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  1. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    Vicente, I think you are playing a much higher level of fantasy that I am. I also think you are significantly underestimating how miraculous daily (yes daily) life was in the middle ages. Every performance of a mass is a miracle. Healing miracles were a commonplace. Saints are all required to have performed miracles, and there are a boatload of saints. The high level of faith of the middle ages was the consequence of the regular and visible supernatural power of the Church.
    I don't think so, I think the problem is you are trying to fit Cerilian rules into Earth rules. In Earth gravity works in some way, no matter if you understand it or not. In Cerilia, the rules of magic say that spellcasters (even L1) can do miracles 24/7 with 100% success rate. That's a rule in Cerilia (and in all DnD), and it will have some effects in how things work for sure (and more: no Saint on Earth comes close to that).

    I think it's going to make a difference having an illness and knowing that money (or faith) can solve it 100% sure and having an illness and not having a clue if it's going to be solved or not. That changes the way you confront your life everyday. Maybe peasants aren't going to see this pretty often, but kings and other rulers?

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    Boosting magic beyond the medieval requires a lot of high level casters walking around. I don't think BR demographics supports that. First and second level spells might be commonly witnessed, but 3rd level spells, are well beyond what common people witness. Regents are somewhere between 5th and 12th levels typically, and that means most of their hierarchy is below that. So I don't know what you think most people are seeing on a common basis.

    As a player who knows the rules, you know what effect the spells have. An in-character description of spells would be more like what regular people experience when they claim to encounter the supernatural. Often no more than a feeling. If you look at the 2nd level clerical spell list, most of these could easily leave you in doubt as to whether something happened. A player knows Aid grants them a +1, but people can't tell they've received a 5% improvement in ability. Most people are unable to recognize the effects of alcohol impairment until they become severe. Given the freedom of fear and the temporary hit points along with the +1 to hit, Aid is going to make someone feel ready for a fight. That's about it.
    There are low level spells that have pretty clear results (healing is the big one here as Andrew says). It's not boosting magic, it's that given the rules that work in Cerilia magic is very efficient, in a total different level than "magic" on Earth.

  2. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by Vicente View Post
    The impact is that magic is common, it's accepted. I don't think it's the same to believe something because of supersticion and believe something because you can see it all the mornings when you wake up.
    This is the core issue here, and I simply don't think that belief based one one kind of evidence beats belief based on evidence. What is important here is not the objective reality that we players accept. Its the degree to which belief was manifest and how it influenced behaviors. Medieval people were so convinced that their supernatural understanding of things was true that it doesn't matter if 1) it was or not, and 2) if you simply gave them additional evidence. When belief is deeply committed (as evidenced in numerous ways, from indulgences, pilgrimages, reliquaries, gifts) you can't get to more deeply committed by proving that something someone thought was real, actually is real.

    In some cases, as Andrew has pointed out, routinization of the miraculous makes it less able top be something of commitment because it becomes something you take for granted as a mechanical part of the world. People worshiped storms because they didn't know what they were. Once you understand meterology, storms go from supernatural to natural and cease to be something worthy of veneration. Its just a powerful thing.

    So if someone is maxed out on belief, more evidence won't make them more convinced and it might reduce their level of belief.

    Also, your assumption about the reliability of magic is not something I would take for granted, both for the reasons I mentioned, because its totally out of character knowledge, and distinguishing between OOC and in-character is an essential part of role playing, but also because the mechanics themselves don't necessarily work that way.

    If disease is a supernatural phenomenon caused by spirits, you don't cast cure disease and get a 100% cure. The disease spirit would have its own spell resistance, saving throws, counter attacks, in short it has defenses. When I cast a spell against another spell, there are nice mechanics for who wins or what happens based on my caster level, the spell level I selected, my intelligence bonus, and whatever other bonuses I can bring to bear all against the other spellcaster's caster level, spell level, INT, and other bonuses.

    Combating disease works the same way. The Disease can have a base DC like a poison (the best way to go if curing the disease is incidental to the story) or the Disease can function as a rival spellcaster who has a few spells mostly which are symptoms and defenses for the disease. This makes combating illness more like a conflict between magic-users of various sorts. Which I prefer if the disease is more central to the story, such a PC illness or because the party traveled to a place to cure an ally.

