Re: Impact of Modern Morality and Philosophy IG
Posted: Mon Oct 10, 2011 6:05 pm
Elvandar Law mentions public floggings in the town square, but anyhoo...
Firstly, we shouldn't really be resisting natural social developments IC, just go with them. I know the game is thematically set in the medieval era, but let's not forget there are very important factors to consider. Firstly Geas can't really be in a dark ages, something historically in our world which refers to a period when people were ignorant of important scientific principles and their lives, cultures and development were heavily influenced by religion and superstition.
In Geas, characters KNOW there are gods, and they've SEEN magic, so they're at a different social calibration than our history, a direct comparison is not really applicable. If you want to see a more violent and unreasonable you'll need to explain to the characters why they should be.
For example, thieves become thieves because of desperate circumstances (usually anyway), either that or social/peer pressure or kleptomania or similar compulsions. In geas, it's actually quite difficult to be poor. A few IC hours of intense herb searching will garner enough herbs to put you in rent for a week and decent meals. That with the money from scalping/singing/juggling means there are plenty of easier and safer ways to make a decent income.
On to capital punishment...burning folks at the stake, hanging them etc. etc.
In theory this should be more prevalent as people are aware of their apparent immortality so a death sentence wouldn't be held in the same regard as in our world...but on the other side, people no longer fear death. Fear makes people act in uncivilised ways and the greatest fear, that of mortality, is gone. We also know what happens in the afterlife, we hang about until ressed, there is no fear of an eternal punishment that makes us seek out those we believe will bring about the fires of hell or the apocalypse.
So in summary, I see the roleplay IC as being appropriate for the social factors. Any forced change would be synthetic and would quickly fade out.
As I'm typing this I'm thinking it would be really cool to have afterlives that we had to progress through upon death, a la purgatory. Something that keeps you away from the real world for a while so that there is more to a death.
The state of your karma determines up or down, the earthly power of the gods would determine the environment you experience, low EP much more unpleasant/difficult, high EP more pleasant/easy/quicker.
This would be a great way to ramp up death as an important social factor and not just death but the manner of it. If you're given proper funerary rites, you get an easier time of it on the other side. Your corpse desecrated and hideous unspeakable rites of terror performed? Your afterlife experience sucketh greatly!
/tangent
So yes, direct comparison of societies with distinctly different social factors is a bit wonky.
Firstly, we shouldn't really be resisting natural social developments IC, just go with them. I know the game is thematically set in the medieval era, but let's not forget there are very important factors to consider. Firstly Geas can't really be in a dark ages, something historically in our world which refers to a period when people were ignorant of important scientific principles and their lives, cultures and development were heavily influenced by religion and superstition.
In Geas, characters KNOW there are gods, and they've SEEN magic, so they're at a different social calibration than our history, a direct comparison is not really applicable. If you want to see a more violent and unreasonable you'll need to explain to the characters why they should be.
For example, thieves become thieves because of desperate circumstances (usually anyway), either that or social/peer pressure or kleptomania or similar compulsions. In geas, it's actually quite difficult to be poor. A few IC hours of intense herb searching will garner enough herbs to put you in rent for a week and decent meals. That with the money from scalping/singing/juggling means there are plenty of easier and safer ways to make a decent income.
On to capital punishment...burning folks at the stake, hanging them etc. etc.
In theory this should be more prevalent as people are aware of their apparent immortality so a death sentence wouldn't be held in the same regard as in our world...but on the other side, people no longer fear death. Fear makes people act in uncivilised ways and the greatest fear, that of mortality, is gone. We also know what happens in the afterlife, we hang about until ressed, there is no fear of an eternal punishment that makes us seek out those we believe will bring about the fires of hell or the apocalypse.
So in summary, I see the roleplay IC as being appropriate for the social factors. Any forced change would be synthetic and would quickly fade out.
As I'm typing this I'm thinking it would be really cool to have afterlives that we had to progress through upon death, a la purgatory. Something that keeps you away from the real world for a while so that there is more to a death.
The state of your karma determines up or down, the earthly power of the gods would determine the environment you experience, low EP much more unpleasant/difficult, high EP more pleasant/easy/quicker.
This would be a great way to ramp up death as an important social factor and not just death but the manner of it. If you're given proper funerary rites, you get an easier time of it on the other side. Your corpse desecrated and hideous unspeakable rites of terror performed? Your afterlife experience sucketh greatly!
/tangent
So yes, direct comparison of societies with distinctly different social factors is a bit wonky.