Religion and Homeland

[Mike Holmes]

I thought I'd bring this up here. I was going to post it to the rules list, but I'm thinking it's really more speculative than the rules currently cover. Though I might try it out there at some point as well.

Each homeland keyword has an associated specialized religion keyword - or in the case of Teshnos a well laid out common magic religion. You get this keyword at the level of your homeland. The point being that these seem rather intentionally separated out. The question is why. If, in fact, a character from a homeland can only have the listed religion keyword, and the religion keyword must have the level of the homeland keyword, then why not just make it one single keyword?

The answer I keep coming up with is because not everyone from a particular homeland follows the same religion. The book even gives an example, of sorts saying that some Heortlings worship dieties from the Earth Pantheon (the text says something like "This is unsusual, but accepted.")

The thing is - I've never once seen any example of a character that didn't have his homeland's religion, nor have I ever heard anyone mention this.


So, question the first, is the separation of homeland and religion supposed to imply that they're, for lack of a better word, modular? Or is the separation for some other reason? Does the Heortling clause mentioned, mean that the character in question would have the Earth Pantheon religion keyword, or would they have the Storm Pantheon Keyword, and be in a cult that's otherwise listed in the Earth Pantheon?

This is an important distinction. Generally the notion is that one can only know magic from their own religion. So the question would be can a Heortling initiate of some Earth Pantheon diety then initiate in a cult from the Storm Pantheon? Put another way, does the diety in question exist in separate forms in both pantheons, or is the diety shared?

The next question, then, is whether or not this particular example is something that can happen elsewhere, or if it's just a special case with Heortlings and Esrolians?

In any case, I'm envisioning people who live in a particular homeland, but who worship an entirely different religion, to be something like a minority subculture. The example I keep thinking of from real world history is that of the Jews who lived amongst other populaces in, say, Catholic Spain (before the Inquisition, for argument's sake). I'm assuming that they'd get the Spain Homeland, and Judaism as their religion.

Now, this is actually pretty common in the real world. Next question is how common it is in Glorantha? More dear to my heart would be ideas of how common it would be in non-Glorantha fantasy worlds. Basically, given a Gloranthan magic as presented in HQ, what's likely in terms of religions existing side by side in the same homeland?


On a somewhat related note, it's clear that many, if not most, specialized magic religions are "mixed" in terms of otherworld. But as presented, the Lunar religion as our primary example, has a theist basic religion keyword (or so it seems to me, correct me if I'm wrong), and then all manner of cults, practices, schools, etc. What this seems to me to say is that the people of the religion can call for divine intervention from the dieties in the pantheon, but that they do not generally get the other benefits of the other associated base level magic keywords. That is, they don't get tradition charms, and they don't get blessings from liturgists.

Or do they? That's my question. Is it possible in a specialized magic religion that provides more than one sort of magic keyword, one that has liturgists, for example in addition to initiates, for the low level worshipper to gain the benefits that these higher level people provide? I mean are there liturgists in the lunar religion at all? If so, to whom do they provide their blessings?

Or is it that you have to choose one of the basic keyword types in a religion like this, representing the basic worship that you do? Can I be a spiritist in the lunar way? I can be a Jakaleel Practitioner who can make charms - are there any tradition spirits to make tradition charms from? Is there a "core practice" in this case?

Or is it simply no, there are no liturgists, and the practitioners cannot make tradition charms because there is no "core practice" from which they come? I sense that this must be the case, or there are a lot of problems to overcome.

One of the reasons that I'm so interested in all of this is that concentration often does not seem like it has a downside. That is, if I'm in a religion with nothing but theist cults comprising it, and hence I would not be allowed to join up with anything but theist cults without dropping the religion, then what do I lose by concentrating? The theoretical talents that I as a player was smart enough not to take for common magic, but instead replaced with feats?

The point is that for concentration to be any kind of trade-off, there has to be a possibility of getting magic from more than one otherworld in the religion. Now this is often the case. Reading the religions more closely, and learning more about them, I find more and more that the religions tend to be mixed. Even the Heortlings - seemingly very theistic, have Kolat, and presumably an associated practice. Not in the HQ book, but canonical Glorantha, I'm given to understand.

But then I'm also told that it would be quite unusual for the kolatings to teach an initiate anything about their ways. Not that it's outright imposible, but that it would be very odd. So, what gives? Are these in the same religion? Is it just a Heortling thing in this case that makes it rare? Let's look at the Lunars where their spiritism isn't so marginalized. What's the case there? Are their animist practices loathe to teach the initiates of the cults of the Lunar way as well?

If it's true in the Lunar Way that there's this Inter-world rivalry, intra-religion, then I'd assume that the idea is that it's everywhere. Perhaps the spirits just don't like the idea of people who worship gods, even if they're putatively in the same religion? I'm curious about the rationale.

What I'm sorta hankering for is a less strict ruling about these things. I mean, yes, any priest of any diety is even going to look a tad more at any initiate of another diety before initiating him. I suspect that's true. But is it really that much more of a problem than this just because they're in a spirit practice? The way I play it, I rule that something in the same religion is the same religion. And the sideways glances between types of magic using folks are not a tremendous barrier to crossing between two types.

There's even a worse problem here in some ways. Obviously devotees are restricted from joining up with any other religious element, and Shamans seem to be similarly restricted. But if you read it one way, all practitioners must belong to a core practice. Well, to what core practice do the Jakaleel Witches belong to? If one assumes that the practice itself is also the core practice (which I've seen suggested) then does that mean that there are tradition spirits available from it? Or is this requirement suspended in the case of mixed religions?

I've even seen arguments that initates can't cross over for some reason. Which would leave us, again, without the ability to use magic from more than one otherworld with the exception of common magic. Is concentration really only about not having common magic from another otherworld? Maybe more interestingly, are the rest of the rules really intent on not letting PCs have magic from more than one of the specialized otherworlds? That seems sad if so. I mean, I could see the argument for it in some ways, but it just doesn't seem very fun.

Anyway, obviously I've been playing a tad openly with these things, in theory, in my games. In fact, due to a mistake in understanding, I actually have as many as six different religions in one homeland in one game we're playing. The question with these is how I should have them each treat each other. I mean I'm tempted to say that they're all part of a larger religion. That is, instead of having only one "base-level" keyword for the religion, I was allowing players to select from many, and develop up from there.

This has some substantial advantages in terms of clarity. The animists all had a core tradition to belong to, and tradition sprits, for example.

Does this seem extreme? Too much mixing? I've been accused of sorta D&Ding things by doing this sort of thing. I have to admit that I do it because I want the players to have a range of selctions to take magic from, and to give concentration "teeth." But I think I handle it pretty well in terms of requirements and such.

Anyhow, should I call these separate religions living in the same place? One thing that really struck me is that this actually can work more or less. I mean, looking at the resultant culture seemed actually rather more realistic than those in Glorantha that seem to have only one religion. It occurs to me that, perhaps the Gloranthan cultures do have many religions in their cultures, but they're just not listed. Which brings me back full circle to the top again. Do Gloranthan cultures have more religions than the primary one listed or not?

If I do go this way in my game, however, saying that the religions are exclusive from each other (as opposed to saying that they're all part of a larger religion), then I'm going to have to mix my religions up some, or I'm back to having concentration mean very little.

As you can see, this is a very complex topic, full of twists and turns. I'd appreciate any feedback anyone has on the subject.

