Okay, so I've been working on world building for my Pathfinder campaign for a month and a half now and there was something that bothers me about deities: they don't seem to matter outside of divine classes. Sure, flavor you may say but I wanted to make a world where the gods are a bit more involved. A reason to bring more roleplay into the group (I may need it...). So I had an idea, miracle bonuses. The concept is that those who offer lip service to their gods may get a +1 bonus here or there, but those who roleplay devout followers will get rewards like the occasional re-roll and larger boosts (mainly because I'm a fluffy bunny GM and dislike killing huge swathes of characters). Thoughts and opinions?
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You can play gods of your world however you want. If you like gods to be more involved like the Olympians in mortal life, go ahead. If you want your gods to be these unreachable being living in another plane of existence, sure.
I always remember a cool little adventure that only appeared in the pathfinder comics where you go and fight ettercaps corrupting a part of the forest. After killing the ettercaps, Gozreth actually thanks you and give you commune with nature 1/week for a year, since you removed the taint of the forest.
Faiths & Philosophies contains several options for religious characters of other classes. If you haven't checked it out yet, take a look.
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There's already options for this in Inner Sea Gods. A character of any class can pick up the Deific Obedience feat, which gives a skill bonus if the worshiper performs a 1 hour religious ritual at the start of each day. Usually this is a +2 sacred/profane bonus to a valuable skill or a +4 bonus to a less valuable skill or a saving throw to a situational effect. At high levels, the feat grants special abilities unique to that god. The book also has three prestige classes that basically allow a character to gain the benefits of a divine class without actually being a cleric or paladin. The evangelist is notable for letting your other class's abilities level up as your evangelist level increases.
So if you want a god to gain benefits to non-clerics, just write up a list of deific obedience boons. Create a resistance or skill bonus the character gets when they perform the obedience ritual, then write up three boons the character gets at character level 12, 16, and 20. If you want to go further, then write 3 boons for the three prestige classes.
To get you started, here's some notes I made about Inner Sea Gods. I analyzed the book's obedience boons when designing the boons for my homebrew goddess.
The prestige class boons vary in theme. The exalted boons usually benefit a spellcaster, particularly a cleric. Sentinel boons usually benefit a fighting character. Evangelist boons seem designed to benefit a general character that might not be a wizard or cleric. Some evangelist boons will directly benefit a class feature from one of the listed required aligned classes listed in the evangelist description. For example, Lamashtu’s second boon affects a summoner eidolon. These boons offer alternate effects for those without the required class feature.
The first boon grants to cast either a 1st-level spell three times per day, a 2nd-level spell twice per day, or a third-level spell once per day as spell-like abilities.
The second boon is a special ability that’s roughly on par with a 5th level spell cast once per day. Some are buffs or allow you to change how a spell or class feature work. Buffs usually last a number of rounds equal to 1 + 1 per 4 HD.
The third boon is roughly on par with an 8th level spell cast once per day. In fact, many of them are spells with mechanical differences thematic for the god. Some will summon a particular creature native to the god’s realm, which last 1 minute per HD, allow telepathic communication at 100 feet, and can be commanded. However, they won’t follow any command that violates its alignment and service to the god. In fact, they may even attack you. See Sarenrae’s angelic ally.
I use "divine intervention" in the form of action/hero points. Basically, characters gain/lose points based on adherence to a particular faith and so on - it is similar to the normal system, but I control the points and spend them when appropriate for the characters (characters with no faith get no points).
This developed out of the initial inclusion of the system. My players never bothered using these points systems when available and voted them out of our optional rules used. After all, we've been playing just fine without them for years.
With this in mind, and desperately wanting a reasonable system for divine intervention, I took the system and reworked it slightly. I no longer "fudge the dice" (EVER) to save characters or boost them when I feel its appropriate unless they have "points". In essence, the system replaced, entirely, my need to ever fudge the dice. It has worked well, but I had to come up with a list of parameters for their gaining the points. That was the only "difficulty". When used, some visual or auditory effect indicates that divine intervention has occurred on behalf of the player, which reminds them to continue their faithful behavior.
