D&D General Pope Wars, nothing but Pope Wars

[Shades of Eternity]

One of the most interesting things in medieval history is the feuding popes where you have two different people declaring this as the supreme divine figure.

How could this used in your game?

 

[Shades of Eternity]

okay here's an idea for the forgotten realms that could play on similar themes.

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Mystryl has returned. She has been resurrected due to plucky adventurers.

When she returns, she summons Midnight, pats her on the head, and says, "Your services are no longer needed."

Needless to say, Midnight doesn't like being treated like this and denounces Mystral and suddenly dueling Mystras.

The weave is now a tug of war, and both goddesses of magic are demanding allegiances while everybody else picks a side, and since it covers magic, nobody can choose to be neutral.

and Poor Azuth, just poor Azuth. He has to go between the two and act as a mediator, but it is hard, so he delegates it to plucky adventurers.

 

[Seramus]

Mystral has returned. She has been resurrected due to plucky adventurers.

When she returns, she summons Midnight, pats her on the head, and says, "Your services are no longer needed."

Needless to say, Midnight doesn't like being treated like this and denounces Mystral and suddenly dueling Mystras.

That's a really interesting idea. Midnight needs all the love she can get. I feel like she gets forgotten even though she's been in the seat longer than any other Faerûn goddess of magic IRL, and a campaign that highlights the differences between all three of them would be just fascinating.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

Some background for pope wars.

 

[Voadam]

In my campaign setting I go with an Eberron type setup where clerics get divine power but not direct grants from gods (if they even exist or not). There is an imperial civil war going on with the state henotheistic church sort of splitting over the head of the church (Ptolus Lothian Church Emperor) trying to consolidate both religious and political power saying the bishops of all cities are subject to his direct control as well as saying a number have fallen to heresy and diabolism. The bishops of a lot of cities take the position that the infernal corruption is in the central church and that theologically each bishop is the head of their own dominion with the central one being equal to but not superior to the others.

So close to a dueling popes situation with separate claims of religious authority and legitimacy.

 

[MarkB]

One obvious possiblity, since we're dealing with a group that has easy access to high-level divine magic, is how one deals with passing of rights and responsibilities in a world with resurrection. If the Pope dies and a new Pope is chosen, but then the old Pope's supporters (or the new one's detractors) spring for the high-price diamond and he comes back, how well-codified in Church doctrine is his right, if any, to reclaim his title?

 

[Shades of Eternity]

One obvious possiblity, since we're dealing with a group that has easy access to high-level divine magic, is how one deals with passing of rights and responsibilities in a world with resurrection. If the Pope dies and a new Pope is chosen, but then the old Pope's supporters (or the new one's detractors) spring for the high-price diamond and he comes back, how well-codified in Church doctrine is his right, if any, to reclaim his title?

So Highlander/Kaiju fights with Popes?

I am so in.

 

[Necropolitan]

Cadaver Synod except instead of being dead the previous Pope's undead and they have to end the threat the lich poses.

 

[aco175]

How many places have one head of the church? Do all the gods have a head of church? Do all of them get together once a year to create rules for the little people? Can a King just declare the Pope is no longer in charge of the church and place himself there?

 

[humble minion]

In D&D the eternal problem is spells like Commune. Doctrinal or hierarchical schisms are had to sustain when once you hit level 9 you can basically just dial up your god and ask for an authoritative yes/no answer. It's the ultimate phone-a-friend option. So you'd have to think about how the schism continues to exist in that milieu - does split extend all the way up to the highest celestial servitors of the deity? Is something somehow interfering with communion with the god? It can feel a bit like a screwjob depriving cleric PCs of that sort of capability, which is part and parcel of their class.

A BBEG in a future FR campaign of mine is going to be a Chosen of Chauntea, a once-faithful cleric who got entrusted with a portion of their deities power and then ... refused to give it back. They still BELIEVE they're faithful, but doctrinally they've gone very Wicker Man - secret fertility rites, human sacrifice, feeding the soil with blood and so on.