Mike

[Bankuei]

Hi Mike,

I love the way you demand to dig deep on anything and everything :)

The thing is - I've never once seen any example of a character that didn't have his homeland's religion, nor have I ever heard anyone mention this.

So, question the first, is the separation of homeland and religion supposed to imply that they're, for lack of a better word, modular? Or is the separation for some other reason?

Well... you already know how I feel about many of the examples in the book :P   But in all seriousness, I think three elements suggest support of the idea that religion is not directly tied to homeland, or even ethnicity.  

The first is the concerns about Lunar missionaries, and of course, Lunarized Sartites.  That would indicate that there's likely to be Heortlings with some Lunar religion keywords running about, probably a few Lunars who adopted a fair amount of Heortling ways(minus Orlanth, of course) while colonizing their lands, etc.  Of course, these are all suggested by the setting, and not directly shown as examples in the book.

The second is the examples of Mr. Puma looking for a new religion to follow.  Likewise, this also suggests that the complexity of seeking "truth", like in real life, isn't an easy, cut and dried affair.  

The third support would be the ideas put forth under the Maximum Game Fun as far as mixing and running with the setting.  Depending on how you view this, it is either the weakest or strongest support for mixing religions across homelands.  If you are of the opinion that MGF(as written in the HQ book) is saying, "Do whatever!", then yeah, that's a cop out.  If you're of the opinion that the book is saying- "Find contradictions, play with them and make them a source of theme to run with", then it's a pretty strong support.

I also have a few quotes from Greg from the mailing list which support the latter idea, and I can dig those out later today or tomorrow if you'd like.

Of course, none of these stand as official answers- so you are probably best off contacting Greg or whomever you deem "authoritive" enough to give you an official answer :)

And, as far as the Lunars go- my understanding is that the two big benefits of the Goddess are being able to utilize all 3 types of magic and being at "full power" while within the boundaries of the glowline.

Chris

[Brand_Robins]

Also it is worth looking at Tarsh. The Specilized Religion there is, of course, Lunar Religion, but we're told that there are renegades who still follow the old ways and refuse to take up the Moon.

The Unspoken Word's website's summary of Tarsh says the following:

Orlanth and the more evident storm deities may have been suppressed, but this is still essentially an Orlanthi culture, albeit with heavy earth-cult overtones.

It later says:

Orlanth's worship is proscribed, although how tightly this is enforced varies wildly. Most of his subcults survive, treated as independent deities. The attributes of kingship are now held by the (royally-sponsored) Cult of Alakoring Rex.

Ernalda, though, is respected as both the sister of Maran Gor and also, since HonEel's interpretation of the Tarshite land rites, "She Who Waits" within the Lunar pantheon. All the earth deities are worshipped, with an interesting conflict existing between the "official" (and rather less bloodthirsty) Maran Gor cult and the Exiles.

There is a clear process of assimilation at work, with attempts being made to find acceptable roles even for the most inconvenient deities. Not only, for example, do Babeester Gor's axe-maidens guard earth temples, they also act as executioners, with heinous criminals being sacrificed to fertilise the fields. Indeed, it is worth noting that Tarshite religion is a fairly bloody affair in general  -- live sacrifice is quite common.

Over a century of imperial contact and missionary work has also brought new deities. The Provincial Church of the Seven Mothers is strong here, its local members burning with the fire of the newly-converted.

There is also a rich pantheon of local and city gods, half-way between village wyters and hero-cults, and fulfilling something of the role of each.  

So we've got quite a bit of religious complexity in Tarsh, and it would be a mistake AFAIC to simply assume all Tarshites are Lunars and/or that there are no Tarshite heroes running around that have a Storm Pantheon or Earth Pantheon keyword about. Of course, the years of assimilation would have changed their focus to the point that Heortlings or Esrolians might barely recognize the Bad Old Tarshite religions.

And man, a campaign centered around the Earth and Storm rebels in happilay Lunar Tarsh, and the ways in which they can't get along and are slowly losing their connections to their gods is one that I"d love to play in.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Actually, the way we played, it was about as likely to encounter a Lunar Heortling as an Orlanthi one, once the characters got north of Shadow Plateau. Visual indicators were often deceptive, as any number of clothes, tools, and so on had crossed the cultures in both ways. Our characters being from the hinterlands of Heortland made them rather curiosities, from many NPCs point of view, because they were so solidly Heortling Orlanthi in their details of dress and practice.

So yeah, a character with Heortling as homeland and any one of a dozen Lunar religious practices as magic/religion, was a common thing. That's always been my ideal character if I ever get a chance to play.

Best,
Ron

[Bryan_T]

I think you really hit on two topics, one being the issue of homeland keyword versus common religion key word, the other being about what members of mixed religions can do.  In this post I'm going to give my views just on the former topic.

There are really three circles here, being geographical region, culture, and common religion.  Occasionally they will be identical in scope (Teshnos is a bit like this).  More often they overlap to some degree, but not totally.  Your question really addressed culture versus common magic religion, so I'll ignore the geography circle, but just remember that while a land and a culture may share a name, that does not mean that culture is only found in that land or that everyone in that land is from that culture.  For example, really Tarsh probably hold three to four major cultures: the exiles, "old" Tarsh (partially assimilated), "New" Tarsh (heavily assimilated), and lunar immigrants.

A feature of Glorantha that may not be unique but which is not common to all fantasy worlds is that it almost fell apart in the past.  Almost every culture traces its descent from a small group who followed the lead of some cultural hero to survive the Darkness, and just as importantly, it is by repeating those rites that the world continues to exist!  This may not be emphasized in the base rule book, but "everyone knows" that if they don't do their sacred time rites, the Darkness will return and the world will die for real.  This tends to create strong ties between culture and religion, as to reject the religion can be seen as deliberate villainy, an abandonment of responsibilities.  In other worlds, this tie is probably not as strong.

However even in Glorantha there are exceptions.  In fact right in the core rules one is presented, although not as clearly as it could be.  Esvular (spelling?  I almost always spell this wrong...) actually has three very different common religions within it:
1.   No-god.  By definition a common magic only religion. (some day I hope to play one of these guys!)
2.   God-Forgot.  Personally I think this should double as a common religion and a specialized magic key word.  As the former you can choose five of the abilities and augment with them.  As the former, in the Teshnan manner, you would take all ten abilities, could use them actively, but forego all other magic.
3.   The Aeolian Church.  The Esvular homeland does not give the common magic religion part of the church, although I'm sure it exists, and it obviously would NOT be No-God or God-Forgot.  Probably something like the "The Little Saints" in Seshnela, a mix of talents handed down since time immemorial and things picked up from the local supernatural beings.  But the Aeolian Church specialized magic keyword almost totally dominates this common magic religion, as it is the only specialized magic key word recognized, and pretty much everyone within the common magic religion also belongs to the specialized magic keyword, if only as a lay worshipper.

So yes, a cultural key word can have more than one common religion key word possible within it.

If you prefer, you could treat each common magic religion as having a distinct culture, then blend the two.  In that case you would have three Esvulari cultural key words, one of No-God aetheists, one for God-Forgot agnostics, and one for Aeolian believers.  In each case then you could just have culture and magic blended into one word.   It would remove one layer of keywords, but would require more cultural keywords—most with minimal differences—to be written.

