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Champion
 
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ChessyPig (4/28/2007)
Have you ever read the game Dogs in the Vineyard? It's an indie tabletop game basically themed around exactly this kind of thing.
I actually have a PDF copy lying around somewhere, perhaps I'll have a closer read.
Maelstrom: Khaniel, Liberated Angel of Enlightenment
RL: Tom
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Champion
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As a continuation of the concept, now I'm interested if people would be interested in playing a tabletop RPG with such a system.
What do people think of the concept of playing a devout character whose “miracles/divine magic/”holy superpowers” manifest completely at the whim of their Deity and is beyond both the characters and players control?
In the most extreme example, the players possess no control over when miracles manifest, they only have the ability to ask for divine aid at any moment (including in the middle of a battle)
Would you be happy to play a character whose special powers are subject to a roll on the “deity response chart”, or just GM fiat and judgment, and which would you prefer?
Or perhaps a system which put more control in the hands of the character.
Would you be more happy with a system (like in Maelstrom) where through a religious ritual the character supplicates to the deity, who then (if the deity so chooses) passes on a blessing (a limited superpower, for example the ability to cause fear in demons 3/week) to the character, and then have the character's choice when and why they use that blessing?
(This is perhaps one interpretation of what how D&D divine magic works)
Or perhaps somewhere between the two, perhaps having "Piety/Faith(or whatever) points" which the characters gain through pious acts that please their deity, where they can be spent to ask for divine intervention and miracles to occur, with the amount of faith points they spend affecting how great a priority/magnitude of the response.
Maelstrom: Khaniel, Liberated Angel of Enlightenment
RL: Tom
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Prodigal
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I think most tabletop RPGs could do with less obviously interventionist deities. So religions and churches and so forth would exist, and maybe one or more deities would exist, but the deities wouldn't particularly do things at the whim of the PCs, and there would be room for doubt over whether they existed at all; meanwhile most of the power of the churches would be the power of any large organised body of people, and the 'clerics' would take skills in a variety of other things, their faith expressed through their function in the church they belong to and/or their philosophy of life if they are not the sort to belong to organised religion.
It seems that whenever you put religion in RPGs at all, you tend to put 'divine magic' in, which then spoils a whole class of interactions (between those who think that divine powers exist and those who don't). Even if cause and effect are somewhat alienated as you propose, it still seems like you're thinking of the highly interventionist kind of deities rather than subtle-interventionist or hardly present at all.
Maelstrom: Jessily the Wemic, previously Tourmaline of Weaver
CUTT: Ref 07/08, previously Kallestra Lorelai Aostare of the Sapphire Tower
EOS: Study the Venin
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Apprentice
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What I would like to see for 'priestly' character types is closer to what D&D already has for the Bard class, and like the existing Turn Undead mechanic. If you take the bardic music ability and turn it into some kind of Intercession ability- giving the priestly character the power to Inspire, Bolster, etc in combat situations. Have you seen the Evangelist prestige class from the Complete Divine? I'd like to see something like that.
I would not like my characters abilities to be at the discretion of the DM. Some sort of 'miracle chart'- maybe. Like if you needed a minimum level of holyness to receive certain benefits?I wouldn't mind if my character had abilities that weren't quite so flashy. Compare Remove Fear with Summon Monster 1 (both from D&D's Cleric 1 list).
I like the look of, but have never fully explored, the Conviction mechanics from White Wolf's Hunter: the Reckoning and Dark Ages: Inquisitor product lines. Hunter was oddly enjoyable because the Characters weren't sure how their own abilities worked.
---------------------------------------- CP: Squire Raymond of the Knights of the Lion
PD: Caspar Janssen, Alkonian journeyman
RL: Graham
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Heroic Knight
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I must say, I am *immensely* impressed with the Piety/Conviction mechanic in Dark Ages: Inquisitor (as well as the setting itself - it's brilliant for anyone who loves knights in shining armour, especially if you may or may not have recently read Labyrinth by Kate Mosse). The 'switch' between callousness (when your conviction raises above your piety) and the way your piety drops if you *rationalise* what you've done rather than atone for it etc...great stuff. Holding your paragon of inquisitorial virtue together as they face not only the enemies of the church, but their own inner demons is immensely fun (rather than being a bit of a chore as often seems to be the case when playing paladin-style characters) because there is a price for success (callousness) as well as failure (loss of faith/direction)
Maelstrom: Aestar, now with 50% MORE emo or your money back
EOS: Previously Sindiri of the Aivelle. Next tba
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Wag
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I was rather impressed with Jedi Knight 2 - for a computer role play game forced to adopt a 'light side/dark side' system they really did well. More relevantly, I think the most satisfying element of the game was the ability to affect your NPCs - either pulling them to the dark side or - making a mistake - and pushing them to the light side. Come R2D2 - embrace the strength of self and cast aside the weakness of lesser souls ...
Marios
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Wag
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| When we wrote the background to Pirates, we thought a lot about the metaphysics of the game and came up with the idea that all gods existed but only if they are believed in and prayed to. As this was a historical (well, alternative history... the metaphysics actually made the history significantly different to that of the real world for various reaons) this meant that any and all gods or variants of gods were around. One of the players was a worshipper of Kali, for example. It was sort of like the idea in Pratchett's Small Gods. There was no 'list of spells' for priests or worshippers. Not even the ones listed in Maelstrom (things like initiate, excommunicate etc were purely social roleplaying things as I beleive they may be intended to be in Maelstrom). Instead, a worshipper could take a skill that made them a 'conduit of their god'. With this you could pray, appealing to your god for intervention. You can do this alone or you can do it with a massed load of worshippers and, generally, the more impressive your 'appeal' the more likely you are to be answered. Then, like the Maelstrom prayer sheet system, the refs decided whether you got help or not and what form this help took. There was also the possibility of 'a price' which could be anything from regular prayers or converting more 'heathens' to funding the building of a cathedral or acquiring 'more souls of the enemy' by killing heathens. Generally, what you got was dependent on how well you played the ritual of the prayer, how generous (or evil) the ref was feeling at the time and whether you were willing to pay the price. Oh, and the help generally needed to be appropriate to the god's sphere of influence. Can't tell you if it worked or not as it was never play tested (only one PC worshipper and he never tried any 'intercessions') but in theory it should work. I do like systems which treat deities as mysterious and dangrous rather than just a power sink for healing. I think there should always be a price (and not just the AD&D price of spending 3 hours reading your cleric scrolls each day) and there should always be dangers. You are using the powers of a being who has self will and is likely to demand things of you, get pissed off when you don't say your prayers properly and so on. So good on you for thinking of this for tabletop... I also, BTW, think the same about magic or psi. There should always be a price and a danger for any use of power.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Whispering God is your friend... trust the Whispering God... Ruins of Empire 1st - 3rd Feb, 2008, Gladstone scout centre, Chester
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