Divine Wifi

[BowStreetRunner]

I didn't want to hijack another thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?557741-On-the-deity-requirement-for-Eldritch-Disciple), so am moving this discussion over here.

It started with a comment about divine casters who worship an ideal instead of a particular deity...

...mechanically if you're a character who worships and draws divine wifi from an abstract force...

...and grew from there.

Divine wifi...perfect.

And now I have to figure out the dynamics of this new mechanic for a future game! Divine Wifi - where divine casters get varying levels of coverage for their particular deity in different locations within the game-world. Each 'bar' of coverage is access to a level of spells. So 9 bars is full coverage. Deities struggle to expand their coverage area as widely as possible. Temples and shrines act like cell towers outside the deity's natural area of influence.

Hmmmm.... This has possibilities! :smallbiggrin:
It even helps explain the whole Vancian casting system, in a way.

yes, that's why clerics have daily slots and can't keep casting indefinitely. they have a reset period of 24 hours.

I wanted to respond to a number of ideas tossed out.


Ur-Priests piggy-back on the signal.

yeah, ur-priests siphon a small amount of bandwidth from a variety of different sources, so no one individual one notices the drain, like in superman 3.
I love the ideas of Ur-Priests as pirating wifi from the divine networks.


Underdark adventures could get interesting. Only coverage available is a local area net set up by Lolth. Dwarves and Gnomes are setting up their own landlines.
My original concept was along the lines that each deity would have a natural area of influence which would have a specific geographic epicenter. So a deity like Poseidon would have a central point considered the 'heart of the sea' where he was all powerful, and his power would radiate from there in a sphere. Temples and shrines would act like cell towers or repeaters that helped carry the signal a bit farther. At first, I just thought that only distance would matter, because it's divine. But your comment made me consider that a signal would be weaker trying to pass through other elements. So a water deity temple or shrine wouldn't carry as far through earth or air, and would be blocked by fire. An urban deity would have a weaker signal through the countryside and that signal would stop very abruptly a short distance into any wilderness.


PS: Is there spell failure in major holy days where the churchtowers are oversaturated?
Oh, I like this! In many of the religious traditions on earth there are particular times when certain types of worship were done - often for secular reasons like when the farmers could make it in from their responsibilities in the fields to get to a church. Each religion would have some of these Peak periods where praying was a bit tricky. When attempting a spell the caster would make a roll and the spell would possibly 1) function normally, 2) go off after a 1d4 round delay, 3) fail completely.

Is there spell level throttling after a number of spells cast? Do all good clerics have the Positive Attitude package which doesn't count divine points for cure spells?I think this would be deity-specific. There would be different approaches among deities to overcoming the limitations of the divine wifi network principle. Some would even band together into Pantheons specifically to share networks, with the upside that they all can piggyback on one another's shrines and peak times are diluted, but the downside that now peak times of other deities in the pantheon can impact their own connections.


Could a Portable Alter (A&EG) or Alter Case (DotF) be used for tethering?
Definitely! I love the tax of needing to set up an altar in order to cast, while it does free the PCs from being completely out of reach in some parts of the world.


I mean, that's basically magic in Faerun. Kinda. Mystra and Shar are competing cell services.
I'm going to need to go back and read Magic of Faerûn. I don't think I ever got that deep into it - mostly borrowing bits and pieces for campaigns in personal settings.


Can I steal this idea?
Since I took the original idea from Venger's quote...

yeah feel free to steal it
There ya go!

[Vaern]

Deities are capable of seeing and interacting with anything as long as they have a nearby holy symbol. Clerics don't need to worry about ever having a weak signal, because every one of them functions as a mobile hotspot.

[BowStreetRunner]

Deities are capable of seeing and interacting with anything as long as they have a nearby holy symbol. Clerics don't need to worry about ever having a weak signal, because every one of them functions as a mobile hotspot.The whole point is to make the setting so that clerics and other divine casters DO have to factor in things like coverage areas, peak times, etc. in their planning. Why go to the trouble to create this entire concept if all that is needed is a holy symbol to defeat it? The Portable Altar and Altar Case that gofnarb mentioned would fill the role of mobile hotspot more appropriately. A Relic holy symbol with the necessary True Believer feat tax, or other magic item that functioned this way might be available too.

For the most part, 3.5 uses Holy Symbols primarily for Turning attempts, not spell-casting.

[Andezzar]

Ur-priests could even be warchalkers wanting to give access to free divine wifi to everyone.

I wonder if in this setting arcane magic should be equally restricted. Dragons could be nodes, that sorcerers tap into.

[Nifft]

Ur-Priests are wardrivers.

Distort Summons is one of those fake cell towers cops use to capture your texts & email.

Violet Rain is when, through the darkest forces of M&A, your entire region is only served by a single internet provider, and they damn well know it.

[BowStreetRunner]

I wonder if in this setting arcane magic should be equally restricted. Dragons could be nodes, that sorcerers tap into.
That is a really important question to consider for balance purposes. I'd think in a balanced campaign this would work along with something that restricts arcane casting based on the origin of the arcane power - casters would need to draw from Draconic, Fey, Elemental, Infernal, Celestial, Abyssal, or some other power source that was tied into the divine conflict. Different divine powers would show affinity toward different arcane sources.