Regards;

Bryan

[Bryan_T]

The second point in Mike's article was comparing the statements about most religions being mixed, with the presentation of one specialized magic system per common magic system.

First I want to clarify how I understand things, which may not match how others (possibly even the authors) understand things.  My understanding of most common religions is that "belonging" is often pretty vague.  There is no cost (0 HP to join a common religion without establishing a relationship to it), no real added benefits beyond perhaps access to common magic, and no real cost to so belonging.  In other words, for most people having the heortling common magic religion or the Seshnelan common magic religion or whatever is much the way in the modern world that many westerners would say they are "Christian" even if they never go to church and are dubious about most aspects of the religion.  But still you know a charm to keep vampires away (wearing a cross around your neck), a way to curse your enemies ("god damn you!"), observe in some way the principle holy days (even if it is with easter bunnies, halloween costumes, and santa claus), and know the basics of the mythology.

At that level you do not get tradition charms, can't call for divine intervention, and don't get liturgical blessings (and can't pray for a miracle).  You may have access to common magic known within that religion.  In some places there might be a real structure at this level (as with the God-Forgot folks or Imarja), in others it may be more a matter of just understanding the mind set and listening to the common stories.

The next step is to take a specialized magic key word.  That is to say, become a communal worshipper, a spiritist, or a lay worshipper.  There is not a rules reason why you could not in fact become more than one of these, so long as you are willing to pay the cost of joining each and make the investment in time and resources into each of them, as each takes 10% of those.  

There are three reasons that joining at this level might be unlikely, however.  First of all, sometimes the authorities of these religions don't approve of it.  Secondly most people go with the "normal" one unless they are called to a different one.  Finally each presents a different way of viewing the world, even if part of the same religion, and few people are comfortable for long absorbing and supporting two different world views.  A fourth, gloranthan, factor is that although all mortals are mixed beings, most have a predominant theistic soul, animist spirit, or essence, so they tend to have a natural calling or attunement towards one of the three systems (why, for example, some heortlings become kolati, even if it means being socially marginalized and belonging to a very limited religion).

If you did belong to two or three specialized magic key words at this level, you could do some combination of asking for divine intervention, wear tradition charms, and get liturgical blessings.  

At higher levels of commitment, I think the biggest barrier to multiple specializations might be acceptance and time.  That is, they may not let you be a liturgist at The Church of the Iron Penitance if you are also known to spend much of your time being flagellated as part of your role as a practioner in the ecstatic rites of the Penitant Whip Tradition.  Even being a spiritist of the Penitent Whip is apt to carry a whiff of unseemly conduct that is apt to make it difficult to become a liturgist—obviously you have some weird habits and could corrupt the congregation!  

Of course, of such improbabilities are player-heroes made!  (See Mike Dawson's sig file for Greg Stafford's own comment on this sort of thing).

In short, I think it is possible, but rare.

Of course, certain religions will make this rarer than others.  Under the red moon, where there are well established and reasonably accepted animist and adept portions of the religion, I would think this is a good deal more common than amongst say the Grazers, where they really only have one specialized magic keyword readily available.

--Bryan

[Donald]

The canon on a lot of the Lunar stuff is hidden away in the ILH1.
There it's clear that the homelands are more social and cultural entities than geographical locations - there are people from the Dara Happen homeland in all the satrapies but they are a minority in most.
Each of those homelands has a religion associated with it and nearly all of them are of one type, so Rinliddi generally worship the theistic Vrimak pantheon while Carmenians generally worship the monothestic Carmenian pantheon. It would be a strange person who worshipped both but not impossible.
Throughout the empire there are also people who worship the Lunar pantheon which includes theists (Yanafal Tarnils), monotheists (Makabaeus) and animists (Jakaleel). Again it is unusual to follow more than one of these but it is not impossible. This bit isn't covered in ILH, details of the Lunar pantheon will be in a subsequent volume, so I've had to extrapolate from other publications.
Finally there's the Seven Mothers Church which is a combination of the main Lunar deities including both theists and animists which means worshippers can get both feats, talents and feats. This is potentially very powerful magic as I discovered when I started writing up an NPC, not so much for the individual things but the possibilities in combination.

[Mike Holmes]

Though I quote Chris first below, I've incorporated my responses to everyone in this post.

I love the way you demand to dig deep on anything and everything :)

Some would call it neurotic, but... :-)

The first is the concerns about Lunar missionaries, and of course, Lunarized Sartites.  That would indicate that there's likely to be Heortlings with some Lunar religion keywords running about, probably a few Lunars who adopted a fair amount of Heortling ways(minus Orlanth, of course) while colonizing their lands, etc.  Of course, these are all suggested by the setting, and not directly shown as examples in the book.

Well, actually there is one huge example in the book of this as Brand points out...Tarsh. Tarsh is, if I'm not mistaken, an entire homeland of essentially culturally Heortlings who have been pretty much co-opted to the Lunar way. And we know that in both Sartar and Tarsh and perhaps elsewhere both religions exist.

And this is a good argument for this sort of thing. But it also argues a different way. If, in fact, somebody is a lunarized Heortling, perhaps he should get a new homeland keyword. That is, does it make more sense to give a Sartarite who worships the Lunar deities the Heortling Keyword with the Lunar religion? Or a whole new homeland keyword indicating the place where he got that religion from.

Put another way, should the Jew in Spain get Spain and Judaism, or Toledo Ghetto as their Homeland keyword? As Bryan points out, is the homeland really about geography, or about culture? I'd agree that it's really about culture, hence why it's Heortling, and not Sartar for the homeland. One problem is the title itself - I'm betting that "Culture" was just to scientifical for them to use it in Glorantha. But the other is that, in some cases they do use the region name instead. Tarsh should actually probably be more like "Lunarized Heortling" if it's to be a culture keyword.

But this just makes things more complicated. I mean one can use the Heortling keyword for the Tarshite who hasn't converted, by altering for local conditions like geography, langage and custom, making it a new homeland. Or one can take the Tarsh Homeland and just modularly take off the religion, and stick on the Storm Pantheon.

To an extent, this part of the discussion is almost semantic. The results of doing the above may look identical in terms of abilities when you're done. So do you say it's a new homeland, or the same one with a different religion. Does it matter at all? Part of this discussion is just me liking modularity. That is, it's nice solution to just plug in the keywords as separtate parts - Regional Culture and Religion.

Also, the question with Tarsh and Sartar vis a vis the Lunar religion is that it's been imposed - I'd like to also look at some places where this has not happened. Are there places where two or more religions have existed more or less peacefully for a while? Or are multiple religions always the result of some insurection that heads eventually one way or another?

As Ron points out, anybody could be Lunar in Sartar, in theory - the question is how did they get that way? I'm assuming conversion in most of those cases. Could even be second generation depending on where from, and that might merit a homeland keyword. Ron was playing Hero Wars, however, so that made these issues a lot simpler to deal with in terms of enumeration. And to some extent the HW attitude in this case that the data is simply not all that important is a good point.

To some extent I'm making a mountain out of a molehil. But I'm hoping that some principle mechanical ideas can come out of the discussion.

The second is the examples of Mr. Puma looking for a new religion to follow.  Likewise, this also suggests that the complexity of seeking "truth", like in real life, isn't an easy, cut and dried affair.

