>Somehow I think we having two different conversations.
Well, maybe....
>Curses are different from Blessings - they are meant to be cast on an enemy.
>They are a projection of "bad" magic at a certain target. Yes, the
>congregation is adding it's will to the Liturgists (giving him Extraordinary
>support, in other words, which, as you note, help him overcome range/target
>penalties). The game mechanics of blesses and curses are pretty much the
>same, but there are differences, such as Blessings not having Number of
>Target mods (Curses do).
I don't know if I like this distinction. A blessing/curse (or positive/negative, if you prefer, or even defensive/offensive) shouldn't be handled two different ways. Feats, for example, seem to work exactly the same wheather they are "Swordhelp" or "Scare the bejeezes out of the neighbors." Similarly, spirits have more or less the same rules used to help the shaman or hurt her foes. Why should liturgy be any different?
>"...minuses on Grimoire skills" is non-game-mechanical? huh?
Um, this is a game, game mechanics have to come into it somewhere. If we agree that using liturgical magic in a friendly manner (non-resisted, I suppose, for a game definition) on a theist is polluting both for the theist and the liturgist this has to be depicted somehow. Saying that liturgical magic works one way for blessings and another for curses seems (to me) to be a much more clumsy game construct.
Not that I'm against the idea, mind you -- it handicaps Western magic nicely. It also encourages communal play instead of the "An Aramite, and Argrimori, and an Aldryami walk into an inn...," which can only be for the good. I just don't like the explaination much. But that's me.
>Liturgical magic (which is what we've been discussing, Wizardly magic is
>outside this discussion) is meant to be community/congregation based. Good
>stuff happens to the congregation, bad stuff happens to their foes. There
>are some prayers for blessings for people not immediately in the
>congregation during the service ("And now a prayer for our boys at the
>front", "A special prayer for the King"), but for the most part if you want
>the blessing, you have to join the worship service.
Yes, maybe that is the problem; I've been thinking of Liturgists as sort of "junior Wizards," but they seem to be a different species of fish.
So I'm assuming that the liturgist can only cast curses against enemies of the congregation, not just targets for the liturgist's personal spite (or justified alarm, for that matter). So a liturgist could cast a curse against "that rotten village next door" or "the Kingdom of War" (good luck), but not against "the Sinister Blue Army Agent" because the congregation doesn't even know the agent exists (much less the Blue Army). I suppose liturgists develop a "Direct the ire of the congregation" skill quickly, if they have to worry about such things. It also adds a bit to Malkioni civil war -- it's hard to direct liturgical effects against people who are potentially part of your congregation; the "will of the people" is divided.
Peter Larsen
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