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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: Ryan_Singer on November 05, 2010, 10:34:19 AM
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eruv
That is all.
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Unless all the people in the enclosure have established a strong, at least quasi-familial relationship and deep shared experiences, I'd say not.
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Unless all the people in the enclosure have established a strong, at least quasi-familial relationship and deep shared experiences, I'd say not.
Have you ever seen a orthodox community? Watch Fiddler on the roof.
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Heh.
I'm actually using exactly that idea in my write-up of Jerusalem. 99% of these count as 0-level thresholds, and cannot support more than the tiniest amount of power. However, there are dozens of them around the city (every group has their own), and they intertwine with each other. This makes it really hard to track someone who's walking around town by magic.
Actually, if you think about it from a DV point of view, it actually makes a little sense. It could be a reasonable example of "the evolution of religion". Thresholds work "in real life", so somewhere along the last 3000 years, the notion of putting up these "virtual walls" made it into the Jewish religion (possibly influenced by people "in the know"). This might even give it a bit more power as a threshold as it is in some sense "faith powered".
Edit: Note that Harry mentions something similar about walls around cemeteries in GP.
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Have you ever seen a orthodox community? Watch Fiddler on the roof.
Yes, I've seen an Orthodox community in real life. I do not disagree that there is something more of a spirit of shared community, but it would have to be a small, physically close-together, long-standing one with very little traffic with the outside. And given the Jewish tradition against magic, it would have to be an outsider setting up the wards, which would impinge upon the psychological insularity of the community necessary for a strong threshold. Granted, wards and threshold are not necessarily concomitant, but the fact of an unrelated outsider doing it would make the task more difficult at best.
The Orthodox communities I've seen have a limited but still-important traffic with the outside; the energies would be diffused greatly, and that's not counting the intimate contact with outsiders that would be necessary for wards. Not saying it's impossible, but that it's far from a given.
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Why would it have to be an outsider of the community. Would not Kabbalah (http://"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabbalah") be a reasonable explaination?
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Why would it have to be an outsider of the community. Would not Kabbalah (http://"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabbalah") be a reasonable explaination?
The magic aspect of Kabbalah has always been considered a bit fringe-y.
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You mean the same way any sort of magical believe has been? :) Maybe, we're just not in the Know. :)
Besides, a tight knit community wouldn't really talk about something like that with outsiders, would then?
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You mean the same way any sort of magical believe has been? :) Maybe, we're just not in the Know. :)
Besides, a tight knit community wouldn't really talk about something like that with outsiders, would then?
Meh, it gets out sooner or later.
In truth, however, whatever does or doesn't happen IRL doesn't HAVE to be identical in the DV. It honestly wouldn't be a great leap from your thoughts to Ryan's idea of an erev qualifying for a threshold and being wardable. In fact, that would be a great story hook for an adventure, wouldn't it? Hidden magical traditions suddenly coming to light? :)
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From what I see in that wikipedia Article, which is all i know about the subject, modern day Eruvs are somewhat less intense than the original ones.
Entire Neighbourhoods enclosed by stringing wires between telephone poles and such. Also they, and the unity that they form, only are in effect on Sabbath.
So, i would only allow wards on Eruvs that are somewhat more traditional. Where people living inside the community really see themselves as extended family. Where this unity is stable, and exists all the time and not only at certain times.
Contact with outsides doesn't play into it. People invite guests into their homes all the time, and highly social people don't get a weaker threshold than loners... so why would that be the case here all of a sudden... In fact, highly social people would probably get a stronger threshold.
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Contact with outsides doesn't play into it. People invite guests into their homes all the time, and highly social people don't get a weaker threshold than loners... so why would that be the case here all of a sudden... In fact, highly social people would probably get a stronger threshold.
But it does. Trade, hiring craftsmen, town officials, etc. - the border can be passed without open invitation in modern Orthodox communities. That would weaken the integrity of the threshold unless the community had been planned and built so that there COULD be no passers-through. Modern erevs tend more towards the idea of a neighborhood, not a physically separate village/town, and that's seriously erosive of the idea of a group threshold.
