Religion

## Gods

Gods have two separate mechanics that combined make up their ability to interact with the world. One is their powers which depend upon their pantheon, your more traditional gods have more powers the more relics and churches are built in their name. However, to actually use their powers or otherwise interact with the world they must make use of "faith", which is a currency they gain based on their aspects. A God of war gets it from battles being fought, a God of the Hearth accumulates it over time from his followers, a God of the Harvest grows stronger as food generation increases. The God of the Harvest in your way? A drought will sufficiently weaken him. Faith also acts as their "Vitality" - a God with high faith would be almost impossible to take down without some mitigating factors (corrupting a relic of their church, profane rites on their holy ground) but a God with low faith is ripe for the picking. Luring a god into overextending himself and depleting his faith is the surest way to gain success in the heavens.

In order to "play the game of deities" you actually have to sacrifice some of your orbs permanently in order to present yourself as a divine being, if that avatar is slain you forever lose access to that power. This is still up for balance and debate.

## Planes

Planes are a very simple method of organizing the Gods and creating a grid-like framework for celestial invasion, but each does have a "Seat of Power" for the most powerful God in that plane and having sufficient power in a plane gives you bonuses and access to new minions and miracles. They are more like separate realms than anything else, and each has a somewhat familiar mythological feel.

## Miracles

Gods have a variety of functions in the world depending on their personalities. Some Gods will do nothing and watch as their followers are pushed aside, others are quick to rise to any affront to their power. Gods can spawn divine quests, create artifacts, send instructions to their worshippers, or perform miracles (when prompted by a priest). Miracles are much like rituals though they require faith to be cast as well as gathered. Most rituals will be cast as "Public Ceremonies" requiring the gathering of their congregation as well as pilgrims, the more that come the faster the miracle will be resolved. Note that Gods can decline to answer the miracle even after it is "successfully" cast.

Miracles resolve much like Rituals but lack any customization options (though the Gods can "spice up" the miracle if they want to). Miracles are cast based on the number of followers, the divine respect of the ceremony leader (title depends on the faith), and any holy relics present. The miracle above is an attempt to summon a divine champion to the world - these champions take faith to maintain in the world but operate as Champions in all respects. They can lead armies, investigate challenges, decipher clues, and even serve as advisers.

When you see a Miracle being cast you can run challenges against it like any other modifier. You can infiltrate the ritual and sabotage it (sometimes with catastrophic results), terrorize its worshippers with a raid, attempt to corrupt it, or a few other options. Let's see what happens with a timely raid.

Because it was a public ceremony we managed to kill a good number of them. We are then allowed to customize the result based on our traits and abilities ranging from wounding (possibly killing) the caster down to lowering the Fame gained from the action. A Raid is a Strength (Terrorize) challenge, you will often find that when an Infiltration will take too long you can default to a Terrorize action for more dramatic results.

Now that we've inflicted significant damages to the ceremony it is likely they will abandon it - or if the need is great enough they will continue but with greater security.