Discord
Changelog
05-30-2012, 06:45 PM
In preparation for an in-game event that will result in influencing certain RP aspects in Thay, I’d like to ask you (the community) for comments, suggestions, concerns, and debate regarding Thayan law. While generally lawful, the rulers of Thay are virtually all evil and will seek to bend or use any laws for their personal gain – as well as those individuals (and PCs) who are expected to follow and/or enforce them.
So, what is a list of laws, and how would they be stated, that you think the majority of the Zulkirs would be in favor of to govern not just the commoners and nobles of Thay, but even the lesser Red Wizards? The laws can be broken into groups with different punishments, or applied based on social standing, or really listed any other way you envision the ruling council of Red Wizards (the Zulkirs) implementing them. They would/could be used to try and avoid disastrous civil wars, keep a level playing field for the various schools of Red Wizards, and lord over the faiths (Kossuth, Cyric, etc) and other organizations that have great influence in Thay as well, and any and everything in between.
Note though that this is just the initial phase of implementing a more defined and written set of laws for Thay. This thread is to be used to provide a broad platform of ideals and recommendations that I and the staff will do our best to refine and officially introduce in-game. So please be aware that while any and all comments are appreciated in regard to firming up how the ‘law’ is implemented and will affect the lives of everyone in-game; not all of the suggestions or ideas presented here may be selected to represent the initial implementation of a more robust in-game system of law, crime, and punishment.
To help with the discussion, the following are entries from official source lore regarding Thayan law, crime, and punishment
Official Source Lore
Dreams of the Red Wizards
Essentially, Thay is an evil society. Overall, the alignment of the country is neutral evil, but this can vary from lawful evil (usually but not always exemplified by the Tharchions and Zulkirs) to chaotic evil (usually exemplified by the actions of many of the Red Wizards who are not Zulkirs).
But wherever one may be in Thay, the rulers and most of their followers are driven by greed and megalomania and paranoia. Each member of the society seems to be dedicated to raising himself to the highest possible pinnacle of success, preferably on the backs of his friends, family, and associates. Not everyone living in Thay feels this way, but it is the way of the majority. It helps explain why members of the ruling class have many acquaintances and associates, but very few friends.
This makes for an almost chaotic evil society, but chaos is kept away by a structure of traditions and laws that allow for the Red Wizards having almost total freedom to do as they please, but just enough restraint through societal pressure and the threat of retribution by all the other wizards to keep Thay from disintegrating into a million tiny magocracies, each with a king mage on top trying to destroy all the other little magic kingdoms.
Thayan law being what it is, gnolls get a great deal of pleasure out of enforcing it. Unlike their wilder brethren, Thayan gnolls are neutral evil, not chaotic evil.
Slaves do escape, and some are rescued by friends and family, but once a slave has been purchased in Thay, he can never legally (according to Thay laws) be a free man again. Slaves cannot be manumitted. They can be retired to lives of leisure if they have pleased their masters greatly, or turned out of the estates of their master for some transgression, but they are still slaves. If found running around free, they can be enslaved by any free person who finds them.
The land of Thay is divided up into 11 administrative regions, known as Tharchs. Each is ruled by a Tharchion or Tharchioness, who is drawn from the nobility of Thay (see Society of Thay). In each region, the ruler’s word is law, though each rules in a different way from his colleagues.
No Tharchion has ultimate authority for the nation, because that is in the hands of the Red Wizards. The authority of a Red Wizard supersedes even that of a Tharchion.
The Laws of Thay
Thay has no code of laws that rules its life. The Zulkirs make all pronouncements that affect the populace, and most of these are individual rulings on individual cases. Among their other duties, the Zulkirs are the high judges of Thay.
The law that rules the nation comes from the Tharchions and from tradition. Some of this tradition is taken from Mulhorand, the rest has developed over the centuries since Thay became a nation.
The following is a short description of the most important laws of Thay.
