The Rangalan Chateaus

Divinity: Rangal
Adherents: The wealthy and the noble
Reach: Chateaus across the continent; membership in one admits you to all
Text: The Book of Rangal
Doctrine: Brotherhood through competition
Entry: High dues, an initiation of contests, and an expensive ribboned sash

The Rangalan Chateaus are a network of clubs for people with money, organised around the Book of Rangal and presented as a faith. Whether they are chiefly a church or chiefly a society is a question members do not seem eager to settle.

Membership

High dues and costly regalia keep out anyone who cannot afford them; a single ribbon for the cross-body sash can cost what would feed a family for a year. Chateaus stand across the continent and membership in one grants visiting rights to all, which makes the association useful to anyone who travels.

Admission is a matter of paying the dues and learning the doctrine of brotherhood through competition. People join for the beliefs and stay for the connections. In the upper strata of society the association is close to a requirement — among nobility, what you do not know will ruin you.

Competition

Competition, and betrayal, sit at the centre of the Book of Rangal. The initiation demonstrates it: an initiate is set against other recent inductees in a series of challenges — puzzles, mock diplomacy, feats of memory — and admission depends on winning enough of them.

In their own words

Bevel Dart, The Musings of a Wanderer

Introduction

The Rangalan Chateaus are a mysterious organization… church…? Fancy buildings, closed doors, high fences, odd symbols, and those cryptic cross-body sashes full of ribbons… And of course this nosy wanderer had to know. May I introduce you to myself, a member of the High Rangalan Chateau of Dreza. Former member. They kicked me out. They don’t like when you keep breaking out in chortles during their rites.

So with a free tongue… quill… I hereby unsecret some of the Chateau’s secrets.

Membership

The Rangalan Chateaus are a series of clubs for people with money. High dues and expense adornments tend to keep the “rabble” out. The cost of a single ribbon for your sash could feed a family for a year!

Chateaus are found across the continent, and membership in one provides visiting rights to all of them. Useful when one goes a’quest’n.

You can usually get yourself inducted by paying the high initial dues and memorizing some mumbo jumbo about brotherhood through competition. It worked for me.

People join for the beliefs but the connections are worth their weight in gold. You can hardly operate in the high stratas of society without this association. In the ranks of nobility, what you don’t know will kill you, or worse, ruin you.

Beliefs & Induction

Competition, and backstabbing, are core within the Book of Rangal. Take the initiation rite as an example. The Initiate is pitted against several other recent inductees in a series of challenges. Challenges include puzzles, mock diplomacy, and memorization. If the Initiate wins a few of these challenges, she is in. But! If a recent inductee loses too many times to new Initiates, they are stripped of their sash and booted.

The Book of Rangal speaks to the privilege of power. Power is earned. It is acquired, maintained, and expanded by deals, words, and cunning.

Order within a Chateau is kept through strict protocol and rank. (do not call the Master-at-Arms a canoodled nincompoop who can’t pick a pumpernickel)

Due to the organization’s usefulness in establishing connections and its exclusivity through cost, the Rangalan Chateaus are the domain of nobility and prosperous merchants. Other powerful organizations also have a showing, including the Slaver's Syndicate, the Guardians of Tomorrow, the Clerks, and the Ion'cavar. Chateaus are considered neutral ground, so even houses with blood feuds can be found seated in the same room. If you want to make it into high society, the only way is through a Chateau. Just know that you will be swept up into the schemes of others of vaster power and tenure. And don’t chortle when they start reciting opening hymns over a brick…

Symbols - Bricks, Shields, and Quills

Speaking of bricks, the Book of Rangal is heavy on symbolism - specifically bricks, shields, and quills, the sacred tools of power. I still have my fancy ceremonial quill. I didn’t care about the sash when they stripped me, it didn’t even have a single ribbon, but the quill I kept up my sleeve as they tossed me out the front gate.

Beliefs & The Book of Rangal

Many of the nobility take this religion very seriously. The Book of Rangal is a holy book. It preaches that power is fought for and earned, and thus those who have earned it are entitled to the luxuries of power. The Book is quoted regularly in court settings as justification of special treatment for the upper class. Negotiations begin by intoning Rangal’s name. Those who rise in the ranks of nobility are known to have Rangal’s blessing, and those who fall are said to have deserved it - not worthy of Rangal. For, you see, there are only so many who may stand immortally in The Rangalan Chateau in the life-hereafter.

Rangal

Anyways… perhaps the most fascinating time I had in my playing a Rangalan was meeting Rangal themself. Rangal is best thought of as a single Divinity with two bodies, one male and one female. They travel, separately, throughout Aropria and take immense pleasure in advising on the machinations of their members. Sometimes they hole up with a few recent inductees, such as yours truly, and guide them on how to overthrow the enterprises of the senior members. It keeps the senior members on their toes, in true Rangalan form.

But beware the moments when both of Rangal’s forms meet at the same Chateau, and for the love of Eos, do NOT chortle when Rangal begins to entone the meeting’s opening rites.