Sandboxing Prompts

[pedromvilar]

Oh, yeah, I saw that tumblr post when Alicorn posted it and thought it was nice but then was busy. And then Curious convinced me to read Effulgence in January and here I am.

Soooo it is all my fault now? :3

Of course it is.

[Bluelantern]

Not sure if it has been suggested before:

The annie x stalas thread provides a new and interesting possibility for interdimensional travel, portalsnake style.

It doesn't even need to include Annie at all, Touched-1 with a desirable power set is touched by the relevant artifact and transported to another world, there they touch Touched-2 to send them to a third world. This way we can have any two characters meet. And unpowered characters can get powers (or drawbacks) as needed.

Soooo it is all my fault now? :3

Of course it is.

bwahahaha.

[DanielH]

I want to see a Thulian Miles learn in Pact. Just to see what they do when they cannot take as their demesne this entire country, or because they will somehow manage it.

[Nemo]

Well, I can say swearing that one oath would be a very bad idea. It's not the kind of thing that can be done literally.

[MaggieoftheOwls]

...Thulian Miles would not be happy with that.

[DanielH]

I think it actually could be taken literally.

[quote]I take as my charge this country and its people, and I swear none shall go hungry that my hand can feed, and none shall be killed that my hand can protect. With this oath I become a thane of Thule, servant to its ruler and friend to its people. May I never forget my duty.]

The first clause is saying that the rest of the oath applies to the country and its inhabitants, and shouldn’t be a problem in itself. The “none shall” clauses do have the “that my hand” qualifier; it seems reasonable to say you cannot feed or protect everybody in the country, and Miles would feed and protect all he could.

The first clause of the second sentence is just plain true, if the oath is said in the right circumstances. The servant and friend clauses seem the only ones that cause a problem: a Miles would not unconditionally serve anybody, especially if they are described by title instead of by being a particular person the Miles trusts, although in practice he usually would serve an emperor Gregor even if he wouldn’t obey all orders. It’s the friend part that has me worried: he cannot know all of the people of Thule on a personal enough level to be their friend.

Finally, the third sentence is not really part of the oath per se and seems fine.

So it seems the oath would only need a slight modification to be literally true, actually.

[Kappa]

Also keep in mind that you're reading a translation. The connotations of "friend" in English don't necessarily apply (and in fact that part of the oath in Thulic is, I think, more clearly meant to express your intent that the people of Thule will be able to come to you for help and that you will not act cruelly toward them or abuse power over them). And I don't know how the longstanding history of that particular oath in Thule would change things.

[Ezra]

If it has longstanding history in Thule, I'd think that the spirits in Thule would know what it means by now, and understand it appropriately.

I'm less cavalier than DanielH about the first sentence. Suppose I have one small food item and ten starving people. Then I'd worry that each of those people is one "my hand can feed", but somebody's going hungry.

[Kappa]

Until you feed the first person, and then you have no food and no more capacity to feed the rest.

[MaggieoftheOwls]

I suppose the oath would prevent you from eating the food item yourself if you're also starving, but that wouldn't be a very Miles thing to do anyway.