Re: Misapplied Misapplied Worship Rules?

From: Jonas Schiött <jonas.schiott_at_...>
Date: Tue, 06 Jun 2000 01:06:21 +0200


Nick Brooke:

>If my reading is right, then any one
>character can *only* perform one kind of worship (sacrifice, veneration,
>asceticism, or ecstatic worship)

Yeah, that was the basis for my arguments too, but then...

>Mind you, HW p.167 says there are "theists who practice ecstatic worship in
>addition to sacrifice", which I don't pretend to understand. Maybe it's a
>loosely worded way of saying, "some theistic cultures include unusual
>individuals who practice ecstatic worship instead of sacrifice (e.g.
>Kolating shamans among the theistic Orlanthi; Jakaleeli shamans among the
>theistic Lunars)"? Let's hope so.

...then I looked closer at this example and the definitions on the following pages and found they were _shockingly_ loose-worded. It's perfectly possible to read these descriptions as saying: "Most people don't use alien magics, but if you really really want to, aaahhh what the heck, go right ahead!"

>Is changing magic systems dealt with in the rules at all? Or am I looking in
>all the wrong places, and missing some statement of the bleeding obvious?

There are no rules for changing systems anywhere. Which unfortunately supports one of two theories: a) change is completely impossible, or b) change is possible at the drop of a hat.

Julian Lord:

>> If my reading is right, then any one character can *only*
>> perform one kind of worship
>
>Generally true ; but this doesn't always apply (for instance)
>to the Secrets of Theism.

At least that one's easy to clear up: the Secrets are explicitly _not_ mystical powers, they just use the same rules. And are just as inefficient.. ;-)

Richard Develyn:

>The question, ISTM, is whether this misapplication is objective or
>subjective.
>
>If it's objective then we're into God Learnery things and I'll leave that
>one well alone (for now).

The whole of the HW rules are God Learnery. And yes, I understand the division of the otherworlds to be objective. There is also one and only one objectively correct way to communicate with each otherworld.

>If it's subjective, then the penalties happen because you *know* you're
>doing the wrong thing, but you're doing it anyway because you have to. I
>think that's fair enough.

I think it's obvious that this is not the case for all the examples on p.247-50. Also, if you do it a certain way for long enough, it would become subjectively right and the penalties should go away.

David Dunham:

>Perhaps the *spirit* suggests a sacrifice.
>
>> if a Praxian shaman
>> sacrifices to Thunder Bird, why doesn't he sacrifice to Waha? Or does he?
>
>Waha has tons of helper spirits he can provide. Thunder Bird doesn't,
>but is too large to integrate.

So to use Richard's terminology, subjectively Praxians have been giving Thunder Bird sacrificial worship as far back as anyone knows. So why the penalty? If the spirit itself _wants_ sacrifice, how can this be misapplied? Unless the fact that he resides in the Spirit Plane makes it objectively so. In which case, you'd think the spirit and the shamans would have worked out some mutually more benificial relationship by now.



Jonas Schiött
Göteborg

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