I'd guess they probably heard most words to carry a conversation during their lifetime. I wonder how long they remember them so they can repeat them. (they can also pay someone to read words out for them so they can repeat them later)
I guess it also depends on how Common or the language works. A language with prefixes (like english) is significantly easier to use than one with a lot of suffixes (like German/Hungarian, where each verb has a different form depending on who's the performer). I'd guess most players use their native language or English when playing.
Also Kenku as a PC is mostly awkward as they "by lore" do not have new ideas.
If you think mimicry means they can string together a collage of words from different sources, then you're missing the point of the challenge.
Kenku cannot produce language. It's not that they cannot make the sounds of language unless they've heard them. It's that they lack the mental ability to use syntax and compose words into sentences.
They do understand language, and know the intent of whole phrases or sentences.
The challenge is to use some phrase you've heard before that best approximates the intent of what you want to say.
I'd say that is an assumption. Nothing says they lack the mental ability to compose words into sentences. They are not stupid, they are just not creative. Sure they cannot make poetry, but they should be able to use the words they heard to form sentences. Realistically you cannot otherwise play a kenku as you as a player don't hear/overhear every single sentence your character have ever heard (walking in the city I doubt the DM will shout many fish seller advertisements), nor can you remember them.
If they use mimicry to actually impersonate someone, that is when they need a check. When Deception is the goal they do not get a free pass on perfectly mimicing sounds or voices.
That is they use the commander's/noble's/king"s/bossman"s earlier command, to send the guards away (with the possible help of a disguise kit, or rather disguise self spell). Or when they want to make fake female help shouts, child crying noises to lure guards away. If you look at the actor feat, which lets anyone to copy a voice they heard, this is a weaker version of that.
The description of the race contradicts. It does say Kenku aren't inventive and are best at following instructions and reproducing ideas through plagiarism. But it also, specifically in "role playing a Kenku" in the same race description, specifically discusses uses metaphorical associations to communicate (a stone tapping hammer sound to signify boredom). They're remixers. They can use audible signifiers and mix them up to communicate, make meaning. Bumblebee is actually a weak but accessible Transformers reference. What you really want as a model is Wreck Gar the Junkion from Transformers the Movie and subsequent season of the original animation. I mean, it's likely the writers of the race weren't as steeped in the psychology of creativity and its interrelationship with language and the aesthetics of remixing/sampling (which has been considered legitimate forms of creativity since techniques proliferated going back to at least Warhold and the earliest Hip Hop, just to drop the accessible beats in that line of thinking) so didn't realize how their text was short circuited, but it seems clear the strictures of the curse in the entry as written and as clarified by JC clearly poses the language games of Kenku as a creative challenge to play with (game, not sufferfest, right?) not something the DM needs to lean hard on policing.
In another thread I was encouraging a Kenku player to play up to the sinister/dreadful cultural associations sometimes ascribed to ravens and their corvids, and make use of the mimicry for max effect. The mimicry abilities of The Predator would be another fun styling in that regard. For anyone wishing to thank me for that recommendation, I can only say, "Anytime..."
I would love to see a Kenku player throw back an NPCs or even another PCs words at them, I'd probably award inspiration.
In the Robert Redford movie "Sneakers" there is a scene where they need to get past an elaborate voice recognition trap. In order to do this, they get a recording of a man saying different words and phrases and edit them all together to make the phrase "Hello, my name is Warner Brandice, verify me." It takes an entire night to gather to words up and edit the tape. The words "Warner Brandice verify me" are all in the intonation of a question so the result fools the computer, but wouldn't be likely to fool a human being.
That's what a player character Kenku sounds like. They have no control over volume, pitch, or intonation, and can only use words they have heard before, or entire phrases made up of words they have heard. It doesn't matter how well they understand languages, they can't create natural sounding speech at all.
