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Res Publica: A Quest of Ancient Rome

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Simon_Jester said:
Ah. My apologies, I had misunderstood the situation, mostly because of misunderstanding what is meant by "minor goddess."

That said, the basic idea is still valid-ish. If Visellia Mertia is forced to train Romans to carry out the rites at the Pools of Amsanctus, while she herself is stuck in Rome maintaining a large temple of Mephitis in a city where few worship the goddess faithfully, then it seems likely that the problem of Mephitis-worship acting as a focus for anti-Roman political sentiment will gradually weaken over time.
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Actually, how do you propose to keep her in Rome? Because the only possible method we have is force, and that leads to the Samnites (who presumably are not entirely stupid) concluding that we have looted the temple of its sacred treasures and abducted their priestess.

Also, where and with what funds do you propose to build and maintain a large temple? If Mephitis is only a household goddess there won't be an existing temple to expand.
 
Simon_Jester said:
The priests are important because they have influence with the worshippers of Mephitis, that is, the Samnites.
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I just wanna point out again that your write-in doesn't force the priestess to move to Rome. You would need to add a line saying that Rome outlaws the practice and the construction of a new temple at this site. Otherwise, there really is no point in building them a temple in Rome.

Edit::ninja: Thats what I get for leaving tabs open that long.
 
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How to build a temple of any size is Visellia's problem. If I were in her shoes, I'd sell off some of the less-sacred temple treasures (any temple of size surely has some) to fund construction of a new venue, or to buy out an existing temple.

Potential negative consequences of forbidding Visellia to leave Rome are a relevant consideration. I had basically figured she'd be forbidden to leave Rome, and that yes this would be enforced by force. We might provide her with a 'bodyguard' detachment, and yes, as I said, potential negative consequences are a relevant consideration.

My basic goal with Captured Gods is to reduce the power of this particular cult by splitting it from its territorial base. This approach worked very well for the Romans, along with culturally uprooting conquered peoples, to the extent where basically the only religion and culture that survived the experience was the Jews. Everything else got the "will it blend" treatment and wound up either dissolved into syncretism or weakened and vulnerable to the rise of Christianity... And Christianity was yet another religion that spread through the open arteries Rome created for the spread of pan-Roman culture throughout the Mediterranean and Europe, even if it was originally a religion that spread through those arteries against the wishes of the Empire.

I think it would be net beneficial to Rome to do this with the cult(s) of Mephitis, but I can certainly understand why you might disagree.

Spacegnom said:
I just wanna point out again that your write-in doesn't force the priestess to move to Rome. You would need to add a line saying that Rome outlaws the practice and the construction of a new temple at this site. Otherwise, there really is no point in building them a temple in Rome.
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I had considered doing exactly that, and you make a good point. Fixing.

Spacegnom said:
I just wanna point out again that your write-in doesn't force the priestess to move to Rome. You would need to add a line saying that Rome outlaws the practice and the construction of a new temple at this site. Otherwise, there really is no point in building them a temple in Rome.

Edit::ninja: Thats what I get for leaving tabs open that long.
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What, victory? You won. :p
 
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Simon_Jester said:
How to build a temple of any size is Visellia's problem. If I were in her shoes, I'd sell off some of the less-sacred temple treasures (any temple of size surely has some) to fund construction of a new venue, or to buy out an existing temple.

Potential negative consequences of forbidding Visellia to leave Rome are a relevant consideration. I had basically figured she'd be forbidden to leave Rome, and that yes this would be enforced by force. We might provide her with a 'bodyguard' detachment, and yes, as I said, potential negative consequences are a relevant consideration.
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And when she refuses to sell the temple treasures? Do we force her then? Because the more I think about this plan, the more it seems to me that it puts Visellia in a position where, so long as she maintains her defiance, she can force us to either martyr her or back down.
 
Caesar said:
And when she refuses to sell the temple treasures? Do we force her then?
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No, but if she's not taking action to re-establish her temple in Rome, then Mephitis has no temple and her cult doesn't get re-established, and it's not because of our decisions.

Alternatively, she gets a small and rather boring shrine, funded by us or Scaevola (who is, as I recall, a senior member of the priesthood), and anything more than that she has to pay for herself.
 
Simon_Jester said:
No, but if she's not taking action to re-establish her temple in Rome, then Mephitis has no temple and her cult doesn't get re-established, and it's not because of our decisions.

