Topic: How do you justify open and close channelling lists in your game worlds?

[Fingolfin80]

Well, the title says it all, I guess. I would like to know if you provide in game explanation to your PGs for the fact that different cults may have the same spell lists.
How do you handle it? The spells are the same for everyone and only the power (PP) comes from the gods? In this case do you allow a cleric to learn spell lists from different cults? In theory it should be possible if the spells are the same.
Otherwise you could state that they are similar but different, but that would require an awful lot of work to customize every single spell for every cult in the campagn. Unless they are formally different but identical in their effecs (which would feel kind of... odd).
Instead, if the deity provide directly the spell (as a miracle) the problem is solved, maybe, but in this case what are PP? Just a measurement of how much you can ask from your god?
It is a very large topic, I know, and there's no right solution, just choices that are more or less coherent with the world they are made for. But I'm tring to figure out which coice I want to make for my own, and other people experience is always a great inspiration, even when very far from what's optimal for my needs.

[Hurin]

There are some cults with unique spell lists: in Shadow World, the priests of the Unlife have some of their own lists (these are given in the spell lists appendix to Powers of Light and Darkness). If you want to delve into homebrew, Brian Hanson (poster on these boards and on the RM Blog) has developed a whole series of spell lists for the followers of Shadow World deities (e.g. followers of the Sun god Phaon get lots of fire/light spells).

But to answer the larger question, I say this: Magic was invented in ancient times, thousands of years ago. The first spellcasters did not differentiate between the realms of magic; they considered them all part of the same power: what we call today 'Arcane' magic. The ancients developed the basic techniques of spellcasting that are still in use today, and some of their basic spells, like the many variants of shield, are thus present in all realms. Later spellcasters differentiated the realms so that they could focus on casting spells more suited to their specific qualities (and thus cast them more easily): those who were more in tune with the essence flows focused on developing their empathy with the magical fabric creation and on casting and shaping spells that tapped into that essence; thus the realm of Essence emerged. Casters who specialized in spells that invoked divine aid, or who offered their services to deities in order to develop their own power, came to be called 'Channelers'. While a Priest and a Cultist may appear to have very different philosophies and behaviours, the way they cast their spells is actually very similar, and indeed some of their spells overlap, because they are both Channeling spellcasters.

[Fingolfin80]

There are some cults with unique spell lists: in Shadow World, the priests of the Unlife have some of their own lists (these are given in the spell lists appendix to Powers of Light and Darkness). If you want to delve into homebrew, Brian Hanson (poster on these boards and on the RM Blog) has developed a whole series of spell lists for the followers of Shadow World deities (e.g. followers of the Sun god Phaon get lots of fire/light spells).

But to answer the larger question, I say this: Magic was invented in ancient times, thousands of years ago. The first spellcasters did not differentiate between the realms of magic; they considered them all part of the same power: what we call today 'Arcane' magic. The ancients developed the basic techniques of spellcasting that are still in use today, and some of their basic spells, like the many variants of shield, are thus present in all realms. Later spellcasters differentiated the realms so that they could focus on casting spells more suited to their specific qualities (and thus cast them more easily): those who were more in tune with the essence flows focused on developing their empathy with the magical fabric creation and on casting and shaping spells that tapped into that essence; thus the realm of Essence emerged. Casters who specialized in spells that invoked divine aid, or who offered their services to deities in order to develop their own power, came to be called 'Channelers'. While a Priest and a Cultist may appear to have very different philosophies and behaviours, the way they cast their spells is actually very similar, and indeed some of their spells overlap, because they are both Channeling spellcasters.

So, in your world deity gives just the PP and clerical spells are very similar to the ones of mages.
I would assume in this case that a cleric of deity A could, if he wanted, teach his spells to a cleric of deity B.

[jdale]

Not relevant for my setting, but I would probably say that the open and closed lists manipulate unformed and shapeless energies of the divine realms, and anyone with a connection to the divine can use those methods. But base lists represent working with the energies of specific divine entities, normally* only with their blessings (which might be implicit or explicit depending on how directly involved you want the gods to be, I tend towards more hands-off myself), and as such even if non-followers learn the prayers, they cannot forge the connections which are required for the spells to work. Followers of gods with similar or overlapping spheres of influence may be an exception to that; they may either share lists or at least may be able to share insight into how their similar lists can work. (I do prefer the idea that learning spells requires study, it is not just the deity leaning down and stamping it into your head.)

