She fell in the icy waters of the White Knife
A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover
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- a song of ice and fire a sword without a hilt d&d 3.5 dungeons & dragons 100% high octane dragon fuel (dragon) ave corvidae battle action dragon diplomacy (dragon) best sister bureaucromancy delicious soul-stuff dragon dreams come true dragon ta'veren greatest uncle hubris is a coward's word in defiance of gods and men mammon's folly mutually assured mage's disjunction qm murderhobo top tier coatl
She fell in the icy waters of the White Knife
Goldfish
Friendly Spider-Fish Abomination
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- Formerly of the Far Realm
@DragonParadox Where did you get the info to build Garin as a Dhampir. He has a lot of racial traits for which I can't find any information.
Goldfish
Friendly Spider-Fish Abomination
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- Formerly of the Far Realm
@LonelyWolf999 having noticed all the ratings I'd like to ask what do you think of the last two updates? I know you are one of the more interested in Westerosi matters and I'm curious about your opinion.
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- United States
Getting Stannis was something long in the making, and I'm satisfied with that.
The problem for us is that getting Stannis isn't quite the same thing as getting the Stormlands.
I'm gonna need some information before I start analyzing the loyalties of the various houses, both potentially to us and immediately to Stannis. Most importantly, what was their reaction to the whole Fenly debacle? Do they even know what happened?
Currently doing some reading on medieval china so I can hopefully represent YI Ti in a nuanced and interesting way. I don't know as much about Chinese history as I do about European and Middle Eastern history. If anyone has any book suggestions I'm interested to hear them.
No one knows, all they know is that Renly suddenly became closer with Stannis after paying his way out of captivity (though Stannis did not seem to reciprocate much) and ended up abdicating to his older brother.
Goldfish
Friendly Spider-Fish Abomination
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- Formerly of the Far Realm
For those of you who like to keep up with them, Waymar, Garin, and Tyene's character sheets have been updated with their trip to Yi-Ti in mind. Some new gear, including PoSK, along with plenty of Alchemical stuff.
One of our three Bags of Greed is finally getting use, too. Plenty of room for exotic purchases, loot, and enemy corpses in one of them.
All three of them are armed with Launchers and explosive munitions like the Wyverns fire, and Tyene has a couple of heavy explosive bombs. For emergencies, of course!
The three of them make a tidy little group, and a powerful one, along with a pair of Erinyes helpers.
I'm looking forward to what DP shows us of their time there.
One of our three Bags of Greed is finally getting use, too. Plenty of room for exotic purchases, loot, and enemy corpses in one of them.
All three of them are armed with Launchers and explosive munitions like the Wyverns fire, and Tyene has a couple of heavy explosive bombs. For emergencies, of course!
The three of them make a tidy little group, and a powerful one, along with a pair of Erinyes helpers.
I'm looking forward to what DP shows us of their time there.
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Well I don't have any books but China has a long history of bureaucracy. Like their Heaven is the Celestial Bureaucracy (with Doaist and Buddhist gods shoved in). It's very different from typical Westerosi lords in that rulers were expected to be scholarly and learned so there isn't as much of a stigma against "nerds" as there would be for a Westerosi lord. There's also a strong kinda meritocracy tradition in that bureaucratic positions are open to anyone. Positions are granted based on how well you do on a single nation wide test. Of course in practice generally only the really rich have the time to study for the exam which tends to have several sections that might or might not be at all useful for a bureaucrat. Like being able to recite entire books of Confucius by heart. Reading comprehensive or analysis? Naw just route memorization son. (I have a ton of salt re Confuscious and the general Asian trend towards route memorization as opposed to actual thinking but I'll get into that later). But the idea is actually doing well on these exams is like a normal person's one way ticket to the good life.
A way I can think of this has propogated to the modern day is how my Chinese immigrant mom was confused at how my elementary classmates used egg head and nerd as insults since those are good things. And the bureaucratic exam is now a nation wide university test that every college wannabe takes on the same day and is the one single factor in determining what college you get into. The general attitude is also that what college you get into determines the course of the rest of your life. No it doesn't really matter what you study so long as you get in. It causes some disconnect when say these parents then come to say America. No mom, getting a 2400 on the SAT alone does not guarantee a spot in Harvard. Yes mom colleges in the US actually want to see that you participate in extraciriculars and have a personality besides "consumes textbooks and get good test scores."
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- France
The user "The Laurent" (who wrote Split) wrote a quest called "Behind the Serpent Throne". I've seen it described as "doing an excellent job of making a setting and magic feel like ancient China".
I don't know enough about ancient China to be sure, but it was certainly interesting and original - and society itself felt strange and foreign to me, which I liked.
In any case it's great and only gets better as it goes on. It's currently on hiatus for IRL-author reasons, but it stopped at a great moment! Go and read it!
