From: owner-7thsea@darkedge.com on behalf of Remi Cogan [remicogan@yahoo.com] Sent: Tuesday, September 14, 1999 11:23 AM Subject: [7th Sea RPG] Re: Noble [JOHN, KEVIN] < What's the advantage of being a noble? What do you get for those 10 points? > Perques will vary according to umpteen variables, including the country's tradition of nobility and just how important a noble you are. < Can you expect to be granted an audience with the monarch? > If you're a Duke, usually yes. If you're Avalon gentry (in English tradition, titled subjects below Earl, I believe, were considered gentry), you'll have the right to at least see the Queen in the House of Lords. If Empereur Leon Alexandre is anything like the real world Sun King, expect to be in his presence for about half of every year as he usually requires all his nobles attend court in Charousse. If you're anything else, then it all depends upon the ruler and the country's traditions. >Are you above the law? > In Eisen, you could make the laws depending on where your domain is. If you're a boyar of Ussura, only Matushka and the Gaius would bind you. Most other situations place nobles in a whole different set of legal code from commoners, one that usually isn't too harsh on petty crime or moderate crime. High crimes are very punishable, like treason. Though you could get light treatment from chummy authorities, don't expect it. < Can you do anything you want on your land? > Ussura, yes. Eisen, usually. Montaigne, you can get away with alot. Everywhere else, you wield considerable power, but abusing it might not be a good idea (ie. don't treat peasants like livestock, levy impoverishing taxes, etc.) < Can you request aid from your countrymen and expect to get it? > It depends upon their generosity if they are your superiors. If they are your vassals, they are obliged to render aid under their feudal contract. However, feudal bonds have already weakened and continue to weaken in almost every country . . . < Is there some inherent reputation with being a noble? > Other than being noble, not really. The nobility system of Theah seem more intact and rational than the historical real world where often you couldn't tell if a baron or marquis or count was genuine or self titled. But considering that there are tens of thousands of true nobles anyway, most won't be famous without something else to distinguish them. < If you are challenged to a duel, do you have special options (ie, on the spot hire someone to defend you)? > No more than the average person. You can refuse the duel (you are not obliged to accept normally), accept it, or pay someone else to fight for you. < Is attacking a noble a capital offense? > If a commoner attacks a noble, count on it. If a noble attacks a noble, the matter might be handled more as a civil suit (ie. pay a hefty fine). If a superior noble attacks an inferior, so long as the violence is considered justified, not much would come of it. < Would the defending noble have the right to dispatch the attacker by any means necessary? > In Vodacce between any duelists, any participant has the right to use whatever means at hand to win the duel whether the duelists are both common, both noble, or a commoner and a noble. Elsewhere, stricter etiquette usually prevails. < Can you expect preferential treatment anywhere you go? > You often can. Just don't wander around in a foreign country that keeps poor relations with your home nation and expect the red carpet. There could even be a bullet with your name on it . . . Also, in Montaigne, the nobility almost always treats other nobles with proper respect for station. However, the peasantry is slowly becoming hostile to its native nobility. They may be even more hostile to nobles expecting wining and dining during their stay in the country that have no legal power over the peasantry. < What rights and priviledges do nobles have in other countries? > Those afforded under "international law", more like international custom. In the real world, such customs were beginning to unfold in Europe after the thiry years war. So, if Theah has acquired the same philosophies, then it's likely that the principle of statesmen immunity (or is it diplomatic immunity? I can't remember) has come about. Basically, someone considered a supreme authority or a member of the supreme authority of a de facto independent territory and its populace is immune from *any* prosecution in *any* other country for actions orchestrated during the statesman's term of power. So, for example, if in the real world Margaret Thatcher, former PM of the UK, went to Argentina or a country with sympathetic relations with Argentina, she would be guaranteed immunity from any prosecution for conducting the Falklands War against Argentina. The Argentinian legal system would not permit her arrest under international custom. Basically concensus developed that if every country that ever felt wronged by another country arrested the other country's leaders, then no statesman would be safe and diplomacy would falter. Now, in RL, this custom is weakening as concensus is building that leaders suspected of particularly horrid crimes during tenure of office (like Hitler, Pinochet, Saddam Hussein) should face trial. But in Theah (if it does have the principal of statesmen immunity), such notions that certain statesmen deserve trial for certain crimes has not come about. However, having immunity for actions taken as a leader of state does not make one automatically immune to crimes committed when not made in state business. For instance, if I were Good King Sandoval, and I went to Vodacce on a pleasure trip where I murdered several people, I could very well expect prosecution as a murderer per Vodacce law (which might not want to try a neighbor king, but it would be possible to). (NOTE: I'm not implying Sandoval would ever do something like that :) It's just an example.) So if your noble is part of a legislative assembly that serves as a (not necessarily "the") supreme power in the country (like Parliament, Estates General, Duma, etc.), he cannot legally be held responsible for actions taken against foreign states while serving his state. If he commits a crime in a foreign land when not serving in an official capacity, he is not automatically guaranteed immunity. There were times when this principle broke down in the real world. During the Napoleonic Wars, other nations regarded Napoleon as so major a threat that they had no qualms about banishing him for what Napoleon would have deemed defensive measures taken to protect the French revolution from hostile regimes abroad. The same could happen in Theah. But if you are playing a hero and act the part, you shouldn't be doing dastardly deeds anyway. Remi Cogan __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Bid and sell for free at http://auctions.yahoo.com --- To unsubscribe, send a message to "majordomo@darkedge.com" and put "unsubscribe 7thsea (or 7thsea-digest)" in the body of the message. Contents Copyright (C) 1997,98,99 by ALDERAC ENTERTAINMENT GROUP, INC.