NorseQuest (A Norse Xianxia)
- Thread starter I.F. Ister
- Start date
- Original Fantasy Action
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- Tags
- norse mythology (mythology) original xianxia cultivation western cultivation ask sirihand did your mother tell you anything? discussion pleases yggdrasil farming gloating gets people killed granary management hubris is a coward's word you will die norsemen do not die when they are killed the qm has a bad memory the qm is bad at math viking courtroom drama (legal drama) vikings
- Location
- some computer lab
IIRC vikings were actually way more handsome than was average at the time, owing to their better hygeine.
I mean would it seem that way to an isekai protag? Plus the whole all cultivator look better as they ascend thing when they get rid of their impurities thing.
CedeTheBees
Probably high right now
- Location
- Somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
[X] Plan: Val Halla, Skald Halla
[X] Plan Keep Looking For The Witch But No Climbing
[X] Plan Keep Looking For The Witch But No Climbing
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I.F. Ister
Fortifying The Thread
- Pronouns
- He/They
Wonderful work, thank you. Do you have a name for it?
Skaldic poetry isn't easy even with ample time to make it and the Norse would just straight up come up with it on the spot!
I actually haven't figured out how much orthstirr to give out for poetry, though it really can't be anything more than a small amount, to prevent gaming of the system. I'm thinking… perhaps 2?
If there's a large influx of poetry than I'll drop it down to 1.
A real Amazon huh?
We will need all the axe skills we get to beat away the boys~~~
...Oh gods, wait, we will be a Freya, and probably get some of her troubles, aren't we?
...let's hope our enemies will be fun to mess with.
Samurai Jack with the Scot man?
The answer is obviously to learn shapeshifthing and BECOME the goat
Can't find anything on naming schemes so let's just go with "Maiden's Ire".
*According to one primary source writer whose believability is debatable.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Sort of? Them bathing regularly and taking care of their hair is well documented beyond that specific account.
That being an issue due to them seducing non-Danish women is the part that's based on one dubious account. So...yes they were cleanly, maybe no on the 'thus considered more handsome'.
- Location
- Bretonnia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I find it wild that the 'savage, uncivilised' raiders are more hygienic than normal.
By the way, what's the social hierarchy for the Norse? Do they have an aristocracy...?
By the way, what's the social hierarchy for the Norse? Do they have an aristocracy...?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Sort of?
As I understand it, throughout most of Norse history there were thralls (ie: slaves), karls (ie: freemen/citizens), and jarls, who basically had many of the same roles as nobles, but being a jarl was a lot less hereditary than most 'noble' titles people think of, being mostly about being respected and rich enough to have a following of warriors (which being the son of a jarl certainly helped with, but it wasn't a guarantee by any means), and sometimes decided by election among karls (either formal or informal). At some points they had a king ruling over the jarls (mostly chosen among the jarls by popular acclaim, or by killing the previous king and saying 'I'm king now.').
Iceland was an exception, with no jarls or kings at all, only free men and slaves.
We've been told that in the quest's world, we have a king-equivalent (though not with that title), so there's that guy, jarls, karls/freemen, and thralls/slaves...though I suspect a karl who works directly for the 'king' might well outrank many jarls in practice if not in theory.
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- Location
- Bretonnia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Huh. Sounds pretty interesting, and I've always enjoyed medieval history. Might read up on it sometime.
Also, I realise that if Abjorn is the one with giant's Blood, Stigr is the one blessed with luck, and Halla is the smart one, then Aki is the NPC who got the fylgja-related trait. I mean, other people probably also realised this, but only now do I actually realise that we should probably befriend him sometime.
One last thing I noticed is that the Norse seem to view killing women as... 'unmanly'? Like, there seems to be a stigma about harming women, but clearly it doesn't run too deep considering the things raiders do and the fact that Osborn and co. had no problem with killing us.
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- Location
- Norway
Adding to the above about social hierarchy:
Before D&D started borrowing the word "Charisma" to mean some kind of mostly fixed character attribute, and various RPGs started borrowing "mana" for some kind of spellcasting resource, these two words meant fairly similar things, and something in that vein was a determiner of social organization among the Norse before they later started getting all formally organized with kings and stuff.
Charisma, mana, charity, victory, luck, fairness, fame, are some of the elements mixed together into an informal estimate of general greatness and leadership. (See also: The whole orthstirr setup.) One of the Norse kennings for a good lord is "Ring-giver": the ring symbolizes both an oath of fealty, and the lord's generosity and wealth.
Bad lords might kick you out at any time, or maybe you leave their service after a short time because they suck, and they hoard the loot or don't get any loot in the first place.
Good lords behave so that you want to stick by them and be visibly known by their name, and they go trading or raiding to get lots of loot, and hand out plenty of it to subordinates.
(You may be thinking finger-rings, which were common, but the really good lords give arm-rings of precious metals, so you can wear it to both flaunt your wealth and show the lord's design.)