There's no reason an unbalanced campaign wouldn't work, of course. It would just be harder to convince players to run restricted divine casters when they could play unrestricted arcane casters.

[kuhaica]

Could make a fun sitting, especially if you want to run something along the lines of some Gods banding up to make there own SUPER MEGA COMPANY CHURCH which is making it harder for all the other already well established Gods to get there singnals out, as why pray to those old guys when you can pray to these new guys and gals for lower rates!


It also gives religious wars an even bigger impact upon the world

[Falontani]

Could make a fun sitting, especially if you want to run something along the lines of some Gods banding up to make there own SUPER MEGA COMPANY CHURCH which is making it harder for all the other already well established Gods to get there singnals out, as why pray to those old guys when you can pray to these new guys and gals for lower rates!


It also gives religious wars an even bigger impact upon the world

Wait, are you talking about a band of Gods connecting services into a pantheon?

[daremetoidareyo]

Could make a fun sitting, especially if you want to run something along the lines of some Gods banding up to make there own SUPER MEGA COMPANY CHURCH which is making it harder for all the other already well established Gods to get there singnals out, as why pray to those old guys when you can pray to these new guys and gals for lower rates!


It also gives religious wars an even bigger impact upon the world

This also sets up a fight between divine power drawn from nature and divine power from gods as cultivation of natural spaces for the mega church would be an encroachment...

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by BowStreetRunner
Temples and shrines act like cell towers outside the deity's natural area of influence.

You are a madman. I salute you. :smalltongue:


Originally Posted by Andezzar
Ur-priests could even be warchalkers wanting to give access to free divine wifi to everyone.

…what’s a warchalker? :smallconfused:


Originally Posted by BowStreetRunner
…a signal would be weaker trying to pass through other elements. So a water deity temple or shrine wouldn't carry as far through earth or air, and would be blocked by fire.

As far as earth and air, keep in mind that a terrestrial landmass is interlaced with countless streams and rivers, which begin with melting snow on a mountain ridge and fan out across a continent, all trickling and winding and rushing towards the sea. The entire continent is threaded with a dendritic network of watercourses, from mountain streams you can step across to massive rivers you can barely see across. I’d say a water deity has extensive reach across a continent, from seashores to continental divides.

Fire would probably be the most dependent on human assistance, since natural fires are fairly rare on a landscape. I could see this deity being dependent on hearth-fires and forges of small settlements, but extremely restricted in deserts, high mountains and all kinds of forest wilderness. Followers of this deity could build fire-towers on ridges and highlands (much like the signal-towers in LoTR) to help carry the fire-signal across forests, swamps, extensive lakelands or inland seas. Imagine a line of fire-towers stretching across Lake Superior towards Hudson Bay, or from stone temple to stone temple in equatorial rainforest.

.

[Andezzar]

…what’s a warchalker? :smallconfused:Someone who does this (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warchalking).

[kuhaica]

Wait, are you talking about a band of Gods connecting services into a pantheon?

Of course not! :smallbiggrin:



This also sets up a fight between divine power drawn from nature and divine power from gods as cultivation of natural spaces for the mega church would be an encroachment...

More or less, which would be the premise of a sitting, some Gods don't like this so someone has to step it up. It would be a good setting for a Demi God sort of adventure. Or it could cause other 'Pantheons' to sprout up in response to this one. All sorts of lovley things.

[Jowgen]

I present my Unified theory of divi-fi.

The divine servers are located on the outer planes. Some pantheons have shared or networked servers to ensure good bandwidth, though each deity has its own private server as well. Planar traits can cause signal interference or boosts, while each deity can use a divi-fi jammer to keep other deities' signals out of their divine realm.

A client can sign up for access to a deity's divi-fi by broadcasting a worship offer, which if accepted gives the deity clearance to broadcast its signal onto their material plane world and grant access according to the terms of service. Some mortals don't want to sign up with a specific deity or pantheon and would rather just get a concept or ideal provider, in which case they basically hop between networks of deities with the right portfolios, though the selection of magic data plans is more limited then (e.g. no cool PrC magic deals).

The overall quality of coverage is determined not only be the rank of the deity's off-plane server, but by the amount of temples, shrines and worshippers. Total number of on-planet worshippers determines the total amount of server bandwidth allocated to the world. Temples act as cell towers, while shrines are like local hot-spots and signal boosters, and each worshipper acts not only as a receiver but also as a divi-wi bridge that can amplify a signal to give it more strength/reach. The deity server rank and global bandwidth allocation determines how far the signal can reach without amplifiers or bridges.

For example a greater deity server, on a material plane world with enough worshippers to also get greater deity bandwidth can broadcast its signal out to 16-20 miles from each of its temples. The signal at the edge of that range is weak, but a shrine can boost it back to full, while a worshipper can bridge the signal out further. A lesser deity, or a greater deity only as many worshippers on a given world as a lesser deity, can only send a signal for 6-10 miles from its temples, so to get comparable coverage a greater concentration of shrines and/or worshippers is needed in the area. If a worshipper is too far out from the next temple, shrine or another worshipper who is within range of those, then he is out of network range and can't download any new divine spell packages.

