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Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 04:45 PM
One thing that's irked me considerably about the deities of 4e is that the information about them in the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide seems to have been intentionally left vague. For someone playing a paladin or a cleric, this can be frustrating, as your religion is the most important part of your roleplaying.

The deity that I find the most confusing is the one I'm playing a paladin of at the moment, Pelor. While I'm relieved that there don't seem to be any more "OMG PELOR'Z REELY EVUL!" jokes floating around, the new Pelor seems to be made up of several disparate elements.

He's the Good god of:


the sun
summer
time
agriculture
the harvest


He also supports those in need and fights against any and all evil. He's worshiped by humans more than any other deity and his tenets are as following:


Alleviate suffering wherever you find it.
Bring Pelor's light into places of farkness, showing kindness, mercy and compassion.
Be watchful against evil.


To be honest, I find it difficult to reconcile all these different aspects in roleplaying a single character.

What do you think? Is there a way to reconcile all these elements? What the hell was up with people claiming that Pelor was actually evil anyway? How would one roleplay a Pelorian character in a place where Pelor wasn't the dominant human religion (I'm playing a Pelorian paladin in a place where The Raven Queen is dominant)?

Thank you for your kind attention.

hamishspence
2008-11-16, 04:52 PM
jozan the cleric of Pelor is depicted as casting a least one Evil spell in PHB- symbol of pain.

In Dragon, the evil ex-cleric of Pelor, in a short story (not sure if it was extract from the 3.0 greyhawk era books) voiced the old philosophical suffering problem: "If Pelor is all-powerful, he is not good, and if he is Good, he is not all powerful"

Starbuck_II
2008-11-16, 04:55 PM
One thing that's irked me considerably about the deities of 4e is that the information about them in the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide seems to have been intentionally left vague. For someone playing a paladin or a cleric, this can be frustrating, as your religion is the most important part of your roleplaying.


He's the Good god of:


the sun
summer
time
agriculture
the harvest


He also supports those in need and fights against any and all evil. He's worshiped by humans more than any other deity and his tenets are as following:


Alleviate suffering wherever you find it.
Bring Pelor's light into places of farkness, showing kindness, mercy and compassion.
Be watchful against evil.


To be honest, I find it difficult to reconcile all these different aspects in roleplaying a single character.

Easy. Focus yourself.

Examples:
You are one with nature and its bountiful harvest. Man kind's Nature is to help those who need help and relieve their pain.
You don't actively kill evil, but you are ready to defend yourself if the need arises.

Really, it is easy. Take what part you will and go with it.




What do you think? Is there a way to reconcile all these elements?

How would one roleplay a Pelorian character in a place where Pelor wasn't the dominant human religion (I'm playing a Pelorian paladin in a place where The Raven Queen is dominant)?

Thank you for your kind attention.
Yes, there is a way. FR did back with Amunator: God of the Sun back in 3rd edition.




The deity that I find the most confusing is the one I'm playing a paladin of at the moment, Pelor. While I'm relieved that there don't seem to be any more "OMG PELOR'Z REELY EVUL!" jokes floating around, the new Pelor seems to be made up of several disparate elements.


What the hell was up with people claiming that Pelor was actually evil anyway?


Run now before Pelorites get you for telling the secret of Pelor's alignment...
There are loads of well supported premises and evideence of Pelors evil in previous editions.

We assume in 4th he is finally good, but we can't be sure.
I'll give you a hint:
Jozan casts evil spells (in the PHB no less) which requires Pelor to be neutral or evil not Good.

In Complete Scoundrel, the Cleric of Pelor says, " Take him, my slaves! Drag his soul back to your dark masters (Pelor I ask?)!"

Mewtarthio
2008-11-16, 04:59 PM
In Dragon, the evil ex-cleric of Pelor, in a short story (not sure if it was extract from the 3.0 greyhawk era books) voiced the old philosophical suffering problem: "If Pelor is all-powerful, he is not good, and if he is Good, he is not all powerful"

That is irrelevant, because Pelor is not all-powerful. The setting's polytheistic.


Jozan casts evil spells (in the PHB no less) which requires Pelor to be neutral or evil not Good.

...I'm not entirely sure, but can't clerics cast spells opposing their own alignments? An evil cleric would be unable to follow Pelor, but I'm pretty sure a cleric of Pelor can cast [Evil] spells.


In Complete Scoundrel, the Cleric of Pelor says, " Take him, my slaves! Drag his soul back to your dark masters (Pelor I ask?)!"

Complete Scoundrel? Was that the one with the Grey Guard?

bosssmiley
2008-11-16, 05:03 PM
While I'm relieved that there don't seem to be any more "OMG PELOR'Z REELY EVUL!" jokes floating around, the new Pelor seems to be made up of several disparate elements.

The 'Pelor is evil' meme goes back at least a decade, to the days of 2E and Planescape. And it's a poor role-player who can't see potential in the idea of a heretical cult that consider the Burning Eye the fount of all evil in the world.

As for trying to get your head around Pelor as written in the the 4E PHB. He's a classic solar divinity archetype, pretty much Apollo + Horus-Re/Amun-Re/Aten.

Starbuck_II
2008-11-16, 05:06 PM
Here is some Pelor Information on his nature of evil essasy:
http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=846926

Random NPC
2008-11-16, 05:09 PM
In Complete Scoundrel, the Cleric of Pelor says, " Take him, my slaves! Drag his soul back to your dark masters (Pelor I ask?)!"

That's the quote for the Malconvoker, which is a good summoner who tricks evil creature into helping him. The cleric is telling his slaves to take the enemy to THEIR dark master, not the cleric's.

Aquillion
2008-11-16, 05:11 PM
I really think we need to start compiling lists of reasons why Pelor is evil in 4e. This is something that WotC absolutely cannot change simply with an edition shift; Pelor's evil is metaphysical in nature and transcends all settings.


That's the quote for the Malconvoker, which is a good summoner who tricks evil creature into helping him. The cleric is telling his slaves to take the enemy to THEIR dark master, not the cleric's.
And... that makes it all right?

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 05:14 PM
Perhaps an explanation of the setting I'm in will help?

Flickerdart
2008-11-16, 05:18 PM
Just because his tenets are to "be watchful against evil" doesn't make him Good. Indeed, parading as a Good god, Pelor can strike at other Evils with impunity.

hamishspence
2008-11-16, 05:24 PM
Cleric section "can't cast spells of alignment opposed to deity"

Though, it could be a "dark Jozan" like the vampire one in Heroes of horror, doing the symbol casting.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 05:28 PM
Here's some information about the setting:

THE VALE OF THORNS________________________
Within an enormous forest (the World Forest) is a wide open space, filled with cruel thorns. Dotted amongst the thorns are walled settlements or clearings with other terrain features (lakes, hills, fey groves, entrances to the Labyrinth, etc).

The Vale of Thorns is a place where the Feywild had collided with the Shadowfell.

Most people aren't prepared to venture into the Thorns. They have a seductive, corrupting beauty, and tales abound of those who have wandered into their embrace and been torn apart. Travel through the Vale can only be achieved via certain ancient paths, known as rose-ways. Some of the larger rose-ways are common knowledge, but most remain a secret to the majority of the mortals of the Vale, and some are known by only the oldest and greatest of the Vale's denizens.

THE THORNS___________________________________________
The Thorns take up most of the space in the Vale. In most places they stand some thirty feet high, thick, dense hedges of razor sharp needles. Each and every one is a paragon, a perfect example of what a thorn hedge should be. Despite their wicked barbs, the Thorns are beautiful, and can captivate and ensnare an unprepared traveller. The emotion they inspire within others is their greatest danger; even if a victim is not torn to pieces by the Thorns he may lose his mind and become their slave, or be drawn into their midst and become unable to find his way home.

Travel through the Thorns falls into three categories: travel by rose-way, travel by path, and travelling blind.

1. Travel by rose-way: Travel by rose-way refers to journeys that take a person along one of the Vale’s many safe walks, the rose-ways. Strewn with blood red rose petals, these trails offer safe passage through the Thorns. Travellers are normally immune to the lures of the Thorns while on a rose-way, though during the summer and winter Equinoxes the Thorns power extends even here.

While the rose-ways protect their travellers from the Thorns, they are far from safe. A myriad of evil creatures, from callous goblins to twisted dryads, prowl amongst the Thorns waiting for an opportune moment to prey upon mortals. Whenever someone leaves the safety of their settlement and traverses the Vale, they take their life in their hands.