This is part of why being a jarl is only semi-hereditary: training and inheritance from Dad helps, but one still has to show personal leadership. It's easy for goons to leave.
Before D&D started borrowing the word "Charisma" to mean some kind of mostly fixed character attribute, and various RPGs started borrowing "mana" for some kind of spellcasting resource, these two words meant fairly similar things, and something in that vein was a determiner of social organization among the Norse before they later started getting all formally organized with kings and stuff.
Charisma, mana, charity, victory, luck, fairness, fame, are some of the elements mixed together into an informal estimate of general greatness and leadership. (See also: The whole orthstirr setup.) One of the Norse kennings for a good lord is "Ring-giver": the ring symbolizes both an oath of fealty, and the lord's generosity and wealth.
Bad lords might kick you out at any time, or maybe you leave their service after a short time because they suck, and they hoard the loot or don't get any loot in the first place.
Good lords behave so that you want to stick by them and be visibly known by their name, and they go trading or raiding to get lots of loot, and hand out plenty of it to subordinates.
(You may be thinking finger-rings, which were common, but the really good lords give arm-rings of precious metals, so you can wear it to both flaunt your wealth and show the lord's design.)
This is part of why being a jarl is only semi-hereditary: training and inheritance from Dad helps, but one still has to show personal leadership. It's easy for goons to leave.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Yep. He's also the one who told us about the witch in the Hading, which is one reason I think that info is good (another is that it was a result of rolling two sixes on two dice). We should really pursue that.
In terms of raiders, contemporary accounts seem to indicate they may have been less inclined to rape than other raiders of the era (not saying much, I'll grant) and they otherwise treated women just like they did men...they were enslaved and sold. That's also mostly raids on foreigners, not their countrymen, which makes a big difference.
As for Osborn and Co., Halla is very much stepping outside her expected role as a woman in Norse society by carrying a weapon and using it to kill men. I think a lot of her protection against certain kinds of violence (ie: getting murdered) is forfeited by that fact. She's acting like a man so she's getting treated like one.
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Yep, why i have visiting his farm as part of my plan.
Together with using our personal option to talk to dad about what happened with the "possession", as there probably are lots of things a 13 year old doesn't know yet.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
As I mentioned previously, I'm down with visiting him, I just think we should see about actually following his advice and finding the witch first. Then we can ask her about the possession (she likely knows a lot more than dad does on the subject) and visit him and talk about meeting her. The flow of events is much smoother and more logical as opposed to giving up on the witch mid-stream for basically no reason.
Putting off meeting the witch in any way is also just a really terrible idea mechanically if she gives us training dice, which seems pretty plausible if we can get her to teach us stuff, if by no means certain.
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"giving up on the witch mid-stream"
How is not spending every waking hour going after her "giving up"?
Calling a turn of spending time with friends&family "giving up" seems overly dramatic.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Stopping when we are, per the QM:
(ie: likely only one turn away) does indeed seem like giving up on a project she's been pretty single minded about thus far, yes. I'm not saying she'll never get back to it, but it's weird to be right on the very verge of success and just stop for no readily explicable reason to go talk to someone we're not that close to at the moment (and indeed, someone who very explicitly advised us to go look for the witch).
Like, going to talk to Aki right now is actively contradicting his own advice to us...that seems unlikely to be super productive to me. It makes more sense, and seems more likely to lead to good results, to go thank him for the advice after we've met and talked to her.
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...
Yeah, with the (You're on the Witch's doorstep, just a little more and you're in.) part it makes much more sense to focus on getting in now.
@KreenWarrior @CedeTheBees
Would it be ok for you if I changed the plan?
Instead of visiting Aki I'd do:
[ ] (Exploration) Go on a walk through...
-[ ] The Hading!
--[ ] use your currency to buy a good meal as offering, carry it to the hedge, If you can't find an entrance call out to the 'witch' requesting permission to enter.
Climbing her hedge could be considered rude.
- Location
- Bretonnia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Also, after seeing the height chart, I think Giant's Blood might actually be literal. I inly thought it was a metaphor or exaggeration, but Abjorn's genuinely freakishly tall, and hasn't even stopped growing. Perhaps he can trace his ancestry to a giant?
CedeTheBees
Probably high right now
- Location
- Somewhere
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I'm fine with that
Crucial missing context here is that 'normal' was the result of an extended downswing due to poorly maintained Roman infrastructure, public baths being associated with vice, and generally rising difficulty of getting clean water from population density(while the usual efficiencies of scale from communal washing couldn't be used).
Which basically meant that savage unchristian peoples were more likely to be washed until better plumbing came around.
I liked talking to Aki because he might be able to tell us how to get through the hedge, but sure, that works.
@KreenWarrior @CedeTheBees @WhoTheHeckity
Plan is updated to reflect us visiting the witch with an offering of <edit>good food</edit>
Plan is updated to reflect us visiting the witch with an offering of <edit>
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