Pieter Sleijpen wrote:

> I really wonder if it is correct to compare RL medieval society with
> Cerillia. There are just plain simple to many shattering differences
> between the two worlds:

Oh, baby, I SOOO agree with that.... but it's a whole 'nother screed that I
was kinda hoping not to get us bogged down in. (I am, however, going to step
in the next room after writing this and do a little "Happy Gary Dance" to
celebrate the fact that someone brought this up.) :-D

> 1) Clear and accepted polythism.
>
> 2) Priests have obvious spell powers.
>
> 3) Wizardly powers is a fact, not myth!
>
> 4) Bloodlines.
>
> 5) While horrible monsters are only stories for most peasants (in Anuire
> or Brechtur that is, in Khinasi, Vos and Rjurik awnsheighlien and their
> monstrous servants are more common), but many of them are first-hand
> stories, which leads to the fact that they are very tangible. I think
> the average peasant would fear the Gorgon or the Spider much more then
> in RL the average French peasant feared the Germans or the English.

To your list I would add:

6) The presence of very different races including elves, dwarves, goblins,
orogs, giants, and let's not forget halflings who actually come from another
world. (How dramatic a change in the medieval model of the universe would that
be?!?)

7) Dragons--a race that apparently predates humanity and is still around. That
should give the humans and other races a vastly different sense of "context" in
the world.

8) Other monsters. In the RW, probably the most fearsome animal you could
fight would be what? An elephant? A tiger or lion, maybe? On Cerilia (and
all other game worlds) there are much scarier things than that running around.
Can you imagine actually coming face to face with an ankheg? Ankhegs aren't
even the most terrifying creature in Cerilia, but I am pretty sure I'd spend
about six hours screaming if I ran into a bug the size of a horse and watched
it chomp into some farm animals.... A bugbear? Forget about it. I'd flip
right out of my socks. And that is to say nothing of the spectacle of a
zombie, skeleton or any other undead. Which makes me realize....

9) Undead. The presence of undead would totally change my view of the real
world. No doubt about the existence of mystical forces then, eh? Don't
believe in creatures from beyond the grave? Well, just say hello to my little
ghoulish friend here.... AAAaaaa!

Gary
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