Individual precepts and truly organic ideology. No, this time its for real guys.

[The_Blind_One]

> Pawns should have their own individual precepts/beliefs rather than ideoligions brute forcing their precepts from a top down perspective onto pawns.

This way pawns have much more individual variety in thoughts and present a more nuanced and diverse ideological perspective that is both complex and simple in how it would interact between pawns and ideologies. Ideologies on themselves also would present more varied and complex perspectives simultaneously. You could allow ideoligions to drift into different accepted precepts organically this way when enough pawns change their precept stance so that the ideoligical 'norm' of the colony becomes something different. (natural drift)

(to be clear, many previous traits such as misogynist, misandrist, nudist, cannibal, transhumanist, flesh purist etc would be replaced with their respective precepts instead that can be dynamically changed over time to represent held ideological positions changing. A misogynist can't become a believer in female supremacy for example without first losing their precept of misogyny.)

> Ideologions should be formed around 'norms' instead of fixed static precepts.

As pawns would have their own precepts and thus express a varied range of beliefs and philosophies, ideoligions would have an accepted 'norm' or range of precepts around which pawns can form stable ideological communities while retaining their individuality. These precept norms wouldn't allow one to deviate too much of course from the core beliefs but represent an accepted range of positions while retaining the same ideoligious group identity.

> Pawns have individual opinions on other pawns based on precept positions.

If you allow pawns to have opinions of each other based on their precepts rather than arbitrary ideoligious affiliation, you could have a lot of nuance and different ideologions combining and living peacefully together as long as they aren't too drastically different from each other or whether they are based on how open they are to diverse thought. Friendships would form more around shared affinity and beliefs rather than arbitrary methods as well. Even rivalry in the same ideologion could exist and form based on different stances on where the precept 'norm' of an ideoligion should lie naturally.

As a simple example, the 'Physical Love' precept could have some leeway in how pawns and the game treat it.

An ideology could have its Physical love precept 'norm' set at 'Spouse Only (Mild)' but individual pawns could still consider their personal precept on this matter as 'Free' or 'Spouse Only (Strict)' and be considered 'in-line' with the religion and not suffer any lack of 'conviction' from this position (as they are only 1 rank or position removed from the norm). Each individual pawn would have their own opinion of each other based on their precepts and try to convince the other through conversations and arguments to make them see the world their way. Some pawns might not care if two other pawns are sharing the same bed when unmarried while another pawn of the same religion might despise it. Diversity of thought and beliefs so to speak in the same ideology.

Even in gameplay mechanics this could come in handy or provide interesting roleplay oppertunity. A pawn that believes in Physical Love: Free and a pawn that believes in Physical Love: Spouse Only (Mild) may therefore have a difference of opinion with each other and may or may not end up sleeping together based on this. Two lover pawns who would have Physical Love: Free for example in an ideoligion which has Physical Love restricted to only Marriage (mild) would still be able to have their relationship go to the next level but would suffer stigma and negative opinions from their fellow colonists who have a different and stricter precept to them.

> The more precepts a pawn has that deviate strongly from the 'norm' of an ideoligion the weaker their conviction would be of that ideology. The more in-line a pawn would be with their ideology's 'norm', the easier it would be for them to retain conviction or prosletyze it. Conversely if a pawn had more precepts in line with an ideology that was trying to convert them and they fit in the precept norm of that ideoligion better than their current ideoligion, the easier it would be to convert them to said ideology.

After all it is easier to convert someone whose precepts only deviates a little such as on whether they can sleep together when in love or not rather than someone who believes in the inherent supremacy of a tunneler cannabalistic blinded and masochistic way of life for example.

You only need to change one small thing in someones precepts compared to eating human flesh, living underground, enjoy being blinded and hurting yourself in masochistic rituals.

Conversions would then be harder for extremely deviating ideologies and easier for similar ones. Converting another pawn then would start by bringing their precepts in line around the 'norm' of the target ideology, slowly bit by bit convincing them of a new better way of life. Once their precepts are brought in line enough to fit your ideology they can be officially converted as believers rather than outright trying to convert them whole piece from one way of life to another completely different and opposite way of life.

Thus one ideology is way easier to convert towards than the other. This also stops pawns who have mental breaks from flip flopping between completely different ideologies overnight like a schizophrenic mental patient. They may change a precept or so but they wouldn't suddenly become new personalities overnight with this method.

Ultimately you can have some interesting colonies this way.

> carnivores and vegetarians living together in the same colony in the same religion (because it's not set as a strict requirement in this ideology for example, it's just a personal precept preference. They may still dislike each other though.)
> Some colonists may think slavery is ok, while others think it is disapproved. (think America 1840's abolitionist christians but varied stances on slavery.)
> Executions? Some may not care while others simply want justice if found guilty.
> Some may think free love is fine while others think marriage is holy. (modern day debate over marriage sanctity)
> Some may demand women be fully covered and others may simply demand that they are fully dressed and with hats/headwraps. (the old burka vs hijab question in islam, yet they are all still muslims.)

They could all still be the same ideoligion and all would have different opinions on each other based on each pawns individual beliefs. A complex web of opinions and personal beliefs in a colony would form from this type of ideological implementation.

