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Showing results for tags 'theology'.
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Ok, in many worlds, divine beings are classified very straight-forwardly as gods in a pantheon. They all recognize the existence of the other gods, and they are all very substantially similar. They all belong to the same kind of theological structure. My thinking on this is why not move away from that kind of model and into variations in deity shape, size, nature, and so on. So, let's just imagine One of Many as a god. One of Many is viable a divine concept, but is also moving away from too much focus on 1 person = 1 divine. Another possible model to consider in variation is the Trinity in Christian theology. The trinity is the notion of 3 divine persons in one deity. Unlike One of Many, it's often presented as something that really cannot be understood, and the nature is perplexing in certain ways where One of Many likely is not. Given that cultural clash is a theme(at least last I thought), how will religious clashing take place? Will there be monotheistic cultures running into polytheism and trying to deal with the objective nature of the other divines through self-deception? Will there be notions of spiritual and divine beings, the sort granting divine powers, that don't really HAVE the full power of godhood? So, could there be "spirits" that can be appealed to? Could there be divine beings that claim they are the substance of existence, they claim to be something so transcendent that it avoids the particular nature of a local deity? Can godless priests, like those who follow an ideal, like Fall From Grace in PS:T be acceptable or allowed? If so, would they be accepted, shunned, or what? What about the idea of unknown gods? They may simply hide, or maybe they belong to local groups that haven't entered the region yet, or maybe they just haven't entered the locality of the world yet. So, in Athens the shrine to the unknown god is pretty well known. Can this concept be applied to Project Eternity in some way shape or fashion? Should the idea of a solid pantheon, with unity and all the rest really be the agenda? It may be desirable to give a solid set of religious notions priests created by players have to accept for roleplay immersion, but perhaps not for the world.
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Ok, so the recent kickstarter update mentioned that the designers are considering the religious make-up of the world. Well, I want theology. I think the Dragon Age universe did a pretty good job of having some theological framework within it. At least with making the chantry unique and distinct and somewhat fleshed out.(Though mostly as kind of a variant of Christianity) Planescape arguably is similar in being very theological. Well, I think theology makes some sense for religion. Maybe not EVERY religious notion having a clearly defined theology to it, but certainly that individuals are going to develop theologies, philosophical theologies, and so on for understanding the world, and that these can/do have some impact given that religions are true in this world. I think that priests and paladins and explicitly religious figures should actually express explicitly religious beliefs, and theological notions native to their religion, so that they seem like they are really people dedicated to this divinity. I think that a lot of effort should be on either matching the real world nature of religion in a highly devout society(which this would likely be given that gods exist) or if twisting it, that these twists make sense(gods being real and impacting the world in easily measurable ways makes a difference). This may require curtailing the # of religious groups somewhat. Also, when considering how to set up gods, I would like consideration for the following notions: mysticism, spiritualism, issues of divinity and tribal identity, syncretism, church politics, heresy, schisms, denominations, the relationship between individuals and the divine, theological disputes, etc. I mean, if gods are real, then theological disputes may very well be the same kind of thing as we have for political disputes. I'm sure these are all thought about already. However, I'm definitely pushing for depth. I mean, I think the game is better modelling itself after BG2, but I think that in this area, PS:Torment is the ideal role model. This may already be the understanding, but I really do want this as the push with religion.