Choice of Rebels Part 1 WIP thread

Thanks!

And boy, am I going to have a bugfest for you all to help me sort out when I push the next update…

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Ah yes, the Shayardene Heresy but as far as we know the Karagond version version of the faith may have always been significantly more brutal, even before Hera build the Thaumatarchy on the back of it.
As far as the religious hierachy goes they sure do benefit from the monopoly the Hegemony grants them and the top of the hierarchy likely enjoy decadent lifestyles that would put most provincial nobles to shame.

Considering the Hegemony is virtual theocracy now, in practice, at least in the provinces, this is at least no longer true now, if it ever was we don’t know, but the faiths influence, certainly in the Shayard our characters know, has grown unchecked and needs to be broken.
Since the Karagonds are focused heavily on the centre, I suspect that if what you’re saying about it being a civil law with a state religion is true anywhere in the Hegemony it will be Karagond, perhaps even limited to Aekos itself.

This is true, but a non Hegemony controlled religious hierarchy would most likely be even more dangerous to my character, so it suits him to go along with the pretense here that the Hegemony’s version of the faith of Xthonos is the only one there is as he’d rather use the corruption of the faith to bring it, and its caste-system down, whereas merely reforming the faith would leave its caste system largely intact.
Getting rid of that caste system is the paramount goal of my character, anything else would be a Pyrrhic victory, at best to him.

Do remember what I said, a non-Hegemony controlled, monopolistic religious hierarchy along the lines of the Shayardene Heresy is quite possibly even more dangerous to my character considering he’s a magic loving, gay non-believer who is a part of the Helot caste to boot.

While religion may be a necessary evil of the human condition the least he can do is flood the religious market with choice and make sure anything but skepticism is kept from having too much influence.

Necessarily being the operative word here.
Some sort of caste system is likely to be at the heart of the Shayardene version as well and by this point my character wants to get rid of the caste system entirely, not replace it with a marginally less oppressive version.
In any case, like I’ve said before, that bit of Hegemony fiction and not making that distinction might prove highly useful to character as well since he wants to do away with, or at least severely weaken the faith of Xthonos itself, acknowledging that the Shayardene and other heresies exist and are valid is not going to make that any easier.

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Considering the Hegemony is virtual theocracy now, in practice, at least in the provinces, this is at least no longer true now, if it ever was we don’t know, but the faiths influence, certainly in the Shayard our characters know, has grown unchecked and needs to be broken.[/quote]

I’d argue that the issue isn’t the influence of the faith, but the stranglehold the Thaumaturch has on its legal expression. It is said in the game that “many devout Shayardenes believe that the Karagond Ecclesiasts distorted the original word of the Angels to justify the bloody rule of the Thaumaturch”. Those devout are potential allies if you don’t attack their faith.

The Ecclesiasts are supposed to interpret the Codex, but any Ecclesiast who deviates from the dogma that the Thaumaturch and his 12 archmages are Eclectoi and above reproach is removed. Thus the Ecclesiasts are little more than propaganda puppets dancing on the corrupt Thaumaturch’s string with no real authority over the Alastors who enforce the law. The Alastors nominally serve the Archon, but in truth serve the Thaumaturch and their highest ranking officials are free to ignore or even override an Archon’s orders. The Ecclesiasts who are supposed to interpret the Codex are only allowed to regurgitate the official interpretations and have no control over the Alastors who play the role of enforcers.

[quote=“idonotlikeusernames, post:3951, topic:1601, full:true”][quote=“P_Tigras, post:3948, topic:1601”]
What is an issue is the doctored canon that the Hegemony-controlled religious hierarchy has been pushing on the populace in order to justify its own atrocities. Charges of heresy and corruption are a powerful wedge that can be used to pry the support of the devout away from the hegemony, especially those suspicious of Karagond’s corruptive influence on the faith and/or are troubled by their consciences.
[/quote]

This is true, but a non Hegemony controlled religious hierarchy would most likely be even more dangerous to my character, so it suits him to go along with the pretense here that the Hegemony’s version of the faith of Xthonos is the only one there is as he’d rather use the corruption of the faith to bring it, and its caste-system down, whereas merely reforming the faith would leave its caste system largely intact.[/quote]

Why do you believe that a non Hegemony controlled religious hierarchy would most likely be even more dangerous to your character?

Pre-conquest Shayard had no helots and a much larger yeomanry. Furthermore, the faith of Xthonos originated in Shayard, not Karagond. I’m thus inclined to believe that a Xthonos Reformation could well be anti-caste in doctrine.

