Quote from: Zirunel;1129318Fair enough, this is all fictional. But to me, and I think for many of the posters here, religion in an rpg setting is important. You want something that seems like it should feel real for both the pcs and the npcs. It should be a big motivator for the good guys and the bad guys.  To me anyway.

Absolutely!  I'm just saying that there is more than one way to flay a heretic in these situations.  It doesn't have to be gods needing worshipers as food, being objective or subjective presences in the setting, being assholes who dole out powers or punishments on mercurial whims, or any other tropes in order to get there.  All it has to be is internally consistent.

Quote from: Jaeger;1129309After reading Ed Greenwoods recent writings over on EN world, I believe that he was just making shit up that sounded cool. When it comes to religion he doesn't have a clue.

That is what I said, he understands religion completely.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1129311The fact that these are only cookie-cutter gods based around what non-polytheist irreligious people think polytheistic gods are like or about is precisely the problem with D&D gods. Having a template for some generic fire god that people apparently devote entire temples to cuz they like fire, or something, doesn't really help me cuz actual polytheistic gods in real life religions aren't just some separate entity with an exclusive club centered around a very specific element, but part of a greater pantheon of interrelated gods that most people worship collectively, rather than as completely separate gods with their own unique independent and competing religions. You may find examples of cults devoted to a single god from time to time, but those are typically mystery religions that serve some specialized purpose rather than representing the norm of how polytheistic religions work or how worship of gods operates.

In real life polytheistic religions each god typically represents more than just ONE specific element (that people are extremely devoted to in exclusion of all others for no apparent reason), but rather an entire host of different things (such as fire + metalwork + creation + teaching/passing on knowledge, etc.) that might be tangentially related but often have some transcendental or symbolic meaning. And people from different parts of the world--and sometimes even different lands within the same general region--often worship different gods or pantheons with different believe structures, rather than just worship the same 15 or so cookie-cutter gods the world over, in their own cookie-cutter temples devoted to just one god operating as competing religions rather than as part of a greater pantheon.



Religious faith transcends the concept of evidence and its not about believing things for the sake of believing them, but because (presumably) they serve some higher purpose in the lives of human beings (whether that purpose is real or merely imagined). Whether or not there's evidence for them is completely irrelevant to the religious person's mind. This is something that's more important to how atheists argue against religious ideas in the internet than to how religious people actually view the world. You're reducing the notion of faith to some technical definition in the dictionary and applying it almost prescriptively when the purpose of dictionaries is to provide descriptive definitions based on common usage, rather than to enforce some sort of fixed notion of what these concepts mean.

Religious faith in the real world, outside of the dictionary, is not about "belief in the absence of evidence". Its about adhering to some transcendental truth that helps guide people's lives and give them hope or helps them achieve some type of understanding of their place in the world, or the true nature of reality, etc. Merely having concrete evidence of the existence of some being purporting to be a "god" is not enough on its own to dispel the need for "faith", because what people have "faith" on is not the existence of that god, but in that god's teachings and whatever that god supposedly represents. And having proof positive that whatever being claiming themselves to be a "god" actually does exist does not prove that whatever they're selling or whatever that god represents for people is also true. That part takes faith, and that faith is the actual foundational principle of a religion, not whether some being purporting to be a god actually exists.

Religions aren't about gods, they're about believe systems. And having evidence that some supremely powerful being exists is not evidence that the systems of belief surrounding them are worth anything, nor does it mean that people will automatically believe in those teachings, transcendental truths, etc., without question. All of that transcends evidence of the existence of gods.

This is problem with D&D's and PF's theology in a nutshell. It isn't a functional theology to begin with.

For example, D&D says the genies are supposedly powerful enough to challenge the gods. However, this doesn't make sense since the gods are apparently beyond game statistics. (At least if you aren't counting epic rules or Immortal Handbook, in which case the genies can't possibly hope to stand a chance.)

PF has this nonsensical story where the gods are the parents of the titans, when the opposite was true in Greek myth. This completely undermines the moral message of the titanomachy, which was about the overthrowing of a tyrannical regime in favor of a new one and not a failed rebellion by spoiled brats!