Laws about Murder
Every murder case is handled individually. Some Tharchions let their Autharches or even the constables on the streets administer justice in these cases. The most common punishment for common people is enslavement (a common punishment for any crime). If the murderer is someone such as an adventurer or a magic-user of some sort the usual punishment is death. Slaves who commit murder are punished (how heavily depends on how important the victim was) and either given back to their master or taken over by the government and sent off to the gold mines. Murder of a slave is not murder, it is theft.
Assuming the person in charge of dealing with murder cases takes the time to hear any arguments, any seemingly good reason for killing someone may be accepted, or the most obvious case of self-defense may get the killer sent to the gold mines.
Laws About Assault
There are no real laws about assault, unless the victim is an important member of society, in which case the assaulter may be slain out of hand or enslaved. Of course, the assaulter can be freed or punished depending on the relative importance of the victim to the assaulter.
Laws About Theft
Unlike many Realms, thieves are not branded and maimed in Thay. They are enslaved. This punishment can be handed out for something as unimportant as a loaf of bread. Particularly important thefts, such as that of a magical item from a wizard, can be punished with death. After all, who wants such an accomplished thief as a slave?
Civil Laws
Suits for redress and righting of commercial wrongs must be brought before the person in authority. This can be a Tharchion, an Autharch, or even a local Red Wizard. Most people try to avoid the justice of wizards, however, since they are said, correctly, to be somewhat whimsical in administering justice, and plaintiffs and defendants alike have been turned into frogs for disturbing a wizard with their petty problems. If there is a dispute between Tharchions, a panel of the Zulkirs hears the argument, and more than one Tharchion has lost life or current body as a judgment.
Disputes between wizards are settled between the wizards. There are no mechanisms for settling such disputes by any other method. If they cannot settle it by talk, they declare feud and people start dying. Sometimes one litigant decides that there is no settling the problem before the other does, and the first thing the other knows about the escalation is when he finds his breakfast has been poisoned.
For this reason, among others, most wizards are accomplished alchemists as well, specializing in poisons and antidotes. However, when the going gets tough, the wizards go shopping - for a good assassin.
The presence of assassins is a way of life in Thay. Since there is no legal method of appeal of any judgment by anyone, frustrated litigants must go to the ultimate appeal, the Assassins guild.
In Thay, the guild is composed of equal numbers of magic-users and thieves, with the occasional fighter thrown in for muscle.
The guild itself is legal, or at least there is no law against its activities. Individual members who do commit murders can be punished for them, if they are caught, but the Zulkirs realize that the assassins perform a service and do not do anything to suppress the Guild itself.
Spellbound
As the people of Thasselen are considered Aznar’s personal possessions, escape is a crime punishable by death - or worse.
Manumission, or freeing, of slaves is forbidden in Thay. Once an individual is sold, he or she is considered a slave for life and nothing short of escape can bring freedom. Particularly beloved or successful slaves are sometimes given their own estates by grateful owners, or are given positions with considerable authority and freedom, but in the eyes of Thayan law they remain slaves. The children of a slave are likewise considered slaves and can never be freed, either. Outside observers have noted that this tradition means that when the Thayans enslave someone, they are enslaving that person’s descendants in perpetuity.
By Thayan law, a zulkir can only be removed if he or she is destroyed utterly, beyond hope of resurrection or existence as a member of the undead.
You might think that the tharchions rule the land. After all, they represent absolute power in the tharchs they rule, and they can choose the autharchs who serve under them. Their word is law and their disapproval is death. Believe me, gnome. It’s true. My uncle once crossed a tharchion, and he vanished.
With the exception of independent small slave farm complexes and the coastal settlements of Bezantur, Thasselen, and Murbant, the Priador remains in a largely wild state. It also harbors a number of preserves where the Red Wizards keep monsters required for research and spell components. There are no restrictions on these creatures, which often venture beyond the boundaries of their preserves. Travelers attacked in the vicinity of these monster preserves are entitled to defend themselves, but Thayan law states that the creatures’ owners are not liable for any damage they do or deaths they inflict.
