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Jung and the Roots of Roleplay
“As it turns out, role-playing was not “invented” by gamers. Not by a long shot. It was invented as a tool used in mental and emotional therapy many years ago . . . thousands of hours of research and study have gone into the uses of role-playing in mental health care.” - Sean Patrick Fannon, from The Fantasy Role-Playing Gamer’s Bible
ARCHETYPAL DESIGNS DIRECT THE PLAY of our lives. They dominate our actions from a place so deep that we give them little thought, even as we manifest their precepts. It is no surprise then that in roleplaying games, the Jungian archetype concept is integral to driving the story, whether we acknowledge it or not. I have heard and seen the word popping up in RPG circles and publications, but often in relation to or substituted for character class. However, I question the industry’s hijacking of the term as it moves away from its traditional use.
It is not so much the broadening of its meaning that is bothersome, and I understand the tendency toward crosslinguistic corner-cutting, but I wonder, when I hear the modern roleplayer speak of character archetype, “do they not mean template, or example?” Because to me, the word is cheapened or compromised when applied to what was always before called class. A character class’s social behavior was always somewhat open-ended, except in the case of paladins and assassins. And what then passed for an archetype was summed up by a character’s alignment.
But it is a small critique, and not one by which I expect to change many minds. The industry has a history of misapplying terms. And I will probably do the same, given enough rope. However, it serves to introduce the approach Mythmaker takes to character behavior, occupation, and class. Because here again, with the word “class” Mythmaker has a different approach. Rather than as an occupation e.g., rogue, wizard, priest, we narrow its use to the designation of social standing.
Characters in Mythmaker are thus described by their social standing, occupation, and archetype. Add to these their background and skill choices, and you have a character that more closely resembles an actual living, breathing, thinking being.
“An archetype is a behavioral pattern, and the reflection of that behavior in a story.” - Jordan Peterson Ph.D.
Think of an archetype as your character’s theme. Here we acknowledge Carl Jung for his contributions to psychology and roleplay. There are a dozen basic personality types to choose from. The twelve types correspond roughly to the various god archetypes of antiquity. And so, we come full circle, honoring a man who pioneered the art of roleplaying.
Reading The Portable JUNG, edited by Joseph Campbell, makes me think that the great psychologist would have been a great GM. Campbell explains, “even before the break with Freud, Jung’s readings in mythology had turned his center of concern from the daylight world of time, space, and personalities to a timeless eviternity of satyrs, nymphs, centaurs, and dragons to be slain.”
In Jung, Campbell seems to describe many of us who still play pretend as adults. He continues, “when he had renounced Freud’s dogma, the whole psychoanalytic community turned against him . . . he was left to wallow in a mercurial sea of fantasies and mythologies, his patients’ dreams and his own . . . in childhood he had enjoyed building-blocks and had gone on to constructing little towns and castles of stones and mud: accordingly, he decided to try going back to that childhood game; and what he presently found was that it was releasing in him streams of fantasy.” I think we can all empathize with that.
The mental images of archetypes are engraved on our genes. Stored in the collective unconscious, they are integral in shaping our personality. However, they are not pre-formed molds for us to fit into, but rather, predispositions of responses to real-world events.
Archetypes can be understood as the underlying structures of the human psyche. The core elements of each archetype are described below, along with historical examples. In Mythmaker, players choose an archetype for their character. The character’s decisions throughout the game should reflect the guidelines of that ideal. A well-played archetype makes a character memorable for everyone at the table.
The Twelve Core Archetypes
Hero, Magician, Outlaw, Explorer, Sage, Innocent, Artist, Ruler, Caregiver, Everyman, Jester, Lover
1. The Hero/Warrior—Ares, Beowulf, Hercules, d’Artagnan, Zenobia, Gawain:
These brave souls are found in all religions and myths. It is often the hero who initiates the journey, leads the party, and sets its goals. They are typically humble, generous, and loving.
2. The Magician—Dionysus, Roger Bacon, Aleister Crowley, Merlin, Medea, Gandalf:
Called wizard, sorceress, mage etc. Historically represented as a wise old man, the magician deals in knowledge, both ancient and new. They are thoughtful, transformative, creative and often unpredictable.