I think it would be too complicated to bother with, and I'd expect most DMs to just handwave it, which would remove the entire point of playing a Kenku. You'd have a flightless Aarokokra instead of a Kenku.
If they use mimicry to actually impersonate someone, that is when they need a check. When Deception is the goal they do not get a free pass on perfectly mimicing sounds or voices.
That is they use the commander's/noble's/king"s/bossman"s earlier command, to send the guards away (with the possible help of a disguise kit, or rather disguise self spell). Or when they want to make fake female help shouts, child crying noises to lure guards away. If you look at the actor feat, which lets anyone to copy a voice they heard, this is a weaker version of that.
It isn't 'if' since they can only speak using mimicry. So they are always "mimic(ing) sounds (they) have heard, including voices."
Sure, but they don't always do it to impersonate someone else and fool others. The "if" refers to the impersonate someone part and not the mimicry part.
but it seems clear the strictures of the curse in the entry as written and as clarified by JC clearly poses the language games of Kenku as a creative challenge to play with (game, not sufferfest, right?) not something the DM needs to lean hard on policing.
Right, so I don't think it's sporting to say, "I can say anything I want, since I've probably heard most of the common words of Common." At least cobble together common phrases, sometimes not using the perfect words for what you mean, but a metaphorical approximation.
If you don't want this challenge, I don't know why you would play a kenku. Just play an aarakocra. You can make a crow or raven themed aarakocra.
I think people are missing the point thinking that Intimidation, Persuasion or Deception require spoken language.
They also may be missing the point that, which skill you use is dependent on your intent.
”Give me the key now and I’ll give you 100 gold when I get back” is Persuasion if you intend to do it, Deception if you don’t and Intimidation if it’s just “Give me the key or else”.
If you don’t share a language with someone you can still Persuade, Deceive and Intimidate them…. If you’re mute you can still do it.
As for Kedku that can “speak” simply by hand waving the “I imitate words I’ve heard to speak normally’… what’s the point?
…but then I feel the same way about the whole variant background thing anyway.
I'd guess they probably heard most words to carry a conversation during their lifetime. I wonder how long they remember them so they can repeat them. (they can also pay someone to read words out for them so they can repeat them later)
I guess it also depends on how Common or the language works. A language with prefixes (like english) is significantly easier to use than one with a lot of suffixes (like German/Hungarian, where each verb has a different form depending on who's the performer). I'd guess most players use their native language or English when playing.
Also Kenku as a PC is mostly awkward as they "by lore" do not have new ideas.
If you think mimicry means they can string together a collage of words from different sources, then you're missing the point of the challenge.
Kenku cannot produce language. It's not that they cannot make the sounds of language unless they've heard them. It's that they lack the mental ability to use syntax and compose words into sentences.
They do understand language, and know the intent of whole phrases or sentences.
The challenge is to use some phrase you've heard before that best approximates the intent of what you want to say.
I'd say that is an assumption. Nothing says they lack the mental ability to compose words into sentences. They are not stupid, they are just not creative. Sure they cannot make poetry, but they should be able to use the words they heard to form sentences.
Realistically you cannot otherwise play a kenku as you as a player don't hear/overhear every single sentence your character have ever heard (walking in the city I doubt the DM will shout many fish seller advertisements), nor can you remember them.
Extra source: https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/956670426934947841
This is a great summary:
https://twitter.com/jaa0109/status/956670718485434368
"Kenku talk like Bumblebee in the Transformers films."
They CAN do that. They can put word together. No matter how many times you write the opposite that won't change.
Confirm from JC:
https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/956670426934947841
"A kenku is capable of speech. But that speech is a bizarre mix of syllables, words, and phrases in voices the kenku has heard."
Based on that I'd say they can create words if they have the syllables.
They can say the word water, if they heard vacation and termination. obviously that might happen with different voices or volumes. :D
If they use mimicry to actually impersonate someone, that is when they need a check. When Deception is the goal they do not get a free pass on perfectly mimicing sounds or voices.