Though Bezantur is nearly as large and prosperous as Waterdeep, it has none of that great city’s joy and beauty. Resting like a suppurating sore on along Thay’s southern coastline, Bezantur is a dark, brooding walled city where assassins walk unhindered, the word of the Red Wizards is unquestioned law, and every imaginable vice (as well as some unimaginable ones) may be instantly satisfied.
Visitors are forced to defend themselves against the thieves, for the humans, gnolls, goblins, and other races that serve in Thrul’s Legion are more interested in living like kings and exploiting Bezantur’s citizenry than in enforcing its laws.
Street of White Roses
This region, which in other cities would be known as the “Red Lantern District”, is one of the most lawless in this highly lawless city. Here, stolen goods are exchanged, illegal deals are struck, forbidden magic is practiced, and courtesans of all sorts walk the streets.
The thieves’ guild controls activities here and pays the Thayan officials well to stay completely away. It is the one part of the city besides the thieves’ guild house where visitors are guaranteed complete safety from official Thayan interference.
Pyarados is a lawless frontier town with a central core of rigid authoritarianism and harsh beauty. I was forced to defend myself against a gang of half-orc bullies in the roughhewn settlement that sprawls around the central citadel.
The upshot of this is that the outer city, beyond the pacifying heights of the walls, is a wild and lawless place where the authorities turn a blind eye to most crimes, allowing street justice to settle accounts. Visitors should note that law enforcement is anything but lax in Pyarados, despite the lack of a large Thayan police force. Vigilantes punish those crimes the Red Wizards ignore, and their punishment is just as swift and certain.
There is much poverty and despair in Surthay, which has spawned a thriving criminal underground. The tharchion professes little tolerance for crime and has given his troops full rein to capture suspected lawbreakers and punish them on the spot. As usual in Thay, this has been taken by the garrison to be a license to pursue, capture, abuse, assault, murder, and destroy as they please.
Fortunately for the citizens of Surthay, the various criminal guilds are relatively powerful and can have particularly troublesome guards disposed of quietly. Systematic bribes and extortion keep other officials under control, but those with no connections to the crime guilds are helpless against the ravages of the Thayan soldiers.
For much of its history, the city’s exact layout remained a closely guarded state secret, and possessing an accurate map of Eltabbar was a crime punishable by death.
The tharchions appoint local bureaucrats, called autharchs, into positions at various levels. Autharchs function as mayors, military leaders, and ministers of various organizations such as trade guilds. Most autharchs have little authority and serve mainly as convenient scapegoats for accasions when a zulkir’s or tharchion’s plans go awry. The autharchs suffer a high turnover rate, since incompetent ones vanish or are killed and competent ones are promoted. The leader of a trade enclave, called a khazark, technically has an equivalent rank to an autharch running a very profitable guild in an equivalent-sized city, although the khazark tends to have higher status because he or she is always a Red Wizard. In situations where a Red Wizard is accused of a crime, the local autharch usually defers to his or her tharchion to avoid the possibly fatal blunder of confronting a Red Wizard who is under the protection of a higher-level politician.
While this chain of command works in theory, in practice the zulkirs hand down orders to the tharchions, autharchs, military, khazarks, or commoners with impunity. The only people with any real independence are the wizards, who endure long apprenticeships to their cruel masters before being able to strike out on their own and possibly enter the ranks of the Red Wizards.
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting - 3rd edition
The Red Wizards form an elite class, the nobility of the land. Through the vast, regional bureaucracy administered by their hand-picked Tharchions, they govern Thay’s laws, commerce, and society.
A Red Wizard is a practicing wizard who has been indoctrinated into the outermost circle of Thayan politics. In Thay, only Red Wizards are allowed to wear red robes, and those who violate this law are swiftly caught and slowly tortured, usually in a public manner. To avoid even the threat of such a punishment, most Thayans never wear anything red, and some refuse to don orange clothing as well. The only exceptions are the clerics of Kossuth, who stand outside the ban and are easily recognized by their holy symbols and their multi-colored robes.
Standing laws in Thay prevent Red Wizards from simply seizing whatever food they want from farmers and any item they desire from merchants.