Downloading divine spell packages generally requires a certain worship contract (which specifies how many spells worth of divine-data they get/day) and divine symbol, which acts as captcha. Some people use fake authentication methods to leech off the network without having a proper contract. Some deities specify that daily spell packages should be chosen/downloaded at specific times of day, likely to avoid general high traffic times or multiple material plane worlds sucking up bandwidth from the server at the same time.

Elder Evils are massive walking Wifi-jammers. Arcane casters are more like dial up, and SLAs are sorta blue-tooth I'd say.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Jowgen
The signal at the edge of that range is weak, but a shrine can boost it back to full, while can bridge the signal out further.

...while what can bridge the signal further? Looks like word or two is missing.

[khadgar567]

until jowgen turn all that in to camping feature this threat gave me solid WTF of my life. You guys have the wackiest theory of the forum congratulations i really mean it.

[Uncle Pine]

I am now subscribed to this thread. My next ideal campaign world already has dwarven rune smith pharaohs hogging arcane arts by fueling them into a series of castes by playing Duel Monsters, having divi-fi to counterbalance the weirdness can only make things spicier.
EDIT: To everyone: keep being the best weirdos around.

[Nifft]

Divine magic is Wifi.

Clerics connect to the Astral Server using a customized APP ("apostolic prayer portal"). This APP is very user-friendly, but the servers are very busy, so each user has a specific designated time-slot during which requests will be served -- that's why you have to choose a specific time of day when you first register with your god's APP. In compensation for the ease of use, the APP is relatively heavyweight and inflexible.

If your soul's ethos slips too far from whatever it was when you first registered, the tones that the APP makes will change. You will not be able to connect (and thus won't get any spells) while your tones are disharmonious. You may need an atonement to re-attune your soul harmonics.


Druids use an encrypted peer-to-peer network -- the language Druidic is only spoken by Druids because it's just Common that's been encrypted, and somehow this works. They each run a cluster of leaf-nodes off a central trunk. When they need to expand their coverage, they can ley lines by building monolithic infrastructure. Or they can grow new server farms using plant magic.


Wizards don't use a single front-end; a Wizard knows a bunch of specific IP(v6) addresses and connects to whichever of them she needs each day to get the bits she needs for the spells she picked. Wizards are surfing the Dark Web™, taking power from something or other -- perhaps the primal forces of nature which also power Divine magic, or perhaps specific entities which provide service but without a friendly Divine interface. Since merely casting Arcane spells can case you to shift alignment, apparently some of these Arcane spells come with a pernicious EULA.


Sorcerers were born with a bunch of code pre-installed, but not working. They don't rely on outside forces, but also they have to either compile their own code, or fix their JAVAPATH, or manage nine incompatible versions of Python... they know fewer programs, and they get access to those programs later, but once they know a program they can use it relatively frequently (at least until that spell-level of Java throws a memory exception and needs 8 quiet hours to restart).


Bards are like Sorcerers, except instead of real programs they just have iTunes.

[Uncle Pine]

By the way, I believe it's perfectly acceptable to have arcane spellcasters not require wifi to cast spells: Dragonlance didn't have clerics take Con hits when they used powerful spells and asymmetry is already part of the system if you consider things like arcane spell failure for armors or the fact that... well, every spellcaster is simply worse than a (psionic) artificers. So unless Venger comes up with an equally clever idea such as divi-fi but for wizards I think shoehorning arcane spells into the wifi system kinda stains the beauty of the original design.

Maybe arcane spellcasters use Wizztarter to crowdfund all their projects?

[daremetoidareyo]

By the way, I believe it's perfectly acceptable to have arcane spellcasters not require wifi to cast spells: Dragonlance didn't have clerics take Con hits when they used powerful spells and asymmetry is already part of the system if you consider things like arcane spell failure for armors or the fact that... well, every spellcaster is simply worse than a (psionic) artificers. So unless Venger comes up with an equally clever idea such as divi-fi but for wizards I think shoehorning arcane spells into the wifi system kinda stains the beauty of the original design.

Maybe arcane spellcasters use Wizztarter to crowdfund all their projects?

Considering the vancian aspects of wizards, I would default to arcane magic being an ecosystem of completely parasitic entities that permeate the planes. Can't cast necromancy because you specialized? That's because your brain is as toxic to necromantic parasitoids as sulphur is to some micro organisms. The spell preparation is actually allowing a root stock parent in written form lay an egg in the wizards physiology. Wizard gets a spell: the spell gets the potential to be a vector.

Higher level spell pteparations are really meditative exercises to make a little hibernaculum in the wizards head.

[Zombulian]

Divine magic is Wifi.

Clerics connect to the Astral Server using a customized APP ("apostolic prayer portal"). This APP is very user-friendly, but the servers are very busy, so each user has a specific designated time-slot during which requests will be served -- that's why you have to choose a specific time of day when you first register with your god's APP. In compensation for the ease of use, the APP is relatively heavyweight and inflexible.

If your soul's ethos slips too far from whatever it was when you first registered, the tones that the APP makes will change. You will not be able to connect (and thus won't get any spells) while your tones are disharmonious. You may need an atonement to re-attune your soul harmonics.


