Religion

AC Feedback and Suggestions
149

We certainly aren’t familiar with the same version of the Bible ^^’ Are you talking about the very real events that inspired the writing of the Binding of Isaac passage?

I am looking at the story of the sacrifice of Isaac (or Esau in Moslem tradition) from the point of view of a religious historian and not a theologist, even though that places me with the opposite hat.

Ok, so straight up. I am a Christian, and do believe in a supernatural God, but I am looking at the story with more neutral eyes.

in these times blood sacrifice as a major part of the religious politics, sacrificing family members meant that you were a hardcore bloke, unafraid to make sacrifices (literally) and make a personal price of burdens. This made you worth following. In a metaculture that honours such sacrifices not doing them would have political consequences. If you didn’t sacrifice a family member at need to the gods, you were a half hearted weak leader, unworthy of following and most likely despised by the gods too.

The Abraham and Isaac story make sense, the God of Israel doesn’t demand human sacrifice, and the story is a work around. You can take it as a God-miracle or as a piece of political spin, it works either way.

In my opinion, you’re taking literary sources too literally.

I totally disagree. These stories would be believed and were relevant to the times. Human sacrifice was not a feature of Hellenistic Greece, but is mentioned from earlier stories, I personally things this helps authenticate them. Agamemnon or the person who resembles the character lived shortly before the Bronze Age Collapse.
Right timeline for this type of behaviour.

Atheism simply means that you do not believe sufficient evidence has been presented for the existence of a deity. The belief that there is, affirmatively, no deity, is anti theism, which is actually more illogical then theism.

In theory maybe, maybe this is how you see it. However in practice atheism has a strong religiosity to it. All too often the same people platform it was a lack of belief not a belief in lack, but then get triggered when facing the religious.
Yes atheism can be strong agnosticism, but it is far more common for atheists to be strongly anti-religious to that extent that there is no difference between their position and that of a hardcore religious fundamentalist.
Richard Dawkins is good example of a religious fanatic who differs from most other religious fanatics only in that he believes that number of gods = 0.
This can visibly occur with atheism as ‘state religion’, most forms of Communism come to mind here.

I do not place the atheism of this game in that category though. The devs are making a pure historical sim and are leaving out unknown factors. I can respect that decision.

I still would like a supernatural mythic version of this game with heroes and active pantheons, but I think that should be late addition DLC or mod.

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150

Yes, they were believed, and yes they were extremely relevant. Origin myths explain the foundation of civilizations and they were believed to be true. But they were primarily concieved to justify moral decisions, laws, traditions, religious practices, not to talk of the modification of real events into legends, epics and religious texts to strenghthen the sense of belonging into a nation/religion/group.

Mmmh… Not really for the Atlantic Coast nor the Neolithic, not for mythical tales as the greek, or one of the Religions of The Book. However, concerning the island of Ireland and and kind of fitting the late Neolithic-Bronze Age there could be Cú Chulainn’s story, explaining the origin of Celtic Ireland, although this particular hero shows similarities with other indo-european heroes, such as the persian Rostan, or Herakles. This also suggests myths can be originated in languages and oral tradition rather than real facts. The earliest texts on irish mythology can be dated back to the middle ages, and not further.

It is a pretty solid idea, although I think it won’t come out as a DLC; it is not what AC aims for. Still, I’d be very interested in a mod that would bring a modern interpretation of origin myths (also meaning making sense of “godly interventions” and make them believable :wink: ) !

151

Exciting discussion, many good arguments from all.
I think too

The topic is just too complex.
There is the faith of every single member of society. Then the religion. Then the impact of religion on society, both internally and externally. Does religion play the same role for each individual? Is the people a sect or a community? Example “curse” - one is depressed, the other laughs and curses back. I think a “divine power” that controls everything we can exclude, so a human sacrifice will only benefit or harm the spectators. It will not affect the course of the sun, the harvest or the weather. But the interpretation of an “enlightened one” must be believed - or not. That’s just how religion works.
In our time, we have more knowledge, which automatically makes us atheists - from a Neolithic point of view. But that’s where the core of the problem of playability lies. Or better, the understanding of requirements for authenticity. Guess, this is very individual and can only be presented as an option or DLC.

And we should not forget that religion has been hampering development and progress for hundreds of years. Using the example of the decay of the Roman Empire, we see how the introduction of a state religion was directed towards tolerance and progress. Result was “the dark Middle Ages”

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Tolerance had nothing to do with it even then.
Religion of itself is usually harmless, it is the political ends to which it is put.

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153

Not to beat a dead horse, but finally just read the other responses that have happened since I last checked.

All I’m saying is, seek and ye shall find. If you seek proof there is no god, you’ll find things that support that. If you seek proof there is a god (or gods) you’ll find it. I believe in Christ. I could list off so many personal proofs and miracles that prove to me God is there but in the end it’s up to the individual to choose.

I would just appreciate that those of all faiths (including atheism, agnosticism, or anti-theism (because all those beliefs are exactly that—beliefs— belief whether there is higher power or not. None of us having any unquestionable proof for or against)) would avoid swinging blows at the Catholic Church (I’m not even catholic) or state religion or organized religion or atheism etc basically just don’t take shots at other people’s spiritual beliefs

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154

On the subject of religion, would it be possible for communities to start believing in one of their own ancestors?
Take Telos in Skyrim for example, a man that did a heroic deed that the people started to worship.