Lords of Darkness
For any Thayan enclave, the Law of Sovereignty applies: The land on which the enclave sits is considered Thayan soil, and Thayan law is the only law. This is more than just words on a trade agreement - the Red Wizards consider the enclave’s land to be a part of Thay, and while they don’t go out of their way to offend their neighbors with strange Thayan customs, they are not averse to punishing lawbreakers in their own fashion.
A person caught stealing might be flogged, or branded, or (rarely) put to death. The Red Wizards have harsh penalties for those who offend or harm a Red Wizards, with beatings, imprisonment, and enslavement all common responses.
Once a Thayan becomes a noble, it is almost impossible to take that status away from his family. Only the unanimous decision of the Zulkirs can remove the status of nobility; this is usually done by outlawing the family, arresting all accessible members, and turning the survivors of the arresting process into slaves.
Unapproachable East
The laws of Thay are, simple, and the penalties are brutal. They are mostly concerned with establishing who's in power. The tharchions and zulkirs consult a set of tomes known as the Library of Law when faced with a serious problem. However, most of the time, the authorities ignore these books in favor of expediency. These are the most important laws of Thay.
Only Red Wizards may wear red robes, so that all shall be able to identify them instantly.
Do not steal from other Thayans or harm their belongings, especially their slaves.
Do not kill or harm another Thayan. (In practice, this means, "Do not kill or harm anyone from your class or above.")
Obey the orders of your betters.
The proscription against wearing red robes is unusual, but Thayans take it so seriously that most refuse to dress in any clothing of that color. The penalty for being caught in such garb is execution on the spot. It's rumored that some of the forces of the Red Wizards always carry a spare red robe or two. This is then supposedly thrown onto the body after the guards have killed someone, giving them an excuse for their actions.
The laws of Thay are enforced by whoever claims to have jurisdiction over the people involved or the location in which the disturbance occurred. In Thay, just about every Red Wizard employs slaves or commoners as private guards. The more powerful the person, the more numerous and more skilled the guards. In Thay, might makes right, and the Red Wizards have plenty of might. The trouble comes when more than one group of guards claims jurisdiction over any particular issue. This happens often, and when it does, a fight usually breaks out.
So, what is a list of laws, and how would they be stated, that you think the majority of the Zulkirs would be in favor of to govern not just the commoners and nobles of Thay, but even the lesser Red Wizards? The laws can be broken into groups with different punishments, or applied based on social standing, or really listed any other way you envision the ruling council of Red Wizards (the Zulkirs) implementing them. They would/could be used to try and avoid disastrous civil wars, keep a level playing field for the various schools of Red Wizards, and lord over the faiths (Kossuth, Cyric, etc) and other organizations that have great influence in Thay as well, and any and everything in between.
Note though that this is just the initial phase of implementing a more defined and written set of laws for Thay. This thread is to be used to provide a broad platform of ideals and recommendations that I and the staff will do our best to refine and officially introduce in-game. So please be aware that while any and all comments are appreciated in regard to firming up how the ‘law’ is implemented and will affect the lives of everyone in-game; not all of the suggestions or ideas presented here may be selected to represent the initial implementation of a more robust in-game system of law, crime, and punishment.
To help with the discussion, the following are entries from official source lore regarding Thayan law, crime, and punishment
Official Source Lore
Dreams of the Red Wizards
Essentially, Thay is an evil society. Overall, the alignment of the country is neutral evil, but this can vary from lawful evil (usually but not always exemplified by the Tharchions and Zulkirs) to chaotic evil (usually exemplified by the actions of many of the Red Wizards who are not Zulkirs).
But wherever one may be in Thay, the rulers and most of their followers are driven by greed and megalomania and paranoia. Each member of the society seems to be dedicated to raising himself to the highest possible pinnacle of success, preferably on the backs of his friends, family, and associates. Not everyone living in Thay feels this way, but it is the way of the majority. It helps explain why members of the ruling class have many acquaintances and associates, but very few friends.