Well, the rules obviously support changing your religion. Not that it should be common neccessarily, but that it can happen. I think that there's no question about these things that there may be individuals who have different religions in these places. The question is whether or not this is the result of some homeland, or of some conversion later in life. That is, we have two cases, the Jew in Spain, or the Catholic in Spain who converts to Judaism (talk about unlikely - but it did happen). The latter is not problematic, we have rules to cover him. It's the former that I'm looking to enumerate properly.

Donald makes a good observation that ILH does give breakdowns of the "cultures" extant in each "country" for lack of a better word (Satrapies there). But this actually argues in favor of no religious mixing in cultures as these cultures are actually ethnically based. That is, when they say "Dara Happan in Tarsh," they don't mean some Tarshite Heortling who worships the Dara Happan Pantheon. They mean ethnically and culturally Dara Happan people living in Tarsh. Presumably, in fact, you could use the Dara Happa Keyword for these people, perhaps adjusted for location. So this indicates that cultures can only have one religion.

So, in this case we could just give our Jew in Spain the Hebrew or Israel homeland keyword adjusted for locale, and be done with it. Instead of the Spain cultural keyword and Judaism as the religion keyword.

So are we saying that religion is locked to culture? Perhaps that they're for these purposes synonymous? Nope, we're back to Tarsh with it's heortlings that we know worship more than one religion. But they're in conflict. Hmm. Are there any examples of a culture not in conflict about religion that has two or more religions practiced by it's members (not simultaneously, but Bob does one, and Bill does another)?

It would be a strange person who worshipped both but not impossible.

Well, the complicating factor here is that they're both part of the Lunar way in this example as I understand it. So perhaps it is possible. But that's then only because they come under an umbrella religion. What Greg has strongly suggested is that almost nobody, certainly not any culture of people, worship more than one religion. Or, rather, if they did, that would actually all be one religion.

So if there's a culture of Praxians who not only worship the Praxian animist religion, and who worship the Storm Pantheon, the subsequent synthesis is actually an entirely new religion. Not two religions. Now, could you represent this with two religion keywords? Ehrm, maybe? That's the sort of thing I'm looking for answers on here.

If you're of the opinion that the book is saying- "Find contradictions, play with them and make them a source of theme to run with", then it's a pretty strong support.

Well, I'll assume this is the case for this purpose. Again, I'm pretty sure it's a good idea to have multiple religions in each homeland. I'm just looking for other viewpoints, and how to implement.

I also have a few quotes from Greg from the mailing list which support the latter idea, and I can dig those out later today or tomorrow if you'd like.

Nah, I know the ones you're talking about. But these are all about individuals I think. I'm more concerned with subcultures. I think Greg is less likely to be supportive of that idea. Or, rather, I think that he'd say that the Puma people living in Sartar still use the Puma People Homeland Keyword, not the heortling keyword and the Puma People ancestor religion.

Of course, none of these stand as official answers- so you are probably best off contacting Greg or whomever you deem "authoritive" enough to give you an official answer :)

Not looking for "official," especially because I sense that the official answer will be "MGF." I looking for what makes the most sense in both Glorantha and abroad in terms of play and how to make that work with the system.

And, as far as the Lunars go- my understanding is that the two big benefits of the Goddess are being able to utilize all 3 types of magic and being at "full power" while within the boundaries of the glowline.

Right. But what does that say about other religions?

[quote = "Bryan"]A feature of Glorantha that may not be unique but which is not common to all fantasy worlds is that it almost fell apart in the past. [/quote]Oh, I think this is common to all fantasy worlds. Common enough, at least. In fact, in all cultures, even if the cataclysm never happened, their myths say it did. So, from a cultural POV, we can assume this is universal.

My point being that I don't see the Gloranthan religions as particularly more strongly linked to cluture than the Aztec culture which had the same belief that the world would end if they stopped sacrificing (or the cognate culture in Shadow World, the Lankan Empire, around which I recently made an entire campaign with that same theme). Sure the world might not have stopped if the Aztecs stopped their sacrifices, but they couldn't have known that, could they?

The question that has been brought up that relates, however, is the "reality" of the magic. That is, it's been said that the magic in Glorantha is real, and hence possibly more potent in making people adhere to their religions. But this is questionable, too. That is, again, the Aztecs "knew" that the world would stop if they stopped sacrificing, and they "knew" that other magic worked. That is, they'd look at what they did, and at the world around them and see changes that they'd attribute to their magic. For the Aztecs magic worked too.

Not to be cheeky, but can you prove that the Aztecs didn't have magic? I'm not saying that they did, just that they believed that they did.

This gets into a really esoteric argument. One could argue that the magic of Glorantha is more "visible" than magic in the real world, so more believable. But I think this is patently false. That is, if magic did work like it worked in Glorantha, then you could have skeptics who would point out the natural laws working behind the mechanisms. In fact, you do have them in Glorantha, they're called God Learners, IIRC. Another argument is not that it's more visible, but that it's more useful or intelligent. But, again, for every argument you can put out there, I can argue that one could be just as skeptical about it.

It all comes down to faith. Do people have doubts about their religions? Sure they do. But think about this. In Glorantha, people may have more of a chance to experience the magic of other cultures. When that happens, what do they think? Don't they have to question their gods at that point? Either their gods are not the only gods, or their gods share power. If their gods share power, then are they worthy of worship?

I think all of these issues are so contrary to fact in the real world, that we really can't draw any conclusions from them about what "would be" the case. I mean what's important is that the players have a feeling that what you portray is correct. And I think that mixed religions are just as plausible, even in Glorantha as a worst case scenario, as they are anywhere else based on how magic works.

I think that the genius of Glorantha and the magic systems that it portrays is that it's really just like ancient earth when we all thought magic worked. Here's a real brain twister - what if there is no magic in Glorantha, and people just think there is. It actually all still works. That is, Magic is just a viewpoint, a belief.


Anyhow, I have no beef with the idea of common magic religions being, well, common, and not part of the specialized magic religion as Bryan points out. Yes, many of the CM Religions are listed as being somehow counter to the main religion, and as such really separate religions. Thing is that if a player takes a CM Religion for their character, there's a question of whether or not they can have both that and a specialized magic religion keyword - rather, if you take a CM religion, does it supercede your specialized magic religion keyword. I think that they possibly can exist side by side. I think the idea of CM Religions is that they're so "common" and sorta lowly that they're not seen as interfering with other religions enough to worry about. I mean certainly there's no problem in terms of some of the specialized magic religions accepting the CM Religions. The only question is whether or not you can be in two at a time.

And there's no dount that it's OK to take magic from a CM Religion and have a specialized magic religion - that's explicit. So really there's no problem with enumeration here in the vast majority of cases. CM Religions have always been problematic in terms of when and if you can have them.

So my point here is that I don't think that CM Religions say much about SM Religions in terms of what might exist side by side in a homeland, and how they co-exist. I'd agree that they lend themselves to the idea that more than one religion exists. But I don't think that they say much about whether or not this creates a cultural divide. Just because Hilda happens to worship the little spirits in the wood nearby every once in a while, and goes to church doesn't mean that she's in a different culture. But if Hilda's neighbor is part of a sub-culture that worships a theistic pantheon?

Mike

[Mike Holmes]

Following my post above with a second...

The second point in Mike's article was comparing the statements about most religions being mixed, with the presentation of one specialized magic system per common magic system.

Reading through what you have here, I think you have some terminological problems. Or perhaps there's something that I really don't get.

