According to Rule 0, if the GM doesn't want to worry about rolling Knowledge checks, whatever the GM determines it is necessary for the character to know, the character knows.
an the character is a seeker of knowledge, and wants to found a library one day.
So what exactly is known? This character would have been trained or raised (or something) in a Temple devoted to Nethys. Despite the focus on magic, I would expect these guys to go in for learning as well.
Now would an educated (no university, what you would expect someone to pick up in a temple of a god of knowledge) person know that there was ever an Azlant or any of the backstory about that place we as players know?
I'm kind of thinking that anything concrete wouldn't go back further than Nex's founding itself. Things like the long history of Osirion would be known, but Technocratic Leagues, Old Mage Jatembi's and the like are the thing of legends. The Great Darkness after the Starfall might be some kind of disputed legend, scoffed at as superstition. No one really knows much about the history or geography of Avistan other than a vague knowledge that Cheliax is up there somewhere, and oh yeah there is this Andoran place, right?
This sounds like a pretty poor temple of knowledge to me. The entire canon of Golarion history is less than two hundred pages here on Earth; I would assume that there's another 200 page book on the History of Golarion that's widely available on Golarion that would be a mainstay of any reasonably good library.
And I would expect any temple of knowledge to have a reasonably good library. And it's not like Nex itself would impose any draconian 1984-esque rules about rewriting history. So I suspect the temple would actually have, you know, multiple books on history.
So I'd say anything you know is fair game for a history-oriented character, and probably a lot more to boot.
Yeah, but while that sounds reasonable, what exactly is mysterious about anything if you go that way?
Anything and everything. If you think that reading a single 200-page book covering ten thousand years of history means that there are no mysteries left, you have an odd opinion of either mysteries or of history.
The important thing to remember about Golarion is that there is no such thing as the widespread sharing and transport of information and learning that we take for granted.
On the other hand, every educated person in the Rennaissance was familiar with the history of Europe starting from Homer. (And familiar with the history of the Middle East starting with Adam and continuing until Saul of Tarsus.)
That's because at that point there was rather wide penetration of a certain dutchman's invention... i.e. Gutenberg's printing press. Prior to that, every book in creation had been individually hand made. Golarion is very much pre-Rennissance in tech.On the other hand, every educated person in the Rennaissance was familiar with the history of Europe starting from Homer. (And familiar with the history of the Middle East starting with Adam and continuing until Saul of Tarsus.)
The important thing to remember about Golarion is that there is no such thing as the widespread sharing and transport of information and learning that we take for granted.
Is it the existence of flintlock pistols that makes you say that, or is it the existence of dragons?
(And Golarion explicitly has printing presses.)
Not all educated people have the same level of education, nor would they be equally informed on the same subjects. They'll be experts on whatever they specialised in. In other words, whatever you want them to be as GM.
The important thing to remember about Golarion is that there is no such thing as the widespread sharing and transport of information and learning that we take for granted.
Not only that, but consider that history is constantly being corrected by new research, archaeological findings, found documents that was previously long lost. Just because an educated person might know his local and regional history - that history might be incorrect. So just how useful is historical information, when the history turns out to be wrong?
I would hazard that most of what is in the Inner Sea World guide would be known to scholars. The problem is that there could also be a lot of contradictory information or incomplete information.
Norbinger loves to keep information secret and has agents that may have assassinated those that could stumble on knowledge of important artifacts. Nobles and cultures sometimes alter history to favor themselves, and it is the job of the scholar to try sifting fact from propaganda.
Some noted scholars may be able to name all of the Thassilonian Runelords, and may even recognize a sketch or two. Of course, for every fact they know, they would also likely believe three or four other "facts" which could prove to be false. You may even have a rough idea of Golarian's solar system. At least enough to know there's other planets with sentient beings on them, and not advisable to travel to them unless you are a tad insane and well prepared.
The biggest elephant in the room is magic. High level divination spells can ruin murder mysteries if not handled carefully by the GM. The same goes for historical mysteries (I'll ask my deity, he/she would know. And what's this Legend Lore spell?). Geographical boundaries are easily crossed by teleport and scrying. As silly as it sounds, there may be a high level mage or two that travelled on Golarian's SUN, and survived to return! Then penned a book about it! (And then was killed by assassins of Norbinger with said book burned to ashes, yet I digress).
