OpenQuest: Alternative Religions

The OpenQuest SRD describes religions thus:

[Religions] teach their members Personal Magic associated with the god and provide temples where worshippers can learn Divine Magic directly from their deity.

The following optional guidelines expand this view of religions to include sects or sub-religions in a main religion, religions that do not grant Divine Magic, and NPC-only religions or “cults”.

Sects

“Pantheon religions”, as the SRD defines them, worship many gods at the same time. Still, one would imagine each of these gods had their own dedicated priesthood which falls under the broader religion but offers specialized knowledge and magic to the dedicated worshiper. At a loss for what to call these sub-religions, this writer settled on the term “sect”.¹

For example, imagine a “Western Pantheon” which incorporates a number of gods, including the storm god Thunor, the sea goddess Ephine, etc., all led by the sun god Amus. Believers could choose to worship the pantheon as a whole, sacrificing to each of the gods depending upon the worshipers’ current needs. E.g. a merchant going on a sea voyage might sacrifice to Ephine as well as the merchant god Erysus, just to be sure. Priests might even run temples with all the gods represented (Amus in the center). On the other hand, larger communities of worshipers might support priests who specialize in one of the gods; the Sect of Erysus, for example, may appeal to money changers and merchants, so it has a dedicated Priest of Erysus who is still part of the religion of the Western Pantheon.

Sects may represent other divisions within a larger religion. For example, one sect may venerate Amus as the king or the gods and bearer of the sun, while another sect may venerate Amus as the god of laws and the guarantor of contracts. Both are equally valid within the loose myth cycle of the Western Pantheon; both reflect an aspect of Amus.

A sect may also represent a radical if not heretical interpretation of a religion’s mythology and rituals. For example, city-dwellers venerate Amus as the leader of the gods, while nomads claims Thunos is the true leader of the gods. Both can’t be correct. It’s up to the two sects (i.e. the GM) whether each sect is considered part of the same religion or are two religions that share most of the same gods.

One final problem arises when religions import gods. For example, assume belief in Maia the Earth Mother (as described in the SRD) is older than the other gods in the Western Pantheon. The Western priests have adopted Maia into the Pantheon, in part to attract followers of the old religion. So is the sect of Maia in the Western Pantheon the same as the independent religion of the Earth Mother? Are they two separate religions? Can priests move from one to the other without issue? That’s a question for the GM, and to some extent the players.

Non-Divine Religions

In the real world, religions may have virtually innumerable gods (e.g. Hinduism, Shinto, animistic religions) or no gods at all (e.g. Buddhism). Many popular ones have a supreme god who denies the existence of most or all other gods (e.g. the Abrahamic religions, Zoroastrianism), which stretches or breaks the model of Divine Magic.

To reflect such religions, we can posit that such religions grants other forms of magic such as Personal Magic or Sorcery (or some other kind invented by the GM). The Religion skill in that faith still signifies advancement in the religion, but advancement in magic requires additional, separate effort to learn spells and increase one’s Personal Magic Casting or Sorcery Casting skill. Consequently raising one’s ranks in the religion does not require extra Growth Points, although it may require achievements within the game world.

Example: Kotharism

Kotharism is a monotheistic religion centered around the nameless One God, as revealed in the Kothar, a holy book compiled several centuries ago. The Kothar provides moral instruction, social guidance, and a legal framework in addition to its more metaphysical and cosmological passages. Thus advancement in the religion requires not only the skill Religion (Kotharism) but literacy in Language (Taveti), the language of the Kothar.

Kotharists practice Sorcery as a way to better comprehend the One God and Their Creation. Personal Magic is allowed but considered an inferior art for the uneducated. Divine Magic, Shamanism, and the Way of the Wise are considered “idolatry” and strictly forbidden.

The Eastern Empire, which practices Kotharism exclusively, has three paths for social advancement: the nobility, the sorcery orders, and scholarship of the Kothar. This last path does not resemble the standard Initiate-Priest path. The table below represents ranks within the clergy:

Religious Skills: Influence, Lore (all), Nature Lore, Trade

Special Benefits: add +20% to social interactions with other Kotharists if they know you study the Kothar.

Imperial Academy Graduates

The Empire, in order to instruct generations of clergy, sorcerers, and nobles, established a system of “academies” in each city and some larger towns. Graduates of any Imperial Academy must have attained Religion (Kotharism) 40% and Language (Taveti) 80%, in addition to other studies, no matter their path.

Advocates

Any adult with sufficient knowledge of the Kothar may speak on behalf of an accused criminal, since in the Empire all law is religious law. (One must supply a certificate from an Imperial Academy or pass a battery of tests to prove this knowledge.) “Advocates” are effectively lawyers in the Imperial legal system. Beyond criminal cases, they act as arbitrators in civil cases and family disputes.

Sages

Sages of the Kothar command the same respect and authority as priests in other religions. The people consider them models of piety and morality. Nobles appoint magistrates and judges from their ranks. As experts in at least one discipline other than the Kothar, their words carry weight. Sages who prove not to be paragons of virtue and probity quickly lose their position, titles, and reputation.

