RuneScape Forum Archive | A question about Zaros

Hguoh

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Padomenes said :
The Zarosians rejected Saradomin's annexation of the territory and chose to kill his troops coming in to re-govern or occupy it. As said again mod sources, everybody here knows this fact. They did not want to be ruled by Saradomin politically.

Pardon me, but how is that a defense? Let's just ignore the bit that you could only justify the idea of Saradomin not anticipating some violent resistance to his foreign government invading and conquering the Zarosians against their will by having him be either incredibly naive or just plain stupid.

Instead let's point out the other absurdity of this. If Saradomin went into the Zarosian Empire anticipating the violence resistance to his annexation, the only thing that makes this different to his destruction of Askroth is that he went into this expecting to crush the resistance ruthlessly rather than letting his temper get the better of him like last time.

Either way you slice it, he's killing people because they refused to be ruled by or follow him (which is exactly what you are trying to say he didn't/doesn't do).

16-Sep-2017 03:51:40 - Last edited on 16-Sep-2017 03:52:15 by Hguoh

Padomenes

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Hguoh said :
Padomenes said :
The Zarosians rejected Saradomin's annexation of the territory and chose to kill his troops coming in to re-govern or occupy it. As said again mod sources, everybody here knows this fact. They did not want to be ruled by Saradomin politically.

Pardon me, but how is that a defense? Let's just ignore the bit that you could only justify the idea of Saradomin not anticipating some violent resistance to his foreign government invading and conquering the Zarosians against their will by having him be either incredibly naive or just plain stupid.

Instead let's point out the other absurdity of this. If Saradomin went into the Zarosian Empire anticipating the violence resistance to his annexation, the only thing that makes this different to his destruction of Askroth is that he went into this expecting to crush the resistance ruthlessly rather than letting his temper get the better of him like last time.

Either way you slice it, he's killing people because they refused to be ruled by or follow him (which is exactly what you are trying to say he didn't/doesn't do). Then howcome those that did not 'resist' using armed force were spared, mod jack on twitter even said a large amount of humans in the area around Varrock were descended from those that lived under his occupation.

The ones that tried to respond with violence or in a resist peaceful takeover kind of way needed to be killed while those that did not he was alright with?

16-Sep-2017 03:58:51 - Last edited on 16-Sep-2017 04:01:34 by Padomenes

Hguoh

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MystLunaris said :
I'd like a source for that too, I can't find any information about who the Icyene were fighting against in that situation.

The information we've gotten on the Icyene's foes has been... odd... to say the least. According to Mods:

The race was sapient.
The race was the dark to the Icyene's light.
Trying to reason with the race would have led to the Icyene's destruction.
The race was native to New Domina.

Some of these seem blatantly contradictory with others (being sapient and yet not being open to reason or being native to New Domina (and thus living alongside the Icyene since before Saradomin came) and yet were going to lead to the Icyene's total destruction), and none have even been remotely confirmed in game.

The reason Pads comes to the conclusion that the race must have been predatory seems to stem from a conversation he and I had where he tried to claim that Saradomin's actions might not have been a genocide. I explained how unlikely it was that this was the case and that he should instead postulate reasons why a genocide could be justified (I mentioned the potential predation angle and also touched upon the idea of a race whose very presence near us would kill us (I believe my example was a race that talked via microwaves)).

Entirely speculation without any shred of mod endorsement (though I wouldn't be surprised if it were the case. That being said, we've seen the reformation of the government policies of Morytania towards a possible coexistence of prey and predator races where predation doesn't have to kill the prey, so it's not like predation automatically rules out coexistence (it just makes it harder).

16-Sep-2017 04:11:10

Hguoh

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Padomenes said :
Then howcome those that did not 'resist' using armed force were spared, mod jack on twitter even said a large amount of humans in the area around Varrock were descended from those that lived under his occupation.

Because they didn't resist. Because they were either willing follow him or to at least put up the false front of doing so. That really doesn't help your case about not killing people who don't bend the knee and follow him.

Padomenes said :
The ones that tried to respond with violence or in a resist peaceful takeover kind of way needed to be killed while those that did not he was alright with?