Druids use an encrypted peer-to-peer network -- the language Druidic is only spoken by Druids because it's just Common that's been encrypted, and somehow this works. They each run a cluster of leaf-nodes off a central trunk. When they need to expand their coverage, they can ley lines by building monolithic infrastructure. Or they can grow new server farms using plant magic.


Wizards don't use a single front-end; a Wizard knows a bunch of specific IP(v6) addresses and connects to whichever of them she needs each day to get the bits she needs for the spells she picked. Wizards are surfing the Dark Web™, taking power from something or other -- perhaps the primal forces of nature which also power Divine magic, or perhaps specific entities which provide service but without a friendly Divine interface. Since merely casting Arcane spells can case you to shift alignment, apparently some of these Arcane spells come with a pernicious EULA.


Sorcerers were born with a bunch of code pre-installed, but not working. They don't rely on outside forces, but also they have to either compile their own code, or fix their JAVAPATH, or manage nine incompatible versions of Python... they know fewer programs, and they get access to those programs later, but once they know a program they can use it relatively frequently (at least until that spell-level of Java throws a memory exception and needs 8 quiet hours to restart).


Bards are like Sorcerers, except instead of real programs they just have iTunes.

So what does that make a Spellthief? A guy who walks around stabbing people with a Flash Drive?

[Nifft]

So what does that make a Spellthief? A guy who walks around stabbing people with a Flash Drive?

Do I need to do all the thinking?

Spellthief is the guy who would totally download a car.

With each strike, the Spellthief executes a port-spoof attack which usurps one of your running programs.

Or downloads one of your latent programs, which are serial-numbered in such a way that you can't cast it after the serial number code has been stolen.

Spellthief redeems your Steam purchase codes. Spellthief steals your Windows serial number. Spellthief takes the cookies right out of your browser's hand, and then Spellthief eats your cookies.

[Venger]

I didn't want to hijack another thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?557741-On-the-deity-requirement-for-Eldritch-Disciple), so am moving this discussion over here.

It started with a comment about divine casters who worship an ideal instead of a particular deity...


...and grew from there.
I'm delighted my idea was of such interest to you.



Oh, I like this! In many of the religious traditions on earth there are particular times when certain types of worship were done - often for secular reasons like when the farmers could make it in from their responsibilities in the fields to get to a church. Each religion would have some of these Peak periods where praying was a bit tricky. When attempting a spell the caster would make a roll and the spell would possibly 1) function normally, 2) go off after a 1d4 round delay, 3) fail completely.
I think this would be deity-specific. There would be different approaches among deities to overcoming the limitations of the divine wifi network principle. Some would even band together into Pantheons specifically to share networks, with the upside that they all can piggyback on one another's shrines and peak times are diluted, but the downside that now peak times of other deities in the pantheon can impact their own connections.
Since losing an action and a slot is no fun for anyone, what about a reduced effect, like through shadow conjuration/evocation? During a high holiday, your spell would function normally but would be at 90% of its variable effect (for example) the advantage here is it's also modular instead of binary, so you can have it be very likely to work when slightly busy, and less so when it's extremely busy, like the celebration of that god's birth, or baker's night or similar.

Congratulations, you have convergently invented surge pricing.



Since I took the original idea from Venger's quote...
It would be really weird for me to come up with this idea and then not agree that information wants to be free.

Like in greek mythology, prometheus didn't actually steal fire, because if he had, the gods wouldn't have it anymore (which they did.) He copied fire and then seeded (fire seeds) so mortals could have it too.




As far as earth and air, keep in mind that a terrestrial landmass is interlaced with countless streams and rivers, which begin with melting snow on a mountain ridge and fan out across a continent, all trickling and winding and rushing towards the sea. The entire continent is threaded with a dendritic network of watercourses, from mountain streams you can step across to massive rivers you can barely see across. I’d say a water deity has extensive reach across a continent, from seashores to continental divides.

Fire would probably be the most dependent on human assistance, since natural fires are fairly rare on a landscape. I could see this deity being dependent on hearth-fires and forges of small settlements, but extremely restricted in deserts, high mountains and all kinds of forest wilderness. Followers of this deity could build fire-towers on ridges and highlands (much like the signal-towers in LoTR) to help carry the fire-signal across forests, swamps, extensive lakelands or inland seas. Imagine a line of fire-towers stretching across Lake Superior towards Hudson Bay, or from stone temple to stone temple in equatorial rainforest.

.
If you want to bring the greek elements to bear, you could use homes as a kind of shorthand for the presence of fire, since if you're assuming a medievalish setting, a house would be keeping one or more hearth fires burning at all times to heat the house, repel animals, etc.

with the existence of continual flame, you could use moon towers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moonlight_tower) to light fires to illuminate whole cities at night to cut down on crime and enable businesses and such to stay open later.

You'd also be able to draw on underground rivers, aquifers, and so on. Irrigation, a vital component to sustaining a community of any size, would also provide at least some connection to a water themed deity even if you were inland.


That is a really important question to consider for balance purposes. I'd think in a balanced campaign this would work along with something that restricts arcane casting based on the origin of the arcane power - casters would need to draw from Draconic, Fey, Elemental, Infernal, Celestial, Abyssal, or some other power source that was tied into the divine conflict. Different divine powers would show affinity toward different arcane sources.