2. Travel by path: Travel by path refers to journeys along a cleared section of the Thorns, but not along a rose-way. Here the Thorns can freely influence travellers, albeit not to the extent that they can when mortals travel blind. At this point the Thorns can only exert their power on travellers to walk off the path and amongst them proper, or to direct the monsters of the Vale to their location.

3. Travelling blind: Travelling blind refers to journeys through the Thorn that do not follow a path. A mortal might leave a path for any number of reasons; running from foes, chasing a quarry, or taking a shortcut. My far the most common reason however, is the lure of the Thorns themselves, who call to mortals when they travel by path. Once in the Thorns a creature is often killed within minutes, the deadly barbs biting hard into their flesh. In other cases the death is psychological, the creature becoming a puppet of the Thorns or simply stripped of mind and put into a vegetative state and left to rot. Memories are a favourite target of the Thorns; a mortal may suddenly find himself many miles from home, with no memory of how he arrived at his current location or how to get back.

As well as the danger the Thorns pose themselves, creatures travelling blind must fight for every step forwards. Without a path already in place, they must create one themselves, hacking through the dense hedges. The Thorns have been known to re-grow behind those who travel blind, leaving them lost or unable to move.

CREATURES OF THE THORNS_____________________________
The common races: The so called ‘common races’ (dragonborn, dwarves, eladrin, elves, half-elves, humans, halflings and tiefling) come range of histories. Oldest of all are the halflings, who travelled to the World Forest from places unknown and settled there.

From the halflings came another race, though very little is known of how they came into the world or what form they took. Some stories tell of them appearing from a halfling witch’s dream, and another of a master inventor building them. What is known is that these beings eventually came to clear a vast section of the World Forest, and built a city that spanned its entirety.

Neither is it known why this race was destroyed. At the height of its magnificence, the great city sunk into the mud, and the race that built it were only ever seen as corpses below the surface. The network of passages, rooms, open squares and great halls is now known as the Labyrinth, and entrances to it can be found all over the Vale.

A great slew of magical energy was released at the death of the great city, and it created new wonders at its touch. Dwarves were born from the living rock of the mountains, and humans from the clay mud that had consumed the city. From the latter came tieflings, in time, evil humans who struck foul bargains with the creatures of the Nine Hells and damned their offspring to bear the mark of this servitude for eternity. It was the tiefling who created the dragonspawn, and the humans soon sought to address the balance by bringing the dragonborn into the world.

The eladrin and elves arrived with the growth of the Thorns, along with the other fey creatures of the Vale. In time some of them were able to throw off the Curse and found settlements of their own.

The other races: The Thorns hold sway over not only the land of the Vale, but also the vast majority of the fey that live within it. As the Thorns grew and covered the earth, the fey were born from them, and born into mental slavery. Satyrs, dryads, eladrin, elves, and many other creatures were these slaves, and remained under the Thorns’ control for centuries. Gradually, small groups of fey threw off what they now refer to as ‘the Curse’, and some (most prevalently the eladrin and elves) founded settlements of their own. Lunaer was one such city, and Garndall another. Illaya’Fae is the largest settlement founded by fey creatures, and comprised of a cross section of all those who have shaken of the Curse.

Freedom from the Curse did not necessarily breed a friendly demeanour however; the Vale’s dryads are quick to attack those who trespass on their groves, its satyrs continue to roam the Vale and do as they please, and the elves and eladrin act no more hospitably to strangers than other races.

The various monstrous races, such as goblins, orcs, kobolds, gnolls and minotaurs, predate the Thorns, and are thus not bound by the Curse (although the Thorns still have the power to bewitch their minds, just as they can any creature).

SETTLEMENTS_______________________________________ ___
In some rare places the Thorns cannot grow. These sheltered pockets, known as glades, are sometimes areas where the Feywild is particularly strong, but sometimes areas where the Shadowfell is particularly strong. Settlements comprised of good or unaligned creatures are built on the former, and settlements comprised of evil creatures are built on the latter. The Vale is sympathetic to the alignments of its denizens however, and a glade can change from Feywild to Shadowfell (or vice versa) depending on who lives there. Usually this process takes at least 25 years, but in rare cases it can be 50 years, centuries, or never happens at all.

There are many glades in addition to the settlements mention below. Some have features of terrain, such as mountains, hills, lakes, springs, forests or copses. Many others have entrances to the Labyrinth, the undead-filled ruins of the metropolis that sank beneath the earth long ago.

Magic items: Note that the magic item economy is not present in the Vale. The Disenchant Item ritual thus has no component cost (DMG pg 155).

Firepoint (Shadowfell):

Firepoint is the largest settlement in the Vale, a city of some 25,000 souls. Its population is a mix of all the standard races, with noticeably less eladrin and more humans. Even monstrous races are common enough here, from gnolls to minotaurs to gnomes to satyrs.

Firepoint was built on the ruins of Narcirca (literally, ‘raven’s cradle’), a great stronghold of the shadar-kai and their first settlement in the Vale. It was destroyed by the eladrin of Lunaer, a battle that cost almost all of the attacking force’s numbers and reduced the city to smoking rubble.

At the time of its destruction Narcirca was situated in a Shadowfell glade, and this fact has not changed since Firepoint’s creation. It becomes noticeably darker and oppressive the closer one draws to the city, and within a mile radius of its city centre there is perpetual drizzle. Firepoint’s architecture, regardless of its designer, invariably looks old and ugly, growing more and more dilapidated as the years go by and eventually falling down entirely. The city is also called ‘the City of Alleys’ because of its narrow, twisting streets and cramped squares. In most places the crowds are thick, crammed into a settlement that is increasingly expanding upwards to make space for its large population.

With no room for fields, and the weather making it impossible to grow anything anyway, Firepoint depends completely on the trade that comes through it. Conveniently, it lies between the farming settlements of the east and the mines of the west, so trade caravans pass through regularly. Effectively, Firepoint controls the wide rose-ways east and west, but should they close for some reason the populace would quickly starve.

Another noticeable feature of Firepoint is its lack of shops. The city has, and always will have, no established market stalls or other places of business where goods can be perused by customers. Instead, a class of people called ‘Bagmen’ (regardless of gender) take orders from customers, and then acquire the goods one way or another. Bagmen are part merchant, part scavenger and part thief, looting, stealing and buying the items their customers want. Rich Bagmen employ a network of other Bagmen (called ‘Runners’) to get their goods, and only handle the customer interaction, but poorer Bagmen must do both tasks.

The time between ordering something and receiving it differ greatly from Bagman to Bagman, and also depend on the rarity of the item. Usually it takes a few days, longer for poor Bagmen and faster for rich ones. Some of the most prominent Bagmen (who therefore have the most and best Runners) can get everyday items in mere hours.

Government: Firepoint is joint ruled by two groups. The first is the nobility, comprised of House Orak, House Sethar and House Lursis. The nobles vote for a Duke or Duchess to rule, and they serve for life (or retirement). The nobles are responsible for maintaining the city’s architecture and infrastructure, and making sure the Watch prevent the undead spilling out from the Labyrinth (which has a large number of entry points in Firepoint). The current Duchess is the human Ekaterina Lursis.

The other group is the Razor Guild, a band of assassins led by a woman called Leshanna Cutter (an eladrin raised by human parents). Miss Cutter, as she prefers to be known, runs the city day-to-day; the Razor Guild is responsible for policing Firepoint, settling legal cases, and maintaining trading affairs. In return, assassins with a Guild licence are free to ply their trade.

Defence: The Watch are Firepoint’s army, a professional body of men and women serving under the nobility. Their primary role is to guard the city from the undead of the Labyrinth, and run regular patrols into its outskirts. In the event of an attack on the city they serve as front-line troops. The entirety of Firepoint are considered to be reserve troops as well, though members of the Razor Guild are called up first.

Commerce: Virtually anything, given time, can be acquired in Firepoint via a Bagman. Magic items and other rarities take considerably longer, and the skill and resources of the Bagman also affect arrival delay.

Organisations: In addition to the Razor Guild, Firepoint boasts a large number of clubs, temples, societies and unions. Each is capable of exerting pressure in the right circumstances, and the temples especially have considerable sway.

