04-17-2014, 01:16 PM | #1 |
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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A dragon as Leviathan
Hope I don't get thrown out for spamming, this is the third thread today... :eek:
Anyway, Hobbes wrote that in the state of nature the life of man was "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." The cure for this was the Leviathan - an impartial force that was the only institution able to use force, but was limited in its role to keeping the subjects safe (at least, that's the interpretation I'll go with here). So, imagine an island with several small neolithic communities. They trade with each other and sometimes feel tempted to go to war over some insult or dispute or other. When they get close to coming to blows, they take sacrifices and go to the mountain plateau at the center of the island, to speak to the Leviathan. The Leviathan is a large dragon - large enough to be effectively immune to the slings and arrows of the islanders (remember, armor is doubled against cutting and impaling weapons). The Leviathan will hear the affair and settle the dispute - and it is in his interest to settle it somewhat fairly, to minimize costly conflicts. Going to war against the Leviathan's decision is to invite swift destruction. The dragon also communicates with the various chieftains in the individual communities. Should anyone threaten a chief that the Leviathan favors, he is turned into a snack. This explains why the dragon has such a big hoard - that's all the gifts and sacrifices - and why the islanders keep him in awe. Now suppose that someone figures out how to make metal weapons. Suddenly there's a weapon that can challenge the Leviathan and bring the whole edifice crashing down... Sound interesting?
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04-17-2014, 02:08 PM | #2 |
Join Date: Feb 2013
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Re: A dragon as Leviathan
Sounds like an episode of (old) Star Trek.
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04-17-2014, 02:29 PM | #3 |
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Caxias do Sul, Brazil
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Re: A dragon as Leviathan
Sounds like a bad attempt of revolution, just because you know a way to kill a dragon, doesn't mean you will be able to do it.
Also, now he has access to metal, the dragon could simply order the smiths to make an armor for him.
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I've revised the Low Tech weapons table: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=112532 |
04-17-2014, 03:03 PM | #4 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
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Re: A dragon as Leviathan
Eh, it's a typical situation where a ruling authority is destabilized. However, if the dragon has been a reasonably 'good' ruler, would-be dragonslayers will tend to get thumped on by humans long before threatening the dragon is an issue.
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04-17-2014, 04:24 PM | #5 |
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Caxias do Sul, Brazil
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Re: A dragon as Leviathan
If he was a hobbesian leviathan he was a good ruler.
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I've revised the Low Tech weapons table: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=112532 |
Tags |
dragon, politics, stone age |
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