It's hard to gauge a tech level of Golarion because of magic equivalents. If anything, it would be like Earth if mass production was never invented.
The biggest elephant in the room is magic. High level divination spells can ruin murder mysteries if not handled carefully by the GM. The same goes for historical mysteries (I'll ask my deity, he/she would know. And what's this Legend Lore spell?). Geographical boundaries are easily crossed by teleport and scrying. As silly as it sounds, there may be a high level mage or two that travelled on Golarian's SUN, and survived to return! Then penned a book about it! (And then was killed by assassins of Norbinger with said book burned to ashes, yet I digress).
Honestly, I don't know how this applies to the gods of Golarian, but I'd think in a world that doesn't have a monotheistic deity, rather a polythiestic ones, are any of the gods omniscient? I would think not. Can a god hide information from other gods, therefore other worshippers? If so, then can an omnipotent being bypass another god's ability to hide information? Without knowing what the developers say regarding this, in my own games, I'd rule that if your deity with certain portfolios of concern have all the knowledge within his area of concern, but of all other things, the deity is completely ignorant. Simply put, unless the question regards something specific to the interests of that god, most likely the answer is no, the deity has no idea...
I think too many players apply monotheistic concepts to apply to all gods, especially ones in a fictional setting. Which I think is completely wrong.
are any of the gods omniscient?
The problem is that a number of Golarion deities existed before Starfall.
Those deities don't have to be omniscient, they just have to listen to their followers while they were alive and pay attention to how the patterns of mortal society moved. Sure, they might not know everything, yet for the deities that were around before Starfall, they probably remember it.
I never said the gods knew everything, yet the eldest could likely be a wellspring of information. I did not mean to imply "all-knowing", yet if you could learn a spell that allowed you to communicate with a mortal that hasn't aged since Azlant was around, it could shed light on some things that would otherwise not be known.
I just meant that GMs have to be wary of players using Commune and Legend Lore to bully their way past historical mysteries (The deity gives a vague answer as they want you to find enlightenment rather than simply give you the direct answer, etc. - as just an example to nip that in the bud.)
At the very least; Asmodeus, Desna, Erastil, Gozreh, Pharasma, Rovagug (though communing sensibly with it might be tough), Shelyn, Torag were around before Starfall.
Possibly added (they say old, yet do not specify pre-starfall): Calistria, Gorum, Sarenrae, and Zon-Kuthon
In short, what's in the Inner Sea World guide is likely known to scholars on Golarion.
PS - I did bring up that Norbinger hides information.
For that matter, Zon-Kuthon was around prior to the Age of Darkness.
He'd made a deal with Abadar to stay away from Golarion "as long as the sun hung in the sky" and used the Age of Darkness as an excuse to return.
I'd think that a scholarly PC from Nex would have a better grasp on global history than most anyone else that isn't a dedicated Sage or a highly placed and long term Pathfinder.
Nex is one of the older nations in the Inner Sea.
Nex is ruled by a non hereditary class of well educated individuals.
Nex likely has lots of books.
Now their could be huge amounts of misinformation included, but still, this is one of the cultures that loves information.
Zon-Kuthon - before he was all cray-cray and slice-happy - i.e., when he was Dou-Bral (sp?)
was not only around pre-Starfall, he was also actively present for the imprisonment of Rovagug. His contribution way back then was basically the last thing he did in helpful collaboration with the other gods, before he went out a'wandering and came back changed.
In one of the Mythic supplements, it states that Dou-Bral made some unique stitchings, if you will, into the 'flesh' of Golarion itself (via mythic monuments), to help seal shut Rovagug's prison. A foreshadowing of his later, creepier interest in bindings and clamps and piercings and other charming whatnot...
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If you were one of my player, Sunbeam, I would never even worry about this because you probably wouldn't ever read even The Inner Sea Guide nevermind any of the paperbacks.
