ok, so i'm not necessarily a proponent of religion in gaming - though i do think that an RPG where religion is tied in somehow, but is not the foundation of the RPG, could be cool.

so if you know of any religion-centric RPGs already out there, have any views on adding religion to an existing RPG, ideas for ways to make an RPG where religion would somehow be a factor (kind of like DnD has gods and character alignments), or reasons why religion in an RPG would be stupid, you can post here.

Umm, don't you think D&D qualifies? I mean, it has a huge number of gods, clerics who try and convert the heathens, actual embodiment of evil and good (devils/demons and solars/planetars), etc...

Or, do you only mean your religion?

Honestly, I'm not trying to be rude, or condescending, but Christianity is not the only religion out there. There are plenty of others, both fantastical, and based in real life religions. Just because it is not Christian-centric, doesn't mean religion doesn't exist in the game, or is not a major part of it.

And if you are specifically looking for a Christian themed RPG, there was one out there, made in the mid-80's. Can't remember the name, but the short version is that it was a terrible flop. It was attacked by the RPG crowd for being a relitively poor RPG, and attacked by the Jack-Chick crowd for even daring to try and bring D&D and Christianity together. Kind of like Christian rock was heavily attacked in the 80's by the religious right, as well, which is kind of sad, because there is some really good Christian rock that could do a decent job of both rocking, and attempting to convert folks.

Anyways, religion exists in gaming, and is alive, well, and strong in some games.

Dave

I love religion in gaming. Religion is an important part of any culture and really should be included in order to make a rounded world. The mysticism and mystery created by religion also makes for excellent plots, and I regularly bring in factors from Cthulhu cults, Mesopotamian myths and yes, even Christian dogma behind my plots.

Depends on the game, in a D&D setting real world religions dont fit in my mind.

In games like SR I think they fit just fine. I like the idea of the Knights Templer, the order of the sylvestrines, voodoo, santeria and all that. Some of my characters are religious to a certain degree. Much like the stereotypical mafia goon being a religious person and what not.

I have a Voodoo Hougan and I did a lot of research for that character. Sure SR had plenty there to play one in the SR world. But I also went and found as much as I possibly could about the religion. For instance, one group of followers specifically says Ghede is the protector of children, so thats an aspect I role play an an aspect Im waiting for the Gm to exploit. I chose Ghede dont know why I just liked him. I found out all I could about that Loa in particular and how he reacts and interacts with the other Loa so I could roleplay the character correctly. I also made sure the GM had all the information I did so he would role play the Loa correctly. Im no where near fluent or well indocterinated in that religion but I feel comfortable enough that it was played correctly and with respect.

Any character I play gets that treatment wether athesist or full blown catholic, or some other religion like buddist or taoist. Personally, I still dont have a religion, I think most of it is hocus pocus for people to find something to believe to make the world make sense. To me the world makes sense much better with out religion. But Im not going to stand in the way of anyone that wants to practice a religion, as long as you dont bother me with it. I think if all those books were taken as ideas for the way people should live and get long that would be great. But when you start killign each other over whos right or wrong its just silly. I mean its like the old beer commercials, tastes great less filling. WHO GIVES A FUCK? just drink and be merry, in the end well find out who was right.

The only time I was happy to see a catholic preaching was when I was leaving school with an idea for a character and I wanted him to be catholic and by chance this guy was there handing out bibles. So I had a bible now to read and base a religious doctorine to the character I made. Other then that I would have had to do some internet searching.

Just popping in with a pre-emptive "be careful". Religion is always a tricky subject, should always be approached respectfully (regardless of which religion you're speaking of), and can very quickly devolve into an argument. Don't let it.

My answer is a sound "eh - maybe." Like many other adult/serious/real-world/controversial themes, it's almost entirely dependent on how it's handled, and (more importantly) the people involved in the game.

I tend to dislike real world religion-as-stats being present in RPGs (as I've mentioned a few times in reference to Shadowrun's stats-and-modifiers for various wiccan/pagan/whatever magical belief system), because I'm wary of writer biais rearing it's ugly head. I liked it just fine when MitS had a suggested listing of Totems for various religious beliefs (Thor or St Michael as Dragonslayer, Athena as Wise Warrior, whatever) -- because multiple faiths had multiple choices, and those choices overlapped with other faiths. Thor isn't a better totem than St Michael, the two are fair and even and balanced, in other words.

