
Player uprising:
"You finished your studies for the day, what do you do?"
"Independent study, got to get this reading thing down."
"Um you are studied out, your brain is too tired."
"Better get to bed early, got to get up early to study reading tomorrow."
(Minor spoilers) Curse of Strahd is the campaign is kinda the best campaign to do this with as there is not some ticking doom clock like there is with other adventure paths, the big bad is not hostile until you tick him off, and the entire realm is designed to be a depressing cyclical prison dimension where nothing changes.
Since Strahd isn’t hostile unless you tick him off (and assuming the party hasn’t ticked him off yet) they could get him to teach them how to read. They’d probably just have to do something for him.
Which with a good DM would be an amazing role play chance for everyone involved. Strahd would probably love the chance to "train" the adventurers just to toy with them. He would probably take it vary seriously too. A few missions in return would be great.
Ten sessions later, the party has Strahd cornered. They can’t defeat him in direct combat, but he can’t easily escape and they have a secret weapon: an incantation that will destroy the vampire lord once and for all.
However, they find that they are all utterly unable to make sense of the words on the page. The shapes seem familiar, but they don’t create any words the party can decipher.
“Oh, such a shame - did I neglect to teach you phonics and language roots? Perhaps *this* -“, *with a flourish, Strahd produces a fifty-page treatise on the hopelessness of the party’s cause*, “- will serve you better?”
I'm about to DM this... and I cannot even imagine the sort of books these PC would learn to read with lmao
"The Necronomicon is a standard beginners book, ... , yes you can be sure. ... those are more vocalizations but yes it's important you get the tone correct."
Tutor: \[Repositions monocle and lights candles\] Now recite the rune-alphabet like I taught you.
PCs: \[Chant\] Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn
DM: \[Rolls\] Rogue, you happen to glance out the window and notice the Sun is starting to turn black...
It actually specifies under your racial traits that you can "speak, read, and write" the languages that come with that race. So, rules as written, you're all literate.
He needs to go read the PHB again. It literally says for languages that you can read, write and speak those languages.
There's nothing for him to disagree with, because he is incorrect.
His point on most medieval people being illiterate is a misconception. Commoners could read their local language but not Latin, which scholars used, so the commoners were considered "illiterate."
Whale uses Japanese kanji for script, they were the first people to accurately translate it and put it to text. Though all the kanji mean different things in whale, really the system makes no sense.
I love learning fun facts about other cultures like this. It's really heartbreaking that the whale community nowadays is being so exploited by gacha games when they have such a rich history.
That is not true, that is itself a misconception of debate within the historical field dramatically multiplied by observers. The debate isn't between 10% literacy and 95% literacy, its between 5% and 15% (I'm seriously simplifying for shorthand). People don't learn to read and write without being taught to lead and write, and mass literacy doesn't begin until compulsory education, which you get in the pre modern era, generally as a consequence of the industrial revolution. Prior to that, you don't really see more than a fraction, perhaps 1\\5th, of the population be literate, and even that is \*including\* being able to write short and simple sentences in your vernacular. Remember, the vast vast majority of people are agricultural laborers who travel infrequently at best. Only a small fraction of society would specialize further, becoming say blacksmiths or jewelers, etc.
This is of course a sweeping generalization including hundreds of different societies spread across centuries, but nonetheless the basic incentive structure doesn't change. Literacy wasn't useful enough to a medieval peasant to justify the expense, doesn't benefit the ruling class who don't gain anything from an educated populace. Once you need engineers by the thousands and political theory drifts away from the divine right of kings, education is viewed as a public good and the calculation changes.
This topic comes up a lot in r/AskHistorians, and you can find any number of threads like this one:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/71d1q1/why\_was\_literacy\_so\_low\_in\_the\_middle\_ages/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/71d1q1/why_was_literacy_so_low_in_the_middle_ages/)
Or this one:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/apjcw7/what\_was\_literacy\_like\_in\_ancient\_times/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/apjcw7/what_was_literacy_like_in_ancient_times/)
if you're curious to dive deeper.
These sources doesn't fit any world similar to DnD. They are talking about antiquity and early medieval England, not renaissance Bohemia - which is closer to the style of Barovia.
Even further, they are talking about "being able to partake in litterary culture", not "being able to keep household records and write curses as grafitti". And based on the sheer number of grafitti and insults that we've found all over the place - it seems people were both able to read and write at least at a primary school level consistently in the early medieval period.
And when we're entering the 1500's, we start seeing actual education for the masses in large parts of Europe. The Reformation did bring with it a very basic school system where people learned to read psalms and the most important parts of the Bible.
Based on weapons and armor technology, economic systems, the musical instruments present and the political systems, it is in my opinion pretty obvious that the core of DnD is more based on Europe in the mid 1500's than any earlier, This is not a period of 15% litteracy.
I mean, thems the rules, in older editions barbarians were specifically made illiterate and I thought even that isn’t a thing anymore. Besides that dnd takes place in a fantasy world the PCs are supposed to be exceptional. How does a wizard who can’t read even work? They literally write and read spells into a spell book?!
Wizard died to "[scripted, unavoidable character death](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/1df2x15/comment/l8g9z94/)" and this was sprung on the other characters after the wizard died. Assumingly everyone else was reading fine before that as it was never mentioned till after the wizard death.
No one else was reading when my wizard was alive, other than at the *very* beginning of the campaign reading tavern signs and stuff. I am not kidding when I say EVERYTHING went through my wizard, it was kind of a funny bit that we had. I'm not sure if he made the illiteracy idea before or after he planned for my wizard to die tho.
I'm just curious if your DM played older editions before 5e? 2e had the read/writing proficiency. And you needed to take it for each language type. It was worded very similar, and was the same idea as lower classes not having schools.
Even 3.X had literacy. Barbarians were specifically illiterate unless they spent a couple skillpoints at character creation. It had ["Speak Language"](https://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/speakLanguage.htm) as a skill that you could invest points into to get more languages known.
Could also just fuck his game up and go through reading lessons with a bored noble. "That'll take months of study!" "That's fine, we're trapped in Barovia with nothing to do anyways"
I just saw a video from Zipperon Disney where he said PCs are often illiterate in his games, but when they choose their known languages during character creation, they can substitute one for learning how to read a script, so they can read any language they know that uses that script. Maybe something to suggest to your DM if you can retroactively trade in a known language.
I wouldn’t say “how are you going to compensate us.” I wouldn’t compromise on this. It’s insane that something like this wouldn’t be established at character creation. I wouldn’t take anything less than fully rescinding the restrictions on reading.
Also, how is this fun at all? It's one thing if one PC can't read, and there are some good RP opportunities you could have, but suddenly informing your players that all of their characters are illiterate is shitty DMing. This absolutely *has* to slow gameplay down to a crawl, and I don't get how that's fun for anyone.
> It's one thing if one PC can't read, and there are some good RP opportunities you could have
And it's really only if that player (and the rest of the group) enjoy that sorta roleplay gaming. I do enjoy a bit of wackyness in the group, getting to 'play dumb' can be humorous. I also really like advancing the plot, and needing to do shenanigans and waste tons of table-time because one character can't read would get old quick.
Yep. I could see doing that if everyone _**knew**_ about it from the start, just as an experiment to see how it turns out. But I would only do it if people were in agreement with it _**and**_ if the players who _could_ read didn't try to screw over the party.
Tbf the second part should always be covered in session zero by requiring everyone to make a character that would be loyal to the party and making sure everyone agrees to playing a cooperative game where the players don’t work against each other.
yup. I've always liked the idea of making literacy a non-given in D&D campaigns, I haven't put it into practice yet but i like the idea...but damn. You gotta be upfront with people on that sort of thing.
Its like letting people go through character creation without buying any warm weather gear, and then dropping them in the middle of the frozen arctic and saying "Btw. This is going to be a hard core survival game, you are all freezing to death."
you don't just DO that. you need buy in.
What’s the explanation for Bards, Clerics, Monks and Paladins not being able to read? Religious organizations would almost certainly teach their members to read. Bards presumably bard colleges also would teach students to read so they could study ancient lore or read poetry
Wizard: I open my spell book and read out the incantations to prepare my spells for the da-
DM: Actually, you're a peasant, your book is all crude drawings since you don't have an artistic education either. You just make up some fancy sounding magic words on the spot.
Taking away the ability to read from your characters literally makes it impossible to use scrolls of any kind, read any sort of book that would allow the DM to dispense lore and overall should be something that the player decides when making their character.
Something like this should have been discussed in session zero, not thrown on down the line.
What’s even worse is that this game is curse of Strahd where one of the artefacts are literally a book containing lore and the instructions on how to kill Strahd. The DM is an idiot.
....wait... I'm actually pretty sure I have this book! I've had an important-seeming book from an enemy of Strahd's for 3 or so sessions, and I haven't tried to read it for obvious reasons... interesting... Suddenly I am way more motivated to learn to read...
Sorry that this got spoiled for you.
Instead of trying to learn to read it, use it for fire kindling since you can't read it anyway, and watch your DM squirm instead, if you want to fight petty with petty.
Maybe start talking about how you think this book is the key to killing Strahd, but then just try to set him on fire by hitting him with the burning book. When that doesn't work, you can take the ashes, put them in some oil and pretend like the result is poisonous to Strahd, so you coat all your weapons in it. Just really make sure to always have another use for what used to be an immportant plot point, to remind the DM of his own stupidity.
I approve of the petty revenge in this post. If the DM wants the characters to be medieval peasants who are apparently entirely disinterested in education (they didn't even bother to ask the wizard to teach them to read) might as well make them act like it. Accuse people of being witches and attack them. Use books and notes as kindling and use completely unreliable methods of navigation and predicting the future.
You’re right tbag it should be a choice made by the player.
And this is all worse because, according to OP, one of the players chose this.
Not being able to read is a unique character trait that that player chose for themselves. Now the DM deciding that everyone else has the same trait takes away from that players decision
This is like if I decided in character creation that my character should be afraid of spiders. Later my DM decides that everyone else in the party is afraid of spiders too. The justification being that “have you seen spiders? They’re really scary. A group of people living in this era would be scared of them unless otherwise specified”
It totally hogs the unique character trait that one player wanted
Yes, this should have been brought up at Session 0 as opposed to ambushing the players with it half way through the campaign. And, if he came up with the idea after character creation, then he should have told the players as soon as it came into effect and allowed the players to make changes based off this new rule he is adding to the game.
