Secret temple within a temple

[Arjan]

I have been tossing with this idea for one of my players but i would like to have you opinions on this.

The PC (a low level priest of sera) want to establish a temple holding in the province of lemnjohen of the giantdowns.
He is secretly contacted by a group called "the white hand". What he doesnt know is that the group is in fact from the kriesha temples of the white witch, trying to infiltrate in the human provinces of the giantdowns.

The group gives the priest of sera all kinds of financial support to establish the temple, and sometimes ask a favor in return. The name of the temple is "Circle of the white coin".

Since kriesha's portfolio is also wealth,making money and trade, it seems to the pc that he has a temple of sera.

my question to you all, how would you handle such a situation? that the temple of sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without letting the PC know about it. how would you cover it up?

Arjan

[kgauck]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Arjan" <brnetboard@TUARHIEVEL.ORG>
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 7:58 AM


> my question to you all, how would you handle such a situation?
> that the temple of sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without letting
> the PC know about it. how would you cover it up?

The PC only knows what you tell them. Choose your words carefully to convey
the sense that the temple is one of Sera without contradicting possible
later discovery of a temple to the Ice Lady. Suggest that any thing
questionable is a Rjurik thing, rather than a reason to reflect on the
Temple of the White Coin. For example, the druids are liable to dislike
both a temple of Kriesha and a temple of Sera. So, hostility among the
druids can just be couched in terms that suggest a disapproval of Sera.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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[morgramen]

I've been toying with a similar idea for my campaign, but the trick I need to figure out is what to do with the RP & GB collections as regards the domain level of play.

If you have a "secret temple" within a temple, then how to subvert the RPs without letting the player regent know about it? I thought about allowing the "secret sect" free access to the "cover temples" bank account (as if it were their own), but that is only a temporary solution - a one time trick as it were. As soon as the "secret" temple used some of the RPs, then the player (operating the "visible" cover-temple) would realize that something is up when his bank account isn't what it should be.

The other option, would be for the secret sect to only use the temple for realm spell purposes, and to let the PC keep the income from the cover temple itself. THis would be ok in hte big picture, but doesn't seem to be the best solution for the subverting temple.

[Birthright-L]

I would have to add though that it would be EXTREMELY difficult for it to be
a temple to more than one deity. Simply put, the temples of the Ice Lady
can ONLY have female priestesses AND practice rather harsh doctrines that
don`t at all mesh with Sera. The players character would have to be an
IDIOT if he didn`t notice the odd rituals.

Tony


----Original Message Follows----
From: Kenneth Gauck <kgauck@MCHSI.COM>


> my question to you all, how would you handle such a situation?
> that the temple of sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without letting
> the PC know about it. how would you cover it up?

The PC only knows what you tell them. Choose your words carefully to convey
the sense that the temple is one of Sera without contradicting possible
later discovery of a temple to the Ice Lady. Suggest that any thing
questionable is a Rjurik thing, rather than a reason to reflect on the
Temple of the White Coin. For example, the druids are liable to dislike
both a temple of Kriesha and a temple of Sera. So, hostility among the
druids can just be couched in terms that suggest a disapproval of Sera.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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[Peter Lubke]

On Tue, 2003-03-11 at 00:58, Arjan wrote:

This post was generated by the Birthright.net message forum.
You can view the entire thread at: http://www.birthright.net/read.php?TID=1421

Arjan wrote:
I have been tossing with this idea for one of my players but i would like to have
you opinions on this.

The PC (a low level priest of sera) want to establish a temple holding in the
province of lemnjohen of the giantdowns.
He is secretly contacted by a group called "the white hand". What he doesnt know
is that the group is in fact from the kriesha temples of the white witch, trying to
infiltrate in the human provinces of the giantdowns.

The group gives the priest of sera all kinds of financial support to establish the
temple, and sometimes ask a favor in return. The name of the temple is "Circle of
the white coin".

Since kriesha`s portfolio is also wealth,making money and trade, it seems to the pc
that he has a temple of sera.

my question to you all, how would you handle such a situation? that the temple of
sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without letting the PC know about it. how would
you cover it up?

