Expanded Broader Alignments

[MagisterCultuum]

OO worshipers indirectly worship Danalin but their overlords are corrupted by Mammon's archangel Hastur, and the highest ranking priests are very self serving and so probably go to Mammon's vault.


Cammulos does not have much of an organized religion. He does have a small cult mentioned in one event, but I forget the name and am not at my PC to check.


Mammon and Esus are the only two evil gods who are proud of their vaults and view them as more than just a part of the great machine of hell. Kael once said that most souls who go to hell start in Mammon's hell, but later changed his mind to say that most languish in Mulcarn's vault first. I prefer to think that most of those in Mulcarn's vault did not deserve hell, and most who really were wicked enough for hell skip straight to Mammon's vault. Regardless, most souls pass through Mammon's vault early in the process of becoming demons.

Not many souls make it to Esus's vault. It is a trap for those few noble or repentant souls who manage to overcome their vices and work their way out of Hell. It appears identical to Erebus, and is supposed to make those who refuse processing think they have escaped home only to find the things they loved in life now empty. Esus does not have many demons serving him. While most evil gods depend heavily on Balors and demon lords, his vault in dominated by living creatures such as changelings and the laws of his vault are almost identical to those of Erebus. Most of those who follow Esus probably have plenty of other vices and are are not devout enough to go straight to his vault (likely going to Mammon and then following the normal path of demon processing), but I suspect those who most fully trust in Deception may be rewarded by serving as his agents in his hell without every going through the torments of being processed into demons. Some may even be taken to his world without ever experiencing death.

 

[Riot_Starter]

technically OO followers don't have a vault to go to since it's a religion without god to worship ( at least not one of the twenty-one that are twenty-two) . I'd say they go in Danalin's Vault, which is pretty much controlled by Hastur ( or at least in part) or directly in Mammon's one.

for more precisions, concerning what happens to people sent into one of the hells, you should see this post from kael :

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=306677

I understand what the hells are for and the different vaults of the gods. My point is why would Esus, Mammon, and the other gods who don't want Armageddon or to force The One back to creation support the cause by using their vaults to help make Infernal? Why not keep the souls of their worshipers to themselves for their own agendas?

 

[Wodan]

I don't know why Kael made certain people evil, but I think the idea was that the Evil people contribute to Armageddon unknowingly because of the corruption and suffering they create. So them being Evil (in game terms) isn't a conscious decision, but a side effect of w/e they were doing.

Just thinking out loud here....

Evil isn't by definition chaotic or malicious, which is another way to say "corruption and suffering". IMO the core of "evil" is being self centered.

If "self" is defined as the individual, this IMO is chaotic evil. If "self" is extended to be the larger group / nation, then that would be lawful evil. Bottom line they care about furthering their selves than others. Good, meanwhile, would be the opposite: they care about other's welfare just as much if not more than their own welfare.

Anyway, what that means is that, while some evil cultures actively contribute to armageddon, some do not and may even work against armageddon. Conversely, some good cultures work against armageddon but some do not and may even contribute to it (this gets back to the question of whether a good razing an evil city would add to or reduce the AC).

The problem with this is that leaders that should not like each other will be indifferent if you use the same diplo-penalties to chaotic/lawful as for evil/good. For example Flauros Lawful Evil and Sabathiel Lawful Good would get along quite well -4 for evil +4 for lawful / -4 for good and +4 for lawful.

Good point. I think dropping the Lawful/Chaotic modifiers by half would work out... I could see Sabathiel disliking Flauros less than Alexis, for example, but he'd still dislike him.

I was going to say I didn't agree but after thought I do. Good / evil hate each other more than law/chaos.

However, I do think that certain religions are antithetical. e.g., It's not so much law vs chaos as Order vs OO. etc.

 

[Valkrionn]

Just thinking out loud here....

Evil isn't by definition chaotic or malicious, which is another way to say "corruption and suffering". IMO the core of "evil" is being self centered.

If "self" is defined as the individual, this IMO is chaotic evil. If "self" is extended to be the larger group / nation, then that would be lawful evil. Bottom line they care about furthering their selves than others. Good, meanwhile, would be the opposite: they care about other's welfare just as much if not more than their own welfare.

Anyway, what that means is that, while some evil cultures actively contribute to armageddon, some do not and may even work against armageddon. Conversely, some good cultures work against armageddon but some do not and may even contribute to it (this gets back to the question of whether a good razing an evil city would add to or reduce the AC).



I was going to say I didn't agree but after thought I do. Good / evil hate each other more than law/chaos.

However, I do think that certain religions are antithetical. e.g., It's not so much law vs chaos as Order vs OO. etc.

OO and Order are very much antithetical - The core principles (Lawful vs Chaos) are opposite each other. The same thing with Empy and Av... Good vs Evil.

