What Do You Want For Yrth

[hal]

Originally Posted by Phantasm

Also, even though a mage can view the event as it happened in the past using magic, can he tell if the perp was using a magical disguise in order to frame someone? Or was a changeling/doppelgänger?

That question above is more of a "thaumatology" based question than not. It also requires that the person who answers the question, have a framework from which to answer. For instance? Using both Divination AND View the Past spells, I could determine if the perp is as he looks to be, and even perhaps determine guilt via magics. As always, the question becomes cultural. If Mages who are not permitted to lie about what their magics tell them - who watches the watchers?

Case in Point? I had a campaign in which an Elven woman was possessed by a mage who had used a powerstone as his soul stone. He could posses her if he know the spell sufficiently well enough to not need arms or hands or words (which he did) an sufficient energy (which the powerstone did). Long story short? They saved a wagon full of screaming children and a frightened wagon drover being pursued by what looked like bandits (no two dressed the same no standardized armor or heraldry). When the two heroes drove off the pursuing bandits with archery fire (They were elven archers), they later met up with the nearby town and entered the inn, where they promptly overheard the story of how the rescuers were driven off from saving the kidnapped children by an army of archers hidden in the edges of the forest. They were THIS close to saving the kids. That's when the players thought "oops - we'd better go save the kids". Then, after killing the villain, it was "oops, she was possessed by an evil one, our bad".

GURPS MAGIC and YRTH has so much potential - if you use discretion over what spells you allow and disallow. That's why I loved those Alaconius Lectures so much back in the day.

[LoneWolf23k]

Originally Posted by hal

GURPS MAGIC and YRTH has so much potential - if you use discretion over what spells you allow and disallow. That's why I loved those Alaconius Lectures so much back in the day.

Who? It's an honest question, this seems interesting and I don't know who that is.

[hal]

Originally Posted by LoneWolf23k

Who? It's an honest question, this seems interesting and I don't know who that is.

Before the Forums existed, the was GURPSNET, the mailing list hosted by SJGames. The Alaconius lectures discussed each spell as if it really worked, and the tactical/strategic implications and or social impact the spell might have. You can find some of the archived lectures via Google. I started to resume the lectures just prior to when GURPS 4e came out because my wife, who has never read a single GURPS book since 1986, started to become infected with wanting to play a mage in the games. Then the forums started up, Gurpsnet fell into a lower energy pattern of activity, and GURPS MAGIC for 4e came out. Haven't written about a college of Magic in the Guise of Alaconius since.

It is sometimes funny when someone would point me towards an Alaconius piece in answer to a question I pose, without them realizing I wrote them.

As mentioned, I've always enjoyed looking at the history of any game world and imagining "what if magic as written, really worked".

[dds_ks]

Originally Posted by David Johansen

So, we've asked why Yrth failed and I think determined that it's a bit too generic for some and a little too lightly detailed. ...

I just started a campaign on Yrth using the Midgard RPG (only available in German). The characters are Banestorm victims and still try to find their ways back to their worlds of origin. Of course the players know that this will never work.
None of the players has ever heard any word about Yrth. They don't have any access to the book. So whatever they feel, it can only be influenced by the setting as their characters perceive it.

The main point that makes my players feeling somehow uncomfortable about Yrth is: How to live in a "political correct" real world, meet the other Players in real life on a "political correct" basis, but play in a "we or they" setting between Muslims and Christians? Maybe it's just "too close to a political real-life issue" - and if that's the point, then I don't see any easy solution.

My interim solution is: have the party move to Sahud - where they have to go anyway, as one character is a KiDoKa (Midgard Game Term, but I guess I don't have to explain this) and needs a teacher to improve his core abilities. Then I have time to come up with the perfect solution...
... or at least with a semi-perfect one...

I guess that maybe this semi-perfect solution could be to stress that it's not THE Christians against THE Muslims. Maybe I need some civil war with several Christians and Muslims on each side of the conflict, making it a conflict for power, not a religious conflict. I guess that Caithness could be a good starting point for that.

[Paulon]

Or Tredroy, for somewhere that representatives of both religions from out of town could want to cause problems for their own gain while opposing factions of their co-religionists might cooperate try to protect the status quo.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by dds_ks

I just started a campaign on Yrth using the Midgard RPG (only available in German). The characters are Banestorm victims and still try to find their ways back to their worlds of origin. Of course the players know that this will never work.
None of the players has ever heard any word about Yrth. They don't have any access to the book. So whatever they feel, it can only be influenced by the setting as their characters perceive it.

The main point that makes my players feeling somehow uncomfortable about Yrth is: How to live in a "political correct" real world, meet the other Players in real life on a "political correct" basis, but play in a "we or they" setting between Muslims and Christians? Maybe it's just "too close to a political real-life issue" - and if that's the point, then I don't see any easy solution.

My interim solution is: have the party move to Sahud - where they have to go anyway, as one character is a KiDoKa (Midgard Game Term, but I guess I don't have to explain this) and needs a teacher to improve his core abilities. Then I have time to come up with the perfect solution...
... or at least with a semi-perfect one...

I guess that maybe this semi-perfect solution could be to stress that it's not THE Christians against THE Muslims. Maybe I need some civil war with several Christians and Muslims on each side of the conflict, making it a conflict for power, not a religious conflict. I guess that Caithness could be a good starting point for that.

