Thema: [Eberron]Keith Baker über die Silver Flame

[Taraxacum]

Ich glaube eher Keith Baker hat den Grundgedanken der CotSF von der realen katholischen Kirche. Was diese sich in ihrer Existenz schon geleistet hat... doch keiner würde sie mit Nazis vergleichen. Entschuldigt bitte diese Anmaßung.

Leider empfinde ich, dass die meisten GM unter die ich in Eberron spielen durfte, die Silberflamme als eine böse Glaubensrichtung, ...nein, nennen wir es lieber falsch ausgelegte Glaubenslehre interpretieren. Doch die Wahrheit scheint eher der Realität und dem Katholizismus zu ähneln.

Was Keith hier versucht hat zu glätten war, dass die Menschen in Eberron nur menschlich sind und natürlich auch voreingenommen, aber der Glaube der Silberflamme ist etwas Gutes, auch seine Doktrinen und dies deutlich in Eberron anerkannt, obwohl die Wege etwas unnachgiebig sind.

Ich muss gestehen, lange Zeit habe ich die Silberflamme auch als fehlgeleitet angesehen, aber dieser Statement hat mir mehr zu denken gegeben. Erneut zeigt Keith seine Vorliebe für die Graue Welt und es tut mir besonders leid dass ich es nicht als Solches gesehen habe.

[Wormys_Queue]

Keith Baker hat  nochmal nachgelegt und gibt einige nur auf den ersten Blick überraschende Erklärung für das Design der "Purge":

In our continuing discussions of the Church of the Silver Flame, the subject of the Lycanthropic Purge has come up. One poster says:

On reflection, I think one of the main things that make many people think of the Flame as intolerant and corrupt is the Purge. As described in the ECS, it was pretty much unwarranted genocide.

I just wanted to speak to this point, because it's valid. In the ECS, what were we trying to do with the Lycanthropic Purge? Did it come across as we intended?

First off, when we were developing the setting, it was still 3E D&D. At that time, all lycanthropes were capable of spreading the curse of lycanthropy. It wasn't until well after the release of the setting that someone pointed out that in 3.5, afflicted lycanthropes DON'T spread the curse, at which point we all slapped our foreheads. The point all along was that lycanthropy was a dangerous, contagious infection. It was most likely to be spread by evil lycanthropes, because they are the ones who take pleasure in attacking other creatures. Even being infected by a good lycanthrope will completely alter your personality and tear you away from your previous life; there's a reason the MM calls it "the curse of lycanthropy" even when it's being spread by good lycanthropes. But evil-aligned lycanthropy is, in my mind, a truly terrifying thing. Before the curse truly takes hold, "evil aligned lycanthropes seek to murder as many intelligent beings as possible, often killing their own family members and friends." Once the curse takes hold, "an evil lycanthrope who is aware of his actions is not compelled to muder indiscriminately, but delights in bloodshed and will certainly seek out opportunities to slaughter intelligent beings, preferably of his own race." (both quotes from page 178 of the 3.5 MM.) In my eyes, the evil lycanthrope isn't a natural beast; natural wolves aren't driven to such excesses of murder. Instead, he embodies our FEARS of nature - the primal terror of the beast that lurks in the dark.

This comes back to my previous point. Supernatural evil is a very real threat in Eberron. it's easy for us to feel sympathy for the werewolf when we don't have to worry about him killing us in the middle of the night. But look at the game Are You A Werewolf? (or Werewolves of Miller's Hollow). When playing that game, does anyone ever say "We should just leave the poor werewolf alone"? No, because the werewolf is murdering someone every night. When we hear the words "witch-hunt", we usually think of an unjustified inquest against innocents... but it takes on an entirely different meaning if there really are witches out there killing people!

That was the point of the Lycanthropic Purge: to say that there was a very real and deadly supernatural threat - a curse that at best would ruin someone's life, and at worst turn him into a bloodthirsty killer - and that the Church took action to stamp it out. It was always intended that their actions should be seen as harsh and as having tragic consequences for both shifters and good lycanthropes. As noted on page 230 of the ECS, the crusade was driven by the followers of the Pure Flame, the small group within the church who lean towards overzealous action. But it was still supposed to be an effort to protect innocents from harm; one that simply had tragic consequences for another group of innocents, the shifters. Even there, the idea always was that this persecution was encouraged by the lycanthropes themselves, who after all "reveled in bloodshed", including that of their own kind. Furthermore, as page 171 of the ECS notes, the Church now realizes that the actions taken against the shifters WERE unjustified and now seeks to prevent further violence and persecution of shifters.

