How to Found a Minor Temple?

[Squaredeal Sten]

Actually I'm thinking of a path though shrine to temple from an Issaries point of view.  The PC's key may be economic development.  This should appeal to the local lord. thane, or chief for obvious reasons. 

How does this sound ?

For example, you' re in Apple Lane....  its population and economy clearly depressed after the Lunar invasion.  There must be more arable land than is under cultivation, because there is at least one ruined house..  Available services have probably declined as the skilled practitioners left town. Call the priestesses and innkeeper and horse breeder together at the thane's house.   You can see the potential but the actuality is economic recession..  This town can either grow or die.   What to do? No, not start a band - this is not River City and I'm not the Music Man.    I can Create Market.

The plan: Let's establish a monthly or weekly market, and hold an Issaries worship ceremony on the side.  An initiate can even do that, you don't need a priest for the basics.   There is an existing shrine on the edge of town.

In any case bring in a traveling priest - or have a good enough market to attract one for free - on seasonal holy days to initiate new members.  Begin to provide marketing services for local produce and craft production, otherwise known as a monthly caravan to the  nearest city.  [Plenty of plot hooks there for the GM.]  Maybe develop local production: Set an NPC to mash some of those apples and produce hard cider which is easier to transport, raise the proof in Storm Season by the old ice wine method,  and you have an exportable product; firewater!  It's already been market tested, just organize the distribution chain, trademark it with an apple lane  brand on the jars or kegs,  and advertise it.   . 

The local congregation grows.  The local economy grows.   The inn and the temple of love get more customers.  The tenant  farmers get to rise above subsistence level.   There is something here to attract more people.  Trips to market provide hooks to hang adventures on.  The shrine is dusted off and popularized. 

The PC grows in skill and POW, gains new rune spells at the temple in the big city and applies them to local needs.  Eventually applies for the priesthood, which for Issaries will normally NOT require getting a job at a temple, but instead should be  be running your own caravan or other successful business and running that weekly market.   (I note that there's no book reference for Issaries God Talkers, but that's what I'm working up to.)

Now with a growing community that has partaken of the benefits of the Issaries cult, can we put together the necessary support for a minor temple?  Essentially an expanded market with a permanent meeting room built around the old shrine, shelves for votive images, niches for a couple of associated cult shrines chosen to NOT compete with the local Orlanth priestess, some art work on the walls, surrounded by permanent shelter for market day, and stones set to hold the Issaries staffs for the market corners.

Of course there is that Heroquest to get though....

How is that for a business plan?  And is it believable in a Gloranthan context?   All without convincing 150 people to migrate as a group. 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 16, 2020 by Squaredeal Sten
clarify

[soltakss]

1 hour ago, lordabdul said:

3. You're going to a place where you cult doesn't exist yet, but there is a local competing cult.

1. So yeah, free t-shirts!

White Shirt Day among the Talastarings was a thing. the Lunar-loving king gave out white shirts to everyone to curry favour.

 

1 hour ago, lordabdul said:

Basically, instead of the heavy handed Lunar methods of conquest, you instead do some sneaky (but possibly coordinated!) cultural/religious overtaking of your neighbours....

But that's exactly what the Lunars do.

1 hour ago, lordabdul said:

I mean, if you offer very similar blessings as the other temple, but you also have free t-shirts and honey-glazed pork chops every Wildday, maybe people will switch over to your deity!

You've got a Healer Goddess? Look, we have a Healer Goddess as well. You have a Trader? So do we. You have a grim dealer of Death? Us too, but ours can come back to life again. You have a sage? Well, lookee here, so do we. You have a Trickster Thief? Well, I'm afraid we don't as we don't encourage that kind of anti-social behaviour. We've also got an Earth Goddess who grows maize and someone who fights horse demons. Oh, look, we have Praxians as well, our Sable Riders are just like your Sable Riders, but with better magic.

[Lordabdul]

31 minutes ago, soltakss said:

But that's exactly what the Lunars do.

That's what they do after they invaded your lands with their soldiers. I'm talking about doing that during peace time... basically more like religious warfare/cold war.

[jajagappa]

6 hours ago, lordabdul said:

That's what they do after they invaded your lands with their soldiers. I'm talking about doing that during peace time...

Actually it IS what they did BEFORE they invaded your lands!  Lunar missionaries and merchants arrived in Dragon Pass during the 1590's (at the same time they were "buying off" Talastar through White Shirt Day).  They were even down into Esrolia, and probably Heortland, preaching the Lunar way (though perhaps also encouraging assassination of Sartar's heirs in the process), as well as establishing the trade that the Empire particularly wanted with Esrolia (and the lands beyond).  

In many ways, you can think of the invasions of 1602 and 1605 occurring because the missionaries and merchants got attacked by barbarous natives.

[Lordabdul]

21 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

Actually it IS what they did BEFORE they invaded your lands!
[...]
In many ways, you can think of the invasions of 1602 and 1605 occurring because the missionaries and merchants got attacked by barbarous natives.

Ah nice... maybe if you play a campaign early enough in the metaplot, you can actually make the players feel guilty about the Lunar invasion  

[Darius West]

On 4/9/2020 at 9:46 PM, Sumath said:

Creating new consecrated ground for a minor temple could require some kind of Heroquest, I suppose. 

Or it might just require a ritual.  Considering that most temples will be built on a clan tula where Hero Quests are played out, the space is more than a little sacred to begin with.

[Squaredeal Sten]

On 4/10/2020 at 3:06 AM, Crel said:

......

I've ruled for my game that Sanctify basically lasts "as long as needed to do one thing." So if you need it up all night to get an answer in your dreams from your Divination spell, it's there. If you need it for three hours so you can do the Dance of the Falling Rains for Orlanth to get your Rune points back, it's good for that too. But it wouldn't be enough to sanctify a temple indefinitely—that only comes about through heroquesting (I don't think even an enchantment ritual does it, although I can see the heroquest requiring sacrifices of POW or other characteristics/goods).

it's also worth keeping in mind that some locations are inherently sanctified, like Larnste's Table and the Hill of Orlanth Victorious. They're sacred, and considered a temple, not because of the actions of mortals but because of what happened there during the God Time.

And now that the Red Book of Magic is published (December 2020), Crel is proven correct:  Sanctify is Duration (special) and   " When the ceremonies cease, the spell effects expire. " 

So it's good for a ceremony of any length.  But unless your ceremony is continuous it will expire some time.

So it won't create a Temple.  We need that wyter.

 

Edited December 30, 2020 by Squaredeal Sten
spelling

[soltakss]

2 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

So it's good for a ceremony of any length.  But unless your ceremony is continuous it will expire some time.

So it won't create a Temple.  We need that wyter.

Tag-Team ceremonies. You just pass on the leading of the ceremony to someone else, so you have a permanent ceremony going.