Narsopath [Shadowfell]:

Formerly an eladrin town called Lunaer (literally, ‘jewel’), Narsopath (literally ‘raven’s flight’) now stands as the largest of the shadar-kai settlements with a population of roughly 10,000. Lunaer was built in a Feywild glade, but its occupation (beginning some thirty years ago) by shadar-kai has warped the place and its beauty is long gone.

As Lunaer the town was one of the eladrin’s most beautiful, full of graceful architecture and lush gardens. Unfortunately the siege of Narcirca had cost the eladrin army dear, and it was unable to repulse the shadar-kai attack. The invaders swept in with minimal casualties and enslaved the entire populace, a revenge attack for the destruction of Narcirca.

Lunaer’s stately architecture was quickly torn down and replaced with high-density, efficient, and entirely ugly housing. A mass drive by the occupiers occurred town-wide, to both destroy the eladrin’s past to replace it with structures based purely on functionality and resource management. The result was dull, grey, and spirit-crushing, but equally strong, defensible and stable.

All of this was made possible by the creation, immediately after the invasion, of the town’s caste system. The caste has four tiers: upper, middle, lower, and untouchables. The upper class rules the town, filling the role of politicians and nobles. The middle class are the administration, doctors, lawyers, merchants and teachers. The lower class are a slave tier, comprised almost exclusively of eladrin captured during the invasion. They take the more menial yet essential and skilled jobs of the city, plumbers, builders, cleaners, farmers, butchers and bakers. The lowest tier, untouchables, are the outcasts of the caste system. Some still fill a role and are thus eligible for housing and food (albeit of the worst quality), such as undertakers and tanners, but most are those who have been rejected by the town entirely and have only begging or thievery to survive on.

Any member of any tier can be moved up or down according to merit, regardless of race, although the system is weighted to favour the higher tiers (and all eladrin were automatically put into the lower class after the invasion). The caste proved to be so successful in Narsopath that it was rolled out across all the shadar-kai settlements, and all shadar-kai are now part of it.

Government: Narsopath is ruled by its upper tier, a group of citizens who have been singled out from an early age as ruler material and trained in town management. In total, the governing body is comprised of a parliament of 50 men and women, with other members of the tier serving in a permanent position as advisers to the parliament and still more running individual sections of the town (such as the army, hospitals, schools, etc).

Defence: Narsopath employs a professional army, drawn from the middle tier, and they also attend to the policing of the town. In the event of a full-blown invasion, the entirety of the upper and middle tiers are conscripted into a militia and serve on the front-line (though the upper tier is usually placed in positions of command, such as unit captains or full-blown generals).

It is illegal to carry a weapon or use magic without a licence in Narsopath, and such licenses are usually only obtainable if the applicant is a member of the army or of the upper tier.

Commerce: Goods are tightly controlled by Narsopath’s government via the merchants of the middle tier. All items are stockpiled in warehouses as soon as possible, and rationed to the populace according to need. No luxuries exist, and it is only via thieves (usually untouchables) that an individual can purchase anything at all. Narsopath trades with other shadar-kai settlements, but is largely self-sufficient due to the fields within the town walls.

Organisations: Societies of any kind are illegal in Narsopath, aside from its parliament and the two General Meetings, held for the middle and lower tiers every six months. At these meetings, members of the tier are called on to bring relevant matters to the attention of the upper tier (such as the state of housing, food rations, etc). Citizens are not permitted to form organisations before or after the General Meetings however, even if such organisations are concerned with General Meeting business.

Artanis
2008-11-16, 05:33 PM
One thing that's irked me considerably about the deities of 4e is that the information about them in the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide seems to have been intentionally left vague. For someone playing a paladin or a cleric, this can be frustrating, as your religion is the most important part of your roleplaying.

The deity that I find the most confusing is the one I'm playing a paladin of at the moment, Pelor. While I'm relieved that there don't seem to be any more "OMG PELOR'Z REELY EVUL!" jokes floating around, the new Pelor seems to be made up of several disparate elements.

He's the Good god of:


the sun
summer
time
agriculture
the harvest


Well, agriculture, the harvest, the sun, and summer all fit together really well. As for time, that's a little harder, but it can still tangentally be fit in by relating it either to an aspect of being the god of summer or an aspect of being the god of the sun.

Summer: Summer is a season, and you often hear people (especially in history) seemingly measure time in "seasons". Or at the very least, measuring a year by "oh, it's time to start planting and/or harvesting again!"
The sun: One word: Sundial. Even if nobody has ever even thought of the very concept of a sundial in the default setting, there's still measuring time in terms of days and nights, and further into morning, noon, afternoon, evening, and night.

Neither of these are a perfect fit, but they're a hell of a lot better than some real-world deities I can think of. Mars is a perfect example: he was the Roman god of war...and was an agricultural deity as well (I suspect because soldiers tended to be paid in land, which they would then put a farm on).




He also supports those in need and fights against any and all evil. He's worshiped by humans more than any other deity and his tenets are as following:


Alleviate suffering wherever you find it.
Bring Pelor's light into places of farkness, showing kindness, mercy and compassion.
Be watchful against evil.


To be honest, I find it difficult to reconcile all these different aspects in roleplaying a single character.

What do you think? Is there a way to reconcile all these elements?
Well, it isn't hard to connect the "bring Pelor's light" bit to the fact that he's the god of the sun. He brings light, so his worshippers would do so as well.

As for the "be good and watch against evil", "light" and "darkness" are often equated with good and evil, respectively. The forces of darkness, the dark side of the force, monsters in the night, etc. It's a bit metaphysical, but I can see a connection.

If the second bit is true, then the "alleviate suffering and show kindness/mercy/compassion/etc." would logically follow:


Assume "light = good". Assume that Pelor's followers "bring light"
=> Pelor's followers bring good.
Good usually involves being nice to people and not liking evil
=> Pelor's followers usually try to be nice to people and usually don't like evil
[]

...and yes, I am a mathematician, if you couldn't tell :smalltongue:

As for humans liking him the most, humans are stereotypically the "plains people" (as opposed to Elves being "forest people" and dwarves being "mountain people" and whatnot). Ever been out to the Great Plains? Lots of wheat. And corn. And cows. And then more wheat. And then more cows. And then even more wheat. And...well, you get the point. So the people who live in Farmlandia are naturally going to worship the farming god.


What the hell was up with people claiming that Pelor was actually evil anyway? How would one roleplay a Pelorian character in a place where Pelor wasn't the dominant human religion (I'm playing a Pelorian paladin in a place where The Raven Queen is dominant)?

Thank you for your kind attention.
I didn't even realize people were calling Pelor evil. Come to think of it, I didn't actually realize people discussed his alignment one way or another *shrug*.

Anyways, you could roleplay a Peloradin in such a world in several ways (some of which depend on specific aspects of the setting that may or may not be there). He could be a rebellious type fighting the established order, like Robin Hood, only with glowing swords. He could be a secret cultist trying to spread his "subversive, unnatural faith" to the underbelly of society. Or he could just be somebody with a wierd religion.

Random NPC
2008-11-16, 05:37 PM
And... that makes it all right?

It doesn't, but that's the point of the Malconvoker (which is F'ing sweet)

OP, you could play a cleric of Pelor who prefers to use his lazer pew pew Lance of Faith and make him more priest like than warrior like. A Paladin is little less different, since he should focus in radiant damage.

I would make his believes be close to Christianity with a sprinkle of spanish inquisition (Nobody would expect it anyway :smallwink: ). He should care for everyone and see they are alright, but never doubt to hurt the transgressors and sinners.

The whole Harvest, agriculture and time goes more to the agrarian believes of Humans and the sun: The sun gives light and warmth, which is good for the crops. The crops keeps us alive and thus it is good. Time is measured by the sun since his movement reflect how much time has passed or how strong it is. If the sun is weak, then we have winter and the crops die. Without the warmth of the sun, we are dead.

Having a Paladin of Pelor in a Raven Queen dominant society is not that hard. He should understand that the Queen is in charge of the time when Pelor has to be absent and where Pelor does not reign, the Raven Queen will. The crops have to die in order to plant them again, so the Raven Queen is respected.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 05:39 PM
The general feel of my Peloradin at the moment is that of a naive, optimistic country boy suddenly trapped in a world where if he shows any weakness or gullibility someone'll cut his throat and steal his purse.

Random NPC
2008-11-16, 05:43 PM
The general feel of my Peloradin at the moment is that of a naive, optimistic country boy suddenly trapped in a world where if he shows any weakness or gullibility someone'll cut his throat and steal his purse.
It feels perfect.