Arjan


In my opinion, if the temple is established by the PC for Sera - then it
is a temple to Sera. The fact that financial backing, and possibly
several of the temple personnel are supplied by the White Witch is
completely irrelevant. The infiltrators and the money does not change
the nature or alliance of the temple worshipers. However ...

From a strict wording point of view I don`t like the use of "secret" in
this context -- I think better meaning is conveyed by "hidden". The
White Witch (through her agents) may also, -- at the same time --
attempt to establish a hidden temple to Kriesha using the temple of Sera
as a cover.

The two temples form parts of two different domains and are administered
separately. The existence of a hidden/secret cult of Kriesha may be
reasonably deduced by the player/regent given that it is an active
temple. However that won`t let them know that the temple is right on top
of them (literally). Gb and RP are handled as normal for each temple.

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[morgramen]

The example I'm using for my campaign is the Temple of Elemental Evil. Consider, that the temple itself is dedicated to the elements, and so the worshipping flock adheres to the principles set down by the priests, believeing all the while that they are worshipping the spirit of air, fire, and otherwise.

However, underneath the robes, and behind closed curtains, the true nature of the elemental religion is in fact, dedicated to Iuz and Zuggtomy. It is these Gods who are in fact recieving the "Juice of Faith", and the elemental aspect is merely a cover to dupe the local peeons.

Is it not possible then, that the masses can be "fooled" into thinking that the local shrine is something other than what it really is? If it is, then is it not also possible that a highly secretive cult could derive "Faith Juice" by posing as priests of Sera and diverting some of the Juice to their own dark Gods without alerting the actual "True" priests of the otherwise, legitimate, temple?

Ergo, a "temple within a temple".

The "divine essence" that is created through worship is there (and this is really the definitive key I think), but does this "god stuff" shoot straight through the express checkout to the God itself, or instead, are the earthly priests (who are in charge of generating that "faith essence") get to manipulate it and direct it to the desired destination? If the earthly priests "create" the essence by preaching doctrine, then couldn't they effectively create "subversive doctrine" that reads like legalesse?

[Peter Lubke]

On Tue, 2003-03-11 at 09:17, morgramen wrote:

This post was generated by the Birthright.net message forum.
You can view the entire thread at: http://www.birthright.net/read.php?TID=1421

morgramen wrote:
The example I`m using for my campaign is the Temple of Elemental Evil.
Consider, that the temple itself is dedicated to the elements, and so the
worshipping flock adheres to the principles set down by the priests,
believeing all the while that they are worshipping the spirit of air,
fire, and otherwise.

However, underneath the robes, and behind closed curtains, the true nature
of the elemental religion is in fact, dedicated to Iuz and Zuggtomy. It is
these Gods who are in fact recieving the "Juice of Faith", and the elemental
aspect is merely a cover to dupe the local peeons.

Is it not possible then, that the masses can be "fooled" into thinking
that the local shrine is something other than what it really is? If it is,
then is it not also possible that a highly secretive cult could derive
"Faith Juice" by posing as priests of Sera and diverting some of the
Juice to their own dark Gods without alerting the actual "True" priests
of the otherwise, legitimate, temple?

It would be unlikely that you would be able to twist the worship of Sera
so as to reflect that of Kriesha. Assuming that it could be done
however, you would have a temple to Kriesha, run by priests of Kriesha
for the glory of ... etc (just with a name change). The truth is still
there. But why would a goddess condone such behavior ? I find it highly
unlikely that you could fool people this way in any case.


Ergo, a "temple within a temple".

The "divine essence" that is created through worship is there (and this
is really the definitive key I think), but does this "god stuff" shoot
straight through the express checkout to the God itself, or instead, are
the earthly priests (who are in charge of generating that "faith essence")
get to manipulate it and direct it to the desired destination? If the
earthly priests "create" the essence by preaching doctrine, then
couldn`t they effectively create "subversive doctrine" that reads like
legalesse?

But, the postulated position was that the players controlled a priest
regent. Here, no matter how you slice it - you can`t hide. No true
priest of Sera will be fooled, and even if you managed to get an
extremely gullible priest - you aren`t going to fool Sera. Sera`s
communication/communion with her priests may be through intermediaries
in most cases -- but how many spells do you see the priest getting
granted for example?

