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So here is the situation: I'm currently rolling an Elf Alchemist on a custom campaign. My character is from Katapesh and is NG. He prefers to specialize in making alchemical bombs and is very inquisitive to a fault(his social skills are a bit lacking).
Well I was looking at the list of main gods and am unsure as to what he would willingly believe in if any. So I'm looking for suggestions on what deity he would believe and why.
My thoughts are that a NG alchemist might follow: Abadar, Cayden, Gozreh,
and Irori.
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Since he is inquisitive, and destructive (with the bombs) why not make him a follower of Nethys? Nethys originates in Osirion, just to the north of Katapesh, and Osirion was in charge of Katapesh for centuries. Maybe your alchemist followed Nethys, but discovered he was no good at "pure" magic, or wasn't specially favored to become a cleric, and so he turned to alchemy to get closer to his god in the only "natural" way he knew how.
Contributor
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It would help to know a couple of things, first.
Is your character following a deity because he actually believes in that deity's teachings or because it is the religion he grew up with or is otherwise familiar/comfortable with? Did he actively go out and search for a religion that matches his beliefs or did he simply follow the religion that his family exposed him to?
If the answer is the latter, then his chosen deity doesn't necessarily need to match up with his character class. It just needs to make sense for his background.
If his connection to the deity is more personal, I'd suggest Abadar, because his faith is common in Katapesh and it encompasses the alchemist's role as a craftsman.
Irori's not a bad choice, but you'll need a way to interpret your alchemist's mutagens. As a god of self-perfection, mutagens only get you half-way there. Giving up mental ability in exchange for physical prowess isn't acheiving self-perfection.
Cayden and Gozreh just don't feel right, unless it's a tie to the old family religion.
Zeugma's suggestion for Nethys is a good one, too, but I'd lean more toward Nethys's striving for arcane knowledge, rather than on his overall interest in magical lore. Of course, Nethys might be able to see the value in making things that go BOOM!
Nethys' bifurcated personality is also reminiscent of Jekyll and Hyde.
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Nethys' bifurcated personality is also reminiscent of Jekyll and Hyde.
That is a really good point! At least for my character I think I'll be having him as a follower as Zeugma suggested. Paris made some good points too like the one about Abadar.
I would like to see what others have chosen as well for their alchemists.
Being as Alchemists are wrapped around a very physical science, their choice on religion is a topic that is interesting to me.
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I like Nethys best of the main gods (and Brigh of the lesser ones), but Abadar, god of gold, wealth, law, and artifice, has it's appeal.
Lead to gold, to an Abadarite could be both a material goal, but also a spiritual goal, in purifying oneself through adherence to the ultimate order, the Law of Abadar himself. The association with the earth could draw upon alchemy as 'natural philosophy,' unlocking the hidden mystical / spiritual power within crude matter, powdering gems and calcifying metals and whatnot, linking spirituality with the substances of the material world. The alchemist, deriving power, sometimes explosive power, sometimes transformative power, from common elements, would fit the Abadarite idealization of material wealth as a sign of spiritual advancement.
In that vein, alchemy would be even more ideally suited to the Kalistocracy of Druma.
An alchemist Kalistocrat who developed alchemical techniques to enhance the appearance of metals (perhaps causing lesser alloys of gold to appear more lustrous, at a distance, or gems to shine more brightly, or cloth to be protected from signs of wear or road dust) could be quite popular with his fellows, as it's not enough to just be wealthy in the Kalistrocracy, one must *look* wealthy.
But he'd have to be careful. A technique that allowed materials of lesser worth to be *sold* as if they were of greater worth would be in violation of all sorts of edicts... Helping his fellows to dress above their station would be acceptable, if scandalous, but creating 'fool's gold' could lead to expulsion from Druma.
Just about any faith would have use for alchemists, 'though.
Calistria's priests would have use for love philtres and aphrodisiacs and painful toxins and drugs to lower inhibitions and get tongues a-wagging.
Torag's priests would seek ways to refine and improve metals, or salves to make their metalcraft (particularly armor and weapons) resistant to corrosion, or hold an edge longer.
Norgorber, DBA Blackfingers, is explicitly a patron of alchemists, herbalists, poisoners and assassins.
