And we're back to "there should be a Religion check to recognize SH's symbols, but since Tav should at least know about Shar (stop thinking in small-terms, the Spellplague is more like if Shar took out electricity for years in our real world), we the player should be informed prior to SH's reveal."
Or even more at least, if we the player aren't told about Shar, then Tav's dialogue options should include an option: "Who's Shar? I lived under a rock for my whole life."
First, the spellplague happened over a hundred years ago. That's a lot of years for folks to get things twisted about in stories, especially when those folks live in a world where something crazy is happening all the time, like the recent decent of Elturel into literal hell.
Second, I'm not even convinced people know what's being argued here. The point under current discussion isn't whether or not someone knows who Shar is or that she's a goddess. The point being discussed is whether or not they would recognize her armor immediately. Or associate her circlet jewelry for worship most foul.
Third, if we want to discuss what people know about Shar, then fine. A. if everyone thought the same about Shar, then there wouldn't be people like Shadowheart. People who worship Shar and see her as a positive in the world. B. yes, knowledge rolls are typically required for knowledge. C. that said, there's nothing wrong with a reveal that's paced by storytelling, where the character learns to trust Shadowheart before learning more and more about Shar through the unfolding of the story. I dare say that information about Shar is getting revealed as the story progresses, most certainly after having played through Grymforge.
Basically, I go back to a post I made in this thread several several pages back. Imagine that the game treats Shar the way so many of you seem to want. You go to Shadowheart's pod. You open the pod. You make a religion roll after seeing Shadowheart's armor. You learn that she worships Shar based on her armor and circlet. You learn right then that Shar is the worst. Literally. The worst. Shar wants to destroy the entire universe, and has tried to do so, resulting in, as someone else put it, millions of deaths. Not even the mind flayers want to destroy everything. What do you do then? Join up with Shadowheart? Or remove her as a threat? Great game so far, right? Like I said, I don't mean this in a rude way, but I'm really glad Larian isn't taking this advice because it's not good and it doesn't go anywhere good.