    DC's can be high. Disease kills people and the results are a normal mortality expectation from a medieval baseline. With spells. Without spells, deaths would be much more common. In the teachings of Hippocrates, the father of medicine from ancient Greece, there were three treatments for medical problems: spells, potions, and surgery. IMC, he was right.

    Quote Originally Posted by myself
    Vicente, I think you are playing a much higher level of fantasy that I am.
    Quote Originally Posted by Vicente View Post
    I don't think so
    On what basis do you make the claim that my fantasy level is as high as yours?

    I think the problem is you are trying to fit Cerilian rules into Earth rules.
    You are on to something, but missing something at the same time. I'll re-phrase the issue. I am attempting to play a low fantasy game, as I think Birthright is written, with a few spectacular exceptions (a very few high level spellcasters). I think my Birthright is authentic to the source material. When I look at the game world as presented, I see that its based to a large degree on certain real world analogs. The Shadow World is very much a Celtic construct, and the whole world has a lot of Celtic stuff here and there. Celtic names, descriptions, and situations are all over the place. 2e had a source book for Celts. Rifts and GURPS have a source book for Celts as well as books on Celtic derived fantasy stuff like King Arthur. While we're at it, I think Birthright is heavily Arthurian too.

    So as I try and understand Cerilia, I don't go to the vanilla D&D first. I go to the foundational material that Baker et al went to. Then I use D&D to mechanize it (instead of GURPS or Rifts or Rolemaster).

    I don't want real work Earth conditions to have a controlling impact on Birthright. Just the other day in another thread I warned not to go too far in making one specific Earth culture the basis of any Cerilian one.
    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    There is no country with Anuire's situation or history. The best you can do is draw analogies to elements of Anuire.
    Rather, if and when Cerilia can benefit from going back to the source material of the real world Celts, Vikings, Romans, Venetians, Normans, Greeks, &c, &c, the I will do that because the source material is richer than the derivative material.

    Second, and here's where your formula was entirely mistaken, I reject the idea that just because its true on Earth or is part of an Earth culture associated with a BR culture, that it must be true in Cerilia too. The correspondence is about looking at the Rjurik, for example, and fleshing them out using Celts, Vikings, and Anglo-Saxons. Not by looing at the Vikings, for example, and deciding the Rjurik must have a trait because the Vikings did.

    Birthright was a step away from the high fantasy of the standard AD&D game. Hence certain limitations on magic, both in terms of the levels of official characters, and in terms of rules limiting who could be an arcanist. In other ways it remained a genuine fantasy setting with some circumstances where great magics were still possible. Using literary (Arthur, Lord of the Rings) and historical (like you need examples) sources is a way to flesh out the setting. Its not a way to turn Birthright into something else.

    In Earth gravity works in some way, no matter if you understand it or not. In Cerilia, the rules of magic say that spellcasters (even L1) can do miracles 24/7 with 100% success rate. That's a rule in Cerilia (and in all DnD), and it will have some effects in how things work for sure (and more: no Saint on Earth comes close to that).
    So I hope its clear that I reject this, because Cerilian magic isn't 100%, isn't so reliable that spells are simply advanced technology in fantasy clothing. One of the elements I think fantasy should never lose (and in this regard I would offer an alternative understanding of high fantasy) is that fantasy is full of wonder. The magic is mysterious. Knowing the game rules is an obstacle to that, because OOC knowledge tends to creep into IC. But mechanical, clockwork reliability to magic undermines it too.

    I think it's going to make a difference having an illness and knowing that money (or faith) can solve it 100% sure and having an illness and not having a clue if it's going to be solved or not.
    You are right. Money = healing is modern medicine. Or tomorrow's medicine. Its not magical, its not fantastic, its not wonderful. There are rules in the brown books for doing things differently, and mechanics that can be applied in similar, but new ways to make magic into something magical, fantastic, and wonderful again. Basically by using the magic vs magic rules and other rules for encountering the supernatural, like in Heroes of Horror.

    There are low level spells that have pretty clear results (healing is the big one here as Andrew says). It's not boosting magic, it's that given the rules that work in Cerilia magic is very efficient, in a total different level than "magic" on Earth.
    Many people are still pretty convinced by magic on earth. But even more, efficient magic isn't magic, its technology.

