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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9788519" data-attributes="member: 6790260">I've had two groups in my Arabian Nights-flavored Dungeon World game, Jewel of the Desert, that I've intentionally given blue-and-orange morality vibes. One, the Shi (arabicized of the Gaelic pronunciation of sidhe), view the world purely in terms of aesthetics. If something is beautiful, then it is worth doing, creating, protecting, preserving, exalting--even if it is incredibly cruel or hurtful. As an example, they used their powerful innate magics to do things like suspending perfectly functional, living organs--presumably taken from a living body!--in crystalline cylinders as a sort of...display. They had vivisection theaters for people to watch humanoid bodies being taken apart, alive. But they also had houses of healing (because healing removes the ugliness of sickness), and incredibly opulent pleasure gardens, and...yeah. The party never personally met any Shi, as they had all fled from (or been destroyed by) the Song of Thorns, but they encountered many creations thereof and the feralized remnants of their creatures and servants.The other, whom the party have very carefully dealt with a few times, are Jinnistani nobles. See, in this world, noble genies cannot control which of their offspring will also become noble genies. And sometimes, the power can skip one, two, three, or even more generations, spontaneously appearing as a result of unknown triggers. (If the trigger were knowable/consistent, you can 100% be sure that the noble genies would have discovered it by now, they would LOVE to know who's going to manifest.)The consequence of this is that noble genies cannot afford to just throw their weight around. If they did, it would completely tear their society apart, and they'd be constantly at one another's throats. Nothing would get done. It would be a horrible mess--for everyone. So they have adapted their culture to this inconvenient spontaneous arrival of potential rivals; they have a code of conduct for their members, and anyone who manifests noble genie powers is immediately brought into that structure and enmeshed into those rules, ensuring that the system is self-sustaining. See...a genie manifesting noble genie powers makes them functionally immortal, their aging stops from the day they manifest and their elemental magical powers slowly but steadily grow until they are each functionally a one-man army of elemental power with some specific element. (Usually, those elements are earth, air, fire, or water; no other element is known, but that doesn't mean it couldn't happen, it just hasn't as far as anyone knows.)As a result of all this...they care a hell of a lot about a bunch of things that mortals don't, and couldn't give two poops about several things mortals do. But, more importantly, why they care about a great many things is very, very different--and that's where the blue-and-orange morality shines the strongest. The highest-ranking Jinnistani nobles--queens, sultans, princes, emirs, sheikha, dukes, barons, etc., those who rule in their own right, not as an agent or minister for another noble--take good care of the citizens of their cities....not because they give an aerial coitus about the people, but because it is a status symbol to other noble genies. "Look at all these happy, productive people in MY city! See how much YOUR people wish they had a leader like ME?" Likewise, they plot and plan and manipulate extensively, often on a timescale of decades or centuries, because they know they have that kind of time. A setback, willingly accepted today, can be the reason that a plan bears greater fruit in a hundred years. The rise (or fall) of mortal rulers is a matter of some concern, but not a particularly dire one.Becoming a noble genie means how you see the world, and the things in it, changes. Some resist the change, and try to hold onto who they once were. Those usually tend to stay at lower ranks, to avoid the politicking and intrigue, unless they're too powerful (there is variation in total power that any given noble genie will achieve without intentional, long-term effort). Those who embrace it, however, are in the majority--and they become something un-human. Not inhuman, mind; they can be quite affable, and even the most conniving and manipulative usually still retain elements of the personality they once held in mortal life. (For a good example, His Majesty, His Eminence, Sahl Thaqib Humaidan al-Nazar yatt-Asmar, Prince of the South Wind; he retains his love of theater, and is the personal patron of the Royal Cyclonic Theater, where the Skywind Repertory Company performs plays scrupulously documenting the very true and accurate story of a certain crew of adventurers...) But they are not human, and it is a grave, grave mistake to view them so--even when they're friendly to you.</blockquote>

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