In the real Middle Ages the religious frontier was porus and which side a given prince or individual warrior took depended on a large number of factors. The constant religious war was one factor and not to be underestimated but ambition, fear, honor, kin-ties or other social and political connections, and just-for-the-heck-of-it also counted and counted big.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by dds_ks

The main point that makes my players feeling somehow uncomfortable about Yrth is: How to live in a "political correct" real world, meet the other Players in real life on a "political correct" basis, but play in a "we or they" setting between Muslims and Christians? Maybe it's just "too close to a political real-life issue" - and if that's the point, then I don't see any easy solution.

Despite the attempts by radicals and reactionaries to re-contextualize them, the current problems in the Middle East are almost all the result of 18th through 20th century politics and movements. al-Wahhab lived from 1702-1792, long after the principle Banestorm. Isreal wasn't founded until 1948 (also long after the priniciple Banestorm).

The issues on Yrth are those of a Christendom largely unaffected by the Reformation (1500s-1600s), and Islam largely unaffected by the Mamluk uprising (1300s-1500s); which makes them very different from contemporary Earth religions. Acknowledging that the Crusades happened isn't problematic or insensitive. Treating the Yrth conflicts as based in the politics of that place, rather than Earth's, shouldn't be either.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Despite the attempts by radicals and reactionaries to re-contextualize them, the current problems in the Middle East are almost all the result of 18th through 20th century politics and movements. al-Wahhab lived from 1702-1792, long after the principle Banestorm. Isreal wasn't founded until 1948 (also long after the priniciple Banestorm).

The issues on Yrth are those of a Christendom largely unaffected by the Reformation (1500s-1600s), and Islam largely unaffected by the Mamluk uprising (1300s-1500s); which makes them very different from contemporary Earth religions. Acknowledging that the Crusades happened isn't problematic or insensitive. Treating the Yrth conflicts as based in the politics of that place, rather than Earth's, shouldn't be either.

On the other hand there is no clear dividing line between modern Middle Eastern problems and Medieval. The Barbary Pirates were a clear decent from medieval times, and terrorists show a distinct resemblance to ghazis(including corsairs). The decay of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of Russia began in the seventeenth century. As late as WW1 the Sultan tried to call Jihad and while only a few Muslims took him seriously his enemies had a long enough memory to get nervous. And Afghans have always been going down in the valley for raids and every once in a while annoyed someone enough to make them want payback though making a mess and going home was usually the only practical way to do that.

In other words trying to find a fixed chronological border between Medieval and Modern times is impossible. Indeed it has been argued that many terrorists seem to live in a fantasy of romanticized Medievalism, and in fact there has always been a lot of that going around whenever there was extremist political violence in the past two hundred years and it was not just Muslims who did it. Just because there are new problems does not mean the old problems are not still there and indeed the main thing new is adding modern technology to the mix. It is hard to see how the Wahabis are really all that special in Islamic fashion. Even Israel could have been founded at any time someone was not paying attention enough to Palestine to mind if some Jewish organization LBOed it the way it (metaphorically)happened in real life. Which means any time Crusading was out of fashion and Jihading was directed elsewhere. All that was needed was, money, influence, a charismatic Jewish leader and enough Jews motivated enough to dig and fight. Money and influence were definitely available. The fact that Israel was not founded in the Middle Ages just means they did not bother, not that the presence of Israel marks a dividing line between the problems then and the problems now.

In any event the fact that enough players are going to identify Crusade and Jihad with modern problems is an indication that Medieval problems are modern problems. Medieval problems have never been forgotten. You can read about them in Victorian literature and even political analysis. In this instance, like so many, thinking them so makes them so and people think them so. The real problem is not whether or not they are real as whether or not players can maintain enough detachment to use them in a game.

[dds_ks]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

In the real Middle Ages the religious frontier was porus and which side a given prince or individual warrior took depended on a large number of factors. The constant religious war was one factor and not to be underestimated but ambition, fear, honor, kin-ties or other social and political connections, and just-for-the-heck-of-it also counted and counted big.

I personally fully agree with the historical facts, but nevertheless, my players don't feel comfortable with the situation their characters are in.
Maybe I should encourage them to read about El Cid...
... and especially about the coalitions in that war...

But the main problem is that it's my task as SL (German for GM, but sounds like "Esel", which translates to "donkey", so it is kind of a "True Name" of all GMs) to make this clearer in the game world, and that could be the General Problem of Yrth?
Because at least in my campaign it can't be any of the other problems mentioned so far, as my players couldn't have perceived any of them so far.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by dds_ks

I personally fully agree with the historical facts, but nevertheless, my players don't feel comfortable with the situation their characters are in.
Maybe I should encourage them to read about El Cid...
... and especially about the coalitions in that war...

But the main problem is that it's my task as SL (German for GM, but sounds like "Esel", which translates to "donkey", so it is kind of a "True Name" of all GMs) to make this clearer in the game world, and that could be the General Problem of Yrth?
Because at least in my campaign it can't be any of the other problems mentioned so far, as my players couldn't have perceived any of them so far.

In the Heston El Cid movie(a very good one by the way) there was a Spanish nationalist crusade which combined Christians and Muslims. That is actually rather anachronistic though some Andualasian Muslims were historically annoyed enough at Morrocans to defect. While it would be hasty to say nationalism as we know it did not exist, localism was more familiar though when the local government was reasonably popular and felt to represent local interests localism did look a lot like nationalism in miniature. In any case there is no reason a party which includes people from multiple religions cannot be found either in history or in Yrth. Cardiel for instance is a limited aristocracy which can be imagined as having people fight for it for nationalist reasons and indeed once did and it is hard to see how the nationalism of an imaginary state is offensive. I personally found it annoying that the most wicked state in Yrth was Christian, but you're gonna get that and Megalos is made up for by Cardiel and Caithness.