Creating a dual caster arcane divine ?

Thematically the tenants of arcane spell casting (experimenting and manipulating the residual energy of creation) is incompatible with divine spell casting (placing faith and training in the memorization of specific “god given” formulas). Psionics being the exception since val have a seperate organ that apparently biologically harnesses ambient cosmic energy like the valinor. In my opinion you probably shouldn’t do a end around with the talent Rudimentary Spellcasting.

That said as the rules are currently written you can currently do this.

The only problem with this is that the Mother Church (and it’s spawn the Milandric Orthodox Church)–overall–takes a rather dim view of those who manipulate the Arcanum through non-Theurgic means. Psionics they are okay with, because the Vals are of divine heritage, but Elder and Eldritch really rubs them the wrong way because it involves taking the powers of creation and wielding them outside the control of the Church. To that end, anyone doing that kind of build starts rubbing into ‘minor heresy’ territory.

Additionally, Henry has stated that the. . . psychology involved for the various Arcanum Sources basically precludes the acquiring any other source (but Psionics, which is more a natural skill than a learned talent):

– Theurgy requires you to remember spells and cants by rote, and requires absolute faith in the deity of the cant to cast. Anyone can do it, so long as they are sufficiently faithful. Should they ever lose faith in the Gods, they lose their powers.

– Thaumaturgy requires a post-graduate degree in arcane theory, being the equivalent of a classical composer who must understand every nuance of every note in their composition before they can complete their symphony. To have it any other way is madness.

– Eldritch magic is the improvised Jazz music of a one-instrument prodigy to Thaumaturgy’s exacting Classical composer. They can both produce beautiful, wonderful music, but have almost opposite approaches to the end result.

– Primal Magic requires the subhorning of ones will to that of a more powerful being, with the reward for giving yourself to whatever powerful creature that they give you access to mighty powers. Should you ever dissociate yourself with that powerful being, the powers it granted you go with it.

That said, it likely isn’t IMPOSSIBLE for you to have an Arcane caster who still worships the Gods even if the church (well, the human church, anyway) considers them sinful. In our world, there are homosexual people in our world who still consider themselves to be adherents to religious sects who are not cool with homosexuality. If there are those who can still find faith even with such a disconnect of doctrine to their choices/lifestyles, there are surely people with the Arcane Spark who worship the Gods and believe in them enough to want to join the church to make the possibly at least REASONABLE, if extraordinarily rare.

I’m personally fine with an errata that says you can’t do it. I asked Pedro about it when we worked on the original rules because it didn’t seem to fit and he was fine leaving it in.

With a sweep of his…

Hat

Paul,

I asked Pedro about it when we worked on the original rules because it didn’t seem to fit and he was fine leaving it in.

If this is true, then Peter made an error.

It definitely isn’t fine. The rules were designed to compliment the setting and the setting dictates that those who can cast Divine spells CANNOT cast Arcane and vice-versa.

I don’t know how I can be clearer than that.

Amusingly enough, the “Many Paths to (one of) the Gods” section in the Codex, which contains advice on how to realize a given character concept(Storm Lord of Hurrian) through a variety of different builds, has one example where a player does the exact thing that SamhainIA mentions in his opening post.

Jimmy has elected to create an Arcane Archetype Hero; because everyone that knows Jimmy knows he is going to play a wizard. This is an unusual choice because a human character with the Arcane Spellcasting Talent has absolutely no option to become a full-fledged Divine Spellcaster as well. Heedless of these constraints, Jimmy creates an Eldritch Caster and, keeping to concept, selects anything that relates to electricity.
Jimmy begins as a proud son of a landed family and selects the Noble Born Background. Like Nelson, Jimmy cannot move directly into the Holy Champion Path, but he does not want to anyhow. Instead, he joins the church with his Tier I advancement by, selecting Initiate Iterant; this has the additional benefit of teaching him a single divine spell chosen from a small number of traditions.
During Tier II Jimmy becomes an Anointed Priest of Hurrian which leaves him free to join the Storm Lords during Tier III. He also intends to use the Learn Spell Talent to expand his Hero’s repertoire of Divine Spells. Probably also needs a note in the errata that you can’t actually do this then.

Yeah. . . I’d like a ruling on that statement. . . I know Henry has stated that the answer is “NO”, but this seems like a major “But really yes” to me.

I’m going to keep telling people no until this is redacted or confirmed, but this seems a pretty clear statement of intention (which I also forgot about).

Sweetness! Thank you very, very much! It is what I expected, but it without an errata this can be used quite effectively by rules-lawyers, especially for those who aren’t on the forums!