Was there even a point for Malak to create a "sibling"?

[dancrilis]

Mellowed, sure, but he would have always hated Thor and the dwarves. As his very first memory, this one colors all the others, he's literally building his identity around it. Plus he'd still be a Cleric of hel so he'd better do what he's told.

Nergal likely would have been fine with him also - whether he could properly make the choice about what do before he was released from Malack I would be unsure about, and going 'screw the dwarves and their entire continent' might have been a reasonable option.

[Metastachydium]

Either Laurin or Miron could have helped out - but I doubt either would have

Eh, if Malack were on board with the idea, he could have simply asked a favour for his little, hairy friend without explaining his larger hairy friends the details. Sole problem is, I see reason to believe that he kind of cared about those two (and even Tarquin) as well.

[Fyraltari]

Nergal likely would have been fine with him also - whether he could properly make the choice about what do before he was released from Malack I would be unsure about, and going 'screw the dwarves and their entire continent' might have been a reasonable option.

I'm not sure it's possible for a Northener (and a dwarf at that) to worship a Western god.

[Anymage]

In it also possible that Malack would have kept him entralled for three days so he could absorb more memories without acting on his own plans (and possible missing the Godsmoot),

Had not-Durkon more time to absorb he might have been different, if he had the three days he would not have been able to be undone by Durkon:


As such it is possible that if he was a trall longer and gained control in different circumstances he might never have followed the plan - or been able to follow the plan and thereby could have started a new one (a cult of Hel linked in trade to the Empire of Blood might be valid to begin a kingdom in the north dedicated to the Northern Goddess of Death).

Like Fyr pointed out, Durkon is at his base a faithful cleric. Add in the part where Hel very much wants to keep that part of him intact (and is responsible for the vampire spirit), and there's no reason to believe that Greg with full memory integration wouldn't be in the same boat. Timing wouldn't meaningfully change anything.

And if we assume that Greg did have the time to fully integrate memories and that the godsmoot was also scheduled for a week later, I don't think another cleric would have any trouble with his friend saying "duty calls, I'll be back when it's over with". (Which yeah, end of the world stuff would interfere with. That's just one of the complications of working for a god.)

I'm not sure it's possible for a Northener (and a dwarf at that) to worship a Western god.

Why wouldn't it be an option? It's unlikely that someone would be in a position to learn enough about a foreign deity in order to get that involved, much like it's most likely that a person in the real world adopts the religion most common in whatever area they grew up in. However, it isn't unknown for a person in the real world to convert if they find another religion suits them better, and I don't see why stickverse residents wouldn't be the same way. And since gods can usually expect roughly as many converts in as converts out, no reason why they'd put in blocks otherwise.

[Worldsong]

I'm not sure it's possible for a Northener (and a dwarf at that) to worship a Western god.

I'd say it's possible but difficult. Might be trickier for an already dedicted cleric since their deity would rather not let them go if possible.

[hroþila]

Why wouldn't it be an option? It's unlikely that someone would be in a position to learn enough about a foreign deity in order to get that involved, much like it's most likely that a person in the real world adopts the religion most common in whatever area they grew up in. However, it isn't unknown for a person in the real world to convert if they find another religion suits them better, and I don't see why stickverse residents wouldn't be the same way. And since gods can usually expect roughly as many converts in as converts out, no reason why they'd put in blocks otherwise.

Because, as far as we know, in the real world worshippers are not a resource that is more or less evenly shared by virtue of a series of agreements between dozens of gods.

I mean, we don't know that you can't change pantheons in the stickverse, but this sounds like a good reason why it wouldn't be possible in any meaningful way. Like someone should obviously be able to burn offerings to deities of different pantheons or whatever (and it is quite likely the guy aboard the Mechane did just that), but that's a bit different.

[Anymage]

Because, as far as we know, in the real world worshippers are not a resource that is more or less evenly shared by virtue of a series of agreements between dozens of gods.

I mean, we don't know that you can't change pantheons in the stickverse, but this sounds like a good reason why it wouldn't be possible in any meaningful way. Like someone should obviously be able to burn offerings to deities of different pantheons or whatever (and it is quite likely the guy aboard the Mechane did just that), but that's a bit different.

Roy is a very lukewarm believer. Haley and Belkar haven't said much about their religious beliefs. Gontor and the whole rest of the Creed of the Stone chose to worship elemental earth. Elan worships a puppet. Those don't sound like the gods compelling belief.

Someone raised in the west is very likely to have their beliefs and cultural baseline defined by the western gods. Ignore the dwarf special case and assume a baseline human; How much would Marduk lose if one saw the twelve gods as a right and true religion compared to one just choosing to follow Nergal?