In other words, for most people having the heortling common magic religion or the Seshnelan common magic religion or whatever is much the way in the modern world that many westerners would say they are "Christian" even if they never go to church and are dubious about most aspects of the religion.  

I agree so far FWIW, this is what the book says. But...

At that level you do not get tradition charms, can't call for divine intervention, and don't get liturgical blessings (and can't pray for a miracle).  You may have access to common magic known within that religion.  In some places there might be a real structure at this level (as with the God-Forgot folks or Imarja), in others it may be more a matter of just understanding the mind set and listening to the common stories.

The next step is to take a specialized magic key word.  That is to say, become a communal worshipper, a spiritist, or a lay worshipper.  There is not a rules reason why you could not in fact become more than one of these, so long as you are willing to pay the cost of joining each and make the investment in time and resources into each of them, as each takes 10% of those.  

OK, two problems.

First, this seems to imply that somehow the common magic religions have something to do with the specialized magic religions. I don't think they do much. About as much as practicing voodoo has to do with being a Roman Catholic. That is, you can become a Catholic without ever knowing anything about Voodoo. That is, I don't see joining a specialized religion as a "next step," I see it as a completely separate option. For example, one could start without any CM Religion knowledge at all, be a Shaman, and then learn common magic afterwards (and join a CM religion if that's allowed).

Second, I don't think you can have more than one basic level religion keyword. Because I think each religion only has one religion keyword associated with it. I mean, far from the simple and obvious examples like Seshnella where there is only one sort of worship in it, complex religions like the Lunar way have only one keyword listed. I don't think this is an oversight, I think that's because that's the one and only keyword to take if you want to be a member of the Lunar way.

Further, Greg has made it clear, in case you were thinking of joining more than one religion, that though there's no rule against it that they thought that people would realize that the idea of joining more than one religion is absurd, and so they didn't think that a rule prohibiting it was neccessary. That is, while the rules technically allow you to join more than one religion, that's an unintended side effect of failing to predict that people might want to take more than one. If they had known people would think about taking more, they'd have expressly prohibited it.

And from some POVs this is sensible. Taking two religions is something akin to believing two contradictory things - that there are two "right ways" to do things. Further, the gods of Glorantha being theoretically objectively real in that world, they don't like the idea of people being in more than one religion. So while one might have relationships with people in two religions and be fooling them into thinking that the character was a worshipper in both, they'd get no magic from one or more likely both religions.

Secondly most people go with the "normal" one unless they are called to a different one.

Looking at the Kolating example, the way I've had it explained to me is that it'll be something like the Jackaleel practice in the Lunar Way. That is, you still start with a theist communal worshipper keyword, but you then take Kolating Practice as a magic keyword.

This said, I may be misremembering that exchange.

If you did belong to two or three specialized magic key words at this level, you could do some combination of asking for divine intervention, wear tradition charms, and get liturgical blessings.

See I don't think this is true. I think that very simply, the Heortlings have no "core practice" from which the Kolating practice derives. It derives, instead, from the same basic theist worship that every Heortling does.

At higher levels of commitment, I think the biggest barrier to multiple specializations might be acceptance and time.

While these are definitely a consideration, for many of the formats there are distinct limitations built in. For example, obviously you can't go outside of the magic of your diety if you're a devotee. Just isn't allowed. Might be problems with other sorts of keywords, too, that's less clear.

Of course, of such improbabilities are player-heroes made!  (See Mike Dawson's sig file for Greg Stafford's own comment on this sort of thing).

I don't want to go off on a tangent, but I really find Greg's comment there preachy. Put another way, all I want to know is the rules. All that other stuff about "unlikely" or whatever is situation specific and I can figure out on my own.

Of course, certain religions will make this rarer than others.  Under the red moon, where there are well established and reasonably accepted animist and adept portions of the religion, I would think this is a good deal more common than amongst say the Grazers, where they really only have one specialized magic keyword readily available.

Again, important to be very careful with the terminology here. The Grazers have many, many specialized magic keywords. What they have only one of is the specialized religion keyword.

It's precisely the confusion between these things that gets people messed up. The basic religion keyword, and the "basic level specialized magic keyword" are the same thing. When you take the Majestic Horses Tradition Religion keyword, that's a Spiritist keyword. Another thing that many people don't get is the "progression" of one sort to the other. That is, when you go from being, say, a Spiritist to being a Practitioner, you actually don't lose the Spiritist keyword. Unlike when you go from the Practitioner to Shaman where it transforms.

So what I see is basically this: each character gets one and only one specialized religion keywords. They may also be able to get additional Common Magic Religion Keywords, I'm unclear on this (I think I knew at one point, but have forgotten). They can then also take one or more (one to start) specialized magic keywords from that religion. Where the Specialized Religion Keyword is of one specific type (Theism, Animism or Wizardry), the associated specialized magic keywords can be from any of the otherworlds, and it doesn't matter that your religion keyword is, say, Theist, you can still get into Animist Practices. And no prejudice against it from the Practice side, because they all came in that way.

Anyhow, it's this reading of the rules that's problematic in many ways, but it's the one that I currently have. I actually think that if one were allowed to come up with, say, the animism version of the Lunar Way Religion Keyword, that this would solve some problems. But it also introduces others at the same time.

In any case, this only barely touches on some of the deeper issues involved, so while I want to deal with these issues, too, let's not let this one part of the discussion sidetrack the rest of it.

Mike

[Brand_Robins]

A couple of thoughts:

Put another way, should the Jew in Spain get Spain and Judaism, or Toledo Ghetto as their Homeland keyword? As Bryan points out, is the homeland really about geography, or about culture?

That depends, almost completely, what it is you are wanting to say about the culture/religious split with the use of Keywords. If the Sephardic Jews in late-medieval Spain have an Israeli homeland keyword (despite the fact there was no such homeland at the time, and that many of the Spanish Jews hadn't been there for more than a visit in over 1000 years) then you're saying a different thing than if the Spanish Jews and the Spanish Christians have the same homeland word.

At that point you can go a couple of ways: you can get all simmy and argue about the history of the people and the region, tossing in facts like the fact that the Sephardic Jews used the Spanish language as a lingua-franca that allowed them to build trade networks with each other across large parts of Europe and the Middle East, but that they were seen as resident aliens by the Christian Spanish, and so on and so forth. Or you could ask what it is you're wanting the story to be about – is it about the conflict of religions or the conflict of nations? Or about the ways the two influence each other?

There is a real degree to which I find Glorantha to be mostly about the later, but with a heavier emphasis on religion. There are nations which exist as things separate from the religions which make up the majority of worship in the nation, but the parts of the nations that most clearly, dramatically, and frequently come into conflict are based around religion – as magic grows out of religion, and it is the magic that forms the big booms of the setting.

There is a degree to which the book assumes that religion and culture are always (the Orlanthi "all/always") co-dependent because by having each nation easily identifiable with each religion it makes for a setting in which vast Imperial armies march on the basis of religious belief and magical force rather than the less gut-wrenching and ever more complicated (or at least more tedious) needs of population expansion and nationalistic control through other-forming.

If the Lunars are Lunars and the Heortlings are Orlanthi and the Teshnites all worship the same pantheon, then when they march against each other you get a collision of not just armies, but magic and beliefs as well. In the really real world where the "Indians" were a vast mix of things that can't be called one religion without straining the use of the word beyond the point of credulity are fighting the Europeans who are all Christian, but very different Christian, and aren't invading because of anything having to do with their religion or anything having to do with the religion of those they are invading –you end up with a mess of conflict that has to do with money and influence and international trade. And while that can make a good story, it's less visceral and immediate than the "They are going to put an end to our gods and our religions! If they win you won't be able to pray anymore!" element of the religious conflict of Glorantha.