 

[black_imperator]

I understand what the hells are for and the different vaults of the gods. My point is why would Esus, Mammon, and the other gods who don't want Armageddon or to force The One back to creation support the cause by using their vaults to help make Infernal? Why not keep the souls of their worshipers to themselves for their own agendas?

Good Question here. I don't think it has really been figured out . ( i still have difficulties to understand why Camulos fell in the first place). One answer could be that they actually agree with part of the things Agares wants ( to take again the power of Creation, mostly, though each of them had different motivations for falling , see the Fall of Mammon for that ). One important thing is the fact that ther falling changed their personnality as well as their sphere of influence. camulos , as the god of war, wants war and ther best way for him to obtain it is to follow agares (and ceridwen's ) schemes.

They may be manipulated by Agares, or Ceridwen , she 's the one who linked their vaults in the first place.

Yt they still do things on their own: i don't think Mulcarn entering into Creation was part of Agares' Plan

here are some thoughts about it

 

[Valkrionn]

Unrelated question: Thinking about adding a new ability to Insane... Randomly changes his Good/Evil alignment, while resetting his chaotic alignment. Would this be interesting, or no?

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Agares himself is not a big fan of having the Infernal acting directly in Erebus, as it means they too often engage in actual combat whereas he would rather take a more subtle approach and corrupt everyone to his side. Bhall and Ceridwen are the main driving force of the invasion of Erebus.

Hyborem has been stealing souls early in their processing in the hells, mostly in Mulcarn's vault as there is no god presiding over it who could stop him from doing so. Manes aren't technically processed enough to really count as demons yet.



In my opinion Cammulos always stood for anarchy, although his old form of anarchy was very much the pacifist sort. He once represented the ability for people to get along without any need for rules or rulers. He was always Junil's antagonist. (You could perhaps say that Cammulos was initially Chaotic Good while Junil was Lawful Neutral.) He opposed Junil's attempts to unilaterally impose his morality, at first because Junil really was going too far but soon because of his strong dislike for everything Junil stood for. Eventually he became adamant there there could be no objective right or wrong, that every subjective opinion is as good as any other, and that each individual should be free to do anything he wants without needing to justify why. He demands that everyone have complete liberty, including freedom to deprive others of all their rights if one has the strength and will to do so. He thus changed from Angel of Harmony to God of Strife. When Gabella first fled the gods Junil was the sword striking out against her while Cammulos was the shield of protection, but after the fall their symbols were switched.

 

[Wodan]

OO and Order are very much antithetical - The core principles (Lawful vs Chaos) are opposite each other. The same thing with Empy and Av... Good vs Evil.

Sounds like you're contradicting the earlier stated intention to make Law vs Order be 0/-1/-2 while Good vs Evil is 0/-2/-4.

(hopefully you understood that that is what my post was in response to.)

 

[Valkrionn]

No, the actual diplo penalties will still be weaker. I'm just saying those are the religions aligned against each other.

I assume that's what you meant?

 

[Darksaber1]

So Cammulos started out True Anarchy, then turn into Modern Anarchy? Makes sense.

 

[hbar]

I understand what the hells are for and the different vaults of the gods. My point is why would Esus, Mammon, and the other gods who don't want Armageddon or to force The One back to creation support the cause by using their vaults to help make Infernal? Why not keep the souls of their worshipers to themselves for their own agendas?

From what (little) I understand of the Gods of Erebus, they are entirely focused on their precepts, and have a hard time thinking outside of them. So, they take great delight in watching souls go through the process; each hell is created to focus a soul single-mindedly on the precept at hand. Long-term planning is probably out of reach of most Gods.

The real question is how the hells got connected in the first place. Considering her precept and disposition, I'd bet Ceriwiden (sp?) is behind it.

 

[Valkrionn]

Ceridwen connected them, yes.

 

[smithroadtrip]

I had a thought. Neutral means either indifferent, or trying to maintain balance. You have already said that True Neutral will be the trying to maintain balance type, as opposed to someone who is completely indifferent type.

There are four other Neutrals though. NG, LN, CN, NE. These Neutrals are likely not trying to maintain balance, these are the uncaring type. They care so much about the other half of their alignment, that they don't care about what they are Neutral in.

Let's say I'm CG. I'm dealing with two other leaders, who are LG and NG respectively. They both like me +4 (making up numbers) for being good. The LG one dislikes me though -2 for me being chaotic. The NG one doesn't care if I am chaotic. Therefore I don't have any + or - for being chaotic to him. He doesn't care about that aspect of the alignment chart. If he cared about it, he wouldn't be NG, he would be LG or CG.

