#qet

I've been boiling a thought in the back of my mind lately, in regards to Naming Things in Fiction.

Newer folk may not know this, but my longest running creative endeavour has been Qet; a dark fantasy eldritch horror setting with inspiration from various Mesoamerican cultures and histories. It's a worldbuilding project, narrative setting, and TTRPG-- relegated to the backburner for over a year now. I needed a break.

Herein lies my problem: Qet's "common" equivalent language is a conlang inspired by Nahuatl.

English-first speakers, particularly fellow Americans, struggle a LOT with Nahuatl and anything similar to it. I'm American so my audience would...include a lot of Americans. Naturally a lot of the friends I'd want to run the game for are also American.

People struggle to read a lot of the proper nouns in Qet. An early first draft campaign took place in the deep caverns of Tchaoxlik, and the players were given Zykeutuezyl-- little light-emitting lizards-- as their primary source of light, to care for.

The bottomless lake Chluetichlon is significant in the lore, the Coulqepluex are a major ethnicity, and Qeplueoytz are shape-shifting monsters entire campaigns could center around. I've more examples, but you get the idea by now, I'm sure.

Part of Qet's inception was me noticing that US/UK fantasy overwhelmingly takes inspiration from European cultures, and That Sucks! There's so much more in the world, for one-- and this is fantasy! I want to see UNIQUE worlds that aren't just England But With Magic. Qet was my first worldbuilding project, and at the time I began, I had yet to develop the ability to just...make new stuff off the dome.

So I needed a solid inspiration from the real world as a starting point, and I chose something I thought was severely underrepresented: Mesoamerica. There is no 1:1 "this is the Maya but they're blue" or "here's the Olmec but they're birds" type stuff in Qet, rather, there's bits and bobs spread amongst original cultures and the world they live in. Corn is a staple food. The climate is hot and humid with a lot of shared flora from the real world Mesoamerican region-- but more differentiated fauna. One culture wears Aztec-inspired capes but live in Pueblo-inspired adobe homes. Polished obsidian mirrors play into eldritch magic. Some cultures sit and sleep on reed mats. One regional religion is a blend of the Aztec faith and Catholicism. Alongside these and many other bits of inspiration, the trade language of the world is Qetlec, which is inspired by Nahuatl.

I quite like a lot of the Qetlec names and words I've come up with over the years. I find several to be particularly satisfying to say! But I do have to admit that I, myself, had to train and practice to pronounce my own conlang. It may be second nature after years of working with it, but I often run into the dreaded "sbah...sbshs...uh...however you say it" or blatant word-butchering from new readers. It's an accessibility problem, after a certain point.

When I think of naming in fictional settings I return time and time again to what I believe to be a shining example of strong, accessible naming: Destiny.

Everything players need to know has a simple name that's typically just straight up English, no matter how alien. The Eliksni? Well that's a difficult name for some, so to players they're just...called "The Fallen." Other alien groups are simply titled: The Cabal, The Vex (who are actually made of radiolarian fluid-- another difficult name), and The Hive.

When they do concoct unique names for things, they do so in a way that should be easy to pronounce for their primarily English speaking audience. Fikrul. Mithrax. Oryx. Savathun is probably the most difficult one and that still seems fairly easy for players to pick up on.

Sometimes Destiny takes proper nouns from existing languages on Earth, but does so in the same manner-- sticking either to words English spakers already know or could feasibly pronounce with ease. Rasputin. Osiris. Ahamkara.

Destiny's player-facing setting is one that is crafted to be accessible. They're careful with their names. It's in the weird background lore that things may get complicated from time to time-- where it's not essential for players to be able to pronounce everything.

Qetlec isn't the only conlang in Qet, there are several others, but I'm less worried about them. It's reasonable to expect that English readers can pronounce Lhehd names like Hanviehl, Ahndel Veha, and Linnh; Tolech names like Mochog, Romtol, and Kupuch; or Auroullott names like Beuttep, Tteunor, and Auroboll.

Eldritch names are fine to be a bit difficult, I think, but I ride the line with those too-- Ul'jvot, Gaegoed, Kub-glorrha. Yaesheuhnahl is right at the edge but, it is a god made of 3 separate entities (Yaesh, Euhn, and Ahl) so I think it's not totally unreasonable.

It's Qetlec in specific that I think causes problems, which is a really big shame because I think it adds a lot to the world's flavor. But it includes a lot of sounds that aren't readily apparent, with things like "x" actually being pronounced "sh" or tight consonant/vowel pairings unfamiliar to the English reader like "ytz" "zyk" and "qeu." Hell, even beyond pairings-- the letters q, y, and z aren't super common in English! (Y is common at the *ends* of words but not at the start.)

I've tried some halfway measures here and there. I include pronunciation tooltips on every word I think folk may have difficulty with-- but that's only really doable on a webpage. In recent years, anything I added that I thought might be difficult to pronounce included an English alternative name. Gaiwej: Whispering Mouth. Asdeom: Adaptive Flesh. Zeloutihue: Lunatic of Lliaq. P'qur: The Labyrinth of Gods.

You get the idea.

I think it did work in making things more accessible, but it did bother me a little that this made the titles of each article much, much longer. It did make for names that were easier to remember, and, crucially-- look up. It was a bit of a have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too solution.

However, while this might work for a setting presented in a wiki format-- it doesn't work for a book or TTRPG. If you find yourself in a canyon and spot something in the distance you wish to warn your comrades of-- are you really going to shout "everyone look out for the Asdeom: Adaptive Flesh?" No. You're going to pick one or the other-- "Asdeom" or "Adaptive Flesh."

