A Review " Language, or Can You Say That in Auld Wormish" by Lee Gold
A second article from Dragon Magazine #1 this delves into possible rulings and thoughts on how to do rulings for language from how much can a 3 intelligence Fighter speak even their own language (they can with limited vocabulary) and alignment language and how much language does a 18 intelligence Elf speak (6 native + 8 acquired). This is a pretty brief bit as it is hard rulings but the interesting bits where.
Languages as Diegetic rewards.
The example they use is a wizard granting the language of were-St. Bernard to a cleric that helped them. This is essentially a useless reward that just gives a roleplay hook to the cleric in the future looking for someone that shares that language.
In addition more interestingly is the giving a mule japanese as a language in a real world setting game. This allowed this mule specifically to speak to its low intelligence owner. An interesting dynamic to add. Does this mean that talking animals count as retainers against a PCs limit? Do all animals? Do no animals even if they can talk to you and are a level 0 retainer in all ways except stat block?
In my own games I have taken to removing alignment languages in my most recent games. Instead I have different factions have their own secret languages (old latin in the church? Secret tongue of the Drune?) knowing these languages is a way to identify yourself as someone who has gained trust of the faction in some way and teaching it to others who have not proven dedication is taboo. Does everything I want out of alignment language. It is a diegetic reward and it helps immerse players in the world while explaining how alignment languages can work.
What has a language?
Ideas that there is a specific tongue for were-St Bernards compared to just speaking dog, wolf, or werebeast.
It goes beyond this though. One PC took "wall" as a language. Does this mean that every object has a language? How likely is an inanimate language to respond or even care enough to be truthful. What motivates a wall?
Is this a real Brandon Sanderson "I am a Stick!" moment? You need to convince this strange and ultimately alien object with a completely alien view of the world to work with you on anything?
In the end Lee Gold rules that anything that has a Command spell for it also has a language. So walls and sticks are out. Plants, Animals, Humans, Monsters, etc all can be communicated with.
Changing Languages
Lee Gold points out a common ruling discrepancy in old school tables here where half of the tables didn't allow changing languages at all and others allowed a character to once per level forget a language in order to learn a new one. May be an interesting dynamic to look at though most tables I have been part of just says "you have to learn the language in setting with extended time and resources spent on that task." I think I like this ruling more then making language such a system tied thing.
Do languages overlap?
If I take horse does that let me talk to centaurs? I speak both common (the human tongue) and horse there must be some overlap between those and what a half man/half horse speaks right? Lee Gold just recommends coming up with % familiarity between them and then rolling that. On a success your dialects of those languages are close enough you can talk. If a fail your urban dialect of common and posh destrier accented tongue is too far away from the woodland rural centaur tongue and you cannot effectively communicate.
Conclusion
This is probably my favorite article from Dragon Magazine #1 and has provided a ton of thinking material for me to look at. It makes me want to rethink of languages in every game I play. Mad wizards giving out niche tongues is a wonderful prize for players to receive.