Also, some open and closed lists might become unavailable if they are too far out of tune with the specific powers of your deity.

* for one possible exception see the Heretical Channeling list here: http://www.guildcompanion.com/scrolls/2014/nov/redefiningarcanemagic03.html

[Spectre771]

The primary question to your question is "How many gods are there in your gaming world?"

For every god there is a religion which was formed by followers.  Each religious group/sect/cult/worshipper prays or honours their god differently.  Even if it's the same god, two religions could worship differently using different ceremonies and observations to achieve the same result.

While a person may not be a Catholic, they may know what the 'sign of the cross' is and may even know "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen."  That doesn't mean they are Catholic or that God would confer any favors upon that person.  Any more than knowing who Buddha is and rubbing the belly of a statue will grant you Divine Intervention from Buddha just because you made the motion with your hand.  However, being a dedicated member of the religious group will give the practitioner "inside information" on scriptures, tenants, ceremonies.  If the practitioner goes to higher ranks in the religious order, secret ceremonies and practices and hidden knowledge may be revealed.  (Who else is waiting for the Vatican to open the vaults to the hidden treasures???)  The worshipper would be taught the meanings and the rites and how open themselves up to the spirit and to commune with their deity correctly or more effectively.

Being a member of any religious order and knowing how to draw divine energy from the heavens, or the earth, or the water, or the trees (depends on which god you are praying to) gives the caster the ability to manipulate it and to gain a miracle, or a spell, or a result.  That's the purpose of learning a spell list, to be taught and to train in manipulating the energies to produce a desired result. 

As Hurin mentions, at one point in time, magical energy was just that... magical energy.  It is/was Arcane magic and Archmages practiced it.  There are no realms of magic, it's just magical energy.  (Archmages are so cool!  I love them, but anyway.)

Closed lists, are specific to the religion.  Using the earlier example, and assuming today's gods and religions act through Divine Intervention, any number of groups could request intervention from their deity to start a fire.  Native American Shamans may need song, dance, and the proper sequence of words.  A Druid may need chants and incantations in the correct language and a sacred staff.  A worshipper of Poseidon may need even more effort to produce the same results as the god of water would have a hard time producing fire where the god of the sun may require very little effort.  A Christian may need even more faith or ability (i.e.: PPs) as the Catholic belief is that Jesus and God and the Holy Spirt do not act through Divine Intervention.  Jesus wouldn't start the fire for the worshipper.

Here is the difference in PP cost for your closed lists that produce the same results.  It may be fewer PPs for a Buddhist to request a fire spell, but a Catholic is not trained in the ways of Buddha and has no idea how to go about requesting fire from Buddha and is thus stuck expending more PP just to achieve the same thing a Buddhist receives;  Closed list training.  Additionally, the Catholic would be branded as a heretic for praying to another god anyway.  A Buddhist may want to walk on water but would have no idea how to request that intervention from a Catholic God as that is also a closed list for Catholics and also a closed list for a Poseidon follower.  The goal is still starting a fire or walking on water.  Same end results, but different methods of getting there and different religious beliefs required to achieve it.

Long winded explanation, but it makes sense in my head and in my gaming world.  Different gods do different things and have different ceremonies to get their attention.  Some results may not be as important to some gods as they are to others and therefore require more PP for the same result. Or some things are just so counter to the god's tenants that it costs more PP to achieve.  The god of healing would be hard pressed to cause 1d10 damage to a target where the god of war would have no issue causing 1d10 to a target.  Same spell, different costs different belief system.

