The Greeks

[Aurora Rossa]

So why did Zompist feel that Almea needed Christians so badly in the first place? I can understand the desire to link the setting to our world in some way, but why bring in such a foreign element? An article from the wiki he created seems to suggest it had something to do with his long-lost Christian beliefs.

[Cadeshadow]

Though I can't speak for Zompist, I can speak for myself. While creating my conworld, I have a desire to bring in Christianity, it's a fuzzy feeling to me, so it's hard to describe but it's something like a "not wanting everything to be a false religion" and a "wanting your people to know salvation-because if this conworld were real, wouldn't God find a way of spreading the true faith?" and something else along the lines of "conpeople should know God"

Hope this helps.

[eodrakken]

Cadeshadow's reasoning is the same as C.S. Lewis's when he chose to include Christ in Narnia. As a Christian, he found it interesting to imagine what form Christ might take in another world -- as he surely would do if that world were real. I can imagine that if you're Christian it might seem depressing and unfair for your conpeople never to have the chance to be saved.

[sangi39]

Cadeshadow's reasoning is the same as C.S. Lewis's when he chose to include Christ in Narnia. As a Christian, he found it interesting to imagine what form Christ might take in another world -- as he surely would do if that world were real. I can imagine that if you're Christian it might seem depressing and unfair for your conpeople never to have the chance to be saved.

Well, "saved" from the writer's point-of-view anyway. I've come up with competing "saving" religious sects in my conculture whereby the method by which a person can be "saved" differ drastically in some cases some of which match up with certain Christian practices without actually being Christian, that is, the acceptance as the first divine son, Perkunus, of the highest deity, Zeys, as the saviour of mankind from the control of the Dark Gods which is similar in a way to the acceptance of Christ, the son of God, as the saviour of mankind and the one through which a person can overcome the temptation of Satan. All I'm really saying by that though is that you don't necessarily have to explicit bring Christ and Christianity into the conworld but find a clever way of developing a rather similar religious belief. This way it could be put down to "the one true Christian God" bringing the "true religion" to the conpeople in a native setting.

[eodrakken]

Well, "saved" from the writer's point-of-view anyway. I've come up with competing "saving" religious sects in my conculture whereby the method by which a person can be "saved" differ drastically in some cases some of which match up with certain Christian practices without actually being Christian, that is, the acceptance as the first divine son, Perkunus, of the highest deity, Zeys, as the saviour of mankind from the control of the Dark Gods which is similar in a way to the acceptance of Christ, the son of God, as the saviour of mankind and the one through which a person can overcome the temptation of Satan. All I'm really saying by that though is that you don't necessarily have to explicit bring Christ and Christianity into the conworld but find a clever way of developing a rather similar religious belief. This way it could be put down to "the one true Christian God" bringing the "true religion" to the conpeople in a native setting.

Which is just what Lewis did, for the most part. It may not be obvious to the casual (or young) reader that Aslan is meant to be Christ, at all.

[sangi39]

Well, "saved" from the writer's point-of-view anyway. I've come up with competing "saving" religious sects in my conculture whereby the method by which a person can be "saved" differ drastically in some cases some of which match up with certain Christian practices without actually being Christian, that is, the acceptance as the first divine son, Perkunus, of the highest deity, Zeys, as the saviour of mankind from the control of the Dark Gods which is similar in a way to the acceptance of Christ, the son of God, as the saviour of mankind and the one through which a person can overcome the temptation of Satan. All I'm really saying by that though is that you don't necessarily have to explicit bring Christ and Christianity into the conworld but find a clever way of developing a rather similar religious belief. This way it could be put down to "the one true Christian God" bringing the "true religion" to the conpeople in a native setting.

Which is just what Lewis did, for the most part. It may not be obvious to the casual (or young) reader that Aslan is meant to be Christ, at all.

I've never read the books but I got that feeling from the movies. A moral teacher who kind of dies, comes back then goes away again to come back again when the time is right. I actually prefer non-transported versions of Christianity which have a nice natural flare to them, they just feel a bit more natural

[Aurora Rossa]

Though I can't speak for Zompist, I can speak for myself. While creating my conworld, I have a desire to bring in Christianity, it's a fuzzy feeling to me, so it's hard to describe but it's something like a "not wanting everything to be a false religion" and a "wanting your people to know salvation-because if this conworld were real, wouldn't God find a way of spreading the true faith?" and something else along the lines of "conpeople should know God"

I suppose that does make sense, as I have kind of the same feeling, albeit not with Christianity. Zompist did indicate he was Christian at one point IIRC and wanted to bring that into his world. Even so, it does seem kind of inelegant to keep them around long after you have changed your mind.

[Yiuel Raumbesrairc]

Even so, it does seem kind of inelegant to keep them around long after you have changed your mind.

That would be like me ditching the Hundredhousers out of Sevy because they're complete assholes with all their annoying traditionnalism and pedant linguistic autonomy. Having non-strawman positions that aren't yours can give some other point of view within your work which might appeal to other people. And you don't look like Any Rand.