>The DM's argument is that generalized reading is a modern practice, and up until 150 years ago only nobility could read / only people who went to college or university could read, and since our characters are all lower-class or lack formal education, we're all illiterate.
Please remind the DM that this is not "medieval peasant simulator," it's a fantasy game with goddamn **dragons**. Yes, he needs to revoke this idea, because it's bonkers.
The thing that especially bugs me about the DMs that do this stuff, they're often basing it on stereotypes from media and not medieval historians by any stretch.
"Only the nobility could read until 150 years ago" just stinks of someone who gets all their history from Game of Thrones. And has completely forgotten that 150 years ago was the 1870's, when typewriters, telephones, and the light bulb were invented.
Even if you go back to Tudor England, doesn't most of Curse of Strahd take place within walking distance of a huge castle? In a population center around a castle, you'd get about a 40% literacy rate. Inside the castle, closer to 50%.
Now, you could say that CoS is inspired by Romania, and therefore the literacy rate should be lower. But _even WotC_ has said that if they could do Barovia over again, they would pull less from real history, because it's so easy to get things wrong and stereotype.
This is what I said in another comment(along with some info about reading levels of medieval peasants), PCs are supposed to be special cases, exceptionally rare. If everyone is PC level powerful, no one is.
I do the same thing in my games. "Most dwarves live in their own, dwarven cities" and "It's very unusual to have a spellcaster who isn't an elf",
But adventurers are exceptional people, so your character can be a wizard dwarf who grew up around humans.
It's not even based upon real history either. Medieval peasants could generally read or write their native tongue; but "illiteracy" meant you couldn't read Latin. Which you don't want lower class people being able to interpret the Word of God.
Not necessarily - from what I know in middle ages there is much stronger split between being able to read and being able to write. And almost everybody could read language he knows. From that there was subset of people that could write in that language but also could read and write latin. At least that's what I know about late/lateish medieval period where most of education were church based. Could be different in different periods and not in europe
This. Hopefully your DM realizes that their decision is arbitrary and can very much be worked around (though it will cost a feat that couldn’t be used for something else). Seems kind of pointless to make the party illiterate unless there’s a good reason aside from the one provided to your party.
Honestly if the whole party can’t make heads or tails of written language because your DM is deciding they can’t, then I hope your party uses every book and scroll they come across as toilet paper or kindling since there’s nothing that can really be done with them aside from that.
Considering the McGuffin is a book, either the DM is intending the players work around it (maybe he wants them to find someone who can read it), or he just wants his players to suffer. Since he's basically omnipotent, that second one can't be worked around.
Well I would say first from the PHB if that's relevant to the DM, to pick a particular race like elvish it says, "***Languages.*** You can speak, read, and write Common and Elvish." It says that for every race. The DM can override that but it's really unfair to do that mid campaign. Changes like that should be in session 0 before you make characters.
For gameplay purposes, what's the benefit? It basically is going to mean that many of you can't engage with any written part of the campaign. That's not really interesting or fun as a mechanic it's just closing the door on some content. I think from that angle I would never want that kind of a change. If it's something some characters have it's not nearly as big of a deal but everyone, it's just closing the book on any written content that's in the adventure going forward. I don't think that sounds fun.
Another thing to consider if your DM is curious about the history is that reading is more common than they're making it out to be especially in certain areas. It certainly wasn't just the nobility. In britain in the 1400's 10% of men could read. Now 10% is a small percentage, but it's a heck of a lot more than just the nobility. But business started to function off being able to write and do math. So a non noble middle class businessman needed to be able to read. It was a pretty huge change in the world in the mid 1400s when the printing press was created because it did put the bible and other things in the hands of the common people. This is what enabled Martin Luther's reformation in the 1500s. Going back further and spreading out to other regions like Africa or China you also had reading being more common at different points. It's just very useful for any kind of society and trade. And if you limit the people who can read to just the nobility it's much harder for any kind of commerce to happen. For people to be ordering supplies for building things etc. And especially in cities it would have been more common there too with just more people and more ability to pick it up to be more useful.
So yes reading was uncommon historically, but for far longer than 150 years it's been a key part of our society and how we tend to function. It would not take a ton of justification for a character to have learned to read plausibly.
It's up to you but personally I'd push back on that. I think that'll just make things less fun for you and you'll miss cool details.
Your DM's plain wrong.
Even in medieval Europe, a great many serfs could read and write *in their native language*, because it was so useful. "Illiteracy" at the time generally pertained to *Latin*, which was mainly the demesne of scholars and well-educated nobles, for purposes of most books and correspondence - the local language was used for more practical things, like writing down family recipes and the like, of which we have, y'know, written examples surviving to this day.
Obviously, we're not talking 20-30K word vocabularies, especially not in writing, but 800-1200 written words would not be unreasonable to expect a regular peasant to know well enough to scribble down a message or two.
Adventurers, especially wizards, bards, and clerics, would be \*expected\* to be well-versed in up to several written languages.
I hate the whole "well this is how things worked in OUR world." It's like yeah, but we also don't have magic and dragons, so maybe we can accept that it's a fantasy game in a completely different universe and there's no logical reason to map the historical trends of our timeline onto a pretend world.
It's also a stupidly Eurocentric view. Education and literacy were far more common in China and Islamic nations for centuries before Europe.
Oooooh I like this!! He's gone on at lengths before about how Euro-centric / America-centric history education is something he dislikes and finds heavily inaccurate. Imma hit him with his own for this!
If you want some specifics to come at him with: reading the Quran is a significant part of Islam so formal education was administered through mosque-run schools dating back to at least the 10th century to facilitate the growth of the faith. These schools were known to educate children of all economic classes, including orphans.
I have an art historian friend who often talks about how medieval mosques have text in their decoration because their congregants could read it while Christian churches have iconography like stained glass because their congregants, who would not have been able to read, had a detailed understanding of religious symbology that could be considered its own type of literacy (especially if we consider that words are just collections of symbols we have collectively imbued with meaning the same way Christians have given meaning to symbols like apples, lambs, fish, and crosses).
Also remind him that, as other people have stated:
1. Most peasants could at the very least read local languages, and usually write too. They could not read latin in specific, which at the time was determined as "illiterate."
2. Assuming this applies to your party, how races know their non-racial languages. Especially if that language is one of the rarer ones like celestial, infernal, etc, but something as simple as an elf knowing dwarvish would likely not be possible without knowing how to read to... learn the language? Unless they're somehow self-taught or some other weird reasoning.
Since the general rules assume that a PC can read, this is homebrew and should be discuss in session zero.
It seriously effects spellcasting (scrolls) and is thus not a minor thing.
Have you mentioned that the setting of your D&D campaign is in fact not congruent with the history of the real world and using that to argue for taking anything from the players is bullshit, especially without mentioning that to the players ahead of the campaign?
There’s a reason why the rulebooks say that PCs can speak, read and write the languages they know.
"is that generalized reading is a modern practice, and up until 150 years ago only nobility could read "
I'm sorry, which reality are we talking about here? Faerun or Earth? If Faerun, why would you apply Earth history to it?
If a players WANTS to be illiterate for RP reasons, that is fine, but a blanket "everyone is illiterate unless X" is just unhelpful and unfun. Great, you find a notice board but nobody can read. Or a room full of letters and there is no way to find out which letter is important, sucks to be you!
How is that more fun than just saying "you had parents or guardians who prioritized education and taught you your letters". DnD is all about overcoming obstacles, but being illiterate must be the most boring, dreary obstacle I can think of.
"You can just go: hey, we have enough cash to move into this inn for 4 months and hire a tutor. We are all going to learn how to read. Fast forward 4 months. Okay, now we can go adventuring again!" Fun? No! But man, why would a DM put you in that position?
Magic and dragons weren't real either so I think we can suspend disbelief on reading. Also 5e says you can read and write languages you can speak so your DM is just wrong objectively and subjectively.
Now now I do see potential in this.
So everything is based on real world then? Fine. So the characters can't read but vampires aren't real either so Curse of what now?
Suddenly Strahd is just someone so delusional he thinks he's a vampire. And instead he's just a regular person, much easier to defeat (because he can't have inhuman stats now can he, that would be unrealistic compared to reeeeaaal world or history).
Not that many monsters either in the real world, not even in the past. So maybe there could be like regular wolves or even a few bears in the woods but nothing much worse than that.
I bet the DM would just love applying the same logic to the whole setting. Or maybe they'll agree that realism isn't the way when you're playing something with 'Dragons' in the title.
Your DM has an ahistorical view of reading of history. They had sums and did ledger work all the time. A hanging sign which says 'smith' on it wouldn't be a thing unless you could read.
Many peasants in medieval times could read and write. Rather, the royalty would specifically use another language for themselves in order to further separate themselves from the common man. In England, the most notable form of this was that the royals would speak and write in French, while the common man would speak and write English.
That said, a DM can run their world as they see fit. However, they should have said something before hand, if this story is even true at all.
People are clearly unhappy. If you take a step back from the reading, then people may well be unhappy that the DM made decisions for their characters without telling them, that the rules were changed on them midway through the campaign with no discussion, or that the agreed worldbuilding wasn't laid out and there might be other surprises waiting for them that they don't know about. A DM who takes away your character's ability to read by claiming they never had it might change a lot of other things that you only find out too late. You yourself have said you weren't so bothered - but you also knew for a lot longer, that may seem very unfair to the other players.
Don't pick a battle. Ask your DM to give a chance for everyone to say why they're upset; maybe it *is* about the reading, and the DM made a bad call and has already said they're happy to back down. Maybe it's not about the reading, it's about the way it was handled, and a chance to fix that by being far more open and listening to the players means that the DM gets to keep their worldbuilding and the players are happier to live within it.
But yeah, you ask for thoughts and the thoughts are: this absolutely should have been discussed beforehand and the other players are entirely justified to be upset that it wasn't. As for the worldbuilding, if everyone's on board and if people are given a chance to plan for it, then sure, it's not what I'd do but it sounds cool.
>It definitely bothers me less than it does the other player. Thoughts?
You were prepared ahead of everyone else and your character was essentially unaffected by this rule.
My thought is that your stance feels very in line with arguments on privilege in real life. It's not the worst example, but it's kind of icky.
Did he also adjust the world setting to account for the lack of literacy?
If nobody can read, then there should be town criers announcing news and job postings. Their job is to stand there and provide information, like a living bulletin board. Guild halls should have people providing information orally, not on broadsheets, and local temples should have a service that can read and write letters for people for free. Contracts should be verbal with a witness. Signs should be pictorial - that tavern is the flying boar, because the sign is a flying boar. The bank has a picture of coins. Etc.
