Gods and Otherlore

Sometimes I wonder if I overthink things, and that I’m letting things grow out of scope. I’m prone to streamlining processes over doing things as any sort of high-fidelity simulation, because I prefer things that flow and play things fast and loose over things that revel in fine details. So when I find myself building systems that go deeper than a roll or two, that account for things like size discrepancy and physical restriction, I also find myself wondering if my work’s not getting too bloated, too out of touch from what I’m trying to do. So then I find myself going at looking at what other people are doing in their own work, and I feel affirmed by two different things:

1. That other folks are asking a lot of the same questions about their own games.
2. That other, different folks, aren’t asking questions are really thinking about matters at all.

One of the first times I really noticed this was when I was working out how grappling was going to work within BASIC. I was worried about scope bloat, so much so that I went and looked at how OGL D20 was handling matters lately. I then immediately felt less bad.

Now I find myself in a similar situation with gods and religion in fantasy settings. It took me forever to get to this point in writing this point because I kept doubting that I has handling matters with the proper tact and humility. Then I realized, “wait, look at the entire history of this subject as far as big-name fantasy games go to date.” Then I realized I should just write the damn article, rather than agonizing over whether or not taking my own approach is the right choice when I could just do another Greco-Norse-Celtic pantheon.

Eat a dick, self-doubt.

The Known World of Otherlore is a living macro-entity. It has blood and breath in many things, and it has a soul of its own, a dreaming will that was birthed by the conflux of the Three Primal Powers: the Light, the Dark and the Wild that grew in the contrast. It has similarly birthed the many forms of mortal life that inhabit it; the gods of the World had no hand in any sort of creation.

Yet still, they Are.

This is because the World’s Will lives on in mortal beings, the same will to grow, perpetuate, evolve and create. Mortals pursue this Will actively, through their own pursuits, as that’s what they (and we, at least in my own personal opinion) call free will. But it also has a potential element that lies in balance to its kinetic, a power that lies in that same mortal Will framed through the subconscious and the darker recesses of the self. This is one of the sources of capital-M Monsters in the World, scary stories and shared nightmares becoming things of unnatural flesh through enough amassed anxious dreams and sleepless nights, wretchedly extruded into form in obscure corners of creation to sow malevolence. But it’s also the source of a more benign and perhaps even more spectacular thing: collective trust and love becoming a very real fuel for miracle-stuff. In other words, Faith manifest.

So do the gods of the Known World come into their own as entities of varying domains, powers and intellects: because people seek things to put their Faith in, so do gods manifest from their will to have one, their need for one to be there for them.

So what do people in Otherlore put their faith in? More to the point, what would they put their faith in?

The Icons here aren’t anything meant to be a complete canon, nor are they something that any character has to take one of as a figure of worship. First, there’s going to come rules for making your own, and second, religion isn’t mandatory for folks in Otherlore, their ability to produce Faith notwithstanding. Instead, this is meant to represent a vertical slice of the small figures who find folk worshippers and prophets among the Free Folk of the World (or, in this case, the Western Dimense, the first region of the World we’re working on). This is a place that is firmly vised between the stagnating conflict between two empires, the Cathedran-Kingdoms of the Holy Throne, and the remnant of the nation of Zin, now held in mindless thrall by an entity as old as mortal life itself, known by many names, “The Nightmare” being most common. The Holy Throne claims the sunny lands to the south and the west, while the Nightmare casts its influence over the cold reaches to the north and east. The Free Folk, who survive against the will of both, make their homes in the places that form the buffer zone between the two, in places hidden, out of the way, defendable or simply too dangerous to outsiders. These are people who have the capacity to live small, normal lives… right up until a power infinitely greater than them decides to ruin everything for them, for no reason. They know this; they may push it out of their minds, allow themselves the fantasy of safety, but they understand that threats live to the North and the South, and that monsters can come from anywhere between. The reality of their world is a harsh one, but in the world and in themselves, they find figures to relate to, rally behind, give thanks and pay respects to figures with, figures who represent their struggle, their goals, and even their weapons and tools to pursue both. Simple respect turns to superstition; superstition turns to ritual, and ritual becomes all sorts of things that not only cultivate faith, but focus it into something of greater significance, giving new animance to things and beings that already were, or bringing a completely new being into strange life.

Thus, a variety pack of six divines, Beings of Belief Made Real, who in particular were made by the collected belief of individuals in hard circumstances. In them, there exists the same harshness and difficulty of their world, but also the same bounty and protection- in the case of the River, it’s more or less the same one-for-one as it always was, except on days when it’s feeling pissed or particularly covetous of its people. These are not gods that come down with quests or make themselves known in glorious form and chuckle about “oh, you mortals,” because that’s not how they do. These are not gods of a shared pantheon, though they may form rivalries or even alliances based on opposed or shared domains, and they’re certainly not divine beings that hold all mortals’ receipts because they went and did the whole “creating reality” thing. Instead, they’re something more of divine mentors, individuals brought to life through the petitioning of people in need. The Free Folk don’t need gods hanging That Which is Owed over their heads, they get enough of that from all the other assholes in their lives; what they need are more who are willing to lend a helping hand.

That’s the sort of divine relationship I wanted to see done in Otherlore, not one where the holy player character isn’t one small cleric in a larger religion with a god that is distant and disconnected. Rather, the exact opposite- one where the holy player character is a big prophet of a small religion, one with a direct line to the manager-in-charge. Gods from on high, who are bored in the affairs of mortals are out for the time being, as it’s too familiar to working for a corporate interest these days. Gods who understand mercy, but style it to their own liking? That’s what I’m on now.