But if you, or anyone who actually read all that stuff, showed me your character sketch and asked the question you just did, I'd dance with joy as I realized that you were a godsend, and I could use you to spice up the boring exposition parts of the adventure where I have to explain to all the players what the Jitska Imperium was or who the Azlanti were and I'd smile rapturously everytime you enthusiastically interrupted me at the table to tell the other players everything you knew about such topics.
I, of course, would reserve the right to change stuff as I saw fit, even if it was just to screw with you.
(Edited)
Page 3 of the Inner Sea Primer (Player Companion series) deals briefly with the extent of educated knowledge of the past. It adds: "What follows is a basic timeline of the Inner Sea, featuring relatively well-known events that a reputable sage might be expected to know."
Although I find it curious as to why he doesn't blame "Parochialism and prejudice" for the classic empires of Africa and Islamic culture in general for their stone cold ignorance of European culture.
Instead of, I don't know, distance or something? Parochialism tends to get a bad response, but knowing about some things isn't going to make one whit of difference to the grain harvest around Florence.
Well, distance is not an issue when you have greater teleport. And the person who is harvesting grain in Florence is not going to be the educated person who is familiar with Herodotus and the history of the Persian War.
Here is my real world DC history
DC 5
Russia is a large country, between Asia and Europe, and was ruled by absolute kings called tzars and then became Communist from 1917 to 1990-1991
DC 10
Russia was modernized by two powerful rules, called Peter the Great (17th century) and Kathreine (Ekatrainia) who tried to import foreign culture, especially German and French.
DC 15
Russia was founded by a mixture of both local Slavic speaking people and Norse explorers and settlers. In particular is Kiev in Modern day Ukraine, Kievian Rus was often at odds with the ancient city of Novgorod.
DC 20
Ivan the terrible defeated the various Mongols and Tartars who had enslaved Rus during the period of Mongol expansion into Europe proper.
DC 25
Although Pushkin is a Romantic poet, he is considered a classic in his country, as prior to Pushkin there was little non-historic or non-religious use of written Russian.
DC 30
During the 19th century there was great debate between the 'zapadni' those who favored a western rational view of things and democratic modernization and the 'slavonophilov' who favored a pan-slavic Eastern Orthodox Christianity and absolute monarchy.
DC 35
The city of Harbin was developed by Russians in the late 19th and early 20th century as rail center in north east China. Later after the Russian Civil War Harbin became a center for White Russian refugees who fled the chaos on the early days of the USSR.
DC 40
Although modern Russia is an energy superpower, famous for it's export of natural gas, Russia was an agricultural powerhouse in the 19th century producing much of the grain exported to the United Kingdom and Central Europe. The so called Russian Imperial Stout (Porter) was in reality brewed in England and exported to Russia who found the high alcohol content refreshing...
IAlthough I find it curious as to why he doesn't blame "Parochialism and prejudice" for the classic empires of Africa and Islamic culture in general for their stone cold ignorance of European culture.
Because it was the Europeans who managed to remain ignorant DESPITE voyaging to Africa in the age of exploration. If Africans had managed to sail up the Danube in canoes before the Euros invaded the Dark Continent, you'd have a point.
As far as Islamic culture goes, Up to the time of the ReConquest, they were considerably MORE informed, more scientifically advanced, and more importantly more tolerant than their European natures. They gave patronage, shelter, tolerance and fellowship to Jewish philosophers and clergy when the Christians were stoning or otherwise ostracizing them.
Well PC self-loathing quote of the week award goes to...
...put seriously the collapse of Islamic intellectualism and the end of the golden age of Islam is a sad sad thing. The west would have likely lost Aristotle as we know it, if not for Islamic scribes. Why modern day Muslim countries continue to shun their intellectual traditions is a topic for another day....as for Africa. come on...they didn't have steel in the 19th century...something that the Japanese had figured out a thousand years earlier.
Here is where you will find the Inner Sea Primer for sale on the Paizo website, in your choice of dead tree or PDF format.
The same information might be available on the wiki, but I haven't looked.
The Inner Sea Primer (from the Player Companion line of products) is a good introduction to the campaign setting for any prospective player. While still a bit "kitchen sink-like", it does give an overview without revealing GM-only secrets (unlike the Inner Sea World Guide in the Campaign Setting line of products, which is meant for GMs).