Fire Phase

Thats true, most mythologyes have gods that aren´t omnipotent, and sometimes far from that...

Tangent--
A few of the hells/vaults are in interesting situations at the dawn of the age of rebirth.
Bhall--does she still dwell in her "good" heaven? Or is she hanging out with Agares in an evil hell? I believe the latter is implied, leaving her old vault vacant of a leader. What would become of her old followers from the Age of Magic in this case?
Mulcarn--dead, well, mostly dead, anyway, leaving his hell devoid of a ruler. I doubt Bhall would be interested in moving in to her antagonist's home.
Sucellus has become god of life, rather than nature, iirc. Not too dramatic a shift, but what of his previous worshipers souls? Do they still 'fit in' with their resting place?
Which begs the question, do the people in Erebus worship gods for their personalities or their sphere or influence or because they agree with their teachings? Would a priest of Bhall have remained a priest of Bhall after her fall? It'd depend on whether he was devoted to her personally, or fire in particular, or to whatever aspect of goodness she represented prior to her crash. (and I'm sure it's different from disciple to disciple)

Didn't Bhall bring her vault with her? I seem to recall her influence being a main part of the reason that FfH's Hell is the dark, fiery place we might expect it to be.

I took that as an indication that she was sort of setting up shop in the entropic wasteland Agares called home. But alternate dimensions can get kinda weird.

Nikis-Knight said:

I took that as an indication that she was sort of setting up shop in the entropic wasteland Agares called home. But alternate dimensions can get kinda weird.

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Agreed.

I felt that during the fall of the angels Agares merged all of their vaults into one, and then when Bhall joined them he converted hers into a hell.

Kael said:

It all depends on how you define a god. If a god is all-powerful then they aren't gods, but a lot of mythology's have limited gods. I think judism was the first to present an all-powerful god.

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jah.

If you define on god on being worshipped by mortals then these are all gods, but then so is Elron Hubbard.

Nikis-Knight said:

Tangent--
A few of the hells/vaults are in interesting situations at the dawn of the age of rebirth.
Bhall--does she still dwell in her "good" heaven? Or is she hanging out with Agares in an evil hell? I believe the latter is implied, leaving her old vault vacant of a leader. What would become of her old followers from the Age of Magic in this case?

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At the begining of the age of rebirth she is lying dormant in Agares hell. It isnt until the age begins that she begins to wake and take an active roll. Her old vault, a realm of holy clensing fire is laregly vacant. In time she will come to recover what is hers. Breaking the ties that bind it to other holy planes and building new ones between it and the hells.

Fire had always been mankinds greatest weapon against evil and the priests used it liberally in the age of magic to protect their cities. When the fire rained down from the sky people were killed everywhere and they rushed to the temples of the fire goddess for protection. They found priests either driven mad, immolating themselves or spreading the fires or priests who were suddenly without power. This last group was the worse off, unable to answer the mobs cries they were often set upon and forced into the very fires that before would never burn them. The people believed it was a sacrifice of an obviously unworthy priest, an attempt to appease Bhall. It didn't work.

Mulcarn--dead, well, mostly dead, anyway, leaving his hell devoid of a ruler. I doubt Bhall would be interested in moving in to her antagonist's home.

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Your right, the wastes lay dormant. The top layer of hell is still frozen and patroled by the few ancient beasts that still exist hoping for the day their master returns.

Sucellus has become god of life, rather than nature, iirc. Not too dramatic a shift, but what of his previous worshipers souls? Do they still 'fit in' with their resting place?

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By and large they stay with Cernunnos. A shift of dominions is not just a change of jobs but a change of who they are. The gods are their dominions manifest, not the other way around.

Which begs the question, do the people in Erebus worship gods for their personalities or their sphere or influence or because they agree with their teachings? Would a priest of Bhall have remained a priest of Bhall after her fall? It'd depend on whether he was devoted to her personally, or fire in particular, or to whatever aspect of goodness she represented prior to her crash. (and I'm sure it's different from disciple to disciple)

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Yeah, the reason for worship will differ. But in the end the relationship is so close its hard to distinguish. But even in the afterlife a soul has the ability to abandon his or her god, no different than the angels that fall or asend occasionally in the FfH world.

So of the souls in Bhalls vault when she fell many fell with her, some fled to other dominions (a lot to Lugus) and those abandoned either stayed in her abandoned vault, began wandering the planes on their own, or made their way to the underworld.

The same for Mulcarn and Sucellus when they were killed. Cernunnos himself left the vault when Sucellus died and stayed with the ljosalfar through the age of ice, helping to protect them. It wasnt until he was promoted to a god that he returned and claimed the plane as his own.

Kael said:

But even in the afterlife a soul has the ability to abandon his or her god, no different than the angels that fall or asend occasionally in the FfH world.

