lesser Valinor

If that is the way it is that explains one thing, but raises another, so I’m not sure what to think. Under this description, one learns Cants, and this allows you to access the residual energy by building a spell by reaching out and just picking the right cosmic legos left over from creation – no real gods involved. They just taught their church the cant and how to build that specific lego spell, and now they aren’t involved anymore, but their priests still have access to the pool of legos left over from creation. That explains how priests/cults/rogue valinor might be able to get away with using these spells in ways the gods may not approve of – because they really aren’t part of the circuit anymore.

The problem with that idea is; then why is faith needed? … snip

The metaphor Henry has used is that the Cant”s cosmic legos build the gun but it is the users faith that pulls the trigger.

Come to think of it he didn’t quite use the words cosmic legos. Still …

Great, now I want to play with Lego. . .

A huge tub of legos left over from the creation just seemed like the right image. Some are artists in what they create, and some follow the directions. But you’re right, it makes me want to play with legos too.

A follow up question occurred to me about churches. What is the state of churches in the unsealed lands? Specifically Bastion? This should be relevant to the new val’Vasik released by the kickstart right? And it raises the question that there probably weren’t different churches there to begin with (Since Xabal built it from ruins with only slaves and refugees), but there churches of the entire pantheon in the city. How did they all get there? Did he start them? Is a valinor of one god able to start churches of others? Obviously he should be a great source for a church of Illiir, but what about the others? I assume their “church” will not be part of the mother church, milinese, etc? Would their church potentially be more like the church of the pantheon, since it was founded by a valinor? Especially a valinor that was to Illiir, but appeared so like a follower of Sarish, that he was originally mistaken for as a valinor of the wrong god?

What exactly was the Church in Bastion? This is a great and timely question and the answer is we don’t know. Hope they publish something with the val Vasik characters! We know Xabal was deeply pious despite being a fallen valinor.

I see 2 significant possibility:

1) Xabal’s deep institutional knowledge of the First Imperium means that he had the knowledge to set up a Pantheonistic clerisy. Unique in Onara is a corner that actually worships the Gods the way They originally wanted humanity to worship them.

2) even though Xabal built physical temples to all the gods he only knew the rites of the Illirite Temple and the only true priests were Illiirite.

Would love to know what the truth is.

Hello,

No, not a publishing oops.

When writing Arcanis, I feel it necessary to convey the game of “telephone” that occurs across large distances, different cultures and over long stretches of time. I find it especially important in this time of instant communication and just about having the vast suim knowledge of humanity at your fingertips.

Xabal was always a Valinor of Illiir. How did he become identified as one of Sarish? See above.

As to the religion, Eric is correct that Xabal wanted to create a mirror image of the Pantheonistic Church and did so up to a point. But even a Valinor doesn’t know everything, so he could only put forth those Cants of the Illiiric church. So while the only divine casting val’Vasik priests are Illiirite, there were “functional” priests for the rest, as needed. So Nerothian priests covered funeral rites and burials, but lacked the Cants to cast spells, as well as the conviction of faith in Neroth. Not that they didn’t believe Neroth existed – Xabal told them so, but because they had a veritable god (little “g”) in their midst and one tends to gravitate to what is in front of them rather than what is ephemeral.

So while other “priests” existed, compared to those outside the Fiendish Expanse they are more caretakers than actiual priests.

Congratulations Eric – seems like you graduated to Arcanis 202.

So Xabal tried to set up a pantheonistic church, but only the illiirites had spells; and all the rest were pretty weak. Than why the multitude of sarishan churches if they weren’t actually able to help against the demons? That seems a little odd. Or was that miscommunication and there are really a ton of Illiirite churches there?

Also, I am very weak on how pantheonistic spells work. Would Illirites from Bastion be able to cast Hammer of Radiance? Its an Illiir/Althares pantheonistic spell. If its a pantheonistic church than there should be joint worshippers, and Xabal should be able to teach it since its an Illiirite spell, right?

Will the Val’Vasiks automatically qualify to take the “Keepers of Forgotten Lore” Path without needing Orthodoxy prestige or will the talents “Dual Faiths” and “The Old Ways” not be limited for them? Since they are pantheonistic to begin with? (I assume not for balance purposes) What affect does seeing a church set up like this by a valinor have on the existing churches?

If we’re taking unofficial guesses, than I would think that they would naturally qualify for the “Seeker’s of Forgotten Lore” path (without orthodoxy prestige) since they were raised pantheonistic, but would not have free access to the talents since they didn’t have access to the cants of other gods while they were in Bastion.

But that’s just my take, and I think I’m batting below random guessing on accuracy on guessing official answers right now.

Of course, that said, I would think they would be natural members of the Orthodoxy, and it might be interesting to know what Bastion looks like today. After all, it’s been 40 years since the Gods Wall fell, right? While traffic should have been light since they are way off the beaten path (to understate things) they still should have been able to import priests of other gods or export initiates to learn and bring knowledge back. Unless Xabal discouraged such activity, but that doesn’t seem likely considering he did teach them what he could to set up churches to the other gods. I would think importing priests of Sarish would have been high priority. And for 40 of those years Xabal was still there. So if he did allow/encourage spiritual learning, than they could have a thriving pantheonistic church going on by now. (But I doubt it, since I assume the answer will be that Xabal was extremely conservative and unofficially discouraged outsider priests coming in to support their churches or something)

No, valVasik do not get a free pass to the “Seekers of Forbidden Knowledge”. As I said above, they were Pantheonistic in name only, or perhaps a little more than that but not much.

They don’t know the rites and rituals, let alone the Cants of the other Gods, other than in a rudimentary way.

Lastly, Bastion was not a major destination for the people on the south side of the Wall. Besides the horde of Infernals in between, there was no real form of communication between them but for a few intrepid folk.

If you’ll recall the three part adventure where you go deep into the Fiendish Expanse, that was the first time a diplomatic delegation was sent to Bastion.