Alternatively, she gets a small and rather boring shrine, funded by us or Scaevola (who is, as I recall, a senior member of the priesthood), and anything more than that she has to pay for herself.
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So this is just an inefficient, needlessly drawn out plan to destroy the cult of Mephitis? Because the end result is going to be the same as just burning the temple and killing her here and now. Well, not quite. The latter at least has the advantage of providing an object lesson on the cost of defiance, while the former merely shows that all our protestations of intending to make the Samnites equal citizens are a clumsy deception and a bad joke.

(I'm ignoring the quagmire of confining a woman who is going to be a citizen in Rome and of trying to compel a cult to build a temple in Rome. Both of those things are going to be considerably more complicated than you seem to be assuming. But even if we manage both, that's how it's going to end.)
 
Since my reply was predicated on you asking "what if Visellia decides not to perform necessary steps to ensure Mephitis-worship continues, to spite us or something," I have to point out that any foreseeable effects of it are NOT the effects I foresee happening.

...

The problem of compelling the temple to be built in Rome is a valid one, but it appears to be one that the Romans had a way of dealing with. Given their habit of kidnapping/adopting other people's gods, it's not like they never had this problem or one like it in real life. Whatever institutions they had which allowed them to do that, must be institutions that would be in play here..
 
Caesar said:
I would argue that you have this backwards. It is important because it draws worshippers from a large area, which it does because of the pools. As a natural focus of worship it was always going to be a large and prestigious temple. Removing the temple is not going to remove the underlying factors that made it important in the first place, at least not on a useful timescale.
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I think that it is a good point to remember folks that we aren't talking of the Judeo-christian rites here, in the ancient world they were a Priest's thing to care for. the Faithful would go to the temple, pay the priest (well, donate to the temple, and maybe be there for a slaughtering of an animal or what not) and be on his way.
So, the importance of the pools is critical to the temple, as it gives it a "connection" to the goddess.

So, again, @Simon_Jester we really can't move it or the priestess, so I think the best option is to ensure the next batch of priestesses are all Roman. I am sure our benefactor might be able to organize something, the current priestess must stay, obviously, and she needs to educate the new priestesses into the details of the worship, *but* rome gets to choose if not all, 2/3 of the prospectives
 
Simon_Jester said:
Since my reply was predicated on you asking "what if Visellia decides not to perform necessary steps to ensure Mephitis-worship continues, to spite us or something," I have to point out that any foreseeable effects of it are NOT the effects I foresee happening.

...

The problem of compelling the temple to be built in Rome is a valid one, but it appears to be one that the Romans had a way of dealing with. Given their habit of kidnapping/adopting other people's gods, it's not like they never had this problem or one like it in real life. Whatever institutions they had which allowed them to do that, must be institutions that would be in play here..
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Adopting, so far as I know, is a far better and more accurate word than kidnapping. Usually, (again, assuming I remember correctly) the cults the Romans adopted came by choice/mutual arrangement, generally when the Sibylene Books and/or other omens suggested that some god was feeling neglected by the Republic. The cult of Cybele was brought in diplomatically during the Second Punic War for that reason. (There were literal negotiations with the King of Pergamum and the cult's priests.) I would suggest, then, that their integratory institutions are not designed to compel cults to move to Rome, because most of them would jump at the chance.

I asked about your plans for Visellia being non-cooperative because, assuming she is a revolutionary firebrand, she has absolutely no incentive to cooperate. Precisely the opposite.
 
If she's non-cooperative, she spends the rest of her life under guard with the Vestal Virgins or some such and her religion dies with her.

Maybe forty years from now somebody wonders why an old woman with a Samnite name is being housed there, selling things from an ever-dwindling store of artifacts in order to pay for food. Then they ignore it and move on, and she is forgotten.

...or she chooses not to defy us, and at least something of her religion survives, and she doesn't expire alone and forgotten as the last relic of a dead culture.

The thing is that we would find either option to be perfectly acceptable. That we're giving her a chance to not die pointlessly in an act of rebellion (whether an immediate or long-term one) is ultimately because we feel like doing so, not because she has any power left by which to compel us to grant mercy.
 
The Sandman said:
If she's non-cooperative, she spends the rest of her life under guard with the Vestal Virgins or some such and her religion dies with her.

Maybe forty years from now somebody wonders why an old woman with a Samnite name is being housed there, selling things from an ever-dwindling store of artifacts in order to pay for food. Then they ignore it and move on, and she is forgotten.

...or she chooses not to defy us, and at least something of her religion survives, and she doesn't expire alone and forgotten as the last relic of a dead culture.