[netbat]

I use two rationales in my world and only go into detail on which one applies if it is important to the character and player. The first is that many open and closed lists represent common powers that all the deities have and can grant as spells to their followers. The second is that regardless of which deity the character follows, there are other deities in the pantheon that can grant that list or spell. As an example since my deities are loosely based on Tolkien's Ainur, my priest of Manwe's base lists are air related, but if he learns Nature's Law(open ch) he might be calling on Yavanna, but Detection Mastery might be from Manwe as well. I have even toyed with the idea of some lists being associated with the pantheon rather than a specific deity with each spell on a list like Barrier Law coming from a different member of the pantheon(Light wall from Varda, Airwall from Manwe, Waterwall from Ulmo etc).

[Jenkyna]

I think one of the things about RM spell lists is that they are really a toolbox for roleplaying. You have Clerics, Lay Healers, and Healers all of whom have spells that perform the same healing function i.e. reattaching a limb is the same thing no matter which class. However the class you choose dramatically affects how you roleplay reattaching a limb.

You can also create localizations for various spells if you want. For example in Shadow World I am pretty sure Shar Bu's Black Channel III slowly destroys the brain of the target as opposed to one of the effects listed in spell law. Shards like to eat brains too, so a spell that causes direct harm to the targets brain sort of fits them.

As long as you preserve the stats and the basic effect you or your players can describe the spells any way that fits their character or the setting.

You're also free to create restrictions on what lists are available to a culture. A forest dwelling society might be unable to receive any magic that harms trees or plants from their tree hugging God.

[Fingolfin80]

Being a member of any religious order and knowing how to draw divine energy from the heavens, or the earth, or the water, or the trees (depends on which god you are praying to) gives the caster the ability to manipulate it and to gain a miracle, or a spell, or a result.  That's the purpose of learning a spell list, to be taught and to train in manipulating the energies to produce a desired result. 

As Hurin mentions, at one point in time, magical energy was just that... magical energy.  It is/was Arcane magic and Archmages practiced it.  There are no realms of magic, it's just magical energy.  (Archmages are so cool!  I love them, but anyway.)

Closed lists, are specific to the religion.  Using the earlier example, and assuming today's gods and religions act through Divine Intervention, any number of groups could request intervention from their deity to start a fire.  Native American Shamans may need song, dance, and the proper sequence of words.  A Druid may need chants and incantations in the correct language and a sacred staff.  A worshipper of Poseidon may need even more effort to produce the same results as the god of water would have a hard time producing fire where the god of the sun may require very little effort.  A Christian may need even more faith or ability (i.e.: PPs) as the Catholic belief is that Jesus and God and the Holy Spirt do not act through Divine Intervention. Jesus wouldn't start the fire for the worshipper.

I'm not sure I'm fully understanding your suggestion. Open lists are common to all religions and closed (and base, i suppose) are specific for each religion? It is similar to my initial idea, the only thing I find difficult to justify is the fact that the open are shared. Probably the best solution for my needs is to consider them a pool of powers accessible to every god but formally very different, so the spells do the same effect but are not excangeble, because are invocation/prayers to the god and not spells in the "wizardy" way.

I know that the basic assumption in RM is that there was an ancient form of magic (arcane) that was a common origin for the three realms, but it doesn't work for my setting. For cosmogonic reasons I need the three realms divided (two, to be honest, because there's no mentalism) and different from each other.

I have even toyed with the idea of some lists being associated with the pantheon rather than a specific deity with each spell on a list like Barrier Law coming from a different member of the pantheon(Light wall from Varda, Airwall from Manwe, Waterwall from Ulmo etc).

I did this in the past, ad worked quite well. My present situation is different because there are many deities but no pantheon, so every cult serve one god only, though no one deny the existence of the other gods, but there can be rivalry between them at times and priesthood is always exclusive.

I think one of the things about RM spell lists is that they are really a toolbox for roleplaying. You have Clerics, Lay Healers, and Healers all of whom have spells that perform the same healing function i.e. reattaching a limb is the same thing no matter which class. However the class you choose dramatically affects how you roleplay reattaching a limb.

I am aware of that, and the flexibility of the system is the thing I like the most in RM, but the mroblem here is more "philosophical" (if you can excuse the term, in absence of a better one) than practical. I'm not searching for a ruling, RM provides me plenty of them, I'm tring to make sense out of it in a way that's coherent with the world they are used in.