    Hat tip to Ryan Caveney.

  3. #13
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    Part of the difference being discussed here is a debate between what I like to refer to as anecdotal history and objective history--and how they apply to gaming.

    Anecdotal history is the history told by the people themselves. It's full of the frailties of people and their perspectives. It includes everything from racism to idealism, religious ecstasy to the underpinnings of science and technology. It's includes the rationalizations of people too mired in their subjective truth (as most of us are) to get a glimpse of the reality of their circumstances anything more than obliquely. It includes political, social and personal self-interest. It includes their beliefs and understanding of reality. It includes everything from the foibles of kings to the lies of their mistresses.

    Objective history is the attempt by historians to apply some sort of rational analysis to the past. It includes, but isn't limited to, all hard and soft sciences. It includes modern thinking and methods. It sifts through all the information available to come up with some sort of amalgamation of past events to develop a meaningful history. Of course, that's a loaded concept because historians exist within the framework of their own anecdotal process, and have their own contextual bias. But there`s really nothing to be done about the Heisenberg`s uncertainty other than to recognize its existence and look to include the variation into the history developed.

    So, what we have here to some extent is a debate between what we recognize as the anecdotal history and an objective view of history. Most people in the Middle Ages believed in magic, considered miracles to be relatively commonplace and behaved as if these things were true. We live in a much more objective time how objective is up for debate, of course) and we view that anecdotal history with more than a little suspicion - sometimes even disdain. However, it`s important when viewing the RL Middle Ages and trying to model that period, or use it as the basis of a thematic recreation (gaming) that things like magic, divine rights of kings, the presence of mystical creatures, etc. were largely accepted. A peasant of the 1100`s would probably not behave demonstrably differently towards his local priest than would one in BR, because even if the BR priest can actually perform miracles - and the BR peasant has actually witnessed them - the RL peasant believes that his priest can do the same, and he might very well have witnessed things that he can only explain as miracles.

    For example, one fairly common method of determining if a person was lying in the Middle Ages was to have a priest sanctify a lump of bread and then give it to the proposed liar. If he was able to swallow it without choking, then he was telling the truth; if he choked on the bread, then he was lying. From a modern perspective this makes about as much sense as drowning witches, but the interesting thing is that it seems to have worked fairly well. As an objective history, the reasons that it worked are that the people believed it would, so it had a kind of placebo affect on the situation. A liar's faith and awe at the process would affect him psychologically (he'd be nervous and have a dry mouth) which would cause him to fail. An honest person would be relaxed, confident in the truth of his cause (giving him a nice, moist mouth) and he`d be able to swallow the bread more easily. Keep in mind also that priests were often the most educated and intelligent people of the time. A priest is more likely to have had some sort of knowledge of the participants, he might be able to "read" them personally to determine who was lying or telling the truth. As the person in charge of the bread he could control its size, dryness and administration. So the priest himself might play a very active role as a judge in the process.

    The point, however, is that from a gaming POV the process that I have objectively described above has very little difference from the social mechanics of spellcasting. A priest performs a ritual in a (probably) unknown language; he evokes a spirit or spirits, he uses mystical tools and then empowers a mundane reagent into a magical object that can perform a specific function. That`s spellcasting in gaming terms, even if we objectively know it was not.

    In that context, we have to remember that BR is based on an anecdotal history, not an objective one. The premise of campaign worlds are an anecdotal history expressed as an objective one. There really are miracles, not just the belief in them. There really are monsters, not just the fear of them. There really are gods, not just the worship of them, etc. In gaming we take an extended view of the anecdotal history and press it right through the objective truth to create an alternate reality.

    When looking at the differences between BR and the RL Middle Ages then, one must consider the affects of anecdotal history expressed as objective reality, and in doing so remember not only the differences created by such an idea, but also that we, as objectivists, are going to try to apply our own historical context to the process, because that`s simply what people do. It`s hard to ignore our own context, even when we are purposefully setting it aside. It`s even harder in BR because many of the races and situations of the setting are more closely linked to our real world history compared to, say, a setting like Eberron. We know the end result and see the process being transformed through our application of objective history, and it's tempting (irresistible in many ways) not to continue that process into a reading of the setting materials.

