Playing A God

[Osprey]

When it comes to relationships between the gods, I don`t think they really
do "borrow" from one another per se. It is possible to extrapolate on the
domain level system of Vassalage, however, to a sort of divine level of
play. Since Cuiraecen is the herald of Haelyn he may have some sort of
godly version of that relationship.... Not having a Liege in the
Vassal-Liege sense, Haelyn probably doesn`t borrow power from anywhere,
unless one is going to posit some godly singularity or some other higher
level of deity.

Haelyn`s power is probably derived from worship, the existence of
organizations that substantiate the "Lawmaker" aspect of his portfolio and
his role as an air god. He would then, derive Divinity Points (or whatever
one wants to call the divine equivalent of regency) from the existence of
law holdings, temples dedicated to his worship and a sort of source-like
"holding" based on the natural environment.

Gary

I think this is a pretty smart way of looking at things. This is why each god has a portfolio of spheres where they have dominion (though not always absolute, as there are 3 Cerilian gods of war&#33.

As a basis, though, every god should certainly derive power directly from their temple holdings. These represent direct worship, homage, and ultimately collective faith in the deity.

Beyond temples, look to the deities' portfolios. I hadn't even thought of the elemental aspects, to be honest.

Realistically, I think the various aspects of the portfolios could be weighted in terms of priorities for differing aspects. Using the above examples of Haelyn, his portfolio includes (from the BRCS): Courage, Justice, Chivalry, Rulership, and War. Mmm, sorry geeman, no Air in there! Air was the domain of Anduiras, but it actually makes sense that Haelyn is less elemental and more human-focused than his predecessor.

I think gods derive power from the actions of mortals. That's the real power of having souls, IMO (and yet another reason why elves don't have deities in Cerilia; if soulless, their worship would have no direct effect on deific existence or power). Holdings represent the actions of mortals on a a mass scale, which definitely simplifies measuring the overall power. But I also like to translate to a personal level, wherein the action of every mortal soul resonates on the deific plane and may effect things there. When these actions are done in a god's name (i.e., imbued with true faith), they have even stronger resonance. Hence, clerics and palidins become the most important of a god's followers because their own action shave such direct effects on the deific plane, and because of their influence over the faith of the masses.

So, looking at Haelyn again:
Courage: Courageous acts in Cerilia strengthen Haelyn's power, especially when performed by those who venerate him. Courageous acts by entire armies or populations could multiply this effect dramatically. Conversely, acts of cowardice might weaken his power as they stand in direct opposition (one must allow for things that weaken gods as well as strengthen them, otherwise the gods would all be super-deities by now&#33.

Justice: I see this really as a combination of the law and good domains. While Anduiras may have simply preferred law over chaos, for Haelyn it is essential that the law be just. In simplified domain terms, I would equate this to law holdings administered by lawful good regents directly empower Haelyn. Those administered by LN or NG regents may also empower him, though to a lesser degree.
On a personal level, whenever a magistrate or ruler performs his civic duty and sees justice done (putting the good of society above that of the individual), he has won a bit of power for Haelyn. Great acts of justice earn greater power (where great personal sacrifice is made for the sake of justice, such as in the Arthur/Guinevere story, where she and Lancelot must be punished for the sake of upholding Camelot's laws and preserving the peace Arthur has established in Briatain). Likewise, a band of heroes bringing a band of robbers in to the local sheriff would also strike a blow for justice.

Chivalry: This seems to be a more personal aspect of Haelyn's portfolio. Knights and nobles who perform chivalrous acts, and inspire such behavior and ideals in others, would empower Haelyn. On the other hand, knights who violated the code of chivalry would certainly weaken him.

Rulership: This is a big one, covering a potentially vast domain. How to handle it? Does all rulership empower Haelyn? Since justice is already covered, and this seems to indicate the sort of law Haelyn endorses, I would relegate rulership to landed regents. But is it simply rulership, seperate from morality? In this case, good rulership would benefit Haelyn (resolving domain events successfully, ruling provinces successfully, etc.), while poor rulership would weaken him (when province levels drop, when domain events are handled poorly or ignored, etc.). Like justice, I think landed regents who follow Haelyn's tenants would be the primary forces empowering Haelyn; the further they strayed from those tenants, the less Haelyn benefits. Chaotic evil regents, even if they were excellent rulers (unlikely, but possible), wouldn't do much for him.
More than any other portfolio aspect, I think this one deserves further consideration; I just wanted to lay out some possiblities.

War: Haelyn is the only deity who has the specific portfolio of War, although Belinik and Cuiraecen share the Battle portfolio, and Cuiraecen also has the Conflict portfolio (and they say Belinik is the god of strife&#33.
Do all wars empower Haelyn? Are we only speaking of "legitimate" wars, where war is officially declared (as opposed to "conflicts;" this strikes me as a very modern distinction, but not entirely appropriate to medievalist perspectives of deific domains; but I'll work with the BRCS for now)?

