Borrowing some ideas from an ENWorld thread, things I plan to use in Kaidan, but ideas that could be applied to a unique fantasy setting of normal genres, what are your thoughts on this...
What if there is no overarching pantheon of gods, rather thousands of spirits. Pristine places of nature, of tranquility, disturbed, unique, or weird all contain some kind of spiritual being. Some more powerful than others, having a variety of powers, preferences, and agendas.
A cleric (priest/shaman/oracle) acquires spells and powers by visiting shrines and places known to be inhabited by a spiritual being, through meditation and sacred rites bond with the site. After which the 'spirit-talker' can commune with whatever spirit resides there. While most spirits aren't inherently evil, some are, so perhaps its best for a priest to be neutrally aligned for successful communion with any spirit.
These priests visit holy sites, commune with the given spirit, performs some task and receives access to spells and powers. Increasing power means that this priest must seek a new spirit, perhaps, but not necessarily a more powerful spirit, to higher level spells or increased powers.
These spirits would have their own wants. Perhaps something as simple as erecting a stone of commemoration, or to enhance the existing shrine. Perhaps it desires the farmers to use the deep pool for their cattle downstream from a currently used one - a pool especially sacred to it. Perhaps a spirits need can only be fulfilled with an adventure to appropriate, return, destroy something, thus good for many plothooks.
Perhaps all monsters could be relegated to spiritual beings personified to accomplish some task - punish the non-believers, what have you. So an owlbear would be played as an owlbear in game, but its existence is not biological, rather it is the summoned or personified anger of an abused sacred grove of trees is reckoning its wrath upon those around it. Goblins are angry spirits of the hills. A pegasi is a noble guardian spirit of the sky, or the clouds around a particular mountain.
In Kaidan, all monsters are categorized as: oni (ogre/demon), spirit (tengu/kappa/kami), yokai (shape-changers), and yurei (undead). All these beings are varying kinds of spirits and can work well in a purely animistic philosophic view.
But in thinking of doing my divine magic like this, I wondered what your thoughts of doing something similar for a more typical fantasy setting?
GP
I like the visiting shrines to acquire spirit powers idea a lot, and having spirits have desires makes it better than just show up, get a new power.
And I think making all, or most, monsters spirits fits in well with the motif.
I would think that the particular power/spells would be granted before the task was accomplished - at least on a temporary basis. Once the task is accomplished the spell/powers are permanent. However if the task fails then the powers are no longer accessable.
That way if your cleric is leveled up for a new spell, he doesn't have to further do some adventure to access it, rather to confirm it. This way the player is not punished for not having meeting the spirits needs fulfilled.
Abuse of such spells could call for some kind of punishment, however...
This sounds like a great system, but unless all the PCs are clerics, or have access to clerical magic, don't you think that requiring certain adventures in order to progress kind of unbalances the cleric characters? One the one hand, the rest of the party may resent having to go on a quest every time the cleric levels (or earns a new spell or whatever), and on the other the cleric may resent having to work so hard for their powers when the martial-type characters, for example, are free to just spend their XP as they wish with no in-game consequence beyond becoming more powerful.
I guess one way you could deal with this is by giving each discipline a similar thing, so that everyone has a similar earn-your-level-up type thing, like the fighter has to go visit famous weapon-masters and earn new techniques from them in the same way that the cleric has to visit the spirits and earn spells from them.
Alternatively, if your overarching plot for the campaign had a lot to do with the spirits, then I guess these quests on their behalf would just feel like progressing the plot, or at least related side-quests from the main plot, and so the cleric's new powers would just be an incidental consequence of following the main story.
Just some thoughts, but like I said, I love the basic idea, so I'm sure those issues can easily be ironed out.
It seems that your interpretation of "spells" is that once granted, they are innate to the character and no longer dependent on the spirits that granted them. Ie. the character does not ask/command spirits to do stuff for him, but creates the spell's effect on his own.
