It is the year 1865 and the United States government is seeking to establish and tame the western frontier. Manifest Destiny is in full swing and the era of American Imperialism is about to begin. In Legends of the West however, fantasy meets history. Americans just have ended the Civil War to free slave orcs from their Confederate secessionist dark elf masters. While technology and modernization is booming with the invention of the steam locomotive, the Gatling gun, and better farming and catting tools, the old practices of magic are being used to blend in with these technological advancements as well. The Era of the mythical cowboy is about to begin!

Rules:

1.This will be a roleplay open to all, as such I'm playing this in the Free Roleplay section, but you need not have to limit your writing post if you're a Casual player or Advanced. While I would like a paragraph for each post, you can have more than that and perhaps up to six paragraphs per-post.

2. A recent change would be that this doesn't just take place in Texas, but all over the western frontier. I may make a simple hub town to start out with for everyone though.

3.Magic is considered something older and archaic, technology is considered newer and more efficient. Yes, you can blend your magic into technology in this roleplay. However you're basically taking old practices and blending them in with the latest in technological advances so not everyone would be capable of doing such.

4.There will be races in this.However, they will be modified to meet history. The races are as followed:

Humans: The US government and it's citizens.

Dwarfs: Irish/ Scottish Immigrants looking to make a name for themselves and a life in the wild west. They're great blacksmiths, engineers, and have monopolies in the trans continental railroad. They also sell and manufacture firearms.

Orcs: The "African Americans" of the story. The civil war for their rights and independence has led to the orc American to gain his freedom, but persecution and discrimination are still rampant.

Vampires and Undead: Former soldiers who have died on the battlefield but rose again. Great generals are most likely to have became vampires. They can have fought for either side or just in the previous wars such as in 1812.

Dragon Men/ Dragon Women: Chinese immigrants, they're natural fire elementals and hardy workers. However, many do not trust them as they're foreigners from the east and untrusted. They're often found working and California and around the west coast. (OOC Note: They are not actual dragons, in fact they're more akin to eastern lizard-men who naturally can spew flame and are just reptilian humanoids as opposed to actual gigantic flying dragons. Most of the Dragon people do not have wings, but they can use fire magic very well.)

Dark Elves: Confederates, were a part of the US until they suceeded over their slaves and economical issues. The US government had just finished the civil war and freed the Orcs of their chains. Confederate characters need not be villains in this, in fact a lot of them looked west to stake their claim and settle out in the west just as humans have.

Los Gatos: Hispanic and Mexican characters shall be anthropomorphic cats, Jaguars, panthers, and all manner of feline. They also currently have a massive army and are south of the border.

Wood Elves: Native Americans.

Giants: Canadian or Paul Bunyon like settlers, they have legal issues but for the most part they'll settle around up north and not in the west. They still may contract to the US government however.

5.While this can be comical at points, I would like this idea to be taken rather seriously. Remember, although this is fantasy it's inspired by real world events and many people fought and died during this time in real life.

6. Magic will be balanced, magic is great for augmenting technology that's been made or having certain things done. In this setting it's also been around for centuries. However, it's not as efficient as modern day technology and it also has practical use in powering up America, being used in steam technology, curing diseases found in the Wild West, and warfare. Magic complements science in this story, it doesn't make itself as the end all solution.

7. People have mistaken this roleplay for my actual beliefs. I would never condone slavery in any way, shape, or form in real life. I believe slavery is intrinsically wrong, that freedom is a fundamental human right and while slavery here has happened, it's up to the players to do something about it. You have the choice to make a character of the race that were formerly slaves or not. Also, you can also choose to be any race that's not been under slavery. The story was meant to portray real life historical events of the lives after the slaves were freed in real life. This is a historical theme and I shall heavily show the enslaved race in a positive manner. I do not condone slavery in real in a single instant. However, history is history and you cannot rewrite it to never have happened. I will leave it up to the player to roleplay whether or not they can personally deal with a character who have faced these issues or not. It's up to the player to realize this is fantasy and thus to play with this theme with historical authenticity or not. I am merely trying to make a historical fantasy roleplay that everyone can enjoy.

Just a shot in the dark here, but what does Orc dialogue sound like? Could you tell me about their racial strengths/limitations and culture?

Just a shot in the dark here, but what does Orc dialogue sound like? Could you tell me about their racial strengths/limitations and culture?

Right, well I wasn't thinking of them talking like an orc in Warhammer. Rather they would perhaps have a grunting and sort of straight forward like accent, (sort of like Orcs in Warcraft instead). Some of them would be able to read and write, but education would be varied and perhaps meager due to being shortly after the end of the civil war. Tribalism would even perhaps be a part of their culture and thus they probably went back to their tribal heritage after being freed in the war. As far as strengths I'm thinking of some very orcish ones. Such as, but not limited to:

.Durable, hardy, and very strong. Classic Orc type. (Think like John Henry type of characters.)

