Don't call them rappas

There’s new news about Tetsubo coming soon. That’s the Japanese-styled RPG that began as a Warhammer supplement and then began turning into a much more authentic game of its own during lockdown. I have been adapting it to work with Paul Mason’s Outlaws RPG. Also, he has lived in Japan for over thirty years so is ideally qualified to advise me on both the rules and the culture.

I began by asking Paul about kusa, a group of medieval Japanese saboteurs-cum-mischief-makers that I read about in a martial arts magazine. The kusa were a sort of precursor to ninja, but I also wanted Tetsubo to dispense with the notion of ninja as feudal-era special ops that was popularized after World War 2. And the best way to go back to the roots of the profession (if indeed it has any that we can isolate from all the modern myths) would be to ditch the name “ninja” in favour of something more historically accurate.

Paul responded: Wikipedia has kusa as another term for ninja, but unfortunately no context behind it, whether it's period-based or regional. My source for terms was the Iga-ryu Ninja Museum. It lists shinobi, ukami, kanja/rappa, onmitsu and ninja as the terms used by period (the last is listed for Taisho: ie the 20th century). Regional terms include some of those period based terms as well as suppa, ukami, dakko, kikimonoyaku, and kurohabaki. Interesting that it includes none of the Wiki ones apart from rappa and shinobi.

So in Tetsubo, kusa became the apprentice level of the kanja (not ninja) profession. I then asked Paul about how to represent defilement.

Paul: The term you need is kegare (穢). It would translate as impurity or uncleanness. When you go to a shrine and wash your hands at the little shack for that purpose, it's a ritual washing to rid you of kegare. This obsession with cleanliness (see also Japanese bath houses, and taking off your shoes when you enter a house) is somewhat relevant in the present pandemic. I've even heard it given as a reason why the Japanese never had an industrial revolution -- better hygiene meant longer lifespan than Brits meant there were not enough surplus agricultural workers, a necessity for industry.

Dave: Funnily enough, I’d previously thought of using kegare for bad joss [a rules concept in Outlaws] and immediately rejected it for the fairly daft reason that Tetsubo already has defilement defined as occurring in specific circumstances (proximity to a dead body, fluffing etiquette when addressing a kami, etc).

Paul: That's exactly what bad joss is supposed to deal with!

Dave: The mental process here is interesting because it illustrates why it’s taking me longer to edit Tetsubo now than it probably took to write it in the first place. I’ll think of a way to implement something (kuji-no-in, say) using Outlaws rules. But then I see there are a couple of other ways to do it, and whichever I choose has knock-on effects, so I enter a mental holding pattern where no decision is taken as I move on to another part of the rules. All of which is pretty stupid given that the people who want Tetsubo will mostly be Warhammer players and the people who want Outlaws really want Outlaws, not Tetsubo – so I’m agonizing over choices that might only matter to the handful of people who buy the book and play it as written.

Paul: I can't help thinking that trying to imagine the kind of people who want to play the game is a bad move. Surely you can only say to yourself: what is this game to me? And design it accordingly. In the case of Tetsubo, the answer is clearly: "not Kwaidan". So just go ahead and do interesting things that wouldn't work in Kwaidan.

Kwaidan was/is to be a roleplaying game set in Heian Japan, considerably more culturally authentic and closer to my heart than Tetsubo, which everybody seems to associate with Kurosawa's early "noodle Easterns".  

Dave: At least I’ve managed to break that holding pattern regarding kegare. You are of course quite right – that’s exactly what I needed to substitute for bad joss. And instead of getting hung up on how to square the abstract acquisition of kegare when acquiring motivation with specific in-game circumstances that cause or remove defilement, all I need to do is put numbers to the latter. +5 kegare for touching a dead body, -[degree of success] for a purification CEREMONY roll, etc.