This makes for an almost chaotic evil society, but chaos is kept away by a structure of traditions and laws that allow for the Red Wizards having almost total freedom to do as they please, but just enough restraint through societal pressure and the threat of retribution by all the other wizards to keep Thay from disintegrating into a million tiny magocracies, each with a king mage on top trying to destroy all the other little magic kingdoms.
Thayan law being what it is, gnolls get a great deal of pleasure out of enforcing it. Unlike their wilder brethren, Thayan gnolls are neutral evil, not chaotic evil.
Slaves do escape, and some are rescued by friends and family, but once a slave has been purchased in Thay, he can never legally (according to Thay laws) be a free man again. Slaves cannot be manumitted. They can be retired to lives of leisure if they have pleased their masters greatly, or turned out of the estates of their master for some transgression, but they are still slaves. If found running around free, they can be enslaved by any free person who finds them.
The land of Thay is divided up into 11 administrative regions, known as Tharchs. Each is ruled by a Tharchion or Tharchioness, who is drawn from the nobility of Thay (see Society of Thay). In each region, the ruler’s word is law, though each rules in a different way from his colleagues.
No Tharchion has ultimate authority for the nation, because that is in the hands of the Red Wizards. The authority of a Red Wizard supersedes even that of a Tharchion.
The Laws of Thay
Thay has no code of laws that rules its life. The Zulkirs make all pronouncements that affect the populace, and most of these are individual rulings on individual cases. Among their other duties, the Zulkirs are the high judges of Thay.
The law that rules the nation comes from the Tharchions and from tradition. Some of this tradition is taken from Mulhorand, the rest has developed over the centuries since Thay became a nation.
The following is a short description of the most important laws of Thay.
Laws about Murder
Every murder case is handled individually. Some Tharchions let their Autharches or even the constables on the streets administer justice in these cases. The most common punishment for common people is enslavement (a common punishment for any crime). If the murderer is someone such as an adventurer or a magic-user of some sort the usual punishment is death. Slaves who commit murder are punished (how heavily depends on how important the victim was) and either given back to their master or taken over by the government and sent off to the gold mines. Murder of a slave is not murder, it is theft.
Assuming the person in charge of dealing with murder cases takes the time to hear any arguments, any seemingly good reason for killing someone may be accepted, or the most obvious case of self-defense may get the killer sent to the gold mines.
Laws About Assault
There are no real laws about assault, unless the victim is an important member of society, in which case the assaulter may be slain out of hand or enslaved. Of course, the assaulter can be freed or punished depending on the relative importance of the victim to the assaulter.
Laws About Theft
Unlike many Realms, thieves are not branded and maimed in Thay. They are enslaved. This punishment can be handed out for something as unimportant as a loaf of bread. Particularly important thefts, such as that of a magical item from a wizard, can be punished with death. After all, who wants such an accomplished thief as a slave?
Civil Laws
Suits for redress and righting of commercial wrongs must be brought before the person in authority. This can be a Tharchion, an Autharch, or even a local Red Wizard. Most people try to avoid the justice of wizards, however, since they are said, correctly, to be somewhat whimsical in administering justice, and plaintiffs and defendants alike have been turned into frogs for disturbing a wizard with their petty problems. If there is a dispute between Tharchions, a panel of the Zulkirs hears the argument, and more than one Tharchion has lost life or current body as a judgment.
Disputes between wizards are settled between the wizards. There are no mechanisms for settling such disputes by any other method. If they cannot settle it by talk, they declare feud and people start dying. Sometimes one litigant decides that there is no settling the problem before the other does, and the first thing the other knows about the escalation is when he finds his breakfast has been poisoned.
For this reason, among others, most wizards are accomplished alchemists as well, specializing in poisons and antidotes. However, when the going gets tough, the wizards go shopping - for a good assassin.
The presence of assassins is a way of life in Thay. Since there is no legal method of appeal of any judgment by anyone, frustrated litigants must go to the ultimate appeal, the Assassins guild.
In Thay, the guild is composed of equal numbers of magic-users and thieves, with the occasional fighter thrown in for muscle.