Of course, there is also a point at which all of the comparisons we're using are a bit disingenuous. The relationship between culture and religion changes between times and places. The way that the ancient Greeks defined the ties between religion and culture (in which any member of a city-state had to be part of the public rituals of worship) and the way that a modern American defines them (where separation of church and state is at the center of so many institutions) are not going to be the same. The changing forces of the nation, the culture, and the religion have been a shifting set of power-dynamics throughout human history.

There is, I think, a degree to which Glorantha does play with this. The Lunar "We Are All Us" is a step towards building a national identity that is outside religious identity, but because of the nature and birth of the Lunar Way it hasn't managed to escape its own religious nature yet. Much like the Roman conquest, in which the clashes of religion and culture were sometimes the same and sometimes not related at all, the Lunar advance has aspects which are all about religion, and aspects that are all about empire. That the matter is confused is probably just because the Lunars are in flux, and aren't certain about their own position or future anymore than anyone else is.

Now, back to the "Orlanthi all" that I mentioned earlier. While I do feel that the mass of Glorantha is set up to strongly equate religion and culture, for all the reasons given above, it also allows for individuals to deviate from that mold because that makes for better stories. (And also more realistic ones, but that may be completely tangential.) The struggles those different individuals face will determine, for them and possibly for the whole world, where the gap between religion and culture falls. It is the Herotling Lunar or the Lunar Orlanthi who are putting the pressure on their cultures and their world, who are breaking the rules and rocking the boat. It is they who get right in and fuck with these esoteric matters in the form of real conflicts in their life, and by their choices display their stand on it.

So how do we decide which keyword combinations these characters get? I have to say that we get them by having the player focus on the conflicts they want their character to have. If your Tarshite takes the Lunar Religion, he is telling you something about his place in Tarsh and his relation to the culture and its dominant religion: he's normal, and within the biggest group. If he takes the Storm Pantheon, but still keeps Tarsh as his homeland, he's telling you something else: he's a Tarshite and part of the culture, but at deep conflict over what religion defines that culture and where the divide between the two things is. Finally, if he takes Heortling from Tarsh as his Homeland with Storm Pantheon as his religion, he's telling you of yet another conflict: a character that has been so disenfranchised by the changing religion of his country that he can no longer consider himself/be considered a part of that culture – the change in religion so changed the culture that he cannot be a part of one while rejecting the other.

Donald makes a good observation that ILH does give breakdowns of the "cultures" extant in each "country" for lack of a better word (Satrapies there). But this actually argues in favor of no religious mixing in cultures as these cultures are actually ethnically based... So are we saying that religion is locked to culture? Perhaps that they're for these purposes synonymous? Nope, we're back to Tarsh with it's heortlings that we know worship more than one religion.

More than anything I think this shows more that the very notions of what ethnicity, nationality, country, and religion are must be things in flux. Dara Happans are actually a great example of this. They are a nation that defined itself, largely, by their solar worship. But now some of them worship the Moon. And the ones that do worship the Moon consider themselves part of the same people with the guys that worship the heron that gives birth to twins in the swamp – but do so while recognizing that those people are not Dara Happans, they're Darjiini. So in that case there is a combination of a culture that was once based on religion, that has now become a state/nation based culture that is partly opened to a new religion that is used to unite peoples of different states. Thus the reason we get such tension between Dara Happan orthodoxy and Lunar modernity is that the two "cultures" are using religion for a very different purpose. One uses it to exclude and define the self vs. the other, the other uses it to include and define everyone as part of the same whole.

So to an old school Dara Happan, to be Dara Happan is to worship old Yelm. To a Lunar Dara Happan, to be Dara Happan is to be from a Dara Happan family and city, raised in that culture but with a different worship. You can still be Dara Happan, but its more important that you're a Lunar because religion trumps culture – a proposition that makes little sense to the old guard who see religion as being culture.

What Greg has strongly suggested is that almost nobody, certainly not any culture of people, worship more than one religion. Or, rather, if they did, that would actually all be one religion.

In all of this I'd like to see an examination of Teshnite religion. Depending on how closely it resembles real-world India it could well end up throwing a lot of this for a loop. The ancient "Hindu" religion didn't actually recognize itself as such for a very, very long time. It was a bunch of different cults, with often radically different ideals about everything, that slowly got pushed towards each other by various cultural processes. In the end, however, the thing that made it all "Hinduism" was outsiders coming into the area and saying, "You're all from basically the same area and all have religions that are much different than ours while being tangentially linked to each other, so we're going to call you all hindu." After a couple hundred (or thousand) years the idea started to stick, and so even to this day people will identify themselves as part of the Hindu religion when their beliefs have next to nothing in common with each other – certainly less than, say, Juadism and Christianity have in common with each other, and those two very much insist they're different religions.

So do the Teshnites all actually have one religion, or do they just get categorized as having one because they all believe in, say, reincarnation and are all from the same general area of the world, and so get lumped together by everyone else? Does that cut it for the Teshnites? Do the ones that believe that the universe has to be maintained by regular sacrifices that contractually bind the gods to do their job (which those feckless bastards wouldn't do if it wasn't for the priests) really think of themselves as the same religion with those who believe that it is ones role in life to love their deity without hesitation or thought of reward, utterly giving the self over to the perfection of divine love? Or do they just kind of accept that they're in the same basket in the eyes of the outside world because they both agree that the gods have the same names, while those Lunar bastards think the red moon is a goddess?

So where is religious unity – in praying together, or just in looking enough alike from the outside that outsiders dump you all in the same basket?

I think Greg's answers to these questions have a lot to do with Greg's take on the interrelations of ancient culture and ancient religion – and I think in his world to be a culture unified depends on having a central religion that the majority of people (not necessarily the entirety of the people) can identify with. So it becomes a circular argument – if they're one culture they have one religion, if they don't they aren't. People like the Tarshites fall into a bubble here – they are still part of the same culture because the old religion hasn't been fully whipped out yet, but their slow and inevitable disenfranchisement is on the way. Either they'll be destroyed or they will eventually end up as a different culture. For now, however, they're in that space between.

So my point here is that I don't think that CM Religions say much about SM Religions in terms of what might exist side by side in a homeland, and how they co-exist. I'd agree that they lend themselves to the idea that more than one religion exists. But I don't think that they say much about whether or not this creates a cultural divide.

I have to agree with that. SRs tend to be "the big thing" and CMs to be a lesser thing. SRs seem to be the type of religion that dominates and helps define a culture. CMs are things that exist because there is variety in any culture, and special variety where cultures meet.

Of course, it could be that over time a CM could become an SR, but I don't have enough Glorthantha Fu to know if that's ever actually happened.

So what I see is basically this: each character gets one and only one specialized religion keywords. They may also be able to get additional Common Magic Religion Keywords...They can then also take one or more (one to start) specialized magic keywords from that religion.

I agree with this.

Where the Specialized Religion Keyword is of one specific type (Theism, Animism or Wizardry), the associated specialized magic keywords can be from any of the otherworlds, and it doesn't matter that your religion keyword is, say, Theist, you can still get into Animist Practices.