Thanks, that I got a lot of that sense from the reading I starred, though since I'm using Six Dynasties China as a base for Yi Ti there will be no small amount of corruption, factionalism and nepotism in involved, all the stuff that makes intrigue fun.
Thanks I'll check it out
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If anyone else is curious about "Behind the Serpent Throne", it's a quest about life at court in a fantasy version of medieval China. The Emperor is a Child, various factions and powerful men are acting up, communications and centralization are medieval-appropriate, there's a rebellion brewing... The MC is the bastard son of an important bureaucrat (and he hates the bureaucrat in question, but whatever), and he's a sort of warrior-poet.
The depiction of Court life is just amazing. Their priorities are both so huge and so skewed (and it's acknowledged in-story!), it's great! And appropriate limits on information-gathering and communications apply, which is nice.
It's not 100% politics, the civil war eventually breaks out and that's both a fantastic change of pace and an amazing new gameboard for the usual politics.
The depiction of Court life is just amazing. Their priorities are both so huge and so skewed (and it's acknowledged in-story!), it's great! And appropriate limits on information-gathering and communications apply, which is nice.
It's not 100% politics, the civil war eventually breaks out and that's both a fantastic change of pace and an amazing new gameboard for the usual politics.
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Just remember.
The state that has fought the Chinese state the most, is the Chinese state
The state that has fought the Chinese state the most, is the Chinese state
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- Noway
That was a good interlude DP. Really brought Stannis and his development to life.
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- United States
... That's going to be a problem. It isn't so much that Stannis is horribly unliked, then that Fenly/Renly were immensely popular. Add in the incredibly suspicious circumstances and general mystery surrounding their 'abdication,' Stannis' general association with the Dragon King, and the increasing proliferation of knowledge about magic ... hell, if I was them, I'd be alarmed.
Just remember.
The state that has fought the Chinese state the most, is the Chinese state
In the case of China like with India I imagine it is best to think of it less as the unified state it has become in modern times and more like an area of cultural influence with central power waning and waxing with the years.
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I would actually also recommend the Kingdom series on Netflix too. Its a zombie drama set around feudal Korea with plenty of politiking. And yes I feel that it would work for not!China as another thing to note is that feudal China was the ultimate big dog in the fuedal Asian world. For a long time fuedal Japan, Korea and other nations did their best to imitate/cargo cult everything big bro China was doing*. For instance, the reason why the Japanese written languge is a mess that uses three different alphabets is that they first tried adopting Chinese characters wholesale (Kanji), and then realized written Chinese doesn't actually mix well at well with spoken Japanese and so invented two other writing systems (Hirigana and Katakana) to graft the two together.
Another thing is really drives ancient China is the whole philosophy of Confucinism. The ultimate driving force behind Confucisnism is fillial piety. You individually owe everything to your ancestors and the family is the supreme end all be all of all social frameworks. The Emperor is supposed to be everyone's dad with the authority that implies. Yes Westeros/western fuedal societies places a big deal on heritiage and parentage, but in Europe you also had the Church/God as being important and seperate/more important than your mere secular familiy/existance. Ancient China is secular in that your temporal family is the ultimate sacred thing; there's not really a seperate force/god.
A few examples of how this manifests is can actually be seen in the taboo against getting tatoos, piercings or even cutting your hair (see all those period dramas where all the dudes have long ass braids). The idea is that your body is a scared gift from your parents and so you dont have the right to modify it. Another is a ancient fable that actually Xi JinPing pushed relatively recently as part of a general Confucinism reivial movement. Essentially a kid eats his own dad's feces and uses their taste to determine how healthy his dad is. Another features a man seriously considering killing his own child to feed his starving mom. These are part of a collection of stories meant to showcase the ultimate paragons of fillial piety. If you haven't guessed yet, traditionally fillial piety is not really a two way street. At all**. tldr; you know how those Westerosi peasants in the Riverlands were appaled by the implication parents literally owned their kids? That might not be the case in not!China.
Fun fact, have a gander at the wiki page for someone who's supposedly my direct ancestor in the male line. The dude in one instance kills one of his sons for being inappropiate with some of the Emperor's concubines! That can easily be seen through the lens of fillial piety where you show loyalty to the ultimate!Dad aka the emperor by killing someone intruding upon the emperor's property Oh right yeah, Imperial Emperors could take multiple wives and also could formally grant women the role of concubine too. Sure European kings had a ton of side chicks too, and some are open about it, but essentially Aegon IV's level of banging wouldn't be too crazy. The weirdest thing would be that he didn't ever promote any concubines to wife status and didn't kick out Naerys from position as head wife.
*Don't @ me modern day Japanese and Koreans.