    There`s another conflict between anecdotal and objective history in the context of gaming: we know that miracles didn't actually happen in the Middle Ages. (At least, most of us don't give a lot of credence to that.) The elephant in the room is that in a game world a suitably powerful wizard could actually get an elephant in the room without too much difficulty. The medieval liar described above might be able to overcome his urge to gag simply because he`s just that good a liar, or the honest person might be called a liar simply because he had a salty breakfast that morning. There's a big difference between the belief that evil beings steal babies and the reality of BR elves actually kidnapping children.

    Furthermore, the simple truth is that most of us don't really want to play in a gaming environment that is all that faithful to the anecdotal history in many objective ways. Do we really want to spend a lot of gaming hours dealing with the misogyny of the Middle Ages? Do any of us really want to deal with the brutalities of family dynamics as expressed in the anecdotal history? Does anybody care to deal with the dentistry of the period? Personally, I'll save that for a textbook and play in a setting where everyone has all their teeth in defiance of the reality of the situation. I want a gaming world where the PCs' hair is relatively free of lice, their mothers unbeaten by their fathers as a matter of course, and the nobles don't necessarily marry their daughters off to very old men for political reasons - unless it`s as an adventure hook.

    Gary
    Last edited by Thelandrin; 07-05-2009 at 11:39 PM. Reason: Expanded vertical length.

  4. #14
    Senior Member The Swordgaunt's Avatar
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    I get the impression that the core of this discussion is 'to what degree should art imitate life.' The arguments presented are all good, IMO, and I see one issue as the dividing one here: playing styles.

    In my portifolio I have a bachellor in history. My interest in that topic stems from my interest in roleplaying. When I GM I tend to use mechanisms from our world to explain why and how. Why? Beacause it gives me a framework. If I need to narrate an encounter in the outskirts of a major trade-port, I have plenty of source-materiel in my head, or in my bookshelf. I believe that both Andrew and Ken use similar sources, and although I am sure that though our styles may match, our worlds are different.

    From what I read, Vicente's style differs in a few ways. Most importantly, there is the Adventurer-argument. Take the example of the seafarers. My question here is, what happens when the Monster of the Deep attacks a ship? The answer is that unless there happens to be a hero or three aboard, the odds are good that the ship will be lost with all hands. Now apply playing-style to this scenario. How common are heroes? How common is magic? If things were black or white the captain would either have hired a party of adventurers, or the tale of the Slaying of the Monster of the Deep would enter the collective mythos of the culture. Most of us, I would assume, are somewhere in between.

    Now let's look at another item of contention, religion. The other day I watched a documentary about a bunch of people in the States who bring their Polaroid cameras into the desert of Arizona to take pictures of the sun. They firmly believe that in these pictures they can see the Holy Virgin, Jesus, and other biblical figures. In the past, this kind of conviction were common. People, ordinary people, could embark on an epic journey to a place of miracle to be healed. Why, some true pilgrims still exist. Just look at Santiago de Compostela. The same essential question applies here. How common are heroes? Does every hamlet have a healer, or are they few and far between?

    On the relationship between temples, we can look to the different faiths of our world for inspiration. Islam recognizes Jesus as a prophet, but the favour is not returned. Blood has been shed between Eastern- and Western Christianity, not to mention between Protestants and papists. Hell, we've even had several popes at once, and no love lost between them. Just because there is no doubt about the existence of other gods and faiths, they do not have to agree. Quite the oposite.

    When it comes to elves and beasties, the exact same question has to be asked. And the answer comes down to playing-styles. Simple as that. How much of life do we want in our art? My guiding principle is 'suspension of disbelief', and I am fully aware that this varies from player to player. As an add-on to this, I've added 'if everyone is special, no one is'. This is why Birthright is my favoued fantasy setting. It is low-fantasy, so both my principles are met. This allows me freedom to tell the story, as I see it.