On that one I'd have to say, "You can if there is such an otherworld tradition to be joined in your religion." Many of the SRs seem to have magical traditions from multiple otherworlds, due to the complexity of divine relations through the history of Glorantha – but I wouldn't take it as given that all SRs have magic from all otherworlds. So long as your SR does, you can, sure – but if your SR doesn't have an animist tradition then you can't just pick up animism as part of the religion.

[Donald]

Looking at the Kolating example, the way I've had it explained to me is that it'll be something like the Jackaleel practice in the Lunar Way. That is, you still start with a theist communal worshipper keyword, but you then take Kolating Practice as a magic keyword.

I'd disagree on this. Jakaleel is a core part of the Lunar religion, one of the Seven Mothers. Kolating is an animist cult in Sartar (and maybe other places) and pretty unrelated to the Storm pantheon. It seems to be much more like the sort of thing you're looking for - a completely separate religion sharing the same cultural background. Someone who becomes a Kolating opts out of the theistic religion and takes Kolating practice instead.

Another example would be the Zebra riders of the Pavis Royal Guard. These are mostly refugees from Sartar but accepted by the other animal nomads. I'm not sure whether they're animists living partially in the primarily theistic culture of Pavis or theists who are regarded as equals by the animist nomads of Prax.

Then there's the great spirit Storm Bull who is the same as the god Urox.

I don't think the link between Homeland and Religion is particularly strong, more a crude link to provide a default for the player. Quoting Pg.37 "Specialised Religions - Each homeland has a dominant religion, and your hero is a member of that religion unless you state that he is not."

I feel the use of "nation" is anachronistic, about the first reference to national identity is late medieval England and that may be Elizabethan historians interpreting facts to create that identity. So we have religions, cultures and empires which reflects much better the ancient world model of Glorantha.

In that context Dara Happa was an empire and the culture of the rulers of that empire who followed the religion of Yelm. When it was conquered by the Carmenians the empire disappeared to be replaced by the Carmenian Empire but the culture and religion remained unchanged. When the Lunar Goddess was born she defeated the Carmenians and the Lunar Empire replaced the Carmenian one. I'm sure some Dara Happens converted to the Carmenian religion and adopted their culture but probably not many because the Carmenian culture and religion were not looking to recruit from the conquered. The Lunars on the other hand are so there are significant numbers of people who have adopted the Lunar religion with or without discarding their previous one. This has even spread to culture - there is a Lunar citizen keyword to reflect this and although it is usually an additional keyword it could be used on its own to reflect someone with no other specific homeland.

[Mike Holmes]

Wow, well said guys.

I like your approach, Brand, of more or less allowing the player to dictate how the keywords are assembled (actually collaboration with the GM who may have some good ideas, too, about how to handle it, or alternatives), and deriving meaning from that. Because I agree that these things are just too maleable from culture to culture and religion to religion to make any really hard and fast assumptions. I think that's the problem that I was having to start. The solution isn't really very comforting, however, because there's no simply rules to follow here.  

The Teshnan religion is actually problematic here, because it's actually a common magic religion. Yep, I missed this until recently, but it's not a specialized magic religion at all. Apparently they don't have one per se. Yes this does raise some big questions about what the cults mean. I believe Josh Neff recently got some clarification on this matter, and I'd like to hear from him on it. That said, he's working on a project right now, and might not be available for a while. Anyone else who followed that thread on the rules list would be encouraged to divulge what they learned about it. Worst case, I'll go look it up myself, and see what they came up with.

But I think that saying that the Teshnans have an overall religion keyword is not saying that they all belong to one tight religion. I think a keyword can, and in this case does, indicate the sort of loose federation of cults that one did find in India. The other obvious option is to treat each and every cult like just another common magic religion.

As for the Lunars, I think I've messed up with my example. Because, in fact, there is the "From Dark Tradition" of which Jackaleel is a practice. That is, there is a tradition one can join. I think, in fact that one can be a member of the Lunar Way, and potentially a starting member of the Lunar Way as well. That said, I think that the problem here is with my overall knowledge of this stuff since I don't own a damn copy of ILH. For those who do, can a person who is in the From Dark Tradition also be a member of the Lunar Way? Or does Lunar Way replace the religion keyword in this case? I've only played a Darjiini, and my reading of the SurEnslib Tradition is that it's not actually part of the Lunar Way, the Darjiini being in somewhat a state of rebellion if only philosophically. Am I wrong there, too?

Overall, does the Lunar Way include "religions within religions" or not? Just to get terms pedantic here, a tradition, a pantheon, or a church is a specialized magic religion. So saying that there are animist traditions within a religion seems to be saying that there's a religion inside of a religion. (In the case of Kolatings as we described them, Brand, that would be a Kolating Practice inside of the Storm Pantheon; I'm pretty sure you meant something like that - also see below).

So maybe it is that one can have multiple religion keywords if they're all part of some "Super-Religion" that allows them together. I'm not sure. I'd be overjoyed to find this was the case, however. Because, again, I think it allows the sort of modularity that I think makes the game more versatile, and allows for the Concentration conundrum to actually have some teeth.

In fact...I'm tempted to allow characters to be in cults from more than one religion. I got lambasted the last time I proposed this, the idea being decried as "D&Dish" or the like (ironic because it's actually more RQish if anything). But, especially as a result of Hero Quests, I think it should be possible. After all, the whole Lunar Way is the syncretization of several religions as a result of a massive heroquest to raise the red moon. Probably not a common thing, but I can see allowing it with the right background concepts behind it.


Donald, it may well be that Kolat represents an entirely different religion. That would certainly simplify the case. But, that isn't what was indicated to me here: http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/HeroQuest-rules/message/19695
Actually the ruling that Rory gives is interesting. Apparently the "base" keyword isn't really "moded" to one of the otherworlds, but allows all of the advantages related to all of the entities in each otherworld. So if the religion includes worship of gods and spirits, then you can call for divine aid, and get Tradition Charms in theory (with the caveat that the character should really be stated as knowing these other esoteric parts of the religion in some way - Rory suggests a relationship to somebody who is in that branch, which makes sense).

He later somewhat contradicts this by saying that the theoretical Kolating Practice is then also the Core Practice, and might not have tradition Spirits (later that it's not a full "birth to death" tradition).

Hmm. Now that I think about that, I think that clarification was made here that "religion" in this context did refer to some "super-religion" meaning "all of the beliefs that the Heortlings share - which was somehow greater than all of the parts of the religion. Basically that, as implied above, there can be full Traditions and Pantheons potentially within an entire "tradition." (I wish I'd referenced that post earlier).

On the subject of Urox, I'll raise you Sword Man, who is just Humakt in disguise. This I'm not really concerned about, because we know that it's actually a different religion. Sword Man is listed as part of the Praxian Tradition, and we know that the Esvulari misapplied worship of the Storm Pantheon is the Church Of Aeol. The real question about the Zebra Riders is whether or not they can really be considered culturally Sartartite (Heortling Keyword).

BTW, the point about the term Nation is well taken, and perhaps Empire is a better one. But, basically, I meant geo-political unit. Sartar is theoretically a Kingdom, and within it there are likely many cultures and religions. There's no Sartar Keyword, but there is a Tarsh Keyword, and that's also kingdom if I'm not mistaken. The point being that there is some overlap between what you can assume about what a Keyword represents. Heortling is most definitely cultural - a culture that exists geographically in Sartar, Heortland, Tarsh, etc. But Tarsh, to be a culture, would maybe more properly be "Lunarized Tarshite" or somesuch (or "Those Candy-Assed Surrender Monkies from the North" to the Heortlings).

