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Lyanna

Gods And Religions Of Eternal Lands

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if it got too lopsided...i suppose. But if all gods are vying for power, i'd think there would be some sort of balance attained. However, the gods are always thinking of ways to shift it.

 

I dunno, you do bring up a good point though...some commingling of ideas is needed on this issue, i think.

 

What ideas do you have lyanna?

And what other ideas do you have CK?

Edited by Quinticus

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Really, I'm all for the combining....... Why not say they can't really lose power beyond a certain minimum, and they just get advantages from their worshippers (ie. instead of a 1-10 scale, a 7-10 scale). The gods get their vying for power, we get a stable pantheon, and nobody gets cast down. :huh:

 

 

 

 

Also, I'm all for a dwarvish god of mead. :lol:

Edited by crusadingknight

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Haha, i like that idea. Lets see what lyanna and the others think about it.

 

*also are we the only ones that look at this forum? Kinda seems like it since no one else has really posted on this thread other than lyanna and geelef. :huh:

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It seems so, but I only do mythology stuff, and only when I'm not working at the client.

Edited by crusadingknight

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I'll go along with the idea of worshippers affecting a god's power in the Lands, but with a certain basic minimum that cannot be decreased.

 

Okay, working with different descriptions for each race's Gods but keeping the "essences" of the Gods the same shouldn't be too difficult then. Got an idea for Orchans already. :P I disagree about demigods and half-gods, though. I think these should be race-specific, and not necessarily apply to all. (ie. Dwarvish god of mead wouldn't appeal to Elves, so they have no such thing).

 

Will post up Glydoc's War Host soon.

 

Waiting to hear Saii's and Kayliana's (as well as other writers) thoughts on how I used their characters - still open to change...

 

-Lyn-

Edited by Lyanna

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Well... my instinct would be to drop the alignments, as at least three of the Gods don't really fit into them. I don't think Satyr/Gaia would all good because she's so fanatical about her cause, and I don't think madness can be made interchangable with evil in Centau's case - he was the turning point in the fight against Selain and Unolas, for example. If anything, I'd also paint Elandria as more neutral, she often seems more concerned with protecting her own pet projects than with the overall health of the lands.

 

Your descriptions are difficult to fault apart from that particular straightjacket, so rather than usurp them I'll add a bit to their psychological profiling. What I'm writing here is to make every God's viewpoint understandable. They all want the best for us in their own ways:

 

Aluwen is pretty self-explanatory - she wants everyone to be happy. She believes in diplomacy first and foremost, violence as a last resort. I don't really need to add much to what you wrote there.

 

Elandria seems very much a matronly figure, she likes thing to be reliable and dependable for her and her peoples. She even more than Aluwen doesn't want the horors of impermanance - particularly war - in the world (hence perhaps her unwillingness to fight on occasion).

 

Satyr is a lover of nature, of beauty and joy. She wants to make the world a brighter, happier place. She more than the other two is willing to become militant abut that, a ruthless side to her which mirrors her fascination with nature itself. In some ways she is closer to Centaur than to her allies in outlook, which is why, like him, she drove the last of her peoples to war with barely a thought.

 

The three neutrals are pretty much all okay (as they don't have to fit into the black or white categories). Your comments on Glilin I particularly like, the only thing I'd add is a quick reminder that he was very old when he was lifted to divinity, and that awareness of age and the wisdom gained from a long life of mortality makes him a little more inclined to think about the quality and type of people involved, rather than the number. Basically he's a bit more street smart than anyone else except perhaps Selain.

 

Glydoc seems okay, though I'd paint him as a little less able to dominate wars etc, as it could cause continuity problems later on or make the story tilt too much towards how he is approached by the ther gods in any given situation. I've been leaning towards giving him a weakness through a distrust of magic/poisons. In the war against Selain he was a more than able general, but until very near the end was consistently outmanouvered by Selain's more underhand tactics.

