Exorcising evil temples

[b-dog]

I was wondering if anyone has any better ideas than I have for exorcising an evil temple. In DF the cleric just rolls against his skill and the Will of the evil temple to be exorcised. I was think to be more involved because I feel older temples will need much more time to cleanse them of evil. The idea I have far is that the temple has a sort of hit point amount which must be reduced to 0 before the temple can be cleansed. I am thinking that each exorcism will inflict damage on the temples evil hit points but more powerful clerics can inflict more damage than weaker ones. So I am thinking that the level of power investiture adds to the damage inflicted thus a cleric with power investiture 1 inflicts 1 point of damage per exorcism while a cleric with power investiture 6 could inflict 6 points of damage to the temple. The cleric could also have a ceremony and each person could add an addition point of damage to the evil temple. But I would think this might be dangerous because if the helper fails their Will roll vs the evil in the temple they might become possessed.

I am also thinking that the evil temple could regenerate it hit points if the demon that is worshipped there is not slain. Maybe the temple gives high unholy sanctity under normal conditions but when cleansed the unholy sanctity is normal. When the temple regenerates 20% of its hit points the unholy sanctity goes to +1, 40% goes to +2, 60% goes to +3, 80% goes to +4 and 100% goes to +5 or high evil sanctity and the temple is back to its full operation.

[tbone]

I see mentions of cleansing altars and "areas". I don't see mention of specifically cleansing a temple – which, as you note, might be a bigger job (if for no other reason than the sheer size of a big temple, I'm thinking).

Perhaps exorcisms could act on some sort of "curse HP" as you suggest (small HP for a single altar, huge HP for a temple complex). Perhaps the result of success is a wearing down of this HP, or a change in sanctity level, or both.

Or perhaps the process is area-based: the cleric selects the area radius (or equivalent for square rooms, etc.), with a bigger area meaning more time, more holy water and incense and all that, and probably more penalties.

However it works, what you're suggesting sounds like a great adventure plot: The cleric needs to cleanse a big temple complex building by building, or room by room. The other PCs will have to protect her from wave after wave of unholy defenders, including spirits or demons continually spawned by areas not yet cleansed. Some spirit or demonic defenders will have to be dealt with directly by the cleric (she'll want more action than just rolling Exorcism vs rooms!). And, uh-oh, a team of demons/monsters/evil clerics is secretly trailing the PCs, re-cursing areas the cleric just cleansed...

Sounds like a fun session to me!

[Refplace]

Since its DFRPG lets try for simple as possible.
I think using the SSR size penalty as a penalty to the roll and maybe add that to the number of hours it takes as well. I would let assistants offset the time penalty if I did that. Say everyone with Exorcism can offset 3 hours and any other divine type helper could cut an hour instead.

And I agree it sounds like a fun adventure challenge.

[b-dog]

Originally Posted by tbone

I see mentions of cleansing altars and "areas". I don't see mention of specifically cleansing a temple – which, as you note, might be a bigger job (if for no other reason than the sheer size of a big temple, I'm thinking).

Perhaps exorcisms could act on some sort of "curse HP" as you suggest (small HP for a single altar, huge HP for a temple complex). Perhaps the result of success is a wearing down of this HP, or a change in sanctity level, or both.

Or perhaps the process is area-based: the cleric selects the area radius (or equivalent for square rooms, etc.), with a bigger area meaning more time, more holy water and incense and all that, and probably more penalties.

However it works, what you're suggesting sounds like a great adventure plot: The cleric needs to cleanse a big temple complex building by building, or room by room. The other PCs will have to protect her from wave after wave of unholy defenders, including spirits or demons continually spawned by areas not yet cleansed. Some spirit or demonic defenders will have to be dealt with directly by the cleric (she'll want more action than just rolling Exorcism vs rooms!). And, uh-oh, a team of demons/monsters/evil clerics is secretly trailing the PCs, re-cursing areas the cleric just cleansed...

Sounds like a fun session to me!