Mike

[James Holloway]

Or does Lunar Way replace the religion keyword in this case? I've only played a Darjiini, and my reading of the SurEnslib Tradition is that it's not actually part of the Lunar Way, the Darjiini being in somewhat a state of rebellion if only philosophically. Am I wrong there, too?

The Darjiini aren't in rebellion as such -- it's just that proper, honest-to-gosh Red Moon worshippers are not as common as all that.

However, if you would like to be one, you can still maintain your old religion (but only if you elect to do so -- normally the Lunar Way replaces it), as long as "no conflict with the Lunar Way exists." (ILH1, p. 17) It doesn't specify when a conflict exists (for a perfectly good reason, really, in that there are dozens if not hundreds of deities within the Empire), so I guess it's up to the Narrator. Pretty obviously, you can't worship Orlanth and the Lunar Way (and ILH1 p. 17 says that "only Orlanth" has been shown not to contain any of the Lunar Power).

As for people who are raised in one culture but worship the religion of another, let's take a look. The problem here is that examples are hard to find -- I don't have Orlanth is Dead or mumbletyThundermumble yet, but let's look at what I've got.  On p. 23 of Barbarian Adventures, we are told that warriors from Lunarized clans or the Aldachuri use the same stats as non-Lunarized Heortlings, just that they tend to initiate into the cults of Solar deities or Pelorian war gods (like Doburdun). This suggests that even though they're from a more "Lunarized" environment (particularly the Aldachuri, who are just from a different environment generally), they still use the Heortling Homeland.

Similarly, Heortland is very different from Sartar, but its inhabitants still use the Heortling keyword. However, I suspect that this is not true of Yelmalions from Sun County, who have very strong control of their area, even though it's smack in the middle of Heortling territory. I bet there's a Sun County keyword floating around somewhere, which if true would suggest that it's the cultural homogeneity that matters. You have the Homeland keyword of the dominant culture of wherever you grew up.

Does that make sense?

[Brand_Robins]

I've only played a Darjiini, and my reading of the SurEnslib Tradition is that it's not actually part of the Lunar Way, the Darjiini being in somewhat a state of rebellion if only philosophically. Am I wrong there, too?

No, that's at least mostly right. Of course every group in the Lunar Empire also has a non-Lunar religion that makes up a big part of it. The Dara Happans have Yelm worship, the Rinliddi have the Vrimak Pantheon, the Syllians worship Moon Bear, the Pelandans the Jernotian Way, the Carmanians their own pantheon, and so it goes. But in all of these areas there is the Lunar Way, with specifically Lunar specialized religions and magical keywords.

What the ILH says about being an Imperial Citizen, and the Imperial Citizen Homeland Keyword, is:

"Imperial Citizenship is  special status avaliable to any of its member peoples, and so some people are Imperial Citizens as well as (or replacing) their native citizenship... in return they pay a "scythe" of a seventh of their income to the State through their local temple, have to obey their Lunar cult leaders, and must report to appointed Imperial leaders for work services.

In most cases, a hero will take this keyword in addition to a homeland keyword. Most Imperial Citizens in Silver Shadow, for example, come from Dara Happan stock and take that homeland keyword. They may choose whether they are exclusivly followers of the Lunar Way or also have  relationship with the Solar religion."  

Really, there seems to be a degree to which the only places that the Lunar Religion doesn't exist more-or-less peacefully as an "over religion" is where it comes into conflict with cultures whose gods have historical beef with the Lunar's peoples or whose gods won't lie down and accept a "still great but not the greatest" roll. The Storm Pantheon gets stomped out of existance in Tarsh, and the Darjiini are treated pretty crappily, but most of the other homelands in the greater Lunar basket keep their own religion -- but all have members who are Lunars in religion, and others who are Lunars in culture, and some who are a mix of both.

So in the Lunar Empire it is possible to be a member of two religions, so long as your religion is officially under the Lunar umbrella and it's people subservient to the Imperial will. The way the book puts it is: "If their magicians can detect the Lunar Power in something, it is part of the Way. Only Orlanth has resisted this test so far. Joining the Lunar Way is a deliberate act that an individual can undertake only voluntarily. Initiation into this new faith supercedes all previous religions... Lunar worshipers may choose to remain in their orriginal religon as well as long as no conflict with the Lunar Way exists."

Really, it seems something like the way the Romans behaved. If your religion can exist under the Roman sky, then you can worship your own gods as you want -- so long as you give offerings at Roman hollidays as well as a sign of loyalty. If your gods or priests will not submit, however, your religion will be wiped from the face of the earth.

So there is a religion within a religion. The Lunar Way is a religion, and some of the other religions under it, like the Solar Pantheon, are SRs. So it may be possible, for example, for a Lunar to be an initiate of Natha (Lunar) and Urvairinus (Solar). Of course, the Lunar Way isn't clearly an SR -- it has common religions and all practices associated with it, so it is possible that it isn't an SR, but is more like a "Cthulhoid All Consuming Umbreall Religion."

We're also told, on page 105 of the MRB, that "Specilized Religions concentrate on one type of magic ot the exclusion of all others. They specify one type of worship and draw magic from one of the Three Otherworlds..." So I'm not sure where that leaves either the Kolat fellows or the Lunars.

I almost have to suggest that the Lunar religion is different than any others, it breaks the rules. The Kolat worshipers may actually be a different SR (in game terms) but because it's an SR that is culturally tied to the dominant SR (and tied by kinship between gods, right?) that it is allowed to exist within the culture of the dominant SR as a heterodox form of the same religion for cultural purpouses.

But there I've gone again, splitting religion and culture apart from each other.

Hmm. Now that I think about that, I think that clarification was made here that "religion" in this context did refer to some "super-religion" meaning "all of the beliefs that the Heortlings share - which was somehow greater than all of the parts of the religion. Basically that, as implied above, there can be full Traditions and Pantheons potentially within an entire "tradition." (I wish I'd referenced that post earlier).

I think this is true. There are the things in a religion that are SRs in game terms, and things that are "religions" in world terms -- and the two do not always perfectly align. (They do most of the time, but it seems they do not have to.)

[James Holloway]

About Kolatings and whether or not they're members of the Storm Pantheon Specialized Religion: I'd vote no. http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=10467&start=15 suggests that Kolat is a Tradition by itself.

Additionally, not being a member of the Storm Tribe religion fits a couple of things we know about Kolatings and the Storm Tribe.

1) Kolatings live very much on the outskirts of societies. Although granted a special status in law, Kolating shamans are wandering outcasts, given food or gifts in exchange for their services but not really part of the community -- or so, at least, implies King of Dragon Pass.

2) There are almost no communal worshippers in the Storm Pantheon religion. "Orlanthi All" Heortlings initiate on reaching adulthood. So communal worshippers who aren't also Initiates or higher are probably only children and people who can't afford the time commitment -- beggars, stickpickers, and so on. This might include Kolatings, but I think not.

Now, is Kolat as a spirit part of the Storm Pantheon in the mythological sense? Yes, absolutely. Orlanth's brother and all that. But I think that Kolatings don't need to take the Storm Pantheon religion.