So for the game let’s say an enemy civilization decides to attack you with a massive army and you have a warrior that defended your village and then passed away, your warriors start to invoke his name before going into battle and as the heroic deeds of him travels through the decendants it becomes sort of like a deity for your civilization.

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There are others who practice child sacrifice, in the ancient Hebrew era. I just wonder if this is just opening the Pandora’s box and like the game that had school shooter that human or more specifically child sacrifice is some how wrong. Just thinking out loud and pondering to deep.

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Trouble is badbear, some decisions on inclusion are up to the artistic choices of the developers and the focus of the game.
Some however are limited by hard regulation.

Child sacrifice MUST be airbrushed out, regardless of our wishes for or against, and regardless of historicity. Computer games and simulations are forbidden under US, EU and Australian law (and likely others) from permitting a player to make a choice to kill children. Now children can die, but only off screen and as a result of a general massed killing. So if a village is destroyed the children may be considered dead too, there is no need for a game to include children surviving and running away. But that is as far as it goes.

Uncasual doesn’t have a choice in the matter, there will be no child sacrifices. Were this to be ignored and child sacrifice included the game will not pass minimum requirements for sale and will be forcably withdrawn until Uncasual complies with restricted content legislation.

Uncasual may include adult human sacrifice or animal sacrifice with fewer legal limitations. Gruesome detail may invoke a higher classification for release, but unlikely will exheed that. Historicity allows some leeway but not much. .

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157

I still think that a good way to deal with child death, for example during a raid, is to have the children run off into the woods and disappear proportionate to the population. That way we don’t know what happens to them and we don’t see anything bad, but we end up with the same effect.

As for sacrifice, I honestly am not sure how prevalent child sacrifice would be in the Neolithic. I can’t say much for later periods, but children were of extreme importance in the Neolithic. We see this in much of their artwork. I can’t deny the possibility of it occurring, but I don’t see much evidence for it and it seems counter to there entire belief system, what little we can discern of it.

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There is some evidence for adult sacrifice, and there are definitely occurrences of children in mass graves, though these children were probably the result of a massacre. In that situation, my first paragraph would apply.

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158

One way to obfuscate child deaths is for the game to include a forced transition sequence taking children out of focus, then removing them. It can be handled this way.

You are playing the game when someone cries out “Oh no, raiders!”
The computer takes control of your point of view and shows the raiders arriving from off screen. When point of view control is returned to the player you will see the community preparing or panicking etc but no children are rendered. They are assumed to be indoors or hiding or otherwise gone. Play continues as normal as you defend your settlement or run from the raiders, with a ‘children missing’ value allocated depending on performance.

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That is certainly another valid way to handle it. These methods can be used to provide the realism that is implicit in such a game as ancient cities, while meeting ESRB ratings and preventing a major stink.

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That is a cool idea.

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161

The above example is scalable for any disaster in which human control is a factor. So a warning of incoming raiders could be replaced by a focus shift to see a tsunami, or fire. Thus in any case where player interaction is a factor children are removed from play and their fate is tied to general performance.
Completely arbitrary events such as plagues or famine can include child deaths, but choices to include or exclude children from medical care prioritising are removed from the player. As for child deaths, they still must occur offscreen, however children who are sick can be assumed to be in huts, caves or buildings (this must be regardless of availability of actual cover) so the law is obeyed and on screen child deaths are not depicted. If it means there is always a tent or lean to for sick or dying children then that will have to be.

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162

I believe we must be guided by the principle that everything that happened historically, or plausibly could, or even should, have happened historically, should be possible in game, regardless whether or not it was “rare”, “common”, “unheard of”, or anything else. The player must be able to create a “standard” neolithic tribe, based on our knowledge of history, but also a “non-standard” tribe. And considering how many thousands of years the neolithic era lasted, and how many thousands, even millions of tribes went through it, there are quite a lot of different religious behaviours…

It seems most of us agree around the following points:

  1. Religion should exist in the game.

  2. Religion should not have a supernatural effect, like @Elfryc wrote:

However, as @Gal2 and @lotus253, among others, write:

  1. The religiosity of our tribe members should be based on what they see, hear, imagine, fear, love, and remember (until such time as writing appears and makes stuff more complicated). It could be objects (the sun, the moon, the clouds, a volcano, the mountains, a river, a lake, a well, etc), wildlife (wolfs, bears, lions, birds, fish, moles, you name it), concepts (sun rise, sun set, night, day, lightning, floods, spirits, ghosts, birth, death, ovulation), and ancestors (the legendary founder of our tribe or clan, maybe a hero, a great mother, a great warrior, like @Shadows1381suggests). Or nothing.

  2. The religion of our tribe should be more or less organised, more or less structured, more or less enforced, depending on the development and qualities of the tribe itself. Maybe a strict, rigid, hierarchic, “centralised” tribe creates a demand on all members to worship the same crocodile god, as the tribe shaman directs? Or maybe every member worships his own group of spirits, forces, animals and celestial bodies?

