Could you make a Christian-oriented RPG?

[Celebrim]

fusangite: "Christians leaders, unlike other modern leaders, are left defending a set of isolated and individual miracles."

I'll keep this brief, because I don't want to disrupt an otherwise good and constructive thread.

You sure don't know many Christians, do you? Isolated? Individual? In the past? How much faith do you think one can have in a religion that doesn't produce miracles?

 

[fusangite]

You sure don't know many Christians, do you? Isolated? Individual? In the past? How much faith do you think one can have in a religion that doesn't produce miracles? [/B]

I'll quote my local Presbyterian minister: "We used to believe in Christ because of the miracles now we believe in him in spite of them."

 

[Wormwood]

You could use d20 Modern to do a quick Left Behind style game. The world is fairly 'open', with plenty of possibiulities within the scope of the novels.

Tribulation Force missions would make a decent game, if that's your cup of tea.

 

[shadow]

A lot of things depend on whether you are planning to make a game that features a monotheistic world, or actually planning on running the game according to Christian beliefs, maybe even running it as an allegory.

In the former scenario simply replace the polytheism of the PHB with a monotheistic world view. Allow clerics to pick from any domains but death, destruction, and evil (such domains would be reserved for "demonic" clerics) This is, by the way, what I'm doing in my homebrewed campaign that features a monotheistic religion loosely based on the medieval Catholic church.

To run the game according to a strict Christian worldview involves a little different playing style. First and foremost, the focus on the game shouldn't revolve around combat and acquisition of treasure ("Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal, but rather lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, will your hear be also. Matthew 6:19- 21 RSV translation) Rather the focus should more on role-playing. A good idea for a campaign could be playing Christians in the early roman empire, a time when Christianity was outlawed and Christians had to go underground.
Strictly speaking, PCs wouldn't be able to play as Socerers or Wizards (such classes would be reserved for NPCs) since messing with the occult is forbidden in the Bible. Clerics could be allowed as PCs (prophet type characters.) However, clerics wouldn't "cast spells". Instead they would demonstrate God's power. In game terms any spell that was used in an inappropriate manner would automatically fail.

 

[JPL]

Not trying to offend...

A fella over at Rpg.net sketched out the idea for a game revolving around Jesus's travels in the Far East during his "missing years."

Jesus and the disciples master the wisdom and martial arts of the Orient, walk the earth, and fight all manner of evil and spiritual corruption.

Throw in some Kabbalistic mysticism to cover the magic and maybe some Gnostic themes...

"Jesus: The Legendary Journeys"

 

[darkdancer]

Tyrant,

are you looking for something specifically Christian? or simply monotheistic? because if it's the latter, you should take a look at sepulchrave's story hour (sorry, I don't know how to make links to the threads) - lady despina's virtue (plus "continued"), heretic of wyre I and II, and rape of morne (morne is a city, not a person...).

actually everyone should read it: it's one of the best things I've ever read!!

 

[s/LaSH]

Two quick things to add.

One, alchemy (mentioned a while ago, and fairly integral to mysticism in medieval times). The quest for the Philosopher's Stone, as I hear it, wasn't to amass wealth. Sure, it could transmute lead to gold, but that wasn't the point - because having mastered the art of such transmutation, you could become immortal. That was what they were after, and I've read records of one guy who claimed to have succeeded... although his claims were, of course, rather dodgy and difficult to prove so many centuries later.

Two, the whole thing about what to 'put in' to a game... arcane magic is a fairly touchy subject, but other than that, the point of such a Christian game would surely be to explore morality? Much like D&D, actually, although some people don't like the alignment rules. To enable an exploration of what's good and what's bad, you need access to all things, not just certain skills defined as 'good'. After all, what is good and why do you get to define it?

I'll ask a theologian about mystic powers when he gets home, but I think the answers may surprise... oh, and I always defined magic as the application of knowledge; but Oxford says this:

The supposed art of influencing the course of events and of producing extraordinary physical phenomena by the occult control of nature or of spirits; sorcery, witchcraft. Also, the practice of this art.

Occult means 'not understood', very roughly, while sorcery is listed as the practice of magic or witchcraft, especially to cause harm. Useful fact for the day.

 

[trancejeremy]

There actually is a Christian orientated d20 RPG - The End, which takes place after the rapture or whatever it's called.

There's also that new game, Engel, from White Wolf I think. It's also d20, but OGLed, not the d20 logo

http://www.white-wolf.com/engel

Apparently, the PCs are angels.

The game Kult is essentially a ripoff of my religion, Gnosticism, which is a form of christianity.

They changed a few bits, and added some angst-ty stuff, but it's still pretty recognizable.

 

[WayneLigon]

Jesus and the disciples master the wisdom and martial arts of the Orient... "Jesus: The Legendary Journeys"

And perhaps come out much like This Watch the clips.

 

[JPL]

Maybe this has already been mentioned...take the gladiator campaign stuff in the new Dragon, and have the characters play gladiators who are early converts.

Once they win their freedom, they walk the earth spreading the Gospel and protecting the meek. But they must struggle to reconcile their warrior training with their new beliefs.