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/tg/ - Traditional Games


I find Shinto shrines fascinating. I would like help in implementing something inspired by them into D&D/Pathfinder.

Here is how they "work in real life." Before the shrine is built, priests consecrate a natural feature (e.g. a mountain, a tree, a waterfall, a boulder) or a manmade object (e.g. a mirror, a sword, a figurine jewel) as a vessel for a kami. After many rituals to attract and appease a kami (it is important to ward evil spirits away from the vessel!), a kami arrives and chooses to live within the vessel.

The priests then construct a shrine around a stationary vessel, or take a portable vessel to a preconstructed shrine. The priests are important because only they can communicate with the kami; some priests can let the kami possess and speak directly through them. The priests keep the kami happy by making its new home as comfortable as possible, acquiring offerings (from the public) for the kami, acceding to the kami's demands, and defending its home from evil spirits who might want to take over. In exchange, the kami offers guidance to the priests (and the public), empowers the priests' divinatory rituals, and blesses the area around the shrine.

Sometimes, the priests clone a kami to spread it elsewhere. The priests consecrate a second vessel for the kami, bring the new vessel to the original vessel, and enact a "cloning ritual" to copy and paste the kami. Then they build a new shrine for the second vessel. This is a real practice! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanj%C5%8D

I think it would be interesting to bring this to D&D/Pathfinder in a way that coexists with traditional fantasy gods. There are many non-evil outsiders of the Outer Planes, elementals and genies of the Inner Planes, fey, and miscellaneous spirits that mortals would love to have around, helping the land and sharing guidance.

Perhaps mortals build lavish shrine-manors full of occult trinkets, hand-picked and consecrated to precisely appeal to a certain type of immortal. (Continued.)
>>
After the shrine-manor is built, occult ritualists gather together to conduct a planar ritual. The ritual conjures the desired type of immortal, but the magic is less forceful than more traditional conjurations; the immortal can return to whence it came with but a thought.

The ritualists plead the immortal to stay and live in such a comfortable home. The occultists will serve the immortal as household servants (miko-maids, one could say), acquire offerings (from the public) for the immortal, accede to the immortal's demands, and defend its home. In exchange, the immortal will offer guidance to the mortals and use all its magic to help the area around the shrine-manor. Furthermore, the occult ritualists will use a follow-up ritual to return the immortal to its home plane, letting the immortal sort out any affairs, before another ritual pulls the immortal back into the shrine-manor.

It usually takes a few attempts, but sooner or later, one immortal will accept the offer. Then the town or city will have its very own [celestial/elemental/genie/fey/spirit] to support the land and the people, and the immortal will enjoy a cushy life as a local god!

There are some drawbacks. The planar energies whirling around the shrine-manor sometimes thin the walls between worlds, allowing other immortals to step through. If another benevolent celestial or Seelie fey comes to visit, that is no problem... but a fiend or an Unseelie fey stepping through is a much bigger problem. This is why the occult ritualists must ward the area from malicious spirits.

That aside, after living in the shrine-manor for a while, the immortal is able to clone itself with the help of further occult rituals. This is similar to a simulacrum. The occult ritualists usually escort the simulacrum to a new shrine-manor elsewhere, where it can help more people.

What does /tg/ think of this? How could the idea be improved or polished? It only really fits in high magic, high fantasy, granted.
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This fits anywhere with occult stuff, but sounds pretty rp heavy.
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See thisfor PF at least
http://www.archivesofnethys.com/MonsterDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Shikigami
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>Pathfinder
>furry art
>Shinto shrines

Color me surprised.
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>>52536556
>Monstergirls
>Furry
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>>52536530

For a Pathfinder-specific implementation (presumably using the rules for occult rituals, as well as a modified version of the rules for idols), Pathfinder's kami are no more suited to the concept described above as Pathfinder's other outsiders and fey.

A CR 2 shikigami kami certainly is not going to be as much of an asset to a town or a city as a CR 2 ovinnik, for example.

Consider the ovinnik, a lowly fey cat:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/fey/house-spirit/ovinnik/

An ovinnik is already a house spirit accustomed to accepting offerings:
>A wise farmer placates resident ovinniks with frequent gifts of warm milk, pancakes, or dead roosters.

Now, give the ovinnik a luxurious home all for itself, in exchange for blessing any townsfolk or cityfolk who come asking it for a blessing.