3. The Outlaw/Destroyer—Poseidon, Calamity Jane, Black Bart, all Forty Thieves, Robin Hood, Hervor:
Labeled revolutionary, misfit, criminal, or vagabond, the outlaw may strive to better the world, but through questionable means. Known to be crafty, vengeful, self-sufficient, patient, hard to hold, and generous (with other people’s money).
4. The Explorer—Artemis, Daniel Boone, Marco Polo, Ponce de Leon, Isabella Bird:
These pioneers are often independent, and always in search of a new adventure. The explorer seeks fulfillment through discovery. They are restless between sojourns and many come off as unreliable. Explorers also seek enlightenment and self-discovery as they search out new frontiers.
5. The Sage—Athena, Dumbledore, Yoda, King Solomon, Helena Blavatsky, Rasputin:
Called seer, visionary, ‘old man on the mountain’, or simply Father, they are constantly seeking truth, perfection, and right. They can be a vital link between past and future. Their quest is often geared to benefit others.
6. The Innocent—Demeter, Dorothy of OZ, Forrest Gump, Mary Poppins, Mowgli:
Virginal and virtuous, their strength lies in trust. They are generally positive and happy. The innocent searches for solutions. They are pure, wholesome, often empathetic, open, and honest.
7. The Artist/Creator—Apollo, Pygmalion, Homer, da Vinci, Hildegard of Bingen:
They seek to create, as if to fill some inner need. Full of ideas, the artist, or visionary, loves the new, the unusual, and unique.
8. The Ruler—Zeus, Sargon of Akkad, King Arthur, Churchill, Genghis Kahn, Queen Boudicca:
Known for their strong but attractive personalities, they are preventers of chaos, role models, and natural leaders. Their actions are guided by a concern for the safety, prosperity, and security of others.
9. The Caregiver/Healer—Hera, the Good Samaritan, Mother Theresa, Asclepius, Florence Nightingale:
They think first of other’s needs, even to the detriment of their own. They are a blessing upon humankind, and above reproach.
10. The Everyman/Orphan—Hephaestus, Charlie Brown, Rhett Butler, Jonathan Harker:
They are quiet, simple, and family focused. They seek to belong and to be accepted, though they are often undervalued and rejected. Rather than extravagance, they prefer possessions that serve basic needs.
11. The Clown/Trickster—Hermes, the Joker, Jack of the Beanstalk, Jack Sparrow, Tyrion Lannister:
Sometimes mixing cruelty with comedy, they can be hard to accept. They often seek to eliminate hypocrisy, and to level the playing field between the powerful and the underdog.
12. The Lover—Aphrodite, Don Juan, Romeo and Juliet, Lancelot and Guinevere:
Mature yet youthful, this archetype is not all about romance—they also encapsulate parental love, friendship, family ties, and spiritual communion. They see the journey as more important than the goal.
“What we are to our inward vision, and what man appears to be sub specie aeternitatis [from the perspective of the eternal], can only be expressed by way of myth. Myth is more individual and expresses life more precisely than does science. Science works with concepts of averages which are far too general to do justice to the subjective variety of an individual life.” - C. G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections
Almost as important as an archetype is a character’s social group. These two dynamics comprise our primary background-building tools and roleplaying guides. Just as knowing where you come from points to where you are going, knowing your community opens an eye inward on yourself. Social groups come in many kinds and sizes—a character can be part of more than one.
The character’s social group represents the society they were raised in. It is a concept reliant as much on the era as the location, for instance: Gauls, Huns, Nubians etc. Social groups are important to roleplaying for providing characters with motivation, as well as context and connections to the world around them. You can bet that the GM will find some way to work it in to the story.
Social groups are also treated as skills in the sense of gaining skill levels. We treat social standing in terms of skill level, as in low class vs. high class. A character’s social class is counted in skill levels. Being ‘high-class’ counts as five levels of the social group skill.
Anyway, the next time someone speaks of their character’s class as their archetype, we hope you will remember Carl Jung, and Mythmaker.
Always game for more,
B. Cool
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