For many campaigns it's not relevant, as jdale noticed, but my players have more fun from these details than from other aspects of the game, so for us is relevant. I have two clerics of different deities that spend more time in their theological quarrels or in tring to put each other in odd situations than in real adventuring, often with comical effects, so these aspects of the setting are more important than others for us.

[brole]

I am aware of that, and the flexibility of the system is the thing I like the most in RM, but the mroblem here is more "philosophical" (if you can excuse the term, in absence of a better one) than practical. I'm not searching for a ruling, RM provides me plenty of them, I'm tring to make sense out of it in a way that's coherent with the world they are used in.

For many campaigns it's not relevant, as jdale noticed, but my players have more fun from these details than from other aspects of the game, so for us is relevant. I have two clerics of different deities that spend more time in their theological quarrels or in tring to put each other in odd situations than in real adventuring, often with comical effects, so these aspects of the setting are more important than others for us.

I use a "supernatural physics" approach whereby spells need to work within a supernatural framework just as the physical world must work within the laws of physics. The magic system is built around the spells in the books.

So a Cleric is such due to rituals that imbue the character with capacity to learn and cast base, closed and open lists.
The rituals to imbue the Cleric are involved and complex, much like priming a surface for a particular type of paint, the Cleric's being is 'primed' to be receptive to particular Cleric lists to the exclusion of other lists. Thus the 'physics' behind different professions.

Open lists require not as much in the way of rituals to 'prime' the caster, thus their availability to more professions.

The professions have overlap in spells usable by them , but different methods and components are used cast the spells.
e.g. a lighter, a match and a magnifying glass are all very different but they can all produce the exact same fire, so to can the profession's various methods although totally different produce the same spell lists.

[jdale]

I'm not sure I'm fully understanding your suggestion. Open lists are common to all religions and closed (and base, i suppose) are specific for each religion? It is similar to my initial idea, the only thing I find difficult to justify is the fact that the open are shared. Probably the best solution for my needs is to consider them a pool of powers accessible to every god but formally very different, so the spells do the same effect but are not excangeble, because are invocation/prayers to the god and not spells in the "wizardy" way.

This really hinges on your idea of what is a spell, which is something that the rules are... ahem... agnostic about.

Is a channeling spell a very specific set of words that must be chanted in a specific way with particular hand movements etc? If so, spells must be taught exactly as created, and won't be shared between faiths. It would be difficult if not impossible for an individual to research a spell, ultimately they need a source with the actual text of the spell. Unless you posit that with sufficient prayer the deity will grant that knowledge directly. Also, there's no room for spell mastery, since the spell is not subject to personal interpretation.

Or is a channeling spell a manipulation of divine energy by an individual with a personal relationship to the divine source who has learned how to do so? In that case the specific words are not so critical. They may be helpful for the individual to learn the correct mindset, but a character of one religion who sees a spell of another may be able to adapt the underlying principles with words that better suit their own relationship to the source. In this case, in order to learn a spell, a caster needs to understand what it is for, how it fits into the arrangement of prayers, and how it relates to the deity, but given those insights they may be able to write appropriate words and you will see differences in the specific words used for the same spells by subgroups even within the same religion.

Personally, I prefer the latter. I see magic as a creative art, and that's true even for channeling. Religion is not rote but relationship, and a relationship can be dynamic. The former either enforces a certain static sameness across all practitioners, or requires direct divine involvement which also takes away a lot of freedom and individuality from the followers who the story is ultimately about.

[Fingolfin80]

This really hinges on your idea of what is a spell, which is something that the rules are... ahem... agnostic about.

True, and I'm glad of that because that should be a matter of the setting, not the rules.

Is a channeling spell a very specific set of words that must be chanted in a specific way with particular hand movements etc? If so, spells must be taught exactly as created, and won't be shared between faiths. It would be difficult if not impossible for an individual to research a spell, ultimately they need a source with the actual text of the spell. Unless you posit that with sufficient prayer the deity will grant that knowledge directly. Also, there's no room for spell mastery, since the spell is not subject to personal interpretation.

