OOTS #1256 - The Discussion Thread

[brian 333]

*scrubbed*

[mjasghar]

Clearly his role goes further than just storms though especially since most Northern dwarves seem to live underground. So for them at least he seems to be more a battle god.

[Fyraltari]

Clearly his role goes further than just storms though especially since most Northern dwarves seem to live underground. So for them at least he seems to be more a battle god.

He generally seems to be in charge of rain and the weather (per Sigdi telling Durkon that clouds are where he keeps rain when he's not using it). Given his demeanor and antagonism with Loki and Surtur, it's likely he's also worshipped as a warrior god in some capacity, but he's not the pantheon's main battle-god which was the claim I objected to.

I also disagree that the dwarves don't see him as that much of a sky god. They see omens in his lightning (see the whole tree business), his main center of worship seems to be Firmament, which is unusually close to the surface, and his priests there have a tradition of star-gazing.

Edit: so his function as a warrior seems secondary to his role of storm-master.

[drazen]

Interesting art problem, the party is now up to 10 humanoids (6 OOTS, Minrah, 2 paladins, and Serini) plus one beholder. Not to mention a cat, a raven, and an allosaurus currently polymorphed into a lizard, although he's parked outside the lair.

I wonder if we'll be skipping to Team Evil or the fiends next, now that everyone's getting along. Sure, Xykon and Redcloak only saw 2 dwarves but their bugbear tracker is going to see a lot more tracks real soon.

[Fyraltari]

Interesting art problem, the party is now up to 10 humanoids (6 OOTS, Minrah, 2 paladins, and Serini) plus one beholder. Not to mention a cat, a raven, and an allosaurus currently polymorphed into a lizard, although he's parked outside the lair.

I wonder if we'll be skipping to Team Evil or the fiends next, now that everyone's getting along. Sure, Xykon and Redcloak only saw 2 dwarves but their bugbear tracker is going to see a lot more tracks real soon.

True (I doubt we'll be cutting off, though), but what does this have to do with the post of mine that you quoted.

[Jacky720]

Either:
A)Because Thor is the one who made the Bet in the first place so he feels it is his responsability to help every single dwarf damned by his fault.
B)They do, but we haven't been shown it because they're not relevant to the story unlike Thor who is Durkon's chosen god.

Probably a mix of both. Other gods can contest souls with Hel, even those that aren't theirs. Thor probably does most of them on principle but he isn't required to.

[drazen]

True (I doubt we'll be cutting off, though), but what does this have to do with the post of mine that you quoted.

Actually nothing. I just forgot to remove the quote when replying to the general thread. It's been the kind of week where I'm really glad it's Friday.

Also the new comic came up -- guess it was a little of both!

[Peelee]

Clearly his role goes further than just storms though especially since most Northern dwarves seem to live underground. So for them at least he seems to be more a battle god.

So, again, to be clear here, you have no source for this at all?

[halfeye]

So, again, to be clear here, you have no source for this at all?

They are somewhat limited by the board restrictions on mentioning real world religions.

[Quizatzhaderac]

Clearly his role goes further than just storms though especially since most Northern dwarves seem to live underground. So for them at least he seems to be more a battle god.

In my opinion there's a conceptual problem with the way D&D does deities.

Are they supposed to be deities of a domain or of a path?

Domains are like choosing the supermarket or post office: it's a question of if I want to send a package or get some bread. Eventually I'll need both; there's no such things as a person that doesn't use both of them. Dwarfs collectively need a bunch of domains, including domains ill suited to adventurers like farming, fertility, family, and fermentation.

Path being worldviews and ethical frameworks. For roleplaying and story purposes we typically want paths so that a cleric can have a special relationship with a deity.

The contradiction being that domains serve to limit the context where a deity is relevant, and paths tend to universalize the context where the deity is relevant.

So is Thor the weather god? Then he doesn't matter underground. Is he the Battle god? Then he doesn't matter when it's time to cure a plague. If we go strictly by domain, most gods are irrelevant most of the time. Some other choice of domain might be relevant more often that weather for dwarfs, but they are all, by their essence, limiting.

I'd say it makes the most sense to think of Thor as a path deity with some domains tacked on. Thor cares if you're good, he cares if you're brave, he cares about most things you do. He doesn't seem to care about the weather foremost.

[arimareiji]

He generally seems to be in charge of rain and the weather (per Sigdi telling Durkon that clouds are where he keeps rain when he's not using it).

So, rain is stored in the clouds?

(Actually quite a lovely description, but I couldn't resist alluding to the famous never-paid-attention-in-biology fail.)

[Peelee]

They are somewhat limited by the board restrictions on mentioning real world religions.

Given that we are not discussing any real-world religious figures and instead are discussing an explicitly fictional deity based on (but still not the same as) the explicitly fictional deity in Dungeons and Dragons, I don't see how that is limiting at all.

[arimareiji]

Actually nothing. I just forgot to remove the quote when replying to the general thread. It's been the kind of week where I'm really glad it's Friday.

Also the new comic came up -- guess it was a little of both!

Ah, thank you much! Today is the second occasion in a row that I've clicked on my bookmark to go to the comic index and seen nothing new (a couple of times, no less)... then when someone referred to a new comic being up, I clicked it again and still saw nothing new until I click Reload.

(For clarity, I didn't return to that spot in browser history. I clicked on a bookmark to go there as a de novo action.)

I'll have to keep it in mind going forward.

[bunsen_h]

Given that we are not discussing any real-world religious figures and instead are discussing an explicitly fictional deity based on (but still not the same as) the explicitly fictional deity in Dungeons and Dragons, I don't see how that is limiting at all.

FWIW, the Norse gods are not without real-world followers. I know one hobbyist blacksmith who wears a hammer-of-Thor pendant -- I haven't inquired as to his actual faith -- and I see more than a few others on Forged in Fire. There are also some SCA fighters with Norse personae who wear that pendant mundanely.

So, rain is stored in the clouds?

(Actually quite a lovely description, but I couldn't resist alluding to the famous never-paid-attention-in-biology fail.)

I don't know what you're alluding to, but I'm curious.