Note that the Thaumaturch and his/her 12 archmages have been declared Eclectoi, and all are “magic loving”. So the issue isn’t magic, it’s how the MC having magic is spun, and this may require building a significant amount of religious credibility before revealing the MC’s magical ability. If the MC can make it appear to be a gift from the angels to rid the land of a corrupt ruler, than it’s a sign of Xthonos’s approval, not Xaos’s corruption. Being gay may not be as much of an issue in the original Codex which was written before Karagond’s Thaumaturchs discovered the benefits of mass-murdering helots for their blood and needed a higher birth rate to make up for all the people they were slaughtering. It’s certainly worth researching.

As for being a non-believer, it’s not necessary to be a believer to appreciate the power of religion and use it as a tool. I doubt very much that the Thaumaturch and his 12 archmages are all believers themselves. A possibility that may be more acceptable to you than cynically co-opting the trappings of faith to rebuild your nation for the better is simply to separate church and state, while quietly encouraging the faith of Xthonos to fracture further, as people freely debate and form their own very different opinions on more obscure passages. Some of these will no doubt be more inclusive.

I’ve never heard of a large group of people who were willing to fight and die for a belief in skepticism or atheism. If you don’t believe in some sort of afterlife than risking death in this one once your own life is no longer in immediate danger tends to look really, really stupid. I can readily understand your desire to flood the market with choice however, and that’s certainly likely to be a much more successful sell than trying to make a national religion of skepticism or atheism.

[quote=“idonotlikeusernames, post:3951, topic:1601, full:true”][quote=“P_Tigras, post:3948, topic:1601”]
It doesn’t necessarily go against what the Faith of Xthonos stands for, only what the Hegemony wants everyone to think the Faith of Xthonos stands for. I consider that to be a highly important distinction.
[/quote]

Necessarily being the operative word here.
Some sort of caste system is likely to be at the heart of the Shayardene version as well and by this point my character wants to get rid of the caste system entirely, not replace it with a marginally less oppressive version.[/quote]

@Havenstone can clarify, but as I see it:

  1. The Faith of Xthonos originated in Shayard before Karagond’s conquest.
  2. Shayard had a much larger yeomanry and no helots prior to Karagond’s conquest.
  3. It wasn’t until Thaumatarch Hera succeeded in brewing other people’s blood into Theurgy-fuel via dismemberment that the -need- for a huge, brutally repressed lower class was created.
  4. It wasn’t until the dismemberment of an enlarged lower class became state policy that a way to justify it needed to be found.
  5. Karagond has added newer books to the original codex and is whispered to have made alterations to the older books in order to make them pro-harrowing and pro-hegemony.

I don’t see any convincing evidence that pre-conquest Shayard had a rigid caste system. A caste system may have become deeply rooted since the conquest, but once the MC amasses sufficient authority I fully plan to do a thorough analysis of the scriptures used to justify it both for authenticity and other legitimate interpretations, with an eye to throwing the full force of the reformation against the caste system.

[quote=“idonotlikeusernames, post:3951, topic:1601, full:true”]In any case, like I’ve said before, that bit of Hegemony fiction and not making that distinction might prove highly useful to character as well since he wants to do away with, or at least severely weaken the faith of Xthonos itself, acknowledging that the Shayardene and other heresies exist and are valid is not going to make that any easier.
[/quote]

Actually it could, as it would fracture the faith and prevent it from unifying against you, especially if you offer many of the splinter groups freedom to practice their own interpretation of the faith as long as they do not interfere with the state. And if you fracture it enough, it will be all but impossible for it to ever grab the reigns of temporal power in the foreseeable future. There are several different ways to play it.

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That is certainly what Linos would like us to believe, my mc is having none of it though.
It is probably true if you want to save the faith, and more importantly the Church of Xthonos, as a unified and quite dominant force in society, which is something my MC absolutely does not want to happen.

Of course my character is no more willing to pretend to obey the Shayardene codex and whatever caste system and proscriptions on modesty and sex it espouses than he is with the Karagond version. Like you said, a hard separation of Church and State is about as far as my character is willing to go.
By all accounts old Shayardene society had a much more classical medieval caste system, even if much of the lower castes were technically free family farmers, they were still being lorded over by a hereditary nobility, whereas my character would like to have a system where status, and some amount of privilege are based on merit, not who your parents were.
While reform might be accepted if it means fracturing the faith that would have to mean there would need to be a dozen weaker weaker reformers, a single strong one cannot be tolerated and is a threat to be disposed of asap.
In fact reform would only be accepted if it means fracturing and diluting the faith.