I’m still undecided about how to handle magic. In a perfect world I wouldn’t bother having it as a separate discipline and simply have it bleed into everything else – but that’s Kwaidan, not Tetsubo. I was listening to the Appendix N Book Club podcast in which somebody said we’d had forty-five years of role-playing, and still nobody has figured out a way to make magic magical.

Paul: That's wrong. Plenty of people have figured out how to make magic magical. It's just that however you do it, once you write down rules someone will find a way to suck the magic out of it. My philosophy is that role-playing magic rules are there for people who don't want magic to be magical. For the rest of us, if you are going to allow players to use magic, it's all about trust.

Dave: I really like the Outlaws magic system and it does feel that sorcerers in Outlaws are very different from the usual RPG artilleryman types. But Outlaws magic has a very strong Chinese flavour (not that I know what a Japanese flavour of magic ought to be like) and it’s a mark of its strength that it doesn’t easily lend itself to conversion to a different setting. You could use the core Outlaws abilities system for anything from Tekumel to Ancient Greece – and Arabian Nights and Camelot, as we’ve said before – because people still have to haggle, fight, sneak, impress, treat wounds, sing, make works of art, etc. But the obstacle to any generic system is magic. That’s where GURPS falters: what would “generic magic” even look like?

Paul: Yet another reason why I don't believe in GURPS. But ironically, if you're doing a Japanese magic system, the closest you're going to find is in a Chinese one. Throw away all that stuff about “shugenja” from Bushido. The image of a sorcerer in Japan is the onmyoshi. And the onmyoshi is a hell of lot closer to an Outlaws sorcerer than he is to a sorcerer in any other game. 

Dave: Given that any magic rules must fit the setting, do I retain the leadenly dull spells inherited from Warhammer, rejigged to give them Outlaws stats? That feels like a lazy option, and when I went through a list of the Tetsubo spells crossing off all the boring ones I was left with barely a dozen – and thus glaring gaps in what sorcerers could do. Pretty much the only thing I like from the original Tetsubo rules is that ninja (now kanja) were a type of sorcerer, but then when I read their spells, hobbled as they are by inheriting the magic system of Warhammer, that concept soon dissolves into the mucky residue medieval alchemists were left with in their vain attempts to turn lead into gold. 

What I should do is spend a couple of weeks with Joly’s Legend in Japanese Art really soaking up the depiction of sorcerers in myth, then rebuild from there. It would be enjoyable, too, but at that point I’d really have to wonder why I was investing that effort into Tetsubo when it’d be better spent on Kwaidan. Just this morning I was flipping through the book and M. Joly chastised me with the information that shugendo is not “wizardry”, but a syncretic mystical sect -- in the real-world sense of mystical, that is. And Royall Tyler’s book Japanese Tales mentions that one folkloric power of wizards is “causing the penis to disappear” – again, that’s more one for Kwaidan, I think.

Paul: Spell-lists are one of those soul-sucking things that I don't miss in role-playing games. I switched to C&S because I liked the way it encouraged the idea that sorcerers were almost 'above' spells. One of my players got so into the mindset that his character spent all his time enchanting materials, and he infuriated (and intimidated, as his character became quite powerful) the other players by showing little interest in their schemes, but simply trying to manipulate them to obtain the rare materials he wanted. I think unless magic has that distance, that otherness, it is simply technology: blasters in Traveller.

Dave: That’s what I thought about most of the magical battles in the Harry Potter films. The wands were just phasers. In Chinese Ghost Story or Game of Thrones, on the rare occasions when you get to see magic it does feel magical.

And as for maboroshi – I don’t even know where that came from. Presumably a class of illusionist in Warhammer, and Jamie and I reached for “phantasm” as a plausible equivalent in Japanese? (Or did it come from Lafcadio Hearn? If so hardly authentic, but Hearn I’d accept as valid in the way that Pre-Raphaelite reimaginings of Arthurian myth are valid.) Do I rebuild the class using Outlaws magic, or abandon it and move the original Tetsubo spells for maboroshi (if any are worth keeping) across to whatever I end up calling sorcerers. (My pocket dictionary suggests maho-tsukai or kijutsu-shi, but I suspect they may be thinking of a stage conjurer.)