The Imperial Council

The Imperial Council is the Empire’s supreme authority on the Kothar. Its members are masters of the Kothar, chosen by the Emperor and accepted by the existing Council. Councilors hand down judgments on important legal questions based on precedent and sound principles of Kothar interpretation. Behind closed doors, they debate the ambiguities and mysteries of the Kothar.

Sects of Kotharism

All Kotharists worship the same One God, but some do it a little differently:

• Orthodox: The Empire propounds a single consistent view of the Kothar, despite debates still raging within the Imperial Council. Unaware of or ignoring these controversies, the Orthodox follow official teachings. They regard themselves as the True Believers, compared to whom others lack sufficient faith, reason, or willpower.

• Progressives: Progressives push the boundaries of what the Orthodox regard as hard lines between faith and apostasy. They learn the languages and cultures of nonbelievers, adopt foreign tools and ideas consistent within the letter of the Kothar, and walk the “murky path” of Personal Magic. Even heathens can have useful ideas, they say.

• Traditionalists: Outside the cities of the Empire a vast rural population, often of conquered people, have low literacy rates and an imperfect view of the Kothar. The latest judgments of the Imperial Council are unknown to them. With little education their folk beliefs have blended with archaic religious law to produce a culture and civil order that would shock an Academy graduate. Their practices stay just this side of heresy.

• Admonishers: Following in the footsteps of the first prophet, the Admonishers decry perceived injustices perpetrated by those in power. Most consider them harmless.

• Djushali: Disciples of the prophetess Djusha seek knowledge of the One God through mystical and ecstatic practices rather than rational study. Some Orthodox press for this sect to be considered heretical, but so far the Djushali have transgressed no boundaries.

Not included are the Heretics, those who, despite clear teaching, persist in beliefs or practices forbidden by the Imperial Council. Persistent heresies within the Empire include the following:

• Iconoclasm: regarding all representational art as “idolatry”.
• Multiculturalism: asserting all cultures are true “in their own way”.
• Sorcerism: persecuting those who use Personal Magic.

Such heresies take permissible beliefs too far, and those who commit them may earn a pardon if they sincerely repent and make amends.

Other heresies put the practitioner far beyond the boundaries of the Kothar: Deism, Diabolism, Idolatry, Pantheism, and Panentheism. Of these Idolatry and Diabolism – worship of false gods and demons – are especially repugnant. Such heresies deny the fundamental truth of Kotharism: the One God is the only god, separate from the world, yet still involved in it through miracles. Such heresies, when discovered, warrant exile, branding, or death.

Cults

The OpenQuest main book (3rd edition, 2023) reserves the name “Cult” for NPC-only “enemy” religions. While this doesn’t make Cults necessarily evil it does make them mysterious and frightening. What are their goals? What magic do they have? How many cultists are there, and what connections do they have? The classic sword-and-sorcery version has near-mindless minions surrounding a high priest performing human sacrifices, but a Cult could as easily be one of the following:

• A formerly conventional religion that has gone off the rails.
• A scam created by a con artist with no special magic and no real god.
• A secretive Cult that poses no immediate threat but must be hiding something.
• A well-hidden Cult with important members in key positions of a town, city, or kingdom.
• A small group of core believers in contact with something not of the Known World(s) that gives its servants strange powers.

Providing a progression of ranks for an NPC-only religion has little point except as a guide to making NPCs. Here’s a rough guide for Cult ranks:

Note that there’s no “Lay Member” equivalent. Cults have no casual members, only fully committed fanatics. If the Cult somehow disguised itself as a legitimate religion, it would only teach common skills and Personal Magic so as not to arouse suspicion.

However, a Cult’s structure may not look much like either the “progression” above or the standard PC religion. It may have few (if any) real ranks, or have a unique rank structure that suits its own beliefs and function in the larger saga.

Likewise Priests may have Divine Magic unlike anything available to PCs, as long as the Magnitude of the spells reflect their power relative to the spells as written. They may not even have Divine Magic at all: Sorcery, Personal Magic, or some bizarre system of powers may suit darker or stranger Cults.

Example: The Death Cult

The Cult of Death acknowledges the death goddess of the Western Pantheon, but worship Death as a distinct entity, one who conducts souls from this world to whatever paradise or punishment awaits them. At one time the religion was fringe but reputable, centered on burying the dead and ensuring they could not return as undead. During the era of the Grim Kings, blasphemous sorcerers who gave themselves theoretical immortality through undeath, the Cult gained its more militant aspect when its priests became hunters of the undead.

Sects of the Death Cult

When the last Grim King became ash, the religion underwent a series of schisms that produced three sects:

1. The Mortician Sect returned to their old duty of disposing of the dead and ensuring they could not return as undead. Some of its practitioners retain martial skills and potent magics, but used solely on the unquiet dead.

2. The Slayer Cult pursued the last of the undead, and when it ran out of undead it turned to monster slaying. When it ran out of monsters, its members turned to assassinating living humans for “donations”, under the flimsy excuse that their new targets had “eluded death”.

3. The Necromancers abandoned their role as Death’s wardens entirely. Their unholy experiments cross the border between life and death from both sides, repeatedly. A necromancer may be able to save your recently deceased loved one, but he (or she) may just as easily turn them into an undead horror out of carelessness or morbid interest.