The guild itself is legal, or at least there is no law against its activities. Individual members who do commit murders can be punished for them, if they are caught, but the Zulkirs realize that the assassins perform a service and do not do anything to suppress the Guild itself.
Spellbound
As the people of Thasselen are considered Aznar’s personal possessions, escape is a crime punishable by death - or worse.
Manumission, or freeing, of slaves is forbidden in Thay. Once an individual is sold, he or she is considered a slave for life and nothing short of escape can bring freedom. Particularly beloved or successful slaves are sometimes given their own estates by grateful owners, or are given positions with considerable authority and freedom, but in the eyes of Thayan law they remain slaves. The children of a slave are likewise considered slaves and can never be freed, either. Outside observers have noted that this tradition means that when the Thayans enslave someone, they are enslaving that person’s descendants in perpetuity.
By Thayan law, a zulkir can only be removed if he or she is destroyed utterly, beyond hope of resurrection or existence as a member of the undead.
You might think that the tharchions rule the land. After all, they represent absolute power in the tharchs they rule, and they can choose the autharchs who serve under them. Their word is law and their disapproval is death. Believe me, gnome. It’s true. My uncle once crossed a tharchion, and he vanished.
With the exception of independent small slave farm complexes and the coastal settlements of Bezantur, Thasselen, and Murbant, the Priador remains in a largely wild state. It also harbors a number of preserves where the Red Wizards keep monsters required for research and spell components. There are no restrictions on these creatures, which often venture beyond the boundaries of their preserves. Travelers attacked in the vicinity of these monster preserves are entitled to defend themselves, but Thayan law states that the creatures’ owners are not liable for any damage they do or deaths they inflict.
Though Bezantur is nearly as large and prosperous as Waterdeep, it has none of that great city’s joy and beauty. Resting like a suppurating sore on along Thay’s southern coastline, Bezantur is a dark, brooding walled city where assassins walk unhindered, the word of the Red Wizards is unquestioned law, and every imaginable vice (as well as some unimaginable ones) may be instantly satisfied.
Visitors are forced to defend themselves against the thieves, for the humans, gnolls, goblins, and other races that serve in Thrul’s Legion are more interested in living like kings and exploiting Bezantur’s citizenry than in enforcing its laws.
Street of White Roses
This region, which in other cities would be known as the “Red Lantern District”, is one of the most lawless in this highly lawless city. Here, stolen goods are exchanged, illegal deals are struck, forbidden magic is practiced, and courtesans of all sorts walk the streets.
The thieves’ guild controls activities here and pays the Thayan officials well to stay completely away. It is the one part of the city besides the thieves’ guild house where visitors are guaranteed complete safety from official Thayan interference.
Pyarados is a lawless frontier town with a central core of rigid authoritarianism and harsh beauty. I was forced to defend myself against a gang of half-orc bullies in the roughhewn settlement that sprawls around the central citadel.
The upshot of this is that the outer city, beyond the pacifying heights of the walls, is a wild and lawless place where the authorities turn a blind eye to most crimes, allowing street justice to settle accounts. Visitors should note that law enforcement is anything but lax in Pyarados, despite the lack of a large Thayan police force. Vigilantes punish those crimes the Red Wizards ignore, and their punishment is just as swift and certain.
There is much poverty and despair in Surthay, which has spawned a thriving criminal underground. The tharchion professes little tolerance for crime and has given his troops full rein to capture suspected lawbreakers and punish them on the spot. As usual in Thay, this has been taken by the garrison to be a license to pursue, capture, abuse, assault, murder, and destroy as they please.
Fortunately for the citizens of Surthay, the various criminal guilds are relatively powerful and can have particularly troublesome guards disposed of quietly. Systematic bribes and extortion keep other officials under control, but those with no connections to the crime guilds are helpless against the ravages of the Thayan soldiers.
For much of its history, the city’s exact layout remained a closely guarded state secret, and possessing an accurate map of Eltabbar was a crime punishable by death.