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/fey/house-spirit/ovinnik/
>Luck Touch (Su)
>With a claw attack or touch attack, an ovinnik can alter a creature’s luck. If the target fails a DC 14 Will save, it either gains a +4 bonus or takes a –4 penalty (the ovinnik’s choice) on its next three d20 rolls. The target can choose to automatically fail the saving throw, but must choose before it knows whether the touch will be beneficial or harmful. The save DC is Charisma-based.

Given that this ability is at-will, the town or city now has a reliable source of blessings for many of its endeavors.

Other D&D editions would presumably use whatever spirit-creatures are most suited to assisting a town or a city. Certainly, in D&D 3.X, any town or city would dearly love to have an all-powerful elemental weird protecting it and offering divination after divination.
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>>52535995
>>52536759

What's the place cost to build? Higher CR beings should cost way more than low ones, plus the cost of the ritual which sounds like Planar Ally stuff. What's the upkeep for food and servants? Gaining magical favors should also require an offering per "blessing" commensurate with spellcasting services. How often do the walls thin and what might come through? What sort of fool would ever expect fey to not fuck them over for kicks?

Really, there's not much that humans are going to get out of this that having a friendly wizard and/or cleric around wouldn't cover.
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>>52537075

Presumably, the opportunity costs for such occult rituals would be lower overall than training a town cleric or wizard, something that there are no real rules for.

Clerics and wizards are ultimately limited by daily uses; that is why the trick is to seek out creatures with highly useful, at-will abilities. In D&D 3.X, for example, an excellent candidate would be a CR 3, "always neutral good," good-subtyped cervidal guardinal:
>Horn Powers (Su): A cervidal can deliver any of several effects by a touch of its horns. The horns can negate any poison or disease (as the spells neutralize poison and remove disease) in the creature touched, dispel an illusion (as a targeted dispel magic spell, except that it affects only spells of the Illusion school and is automatically successful), or dismiss (as a dismissal spell) a summoned, conjured, or extraplanar creature. Each of these horn powers can be used at will as a standard action. Except as noted, all these abilities function as the corresponding spells. Caster level 20th; save DC 13 + spell level.

>What sort of fool would ever expect fey to not fuck them over for kicks?
Plenty of people, considering that fey in D&D and Pathfinder range from good-hearted to vile-hearted (just like mortal humanoids), and the idea is to call upon one of the former. Pixies, for example, are neutral good by default in their monster entries in D&D 3.5, D&D 5e, and Pathfinder. We have no data on the "average" pixie in D&D 4e save for the unaligned "pixie ambusher." Of course, pixies are not particularly useful as civil servants to a town or a city.
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It sounds like fun, but not exactly the sort of thing one should have rules for unless your players wish to have a campaign based around it.

Much like, say, building a wall, there can be real benefits to a society, but these benefits will likely only matter to adventurers on a basis of them already existing, and taking advantage of them. Aka, manning the walls against an invasion, or bringing an offering to the existing town god for a blessing. Perhaps the occasional quest hook based off of them (Go kill that 7th level commander who keeps discovering Portals past our wall, please go retrieve this special offering to appease our spirit.)
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>>52537899

Certainly, there are many plot hooks that can arise as a result of such a setting element.
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>>52535995
>>52536000
I have little bit of contention with your posts, mostly related to a minor point of theology and mythology. Overall, however, I love it, and it gets much closer to an actual implementation of Shinto in a game than many other attempts.
The Go-Shintai is often translated and understood, even in Japan, as being the physical home of the Kami. If you delve a bit deeper, you realize that's understood that way due to conceptual limitations of ancient societies: it's actually closer to requesting that the Kami give you their phone number/giving them an extension of themselves. So the Kanjo ritual is less "cloning" or "splitting", and more like copying their number into another phone, or adding another skype call.
Said analogy is very rough, so take it with a grain of salt. Hell, take a whole tablespoon of the stuff.
So onto how this can change your implementation: very little. The ritual would enchant an object to be a point of presence for the Immortal, allowing them to serve multiple communities. Each Shintai is therefore not a binding item, but rather a passageway between said Immortal's home area and the community that allows limited communication.
Part of your implementation is also rather European, in the contractual nature of the initial ritual. Every time that ritual is done, you have to bargain with an immortal, seeing if its powers, attitudes, and goals align with the community - or you can go to another shrine-manor and bargain with their Immortal to also serve your area.
Calling upon the Immortal is less performing an occult ritual, and more like activating a contractual obligation - just keep up your end of the bargain.

