Faith and corruption - situation getting out of hand

[Grandmikus]

I have a significant problem on my hands in my current campaign due to some player errors and how I decided to run things

We are playing in Katapesh's city Solku, a small yet very fortified town devoted to worship of Sarenrae. More than a half of the party are faith based classes who worship the sun goddess and they were returning to Solku from their latest mission which was a complete success but revealed some pretty nasty stuff about the Dwarven inqisitor/synthesist who was very eager to kill and burn people in the name of the faith. While he directed his wrath towards foes and did some bad puns to his comrades he was quite bloodthirsty. On numerous occasions he killed monsters who didn't want to fight and got himself dominated by a Daemon and nearly killed the whole party. He even got himself infested with some kind of weird parasite and preached his arcane synthethic powers come from god. The party priest ordered the paladin to escort him back to town with a letter describing his worries about the good inqisitors and askd for further examination by the priesthood.

We decided that the inquisitor was learning a variation of false divine magic so his synthesist powers looked like divine powers, at least when his master did it. Unfortunatlly the inqisition was full of shady people who were commited to helping the church of sarenrae using every means neccessary. The didn't want to give any doubt to the top bras about things they didn't need to know and wanted to create a distraction from the PC inqisitor trail so that he could complete his training or go on another longer quest. The Iomedae - Sarenrae church conflict was choosen. In Solku the head priestess of Iomedae has an old feud with the Sarenrae church over the slaughtered paladins who came to the city's rescue and she won't send any help no matter how Lady Cynore the current Sarenrae church leader asks her for forgivness. The plan was easy

-Slip away during the night
-Change into pre prepared skinsaw men costumes
-Break into the relatively small Iomedae chapple
-Desecrate it
-Help the Iomedae preistess by finding a small group of Norgreb cultists, frame them and kill before they can attests to their innocence

What went wrong
-the PC inqisitor locked the priestess in her room and lit the damn thing on fire burning the whole chapple
-while running away he killed a young guard by THROWING HIS FAMILY'S HEIRLOOM AXE
- Priestess was saved by the PC paladin and he was latter given by his fellow guardsmen his companion's HEIRLOOM AXE as the suspects weapon.

While the two religions were on a brinck of peace the PC paladin walked to his superior and said he had an idea who the killer was and when questioned by the guard Lieutenant he told her to keep her nose out of the Temple jurisdiction stating its their business and they have nothing to say about it. His superior was so flabbergasted by all those events she agreed with her best student: the PC paladin.

This went downhill fast. Dwarven PC inqisitor and the whole inqisition sect was imprisoned. The next morrning the head of the church abdicated and made the PC paladin the new temporary/permament leader and she herself went/escaped to fight the gnols, leaveaning everything, as part of her penance. The PC paladin ordered a quick trail of the PC inqisitor herself as the prosecutor. During the trail the temple was surrounded with an angry mob of merchants, middle and higher class city representatives led by the city leader Lord Kel Kalar. They were angry about the church's unlawful actions and bossy attitude towards the city council reminiscent of times before the creation of the city council. Lord Kel Kalar demanded the release of the culprit to him and a fair trail. The PC paladin stubborn and afraid of the secrets the PC inqisitor or his masters might tell the goverment about the temple ordered the trail to continue under the temple siege. He even imprisoned the iomedae prestess who wanted to join the mob after recovering from her injuries. I think the PC paladin wanted to execute the PC inqisitor but the penalty for his crimes was excommunication and banishment instead. The PC paladin sneaked out of the temple with the PC inqisitor and released him outside the city walls while being chased by Lord Kel Kalar and his city guards and later caught redhanded.

Today I trailed the PC paladin for helping the murderer escape, opposing the law enforcers and imprisoning the Iomedae priestess. He was found guilty and instead of giving him 50 lashes the judge was convinced (by the new head of the church) to a lesser punishment. I stripped the PC paladin naked, cut her bald and paraded her around the city on a leash while people threw all kinds of things at her. After that her father had comitted suicide as he couldn't do his job as a merchant no more. The PC paladin was ordered to go immediatly on a penance crusade to a local town and protect it for few years as a part of the deal with the city.

Now the PC paladin is broken yet still retains her paladin powers. She thinks the Solku church is corrupt to the core and wants to create an opposed sect which would dispose of the old corrupt one or contact her divine providers to ask for help against her seniors.