The tharchions appoint local bureaucrats, called autharchs, into positions at various levels. Autharchs function as mayors, military leaders, and ministers of various organizations such as trade guilds. Most autharchs have little authority and serve mainly as convenient scapegoats for accasions when a zulkir’s or tharchion’s plans go awry. The autharchs suffer a high turnover rate, since incompetent ones vanish or are killed and competent ones are promoted. The leader of a trade enclave, called a khazark, technically has an equivalent rank to an autharch running a very profitable guild in an equivalent-sized city, although the khazark tends to have higher status because he or she is always a Red Wizard. In situations where a Red Wizard is accused of a crime, the local autharch usually defers to his or her tharchion to avoid the possibly fatal blunder of confronting a Red Wizard who is under the protection of a higher-level politician.
While this chain of command works in theory, in practice the zulkirs hand down orders to the tharchions, autharchs, military, khazarks, or commoners with impunity. The only people with any real independence are the wizards, who endure long apprenticeships to their cruel masters before being able to strike out on their own and possibly enter the ranks of the Red Wizards.
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting - 3rd edition
The Red Wizards form an elite class, the nobility of the land. Through the vast, regional bureaucracy administered by their hand-picked Tharchions, they govern Thay’s laws, commerce, and society.
A Red Wizard is a practicing wizard who has been indoctrinated into the outermost circle of Thayan politics. In Thay, only Red Wizards are allowed to wear red robes, and those who violate this law are swiftly caught and slowly tortured, usually in a public manner. To avoid even the threat of such a punishment, most Thayans never wear anything red, and some refuse to don orange clothing as well. The only exceptions are the clerics of Kossuth, who stand outside the ban and are easily recognized by their holy symbols and their multi-colored robes.
Standing laws in Thay prevent Red Wizards from simply seizing whatever food they want from farmers and any item they desire from merchants.
Lords of Darkness
For any Thayan enclave, the Law of Sovereignty applies: The land on which the enclave sits is considered Thayan soil, and Thayan law is the only law. This is more than just words on a trade agreement - the Red Wizards consider the enclave’s land to be a part of Thay, and while they don’t go out of their way to offend their neighbors with strange Thayan customs, they are not averse to punishing lawbreakers in their own fashion.
A person caught stealing might be flogged, or branded, or (rarely) put to death. The Red Wizards have harsh penalties for those who offend or harm a Red Wizards, with beatings, imprisonment, and enslavement all common responses.
Once a Thayan becomes a noble, it is almost impossible to take that status away from his family. Only the unanimous decision of the Zulkirs can remove the status of nobility; this is usually done by outlawing the family, arresting all accessible members, and turning the survivors of the arresting process into slaves.
Unapproachable East
The laws of Thay are, simple, and the penalties are brutal. They are mostly concerned with establishing who's in power. The tharchions and zulkirs consult a set of tomes known as the Library of Law when faced with a serious problem. However, most of the time, the authorities ignore these books in favor of expediency. These are the most important laws of Thay.
Only Red Wizards may wear red robes, so that all shall be able to identify them instantly.
Do not steal from other Thayans or harm their belongings, especially their slaves.
Do not kill or harm another Thayan. (In practice, this means, "Do not kill or harm anyone from your class or above.")
Obey the orders of your betters.
The proscription against wearing red robes is unusual, but Thayans take it so seriously that most refuse to dress in any clothing of that color. The penalty for being caught in such garb is execution on the spot. It's rumored that some of the forces of the Red Wizards always carry a spare red robe or two. This is then supposedly thrown onto the body after the guards have killed someone, giving them an excuse for their actions.
The laws of Thay are enforced by whoever claims to have jurisdiction over the people involved or the location in which the disturbance occurred. In Thay, just about every Red Wizard employs slaves or commoners as private guards. The more powerful the person, the more numerous and more skilled the guards. In Thay, might makes right, and the Red Wizards have plenty of might. The trouble comes when more than one group of guards claims jurisdiction over any particular issue. This happens often, and when it does, a fight usually breaks out.