There's no reason an unbalanced campaign wouldn't work, of course. It would just be harder to convince players to run restricted divine casters when they could play unrestricted arcane casters.

as we're all aware, 3.5 isn't a balanced system since some options are simply better than others. that said, if your goal in a homebrew campaign like this is to get people to play clerics to see how this system works, you'll need to provide some incentive for them to play the only class that's been hit with the nerfbat instead of avoiding it entirely. perhaps an all cleric party or similar.


Could make a fun sitting, especially if you want to run something along the lines of some Gods banding up to make there own SUPER MEGA COMPANY CHURCH which is making it harder for all the other already well established Gods to get there singnals out, as why pray to those old guys when you can pray to these new guys and gals for lower rates!


It also gives religious wars an even bigger impact upon the world
this would be like telecom companies merging with one another to create regional monopolies. various countries within your setting could pass legislature prohibiting the worship of a pantheon or temples constructed to a pantheon under similar thought processes to trustbusting protections, like those attempting to keep AT&T in check.


By the way, I believe it's perfectly acceptable to have arcane spellcasters not require wifi to cast spells: Dragonlance didn't have clerics take Con hits when they used powerful spells and asymmetry is already part of the system if you consider things like arcane spell failure for armors or the fact that... well, every spellcaster is simply worse than a (psionic) artificers. So unless Venger comes up with an equally clever idea such as divi-fi but for wizards I think shoehorning arcane spells into the wifi system kinda stains the beauty of the original design.

Maybe arcane spellcasters use Wizztarter to crowdfund all their projects?
One clever idea isn't enough, huh? :smalltongue: I'll see if anything comes to me.


Considering the vancian aspects of wizards, I would default to arcane magic being an ecosystem of completely parasitic entities that permeate the planes. Can't cast necromancy because you specialized? That's because your brain is as toxic to necromantic parasitoids as sulphur is to some micro organisms. The spell preparation is actually allowing a root stock parent in written form lay an egg in the wizards physiology. Wizard gets a spell: the spell gets the potential to be a vector.

Higher level spell pteparations are really meditative exercises to make a little hibernaculum in the wizards head.
That's a pretty cool idea, and it introduces the classic fantasy trope of "organic vs technological" to the arcane/divine cplit.


So what does that make a Spellthief? A guy who walks around stabbing people with a Flash Drive?

spellthieves are phreakers

[DragonsAion]

Spellthieves would be masters of DDOS attacks or just plan hackers.

...So what about those 2 year contracts and after the 2 years can you reselect your domains or change gods?

[Andezzar]

Considering the vancian aspects of wizards, I would default to arcane magic being an ecosystem of completely parasitic entities that permeate the planes. Can't cast necromancy because you specialized? That's because your brain is as toxic to necromantic parasitoids as sulphur is to some micro organisms. The spell preparation is actually allowing a root stock parent in written form lay an egg in the wizards physiology. Wizard gets a spell: the spell gets the potential to be a vector.I don't want midichlorians in my D&D.

[Zombulian]

I don't want midichlorians in my D&D.

This was my thought as well.

[Venger]

Spellthieves would be masters of DDOS attacks or just plan hackers.

...So what about those 2 year contracts and after the 2 years can you reselect your domains or change gods?

How does spoofing work in this setting? Say I run out my daily allowance for slots under provider 1. Is there a mechanic for me to try to pretend to be another cleric and keep casting?

[Nifft]

How does spoofing work in this setting? Say I run out my daily allowance for slots under provider 1. Is there a mechanic for me to try to pretend to be another cleric and keep casting?

Sure, just open a sock-puppet account using the Leadership feat.

[PhantasyPen]

One thing that bothers me about this: Peak Prayer Times should also be Peak *Performance* Times, since a god's power is directly drawn from the number of worshippers, so the more people praying at once the more processing power the god possesses.

[Nifft]

One thing that bothers me about this: Peak Prayer Times should also be Peak *Performance* Times, since a god's power is directly drawn from the number of worshippers, so the more people praying at once the more processing power the god possesses.



Clerics meditate or pray for their spells. Each cleric must choose a time at which he must spend 1 hour each day in quiet contemplation or supplication to regain his daily allotment of spells. Time spent resting has no effect on whether a cleric can prepare spells. A cleric may prepare and cast any spell on the cleric spell list, provided that he can cast spells of that level, but he must choose which spells to prepare during his daily meditation.
There's nothing I can see about regular worship / prayer times coinciding with whatever time this particular PC picks.

[Venger]

One thing that bothers me about this: Peak Prayer Times should also be Peak *Performance* Times, since a god's power is directly drawn from the number of worshippers, so the more people praying at once the more processing power the god possesses.
You're assuming that a cleric getting spell slots is somehow empowering the god.

In a normal setting, I'd agree. In this one, I would think the cleric getting their daily allotment of spells is them leeching. When people just go to church and venerate the god or have a parade or make sacrifices without getting slots from the god in return, that'd be seeding and giving the god more energy to help the faithful out with spell slots.