In such a case - you don`t have a temple within a temple. You have a
temple of Kriesha with a load of fresh paint over the sign "Kriesha`s
Temple", with a bad over-paint job saying "Temple of Sera" (probably
misspelled at that). There`s no two temples here.



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[ryancaveney]

Arjan wrote:

> the temple of sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without
> letting the PC know about it.

I think it is in principle possible to have a temple that claims to
worship one diety but actually worships another. In fact, I suspect
temples to Eloele (and individual priests of Eloele serving in temples to
other gods, pretending to be priests of that other god) do this all the
time -- the idea of stealing worship seems extremely appropriate to her.
However, the specifics of this situation (the priest himself does not know
what is going on) make arranging that much more difficult.

IMO, the specific ritual done can direct what Morg called "Faith Juice" to
any desired recipient; what use, if any, that recipient can make of the
energy is determined by their personal skills and power. For example, IMO
this is exactly how temple regents gain RP and cast realm spells. It
should be possible for someone with enough ranks in Knowledge(Religion) to
construct a ritual that actually sends the energy somewhere other than
where it looks to a casual observer like it should go, where "casual" is
defined by some sort of opposed test of Knowledge(Religion). I don`t
think this plan is defeated by the objections Peter Lubke notes, because
IMO communication with the gods is much less easy and detailed than he
seems to think. Especially if the temple is misdirected from the
beginning, I think the gods would have a tough time noticing (or at
least pinpointing) the problem.

According to my theory, no matter how much financial support is provided
by the Krieshans, if the PC conducts the standard Seran worship service
out of the standard Seran prayer book, the "Faith Juice" goes to Sera.
If, however, his backers were to provide a rewritten liturgy, and he used
those rituals to conduct services, then the energy would go wherever the
new ritual directed, such as to Kriesha. Whether the priest himself, or
any other visiting priest of Sera could tell the difference would be a
matter of Knowledge(Religion) as I said above -- although this does call
for a variety of circumstance bonuses, as I suspect (as Kenneth Gauck
suggests) the more conservative druids couldn`t be bothered to tell the
difference anyway. At this point I am tempted to argue for splitting the
Knowledge(Religion) skill into different ones for each god.

There could be other ways to steal the energy, but they are rather more
intrusive and require more effort to get right and keep hidden. They
would all have to involve some large-scale magical ritual/spell: a realm
spell should be able to do the trick, as might summoning some big shadow
world beastie to inhabit the temple and redirect the outgoing flow of
"Faith Juice" (doubtless for the price of keeping some fraction for its
own use). However, I think that for this sort of thing to work without
the help of the regent priest, it would probably also steal some of his
RP in the process, which he would almost surely notice.


Ryan Caveney

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[Ariadne]

Originally posted by morgramen

The example I'm using for my campaign is the Temple of Elemental Evil.
You don't like your players, do you??? ;)

[kgauck]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Anthony Edwards" <anthony_c_edwards@HOTMAIL.COM>
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 2:06 PM


> I would have to add though that it would be EXTREMELY difficult
> for it to be a temple to more than one deity. Simply put, the temples
> of the Ice Lady can ONLY have female priestesses AND practice
> rather harsh doctrines that don`t at all mesh with Sera. The players
> character would have to be an IDIOT if he didn`t notice the odd rituals.

I would think that too if I supposed that a covert temple would use overt
rituals. You see, the DM wrote the list and told he wanted to have a covert
temple, so for purposes of argument its a given. I wrote my post to offer
an explaination of how it might happen, as a way of answering the question
that was asked. We have previously discussed how the TCV in Osoerde might
have infiltrated the temples of Cuiraecen, corrupting values of the knights
of the Stormlord. We have discussed the presence of Torias Griene (priest
of Eloéle) in the Northern Imperial Temple. Its reasonable to devise an
intrigue where priests of one temple infiltrate another. The DM who asked
the question offered a rational based in finance. Why nay say? Its more
constructive to figure out how it could happen within the setting, given
that someone is already going to run the senario.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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[kgauck]

----- Original Message -----
From: "morgramen" <brnetboard@TUARHIEVEL.ORG>
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 1:53 PM


> If you have a "secret temple" within a temple, then how to
> subvert the RPs without letting the player regent know about it?