[Riftwolf]

Roy is a very lukewarm believer. Haley and Belkar haven't said much about their religious beliefs. Gontor and the whole rest of the Creed of the Stone chose to worship elemental earth. Elan worships a puppet. Those don't sound like the gods compelling belief.

Someone raised in the west is very likely to have their beliefs and cultural baseline defined by the western gods. Ignore the dwarf special case and assume a baseline human; How much would Marduk lose if one saw the twelve gods as a right and true religion compared to one just choosing to follow Nergal?

I can imagine Western/Southern Deities who value honour (and expect their followers to live honourable lives) welcoming Dwarven followers (I don't know enough about the Western Pantheon and their representation in D&D but I'm guessing Marduk is one such God). Live honourably = great, regular afterlife agreement. Live dishonourably = no longer my jurisdiction. It might be a rare occurrence, and I doubt Marduk/Ox will be arguing for individual souls like Thor did (as two quiddities arguing the definition of honour would be marginally more catastrophic than a forum alignment thread), but it might not be impossible.

[hroþila]

Roy is a very lukewarm believer. Haley and Belkar haven't said much about their religious beliefs. Gontor and the whole rest of the Creed of the Stone chose to worship elemental earth. Elan worships a puppet. Those don't sound like the gods compelling belief.

Someone raised in the west is very likely to have their beliefs and cultural baseline defined by the western gods. Ignore the dwarf special case and assume a baseline human; How much would Marduk lose if one saw the twelve gods as a right and true religion compared to one just choosing to follow Nergal?

It's not about "compelling belief" or devotion, though, or at least not entirely about devotion. Roy is a very lukewarm "believer", but he absolutely believes the Northern gods exist, and that belief powers the Northern gods whether or not Roy actively worships them (i.e. by participating in rituals, praying, etc). We don't know that Gontor and Elan stopped powering the Northern gods when they started worshipping other things.

[Anymage]

It's not about "compelling belief" or devotion, though, or at least not entirely about devotion. Roy is a very lukewarm "believer", but he absolutely believes the Northern gods exist, and that belief powers the Northern gods whether or not Roy actively worships them (i.e. by participating in rituals, praying, etc). We don't know that Gontor and Elan stopped powering the Northern gods when they started worshipping other things.

I "believe in" the existence of all the major real-world faiths, because those faiths all verifiably exist. The existence of real-world deities is well outside this board's purpose, but if there were indisputable evidence for their existence I'd believe in all of them too. The same way that I "believe in" giraffes or the pyramids. In the stickverse where gods are verifiably real, every educated person "believes in" other gods in very much the same way; Malack knows that the northern gods exist and has at least a passing understanding of them, even if they aren't as important to him as his own patron deity. Practically everybody in the stickverse believes in the existence of all the major pantheons and all the gods within.

Devotion and worship are the big things that a convert would redirect. Again, until you can show me how not worshiping at all or throwing that worship away on a puppet is meaningfully worse than worshiping a god of another pantheon, I'm not seeing why gods would be too bothered in the general case.

(In the specific case of dwarves, I don't know what would happen if all dwarves everywhere upended their culture and decided to suddenly move to the south, dress in all blue and worship the southern gods. There might have been divine compacts hammered out ahead of time, it might be a specieswide loophole. Given that "get all dwarves to coordinate on becoming culturally southerners" is ballpark as likely as "get all dwarves to coordinate a mass honorable suicide civil war", I don't see this having any risk of moving beyond theory.)

[Worldsong]

I imagine that in more rural areas belief in the gods from other regions would still be a bit more questionable, but beyond that any experienced traveller would take their existence for granted and so would anyone who lives in large enough a settlement that clerics from other places would end up passing through there.

[BeerMug Paladin]

I recognize that the thread has sort of moved on, but I'd like to ask a few more related questions. Was there even a point for Eugene to create offspring? Did Tarquin have an original idea for how having children would fit into his plans, and if so what was it? What was the point of V taking care of children with their spouse? Before the black dragon lost her husband to adventurers, was there an original point to her son? We already know that Haley, The Draketooth Clan and Hinjo were created to either be allies or to continue running a scheme after a parent's death.

We got to see Malak express sentimentality over previous spawn. So it seems pretty straightforwards to me. He was trying to do a modern remake of something from an earlier decade.

[KillianHawkeye]

They could both prepare / cast sending, so I think they'd have kept in touch.

They also became friends on Macebook.

[Precure]

They also became friends on Macebook.

Durkon needs to update that.

[ebarde]

Malak was not well versed of Northern cosmology, and even if he was, Durkon was way too much of an outliar for him to have predicted what would hapoen.