Or is a channeling spell a manipulation of divine energy by an individual with a personal relationship to the divine source who has learned how to do so? In that case the specific words are not so critical. They may be helpful for the individual to learn the correct mindset, but a character of one religion who sees a spell of another may be able to adapt the underlying principles with words that better suit their own relationship to the source. In this case, in order to learn a spell, a caster needs to understand what it is for, how it fits into the arrangement of prayers, and how it relates to the deity, but given those insights they may be able to write appropriate words and you will see differences in the specific words used for the same spells by subgroups even within the same religion.

Personally, I prefer the latter. I see magic as a creative art, and that's true even for channeling. Religion is not rote but relationship, and a relationship can be dynamic. The former either enforces a certain static sameness across all practitioners, or requires direct divine involvement which also takes away a lot of freedom and individuality from the followers who the story is ultimately about.

Good insight. I like the spell mastery more in the Essence field of action than in Channeling, since the latter is borrowing the power from an external entity, so I feel that a fine control is out of place. But the second view that you describe allow a more instinctive approach to the matter which in the end I like. While essence users learn spells from books and get the ability to cast spells through other means (no one has magic naturally in my setting, it must be acquired somehow, at least for humans),  channelers get them through their cults, and make sense that their way to aquire and cast spells could be more "free" in excange of a loss of flexibility in the spells itself.
There are other restrictions, so it wouldn't unbalance the game too much in comparison with mages. For example, I have a cult so ancient that their sacred texts are in a lost dead language, and their prayers/invocation must be done in that language, effectively preventing other cults from learning them. Another cult has rituals through wich they recieve
the enlightenment and with that the new spells, so they are bound to priesthood hierarchy for develping their magic skills.
So I think the second view will work forme too, even if for different reasons.

[OLF, i.e. Olf Le Fol]

In my system (and world), there's no correlation between spell lists and magical realms. So, on one side, you have open, closed and base spell lists, and, independently, one the other side, you have magical realms.
Spell lists are merely sets of spells learnt "together" the one after the other as they follow the same philosophy, whereas magical realms determine how to get the magical energy (the "fuel", if you want) to be able to cast spells. As such, I have rules governing acquisition and casting of spells (which are pretty much, as far as RM2 is concerned, the RM2 RAW, except for no differentiation between realms as all open, closed and base are considered of the caster's "own" realm), and rules governing acquisition and powering spells (which is completely different from RM2's logic, and goes very beyond the mere acquisition of PPs). so that casters from different realms aren't different by the spells they're able to cast (which is the RM way), but by the way their magical energy (thus power) varies. For instance, an Essence spellcaster draws his power from life around him so he's all the more powerful (PP and level wise) the more life abounds around him (in a huge city or forest for instance), and all the weaker the less life there is around him (e.g., in a desert), being at his lowest power level when surrounded by undead. OTOH, the more fanatical a Channeling spellcaster (I call that a "Divine" spellcaster but...), the more powerful he grows, the less devoted, the less powerful. As for Mentalism users ("Personal Magic users"), they all have a "Motivation" (a reason to live and act, if you want), and the more they act for this "Motivation", the more powerful they are (e.g., if someone has "curiosity" as his "Motivation", the more something makes him curious, the more powerful he'd get, but make him do something he thinks as uninteresting, and he'd be at his lowest power level; similarly for someone whose "Motivation" is his "friends" for instance, who get powered up when protecting his friends but powered down when fighting with enemies temporarily turned allies). Not to mention "special" abilities coming as a consequence of such a logic, such as Essence users being better at healing, Divine users being able to call for "miracles" or Personal users being able of feats of willpower. Blahblahblah, TMI already so I'll stop there.

So, to answer your question, spell lists from worshippers from different gods may overlap, first because they're merely from the same pantheon, thus have some common basic abilities, or because they have common needs. For instance, everyone needs healing, so it makes sense to each and any god to have a few priests knowing at least basic healing.
That being said, as no spell lists is tied to a specific realm, it implies no RM "profession" is either, so a priest (the actual job) may be a Magician (the RM profession) of the Mentalism realm.