Also, never fear the power of the Tropes (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FarmBoy)

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 05:49 PM
Well...not exactly a farm boy. His human father left his elf mother when he found out she was pregnant, and after he was born she couldn't take care of him on her own, so she gave him to the priests of a tiny Pelorian abbey in a small farming community. He was raised by priests rather than farmers.:smallredface:

Doomsy
2008-11-16, 06:14 PM
One thing that's irked me considerably about the deities of 4e is that the information about them in the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Guide seems to have been intentionally left vague. For someone playing a paladin or a cleric, this can be frustrating, as your religion is the most important part of your roleplaying.

The deity that I find the most confusing is the one I'm playing a paladin of at the moment, Pelor. While I'm relieved that there don't seem to be any more "OMG PELOR'Z REELY EVUL!" jokes floating around, the new Pelor seems to be made up of several disparate elements.

He's the Good god of:


the sun
summer
time
agriculture
the harvest


He also supports those in need and fights against any and all evil. He's worshiped by humans more than any other deity and his tenets are as following:


Alleviate suffering wherever you find it.
Bring Pelor's light into places of farkness, showing kindness, mercy and compassion.
Be watchful against evil.


To be honest, I find it difficult to reconcile all these different aspects in roleplaying a single character.

What do you think? Is there a way to reconcile all these elements? What the hell was up with people claiming that Pelor was actually evil anyway? How would one roleplay a Pelorian character in a place where Pelor wasn't the dominant human religion (I'm playing a Pelorian paladin in a place where The Raven Queen is dominant)?

Thank you for your kind attention.

My basic theory?

"Hey, the sun is good, right?" Was the general and most depthful thought involved in writing him up. While many gods have fertility and harvest aspects (primitive people thought about food a lot and hedged their bets accordingly), his portfolio is pretty much all over. Most of it is vaguely connected and badly thought out. This is generally typical for D&D, though. I'd suggest just reorganizing as you see fit and with aid from your DM.

And...Time? What the hell? People used the stars for calenders and navigation, not the largely unchanging amorphous ball of flaming gas. I can get the rest vaguely, but that is just..lazy.

Artanis
2008-11-16, 06:30 PM
Mind explaining how, exactly, his portfolio is "pretty much all over"? Pretty much every single aspect of the portfolio can be tied to either A) agriculture, or B) the sun, which are connected to each other.

As for time, the PHB doesn't say he's the god of time. It says he's the Keeper of time, but doesn't say he's the god of it. The fact that people measure time in terms of days (you know, the number of times the sun crosses the sky) ties KEEPING time to the SUN god a lot more closely than many real-world deities.

Ryuuk
2008-11-16, 06:33 PM
Sun and Time aren't that far-fetched. If you don't have any other means to tell time, then the position of the sun would pretty much dictates it. For a follower of Pelor, time might simply mean "Sun's up? Need to get to work, the harvest doesn't tend to itself and summer doesn't last forever. Sun's setting? Alright, it's been a long day guys, lets keep going tomorrow."

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-11-16, 06:42 PM
He's the Good god of:


the sun
summer
time
agriculture
the harvest


He also supports those in need and fights against any and all evil. He's worshiped by humans more than any other deity and his tenets are as following:


Alleviate suffering wherever you find it.
Bring Pelor's light into places of farkness, showing kindness, mercy and compassion.
Be watchful against evil.


To be honest, I find it difficult to reconcile all these different aspects in roleplaying a single character.Don't forget sunburn, skin cancer, drought, and heat exhaustion. :smallwink:

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 06:45 PM
Uh, that's only if you go out without the proper precautions.:smallconfused:

Doomsy
2008-11-16, 08:07 PM
Mind explaining how, exactly, his portfolio is "pretty much all over"? Pretty much every single aspect of the portfolio can be tied to either A) agriculture, or B) the sun, which are connected to each other.

As for time, the PHB doesn't say he's the god of time. It says he's the Keeper of time, but doesn't say he's the god of it. The fact that people measure time in terms of days (you know, the number of times the sun crosses the sky) ties KEEPING time to the SUN god a lot more closely than many real-world deities.

1. Days were not that important to feudal cultures. Knowing the seasons and the months were vital. The sun is a fairly useless landmark - it rises, it falls, it has no irregularities to use as marking periods. The first calendars were lunar because it offered a much better way of timekeeping then asking the guy next to you how many days he had on his count. The dog days of summer come from the constellation Sirius being visible in the evening sky, not some arbitrary day count. Same goes for a lot of time keeping styles.

2. Fall was harvest for a large number of important food crops, more than summer in a lot of areas. There are some in summer, but depending on your area...well. Fall is probably the biggest and most well known harvest time, but this can be arguable and depends a lot on specifics of climate and geography. Same argument can be applied to agriculture - it is a blanket term. Planting, harvest, growth, are actual phases and make sense for an agriculturally based community. Which would be every thing above tribal level.

3. All communities in fantasy are agriculturally based, or tribal, or meat eaters using magic butt-pulls to support themselves. Farming goes on any and everywhere. Not even close to 10 percent of all communities who agricultural in nature worship Pelor. It is pretty much just a boilerplate add-on to any gods portfolio, and that includes historical RL ones. Including Thor.
3. His tenents are so painfully generic that they feel they might have been scripted as some corporate memo.

4. If he is Master of Time, what does the God of Time do? Do gods farm out minor roles? Could I get some explanation here? Is he like the, pardon the pun, day manager of the time franchise?

Tequila Sunrise
2008-11-16, 08:25 PM
To be honest, I find it difficult to reconcile all these different aspects in roleplaying a single character.

What do you think? Is there a way to reconcile all these elements? What the hell was up with people claiming that Pelor was actually evil anyway? How would one roleplay a Pelorian character in a place where Pelor wasn't the dominant human religion (I'm playing a Pelorian paladin in a place where The Raven Queen is dominant)?

Thank you for your kind attention.
It would help if you could tell us why exactly you're having trouble "reconciling" Pelor's portfolio elements, because I can't see where anyone could have difficulty. Being the god of agriculture and summer is a bit odd--most gods of agriculture focus on the spring season when planting starts--but other than that what's so confusing to you? If it helps, think of Pelor as our real world God in D&D...with the added portfolio element of agriculture.

Something to also consider: just because your character is faithful to Pelor doesn't mean he has to revere all of Pelor's aspects in equal measure, or at all. If certain elements of Pelor's dogma don't make sense with others, drop them. That's what different Pelorian sects are for.

TS

Artanis
2008-11-16, 08:26 PM
*Doomsy's post*

Are you saying that the time thing is your one and only objection, and it's enough to ruin the entire portfolio for you?

Further regarding the time thing, tell me how long it is until tuesday. How long do I have to wait for the next Tennessee Volunteers game? My guess is that your answer will be in the form of "X days". And again, it says "keeper of time", not god of, not master of. I have no damn clue what being the "keeper of time" entails, but it does not necessarily mean that he's The Time Guy.

And like I said before, no matter how hokey you think this connection is, there's a LOT of real-life connections that are worse. The god of war also being an agriculture god? The god of hell also being the god of wealth? The god of the ocean also being the god of EARTHquakes? And that's just Roman deities.


As for his tenets, if you are upset about Pelor's being generic, then you must despise a LOT of the DnD deities, because there's a whole lot of generic tenets to go around. As just a few examples, the Raven Queen's tenets boil down to "be a jackass"; Sehanine's to "do your own thing"; and Bahamut's are a lawful, and even more generic, version of Pelor's.

Tell me, what you you suggest he have for tenets?

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 08:30 PM
It would help if you could tell us why exactly you're having trouble "reconciling" Pelor's portfolio elements, because I can't see where anyone could have difficulty. Being the god of agriculture and summer is a bit odd--most gods of agriculture focus on the spring season when planting starts--but other than that what's so confusing to you? If it helps, think of Pelor as our real world God in D&D...with the added portfolio element of agriculture.

Something to also consider: just because your character is faithful to Pelor doesn't mean he has to revere all of Pelor's aspects in equal measure, or at all. If certain elements of Pelor's dogma don't make sense with others, drop them. That's what different Pelorian sects are for.

TS

Mainly trying to reconcile what for all intents and purposes is a farmer's god in a place where farming is all but impossible because of the evil thorns.

SurlySeraph
2008-11-16, 08:38 PM
jozan the cleric of Pelor is depicted as casting a least one Evil spell in PHB- symbol of pain.