Not to mention my frustration with the whole concept of leveling, which I don't believe supports mythic play very well. Mostly because leveling is a game abstraction meant to represent character growth and isn't used outside of gaming (unless you count that stupid LitRPG genre). The leveling mechanic breaks down eventually, as seen with both Epic (exemplified by Immortal's Handbook) and PF's Mythic rules.

In fact, by the standards of real mythology a typical D&D party are essentially mythic heroes because slaying giant monsters on a regular basis was reserved for mythic heroes. Mythology, legend, and folklore don't have leveling systems!

It wouldn't be possible to run the labors of Heracles because their order doesn't follow the challenge ratings of the D&D equivalents of those monsters.

So I guess it's a good thing I decided to use Mythras Classic Fantasy instead of 5e.

You can create complex religions for your campaign...but then you need significant player buy-in to play religious PCs.

If you want players to remember (or even be aware of) feast days, chants, holidays, myths etc, then these things have to matter to the campaign. Knowing about these things must provide tangible benefit to the PCs, and dumping that burden on the poor sucker playing the Cleric isn't a good plan.

Religion is a big deal in the Fading Suns RPG. As such, I always had the PCs run into various religious elements and when they did, I would tell the players, of course your PCs know about this, here let me give you broad overview of what's up, now back into the game. Over time, some (not all) players integrated the various religious bits into their characters' interactions with the setting. BUT the only reason the players paid attention was because religion was very important to the NPCs and thus, the PCs had to interact with that.

But I wouldn't want to tackle complex religion in setting with lots of gods and religions. I've had a hard enough time with Mazes & Minotaurs getting the players to remember the differences between even a handful of Greek gods and religion is pretty homogeneous as all the gods are in the same pantheon.  

In my OD&D game, I have three religions of Man (Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic) and I have them defined in broad strokes. Enough for the Cleric players to feel unique, but not to much to burden anyone. Because each of the religions are starkly different, its easier on the players. And as a further value-add to player buy-in, I provide benefits for non-clerics to become acolytes of the major cults. The net result is 50% of non-clerics are devout worshipers which makes the investment in learning and the learning curve worthwhile for the table.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1129353You can create complex religions for your campaign...but then you need significant player buy-in to play religious PCs.

If you want players to remember (or even be aware of) feast days, chants, holidays, myths etc...

Memorizing holidays isn't why people roleplay, and no other class is bogged down with those kind of irrelevancies. No player of a magic-user is expected to memorize the names of the 30 foundational tomes of wizardry, for instance.

When it comes to clerics, too many players and DMs take the wrong approach. Wipe away all the boring details, and focus on the fun parts that actually come up in the game, instead. D&D's classic Hammer Horror vampire-hunting Bishop Turpin is a good start -- even things like your religion are abstracted away in favor of stuff like blasting hordes of skeletons.

Another game with an intriguing approach is Exalted (which I know little about, so I may be mangling) -- the Zenith caste are the priests of the setting, but again the actual religion is poorly defined in the writeups I've seen. Instead, it focuses more on the active, dynamic aspect -- they are supposed to charismatic prophets. That's an important aspect that can be fun to roleplay, and which D&D often neglects. Clerics shouldn't be dull magistrates, parish priests, or confessors; they should be active, purposeful, and driven. Have zany beliefs and crazy visions.

Leave the stuff like holidays as flavor. Don't spell them out, and for Tarterus' sake don't make another of those tiresome calendars. Instead, bring them in as flavor, when needed. Want a holy day for an adventure? Poof! It's a holy day. Does your cleric need something to do in the downtime between adventures? Make up some observance. Try to be consistent with those details once established, but don't worry too much about it.

Following up Spinachcat's and Pat's posts...

Yeah, I wouldn't even bother naming every god in the world, cuz like I mentioned in my last post the specific gods people worshiped in real life religions could sometimes vary from land to land, giving way to too much variability. Sometimes these were essentially variations of the same gods, other times they might be unique to certain places--perhaps carryovers from older cultures that settled those lands but were conquered by migrating warrior cultures that became more dominant.