    One last thing on using RL-references in fantasy storytelling. There is, as far as I know, not a single game or work of fiction in the genre that doesn't use those. Swords are one example, Tolkien's massive use of historical, linguistical, cultural and anecdotal references is another. It all comes down to preferences and style.
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  5. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    Polytheism has a big impact - but consider roman times which are fairly recent and where you have polytheism mixing with temples of the one god. That means that the BR churches will have some differences to late medieval times, but not as many as some people think - for example, how many chapels in RL are there dedicated to Mary? How many prayers to Jesus / archangels / saints? These are different gods in all but name which gives a very easy way to see how churches of Haelyn (king of the gods) will relate to Avani (his vizier), Cuiraecen (his champion), etc, etc...
    Churches are the house of God, and then they can be dedicated to some Saint, Virgin or whatever, but they are for God in the end. Temples of Nesirie aren't for Haelyn at all. Saints, angels,... are powerful beings but no one would compare them to God.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    Also priest v priest competition is very different to priest v mage - in one you have two people each saying that their god is best. In the second case the wizard is laughing and saying that gods are unnecessary and power comes to any who take it - priests will struggle against each other, but immediately band together to smash mages as a mage is living proof that the priests miracles are mere magic and thus unworthy of worship, they thus undermine the faith, while a rival cleric just twists doctrine...
    I don't think this makes sense in Birthright: true mages can cast spells because they have the blood of the old gods, they can't hardly say gods are unnecesary. Elves may recieve this treatment (among many other reasons), but I don't see that arrogant human mage archetype you are saying pretty common in Cerilia (maybe some are like that, but mages aren't so idiot in general).

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    So I'm struggling to see magic as common, your peasant goes to the town temple with a farming injury, their father pleads that they are worthy, have paid their tithe, etc, etc, the priests accept the petition and call upon sacred Nesirie for a miracle - and it will all be bound with ritual and pomp and be anything but common - as stated, churches want mystery, they want pageantry, they do not want to be trader joe's who are treated as nothing more than craftsmen, their aim is to gather worship and faith, and that needs to be seen as divine in the RL sense.

    As a result the most common spellcasters will be restricting their casting - once or twice in a peasants lifetime they might be healed, perhaps more often for women, that sort of visible magic won't be a daily/weekly event. Accordingly while it will be known that the gods grant power to their servants - just like in RL - 'magic' is otherwise no different from the peasant's perspective in BR or RL.
    This point of the argument is the one I find more strange: why priests would behave as you say? They want people following them, they want people praying their gods, and casting as much as possible is the best way to get that by a far margin. Casting every sun eclipse is going to make the guy who casts all the mornings popular very quickly.

    Also remember that Birthright has two things without an equivalent in real life: the first one is alignment. Priests can't do whatever they want: priests able to cast spells from a good god can't have a happy face in front of you and be a terrible evil person on the inside, that doesn't work in Cerilia.

    The second one is that the current gods used to be humans (that they are the second wave of gods is pretty strange by itself). I suppose in my games that's common knowledge in Birthright, but I get the feeling no one knows that in your world...

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    If you have 1-3% of priests casting spells, and maybe 1/2% to 1% magicians in the ranks as well, you still get 96%+ of the clergy unable to cast spells, so the vast majority of the church has exactly the same issues as RL churches. The chrch has boosts from its 'living saints' / miracle workers, but that is no different to having a firebrand preacher who can exorcise demons, lay on hands, induce rapture, etc - all of which the RL churches have had for a long time.
    That's something real life churches did, but that's something strange for a Birthright church to do: if you were the leader of a church, why would you risk your reputation sending someone to do a work that you know he can't do for sure? Why not sending the one who can do it? This would be like a regent sending a lieutenant to handle a problem that you know in advance he can't manage: a mess.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    I'm a king, four generations ago my great great grandfather sent a missive that was ignored, now I finally get a response from the elves, they obviously name their children after their fathers... Humans who live 3-4 decades, 5-6 if noble and lucky, and who have little in the way of reliable histories are not going to assume that the elf spoken to in legend is the same elf they are speaking with, much less accept a clear stripling saying that they are centuries old. It is, afterall, very hard to prove that you are immortal.

    You might get a handful of cases where diplomacy is common where the aged retainer wonderingly says that 'the prince hasn't aged in all my years', but that is countered by many social factors, not least of which is face recognition for different races - all elves/dwarves look the same to someone who has seen only Anuirean faces their whole life...
    There's an elf with a realm in all the maps who by the way, fought in Deismaar. Again, that's common knowledge in my games. Given that, there's quite a strong evidence that elves are long lived. People who border elven or dwarf realms and have to interact with them (even if it's not much) may have extra clues to believe that, specially regents (that I see as pretty well informed in general).