Really, you can pretty much pick any diety, as one's 'day job' doesn't have to have much, if anything, to do with the faith of one's upbringing. Obviously, there won't be a whole lot of assassins following Sarenrae's path, but alchemists aren't quite so cut-and-dried in their moral options.
I think you're getting caught up on the "Patron God" box on your character sheet and the idea that all characters must be involved in some form of organized worship, if just so Pharasma has somewhere to send their souls.
While it's possible for alchemists to be devout worshippers of any god, I think a great number of them if not the majority wouldn't have time for it, too caught up in the alchemist's quest to have time to worship anyone.
This isn't to say that they're atheists or agnostics--in a world like Golarion where the gods are known to make occasional public appearances and give daily proof of their existence, neither philosophy is liable to be believed in by any but the mad, and not even most of them--but I think alchemists would be more Hanukkah and Easter polytheists. That is to say, while they believe in the gods insomuch as they believe they exist and have power, they'd only show up to the churches and temples if there was some important festival that they'd need to go to for social or political reasons.
It should also be pointed out that while Norgorber is an evil god, if he's the god of alchemy and poison, it might make sense to worship or at least propitiate him in that aspect, even if the character has no use for the evil or murder portions of the god. The prayer might be nothing more than "Blackfingers, let this be the formula that works" and probably isn't much more than that. A formula that only works while propitiating Norgorber isn't a very good formula.
In short, let the character worship whomever he likes, but realize that worship is probably more lip service polytheism than any devout feelings, since an alchemist has bigger priorities.
What a fitting thread to post my first comment in.
I just so happen to have made an elf alchemist for a campaign that we are about to start up. Our D.M. printed out a list of questions to help us flesh out our characters a little bit besides more than "i keel stuff".
Anyway, one of the questions asks about their spirituality and if so, what they followed. At first i thought to myself that she wouldn't have a spiritual side seeing that she believed that everything could be expressed by science. This came mostly from a personal view of mine that she has never had any physical evidence of a higher power.
But then i realized that one of her closest friends is a cleric/oracle/paladin. So i read up a little on each of the different gods, comparing her personality with the overviews of each deity and i came across Erastil.
I wouldn't say that all alchemists would follow the teachings of Erastil, but after seeing how much her personality matched up with Erastil i started thinking up all sorts of cool story related stuff that our D.M. could use if he felt like it. Its where i got Hyperion of Erastil from, seeing as she is the physical incarnation of one of Erastil's most trusted angels that has been sent to end the blight of the land she is in. (Don't ask me where as i cant remember what it is called at the moment ^_^')
This'll sound odd (and would probably work better for an NPC anyway, but...) for some reason I love the idea of an alchemist/midwife who serves Lamashtu, giving expectant mothers 'medicaments' that turn their kids into gnolls or other monsters.
This'll sound odd (and would probably work better for an NPC anyway, but...) for some reason I love the idea of an alchemist/midwife who serves Lamashtu, giving expectant mothers 'medicaments' that turn their kids into gnolls or other monsters.
Cool idea, but this would have to be a traveling character or the locals would start to catch on pretty quick.
If you're going to be a demon worshiping alchemist, Lamashtu's a good choice. But Haagenti, the demon lord of alchemy, is a better one. :-P
True. I focused on Lamashtu because of the whole "mutagen" aspect of the Alchemist.
Brigh is the goddess of invention :) Religions of Golarion Pathfinder Wiki Neutral, Neutral Good :)
I think Norgorber could be an excellent fit, if worshiping an evil god is on the table. Secrets, poison. He very much fits the Mr. Hyde dimension of the class.
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The following post contains minor SPOILAGE for people who can't count together two and two about a certain RotRL adventure name and a certain god.
I was planning on making my rogue/alchemist character, Niero Brandt, officially a worshipper of Milani and Brigh, the first goddess having ties to Galt, the land of his ancestors and personal freedoms and the second goddess serving as a sort of general "muse of invention"(lol, "muse").
Behind the curtains though, he secretly petitions Norgorber for his poisons to work and pays a grudging respect to Haagenti since the alchemical manuscripts that he used to teach himself the art were fashioned by someone who imagined the demon lord an integral part of the alchemical process.
