Well, I'll see if I can unravel some of this mess....
Each Homeland has "Regional Common Magic Religions". Flesh Man for the Heortlings, etc. Normally, these teach nothing other than common magic. Imarja is basically of this type, expanded to "full keyword status" Don't bother to count Imarja as a speicialized Religion. Note that the only skills she teaches are either part of a homeland keyword (History of Esrolia) or part of a generic religious keyword (Worship, Mythology).
Some occupations (Specifically, Musicians/entertainers and Thiefs) have Pan-Gloranthan (or, at least, Pan-what we've bothered to enumerate Gloranthan). A player deciding to take either Lanbril or Donander counts that as his "Specialized Magic", Yes.
Vai Madar Sa is a CM religion because he's a crazy mixed up diety. Neither fully God, nor fully Spirit, nor fully Essence, nor fully human. I suspect (though don't know), that the Eastern systems are like this, with CM religions rather than "Theistic", "Animistic" or "Wizardry". Count VMS as a "Specialized Magic" keyword.
Finally there is the 7 Moms. This is an organ of the expansionist Lunar empire. Looking at the list of abilities given, this looks like a Regional CM Religion like Imarja. It was also specifically crafted by the Lunars to be an entry point to the Lunar Religion. I'd treat it like Imarja: not a specialized Religion choice.
> So, are the occupations and homelands "balanced" in terms of Common Magic
> Religion Keywords - that is do they count against some limit? Or do some
> occupations and homelands have this "advantage" of free extra keywords
> associated with them?
Lanbril and Donander are the only two gods (that we know of) that have this style of cross-cultural worship. They are outside of any cultural norms, and are always considered a bit "off" in the eyes of "normal folk". Every Homeland has its own Thief god(s), and its own Musician god(s) (spirits, essences... ). Players should be lightly penalized socially for taking them: "what's the matter, Skovara ain't good enough for you?" They are basically an outsider, not taking part of "our normal religious observences". On the other hand, being the meta-deities of their craft, the Regional dieties are "part" of them - all Gods (Spirits, Essences) of Music are part of Donander, and can provide magic to the hero (subject to those social penalties - a local cult might not *want* to teach you their magic, even though you're "fully qualified" - I suggest some sort of gift to the cult...)
The Common Magic religions mentioned in the Homeland descriptions should be treated like Imarja - they aren't going to teach anything outside of the normal "Homeland Keyword" ability list, at best they might teach one minor ability. They are inextricably intertwined in the Homeland keyword.
RR
It is by my order and for the good of the state that the bearer of this has
done what he has done.
- Richelieu
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