Ah, whatever. You're arguing for the sake of arguing. Couple of posts ago you agreed that there should be a religion check, then you argued that the uncultured wouldn't know what the symbol or the onyx stand for, now you're arguing that people who are familiar with Shar and her disciples wouldn't recognize/throw a second glance to the onyx or the symbol because -- ah, right, now it's back to the symbol being laughably unrecognizable.
I'll reiterate, whatever. Weird hill to die on -- that's a saying by the way, no need to argue about the semantics of that too -- but you do you.
From my point of view, you're the one dying on the hill here.
My argument has been consistent the entire time. I think it's ridiculous to say people would look at Shadowheart and jump to the conclusion that she's a follower of Shar because she's wearing an onyx circlet and has black circles on the shoulders of her armor. I think that entire suggestion lacks insight into the complexity of people. It's the product of reading setting books and then making wild assumptions about entire population groups in a decidedly narrow minded way.
I've said time and again that you're argument is an example of rigid thinking and that the world (people) don't work that way.
I expect a DM with a little age and experience to bring some nuance to the table, to understand the day to day livelihoods of the NPCs, to get that they're "real" people with "real" lives and not carbon copies of whatever meta reality the DM wants to impose.
I'm not arguing for the sake of arguing. I think you're wrong, and I'm pointing it out. There's a difference.
I never agreed there should be a religion check... if by that you mean I agreed there should be a check to accuse Shadowheart of being a follower of Shar. I said there should be a religion check to *give the PC some common knowledge about Shar* so that when it comes out that Shadowheart is a follower... then the PC has some base of information to fall back on. In my opinion, that's not necessary, but I agreed that it would be okay.
Suggesting that I said there should be a religion check to make an accusation against Shadowheart is just a comprehension issue, plain and simple. I'm glad I can clear it up because that's certainly not what I was saying.
As for the symbol being unrecognizable, yes. It's a circle. It's a design in thousands of pieces of jewelry and artwork. In fact, I literally point to evidence that it's unrecognizable: the evidence being that NO ONE IN THE GAME RECOGNIZES IT.
