Tabletop roleplaying games like Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) exist in a world unlike our own. It's recognizable enough to be grounded in reality but fantastical enough to serve as escapism. Players become parties of adventurers, traveling from one feudal village to another, solving problems for the local populous. Sometimes these are solvable with cunning and/or diplomacy but most of the time the solution is violence.

And for gameplay's sake, this makes sense. Opposing sides make compelling gameplay (e.g. chess) and death has the highest stakes (e.g. life). But to avoid the grim realities of conflict (and keep everyone coming back for more), the suffering is sandblasted off. Creatures don't die so much as they fade into oblivion when their health points become zero. We're left with the PG-13 simulacrum of bloodshed, a violence-soaked game with the whimsical tone of improv comedy— a game where it is socially acceptable to cheer when the killing is done. D&D is a system that could be used for literally anything, yet the dice always seem to roll damage.

But it doesn't have to be this way.

Legends & Lattes: A Novel of High Fantasy and Low Stakes (L&L) provides a template for a fantasy story without the need for murder. L&L exists in an infringement-free D&D universe but tells a very un-D&D story. It follows Viv, a recently retired Orc warrior looking to escape the adventuring lifestyle and start a coffee shop. She teams up with a party of evil fantasy characters and together they reinvent the modern coffee experience. The violence here isn't just sanitized— it's missing. Heroism and villainy do still exist but the victory conditions are pacifist. For L&L "to kill" and "to win" are no longer the same verb.

And if this is the evolution of fantasy, then I'm 100% on board.

The general public has become a lot less enamored with conflict. And who can blame them? Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan—the world map is a constant reminder that there is no glory in war. Too long have we been fed propaganda of the faceless evil. It's never a bloodless victory. Someone always bleeds. I have read too many revisionist narratives to fully believe the propaganda ever again. It turns out all those "savage barbarians" had loved ones so why should goblins be any different? High fantasy novels clean up the gore but they don't sanitize the body count. Dark Elves with whirling scimitars may feel little guilt for the lives they end. But I sure do.

L&L adopts a new kind of escapism. Instead of slaying baddies, it hangs up the sword and dispenses a new— equally impossible— fantasy. This is specifically tailored wish fulfillment for the hyper-capitalist uncertainty of our modern world. L&L isn't about slaying the dragon. It's about using equal parts found family and gnomish engineering to reinvent the modern coffee shop.

In short, It's the fantasy of capitalism done right.

And that's pretty cool.

Not every text needs to be revolutionary. If I'm going to escape to a new world, it might as well be to one where good things happen to good people, where risks can be taken without worrying about economic disaster-- where you assemble a family. L&L takes the trappings of high fantasy, stirs in the creature comforts of modern life, and delivers a heartwarming snack.