Here's a suggestion to help with creating these contracts: New World of Darkness Changeling the Lost. Plenty of inspiration there, especially in the Goblin Markets book. Weird requirements are awesome, such as a community that bans cats because their contract is void if a pregnant black cat crosses a particular threshold.
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>>52539122

>If you delve a bit deeper, you realize that's understood that way due to conceptual limitations of ancient societies: it's actually closer to requesting that the Kami give you their phone number/giving them an extension of themselves. So the Kanjo ritual is less "cloning" or "splitting", and more like copying their number into another phone, or adding another skype call.
That is not what I took from the Wikipedia article on the subject ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanj%C5%8D ), but I suppose I will take your word over the article's.

>The ritual would enchant an object to be a point of presence for the Immortal, allowing them to serve multiple communities. Each Shintai is therefore not a binding item, but rather a passageway between said Immortal's home area and the community that allows limited communication.
This simply seems like creating portals linking shrine-manors, though said portals would function only for that specific immortal. This would be a self-limiting scheme, since the immortal would be spreading themselves out. The immortal could presumably grow stronger and therefore be more equipped to serve multiple communities, of course.
I like this idea. It is very Planescape and makes good use of the D&D gimmick of magical portals.

>Every time that ritual is done, you have to bargain with an immortal, seeing if its powers, attitudes, and goals align with the community
Yes; that is why I say it usually takes a few attempts to find an immortal who will actually accept. Presumably, the majority simply go, "This house is quite nice, it is thoughtful of you to prepare this for me, and your offer is generous; but I think I prefer my home plane."

>Calling upon the Immortal is less performing an occult ritual.
The reason why I call these "occult ritualists" is because in my imagination, any mortal in D&Dland who delves into matters of the planes, extraplanar creatures, extraplanar conjuration, and the like is an occultist.
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>>52535995
The idea I had for this same concept was that divine casters who worship Kami instead of Gods can naturally make contact with the spirits significant to a locale and gain powers from them. Instead of having a set spell time and two domains, Kami clerics simply get their spells whenever they commune with the spirits, and have one domain which they can chose based on the locale (a river that was the site of a bloody battle, for example, might have Ocean, War, Death, and Destruction domains available). As a result, they're much more versatile than Clerics, in terms of making changes while on the move, but they have one less domain to call upon, so they have to be smarter about their choice.
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>>52539816
>but I suppose I will take your word over the article's.
You don't have to. that's just what I've concluded from my studies. I could be wrong, but Shinto is a rather flexible faith. I mean, to me, Shinto has an anarcho-mutualistic relationship between mortals and Kami as its basis. How many Shintoists are going to agree with that?
But anyways.
>the immortal would be spreading themselves out. The immortal could presumably grow stronger and therefore be more equipped to serve multiple communities, of course.
Which is where the contractual nature comes in: the rituals required by the contract are what gives them the strength to take care of multiple communities. The "portals" could be less portals and more like a point that is always familiar for purposes of gate/teleport and divination for the immortal.
But it's actually rather hard to map mythologies to D&D.
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>>52540006
That's true. The greco-roman pantheon used to be core to D&D, but there's not a thing in any of the books about burnt offerings or household gods.
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>>52539962

This sounds more suited to a D&D 3.5-style binder, or a third-party-Pathfinder-style pactmaker or medium (empath).

>>52540006

>I could be wrong, but Shinto is a rather flexible faith.
It certainly seems so.
I personally like the idea of a network of shrine-manors with portals that work only for the immortal associated with them.

>Which is where the contractual nature comes in: the rituals required by the contract are what gives them the strength to take care of multiple communities.
It could certainly work in such a Changeling: The Lost-esque way, but I would prefer it if the immortal *also* had to accumulate enough power to serve multiple communities. This way, there would be an impetus to let the newly enshrined immortal grow before adding a new shrine to the network.

>But it's actually rather hard to map mythologies to D&D.
This is why I prefer to make use of D&D's preexisting planar mythologies. For instance, in the Great Wheel, that would be archons in Mount Celestia, guardinals in Elysium, yugoloths (mostly) in Gehenna, fey just about everywhere, and so on. It is familiar for many players, and utilizing it in new ways inspired (but not bound by) real-world mythology can add an interesting twist to the Great Wheel, the World Axis, or your D&D cosmology of choice.