[eodrakken]

I've never read the books but I got that feeling from the movies. A moral teacher who kind of dies, comes back then goes away again to come back again when the time is right. I actually prefer non-transported versions of Christianity which have a nice natural flare to them, they just feel a bit more natural :)

And I've never seen the movies so I couldn't say whether they're more or less obviously Christian than the books! :)

Even so, it does seem kind of inelegant to keep them around long after you have changed your mind.

There's always a place for revising one's own work, but also sometimes you just want to leave things as you originally did them, either because so much later work depends on it, or because you respect it as a testament to your earlier mindset, or both.

I think it would be hard to rewrite Almea without the Greeks, considering all the history and politics that depend on them. I guess it would be possible to make it a wayward ship from an inaccessible area of Almea, instead of from Earth, and that they just happened to have a Christian-esque religion. But after all this time, *that* would seem more inelegant to me, and indeed rather forced.

[Mornche Geddick]

By the time of LOTR, OK; but who fed the orcs of the Misty Mountains in the time of The Hobbit?

All we really know is they fed Gollum. And that Misty Mountain underground lake fish was a luxury reserved for the Great Goblin.

Misty Mountain Goats?

Or is the point that the population was definitely too large to have lived solely on hunting and gathering? I don't really remember.

It certainly was large - almost big enough to overrun the Lakemen, the wood-elves and the Dwarves of the Iron Hills at the Battle of the Five Armies.

[GreenBowTie]

So do descendants of the Ellenicoi have eight toes or ten?

[Shm Jay]

Eight, no? The humans were not interfertile with the Almeans.

[Yiuel Raumbesrairc]

So do descendants of the Ellenicoi have eight toes or ten?

The Elenicoi do not have living biological descendants beyond the second generation (and the second generation concerns only one lonely guy, poor him knowing he'll never have biological children). They adopted children (from whom?) and these were uesti, so eight toes.

[Xephyr]

Though I can't speak for Zompist, I can speak for myself. While creating my conworld, I have a desire to bring in Christianity, it's a fuzzy feeling to me, so it's hard to describe but it's something like a "not wanting everything to be a false religion" and a "wanting your people to know salvation-because if this conworld were real, wouldn't God find a way of spreading the true faith?" and something else along the lines of "conpeople should know God"

I suppose that does make sense, as I have kind of the same feeling, albeit not with Christianity. Zompist did indicate he was Christian at one point IIRC and wanted to bring that into his world. Even so, it does seem kind of inelegant to keep them around long after you have changed your mind.

The following applies to both of you, but in a different way for each:

Conpeople aren't real.

[zompist]

Though I can't speak for Zompist, I can speak for myself. While creating my conworld, I have a desire to bring in Christianity, it's a fuzzy feeling to me, so it's hard to describe but it's something like a "not wanting everything to be a false religion" and a "wanting your people to know salvation-because if this conworld were real, wouldn't God find a way of spreading the true faith?" and something else along the lines of "conpeople should know God"

I suppose that does make sense, as I have kind of the same feeling, albeit not with Christianity. Zompist did indicate he was Christian at one point IIRC and wanted to bring that into his world. Even so, it does seem kind of inelegant to keep them around long after you have changed your mind.

The following applies to both of you, but in a different way for each:

Conpeople aren't real.

True, but so? Isn't this like saying "Conpeople aren't real; therefore they don't need to eat"?

For someone with a belief system, that system is reality, and conforming a world to it is realism. If it's God, then you worry about your character's relationship to God just as you worry about their way of life and their conflicts. If it's Marxism, then you analyze their economic and social systems in a Marxist way.

[Xephyr]

Though I can't speak for Zompist, I can speak for myself. While creating my conworld, I have a desire to bring in Christianity, it's a fuzzy feeling to me, so it's hard to describe but it's something like a "not wanting everything to be a false religion" and a "wanting your people to know salvation-because if this conworld were real, wouldn't God find a way of spreading the true faith?" and something else along the lines of "conpeople should know God"

I suppose that does make sense, as I have kind of the same feeling, albeit not with Christianity. Zompist did indicate he was Christian at one point IIRC and wanted to bring that into his world. Even so, it does seem kind of inelegant to keep them around long after you have changed your mind.

The following applies to both of you, but in a different way for each:

Conpeople aren't real.

True, but so? Isn't this like saying "Conpeople aren't real; therefore they don't need to eat"?

For someone with a belief system, that system is reality, and conforming a world to it is realism. If it's God, then you worry about your character's relationship to God just as you worry about their way of life and their conflicts. If it's Marxism, then you analyze their economic and social systems in a Marxist way.

They need to eat and so they eat on their own.. conpeople, like all people, care for themselves. It's a natural thing, whether one is dealing with alternate history Italians, alternate history Olmecs, or an alien conpeople. The first would probably be Christians, the latter two certainly not. I don't think a conworlder really ought to take the caretaker role, but if one is going to anyway, how is giving your conpeople historically-implausible Christianity different from making them immune to all disease and giving them government free from corruption and a society free from theft? If a conlanger were to make a conworld with any of those, I'd for damn sure consider them naive fantasizers and not realistic conworlders. Wouldn't you?