The way I would handle this is that events are subtly adjusted to serve the
secret society as well as the PC. In such scenarios appearances are more
important than realities.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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[kgauck]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ryan B. Caveney" <ryanb@CYBERCOM.NET>
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 5:59 PM

> If, however, his backers were to provide a rewritten liturgy, and he used
> those rituals to conduct services, then the energy would go wherever the
> new ritual directed, such as to Kriesha.

And since the scenario takes place in the Giantdowns, the locals can
certainly argue that to 1) appeal to the Rjurik, you`ll need ritual x,
formula y, and offering z, and 2) given the non-merchantile nature of the
Giantdowns, too much of the standard book won`t appeal to the locals.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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[Peter Lubke]

On Tue, 2003-03-11 at 00:58, Arjan wrote:

This post was generated by the Birthright.net message forum.
You can view the entire thread at: http://www.birthright.net/read.php?TID=1421

Arjan wrote:
I have been tossing with this idea for one of my players but i would like
to have you opinions on this.

The PC (a low level priest of sera) want to establish a temple holding in
the province of lemnjohen of the giantdowns.
He is secretly contacted by a group called "the white hand". What he
doesnt know is that the group is in fact from the kriesha temples of the
white witch, trying to infiltrate in the human provinces of the giantdowns.

So far we have had a PC priest of Sera establish a temple to Sera with
financial help from a group of businessmen - whose motives are less than
pure, in exchange for a favor. No problem. Doesn`t make the temple
anything special.


The group gives the priest of sera all kinds of financial support to
establish the temple, and sometimes ask a favor in return. The name of
the temple is "Circle of the white coin".

Who named the temple? Who controls the temple? It would be expected that
the PC priest is the answer to both questions given the previous
description.


Since kriesha`s portfolio is also wealth,making money and trade, it seems
to the pc that he has a temple of sera.

Yes.


my question to you all, how would you handle such a situation? that the
temple of sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without letting the PC know
about it. how would you cover it up?

Can`t be done. A single temple cannot be both, nor could the
non-existence of a temple to Sera be hidden from the PC regent. But...
the temple of Sera may contain elements of another faith.

Are you contemplating that the building(s) house two separate faiths,
one of which is unaware of the others existence? - which is a different
situation. And/Or that the organization of the Sera faith consists
instead of two organizations, one contained partially of wholly within
the other, and of which the containing organization is wholly or
partially unaware of. (c.f. the Black Ajah of the White Tower in Robert
Jordans "Wheel of Time" ?)

Just as in some Rjurik realms the province regent is unaware of the
presence of WW guilds, so would the PC regent be unaware of the presence
of WW temples. (although any use of influence by the WW temples should
provide some clue to deduce the strength of WW temple activity - and
possibly its location i.e. within the temple of Sera). But the WW temple
still forms a separate entity.

Certainly efforts of the WW temple may affect and/or influence the
actions of the Sera temple -- e.g. false reports to the PC regent may
influence him into taking an action that is beneficial to the WW temple.
Or, actions of the PC regent may be reduced in effectiveness due to a
lack of normal diligence of temple personnel who are in fact loyal to
the WW temple instead. The DM controls such information and such
results.

Simple solutions are best.

