Prognosticracy: Form of government where all decisions and laws are made based on incredibly powerful divination rituals (e.g. 3.5-style Contact Other Plane with take 10).
Those with administrative, legislative, and/or judicial power are invariably diviners of some stripe. Politics are based on interpretation of divinations and subversions thereof. Free will is optional.
What would it be like, /tg/?
Very fatalistic attitude in government. Rapid shift to belief that whatever they see is inevitable.
>>46685891
Short, bloody, and unpleasant for everyone involved. Divination is, by its nature, unreliable, subject to interpretation, and often contradictory, meaning that the actions of the government will appear as devoid of sense and reason. Laws will often change. Seemingly random edicts will be enforced at inopportune times. Rebellion will happen, admittedly most of it will be discovered and put down quickly, but the realm will be in a permanent state of violent flux.
>>46686170
>Divination is, by its nature, unreliable, subject to interpretation, and often contradictory
Depends. COP is kinda clear-cut on yes/no and you can ask parity questions.
>>46686170
>Divination is, by its nature, unreliable, subject to interpretation, and often contradictory, meaning that the actions of the government will appear as devoid of sense and reason.
Nah, government is split by hopefuls, fatalists, progressionists, etc. who interpret things their way
>>46685891
>What would it be like, /tg/?
Maybe like Castle Gormenghast?
>Omens are taken seriously by most people, even non-diviners. Many may wait until "the stars are right" before making major life choices, like starting a new business or getting married.
>Usual magocracy tropes, but either every mage learns divination magic to some degree or diviners are given some degree of preferential treatment
>Extensive records of any visions that have not yet come true means you'll need bureaucrats and archivists (but they'd already exist in the usual magocracy)
>Probably a team of people dedicated to figuring out what the more obscure prophecies mean (Dept. of Mysteries from Harry Potter?)
>Can still have a a king, legislature, senate, etc., but the diviners would be the ones in the know.
Probably a pretty normal nation, otherwise. The common folk may be more superstitious, but that's to be expected.
>>46686170
Divination has to be reliable at least a majority of the time, or else people would eventually stop using it.
>>46689522
I could also see many people buying charms/enchantments to make themselves and their homes harder to scry on. A magical surveillance state could grow from a prognosticracy.
I actually imagine a senate or congress of diviners being the ones in charge of recognizing and interpreting the omens, possibly elected officials, but also possibly a select team of individuals handpicked by their predecesors. Decisions would be made by vote after deliberation, and more controversial omens would probably become a true shitshow of bickering and politics.
>>46685891
Minority Report
>>46689709
I meant to add that this are the state figureheads as well. A king with a team of diviners is still a monarchy, a true prognosticracy should have the diviners as the legitimate authority.
Seems kinda like the Roman college of Augurs, except with real omens being used to exert political power instead of fake ones
How about the two major factions of the Prognosticracy being the Auspices (Augurs, who interpret birds) and Haruspices (who interpret entrails), with the balance of power being dictated by how many prophecies they get right
>>46689771
Political parties would more likely be formed around the question of:
"We know the future (maybe), so what do we do about it?"
Do they try to fight fate and make something else happen?
Do they try to subvert fate to redirect it?
Do they try to enforce fate in the name of some grand, promised utopia that can supposedly be achieved only if all prophecies come to pass?
>>46689880
Fair enough
How about the "veil between worlds" or whatever bullshit is naturally weaker in the lands of the Prognosticracy, hence why divination works better and a society has been built around it? This is so you don't wonder why the whole world isn't just run by Diviners
>>46685891
I read this as Procrastinocracy, and really hoped it would be a thread where all major fovernment decisions are made later or in the final several minutes before deadlines with very little discussion or debate preceeding
>>46690218
Yeah, but we've already got that. This is about fantasy.
>>46685891
> Form of government where all decisions and laws are made based on incredibly powerful divination rituals
> What would it be like, /tg/?
Those in charge of interpretation will be the ones in charge of everything.
>>46690649
>Those in charge of interpretation will be the ones in charge of everything.
Yes, that's... pretty much what the 'cracy' in 'prognosticracy' implies.
>>46685891
Does scrying count as divination?
>>46692431
Yes, NSA.
>>46686460
>COP is kinda clear-cut on yes/no and you can ask parity questions.
Contact Other Plane is asking an outsider for free consulting. It isn't reliable at all. There's literally a table you roll on to see if it decides to maliciously lie to you. How on Gaia did you think this is a good idea?
>>46692576
Using 3.5-style Contact Other Plane to contact greater deities (yes, deities, plural; remember that the spell specifically sees the caster polling multiple gods of a certain category) produces an 88% chance for a true answer, a 2% chance for no answer, a 9% chance for a lie, and a 1% chance for a random answer. Contacting greater deities poses no risk to someone with Intelligence modifier +6, as taking 10 is possible; Pathfinder had to specifically bar this, but it is possible in 3.5.
There is absolutely nothing stopping the caster from asking parity questions like "Did you answer my previous question truthfully?", perhaps even multiple times.
D&D 3.5's default setting is its version of the Great Wheel, which contains an innumerable amount of gods (the Fiendish Codices I and II quite clearly show that the old mythological pantheons from AD&D 2e's deific lineup still exist even in 3.5's take on the Great Wheel, and this is before we get into sprawling pantheons like the Oerthian pantheon), many of which are greater gods. Thus, it is unlikely that any given god could find themselves exhausted by fielding Contact Other Plane inquiries.
Remember that gods in 3.5 have the Portfolio Sense ability, which makes polling them a perfectly valid method of prognostication via Contact Other Plane.
>>46689701
Perhaps these charms, unbeknownst to they who purchase them, actually have the opposite effect; while they do protect against some prying eyes, those who know the secret codes of entry can utilize the power of the charms to look make their scrying easier.
Perhaps the government secretly controls the suppliers of these charms, and, while the front selling them promotes their use "to keep out the eyes of the men in [capital city]", in fact uses them to keep watch over the citizenry and stop any sympathizers with rebellion or revolt who might threaten the peace and prosperity of the Kingdom of the All-Seeing Eye.
Perhaps the rebellion knows this, but rather than destroying the charms, works tirelessly to find the secret codes and see who the All-Seeing Eye is watching, and perhaps switches them around to show It the wrong things.We scroll-hackers now?