Edit: I really like your race, Cyrad.
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I wanted to make a world where the gods are a bit more involved. A reason to bring more roleplay into the group (I may need it...). So I had an idea, miracle bonuses. The concept is that those who offer lip service to their gods may get a +1 bonus here or there, but those who roleplay devout followers will get rewards like the occasional re-roll and larger boosts (mainly because I'm a fluffy bunny GM and dislike killing huge swathes of characters). Thoughts and opinions?
In the Scarred Lands setting, there was something called invocations.
Each god had two or three invocations, which represented a brief prayer to the god that would give you a +1 bonus to something in that gods area of expertise. The goddess of archery, music and the hunt would reward a 1 round invocation from one of her followers with a +1 bonus to a ranged missile attack, to a perform check, or to a survival roll. The system presented allowed one to pray for up to three rounds in this manner, and gain up to a +3 bonus on a single roll, but I'd probably skip that and go with a +2 bonus for skill rolls and a maximum of +1 for an attack roll or something.
There was also a wizard PrC called the Cabalist or Master Cabalist or something that tapped into the power of invocations and the gods to enhance his spellcasting, learning a series of special god-specific invocations, such as one from the aforementioned hunt goddess to give a bonus to a ranged spell attack roll, with the restriction that the Cabalist couldn't learn these theurgic invocations to any god who had an alignment opposed to his own (encouraging him to be true Neutral, to maximize the options!). Normal invocations were limited to worshippers of a specific god, so an archer who worshipped the god of paladins, craft and fire might be able to do invocations to increase fire damage, or buff a craft roll, but would not be able to use that invocation to the Hunt goddess to increase his ranged attack roll.
In any case, they'd be determined by the gods areas of concern, so a worshipper of Greyhawk's Wee Jas (law, death, magic) might have invocations involving spells with the Law descriptor, coup de grace rolls and concentration checks, or something, while a worshipper of Golarion's Irori (history, knowledge and self-perfection) might have one with a higher bonus to knowledge-history checks, one with a lower bonus to *any* knowledge check, and one with a bonus to rolls to shake off a continuing effect like a disease, poison, bleed effect, hold person spell, etc. (self-perfection isn't as easy as the rest, I kinda flailed a bit on that last one...). :)
In the Scarred Lands, this was a general option usable by anyone, with no feat or class ability or whatever requirement (other than being a worshipper of a specific god). A different way of doing it could be to gate it behind some sort of feat, like the Obedience thing, although I'd be inclined to making the invocations a bit more useful, and perhaps even faster (move action?), although making them too useful might end up necessitating some sort of daily use limit, and since the areas of concern of different gods weren't 'balanced' for this sort of use, some would be more or less useful than others.
Oh, awesome...more stuff to buy. Kidding. ;)
Dang, so many good ideas, though. I wanted to make it for everyone, though. Making it a Feat would crank up the power a teeny bit too much for my tastes and using those stats for a "blanket bonus" makes it a little too good. Hero points might be the best way to go...my players may balk at something so 4th Edition but then that's why I always have my rebuttal prepared:
"Oh, I'm sorry, if you'd like to spend 2-3 months making an exhaustive sandbox campaign world that I can enjoy, then please do so by all means..."
And if that doesn't work there's always running out the door impotently flailing my arms with tears running down my cheeks chanting "Meanie, meanie, mean-faces" all the way home. That usually teaches them.
So I'll pick up the Faiths and Philosophies guide book when I can so I can compare it all a bit better. Custom pantheon or no, Pathfinder is Pathfinder.
@Set: Headshot! Um...anyway I checked your post. It's good stuff but I was thinking something more along the lines of occasional bonuses instead of easy to use prayers ready for invoking. I'd love to use those rules, but the problem is I'm lazy so any significant balancing a short prayer could quickly get out of hand in my group. Basically I'm a roleplayer that's expecting a few power gamers (not the munchkin variety, though) and I'm abjectly terrified of giving them easily abusable bonuses they can grab at just about any time.