Paul: Maboroshi means illusion, not illusionist. Annoyingly, Illusionist would be Maboroshishi, which is too silly to use. And Maboroshiya, the alternative, sounds like a shop (remember Mr Benn?). Maho-tsukai is a literal translation of “magic-user”, which was a term I hated in D&D from the very earliest days. I mean, you could use it, and the Japanese term is probably marginally better, in that it is slightly possible that someone might say it, whereas one reason I shacked up with C&S so early was that I could never imagine any story in which someone said, “He is a mighty magic-user!”

Kijutsushi sounds more interesting. The scroll you asked me to research, after all, was from a series called kijutsu no kagami, ie “the mirror of kijutsu”. Strictly speaking, it means “magic tricks”, but it might have more to it, and the scroll suggests that it does.

So this is how the sorcerous professions of Tetsubo ended up:

The generic term for the spellcasters of Yamato is mahutsukai. There are four broad classes:

• Onmyoshi specialize in astrology, divination, protection against spirits, and the study and manipulation of the five elements, with particular emphasis on geomancy and the correct directions and locations to avoid bad luck. By preference they channel magical energy from iyashirochi (ley lines or ‘dragon veins’, natural sources of ki in the landscape) or from the spirit world. 
• Genka are a more select and secretive school of mages who practice spells connected with death, illusion and destructive energy. They have a reputation for drawing magical energy from servants, acolytes or even from unwilling captives. 
• Taoist mages are mystic hermits who develop control over reality and natural forces by means of asceticism and meditation. They prefer to draw their magical force from within themselves, often while meditating under waterfalls, and store it in a focus (often a mirror or gourd) until needed. 
• Kanja are the eerie ‘wizards of the night’ whose study of magic revolves around their activities as assassins, saboteurs and spies. They power their spells with whatever source of occult energy is most conveniently to hand.

But that’s not the whole story. A sorcerer might change his or her school, acquiring spells and practices from several classes. Bukyo priests have access to magic not studied by any of the mahutsukai and that uses spiritual power. Shinto priests obtain boons from kami that serve the same function as spells. And anyone might acquire knowledge of spells from a supernatural being like a tengu or from a book, whether or not they have any formal training in magic.

In any case, ordinary people are unversed in the types of magic and use the various terms for mahutsukai classes as if they were interchangeable. In a state of ignorance, personal prejudice will often serve to supply a definition. Thus a spellcaster who has associated with the speaker's own lord may be described as an onmyoshi, one suspected of working for an enemy lord may be called a genka or kanja, and one known to have come from Huaxia or who refuses employment may be labelled a Taoist. Sorcerers themselves do little to clear up this state of confusion, as each sorcerer knows that his or her power will be greater against a foe who is not quite sure what to expect.

Ways into Sparta

I’m not one of those who are scornful of the struggles that actors face in getting into character. It’s not as hard as coal mining? Can’t argue there, but it does drive some needles very deep into the actor’s psyche and sense of self-worth. Don’t discount emotional hardships, is all I’m saying.

Take Charles Laughton, driven almost to despair by his inability to get a handle on his part in I, Claudius. He finally solved it by playing a gramophone recording of Edward VIII’s abdication speech right before he’d walk on set. Similarly, though with a lot less of the hand-wringing, Sir Kenneth Branagh reportedly sought advice from Prince Charles before embarking on the role of Henry V.

The point is: you need to find a way in. Paul Mason and I used to talk about finding “the Englishness of Heian Japan” or whatever abstruse setting we had picked for our latest roleplaying campaign. It’s not that we really believe there is any “English” component there, and in particular not that we wanted to anglicize the setting in any way, just that you’re looking for the stepping stones that will get you started. Once you have that first step, you can start to build a mental model of your character within the exotic setting – until eventually it doesn’t feel exotic any more. You have passed through the stage of liminality and, now that you inhabit the setting, you can jettison those familiar analogies that got you started.

