Deliverator
Graphical Hackificator
I know Keldath is doing some work on these for the next patch, so I thought I'd share my thoughts on religions to get another discussion going.
If I understand Keldath's plan correctly, he is going to allow each civ to choose only two out of 12 total religions. I'll see if I can guess the thinking behind this. (Correct me, if I'm wrong Keldath.)
Each civ can only choose 2 out of the 12 religions. So for example the Atreides two religions would be different from the Harkonnen's two religions, leading to a greater chance of friction between the two.
Getting religions that fit the Dune is not actually as easy as it first seems. Of the seven current ones I think only Zensunni is strongly characterised in the books, the Zensunni Wanderers being the predecessors of the Fremen.
The Dune appendix under the Orange Catholic Bible entry, gives a list of the "most ancient religions" as "including the Maometh Saari, Mahayana Christianity, Zensunni Catholicism and Buddislamic traditions."
Judaism and Zensufism are mentioned by Frank Herbert in Chapterhouse Dune.
Muadru, Navachristianity, Zenshiism are prequel inventions and a bit lame if you ask me. Muadru is a bit obviously close to Muad'Dib for a supposedly ancient religion...
I think the biggest problem is that not all of the factions are actually that religious in the books.
The Fremen obviously are religious and passionately so. In their messianic legends they are awaiting the Lisan Al-Gaib or Mahdi. Both Liet-Kynes ("Liet knows" instead of "God knows") and the worms are treated with religious reverence.
The Bene Gesserit seed religions everywhere through the Missionaria Protectiva in order to gain power and influence, but don't believe in the religions they seed. It could be argued that they ultimately are religious themselves, in that they are seeking to create the Kwisatz Haderach, the super-being who will bring them overt universal domination. Whereas the Fremen are looking for a man who will lead them to paradise, the BG are looking for a man who will lead them to total power.
(From Wikipedia) The Tleilaxu are Zensufi, a distant offshoot of Buddhism and Sufism, and are organized along theistic lines. They have spent thousands of years concealing this fact, waiting for their ascendancy, which they believe to be occurring in Heretics of Dune. Their secret holy language is called Islamiyat, an ancient tongue the Bene Gesserit recognize and employ to elicit trust from the Tleilaxu. The Bene Gesserit pretend to share the Tleilaxu "Great Belief, the Sufi-Zensunni ecumenism that had spawned the Bene Tleilax."
So that covers 4 out of the 12 civs we currently have. For the others religion is a bit harder to justify from theme.
For example, (Wikipedia again) in 'Appendix A' of Dune, Herbert wrote that the Guild, along with the Bene Gesserit order, was responsible for the standardization of religion in the Dune universe; they promoted the adoption of the Orange Catholic Bible and offered protection to the dissenting theologians who created this book. Nonetheless, in the same appendix, Herbert held that the Guild members themselves were atheists, and only promoted this move to promote a stable societal order from which they could profit.
Are the Atreides (pre-Muad'Dib), Harkonnen, Corrino, Ix all that religious in the books? Not particularly. Ordos, Fenring and Ecaz sound similarly irreligious from the small amount of theme we have.
I'm thinking perhaps if we widen the concept of a religion to be more of a philosophy or cultural slant. For example, we could have religion called Honor of the Old Houses which Atreides have a preference for, representing there belief in the importance of honour and just dealings. Harkonnen could have one that represents their cruelty and oppression. The only problem with going down this road is that you start to get overlap with civics. Perhaps we could make the current pro-spice / pro-terraforming civics into religions?
Anyway, just wanted to share my thoughts on this part of the game...
If I understand Keldath's plan correctly, he is going to allow each civ to choose only two out of 12 total religions. I'll see if I can guess the thinking behind this. (Correct me, if I'm wrong Keldath.)
Each civ can only choose 2 out of the 12 religions. So for example the Atreides two religions would be different from the Harkonnen's two religions, leading to a greater chance of friction between the two.
Getting religions that fit the Dune is not actually as easy as it first seems. Of the seven current ones I think only Zensunni is strongly characterised in the books, the Zensunni Wanderers being the predecessors of the Fremen.
The Dune appendix under the Orange Catholic Bible entry, gives a list of the "most ancient religions" as "including the Maometh Saari, Mahayana Christianity, Zensunni Catholicism and Buddislamic traditions."
Judaism and Zensufism are mentioned by Frank Herbert in Chapterhouse Dune.
Muadru, Navachristianity, Zenshiism are prequel inventions and a bit lame if you ask me. Muadru is a bit obviously close to Muad'Dib for a supposedly ancient religion...
I think the biggest problem is that not all of the factions are actually that religious in the books.
The Fremen obviously are religious and passionately so. In their messianic legends they are awaiting the Lisan Al-Gaib or Mahdi. Both Liet-Kynes ("Liet knows" instead of "God knows") and the worms are treated with religious reverence.
The Bene Gesserit seed religions everywhere through the Missionaria Protectiva in order to gain power and influence, but don't believe in the religions they seed. It could be argued that they ultimately are religious themselves, in that they are seeking to create the Kwisatz Haderach, the super-being who will bring them overt universal domination. Whereas the Fremen are looking for a man who will lead them to paradise, the BG are looking for a man who will lead them to total power.
(From Wikipedia) The Tleilaxu are Zensufi, a distant offshoot of Buddhism and Sufism, and are organized along theistic lines. They have spent thousands of years concealing this fact, waiting for their ascendancy, which they believe to be occurring in Heretics of Dune. Their secret holy language is called Islamiyat, an ancient tongue the Bene Gesserit recognize and employ to elicit trust from the Tleilaxu. The Bene Gesserit pretend to share the Tleilaxu "Great Belief, the Sufi-Zensunni ecumenism that had spawned the Bene Tleilax."
So that covers 4 out of the 12 civs we currently have. For the others religion is a bit harder to justify from theme.
For example, (Wikipedia again) in 'Appendix A' of Dune, Herbert wrote that the Guild, along with the Bene Gesserit order, was responsible for the standardization of religion in the Dune universe; they promoted the adoption of the Orange Catholic Bible and offered protection to the dissenting theologians who created this book. Nonetheless, in the same appendix, Herbert held that the Guild members themselves were atheists, and only promoted this move to promote a stable societal order from which they could profit.
Are the Atreides (pre-Muad'Dib), Harkonnen, Corrino, Ix all that religious in the books? Not particularly. Ordos, Fenring and Ecaz sound similarly irreligious from the small amount of theme we have.
I'm thinking perhaps if we widen the concept of a religion to be more of a philosophy or cultural slant. For example, we could have religion called Honor of the Old Houses which Atreides have a preference for, representing there belief in the importance of honour and just dealings. Harkonnen could have one that represents their cruelty and oppression. The only problem with going down this road is that you start to get overlap with civics. Perhaps we could make the current pro-spice / pro-terraforming civics into religions?
Anyway, just wanted to share my thoughts on this part of the game...
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