Priests and Faiths

[Horace]

Why is that? Do you need to be able to cast "heal" to spread your religion and follow the ethos of your chosen god in your behaviour? Do you need to be able to turn undead to teach others about your god and convince others to follow him/her? No way.

If you're suggesting it's totally kosher to role play being a priest of a faith without actually being a priest of a faith...then I take back everything I said.

I have always been under the assumption that doing so is bad pool.

[Selveem]

Actually, I remember that too. Like people saying they were 'fighter of Lathander' without actually being faithed..

[Harroghty]

Well, that begs the question of what being "a member of the faith means". (This is the term used in the associated help files.)

If you are defining "member of the faith" as "member of the church" then this opens a loop-hole for a player to portray their character as worshipping that god but not a member of the church. This is done often right now and it seems unremarkable for most classes (if you decide that your level 2 character worships a god then it's not a big deal), but the trouble, as Horace points out, is with priests. A fighter who worships a god does not imply any kind of godly or ecclesiastical endorsement, but a priest who worships a god and receives divine spells seems to imply some kind of endorsement from that power.

So where is the line?

[Caelnai]

If you're suggesting it's totally kosher to role play being a priest of a faith without actually being a priest of a faith...then I take back everything I said.

Umm, one of my favorite priests in game is unfaithed and I believe intends to stay that way. He's got a great spiel about glorifying pantheistic spirituality, neutrality...all that jazz.

Thats a bit different than claiming something you aren't in your title, which I also don't see as my business. I'd let the offended God in question deal with that.

[Dalvyn]

Sure, you can say that you are a priest of god X. Obviously, if you misbehave or act in opposition to god X's ethos, you might get struck by divine lightning, but nothing prevents an unfaithed follower from talking about his faith, or even saying that his spells come from god X.

A priest of Mask can come to the square and pretend that his spells come from Tyr. Why couldn't a hopeful priest of Tyr say the same thing?

[Horace]

I agree with you 100% I just always assumed that those within the faith would get upset by it.

edit: with this in mind, i withdraw my proposal then. i was just sick of playing a priest who didn't have a god

[Lerytha]

Let them get upset. It's an interesting RP, if it ever happens.

I think its a throwback from when there was a very heavy enforcement of some RP rules. This heavy enforcement has died down a lot, recently, in favour of completely IC, player-based RP enforcement. Obviously the imms get involved if something bad happens OOC, or something really bad happens IC, but largely, I think we're a bit more trusted to deal with things on our own.

In the old days, I remember being told we could not RP a faith we were not part of. Nowadays (as seen by Dalvyn's post) that has obviously changed. So, that means, go for it!

(Although the original point about faith delays due to inactive faith managers does still bear looking at, but in perhaps a not-so-specific way)

[Selveem]

So does this mean Kadred can begin claiming to follow Helm even though he can't be faithed because the faith quest requires you to be Lawful alignment?

[Dalvyn]

So does this mean Kadred can begin claiming to follow Helm even though he can't be faithed because the faith quest requires you to be Lawful alignment?

A priest of Mask can come to the square and pretend that his spells come from Tyr. Why couldn't a hopeful priest of Tyr say the same thing?

[Isaldur]

If your priest doesn't meet requirements to even be a priest of that god yet claims to be, you might run into an issue when a real priest finds him/her out. If you do meet the requirements and you've just yet to be quested by a god/faith manager then I'd say claiming the God is granting you a limited selection of prayers until you are quested is perfectly acceptable. It looks like you can claim whatever you want ICly based off of what the Admin are saying, but like anything else if the evidence is to the contrary you may be dealing with IC repercussions.

[Horace]

How though, Isaldur?

Faithed priest: Who is your god?
Unfaithed priest: I pray to Gond and my prayers are granted.
Faithed priest: nuh uh, you aren't on the faith list!

It's the problem that I was talking about. You cast divine magic - that is the mechanical qualifier for being favored by a god. It's impossible to refute in character as the accusing priest. All he can do is watch the unfaithed priest pray, and then watch his prayers be granted.

That's precisely why I was so surprised by the answer. But I believe it to be in the better interest of the game. A player who chooses to play a priest, should always be able to chose their own god...this allows that.