It's more strange that an ideoligion represents a monolith of fixed precepts rather than a diversity of thought based around a 'norm'. Pawn should have individual beliefs while still remaining part of the same community and providing diverse interactions between different pawns based on their individual positions and precepts in regards to what truly defines their ideoligion and pawnhood.

If you wanted your colony to move more towards an individual pawns precepts, you could just make them the new 'moral guide' as this would give that pawn increased chance at convincing other pawns of the same faith into following their specific precept preferences. This would effectively give you the player some leeway into organizing and leading your colonies reform. Assigning that pawn which has the unique precept Diversity of Thought: Exalted might be just what your colony needs to mesh all the different ideoligions together in your colony without them all going berserk on each other.

What ya all think?

> It provides more believable nuanced ideologions with a diversity of pawn beliefs who would have individual preferences.
> More interactions between pawns based on individual precept preferences forming more complex and interesting relationships.
> Organic 'norm' drift of ideoligious precepts providing natural evolution of ideologions over time.
> Conversions are based on relatedness and affinity to other ideoligions rather than arbitrary conversion mechanics.
> Diversity of colonies without everyone breaking out into full out brawls because they differ on one single precept.

In simpler terms, it's colonists that make up an ideoligion, not the other way around.

[GoblinCookie]

What ya all think?

> It provides more believable nuanced ideologions with a diversity of pawn beliefs who would have individual preferences.
> More interactions between pawns based on individual precept preferences forming more complex and interesting relationships.
> Organic 'norm' drift of ideoligious precepts providing natural evolution of ideologions over time.
> Conversions are based on relatedness and affinity to other ideoligions rather than arbitrary conversion mechanics.
> Diversity of colonies without everyone breaking out into full out brawls because they differ on one single precept.

In simpler terms, it's colonists that make up an ideoligion, not the other way around.

Our colonists aren't supposed to be the sum of the ideologion, our colonists may be only a few people out a religion that may well have billions of members.  Therefore our influence on the ideologion as a whole is likely to be minimal unless we really are it's own representatives (in the galaxy not just on our planet). 

As things presently stand, disagreements between individual pawns and their ideoligion is presently represented by having a trait that conflicts with their ideologion, this does directly make them easier to convert someone if they have traits that conflict with their own ideologion.  I am unclear as to why all the personal ideological beliefs cannot be incorporated into the present trait system and why they would have to be replaced.  Maybe the maximum number of traits would have to be increased, but that is trivial. 

It is unclear also how individual dissent is supposed to actually deliver change realistically.  Religions do not change much over time and for that reason all existing religions tend to agree on most practical matters of ethics (their precepts are pretty much that precepts *of* the first religion).  Basically religions only change their beliefs when their beliefs become totally untenable given the wider secular world, a world that does not really exist at the moment.  If enough people acting in secular world ignore the religions precepts enough that the only way to maintain authority is for the religion to chance it's own beliefs to conform to that world, it will change but it will do so as little as it can get away with. 

Maybe the best way to represent this is to have it that if the player ignores the precepts of their ideoligion enough for long enough, they will adopt a new ideoligion that at least does not contradict their actions.  It is hard to fathom how to fit individual pawns trait in here, maybe some folks will maintain their original ideologion and those with the traits that correspond to the new ideoligion will be more likely to join it? 

[falanian]

I agree for most big religions this would be the case, so I can see why changing the main game to be individual-based would be a little fraught. Cults, however, are a different story, since they often really do have just a few members whose beliefs change over time. I think the-blind-ones system would work really, really well for that. It would definitely be a good mod, but playing as a preestablished religion, it doesn't work as well.
Making the traits into individual precepts is really interesting to me though. I think the way that ideology handles individuals sinning (assuming it was forced, having the pawn take a mood debuff) is a little wacky since people willfully go against their religion all the time. Making nudist/cannibal etc. negate those precepts is a step in the right direction, and maybe general traits like "devout" or "fake believer" would help, but having individual precepts which can be slightly different from the main ideology works too.

[GoblinCookie]

I agree for most big religions this would be the case, so I can see why changing the main game to be individual-based would be a little fraught. Cults, however, are a different story, since they often really do have just a few members whose beliefs change over time. I think the-blind-ones system would work really, really well for that. It would definitely be a good mod, but playing as a preestablished religion, it doesn't work as well.
Making the traits into individual precepts is really interesting to me though. I think the way that ideology handles individuals sinning (assuming it was forced, having the pawn take a mood debuff) is a little wacky since people willfully go against their religion all the time. Making nudist/cannibal etc. negate those precepts is a step in the right direction, and maybe general traits like "devout" or "fake believer" would help, but having individual precepts which can be slightly different from the main ideology works too.

They do negate those precepts already in most cases I think.  It certainly does in the case of clothing and nudist.  There are some holes in the system however, like charitable psychopaths.

I felt there was a better way of handling the 'are we are cult?' issue than simply having to set this up manually (though that could be an option).  The idea is that we always start with an established religion but if our actions as the player contradicts their beliefs enough we will up with a new religion forming in our colony, one heavily influenced by the original religion. 

This 'new religion' tag prevents the game from creating characters outside our colony that have that religion.  Everyone else that we encounter will *not* be of that religion.