  3. The religion should be both a private and collective concern, depending, again, on the tribe itself, and how it is organised and functions. If everyone lives practically the same way, and spends the days the same way, they may be more open to celebrating and worshipping together… or not. If they’re very specialised and keep away from each other a lot of time, then maybe they will worship and celebrate apart? Maybe they all worship the same forces and entities, but with an individual focus? The pregnant women pray to the divine entity of birth and life, while the young males dance the ritual dance of the hunt?

  4. There should be a great deal of small, almost insignificant rituals, traditions, and religious and or cultural expression, throughout the daily lives of our tribesmen, like a quick silent prayer, or falling down on one’s knees, or kissing the ground, or raising up ones arms and looking upon the sky, or spilling water on the ground, or (as in Homer) pouring out some wine as an offering to the gods before drinking, or the likes. The rituals and behaviours can be prompted by daily events (rising of the sun, setting of the sun, midday), or by performing certain actions (going out on a hunt, sowing new crops, crossing a river, coming home, and so forth… the possibilities are endless, as @lotus253 would energetically tell you.

  5. It therefore makes sense that the passage of greater occasions should be more solemnly celebrated, like the passing of the full moon, or the solstices, the birth of a child, especially a first one, or the death of an elder, or the coming of the first season rains, or the passage of a comet, or a rite of passage of a tribe member’s life. Already when the game begins, our tribe members should have some concept of this, some thought of how to do it, memories of past occasions and so forth. The player should be able to change this, especially over time, and “push” the tribe towards a something else. I suggest, as oft-times before, the use of events, triggered by both the thoughts, wishes, and knowledge of the tribe members, and by the environment and the specific occasion. Maybe a few sliders? @lotus253 has some good suggestions in this.

  6. Just like the level of development and organisation of your tribe decides how religion functions collectively and even individually, and how the knowledge of your tribe (and it’s members) decide a lot about how the members view religion, so should also the knowledge, or technology of the tribe, decide what can be made practically. If the tribe members have discovered the art of metallurgy, and know that native gold can be fashioned into objects, then maybe someone is more prone to suggest making a golden sickle, and burying it in the local field, as an offering to the earth spirits? Or if a tribe member has inadvertently stumbled upon the discovery of how heavy stone blocks can be transported with the helps of ropes and wooden logs… maybe the same tribe member might suggest building a megalithic structure…? This connects to the discussions on technology and knowledge.

  7. There should be a possibility, however small, and however discreet, for problematic concepts like human sacrifices and even cannibalism (of a religious kind). As pointed out by several persons, this can be a big problems both for some players and for the game’s rating and even reputation. There is however no reason why these concepts should be openly shown or even mentioned. In one case, the game might simply show an event saying “Ugga-Bugga, 17, has passed away”. Whether or not Ugga-Bugga died of starvation, or was sacrificed by his starving tribe members to the gods of food, is left to the player’s imagination. Another option is to do make it slightly more open, but still euphemistic: “Ugga-Bugga, 24, has given his life to [the gods]/[the god X]”. Regardless, it seems most players, and potential players, would agree that taking away the ability to sacrifice at all (be it wine, food, gold, or a pair of turtle doves), would take away a lot of the historical realism of the game.

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163

The way I see it, if we start the game from the dawn of civilisation then players should be able to place the founding stones however they choose dependent on the available technology and likely thinking.

There is bugbear with this, our player driven root up societies may progress not to resemble any historically evident culture. Some might argue this makes the game ahistorical but I do not.

Players may develop a society with a dominant matriarchy. Primitive tribal cultures on these lines do exist. However player choice could then maintain that during the technological curve and create an ahistorical but systemically and logically founded Amazon society.
Player choice could lead to lobsided technological development, early literacy or even democracy, because democracy also does exist in some primitive tribes and thus could be a foundational tenet of a society. Monotheism is also an advance that could be seminal in a people group.

This could head in any direction and religion is the key, religion will be based on immediate observables, but with players able to choose how these observables are interpreted and in establishing a heirarchy of importance will shape the thinking of the society.

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164

This is one subject that does not die. :slight_smile:

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Sorry, I’m late to the party.

From the article - I’d wager that the two main reasons they don’t have religion is the “no coercion rule”, as (forced) evangelism is an important component of any major religion that wants to last more than a few generations in any recognizable form, and the fact that they seem to have no war against superior opponents, thus making their culture seem complete (Asian cultures were similar, until the West showed up with warships and threatened to use them).

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How do you mean Asian cultures were similar to the Pirahã until the arrival of the West in terms of religion? Zoroastrianism dominated much of the Middle East until the arrival of Islam, Hinduism maintains a powerful presence across Indian society as was for thousands of years, even China and Japan have folk Religions that predate Buddhism.

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The Middle East and Indians may be on the Asian continent, but they are not usually considered Asian.

I meant they were similar as far as seeing their culture as “complete”; they are not similar in terms of religion as the Pirahã don’t have any.

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i would like to see kind of random religions where the player has a bit controll over, that u just doing a thing and ur villagers just do random shit 1 day.