I disliked (on principle) the various modifiers given for different pseudo-real world belief systems in a seperate book (SOTA'64, maybe?), wherein wiccans got one set of mods, pagans another, etc. What if my real-life gaming group is made up of a bunch of people that follow those real-world faiths (a not impossible concept), and someone doesn't like that someone else's religion is "better" than theirs, in-game? What if the writer of some SR source material is really into his religion, and gives it unrealistically potent statistical modifiers, and gives religions he doesn't like so much shitty ones? It's a mess I'd rather avoid wholly, and one I thought Shadowrun had avoided, by simply giving all real-world faiths comparable (and even interchangeable) statistics.

Really, my religion does not affect how I roleplay as much as why I roleplay. I want to tell stories, either from outside (as the GM) or inside (as a player) because that is my role in life.

If you want a game with religion, Pendragon (currently White-Wolf, used to be Chaosium) is Arthurian legend with religion (all applicable religions) at its core. Any knight can have a religion but Pendragon rewards those whose virtues and vices are appropriate to their chosen gods.

thanks to Frag-o and Critias for their SR related thoughts - some good points

Critias - i don't have SOTA'64...now i want to pick it up to see what they've done in this area

and thanks to Firewall for his Pendragon suggestion as an RPG that already has religion integrated into it. have they (chaosium/white-wolf) designed the game in such a way as to promote religious-based campaigns/plots; or is religion in Pendragon much the same as in DnD, where it's present but could easily not be a main theme?

I use it in-game when it is appropriate. D&D gods and their clerics, a fictionalized god when you're doing something like In-Nomine, etc.

If a character in a game is religious and it's part of the character, that's acceptable.

Not acceptable: a player trying to bring his/her religion to the group during or in the context of gaming (this is gaming for fun, not "real life conversion time"); a player making other players uncomfortable due to their religion or lack thereof (be it the player is religious and trying to be preachy, or a player is mocking another for their religion, or anything like that).

If it's a group of friends, and everyone knows one another well, and they want to discuss something like that during a day of gaming, that's one thing. But to bring it to a situation where it's not necessary just to stir things up? Not acceptable.

I'm not religious, and in "RL", I have very strong opinions about the issue. However, gaming is not RL, even when it's an allegory or metaphor for it. I have no compunction regarding religion and the portrayal of it in games. (I have a great idea for a Catholic priest that has some issues with thinking he's directly in touch with the Almighty, ala Braveheart, for example. I can't wait to play him in a SR game.)

We had a guy who played with us for a few sessions years ago. Really good guy, he was reglious I would say. Went to church every sunday and all that. He seen me thumbing through some books one day at work and we got to talking about it. He got so into it he ran out and bought his own copy of the BBB so he could make a character and join our group.

The thing that was so odd. He wanted to play a sniper that thought he was touched by god. He was a "retired" priest. He felt the hand of god give him a new path to follow. He just up and left the church to go kill infidels.

It was pretty damn cool, because the guy really knew th ebible so he was laying down scripture in the middle of fights and it was one of the funniest things I had ever seen.

I would say this was about the Pulp Fiction time, well before Saving Private Ryan. So the character had a bit of uniquness to it.

it's interesting that you say that eidolon...

i've never really put much brain power into thinking about a religion-centric RPG because, frankly, i don't really want one. but the time i have spent thinking about it has led me to one conclusion:

i think it would be hard to create a fun religious RPG because the point of most RPGs is to act out doing things that you would never get to actually do. stuff like being a criminal, living in medieval times fighting fantastic monsters, living in the distant future where you can have cyber body parts and enter the internet matrix-style, et cetera et cetera. but you can be religious in RL, so where's the fun in being religious in an RPG unless it's more of just a character quirk (like Frag-o's friend's character who was a sniper for God) in a game where the basis is something more exciting and/or fantastic?

the challenge would be to create a religious RPG where you can actually make religion the focus and make it fun, but without having to resort to making up your own religions and making it playable for the RL religious and non-religious alike.

And there's where you're going to find your biggest challenge in today's society. Religion, for all its attempts to the contrary, is divisive.

There's a lot of reasons for that, though, and a lot of them are pretty good.

To me, the absolute biggest issue is the lack of a live and let live mentality among certain groups (religious or not). But that's just me.

There are several RPG's out there that do have fairly heavy doses of modern religions in them - Deadlands (ie. the Blessed archetype), 7th Sea (religions loosely based upon most western real-world religions), Legend of the Five Rings (like 7th Sea, but loosely based on far-eastern religions), and one put out by Green Ronin I believe using the OGL 3.5 system called "The Rapture(?)" which is Christian/Bible based.

I agree that using religion can be devisive, but if acceptable to all in your group, it can also make for better gaming and even learning.

it will depend on teh game/gamesystem.

