Cyrodillic cults

[Worsas]

Popular god of the Eight Divines. In Cyrodiil, she has nearly a dozen different cults, some devoted to women, some to artists and aesthetics, and others to erotic instruction.

Oblivion hurray!

[Helena]

The Ancestor Monks, of course. As well as various other religious cults.

Here's an idea: how about an Ayleid revivalist cult? I don't mean anything like Umbacano from Oblivion, just a bunch of people who are fascinated by Ayleid culture (a bit like modern-day historical recreationists).

[Worsas]

I was also citing this because it is from the nord-description of dibella and you might have missed it yet.

We were discussing at shotn about how much to stress religion in Skyrim. I suggested not giving the nord religion a faction on its own, yet definetively presenting it ingame in dialogue and with sanctuaries.

But I imagine that that Cyrodiil for its variety of cults should probably give religion high priority. I also believe to remember that there are numerous sects and cults among the nibenese.

That's just one more thought I wanted to contribute here.

[Helena]

I've read that description, yeah. The religious cults have been discussed a bit in this thread.

[Lady Nerevar]

There are also some ideas for cults in this archive I posted.

[Worsas]

I have had a long read through your brainstorming archive and noticed your passages about the imperial cult being more relevant abroad than inside of Cyrodiil (Secondary religion of the Nibenean).

Will this in any way take influence on the appearance of chapels devoted to single divines then? I guess it must be some kind of official religion to them. I believe to remember something like the "nine and the empire" spoken from the mouths of legionaries in MW.

Anyway it's great that you are making up something truly complex there, needless to post a random reference from my side.

How do you think will the minor cults present their patrons/matrons? Idols (wood,metal,clay,bone), portraits, reliefs? This could be interesting when it comes to interior-cluttering. I suppose the family cults will have those standing in their houses.

It would be cool if one could even write down a couple of religious texts to spread over households. Perhaps a smart lore-mum could have a go at wording something there

[Helena]

Will this in any way take influence on the appearance of chapels devoted to single divines then? I guess it must be some kind of official religion to them. I believe to remember something like the "nine and the empire" spoken from the mouths of legionaries in MW.

We will be placing a lot more emphasis on the individual Divines in P:C, though obviously people will still worship the Nine as a group. Revenant posted a chapel concept here and we've discussed having different buildings to suit the architecture of each city, though I'm not sure whether that will be followed through.

In practice we're going to be limited in the number of cults we can realistically portray, especially if we're going to have quests for any of them. I'd suggest going for variety rather than quantity.

[Worsas]

I guess it is always a compressed presentation of the fictive place anyway and things end up omitted necessarily if you stress quality over quantity.

I remember when i played through the imperial cult in morrowind how i could join something like sub-orders at some point. Those orders were all within the imperial cult, so you did not actually enter a new faction. I don't know anymore how they were called. I think you might be doing something similar in the end, treating cults devoted to single divines as sub-cults of the imperial cult.

[TerrifyingDaedricFoe]

You did almoner quests (collecting money), shrine sergeant quests (fighter's guild-esque quests), lay healer quests (collecting ingredients) and oracle quests (finding artifacts). I wouldn't describe them as sub-factions though. More like different guild halls with more specialised quests - except all in one room.

[Lady Nerevar]

You don't have to make the cults joinable to have them. Suggestions in dialog, strategically placed temples, icons, statuettes, and other devotional items in people's homes.

I'm a huge fan of orthodox icons and dip- and triptychs. I can imagine a range of styles, from more realistic Roman to iconographic Byzantine to geometric northern European styles.

[Revenant]

A combination of the last two posts would work for me.

[Helena]

You don't have to make the cults joinable to have them. Suggestions in dialog, strategically placed temples, icons, statuettes, and other devotional items in people's homes.

They don't have to be joinable, but if we're going to flesh them out in any meaningful way, they'll need quite a bit of work put in to them. We could just have a bunch of people saying "I belong to the cult of [X]", but that wouldn't be especially interesting. I guess we could always use a combination of both, with a special topic for "cults" where random people can describe their affiliations, and a few cults that are portrayed in more detail.

[Praedator]

You don't have to make the cults joinable to have them. Suggestions in dialog, strategically placed temples, icons, statuettes, and other devotional items in people's homes.

They don't have to be joinable, but if we're going to flesh them out in any meaningful way, they'll need quite a bit of work put in to them. We could just have a bunch of people saying "I belong to the cult of [X]", but that wouldn't be especially interesting. I guess we could always use a combination of both, with a special topic for "cults" where random people can describe their affiliations, and a few cults that are portrayed in more detail.

Sounds good Helena, especially with some level or trade filters, or only when you have high speechcraft

[Lady Nerevar]

You don't have to make the cults joinable to have them. Suggestions in dialog, strategically placed temples, icons, statuettes, and other devotional items in people's homes.

They don't have to be joinable, but if we're going to flesh them out in any meaningful way, they'll need quite a bit of work put in to them. We could just have a bunch of people saying "I belong to the cult of [X]", but that wouldn't be especially interesting. I guess we could always use a combination of both, with a special topic for "cults" where random people can describe their affiliations, and a few cults that are portrayed in more detail.

Yea, that's what I was thinking. Lore is as much about the visual suggestion as it is about the explanation. The ash pits of the Dunmer are never explained, but their prevalence and what we know about other parts of Dunmer culture give us the an incredible amount of atmosphere. Something similar can be done with Cyrodiilic cults. Off the top of my head - traditional (post-christian) slavic houses have an iconostasis like area on a shelf in the corner of the house, usually surrounded by a hand-made towel/shawl/thing (ruchnik, if anyone speaks Russian). If something similar (whether visually or thematically) was in Cyrodiil, you don't even have to say "I belong to cult X," it says it for you.

[Helena]

Sounds like a good idea. The book Reflections On Cult Worship suggests that religion tends to be more of a 'private' matter in Cyrodiil anyway, so house shrines would make sense.

[Revenant]

House shrines are definitey something we should add at some point. The word 'iconostasis' is too nice a word to not use aswell.

[SamirA]

I am all for this idea being used. I would love to see some religious iconography in peoples homes and such in Cyrodiil.