Hero points might be the best way to go...my players may balk at something so 4th Edition but then that's why I always have my rebuttal prepared:
My players hated 4e, as well. Best things about using the hero point system?
When you use the system, they don't need to know the crunch behind it, as it is a GM tool and not one they use directly (ie you use it, they just get the benefit). My players just know I have a divine intervention system, see the effects on occasion, I track the points and they never know how much they have or all the potential uses, and that they get to choose being pious or not. They seem to love it, which cracks me up because they hated it when it was in their control.
Hero points might be the best way to go...my players may balk at something so 4th Edition but then that's why I always have my rebuttal prepared:My players hated 4e, as well. Best things about using the hero point system?
When you use the system, they don't need to know the crunch behind it, as it is a GM tool and not one they use directly (ie you use it, they just get the benefit). My players just know I have a divine intervention system, see the effects on occasion, I track the points and they never know how much they have or all the potential uses, and that they get to choose being pious or not. They seem to love it, which cracks me up because they hated it when it was in their control.
So the players can use hero points, but they never know how many they have or when they get them? I really like that. It also reflects the nature of the gods, too. Even clerics with divination spells rarely if ever direct communication from their gods. It encourages PCs to just do their best to serve the god and hope it's enough.
The only hero point system I really liked came from Shadowrun 5th Ed. Every character had "edge" they could spend to buff skills or prevent botches. Edge replenishes. However, a player can choose to burn edge to gain an absurd skill bonus or survive a potentially fatal circumstance at the cost of permanently reducing their maximum amount of edge.
(Also, thank you, Da'ath! I'm glad you liked my race!)
Hero points might be the best way to go...my players may balk at something so 4th Edition but then that's why I always have my rebuttal prepared:My players hated 4e, as well. Best things about using the hero point system?
When you use the system, they don't need to know the crunch behind it, as it is a GM tool and not one they use directly (ie you use it, they just get the benefit). My players just know I have a divine intervention system, see the effects on occasion, I track the points and they never know how much they have or all the potential uses, and that they get to choose being pious or not. They seem to love it, which cracks me up because they hated it when it was in their control.
Oh yes, that hits me right here. *points to appendix* My appendix doesn't lie. That is excellent for all the reasons Cyrad mentioned.
@Cyrad: Ah Shadowrun...one day I may be able to convince my players that story driven skill based systems don't end up being boring...well...unless you have too many people at the table.
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When we started using the system, I didn't even let them out of character attempt the use of the points, they didn't have a clue how it worked and are still only guessing today - it cut down a lot on attempts to game the system too. As GM, I always know where a combat is going to go long before the players do, so I'll give a few examples of them in use, which have actually occurred. Keep in mind I'm using a hybrid of SWSE's Force Points, Pathfinder Hero Points, and SRD Action Points.
- Player X will die if he fails his saving throw. He fails his saving throw. As he hits the ground, he sees a vision of his goddess before all goes black, but does not die. (Usage: roughly equivalent to cheat death in the hero point section).
- Player Y has been having trouble hitting all day. If the opponent survives much longer, she and her allies are going to die. She describes her action, adding in she says a little prayer to her god and rolls the dice. Her attack strikes soundly and surely. She feels a strange warmth come over her and suddenly strikes again. (Usage: she rolls her die, since she hit, I didn't bother using a point as it'd be wasteful. Her damage is reasonable, but not quite enough to kill the beast. I expend a point, due to her prayer, and grant her an additional standard action in the form of a standard attack. She rolls, hits, and finishes it off, ultimately saving the party cleric that I was going to kill in all probability on the next action).
- Player Z isn't sure what the party should do next. They make camp and he tells his allies he's going to pray to his god for guidance (purely RP, he didn't expect anything to come of it). When he awakens, he's had a vision with several new clues regarding the mission. (Usage: Similar to the inspiration option in hero points. I granted him a vision in the form of a dream with subtle and not so subtle symbology).