** yes there are later scholars who're like "maybe parents should care for their kids just as much!!!" Helicopter parents are defintiely a thing in Asian culture alas.
I remember interludes with the Swanns where devils were taking advantage of this to try and smear Stannis's name. Like they had a black flaming stag prancing around. In this case we got Aradia to show these guys it was devils smearing Stannis, buuutttt...
Lol you are no longer welcome in the PRC for besmirching China's glorious40005000 6000 (if the Koreans haven't yet gotten to claiming this high of a number) years of unbroken history.
Another thing is really drives ancient China is the whole philosophy of Confucinism. The ultimate driving force behind Confucisnism is fillial piety. You individually owe everything to your ancestors and the family is the supreme end all be all of all social frameworks. The Emperor is supposed to be everyone's dad with the authority that implies. Yes Westeros/western fuedal societies places a big deal on heritiage and parentage, but in Europe you also had the Church/God as being important and seperate/more important than your mere secular familiy/existance. Ancient China is secular in that your temporal family is the ultimate sacred thing; there's not really a seperate force/god.
A few examples of how this manifests is can actually be seen in the taboo against getting tatoos, piercings or even cutting your hair (see all those period dramas where all the dudes have long ass braids). The idea is that your body is a scared gift from your parents and so you dont have the right to modify it. Another is a ancient fable that actually Xi JinPing pushed relatively recently as part of a general Confucinism reivial movement. Essentially a kid eats his own dad's feces and uses their taste to determine how healthy his dad is. Another features a man seriously considering killing his own child to feed his starving mom. These are part of a collection of stories meant to showcase the ultimate paragons of fillial piety. If you haven't guessed yet, traditionally fillial piety is not really a two way street. At all**. tldr; you know how those Westerosi peasants in the Riverlands were appaled by the implication parents literally owned their kids? That might not be the case in not!China.
Fun fact, have a gander at the wiki page for someone who's supposedly my direct ancestor in the male line. The dude in one instance kills one of his sons for being inappropiate with some of the Emperor's concubines! That can easily be seen through the lens of fillial piety where you show loyalty to the ultimate!Dad aka the emperor by killing someone intruding upon the emperor's property
Oh right yeah, Imperial Emperors could take multiple wives and also could formally grant women the role of concubine too. Sure European kings had a ton of side chicks too, and some are open about it, but essentially Aegon IV's level of banging wouldn't be too crazy. The weirdest thing would be that he didn't ever promote any concubines to wife status and didn't kick out Naerys from position as head wife.*Don't @ me modern day Japanese and Koreans.
** yes there are later scholars who're like "maybe parents should care for their kids just as much!!!" Helicopter parents are defintiely a thing in Asian culture alas.
I remember interludes with the Swanns where devils were taking advantage of this to try and smear Stannis's name. Like they had a black flaming stag prancing around. In this case we got Aradia to show these guys it was devils smearing Stannis, buuutttt...
Lol you are no longer welcome in the PRC for besmirching China's glorious
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Chinese history ( at least territorially) basically boils down to "China is whole again. And then it broke again." It is kind of strange that Yi-Ti didn't devolve yet because canon describes the region as the Land of a hundred kingdoms. A statement which implies it is one of those periods where central authority was non existent. And with demons, devils, Tiamat and the others it is curious that the nation didn't divide yet again with the various supernatural factions playing off the desperate decentralized kingdoms against each other in proxy wars.
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- United States
Oh, Yi Ti did break down. Except it broke down more in the way Japan broke down IRL. Lip service is paid to the Emperor, but there are hundreds of warlords everywhere who basically do their own thing, and two challengers to the throne in the form of the Orange Emperor and the Yellow Emperor.
And of course the Golden Company wrecking everything they touch, as always.
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- Who knows?
Sup
Also I have an Aunt who's peeved some of the more popular media depictions of this Era is from Japan. She didn't like my cousin playing Dynasty Warriors essentially.
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- Brazil
@DragonParadox something that might just fit like a glove is Romance of the Three Kingdoms, it is one of the very cornerstones of chinese literature, and quoting from the wiki: part historical, part legend, part myth.
I know they make zombie films about everything, but that a real novel setting.
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Oh wow. that means that we can play the game of "Who wants to be king/our vassal" very easily here. Supply a few warlords here, promise protection there and bang, vassals in Yi-ti.
Edit: No we aren't banging vassals in Yi-ti. there were supposed to be a comma there. It is fixed now.
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Yes! And that's what makes it work imo. The Zombies (kinda technically a spoiler zombies are involved but Eh it's obvious soon enough) are merely a part of the general politicking happening.
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- France
Be aware that they have a Viserys analogue too. He's far weaker and he isn't a Dragon, but he is going around reuniting things and being the rightful ruler !