 

Unolas I won't add anything to in terms of depth, I already have a certain sympathy for someone who wishes to improve society through increasing knowledge alone, even if it's a naive wish :(.

 

Centau I'd pretty much agree with, but with a couple of provisos. Firstly, the should be limits to his madness. He obviously does remember enough of his former self to swear revenge against Mortos, and of Satyr/gaia to try and protect her (hence his charging of the Centaur and his attempts to stop her people from following). Secondly, he does have an ideology, and did before his madness, which there is a certain background for in the human mind. Who hasn't at one time or another wanted to run away from themselves, to change into something new, to change the world around them...

 

Selain is certainly a bit one-dimensional, and in all fairness he has from the start been a caricature. Superficially I'd like to keep him as is, just for the pantomime 'boo hiss' effect, but to give him more depth, I'd say he has always come from the wrong side of the tracks, brought up in a bad neighbourhood, bullied and abused. His lust for ultimate power does have a purpose, for both him and the Orchans he came from. It is an interesting thought that if he ever gained true power, he could well be a true champion of the underdog.

 

Mortos is difficult to sympathise with at any level, as he wants to destroy reality. That kind of suicidal hatred of everything is difficult to comprehend for many. But Mortos is old. he decided a very long time ago that he wished not to exist, wished to forego the agony of reason. Long before, and long after the tiny lives of mortals he will still be here, and he doesn't want to be. There could be no greater torture than to be immortal and hate your very existence. To see these tiny beings, with that ability to die, to cease existence, flit past him as a sparrow flits past a man... he hates it, hates the reminder that afflicts him in every moment of every day. To destroy it would perhaps dim his pain.

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Saii, I absolutely LOVE your modifications! :):rolleyes: :lol: They bring a whole new aspect to the Gods, especially to the "evil" ones - Mortos seems so wretched and pitiful now that I sympathise with him. This is classic:

There could be no greater torture than to be immortal and hate your very existence.

 

Okay, I'll write updated versions of these Gods then.

 

-Lyn-

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Erm...Hrm then...so we have something like:

 

Power |>Power Struggle - > No ambitions - > Various-------------|

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

++++++|------------------------Overdeity--------------------------------|

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

++++----|The Nine---------------------------------------------------------|

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

++-------|Demi-gods-------------------------------------------------------|

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|

+---------|----------------------------------------Various Other immortals|

 

Erm...so the elements are controlled by the overdeity? (ie. fire, water, air, earth...)

And...is this some divine sexism I see? I never noticed it before. rofl :)

Edited by crusadingknight

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B):P What do you think? :)

 

Anyway, tell you what - we'll let this be the Human description of the Gods. Since they're focused a lot on structures and permanence, this is the "standard" theological definitions given by the various churches in Humanity. They define religion in the sense of a mighty conflict between Good and Evil. (And hence, the raw elements of nature are considered threatening and 'evil'). However, the Humans are the only ones to have churches and systematic theology (except maybe the Gnomes). The rest of the races will have similar concepts, but vastly different ways of expressing them or living them out. (eg. Elves don't see it as a conflict, but some sort of interconnected web of life, where death and life are just cyclical patterns in the web.)

 

-Lyn-

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Ok.. let's see my opinion about religion (and the world).. as always i'll be the one poking holes in other people's works, sorry :lol:.

 

First in general:

I think (some) people might focus too much on these being a "standard" fantasy world, inspired from northern european mithology. Actually even that would be cool with me, but i'd rather not have it inspired too much from a couple of 20th century fantasy books.

I think most fantasy is a bit like a James Bond movie.. everybody knows it's ridiculous, bad and full of stereotypes, all dwarves behaving like drunken scotish santa-clauses with axes, or narcissistic self-righteous elves, or rather stupid, weak and destructive humans. But we like it because that's the way it's "supposed to be" ...