I think the whole situation is getting really out of hand. I consulted the gods of golarion but I still don't know how I should react to those ideas or how divine servants should react. I only remember that gods were OK when it came to religious divisions in their churches. Any ideas how should I present react to this?

[Viliana]

Depends. If Solku church was "right" from DM's and godness perspective than player wants to commit a blasphemy and heresy. In this case, the paladin should lose all his powers or do the atonement. It can even end with witch hunting, because he will be the enemy of the church.

If not, then godness through her servants should help PC or do nothing.

PS: What's the party lvl? Godness shouldn't interfere if they are not important.

[MrSin]

Viliana wrote:

Depends. If Solku church was "right" from DM's and godness perspective than player wants to commit a blasphemy and heresy. In this case, the paladin should lose all his powers or do the atonement. It can even end with witch hunting.

Heresy and Blasphemy don't make a paladin fall. If they did I'd cast the latter more often.

More seriously, if you think its getting out of hand, have a chat with the players about the type of game you all want to run and see if this is the kind if they're okay with where its headed. If not... Yeah, you probably got out of hand.

I don't see any problem with starting your own sect to root out the evils of another personally.

[Volaran]

There are some issues there. Sarenrae is the goddess of healing, so I could see her preferring a non-violent solution, but the Keleshite version of her religion is known for being...more brutal than necessary, and if I recall, that is where the Katapeshi branch of the faith originates.

The paladin retaining her power is a very telling sign. To me, that suggests she is on the right path, and she has suffered for her understanding.

Solku is also in a precarious position, as it is threatened by gnollish hoards, and the martial might of the Saerenites are a big part in holding them at bay. Would Sarenrae want opposing factions within her church if it would mean the whole city could get wiped out?

As a GM, I might be inclined to send the PC a vision, and then a minor PC as an advisor (perhaps a hound archon). Particularly if the archon were to work with the PC openly, this could be a sign that she has the favour of Sarenrae, mitigating the violence of an intra-church conflict.

[Viliana]

MrSin wrote:

Heresy and Blasphemy don't make a paladin fall. If they did I'd cast the latter more often.

More seriously, if you think its getting out of hand, have a chat with the players about the type of game you all want to run and see if this is the kind if they're okay with where its headed. If not... Yeah, you probably got out of hand.

I don't see any problem with starting your own sect to root out the evils of another personally.

Going against god's principles should be counted as fall in my opinion. No god should lends his power to someone who is against him. At least it's what I understood from OP. Making another sect is fine, but making a sect oriented on purging can harm entire church and may not be supported by the godness. As Volaran noted, it may end badly.

I agree with the rest of your post. OP should talk with the player, because if they're not okay with this... then yes. You probably go out of hand ;)

[Grandmikus]

As far as I know the players welcome a spicy conflict such as this. My problem is that I don't know how to respond to some very serious problems that spawned in time of two game sessions.

From my perspective all parties were correct but overzealous in their actions

The city wanted to retain independence from the church, a very peculiar position they fought out in the aftermath of the last gnoll siege. They didn't want any conflict with the church due to the fact that the Paladins are responsible for training and preparing SOlku's militiamen.

The Church higher ups wanted to help the poor but would lose a lot of supporters and contributors if the people knew they did something more than that, like spying and sabotage.

The PC paladin was horribly focused on his faith's status in the city. He wanted to shield the church from prosecution, keep it strong to protect Solku and the still help the poor.

Even the inquisitors were mostly martyrs and anti heroes. One of them even suggested putting a death sentence on himself and his collegues so that nobody would spill the beans outside of the church

Now looking at that the divine patrons have to decide who to support or if they should even pick a side. Each party did their best and the only thing that failed was the Stubborness of the PC paladin in following his code of conduct and protecting temple's influence.

Thats why no one lost their powers aside from the PC inquisitor who commited murder and did heinous acts of blasphemy.

As of now they are at 6th level.

[Arbane the Terrible]

Cast Commune. Why engage in scriptural hair-splitting when you can just ASK a god what they want?

[Viliana]

In my opinion, deites shouldn't interfere in fidding cases like this. Imagine: you are the god. One of your minor knight (not even a priest!) through own stubbornness lost xis pride. Nobody died, nothing has changed, life is going on.

Would you intefere, while having with your servants much more important things to do? It's a Church job to fix the problem. This is why you have a Church in the first place: to not babysit every aspect of your own faith! If there is a problem, then The Church should fix it. Not you.

