Religion is missing something?

[Indirik]

Fun doesn't make "good", in my book. You can have a bunch of nobles actively preaching about how squirrels will end us and about how we must worship the holy badger while wearing pink tutus, and RP a bunch around that and actively spread it. Could be fun. Would be stupid as hell, though, and wouldn't qualify as "good" in my book simply because it is fun.

I wouldn't call such a religion a good one either. And it definitely wouldn't be a fun religion for me. But there are people out there that like such things. Dunkontology, the donut religion on EC, developed a pretty large following. At one time, before religions were actual game mechanics, they had the second largest guild in the game, and were established on two or three islands. I personally think it was pretty ridiculous, but lots of people enjoyed it.

Does a lot of theology text result in a lot of tl;dr? Yes, of course. But then again, I'd bet most SA players never really read the few SA texts there are either, and almost all of them never contributed to developping RP. So what's your point, if the end result is the same in both cases?

The end result is most definitely not the same. If one person creates and delivers the entire theology, then one person has contributed to it, and only that one person is invested in it. When that person leaves, it will most likely fail. This is a pattern that we have seen over and over again. If ten people make major contributions to it, then ten people are invested in it. When he "founder" leaves, it will continue, carried on by the other people that are invested in it. That's what happened in SA when Mathurin left, and we didn't know if he would ever be back. Most of us thought he was gone for good. Other people that were invested in it took over, and kept things going, adding more to the theology.

You don't have to have 100% participation and activity to keep things alive. You just need a large enough core group of people that are actively invested in it, that it can survive the loss of a single key person. But as those key people leave, those that are left have to make an effort to get more people involved. That was the reason behind the large pool of elders we designed for SA, with regular elections for some of the elder positions. Keep interest going for a larger pool of noble, as well as leave the option open for almost anyone to actually become a guiding member of the faith.

[Hroppa]

Actually, what am I saying, my character on Far East Island was an elder priest of MAE, and made fairly substantial additions and changes to the faith. New rituals and ceremonies, new religious iconography, new theological doctrines...

It is harder to work with existing material (while respecting others' previous work) than to create your own theology from scratch, I agree. On the other hand, there's much more motivation to engage with an existing body of theology and worshippers.

Edit: And this was all long after the founder, and subsequent dignitaries, had basically lost interest.

[Bedwyr]

One thing that ties into the one person vs lots of people developing theology debate...

"Long lost" religions that are "rediscovered" need to burn in eternal hellfire.  It's possible, I'm sure, to have a great religion based around that.  But it bugs me every time.

[Adriddae]

One thing that ties into the one person vs lots of people developing theology debate...

"Long lost" religions that are "rediscovered" need to burn in eternal hellfire.  It's possible, I'm sure, to have a great religion based around that.  But it bugs me every time.

We need to have more religions based around characters. Some people need to proclaim themselves as gods!

[Chenier]

Survival is not the point, change adaptation, new ideas. Most of the time the creativity dies.

Survival is a challenge by itself. The game doesn't account for leadership change, and VE almost died due to game mechanics when the founder left. We are now locked with most elder positions forever locked out, too, highest occupied elder rank being the 7th right now I think.

If religions (and guilds) weren't so crippled when their founders left, then others would be more willing to contribute to such faiths that otherwise appear as at least partial dead ends.

The end result is most definitely not the same. If one person creates and delivers the entire theology, then one person has contributed to it, and only that one person is invested in it. When that person leaves, it will most likely fail. This is a pattern that we have seen over and over again. If ten people make major contributions to it, then ten people are invested in it. When he "founder" leaves, it will continue, carried on by the other people that are invested in it. That's what happened in SA when Mathurin left, and we didn't know if he would ever be back. Most of us thought he was gone for good. Other people that were invested in it took over, and kept things going, adding more to the theology.

You don't have to have 100% participation and activity to keep things alive. You just need a large enough core group of people that are actively invested in it, that it can survive the loss of a single key person. But as those key people leave, those that are left have to make an effort to get more people involved. That was the reason behind the large pool of elders we designed for SA, with regular elections for some of the elder positions. Keep interest going for a larger pool of noble, as well as leave the option open for almost anyone to actually become a guiding member of the faith.

It is the same, you just wrongly associated swiss cheese religions being determined only by the founder, while suggesting that those with more holes than content are the opposite. That is a bad logical fallacy. They are not tied to each other, as you can just as easily have faiths with a lot of predetermined lore that have faithful participate in order to add significant amounts of lore and theology as you can have faiths with more blanks than content never have the faithful have a say in anything. A leader guiding theology doesn't mean that he's doing it all himself and that subordinates cannot participate. A good chunk of mythology in the Blood Cult was written or inspired by the faithful, another good chunk was derived from other faiths. Every now and then, established faith with decent amounts of content will have people contribute to them (old religions with content get more of this than old religions without any, I would say).

To repeat myself: amount of content and amount of participation are not dependent on each other. Experience shows all combinations are possible, leadership style has more impact than amount of content on the short to long term, and lots of content can be beneficial on the very long term (why bother writing lore on a religion if no one cared to do so for many years prior?).

[De-Legro]

Would any game religion pass IRL? No, of course no, no one has the time to develop a religion to that extent. However, with a bit of suspense of disbelief, and can imagine that if there is enough written on the key fundamental questions, then there are answers, "unwritten", on most of the rest.

If there's nothing to work on, however, I cannot suspend disbelief to tell myself that such a religion would give satisfying answers to the fundamental questions of life.

Fun doesn't make "good", in my book. You can have a bunch of nobles actively preaching about how squirrels will end us and about how we must worship the holy badger while wearing pink tutus, and RP a bunch around that and actively spread it. Could be fun. Would be stupid as hell, though, and wouldn't qualify as "good" in my book simply because it is fun.