[Lerytha]

Horace:

a) Claiming you follow a god will not make a faith manager go nuts and accuse you of not following. You can RP as having been taught a few prayers by your old teacher in the faith who sent you to learn more about "Oghma" or "Talos", or whatever god you ICly follow but haven't been faithed in yet. I think we're getting too caught up in thinking IC faith means ICly BEING faithed. Nuh-uh. Just say "well, I've worshipped Tempus all my life and get my prayers from him, but nothing like what I know I can do if I ever devote myself to him as completely as you, Faith Manager".

b) Say you're a Maskarran and you want to pretend to be a Mielikkian? Well, you'd do it away from a Mielikkian, and make sure you were disguised and make sure you didn't reveal your name. Would actually make some real purpose to not sharing your name as opposed to just "Being evil and mysterious by default".

I still think some thought about the system could be made, but tying ourself into IC knots about whether you can "claim" you follow a god until you are on a faith list is silly. Miriel worships Corellon. She's not on the faith list. Miriel knows Mystran dogma extemely well and worships her a lot. She's not on the faith list. If she was a priest of Mielikki, she might still worship both those gods. Nobody could ever say to her, "Mmmer, you're not on the faith list you're not a true follower".

[Horace]

We're singing the same song, Lerytha.

I always assumed it wasn't alright because how vigilant players would be about the validity of worship being qualified by the ability to provide a faith symbol. Which is just ridiculous. I'm glad to see that isn't the case anymore.

[Lirith]

I think Isaldur is referring to any RP or alignment requirements for a particular deity, not a faith list requirement. At least, that's what I thought he meant.

[Horace]

Oh, yeah - that's a given.

If you're CE and you think it's a good idea to pretend to worship Tyr, you're either insane, or a canon NPC created to hide within the ranks of waterdeep. Either way the jig will be up shortly without storyline assistance explaining the ability to do so.

[Isaldur]

All a priest has to do is use one of the many detect law/chaos/good/evil or Know Alignment spells to know anyone claiming to be a priest of a god that does not meet the requirements of being a priest of that god is full of it.

Example being a Chaotic aligned character claiming Helm grants him prayers, and a Priest of Helm knowing this is false simply by detecting the fellow as someone that furthers the means of chaos. For Gods that allow priests of any alignment, or more of a mix of alignments than those like Helm, Tyr, Torm, then it could be trickier.

That is what I meant.

[Lerytha]

Of course, Isaldur, that would be up to the person impersonating or claiming, to decide. Basically, if I was going to impersonate a Mielikkian, I'd do it. They're chaotic enough to accept chaotic neutral, true neutral, etc. So a Maskarran could pass for one around crowds that didn't include a regular Mielikkian.

If a Maskarran wants to impersonate a Helmite, let them. Its just their cover won't last very long at all. But that's still IC, as would be the consequences.

[Oghma]

I've sort of forgotten where this thread is going. With most faiths being updated and all (Save for the ones still under imm/fm supervision) I'm curious about the claims of non faithing and finding the reasons behind them that some are discussing on here.

So, if you are currently not being faithed for any reason not on my earlier post and you are a priest, please list some of the reasons behind it. My list was:

Special cases being handled by imms/faith managers that are active
-Cases where characters have not actively pursued faiths beyond setting status to hopeful
-Cases where characters have shown themselves to be currently unfit for faithing and are either pursuing faith options with the aid of faith managers or faithed members to improve and become fit for faithing on their own time
-Cases where hopefuls are on in different timezones

Add to the list
-Deity is not yet in the game and am patiently waiting

Anything not on that list without going into too much detail.

[Horace]

I started this thread because I had near 400 hours on a priest without even getting to speak to a faith manager. With myself being active IC and OOC to make the contact. My frustration grew further when I found that by the rules in the howto, I was going to have to wait months to seek an alternate route.

I'm currently sated by Dalvyn's approval of being able to sincerely roleplay of a faith, without having the little symbol.

[Isaldur]

Right Lerytha, which is why I said Dalvyn has pretty much said go for it and that IC actions have IC consequences, which I also droned on about in my initial post.