Choice of Rebels Part 1 WIP thread

Hey @Ramidel @Havenstone in the LDS religion Joseph Smith didn’t go off of the bible it wasn’t a runoff of the Bible it was the books by themselves translated from the gold plates into English not a runoff of the Bible I’m not trying to be rude but if I come off as that I’m sorry but I just wanted you guys to know what you were talking about If your wondering how I know this I like to be very well informed and I used to be LDS not LDSF you know the polygamists that you see on tv.

Proccess blood?! No one is safe now…

Hey @Generikb, no worries, you weren’t rude. I don’t think either @Ramidel or I meant to imply that the Book of Mormon was a “runoff” of the Bible. It’s a new revelation that builds on an old one – like every other stage of development in the Abrahamic scriptural tradition. (I’d say the same of e.g. Deuteronomy, the Prophets, the New Testament, and the Qur’an.) “Build on” doesn’t mean copy, it just means that the story of the new revelation (in this case, Joseph Smith’s purported gold plates) is framed by and reinterprets the prior revelations. Just take the purpose statement on the title page, and it’s clear that this is intended for people who’ve read the earlier scriptures and know the meaning of Biblical jargon and characters like “the house of Israel,” “Jesus the Christ,” “covenants of the Lord,” “Jew and Gentile,” etc.

I think the main question for me is will we have to gruesomely harrow our victims in order to obtain magically useful or can we learn to maybe process it slightly differently, even if that difference likely means the blood thus obtained is less magically powerful than an equivalent volume of “properly harrowed” blood is.
The answer to this question likely determines what kind of rebellion and more importantly post-rebellion society I could possibly hope to build would look like. If the Hegemony’s way is truly the only one than that would mean that theurgy is a dead end and my character would be limited to using his own blood and repudiating all use of blood magic should the rebellion ultimately triumph, even if that means causing societal collapse.
On the other hand if blood can be repeatedly taken while leaving the subject alive then a society based around a “blood tax” for all citizens would be possible and possibly even desirable.

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@Havenstone Speaking of new revelations, how would it happen, would the MC (claim to) hear voices/have a vision like Muhammad or Joan of Arc or would s/he present a document like Moses or Joseph Smith?

And could the MC meet someone claiming that s/he had a new revelation?

You know I would laugh at anyone who would talk to my grandma about religion like the people on this thread and website discuss it because if they tried she would smack them on the mouth and take a switch to their behinds to put it nicely but I’m more open minded about religion and like how you’ve conducted yourself In your reply mr. @Havenstone

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@Generikb Heh. I wonder what your grandma would say if she ever sat in on a seminary class, since people who study religion are constantly dissecting stuff about the Bible, the Book of Mormon, et cetera as part of their classwork. These are often people who are studying to be priests or ministers within their own denominations, too.

But yeah, since religion has an important role in this game, we’ll be looking at the role of religion in society and discussing it in this thread from time to time.

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Well, folks who’ve been on the forum for a bit may know that I’m an evangelical Christian myself. That skews the way I talk and think about religion; for example, I’m comfortable with the flawed human element in every religion (including my own) and I want to engage seriously with others’ critiques rather than withdrawing behind walls of reverence, authority, and the threat of literal or metaphorical switches to the behind. (:

Choice of Rebels is in part a way for me to explore some common critiques of religion (and specifically Christianity) around social order, injustice, forgiveness, and pacifism. Hopefully in a way that’s more fun than a theology treatise.

WulfyK, I think if I went that route, it would likely be inspired by internal visions (real or feigned) rather than happening upon an ancient text and reinterpreting the canon in light of it (see not only Smith but King Josiah and, in a more recent and scholarly vein, Elaine Pagels).

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Hey @Havenstone can you use other religions unlike Christianity like Buddhism or Hinduism to make the game more interesting in the story it could play out like while you were camping in a cave you discovered paintings or tablets or whatever that depicted the story of a religion that had been cast aside and forgotten by the Karagond

I think that I’ll stick with the paganism-displaced-by-monotheism dynamic of my own ethnic heritage, rather than try to do justice to the meeting of Bible and Upanishads. (In this game, anyway.)

The other religions displaced by Karagon were the Forgotten Gods of Wiendrj, as well as the gods the Nyr abandoned after they so signally failed to defend them from the Theurges. The Abhuman faith will also be important in future games. None of them are much like the religions of South/East Asia in our world, though.

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And the Halassur religion?

I think remember a mention of the divine mother some where. Not sure if that was here or from the religion thread.

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How could I have neglected that? Yes, also significant, and also West Asian-esque.

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I think that having actual visions (I originally used the term “true visions,” but what I mean is “the PC actually seeing this”) dictating a new religion would skew the narrative a bit, since I mean, the PC would not be choosing to reform the religion in that manner. So I think that a genuine new revelation (as opposed to one that the PC created entirely ex rectum) is out of theme for the game you’ve written so far.

I thik if there will be any actual vision, it would be something difficult to achieve, and require a very high believe stat. Also, the content of the revelation might be partially dependant on the previous choices of the MC.

The PC wouldn’t receive the new revelation in a wholly unambiguous form – no importunate angels or mountaintop visions. It would be more a question of whether the PC chose to believe that e.g. a string of good ideas reinforced by coincidences and odd dreams add up to a divine revelation to them, or not. If not, of course, a revelation ex rectum is always a possibility.

Ah, got it. That would make more sense, yes.

I have a question. When the rebellion is over, what then? I understand this will be covered in future games (if there are future games) but will the MC become king/queen or will we have the option of putting someone on the throne or even choosing a different form of government?

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Oh choice of rebel it has been awhile since I last played. I remember fondly how my dreams of viva le revolution began. Oh those were the days…

My mc is a simple Helot who just wants to watch his overlords and everything they stand for burn. Everything besides his goal and his followers are of zero importance.I believe if this was a movie the song Soldiers by Otherwise would play in the background as they fought their battles.

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Welcome back Raz and I don’t know about the song part but okay.

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