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[ConjurerDragon]

morgramen wrote:

>This post was generated by the Birthright.net message forum.
> You can view the entire thread at: http://www.birthright.net/read.php?TID=1421
>
> morgramen wrote:
> I`ve been toying with a similar idea for my campaign, but the trick I need to figure out is what to do with the RP & GB collections as regards the domain level of play.
>
>If you have a "secret temple" within a temple, then how to subvert the RPs without letting the player regent know about it? I thought about allowing the "secret sect" free access to the "cover temples" bank account (as if it were their own), but that is only a temporary solution - a one time trick as it were. As soon as the "secret" temple used some of the RPs, then the player (operating the "visible" cover-temple) would realize that something is up when his bank account isn`t what it should be.
>
>The other option, would be for the secret sect to only use the temple for realm spell purposes, and to let the PC keep the income from the cover temple itself. THis would be ok in hte big picture, but doesn`t seem to be the best solution for the subverting temple.
>
Rule by Council as in the new draft 0.0. Every member has full right to
spend money and influence (gb + RP).
Both the Priest of Sera and the covertly operating priestess of Kriesha
can spend resources.
bye
Michael Romes

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[ConjurerDragon]

Peter Lubke wrote:

>On Tue, 2003-03-11 at 09:17, morgramen wrote:
>
> This post was generated by the Birthright.net message forum.
> You can view the entire thread at: http://www.birthright.net/read.php?TID=1421
>
> morgramen wrote:
> The example I`m using for my campaign is the Temple of Elemental Evil.
> Consider, that the temple itself is dedicated to the elements, and so the
> worshipping flock adheres to the principles set down by the priests,
> believeing all the while that they are worshipping the spirit of air,
> fire, and otherwise.
>
> However, underneath the robes, and behind closed curtains, the true nature
> of the elemental religion is in fact, dedicated to Iuz and Zuggtomy. It is
> these Gods who are in fact recieving the "Juice of Faith", and the elemental
> aspect is merely a cover to dupe the local peeons.
>
> Is it not possible then, that the masses can be "fooled" into thinking
> that the local shrine is something other than what it really is? If it is,
> then is it not also possible that a highly secretive cult could derive
> "Faith Juice" by posing as priests of Sera and diverting some of the
> Juice to their own dark Gods without alerting the actual "True" priests
> of the otherwise, legitimate, temple?
>
>It would be unlikely that you would be able to twist the worship of Sera
>so as to reflect that of Kriesha. Assuming that it could be done
>however, you would have a temple to Kriesha, run by priests of Kriesha
>for the glory of ... etc (just with a name change). The truth is still
>there. But why would a goddess condone such behavior ? I find it highly
>unlikely that you could fool people this way in any case.
>
It is very likely. Not one among thousand commoners will have Knowledge
(Religion Sera) and will be at the mercy of the priest to tell him what
is right. In addition a similar situation happened in the Legend of the
Hero Kings when the Priest of Belinik opened his temple: He did not
state: Here you pray to Belinik! Come join the dark legions! No, the
people thought and were made to think that they prayed for strenght,
courage and so on, similar to Cuiraceens portfolio - and the bloody
altar was not openly visible.

>Ergo, a "temple within a temple".
>
> The "divine essence" that is created through worship is there (and this
> is really the definitive key I think), but does this "god stuff" shoot
> straight through the express checkout to the God itself, or instead, are
> the earthly priests (who are in charge of generating that "faith essence")
> get to manipulate it and direct it to the desired destination? If the
> earthly priests "create" the essence by preaching doctrine, then
> couldn`t they effectively create "subversive doctrine" that reads like
> legalesse?
>
>But, the postulated position was that the players controlled a priest
>regent. Here, no matter how you slice it - you can`t hide. No true
>priest of Sera will be fooled, and even if you managed to get an
>extremely gullible priest - you aren`t going to fool Sera. Sera`s
>communication/communion with her priests may be through intermediaries
>in most cases -- but how many spells do you see the priest getting
>granted for example?
>
>In such a case - you don`t have a temple within a temple. You have a
>temple of Kriesha with a load of fresh paint over the sign "Kriesha`s
>Temple", with a bad over-paint job saying "Temple of Sera" (probably
>misspelled at that). There`s no two temples here.
>
In the PS of Talinie we have a Priest of Haelyn who actually is a priest
of Eloele, Griene.
The gods do not care about worldly affairs - they will not send a
message to the priest of sera "Warning! Danger! Priests of Kriesha
around!" but stay aloof of worldly affairs and get not involved -
similar to the 1st directive of Star Trek. A dream with dangerous
contents and omens would perhaps be all after a few months...
bye
Michael Romes

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[Eosin the Red]

>>>>>The gods do not care about worldly affairs - they will not send a
message to the priest of sera "Warning! Danger! Priests of Kriesha
around!" but stay aloof of worldly affairs and get not involved -
similar to the 1st directive of Star Trek. A dream with dangerous
contents and omens would perhaps be all after a few months...