In Dragon, the evil ex-cleric of Pelor, in a short story (not sure if it was extract from the 3.0 greyhawk era books) voiced the old philosophical suffering problem: "If Pelor is all-powerful, he is not good, and if he is Good, he is not all powerful"


Here is some Pelor Information on his nature of evil essasy:
http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=846926


Don't forget sunburn, skin cancer, drought, and heat exhaustion. :smallwink:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v350/RenegadePaladin/Moderation%20Stuff/locked-blue.jpg

Nerd-o-rama
2008-11-16, 08:57 PM
Mainly trying to reconcile what for all intents and purposes is a farmer's god in a place where farming is all but impossible because of the evil thorns.Well, like you said. He's a naive upbeat foreigner with a wacky foreign god. Think of him as an ancient Egyptian (whose main gods were all about the Sun and agriculture) who somehow ended up in pre-feudal Norway (whose main gods were all about rainstorms, snowstorms, and pillaging.) He's a major fish out of water, to be sure, so roll with that.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 09:04 PM
I've spoken with my DM. Apparently Pelor has more of a following in the Vale than I originally thought. The only reason I thought the Raven Queen was dominant was because the only divine based character we've met is a priestess of the Raven Queen (She's the DM's character, and is actually a rogue/warlock by class, but is an ordained priestess of the Raven Queen. She's just not a Cleric.). Erathis and Melora have strong followings as well.

Doomsy
2008-11-16, 09:08 PM
Are you saying that the time thing is your one and only objection, and it's enough to ruin the entire portfolio for you?

Further regarding the time thing, tell me how long it is until tuesday. How long do I have to wait for the next Tennessee Volunteers game? My guess is that your answer will be in the form of "X days". And again, it says "keeper of time", not god of, not master of. I have no damn clue what being the "keeper of time" entails, but it does not necessarily mean that he's The Time Guy.

And like I said before, no matter how hokey you think this connection is, there's a LOT of real-life connections that are worse. The god of war also being an agriculture god? The god of hell also being the god of wealth? The god of the ocean also being the god of EARTHquakes? And that's just Roman deities.


As for his tenets, if you are upset about Pelor's being generic, then you must despise a LOT of the DnD deities, because there's a whole lot of generic tenets to go around. As just a few examples, the Raven Queen's tenets boil down to "be a jackass"; Sehanine's to "do your own thing"; and Bahamut's are a lawful, and even more generic, version of Pelor's.

Tell me, what you you suggest he have for tenets?

Actually, those gods you are talking about make a hell of a lot of sense. Rome was near the Mediterranean. Think about what happens when you get an earthquake near the ocean or in it, and pretend not to have a modern education. The god of wealth and the god of hell being the same person? Hey, I wonder how primitive people (or modern ones) could possibly link corruption and wealth. It seems like a real stretch, doesn't it? I mean, really. It is not like people who accumulate lots of money quickly or make the acquisition of wealth itself their only goal are ever unpopular, less than honest, altruistic, or any of the other things that would cause people to dislike them.
God of war and agricultural? Like I said, agriculture is the GED of the gods. If you can't swing that your followers starve. Most of them have some attachment to it. Fertility and war are another attached version, and fertility/agriculture were largely linked for the same reason - humans connect sex and violence on several basic levels. We have much the same reactions to both.

As for tenants? Let's see. I'd probably include a lot about keeping a fire burning every night in worship of Pelor, including a candle or such, one that is lit the moment the sun goes down until it goes up. Special dispensation, as always, for extraordinary circumstances. An instruction to always leave a light on in any place you leave as a sign of respect to Pelor - a fire in the hearth, a single candle burning, etc. Oh, and an order to burn the corpses of the enemies as part of a religious ceremony to purify them or the earth of their presence. Simple things but good roleplaying opportunities.

As for your time thing- a God is the Keeper of Time. They don't just GIVE OUT titles. You don't declare yourself the Master of Tides unless you have something to do with the water, or you look like a major class idiot. Unless the God of Time is *employing* Pelor like a common shopclerk, that is pretty much to be considered part of his domain. Another God in his pantheon has it listed, I'll say I'm sorry.

And days are relative. You are talking about counting. You need to have something delivered in a few months, you don't use days. Months are comprised of days yes, have a cookie. Now understand that study of the night sky is how the original calendars were set up, by the movement of constellations everybody in the area could see, and could be used to announce the changing of seasons - and to properly time religious, commercial, and political events without depending on faulty human memory. You can check the stars, you can check a wristwatch. You can't check and be absolutely sure that Frank is sure the guy said 225 days at noon and has not lost the count. Frank might miss a day. Frank might get stabbed in the eye and not remember if it was the 220th day or the 225th. Frank might be a dumbass. Stars are reliable, steady, and can be used to accurately measure time, especially over longer periods of time. That is exactly why we used them for that instead of, "Hey, a few thousand days ago..."

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 10:13 PM
Well, like you said. He's a naive upbeat foreigner with a wacky foreign god. Think of him as an ancient Egyptian (whose main gods were all about the Sun and agriculture) who somehow ended up in pre-feudal Norway (whose main gods were all about rainstorms, snowstorms, and pillaging.) He's a major fish out of water, to be sure, so roll with that.

As I said, Pelor is not a "wacky foreign god" in the Vale. The Raven Queen may have the strongest following in the biggest city (Firepoint), but she has to share that following with Erathis, who is also prominent there. And frankly my character's gonna be miserable there, since the sun never shines there due to the constant cloud cover and the rain.

Mewtarthio
2008-11-16, 10:50 PM
The god of wealth and the god of hell being the same person? Hey, I wonder how primitive people (or modern ones) could possibly link corruption and wealth. It seems like a real stretch, doesn't it? I mean, really. It is not like people who accumulate lots of money quickly or make the acquisition of wealth itself their only goal are ever unpopular, less than honest, altruistic, or any of the other things that would cause people to dislike them.

Actually, Hades gets kind of a bum rap in modern culture just because we think that Underwold = Hell. He was actually a pretty nice guy compared to all the other gods. Which doesn't say much, granted...

I'm pretty sure that the god of the Underworld become the god of Wealth because his domain is underground, where he keeps the dead, and wealth is measured in precious metals, which are also underground.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 10:59 PM
That is correct!

Random NPC
2008-11-16, 11:09 PM
And...Time? What the hell? People used the stars for calenders and navigation, not the largely unchanging amorphous ball of flaming gas. I can get the rest vaguely, but that is just..lazy.

Funny

Here's the Japanese/Chinese symbol for Sun

http://www.kanjisite.com/images/kanji/4kb/nichi_hi.gif

Here's the symbol for Temple

http://www.kanjisite.com/images/kanji/2kb/ji_tera.gif

And here's the symbol for Time

http://www.kanjisite.com/images/kanji/4kb/ji_toki.gif


weird, huh? :smallamused:

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 11:14 PM
So does that mean that the Temple of Time in Zelda should have a sun motif?:smallbiggrin:

Random NPC
2008-11-16, 11:19 PM
So does that mean that the Temple of Time in Zelda should have a sun motif?:smallbiggrin:

It did :smallbiggrin:

The door of time had a sun in it.

http://www.zeldawiki.org/images/thumb/1/1f/DoorOfTime1.jpg/180px-DoorOfTime1.jpg

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-16, 11:30 PM
Cool! :smallcool:

Fishy
2008-11-17, 12:04 AM
Way back before the city of Rome, much less the Roman Empire, Mars was an agricultural god. Specifically, it (not he) was the spirit you asked to protect your crops from external misfortune, things the farmer has no good way to control. There are a large number of things that can ruin a farmer's day, ranging from frost, to drought, to pests, to disease- and those jerks in the other tribe who keep stealing your cattle.

When everybody farmed sheep, Mars was the god who protected your sheep from bandits. When tribal warfare got scarier, Mars became the god who protected your family from raiding parties. As warfare developed, Mars became the god who protected your people's land from invading armies.

In a world that had zombies, orcs and dragons, Mars would be the god who protected civilization from monsters. Ie, Pelor.

<Additional unnecessary geekery>Romans had a different conception of religion than we do today. When the Roman Army laid siege to a city, they would pray to the gods that their enemies worshipped. If their gods let the city fall, the Romans promised to spare their temples and take their statues back to Rome to be worshipped, glorified and sacrificed to. Makes a certain amount of sense.

