One thing I’ve always liked in science fiction and fantasy literature is the diversity of languages to be found. Yet in most TTRPGs, there seems to be a deficiency of languages. Yes, there is a short list along with a sub list of languages, but they are mostly racial, species, or alignment tongues. As someone who prefers a good mix of non-human and human-centric style gaming, having Klang the Klingon learn “Lyranian” or “Bleploppian” is next to useless, and doesn’t really represent even the base-line game’s assumption of sentient thinking beings as the predominant races in existence.
This has always made little to no sense to me, as language is not something really complicated to add to a game or implement during gameplay.
In our real-world past, language was not necessarily exclusive to the scholarly realm. There’s plenty of evidence that common folk around the ancient Mediterranean, for instance, where trade was common and written languages were often assumed from foreign countries, knew a few languages other than their own as a matter-of-fact, with the scholarly types being adept in a dozen or more. Even today, in geographical areas like Europe, where there are a lot of languages spoken in a relatively small area, it is common to be adept at two or three languages, with a passing knowledge of several more. A recent girlfriend from Bulgaria speaks English, Turkish, and Romani fluently, and can get by conversationally in Arabic, Spanish, and French, and professes to have never studied a foreign language past what passes for high school over there.
Here is my take on some of the more/most common languages and or dialects a PC might know or run into in my weird science fiction fantasy homebrew game, Veiled Echoes of Future Past in Neverwhere. For this entry, I’m presenting some “basic” languages to use in your games. Each language has a generic and/or a specific name, so it can be easily dropped into any campaign; you may want to rename each, as appropriate, to give it that much more flavor or to make it your own at your table.
For my campaign, I’m allowing characters to start with up to four languages, with more based on their Intelligence bonuses, with the ability to learn more languages upon gaining odd-numbered levels (3rd, 5th, etc). You may want to increase or decrease that according to your preference, or just base their learning new tongues on some in-play criteria.
Do You Speak It?
Common - This remains the baseline language of most cultures. By that, I mean the generic language native to the majority of your game’s species, races, worlds, ect.
Maiusculus Canto - This tongue is an older version of common, perhaps comparable to Old English or Latin, out of use by common folk, but still learned and used to an extent by scholars, nobility, and perhaps the magic users and scholars in your campaign.
Arcana - This is the language of magic, used exclusively by those properly inducted into the secretive guilds and orders who practice the arcane arts. More a language of “science” than of conversation, not unlike what you may hear physicists or chemist rattling off.
Fringer - This is the language(s) of beings and the races from the edges of known space and dimensions, like the native tongue of the Fungi of Yoggoth or the men of Carcosa, or the Vong from the expanded Star Wars lore. These are a collection of highly different and eclectic languages of truly alien sentient beings. Some that are unpronounceable to humans, as the vocalizations are beyond what a human can physically intone. Or use means such as multi-limbs, insectoid clicks, alien reverberations, energy effects, pheramones, ect to be fully spoken. These languages are often referred to as Xeno tongues by the core civilizations in the core worlds. Useful to know for PCs frequenting often raided borderlands, or dealing with the plentiful Xeno types from these remote lands and rim worlds.
Khor-Vasi - Born in the shifting, radioactive reality-shifting dunes of the outlands and forged in the brutal, hyper-industrial foundry-cities, Khor-Vasi is the undisputed lingua franca of the wastes. It is a language of survival, trade, and high science. It uses sharp, guttural phonetics to cut through the howling radioactive winds, while the master architects and cyber-engineers of the spire-cities use its mathematical precision to blueprint impossible monuments and techno-arcane engines. To the untrained ear, it sounds like metallic clicking and grinding stone; to the initiated, it is the purest expression of logic and geometry in the cosmos.
Wildling - This is the tongue of the “Old Folk” from previous long lost aons and prior civilizations. Not unlike the Celtic, Wohl, or Viking languages, it is the language of the remnants of the old tribes still practicing the old ways, and often confined to the wilder corners of the civilized universe. Its written form is runic, and often found carved in megalithic stones, ruins, and cairns.