Still i'd rather our world wasn't like that, if at least in the storyliness if it could get away from being too midgardnish. Of course we need to have some fantasy conventions, but let's have the characters (and gods) develop an individuality naturally from that (so yes drop the alignaments).

 

Anyway back to religion:

I like the current major gods and their personalities, and reading Sii's very cool "history of the lands" i see them more like a greek then norhern pantheon.

So they are indeed powerfull, but they do have a lot of human weakneses (chief among them their ego of course), they squable, and they get involved in the affaires of mortals (for example the gods can be like in most (all ?) politheist religions patrons of something - such as manu,crafting,etc... nothing wrong with that, and that dosen't "lower" them).

I think any attempt to elevate them, to make them abstract rather then a reality (to make religion "relative" to each race) is misguided.

Of course the races and cultures will have different interpretations of the events, different religious practices, but of the same real history (as opposed to recored from a human POV).

So maybe after you finish this you can have fun writing stories about what is remembered by the different races, what they know and how they interpret it, but don't start with that, especially if you want to have any consistency in your stories.

 

As for the gods:

Don't put a named Overdeity in.. just hint there's something higher then the gods and that the world experiment had something to do with exploring things that are unknown even to them.

 

I don't think you should put too many other immortals in the game either, ideally none except the big gods themselves. You have gods, some demi-gods (maybe unafected by illness/old age but still vulnerable to attack, or in the case of the very powerfull, maybe just specific magic), and maybe a bigger lower population of different magical beings (various spirits, comparable in overall "power" to mortals, although not of the same nature).

 

I also find it hard to belive that the most short-lived of the races would be the one keeping the most detailed records of what happened (i mean you can always ask the elves that might have actually been there, right ? or dwarves who like permanence too...), however passionate with permanence they might be. (and if they did it, i doubt Aluwen would be painted as the most powerfull godess, and not Elandria, and i doubt that they wouldn't have played a more central role in their mithology - i mean i can tell most of you writers play elves :))

 

CK, you've finally noticed that the godeses are all good and none of the gods are ?

I don't mind i like neutrals best ... i personally consider it more like "officially good" or on the "let's protect the word / puny mortals" team then truely good in the sense we understand it (compassion, etc..).

 

Anyway, after all this criticism, great work all :D

Especially most of Saii's world/writings and that "Diary of a Common man"... those where really good :)

Edited by Xilcox

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Thanks for the input, Xilcox. :blink:

 

Okay guys, I've been thinking long and hard over this.

 

It would have been nice to create a complex world, with different racial pantheons, systems of belief, and all - BUT, for various gameplay and player demographic reasons (read: young teenage players), I've decided we're just going to stick to the basics. I've looked at games with both complex systems of belief as well as those games with simpler religious systems. Both are equally successful, but one is very hard to get into and confusing, whereas the other is fairly easy to understand. Therefore, we're going to go with the "fairly easy to understand" bit. What I mean by that is:

 

- Some mysterious Over-deity/Force/Power that nobody really knows about.

- Shared gods by all, bearing the same names. Elandria is Elandria to all the races and has the same characteristics, etc. Let's just have ONE pantheon of greater gods.

- Minor immortals/demigods, that may or may not be connected with racial beliefs. (eg. the Necromancer of Naralik)

- Differences in racial practices of religions instead.

 

Basically, we're going to try and keep it simple - partially because our players might not be able to grasp too complex a religious system, partially because it give role-players the freedom to create stories of their own, partially because it promotes continuity between stories (if everyone keeps referring to a god by a different name, it would be hard to match everything without constantly referring to some sort of lexicon or encyclopedia... I don't want players to do that).

 

The Gods will each have their specific natures and personalities - there will be unified churches across the world that promote their particular deity's interests, open to all races. The main theme will basically be a struggle between the gods - not for power, per se, but to prove that their particular theories/values are the best or most-admired. This will be measured by the number of worshippers they have. Basically, we're their 'points' system. A greater number of worshippers means more influence with the other deities, to swing votes to their particular likings, or at least to find common ground.

