Domhain Sceal 2nd Edition

Perhaps, I'd rather not have deities be so cut and dry though. Nature is motherly, diaster is evil part of the motivation behind the original DS was to get away from these tropes and cliches.

Well, deities examples can change, obviously. There're there to illustrate the idea as opposed to list what deities are actually there.

Also, they are Celestial Gods who are more like representations of reality. Terriestial Gods, on the other hand, are far less cut and dry (I'm thinking of making them like Exalted where they are mortals chosen by the Celestial Gods, which is how they get their portfolios. And for laughs they can be chosen by TWO or more conflicting portfolios).

edited 29th May '13 2:50:07 PM by IraTheSquire

Understandable but in reality the truth resists simplicity.

edited 29th May '13 8:33:30 PM by Vyctorian

At first I didn't like your idea, but after I reread it I liked it a little bit more. I haven't come up with anything yet though.

Well, A) World is young, too young to likely have sentient life. Magic happened! The Aether bleed into this world which hyper evolved life until it was sentient which bleed back into the Aether. B) This mostly happened around ley lines, which are like a cross between rivers of flowing mana and fissures in reality.

I like the second because it can help explain why different races, creatures and classes came about in different ways depending on how much magic leaked out, and how quickly and how the already existed natural factors influenced, encouraged or discouraged it's existence.

I don't see why magic would only and simply give sentience to a handful amount of living beings. It also seems to limit magic to sentient beings only. If magic were to give sentience I think I'd prefer if the gods did so.

Simple is good, or we'll end up like the last version.

And a lack of complexity just leads to Tolkien-ism/ D&D, we'd just end up The Same But Different, I'm not building Dungeons And Dragons, that already exists and they've done a fine job at doing it for 30+ years now; if I did otherwise it be waste of time and effort.

The last version was too complex but that doesn't mean we should go ultra simple, that goes against the entire spirit of why this project came into exist. We're suppose breaking free of many of the typical campaign setting tropes not going along side them or giving into them. Too much complexity is can be confusing which is what happened to the last project but a lack of complexity is boring, status quo up-holding and doesn't reflect reality in a way that is more harmful to world than helpful.

Simple should be a starting point, but not the end.

edited 30th May '13 2:45:00 PM by Vyctorian

But we are at the starting point, that's the thing. My idea was just that the World itself is a Genius Loci with different facets of its personality manifesting themselves as entities. Details and complexity and subversions/inversions/deconstructions all can come later.

@Vyctorian: A & B were not meant to be mutually exclusive. A can be dropped though, for a better idea.

@Ira The Squire: The Celestial Gods, in the last version, were just abstract ideas given sentience. While making Terrestrials into the Exalted appeals to me, I -would- like to keep that idea about Celestial Gods the same. BUT, it's also possible to make both of them the same.

I think gods coming out of the nodes as the first intelligent & magical beings influenced by magic could work, and they created more beings themselves. That way this leaves it open for other beings to be born of magic or intellect that on who aren't necessarily gods.

Also are we going for gods that came after the creation of the world? It seems like we are, Well at least before the world had substance.

Yes, I think I like it better this way. There could even be a story how the prehistorical gods decided yo build their own god city, Olympus-style.

Also, there should be (if there isn't already) a direct link between mind and magic, as was previously discussed. The soul would give access to the magic energy, and the mind (that is also the soul or something) lets living beings, sentient or not, manipulate it in various levels. The first gods would also be the first sentient beings, made of pure magic, born at the first Ley Nodes. Having a clearer and more direct link between soul and magic than any other being, they end being very powerful, and also the way they use their powers would shape their minds. Then they get to create their own living beings, then their own sentient beings and their own place to live.

I originally described the Aether as the realm of the mind, so yes.

As for proto-gods, I discussed that in the last edition, but I tried to keep it purposefully vague.

Sounds good to me but I think we should have a work around for soulless creates like those of machine race (warforged/golem).

Workaround is simple, they have souls.

Okay now we're getting into the nature of our souls, and if gods have souls or are souls that should come next before we develop the other aspects of gods. At least that's what I think.

Terrestrial Gods have souls, most are ascended mortals but I'd also give room to plain spirits ascending to godhood.

Celestial Gods can be left vague.

I liked the ideas of Terrestrial Gods being influenced by Celestial Gods, the old style of how they came about in hindsight basically allowed anyone with celeb level fame to ascend sometimes not even then.

Personally I think Celestial Gods should have some kinda soul, especially if souls are being used as a reason why our magic works a certain way.

We could do the two part soul structure from Exalted.

That's the high soul, low soul thing right?

Yep, high soul is like the soul-soul, while the low soul is like the beast soul / animus / life force deal. Sentient mortals have both, while animals only have the latter. Possibly, Celestial Gods could have only one or the other. If all they have is an animus, then its one that has become complex enough to show sentience.

That works.

And the fact that souls are linked to limitless energy can give rise to societies where that energy is directly harnessed. As in: attack cities, kill all the citizens, and take the souls and use them like batteries.

That gives me another idea: while souls can be used to tap magical energy, doing so can damage the soul. The more energy extracted, the more damage until it is destroyed. That gives an incentive for evil being to collect souls as the more souls means more energy can be extracted at any one time (and fixes the old problem of "why the heck would anyone want your soul" when people deals with demons/devils).

edited 31st May '13 1:04:23 AM by IraTheSquire

There should also be some kinda soul repair or recovery option in our world as well, if we go that route.

Yeah. Souls repair themselves overtime. Forgot to mention that.

edited 31st May '13 6:36:22 AM by IraTheSquire