Bio-Vocalic - This is the savage, overlapping lexicon of the deep southern jungles, where untamed nature and weird, ancient alien science bleed together. The language shifts like quicksilver from tribe to tribe, combining ancestral native dialects with sharp, alien throat-singing that cuts right through the dense swamp-drone. To survive the exotic perils of these lost worlds, outland pioneers must quickly learn to parse its wild, untamed rhythms. A basic understanding can be achieved. A necessary language for explorers of lost worlds and exotic locales.
Trade Language 1through 6 - The languages of traders and merchants, serving a role similar to the tongues of Renaissance Earth, Phoenicia, or Venice. Always useful to know, as almost any civilized lands, dimensions, and worlds the PCs are likely to travel to will have at least a few individuals conversant in this language for the sake of the greatest motivator of all: Wealth!
Ancient/Progenitor - The language of lost civilizations of eons past. Likely found only spoken by obscure cults, lost cities, and with a written form appearing as pictographs or hieroglyphs. Or by members of an ancient and/or progenitor. Another useful tongue for adventurers, at least for those with more scholarly tendencies. Or for adventurers delving into the mysteries of the extreme past and the edges of reality.
UnderWorld Tongue - The mish-mash language of pirates and dark ports of call that serve as melting pots for the thieves and rogues of dozens of cultures and races. Useful to know for adventures of a dubious nature, and the foundation for what is sometimes known as “thieves’ cant”. Below are some common dialects and variants.
The Baseline: Slip-Cant
Slip-Cant is the jagged, neon-bruised slang born in the lawless spaceports, asteroid-taverns, and dark ports of call where the multiverse’s scum congeal. It is a hyper-kinetic, ever-shifting dialect that blends stolen military codes, alien curses, and the frantic hand-signs of void-thieves into a single, cohesive underworld tongue. For any scoundrel or anti-hero embarking on adventures of a highly dubious nature, mastering the Cant is the only way to trade illicit cargo without getting a plasma bolt to the chest.
Sub-Dialect 1: Void-Jargon (The Corsair Tongue)
Smelling of ozone, spilled synthetic ale, and black-market fuel, Void-Jargon is the bastard tongue of the cosmic backwaters. Cooked up by space-corsairs, interdimensional renegades, and multi-species cutthroats, it fuses dozens of dead world languages into a sharp, utilitarian code. It serves as the ultimate deep-space pirate slang—a necessary tool for navigating a galaxy of lawless frontiers and back-alley crew contracts.
Sub-Dialect 2: Low-Chroma (The Street & Slum Shorthand)
Low-Chroma is the gritty, polyglot street-slang whispered in the shadow of rusting star-hulks and lawless orbital slums. It is a masterclass in survivalist shorthand, combining cybernetic data-bursts, ancient maritime slang, and the guttural dialects of the outer rings into a fast-talking dialect for the desperate. If you’re a rogue running with a crew of multi-versal drifters on the neon-lit neon streets, this is the language of the heist and the getaway.
Sub-Dialect 3: Scum-Phonix (The Black-Market Encryption)
Born from the lawless collision of a thousand desperate cultures, Scum-Phonix is the official dialect of the multiverse’s darkest black markets and smuggling rings. It is a beautifully chaotic mess of pirate jargon, data-encryption chatter, and raw street-grit that serves as a hyper-obscured sub-cant across every shady port of call. For mercenaries and smugglers operating on the wrong side of interstellar law, it is the ultimate tool for keeping the authorities completely in the dark.
There you go! I hope these can get you started. The next step is, of course, to actually utilize them in your campaigns, the easiest ways being through treasure maps, tricky employers, and expeditions to faraway places. If you make it more profitable through wealth and xp for your players to be proactive in learning and utilizing the many languages of your campaign setting, they’ll adopt the custom quickly, and give that much more atmosphere and immersion to your game!
Till Next Time. Keep those Dice rolling and the Imagination going!
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