Howard conflicts with you.
Howard never gave us a solid answer on whether Crom was real or pure superstition on the part of Cimmerians.
Howard himself (in his Hyborian writings), in fact, barely dignified “Gods” as being real. They were often either entities of the Outer Dark, or pure superstition. Misunderstood extraterrestrials were a much more real thing than God’s
If you want only foundational documents, you don’t have the lore of a hundred years. You have hundred year old lore.
Noting only Howard and explicitly excluding anything de Camp edited or finished means the only works you can consider are The Hour of the Dragon and the short stories in Weird Tales. Many of the compilations were post party edited by de Camp.
If this talk of Crom is giving you such a fit, this one can only imagine what the fusion of Derketo and Derketa, and then shoehorning her into the Lemurians, must be doing to your insides.
That’s one positive (out of a very few), I have internet connection that only allows a couple webpages, but this forum is somehow survived the restrictions, so I mainly reply to topics when I’m working.
… To primitive people, yeah, an advanced species, with powers like that, is a god. I don’t see what you are arguing here other than semantics, that has nothing, nothing at all to do with the idea of if Crom would provide any benefit to his followers. Also, you’re talking about the pseudo history he wrote for the Hyborian Age? Really? That is your argument? That he, in a document meant to cover the evolving and migration of the human cultures through the period somehow what? Because it doesn’t specifically go into the deities somehow invalidates them? That and given some of the events in the stories with regard to priest of Mitra, and Set, you’re going to say the reality of divine powers in the Hyborean stories is somehow in doubt. Re-read them, really.
According to you. Anyone else here who has read the lore, and isn’t invested in the ‘Crom gives stuff to make things fair’ business would say otherwise. Stop trying to torture words and the lore to support a position which it clearly, clearly by any honest reading does not.
Yeap, that is sort of what happens with most intellectual properties, especially ones where the author had very clear ideas he wanted to explore. REH finished on Red Nails, and it along with the rest of his stories in Conan’s time are very coherent. Also, notice how the subject of just taking a dead person’s intellectual property to just use like a stepping stool to publish more pulp was ignored.
No fits here. And how so? I read the Hyborian Age, where it covers the migrations, and Intergrations of peoples across the land. Also, I think it is safe to infer that the Derketa aspect is either an editorial oversite misspelling, or more likely just a regional to Shem variation. Since it is just seen in Red Nails, not really bothered with it at all. And what sort of point would it even make anyhow?
This one apologies.
This one has taken your arguments as potentially serious and perhaps even in good faith, but now see that was foolish.
Your vapid claims that “No one is taking a subjective stance, or ‘spiritual’ introspection to what Crom represents in the Hyborian Age. Gods, demons, spirits, etc, are objective realities in the setting.” and that Howard is the only canon are in complete contradiction.
Howard’s divinities are subjective almost entirely.
But this one must applaud the durability of your troll job, as internally inconsistent as it was.
Ok first thing is first. Welcome back @DethosThePict, it has been a while in between discussions. I look forward to debating the lore with you again. But first.
If you wish to argue in opposition that is absolutely fine with me. You are entitled to your own viewpoint and I openly encourage it. And heck, I will happilly debate you with passion until we both turn blue in the face. However that does not mean it is accepatable for you to insult other members or be derogatory towards them. For one it is a violation of the forums Community Guidelines. In addition, there are enough abusive and toxic trolls on the forum now as it is. It would be amazing if we could keep this thread free from the same same abusive rhetoric, as it has been for years now. And feel that we all as sophistocated adults, can discuss and issue openly and remain civil and objective throughout the course of it. For ALL members; please treat other posters in the same manner you would like to be treated yourself.
That is odd, as I have not argued that ‘Crom should do more’, nor for that matter that he should to anything at all. And I have made that abundantly clear throughout the thread. Please refer to Post no.7:
Please refrain from putting words into my mouth. So either you did not read the post before replying, failed to comprehend it or you are deliberately misrepresenting what I have said, and that is called a Strawman.
No, I know and am accepting the lore and have been actively citing it throughout the thread as it progresses…ALL of the lore. Go ahead and see for yourself. You on the other hand are making a conceited decision to view the issue from a puritanical standpoint and dismiss the works all authors aside from one because you personally do not approve of the inclusion of their contributions, ie- Expanded Universe lore. And I hate to break it to you, but Conan Exiles utilises lore from Robert E Howard’s work and from the Expanded Universe, and Funcom has made it quite clear that Conan Exiles utilises all sources as lore. This was also stated much earlier too, but I cannot seem to unearth the relevant post.
