User talk:Vellos/Standard Oaths

These are some oaths I came up with after reviewing some available primary source material. They are, in my opinion, both too long and too vague. They need to be shorter and more precise, but they need to still leave wiggle-room, and still sound medieval, and still be a real OATH. Criticism welcome. Vellos 18:32, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

I don't think these are too long or too vague. In fact, I welcome vagueness for these. The more opportinities there are for misunderstanding, the better it is. vonGenf 20:11, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

I think some degree of wiggle room is good, but I don't know that we necessarily want to be vague. These oaths do not match game function very clearly; so that their relation to ANY function is, I think, limited. They need to be BM-ized. I figured the length would be an issue because we want the system to be simple. Vellos 23:48, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Erm... I only object to the use of the word God in those oaths. BM has lots of religions, and unless the user is going to manually input his personal god's name there, it shouldn't be there. Not for the standardized oaths anyway. Unless we can change the reference to God to maybe a reference to the vassal's personal beliefs? - Ta|i 02:45, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

I was thinking about that. I included God because theology is a necessity: feudalism implies a certain degree of personalism, and therefore personal beliefs. You don't swear an oath without invoking higher powers. Now, in my proposal, all oaths will be customizable: you could delete all this text and make your oath, "I swear to throw turnips at my lord, as long as he will eat a snake," provided you both agree to it. So this would, I should emphasize, not be entirely set. However, you do raise a good point: this oath only works for essentially monotheistic (or pseudo-monotheist) religions. For polytheist, pantheist, or pseudo-theistic religions, these formats don't work. However, we MUST include the theological in the standard oaths. So the question is: how can we write a standard baseline oath which can fit most/all BM religions? Obviously it won't be theologically specific, but it has to be theological. Vellos 03:37, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

"God" could easily replaced by "$HIGHERPOWER". This easily fits for polytheist religions ( In the sight of the Aenils, Under the gaze of the Stars, etc.), but it could also be replaced by "I swear in the name of our King" or "I swear on the lands of my mother" or something else entirely. But I do agree that you should swear by something. vonGenf 20:08, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

"I swear by the Keplerville prize turnip of 1168..." --Aerywyn 04:02, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

It could be replaced by "$HIGHERPOWER"... except the whole point of these oaths was that it wouldn't have to be typed. They're fully automatic. I know of no way to automate the higher power; unless you want it to be a string to plug in your religion: "I swear by Qyrvaggism," I swear by the "Magna Aenilia Ecclesia," etc, etc. For nobles with no religion... heck I'd like to prohibit the non-religious from receiving oaths. But I know that'll be unpopular, so the non-religious could just have "God." However, VonGenf, it will NOT work to swear by our king, or by a mother. It must be something higher, something abstracted, something without family or state ties. Those ties are within the context of oaths, and so the object of swearing must be exogenous to the system of oath-taking entirely: exogenous to "the world" as our feudal characters know it. Therefore, God ("higher power"). Vellos 14:52, 11 June 2010 (UTC)