Yeah, that won’t really fly is my character is sick and tired of even pretending to be pious. In any case that bridge has already been crossed and burned since he both calls himself a Goete already and dismisses Linos’ suggestion as a rather funny joke.

Sure, maybe, but my mc is not willing to stake any future (lack of) a fulfilling sex life on a mere maybe.
For all we know the old Shayardene version of the faith regularly held its own inquisitions to root out witches and other deviants. :smiling_imp:

This is true and I have considered it but whether that’s going to be feasible will depend on how many good opportunities will present itself that will fracture the faith, instead of merely reforming or replacing some of its worst doctrines as no religion can be allowed to remain as powerful and unified as the faith of Xthonos is now.
A single Martin Luther is a threat two dozen of them with nearly equal sized groups of followers, that’s different.

This does not matter as much to my character personally, as he does not feel the need to have any “faith’s” sanction, but it sure would be nice for the more faithful homosexual people.
I’m not holding out too much hope on that point though, since most of the splinter groups basing themselves on the old Shayardene codex may also lead to them developing a more medieval, “originalist” interpretation of it and the faith of Xthonos does not seem to me like it ever was a nice, inclusive and tolerant ideology, even in its older Shayardene manifestation.

Not directly maybe but secular nationalism can accomplish it just as well as any faith. I do concede that building a new “imagined community” that would form the basis for it, especially in a larger and multi-cultural republic is going to take a considerable amount of time and effort and probably at least a few generations as well.

I don’t think that my character desires to make anything a national religion, not even skepticism, unless pressured hard on this. The original plan was indeed for the new regime to separate Church and State in a hard separation and treat religious policy as something akin to anti-thrust law. Make sure the market has plenty of choice and no single one of them gets too large or powerful.
How hard getting there will be, or whether its even possible at all will to a large extend depend on whether the current faiths fractures and divides nicely or if a single strong figure and ideology arises to re-unify it.

In either case if my character forms a new regime it will tend to favour skeptics and atheists for its top posts.

Which would make them highly susceptible to rallying around a new strongman if and when the Thaumatarch falls and that does not bode well of their ability to think critically and for themselves, which is sorely needed for them to form their own interpretations of either the Karagond or Shayardene codex and fracture the faith in a way that would be acceptable to my character.

So it would seem that fracturing the faith along acceptable lines would likely require the removal of most of the official Ecclesiasts and leaving the new interpretation mostly up to the people who are now weak and isolated Diakons while hoping that no new “prophet”, “Eclect” strong enough to keep (the larger portion of) the faith together arises.

At least the fact that the current Ecclesiasts are nominally responsible for most the Hegemony’s travesties gives me good cause to dispose of them.

Hmmm, yes if you put it that way that might be better, my original reason was that the brutal Karagond version must remain the “official” version for as long as possible in order to weaken the popularity and support of the faith and, more important right now, to allow my character to loot and burn any church property he gets his hands on. Formally acknowledging any splinter groups, who I must then extend rights and protection to would put a crimp in the Rebellion’s finances and possibly the new regime’s rebuilding efforts.
On the other hand the way you just put it that might be worth the trade off in lost income through loot, provided I can make it happen in-game.

I’ll admit my original flooding the market strategy was based more on direct competitors to the current faith, not splinter groups of it. I do still fear that leaving the new society majority Xthonic would mean the survival of their morality (such as dress, chastity and sexual mores) and the caste system to an unacceptable degree, even if the faith loses most, or all of its temporal power.

That’s a decent analysis but absent @Havenstone clarifying, it does contain a couple of big if’s.

  1. No question about it.
  2. Yes, but I do still wonder if the yeomanry was truly the lowest class in old Shayardene society, even though they were the largest it is still quite possible some slaves, or serfs existed below them. If so, the old Shayardene codex likely supported that practice, though the economic realities back then would have meant it would have been limited and likely in decline. Of course today’s Hegemonic economy and means of production are quite different making those sections suddenly relevant again. Which might mean that combined with the deeply rooted class system that exists now it would be largely worthless, if not outright harmful, to the true fight against the class system.
  3. No comment here.
  4. To be fair brutally oppressed Helotry was already the custom in Karagond proper long before Hera, as Karagond’s Sparta seems to have won the conflict among their city states quite decisively long before that. It’s just that they began killing them at set times and age brackets for blood rather than randomly for sport and entertainment.
  5. All true not that it matters much, as see below:

Originalist interpretation is not something my character is likely to value even if he was amenable to using the faith as a basis for a new state. He’d be more likely to repeat the trick the Hegemony pulled in the first place and base it on his own new books of “revelations of latter-day Angels”.
Much less chance of nasty surprises, such as the possible re-establishment of the witch hunting, gay murdering Shayardene Inquisition that way.