The thing is that we would find either option to be perfectly acceptable. That we're giving her a chance to not die pointlessly in an act of rebellion (whether an immediate or long-term one) is ultimately because we feel like doing so, not because she has any power left by which to compel us to grant mercy.
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Or she kills herself in the Forum and calls down a curse on the Republic. Or some popularis prick decides to make an issue of the fact that she is a citizen who has technically committed no crime. Or the festering wound of Rome trying to destroy their major cult by stealth (after making such a production of telling them that they were equal citizens) enrages the Samnites to further resistance.

But I'm sure that if we just ignore any potential bad outcomes hard enough everything will work out.

Edit: The idea that Visellia is powerless here confounds me. She is an extremely potent symbol and test case of how Rome actually intends to treat the Samnites.

Edit the Second: I'll rephrase that. Grand Theft God turns her into such a symbol. Leaving her and the temple alone leaves her as a local leader of some influence.
 
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Mefitis presents us with a quadrilemma:

i) Spare her priestess and her temple (Mercy)
ii) Kill her priestess and destroy her temple (Rome, Triumphant)
iii) Spare her priestess but destroy her temple (Black Mercy)
iv) Spare her temple but kill her priestess (Victor Over Death)

Options i) and ii) are accepting or rejecting her presented challenge, that she is powerful and a threat, either granting her request or denying it (deeming whether each option is a trick option, and deeming if the threat is really substantial).

Options iii) and iv) are about discarding the premise of the challenge, and deciding which aspect is the greater threat, the temple or the priestess? To the enemy which is of greater value, the human and social worth of a person that can organise the resistance, or the symbolic value of a locus commemorative of the destruction of the settlement? Which is the greater supernatural threat, the ghost of a slain priestess, or the divine wrath over a desecrated place or worship? And so on; and what clues, grounds, etc do we have to prefer one or the other.

As a fifth option, I don't see how the godnapping is principally different than options iii) & iv). Instead of a choice between leaving the temple alone or eradicating it, it compromises through the re-localisation attempt, and instead of either killing the priestess or letting her live, it tries to compromise by trying to bind her to the displaced temple.

I don't think this extra option is inherently more likely to succeed than either ones (iii & iv) trying to discern which components of the worship complex are more likely to be targeted successfully. For instance, moving the temple to Rome could be perceived as as great or even greater humiliation or desecration as just razing it. Or, the local community could be just as much goaded to resistance or feel alienated from the godly favour of Mefitis.

In short, this cleverness is not clever enough to really get rid of the conflicting consequences of our choice. It just replaces some compromises (between the temple and the priestess) with other compromises (how to neuter the temple without destroying it, and how to make the priestess servitude of Mefitis serve Rome as well).
 
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@Telamon
New reader here. Just wanted to say hi and mention that the quest is super interesting! I hope that I can participate in future votes, though classes are heating up and I'm not sure about how that will go. Thanks for writing this!
 
Caesar said:
But I'm sure that if we just ignore any potential bad outcomes hard enough everything will work out.
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I'm insulted, and I'm tired of being insulted.

Agree or disagree with my plan if you want, and ALL you want. Whatever. Have it how you want, the field in which I grow my fucks is barren.

But in case you didn't notice, your plan already has a 5:3 advantage in votes cast. It is therefore winning by a fairly comfortable margin.

As such, you could at least have the grace to not be actively insulting and sneering in your contempt for my plan and its advocates.
 
Simon_Jester said:
I'm insulted, and I'm tired of being insulted.

Agree or disagree with my plan if you want, and ALL you want. Whatever. Have it how you want, the field in which I grow my fucks is barren.

But in case you didn't notice, your plan already has a 5:3 advantage in votes cast. It is therefore winning by a fairly comfortable margin.

As such, you could at least have the grace to not be actively insulting and sneering in your contempt for my plan and its advocates.
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That was aimed purely at the attitude expressed in the post I was quoting, that Visellia had no options but to submit or fade into obscurity, the implicit statement that there were no potential downsides to Grand Theft God. It was meant as an expression of exasperation, and I'm sorry if my phrasing/tone lead to it coming across as a personal attack, on you or @The Sandman. It could and should have been expressed better.
 
If someone points out that a plan presents our enemy with an unpleasant dilemma, it may not be correct to interpret that as "I'm willfully ignoring anything that could possibly go wrong!"
 
My argument was that it did not necessarily present our enemy with an unpleasant dilemma, and that it doing so is a success state for the plan. There are several legal and logistical hurdles to clear before putting her in that position, and even then she has options.

Again, my tone and word choice in my response were poor, and I freely concede that.
 
[X] Plan Sulla Redux

I promised myself I wouldn't read this until it was 50k words long due to previous experiences with Telamon but I apparently lack any self-control.

Regardless, I really like the concept and there are far too few historical quests on the site in general.
 
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