.They would have shaman ritualistic magic, old ways done by chieftains and local shamans.

.Orcs would have great health, and may heal naturally faster than a human.

.They can use most modern devices, but are prone to breaking more fragile pieces of technology. However they can melee very well in case their tools have to be used for defense.

.They may or may not be good at particular craftsmanship.

.Strong unity towards other non-humans, but also can be friendly towards humans. (The mentality of "human/ white" superiority would still be around until what would be the future in this universe. This is historical.)

Some limitations would be:

.They can easily break tools.

.They're not the most educated bunch, then again they just came out of slavery.

.Their magic maybe very old fashioned, like centuries old and shamanistic.

.They cannot mount horses, they will break the backs of said steeds with their natural muscle mass.

.Others may still see them as inferiors, and a lot of the law still tries to mess them over. (Think Jim Crow laws.)

Isn't this a teeeeeeeeeny bit racist? Like, associating real world races with fantasy races that have stereotypical 'traits?' Like, that is some fairly fucking heavy connotations right there...

Isn't this a teeeeeeeeeny bit racist? Like, associating real world races with fantasy races that have stereotypical 'traits?' Like, that is some fairly fucking heavy connotations right there...

Way to jump to conclusions, in this roleplay I had the idea of white, southern people such as myself as half vampire or dark elf. Of course it's about race, it's fantasy. As far as actual racism goes, no it's not. The idea is that the United States would be composed of different fantasy races, and not just all human. Seriously, play a game of Warhammer and see how many races are changed into mythological creatures or inspired by real world groups. (Example: Romanians are vampires except for the Von Carstein family, High Elves are British, Chaos are vikings, Lizardmen are Mesoamerican,Beastmen being Germanic invaders,ect.)

Your notion that I'm saying being any of the races are "bad" is unfounded. This is a setting where the United States had to deal with not only the issue of simple skin color, but being different fantasy species with various capabilities as well. If you do not like the idea you're free to not join, but don't toss false allegations of racism where they're are none.

@Jaredthefox92

Except at no point does Warhammer go directly:

"Orcs/Orks = British people."

They go. "We took the common myths about Vampires and Vlad the Impaler, a Romanian, and we based a fantasy race and culture around them, which will resemble Romania thanks to this."

See the difference?

@Jaredthefox92

Except at no point does Warhammer go directly:

"Orcs/Orks = British people."

They go. "We took the common myths about Vampires and Vlad the Impaler, a Romanian, and we based a fantasy race and culture around them, which will resemble Romania thanks to this."

See the difference?

Pfft! It's clearly known in the Warhammer community that the Orks are inspired by British football hooligans as an in joke.

There are no "myths" of Chaos being vikings or of High Elves being British as well, also technically the Skaven are English too. Oh, and vampires are NOT just Romanian, the Von Carstein family are actually German and are technically legal Elector Counts by region as well. Anyone can be a vampire, it just so happens that they're situated in Romania, but have Von Carsteins have German heritage in that is what they were in their previous lives.

Seriously, now you're still jumping to conclusions. I made these races all based on what would be most fitting, I really wanted to make my "southern white race" of vampires where white people up north would be normal humans. However, my friend from Italy simply suggested I do dark elves instead. I merely choose these races out of pure historical context.

<Snipped quote by Lady Selune>

Pfft! It's clearly known in the Warhammer community that the Orks are inspired by British football hooligans as an in joke.

There are no "myths" of Chaos being vikings or of High Elves being British as well, also technically the Skaven are English too. Oh, and vampires are NOT just Romanian, the Von Carstein family are actually German and are technically legal Elector Counts by region as well. Anyone can be a vampire, it just so happens that they're situated in Romania, but have Von Carsteins have German heritage in that is what they were in their previous lives.

Seriously, now you're still jumping to conclusions. I made these races all based on what would be most fitting, I really wanted to make my "southern white race" of vampires where white people up north would be normal humans. However, my friend from Italy simply suggested I do dark elves instead. I merely choose these races out of pure historical context.

Just seen this pop by and so.

Your missing one key point here, espechily on your Ork / IN RP comparison. I have read both latest and original Warhammer books like inquisition war serris.

Orks, are close to the cultural negetive atrabutes and strotypes of the time. Your same ill educated, more durable and so argument is a historical view point of the tome long proved wrong.

Warhammer. And its core nature is dark joke, the ork race especially has a joke nature to soften things, and the sheer brutality, of a race that is basically fungal omnicide.