He found the sleeping body of a disheveled gnome in a piss-filled gutter ditch when leaving Magnimar in the Jenivere(for Serpent's Skull AP) after having been raised from the death only 11 hours earlier(after dying in Rise of the Runelords). The manuscripts on the body were somewhat soaked in mud, but after cleaning the things during the journey, he finds a treasure trove of heresy and knowledge. You know, the kind of stuff you get corruption points for in Dark Heresy and make SAN checks in Call of Cthulhu. Anyhow, the gnome, Elihu Karnios, imagined that all change could only come forth from the demon lord and that creating each extract was a small prayer to the Lord of Change. And one another thing, the gnome was completely fixated with reptiles of all kinds, especially with snakes.
Furthermore, Norgorber is something the character doesn't know too much about other than being some kind of god of ruthless rogues and poisoners. My character died way before the Skinsaw Murders happened and was resurrected just before Spires of Xin-Shalast, so he missed the conflict with the Skinsaw Cultists the other members had to suffer through. To him Norgorber is basically a necessary evil and it is his experimentation with poisons blessed by Blackfigers that give the resistance necessary to withstand natural venoms used by jungle predators and underground horrors. The character has no problem believing that poisons work just fine without brown-nosing Norgorber, but believes himself somewhat in debt to the hooded fellow and doesn't want to have "an accident"
So, we have a Neutral Good character with tendencies towards the Chaotic. He is practical enough to not pay too much subservience to any a god, but not wise enough to get rid of the manuscripts and avoid the same fixation the gnome had. Add into this a slowly budding addiction to the adreline brews the author of the codexes liked to call "mutagens" and hilarity ensues. Hilarity and either a serpentine second personality of cold logic and uninhibited devastation or just good old no-holds-barred Chaotic Neutrality.
It'll be especially funny when he realises that over half the party is either chaotic or neutral or going to that direction. And one of those guys is a serpentine bloodline sorcerer while yet another is pretty explicit with his worship of Angazhan, the demon lord of apes. Crazy folks abound!
So yeah, best campaign premise ever. I'm going to eat my toes if we don't tear each other apart and just barely avoid changing over to playing a bunch of noble warrior race guys and a cleric of happy-sappy sky god. Then realise our mistake and the one member left standing just decides to take charge through extortion and bribery once everyone recuperates instead of coup-de-graceing the bastars for messing with the character's plans.
Anyhow, hope my notes gave you some ideas.
This is interesting but theologically flawed in that, for example, while Cayden Cailean is god of alcohol, and Caydenite priest take good wine as proof of Cayden's approval and vinegar as the sign of his displeasure, an alchemist and even a competent vintner will know that they're the product of two separate yeast strains, the second one known informally as "Mother of Vinegar." And as vinegar has many uses, including many in cooking, there also comes a question of whether the Accidental Hero hates salad dressing.
Moreover, the historic record, and even church records, will show that alcohol and vinegar both preexisted the Accidental Hero. I mean, if there were no wine or beer before Cayden, Cayden couldn't have been drunk when he took the test of the Starstone, now could he?
The same goes with poisons and Norgober and likewise alchemical extracts and the demon lord of change. If a formula requires divine intervention to work, it's not a very useful formula, and the fact that the demon lord of change approves of people swilling alchemical extracts and takes them as a sign of devotion is about like Cayden Cailean seeing someone somewhere drinking a glass of wine and approving of this and then going on to assume that this is some sort of propitiation of him, which is frankly kind of delusional even for a drunk god.
Heck, even if someone says they're going to worship Cayden Cailean, meaning that they're going to the local pub for a beer, and when they next say they're worshipping Cayden it's a euphemism for going to the loo, is this really worship?
I think it's more a case that you and Cayden both clicked Like on the Facebook page for beer, and ditto with you, Norgorber and the demon lord of change on the Facebook page for alchemy. They may start sending you "friend" requests after that, or suggesting that you become a fan of theirs, but being pestered by drunk gods is not the same thing as worshipping them.
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Surprised no one's mentioned Irori. Especially for lawful alchemists.
I can see him being appealing to alchemists both in the knowlege aspect and the 'perfected self' aspect.
An alchemist could, in theory, look at using his extracts on himself to 'perfect' mind/body/spirit, like Irori is said to have done.
That might be more 'attempting to emulate' instead of Worship though.