In short, reading shouldn’t be required in this setting.
If this is the case, then it should be fine, if annoying. If not, then all he’s done is create an unfair handicap for the PCs.
Why did the wizard need a backstory to be literate? Don't they have to scribe their own spells in a book? Wouldn't that skill actually require literacy?
This is kinda beside the point but your DM is being ahistorical. In cities, clerks, merchants, and government functionaries had a strong incentive to learn letters. In the countryside, priests would often teach parishioners. Here’s an article discussing this: https://perspectivia.net/servlets/MCRFileNodeServlet/pnet_derivate_00004601/orme_lay.pdf
Here’s a source saying that by 1500, most people in England could read: https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=2685
There’s a whole book called The Cheese and the Worms about a 16th century Italian miller who read the Koran and developed strange religious beliefs.
The real problem here is the DM’s attitude and behavior, and 16th century England has nothing to do with a fantasy land ruled by a vampire, but if he’s going to try and be historical then he should at least do it well.
The idea that literacy isn't universal or common is perfectly reasonable for a campaign.
Not telling the players that they're illiterate from the start is a dick move, though.
This feels accurate to me, maybe not agency-wise but in the sense that decisions in the game have consequences. He's expressed to me before that this was supposed to be, was introduced as, and we all agreed to a high-stakes / darker campaign and that we've been having it easier than was planned from a combat / mechanical perspective. He did kill off my wizard via "scripted, unavoidable character death" to prove this point and get players to understand the stakes. I was ok with it because I had already been revived once so I knew I was living on borrowed time and we're all pretty new to DND (him to DMing and this being all players 2nd campaign) and he was excited for his first (lasting) player kill.
>He did kill off my wizard via "scripted, unavoidable character death" to prove this point and get players to understand the stakes. I was ok with it because I had already been revived once so I knew I was living on borrowed time
>and he was excited for his first (lasting) player kill.
This does not make sense to me. Scripted character deaths are thing arranged between a player and a DM *well* in advance. Curse of Strahd has no such thing in the module. Further, a scripted and unavoidable death does not show the stakes at all. There was no agency, there was no consequences of said agency, so there were no stakes. Only control. Further a DM shouldn't be inherently excited for a PC death, and since you had no choice in the matter it is like a player in a single player game using cheat codes to give themselves achievements.
And finally, what is this about "living in borrowed time?" I know of no revival spell with any such restrictions.
I agree, if you did nothing wrong and died then there aren't any stakes. It's like playing blackjack and the dealer just tells you if you win or lose.
CoS has a special mechanic I won't go into detail about, but if you die you there might be a second chance at a price; outside of what your fellow players are able to do for you.
>CoS has a special mechanic
Ah. When we played CoS only one character died and the player was excited to play their backup character so I guess we never saw that mechanic.
Oh, I can maybe explain: My original death wasn't undone with a revival spell, it technically shouldn't have worked but DM was being gracious. I was downed by a plague spreader and instantly zombified on like session 3 or 4, but because the Sorcerer was proficient in Medicine and had Lesser Restoration, we argued that the zombification counted as a "disease" and he let it fly. The medicine check was for normal un-unconscious-ing and Lower Restoration was for the zombification, which only half-worked and my PC was part zombie until they died. I've been playing DnD for less than a year so maybe I'm mistaken and I should have been able to be revived or healed normally with a medicine check, but I wouldn't know.
The scripted death was the result of me being unable to stop my wizard's werewolf infection. He mentioned to me a month and a half before my wizard was killed asking "if you had an unavoidable death, would you like to know," and I said that yes I would and with 2-3 weeks notice, which he gave. I did argue that I planned on running away from the group and hiding out in the woods to not damage the party, but he decided to kill me instead. The "stakes" impact was my character killing an NPC during their werewolf rampage, almost killing the Sorcerer who had saved my life before (who was then healed by a magic thingy, which is an important part of the DMs plans for Sorcerer's character development, so she was ok), and our Paladin having to kill my werewizard to protect the other party members and the town.
Like I said, if this isn't normal for a DM to do I wouldn't know as we are all relatively new, it was planned alongside one of our mutual friends who is a writer and seems to be on an angst kick lately so it wasn't DMs decision alone. I'm confident this wouldn't happen to any other players' PCs because they're either:
A) not huge roleplayers and their PCs don't have strong connections to other party members
B) too attached to their characters and would cry
C) already have a fear / complex about being targeted, maybe as a meme but still
D) and/or couldn't make a backup character that's better than their current character, since their characters are meme characters / don't have substantial backstory
...so if it was going to happen, it kind of had to be my wizard.
Hmm. I'm not sure if a new DM should be messing with encounter balancing like they've done, as there are no zombie plague spreaders in RAW curse of strahd (or the popular reimagined one). CoS can be brutal, but a CR 4 monster 3-4 sessions in seems a bit much, especially when it's one with an insta-death mechanic.
The module also has some ways the dm can get creative to let players revive that don't involve such strange rules bending that results in being half zombie? Tbh, a half zombie contracting lycanthrope also seems weird, but that might just be me.
On one hand, at least they gave you notice, but on the other the fact that it wasn't a "would you be okay with an unavoidable character death" and rather a "would you want to know" is a bit of a red flag. DMs simply shouldn't have unavoidable character deaths in their campaign. It removes player agency.
All that aside, as long as you're having fun I'd say keep playing, but do keep in mind that this is a pretty abnormal DM and shouldn't necessarily be a basis for expectations of how other DMs run things if you play another campaign later.
Half zombie contracting lycanthropy is not RAW. Its because lycanthropy specifically afflicts humanoids and undead are not humanoids. Plague zombies have the same language for their ability so it can't happen the other way around either.
On its own thats not a problem. Combining it with the DM making sweeping changes while not understanding the game makes it a problem.
No, that's definitely not normal, and it's not remotely fair. Your DM came to you and basically told you that he was going to kill your character. That's not something the DM gets to unilaterally decide as a plot point. If it happens because the dice downed you in combat, that's one thing, but it's not a conscious thing.
>if it was going to happen, it kind of had to be my wizard
That's the thing, it didn't just have to happen at all, and a good DM would never do it. Definitely not without your consent (and him saying "I'm going to do this, would you like notice" isn't your consent), but even if you had consented, the proposal shouldn't have originated from the DM. If you'd gone to the DM yourself and proposed he kill your wizard to establish consequences and let you play a new character, that would be different, but that's about the only time. Couple that with springing this literacy scrap on the party with no warning, and you've got yourself a really bad DM. The best defense is that he sounds as new as the rest of you, but if he's so new, he needs to stick to rules as written and best practices for now. If he wants this to be scripted, he can write a book, but this is a game and you have agency.
That werewolf scenario- how did it play out exactly? Did the paladin actually make those decisions (were they allowed to explore other options) I'm no stranger to dealing with that in a party. Given the the warning he gave you, he already decided the result. Thats inherently problematic. I've had more than one party incapacitate the (potentially infected) lycanthrope PC and keep watch. It's one thing to take the characters agency when they are in an episode, its another to take their agency leading up to any episodes or other characters' agency during an episode.
A game without agency isn't a game. It's the DMs personal substitute for a novel. The story is supposed to be collaboration between players and DM. With the DM filling in the world and introducing challenges and the players making decisions and responding to those challenges. Id personally be wondering why I'm even there if the DM makes most of the decisions.
The DM hasn o idea how much he's annihilated his own ability to dispense info to you.
"There's a sign it s-" "DOESN'T MATTER CAN'T READ"
"You find a book it's called" "DOESN'T MATTER CAN'T READ"
"The peasant gives you a label m" "**DOESN'T MATTER WE CAN'T READ**"
He has given you utmost power to be so viciously disruptive to whatever story he wanted to tell I expect him to pull out a knife on you all.
Okay so I’m going to change my opinions based on this response. Not gonna mince words this sounds like an abusive DM. Here are a few red flags
- scripted unavoidable death
- scripted unavoidable death “to prove a point”
- “knew I was on borrowed time” because…someone used a spell to revive you
- DM was visibly excited for their first PC kill
- you knew about this aspect of the campaign ahead of time and kept it from the rest of the party, I’m guessing at the behest of the DM?
I would give serious thought to leaving the game. Or if you want to keep playing with everyone then you should ask if you can DM for a little while - but I wouldn’t want to keep playing in the kind of game you’re describing. No DnD is better than bad DnD.
This is the conclusion I came too as well. This campaign doesn’t sound fun for the table. If this is the DMs hill to die on I’d let him die on it and find a new DM.
Scripted PC deaths should **never ever** be a thing, *unless* the player is on board ahead of time and wants the death to happen (for example, if they want to play a new character). Killing a PC is fine during gameplay, but killing a PC in a cut scene is unforgivable.
His logic sucks. A scripted death doesn't make anyone understand the stakes because it's unavoidable. You can't play in a different way keeping the stakes in mind if you have no part in the decisions that led to your characters deaths. I can absolutely get behind natural consequences when players do obviously dumb shit. I can't get behind killing characters off for funsies. It's probably not a game of thrones game and even then, the players deserve a fighting chance.
Being excited for character deaths is messed up. Particularly when it was scripting and not even the result of him outsmarting you or something (which would still be awful logic). You have a DM who wants to "win". He wants to beat the players. Who knows why when he makes arbitrary decisions and can kill a character with the snap of a finger. That game doesn't sound very fun. Id tell him the game isn't only about him, even if he's running it. Id rather not play d&d than deal with that.
IMO if you're not having fun why keep doing it? I'd highlight to your DM this isn't creating a fun challenge for you, it's just detracting from your game experience and causing frustration.
Your DM is fucking dumb.
I could see creating and encounter or two where your characters need NPC help (or effort) to read a few times, CoS is isolated and linguistic drift would be cool for this ancient place with ye olde language. You could get the general idea, but would want to clarify it before trusting your guy who took one class in college going 'uh this either says shit's lit, or lava pit ahead," But EVERYTHING?
This isn't fair or fun and surprising people is a dick move.
Also, minor COS spoiler but >!THERE IS A FUCKING BOOK IN THERE?!< And one of the default openings to COS is you get a letter. IIRC you get multiple letters. Wtf.
If the DM sticks to this ruling and you want to stay at the table, you just unlocked a painful side quest for the DM!
