True Believer in Evil

[Silverblaze]

A caveat to my post as well.  Faith is not the same as subservience.  If the being worshiping does so out of fear; not belief - free will - or reverence.... True Faith does not apply.

An outsider tried to tempt my true believer to join his cuase in a game a while back.  After a short internal debate my reply was of course : No.

"Any man of the quality you want; will not join you. To break faith in something else means that they are not loyal; nor a true believer and you do not want them.  Anyone who is truly loyal and faithful will not break faith and similarly will not join you.  In short you do not deserve a me."

The being was displeased but could not refute the logic.

Faith is a tenuous difficult thing.

[AlexFallad]

On the gripping hand,

Alert the Sector Imperial Fleet that there is a Motie breach of the blockade!

Run for your lives! (Or livable space anyway)

[SunlessNick]

Yes!  Someone got the reference!

There is another angle for evil faith, maybe.  Rather than using demons or old gods, if you compare the "White God" to Ormazd rather than Yahweh, then you could posit a corresponding Ahriman - which makes for an evil god of the same kind of "cut above" guys like Odin that the True Faith powers seem to reach.  Faith in Ahriman would be a faith in evil, corruption, and lies - and as I remarked before, not many people would be vile enough to have a true faith in those things as the rightful ways of the world.  But that's the least dissonant source I can think of for an evil parallel of True Faith.

[Richard_Chilton]

But who could have faith in anything arising from a being that was the anti-thesis of truth?

"Yes, I believe what I do because the Untrue One promised me... He promised... Oh damn I'm screwed."

In a sense you have have to have faith in Ormazd (or Ahura Mazda as he is better known) and then pervert that faith by selecting his opposite number to follow.  To follow Ahriman as he is defined by his foes than by anything Ahriman communicates to you, because by definition Ahriman cannot contain the truth.

Richard

[SunlessNick]

I never suggested it would be a good investment. 

[Bruce Coulson]

It could be interesting, from a story point of view, to have a LaVey Satanist be on the side of the angels (so to speak).

After all, the tenets of modern Satanism are more or less hedonism and selfishness.  There's nothing wrong, from their written point of view, for someone to help kittens out of trees and little old ladies across the street...if that's what you WANT to do, and it does something for you.  Doing something because it feels good is correct, from LaVey Satanist principles.

So, you could have a  'good' Satanist who has True Faith...although perhaps not from where he thinks it comes from.

I believe C.S. Lewis covered this idea in the last Narnia book in the series.

[ways and means]

I was of the opinion that True Faith could mean true faith in anything, or to quote Terry Prattchett Religion isn't necessarily nice.

[devonapple]

I was of the opinion that True Faith could mean true faith in anything, or to quote Terry Prattchett Religion isn't necessarily nice.

You are, of course, entitled to your opinion. And Pratchett is very clever. If you can make it work in a game, let us know how it goes. Don't let other folks discourage you.

But if the community's input is a factor you regard, then the overall opinion seems to indicate that this idea isn't particularly plausible. This can become - almost literally - a religious debate from here, and that's not a productive direction.

[ways and means]

You are, of course, entitled to your opinion. And Pratchett is very clever. If you can make it work in a game, let us know how it goes. Don't let other folks discourage you.

But if the community's input is a factor you regard, then the overall opinion seems to indicate that this idea isn't particularly plausible. This can become - almost literally - a religious debate from here, and that's not a productive direction.

I will have to keep my nasty true believers Christian then (rather than Aztec or Ancient Egyptian) still though at least that leaves me Witchfinders, Inqusistion members, Crusaders and Pope Pius.

[Richard_Chilton]

"Nasty" and "Faith Power from a good source" don't really mesh well either.

In the books there aren't many example of people who have Faith and they tend to do the Right Thing because of their beliefs.  Like the scene where someone who has murdered and tortured and done unspeakable things agreed to toss away his coin and the two Knights of the Cross facing him gave him the chance to make a new life because that's what they should do.

Micheal is a Righteous Man, not a self righteous one, and that's the key to his Faith.

Richard

[Silverblaze]

It could be interesting, from a story point of view, to have a LaVey Satanist be on the side of the angels (so to speak).