That’s the good way to do it. The bad way is to try to conform the setting to tropes you find familiar. Leaving aside the speedos, Frank Miller reduced Spartan culture to a bunch of violent libertarian nutters. That said, Miller reduces everything to violent libertarian nutters, so maybe we shouldn’t read much into it. As an approach to roleplaying in Sparta, it’s barren ground; it will lead you back into your own concerns and cultural views, not closer to the mind-set of a Spartan. The film adaptation of 300 likewise. The 1962 movie The Three Hundred Spartans was long mocked for being inauthentic, and lord knows I’m not recommending it, but arguably it’s still a lot more authentic than anything Zack Snyder has ever perpetrated.

You could look at Steven Pressfield’s book The Gates of Fire. Pressfield was a Marine, so he knows about soldiering. Trouble is, the type of soldiering he knows is likely very different from the experience of a hoplite in 480 BC. I’m not talking about drill or weaponry. Recruits into modern Western military forces tend to be rural or suburban and from a lower socioeconomic status than the general population. This leads to a specific style of training, a particular idiom of social interaction, which in British Army terms we might characterize as the “you ‘orrible little man” attitude. Or, going back to the US Marines, who can forget the Gunny’s welcoming speech from Full Metal Jacket?

If Pressfield were familiar with the Gurkhas, he’d know that if your soldiers come from a society that esteems military service you don’t need to treat them like dirtbags to get what you want. No sergeant or officer in the British Gurkha units ever needs to scream at a Gurkha soldier. Theirs is a martial culture. In such a culture, discipline flows from self-discipline. That is nearer (perhaps, for we can only surmise) to the Spartan way of thinking. All of these spartiate warriors are, after all, the aristocracy of their world. Martial values have been inculcated in them from childhood. They’re not unruly rednecks who you have to break down and rebuild into soldiers.

That suggests to me another analogy. You know the saying, apocryphally attributed to Wellington, about the battle of Waterloo having been won on the playing fields of Eton. Those young Spartans, graduates of the agoge, are maybe not so different from the pupils of a tough Victorian or Edwardian public school. That system produced exactly the sort of chap who adhered to the values of his parents and grandparents, who would politely give up his seat to an elder, and who had the reckless courage to throw himself into battle at the head of his men armed with just a pistol and a stiff upper lip.

That’s one way into Sparta, anyway. I’ll reiterate that you’re not aiming to describe Sparta in terms of Rugby School or the Marine Corps or NRA anti-federalists or Baywatch extras. That would just be cultural chauvinism and it gets you nowhere in either acting or roleplaying. What you want is the key that opens a door in your own imagination so that you can construct a credible and internally consistent Sparta there.

And incidentally you might need several different keys. One of my players, seeing the map in the Sparta Sourcebook, said, “I never realized there were so many shrines and temples.” If you’re a Westerner who has travelled in the Orient, particularly somewhere like Taiwan, you won’t find that kind of society hard to comprehend. Even less so if you’re Taiwanese, of course.Another player was surprised that Ares wasn't much worshipped in Sparta, except as a cult among immature boys. The truth is that professional soldiers throughout history have rarely regarded war as anything admirable. A Spartan would tell you that it's not battle they worship, but victory.

Roleplaying in non-traditional settings doesn’t appeal to all tastes. It takes commitment, but when you carry it off it reaches a deeper place and yields more rewarding results than any campaign with Scottish dwarves and hippy elves ever can. So, if places like Tekumel or Sparta or Heian Japan are your bag, what tricks do you use for finding your way in?

Some sources that may prove useful and/or inspirational:

• Choice of the Petal Throne (game) by Danielle Goudeau
• Spartan Reflections by Paul Cartledge
• The World of the Shining Prince: Court Life in Ancient Japan by Ivan Morris