Instead I would focus on providing a general idea of what types of pantheons and religions exist in the different major cultural groups in the setting, naming only the major gods of each.

Maybe the barbarians of the north worship warlike gods who defeated the frost giants that used dominate the frozen mountains according to legend, and now demand constant conflict as tribute, ensuring that only the strongest tribes survive in such harsh cold climates. While the barbarians of the southern jungles worship animal spirits that teach them how to survive in the jungle--the Jaguar could be the spirit of hunting, stealth and misdirection, while Crocodile could be the spirit of protection, resilience and survival, etc.

People from the central civilized lands of the world might worship gods more similar to the Greeks or Romans, while those of the eastern lands might be more similar to Mesopotamian gods, and the barbarians of the surrounding eastern desert might worship Jinns, and the Jinns might be classed by elements, geographic features or environmental phenomena, like oasis jinns, desert sand jinns, fire jinns, dust storm jinns, etc.

This gives me a general idea of what things are like and interesting stuff to throw at players (venturing into the desert? Get ready to pay tribute to some Jinn!) without getting into the details of everything there is.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;1129273No.

   Faith is belief in something based on an authority judged to be trustworthy, but without knowledge that compels the mind's assent.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1129317Welcome to the internet!

Quote from: Zirunel;1129318Fair enough, this is all fictional. But to me, and I think for many of the posters here, religion in an rpg setting is important. You want something that seems like it should feel real for both the pcs and the npcs. It should be a big motivator for the good guys and the bad guys.  To me anyway.

And although I have no experience of forgotten realms, I do have both the LbB Gods demigod and heroes, and the hardcover Deities and Demigods, and you know what? They are the only dnd books I found I had no use for. Both seemed so lame. "Hey, I'm the orc god. What's my schtick? Well I'm totally the orc'iest. I'm so orcie it hurts." Oh yeah? Well I'm the gnome god. I'm the gnomiest. I'm so gnomy it hurts."

Just didn't do it for me. For some reason unconvincing religion really weakens a setting.

EDITED to add: not to mention "Hey, I'm Artemis. I was worshipped on the planet Earth. Which isn't here. Why the hell do I show up? I dunno, but here's my stat block. You know, in case we go at it mano a mano."

It's cool that you want to play that way. I do not want to simulate real world religions and their problems in anyway. I am very happy playing without schisms.  I like playing in a world where the clerics are very clear on what their deity wants. And the church of Torm has no internal religious problems. Doesn't bother me in the least. It makes sense to me that internally the churches won't have the problems and debates over theological matters like in the real world since the god would just settle it himself. Cool that you want that. But I am happy without it.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1129367Yeah, I wouldn't even bother naming every god in the world, cuz like I mentioned in my last post the specific gods people worshiped in real life religions could sometimes vary from land to land, giving way to too much variability. Sometimes these were essentially variations of the same gods, other times they might be unique to certain places--perhaps carryovers from older cultures that settled those lands but were conquered by migrating warrior cultures that became more dominant.

Of course, that's based on the presumption of a real-world-like arrangement where every culture has its own gods, which may or may not actually exist.  But there's also the option of a setting where the gods are real and have at least some minimal level of communication with humanity, such that every culture knows of the same gods.  Different cultures may call them by different names or emphasize the worship of one god (who is more in line with their cultural values) over another (who isn't a good fit).

The Elder Scrolls computer games are a good example of this kind of arrangement - for the most part, everyone worships the same Nine gods, although there are some deviations - the Dunmer of Morrowind have their own separate Tribunal of three ascended gods, the Thalmor insist that Talos/Tiber Septim is not a god at all, and so on.  And then there are the daedra princes who, again, are recognized by pretty much everyone and have their own daedra cults separate from the worship of the Nine.  But, if you add up all the gods and daedra princes, you end up with about two dozen specific deities, which is not an unreasonable number of names to come up with, even if the god mainly known as "Akatosh" is called "Auri-El" in ancient elvish texts, and "Alkosh" by the Khajiit.