That is they use the commander's/noble's/king"s/bossman"s earlier command, to send the guards away (with the possible help of a disguise kit, or rather disguise self spell). Or when they want to make fake female help shouts, child crying noises to lure guards away. If you look at the actor feat, which lets anyone to copy a voice they heard, this is a weaker version of that.
"When mimicking voices, they can only repeat words and phrases they have heard, not create new sentences."
https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/kenku
The description of the race contradicts. It does say Kenku aren't inventive and are best at following instructions and reproducing ideas through plagiarism. But it also, specifically in "role playing a Kenku" in the same race description, specifically discusses uses metaphorical associations to communicate (a stone tapping hammer sound to signify boredom). They're remixers. They can use audible signifiers and mix them up to communicate, make meaning. Bumblebee is actually a weak but accessible Transformers reference. What you really want as a model is Wreck Gar the Junkion from Transformers the Movie and subsequent season of the original animation. I mean, it's likely the writers of the race weren't as steeped in the psychology of creativity and its interrelationship with language and the aesthetics of remixing/sampling (which has been considered legitimate forms of creativity since techniques proliferated going back to at least Warhold and the earliest Hip Hop, just to drop the accessible beats in that line of thinking) so didn't realize how their text was short circuited, but it seems clear the strictures of the curse in the entry as written and as clarified by JC clearly poses the language games of Kenku as a creative challenge to play with (game, not sufferfest, right?) not something the DM needs to lean hard on policing.
In another thread I was encouraging a Kenku player to play up to the sinister/dreadful cultural associations sometimes ascribed to ravens and their corvids, and make use of the mimicry for max effect. The mimicry abilities of The Predator would be another fun styling in that regard. For anyone wishing to thank me for that recommendation, I can only say, "Anytime..."
I would love to see a Kenku player throw back an NPCs or even another PCs words at them, I'd probably award inspiration.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
In the Robert Redford movie "Sneakers" there is a scene where they need to get past an elaborate voice recognition trap. In order to do this, they get a recording of a man saying different words and phrases and edit them all together to make the phrase "Hello, my name is Warner Brandice, verify me." It takes an entire night to gather to words up and edit the tape. The words "Warner Brandice verify me" are all in the intonation of a question so the result fools the computer, but wouldn't be likely to fool a human being.
That's what a player character Kenku sounds like. They have no control over volume, pitch, or intonation, and can only use words they have heard before, or entire phrases made up of words they have heard. It doesn't matter how well they understand languages, they can't create natural sounding speech at all.
I think it would be too complicated to bother with, and I'd expect most DMs to just handwave it, which would remove the entire point of playing a Kenku. You'd have a flightless Aarokokra instead of a Kenku.
<Insert clever signature here>
Sure, but they don't always do it to impersonate someone else and fool others. The "if" refers to the impersonate someone part and not the mimicry part.
Right, so I don't think it's sporting to say, "I can say anything I want, since I've probably heard most of the common words of Common." At least cobble together common phrases, sometimes not using the perfect words for what you mean, but a metaphorical approximation.
If you don't want this challenge, I don't know why you would play a kenku. Just play an aarakocra. You can make a crow or raven themed aarakocra.
I think people are missing the point thinking that Intimidation, Persuasion or Deception require spoken language.
They also may be missing the point that, which skill you use is dependent on your intent.
”Give me the key now and I’ll give you 100 gold when I get back” is Persuasion if you intend to do it, Deception if you don’t and Intimidation if it’s just “Give me the key or else”.
If you don’t share a language with someone you can still Persuade, Deceive and Intimidate them…. If you’re mute you can still do it.
As for Kedku that can “speak” simply by hand waving the “I imitate words I’ve heard to speak normally’… what’s the point?
…but then I feel the same way about the whole variant background thing anyway.
I still don’t understand why anyone who wasn’t interested in role playing the curse would select a Kendu.