I'm wary of saying any legitimate war empowers Haelyn. Perhaps the fact would be that although a war empowers him, if it is unjust he loses as much (or more, due to the scale) from that portfolio. The ideal war for Haelyn is waged for the sake of justice, perhaps against a corrupt or tyrannical ruler (Justice portfolio), and especially where the armies who battle for the cause of justice conduct themselves with honor, courage, and mercy where it is due (Chivalry and Courage portfolios). If those forces win, then noble rulership would be installed in the conquered domain (Rulership). Every warrior who participates in such a war would strike a blow for Haelyn (whether they knew it or not, though those who followed Haelyn or dedicated themselves to him would further empower their god). On the other hand, a warrior who dedicated his actions to Cuiraecen while participating in such a war might split the benefits between the two gods.

It is this kind of event that would provide the ultimate force of empowerment to Haelyn, because it fulfills every one of his portfolios and is being waged by so many mortals at one time, and affects so many more. Such would be the best-case examples of the old Imperial wars of conquest, where Haelyn's rise to power would have been fastest and most dramatic.

All of these things could likely be translated to RP if such a system was used, but regardless these are some potential guidelines for how a deity might maintain, strengthen, or lose his power. As a general rule, I think hypocrisy would be particularly damaging to a deity: a cleric of Haelyn claiming to support a war of conquest on a neighboring realm (the Archprelate of the WIT supporting Darien Avan's conquest of Boeruine, for example) for "the good of people," when the two rulers are really just fighting for personal power despite both being fairly just and noble regents, would be a powerful example of abusing the deity's precepts and weakening his power.

Well, those are some thoughts on the matter. What do you think?

[teloft]

looks good.


now Im thinking, how would a system look like thet would rule thees things.

Im talking players here. and How to create a god, rice to godhood.

1st you must be blooded,

2nd you must have the blood ability "divine rule" only awailable to the true blooded, but in all bloodtypes.

3rd you must colect create a portfolio. perhaps this is conected to the bloodtype powering the ability "divine rule", and your skilles, you sould be able to create your portfolio on low level, and even chance it trow out your life as a earthly/godly creature.

4th you must gain power trow your portfolio.

I would rule thet the portfolio power gain is so much more then normal Rp gain in the holding sence, thet the god benifits little by using his own time governing holdings. therefore making it easyer for players to leav for godly adventure.

to colect the souls of the fallen, the soul must be willing, now it can enter a godly domain. But by doing so, you unite your essence with your god. in order to brake free from 'hell' or 'heaven' you must fyrst somehow take back your essence. (perhaps this is a bit silly thow) But would explain way so few ever come back to hunt us.

So to animate the dead, you acsuly take the essence of thows dead people and power there bodys, and therefore lessening there god. witch will never be wery happy about it. it would be like making blood theafth on a regent.

Now elven corpes cant be made into zobies or can thay? (Im going off topic here) <_<


...


Now a god dos not have to do like Haelyn did. to asend like this and go to a godly domain of his own, where he can comunicate with all of the world from a paralel singular, (or a teleport spell lol) perhaps restricted to appear somewere close to his holy grounds, like his temples. Or a flokk of his worshipers. therefore a god with no worshipers in any part of a land, has no real acsess to thet part of land, exept by walking there him selfe.


Im thinking about the gorgon, how godly is the gorgon, I would rule thet he has a godly portfolio, even thow he has either, not chosen to go from this world, or he hasnt gaind the power needed.

h34r:

[geeman]

teloft writes:



> now Im thinking, how would a system look like thet would rule

> thees things.



The short answer is "I don`t know."



The long answer is... a book that`ll cost $29.95 US.



I`ve done a lot of thinking on this kind of thing in the past, I`ve

scribbled up a few notes here and there to describe events at various

"levels of play" and when it boils right down to it, I don`t think the

divine level of play would or should necessarily look much like BR`s domain

level of play. I know lots of folks like the idea of BR`s domain level

`porting directly into other campaign worlds, or being extrapolated into

different scales, but I`m not convinced BR`s game mechanics are necessarily

the best way to reflect, for instance, a system of play that worked at the

township level rather than the province level simply by scaling the rules,

nor do I think it would necessarily be the best way of portraying events at

an empire level, or at a continental level, world level, cluster level, and

onward all the way to divinities, planes of existence, alternate realities,

etc.



Essentially, different levels of play should IMO look as different from one

another as the domain level does from the adventure level. That`s not to

say there shouldn`t be interactions. Interactions are one of my favorite

aspects of using the domain level of play, but when it comes to things like

holdings, provinces, units of soldiers, etc. I don`t think a divine level of

play will use any of those things directly, and a whole new rules set is

probably a better way of dealing with such situations rather than attempting

to make them fit into the BR model of petty domains.



