mikedavis.bsky.social
Historian in WNC, working on THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW and nuclear war, teaching part-time at Lees-McRae College, opinions my own, available for professional consultation.
22,855 posts
1,812 followers
1,615 following
Getting Started
Active Commenter
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that's good! that reflects highly on your character. a bad person would be coming up with reasons why these are "good feelings, actually."
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In a nice way!
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Yes, it is bad.
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but seriously, I always wait to comment because I think of Oswald and how utterly bizarre that was - but of course utterly bizarre things are not what usually happens.
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a wonderful people. I wish our nations were the friends we once were. someday.
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the guy seems like a freak but then they usually do.
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we know what to call people who think Trump isn't so bad, even if they claim to be people of the Left.
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bsky.app/profile/mike...
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"War is not God, but I Am" is good too. solid fanfic.
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ah jeez I'm nerdsplaining - I know you know the reference @catholickungfu.bsky.social , but I figure not all your readers would, sorry!
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- even though it's a church where women dominate the upper hierarchy, has policies about the very real but not divine magic of the setting, and has its theological clashes w/elves who practice their traditional religion, ox-men Muslim totalitarians, etc.
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we the viewer are supposed to look at this and say "Ah-hah, this is medieval Catholicism", which it certainly strongly resembles!
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an example - the Church of Andraste from the Dragon Age franchise - a faith with a prophet martyred by a betrayer, founding a church that has forgotten the social egalitarianism of its early days, which has its hierarchies, its holy wars, its scholars and chaplains and sinners, etc.
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Neat! I don't know that one but it sounds worth reading.
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I am glad that Wick tilted to the left rather than the right as he got older but there's still a little too much salt in the soup, if that makes sense.
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I'm thinking of fictional religions that we the reader/viewer are supposed to understand as being stand-ins for Christianity - because that leads us to something interesting w/"what are the signifiers of Christianity in secular pop culture?"
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oh that book looks fun!
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going back up-thread, this is why the MPG is set in the Anarchy, because it's a "medieval England" that will feel familiar to Anglo-American players, but doesn't have as strong a central state to handle things.
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even in an egalitarian and multicultural society, eventually you have to tell the Moloch people that it's time to get in the back of the wagon.
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well if your society has functional law enforcement, adventurers are in a troublesome social place.
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aren't they all. but seriously, which one comes to mind?
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no escaping some kind of subjectivity in setting up your social norms. that's my opinion, anyway.
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yep - Shar came to mind. Baldur's Gate law enforcement shouldn't burn Shar worshippers at the stake but they definitely should keep an eye on what's going on over there.
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that's just the regular investigatory division. people get them confused a lot.
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if there literally are evil gods and evil churches out there, an Inquisition at least has a place in a society's legal system, even if they definitely need a strong Internal Affairs division.
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you would probably know this much better than I would - is there much scholarship on "not-Christianity but obviously Christianity" in sf/fantasy settings?
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was gonna say
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so if the PCs are rescuing a heroic scientist from the perfidious grip of the Inquisition, that scientist almost certainly was recently working at one of the Spain-equivalent's innovative and well-funded universities.
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I did like the angle that the Church used to be a beacon of scientific progress, but some recent suspicious deaths have put premilliennialists in the driver's seat, so now we're not doing that anymore to concentrate on the apocalypse.
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you guys had a 30 Years War over this! you burned the setting's equivalent of Germany to the ground! come on, man.
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While I otherwise have great memories of playing in the 7th Sea game, their Reformation comes across as truly peculiar since both the Vaticine Church and their Objectionist rivals are clearly the product of 20th/21st century liberals who want everyone to get along.
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a surprise plot twist - they are forced to team up when a wizard working for the King shows up with plans to build a royal bridge over the Fae Brook.
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the PCs rescue the abbot of the Church of Light from the thugs hired by the Duke. (you know the one, with the dark beard and dark doublet) does this mean the duke has embraced the Church of Darkness? no he's just losing the case about the ferry rights and thought some legbreaking would help.
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you know they did their research because church lawyer is an NPC class. realistic medieval fantasy should have nobles and abbots suing each other with it v. clear that this doesn't change the noble's worldview at all.
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I like the old Mythic Vistas Medieval Player's Guide, which tried to seriously address this in a world that is both Anarchy-era England and one that functions on 3.0 D&D logic.
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"merely a Le Roi franchise holder."
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Louis XIV sez “WHAT other kings?”
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This is a good turn of phrase
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the ghost of Joseph Smith appears and announces "I'll allow it!"
(He is not helping)
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"the Virgin Mary is even an American what’s wrong with you?”
is-is she? I have made some errors in that case.
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Everett makes sense as an extremely violent Walter Mitty - Condo was a small, artistic man of deep feeling who put all his frustrations about daily life on the page. And it's great!
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is Jackie Robinson somehow played by Brock Peters circa TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD? yes.
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when my mom told me my biscuits would have made her mom proud
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all post-DS9 prophet visions take place somewhere in what is clearly a multi-species Ebbets Field.
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no king but what we make it. wait that's mixed up