The reverse apllies to you. If you are incapable of accepting that Conan Exiles draws on the works of a diverse range of literary and media sources, and want a experience that is purely Howard’s alone, then go and read the books, or establish a roleaying server. However, do not push your own false consensus affect and insist that others collectively dismiss the works generated by countless creative and talented individuals and demand that other people should have play and experience the game in accordance to your own personal beliefs. Oh and nice Appeal to Emotion fallacy there with the “lore of the century” hyperbole.
No, I am affraid not, but rather simple syllogistic reasoning. Supported by lore at that. And here stands another blinding inconsitency and self-contradicting false narrative promulgated by purists; you seem to feel that you can claim it both ways.
You then in your own words go on to suggest that you would accept a certain iteration of Crom having features:
In one breath you are saying that Crom does not care what men do, as he is a distant and uncarring god who does not concern himself with the affairs of men, then in the next breath you purport that attempts to venerate him or display ones allegiance to him will be met with the destruction of the individual. Sorry DethosThePict but you can’t claim it both ways. Two distinct possibilities exist here, and both are congruent with what has been proposed. Either Crom 1) couldn’t care less if I built object as a display of allegiance to him (ie-distant uncarring god), or 2) he would be resentful and attempt to destroy the offending artifacts or individuals, such as via Crom purge or imbuing negative effects upon artifact (ie-sends doom and curses). Whichever way you would like to spin it, either would work a from a mechanics perspective on one hand, and remain in congruent with the lore on the other. Again, there is ample lore to support adding further in-game artifacts. The crux of your own argument is derived from a point of personal preference, and decision to ignore that lore.
Ahh the old Slippery Slope fallacy. I seem to be assembling a nice little bingo card here. Of course what you are offering here is little more than a false equivalency infused with rampant catastrophising. It is tantamount to arguing that if we accept as Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power series as LotR lore it will result in adding My Little Pony into it. It is the same weak argument as saying that all Star Wars material not written by George Lucas and that all Marvel material not written by Stan Lee does not count as lore. Sorry to say but it does. Its just another take on the ‘No True Scottsman’ fallacy. If you want to tell yourself in your own mind that it does not exist and is not part of the Conan world that is your own business. But the bald faced fact is that it does exist in the Conan world, and therefore certainly does count. Period. You are simply interpreting things from a very biased viewpoint, the purist one.
Viewing things from this narrow standpoint is a decision for the individual and again, a personal choice, NOT an obligation for the masses or the entire fanbase. And it is acutely obvious from the numbers of support on thread that the playerbase want to have options.
And no, polemics and sophistry like usual every time this topic has gotten the necro treatment via you.
You can’t accept that Crom gives nothing. You can’t accept that there is a god in game that gives no mechanical advantage. You also cannot accept that the god also gives a hinderance with not being able to complete the journey steps. And you want a change to the game that goes against the lore.
And I’ll say no, and continue to say no. Because no amount of word torture, misleading (which yes, you are), or the like will change that. As one reply a few years ago in this thread laid it out,
From a universe standpoint, I know nothing. I haven’t read any of the books, comics, etc. Heck, I haven’t even seen the movies. Conan exiles is my only real glimpse into the sweaty loincloth of Conan the Barbarian’s lore.
However I have played lots of games over the years. I do know that there should be mechanical benefits that reward player choice. Choosing Crom over other gods should not be a negative option. I’m not asking for a religious shrine, archpriests, avatars, or bubbles, as those don’t suit the God of “do it yourself.” I do believe, however, that Crom as a mechanic in a game needs some love. Ideas that I’ve liked:
Special Weapon crafters called something like Follower of Crom that make legendary weapons and/or armor
More in-game lore regarding Crom.
Some kind of altar, but different from the other gods in that it wouldn’t give Zeal (for Journey Steps)
Edit: I didn’t want to double post, but still had something to say regarding Crom as a religious choice at character creation. In D&D 3.5, there are good feats to take and bad feats to take. You don’t really get punished for taking bad feats, though. For example, Power Attack is a great feat that ups your melee damage in exchange for a penalty on your attack roll. It’s the bread and butter of melee. There’s also bad feats like Animal Affinity which gives +2 bonus on Ride and Handle Animal checks. The bonus is so small that it doesn’t really make a huge difference. Thing is, Animal Affinity isn’t optimal, but still gives a bonus. Crom doesn’t. Crom in Conan Exiles is the equivalent of simply not taking any feat at all at character creation, which, imo, is a poor game design decision.
