it's literally a fucking core element of DnD - ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

dov.bsky.social • 1 day ago

it's literally a fucking core element of DnD

Reposted from Kate Elliott

I get people can't read everything but I wish they would read more widely before they claim that Sanderson is "taking up a standard that has lain mostly unwielded on the landscape of the genre for some time" (writing invented/real religion/s as a crucial part of worldbuilding in sff worlds).

Comments

renevq.bsky.social•1 day ago

Extrapolating from folklore is probably the whole foundation of fantasy lit. I’d be very wary of any fantasy story that didn’t majorly account for religion and metaphysics.

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

depends on one's definition of fantasy and even then it's not necessarily relevant to every possible story

ftmshepard.bsky.social•23 hours ago

Man I like sanderson and this is genuinely insane

dov.bsky.social•1 day ago

sure sanderson writes about the place of religion in fantasy worldbuilding. you know who else does? literally every single person who has heard the word "cleric"

dalassa.bsky.social•1 day ago

Christianity with the serial numbers files off is still a religion for fantasy.

dalassa.bsky.social•1 day ago

Does Mercedes Lackey count? Because Velgarth has a bunch of different religious modes sprinkled throughout. Different cultures interact with deities in different ways. Like everything from “we like all gods and have no established religion” to “uh, our theocracy upset our patron deity…

dalassa.bsky.social•1 day ago

and his former high priest is now a pile of ashes on the altar.”

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

literally can't think of any major fantasy writer who does not at least have a little religion in their books

dalassa.bsky.social•1 day ago

Anne McCaffrey!

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

*technically* it's SF!

dov.bsky.social•1 day ago

what the hell is in the water lately. the way some of you are talking (not kate but the people she's complaining about obvs) make it sound like the quality of literature is in some kind of freefall fucking decline and every single example you use is of things that aren't real

samulmschneider.bsky.social•1 day ago

one of the more stupid-as-hell-but-fun takes on this is Rifts, which is basically "what if all the various powerful supernatural entities got to have a field day on earth due to our psychic-nuclear apocalypse."

jamph.bsky.social•1 day ago

People don't read.

thewanderingjew.bsky.social•1 day ago

Oh boy are we mad about something today? I could use something outside of geopolitics

thewanderingjew.bsky.social•1 day ago

Maybe I’ll stake out a position that even in SFF contexts, we should see the god of Abraham as equally present as here

chbarts.bsky.social•1 day ago

Or a story involving warring gods, paralleling how, in Israel, the El pantheon was driven out by the Yahweh pantheon, which eventually became Yahweh alone as the single acknowledged deity.

dov.bsky.social•1 day ago

"making fantasy acceptable to haredim: why almost nothing except tolkien qualifies"

thewanderingjew.bsky.social•1 day ago

That said, people can have whatever religious practices, but there may be no god but god

asherelbein.bsky.social•1 day ago

...interesting. Say more

carriagereturn.bsky.social•1 day ago

Let me tell you about The Sparrow or Jesuits in SPAAAAAACCCCCEEEEEE

thewanderingjew.bsky.social•1 day ago

Jesuits gave us the Big Bang after all

thewanderingjew.bsky.social•1 day ago

Anything else isn’t god, after all, it would just be a kind of hero/jinn

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

I would say that this is a false dichotomy, I mean, God of Abraham is not the only monotheistic god ever worshipped (nor was he himself always worshipped as the only God either, but that's another matter)

thewanderingjew.bsky.social•1 day ago

Or at least, there is only the Infinite God, by definition such God would be in all universes, and we cannot imagine the ein sof as absent

mikedavis.bsky.social•1 day ago

There's a story (with a rather unsatisfying conclusion) out there with the conceit that astronauts return from a failed extrasolar colonial expedition to find that the entire population of Earth has been Raptured.

mikedavis.bsky.social•1 day ago

(at least that's what the records say - Jesus appears and announces he's taking all of humanity back to Heaven in a week. there are six days of records after that.)

richarddwyer.bsky.social•1 day ago

Like, if G.R.R Martin has been doing it for 30 years I'm not exactly sure when it went underground.

dalassa.bsky.social•1 day ago

Okay but GRRM is bad at writing religion.

richarddwyer.bsky.social•1 day ago

"The Faith if the Seven is based on the medieval Catholic church, only with not power, land, or ability to appoint its own Pope."

"OK, George, I'm going to buy you some history books..."

dalassa.bsky.social•1 day ago

He won’t read them. Not even as much as Gary Gygax did.

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

plenty of both positive (Nenneke) and negative (most male priests) depictions of religion in Sapkowski's Witcher stories in the last almost 40 years too, even if it's never particularly central

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

to be fair 1) it's not entirely crucial to his worldbuilding 2) worldbuilding is not entirely crucial to his writing in the first place

richarddwyer.bsky.social•1 day ago

Also, Tolkien absolutely places religion at the heart of Lord of the Rings.

Now it obviously doesn't include much organised religion, but as a Anglo-Catholic he understands that is not really important, and "protecting the local pubs opening hours" is the true practice of faith.

richarddwyer.bsky.social•1 day ago

The scouring of the shire would make a fantastic Holy Book.

richarddwyer.bsky.social•1 day ago

He wrote a "What to do if facism comes to England" book in 1955 and it was just "Step one, begin an armed rebellion.".

Like Tolkien was not perfect, but fucking hell did he get the essential right.

cadencecivet.bsky.social•1 day ago

"BrandoSando is doing something new and unexplored"

:|

sysfin.bsky.social•1 day ago

I hate the amount of attention paid to unconnected lore in modern writing, especially genre fiction.

Like Brando Sando is fine but his style is just what I don't care for anymore....

Mind you I have about ~50 old books published by TSR so I do get the appeal.

dov.bsky.social•1 day ago

Thing about Brandon as well is that - can I speak my truth? i'm going to speak my truth -

he is a terrible writer

dov.bsky.social•1 day ago

his worldbuilding _is_ interesting and i do not begrudge him that but the actual writing is so fucking dull man

sysfin.bsky.social•1 day ago

A lot of very popular old white guy writers, especially scifi, would also fall into that category.

They write about BIG THING with paper dolls instead of characters.

ausir.bsky.social•1 day ago

out of these four: interesting worldbuilding, memorable characters, engaging story and eloquent writing style, some manage to at least have two, or even three

erinyes.diy•1 day ago

"lolth-araushnee is a faerun retelling of the sumerian ereshkigal myth,," i explain helpfully to the girl who is crushing on me enough to put up with my shit

mikedavis.bsky.social•1 day ago

a medievalist friend wants to see more lawsuits and legal drama in D&D and I am all in favor of it. "the duke hired thugs to beat up the abbot! is it because he hates the god of light? no - it's because the abbot won't give him his share of the bridge toll!"

llyfrgellbabel.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Six book saga based on the military rivalry of the Dioceses of St. David's and Hereford

meangrape.com•1 day ago

I’d play it

carriagereturn.bsky.social•1 day ago

I *believe* Mercedes Lackey includes stuff like that in the Vows and Honors books.