Not really true. Just ask Medoere and Diemed. They do interfer but when and
why is not usually descenable to the mere mortals.

PS - my take is to give WW a "virtual" zero level guild holding to allow
them to spy and perform acts of espionage. If they were rooted out by
counter espionage, it would be likely that Sera would take the wrap.

Eosin

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[Birthright-L]

I think the answer here lies in the structure of feudalism. Unless the PC
administers this particular temple himself, we must remember that in a
feudal system, much of the resources are actually administered on the local
level. So even if a level 3 temple holding pays a tribute of 3 GB and 3 RP
to the regent of the church, there is still room to divert other funds to
their own illicit projects. GB certainly, and depending on how you see
regency points, they could get some of those too.

IMC, I use a pretty lose definition of RP - they are a kind of
divinely-inspired prestige points. Thus, both players and NPCs can earn
extra RP for various actions, and vassals can certainly spend a smallnumber
of RPs on various tasks, without dilluting the number of RPs the pay to
their lord. Very role-play oriented, with RP as just another prop in the
DM`s arsenal. I understand others play it much more strictly - which is
reasonable in a PBM game.

But you cannot divert RP from the PC regent without his knowledge - that is
both unreasonable and difficult to conceal.

/Carl


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[Ariadne]

Originally posted by Birthright-L (Tony)

Simply put, the temples of the Ice Lady can ONLY have female priestesses AND practice rather harsh doctrines that don`t at all mesh with Sera. The players character would have to be an IDIOT if he didn`t notice the odd rituals.
The first part is not completely true. In Vosgaard are NEARLY all clerics female (Male clerics are in Belinik's church). In other parts of Cerilia (say Brechtür or Rjurik) Kriesha might have male clerics. Because the temple is within the Giantdowns there could be "unusual" clerics of Kriesha. With the second part I agree with you...

[Arjan]

Originally posted by Peter Lubke



So far we have had a PC priest of Sera establish a temple to Sera with
financial help from a group of businessmen - whose motives are less than
pure, in exchange for a favor. No problem. Doesn`t make the temple
anything special.

No these were priests of kriesha that gave him all the financial support to establish (ie: create holding) the temple



The group gives the priest of sera all kinds of financial support to
establish the temple, and sometimes ask a favor in return. The name of
the temple is "Circle of the white coin".

Who named the temple? Who controls the temple? It would be expected that
the PC priest is the answer to both questions given the previous
description.


The temple name was GIVEN to the PC Priest, the group gave the name to the priest. as in we give you money to... and the name will be The Circle of the White Coin



Since kriesha`s portfolio is also wealth,making money and trade, it seems
to the pc that he has a temple of sera.

Yes.


my question to you all, how would you handle such a situation? that the
temple of sera is in fact a temple of kriesha without letting the PC know
about it. how would you cover it up?

Can`t be done. A single temple cannot be both, nor could the
non-existence of a temple to Sera be hidden from the PC regent. But...
the temple of Sera may contain elements of another faith.



Ok this thread isnt going the way i wanted, so i'll try to straighten things out.

the Temple IS a "covert" holding, thus in fact a temple of Kriesha, but lead by a puppet PC brecht priest of sera who doent know that.

the group that are "supporting" him also gave him certain rules, such as: the lady must be addressed as: the lady of wealth and trade in all prayers. (so call sera or kriesha by name is not allowed)
i am still thinking about the woman priest only, i guess the player likes that ALOT :)

so far he is buying all this shit, neither he or the players have any clue this is hapening.

so all i ask from you...
Not if this is posible...because i already did, so it is :)

but.... how you guys/gals would handly such a covert holding led by a puppet.

Arjan

[geeman]

At 05:20 PM 3/11/2003 +0100, Arjan wrote:

>but.... how you guys/gals would handly such a covert holding led by a puppet.

