Questions about cult initiates as they're defined in Sartar: Kingdom of Heroes. It's clear that they spend 30%+ of their time on religion, and that they're a less restrictive category than god-talker, priest, or devotee. But how many adults are cult initiates? The cult numbers in S:KoH Book 2 imply that most adults are initiates, but I don't trust those numbers because they don't count children comprehensibly, they don't seem to count the "Orlanthi 85%" as 85%, and the concept of cult initiates seems to be that they're a minority, not everybody.
Each answer to the "how many" question leads to other questions.
If a majority of adults are cult initiates, why are a minority of them not? (One answer could be that most cottars and stickpickers are lay members, and vice versa. That would imply some interesting things about Sartarite society.)
If almost all adults are cult initiates:
* What do they do with the 20% of their time taken up by cult activities and rituals, beyond holy and sacred days? (One answer could be that they spend a few hours a day doing cult magic as part of their job, but more individually than communally.)
- What's the point of defining lay membership?
If only a minority of adults are cult initiates, I ask the following questions. I ask them twice each, once for the <10% urban population and once for the rural population.
* How many are cult initiates?
- Why do some people become cult initiates whereas most don't?
- How much overlap is there between cult initiates and thanes? And carls, for that matter.
- What percentage of cult initiates initiate to Orlanth or Ernalda, versus minor gods?
- How does all of this relate to the idea of the Orlanthi 85%?