As the Roman Empire expanded, the ran into worshippers of Ares, the Greek (Hellenistic, but who uses that word) god of War. The Romans were comfortable thinking of Mars and Ares as the same god, even though Mars was a god of defensive warfare, and Ares was a god of glorious single combat and overpowering your enemies with brute strength. And Ares was Anthropomorphic. And the son of Zeus. And the brother of a half-dozen other gods, with a dozen or so illegitimate children.

The Roman response to these things wasn't "Blasphemy, kill them!" but "Hey, I didn't know that about Mars. Hunh. Cool. I guess we need to rewrite some of our prayers."</geekery>

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-17, 12:25 AM
That is so cool!

I thought Ares represented senseless brutality and massacres though.

Fishy
2008-11-17, 12:57 AM
Brute strength and violence are different from brutality and massacres. I think the greek world generally respected that there's no glory in beating up people weaker than you. The reason Ares gets a bad reputation is because of Athena.

Ares and Athena are siblings, and both war deities, but where Ares is the god of victory through strength, Aethena is the god of victory through strategy, tactics, cleverness, and cooler weaponry. She's badass. Athena told Hercules how to beat the Nemian Lion: use the monster's own indestructible claws to cut his indestructible hide, and after you're done, skin its hide and make an indestructible suit of armor. Athena told Pallas how to beat Medusa the Gorgon: polish your shield to a mirror-shine (really hard to do, btw), so you go in with a weapon that negates the monster's. And after you're done, cut off the creature's head and keep it into a bag, to use as a weapon.

Now, in the Norse pantheon, Loki is the god of trickery and Thor is the god of strength. Loki is kind of a jerk and everyone hates him. All of his children are wolves or serpents or hideously ugly. Thor, on the other hand, is awesome. There's a story where Thor goes on a diplomatic mission to the Jotun, who basically hate the gods. They asked Thor to perform a series of tasks to prove his strength: lifting a small housecat, drinking a single glass of mead, and arm-wrestling a 90 year old woman. Secretly, the Jotuns had cast illusions all over their hall- the housecat was a dragon-serpent large enough to encircle the entire earth, the mead glass connected to all of the water of all the world's oceans, and the old woman was and incarnation of the power of Time. Obviously, Thor couldn't actually do any of these things, but because he was mighty enough to -almost- do them, the tricky Jotun were impressed enough to stop their war.

The difference is, of course, that Greek culture valued Trickery more than Strength, and Norse culture valued Strength more than Trickery. Most of western culture sides with Athena on this one, but there's no reason at all why Pelor, God Of Hitting Monsters With Sticks couldn't be a sympathetic, likeable, Good character.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-17, 01:06 AM
Okay, obsessive mythology geek hat on.

I thought Heracles beat the Nemean Lion by strangling it, and then used the claws to skin it.

And I know all about the whole thing with the giants. Thor wasn't the only one they fooled. Loki himself got tricked when he tried to win an eating contest against the incarnation of fire, which consumes all, and their manservant Thialfi was beaten in a footrace by the manifestation of thought, who was so fast that he ran all the way to the finish, and then ran back to ask Thialfi if he needed any help.

And I thought Kord was the go-to god for hitting monsters with sticks.

Artanis
2008-11-17, 02:13 AM
That is so cool!

I thought Ares represented senseless brutality and massacres though.
To go with what Fishy said...

Although they're often thought of as essentially the same thing (and with good reason), there's actually quite a few differences between Roman mythology and Greek mythology, oftentimes in terms of how much said civilizations liked the respective deities.

With Ares/Mars in particular, the Greeks hated Ares. Or at least didn't like him very much. War happened, but war sucks, and the Greeks, like most people, were happy when that jackass Ares decided to go somewhere else. The Romans, on the other hand, LOVED Mars. They even believed that their founder, Romulus, was the son of Mars.

So basically, Ares/Mars was kinda both. To the Greeks, he was the god of people getting stabbed to death and things sucking the way war tends to suck. To the Romans, he was the god of bringing power and glory to Rome by going out and being totally badass as you beat the crap out of Rome's enemies.


As an aside, Venus/Aphrodite and Cronus/Saturn are other notable deities that the two had differing opinions about.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-17, 08:08 AM
I see. So there could be differing opinions of what Pelor is about because my character's a foreigner and doesn't worship Pelor in the same way the people of the Vale do.

Roderick_BR
2008-11-17, 11:45 AM
(...)
He's the Good god of:


the sun
summer
time
agriculture
the harvest


He also supports those in need and fights against any and all evil. He's worshiped by humans more than any other deity and his tenets are as following:


Alleviate suffering wherever you find it.
Bring Pelor's light into places of farkness, showing kindness, mercy and compassion.
Be watchful against evil.

(...)
I'm pretty sure he was all that in 3.0/3.5 as well, except for time, agriculture, and harvest. I think those would fit better a nature deity.
Anyay, how you used to play him in 3.5? Play it the same way.


jozan the cleric of Pelor is depicted as casting a least one Evil spell in PHB- symbol of pain.

In Dragon, the evil ex-cleric of Pelor, in a short story (not sure if it was extract from the 3.0 greyhawk era books) voiced the old philosophical suffering problem: "If Pelor is all-powerful, he is not good, and if he is Good, he is not all powerful"
Yeah, we went through it years ago. The spell Jozan is casting was a unaligned 3.0 spell, before it was split in 3.5, so, that spell was retconed. Jozan never actually had access to it. End.

And for the other guy... evil and ex cleric or Pelor... you can see that he was kicked out because he thought Pelor was not good. He shifted alignment to evil, and lost the powers granted by pelor. Simple. While the official version shows [good] in his entry, I'll still assume that Pelor is good. Unless you schew the whole alignment system and/or go work for Wizards and convince them to change it :smalltongue:

Tequila Sunrise
2008-11-17, 11:56 AM
Mainly trying to reconcile what for all intents and purposes is a farmer's god in a place where farming is all but impossible because of the evil thorns.
If farming is impossible, how does civilization exist? What do people eat?

If farming really is impossible, the Pelorian faith could be dedicated to making agriculture the way it used to be before the evil thorns. Or, if the evil thorns always existed, it could be dedicated to finding a "promised land" where the thorns don't try to stab the farmers.

TS

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-17, 12:00 PM
As far as we can tell, people eat food that they buy from traders and stuff. There may be small farms in glades throughout the place, but the main city is so large it completely fills up the glade it's in, and it's very, very overcrowded. Besides, crime wouldn't be so rampant if there were enough food to go around, would there?

Inyssius Tor
2008-11-17, 04:57 PM
So... most of the Glade is occupied by people for two reasons? The uncursed fey are there because they're linked somehow to the land, or they're dedicated to undoing the Curse. Everyone else is there either because they have a deathwish, or because they need to hold the trade routes open so that caravans can carry grain west and ore east. Or because they're evil and interested in messing around with the Curse.

Sounds like it ought to be a string of military outposts and fey enclaves, not the hellhole metropolis it is...

Anyway, it doesn't really matter much; a person can follow Kord without crackling with lightning and thunder, a person can follow Corellon without being a mage, and a person can follow Pelor without being a farmer.

Nerd-o-rama
2008-11-17, 05:06 PM
As I said, Pelor is not a "wacky foreign god" in the Vale. The Raven Queen may have the strongest following in the biggest city (Firepoint), but she has to share that following with Erathis, who is also prominent there. And frankly my character's gonna be miserable there, since the sun never shines there due to the constant cloud cover and the rain.Yes, but you said that after I posted. Your earlier posts indicated a much smaller following of Pelor in this area.

Zeful
2008-11-17, 05:10 PM
jozan the cleric of Pelor is depicted as casting a least one Evil spell in PHB- symbol of pain.

In Dragon, the evil ex-cleric of Pelor, in a short story (not sure if it was extract from the 3.0 greyhawk era books) voiced the old philosophical suffering problem: "If Pelor is all-powerful, he is not good, and if he is Good, he is not all powerful"

Yeah that's when symbol of pain was part of the Symbol spell in 3.0 it had no alignment descriptors. That was WotC being stupid.

hamishspence
2008-11-17, 05:13 PM
yes- Don't Cut And Paste that much.

Paladin suffers a bit from this- they really ought to have remembered the bit from atonement that says paladins fall for unknowing and compelled evil acts, not just willful ones.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-17, 07:44 PM
So... most of the Glade is occupied by people for two reasons? The uncursed fey are there because they're linked somehow to the land, or they're dedicated to undoing the Curse. Everyone else is there either because they have a deathwish, or because they need to hold the trade routes open so that caravans can carry grain west and ore east. Or because they're evil and interested in messing around with the Curse.

