Comment by Karen

Also 'trigger-happy' seems like an odd sort of term to use in a place that (as far as we've seen so far) has no guns... o_o And yet I can't think of a comparable phrase that would work. I guess it comes down to the "Call a smerp a rabbit" kind of thing again?

Reply by Rachel

It could be? But the word trigger dates back to the 1600s or earlier, really. "Trigger-happy" doesn't show up allegedly till the 30s and 40s, but even so...

I mean, crossbows have triggers as well. It isn't impossible for a medieval-esque society like Varænske's to have the word and later develop the idea of "a person who is quick to fire [a crossbow] is happy to use the trigger" and distilling it to that phrase the same as we did.

#in which rachel over-analyzes words

Reply by Karen

I hadn't considered crossbows! Okay, I feel satisfied :) Thank you for your excellent overanalyzation.

Reply by Asterai

Crossbows aside, it is hard to come up with a close equivalent for trigger-happy. Bloodthirsty is a relation, but doesn't conjure the same image of dangerous jumpiness. Uuuuhhhh... quick to kill? Quick to blame? Aggressive is a good fallback, but doesn't flow the same, doesn't sound like casual conversation.

Reply by Rachel

Hm, that's a good point. I'd start leaning toward "bloodlust" types of words, to hit the "eagerly belligerent" feel that trigger-happy has, but bloodlust is also not very good for trying to sound conversational.

Which is where I *personally* think the criticism breaks down. To me anachronistic language isn't inherently suspension-of-disbelief-breaking, so I tend to gloss over the issue of "would they have reason to use this word" and focus more on "did this say what it was supposed to say in a way that was efficient and sounded natural?"

Not everyone is me, though, so I get that for some people it DOES break suspension of disbelief, and that's not like, BAD. ;u;

Reply by szukam spawacza

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Reply by Shazzbaa

There've been a few modern words leaked into the RW-folks' diction (medieval people didn't really get a lot of mileage out of "holy crap" either xD ) -- I have my own explanations, but it's a background thing so I think I'll save them for later. :") MIGHT MAKE A GOOD VOTE INCENTIVE SOME DAY

(As an aside, if world-reasons had prevented me from using "trigger-happy" I would've gone with "overzealous." It loses the specific visual of being quick to fire, but it keeps the feeling of the hunters being way too excited to carry out their duty of murdering aberrants.)