I have started my trip down the rabbit hole

[Croms_Faithful]

@biggcane55

Moving jar production to a special “station” mimicing t3 altar ( Croms???— @Croms_Faithful for you…any ideas on what yhe "sacrifice should be? Scraps instead of zeal?)

I am flattered that you would ask for my input @biggcane55. Thankyou. Before I offer my own suggestions, please do bear two things in mind. The first is that I am not an executive authority on this matter, just a Crom crazed fan advocating what can actually fit with the lore. And the second is please do remember that this is your game and your creative project biggcane55. And I do not want to seem like I am placing undue influence on you or your individual creative vision. Now with that in mind I am happy to contribute what I can, and let you ponder your options. If someone were to say to me today that we want you to select some Crom goodies for the vanilla game, here are the items I would recommend. *For the reader: please note that these are among the closest lore friendly options I could unearth.

@biggcane55

any ideas on what yhe "sacrifice should be?

By this I suspect you are referring to what we would actually offer to produce ‘manifestations of zeal’ at the bench…? Ironically biggcane55, I think that the sacrifice should be just that, an sacrifice. But not the human kind, the animal kind. There is both Expanded Universe lore and and a strong inference in Robert E Howard’s lore which point towards this. The references are as follows:

@Croms_Faithful

Facing a dishonourable and unworthy death at the hands of a malevolent sorcerer, Crom intervenes to save him from certain death, so he may have a more glorious one. Conan slays the sorcerer and later makes only his second Sacrifice ever to Crom as restitution. ~King Conan #8.

So there we have Conan himself making animal sacrifices to Crom. Twice.

@Croms_Faithful

They were a moody and brooding race, whose gods were Crom and his brood. They did not practice human sacrifice, for it was their belief that that their gods were indifferent to the fate of men. ~Notes on Various Peoples of the Hyborian Age.

Yes as I have said before this is an inference on my part, but one which makes sense when coupled with the prior example. I found it curious that Howard chose to establish a distinction here, specifying human sacrifice, as opposed to simply saying accepts no sacrifice.

So, left to me I would say either live baby animals first, or animal heads. From a balance perspective it would ensure that Crom still requires the most work to build ‘zeal’, because of weight restrictions. Baby animals weighing in at some 50 kgs/lbs each, and heads arent light either. In addition, they are fewer and further in between. We can just rack up some 30-40 offerings like if we cleared out say, The Summoning Place. Don’t fancy animal offerings? Then perhaps the weapons or armor of defeated foes, in the spirit of ‘strive and slay’.

Now in regards to the ‘manifestation of zeal’ themselves, you could well stick with them, but I guess it depends on how you would want Crom to respond to them, if at all. If you are going with the ‘distant, uncarring god’ approach, which is what we have in Conan Exiles now, maybe just stick with manifestation of zeal, or manifestation of loyalty/allegiance. But if you are going for the ‘sends doom and curses’ approach, perhaps name it something along the lines of manifestation of scorn/resentfulness/rage.

Honestly I would welcome the thoughts of yourself or other members on this one too. Heck I would love it if Joel were to tell us what he would use or envision IF he were to ever add them or to create his own mod.