After all, the tenets of modern Satanism are more or less hedonism and selfishness.  There's nothing wrong, from their written point of view, for someone to help kittens out of trees and little old ladies across the street...if that's what you WANT to do, and it does something for you.  Doing something because it feels good is correct, from LaVey Satanist principles.

So, you could have a  'good' Satanist who has True Faith...although perhaps not from where he thinks it comes from.

I believe C.S. Lewis covered this idea in the last Narnia book in the series.

O.O I love that idea!

[Silverblaze]

"Nasty" and "Faith Power from a good source" don't really mesh well either.

In the books there aren't many example of people who have Faith and they tend to do the Right Thing because of their beliefs.  Like the scene where someone who has murdered and tortured and done unspeakable things agreed to toss away his coin and the two Knights of the Cross facing him gave him the chance to make a new life because that's what they should do.

Micheal is a Righteous Man, not a self righteous one, and that's the key to his Faith.

Richard

Spot on there.

[ways and means]

I have a several theological problems with your interpretation of true faith (that faith is only true for nice religions who are tied into the particular values which we currently subscribe too, so you are saying all the crusaders who sacrafised their lives and livings to do what they believed is right, even if this did involve genocide did not have true faith. Or that all the people who throughout the ages devoted their life to the chruch even though it recomended violence to women for the sole crime of being educated did not have true faith.) The simple arguement comes down to whether you believe true faith transcends good and evil (by that I mean the subjective good and evil rather than the Universal theory which keeps changing) or whether True Faith is just a manifestation of the current conception of the good. As both sides of this equation are entirly subjective (no matter how much you universalists argue otherwise) there is correct answer which makes debating it fruitless.

[Becq]

I think I'll offer my answer the OP question this way:

The True Faith powers as written in the book represent True Faith in the Almighty, which covers the faiths of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.  (Not all aspects of those worldy religeons, but those aspects that truly (or Truly) adhere to the wishes of the Almighty, which because it's a question of Faith may end up being a judgment call by the GM and/or table.  It might also be ruled that followers of some other religeons are actually followers of the Almighty, though by a different name.  Again, a judgement call.  Likewise, those who do 'the right thing' as an expression of personal belief without expressly being a part of a religeon might even qualify (Sanya would be a great argument for this).

In all of these cases, the characters are qualifying because they are genuinely following the wishes of the Almighty (who is definitively real in the Dresdenverse, OOC arguments aside), knowingly or not.  I do not believe that characters who a "true adherents" to religeons that contradict the will of the Almighty would qualify for True Faith powers.

That said, I could easily see justification for an alternate set of True Faith-like powers that *could* be used by True Adherants to other sufficiently powerful entities.  Some of these powers might be carbon copies of True Faith powers, while others might have a very different flavor.  For example, I think that by nature, powers granted by an evil power would tend toward aggression, rather than defense (so "Bless This House" might be replaced by "Aura of Defilement" which grants a bonus (+1 or +2) to attempts to destroy thresholds).

[Richard_Chilton]

I have a several theological problems with your interpretation of true faith...

I'm assuming that those problems are based on real life issues, not on a series of books.  My postings on this thread all deal with Faith as it is portrayed in the novels.  Well, they also include a bit on game balance, but that's minor.  They have nothing to do with any real life religious views I may or may not have.

The Jim Butcher forum has rules about something called "touchy topics".  Those rules rarely come up here, but I have seen warnings given out in other areas.  Debates that touch on racism, sexism, religion, and disgusting crimes (those that sometimes get cited on the "Is Marcone good or evil" threads) just aren't allowed.  I've seen messages edited by mods and posters told to take a bit of time off when they keep harping on those subjects.  Which is why I'm being careful only to talk about this subject as it applies to the books and the RPG.  I'd prefer to get warnings only by citing the things that Marcone allows to happen that negatively impact on children.

The theological at work in the DV seems a bit two dimensional at times - or maybe we just don't know enough about it.  It could evolve the way the Wardens went from the Bogymen to "people doing the job that needs doing" as the series progressed.  But until things change what we have to work are people like Micheal.  There have been many other 'gods' talked about, but none of their followers seem to have gotten any Faith based powers.

But maybe I'm wrong.  Maybe I missed some character somewhere.  I'm tempted to wander over to the Spoilers board and challenge the folks there to find Faith based powers that aren't connected to the White God (that's the term they use there - borrowed from Mab).  If anyone can find an example it will be those people.

Richard