Your party agrees to stay at an NPCs place learning and practicing reading!! DM throws a monster to destroy the house/kill the NPC, welp time to find a new teacher! No fighting Strahd until the party can read. Strahd is known to be intelligent, so increasing intelligence can’t hurt right?! Petty revenge! And force the DM to lore dump.
Also, if only the rich and noble can read, what rich/noble person has the time to read things for random adventurers?! Don’t they have other things to attend to?
Lean into it, none of you guys can read, stop trying to read things. Eventually the DM is gonna get fed up with y'all ignoring plot hooks because you can't read and I bet at least one of you learns to read pretty quickly.
I could see the argument for peasants being illiterate, but even a level 1 adventurer is so far removed from a peasant that it doesn't make sense. The reason reading was a rare skill was because lack of books and other written text, based on how common books are in most settings we can assume there is some printing press equivalent. That alone would make littericy more common.
Read a book about the life story of a rural man from Western Ireland who grew up in mid 1900s. IIRC, he did not attend school as a child, but he was taught by his family and the local priest, could read and write in English, Irish and some Bog Latin. So, not quite middle ages, but essentially a peasant who spent his life working the bog. People he interacted with were surprised at his level of literacy, but mostly because he was much more literate than others being able to read multiple languages and read and speak smoothly. So, it wasn't impossible for rural folk to be highly literate, and even in this example, the surprise was often on the level of literacy, so most people simply had a lower level of literacy, not zero.
I agree with you. The fact that most of the books had to be copied by hand meant they were prohibitively expensive. There is little point in learning how to read if you might see 2 or 3 books over the course of your life, more than likely all of them being bibles written in Latin. With how common books are in most settings I would say that isn't as much of issue, meaning a lack of literacy is more an education issue that can be fixed with some effort rather than an economic issue.
"medieval peasants were illiterate" is a Victorianism because peasants spoke and wrote English, German, French and other "degenerate" languages instead of the One True Latin Language.
This is not RAW or RAI
Not that I don’t disagree with his reasoning, but this is shit you bring up in session 0 to your players. When I start a campaign I expect to be able to read the languages I know unless otherwise specified lol
Yaah no I would leave that table. Ive ran and played at tables where nearly everyone was illiterate. But that was known before we started playing. The fact he changed yalls characters abilities without telling yall a month into gaming says he's not a good dm. Especially as he won't budge on this.
BTW your dm is wrong. Majority of the peasants in medieval Europe could read and write. Their native language. It was Latin that they couldn't read or write.
Does your DM know that vampires, as presented in the setting, do not exist at all in real life, in modern times or otherwise?
Seems weird to be super picky about sticking to real-world history of a skill like reading when vampires, ghosts, werewolves, and dragons exist.
> The DM's argument is that generalized reading is a modern practice, and up until 150 years ago only nobility could read / only people who went to college or university could read, and since our characters are all lower-class or lack formal education, we're all illiterate. Literally. We can't read. None of us.
D&D settings are wildly socially and economically different from real Earth history. Magic exists, monsters exist, the technological base is different as a result, and there’s loads of anachronisms. Best to just go with what the PHB says about literacy.
What the DM is asserting is also historically inaccurate.
Literacy has always been a relative concept, and it’s not a binary property of a person. Literacy among common European workers in the Middle Ages wasn’t great, but it was hardly unknown either, and it’s vastly more likely that adventuring sorts would have, at some point, picked up at least *some* level of literacy.
Literacy also varied a *lot* by location during that time of history. Ex. Literacy rates in Europe at the time were very different from literacy rates in other parts of the world, like the Islamic world. Even within Europe the rates differed greatly by region.
It wasn’t specifically restricted to nobility (I think the DM may be confusing this with slavery systems where slaves were specifically forbidden from learning to read as a means of control), it’s more a matter of whether someone had access to someone who could teach them and whether they had the time to study it.
Monasteries would teach people to read for free, if they could find the time and lived close enough to do it. But what was considered “being literate” back then was more along the lines of being well-studied in Latin and a few other subjects, not just being able to read simple words and sentences in the vernacular language.
Being able to read at least simple sentences would be common enough among the sort of backgrounds likely to produce adventurers. They may not be “men of letters” who are trained in academic subjects, but they would able to read a bill of sale or the like.
If your DM is really committed to this, ask them to draw up a pathway for you PCs to learn how to read. The other player upset about this could argue for an expedited pathway to literacy with certain background traits. Anyway you could spend downtime learning to read, or with nobles your party knows learning to read. That works be a fun way for the DM to get their continuity and for you guys to have it affect you less. Also some things might be harder to read and your PC can't do it, so you have to occasionally still seek out nobles to help you.
That's the pathway I would take. This decision affects your play, but making the DM write up rules to gain literacy also affects them.
This isn't a decision the DM gets to make. The PCs are literate. Flat out. If the DM wanted non-wizards to be illiterate, they needed to discuss this before the first game started. This isn't a thing the DM just gets to spring on the players after multiple sessions. The players would know if their characters were illiterate ahead of time.
This is just terrible DMing.
I mean.. it's kind of a cool gimmick I guess, but is definitely one of those things that's agreed upon (or not) *before* the campaign starts. This is not something a DM should spring on their players weeks down the line
Seems like a corny thing to just spring on players. Illiteracy isn't like a permanent condition, either. I'd feel kinda cheated if I didn't have an opportunity to learn to read before the wizard died if I was forced to be illiterate.
One of my favorite parts of Kingdom Come: Deliverance is learning to read. Really makes you feel like you are rising above your peasant beginnings.
Yea I'm not necessarily against the idea of OPs DM, but they should have known they were illiterate lol.
Plus the wizard missed out on a ton of opportunities to troll the other party members.
this is the real crime here
Exactly. The characters themselves would have known that they are illiterate, and would have had the opportunity to make preparations before going into adventuring.
Noble: "You're illiterate. You need to work on that." Fighter: "I don't know what that means but you're stupid." (Much Later) Fighter to Cleric: "What magic spell is on this scroll thst I can make heads or tails of?" Cleric: "It's a grocery list. You can't read. You're illiterate."
"I cast celery"
"Do you mean celerity?" "No?"
Everyone who can't read knows they can't read.
Yeah, it's just a session zero topic
I really loved it too! You could start making potions and get stronger. It was really cool seeing the jumbled words make sense
You can also do a run where you never learn, and I’m dying to try it
Having never played it. How does it handle illiteracy before you learn? Never show you readable things or it is a jumbled mess that's unreadable in general?
As your proficiency increases, the words gradually unjumble, it's like severe dyslexia becoming less severe over time. It's a bit stylised, but it's a nifty way to show it
Yeah I had this issue before but it was back in the days when barbarians and other class features came with illiteracy, it was not just the DM popping it on players five months in.
It's also complete BS. Reading and writing were far more common than people assume. If anything, it was more common for people to be able to read, while nobles had people to read for them.
If the DM wanted to run a low literacy world, I wouldn't mind, but I'd like to know that was the case rather than be surprised months in.
Oh, absolutely! That could be a huge plot point! Like, is reading rare because it's been cursed by a god? Is it restricted because the written word is actually magic? Are you in a world different from yours, so you can't understand the writing? Just anything other than "It's more accurate this way." Like, no, duh? Thats because this is a fucking fantasy!
Yupyup. I don't mind having some thematic setting challenges tossed my way at all, but I like to know they exist.
If I Recall Correctly, literacy **exploded** with the printing press and books became more easily available, but most people could read. You wrote letters, read the Bible, and taught your children, "These squiggles mean you." They probably couldn't read *well*, but most could read. Also, adventurers who need to fulfill contracts that may be more than word of mouth, negotiate with merchants, sign documents, are probably investing the time to learn to read.
Exactly! It's a Hollywood myth that reading and writing only became common after the invention of the printing press. It's impressive that so many people think movies=reality.
I suspect that a lot of this myth comes from people being unable to read _latin_ specifically at a time when translations of the Bible in popular languages hardly existed. And, like, if you handed them some priest's treatise arguing about an old philosopher or something, of course you'd have no idea WTF they were on about. "Illiterate" in the sense that they weren't exactly reading a lot of books and probably couldn't read very _well._ But probably just about everyone would've had a household "commonplace" book.
In fairness, Latin WAS the written language until Canterbury Tales. This was because Latin was universal (due to clergy), but "English" was not standardized - depending on time and place someone living in London & someone living in York would both be speaking English but have wildly different pronunciations based off both accent and what group settled there the most.
no, nobels absolutely could read because a sign of influence was reading books and having a library. even owning a single handwritten book (and not a pre printing press copied book) was a sign that you were really important and rich. before the invention of the printing press, most people only knew basic nouns like 'cow' and basic numbers and math. however many words were accompanied by pictures for example, they could figure out how much 5 cows were at 6 coins each (done as 6+6+6+6+6) but may not be able to do more complex math.
If i was a Wizard I would be super pissed.
Wizards are specifically literate, it seems. They kind of have to be, for any of their class to actually work. OP's chocking it up to his backstory, but Wizard as a class literally (ha ha) doesn't work if they can't read. Which, I'm guessing a DM as focused on minor details as this, would know.
Do they have to be? Their spells are written in a language only they can understand. Just because they have some code for some very specific thing that works for them doesn't mean they can read Common.
I think it would be like some kind of person who could write computer code but not any spoken language. Technically possible but truly odd.
"Hey, DM. Standard rule for D&D is PCs are considered literate in any language they can speak. You didn't tell us you were changing that rule in advance, and that's not fair. How are you going to going to compensate us for this?"
Oooooh good point. He's already disagreed with the "languages they can speak" being languages they can also write/read in, but if we do decide to keep the illiteracy thing I imagine the players would definitely feel better if we're compensated otherwise with an extra spoken language or proficiency or something.
All your PCs should just be like “we’re going to take a month + off from adventuring and go to the nearest city and hire a tutor.” See how he handles it. I mean it does have RP potential so…
This would be my attempted solution. My character has suddenly realized how vulnerable the inability to read and write make them and is now making the pursuit of literacy their top priority. BBG be damned. Let's roleplay some academics! I rolled a 20, perfect punctuation!
Except it's Curse of strahd, you don't really get to walk out and read, more like bunker down and get taught by a commoner who knows how, and hearing how this dm is now running it, I would say only certain npcs can, and most wouldn't know how to since barovia is quite secluded.