[sarcasm] Sure Pads, the armed force of soldiers who come to your home and demand you obey their rules or leave the only homes and lives you've ever known to avoid subjugation by them and kill those who disagree are doing a totally peaceful takeover. [/sarcasm]

16-Sep-2017 04:16:28 - Last edited on 16-Sep-2017 04:25:34 by Hguoh

Padomenes

Posts: 3,662 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Hguoh said :
Padomenes said :
Then howcome those that did not 'resist' using armed force were spared, mod jack on twitter even said a large amount of humans in the area around Varrock were descended from those that lived under his occupation.

Because they didn't resist. Because they were either willing follow him or to at least put up the false front of doing so. That really doesn't help your case about not killing people who don't bend the knee and follow him.

Padomenes said :
The ones that tried to respond with violence or in a resist peaceful takeover kind of way needed to be killed while those that did not he was alright with?

[sarcasm] Sure Pads, the armed force of soldiers who come to your home and demand you obey their rules and kill those who disagree are doing a totally peaceful takeover. [/sarcasm] They didn't have to 'follow him', all it was hinted is that they had to follow and live under his new laws plus accept Saradominism as the 'state religion'.

Or it makes sense they wouldn't fight back at those whom 'attacked their occupation'? Maybe there were some ideological disagreements, what if the empire educated certain Zarosians to view Saradomin's society as 'oppressive' and 'bringing poverty' if implemented?

We are also talking about a massive amount, living under Saradominist occupation: https://twitter.com/JagexJack/status/822095473859264513

16-Sep-2017 04:27:51

Padomenes

Posts: 3,662 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Hguoh said :
MystLunaris said :
I'd like a source for that too, I can't find any information about who the Icyene were fighting against in that situation.

The information we've gotten on the Icyene's foes has been... odd... to say the least. According to Mods:

The race was sapient.
The race was the dark to the Icyene's light.
Trying to reason with the race would have led to the Icyene's destruction.
The race was native to New Domina.

Some of these seem blatantly contradictory with others (being sapient and yet not being open to reason or being native to New Domina (and thus living alongside the Icyene since before Saradomin came) and yet were going to lead to the Icyene's total destruction), and none have even been remotely confirmed in game.

The reason Pads comes to the conclusion that the race must have been predatory seems to stem from a conversation he and I had where he tried to claim that Saradomin's actions might not have been a genocide. I explained how unlikely it was that this was the case and that he should instead postulate reasons why a genocide could be justified (I mentioned the potential predation angle and also touched upon the idea of a race whose very presence near us would kill us (I believe my example was a race that talked via microwaves)).

Entirely speculation without any shred of mod endorsement (though I wouldn't be surprised if it were the case. That being said, we've seen the reformation of the government policies of Morytania towards a possible coexistence of prey and predator races where predation doesn't have to kill the prey, so it's not like predation automatically rules out coexistence (it just makes it harder). http://services.runescape.com/m=forum/forums.ws?341,342,400,65872579

16-Sep-2017 04:29:32 - Last edited on 16-Sep-2017 04:29:57 by Padomenes

Hguoh

Posts: 7,581 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Padomenes said :
http://services.runescape.com/m=forum/forums.ws?341,342,400,65872579

And how does any of that disagree with anything I just said Pads?

The bit about the other New Domina race just leaves out the sapient bit.
And the bit on the conquest of the Zarosian Empire only corroborates my claims. He thinks it would have gone more peacefully if there weren't loyal Zarosians to try and continue in Zaros's absence (totally unexpected for areas that were ruled by Zaros for most or all of the 2nd age and nobody else was trying to grab the newly available premium real estate (again, how totally unexpected that gods trying to make footholds on the perfect world would leap at the opportunity).

16-Sep-2017 04:32:26 - Last edited on 16-Sep-2017 04:36:37 by Hguoh

Padomenes

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Hguoh said :
Padomenes said :
http://services.runescape.com/m=forum/forums.ws?341,342,400,65872579

And how does any of that disagree with anything I just said Pads?

