Castles

[RPG Post]

Castles

I live near a castle. Not some stucco- facaded and wood structure but an actual stone castle built by hand on a bank of the Little Miami River. Chateau LaRoche is the loving handiwork of one man, built over 50 or so years to 1/5 scale of a castle he saw in France during WWII. When I was growing up I even helped scoop up a few stones from the river to help out.

[end_news_blurb]

Chateau LaRoche

The first thing one notices about Chateau LaRoche, other than there is a freakin castle on the outskirts of a small city in the Mid-Western United States, is that it is, though landscaped, at odds with its surroundings. Canoing down the river one sweeps around a gentle bend and there it is. Or, if you drive to it, one drives down a steep, very steep, twisty road and suddenly it's pops up. It has presence. It is not huge or ornate or positioned amidst hundreds of acres of well tended gardens, and perhaps for those reasons it feels “real” rather than a pretend, summer home for the rich.

Possibly those living in Europe might have a more jaded response to castles. I obviously can't speak for the readers (or dwellers) there but this one was built to inspire wonder. Harry built it for children, hoping the would experience the awe he originally felt upon seeing his first. And, perhaps because I first saw it as a child, it still retains a warm, fuzzy place in my memories. Others who grew up knowing Harry or romanced by the castle became the current care-takers, The Knights of the Golden Trail. They keep the castle open to visitors and run periodic events and, until this year, a haunted castle for Halloween.

Castles in Role-Playing Games

Chateau LaRoche serves as a blue-print for me in gaming. It is dusty, dirty, muddy when it rains or floods and worn. Those are not meant to detract from the wonder, they merely are parts of its being. The hallways are narrow, the rooms small, the staircases steep. It is cramped and dank feeling, with an almost certain feeling that no hearth fire could ever heat it enough. As an outpost or fort, it would serve well its duty of defense but as a home ...which it was to Harry ...it lacks a certain warmth. One can imagine what kind of defensive walls would ring it were it meant to shield a village from attack but Harry never saw the need to put up walls.

Because it has that certain presence, and because in most medieval-styled campaign settings, villagers did not have the Internet, a castle would command attention and respect. Except from those from anarcho-syndicalist communes. Player Characters might be blasé about yet another castle but to the commoners, seeing one, let alone visiting one would be infrequent and memorable. Especially visiting one, probably as a guest of the state, to be locked in the basement until such time as termination was required. Granted some part of the population grew up in the farms and villages surrounding the castle, yet still it would remain omnipresent, iconic and a source of distrust, fear, respect and possibly merriment (for the festivals held within its walls.)

Walking through the grounds and hallways of a real castle can be instructive, possibly a catalyst for new adventures. There is a list of U.S. Castles on-line. If you get time, and have the luck of living near a castle, take a look.

[Justin OOC]

That's really awesome

[Mr Fox]

Wow, I had no idea there were that many castles in America.