I don`t know for sure how I`d do it, not knowing all the details of how the
session was played out, but it seems to me there are a few ways of doing this.

1a. The puppet could be a vassal whose regency (or most of it) goes to
his liege. The temple he controls really is a temple to Sera, but as a
vassal transfers regency to the regent in charge of the temple of Kreisha.
1b. The puppet could be a vassal whose regency (or most of it) goes to
his liege, but he unknowingly controls a temple to Kreisha.
2. The puppet could be an independent regent (no vassalage agreement)
but due to the mixed motives of those who are his backers and the way the
holding is subverted his domain is in some sort of constant flux. It`s
permanently contested (in the 2e version of that action) or has some sort
of limitations on it--like the kinds of actions that can be performed in
the province, sort of like the way source holdings are limited by their
very nature.
3. The puppet need not be a vassal or a regent. He could just be
"staff" for one of the temple holding "manifestations" per various sources
that describe such characters. That is, he`s just the curator of a shrine
that he thinks is dedicated to Sera, but is in fact dedicated to Kreisha.
4. The puppet could control nothing more than a temple(0) in which case
his exact status as regent or vassal doesn`t make a difference since he
generates no RP. If the holding level does increase, however, the issue
will need to be addressed.

Lots of adventure possibilities here, most of which I`m sure you`ve
considered. I like the idea, however, of doing a sort of reverse dungeon
kind of thing where your PC in charge of the temple must destroy it from
ubiquitous "invaders" who are, in fact, there to destroy a temple of
evil. The ensuing revelations could be a lot of fun.

Gary

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[ryancaveney]

On Tue, 11 Mar 2003, Arjan wrote:

> No these were priests of kriesha that gave him all the financial
> support to establish (ie: create holding) the temple

Regardless of where he got the money, if the PC creates the holding, he
gets to pick which god it is dedicated to. If his backers created the
holding, they could make a temple to Kriesha, and then invest him with it
claiming it was a temple to Sera -- but just because they gave him the
resources doesn`t mean they automatically control what he does with them,
or indeed have any say at all!

I suppose what you`re talking about could be modeled as a sort of strange
Espionage action which would cause the holding he created to be one he
didn`t plan on, but letting that be a common occurrence would throw the
whole campaign into utter chaos. Again, some sort of special secret realm
spell should be able to have set things up appropriately, and the plotters
would need to be very careful to prevent any sign of it leaking out.

> The temple name was GIVEN to the PC Priest, the group gave the name to
> the priest. as in we give you money to... and the name will be The
> Circle of the White Coin

I still say there is a big difference, both in game mechanics and in real
life, between "Here is some money; please use it to make this thing for
us" and "We have made this thing; please take over its operation for us."
Did they give him the money and ask him to create the holding, or did they
create the holding and then invest him with it?

> the Temple IS a "covert" holding, thus in fact a temple of Kriesha,
> but lead by a puppet PC brecht priest of sera who doent know that.

I will admit to never having liked the idea of covert holdings, but I am
nevertheless trying to play along in good faith.

> the group that are "supporting" him also gave him certain rules,
> such as: the lady must be addressed as: the lady of wealth and trade
> in all prayers. (so call sera or kriesha by name is not allowed)

OK, that is definitely part of what I meant about designing a misdirection
ritual that would pass casual scrutiny. What does the PC think of these
restrictions? Has he ever broken (or considered breaking) them? How did
(or would) his backers respond?

> Not if this is posible...because i already did, so it is :)

=)

> but.... how you guys/gals would handly such a covert holding led by a puppet.

What I would say is, in order for it to be possible his backers would have
had to put in a great deal of effort before ever speaking to him for the
first time. Therefore, since their plan seems to be succeeding, they must
have actually done all that work even if you hadn`t previously imagined
them doing so. How`s that for working by DM fiat? =)

Seriously, to get this right is a difficult undertaking. The PC`s
Krieshan backers would have to have known this, and planned accordingly.


