Yes.
A living person counts as an unique
> item?
Possibly. It depends on the role the person is taking in the ritual.
Since coats of chain, swords and other weapons are quite expensive,
> how come the only give one bonus point each in the Arming of Orlanth
> example?
Expense doesn't matter, applicability to the ritual/representation of the original myth does. A ritual might give 1 point for a jeweled crown, but 3 for a plain ol' chicken feather, because in the myth the feather was much more important than the crown.
While Issaries will publish some rituals as part of adventures, we expect that players will make up many of their own rituals, determining what objects/actions are necessary and how much they give to the ritual.
> Then, questions about misapplied worship. Are Lunar sorcerers and
Heortling
> spirit-talkers (for example) practicing misapplied worship?
No. They are approaching their OtherSide entity in the proper manner - Lunar Sorcerers are really dealing with nodes on the Sorcery Plane (whatever they might call it), while heortling Spirit talkers are actually dealing with beings from the Spirit World.
Note that the only spirit talkers the Heortlings have are the Kolating shamans - all other Heortling spirit traditions (such as the Chalk Man tradition) are secondary ones.
Do they still
> have a relationship with their culture's main religion (i.e., Worships
> [Celestial or Storm] Pantheon) or would they have respectively Member of
the
> (what? Carmanian?) Church and Kolati (Storm?) Tradition?
No and Yes. They don't have a ability rating in "Worship x Pantheon", they have the appropriate Order/Tradition/Path relationship. However, that does not mean that they have rejected the tenets of their society - Lunar Sorcery is an accepted part of the Solar/Lunar magical background, just as shamanism is part of the Storm background. They "main" religions recognize that there are some wierd beings "out there" that are part of their belief system.
After all they grew
> up in a theistic society and so approach their respective kind of magic
with
> the wrong mindset.
The Otherworld calls people in mysterious ways. Your parents may you want to grow up and worship Humakt, but you feel the call to Chalana Arroy... (Or Kolat, or...).
> (Partially OT here) Are misapplied worshippers (mostly, usually) aware of
> the "true" reason why their magic is less powerful or do they devise
> cleverer explanations.
If they notice the difference, they will make up an explanation of why it's more difficult to do their type of magic. There was a small bit on the website for a while of a Praxian shaman talking to worshippers of Humakt & Orlanth (Anyone know where it is? I couldn't find it in a quick search).
>The fact that Hero plane travelling provides positive
> information on myths' reality (to anyone strange enough to ask) seems to
> prove that Gloranthan have a way to determine what they do really worship,
> but the Seshnegi order that worships St. Dormal certainly concocted a
nifty
> explanation for their difficulties in getting magic from their patron
saint.
The Hero plane doesn't *necessarily* show truth. To visit the Heroplane is Heroquesting, and as we know, it is all too easy for the Hero to fail in his quest - thus hiding or even *changing* the truth for that hero!
Roderick
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