I fact many races, often have a small aspect that counters the darker, or potential negetive refrence used. You it seemed relised a link but not used somthing to soften that link or make it less direct. Dark eldar are sadistic as hell, but they also troollish. Orks are viola t with humour. Mankind facepalm in stupidity, while also casually making Nazi Germanny or a gulag holiday camps espechily whwn grey knights kill just for knowing somthing. Again, chaos as some form of releof, for a group who have the darkest in the experiments of honsou and fabius bile.

There lies a uncomfortable refrence. I would just suggest you think about it, and while no one been majorly offended, just be careful that the ground your on is a a little thinner than you probbly want be on comfortablely.

So please just consider the points, as it seems you have a good idea but may want to consider your use of refrence and contexts.

I was the one to suggest the orc inclusion as plantation workers. However I rather suggested that the orcs (which I was comparing to Tolkien, not Warhammer) had been defeated yet again by the other races on one of their repeated crusades of pillaging and plunder.

Unlike preyed upon Africans the thought was that the orcs put themselves in their position of indentured servitude through their constant warmongering. This allows for higher minded characters to question the wisdom of the deplorable situation and maybe seek an alternative solution.

One must have evil to tell a story of good conquering evil.

<Snipped quote by Jaredthefox92>

Just seen this pop by and so.

Your missing one key point here, espechily on your Ork / IN RP comparison. I have read both latest and original Warhammer books like inquisition war serris.

Orks, are close to the cultural negetive atrabutes and strotypes of the time. Your same ill educated, more durable and so argument is a historical view point of the tome long proved wrong.

Warhammer. And its core nature is dark joke, the ork race especially has a joke nature to soften things, and the sheer brutality, of a race that is basically fungal omnicide.

I fact many races, often have a small aspect that counters the darker, or potential negetive refrence used. You it seemed relised a link but not used somthing to soften that link or make it less direct. Dark eldar are sadistic as hell, but they also troollish. Orks are viola t with humour. Mankind facepalm in stupidity, while also casually making Nazi Germanny or a gulag holiday camps espechily whwn grey knights kill just for knowing somthing. Again, chaos as some form of releof, for a group who have the darkest in the experiments of honsou and fabius bile.

There lies a uncomfortable refrence. I would just suggest you think about it, and while no one been majorly offended, just be careful that the ground your on is a a little thinner than you probbly want be on comfortablely.

So please just consider the points, as it seems you have a good idea but may want to consider your use of refrence and contexts.

This roleplay wasn't based on Warhammer 40,000. I actually wanted to mix themes from Warhammer Fantasy, Skyrim, and Warcraft here to be honest with you.

They're only "ill educated" because they were former slaves and slaves had to go into an education transition period in real life shortly after the Civil War. This was meant to be historical based on what a free'd slave had to went through. In fact I planned on having an orc version of Fredrick Douglas in this roleplay:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Douglass


I think the issue here is people are getting the notion that I want these Orcs to be bad, no. I actually would like them in a sympathetic point of view in this story, if anything I would like actually for the Confederate Dark Elves/ Vampires to be the ones who are the villains in this. (Sort of like that one guy in the Wild West movie who basically wanted to rebuild the Confederacy.) Anyways, the point for the Orcs is not that they're bad and that all races are sort of at fault for the events in the roleplay. I am trying to not make this roleplay say being a single race is "bad", and anyone can make a character from any race they want. I think people are misunderstanding what I had planned. I wanted this to be like Skyrim where it's basically a big clash of ideals, culture, and of course the dangers of living and settling on the Western Frontier. However, I also want to keep it historically accurate and the simple fact was that many came from all over to tame the west.

I will say this very explicitly. I am not trying to bring about any negative connotations based on real life stereotypes into this story. It's a fantasy roleplay, there are no vampires. No orcs, this is not about shaming anyone's background. This is a fantasy story meant to entertain and provoke the imagination. I just haven't thought of my unique ideas yet due to college and my limited time frame.

I was the one to suggest the orc inclusion as plantation workers. However I rather suggested that the orcs (which I was comparing to Tolkien, not Warhammer) had been defeated yet again by the other races on one of their repeated crusades of pillaging and plunder.

Unlike preyed upon Africans the thought was that the orcs put themselves in their position of indentured servitude through their constant warmongering. This allows for higher minded characters to question the wisdom of the deplorable situation and maybe seek an alternative solution.

One must have evil to tell a story of good conquering evil.

So basically I should have an Orc villain that's perhaps a leader of a band of what would be Desperadoes? I mean, I could make an antagonist like this if necessary. I actually wanted to base the orcs in this more akin to Warcraft and Skyrim orcs, they can be sympathetic and likeable to even humans. This is why basically the United States government saw this as an injustice and burnt this fictional Atlanta to the ground, (probably burning all the vampires or just killing all the dark elves.)