Since we've started using this, they've begun actively attempting to figure out and use the system: one player regularly donates to his religious organization, another preaches the good word, others roleplay their characters as more or less pious depending on character. I saw a definite increase in them asking for a "blessing" from their deity at critical moments, particularly if the dice have been failing them over the course of a session. In essence, I keep the entirety of the mechanics out of their hands and my game has certainly improved as a result of it.
I also do not reward characters by picking the anti-hero option (i.e. not having a deity). It doesn't exist. If you don't worship the gods, you get no special favors from them and you certainly don't get a feat as Paizo suggests. One of my players plays a very Conan-like character, and even while he serves his gods interests, he's fairly blasphemous at times. He STILL gets the benefits of the system. Only godless characters don't get the benefits or those who only pay lip service.
I hope that better explains it.
I'll have to take a look at the Shadowrun 5e - I've never really looked at the game before, but I've heard good things.
Edit: thank you, Cyrad, for sharing it. I'm going to see if I can find a way to insert them into my setting. Thankfully, I've got more than enough undiscovered territory to fit them in.
Da'ath, you and me may be kindred spirits to an extent. I absolutely love your system and I'll definitely use a big part of it. Not to discount the wonderful advice I received from the other forum-goers of course, but that system just gives me that "Eureka!" feeling. And I totally agree with the no deity thing. Details are for another time, but suffice to say since roughly half my pantheon is literally mortal ideas and personifications that became powerful enough to become sentient the "atheist divine class" does not exist in my world. And I heartily recommend 5th edition Shadowrun.
@Ascalaphus: My players generally don't take those traits into account. Basically my goals with this thread are twofold.
1. Make deities more important to non-divine classes (Cleric, Pally, Inquisitor, Oracle and the Hybrid derivatives). It just seems that a name gets tossed besides the Deity line with very little attention paid to it.
2. Get my players to RP more. I ran into a problem with an Iron Kingdoms campaign where I lost interest after trying to make the world as vibrant and colorful as possible and getting...very little interaction as far as IC chat. I don't think they're bad players per se, but I'd like to see some more interaction with their surroundings and I hope their awareness of the cosmology will help with that.
I also do not reward characters by picking the anti-hero option (i.e. not having a deity). It doesn't exist. If you don't worship the gods, you get no special favors from them and you certainly don't get a feat as Paizo suggests. One of my players plays a very Conan-like character, and even while he serves his gods interests, he's fairly blasphemous at times. He STILL gets the benefits of the system. Only godless characters don't get the benefits or those who only pay lip service.
The reward is that you aren't beholden to a deity and do not need to appease it or behave in the deity's preferred manner. That's a pretty nice reward, and I'd likely take that option if it exists unless I had a specific concept in mind. (I don't do religious types very well.)
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@Ascalaphus: My players generally don't take those traits into account. Basically my goals with this thread are twofold.
Is it that the traits aren't good enough to tempt them, or that they just take the mechanics and ignore the flavor?
In my home game I've written a new set of traits instead of the published ones, both to weed out some broken ones (Magical Lineage, Reactionary) and to set down the flavor of the setting. And I've made it clear that when you take a trait, the flavor is mandatory. If you don't want a past as a bandit, don't take the Bandit trait.
@Ascalaphus: My players generally don't take those traits into account. Basically my goals with this thread are twofold.Is it that the traits aren't good enough to tempt them, or that they just take the mechanics and ignore the flavor?
In my home game I've written a new set of traits instead of the published ones, both to weed out some broken ones (Magical Lineage, Reactionary) and to set down the flavor of the setting. And I've made it clear that when you take a trait, the flavor is mandatory. If you don't want a past as a bandit, don't take the Bandit trait.
The former I guess? I think it's more they don't really know the traits exist (and I usually ignore them myself). The issue I'm running with is that a couple of the players don't really let themselves get engaged in the world. It's a mixed bag, really.
What do they find engaging? Do they have any connections to the world? What are their motivations? Do their characters have long-term goals?