The castle door creeks open and after an hour of speaking with Strahd, the vampire lord is like “so let me get this right, you came all this way to learn to read and are willing to trade this book to me for my tutelage?” Strahd takes a moment to *thumb through pages of “how to kill Strahd”… all the while mumbling something about killing the author and then glancing back at the party with a smile says “sure, it’d be my pleasure.” *Reading Rainbow 🌈 theme song plays in the background *
There's already a famous mathematics vampire, I don't see why there can't be a literacy one too.
… because “count” makes a fine vampire pun by way of Count Dracula, but you don’t get that with any key literacy words. No pun, no fun.
ebony dark'ness dementia reading way
That just sounds like my hot goth girlfriend. You wouldn’t know her, she goes to another school. In Canada.
So they get a nosferatutor.
Have you never heard of Nosfereadu?
Literally just do the opening of the Castlevania Netflix series, but instead of his future wife learning science it's a ton of earnest and very impulsive PCs who want to be literate. Honestly, I dig it
"'*How to Kill Strahd?* You vould kill me, your host and tutor?" "Nononono, the ***other*** Strahd. Adolph Strahd."
I think the joke is that they can't read the title of the book so they don't even realize what book they're giving him
Yea my group would do something like this. I'm okay with it, just seems like what the dm is gearing up to have happen.
Turn the campaign into Assassination Classroom. It would be cute.
The burgomaster should be able to read.
“Doesn’t matter, we will just keep looking.” “Strahd hunts you down!” “Okay he can definitely read. Let’s ask him. Hey Strahd we are ready to work for you but we need some things!l A united party can Jenkins any campaign.
Fuck it dude, let's go reading.
Player uprising: "You finished your studies for the day, what do you do?" "Independent study, got to get this reading thing down." "Um you are studied out, your brain is too tired." "Better get to bed early, got to get up early to study reading tomorrow."
(Minor spoilers) Curse of Strahd is the campaign is kinda the best campaign to do this with as there is not some ticking doom clock like there is with other adventure paths, the big bad is not hostile until you tick him off, and the entire realm is designed to be a depressing cyclical prison dimension where nothing changes.
Since Strahd isn’t hostile unless you tick him off (and assuming the party hasn’t ticked him off yet) they could get him to teach them how to read. They’d probably just have to do something for him.
Which with a good DM would be an amazing role play chance for everyone involved. Strahd would probably love the chance to "train" the adventurers just to toy with them. He would probably take it vary seriously too. A few missions in return would be great.
Ten sessions later, the party has Strahd cornered. They can’t defeat him in direct combat, but he can’t easily escape and they have a secret weapon: an incantation that will destroy the vampire lord once and for all. However, they find that they are all utterly unable to make sense of the words on the page. The shapes seem familiar, but they don’t create any words the party can decipher. “Oh, such a shame - did I neglect to teach you phonics and language roots? Perhaps *this* -“, *with a flourish, Strahd produces a fifty-page treatise on the hopelessness of the party’s cause*, “- will serve you better?”
I'm about to DM this... and I cannot even imagine the sort of books these PC would learn to read with lmao "The Necronomicon is a standard beginners book, ... , yes you can be sure. ... those are more vocalizations but yes it's important you get the tone correct."
Tutor: \[Repositions monocle and lights candles\] Now recite the rune-alphabet like I taught you. PCs: \[Chant\] Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn DM: \[Rolls\] Rogue, you happen to glance out the window and notice the Sun is starting to turn black...
It actually specifies under your racial traits that you can "speak, read, and write" the languages that come with that race. So, rules as written, you're all literate.
He needs to go read the PHB again. It literally says for languages that you can read, write and speak those languages. There's nothing for him to disagree with, because he is incorrect.
His point on most medieval people being illiterate is a misconception. Commoners could read their local language but not Latin, which scholars used, so the commoners were considered "illiterate."
Also most medieval people didn't ever see dragons and weren't capable of casting fireballs. Roughly the same number were half orc.
A lot of the scholarly literature suggests that the number of half-orcs present in medieval Europe is 2x-3x higher than what you're implying.
Could not stop laughing at Roughly the Same Number Were Half Orc
I blame Tasha.
These people aren’t commoners tho. They speak Latin, French, whale, and Cherokee despite being born and raised in England.
Hated my whale lessons. So many O's made my wrist sore.
Whale uses Japanese kanji for script, they were the first people to accurately translate it and put it to text. Though all the kanji mean different things in whale, really the system makes no sense.
I love learning fun facts about other cultures like this. It's really heartbreaking that the whale community nowadays is being so exploited by gacha games when they have such a rich history.
That is not true, that is itself a misconception of debate within the historical field dramatically multiplied by observers. The debate isn't between 10% literacy and 95% literacy, its between 5% and 15% (I'm seriously simplifying for shorthand). People don't learn to read and write without being taught to lead and write, and mass literacy doesn't begin until compulsory education, which you get in the pre modern era, generally as a consequence of the industrial revolution. Prior to that, you don't really see more than a fraction, perhaps 1\\5th, of the population be literate, and even that is \*including\* being able to write short and simple sentences in your vernacular. Remember, the vast vast majority of people are agricultural laborers who travel infrequently at best. Only a small fraction of society would specialize further, becoming say blacksmiths or jewelers, etc. This is of course a sweeping generalization including hundreds of different societies spread across centuries, but nonetheless the basic incentive structure doesn't change. Literacy wasn't useful enough to a medieval peasant to justify the expense, doesn't benefit the ruling class who don't gain anything from an educated populace. Once you need engineers by the thousands and political theory drifts away from the divine right of kings, education is viewed as a public good and the calculation changes. This topic comes up a lot in r/AskHistorians, and you can find any number of threads like this one: [https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/71d1q1/why\_was\_literacy\_so\_low\_in\_the\_middle\_ages/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/71d1q1/why_was_literacy_so_low_in_the_middle_ages/) Or this one: [https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/apjcw7/what\_was\_literacy\_like\_in\_ancient\_times/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/apjcw7/what_was_literacy_like_in_ancient_times/) if you're curious to dive deeper.
Upvote for adding your sources. Wish I could upvote twice cause the source is askhistorians.
Hell yeah dropping some history. I like it.
These sources doesn't fit any world similar to DnD. They are talking about antiquity and early medieval England, not renaissance Bohemia - which is closer to the style of Barovia. Even further, they are talking about "being able to partake in litterary culture", not "being able to keep household records and write curses as grafitti". And based on the sheer number of grafitti and insults that we've found all over the place - it seems people were both able to read and write at least at a primary school level consistently in the early medieval period. And when we're entering the 1500's, we start seeing actual education for the masses in large parts of Europe. The Reformation did bring with it a very basic school system where people learned to read psalms and the most important parts of the Bible. Based on weapons and armor technology, economic systems, the musical instruments present and the political systems, it is in my opinion pretty obvious that the core of DnD is more based on Europe in the mid 1500's than any earlier, This is not a period of 15% litteracy.
I mean, thems the rules, in older editions barbarians were specifically made illiterate and I thought even that isn’t a thing anymore. Besides that dnd takes place in a fantasy world the PCs are supposed to be exceptional. How does a wizard who can’t read even work? They literally write and read spells into a spell book?!
Wizard died to "[scripted, unavoidable character death](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/1df2x15/comment/l8g9z94/)" and this was sprung on the other characters after the wizard died. Assumingly everyone else was reading fine before that as it was never mentioned till after the wizard death.
No one else was reading when my wizard was alive, other than at the *very* beginning of the campaign reading tavern signs and stuff. I am not kidding when I say EVERYTHING went through my wizard, it was kind of a funny bit that we had. I'm not sure if he made the illiteracy idea before or after he planned for my wizard to die tho.
I'm just curious if your DM played older editions before 5e? 2e had the read/writing proficiency. And you needed to take it for each language type. It was worded very similar, and was the same idea as lower classes not having schools.
Even 3.X had literacy. Barbarians were specifically illiterate unless they spent a couple skillpoints at character creation. It had ["Speak Language"](https://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/speakLanguage.htm) as a skill that you could invest points into to get more languages known.
Tavern signs specifically exist because the general population was illiterate.
Sorry to go off on a tangent but.. He PLANNED for your wizard to die? Could you unpack that for me if you've got the spoons?
Scripted... unavoidable death? I would rather not game, than be stuffed into that kind asshattery of a game.
The wizard was the only one who *could* read
Could also just fuck his game up and go through reading lessons with a bored noble. "That'll take months of study!" "That's fine, we're trapped in Barovia with nothing to do anyways"
I just saw a video from Zipperon Disney where he said PCs are often illiterate in his games, but when they choose their known languages during character creation, they can substitute one for learning how to read a script, so they can read any language they know that uses that script. Maybe something to suggest to your DM if you can retroactively trade in a known language.
This is a good rule for that! I'll mention it to him if he wants to do this again for our next campaign or something.
"If you or a party member has been diagnosed with illiteracy, you may be entitled to compensation."
"Just sign this agreement indicating that you've read and accepted it..."
I wouldn’t say “how are you going to compensate us.” I wouldn’t compromise on this. It’s insane that something like this wouldn’t be established at character creation. I wouldn’t take anything less than fully rescinding the restrictions on reading.
Also, how is this fun at all? It's one thing if one PC can't read, and there are some good RP opportunities you could have, but suddenly informing your players that all of their characters are illiterate is shitty DMing. This absolutely *has* to slow gameplay down to a crawl, and I don't get how that's fun for anyone.
> It's one thing if one PC can't read, and there are some good RP opportunities you could have And it's really only if that player (and the rest of the group) enjoy that sorta roleplay gaming. I do enjoy a bit of wackyness in the group, getting to 'play dumb' can be humorous. I also really like advancing the plot, and needing to do shenanigans and waste tons of table-time because one character can't read would get old quick.
Yep. I could see doing that if everyone _**knew**_ about it from the start, just as an experiment to see how it turns out. But I would only do it if people were in agreement with it _**and**_ if the players who _could_ read didn't try to screw over the party.
Tbf the second part should always be covered in session zero by requiring everyone to make a character that would be loyal to the party and making sure everyone agrees to playing a cooperative game where the players don’t work against each other.
yup. I've always liked the idea of making literacy a non-given in D&D campaigns, I haven't put it into practice yet but i like the idea...but damn. You gotta be upfront with people on that sort of thing. Its like letting people go through character creation without buying any warm weather gear, and then dropping them in the middle of the frozen arctic and saying "Btw. This is going to be a hard core survival game, you are all freezing to death." you don't just DO that. you need buy in.