    And that's not entering in other stranger reasons like having elven prisioners who don't age or something along those lines.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    My point is, that people don't want to believe that elves are immortal - they may not accept that they are non-human at all. They may well take the view that goblins/dwarves are cursed with ugliness, elves cursed with frailty, etc, but that they are all still human - why you can even breed with them if desperate enough...
    Again, I see that as trying to fit an Earth explanation into Birthright. There was people on earth that would be called dwarf because their size (and that size could be explained as you like the most: genetics, curses, whatever), but there was not a whole kingdom of dwarves in the Earth.

    Goblins, orogs, dwarves, elves,... why you are going to think they are cursed humans when they are so "common"? I don't think that makes sense either. And what dwarves think about orogs? Do they think humans are tall dwarves? And elves are tall skiny humans that are really dwarves?)

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    How many times to people meet el-stony in your game? I'd expect in most his rivings every few generations are about it - you don't bump into him in the market. And as far as 99.9% of the population is concerned they can no more protect against a regent than they can a god - a peasant has their mates, a stout staff, maybe a scythe, hammer, knife, etc - they can't hold their own against any noble, and frankly most nobles would be well aware that they can't challenge any of the realm rulers as well. I'd note that the awe/terror felt by people when going to meet the pope, president, popstar, etc, etc can be very real indeed.
    No one has met him ever (honestly, I think he has no place in the setting, a really powerful, highly intelligent guy who doesn't get what he wants even if nothing can stop him).

    I agree that you can feel terror or awe meeting a really important person, but meeting Satan or God would be in a total different level than meeting any human in the Earth. The same happens with the Gorgon, but the Gorgon is closer than God and Satan, he has a realm, troops, he killed the last emperor, he is the brother of a god, he fought in the battle that defined the world,...

    In the end, if you are a peasant, you know swords and arrows kill nobles as well as they kill you, but the Gorgon is a whole different matter.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    Hmm, I thought it started because you were concerned that we were assuming commonalities with the medieval world which were unsustainable given game mechanic changes.

    The major changes that I see are going to come from clerical healing, plant growth, and character levels. The first two have ready RL analogues that we can use in extrapolation, the latter is harder, but should not be overstated - ultra high level characters are very rare, over L9-12 is almost unheard of in human lands, so you will get social mobility and legendary heroes in most realms, but not army-killing engines of destruction. That's deliberate setting design of course, the domain system breaks down if no-one bothers hiring armies to make war...
    This started (I think) about how adventurer parties would be formed and how adventures would find them. I proposed two things that Kenneth said that wouldn't be common or make much sense in our middle ages and I said that Cerilia and the Earth have enough differences to allow those things to be acommodated in the game without breaking the feeling. I agree that drawing paralellisms to our middle ages makes playing easier, but I can't agree saying something it's highly improbable because it just was in the Earth.

  6. #16
    Ehrshegh of Spelling Thelandrin's Avatar
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    I think it's entirely possible to be "the serpent underneath", if you'll forgive the Shakespearian quote. There is an LE priest of Haelyn after all, so the strict 3E alignment requirements (obviously) weren't taken into account.

    Ius Hibernicum, in nomine juris. Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.

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    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    This is the core issue here, and I simply don't think that belief based one one kind of evidence beats belief based on evidence. What is important here is not the objective reality that we players accept. Its the degree to which belief was manifest and how it influenced behaviors. Medieval people were so convinced that their supernatural understanding of things was true that it doesn't matter if 1) it was or not, and 2) if you simply gave them additional evidence. When belief is deeply committed (as evidenced in numerous ways, from indulgences, pilgrimages, reliquaries, gifts) you can't get to more deeply committed by proving that something someone thought was real, actually is real.
    I do think it beats it. We have a peasant, and he has a wife and a son. They are the most importants things in his life. But first his wife gets ill. In Birthright he lives close to a cleric able to cast a prayer (CLW) that saves her. In Earth middle ages the same happens and she may or not live. Let's say she dies. And then the same happens with my son.

    I fail to see that the peasant would behave and think the same in Birthright and in Earth. Also, take into account that the gods in Birthright are a whole different thing than God, specially in alignment (I don't think personally God as stated is LG/NG/CG).

