>The statement is so clear, I can't believe it isn't deliberate. Treating a
>congregation as one being, assuming penalties and bonuses cancel, etc. are
>all fine house rules, but they ain't what the rules say. Page 159 is pretty
>clear that you're supposed to say "-40 for congregation size, +13 for total
>support, +10 for shrine, +10 for holy day."
I agree. This seems to work just fine. I like being able to plumb the details for why it works and find out that it does.
>I *think* the idea is that
>liturgists should actually spend HP on pushing their "Use Abiding Book" or
>whatever up to a level where they can more or less guarantee a success.
I disagree. I think that a -7 is something that can be overcome with skill fairly regularly (or other bonuses). Further, I think that these probably just fail sometimes. If the liturgist is not good at it, maybe he only gets the blessings to stick occasionally.
I'm also pretty sure that the congregation probably doesn't notice one way or the other. That is, I think these things are sorta subtle. Even on a failure, I think the appropriate lightshow happens. The real test is during the week when you see if the blessing worked in application. But in that case, was it really the blessing that failed, or was it your own skill? I think the character doesn't really know. So the member of the congregation has hope and faith that he'll be blessed, but there's still room for doubt.
Heck, sometimes they may even be able to tell that the liturgist failed. But does that mean that you kick him out? Especially if he's the only one available? No, you tell him better luck next week, and apply social pressure to get him to do a better job next time. Meaning increasing his skill so he can be consistent.
This all seems to make for such a rich and accurate portrayal of the religion in question that I'm not sure why people are having a problem with it. In general I think that's the case with the rules. Yes, occasionally they'll contradict some known fact about Glorantha. In that case, make an additional conflict out of the source of the contradiction that will allow it to be resolved.
Feature, not bug.
Mike
Powered by hypermail