Quote from: nDervish;1129372Of course, that's based on the presumption of a real-world-like arrangement where every culture has its own gods, which may or may not actually exist.  But there's also the option of a setting where the gods are real and have at least some minimal level of communication with humanity, such that every culture knows of the same gods.  Different cultures may call them by different names or emphasize the worship of one god (who is more in line with their cultural values) over another (who isn't a good fit).

The Elder Scrolls computer games are a good example of this kind of arrangement - for the most part, everyone worships the same Nine gods, although there are some deviations - the Dunmer of Morrowind have their own separate Tribunal of three ascended gods, the Thalmor insist that Talos/Tiber Septim is not a god at all, and so on.  And then there are the daedra princes who, again, are recognized by pretty much everyone and have their own daedra cults separate from the worship of the Nine.  But, if you add up all the gods and daedra princes, you end up with about two dozen specific deities, which is not an unreasonable number of names to come up with, even if the god mainly known as "Akatosh" is called "Auri-El" in ancient elvish texts, and "Alkosh" by the Khajiit.

Yeah, but the difference is that, while perhaps limited or narrow in scope, Elder Scrolls at least has a consistent theology. They have a set of common acceptable gods everyone worships across the single Empire in the world. Then they also have the unacceptable Daedric Princes, who at best have questionable motives and morality. And Dunmer have their own ancestral gods, which adds flavor and cultural distinctiveness. It's not just a bunch of random gods competing for worship because... reasons.

And having multiple pantheons doesn't discount the possibility that they might all be real, and maybe even take an active role in shaping events or grants favors to their worshipers. They would just tend to focus on cultures and regions where they're worshiped, rather than extending beyond their spheres of control.

Quote from: Zirunel;1129318Fair enough, this is all fictional. But to me, and I think for many of the posters here, religion in an rpg setting is important. You want something that seems like it should feel real for both the pcs and the npcs. It should be a big motivator for the good guys and the bad guys.  To me anyway.

And although I have no experience of forgotten realms, I do have both the LbB Gods demigod and heroes, and the hardcover Deities and Demigods, and you know what? They are the only dnd books I found I had no use for. Both seemed so lame. "Hey, I'm the orc god. What's my schtick? Well I'm totally the orc'iest. I'm so orcie it hurts." Oh yeah? Well I'm the gnome god. I'm the gnomiest. I'm so gnomy it hurts."

Just didn't do it for me. For some reason unconvincing religion really weakens a setting.

EDITED to add: not to mention "Hey, I'm Artemis. I was worshipped on the planet Earth. Which isn't here. Why the hell do I show up? I dunno, but here's my stat block. You know, in case we go at it mano a mano."

It should feel real for PCs and NPCs, otherwise it breaks immersion by...

Quote from: Manic Modron;1129328Absolutely!  I'm just saying that there is more than one way to flay a heretic in these situations.  It doesn't have to be gods needing worshipers as food, being objective or subjective presences in the setting, being assholes who dole out powers or punishments on mercurial whims, or any other tropes in order to get there.  All it has to be is internally consistent.

NOT Being internally consistent, which is IMHO something an atheist/agnostic cleric/paladin is guilty off by how the class is constructed.

I can house rule it to make it so, but the books have to be internally consistent, because if not then I need to houserule even more, not only the stuff I like that isn't there or the stuff I don't like that is... But also the immersion breaking stuff.

Which is why my Cleric/Paladin in a non monotheistic setting must make sure to be in the good graces of the deity, because it's how much favor he has managed to accrue that determines how powerful he is, and the deity needs the worship as food.

In a monotheistic setting with "The One True God tm" this becomes easier since automatically all wizards become suspects of pacts with "The Enemy tm" plus the closer you get to IRL Earth the easier is to sell faith as the thing that makes the Cleric/Paladin powerhouses.

Look, Bugle.  I get it.  Divine empowerment without specific devotion is pineapple on your pizza.  Or beans in your chili, whatever the food thing that applies in your case is.  Maybe water-chestnuts, I don't know.

I even agree that some settings demand this sort of cosmology.  I even mentioned it previously in reference to Discworld and American Gods.