I typically require my players to establish a connection to the world in some way, such as having NPC family members. In my campaign, the monk's surrogate mother is a quest giver and high priestess of the local church. Another PC fell in love with an NPC. The alchemist began the campaign as a criminal who blew up the town library to spite the librarian that works there.
Give them something to care about in character.
Da'ath, you and me may be kindred spirits to an extent. I absolutely love your system and I'll definitely use a big part of it. Not to discount the wonderful advice I received from the other forum-goers of course, but that system just gives me that "Eureka!" feeling. And I totally agree with the no deity thing. Details are for another time, but suffice to say since roughly half my pantheon is literally mortal ideas and personifications that became powerful enough to become sentient the "atheist divine class" does not exist in my world. And I heartily recommend 5th edition Shadowrun.
I genuinely hope it helps and I'm glad you like it. As for kindred spirits, it is quite possible. I find several folks on these forums as such in some form or fashion. I felt like such a dope the moment I realized I could use action/hero/force/whatever points as the GM in the form of divine intervention - why had it not occurred to me before?
The reward is that you aren't beholden to a deity and do not need to appease it or behave in the deity's preferred manner. That's a pretty nice reward, and I'd likely take that option if it exists unless I had a specific concept in mind. (I don't do religious types very well.)
That is exactly how I see it, though that may not have come through in my post. It is why I hated the antihero option pathfinder presented in the standard hero point system, frankly, as it appeals to the munchkin in us all (especially in one-shot games and the like), and not the roleplayer. A couple of my religious rogue characters, when I get the chance to play and not GM, are charlatans - not unlike Benny in the Mummy. I refer to it as "Piety of Opportunity".=)
What do they find engaging? Do they have any connections to the world? What are their motivations? Do their characters have long-term goals?
I typically require my players to establish a connection to the world in some way, such as having NPC family members. In my campaign, the monk's surrogate mother is a quest giver and high priestess of the local church. Another PC fell in love with an NPC. The alchemist began the campaign as a criminal who blew up the town library to spite the librarian that works there.
Give them something to care about in character.
Right on the money. Getting your players emotionally invested in a game is a sure way to make it memorable.
What do they find engaging? Do they have any connections to the world? What are their motivations? Do their characters have long-term goals?
I typically require my players to establish a connection to the world in some way, such as having NPC family members. In my campaign, the monk's surrogate mother is a quest giver and high priestess of the local church. Another PC fell in love with an NPC. The alchemist began the campaign as a criminal who blew up the town library to spite the librarian that works there.
Give them something to care about in character.
That's pretty good advice. I'll try to follow it.
I just had a brainstorm(Quite literally in some ways). Mental Inventory sheet. Lined paper with a line drawn down the middle. A number such as 1: 2: 3: ect. written at the beginning of each slot. A character gets 1 slot per level plus double their intelligence bonus. Half that if they keep spells in their memory. Each slot can contain a ritual, invocation, or something studied. If something studied is used in an illusion, scrying attempt, or teleport destination they get the bonus. A good backstory will get you some free slots(I ran away from home when I found out my family was a cult of spider worshipers, so the image of the drider that was living in the attic is burned into my memory.)
You get the players to keep track of these things, and it becomes harder for them to spam the concept. No more"I pray to all 500 gods before I open the door." or "Yeah, I read all about zlipblaches all the time, it's my hobby." If you look at my Rituals topic, you'll see that a branded monk could have the new edge he or she needs. A monk could boost his con. by always asking Buddha for patience.
I just had a brainstorm(Quite literally in some ways). Mental Inventory sheet. Lined paper with a line drawn down the middle. A number such as 1: 2: 3: ect. written at the beginning of each slot. A character gets 1 slot per level plus double their intelligence bonus. Half that if they keep spells in their memory. Each slot can contain a ritual, invocation, or something studied. If something studied is used in an illusion, scrying attempt, or teleport destination they get the bonus. A good backstory will get you some free slots(I ran away from home when I found out my family was a cult of spider worshipers, so the image of the drider that was living in the attic is burned into my memory.)