[Acanous]

Spellthief redeems your Steam purchase codes. Spellthief steals your Windows serial number. Spellthief takes the cookies right out of your browser's hand, and then Spellthief eats your cookies.
I knew i recognized that from somewhere (www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1782)

[Nifft]

I knew i recognized that from somewhere (www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1782)

First I've seen that web comic.

Is it good?

[Zombulian]

First I've seen that web comic.

Is it good?

If you like furries.

[Nifft]

If you like furries.

Ah, not so much.

Thank you kindly for the info.

-- -- --

Rangers & Paladins need both hands for their weapons (+ shield maybe), so they don't have a full divifi client device. Their interface is more like an Apple Watch (or the Android equivalent) -- it technically gets service, but the bandwidth is low, and the memory ceiling is even lower.

[BowStreetRunner]

You're assuming that a cleric getting spell slots is somehow empowering the god.

In a normal setting, I'd agree. In this one, I would think the cleric getting their daily allotment of spells is them leeching. When people just go to church and venerate the god or have a parade or make sacrifices without getting slots from the god in return, that'd be seeding and giving the god more energy to help the faithful out with spell slots.
I think this would be the best way. Worship service times, high holy holidays, periods of sacrifice, and the like would actually not interfere with spell-casting. There would be times however when the high priests were performing miracles for the masses. Times when people would line up for blessings, healing, and the like. At these times clerics would need to be cautious about planning a raid with their party, as those would be the times when service was spotty.


As far as earth and air, keep in mind that a terrestrial landmass is interlaced with countless streams and rivers, which begin with melting snow on a mountain ridge and fan out across a continent, all trickling and winding and rushing towards the sea. The entire continent is threaded with a dendritic network of watercourses, from mountain streams you can step across to massive rivers you can barely see across. I’d say a water deity has extensive reach across a continent, from seashores to continental divides.

Fire would probably be the most dependent on human assistance, since natural fires are fairly rare on a landscape. I could see this deity being dependent on hearth-fires and forges of small settlements, but extremely restricted in deserts, high mountains and all kinds of forest wilderness. Followers of this deity could build fire-towers on ridges and highlands (much like the signal-towers in LoTR) to help carry the fire-signal across forests, swamps, extensive lakelands or inland seas. Imagine a line of fire-towers stretching across Lake Superior towards Hudson Bay, or from stone temple to stone temple in equatorial rainforest.It wouldn't just be elemental concepts either. Pretty much each Domain would be tied in to this effect. So Air, Earth, Fire and Water domains we covered. But Animal and Plant domains rely on the presence of those creatures, Death Domain would be tied to things like graveyards (both natural and man-made). Some of the domains are harder to conceptualize, but each would have areas of natural strength and then rely on temples and shrines beyond that. As was put by Jowgen, the source of each deity's power is actually on the outer planes. Domains and the forces related to them would be the inroads for each deity to spread their network through the world, and temples and shrines would be mortal constructs to help enhance this natural influence.


The divine servers are located on the outer planes. Some pantheons have shared or networked servers to ensure good bandwidth, though each deity has its own private server as well. Planar traits can cause signal interference or boosts, while each deity can use a divi-fi jammer to keep other deities' signals out of their divine realm.Divine casters travelling outside the material plane could run into complete and total lack of service if they end up in a contrary domain. Which is another reason why much of the real conflict is on the material plane.


I don't want midichlorians in my D&D.I used to have a housemate who was an entomologist. He thought it would be funny to put some of the bugs he used to feed his pet iguana into my cereal box. This is how I envision midichlorians in D&D: Mealworms in my cereal. :smallyuk:


How does spoofing work in this setting? Say I run out my daily allowance for slots under provider 1. Is there a mechanic for me to try to pretend to be another cleric and keep casting?I actually think this setting opens the door for custom feats, magic items, and even spells to take advantage of the unique situations that arise.

[Lapak]

I don't want midichlorians in my D&D.Gotcha covered.

Wizards aren't wifi users. They use a much more primitive and much less refined spectrum of energy: they're essentially ham radio operators. None of them can hold a candle to the juice a god can generate overall, but on the other hand they carry their own transmitter around with them at all times and it's all dedicated to their personal use. They just need periodic down time to recharge the battery that powers it. There's as many methods to charge up as there are wizards - some wizards are solar-powered, some crank the generator with dream energy, some wizards have learned to convert consumed food into magic potential - but what they all have in common is that it takes about 8 hours of uninterrupted charge-time to get back up to full power.

Gods pretty much despise wizards, not only for their pirate-broadcast "magic wants to be free, man" ways, but because particularly potent wizardry can cause interference with the divine wifi signal. They're not the same wavelength, but pump enough raw energy into the air and everything gets a little fuzzy around the edges, causing slight service interruptions that momentarily delay the effects of divine magic as the download has to complete and run a checksum to make sure it arrived intact before executing. Clerics are typically encouraged not to associate with the riffraff unless it's necessary for a Divine Purpose, though there will always be those in the divine hierarchy who buck the trend out of rebelliousness or a belief in their ability to convert the wicked with friendship. A god that sees too many home-operators messing with His airwaves may send some suggestions for a neighborhood cleanup effort down the prayer line, ranging from the polite or seemingly-innocent (missionaries showing up at the wizard's tower every couple of days to share the good news, the site for the new temple with the really loud bell tower being chosen next door by sheer coincidence) to the blunt (local politicians encouraged to introduce 'unlicensed magic' taxes, constabulary bribed to hold all deliveries for 'routine inspection') to the extreme (an Inquisition complete with torches and fancy hats.)