>>52540062

Again, I generally prefer to focus on the preexisting, "secular" planar mythology rather than anything directly pantheon-related.
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>>52539816
>Yes; that is why I say it usually takes a few attempts to find an immortal who will actually accept. Presumably, the majority simply go, "This house is quite nice, it is thoughtful of you to prepare this for me, and your offer is generous; but I think I prefer my home plane."
It's quite possible that they go for the dumber ones, or as quite often occurs they capture less well meaning eviler beings and purify them over time with holy implements.
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>>52540320

>dumber ones
Or perhaps those more invested in directly aiding mortals.

>they capture less well meaning eviler beings and purify them over time with holy implements.
I can see this being done deliberately, although it would have to be a forceful binding. It would give a rough start to the shrine-manor, but the payoff would be a purified fiend.

That said, I have to wonder if there are any tales of Shinto kannushi and miko having unwittingly sealed an evil spirit into a vessel, which then had a shrine built around it. It would certainly be a catastrophical mistake, no? Does it have precedent? It would make for a good plot hook, at any rate.
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>>52540690
Not off the top of my head, but shimenawa, the frilly rope things that the japanese use in rituals, is a purifying demarcation used as a boundary. The most dramatic example of it used as a barrier as such was to stop Amaterasu from crawling back into the cave she was being a NEET inside.

In particular, shimewa are often used around a yorishiro, or "an object capable of attracting spirits".

The shinto religion quite literally get rocks or trees that a spirit might possess, then tie them up with spiritual rope so they might have free access to the spirits. Doesn't matter that much if it was good or evil if they have it in bondage, now, right?
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>>52540976

D&D's various planar cosmologies have always made out the mortal world to be absolutely lousy with planar portals and crossings, be it the Great Wheel's portals to everywhere (especially Sigil) or the World Axis's connections between the natural world and its reflections.

Certainly, there would be wards around objects capable of letting immortals into the Prime Material Plane/the natural world. Better to be safe than sorry when there is the very real risk of fiendish incursion.

It would certainly be very interesting to portray a vaguely Shinto-like religion in a fashion that acknowledges, respects, and works within the rules of a D&D planar cosmology like the Great Wheel or the World Axis.
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>>52540976
I don't understand. Does this work by making the wrapped object a gate/refuge for spirits to come and go, so you can talk with one when it visits, or to trap the spirit so it can't leave said object?

Also, does the tree/whatever have to be pure/specially prepared etc., or would it work if you had an evil tree possessed by a demon you wanted to seal?
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>>52542325

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimenawa

According to Wikipedia, they are used to ward off evil spirits. They are selective in their abjurations, then.
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>>52542325
>>52542815
It's a trap. You can seal spirits inside with a Shimenawa.
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>>52536556
Somebody's interested in implementing a unique cultural practice into a game
>lel you're a weeaboo
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Now I finally know what the hell "shintai" actually means after reading Exalted for some time.
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Let us take this a step further: what if this practice was not limited to mortals conjuring immortals? What if immortals from other planes of existence saw fit to attempt to conjure and bargain with powerful mortal magicians and adventurers?

For instance, in the Great Wheel, not all places in the planes are full of potent outsiders. In fact, most of them are populated by weak fledglings. I could certainly see celestials from the Upper Planes conjuring a mortal wizard from the Prime Material Plane and enticing them to stay and help their heavenly duties by offering them a shrine-manor and a host of miko-maids to be at their beck and call.

What if this was to occur to an entire party?
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>>52549018
Then you'd have a neat little adventure arc. Could make for a nice campaign, though Celestials probably wouldn't forcibly summon mortals (they'd be more likely to get their assistance as part of some kind of trade/deal), as they would presumably hold mortals on the Planes to the standards they hold themselves to on the Prime.
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>>52549052

Forcible summoning is not the point. Going through equitable bargains with different patrons-to-be is the point of the shrine-manor system.
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So you want to implement a ritual for transferring kami in PF and don't know about kami existing in PF. So you try to replace them with outsiders, and fuck up the whole thing and stretch the original ritual in ways its not meant to.

http://www.pathfinderwiki.com/wiki/Kami
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/kami/

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/kami/kami-zuishin/
>While all kami are enemies of oni, none are so fervent as the zuishin. Known also as shrine kami, zuishin take as their wards gates, doorways, religious places, and the spiritual archways known as torii, ensuring that the gates are respected.