I think it's important to be as depressing as possible about religion in your games so as to make the game setting suitably dystopian. Even in D&D make the "good" priests and clerics just as bad as the "evil" ones by making them do things like witch-hunts, by trying to force certain lifestyles on peasants, etc.

thanks to Iron Guardian i got wise and started googling:

Rapture: The Second Coming

Holy Lands

Spiritual Warfare

that's enough for me to say that christian gaming is covered well enough. so i think we've concluded so far that:

1) there are many non-religious games having elements of either RL or madeup religions. and, in fact, the religious elements in many games are so present that you could create an entire religious-centric campaign.

2) there are rpgs out there that focus mainly on a christian religious setting.

in my mind, we only need one more list-item to be complete - rpgs with a main non-christian focus. these have proven so far to be nearly non-existant in my searches for:

wicken 0
voodoo 1 - Fright Night: Voodoo Island (d20 Modern)
buddhism 1 - Tibet the RPG
islam 0

so maybe that's enough to say that there is a market of non-christian rpgs as well - but that's not a real solid bet yet. anybody else got any?

Actually, the game I was thinking of was called "Testament" I believe which was a RPG set in Biblical times and used the OGL system...came out a few years ago and was produced by Green Ronin I think.

As for non-Christian themed RPG's, there are Legend of the Five Rings and Bushido which involve Buddhism, Shintoism, and Daoism. Other games which touch on non-Christian religions are 7th Sea, Deadlands, White Wolf's previous WOD, and Ars Magica.

Testament RPG

I dont think its particularly aimed at chrisitans. It specifically states you can be a sorcerer working for the pharaoh and etc. Though it is set in biblical times. Though if you look at the examples of the "other" people they do seem to be the archetypical bad guyd, Idol Makers, Magus, Sorcerers and all, the only one that looks like a good guy is the Prophet of God.

Testament RPG (GR site)

i like the slogan "You've Read The Book, Now Play The Game!"

The game's not specifically about Voodoo, but I know the authors did a bunch of research into developing a solid system for Voodoo as a big part of the setting for their pirate game Skull & Bones.

Bull

We're taking a break from SR at the moment and playing Cthulu. Hard to keep religion out of that one!

To the original question: sure I love exploring (lots of different) real world religious themes and history in rpgs. And in films, and in books. And despite being an athiest (now) I quite enjoy playing characters who are preachers (I've had more than one of those and have grown very attached to them) and have tried to play them respectfully.

That is an issue though. If you try to explore these themes in art (and games) then you risk offending religious sensibilities. How do you, craigpierce, feel about the Da Vinci Code? (The subject matter- let's leave the writing style etc out of it). Did you enjoy seeing a discussion of religious themes and an acknowledgement that Jesus really existed, or were you offended by the disagreements with official church canon?

I've been wondering, actually, about the portrayal of Islam in Shadowrun. Given the way things are going, how long will it be before some Imam calls for a fatwa on Shadowrun because its treatment of Islam is in some way seen as offensive and misrepresentative of the 'true word'.

I'll answer the Da Vinci Code. I'm a semi-practicing Catholic. Firstly, I hate to say, the writing style is horrible, which put me off on the wrong foot. Ignoring that, I did NOT enjoy Da Vinci Code because it made such a peurile, one-sided, poorly explained mess of religion, Catholicism in particular. It would be like if I wrote a book about DSF and I represented the forums as a group of all males who enjoy blowing things up and every single member is a borderline terrorist who lacks logic and compassion. Brown simply did bad research and propogated wicked (and wrong) stereotypes against everyone who happened to be religious in the book.

If you took the very basic plot (illuminati left a trail across Rome) and took out all of Brown's own anti-religious bigotry, stupid religious characters, incorrect information on religion (and poor writing, poor understanding of science, poor research), even if the Church was cast as the bad guy, I probably would have found it interesting.

If you look at an example like Stigmata, the movie made a few years ago, I DID enjoy that. The Church was cast in a bad light, but they explained it in a way that made sense. The writers didn't put out false information or lie about the Church (or at least not about anything major). I also enjoyed Godfather III, where the Church was involved with a major scandal and several very high officials set up an assassination.

I love stories about the Church and church history. I don't mind when the church is cast as serving an evil role. I DO mind when the author lies about the church to make his story, especially when he paints those lies as truth. I do mind when EVERY SINGLE MEMBER of the religion is evil and/or stupid. Paint a few high up members, but not *everyone*.

Yeah it's not my group, so maybe I just didn't pick up on it, like you say. And I'm also going from memory- although looking on-line to refresh my memory I think Cardinal Mortati is one such 'good guy' and there was some Swiss Guard Commander as well, I think. But please yes, go and check for me.

No I guess not. It's a human failing, but I'm sure it can't be improved by philosophies that place more importance on faith and feeling than evidence and reason.