 

And somewhere over all this, the Over-Deity is watching...

 

-Lyn-

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BUT, for various gameplay and player demographic reasons (read: young teenage players).

 

Age has nothing to do with it. I'd memorised the entire Norse pantheon, lesser immortals, bloodlines, powers, and several of their myths too at age 14. tongue.gif

 

I think any attempt to elevate them, to make them abstract rather then a reality (to make religion "relative" to each race) is misguided.

 

 

I don't think that's really what we're doing, making them abstract - just different races _believe_ different things. (Ex. in life, is C code mathematics, or geographically oriented prose? It's in your point of view).

 

PS. Humans would tend to have some of the best records, because they tend to spread out and learn, and their opinions on heresy and blasphemy are more reserved than, ie. the elves.

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BUT, for various gameplay and player demographic reasons (read: young teenage players).

 

Age has nothing to do with it. I'd memorised the entire Norse pantheon, lesser immortals, bloodlines, powers, and several of their myths too at age 14. tongue.gif

Hehe...thanks CK. :P

 

Anyway, that's not the problem. :D I remember doing that, too...except that for me it was the Greek pantheon. The thing is, could you remember the Norse, Greek/Roman, Egyptian, Sumerian, Chinese and Indian pantheons - all simultaneously? Six different racial beliefs - that would be the magnitude of the task I was describing. It's simply too much info, and adds unnecessary complexity to the storyline when it's not really needed. :D

 

-Lyn-

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After seeing the various arguments, i'm inclined to agree that simpler is better. I, myself, am willing to take the time to learn about the different races and the religions that they follow. HOWEVER, judging by the number of people who have imput on this thread (what a grand total of 5 or 6?), i think it's safe to say many of the players aren't all that interested.

 

This overdiety ("The Unnamed" :D ), then, is to have no influence on the world at large? Or is it going to be the old "God works in mysterious ways" thing? Either way is agreeable to me. To me, the first says "The Unnamed" has ONLY the power to create. But that's my view on it. Mortos is supposed to be the god of the underworld, which seems to me he's hellbent on destruction. This is polar to "The Unnamed" So why is he a lesser God? or why does he interact more?

 

My views always seem to be warped and wrong, so i just thought i'd add my oppions for others to consider.

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I would suppose that with the former god of balance being the most powerful, "The Unnamed" would have to be neutral, else Aluwen would either a. Be subservient, or b. Be the greatest of the Gods. Balance is both creating and destroying, so there's my answer to your views. :D

Edited by crusadingknight

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Seems reasonable to me! I guess the God fighting for life Aluwen would be the balance to Mortos. ^_^

 

So, then do these "lesser" Gods acknowledge "The Unnamed"'s being? Or do they just live their merry lives vying for controll and believing they, individually, are the most powerful?

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"God who works in mysterious ways."

 

Basically, we don't know what the gods think of He/She/It. Leave some mystery there. :D There is just this unknown Force in the universe that the gods seem to be aware of, but we have no idea how they relate to that force. I think we'll try to create conflicting legends and theological treatises on that. Nobody knows, but it's food for speculation in theological circles.

 

-Lyn-

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k thanks for the clarification!

 

I have some theological changes to make to my stories, then...when reviewing what i sent you, please just ignore all references to Gods. I'll be restructuring the story, around all of this. Make any suggestions you want as to what i can/should do. My brains are busted due to school and work! ^_^

 

BUSINESS LAW SUCKS!!! AVOID IT AT ALL COSTS!!!