Does a lot of theology text result in a lot of tl;dr? Yes, of course. But then again, I'd bet most SA players never really read the few SA texts there are either, and almost all of them never contributed to developping RP. So what's your point, if the end result is the same in both cases? At least when there is established theology, those who did bother can lecture others on the proper way of doing things. Hell, at least there is a determined proper way of doing things, for those who cared enough to look it up. When in the Cult, I had on many occasions people come ask questions to me about this or that, obviously not having read the wiki. It was a great opportunity to link various bits of lore with current events, and therefore publish new lore or documents. Indeed, a lot of texts you can see on the cult's wiki didn't just come out of my ass on day 1, it was the result of interaction with others.

I 100% disagree that intentionally leaving more blanks than text makes a religion better. It's certainly a key to success to not have any arbitrary rules as RL religions have as even the smallest rule will turn away some people, but that just makes for a !@#$ty (even if successful) religion. A good religion should feel like it could have been a real western religion in the days.

To me the issue isn't about blanks or reams of developed theology, its about a religion being fluid. Religious though changes, sometimes small changes sometimes big. Take Christian though on the after life, Hell was absent from early Christian churches, was pushed heavily in the middle ages when fear was such a large part of Church preaching, and currently is once again absent in some denominations.

SA succeeds in my opinion because regardless of how much stuff is actually written on the wiki (which lets face it is not some official place that EVERYTHING must be placed) theological discussion and development is an active part of that religion.

Besides which no religion STARTS we a massively developed Theology, this things do grow organically in some way. We often bypass that IG in many ways, rediscovering ancient faiths, visions from gods etc, but the fact remains that in far too many religions once they are set up that theological growth dies, and I believe that with it much of the potential vitality of the faith dies.

For instance Chénier how many of those original super active Blood Cultist were is some way involved in the forming of the theology? As yourself if perhaps part of the recruitment problem later was people felt like a square peg in a round hole that was created by other players for their own characters and reasons?

[Anaris]

We are now locked with most elder positions forever locked out, too, highest occupied elder rank being the 7th right now I think.

I definitely posted the announcement of the fix for that to the newsticker when it came out several months ago.

Any elder of the highest occupied rank can now reclaim the missing ranks, all but the Founder rank.

[Chenier]

For instance Chénier how many of those original super active Blood Cultist were is some way involved in the forming of the theology? As yourself if perhaps part of the recruitment problem later was people felt like a square peg in a round hole that was created by other players for their own characters and reasons?

The BC was a niche religion. I never found established theology to be the problem, I rather always felt it made us more authentic.

And the lore was established over time. Sure, I did most of it, but bits every here and there until the days it started declining, really. Others also contributed.

I definitely posted the announcement of the fix for that to the newsticker when it came out several months ago.

Any elder of the highest occupied rank can now reclaim the missing ranks, all but the Founder rank.

Seriously? I don't remember that.

[Chenier]

I definitely posted the announcement of the fix for that to the newsticker when it came out several months ago.

Any elder of the highest occupied rank can now reclaim the missing ranks, all but the Founder rank.

Out-of-Character from Sofia MacDuff   (21 minutes ago)
I'm digging through the interface for managing ranks and people. Sadly, I don't see a means to promote myself higher.

I was under the impression that if the highest ranking member of a guild/religion left, the next highest could take (or would be automatically) control. I'm not seeing that kind of tool here.

I'll look a bit more and see what I can dig up.

Aaron Crandall

Where can this tool be found?

[Anaris]

Where can this tool be found?

In the Manage Guild Ranks page, down at the bottom, I believe.

[Draco Tanos]

That's correct.  I used it on EC with the Church of Humanity and Askarn used it on BT with the Golden Feather.

[Alasteir]

Well, I believe religion is missing something more than a roleplay class.

Since the earlier hour of the civilizations, the religion were intrinsicly linked with medicine and healing people. But we don't have it on BM. I can quote this from the Egypts, Aesculapius for the romans, PAnacea for the greeks, Airmid for the celtians, and numerous more. Perharps, a subclass like "healer" could appear. What about giving the preachers the option to hire healers (the paraphernalia) and let them cure the people hurt by loot? This could give the preachers something to do with paraphernalia, and, more, something to spend the money. Preachers are a good class to gain money, as you spend with little. You can't hire soldiers, and have no use to paraphernalia.

Plus, with this, we can give the religion temples and etc the option to help the commoners, too, to be healed.

We can't forget that BM is a game based on something like the middle ages, and medicine, science chermistry, physics, are all moved by the religions.

[Tom]

Over my dead body, and you can quote me on that.


This is, in fact, a frequently rejected wish. The problem here isn't history (we could go into that, it won't be pretty for religion), the problem is that way too many games have followed the "priest == healer" cliché. And I don't want to do that, in order to keep the distinction between BM and D&D.

[Alasteir]

I must say, I did not think in D&d and other RPGs... I'm sorry, Tom. But I really did not think in a subclass wich would give to the priests a "power" to them. I thought them hiring some healers, and travel from here to there and send them to cure loot people (helping them going fast to the former levels) or wounded soldiers. They can help, but with common and ordinary things, like herbs. BM is not a game of high magic things =)

[De-Legro]

I must say, I did not think in D&d and other RPGs... I'm sorry, Tom. But I really did not think in a subclass wich would give to the priests a "power" to them. I thought them hiring some healers, and travel from here to there and send them to cure loot people (helping them going fast to the former levels) or wounded soldiers. They can help, but with common and ordinary things, like herbs. BM is not a game of high magic things =)

Its not about HOW they heal, its about breaking away from the fact that most RPG's will pigeon whole priests into a healer role.