Ryan Caveney

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[kgauck]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ryan B. Caveney" <ryanb@CYBERCOM.NET>
Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 2:24 PM


> I still say there is a big difference, both in game mechanics and in real
> life, between "Here is some money; please use it to make this thing for
> us" and "We have made this thing; please take over its operation for us."
> Did they give him the money and ask him to create the holding, or did they
> create the holding and then invest him with it?

Some may have heard of one version of the Nigerian Letter con going around
where someone claims they are refuges from tyranny and oppression and if you
could help me set up bank accounts in your country, I`ll give you a nice
percentage of my vast wealth. Some criminals get you to launder their money
for them and you never get the reward you expected. This is similar to the
Nigerian Letter, but with a holding. The people with the resources are
conning the ruler. No doubt they build a 0-level holding, tell the ruler
who should handle the next shrine over here, who should be promoted to
archpriest here, and treasurer there. If they can get the duped ruler to
little more than sign on the dotted line, do what he`s told, and avoid any
questions, it should work as well as any con.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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[Beruin]

How to handle this situation, largely depends on the goals of the priests of Kriesha. As they want to infiltrate the human population of the Giantdowns, I believe they would bide their time till the temple of Sera would be firmly planted in the region and then try to take over rulership of the temple.
This would mean that the temple of your PC would function as a temple of Sera for all appearance, but the church of Kriesha would insure that key positions would be held by their own followers. Then, when the temple has become influential and attracted a following among the humans of the Giantdowns, the followers of Kriesha would try to get rid of the PC - who has outlasted his usefulness - and take over the temple. If the second-in-command of the temple is in truth a follower of Kriesha this take over would be automatic if the PC is slain or even only absent for a longer period of time. Then, the rituals of the temple would slowly change over time, unreliable personnel will be exchanged until the temple is a fully grown temple of Kriesha.

However, until then, the PC should get a chance to discover that all is not as it seems and he should also be able to find allies , i.e. loyal followers of Sera, among the temple`s clergy.

For additional ideas, you might also take a look at the adventure "Tears for Twilight Hollow" in Dungeon 90, if you can procure it. This adventure has a similar theme and you might be able to borrow some ideas even though it`s a high powered FR adventure, featuring things like a mechanical beholder armed with ten magical wands.

Hope this has been somewhat useful,
Christoph Tiemann

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[Peter Lubke]

On Wed, 2003-03-12 at 03:20, Arjan wrote:



Ok this thread isnt going the way i wanted, so i`ll try to straighten things out.

the Temple IS a "covert" holding, thus in fact a temple of Kriesha, but lead by a puppet PC brecht priest of sera who doent know that.

the group that are "supporting" him also gave him certain rules, such as: the lady must be addressed as: the lady of wealth and trade in all prayers. (so call sera or kriesha by name is not allowed)
i am still thinking about the woman priest only, i guess the player likes that ALOT :)

so far he is buying all this shit, neither he or the players have any clue this is hapening.

so all i ask from you...
Not if this is posible...because i already did, so it is :)

but.... how you guys/gals would handly such a covert holding led by a puppet.

Oh, easily in that case. The PC isn`t really leading anything at all is
he? He`s in control of nothing .... but he thinks he is. So, unless the
real leaders agree to attempt any of his domain actions - they will all
fail - after all he can`t actually be getting RP or GB unless the real
leader allows him to get some. Now the temple does produce dome RP and
GB (I assume), but control of that is not in the hands of the PC. This
is just a case of misdirection.

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[Arjan]

Originally posted by Peter Lubke

Oh, easily in that case. The PC isn`t really leading anything at all is
he? He`s in control of nothing .... but he thinks he is. So, unless the
real leaders agree to attempt any of his domain actions - they will all
fail - after all he can`t actually be getting RP or GB unless the real
leader allows him to get some. Now the temple does produce dome RP and
GB (I assume), but control of that is not in the hands of the PC. This
is just a case of misdirection.



Exactly, although it only generates GB at the moment due to insufficient skill ranks of the PC on the neccessary skills (less then 5 ranks collects 0% RP).
I am thinking of giving him an Lieutenant who advises him what to do who is infact the puppet master and a priest of Kriesha.
Then when he has enough skills to receive RP he will find out there is something wrong.
He isnt able to collect them.

Arjan