[Acanous]

If you like furries.

That’s really not a fair assessment of the comic. There are wizards, one of which has a transformation spell that gives him a cat-creature form. It comes up very rarely. There’s a shifter that can turn into a squirrel. Way back over a decade ago there was a story arc with a handful of shifters, who were practically never seen again. For the last 4 years or so it’s been kids with magic fighting monsters.


People who like furries are going to be disappointed in the lack of furries.

Anyway, divine wifi.

I can see actual LG vs LG conflict arising out of this, and that’s a story I almost never get to tell- it’s too likely they’ll hug it out and team up later. If your god is say, the LG god of harvests, and requires farmland to carry divi-fi, and the LG god of cities needs some land appropriated for a temple...

[DragonsAion]

So what about data usage and is there and overage charge?

[daremetoidareyo]

So what about data usage and is there and overage charge?

The lawful planes enforce net neutrality as part of the pact primeval.

[Zombulian]

That’s really not a fair assessment of the comic. There are wizards, one of which has a transformation spell that gives him a cat-creature form. It comes up very rarely. There’s a shifter that can turn into a squirrel. Way back over a decade ago there was a story arc with a handful of shifters, who were practically never seen again. For the last 4 years or so it’s been kids with magic fighting monsters.


People who like furries are going to be disappointed in the lack of furries.

Yeah it probably wasn't fair for me to answer as it's probably been 6 years since I read the thing. I just remember a lot of sexual stuff with yon squirrel maiden.

[BowStreetRunner]

I can see actual LG vs LG conflict arising out of this, and that’s a story I almost never get to tell- it’s too likely they’ll hug it out and team up later. If your god is say, the LG god of harvests, and requires farmland to carry divi-fi, and the LG god of cities needs some land appropriated for a temple...
I could see this as a conflict in any settings - the spread of cities sponsored by Urbanus (NG) encroaching on the woodlands of Ehlonna (NG) could create friction between the two regardless of setting. But competition for resources (worshipers, network access) is a great source of friction among the gods of any campaign world.

So what about data usage and is there and overage charge?
Overages are something that would require another house rule to represent. IRL you have a contract for a certain amount of usage and no hard cap, so you can go over. In the game each character has a set number of spells per day. Allowing overages would mean players could cast beyond their daily limits. A novel idea. But what would be the charges associated with overage casting? This is something I'd like to explore a little more. Has there ever been an option to allow casters to go over their daily allotments in exchange for facing some sort of penalty?

The lawful planes enforce net neutrality as part of the pact primeval.I think Net neutrality would come into play when using a provider other than your own (part of the network that belonged to a different deity in your pantheon) to access spells from your own deity, but also anytime you use your deity's network to access something not in your god's portfolio. So any of those feats/abilities that allow you to cast something not explicitly on your deity's list (general cleric spells + your deity's domain spells, in most cases) would require net neutrality to be in place. Without it there might be additional problems accessing such spells.

[thethird]

Gotcha covered.

Wizards aren't wifi users. They use a much more primitive and much less refined spectrum of energy: they're essentially ham radio operators. None of them can hold a candle to the juice a god can generate overall, but on the other hand they carry their own transmitter around with them at all times and it's all dedicated to their personal use. They just need periodic down time to recharge the battery that powers it. There's as many methods to charge up as there are wizards - some wizards are solar-powered, some crank the generator with dream energy, some wizards have learned to convert consumed food into magic potential - but what they all have in common is that it takes about 8 hours of uninterrupted charge-time to get back up to full power.

Gods pretty much despise wizards, not only for their pirate-broadcast "magic wants to be free, man" ways, but because particularly potent wizardry can cause interference with the divine wifi signal. They're not the same wavelength, but pump enough raw energy into the air and everything gets a little fuzzy around the edges, causing slight service interruptions that momentarily delay the effects of divine magic as the download has to complete and run a checksum to make sure it arrived intact before executing. Clerics are typically encouraged not to associate with the riffraff unless it's necessary for a Divine Purpose, though there will always be those in the divine hierarchy who buck the trend out of rebelliousness or a belief in their ability to convert the wicked with friendship. A god that sees too many home-operators messing with His airwaves may send some suggestions for a neighborhood cleanup effort down the prayer line, ranging from the polite or seemingly-innocent (missionaries showing up at the wizard's tower every couple of days to share the good news, the site for the new temple with the really loud bell tower being chosen next door by sheer coincidence) to the blunt (local politicians encouraged to introduce 'unlicensed magic' taxes, constabulary bribed to hold all deliveries for 'routine inspection') to the extreme (an Inquisition complete with torches and fancy hats.)

Are gods simply very powerful wizards then?

[Nifft]

Are gods simply very powerful wizards then?

Don't look down on Wizards like that.

[Uncle Pine]

Are gods simply very powerful wizards then?

Don't look down on Wizards like that.
May I sig this? :smallbiggrin:

[Nifft]

May I sig this? :smallbiggrin:

You have my permission.

