Sometimes i think about the idea of Common as a language in fantasy settings.
On the one hand, it’s a nice convenient narrative device that doesn’t necessarily need to be explored, but if you do take a moment to think about where it came from or what it might look like, you find that there’s really only 2 possible origins.
In settings where humans speak common and only Common, while every other race has its own language and also speaks Common, the implication is rather clear: at some point in the setting’s history, humans did the imperialism thing, and while their empire has crumbled, the only reason everyone speaks Human is that way back when, they had to, and since everyone speaks it, the humans rebranded their language as Common and painted themselves as the default race in a not-so-subtle parallel of real-world whiteness.
In settings where Human and Common are separate languages, though (and I haven’t seen nearly as many of these as I’d like), Common would have developed communally between at least three or four races who needed to communicate all together. With only two races trying to communicate, no one would need to learn more than one new language, but if, say, a marketplace became a trading hub for humans, dwarves, orcs, and elves, then either any given trader would need to learn three new languages to be sure that they could talk to every potential customer, OR a pidgin could spring up around that marketplace that eventually spreads as the traders travel the world.
Drop your concept of Common meaning “english, but in middle earth” for a moment and imagine a language where everyone uses human words for produce, farming, and carpentry; dwarven words for gemstones, masonry, and construction; elven words for textiles, magic, and music; and orcish words for smithing weaponry/armor, and livestock. Imagine that it’s all tied together with a mishmash of grammatical structures where some words conjugate and others don’t, some adjectives go before the noun and some go after, and plurals and tenses vary wildly based on what you’re talking about.
Now try to tell me that’s not infinitely more interesting.
in my campaign, my players found an old journal written in what was common at the time and is now considered a dead language thats difficult to decipher.
god. lord. I still cant get over Marinas backstory its just the funniest fucking thing to me. like imagine if you were a member of Seal Team 6 and also helped make a gun that can kill like 40 people at once effortlessly but one day enemies came to your territory and just sang a fucking bop. the shookest jam. and imagine that song went so hard that you decided to flee your position leave the country change your identity and start a band. thats Marinas canon backstory
like come ON the homestuck beta troll girls were all very interesting and wonderful and most importantly, they were thirteen year old girls who were still developing as people when they met their deaths and began a long, traumatizing journey through space time!!!! and yet everyone either sexualizes and objectifies the ideas of them or fucking ignores the context of how their characters work and do stupid shit like stan some super ooc softboy version of karkat!
Catch me still stanning Amporas till I die
are you seriously admitting a major character flaw and simultaneously proving that i’m right