So a MAJOR issue is that the ECS was written under the assumption that afflicted lycanthropes are infectious. The Dragonshard stating that "they became infectious" is essentially an effort to match the original intention of the event with the change in the 3.5 rules. Hence the idea that all lycanthropes were infectious WHEN THE PURGE OCCURRED - because they WERE infectious when we as designers came up with the idea OF the purge.

In any case, the Purge was always supposed to be a sign of how good intentions can go wrong, and the final days of the Purge WERE supposed to be a sign of how justice can turn into a hunt for vengeance. But it was always supposed to be the case that the purge BEGAN as a noble endeavor. But the poster above says that the ECS presentation describes it as "unwarranted genocide", and the primary thing that makes the Church look intolerant and corrupt. So I wanted to take a closer look at exactly what the ECS says about it, and the church in general.

Page 67-68 (Main description of the religion): Nothing about the purge, beyond the fact that the church "is dedicated to protecting the common people against supernatural forces of evil." Not only is there nothing about the Purge, there's nothing about corruption within the church. If one takes this as the simplest, most fundamental description of the faith, it's just an LG religion dedicated to fighting supernatural evil.

Page 77 echoes this: "The Church of the Silver Flame is dedicated to fighting supernatural forces of evil across Khorvaire... most exorcists of the Silver Flame are... on the front lines of the war against evil."

Page 170-171, in describing the Eldeen Reaches, states "Hunters and warriors devoted to the Silver Flame came to battle evil magical beasts, eventually driving the more dangerous creatures into the deep woods." Again, a purely positive depiction. Continuing on, it does specifically state that shifters have suffered persecution at the hands of the Silver Flame, but that in recent years the church has withdrawn from this position and doesn't consider the shifters to be spawn of evil.

The description of Thrane doesn't even mention the Purge.

Page 225 says "The inquisition to wipe out lycanthropes is launched by the church of the Silver Flame. It lasts fifty years and drives the species almost to extinction." Here, clearly we're dealing with a few loaded words - "inquisition" and "extinction". Again, to me, our original intention could have been described along the lines of "The CDC begins an aggressive campaign to wipe out smallpox. It takes fifty years and almost completely eliminates the disease." In writing this section, we were working with the assumption that lycanthropy was an infectious curse which at best changes your personality and drives you away from civilization, and at worst turns you into a killer. Again, it was always intended to be an act that was extremely harsh - but it was still intended to be an act taken to deal with a very real threat. If they killed instead of curing, it was because curing lycanthropy is a very difficult task (either requiring a 12th-level cleric within a set time limit, or a lower-level cleric and a DC 20 Will check - which the afflicted character can always choose to have fail!) and every day innocent people were dying or being afflicted. It may have ended as a stereotypical witch hunt, but in the begining there were real, deadly "witches" killing people.

Finally, we get the description of the Church of the Silver Flame on page 229-230. It says the following:
"The priests and paladins of the Silver Flame have battled the forces of darkness for hundreds of years... Its followers are engaged in a never-ending struggle against the forces of evil. They have fought demons, hunted lycanthropes almost to extinction, and battled all manner of monsters..."

Purely taking that statement, does it sound like battling lycanthropes is supposed to be a bad thing? We've lumped them with demons and "monsters". As I said, the big thing here is that we, the writers, didn't realize the vast sympathy many people have for lycanthropes. Again, I see the D&D werewolf as a terrifying creature embodying our fear of the predator - a creature who "delights in bloodshed" and may murder his own family and friends. By and large, this wasn't supposed to BE an evil act; it was supposed to be an attempt to defend the innocent from supernatural evil.