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    People worshiped storms because they didn't know what they were. Once you understand meterology, storms go from supernatural to natural and cease to be something worthy of veneration. Its just a powerful thing.
    Yes, but gods are never going to be explained. And even if they are, the nice thing is that in Birthright they are 100% real, so there's a really solid reason to believe in them.

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    So if someone is maxed out on belief, more evidence won't make them more convinced and it might reduce their level of belief.
    I don't think people in middle ages was maxed out on belief at all. But it was pretty dangerous to say you weren't and it didn't hurt at all to say you were. And I fail to see how you are going to have a problem believing in something that exists for sure (you wouldn't even use "belief" then).

    You know gods exists, you know heaven exists, you can see their work in the Earth commonly, you know that when you die you are going to go for the whole eternity to a good place or to a bad place. It's pretty easy to believe with all those facts (and a far more natural process).

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    On what basis do you make the claim that my fantasy level is as high as yours?
    I do say it in the basis that I think you are putting my fantasy level much higher than it is.

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    Birthright was a step away from the high fantasy of the standard AD&D game. Hence certain limitations on magic, both in terms of the levels of official characters, and in terms of rules limiting who could be an arcanist. In other ways it remained a genuine fantasy setting with some circumstances where great magics were still possible. Using literary (Arthur, Lord of the Rings) and historical (like you need examples) sources is a way to flesh out the setting. Its not a way to turn Birthright into something else.
    Yes, magic, non-humans,... are not as common as in Forgotten Realms, but they are a lot more common than they were in the Earth. I don't see how I'm turning Birthright into something else by saying that magic works as it's supposed to do and that given that magic exists people will behave different in some situations than in the Earth.

    I personally think that the half-step that Birthright takes to try to move away from high fantasy makes it totally broken in the beliavility department, but that's for another thread (Gorgon or Rhuobe not conquering/killing anything in 10000 miles around them doesn't make any sense). Birthright would be much better served if those high-level anomalies didn't exist, because they exist only to challenge characters and not because they make any sense inside the setting as presented.

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    So I hope its clear that I reject this, because Cerilian magic isn't 100%, isn't so reliable that spells are simply advanced technology in fantasy clothing. One of the elements I think fantasy should never lose (and in this regard I would offer an alternative understanding of high fantasy) is that fantasy is full of wonder. The magic is mysterious. Knowing the game rules is an obstacle to that, because OOC knowledge tends to creep into IC. But mechanical, clockwork reliability to magic undermines it too.
    Gravity is 100% reliable: everytime I throw a stone up, it comes down. Magic has the same type of reliabiliy because the laws of magic in Cerilia are stated the way they are. And even with 100% reliability it continues to be full of wonder, I don't think those two things are exclusive.

    Quote Originally Posted by kgauck View Post
    Many people are still pretty convinced by magic on earth. But even more, efficient magic isn't magic, its technology.
    The problem is that magic as defined in Dungeons and Dragons is efficient. You may don't like it, but it is efficient in DnD so it is in Birthright. Birthright only made it less common. But a CLW works the same in Faerun or Cerilia or Absalom.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Thelandrin View Post
    I think it's entirely possible to be "the serpent underneath", if you'll forgive the Shakespearian quote. There is an LE priest of Haelyn after all, so the strict 3E alignment requirements (obviously) weren't taken into account.
    Good catch: reading the Book of Priestcraft I see that priests are limited by alignment but not limited to their god alignment only. So the "alignment restriction" continues existing (although not as strong as I stated it).

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    Hmm, the trouble here, is that the more I follow the discussion, the more I think that Br will be more like RL for the most part.

    * Priests really can cure people = people more likely to believe

    * Wizards really can cast spells - and ones equal in power to the priests, they gain their power from demons (Azrai/elves) = priests really don't like wizards and consider them at best as rivals.

    * Nobles really have divine power = peasants really revere them as 'betters'

    * People who have milky skin & white hair, black skin & curly hair, brown skinned / yellow skinned, etc, etc are different, follow strange customs, worship foreign gods and are thus evil and dangerous = people who have green skin / scales / short / tall etc are different, follow strange customs, etc, etc

    Basically you get flavour changes, a few social differences, but otherwise just more of the same.

    Frankly rather than 'peasants are different, open minded, tolerant, socially mobile' I get 'peasants stick to their own, shun strangers, live out their parent's lives' etc.