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Wouldn't that really piss off said god? Or would the soul be moved to a place where it is unable to be harmed by their ex-god?

Anyway, I think that the heavenly fire thing should return. I always liked the idea of a heavenly fire instead of a hellish fire. Perhaps someone could take upon Bhall's old mantle? It hasn't really been brought up whether a mortal can ascend to deity-level, and I think it would be a nice addition to have someone fill Bhall's old role. It would be interesting to have a "good" fire line and an "evil" fire line. It would also tie in to diplomacy ("You use holy fire", "You use unholy fire"). I don't want to go making your world, though (I just like writing stories that are growing).

Edit: This discussion has gotten really off-topic, but I guess a Q&A topic about the story is a nice thing to have.

MrManNo1 said:

Anyway, I think that the heavenly fire thing should return. I always liked the idea of a heavenly fire instead of a hellish fire. Perhaps someone could take upon Bhall's old mantle? It hasn't really been brought up whether a mortal can ascend to deity-level, and I think it would be a nice addition to have someone fill Bhall's old role. It would be interesting to have a "good" fire line and an "evil" fire line. It would also tie in to diplomacy ("You use holy fire", "You use unholy fire"). I don't want to go making your world, though (I just like writing stories that are growing).

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Well, keep in mind that the only two priests to have access to the fire sphere are the Order and Veil. I don't know if fire itself should become the basis for a whole diplomatic modifier, but there's clearly some interesting stuff going on.

Reminds me of an idea for another alignment religion--rather than being set in stone, once established, it would change all adopters to the alignment of the founder. So you could have a good or neutral or evil religion with the same themes. Would work for the fire, maybe either worshiping Bhall or an angel of hers that still follows the ways of righteousness...

Chandrasekhar said:

Well, keep in mind that the only two priests to have access to the fire sphere are the Order and Veil.

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That's true. I didn't think of that. It would be nice if priest units were more versitile, but I guess that would defeat the purpose in having gods with magic-spheres.

Chandrasekhar said:

I don't know if fire itself should become the basis for a whole diplomatic modifier, but there's clearly some interesting stuff going on.

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I don't see why not. Some good leaders will get mad at you if you have a unit with death or entropy. I just figured it'd add another level to the diplomacy. Good leaders would not want to be with someone who used a demonic fire, and evil leaders would not want to be with someone who used an angelic fire.

Well arguably we already have that encompassed in the order/ashen veil religions-they both use fire very effectively but hate each other. And the good civs without that fire still love all order civs.

But where the power to use Fire from the Order comes ? Junil ? o.o

Kael said:

I think judism was the first to present an all-powerful god.

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Akhenaton's Aton was the first real monotheistic god. it is beleived that Aton evolved into the jewish god during thwe exodus. (moses being an egyptian prince had the power to force an entire religion on a people in return for help to excape...)

Actually, there's no way to know who was the first omnipotent god. There are even theories which say Aten and Jehovah are one and the same, that the bible actually tells the story of Egypt and that the names were only replaced by fictional ones.

I hope they add in a volcano terrain as well, I want to see that volcano erupt and flow lava like that in civ 3. So see if you could add that, or you if it's going to be like a hell map, then make sure that the ocean is lava, there are magma, volcano, molten terrain. Make it look like hell if it going to the fire phase/era.

I don't know if it's possible to turn every terrain to lava if it is another era in the game other then rebirth.

Kael said:

The gods are their dominions manifest, not the other way around.

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Since the evil gods took control of their own destiny, wouldn't that relation be the other way around for them?

M@ni@c said:

Since the evil gods took control of their own destiny, wouldn't that relation be the other way around for them?

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Thats fair, there is obviously some play there. I tend to think of the gods as having very 2 dimensional personalities. They are the personification of their dominion. Junil is not a great general sitting in the clouds waging war against his enemies. He is perfect order, that helps him in some ways and hurts him in others but he is unable to be more than that (or if he did change then the definition of order would change to what he was).

In my mind I lean more toward the first way (he is order, and unable to perceive anything outside of that) but you are right and there have been changes over the history of Erebus which would indicate that some change is possible.

Kael said:

The "creator" god is actually fairly typicaly in a lot of ancient religions, that some god would come in, start everything, then back away. The concept of gods that gather their worshippers is probably most popular in norse mythology where the warriors go to the halls of their patron god to prepare for ragnarok.

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Four words: Ragnarok Mode

Two words! Two! Ragnarok. Mode. You don't count the words introducing the words, the logical extension of that would be "I've got seven words for ya: patience."

And Ragnarok Mode by Kael's definition would be more like the return of all the dead soldiers to fight with you in a final climactic battle, not an avatar descending from heaven. Although that could be cool - the host of the Einherjar here to help you prevent the Sheaim from ending the world - it would be hard to make without killing the game.