With that said, it WAS supposed to be an action that was flawed in its execution, because it did result in the death of good lycanthropes, and the persecution of innocent shifters (though as I said, in part that was supposed to be encouraged by the lycanthropes themselves; it was absolutely to their interests to have the church fighting innocents and being distracted from the true foe, and THEY had no love of shifters - remember, they enjoy murdering their own kind). This was supposed to be driven by the overzealous and intolerant MINORITY in the church, as spelled out on page 230. "A SMALL portion of the faithful believe in the Pure Flame.... in the past, the Puritans helped initiate the inquisition against lycanthropes and inspired crusades of all types." Likewise, you have the central idea of Are You A Werewolf - that in their panic and quest for vengeance, the people who have suffered at the hands of these creatures will themselves kill innocents. Again, I consider the stronghold of the Pure Flame to be IN Aundair, where the people have suffered supernatural terrors and see the Silver Flame as a weapon.

In conclusion, I'm just saying that the material in the dragonshards and later books reflects the view I always had of the Purge; I simply didn't realized that we needed to spell it out so clearly (and the rules change threw everything off). It was supposed to be a harsh solution to a problem that sacrificed a certain number of innocents in the interests of saving many, many, more. The modern church considers the persecution of innocent shifters to be a mistake and a tragedy, but at the time, it was driven by the very real threat of the lycanthropes hidden within their communities - lycanthropes that enjoyed preying on shifters as much as humans. In a world where good and evil aren't always clear-cut, the evil lycanthrope was something I always considered to be VERY clear-cut... because it's an unnatural and extreme variation of the alignment forced on the victim by a magical curse. It was never supposed to be "unwarranted genocide", any more than the statement "They have fought demons, hunted lycanthropes almost to extinction, and battled all manner of monsters..." is supposed to make you say "Awww... poor widdle demons." It was supposed to be a virtuous act that simply went too far, and which, because of human failings, became a quest for vengeance that harmed innocent shifters and good lycanthropes when it was originally a quest to destroy true monsters.

So, it was always supposed to be a FLAWED action, an action that had tragic consequences. But like the Church itself, overall it was supposed to have been a noble act DESPITE the flaws and tragedy. Again, shades of gray - not perfect justice, but an attempt to deal with a terrifying threat that sadly fell prey to human imperfection, mob mentality, and the thirst for vengeance once the threat was effectively contained. So next time you play Are You A Werewolf?, think of Aundair and the Silver Flame.

Quelle

[Wormys_Queue]

und den hier schieb ich noch schnell nach, da hier etwas über den Vergleich der Silver Flame zur katholischen Kirche gesagt wird:

There's been a lively discussion in response to my last post regarding the Church of the Silver Flame and the other religions of Eberron. I've been responding to individual comments, but the last comment that's come up is one which I felt deserved to be the subject of a new post.

Edhel writes: "Keith, you _really_ need to check your info on Mother Teresa. She's the 'good PR but rotten to the core/deluded fool' type that IMO the Silver Flame / Catholic church / any authoritarian institution so easily protects. To me, the SF has always resembled Catholic church. One authority and lots of gullible people to take advantage of..."

This isn't the first time I've seen people make this sort of comparison. In comparison to the loosely organized pantheistic Sovereign Host, the Church of the Silver Flame is an institution with clear hierarchy, strong established doctrine, and a history both of military action and well-intentioned actions that have occasionally had terrible consequences... and for that matter, a history of supporting charitable works across Khorvaire.

But at the end of the day, in my opinion, the Church of the Silver Flame has more in common with the Jedi Order of Star Wars than any religion of our world. It is not the Catholic Church nor any other religion of Earth, and people should consider the following things before jumping to this conclusion.

1. The unquestioned presence of supernatural evil. Check your ECS: the core principle of the Church of the Silver Flame, above everything else, is to protect the innocent from supernatural evil. You could argue that any religion in our world may be seen as serving the same purpose; but it means something very different in Eberron. We're talking about a world where the dead DO walk. Where anyone you speak to could be an ancient rakshasa plotting your destruction. A world where the Dreaming Dark manipulates your sleeping mind, and where the daelkyr linger below the ground waiting to rise again. If you are a human living in western Aundair or the eastern Eldeen Reaches, odds are good you have people in your family tree who were killed by werewolves - and again, when the Silver Flame first began the Purge, the typical templar was far outgunned by the typical lycanthrope. The comment above describes the church as a power that takes advantage of "gullible people". But in Eberron, there's no mystery about its mission: when demons break free from Khyber, you'll be glad to have paladins come to your defense. Eberron is not Earth, and people are constantly faced with threats that we only think of as myth and story.

