Humor in a fantasy setting
I'm creating a story based on the D&D Forgotten Realms campaign. Considering the main adversary in this case is a balor demon named Bob, an ally of the adventurers is a gold dragon named Joe, etc.
How can I add humor to this story without destroying the action? Can you also add some examples? Also, the characters should have all the abilities and weaknesses of a true D&D character such that I can create a stat block for each of them that can actually make sense.
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You've gotten a good start with the name. Part of humor comes from confounding expectations.
So you have this big snarly demon... named Bob. Maybe the damsel in distress is a guy in drag who was just trying to avoid the draft, and couldn't get out of his lie fast enough. Maybe the hero reveals he's bi, and that he's entirely cool with a male damsel. Maybe the bad guy is four kids operating a suit of armor by remote control. Maybe the hero's mage is Sherlock Holmes.
Go through the D&D tropes and turn them sideways. How much you pile on depends on whether you want it to be merely funny or a rip-roaring parody which still plays by the rules. (Which I would totally read, by the way.)
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I think the paladin and the cleric should be madly in love with each other, and keep trying to convert the other to their religion so they can get married. This gives you a great time to call someone a heretic during lovers quarrels. This can be made funnier if the religions are closely related like Methodist and Lutheran, and the other guys are followers of widely divergent religions like if the barbarian was a druid and the elf was constantly visiting witch doctors and fortune tellers.
I also recommend the web comic "order of the stick" and the book "one quest hold the dragons".
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One easy way to go about portioning humor is picking a comical character (or two) and peppering the story with their wit, ineptitude, craziness, grave pessimism, or whichever other approach that makes them humorous that you like.
In D&D settings that character would traditionally be some kind of bard, a person whose job was to be funny - making all the companions the butt of his humor and annoying them to no end, being a pragmatical coward in face of impossible odds, or opposite, charging bravely on the forefront with a song on his mouth. ("I was trying to bluff!")
While the rest of the team takes the reality of the world in all seriousness, he keeps a healthy distance. Which may get him in trouble or resolve problems in equal proportions. Let's say the dragon introduces himself as Joerniperissimus Nightmare of The Dreaded Gorge and the joker is the one to address him as Joe first.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/9776. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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I'm not suggesting migrating the question, and of course this is several years old. But I've noticed in the RPGs.StackExchange they often discuss balancing humor and action, and that may be another way for anyone finding this question from the future to address it.
Some Q&As there that may be relevant: https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/8002/how-do-i-get-my-pcs-to-not-be-a-bunch-of-murderous-cretins - the Question lists some satires, and also how horrific the game would is if things are taken literally -- sometimes ultra-realism can be darkly humorous.
https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/134590/how-do-i-deal-with-players-who-make-friends-with-goblins?noredirect=1&lq=1 -- I love this question because I'm doing my first D&D this weekend, and my character is a rogue dwarf with a sage background, and I'd totally rather make friends with everything, instead of being a murder-hobo. My friend picked my weapons and battle-stuff because it's so beyond my own worldview. For YOUR writing, this could imply having some characters who are genre-blind, and don't "know" that Combat Is The Goal, or other assumptions most take for granted.
https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/140796/how-can-i-play-a-dumb-and-un-charismatic-character/ - just that question alone is almost as brilliant as "How much mayhem can I wreak as a sentient fish?" (I think from worldbuilding? It was on the Hot Network Qs page). But another great option for humor -- whatever the dominant trait should be, this guy has the opposite. Like Rincewind in the start of the Discworld series -- a wizard, but he couldn't do magic. Have a weak fighter/barbarian (brave, but can barely lift a bag of flour, so has to attack differently.) A clumsy, not quite charismatic Rogue. A Dyslexic wizard, so their spells come our "wrong"? (Since it's a story, not a game, you're not bound by stats limitations!)
I hope you come back and comment with a link to your finished work!
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