And this is your solution. Add to the game a fixer. Maybe some hi-lvl priest or better: another paladin who will talk with a PC. By doing that, you can cool down things, explain other and maybe persuade different approache. Show in-game what was a mistake and explain why. You do not need deites and divine servants for this. Just someone more experienced. That's all. Someone who will tutor proper ways. Remember that Sarenrae's Church rather try to avoid conflicts. Creating another sect may lead to a bloodshed and this is not what Saerenites would like to approve.

Especially in this scenario, while having gnolls at the gate...

[Volaran]

I think the problem with assigning another priest or paladin as the PC's adviser was basically spelled out in the original post. The previous head of Solku's Sarenites retired and left the PC paladin temporarily in charge (suggesting she was likely the highest ranking paladin available).

Any adviser-priest or paladin is probably going to have to come from outside of Solku, and since it is the most prominent stronghold of Sarenrae in Katapesh, probably outside the region, which is also more complicated by Sarenrae not having that strict of a church hierarchy (IIRC). ie, the priests in Solku don't really have anyone further up the chain of command, though there are definitely more powerful clergy elsewhere.

Moreover, we have the situation with the PC inquisitor, which complicates matters. Right in the class description, inquisitors are permitted a bit of leeway when going outside of their religion's ethos, but the PC took an already shady plan and turned it into attempted murder.

So, there are a few things that need to dealt with. Solku is a stronghold of Sarenrae, and was founded by Sarenites. It is perfectly legitimate in my mind for their clergy to be tried by the church. In fact, it would not surprise me if that were a tradition of the city. It also doesn't surprise me that exile/excommunication would be a punishment for these kinds of crimes. Sarenrae is a diety of mercy and healing after all.

That said, given that the crime was again another religious leader, I think the lord of the city was more than justified demanding this be handled by him. I think the punishment dealt out to the paladin was extremely harsh, particularly given that he was doing this to the interim head of Sarenrae's faithful in Solku, among which I believe Lord Kel Kalar counts himself. I could see this harming him politically.

So, the net result here seems to be that the inquisitor was excommunicated and exiled by the church, but the paladin was exiled by the city council.

This seems to me that it would provide a good opportunity for both PCs. Since the paladin will be protecting this remote town for a few years, she likely won't have access to someone who can simply cast commune. However, if she still has her powers, she can be reasonably sure that she acted in good faith.

I'd still suggest a hound archon arrive in this remote town to act as an adviser. Sarenrae obviously doesn't intervene in mortal affairs directly very often, but a faithful servant from the celestial realms is a clear sign of approval at a time when the paladin is probably at her lowest.

Moreover, this might be a good time for the inquisitor to grow as well. Class directives or not, the inquisitor clearly acted against Sarenrae's teachings, and I wouldn't be surprised if the goddess had stripped some or all of his powers. Yet, if the paladin intends to act against the church establishment in Solku, she might be able to use the inquisitor's help, and thus help him redeem himself. Paladins do have to walk a stricter line than inquisitors, and someone more worldly or politically inclined could be a great help in the days to come. Unless he's just a crazy murder hobo, because his previous actions could indicate that as well ;)

(BTW, thanks for starting this topic. I generally avoid the boards this days, but have run a campaign in and around Solku previously, so I find it an interesting area, and like contributing to the discussion.)

[Viliana]

Volaran wrote:

I think the problem with assigning another priest or paladin as the PC's adviser was basically spelled out in the original post. The previous head of Solku's Sarenites retired and left the PC paladin temporarily in charge (suggesting she was likely the highest ranking paladin available).

Any adviser-priest or paladin is probably going to have to come from outside of Solku, and since it is the most prominent stronghold of Sarenrae in Katapesh, probably outside the region, which is also more complicated by Sarenrae not having that strict of a church hierarchy (IIRC). ie, the priests in Solku don't really have anyone further up the chain of command, though there are definitely more powerful clergy elsewhere.

Sorry, I wasn't precise enough. By a NPC-Fixer I meant someone from outside of this mess.

It's not going to solve the PC inquisitor problem, but from what I understood, he ran away.

Grandmikus wrote:

The PC paladin sneaked out of the temple with the PC inqisitor and released him outside the city walls

Maybe the PC inquisitor should take a heretic archetype? That class can do something like that.