A different take would be that spellcasting is actually nothing more than communing and bargaining with spirits, which would mean that a character's access to spells would primarily depend on location, as it would be dictated by the kinds of spirits that happen to be nearby. Thus the same character might have a different list of spells to draw from when he's standing on the top of a mountain, than when he's on a ship in the middle of an ocean.
Quote from: GhostmanIt seems that your interpretation of "spells" is that once granted, they are innate to the character and no longer dependent on the spirits that granted them. Ie. the character does not ask/command spirits to do stuff for him, but creates the spell's effect on his own.
A different take would be that spellcasting is actually nothing more than communing and bargaining with spirits, which would mean that a character's access to spells would primarily depend on location, as it would be dictated by the kinds of spirits that happen to be nearby. Thus the same character might have a different list of spells to draw from when he's standing on the top of a mountain, than when he's on a ship in the middle of an ocean.
I think my initials thoughts are wrong here. Your second take above seems much more appropriate and I've already come to that conclusion. Using spells is based on proximity to the power granting spirit. The further you are from the source the weaker your powers get, and if you travel afar, you'll need to find and commune with a new spirit to access powers once again. I think its better for all spirits to provide the same general spells, though certain spirits can empower specific kinds of spells - like nature spirits could induce more powerful druid-like spells, for example.
To kindling, spirit interaction is a major part of the setting, so yes, your cleric's antics in achieving greater spell power would be closely associated with PC goals anyway. Any non-human could be essentially a spirit being of some type. So you're either associating with humans or interacting with spirits if you do anything.
Besides if players possess ancestral relics (weapons and magic items) they too have their own quests to accomodate.
While I want to have more specific direction in a specific adventure, local characters always have something to do whether there's an adventure or not.
GP
OK, thinking in 3x/PF game mechanics at the moment, perhaps this should be some alternate divine caster, though I don't want to call it 'Shaman', the local name is a Kannushi (in Kaidan).
Since spell lists are all the rage in the Adv. Players Guide, I will use that to tweak my caster.
For one thing, I feel the General Cleric Spell list is too broad. Why should a sea cleric have access to flamestrike? If I clipped the general spell list down to the essentials, heals, remove curse, prayer, bless, prayer beads, heroic feat, reincarnation, etc - that would fix part of what is wrong with the cleric. Though I don't mean to fix the cleric, rather build a new class.
Now clerics gain access to Domains, spheres of spells, 1/level that fit a particular deities portfolios of powers.
If I curb the amount of General Spells, I have to counter that by allowing 'domains' that include a wider range of spells. However, because spirits are bound to specific locations and they cannot grant spells beyond a certain range, these divine casters when traveling must find new holy sites to bond with and spirits to commune to regain perhaps a different domain of spells. I might have to use a different word than domain since I need more spells than what is currently available in a standard cleric domain.
Thus the Kannushi's spell casting powers are determined by proximity to site and spirit one is currently attuned. His general spells (altered) remain, but his spirit granted powers change based on the new local spirits powers and agendas.
As an aside, I have magic items that require event triggers to activate powers, these events are things like defeating a house enemy in single combat, or saving the life of someone more fortunate than you - so there are items that create story goals.
Martial characters - fighters, rangers, monks, rogues will seek different and advanced techniques for fighting, espionage, styles and talents acquired through goals and mini modules.
So aside from any over-arching plot or current adventure the setting is designed to propigate its own storyline based on its spiritual nature and connection to all beings and things. I could easily see a sand-box style game where the interactions with spirits of the land, ancestral spirits of weapons and items, cursed undead yurei spirits could drive their own stories.
I even plan to create detailed gazeteers of each main island, as well as the imperial capital and perhaps a sacred sites one, complete with geography, political atmosphere, current events, major NPCs, factions, and 50 or more plot hooks, perhaps a half dozen new monsters, new spells, new magic items and local legends.
At the same time I want to create a larger 1st - 20th campaign set in Kaidan, as well as one other mini-arc (3 adventure module) focused on the Shinobi/Ninja Houses of Kaidan.
Beyond that I don't expect an endless module release, I think a periodic monster book or other, a collection of mini-modules based on real Kaidan stories - and the setting should pretty much run itself.
Thoughts?
GP