I'm looking for ways to make this better however, I would like help on making this story better. I just have a lot on my plate offline with college and life so I'm sort of frantic with posting.

Hey, you're missing leprechauns for your Irish stereotype analog.

I will say this very explicitly. I am not trying to bring about any negative connotations based on real life stereotypes into this story.

Yet that's exactly what you're doing with your race analogs.

Hey, you're missing leprechauns for your Irish stereotype analog.

<Snipped quote by Jaredthefox92>
Yet that's exactly what you're doing with your race analogs.

Actually, the Irish would be Dwarfs. (Also, just to let you know, more than likely I have heritage from Ireland.) Still, I picked Dwarfs because they could have a monopoly on the trans-continental railroad and probably have executive rights to it's construction and operation.

@Jaredthefox92
Ok first I would like to start off and say that I, nor anyone else (I dont believe) thinks you are racist. However, the RP is a bit on the nose, and could be seen as racist.
Now I know it is not your fault for how people view your roleplay, but nevertheless it is how they see it, and I believe that because of that you're likely not to get interest. So I suggest you come up with a different idea that is not a civil war au. Warhammer and warcraft obviously based some of their races off of real world stereotypes, yes. However it was still loosely based in a world of their own creation. This is, as I said, a bit too on the nose.
So I will have to suggest, as a mod, to change it or take it down. Im only suggesting because I know you have no ill intent.

However if you do not, I will need to take it up with the other mods. And I know they are not as lenient as I.

@Jaredthefox92
Ok first I would like to start off and say that I, nor anyone else (I dont believe) thinks you are racist. However, the RP is a bit on the nose, and could be seen as racist.
Now I know it is not your fault for how people view your roleplay, but nevertheless it is how they see it, and I believe that because of that you're likely not to get interest. So I suggest you come up with a different idea that is not a civil war au. Warhammer and warcraft obviously based some of their races off of real world stereotypes, yes. However it was still loosely based in a world of their own creation. This is, as I said, a bit too on the nose.
So I will have to suggest, as a mod, to change it or take it down. Im only suggesting because I know you have no ill intent.

However if you do not, I will need to take it up with the other mods. And I know they are not as lenient as I.

Wait, the roleplay is supposed to be about the wild west after 1865, how can I change this? The thing is the Civil War just ended and I wanted to make a setting based on what many would be reeling back from the fallout of what just happened a few years prior. It's not even about slavery as the main theme, it's a western cowboy fantasy.

No yeah assigning a list of predetermined stereotypes to every existing race in real life is racial stereotyping no matter how you look at it. That's the definition of racism. This is undeniably racist at its core because of that.

bro what about goblins = jews???

Why not set it in an alternate version of straight Warhammer Fantasy? It would take a little more work, but you could put together a similar setting by tweaking the world a little bit. Perhaps a great drought has hit the world. You could set it in the Badlands as well as a devastated Bretonnia and an Empire that is clinging to life.

Would make it harder to justify the different races all getting along and intermingling, but perhaps desperate times call for desperate measures? With Bretonnia and the Empire in a bad way you get a good sized lawless area. The different races of Warhammer could then fill in for the different sort of pulp action from a Western, without the problems that arise from having Orcs filling the role of African Americans. As much as that could be done well and be quite interesting it definitely creates some problems.

Ex:
It is 40 years since a pall fell upon the lands. It was Famine that brought the empires of Man to their knees, though they were not the only ones affected. The world grew warmer, the grass died, the lakes dried up, and darkness encroached. The great nations drew their borders back as travel become neigh impossible. Yet now, finally, things are blooming once more. The world is easing up and a new age of expansion is about to begin. All of the once great nations have suffered terribly in the past 40 years. Now that things are getting better it is only a matter of time before the remaining nations seek to reclaim what they have had to abandon. An era of Imperialism is about to begin, and as these lands will need to be resettled and claimed it's all going to happen at a backbreaking pace.

Most of the other stuff would be pretty similar. The Empire and Bretonnia fill in similar roles to North/South, they're both sort of at war with each other now to avoid starvation and to claim as much of the land as possible. Dwarves and High Elves could fill roles similar to say France and England.

Whether you take that approach or not you should rework it a bit. Mythical Cowboys definitely has a cool ring and you've got a number of folk interested. Cool ideas about Badges offering protection as well. Just creating a fictionalized setting dead similar to a Western but not set in a Fantasy Races version of the real world will help a lot.

You might also just ignore the Civil War aspect and have a Wild West/Manifest Destiny that's happening without a Civil War, or keep a Civil War but either get rid of slavery altogether or keep it as it was in history (meaning it was man's cruelty to man). Orcs could still be used as just sort of general baddies. Sort of like Space Pirate Orcs from WH 40K only they ride around on horses.

Bro... What about Halflings = Bavarians?