Gary

[lordofallandnothing]

i am trying to device a system that will be codependant on the amount of of bloodline points that you have,but that once you reach a certain level of deification you then must have a worshipper base as well.i find that even though this sounds complicated that in th end it is what works best especially considering that that is how the gods rose after the battle where the old ones were destroyed(through having such a mind-numbing amount of bloodline points basically).i believe that that is what made them all become gods and that a continued worship base is what provides them with ongoing power above that level of bloodline points.for example.say that you have a being that is a level 1 deity that rose that far through bloodline points...they expend the base amount of bloodline points to achieve that level but now have very few bloodline points left.they gain bloodline points through blooded individuals on the prime material plane that die and reside in their realm,through being worshipped hence in a minor way they gain it through their temples otherwise they would have no need of temples whatsoever.they can also gain them through the slaying of another deity as well as the usurpation of their portfolio,as well as by absorbing other celestial/infernal beings into themselves that they destroy (which mattering upon the overall power levels of the being absorbed versus their own power level might change their alignment or abilities.etc)

[RaspK_FOG]

All of these seem very interesting, but tell me, really, are you ready to formulate a set of rules that would handle this? Or else, it would simply fall in the vagueness of ad hoc, and many people dislike it, so?

[teloft]

ruling a kingdome, where the people worship the king sould alow you to create a dety-portfolio.

when you have started your work on the portfolio, thet is needed to be a sucsesfull god. you can start granting spells.

the only need to be a god is to be able to grant hig level spells.

I would say thet the gorgon is able to grant his followers the use of divine spells. perhaps not at wery hig level, perhaps so.

but take into consideration.

a god would not alow anyone acsess to a miricle in her name.

h34r:

[lordofallandnothing]

yes if your country that you ruuled had enough beings in it that worshipped you as a living god(actually saw a nice class once with that name) and they were devout enough and all then i would allow a being to gain the blood ability of "grant spells" if their bloodline strength was strong enough of course.that bloodline ability is actually a prequisite in the system i am attempting to build.

[Ariadne]

Originally posted by lordofallandnothing@Oct 30 2003, 03:02 AM
yes if your country that you ruuled had enough beings in it that worshipped you as a living god(actually saw a nice class once with that name) and they were devout enough and all then i would allow a being to gain the blood ability of "grant spells" if their bloodline strength was strong enough of course.that bloodline ability is actually a prequisite in the system i am attempting to build.

This would be a bit like in old Egypte. The pharaos where worshiped like "living" gods too. Maybe this is a bit strange for the Cerilian culture. The Serpent is an Awnsheglien, so there is some reason to worshipping him. So a prerequistite might be to be Awnsheglien/ Ersheglien or at least 25th character level to impress "followers".

[teloft]

personaly I dont like to conect level and experience with godhood.

what about thows born to be a god? thay sould start at first lv, only with lodes of + in level adjustments for begin huge powerfull. witch in efect reduces there experience gaining.

But ofcours I would not expect to see a graiter good with only few character levels.. lol... well unless all the other gods recently passed away somehow. &#33;&#33;&#33;

I would say thet you canot become a god or become blooded, unless you are somehow exposed to it. like begin born thet way. or begin soked in it for some length of time without finding a suden deth.

I could rule thet for a lesser begin, or a puny human, there could be a fort save with the DC of the amout of points begin soaked. if faild, you die. if not you efectively absorb the blood. becoming blooded. Now there is a will save in order to see who has controle. The blood will ofer you a true merge, but if you figth it, you dont merge with it, unless you fail your will save. But you can always fail it my defolt, or be willing.

If we use the blood feats run in familys. like if the blood feat &#39;longlife&#39; has never been known of in your family, its probebly not in your blood. and therefore you can never gain it. unless you are exposed to it. by, fx killing somone with long life. or by unity of your selfe and somone with long life. thet unity of blood. or bloodbrothers can be stronger then vassal. alowing the 2 or more persons to shear there blood with the others, gaining acsess to the blood feats of your blood brothers, at the time of the seremony.

___

the phone rang And now all i can think of are the old icelandic sagas, where leaders maid bonds betvine familys by mixing there blood, and seal it with the power of the earth.

efectively becoming brothers of blood, even stronger bond then brothers by birth.

h34r:

[lordofallandnothing]

i am currently designing my own way for a blooded regent to become a god of at least a quasi level if not higherit will be a level a twenty level progression prestige class that will only be able to be taken by a blooded being.i am trying to make it so that it will be able to be integrated into the birthright rules that are used on this site and then i shall post it here.i will make it in a few different ways then i shall post them all here(at least two different builds for it maybe three) that way i can get a poll going to see which one that the people here like (if any) all i ask of course is that if ya post it anywhere else that ya give me credit for it kk it should be either posted tonight or tomorrow morning for anyone that is interested.have a great day all