"I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High.
But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes."
--Psalm 82
Folk here talk to things, and they become real. If they give their faith, the receiver has power. Worship makes godlings and spirits. There are thousands of them, and they live a very long time, even after the worship ends and memory fades.
Belief is how each river has a godling. Forgetfulness is why the Chimera is so bitter.
Faith is like gravity: gather enough of its weight, and you are a god in truth. As a god you are not wiser, but rather more powerful, deeper, more Real than real. You gain the Sight. Gods and spirits have one foot here, one foot in the Realm Beyond.
No one knows why ascension occurs: that is the central mystery of faith. Faith is a sword that beheads the world. Numberless are the myriad powers of gods and spirits, for faith can accomplish miracles.
Clerics do not pray for power: we are on the journey to ascension. Every cleric is a minor saint. Our names are invoked by farmers to bless a meal, or protect a lamb.
Wisdom and Charisma are a cleric's core attributes: the first to sense divine opportunity and danger, the second to convince others to believe in our heroism and piety. We clerics have a divine patron to be sure, but waiting for miracles is chancy. If we want to change the world through our will, through 'spells' and rebuking the undead, we need faith. We need followers.
Maybe we started out the hero of our village or the last hope of a family of bandits. Maybe we spun tales so well in school that their lies hemmed in power, drawing in friends like flies.
A few is enough, if the faith is pure.
When clerics come back from the dungeon, cash in hand, we go looking for folks to hear our legend. We share our money, share our tales, use our power to empower and heal people. Every mended bone is faith that this holy magic works, a blessing returned tenfold over time.
"Faith is acting on what you believe in."
You are a young cleric, St. Agwen. If you want to acquire more powers, survive greater perils, discover new spells? Evangelize yourself. Get more believers--spend your silver on the poor, the faithful, above all the needy and the gullible. Don't hide your light: tell them who is saving them, and how great you are. If they first hear of your patron through your sermons, all the better.
Be the saint they want to see in the world. Their expectations are your morality, their lies about you, reality. Become a legend, and pray your followers continue in good health and happiness. Defend them from all ills.
With enough time, you will become a demi-god, standing by your divine patron in the minds of many. Powerful clerics only die when the faith of their followers is broken. Every cult leader is Rasputin.
Godhood is within reach. With enough faith, you will move mountains.
-- A translation*, from Tradespeak, of an excerpt of a letter to St. Agwen, from the Matriarch of Nomon, 12 Nightsmonth
*For the next entry in this collection, see 'Every hero a legend'.
Your writing is fun to read! This is a very strong concept and makes a lot of sense for D&D esque worlds. Your but about faith being like gravity was neat! I don't know your setting but the reference to Rasputin in a document supposedly in-universe was strange but intriguing!
ReplyDeleteThank you for the kind words! This idea came about because I really like the way that Swords of the Serpentine discusses the main city-god, and I was tired of big pantheons when I started a new campaign. I put SotS’s Eversink in that campaign, and my friend’s cleric likes to evangelize but is happily morally flexible. So I started thinking about how a world like that could come to be. Fun part is, it operates completely behind the scenes for now; one can turn this saint-cleric thing up or down in importance. He has not noticed that faith is like gravity yet….
DeleteAs for Rasputin, that was me taking a liberty as a translator, picking a famous person from our world who was similar to the one in theirs. My setting is not THAT cool, unfortunately. :)
I have actually used Rasputin and Dracula in a fantasy setting where Dracula was basically the king of vampires in every reality including the real world and the fantasy setting of the game
DeleteThat sounds badass! Chronicles of Amber, but dark. Did you do that for every iconic monster, or just vampires?
DeleteRasputin is one of those magical true stories I find fascinating—well documented, but hard to explain.
Just vampires. I had an idea for mosquito vampires and it became a whole thing
DeleteSuper stirges!
DeleteThe cleric is such a great gift D&D has given to gaming! We've taken it's existence for granted, but it's actually pretty unique thing. When thinking about fantasy, one might get excited about knights, wizards, elves, dwarfs etc. But priests? Still, they've become a very important fantasy archetype. The obvious real world inspiration are the bishops of old, especially bishop Odo from the Bayeaux Tapestry, or maybe the hospitaller knights?
ReplyDeleteI think originally the first inspiration was Van Helsing (check me on that), but yes they morphed into medieval warrior bishops quickly. I suspect clerics get relegated to boring heal-bots bc DnD-inspired systems and settings often take the gods for granted. It’s more fun for me when a clerics relationship to divine power is fraught and their spell list is weird and idiosyncratic: Clerics are the OG Warlocks after all.
Delete