If your comrades have internalized only one of the two names, especially the one opposite what you called out-- they might be confused. We solved one problem only to create a new one! The easier solution is to simply have one, memorable-- and pronounceable-- name.

And that's where I'm stuck, I suppose. I'm attached to the many unpronouncible names of Qet and I know I must do away with them. I need to make new rules that limit how many syllables they may have, and cut out sounds that are difficult for English speakers.

Part of me thinks I need to start entirely from scratch on Qetlec instead of just reworking what's there. That I'm going to be too blinded by familiarity to spot all the problem areas, or too attached to change key nouns. Is "Zeloutihue" totally fine and pronounceable for the average English speaker? I can't tell! I'm lost in the sauce here!

If words like zykeutuezyl and olxlikliz are totally easy for me by now, how can I judge everything else fairly?

This is all to say, hey, think about this from the start. Don't make my mistakes and end up in this pit with me-- if you want your project to be accessible to your intended audience, consider the language(s) they might speak. What sounds are they familiar with? Could they feasibly pronounce all the important terminology in your work?

So, as probably previously mentioned, my bronze age eldritch horror game— Qet— originally began life as a 5e module. There's a LOT of design poison that came from those origins, and I think I've hit upon another one: progression.

What does character progression look like in a horror game? Typically, progression in an RPG means that your character grows more powerful, which I think is antithetical to horror— unless you can balance it with particularly compelling difficulty spikes to compensate. There's a balance to strike between player agency and hitting the tone of a horror story— you can't empower the main characters too much, or tension begins to fade. If you make it easy for your players to die, and lose their characters forever, they become jaded and easily detached from future characters— or they lose complete interest in continuing the campaign. (This is a problem in Call of Cthulhu, and one that is much more pronounced in many horror video games...which have their tension and mystery dissipate upon subsequent deaths.) Death isn't particularly interesting of a consequence, but it is still important to maintain some form of consistent tension. In Qet, you can come back to life a limited number of times-- exactly how many times that is depends on your choices, and some luck. Every time you come back to life, you have to sacrifice something to the Thought of Death— typically parts of your body, but things like strong memories, Quality scores, and entire Skills can be sacrificed as well. You also have a connection to the Thought which degrades (via dice roll) each time you return to your body. So, you're steadily growing weaker and weaker over the course of a campaign...except... ...at current, Qet has a levelling system (Tiers). You develop Skills to reach higher Tiers, higher Tiers let you access better Skills, and allow you to increase your Quality scores. Granted, there are a grand total of 4 Tiers. (Which is why I didn't call them Levels. Feels different.) Needless to say, this feels...weirdly out of touch with this being a horror game. It's something I hadn't mulled over back in 2019 when I started, and never questioned when looking back, until now. So, how can I have players explore and grow their characters mechanically, without undermining the game's tone and tension? Here's the thing— Qet already has other methods of progression that don't create a power fantasy; 1- Alchemy. You can mutate your body with alchemy, adding new body parts and changing those you have-- at risk of things going very, very wrong, and getting stuck with negative mutations. (Like, trying to gain sharp teeth...and instead of growing them in your mouth, growing them in your stomach.) 2- Manipulative Magic. While you become more powerful as you gain access to stronger spells, you have to uh...cannibalize people to gain this power in the first place. This corrupts you steadily as you transform into a qepluezet olxlikliz (blood sick). Which not only has your body begin to betray you as the souls of those you've consumed coalesce and rebel, but it also attracts the Qrol-- a cult who's well-trained members hunt down the blood sick. (And this is a game where getting into a fight is rarely desirable.) 3- Eldritch Magic. Again, you gain access to stronger spells as you progress through this. However, it first requires a certain amount of eldritch Insight, and it requires that you find a source that you can borrow power from. Sources can be from eldritch entities, objects, and even cosmic diseases. Each requires a particular sacrifice for their power, and further beyond this-- each branch of eldritch magic then requires a different risk/reward to actually cast their spells. Some use your health, others give you temporary curses, some give you body horror transformations. I will probably rework Eldritch Magic to instead come from the Thought of Death, just to streamline things a lil. Narratively make it that players are borrowing the memories, skills, and strengths of those who have passed into the Thought for themselves-- at the risk of weakening their consciousness' ability to return to their body. Or something like that. I'll figure it out.

Dromund Kaas.  A Sith fortress; private chambers.  A four-poster bed with red velvet curtains, and a holocomm ping.  The creak of a few syllables unpronounceable by humans, but very distinctly a groan; then an arm reached over, a button pressed, and an “Mm?  Qet, it’s nine…”

“You said you were going to be diurnal this week.”

“Ah.  Damn.”

🔵

Serenity, in orbit over a mid-rim world.  Rumpled sleeping robes; a stretch and yawn.  Meditation, and then the morning routine: underclothes, overclothes, hair plaited, lightsaber clipped onto sash, robe, jewellery.  The Jedi leaves her small room, and smiles at the Trandoshan lying on the floor above the engine bay, basking in the heat radiating through the metal.  “Good morning, Qyzen.”

“Little hunter, is not time for waking.”

A soft chuckle; “Of course.  My apologies, Qy.”  A guttural sort of growl sound, and the padding of footsteps as  he’s left alone to finish waking.

🔵

Coruscant.  A small apartment high up enough to see the sun.  Sanewso smiles, blue hair rumpled, blue face smiling, and knuckles the sleep from his red eyes. Beside him, his husband wakes, and  rolls over to look at him.  “You sing delight,” murmurs Vector.