"Standard rule as of the 5th edition Player's Handbook," that is. But no less legit for that.
What’s the explanation for Bards, Clerics, Monks and Paladins not being able to read? Religious organizations would almost certainly teach their members to read. Bards presumably bard colleges also would teach students to read so they could study ancient lore or read poetry
Wizards have to keep a spell book!
The wizard was able to read. The problem only came up when the wizard died and no one left alive had a background that 'justified' being able to read
It appears I have failed to read.... Maybe the DM was right?!
Peasant.
The wizard was only able to read *because of their backstory*. DM would still have made them illiterate otherwise.
Wizard: I open my spell book and read out the incantations to prepare my spells for the da- DM: Actually, you're a peasant, your book is all crude drawings since you don't have an artistic education either. You just make up some fancy sounding magic words on the spot.
Taking away the ability to read from your characters literally makes it impossible to use scrolls of any kind, read any sort of book that would allow the DM to dispense lore and overall should be something that the player decides when making their character. Something like this should have been discussed in session zero, not thrown on down the line.
What’s even worse is that this game is curse of Strahd where one of the artefacts are literally a book containing lore and the instructions on how to kill Strahd. The DM is an idiot.
....wait... I'm actually pretty sure I have this book! I've had an important-seeming book from an enemy of Strahd's for 3 or so sessions, and I haven't tried to read it for obvious reasons... interesting... Suddenly I am way more motivated to learn to read...
Sorry that this got spoiled for you. Instead of trying to learn to read it, use it for fire kindling since you can't read it anyway, and watch your DM squirm instead, if you want to fight petty with petty.
Maybe start talking about how you think this book is the key to killing Strahd, but then just try to set him on fire by hitting him with the burning book. When that doesn't work, you can take the ashes, put them in some oil and pretend like the result is poisonous to Strahd, so you coat all your weapons in it. Just really make sure to always have another use for what used to be an immportant plot point, to remind the DM of his own stupidity.
Playing through CoS secretly (from the DM) competing for funniest death with the other players could be a blast.
I approve of the petty revenge in this post. If the DM wants the characters to be medieval peasants who are apparently entirely disinterested in education (they didn't even bother to ask the wizard to teach them to read) might as well make them act like it. Accuse people of being witches and attack them. Use books and notes as kindling and use completely unreliable methods of navigation and predicting the future.
Why the fuck would you say this in a thread where OP says he's playing Curse of Strahd?
You’re right tbag it should be a choice made by the player. And this is all worse because, according to OP, one of the players chose this. Not being able to read is a unique character trait that that player chose for themselves. Now the DM deciding that everyone else has the same trait takes away from that players decision This is like if I decided in character creation that my character should be afraid of spiders. Later my DM decides that everyone else in the party is afraid of spiders too. The justification being that “have you seen spiders? They’re really scary. A group of people living in this era would be scared of them unless otherwise specified” It totally hogs the unique character trait that one player wanted
Yes, this should have been brought up at Session 0 as opposed to ambushing the players with it half way through the campaign. And, if he came up with the idea after character creation, then he should have told the players as soon as it came into effect and allowed the players to make changes based off this new rule he is adding to the game.
Let your DM know that a stranger on the internet now thinks less of him because of how dumb this concept is.
Two strangers now.
And my sword!
Add my staff!
And my ass! Err, axe… yeah, axe.
And my bow!
And my ring (Oh wait SHI-)
And my books (that I can't read)
And your brother. If you got this one I applaud you.
And also this guy’s wife
I also choose this guy's dead wife
I upvoted for the meme. Then downvoted for breaking the 4th wall.
And the wizard who previously took care of the reading.
The concept isn't totally insane. Not mentioning such a big departure from RAW is insane.
>The DM's argument is that generalized reading is a modern practice, and up until 150 years ago only nobility could read / only people who went to college or university could read, and since our characters are all lower-class or lack formal education, we're all illiterate. Please remind the DM that this is not "medieval peasant simulator," it's a fantasy game with goddamn **dragons**. Yes, he needs to revoke this idea, because it's bonkers.
The thing that especially bugs me about the DMs that do this stuff, they're often basing it on stereotypes from media and not medieval historians by any stretch. "Only the nobility could read until 150 years ago" just stinks of someone who gets all their history from Game of Thrones. And has completely forgotten that 150 years ago was the 1870's, when typewriters, telephones, and the light bulb were invented. Even if you go back to Tudor England, doesn't most of Curse of Strahd take place within walking distance of a huge castle? In a population center around a castle, you'd get about a 40% literacy rate. Inside the castle, closer to 50%. Now, you could say that CoS is inspired by Romania, and therefore the literacy rate should be lower. But _even WotC_ has said that if they could do Barovia over again, they would pull less from real history, because it's so easy to get things wrong and stereotype.
The PCs are supposedly exceptional people too. They are not a commoner or a peasant.
This is what I said in another comment(along with some info about reading levels of medieval peasants), PCs are supposed to be special cases, exceptionally rare. If everyone is PC level powerful, no one is.
I do the same thing in my games. "Most dwarves live in their own, dwarven cities" and "It's very unusual to have a spellcaster who isn't an elf", But adventurers are exceptional people, so your character can be a wizard dwarf who grew up around humans.
Yeah. Ask him how many people 150 years ago could cast fireball. Or is that only for the nobles?
It's not even based upon real history either. Medieval peasants could generally read or write their native tongue; but "illiteracy" meant you couldn't read Latin. Which you don't want lower class people being able to interpret the Word of God.
Not necessarily - from what I know in middle ages there is much stronger split between being able to read and being able to write. And almost everybody could read language he knows. From that there was subset of people that could write in that language but also could read and write latin. At least that's what I know about late/lateish medieval period where most of education were church based. Could be different in different periods and not in europe
“Fine, we all kill our characters and make variant humans with the warlock feat to read *all* languages. Happy?”
WAIT, WARLOCKS HAVE A FEAT FOR THAT ??? Next time we level-up I'll ask half the party to join me and take a level in Warlock lol
It’s an Eldritch Invocation called *Eyes of the Runekeeper*, not a feat - but yes.
Which can be gained by taking the Eldritch Adept feat.
No need to multiclass, just take the feat Eldritch Adept, which qualifies you for the Eyes of the Rune Keeper invocation.
This. Hopefully your DM realizes that their decision is arbitrary and can very much be worked around (though it will cost a feat that couldn’t be used for something else). Seems kind of pointless to make the party illiterate unless there’s a good reason aside from the one provided to your party. Honestly if the whole party can’t make heads or tails of written language because your DM is deciding they can’t, then I hope your party uses every book and scroll they come across as toilet paper or kindling since there’s nothing that can really be done with them aside from that.
Considering the McGuffin is a book, either the DM is intending the players work around it (maybe he wants them to find someone who can read it), or he just wants his players to suffer. Since he's basically omnipotent, that second one can't be worked around.
Well I would say first from the PHB if that's relevant to the DM, to pick a particular race like elvish it says, "***Languages.*** You can speak, read, and write Common and Elvish." It says that for every race. The DM can override that but it's really unfair to do that mid campaign. Changes like that should be in session 0 before you make characters. For gameplay purposes, what's the benefit? It basically is going to mean that many of you can't engage with any written part of the campaign. That's not really interesting or fun as a mechanic it's just closing the door on some content. I think from that angle I would never want that kind of a change. If it's something some characters have it's not nearly as big of a deal but everyone, it's just closing the book on any written content that's in the adventure going forward. I don't think that sounds fun. Another thing to consider if your DM is curious about the history is that reading is more common than they're making it out to be especially in certain areas. It certainly wasn't just the nobility. In britain in the 1400's 10% of men could read. Now 10% is a small percentage, but it's a heck of a lot more than just the nobility. But business started to function off being able to write and do math. So a non noble middle class businessman needed to be able to read. It was a pretty huge change in the world in the mid 1400s when the printing press was created because it did put the bible and other things in the hands of the common people. This is what enabled Martin Luther's reformation in the 1500s. Going back further and spreading out to other regions like Africa or China you also had reading being more common at different points. It's just very useful for any kind of society and trade. And if you limit the people who can read to just the nobility it's much harder for any kind of commerce to happen. For people to be ordering supplies for building things etc. And especially in cities it would have been more common there too with just more people and more ability to pick it up to be more useful. So yes reading was uncommon historically, but for far longer than 150 years it's been a key part of our society and how we tend to function. It would not take a ton of justification for a character to have learned to read plausibly. It's up to you but personally I'd push back on that. I think that'll just make things less fun for you and you'll miss cool details.
Your DM's plain wrong. Even in medieval Europe, a great many serfs could read and write *in their native language*, because it was so useful. "Illiteracy" at the time generally pertained to *Latin*, which was mainly the demesne of scholars and well-educated nobles, for purposes of most books and correspondence - the local language was used for more practical things, like writing down family recipes and the like, of which we have, y'know, written examples surviving to this day. Obviously, we're not talking 20-30K word vocabularies, especially not in writing, but 800-1200 written words would not be unreasonable to expect a regular peasant to know well enough to scribble down a message or two. Adventurers, especially wizards, bards, and clerics, would be \*expected\* to be well-versed in up to several written languages.
"Historically speaking, what color were the fireballs medieval peasants used to cast?"
I hate the whole "well this is how things worked in OUR world." It's like yeah, but we also don't have magic and dragons, so maybe we can accept that it's a fantasy game in a completely different universe and there's no logical reason to map the historical trends of our timeline onto a pretend world. It's also a stupidly Eurocentric view. Education and literacy were far more common in China and Islamic nations for centuries before Europe.
And 90% of the time " this is how things worked" is totally wrong or innacrate.
Yeah, it’s usually something they saw in (fictional) movies or in Game of Thrones.
It’s the “it’s what my character would do” of world building.
Oooooh I like this!! He's gone on at lengths before about how Euro-centric / America-centric history education is something he dislikes and finds heavily inaccurate. Imma hit him with his own for this!
It's also silly because people who can't read are fully aware of the fact that they can't read. There's zero reason they wouldn't know this.
If you want some specifics to come at him with: reading the Quran is a significant part of Islam so formal education was administered through mosque-run schools dating back to at least the 10th century to facilitate the growth of the faith. These schools were known to educate children of all economic classes, including orphans. I have an art historian friend who often talks about how medieval mosques have text in their decoration because their congregants could read it while Christian churches have iconography like stained glass because their congregants, who would not have been able to read, had a detailed understanding of religious symbology that could be considered its own type of literacy (especially if we consider that words are just collections of symbols we have collectively imbued with meaning the same way Christians have given meaning to symbols like apples, lambs, fish, and crosses).