Take Forgotten Realms, for example.  Being an atheist in that setting is all kinds of a bad idea.  Not only do gods need their bowl of Manna-Prayer Hymnios in the morning or they get all cranky, but if you die as an atheist you get turned into mortar in a big ol' wall at the end of reality.  OUCH.  Not only that, but because the goddess of magic is also the body of magic itself, even the most scholarly and jaded of wizards won't risk being an atheist or magic might stop working for EVERYTHING if she starves.  Ouch again.

What I am saying is that this is not universal.  No houserules are needed because outside of setting conceits/tropes it doesn't break any rules.  It isn't even universal in D&D since it is explicitly called out in 3rd edition as an option to be devoted to  cause or philosophy instead of an actual god.  It is not new, revolutionary, or game breaking.

If gods in a setting do not need worshipers as batteries for their existence or if the god/champion relationship is something other than a vending machine where you put prayers in and get spells out, then a bunch of other options open up.

You only need one of two things in order to be a cleric/paladin/theurge/thaumaturge; either sufficient devotion to tap into power on your own or a divine patron willing to empower you.

Everything else is arguing about toppings on pizza.  And I'd rather talk about what kinds of pizza we like rather than get told that the Italian style flatbread & toppings on our plate isn't pizza because of some semantic dictionary copy paste.

If we have a cleric without god or religion, then why call that person a cleric at all? Why call it divine magic? Just make them another kind of wizard. It's like a black mage or a white mage. Some wizards are good at casting spells to blow things up, some wizards are good at casting healing spells. There we go, secular clerics. Because if you remove religion from the cleric, they aren't really clerics anymore, they are just a set of powers that the character can use and so it might as well be another kind of wizardry.

Quote from: Shasarak;1129331That is what I said, he understands religion completely.

LOL   If someone thinks that religion is no more than "...making shit up that sounded cool."  then they merely demonstrate that they do not really understand religion at all. Which is why D&D pantheons and Mr. Greenwoods attempts to make in-game religions come off as pure drivel to those of us that do.


 ...  

Quote from: ShieldWife;1129399If we have a cleric without god or religion, then why call that person a cleric at all? Why call it divine magic? Just make them another kind of wizard. It's like a black mage or a white mage. Some wizards are good at casting spells to blow things up, some wizards are good at casting healing spells. There we go, secular clerics. Because if you remove religion from the cleric, they aren't really clerics anymore, they are just a set of powers that the character can use and so it might as well be another kind of wizardry.

That is functionally what D&D Clerics are - just another type of magic user. They use exactly the same spell list.

I am a big proponent of Divine Miracles being handled different systematically than Magic in any RPG. Otherwise, what's the point?

Quote from: ShieldWife;1129399If we have a cleric without god or religion, then why call that person a cleric at all? Why call it divine magic? Just make them another kind of wizard. It's like a black mage or a white mage. Some wizards are good at casting spells to blow things up, some wizards are good at casting healing spells. There we go, secular clerics. Because if you remove religion from the cleric, they aren't really clerics anymore, they are just a set of powers that the character can use and so it might as well be another kind of wizardry.

A number of games have a divide between spirit magic and hermetic magic -- like RuneQuest and Shadowrun as well as many others. Spirit magic isn't divine, but it is distinct from the hermetic book-learning magic that wizards use. Both can be distinct from divine magic, but sometimes there's a blending between spirit magic and divine magic.

I could easily picture a setting where non-priest shamans use the same kind of magic as priests.

Along related lines, in the real world, there is often a grey area between a priest and a non-religious scholar or functionary. There are shamans, monks/nuns, witch doctors, kabbalists, and others who blur the lines between religious priests and secular sorcerers.

Quote from: Jaeger;1129403LOL   If someone thinks that religion is no more than "...making shit up that sounded cool."  then they merely demonstrate that they do not really understand religion at all. Which is why D&D pantheons and Mr. Greenwoods attempts to make in-game religions come off as pure drivel to those of us that do.

I have seen far too many religions to believe that making up shit that sounds cool is any different to what really happened except maybe Greenwood used less psychodelics for his ideas.