The party I'm DMing through SCAP has only one cleric, a worshipper of Mayaheine (an otherworldly paladin recently raised to divinity by Pelor for anyone unfamiliar with her), and I intend to give him the divinely assigned task of helping out the Church of Pelor in Cauldron and building a new cult of Mayaheine as well. I imagine other DMs and players have had characters go through the process of building a church in Cauldron, and I'm hoping you'll be willing to share your experiences. What sorts of challenges confronted your character? How much time and resources did the characters have to devote to the project, and how did it affect their ability to adventure?
Well, maybe no one has found this to be an issue in their campaigns, but anyway, I figured out a system to judge the success of my party's cleric as he tries to establish a Church of Mayaheine in Cauldron. I borrowed elements from the church affiliations system in Complete Champion, and this particular model is built for a goddess with Protection as a central part of her portfolio, so the model would need altering for a god with a different focus. Here's what I came up with:
Thoughts on Building a Church
Once a month, the PC makes a Charisma check to determine how proselytizing has been going. On the reasoning that Mayaheine is above all a goddess of protection, the DC of the monthly check depends on how threatened the populace is feeling each month. The more comfortable the people, the harder it is to make them feel the need of Mayaheine's presence in their lives.
Secure mood: DC 25
Anxious mood: DC 20
Frightened Mood: DC 15
Panicked mood: DC 10
He manages to draw one ordinary worshipper of Mayaheine for each point by which he beats the DC. Each worshipper contributes a small sum to the church each month, and the number of worshippers accumulates month to month, so the church earns 1d10 sp x the number of worshippers each month. For every 5 points by which he beats the DC, he also draws a worshipper who has either the means to make a more substantial donation (1d10 x 2gp per month) or to make some substantial commitment of time or service. For every ten points by which he beats the DC, he also gets a major patron who can make a dramatic contribution to the church through charity or influence. If he fails the DC for the month, he will lose worshippers along the same lines of calculation reversed. E.g., missing the DC by 5 would entail losing the active devotion of 5 ordinary worshippers and 1 mid-range worshipper.
Worshippers assume that any contribution they make will be used to further the interests of the Church of Mayaheine; any evidence that their contributions are being used for any other purpose will severely affect their loyalty to the Church.
There are actions the cleric can take to improve his modifier on the proselytizing roll, and other circumstances might negatively impact his performance as well. The following list is not exhaustive; other modifiers will be applied at DM discretion.
PC is a cleric of the relevant deity: = + 1/2 cleric level
PC makes a Perform (oratory, sermon, or homily) check, for which the DC is the city mood DC -5 = +2
PC is based in a well-kept church = + Gp value of church/2000
PC publicly saves the life of an innocent = +2
PC publicly defeats a serious threat to the city = + CR of threat/2
PC uses spells to care for citizens for free = + # of spell levels donated*
PC has Knowledge (religion) 5-9 ranks = +1
PC has Knowledge (religion) 10 or more ranks = +2
PC has Will Save bonus +10 or higher = +1
PC has Strength score of 20 or higher = +1
NPCs serve the church as PC cohorts = +1/2 cumulative NPC levels
PC is defeated in the public eye = -5
PC is publicly humiliated = DM discretion
PC is absent from the city for 3 days consecutively = -2
PC is absent from the city for a week = -5
PC fails to resist a public threat = -5
PC associates with a known criminal or other threat to the common good = -2
PC associates with an evil outsider = -10
PC publicly engages in an evil act = -5
PC is caught misusing church funds = -15
* Each month, the player decides how many spell levels per day he is willing to donate to care for those who seek his deity’s aid. When on a normal day he faces an encounter in the city without special preparation, he rolls percentile dice to determine how many of those spell levels he has already used, and then sacrifices that many levels of prepared spells of his choice. Orisons count as ½ a level.
I haven't had a chance to try this out in practice yet, but I feel pretty excited about it. I hope someone else can get some use out of it too!
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My group has a priest of Moradin in it who is a bit on the poor side, but was insistant on immediatly building something. I had to skip past Chapter TWO due to the group already being almost 4th level as they finished up Chapter One.
I had my dwarven priest find some local stone carvers (dwarven of course) to get started on a shrine to Moradin, but have kept things simple after that to keep the player focused on the plot line rather than flying off on a tangent. I hope to have him set up his shrine, be happy about it and get back into being with the group as they plunge into Chapter Three.
Couldn't he reclaim the Malachite Fortress?
It's already there, it's already dwarf-sized, and IIRC, it already even has a shrine, with a big statue in it, of a dwarf hero.|
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The party I'm DMing through SCAP has only one cleric, a worshipper of Mayaheine (an otherworldly paladin recently raised to divinity by Pelor for anyone unfamiliar with her), and I intend to give him the divinely assigned task of helping out the Church of Pelor in Cauldron and building a new cult of Mayaheine as well. I imagine other DMs and players have had characters go through the process of building a church in Cauldron, and I'm hoping you'll be willing to share your experiences. What sorts of challenges confronted your character? How much time and resources did the characters have to devote to the project, and how did it affect their ability to adventure?
What level are the PCs, and how far are they through the AP?
That will give us a better idea of their public profile, and whether the citizens have bigger troubles to worry about.You say that the public may not see the need to contribute to a deity of Protection, when times are good, but they contribute to Pelor. The trick is to persuade them why they should divert their tithes from the existing church; saying that 'Pelor isn't protecting you!' won't go down well.
There's also a tipping point, when disaster becomes too great, that the citizens will choose to keep their money, panic-buy supplies, and/or flee with it, rather than give it away for a potential good word in the afterlife with an unproven patron.
What level are the PCs, and how far are they through the AP?
That will give us a better idea of their public profile, and whether the citizens have bigger troubles to worry about.You say that the public may not see the need to contribute to a deity of Protection, when times are good, but they contribute to Pelor. The trick is to persuade them why they should divert their tithes from the existing church; saying that 'Pelor isn't protecting you!' won't go down well.
There's also a tipping point, when disaster becomes too great, that the citizens will choose to keep their money, panic-buy supplies, and/or flee with it, rather than give it away for a potential good word in the afterlife with an unproven patron.
The party is presently at 4th level, just starting Flood Season. At this point the cleric has had a visitation from a divine servant to start a temple for Mayaheine, and the player was very gung ho about it; he rushed right out and started investigating real estate options. I patched together some options using the city map so he could have a choice, but there was a spot that I thought I could do interesting things with later that I made especially attractive to him.
So far the cleric has been in the news for the party's heroics in Ch. 1, and is about to make the news for similar heroics in Ch. 2. But he's also been hauled before the city court for casting a destructive spell in the city streets (Sound Blast at an enemy sniper on top of a tenement building, blowing out every window in the place), and that made the papers too. And Brother Jurgensen at the Shrine of Pelor is none too happy about his helper setting up a church of his own.
As far as the public's attitudes, at the beginning of Ch.3 they're going to be pretty secure -- it's Festival season, after all. So it's going to be hard for him to make people feel the need for a new divine protector, at least at first. I may also start factoring in competition from other churches; Cuthbert's followers obviously also see themselves as protectors of the city, and I imagine Jurgensen is not going to be happy about Pelor's protege drawing more worship than Pelor does. So I may have other deity's representatives take action at some point, including opposed checks for Oratory and the like.
Suggestions are of course very welcome!