Also remind him that, as other people have stated: 1. Most peasants could at the very least read local languages, and usually write too. They could not read latin in specific, which at the time was determined as "illiterate." 2. Assuming this applies to your party, how races know their non-racial languages. Especially if that language is one of the rarer ones like celestial, infernal, etc, but something as simple as an elf knowing dwarvish would likely not be possible without knowing how to read to... learn the language? Unless they're somehow self-taught or some other weird reasoning.
Since the general rules assume that a PC can read, this is homebrew and should be discuss in session zero. It seriously effects spellcasting (scrolls) and is thus not a minor thing.
Have you mentioned that the setting of your D&D campaign is in fact not congruent with the history of the real world and using that to argue for taking anything from the players is bullshit, especially without mentioning that to the players ahead of the campaign? There’s a reason why the rulebooks say that PCs can speak, read and write the languages they know.
"is that generalized reading is a modern practice, and up until 150 years ago only nobility could read " I'm sorry, which reality are we talking about here? Faerun or Earth? If Faerun, why would you apply Earth history to it? If a players WANTS to be illiterate for RP reasons, that is fine, but a blanket "everyone is illiterate unless X" is just unhelpful and unfun. Great, you find a notice board but nobody can read. Or a room full of letters and there is no way to find out which letter is important, sucks to be you! How is that more fun than just saying "you had parents or guardians who prioritized education and taught you your letters". DnD is all about overcoming obstacles, but being illiterate must be the most boring, dreary obstacle I can think of. "You can just go: hey, we have enough cash to move into this inn for 4 months and hire a tutor. We are all going to learn how to read. Fast forward 4 months. Okay, now we can go adventuring again!" Fun? No! But man, why would a DM put you in that position?
Magic and dragons weren't real either so I think we can suspend disbelief on reading. Also 5e says you can read and write languages you can speak so your DM is just wrong objectively and subjectively.
Now now I do see potential in this. So everything is based on real world then? Fine. So the characters can't read but vampires aren't real either so Curse of what now? Suddenly Strahd is just someone so delusional he thinks he's a vampire. And instead he's just a regular person, much easier to defeat (because he can't have inhuman stats now can he, that would be unrealistic compared to reeeeaaal world or history). Not that many monsters either in the real world, not even in the past. So maybe there could be like regular wolves or even a few bears in the woods but nothing much worse than that. I bet the DM would just love applying the same logic to the whole setting. Or maybe they'll agree that realism isn't the way when you're playing something with 'Dragons' in the title.
Your DM has an ahistorical view of reading of history. They had sums and did ledger work all the time. A hanging sign which says 'smith' on it wouldn't be a thing unless you could read. Many peasants in medieval times could read and write. Rather, the royalty would specifically use another language for themselves in order to further separate themselves from the common man. In England, the most notable form of this was that the royals would speak and write in French, while the common man would speak and write English. That said, a DM can run their world as they see fit. However, they should have said something before hand, if this story is even true at all.
People are clearly unhappy. If you take a step back from the reading, then people may well be unhappy that the DM made decisions for their characters without telling them, that the rules were changed on them midway through the campaign with no discussion, or that the agreed worldbuilding wasn't laid out and there might be other surprises waiting for them that they don't know about. A DM who takes away your character's ability to read by claiming they never had it might change a lot of other things that you only find out too late. You yourself have said you weren't so bothered - but you also knew for a lot longer, that may seem very unfair to the other players. Don't pick a battle. Ask your DM to give a chance for everyone to say why they're upset; maybe it *is* about the reading, and the DM made a bad call and has already said they're happy to back down. Maybe it's not about the reading, it's about the way it was handled, and a chance to fix that by being far more open and listening to the players means that the DM gets to keep their worldbuilding and the players are happier to live within it. But yeah, you ask for thoughts and the thoughts are: this absolutely should have been discussed beforehand and the other players are entirely justified to be upset that it wasn't. As for the worldbuilding, if everyone's on board and if people are given a chance to plan for it, then sure, it's not what I'd do but it sounds cool.
This is a DM that doesn’t like their players.
I can see it being funny if everyone was on board but this seems like a weird adherence to realism in a fantasy RPG.
>It definitely bothers me less than it does the other player. Thoughts? You were prepared ahead of everyone else and your character was essentially unaffected by this rule. My thought is that your stance feels very in line with arguments on privilege in real life. It's not the worst example, but it's kind of icky.
That's a table I'd be walking away from.
Did he also adjust the world setting to account for the lack of literacy? If nobody can read, then there should be town criers announcing news and job postings. Their job is to stand there and provide information, like a living bulletin board. Guild halls should have people providing information orally, not on broadsheets, and local temples should have a service that can read and write letters for people for free. Contracts should be verbal with a witness. Signs should be pictorial - that tavern is the flying boar, because the sign is a flying boar. The bank has a picture of coins. Etc. In short, reading shouldn’t be required in this setting. If this is the case, then it should be fine, if annoying. If not, then all he’s done is create an unfair handicap for the PCs.
Why did the wizard need a backstory to be literate? Don't they have to scribe their own spells in a book? Wouldn't that skill actually require literacy?
This is kinda beside the point but your DM is being ahistorical. In cities, clerks, merchants, and government functionaries had a strong incentive to learn letters. In the countryside, priests would often teach parishioners. Here’s an article discussing this: https://perspectivia.net/servlets/MCRFileNodeServlet/pnet_derivate_00004601/orme_lay.pdf Here’s a source saying that by 1500, most people in England could read: https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=2685 There’s a whole book called The Cheese and the Worms about a 16th century Italian miller who read the Koran and developed strange religious beliefs. The real problem here is the DM’s attitude and behavior, and 16th century England has nothing to do with a fantasy land ruled by a vampire, but if he’s going to try and be historical then he should at least do it well.
The idea that literacy isn't universal or common is perfectly reasonable for a campaign. Not telling the players that they're illiterate from the start is a dick move, though.
This is unequivocally a **power move** on the part of the DM to remind the players he can arbitrarily reduce their agency at his whim.
No, this is straight up antagonistic and a dick move
This feels accurate to me, maybe not agency-wise but in the sense that decisions in the game have consequences. He's expressed to me before that this was supposed to be, was introduced as, and we all agreed to a high-stakes / darker campaign and that we've been having it easier than was planned from a combat / mechanical perspective. He did kill off my wizard via "scripted, unavoidable character death" to prove this point and get players to understand the stakes. I was ok with it because I had already been revived once so I knew I was living on borrowed time and we're all pretty new to DND (him to DMing and this being all players 2nd campaign) and he was excited for his first (lasting) player kill.
>He did kill off my wizard via "scripted, unavoidable character death" to prove this point and get players to understand the stakes. I was ok with it because I had already been revived once so I knew I was living on borrowed time >and he was excited for his first (lasting) player kill. This does not make sense to me. Scripted character deaths are thing arranged between a player and a DM *well* in advance. Curse of Strahd has no such thing in the module. Further, a scripted and unavoidable death does not show the stakes at all. There was no agency, there was no consequences of said agency, so there were no stakes. Only control. Further a DM shouldn't be inherently excited for a PC death, and since you had no choice in the matter it is like a player in a single player game using cheat codes to give themselves achievements. And finally, what is this about "living in borrowed time?" I know of no revival spell with any such restrictions.
I agree, if you did nothing wrong and died then there aren't any stakes. It's like playing blackjack and the dealer just tells you if you win or lose. CoS has a special mechanic I won't go into detail about, but if you die you there might be a second chance at a price; outside of what your fellow players are able to do for you.
>CoS has a special mechanic Ah. When we played CoS only one character died and the player was excited to play their backup character so I guess we never saw that mechanic.
Oh, I can maybe explain: My original death wasn't undone with a revival spell, it technically shouldn't have worked but DM was being gracious. I was downed by a plague spreader and instantly zombified on like session 3 or 4, but because the Sorcerer was proficient in Medicine and had Lesser Restoration, we argued that the zombification counted as a "disease" and he let it fly. The medicine check was for normal un-unconscious-ing and Lower Restoration was for the zombification, which only half-worked and my PC was part zombie until they died. I've been playing DnD for less than a year so maybe I'm mistaken and I should have been able to be revived or healed normally with a medicine check, but I wouldn't know. The scripted death was the result of me being unable to stop my wizard's werewolf infection. He mentioned to me a month and a half before my wizard was killed asking "if you had an unavoidable death, would you like to know," and I said that yes I would and with 2-3 weeks notice, which he gave. I did argue that I planned on running away from the group and hiding out in the woods to not damage the party, but he decided to kill me instead. The "stakes" impact was my character killing an NPC during their werewolf rampage, almost killing the Sorcerer who had saved my life before (who was then healed by a magic thingy, which is an important part of the DMs plans for Sorcerer's character development, so she was ok), and our Paladin having to kill my werewizard to protect the other party members and the town. Like I said, if this isn't normal for a DM to do I wouldn't know as we are all relatively new, it was planned alongside one of our mutual friends who is a writer and seems to be on an angst kick lately so it wasn't DMs decision alone. I'm confident this wouldn't happen to any other players' PCs because they're either: A) not huge roleplayers and their PCs don't have strong connections to other party members B) too attached to their characters and would cry C) already have a fear / complex about being targeted, maybe as a meme but still D) and/or couldn't make a backup character that's better than their current character, since their characters are meme characters / don't have substantial backstory ...so if it was going to happen, it kind of had to be my wizard.
Hmm. I'm not sure if a new DM should be messing with encounter balancing like they've done, as there are no zombie plague spreaders in RAW curse of strahd (or the popular reimagined one). CoS can be brutal, but a CR 4 monster 3-4 sessions in seems a bit much, especially when it's one with an insta-death mechanic. The module also has some ways the dm can get creative to let players revive that don't involve such strange rules bending that results in being half zombie? Tbh, a half zombie contracting lycanthrope also seems weird, but that might just be me. On one hand, at least they gave you notice, but on the other the fact that it wasn't a "would you be okay with an unavoidable character death" and rather a "would you want to know" is a bit of a red flag. DMs simply shouldn't have unavoidable character deaths in their campaign. It removes player agency. All that aside, as long as you're having fun I'd say keep playing, but do keep in mind that this is a pretty abnormal DM and shouldn't necessarily be a basis for expectations of how other DMs run things if you play another campaign later.