    The Gorgon, Rhoubhe, etc can be issues - but only get more so as fantasy increases. My Rhoubhe could cut a bloody swathe from court to court yes, but he'd better not attack an army or risk a fe lucky hits, being court in a net, etc, etc - and even if successful returning home to a burnt desert sown with salt with only the scaffolds from which his followers hung as trees...

    The Gorgon has his own court, knightly orders (the last true Andu), problems with the shadow World, struggles against the gods themselves, etc, etc - he has no interest in fighting for the throne of Anuire, he wants Belinik licking his boots and Haelyn kneeling before him apologising for his folly in not supporting him to become first emperor...


    As for my gods, everyone knows that Haelyn, etc ascended - they were a) in charge, b) where the glowing crater is now and c) vanished without a trace when the mushroom cloud appeared (so did many thousands of others, but they were mostly peasants so don't count) ergo clearly they ascended to heaven. What I don't do is have actual gods in play - the closest things are the Gorgon, the Serpent, and the Spider. The Raven, Magian and White Witch have realised that they need tens of thousands of mortal worshipers but are way behind... Partly that's because I want scheming conniving priests, and partly because I used to feel weird roleplaying a god.

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    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    Hmm, the trouble here, is that the more I follow the discussion, the more I think that Br will be more like RL for the most part.

    * Priests really can cure people = people more likely to believe
    Believing or not is not an option in Birthright, that's the point. I continue thinking that changes at least a little how people behave and more important, how the Church behaves, because in the Earth for example it can have people not believing in its high ranks, something just impossible in Birthright.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    * Wizards really can cast spells - and ones equal in power to the priests, they gain their power from demons (Azrai/elves) = priests really don't like wizards and consider them at best as rivals.

    * Nobles really have divine power = peasants really revere them as 'betters'

    * People who have milky skin & white hair, black skin & curly hair, brown skinned / yellow skinned, etc, etc are different, follow strange customs, worship foreign gods and are thus evil and dangerous = people who have green skin / scales / short / tall etc are different, follow strange customs, etc, etc

    Basically you get flavour changes, a few social differences, but otherwise just more of the same.

    Frankly rather than 'peasants are different, open minded, tolerant, socially mobile' I get 'peasants stick to their own, shun strangers, live out their parent's lives' etc.
    Again, it's going to be different enough to admit differences here and there without breaking the overall feeling. I think I never said it was going to be a total alien world.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    The Gorgon, Rhoubhe, etc can be issues - but only get more so as fantasy increases. My Rhoubhe could cut a bloody swathe from court to court yes, but he'd better not attack an army or risk a fe lucky hits, being court in a net, etc, etc - and even if successful returning home to a burnt desert sown with salt with only the scaffolds from which his followers hung as trees...
    This is pretty off topic but I'm really interested in these questions.

    In the time an army marches from Avanil or Boeruine to his domain, Rhuobe can kill most of the nobility in both kingdoms (rendering them unable to take actions), kill the army chain of command (rendering it unable to do bad things to his domain), and drink some mojitos. He just doesn't do it because... no idea. Rhuobe has the intelligence, the experience, the personal power, and the motivation to wreak havoc around his kingdom.

    Btw, I'm curious, but how do you think an army is going to have a chance of hitting Rhuobe? Technically that's impossible as he is inmune to normal weapons and missile weapons. The only thing would be something like overpowering him and capturing him, but he has to behave like a total idiot to allow that to happen (and even that could be arguable to work).

    This has nothing to do with the fantasy level, it's just that the Rhuobe that comes in the Boxed Set is overpowered.

    Quote Originally Posted by AndrewTall View Post
    The Gorgon has his own court, knightly orders (the last true Andu), problems with the shadow World, struggles against the gods themselves, etc, etc - he has no interest in fighting for the throne of Anuire, he wants Belinik licking his boots and Haelyn kneeling before him apologising for his folly in not supporting him to become first emperor...
    The Gorgon is even worse than Rhuobe, he has Int 19, and appart from personal power, experience and motivation, he has resources at his disposal. He could conquer all Anuire (easy) to make people worship him (harder) if he really wants godhood and see other gods crying (simple idea, I'm sure he can come up with much more convoluted and complicated plans to achieve his goals).

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