You get the players to keep track of these things, and it becomes harder for them to spam the concept. No more"I pray to all 500 gods before I open the door." or "Yeah, I read all about zlipblaches all the time, it's my hobby." If you look at my Rituals topic, you'll see that a branded monk could have the new edge he or she needs. A monk could boost his con. by always asking Buddha for patience.
Ummm...by reading your post it looks like you're suggesting everyone get divine spells. I think if I did that, my players would mutiny. Actually, if I did that I would mutiny, so I would be mutinying myself.
EVERYTHING is better with pirates.
Ummm...by reading your post it looks like you're suggesting everyone get divine spells. I think if I did that, my players would mutiny. Actually, if I did that I would mutiny, so I would be mutinying myself.I just had a brainstorm(Quite literally in some ways). Mental Inventory sheet. Lined paper with a line drawn down the middle. A number such as 1: 2: 3: ect. written at the beginning of each slot. A character gets 1 slot per level plus double their intelligence bonus. Half that if they keep spells in their memory. Each slot can contain a ritual, invocation, or something studied. If something studied is used in an illusion, scrying attempt, or teleport destination they get the bonus. A good backstory will get you some free slots(I ran away from home when I found out my family was a cult of spider worshipers, so the image of the drider that was living in the attic is burned into my memory.)
You get the players to keep track of these things, and it becomes harder for them to spam the concept. No more"I pray to all 500 gods before I open the door." or "Yeah, I read all about zlipblaches all the time, it's my hobby." If you look at my Rituals topic, you'll see that a branded monk could have the new edge he or she needs. A monk could boost his con. by always asking Buddha for patience.
Read my ritual topic. It's not spells. It is greater risks and use of skills. You are on the side of hiding everything behind the DM screen. There is a topic where the OP was suggesting the players not even have character sheets. It looks from your reaction he or she might be able to get a table together. I will move my idea to the ritual topic, as much as I can. Still, look at my ritual topic. You could still use them even if you keep all details hidden. Still, you need to control how many invocations they have access to. Some players will try to spam the concept, even if they have to do it blind.
If my gaming group started griping like that, I would ask them if they prefer an everything hidden amnesia game.http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2rfrd?Super-Narrative-Mode
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2osmr?New-ritual-system-Suggestions-welcome
Go to New-ritual-system-Suggestions-welcome
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I consider the god(s) a character worships is as important a descriptor of his personality as the alignment is.
Consider the implied differences in the values of two PCs or NPCs of the exact same class and the exact same alignment, yet one worships Erastil and the other Abadar.
So, yeah. A character's faith has a ton of relevance in describing the foundation of that character's personality... even for the non-divine classes.
Sooooo invocations. Is it like, the character mentions their god, possibly in their catch phrase, and it affects the next appropriate die roll, that day? Like "Thor's hammer!" might give a second chance to confirm a crit.
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Sooooo invocations. Is it like, the character mentions their god, possibly in their catch phrase, and it affects the next appropriate die roll, that day? Like "Thor's hammer!" might give a second chance to confirm a crit.
Pretty much. The actual invocations themselves weren't written down, but you could probably come up with them pretty easily, since there were about three per god.
Bumped in the name of Bastet!
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In the Emerald Spire Campaign that we're playing, we've been roleplaying the Deific Obediences without taking the feats OR getting the benefits. So our inquisitor of Gorum wakes up our party every morning by banging on his armor and shouting the names of all of his victims (sorry, victorious conquests) at the top of his lungs.
My maestro-blooded sorcerer who worships Shelyn, and has been up late most nights playing music trying to raise money for our group debts, got cranky about the rude awakening. So as part of her deific obedience, she wrote a high speed song (along the same lines at Tom Lehr's Periodic Table of Elements) listing all of his glorious victories and ending the list by mentioning her own murdered sleep...
With the right group, you can totally roleplay anything. We've mined Inner Sea Gods for all kinds of great ideas.
Hmm
I'm bumping this. In a good modernest Pathfinder campaign, functioning invocations would be really cool.