The bit about the other New Domina race just leaves out the sapient bit.
And the bit on the conquest of the Zarosian Empire only corroborates my claims. He thinks it would have gone more peacefully if there weren't loyal Zarosians to try and continue in Zaros's absence (totally unexpected for areas that were ruled by Zaros for most or all of the 2nd age and nobody else was trying to grab the newly available premium real estate (again, how totally unexpected that gods trying to make footholds on the perfect world would leap at the opportunity). Stu confirmed they were unwilling to negotiate in the lore-corner under any circumstances.

Also what if some of these 'loyal Zarosians' attacked Saradomin's troops that were coming in peacefully, and were taught that it was an 'oppressive regime that would lead to poverty' say in propaganda then freaked out as the 'fight oppression' part in the ancient godbook hints? What would have been the problem if they could have been free to practice their religion but had to follow Saradomin's laws?

Situations where people that disagree with views attack liberators of territory are quite common, in this case some Zarosians were not comfortable with Saradomin trying to enforce equality on their society and believe in 'competition/might is right'? What of that then?

16-Sep-2017 04:44:39 - Last edited on 16-Sep-2017 04:48:23 by Padomenes

Hguoh

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Padomenes said :
Stu confirmed they were unwilling to negotiate in the lore-corner under any circumstances.

Yes, and I noted that the race was apparently unable to be reasoned with, which still doesn't really make sense with their supposed sapience.

Padomenes said :
Also what if some of these 'loyal Zarosians' attacked Saradomin's troops that were coming in peacefully, and were taught that it was an 'oppressive regime that would lead to poverty' say in propaganda then freaked out as the 'fight oppression' part in the ancient godbook hints? What would have been the problem if they could have been free to practice their religion but had to follow Saradomin's laws?

So all you've got is an unsubstantiated hypothetical that runs contrary to everything we've had that tells us that any surviving Zarosians couldn't openly practice their religion in Saradominist lands. Besides, we have good reason to suspect that Saradomin went in guns blazing (Torva's passage of the Virtus Book).

Padomenes said :
Situations where people that disagree with views attack liberators of territory are quite common, in this case some Zarosians were not comfortable with Saradomin trying to enforce equality on their society and believe in 'competition/might is right'? What of that then?

And why do you think those disagreement's happen? Because the only difference between conquering a people and 'liberating' them is the narrative constructed after the fact.

Also, equality? These are the events that led to the 3rd age, remember? The time period when Saradomin's own empire adopted the policy of prioritizing golem limbs for Icyene over humans. Besides, I'm pretty sure people in capitalist nations (most if not all democracies) would be quite against a communist force coming into their country to spread 'equality' (and especially not if they come armed and ready for a fight).

16-Sep-2017 10:10:47

MystLunaris

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I'll refrain from discussing both empires in the second age, since it's mostly speculation on both sides (although there is still enough to make some good points there's not really enough for any solid answers).
However, if you really think that Zaros's empire was against equality and equal opportunity then you're just flat out wrong, while in the end his empire may have ended up with a seedy underbelly that preyed on the weak, that most certainly was not his intention, his own philosophy is all about people becoming better and the strongest they can be and it's shown that his empire tried to make this as easy as possible for people, he built aqueducts, farms and helped improve the knowledge of farming, he encouraged education of all his citizens, he created a system of rules that for the most part allowed very different races to live alongside each other peacefully and I'm pretty sure he's had the only civilisation to ever build asylums to care for the mentally ill.

In terms of the whole Garlandia thing, there are still more options for a peaceful resoultion than just talking to the other race, as said on the thread you linked and as I thought myself, Saradomin could have travelled to different worlds trying to find one suitable for either the Icyene or the "Evil" race and then just moved them all there when he found somewhere suitable, he already had
high influence in Teragard and various other realms he introduced humans to, why couldn't he just bring the Icyene there if they really wanted to be peaceful?
If for some reason that wouldn't work there's still other options, he could have made a barrier around the Icyene cities to prevent them from being attacked, either a solid magical forcefield or something like the Salve.
Plus even if for some reason neither of those options would work, there's still plenty of militaristic options that don't end in total genocide and extinction. 99-120 Skill content , Skilling boss ideas , Talents , God Emissary D&D/Minigame , Vampyric and Elven tech trees

16-Sep-2017 11:23:37

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A question about Zaros