It's irrelevant, anyway. Your game could certainly come up with the equivalent to a gated community - problem solved and without need for rationalizing and guessing about real-life things.
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I think you worded it wrong, Ryan. An Eruv is a boundary and can support a ward or threshold. As pointed out above, I suspect that most Eruvs are formalities, and would therefore not support a threshold, though some very tight-knit communities might. But even if it had no threshold, I would think that the boundary (which according to the article is often demarked by a wire enclosure complete with wire 'doorways') would be suitable for erecting a ward upon. That said, it would be a very LARGE ward (at +2 complexity per zone, and each home/yard/etc enclosed would have multiple zones). Putting up the ward would also cut off electricity, and might be problematic in terms of the exceptions needed to allow residents and their guests to come and go (none of which would matter as much for an Oh, Shit! moment when you needed to put up a temporary ward to protect the community).
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Good point on the electricity and phone. But yeah, as an emergency-measure consideration, I think it could work at least to some extent. To be arranged with your GM.
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The nature of the Eruv could play a part in it's threshholdery. I'd expect that one where the "neighborhood" were mainly members of the same extended family, it should have more potential than a Eruv where there's no particular family with which the site's "identity" is tied to.
Just my guestimation there.
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Hi, all, first post, been lurking a while.
Actually been playing with this concept for a bit, and I have one other thing to add to the discussion:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mezuzah
My partner-in-crime/sounding board and I have been discussing this, and agree that it the mezuzah was put up by a devout member of the faith, it would literally function as "Bless This House" and boost the threshold level by +1 or +2. (this only works if the parchment is regularly checked and then reattached with the same level of devoutness; if the parchment is damaged or if the sullen teenager does it just to get it out of the way, no bonus).
But as for the main eruv discussion, having grown up in an area where the eruv has real meaning and significance (I've seen 60-year-old men put on their heavy woolen vestments at home and walk the distance to synagogue, wearing them on top of the stereotypical black suit... in the summer, rather than break the prohibition of carrying on the Sabbath), I'd agree, yeah, most Eruvs are not going to be more than +0 thresholds, because the community its servicing is too new, too divided, or the eruv is too frequently down due to inclement weather breaking the boundary string. But there will be a few that are more potent. And some that will be very potent.
A suggestion for a rule of thumb? +1 threshold strength for every decade after the first that the community has been there with at least ten families (a minyan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minyan)), as a base strength to start fiddling with. Other factors effects--population turnover, number of synagogues, etc--can't be rule of thumb-d that easily.
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Or perhaps each generation since it was founded? Raising a family strengthens the threshold, after all.
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I think you worded it wrong, Ryan. An Eruv is a boundary and can support a ward or threshold. As pointed out above, I suspect that most Eruvs are formalities, and would therefore not support a threshold, though some very tight-knit communities might. But even if it had no threshold, I would think that the boundary (which according to the article is often demarked by a wire enclosure complete with wire 'doorways') would be suitable for erecting a ward upon.
That article is a bit of an oversimplification when it comes to virtual eruvs. The Talmudic laws on the Eruv (which I admit, I have studied only a wee little bit) are based on the idea that the entrance to a courtyard is symbolically similar to the opening of the First Temple, and also the Tabernacle and must follow certain height and width limitations. But, if there is a lintel at a certain height, you can use an opening of any width (as long as there are doorposts I think). Effectively, the wires are lintels. So, they're not walls. The whole virtual eruv is threshold.
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The other example we have of thresholds is a Church.
- It's a public building.
- Everyone is theoretically invited.
- Maintenance/Electricity all apply.
The reason it gets a threshold status is because of "hallowed ground", and it's understood that there is some sort of divine protection going on.
While an eruv wouldn't have that divine aspect quite so strongly, there is certainly a religious component to it, which I would argue would make it more powerful than an your average "intrinsic" threshold created by a community/family who never gave any thought to it.
Another point in favor of an eruv is that in many cases the community is actively checking up on and religiously (pun intended) attending to it. It is common practice in the US to have an automated voice message and weekly e-mail telling people that the Eruv is "active". To me this feels like the constant maintenance described that is needed for focus items in the RPG.