As for the old Shayardene (caste) system it is not likely to have much relevance in the face to current realities anyway Still…

A good indicator of the rigidity of the system in old Shayard would likely be impossible to establish today, as it would require meticulous records of social mobility that wouldn’t have survived the transition to the Hegemony, if they ever even existed at all. A dozen or so old stories of yeoman families having been ennobled or slaves being freed after some sort of heroics isn’t going to cut it to convince my character of the Old Shayardene (caste) system having been anything more than marginally less rigid than the current one of the Hegemony.
The old yeomen may have been freer and happier on average, but did they get more or even any opportunities, again on average, to rise beyond their original farming station based on their talents and abilities? That would be the big historical question for my character and it is not likely to be one that can be answered in enough detail to make pondering it worthwhile.

Given how vastly different the economic realities of today’s Hegemony are compared to old Shayard it is also unlikely that the answer to that question would have anything more than academic value.
The future of farming, for example is more likely to lie with either the co-operative or the collective farm anyway, transitioning back to the old Shayardene model of family farming would likely not be practical in any event. The current noble estate plantation model does need to go though, as having been on the wrong end of one it’s not something my character will tolerate for long post-rebellion.

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A quick clarification, somewhat incidental to the main point of contention: the religion of Xthonos is pro-natalist (for helots) and intensely hostile to premarital sex (for everyone not powerful enough to ignore it). But it’s not otherwise homophobic.

As you may know if you and Breden are chaste lovers in Ch 2, the Xthonic canon includes a version of Aristophanes’ myth – some people are by nature drawn to an “other half” of the same sex, and others to the opposite sex, depending on who their original soul was paired with. The person you eventually marry is (if your mind is orderly enough to recognize them, and not distracted by concupiscence) that lost other half. There are well worked-out rules for adoption and inheritance for same-sex couples.

For helots, of course, this is in strong tension with the economic necessity of breeding on a massive scale. The socio-economic realities have led some Ecclesiasts and Diakons to declare that breeding (and thus, to preserve virtue, opposite-sex marriage) is an intrinsic part of helot nature – an idea frequently trotted out to explain why mullow is banned for helots. A second more helot-friendly category of priest, like Olynna, would strongly condemn the idea that breeding is part of helot telos; it contradicts both the Codex and experience (incidentally, there’s no mention of mullow anywhere in the Codex; it’s as if the plant didn’t exist back then). And the majority would see it as an excessive interpretation, while not outright condemning it.

Ecclesiasts of the first sort would see same-sex helot relationships as actually unnatural – the lower castes imitating something only higher castes are drawn to by nature. Most Ecclesiasts instead accept that some helots are not naturally inclined to breeding; while they tacitly recognize that those helots are more likely to be Harrowed early if they don’t act against their nature, their official position would be that same-sex attracted helots should not breed, but follow their Xthonos-given nature.

Most mainstream Ecclesiasts would however turn a (rather relieved) blind eye to helots who enter marriages of convenience in order to breed while maintaining long-term same-sex partnerships (in some cases quite openly). Helot breeding is a duty to society, and if it’s in tension with other aspects of good order, those other aspects are often tacitly ignored. Only if extramarital relations become too promiscuous is it actually treated as an offense to public order.

So yes,

is definitely at stake, and the lives of gay and lesbian helots appalling in many ways. I just wanted to note before the conversation goes further down this line that words like “inclusive” and “deviants” in the gameworld wouldn’t be applied in the same way as they are by certain religions in our world.

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So for Helots gay rights are basically stuck in don’t ask don’t tell mode in most places, most of the time, with fringes of actual condemnation by the more hard line, Hegemonic Ecclesiasts, like Zebed probably was.

As to that other thing were the Yeoman actually the lowest class in old Shayard or was there something below, and if so what did the old Codex have to say about slavery or its close derivatives such as serfdom?
Or are the answers to that to spoiler y to give at this stage?