An occult ritual to transfer or even make another zuishin (or other kami such as dosojins and such) to protect a shrine seems fairly neat.
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>>52549298

I have already covered this here: >>52536759

A zuishin kami has relatively little to offer a community for an extravagant CR 10. Consider a much more economical choral angel:

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/outsiders/angel/angel-choral-b5/
At just CR 6, a choral angel has at-will dispel evil, dispel magic, remove curse, remove disease, and remove fear. Such a suite is more than enough to uphold the mental and physical health of a community.

Consider, as well, a CR 6 blodeuwedd:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/fey/blodeuwedd/
With at-will plant growth and the ability to teleport miles away, a single appeased blodeuwedd could augment the fertility of an entire region's fields as the fey roams around and casts plant growth.
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>>52549567
>little to offer it's community at CR 10
>CR 6 creature is better really anon!
>watch little angel get eaten by oni
Great idea, dickhead.

The low CR creatures die easily.
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>>52549629

A CR 6 choral angel is quite a decent warrior against evil, between an angelic protective aura, flight, and ranged touch attacks that deal sonic damage.
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> tfw the wikipedia articles on shinto and religion/mythology in general are so shallow
How do you guys get your learning about it? I want to browse through information on it so I can understand the culture a little better. Also so I can steal things from the mythology to use in my settings, obviously.
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>>52549868

I learned of the shrine system just yesterday from Wikipedia. Its articles on the matter seemed sufficient to me.
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>>52549298
>So you want to implement a ritual for transferring kami in PF and don't know about kami existing in PF.
The whole idea is implementing the abundance of D&D outsider types as appropriate, not just kami which are confined to a single place in Pathfinder setting and woefully underdeveloped. It takes the idea os shinto shrines and merges it with D&D cosmology. Do not get too hang up on the term "kami". At least that's how I understood the OP.

>>52536556
>kemonomimi
>furry
Next time you are going to tell me Avatar: The Last Airbender is an anime.

>>52535995
I like the idea. Small, local cults and shrines with quirky spirits are more interesting than sprawling, monolithic religions worshipping huge pantheons. But while we are at it, what would be the interaction with more established churches? Would they also employ servitors of their gods in local shrines, fight with the "old faith" or simply coexist? Some kind of syncretism?
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>>52551477

>But while we are at it, what would be the interaction with more established churches? Would they also employ servitors of their gods in local shrines, fight with the "old faith" or simply coexist? Some kind of syncretism?

More traditional D&D gods could be the equivalent of the Buddhas:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinbutsu-sh%C5%ABg%C5%8D
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>>52535995
I've found that many RPGs have poor support for religion in general.

One of the major problems is that often there is no mechanical benefit for non-cleric class characters to follow a religion.

Little mechanical benefits like travellers visiting a shrine to get a good luck blessing for their travels would add in a little bit of detail and encourage players to engage in the setting more.
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>>52555291

Creatures that can confer some sort of buffing effect at-will make for excellent shrine "kami."
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>>52544140
Don't be a fucking liar, weeb.
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>>52551477
>>52552093
If you want to explore Shinto's contact with other religions, you may want to take a look at the concept of State Shinto: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Shinto

In short, the state can claim Shinto as a primary faith and deem itself a theocracy of sorts. The distinction between traditional Shinto and State Shinto was made by Westerners, but you can use the concept on city-states or countries.
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>>52555291
That's probably religion is simply a source of power for some classes or something you write on your character sheet and forget. Not many groups focus on it and when they do, religion probably becomes a significant part of the plot.

>>52552093
So you make a shrine for local kami and it also serves as temple for a god? That would probably require the people to pick their kami in accordance with the local worshipped god so you won't get an enshrined angel and Asmodean temple in the same building.
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bump
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>>52559512

Is this not simply a matter of a ruler claiming divine descent, as many other sovereigns would?