[Neek]

Wasn't it Tolkien who toyed with the whole concept of Subcreation? At least, I first drew the parallel between Tolkien's responsibility in his work and the presence of the Elenicoi on Almea--it seemed appropriate that a person, worried about the inherent sin of creating a fictional world was in an act of small-scale creation of the Genesis type, would prefer to Christianize his people in some form (whether subtly or otherwise). Not just to "save" his people, but also spare himself rejection and ostracization by peers for creating a pagan world. Zompist's inclusion of Christian missionaries being sent to Almea implies (to me, at least; he's free to shoot me down for this) a Tolkienesque subcreation.

This has become less the theme, considering D&D's role in a good number of people's conworlds. We've moved so far in just a decade from subcreation AND mocking D&D's pseduo-polytheism, that we're more willing and capable of exploring religions as societal constructs.

The Elenicoi are implausibilities, sure. There exists some elements of post-Nicaean Christianity that seem to be attempts to work in Christian concepts without being overtly so. The Elenicoi had entered Zompist's works when it was young, and the concept had a profound impact on the history of Eretald, that removing it today would require an entire reshaping of Almea as we see it. I don't doubt that could Zompist do it differently today, he would have already done so.

[Salmoneus]

It's not implausible for there to be Christianity on Almea - if you believe in an evangelising God.

[hwhatting]

The Elenicoi are implausibilities, sure. There exists some elements of post-Nicaean Christianity that seem to be attempts to work in Christian concepts without being overtly so. The Elenicoi had entered Zompist's works when it was young, and the concept had a profound impact on the history of Eretald, that removing it today would require an entire reshaping of Almea as we see it. I don't doubt that could Zompist do it differently today, he would have already done so.

I'm not even sure whether he would, or ought to. In the end, the Elenicoi or the words borrowed from Earth languages in Verdurian or the D&D / Highschool in-jokes are things that link Almea to our world. On the whole, zomp has airbrushed these things in well enough, so when I find such nuggets, they make me smile and don't disturb my immersion. To me, these things show that Almea is a product of the heart and not only a detached exercise in world-building (and why would anyone even want to do that)?

[Neek]

The Elenicoi are implausibilities, sure. There exists some elements of post-Nicaean Christianity that seem to be attempts to work in Christian concepts without being overtly so. The Elenicoi had entered Zompist's works when it was young, and the concept had a profound impact on the history of Eretald, that removing it today would require an entire reshaping of Almea as we see it. I don't doubt that could Zompist do it differently today, he would have already done so.

I'm not even sure whether he would, or ought to. In the end, the Elenicoi or the words borrowed from Earth languages in Verdurian or the D&D / Highschool in-jokes are things that link Almea to our world. On the whole, zomp has airbrushed these things in well enough, so when I find such nuggets, they make me smile and don't disturb my immersion. To me, these things show that Almea is a product of the heart and not only a detached exercise in world-building (and why would anyone even want to do that)?

I was cold in my wording; those do make the world seem far greater than it would be otherwise--but I'm basing this on something that I believe Zompist has stated before in the past. I could be wrong, however.

[-]

how is giving your conpeople historically-implausible Christianity different from making them immune to all disease and giving them government free from corruption and a society free from theft?

I thought about giving my conpeople historically-implausible Islam once, but now I realize this would be exactly like giving them cold fusion and universal peace and streets in which children can play at all hours of the night without fear. That just follows logically.

[Xephyr]

how is giving your conpeople historically-implausible Christianity different from making them immune to all disease and giving them government free from corruption and a society free from theft?

I thought about giving my conpeople historically-implausible Islam once, but now I realize this would be exactly like giving them cold fusion and universal peace and streets in which children can play at all hours of the night without fear. That just follows logically.

Did you.. read.. the post by zompist that that was in response to?

[-]

I don't see any posts from Zomp in this thread that it would have made sense as a response to, and now the post I was responding to seems to've vanished. That's cool, whatevs.

[Xephyr]

I don't see any posts from Zomp in this thread that it would have made sense as a response to, and now the post I was responding to seems to've vanished. That's cool, whatevs.

Then let me explain. It looks like your post was sarcastically suggesting that giving a people Islam is equivalent to giving them all the wonderful things in the world.. the sarcasm indicating that you don't think that's the case. I don't either. I'm vehemently anti-religious, people tell me. But I was referring to a hypothetical conlanger for whom "a belief system... is reality, and conforming a world to it is realism" and who "worr[es] about [their] character's relationship to God just as [they] worry about their way of life and their conflicts". And the point of my post was that for a conlanger, giving your conpeople all the merriments possible in life-- be it justice or salvation-- is bad if it includes a sacrifice of realism.

[So Haleza Grise]

if it includes a sacrifice of realism.

Zompist is (or was) a bit unconventional in that his conworlds are biased towards realism. Most conworlds at least contain some element of counter-factual thought experiment, and many more are projections of various philosophical/ideological concerns into another realm.