Does anyone bother punishing helots for (heterosexual) unchastity in the first place?

Also, does the fact that the Codex idealizes marriage-for-love lead to problems when an aristocratic family needs to arrange a marriage? (Or when an aristocratic teenager announces that they want to marry the helot who grew up as their playmate…) Or are arranged marriages not a Karagond thing?

I’m curious way something like Islamic polygamy is encouraged among the helots. Is monogamous marriage part of the cannon? This would be one of the easiest ways to promote certain helot bloodlines and increase the population from a pragmatic perspective. Plus it is then easier to harrow less useful male helots.

I feel like marriage to one person for life can also lead to xaos or at least a lack of social harmony without divorce being permissible.

Most likely not since it comes with this caveat: [quote=“Havenstone, post:3954, topic:1601”]
(for everyone not powerful enough to ignore it)
[/quote]

Probably meaning the Helots, the Yeomanry, the merchants and the rest of the lower and middle classes and castes.
Most nobles of any significance would thus be largely free to ignore the bits that don’t suit them, a point my character will increasingly enjoy rubbing into the faces of Ecclesiasts, like Linos every time they give him too much backtalk.

It doesn’t seem to be done that way currently, though it might be an option for the PCs’ new Hegemony. Harvest most of the males and the nonproducing females for blood, breed the rest.

Right that’s kinda what I’m getting at. I am surprised the pragmatism that the Karagons have otherwise demonstrated in other areas of their religion isn’t found where it would be most useful to them. Maybe male only polygamy doesn’t exist in their world and never has? Anyway it is certainly the fastest way to high fertility rates.

Yeah. The reason it’s not done may be because they are trying to avoid too much despair for the helots - letting them pretend to live a normal life until their date with the Harrower.

Considering most Helots are chattel slaves and we know from historical evidence that such slavery tends to scar people for life, this is most likely not the case as helots can hardly be said to live “normal” fulfilling lives.
It’s more likely that the sort of male only polygamy @cascat07 is referring either doesn’t exist in the known world, or that it is associated with something they find really revolting, perhaps it’s a central tenet of the Hallasurq religion.

It’s a difference in kind. There’s a reason the Diakons exist, and that reason is to give the helots something to hope for in the afterlife - a widespread we’ll-all-die-anyway mentality isn’t in the Hegemony’s interests. So a degree of normality - like marriage - instead of treating them like pure livestock may be part of the social engineering.

Alternately, the helots generally don’t have too much contact with the aristocracy. Letting helots more-or-less screw as they please may simply be more efficient from the aristocracy’s time standpoint.

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Kind of. You can tell, and you won’t (formally) be punished for it. You’ll just get bumped up the non-productive assets list.

[quote=“idonotlikeusernames, post:3955, topic:1601”]
As to that other thing were the Yeoman actually the lowest class in old Shayard or was there something below[/quote]
There were yeomen living in debt bondage, and there were landless laborers, but there wasn’t a serf class as such.

Now that’s a good question. :slight_smile:

Many nobles do. It’s a bit of a sport.

The Codex idealizes finding your perfect match. It’s generally recognized that parents may be better suited than youths to recognizing that match – and in particular, that youths are more likely to be blinded by concupiscence and miss it. Arranged marriages are the norm, especially among nobles.

(As it happens, my Nepali language lesson this morning touched on exactly this – Nepali culture has both arranged marriage and the idea that everyone has one God-ordained match and that a couple who marry were fated to do so.)

Absolutely. Marriage is between two people. Only barbarians or slaves who can’t control their appetites would think of polygamy as an option.

Karagond religion is not totally pragmatic – whose is? – and they would be inclined to contest the idea that polygamy would bring a fertility boost if it were suggested, as from their perspective most helots who are of age spend their time breeding anyway.

Both are considered entirely fine in the gameworld.

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What if there is a 20 year difference or more between the two people… would the same allowances that are made for same-sex relationships made for those inter-generational relationships?

Why would an allowance be needed (assuming a helot lives to be more than 20 years older than another pubescent helot)?

It’s not like those relationships were even remotely strange before very recently.

Just replied to a few questions, but for reasons the response is now three posts up.

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…Is the Game going to be updated someday?

@COGZealot Well, the author’s still alive and kicking, so I’m sure it’ll happen someday. And it’s probably worth noting that asking for updates is against the forum rules, more specifically the ‘Keep It Tidy’ section.

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