Sounds like it ought to be a string of military outposts and fey enclaves, not the hellhole metropolis it is...

To be frank, I'm not sure where my DM is going with this. As far as I know the eladrin attacked the city that is now Firepoint simply out of an ingrained hatred of the shadar-kai. That's the only reason I can think of for why they didn't just occupy the city and use what the shadar-kai had already built and razed it to the ground instead, and why the shadar-kai did the exact same thing when they attacked Lunaer at the opening of the campaign. They hate each others guts and fight whenever they encounter one another.

Furthermore, everyone living in the Vale is a victim of circumstance. A prisoner if you will. The only reason they're in the place is because it's where the thorns don't grow, and the common philosophy is every person for him/herself. I'm guessing that's part of why it's the hellhole it is. Everyone's so damn selfish and there's so much hatred in the air that they can't unite for the common good. :smallfrown:

...I think I've just had an epiphany on what my character's destiny should be!:smallsmile:

Alyss
2008-11-17, 08:40 PM
Yes, the eladrin attacked Narcirca because they hate the shadar-kai. They have a long history of atrocities against one another, and this was just one more. And the eladrin didn't build on it because they hated the shadar-kai that much: they just wanted to burn it to the ground, salt the earth, and forget about it.

Free ground is priceless in the Vale. The eladrin might not have been able to bring themselves to live in that particular glade, but lots of other people weren't that picky. So humans moved in and started building.

These days, people live in Firepoint for the same reason: it's safe. There's a wall, there are soldiers guarding the place, and there's plenty of was to make money. Most people are too poor to risk leaving and finding somewhere else. Others are rich enough to enjoy staying.

Concentrating on the Curse is looking at this thing wrong. It's got nothing to do with why people live in Firepoint. Miss Cutter herself is eladrin, which means either she threw off the Curse herself or her ancestors did. But she lives in Firepoint because it's her place of business. She's not evil, or bothered about the Curse, she just wants to make a living.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-17, 08:44 PM
And this is is my DM. Hello Alyss!:smallsmile:

Alyss
2008-11-17, 08:54 PM
Hey. Just thought I'd drop in and help ya'll talk through this with Zousha.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-18, 09:29 AM
Oh, I forgot to mention. Firearms are present in the setting.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-18, 07:59 PM
Does that have any effect on religion?

Mewtarthio
2008-11-18, 08:09 PM
Probably not, no. Certainly not for a god of agriculture and evil-hunting, anyway.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-18, 08:19 PM
Are you sure? We're talking guns here. Guns. I'm wearing plate armor. Not really useful when there's guns around.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-18, 08:26 PM
Are you sure? We're talking guns here. Guns. I'm wearing plate armor. Not really useful when there's guns around.

Sure, but what's that have to do with religion? :smalltongue:

Inyssius Tor
2008-11-18, 08:58 PM
Does that have any effect on religion?

Unless the gunpowder is made by grinding up the souls of the innocent... probably not.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-18, 09:06 PM
It just seems anachronistic in what's ostensibly a medieval fantasy game. The only reason the DM added it was because she played Fable II recently. Fable II doesn't have plate armor. Gee, I wonder why?

Mewtarthio
2008-11-18, 09:35 PM
Be that as it may, guns will only effect religion indirectly (eg if somebody uses guns to win a holy war). This, of course, makes what I consider to be a number of fair assumptions, such as no new God of Guns being born to monitor the new technology and guns being just as useless against deities as other weapons.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-18, 09:41 PM
But it's the principle of the thing. Shoot a guy with an arrow and he'll rip it out and keep on going. Shoot him with a bullet and he's dead forever.

gibbo88
2008-11-18, 09:47 PM
I would disagree, the places that would be an instant kill with a gun are places that would be kills with an arrow, such as head, heart, major arteries. You hit anyone there with an arrow and they will go down just as fast. The only difference is the time between firing. A gunman will get off shots, even with a single shot rifle, faster then your average bowman and will require far less training to use it effectively.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-18, 09:47 PM
But it's the principle of the thing. Shoot a guy with an arrow and he'll rip it out and keep on going. Shoot him with a bullet and he's dead forever.

Yeah, not so much. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AnnoyingArrows)

Remember that the first guns were introduced in the medieval period, and did, in fact, lead to the elimination of heavy cavalry from warfare. Heck, D&D has had guns in it since at least 2E and they never really interacted properly with armor.

Under the RAW, guns would not have any special "armor piercing" capacity, so your Plate armor is just as good against a bullet as it would be against a sword. Don't sweat it, unless he starts throwing dwarves with dual SMGs at you. In that case, ask to retrain your bastard sword for a Desert Eagle and rock 'n roll :smalltongue:

Mewtarthio
2008-11-18, 09:52 PM
...You are referring to the HP system when you talk about ripping out an arrow, right? Bullets are bound to that same HP system, so unless those homebrewed firearms have instant death as their [W], you've got nothing to worry about.

If firearms do deal instant death on any hit, then you've got a problem. Still, it won't spill over into the world of religion. Pelor should be relatively untouched, at least, though if guns become common then he should start becoming very popular as citizens decide to take undead hunting into their own hands. It certainly can't hurt him: He's the God of Agriculture, so he's pretty much indispensable.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-11-18, 09:55 PM
I would disagree, the places that would be an instant kill with a gun are places that would be kills with an arrow, such as head, heart, major arteries. You hit anyone there with an arrow and they will go down just as fast. The only difference is the time between firing. A gunman will get off shots, even with a single shot rifle, faster then your average bowman and will require far less training to use it effectively.Depends on the bowman and the gun. The English launched unaimed mass volleys of arrows once every 3 seconds with longbows, while a musket can only fire once every ~20 seconds. Some guns were as low as once a minute. The advantage, of course is that they ignore armor IRL.

One of my games introduced guns recently, and we went from tracking 3 defense values to tracking 4. Melee, based on Agility and Str, Missile, based on Agility and Perception, Grapple, based on Agility and Will, and Linear, vs bullets, based on Agility and Common Sense, fluffed as 'Keeping your *** head out of the way'. Armor does not apply.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-18, 09:59 PM
But the principles of Fantasy Gun Control (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FantasyGunControl)!

Ravens_cry
2008-11-18, 10:00 PM
Actually, a God of Guns would be rather awesome in my opinion. Probably some spin off of a craftsmen god, like Vulcan and Hephaestus. With titles liek The Equalizer, He of the Loud Voice, Fire Talker, how can you go wrong? Likely opposed to the specific gods of magic, because guns can put the power of a mage, in the hands of anybody.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-18, 10:02 PM
Actually, a God of Guns would be rather awesome in my opinion. Probably some spin off of a craftsmen god, like Vulcan and Hephaestus. With titles liek The Equalizer, He of the Loud Voice, Fire Talker, how can you go wrong? Likely opposed to the specific gods of magic, because guns can put the power of a mage, in the hands of anybody.

The Ptolus setting is amusing because it has a cult within the Church of the Machine devoted to Magitek. They all wear long coats, have guns, and sport tinted goggles.

Upon learning of their existence, my character did his best to find a reason to bring them along on every adventure. :smallbiggrin:

chiasaur11
2008-11-18, 10:22 PM
Actually, a God of Guns would be rather awesome in my opinion. Probably some spin off of a craftsmen god, like Vulcan and Hephaestus. With titles liek The Equalizer, He of the Loud Voice, Fire Talker, how can you go wrong? Likely opposed to the specific gods of magic, because guns can put the power of a mage, in the hands of anybody.

Also: Likely in favor of more Dakka.

Ravens_cry
2008-11-18, 10:38 PM
Also: Likely in favor of more Dakka.
Yes, always in favor of that perfection of being known as 'Dakka'.:smallbiggrin:

Alyss
2008-11-18, 11:57 PM
Just for clarification, these (http://www.box.net/shared/en8mb7avk5) are the fire arms we'll be using in the game. Very simple, d10 damage, high crit ranged weapons.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-19, 12:14 AM
You're still getting your Rennaisance technology all over my Dark Age fantasy.:smallannoyed:

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-19, 12:28 AM
You're still getting your Rennaisance technology all over my Dark Age fantasy.:smallannoyed:

If it's really bothering you, pull a Mitsurugi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xianghua#Mitsurugi) and spend most of your time decrying the dishonorable and wicked way of the gun.