2. The Church was born in such an act of salvation. The modern church of the Silver Flame was born when one of the Overlords of the Age of Demons partially broke free of his bonds and called a host of demons to Thrane. As it was, many innocents were killed - but only a fraction of those who would have fallen if the rajah had fully escaped and stretched his hand over Thrane. Essentially, imagine Cthulhu rising, smashing New York City, and then being defeated by a champion empowered by a force of light - who gave up her life in the process. Would you really be shocked to see many New Yorkers - $^#& that, many Americans - choosing to embrace this force that was responsible for their salvation? That's the core of the Church of the Silver Flame: an act of selfless sacrifice in the face of a terrifying threat. Similar evil must be defeated with similar sacrifice - while human evils such as greed and selfish aggression must be overcome through compassion.

3. Jaela herself is a leader chosen by the Flame. She's not the product of politics, otherwise we'd be looking at Keeper Krozen right about now. I don't think we've had any 11-year-old Popes, though I admit my knowedge of European theology is rusty. We have our corruption among those who are using the church as a way to gain power. But at its heart, the spiritual leader of the church is unquestionably chosen by the force that empowers the church. Whether you believe in the true divinity of the Flame is up to you - but whatever that power is, it chose Jaela. Thus, we can hope that her moderate views represent the true path the faithful should follow.

4. True champions of the Silver Flame risk their lives to defend people of all faiths. Again, the early days of the Lycanthropic Purge weren't a "purge" or a witch trial; they were a bloodbath. Try it yourself - match a 1st-level human warrior up against a werewolf. And the people of Aundair were NOT followers of the Silver Flame (although many admittedly were inspired to adopt the faith due to the selfless actions of the templars, leading to the support you seen in the region today). Far from despising these heathens who followed the Sovereign host, the soldiers of the Silver Flame laid down their lives to protect them. Because the core principle of the Silver Flame is to protect the innocent from supernatural evil. Not "innocent followers of the Silver Flame" - ANY innocents. In Eberron, there IS darkness and light. There are angels and devils. And the Church of the Silver Flame is dedicated to fighting the darkness.

With all of that said, again, the point of Eberron is that even in such a bastion of light you will find darkness - that human nature will always be seen. Just as with the Jedi you have those who do turn to the Dark Side. Nonetheless, I think the Jedi are a good metaphor to use - because like the Jedi, the champions of the Silver Flame are charged to fight forces of evil that we know only from our nightmares.

There's nothing wrong with considering elements of our history and life as touchstones for a game - it's these things that make a game feel real. But just don't forget the things that make it different from our world. The Church of the Silver Flame may have greedy priests who take advantage of their flock (the Sovereign Host certainly does, as seen in some of the novels) or who have joined the priesthood for political reasons as opposed to spiritual ones. But it also has a clear, vital mission. This IS a world threatened by demons and monsters. At any point a rajah could rise, a new incursion come come from Shavarath or Xoriat, a quori could decide to claim your dreams, or a legion of undead could attack your village. And when these things happen, you can hope that Champions of the Flame will be there to save you, as they have been since the couatl first kindled the Flame in the Age of Demons. Yes, the presence of a central authority does create the potential for abuse of that authority (although again, remember: the Keeper is chosen by the Flame). You may find a faithless minister, a greedy cardinal, an intolerant templar, or even a cleric serving the darkness within the Flame. But the followers of the Silver Flame also include people who have chosen to serve the light and take a stand against the darkness - people who recognize the presence of TRUE evil in the world (and again, look to the hierarchy of evil in Faiths of Eberron for a clear definition of how the church sees this) and who are prepared to defend others from it, even if it costs their lives.

So again, I have no problem with people choosing to emphasize the darkness within the Church, or doing their own thing with it. But in looking to the principles behind our original ideas when we created the church in the ECS, it was intended to be a force for good whose followers don't always live up to the incredibly high standards of their faith - not a fundamentally corrupt, flawed institution that does more harm than good.