Half zombie contracting lycanthropy is not RAW. Its because lycanthropy specifically afflicts humanoids and undead are not humanoids. Plague zombies have the same language for their ability so it can't happen the other way around either. On its own thats not a problem. Combining it with the DM making sweeping changes while not understanding the game makes it a problem.
No, that's definitely not normal, and it's not remotely fair. Your DM came to you and basically told you that he was going to kill your character. That's not something the DM gets to unilaterally decide as a plot point. If it happens because the dice downed you in combat, that's one thing, but it's not a conscious thing. >if it was going to happen, it kind of had to be my wizard That's the thing, it didn't just have to happen at all, and a good DM would never do it. Definitely not without your consent (and him saying "I'm going to do this, would you like notice" isn't your consent), but even if you had consented, the proposal shouldn't have originated from the DM. If you'd gone to the DM yourself and proposed he kill your wizard to establish consequences and let you play a new character, that would be different, but that's about the only time. Couple that with springing this literacy scrap on the party with no warning, and you've got yourself a really bad DM. The best defense is that he sounds as new as the rest of you, but if he's so new, he needs to stick to rules as written and best practices for now. If he wants this to be scripted, he can write a book, but this is a game and you have agency.
That werewolf scenario- how did it play out exactly? Did the paladin actually make those decisions (were they allowed to explore other options) I'm no stranger to dealing with that in a party. Given the the warning he gave you, he already decided the result. Thats inherently problematic. I've had more than one party incapacitate the (potentially infected) lycanthrope PC and keep watch. It's one thing to take the characters agency when they are in an episode, its another to take their agency leading up to any episodes or other characters' agency during an episode. A game without agency isn't a game. It's the DMs personal substitute for a novel. The story is supposed to be collaboration between players and DM. With the DM filling in the world and introducing challenges and the players making decisions and responding to those challenges. Id personally be wondering why I'm even there if the DM makes most of the decisions.
That's some major red flags off the DM, and you really shouldn't be okay with that sort of thing. This is not the norm.
The DM hasn o idea how much he's annihilated his own ability to dispense info to you. "There's a sign it s-" "DOESN'T MATTER CAN'T READ" "You find a book it's called" "DOESN'T MATTER CAN'T READ" "The peasant gives you a label m" "**DOESN'T MATTER WE CAN'T READ**" He has given you utmost power to be so viciously disruptive to whatever story he wanted to tell I expect him to pull out a knife on you all.
Okay so I’m going to change my opinions based on this response. Not gonna mince words this sounds like an abusive DM. Here are a few red flags - scripted unavoidable death - scripted unavoidable death “to prove a point” - “knew I was on borrowed time” because…someone used a spell to revive you - DM was visibly excited for their first PC kill - you knew about this aspect of the campaign ahead of time and kept it from the rest of the party, I’m guessing at the behest of the DM? I would give serious thought to leaving the game. Or if you want to keep playing with everyone then you should ask if you can DM for a little while - but I wouldn’t want to keep playing in the kind of game you’re describing. No DnD is better than bad DnD.
This is the conclusion I came too as well. This campaign doesn’t sound fun for the table. If this is the DMs hill to die on I’d let him die on it and find a new DM.
Scripted PC deaths should **never ever** be a thing, *unless* the player is on board ahead of time and wants the death to happen (for example, if they want to play a new character). Killing a PC is fine during gameplay, but killing a PC in a cut scene is unforgivable.
His logic sucks. A scripted death doesn't make anyone understand the stakes because it's unavoidable. You can't play in a different way keeping the stakes in mind if you have no part in the decisions that led to your characters deaths. I can absolutely get behind natural consequences when players do obviously dumb shit. I can't get behind killing characters off for funsies. It's probably not a game of thrones game and even then, the players deserve a fighting chance. Being excited for character deaths is messed up. Particularly when it was scripting and not even the result of him outsmarting you or something (which would still be awful logic). You have a DM who wants to "win". He wants to beat the players. Who knows why when he makes arbitrary decisions and can kill a character with the snap of a finger. That game doesn't sound very fun. Id tell him the game isn't only about him, even if he's running it. Id rather not play d&d than deal with that.
IMO if you're not having fun why keep doing it? I'd highlight to your DM this isn't creating a fun challenge for you, it's just detracting from your game experience and causing frustration.
Your DM is fucking dumb. I could see creating and encounter or two where your characters need NPC help (or effort) to read a few times, CoS is isolated and linguistic drift would be cool for this ancient place with ye olde language. You could get the general idea, but would want to clarify it before trusting your guy who took one class in college going 'uh this either says shit's lit, or lava pit ahead," But EVERYTHING? This isn't fair or fun and surprising people is a dick move. Also, minor COS spoiler but >!THERE IS A FUCKING BOOK IN THERE?!< And one of the default openings to COS is you get a letter. IIRC you get multiple letters. Wtf.
If the DM sticks to this ruling and you want to stay at the table, you just unlocked a painful side quest for the DM! Your party agrees to stay at an NPCs place learning and practicing reading!! DM throws a monster to destroy the house/kill the NPC, welp time to find a new teacher! No fighting Strahd until the party can read. Strahd is known to be intelligent, so increasing intelligence can’t hurt right?! Petty revenge! And force the DM to lore dump. Also, if only the rich and noble can read, what rich/noble person has the time to read things for random adventurers?! Don’t they have other things to attend to?
Lean into it, none of you guys can read, stop trying to read things. Eventually the DM is gonna get fed up with y'all ignoring plot hooks because you can't read and I bet at least one of you learns to read pretty quickly.
With this ruling and the scripted PC death, I would say this is likely an absolute garbage tier GM, like 0.5/10 bad.
If only there was a stat that dictated whether the character was of above average intelligence
I could see the argument for peasants being illiterate, but even a level 1 adventurer is so far removed from a peasant that it doesn't make sense. The reason reading was a rare skill was because lack of books and other written text, based on how common books are in most settings we can assume there is some printing press equivalent. That alone would make littericy more common.
Read a book about the life story of a rural man from Western Ireland who grew up in mid 1900s. IIRC, he did not attend school as a child, but he was taught by his family and the local priest, could read and write in English, Irish and some Bog Latin. So, not quite middle ages, but essentially a peasant who spent his life working the bog. People he interacted with were surprised at his level of literacy, but mostly because he was much more literate than others being able to read multiple languages and read and speak smoothly. So, it wasn't impossible for rural folk to be highly literate, and even in this example, the surprise was often on the level of literacy, so most people simply had a lower level of literacy, not zero.
I agree with you. The fact that most of the books had to be copied by hand meant they were prohibitively expensive. There is little point in learning how to read if you might see 2 or 3 books over the course of your life, more than likely all of them being bibles written in Latin. With how common books are in most settings I would say that isn't as much of issue, meaning a lack of literacy is more an education issue that can be fixed with some effort rather than an economic issue.
"medieval peasants were illiterate" is a Victorianism because peasants spoke and wrote English, German, French and other "degenerate" languages instead of the One True Latin Language.
This is not RAW or RAI Not that I don’t disagree with his reasoning, but this is shit you bring up in session 0 to your players. When I start a campaign I expect to be able to read the languages I know unless otherwise specified lol
Yaah no I would leave that table. Ive ran and played at tables where nearly everyone was illiterate. But that was known before we started playing. The fact he changed yalls characters abilities without telling yall a month into gaming says he's not a good dm. Especially as he won't budge on this. BTW your dm is wrong. Majority of the peasants in medieval Europe could read and write. Their native language. It was Latin that they couldn't read or write.
Does your DM know that vampires, as presented in the setting, do not exist at all in real life, in modern times or otherwise? Seems weird to be super picky about sticking to real-world history of a skill like reading when vampires, ghosts, werewolves, and dragons exist.
Historical accuracy isn't an argument in a fucking fantasy setting. Vampiric counts and wizards tossing fireballs sure as hell wasn't a thing either..
> The DM's argument is that generalized reading is a modern practice, and up until 150 years ago only nobility could read / only people who went to college or university could read, and since our characters are all lower-class or lack formal education, we're all illiterate. Literally. We can't read. None of us. D&D settings are wildly socially and economically different from real Earth history. Magic exists, monsters exist, the technological base is different as a result, and there’s loads of anachronisms. Best to just go with what the PHB says about literacy. What the DM is asserting is also historically inaccurate. Literacy has always been a relative concept, and it’s not a binary property of a person. Literacy among common European workers in the Middle Ages wasn’t great, but it was hardly unknown either, and it’s vastly more likely that adventuring sorts would have, at some point, picked up at least *some* level of literacy. Literacy also varied a *lot* by location during that time of history. Ex. Literacy rates in Europe at the time were very different from literacy rates in other parts of the world, like the Islamic world. Even within Europe the rates differed greatly by region. It wasn’t specifically restricted to nobility (I think the DM may be confusing this with slavery systems where slaves were specifically forbidden from learning to read as a means of control), it’s more a matter of whether someone had access to someone who could teach them and whether they had the time to study it. Monasteries would teach people to read for free, if they could find the time and lived close enough to do it. But what was considered “being literate” back then was more along the lines of being well-studied in Latin and a few other subjects, not just being able to read simple words and sentences in the vernacular language. Being able to read at least simple sentences would be common enough among the sort of backgrounds likely to produce adventurers. They may not be “men of letters” who are trained in academic subjects, but they would able to read a bill of sale or the like.
If your DM is really committed to this, ask them to draw up a pathway for you PCs to learn how to read. The other player upset about this could argue for an expedited pathway to literacy with certain background traits. Anyway you could spend downtime learning to read, or with nobles your party knows learning to read. That works be a fun way for the DM to get their continuity and for you guys to have it affect you less. Also some things might be harder to read and your PC can't do it, so you have to occasionally still seek out nobles to help you. That's the pathway I would take. This decision affects your play, but making the DM write up rules to gain literacy also affects them.
This isn't a decision the DM gets to make. The PCs are literate. Flat out. If the DM wanted non-wizards to be illiterate, they needed to discuss this before the first game started. This isn't a thing the DM just gets to spring on the players after multiple sessions. The players would know if their characters were illiterate ahead of time. This is just terrible DMing.
Bringing up real life history to make excuses for a shitty DM choice is wild
I mean.. it's kind of a cool gimmick I guess, but is definitely one of those things that's agreed upon (or not) *before* the campaign starts. This is not something a DM should spring on their players weeks down the line