Though, by this point, I think you're just pulling our collective chain.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-19, 12:35 AM
I beg your pardon?:smallconfused:

Pulling chains? Am I being annoying?

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-19, 12:40 AM
I beg your pardon?:smallconfused:

Pulling chains? Am I being annoying?

Ah, no.

The Internet seems to disagree with my translation of the idiom, so I'll just say "I think you're just joking around with us about your opposition to guns in a Fantasy adventure."

Nerd-o-rama
2008-11-19, 12:41 AM
Early firearms really aren't going to be a hell of a lot more effective than a crossbow, and they serve the exact same profile: point-and-shoot armor-piercing projectile.

I think I once suggested a houserule for 4e guns that was "take the crossbows, up their load times by an action, and increase their damage by one die type". Now this isn't perfectly realistic, but it fits neatly into the 4e paradigm.

Sticking High Crit on a crossbow also works. And if bolt-action and speed-loader revolver mechanisms have been invented, obviously you don't need to increase load times.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-19, 12:49 AM
Ah, no.

The Internet seems to disagree with my translation of the idiom, so I'll just say "I think you're just joking around with us about your opposition to guns in a Fantasy adventure."

I'll tolerate them if I have to, but in my opinion if the game is going to have firearms, flavor it like Fable II and have everyone dressed in frock coats and powdered wigs instead of plate armor and wizard robes! I picture a city like Minas Tirith or Gondolin when I think of Lunaer in the Vale, and then you add guns to the picture and it just ruins it for me.

Jothki
2008-11-19, 02:59 AM
Going back to the original point of the thread, it seems to me that Pelor is a fundamentally positive deity, possibly the most so that there is. Pelor doesn't create, as a god of spring would, reward, as a god of fall would, or destroy, as a god of winter would. Instead, as a god of summer, he nutures what is already there, seeking to make things reach their full potential.

A follower of Pelor would look at things as they are and seek to make them better, and have difficultly accepting that something is bad but not worth changing. Some followers of Pelor might see things that they consider evil to be a blight on the potential of the world as a whole and crusade against them, while other followers might see potential within them and attempt to reform them. Those two types of followers likely wouldn't get along very well, but in both cases, they genuinely seek to make the world a better place, not to carry out some ideal of justice or righteousness.

In settings with even the slightest bit of cynicism, slamming face-first into reality is going to hurt.

Moff Chumley
2008-11-19, 12:17 PM
I'd say definitely go with ^.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-19, 01:16 PM
Going back to the original point of the thread, it seems to me that Pelor is a fundamentally positive deity, possibly the most so that there is. Pelor doesn't create, as a god of spring would, reward, as a god of fall would, or destroy, as a god of winter would. Instead, as a god of summer, he nutures what is already there, seeking to make things reach their full potential.

A follower of Pelor would look at things as they are and seek to make them better, and have difficultly accepting that something is bad but not worth changing. Some followers of Pelor might see things that they consider evil to be a blight on the potential of the world as a whole and crusade against them, while other followers might see potential within them and attempt to reform them. Those two types of followers likely wouldn't get along very well, but in both cases, they genuinely seek to make the world a better place, not to carry out some ideal of justice or righteousness.

In settings with even the slightest bit of cynicism, slamming face-first into reality is going to hurt.
That sounds like what I want to do with this character. Make the Vale a better place through Pelor's light and warmth.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-19, 07:06 PM
What would a knightly order dedicated to Pelor be structured like? I'm imagining something similar to the Knights Hospitaller, but I don't know too much about them to be sure.

I'm thinking of calling it "The Order of the Blazing Lion" and using something like this as its symbol.

http://fc50.deviantart.com/fs36/f/2008/258/8/1/81280387d8b7be78a80e9271f1146333.jpg

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-20, 01:44 AM
How would a religious knightly order work anyhow? The Knights Templar and Hospitaller were priests who joined the Crusades, weren't they?

Aquillion
2008-11-20, 04:56 AM
How would a religious knightly order work anyhow? The Knights Templar and Hospitaller were priests who joined the Crusades, weren't they?Not exactly. They were large military organizations, funded by donations, which protected not only priests but any Christian holdings in the holy lands. The Knights Templar were around for two hundred-odd years and remain the primary model for most religious military orders in fiction; but they are a fairly accurate model, in some ways. They were actually a large, organized and well-trained fighting force, not just some priests with ceremonial weapons.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-20, 11:20 AM
I see. But how much influence did they have overall, compared to nations with standing armies?

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-21, 03:10 AM
I am officially at a loss. My paladin just witnessed the cold-blooded murder of a little girl at the hands of goblins. They did it after they were alerted to our presence by our normally stoic and sometimes insightful warforged fighter suddenly charged towards them yelling "KILL THEM ALL!" Just after I tried formulating a plan to prevent that.

I personally decapitated the goblin that killed the little girl, but the fight's still not over (it's an online campaign, in case it's been forgotten).

I don't know how the hell he should react after the fight's over. Cradle the girl's body and cry? Scream at the warforged for pulling a Leeroy Jenkins on us? Beg the rogue/warlock priestess of the Raven Queen to do something? I feel too floored to know what to do.

Aquillion
2008-11-21, 01:26 PM
I see. But how much influence did they have overall, compared to nations with standing armies?
From Wikipedia:

The Templars' impoverished status did not last long. They had a powerful advocate in Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, a leading Church figure and a nephew of one of the founding knights. He spoke and wrote persuasively on their behalf, and in 1129 at the Council of Troyes, the Order was officially endorsed by the Church. With this formal blessing, the Templars became a favored charity throughout Christendom, receiving money, land, businesses, and noble-born sons from families who were eager to help with the fight in the Holy Land. Another major benefit came in 1139, when Pope Innocent II's papal bull Omne Datum Optimum exempted the Order from obedience to local laws. This ruling meant that the Templars could pass freely through all borders, were not required to pay any taxes, and were exempt from all authority except that of the Pope.

Based on this mix of donations and business dealing, the Templars established financial networks across the whole of Christendom. They acquired large tracts of land, both in Europe and the Middle East; they bought and managed farms and vineyards; they built churches and castles; they were involved in manufacturing, import and export; they had their own fleet of ships; and at one point they even owned the entire island of Cyprus. The Order of the Knights Templar arguably qualifies as the world's first multinational corporation.
Sort of like a Catholic version of Blackwater? :smallamused:

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-21, 02:24 PM
What's Blackwater?

Aquillion
2008-11-21, 02:29 PM
What's Blackwater?
Blackwater Worldwide (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_USA).

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-21, 02:32 PM
Oh, so like mercenaries, except alligned with religious causes instead of financial ones?

Piedmon_Sama
2008-11-21, 02:47 PM
It wasn't like the Knights were expecting these grants as pay, though of course they depended on them to keep going. It was common throughout the Middle Ages to donate lands to monastic communities, which the monks would manage, though in theory the land was "given to God." Although land was the most common donation, others included sending your sons or daughters to be monks or nuns, donating money to the abbey/monastery. This is how the Knights Templar (and other crusading orders) worked--they were essentially a monastic community (and yes, monasteries could become very powerful financial organizations, and act as landlords over sprawling territories) with the added task of being soldiers.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-21, 03:13 PM
I see. Maybe I'll see if I can talk the DM into me getting some land as a reward for my heroic deeds!:smallbiggrin:

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-21, 03:36 PM
I don't know how the hell he should react after the fight's over. Cradle the girl's body and cry? Scream at the warforged for pulling a Leeroy Jenkins on us? Beg the rogue/warlock priestess of the Raven Queen to do something? I feel too floored to know what to do.

Then be stunned. If you can't figure out how your character would react, it's safe to assume he would be at a loss too.

There is precedent (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HeroicBSOD) for this reaction :smalltongue:

Alyss
2008-11-21, 04:40 PM
I see. Maybe I'll see if I can talk the DM into me getting some land as a reward for my heroic deeds!:smallbiggrin:

First you'll actually have to do something heroic, honey.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-21, 07:02 PM
I know that! But first we've got to finish our fight.

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-23, 01:08 AM
Been reading through some of my 3.5 books. How much do you think carries over from Pelor's description in that edition to the new one?

Archpaladin Zousha
2008-11-23, 08:15 PM
I wonder if there'll be any more information about the gods in Manual of the Planes.