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could you remember the Norse, Greek/Roman, Egyptian, Sumerian, Chinese and Indian pantheons - all simultaneously?

i do that all the time...its called being a history major with a fascination with ancient religion and culture :blink: add in a touch of belief in cultural growth theory (since most cultures share a number of common myths/beliefs, they must have SOME shared basis...ie. events happened, were remebered and handed down...just changed as each culture evolved) and it makes for some very interesting arguements with professors....but thats neither here nor there...where was i going with this? oh, nevermind, when i think of it, i'll post it....sheesh, i'm growing more and more like the stereo-typical absent minded professor everyday...and i havent even completed my bacelor's degree!! :wanders off shaking his head and mumbling to himself:

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could you remember the Norse, Greek/Roman, Egyptian, Sumerian, Chinese and Indian pantheons - all simultaneously?

i do that all the time...its called being a history major with a fascination with ancient religion and culture :angry: add in a touch of belief in cultural growth theory (since most cultures share a number of common myths/beliefs, they must have SOME shared basis...ie. events happened, were remebered and handed down...just changed as each culture evolved) and it makes for some very interesting arguements with professors....but thats neither here nor there...where was i going with this? oh, nevermind, when i think of it, i'll post it....sheesh, i'm growing more and more like the stereo-typical absent minded professor everyday...and i havent even completed my bacelor's degree!! :wanders off shaking his head and mumbling to himself:

Not only that, you didn't actually complete even one sentence :blink:

Maybe all that remembering pantheons screwed over remembering everything else :lol:

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:P I never complete my sentences....havent you noticed that....i just keep rambling on....but this really has nothing to do with the god and religions :)

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Regrading the "overdeity"

 

Quote from Quinitcus:

This overdiety ("The Unnamed"  ), then, is to have no influence on the world at large? Or is it going to be the old "God works in mysterious ways" thing? Either way is agreeable to me.

 

Quote from Lyanna:

"God who works in mysterious ways."

 

Basically, we don't know what the gods think of He/She/It. Leave some mystery there.  There is just this unknown Force in the universe that the gods seem to be aware of, but we have no idea how they relate to that force. I think we'll try to create conflicting legends and theological treatises on that. Nobody knows, but it's food for speculation in theological circles.

 

We, in the Brotherhood of Bane, know this overdeity as; Bane - the Primal God.

 

Our doctrine, called the "Truescrolls" (also know as the Book of Bane) states:

 

What went before...

 

Before time, before matter, before energy, the great gods of chaos ruled the vast masses of pure oblivion. And there was nothing until... something stirred in the unseen edges. Out of the roars of the chaos gods a thought was born. That thought planted itself, with uttermost care, in the minds of the gods, and from that thought... matter, energy and time was born and planted into the endless plains of nothingness.

 

What came...

 

The Lands formed around that thought, feed by its promise of a new world. The chaos gods slowly turned their eyes to the Lands, and so the first Great War began - the Creation War. The chaos gods were infused into the lands for all eternity, so was the birth of the Eternal Lands.

 

The Eternal lands saw beings develop out of the first thought and the chaos of the gods, hence came man, elf, dwarf and beast to ravage the Eternal Lands.

 

What was...

 

Out of chaos came order and the first thought was split into good and evil, so the second great war began - the Triumph Wars. Where the empires saw their dawn, there were also a seed of chaos emerging and finally the chaos erupted by the hand of Bane, the primal god. Bane saw the evil seed in the Eternal Lands grow stronger and stronger and out of that vision he saw what had to be done - evil had to be eradicated from the Eternal Lands. So the great bane of all evil formed a shimmering wave that swept across the continents, wiping the memories of all sentient beings.

 

What is...

 

As a final act, the great god Bane infused some of his powers into the men that were to be the Divine Rulers of the Brotherhood of Bane. The Divine Rulers began their quest to bring goodness to the Eternal lands and they knew, in their minds, that only the complete vanquishing of all evilness would ever bring Bane back to the Eternal lands.

 

Please note that some finer points may have been lost in translation from this very ancient text.

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Hehe... you know, if I could get one of the programmers to design a pop-up window for me whenever you click on an item in the game, I might put that text inside a background scroll somewhere in the game. :) But only if I can get that pop-up window and supporting system designed. ;)

 

-Lyn-

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