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ShortQuests -- individual adventure modules! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed to plug in to your game.

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="TheLastMehina" data-source="post: 1204543" data-attributes="member: 15076">How to keep a large number of people docilely contained in a state of quasi-oppression. Step One: Make Them Want To Be There. Set up a special religion just for the Exiles. From the cradle to the grave, each and every Exile is taught that they are the Chosen People of <Insert Deity Here>. Write a history for the Exiles, which may or may not have any basis in reality. Perhaps a prophet arose among the Exiles, and taught them the true nature of <IDH>. The Outsiders thought this was heresy, and persecuted the Exiles severely. But <IDH> took pity on his Chosen People, and led them to the land which is now the Great Storm. Perhaps the Storm is <IDH>'s doing, as a way to protect his Chosen People. One day, the prophet will return and lead his people to righteous dominion over all the nations of the world - the catch being that the prophet will return to the Storm, and his Chosen People must be there to recieve him, or lose their chance at power. Build up the religious teachings of the Exiles. The Storm is a land of peace and prosperity, where the Chosen People may flourish in virtue. Outside, though, is nothing but pain and sin and death. Mothers scare their children into obedience using stories of the horrors beyond the Storm. Step Two: Give Them A Goal Within Their Borders To Work For. Maybe the religion is more than a religion. Maybe it's something rather like the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages... not just a spiritual force, but a political and economic one, as well. Concentrate all the power of Exile society into the clergy. Those who are eligible to enter the clergy will then spend most of their time and effort climbing the clerical ladder, at the top of which is power and influence and money. Maybe throw in a few splinter sects for the main body of the religion to contend against, and focus their attention on. Those who are not eligible to enter the clergy will work for some other goal. Perhaps members of the religion are encouraged to attend temple rituals regularly...but only members sufficiently worthy are allowed in. So most members will spend time and effort working to attain and maintain their worthiness, and be too busy to question what's outside the Storm. Step Three: Distract Them. Give the Exiles goals to work for, something that requires their whole society to back, such as the building of pyramids. Or the farming of the special Absentius Deciduous trees. Maybe both. If the Exiles are focused on how great life inside the Storm is, how bad it is outside the Storm, how critical it is for them to go to temple, and how necessary it is for them to help build new temples, most Exiles will be too wrapped up in those issues to really question. War is generally a good thing to accomplish Step 3, but doesn't work well in a closed environment like the Storm. If you can find an enemy for them to fight, though, it would work well. Hell, you could make the enemy something akin to medieval "witches", or 1950s Communists - shadowly enemies which must be guarded against and rooted out for the good of the whole. Of course you will come across questioners and dissenters, people who aren't content with the status quo, who see beyond the idiocies of the religion and the stagnation of the society. Those'd be your PCs <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />.</blockquote>

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