[Andor13]

So what about Shinto style little local gods with 'naught but little roadside shrines or little cairns? Is that some old school dial-up BBS boards hanging on in a world that has moved on?

[Mato]

Hi, post skimmer here. I made it as far as the idea of a bad signal from your deity limits spell access is something that appeared in 2nd edition. In 3rd, Modern makes a couple references to the idea of networks being created out of magic and you even get some spells for it (like emailing scrolls). And 5th's UA modern article includes a channel divinity option to make any city utility work perfectly, in some countries that would include Internet access which makes your clerics a provider of actual wifi.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

I can see actual LG vs LG conflict arising out of this, and that’s a story I almost never get to tell- it’s too likely they’ll hug it out and team up later. If your god is say, the LG god of harvests, and requires farmland to carry divi-fi, and the LG god of cities needs some land appropriated for a temple...

Nah, LG vs. LG conflict probably wouldn't happen, providers like keeping people locked to their phones and their data plans too much and inter-faith conflicts might convince worshipers to switch providers.

LG (http://www.lg.com/global/mobile/index.html) vs. NG (https://www.ng-mobile.de/) vs. CG (https://cg-mobile.com/?SID=kk2490551mk9g383okem0b8js0) conflicts, however... :smallwink:

[BowStreetRunner]

There have been a lot of interesting suggestions here. I'm just going to share the parts that I am adopting for the campaign I am working on. Obviously others will have their own thoughts as to what would be best to include, so this is just what I chose to use.

Each deity has a realm in the outer planes where they are all powerful. On the mortal planes worshippers of the deity can take class levels with divine casting in order to access level 0 spells from that deity anywhere on the plane. When a shrine to the deity is erected (an altar is sufficient) and the proper rituals performed, this location allows access to spells up to 3rd level from that deity, in a radius of 10 miles. Spells up to 2nd level are available out an additional 10 miles, and up to 1st level 10 miles further than that. An actual temple that is consecrated to the deity grants up to 6th level spells, with declining levels in 20 mile increments. There are also greater temples (may be called a cathedral, high temple, basilica, etc.) that grant up to 9th level spells, with declining levels in 30 mile increments. Regardless of the level available, individual casters still need to be able to use spells of that level.

Each deity has certain conditions considered favorable based on their domains and/or portfolio. When these conditions are present, availability of spells goes up to 1 level higher than normal. (Maximum spell level available would be higher in a forest for worshippers of a forest god, higher during storms for worshippers of a storm god, or higher during battles for worshippers of a war god.) Possession of a Relic would always be considered favorable conditions for the associated deity to divine casters with the True Believer feat. Each deity would also have a high holy day when conditions are always considered favorable.

The area around a shrine or temple can also be considered unfavorable to opposed deities. In these areas opposed divine casters have access to spells 1 level lower than normal. Note that an opposed deity is one that has been specifically designated such - it does not apply to just any deity of a differing alignment or viewpoint.

Certain deities are part of pantheons that share temples. A temple to a a specific deity in that pantheon will grant divine casters who worship other deities in the pantheon unlimited access to spells up to 1 level below the maximum for that area, and up to 1 spell per day of the highest level abailable. There are also temples dedicated to the pantheon as a whole. These have no restriction on the highest level spells for any member of the pantheon. Members of the same pantheon are never considered opposed deities.

Divine casters regain their normal alotment of spell slots each day when they meditate and pray, regardless of the level of access available. However, divine casters who prepare spells for the day can only prepare spells that area currently available. They must level any slots open that are of a higher level than current conditions allow. Later they may fill these slots if they gain access to an area with spells of that level through 10 minutes of further prayer and meditation. If the divine caster is able to cast spontaneously then those spells may be cast as soon as the caster has the necessary slots and finds themselves in an area that grants spells of that level. Divine casters may always use higher level spell slots to prepare and/or cast lower level spells that are available. (Note that if a spell is prepared but access to that level is lost later, the spell is still considered prepared until cast. It just can't be cast until that level is available.)

On high holy days priests of each deity are expected to bestow extra blessings upon their worshippers in some way. Due to the vast number of spells being cast at that time, on these days there is a cumulative 5% chance each spell cast will fail - although the spell slot will not be used up. Once a spell fails in this way the failure chance resets to 5% again.

A few specific items would be added to the campaign.
- Various types of portable altars would exist that are already properly consecrated to serve as mobile shrines.
- For each deity there would be a type of incense, holy water, unguent, or similar substance that would serve as a consumable which creats favorable conditions during spell preparation.

A couple more notes about the campaign:
- In this specific campaign, there is a massive empire surrounded by a handful of smaller kingdoms, city states, and lots of barbarian tribes (similar to the Roman Empire).
- Arcane magic is outlawed and subject to persecution by the Inquisition.
- Druids come from the barbarian lands and are subject to persecution as pagans.
- Divine casters to any but the Imperial Pantheon are considered heretics and also persecuted.
- A Schism has occurred in the Imperial church, with the pantheon dividing between the Eastern and Western deities. The Empire has fallen into a state of civil war as a result, with the Emperor refusing to choose sides and remaining neutral while the two factions wage war.