No, that is putting the game, over the setting. CE is about playing within the lore of REH, not paying it lip service to ‘balance’ things in the usual MMO copy paste design.
Ao, who has no benefits, hears no prayers, etc, exist in DnD and is a vital part of the Realms. Know plenty of players that have characters that prescribe to the All Father’s faith. And DM’ed plenty of games where they received no benefit, taking on such a character concept knowing that.
Crom as is done is not poor game design. It is just an unorthodox game design given the perpetuation of the idea of ‘balanced’ game play in many multi-player games. And I for one am glad that sacred cow, of everything must serve the player, was ignored here in favor of keeping to the lore to provide an immersive experience over an arbitrary mechanical choice, one to just stick with a paradigm that contributes nothing in this game’s case.
Not exactly. Crom should be a valid choice, and currently isn’t. That is the main issue here. A player who chooses a different god and simply doesn’t build any altars is the same, mechanically, as a Crom follower.
This is strictly false. Directly quoted from the Forgotten Realms wiki: “However, when Ao found worthy mortals, able to uphold the responsibilities of a deity, he promoted them to divinity almost instantly” which is cited in Faiths & Avatars . Additionally, a cleric of Ao still receives spells per day and 2 domains. It’s the same as selecting any other god, or not selecting any god and simply being a cleric of an ideal. A cleric worshipping Ao is not penalized for doing so by having their spells taken away, at least not by D&D’s game mechanics.
I stand by my statement that Crom, as it is, is poor design because it actively punishes the player for choosing him.
First of all welcome back. I am way younger than you in the game and the forum so I will start paying my respects to you.
I have some simple questions not exactly to you but to you too.
For reasons I can’t explain oi was always and still pick Crom. I pick Crom because this is what God is, someone that gave me life to live and my choises will define the quality of my life. Yet I feel a void… (rhetorical)
Now the real deal…
The game had a really great lore to be builded, so it did and it became a really wonderful game. Yet this lore is placing boundaries to the evolution of the game.
So how many people you think really know the lore of this game?
A few…
Should these people, that apparently are not enough, stop the evolution of the game?
I believe that they shouldn’t.
Still the company so far, from what I read here, is standing very respectful to the lore.
As a player, lore or not, creating with my own fantasy characters and gaming to leave for awhile my real life behind, I choose Crom. Yet my character is Bella (my dogs name) a Hyborian girl, femme fattale, @Oduda once fixed me a wonderful connection how my characters father would be from Argos and my mother from Cimmeria, by the lore. So yes I want the company to keep respecting the lore, because it is beautiful, and you the lore masters stop fighting to each other but give us your lights and reasons to love the lore more, so we can pass it through.
Be more open minded and creative, this I believe what @Croms_Faithful seeks here.
Nice to have you back.
Ps. @LostBrythunian have teached us a lot, please stick around and do the same, thank you.
Nope, is in ‘Faiths & Avatars’ pg 30. Was also shown at times that clerics of Ao were actually receiving their spells from Cyric, not Ao, as a part of a plot. Granted, we are getting into edition war territory here. But originally, nope Ao was not active or involved with mortals.
What does this even mean? What makes a choice here valid? That it provides some mechanical benefit?
Those are assumptions, with regards to numbers of people, etc.
And, no, sticking to lore especially as everything goes toward cross over Fortnite metaverse messes of marketing, I think matters greatly. No one is standing in the evolution of the game, they are standing in the way of its devolving to fit some game design paradigm that lots of others places already offer, and most do poorly.
To clarify what I meant by “valid” choice, is that it should have a benefit comparative to selecting a different god. To compare it to the Ao example listed above, the Lore of the setting states that Ao isn’t granting clerics any spells, but the mechanics of the game state that clerics of Ao still get spells and domains.
Designing a game from a “Lore first” perspective is wonderful, and from the lore that I’ve gleaned from the world in Exiles, Conan is a fantastic wellspring of lore. At the end of the day, Conan Exiles is a game with player-driven choices. Selecting Crom should not simply be a detriment to your character. Which is why I like the options that revolve around venerating Crom but not expecting anything from him. Followers of Crom shouldn’t function like other worshippers, but provide things that are made by man. I like the idea of crafting legendary weapons/armor at a forge of Crom’s faithful. It’s not an altar, but rather something built by a man devoted to the god of “do it yourself”
Why? No really, why? Is this going to tie back to some point on game design? If so, we are at an impasse. The game only exists, because of the lore of REH. It is the product, not its design. To shoehorn in Crom benefits is just trying to as I said comply with some player exceptions for arbitrary balance concepts.
If everyone had the same views, then these forums would have no purpose