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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kareyev" data-source="post: 369012" data-attributes="member: 4823">I'm in the mists of creating a campaign with a monotheistic religion.  The campaign is centered around the activities of a Merchant Guild and not the church, but to help players have a reason to player a cleric working for the guild I decided early on that the two would have to have at least neutral relations, if not one of mutual support.  As trade requires a somewhat stable environment to thrive I decided that the main embodiment of the church would have generally LN tenancies.  I too wanted the god figure to be able to dip into any alignment and domain so a neutral figure didn't work for me.  From the church's public view LN is the standard, but within the church there are those with different views.  The Church and Guild use these aspects help themselves grown in power.  For the farmer/laborer of the lands they send simple priests who seek to help the meek.  This is also a major view the Church promotes publicly.  When a dark deed is needed to root out someone uncooperative they may use someone with a darker aspect, but this would be done quietly.  But how do you make a deity that would be ok with this approach?  I decided that the Church believes that the power just wants to be worshiped.  The Church believes that the Diety is not particular about how it happens and is patient to see what ways mortals will develop to worship.  Most of the common folk only know of the aspect the Church uses publicly.  Other forms do still exist, but they are hidden from the view of the common man.  Druids in their groves, Orcish Shamans in the mountains.  Of course the church may be wrong about there view.  But that is something for my players to figure out.  [insert evil laugh]Now one other major aspect of this campaign is that the Guild is about to make contact with another culture that is very different.  For this different culture I needed another outlook on Religion that would fit into this same mold.  For this culture I decided that they see a Diety as a manifestation of their morality.  Nullists seeking to reveal that the world does not exist.  Platoists believing that everything has a perfect form.  Aristotlists seeking to measure and categories things.  Spinozains believing in a free will of the individual.   I'm sure you get the idea.  (Just finished reading Sophie's World so my head is flooded with philosophy at the moment.)As for a PC changing domains after the initial creation I had not really thought about it.  If a character had a major personality change for some reason I probably would go along with it, but there would have to be a good reason why and perhaps a slight disruption in the clerics power during the transition.Dogmatic struggles within a monotheistic church should be a given.  When there is only one power everyone is going to want their view of that power to be right.  Especially if it could mean bringing that person closer to their goals, whether they be good or evil.  In my own campaign the Guild will be warned if they use the darker side of the Church too much.  There will be those in the Church who will question how close should the Guild and Church be regardless of this.   And then word of these new religious perceptions will be flooding in from the new culture challenging the power of the Church from within and without.  And then there is this monk who keeps nailing questions about the nature of the diety on the front door....Hope that gives you some good ideas!  Let us know what you come up with.Cheers.</blockquote>

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