How to stat the power of granting spellcasting ability in exchange for prayers?

[SolemnGolem]

20200825 update: this post below sums up the build for a deity capable of absorbing ER from prayers, and capable of bestowing PI and ER upon worshippers. Still working on how to bestow skills, as I'm sure the mathematics are suspect.

An occasional narrative meme throughout history and mythology is the concept of a being that, if you think nice thoughts to it for a set amount of time, it can give you the ability to cast spells.

In many narratives, the grantor being is incredibly powerful, and is often referred to with words showing great respect, elemental regard, or four-letter-virulence. "Baal!" "Zeus!" "Juno!" "YHWH!" "玉皇大帝！" etc.

But what if you wanted to stat up something quite small that grants you spellcasting power if you thought nice things about it? Like a godling, a mini-G, a hemi-demi-semi-god?

How would you stat this up?

I see this as having two parts. First, the mini-G would need a sort of Affliction, that grants a target Power Investiture and possibly FP/ER for a caster. Perhaps it would also grant a skill, if we treat clerical spells as a skill-based casting. Depending on the system, the mini-G may need to generate a radius of Divine Power (or whatever the priestly equivalent of Mana is) otherwise the clerical spells would just fizzle.

Second, the worshipper needs to spend a certain amount of time in Disciplines of Faith, engaged in some sort of action (e.g. prayer, rituals, song, chanting, dance) that gives the mini-G enough energy to grant the above PI, FP/ER, spell skill points, and Divine Power.

Because of the energies involved, it may take many, many worshippers to fully "charge the divine battery" of the mini-G just for the mini-G to return these points focused into one priest.

Has anybody sat down and tried to make this calculus work? I'm looking at the rules for Ceremonial Casting and that seems like it could be helpful in providing rules for how a lay person could nonetheless contribute casting power to the system. A single ordained leader with some casting ability, plus hundreds of choreographed or organized lay worshippers, could generate the necessary amount of raw power so the mini-G could refract it and empower it into a single worshipper leader or cadre.

[Christopher R. Rice]

I ran a gods game a while back and I called it an Unusual Background in my setting bible/framework. I considered Affliction (and indeed, did use the pricing for it), but I settled on 100 points for "If you worship me you gain spells".

[SolemnGolem]

I stumbled across a helpful post by Varyon from a few months back which had this to say on the matter:

Being able to grant abilities could be some form of Affliction, having Allies (who themselves have something akin to Granted by Patron or whatever on their abilities), or even having something akin to Weirdness Magnet/Origin Magnet (if you can't control it, and those who you "grant" power have no built-in inclination to server you). Allowing your allies to use your own energy reserve is going to be something of a reversed version of the Drains Familiar Limitation (DF5, also Pyramid #3/75). This basically gives them an Energy Reserve with Drains Patron -50% (in place of Granted by Patron -50%). Note these are abilities held by those you empower; again, having the ability to empower people in this fashion is either Affliction of the relevant abilities (if you can use it willy-nilly) or Ally.

In my campaign, I have a tulpa death god that was created by accident. A lich king set up a bogus religion (coopting the iconography of a dead religion, the Wardkeeper) to keep his living kingdom quiet and to let him get on with his magical research in peace. However, after a few decades to a century or so, he noticed that the clerics of the false religion were actually being given real clerical spells.

The king discovered that a captive angel in his dungeons (a divine servitor of the dead Wardkeeper god) had birthed a child of rage from its skull. This floating monstrous god looked like a stillborn infant of prodigious size, and it grew more powerful from the prayers of the faithful, and could grant some minor spellcasting ability to certain priestly folk.

The lich, ever pragmatic, decided to lock both mother-angel and god-child away in a facility above a void, so that if things really went south, the failsafes could flush them away into another dimension. But he has them under observation to see what magical findings they can give him.

The godling is a being that I'm trying to stat up, and I'm toying with the idea of a GURPS build for it.

Note that this is entirely academic in nature and not practical. I know I don't have to do this. But GURPS makes it irresistible since the system is so flexible.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by SolemnGolem

An occasional narrative meme throughout history and mythology is the concept of a being that, if you think nice thoughts to it for a set amount of time, it can give you the ability to cast spells.

You can also interpret the ideas under "Meditation, Holiness, or Study" on pp. 53-54 of Thaumatology this way.

[dcarson]

That's what I was thinking also. Meditation magic for how much. and how fast you get power.

[SolemnGolem]

That works... for the caster. What about the entity granting the spells and spellcasting ability?

The entity would need some sort of ability or power that gives them ER, say if somebody prays to them (perhaps with a range modifier). Then the entity would need to be able to Afflict a target faithful with the advantages (PI, ER, skills etc.) also at range.

I'm not sure how to price an advantage where an entity can imbue a location (or radius area) with levels of holiness to enable clerical spellcasting even if it would otherwise not have this.

[Dingle]

I think you might not want to actually stat up the power granting ability of the mini-G.
Just stat its other abilities and give it some form of allies to represent the fact that people with magic powers are incentivised to be nice to it.

[Aldric]

You could start by making the faithful into an ally group, and give your mini-G ER/FP granted by the faithful and with conditional recharge.

I would then work on some form of telepathy with the faithful as well.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by SolemnGolem

I'm not sure how to price an advantage where an entity can imbue a location (or radius area) with levels of holiness to enable clerical spellcasting even if it would otherwise not have this.

Mana Enhancer in a no/low-mana background. If divine spellcasting doesn't work on "mana", just rename it and split "divine mana" and "mundane mana" into two different parallel systems (whatever those are called in the setting). Or don't have mundane mana at all.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by SolemnGolem

That works... for the caster. What about the entity granting the spells and spellcasting ability?

<Shrug> I'd just represent them as "Ally Group: Priesthood" and let 'em pay for their own damn spells and clerical investment.