The argument hinges on the point that if you are Neutral in one aspect, you don't care about it. Perhaps there are people who try to maintain balance in that one aspect, but they care about the other half. I very much doubt that most people are like this though. Just my two cents.

 

[sylvain5477]

But then he would be twice as senstive ti the other side of alignment.
said, a NG and a LN, and you are LE:
NG : does not care about the L, but very much about the E ==> big -8
LN : does not care about the E, but very much about the L ==> big +8

or in your example:
said a LG and NG and you're CG:
LG care normally about C and G ==> -4 +4 = 0
NG does not care about the C, but very much about the G ==> big +8

 

[Wodan]

Another way to do it, and probably more realistic, is to balance both axis equally, and give only half positive bonus for same vs full negative for difference. i.e., +2/0/-4 and +2/0/-4.

The reasoning here is that "like" is not as much of a motivating factor as "hate". Do I like someone of the same alignment or do I hate someone of the opposite alignment more?

So, for the CG perspective:
CG to LG would be -2 (-4 for chaos to law and +2 for good to good).
Meanwhile, CG to NG would be 0. CG to CG would be +2.
NG would be +2, N would be 0, CN would be +2.
LE would be -8, to NE would be -4, and to CE would be -2.

(Alternately to +2/0/-4, the numbers could be +2/0/-3 or +1/0/-4 or whatever is desired.)

 

[Valkrionn]

Currently, the modifiers are: +4/-4 on the Good/Evil axis, +2/-2 on the Lawful Chaotic axis. I think going with what you suggested could be better, though.

 

[xienwolf]

Another way to do it, and probably more realistic, is to balance both axis equally, and give only half positive bonus for same vs full negative for difference. i.e., +2/0/-4 and +2/0/-4.

The reasoning here is that "like" is not as much of a motivating factor as "hate". Do I like someone of the same alignment or do I hate someone of the opposite alignment more?

So, for the CG perspective:
CG to LG would be -2 (-4 for chaos to law and +2 for good to good).
Meanwhile, CG to NG would be 0. CG to CG would be +2.
NG would be +2, N would be 0, CN would be +2.
LE would be -8, to NE would be -4, and to CE would be -2.

(Alternately to +2/0/-4, the numbers could be +2/0/-3 or +1/0/-4 or whatever is desired.)

Ah, but the REASON that you "liking" someone means less than you "hating" someone is simply because there are more people in your life that you "like" than there are that you "hate" so the feeling is more concentrated when activated.

So if you wanted to go with this approach, you would have someone who is Good gain a +(number of Evil people known) toward all other people who are Good, and a -(number of Good people known) toward all other people who are Evil. Thus if there is only 1 Good guy and 20 Evil guys, you REALLY like that one other guy who is like you, and you realize you are outnumbered, so keep the muttered curses toward the Evil folks as sub-vocal as you can.

 

[Wodan]

Ah, but the REASON that you "liking" someone means less than you "hating" someone is simply because there are more people in your life that you "like" than there are that you "hate" so the feeling is more concentrated when activated.

Are you extrapolating into RL (real life) or something? Because otherwise that makes no sense.

In the game, frankly, diplomacy is driven by negatives. Rarely, if ever, is there a genuine trust. Even then, you never quite turn your back.

So if you wanted to go with this approach, you would have someone who is Good gain a +(number of Evil people known) toward all other people who are Good, and a -(number of Good people known) toward all other people who are Evil. Thus if there is only 1 Good guy and 20 Evil guys, you REALLY like that one other guy who is like you, and you realize you are outnumbered, so keep the muttered curses toward the Evil folks as sub-vocal as you can.

That's a level of doublethink that is beyond the sophistocation of the game, methinks.

Though, the notion of having a "feedback" mechanism is interesting, based on # and type of alignments. They could even be weighted... after all, that evil guy who has only 2 cities is hardly a factor.

 

[smithroadtrip]

Ah, but the REASON that you "liking" someone means less than you "hating" someone is simply because there are more people in your life that you "like" than there are that you "hate" so the feeling is more concentrated when activated.

So if you wanted to go with this approach, you would have someone who is Good gain a +(number of Evil people known) toward all other people who are Good, and a -(number of Good people known) toward all other people who are Evil. Thus if there is only 1 Good guy and 20 Evil guys, you REALLY like that one other guy who is like you, and you realize you are outnumbered, so keep the muttered curses toward the Evil folks as sub-vocal as you can.

Wow. I really like this idea. If this is how the system worked, it would mean we still get the good vs evil battles. However, it would mean that the game wouldn't be so peaceful if everyone was good or neutral or evil.

I think that makes sense. If there are 4 good guys and 4 evil guys, everyone wants to team up along ideological lines. If the good guys win, they then begin to see the subtle differences between each one's belief. Everyone begins to think that they are the true good people, and that the other factions have it wrong.