clerics

One of the crazy things about Dungeons and Dragons, that prevents it from being more generally adaptable to different settings, is its treatment of theology, and by extension, of religion. (Well, I haven't played D&D in years, and not the current edition, so in modern terms I guess I mean Pathfinder.)

In D&D, there are real, powerful gods, and clerics are connected to them. If you want a cult where the god is (like in real life) sort of unknown, an open question, D&D doesn't represent this well. I think Eberron tried to be more ambiguous, but most of the time, there are gods, they are definite, their existence just is.

So--a culture that venerates gods with no unambiguous reality? Non-standard.
An empire where the god is the dead father of the present empire, like Rome? Nope.
A cleric of a cult that venerates something that isn't really a god (like the Sun, or a dragon) or may not exist at all (like a legendary hero)--not a cleric in game terms.

Nope, D&D has its particular theological rules, and your particular campaign may be even tighter.

It's limiting, and something I ran up against when I started playing it, because divine casters were expected to have an affiliation with and outlook on the supernatural that I did not expect, and not to have views that seemed reasonable to me in fantasy worldbuilding.

Bleh.

Something that came back to mind after a discussion about the cult of Sol Invictus. Not Saturn & Jove, not Sol Invictus, not the divine Caesar, not Jesus Christ, had clerics quite like those in D&D--as far as I know.

Funny way to set up something that spawned so many variants and settings.

Good line

"It's awesome when people manage to do stuff that doesn't come easily to them. Any stuff, any people."

Reply on a friend's dw.

Chicago yer-all-Fired

I like Chicago Fire, but the way they're writing it, they're set up to write out most of the main cast by the end of the season. I mean, not just that anyone could be written off randomly, but it feels like we're watching some of these characters' last year on the job.

I think Casey (whose fiancée has already dropped off the show), the chief, and Otis are mostly in the clear--at the moment. (Though earlier this season Casey kind of attacked a cop, so maybe not.)

Hermann's always looking for a new way to make money and might just quit, Severide is hiding an injury that could cripple him, Dawson is the hothead (OK, so are Casey and Severide, kinda, but she's a hothead on the job), Shay gets sucked into Severide's and Dawson's problems and could lose her job because of them, Mills has a mother who wants him to quit (and fits the doomed nice guy trope), and Mouch...is out of shape. And last week Leon (who seemed pretty solid) did something that he's now really torn up about.

Seriously, if this is a one-season show, they can have all the main characters lose their jobs by May. If it's not, seriously, did they give the whole cast one-year contracts? Everybody's set up to be able go at the end of the year.

At least it's a way to get drama for this season and foreshadow anyone leaving at the end of the season without it feeling random. Oddly, though, the one supporting character that already did have to leave the department did leave after a sudden random accident. And the way Hallie was written out was kind of out of left field too. (Then again, their departures help play off Severide and Dawson, and serve their arcs, so they're not totally left field thematically.)

So I don't know. Maybe this show goes for six years, and Dawson and Severide hold on all that time.