>>52560688

>That would probably require the people to pick their kami in accordance with the local worshipped god so you won't get an enshrined angel and Asmodean temple in the same building.
Presumably, Shinto-Buddhist temples in real life were careful to pair together appropriate kami and Buddhas. In this hypothetical setup, the same care would apply.
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I suppose I should ask by this point, then: what are some interesting plot hooks and adventures that can arise from such an enshrinement system?
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>>52558705
>calling people weeaboos because they find another culture's practices gameable
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>>52568587
>Enshrined outsider demanded to take a wife from local population each year. Said wife is supposed to be his chief priestess and servant/maid for one year and then she is released. The problem is, this year the chosen wife escaped with her mortal lover! You will have to find her and explain the situation or the outsider gets angry and nullifies his contract.
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>>52555291
I find life has the same problem
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>>52571893
>The problem is, this year the chosen wife escaped with her mortal lover!
The twist is that the mortal lover is actually the enshrined outsider, who wants to reneg on the contract, escape, and see the world!

What now?
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>>52559512
>The distinction between traditional Shinto and State Shinto was made by Westerners
Well basically... when you introduce a new religion to an area, it doesn't just replace the old beliefs, it absorbs them.

When Buddhism was introduced to Japan, some people worshipped mountains, some worshipped dragons, some thought that all foreigners were shapeshifting badgers, etc. So the village that worshipped a dragon continues to do so - it's just that now they believe that the dragon is a fellow Buddhist, trapped in the cycle of reincarnation like they are.

"Shinto" was a nationalist concept that only came about in the Meiji Restoration of the late 19th century, when some Buddhist rituals were classified as "part of Japan's unique cultural heritage" and had to be performed in separate buildings.

Few Japanese people would call themselves "Shintoist". Buddhism is something you believe, Shinto is something you *do*, like Hallowe'en or Christmas.
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>>52552093
>More traditional D&D gods could be the equivalent of the Buddhas:
This. Cross out every occurence of the word "divine" in the books and write "Buddhist". Buddhism has way more focus on destroying evil things through holy power, destroying good things though unholy power, etc., whereas Shinto treats everything as having the potential for both good *and* evil at all times, and is less forceful in its approach.

Shinto magic wields spirits as weapons directly. Buddhist magic doesn't physically call Buddhas to your location, it just summons an illusion of a wrathful deity to terrify enemies, or penalizes people for defying cosmic rules, or lets you shoot energy blasts shaped like Buddha's giant fist.
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Anyone got neat looking Shrine art?
Either Shinto or any other sort of eastern religion.
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What is the difference between a Kami and an Elemental?
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>>52560688
I believe that in one of the other nations there actually is a church of Asmodeus that hasn't gone full Cheliax.
They worship him using a different name and only really focus on his divine job of Lawyer. Using them as an example I think it would be possible to have a temple dedicated to some typically evil god and a kami defender.
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>>52560688
>So you make a shrine for local kami and it also serves as temple for a god? That would probably require the people to pick their kami in accordance with the local worshipped god so you won't get an enshrined angel and Asmodean temple in the same building.
In most cases the being worshipped in the shrine is going to be an ally or follower of the being worshipped in the temple.

E.g. if you have a temple to Pelor, he might ask you to build a shrine on the grounds so he can send down an archon to live there and protect it for him.
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>>52578500
Not much.
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>>52579145

Would it not be a more accurate parallel to say that the shrine to the archon was built first, and that people consecrated the shrine to Pelor only after the fact?

(Or rather, it would not exactly be Pelor, because he is not actually a Celestian god in the Great Wheel. He is an Elysian god and thus associated with guardinals, which are animal-folk celestials.)
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>>52536382
Shinto was the official state religion of Japan for centuries. Please show some respect.
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>>52578621
Also that one people who've fused Desna and that one nature god together still manage to get by without some angel or whatever descending from the heavens to set them straight.
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>>52535995

Girl on right is wearing a sock but you can still see her individual toes. Poor planning or footfag?
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>>52578280

In D&D 4e terms, would this effectively place Buddhism under the divine power source and Shinto under the primal power source?

>>52580694

To be fair, calling down extradimensional creatures does not seem particularly Shinto-like.
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>>52549629
You say that like CR is anywhere close to being accurate or balanced. Remember, THAT DAMN CRAB was only CR 3, as are the fuckfests that are Shadows.
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>>52583901
>shadow goes to town intending to feast on people's strength
>shadow is captured with holy ghost-touch rope!
>shadow held in bondage
>shadow is used as whip-like melee weapon against trolls intent on ravaging town, and the weakened trolls are dispatched with fire
>shadow is deified as holy spirit of the town and prayed to every day while kept in bondage in view of everyone

>shadow never asked for this
>>
here's a pretty cool story from a book on shinto i've been reading:

> During the reign of Emperor Keitai [early sixth century], Matachi of the Yahazu lineage cleared the reed plain in the valley to the west of the [present] district [office] and opened up new rice fields there.
> Then, yato-no-kami flocked together and appeared in great numbers, stopping people from entering and cultivating the fields. According to local people, yato-no-kami have the bodies of snakes, carrying horns on their heads.
> If one looks back at them while fleeing, one’s house and kin will be wiped out and one will have no descendants.
> Matachi was greatly angered by this. Wearing armor and carrying a spear in his hand, he slew them and chased them away.
> At the mountain entrance he planted a stick in a ditch as a mark, and he announced to the yato-no-kami: “We shall give the land above this stick to you, as the domain of the kami, but the land below it will be turned into rice fields for the people. I shall become a priest [hafuri] of the kami, and I shall revere and worship you in all eternity. I pray, do not strike us; do not bear a grudge against us!”
> He set up a yashiro and did worship there for the first time.
> He cleared ten tokoro of rice fields, and Matachi’s descendants have performed worship here until this day

This was recorded in a gazetteer around 720.
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>>52584774
He should've brought someone in to shoot down those birds.
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>>52582328
>In D&D 4e terms, would this effectively place Buddhism under the divine power source and Shinto under the primal power source?
More or less.
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>>52582328
>>52588455
And because you've almost certainly played Hopeless Masquerade...

Taoism probably fits best under Arcane. However, it's only in modern times that Taoism is considered a religion - in Jidai Geki settings it was considered an ascetic lifestyle, and there wasn't any word for "someone who only follows the Tao a little". That said, Taoist beliefs could be found throughout Shinto and Buddhism, most notably in Koushin and Zen.
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>>52549868
I studied it semi-extensively. To be frank, the Kojiki is nice for getting background mythology, but what I really want is to find an english translation of volumes 1-10 of the Engishiki - those volumes deal with the early attempts to standardize the rituals of Shinto.
There's also some good books on the subject. Some of them are also a bit cultic, but give a good grounding in some of the basics of Shinto.
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/tg/ seems to be the only place that discusses Shinto. Shall we have a discussion so that idiots don't scream at us for making a thread?
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>>52592828
How do you introduce not-Shinto into a generic Western D&D setting without the players realizing it's Japanese?
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>>52549018
then we get the comf. the delicious, delicious comf
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>>52597401
>implying generic western D&D doesn't already have not!shinto
just make monks and druids part of the same religion, or combine cleric, warlock, and druid, or druid. they are very mysterious, you know.
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>>52598900
Monks and druids are NOT Shinto.
Monks are Buddhist at best.
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>>52599708
>monks and druids are not!shinto
thanks for agreeing with me
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>>52600336
Nope. Monks are Buddhist at best.
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>>52597401
That would be hard and require your players to know next to nothing about far eastern cultures. You would have to not put much emphasis on traditional Japanese motifs, reskin various rituals and implements, maybe come up with new terms and names.

>>52584636
>using Shadow as a whip.
Step up your game (pic related, look at the last sentence).

Also, divine BDSM sounds hot.

>>52582328
>calling down extradimensional creatures does not seem particularly Shinto-like.
Yes, Shinto looks to be focused more on outsiders (native) and natural spirits. Still, you don't really have to be beholden to how Shinto really was.

>>52575185
The enshrined outsider asked his friend to pose as him while he's away skeddadling... but this friend is in hopeless unrequited love with him?!
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>>52597401
Forest fey have started attacking residents of a nearby town, creating bad weather, and causing food to rot.

This is odd, because the town has an appointed representative who travels into the forest once a month to meet with the fey and make sure they're not doing anything that would anger them. His family has been doing it for over a hundred years now, and it's reached the point where the fey seem genuinely fond of them. However, the last time he entered the forest, he was attacked by pixies and driven off before he could speak with anyone.

Find out what's happened.
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>>52603915
Also emphasize that the fey previously *helped* the town - bandits mysteriously falling unconscious, a bubble of calm winds around town in a hurricane, or strangers who sell amazing medicine to the sick, then vanish into thin air

If there are wizards in town, explain that arcane magic manipulates near-mindless "spiritual plankton" in the environment to produce its effects - some of these plankton are larval fey who serve the fey leaders of their region, meaning that the Lord of the Forest can make certain kinds of spells harder to cast (particularly ones that alter the environment).




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