Posted By Themata at 12:44 AM - Wed Mar 29 2017
All of these sound great to me, as long as choosing a religious path is basically the same as choosing any other path.
What I mean by this is that choosing to go down a religious path should be the same as choosing to be a blacksmith, or a master sword fighter, or an animal tamer. If it is what you want to do, it should take up your skills and time, just like everyone else.
What I personally think will be super lame, is if religion is basically an opt in / opt out deal, where everyone can just do it for free in addition to their primary focus, and get benefits from it. Because this classifies people into two categories. Religious people with an advantage, and non-religious people with a disadvantage.
So. As you describe, hell yes, I love the idea of a religious person who can mend peoples' spirit to help decrease the effects of a coup de grace, or who can bless weapons, or who can bless children to improve their chances of a good life. Or even give them visions that slowly tell them the story of the lore of CoE. As long as this is their primary role, and stops them from participating in any other area of the game in a large amount, just like any other role would
Feeling kind of weird with this. This isn't actually reflected in reality. Oftentimes, you do have religious carpenters, bakers, contractors, etc.
Working towards the abilities you've mentioned above is indeed closer to an occupation than the, "Opt in/opt out" deal, but IRL that's not a benefit of religion. It's just an occupation related to religions.
Religion is neither something you simply sign up for nor something you work for as a mere occupation. I'd recommend leaving religions to roleplay for the most part, then having events every now and again where players are contacted by one deity or another, maybe given knowledge, maybe a task, etc.