White Wolf Language-Butchery (was: Chinese/japanese Pronounciation)

On Sat, 1 Jun 2002 23:49:39 +0200 "Stefan \"1of3\" Koch"
<OneOfThree@...> writes:
> Hi.
> A role-playing friend of mine asked me for the proper pronounciation
> of two
> chinese/japanese words from White Wolf's role-playing game "Kindred
> of the East".
> Unfortunatly I have no idea of these languages.
> The words are
> Kuei-jin: mixture of Chinese and Japanese. "kuei" should be Chinese
> for
> something like "specter" and "jin" is Japanese. Don't ask me why the
> authors mixed that.
> The other is "quincunx" which is Chinese.
> It would be very nice of you to help me.
> Stefan
-

Sorry i can't help you with that, but i can complain about White Wolf's
use of languages too :-) .  I've always been interested in the Middle
Eastern features of their games, like the Assamites from Vampire, and the
Ahl-i-Batin from Mage.  Many of the terms connected to those groups are
Arabic, and since i'm taking Arabic now (i think my final is on friday) i
like trying to check up on them.

Like, in the Assamite clanbook, it says that their Western name is
derived from Assam, a 'European mis-hearing or mispronounciation' of
their founder's name, Haqim.  Now, whether "Haqim" is supposed to
represent /Ha:kim/ or /Haki:m/ or something with a /q/ or who knows what
is one question, but i find it hard that anyone could mistake "Haqim" for
"Assam" - the only thing they share in common is one |a| and an |m|.  So,
i looked through the dictionary, and came up with the idea that the term
"Assamite" could 'actually' be from /as'amm/ "deaf" or /samm/ "poison"
(the first with emphatic /s/, the second with regular).

And when it comes to the Ahl-i-Batin from Mage, i have no idea what that
medial |-i-| could be... maybe someone else here would know, but i just
thought that it would make more sense as /ahl alba:t'in/, "people (of)
the subtle (one)".

And then i have a friend who created his own RPG system, and who has the
habit of using random apostrophes to make names sound 'alien' :-P  I like
to get back at him by pronouncing them as ejectives...


-Stephen (Steg)
 "yaldi hatov veharakh
  al tira' ve'al tifhhad..."
     ~ 'prince of egypt', yokheved's song

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