Arabian Nights and Coriolis RPG

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I'm about to start a game of Coriolis, an RPG that's self-described as "Arabian Nights in space". But, to my mind, the game's background doesn't reinforce the "feel" of the Arabian Nights, apart from using Arabic names.

Which prompts the question: what features of the Arabian Nights tales are characteristic of that body of work, as opposed to any other tradition of storytelling?

I've got:

  • urban, mercantile, middle-class focus
  • ... except when the stories are about the lives of sultans and princes
  • stories within stories; some with clear morals, some where the morality is implicit
  • huge swings of fate and coincidence, and the fatalism to accept it
  • morals and cleverness win the day, over stories hinging on physical prowess and strength of arms
  • riches come to the deserving, or "winning the lottery" makes someone a good person
  • exoticism, riches, and opulence
  • deep, eternal love at first sight
  • erudition and nobility of spirit are reflected as physical beauty, and vice versa

What do you think?

Comments

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    Maybe add that cleverness and plot resolution are often accomplished by female characters despite operating within superficially strict social constraints?
    Also, disguises are a Big Thing and often used by Goodies and Baddies alike.

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    This is a problem with other ‘Arabian Nights’ themed games I’ve read - they only give you a cursory and vague Arabian masque without capturing the essence of the Nights.

    I’d think you want to have a fairly strong nod to the frame story, which means the ability to spin a good yarn should be persuasive, to the point where it can save your life. And this matches well to the ‘story writhin a story’ theme. I guess one would need to decide if this means ‘a story within a scenario’ (I.e. one of the activities that players engage in while having their adventures is storytelling) or is it scenarios within scenarios (the main adventure is paused while a sub- quest takes place, as with Glorantha Heroquests). Could be both.

    Also, in order to tell wondrous stories, you need to have wonders, and lots of them. The Nights uses magical items, Jinn, magicians, shapechanging, and chance coincidence to achieve wonder, not to mention exotic places and rapid transit and brushes with fame. You’d need to figure out how to translate these into a sci-fi universe. Would weird tech, aliens, mentads, mutations, spatial anomalies, and wormholes be enough? I feel like this needs a lot more thought out into it.

    Also, what is the concept of nobility in the setting? Are we talking about Emperor Skywalker dressing like a commoner and walking around the spaceship at night? Somehow that feels too on the nose. So how do you capture that kind of tale?

    Same with flying carpets and magic horses. In a setting with spaceships, would such things be marvellous? Do you dump them altogether as wondrous elements, or do you constrain the setting significantly (like restrict it to a single planet, for example?) maybe miraculous travel jumps dimensions, or jumps time?
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    Yes to clever women, but also a lot of women who are treated as no better than property than their fathers and prospective husbands.

    Disguises, yes, both deliberate (al-Rashid) and accidental (the three dervishes).

    Yes to stories and the power of stories. And also the equivalence between erudition and education with moral worth.

    Stories within stories? It could be done with extended flashbacks, especially with some of the players taking on other minor characters.

    Wonders and fantastic items. Those have two roles. One is that they set up the hero as being exceptional, and so the story. The other is that they're a mechanism for showing the moral worth of the hero. Ali Baba passes the morality test by taking only what he needs. The dervish ignores warnings and loses his eyes.

    Good thoughts, all! Thanks.

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