Why be a darkfriend?

[RAD]

One more thought: a better metaphor might be a pyramid scheme. The folks who got in at the bottom (the Forsaken) reap the profits while the suckers who join later on get stepped on. I wonder if you get a free piece of Sea Folk porcelean if you bring in ten recruits?

[Yobmod]

Yob, what pagans are you talking about?

To the Catholic church, a pagan was a non-Christian.

I was using this definition:

1. One who is not a Christian, Muslim, or Jew, especially a worshiper of a polytheistic religion.

also from religioustolerance.com

A Neopagan religion is a modern faith which has been recently reconstructed from beliefs, deities, symbols, practices and other elements of an ancient religion. For example, the Druidic religion is based on the faith and practices of the ancient Celtic professional class; followers of Asatru adhere to the ancient, pre-Christian Norse religion; Wiccans also trace their roots back to the pre-Celtic era in Europe. Other Neo-pagans follow Roman, Greek, Egyptian or similar ancient tradition.
Many Wiccans and other Neopagans refer to themselves simply as "Pagans." Unfortunately, the word has many different meanings -- some quite negative.

and i chose Pan as he (or an equivalent god of sex / wine) is present in quite a few ancient religions. The satanism is a reference to the european tradition of wicca (witches) being satanists, and biblical beliefs that all occultism is from the devil.

The pyramid scheme metaphor is probably the best. Even today idiots still join them (its not a pyramid, its a trapezoid!). Although how DF's manage to recruit without being able to talk in public is never revealed.

[RAD]

The darkfriends are monotheists, same as the lightfriends.

Of course, one could also argue that both side are part of the same theology. The WOT has only one world-wide spiritual belief. I can't exactly call it a religion: there aren't any churches or priests, which adds another dimension: how does one stamp out heretical beliefs without a clergy? The Prophet's the closest thing we've seen. Do common folk hear the stories of Light and Shadow from the local Wisdom? What's to stop different sects and heresies from developing? The only alternative to dualism is the Way of the Leaf.

[Zeratul]

There are benefits that go along with being a Darkfriend. Each one is "touched by the Dark Lord" and has capabilities beyond that of others.

That's not true. Apart from one or two examples in EOTW, none of the Darkfriends we've seen ahve special abilities apart from channeling, which has nothing to do with DO.

I don't think the pyramid analogy is a good one. In pyramids at least some of the people who get involved in the most early stages win some money. In the Darkfriends organisation, nobody has won for 3000 years and yet there are crowds wanting to join in. Also there's the fact that it must be really, really hard to get successfully in touch with other Darkfriends when you want to join them. Yet, as the Guide states, between 0,5 and 1% of the population are darkfriends, which I personally find totally ridiculous.

[Yobmod]

What were the downsides of being a DF when the DO was imprisoned and may never have been released?

We're assuming it has Judeo-christian downsides (ie going too hell etc), but none of the Randlanders ever seem to talk about or even think about their creator or afterlife in that way from what i remember.

So until the seals started breaking, maybe prospective DF's considered it as some kind of evil freemasons type organisation. There's danger in being discovered, but not to your soul. Although i dont recall the benifits being very good - a chance to lord it over your social superiors maybe, but as they meet anonamously this would stretch much to their daily lives.

I guess there could be a magical aspect to it. ie. once you take the vow it cannot be recinded. That would make it easier to pressure or trick ppl into joining without worrying that they'll change their minds. But i got the feeling that there was more to being a DF than just calling yourself one - you had to really mean it when you signed up.

No one ever accused RJ of creating character's that had any intelligence

[Yobmod]

I've just thought - Its very strange having a world with a real live Dark Lord, in which the creator is so ignored. The lack of priest or at least temples seems a flaw in the worldbuilding.

I know plenty of other fantasies have Dark Lords and don't dwell on religion, but they are usually less focused on the politics of city life.

[Psylent]

Main reasons for being a darkfriend:

Power. Either in the form of special supernatural power or in terms of having added social power.

Nothing to lose. You're already a bad egg. Nothing to lose by teaming up with a bunch of other bad eggs.

Spirit of Rebelliousness. Down with the system! You get involved just for kicks or thinking that it is no big deal. Alternatively you just hate the Light ( White Cloaks tortured daddy for days just because they thought he was a darkfriend but really my daddy was the sweetest, nicest person ever. The Light is evil and must be destroyed!).

[Kraven_Mittens]

the reason the spy thing wouldn't work is cause no one nows who the other is or where they are onless a myl tells them where to meet and they don't truest each other at all thats why they are incompetent as spys and kidnappers every bad guy sidicate that has been in our universe has trusted each other to do their jobs the best they can be. but the dark one sues mistrust in to the mix of his own followers and enemies, for laughs.

[Yobmod]

One of the rather obvious things to do, if one is a Randiverse ruler, is to try to infiltrate the Darkfriends. Like, say, I capture someone who's a Darkfriend, but not guilty of anything else too heinous, and I give him/her a choice: Tell me everything there is to know about the whole Darkfriend organization and live...or don't tell, and get to meet my...attitude adjusters.

I have given up on WoT, but i'm still suprised at some of the criticisms - have you people read the books?

1) Darkfriends have been captured and tortured. Their fear of retribution from the DO is always greater than their fear of torture, and in cases where pain may overcome this fear, they are assasinated asap (by assasins it is impossible to guard against, ie grey men, gholams, black ajah, unknown nasties).

2) Darkfriends are not just a political lobbying group that you can pretend to join. Even before the breaking of the seals there were those who could ensure that you were really pledging your soul, and presumable magically enforcing it - Fain sees a physical change in darkfriends, and the forsaken seemed to have no trouble finding them out. This not only makes conversion back to the light unlikely, it maked infiltration impossible unless you are actually a darkfriend!

3) Like any half decent fictional spy organisation, none of the accessible darkfriends know enough to be useful in rooting out the organisation. Remember the big gathering, everyone wore masks? or the darkfriend POV chapters, where they are shown to not recognise each other? They clearly have a cell system, and measures in place to prevent any betrayal from implicating the minimum number of members.


Darkfriends may be useless and stupid, and make up way too many boring plotlines, but there is nothing intrinsically wrong with the idea of a Dark Lord having a bunch of henchmen living disguised in society. Especially in a fantasy series in which being a spy has magical / mystical implications.