Yeah you sort of laid out the adventure I had in mind. The idea I had was that there was a temple for demon lords that was built upon and an altar to an ancient cosmic evil. The PCs go into the ancient temple and they have to exorcise it which takes a long time and there is a chance of wandering monsters. Once exorcised the clock is on because the ancient temple regenerates and it powers the other demonic temples and altars. The worshipers of the other demonic temples catch on and they go looking for the intruders. The PCs now have a chance to defeat these demonic temples while the ancient evil temple is not at full power. Once it is then the PCs need to try to escape because the demonic temples will be too powerful.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by b-dog

I was wondering if anyone has any better ideas than I have for exorcising an evil temple.

In general, once the initial dungeon has been cleared, this fits in the category of "not very interesting for the PCs, except as location for Plot Devices to show up"; it might be a lot of work, but it's simply not terribly exciting work -- unless, of course, there's a hidden under-dungeon or a nasty horror that was being kept imprisoned and is now free, or some such.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Since its DFRPG lets try for simple as possible.
I think using the SSR size penalty as a penalty to the roll and maybe add that to the number of hours it takes as well. I would let assistants offset the time penalty if I did that. Say everyone with Exorcism can offset 3 hours and any other divine type helper could cut an hour instead.

And I agree it sounds like a fun adventure challenge.

I'd probably treat every 'helper' with Exorcism 12+ as contributing their full time to the cleansing and every helper that didn't as contributing 1/4th the time.

So 2 PCs with Exorcism 12+ and 4 without would get 3 hours of cleansing done per hour of work.

Then I'd treat the 'yds' as square feet and set the hours of cleaning off the Size column on the SSR chart (round up). So a 30,000 sq foot temple would take 25 hours to cleanse and reconsecrate.

[Bruno]

The problem with someone having to perform an extended action (exorcise the evil, disarm the deathtrap, unlock the gates so reinforcements can get in, close the portal to the realm of the dead, whatever) while the rest of the party defends them from waves of mooks is that it's usually quite boring for the person performing the extended action. Your turn tends to be "I do the thing" again and again and again.

I need to go back and look at some D&D 4e adventures I have, I remember a few had an interesting way of handling this sort of effort. Basically, D&D 4th edition had "skill challenges" where the entire party had to participate.[1]

A skill challenge can normally be any kind of non-combat group problem, but I've actually seen an adventure handle entire dungeon crawls as a skill challenge, which I thought was pretty innovative (and funny). The challenge goes in rounds (like combat in D&D, you could go around the initiative list in GURPS but this is a situation where I think rounds work better), and it needs a certain number of successful rounds to complete it.

Each round of the challenge everyone picks a skill to use to try and further the situation (so no hiding the half-ogre barbarian with the awful nose-picking habit at the back of a social challenge). Using inappropriate approaches might be a big penalty, or an automatic failure. Using a particularly appropriate skill might count for extra successes, or earn extra successes on a good Margin of Success.

Depending on the individual number of successes and failures rolled (which is a good control for how difficult the challenge is, and feel free to ramp the difficulty up as the challenge progresses), the round is a success or a failure. You get a penalty when you fail (everyone takes unavoidable damage, you get a little lost and lose travel time and eat rations, you have to fight a random encounter, the gate guards increase the toll you have to pay to get in, the judge increases your jail time...), or you get one successful round to add to your total.

When you accumulate enough successful rounds, you "win" the skill challenge and get whatever you were trying to get, and some XP. The original idea was that you had to get a certain number of successful rounds before you got a certain number of failed rounds, but I think that's needlessly gameist - the penalties you're accumulating are punishment enough most times, or there's an actual time limit you're dealing with and you simply need to finish the challenge before the time limit runs out.

I know I've seen multiple adventures handle exorcisms/demon gate closures/whatever as skill challenges, and in various ways (including having attacks on the hordes of enemies count as not-failures that reduce the amount of incoming damage each round). I think at least one allowed non-exorcist rolls to actually help advance things but that may not be what you want here. Either way, this kind of thing lets you churn through the exorcism faster than handling second-by-second combat for an entire 3 hour exorcism, while still letting everyone get involved and roll dice each "round".

Doing it this way would probably require at least one successful use of Exorcism for the round to be a success - meaning the cleric can actually pause the exorcism to heal up someone dangerously close to death or otherwise take a different action, but knowing that this will result in the overall round being a failure and thus something bad happening. Letting players make decisions is always good.

I might run a separate skill challenge for each area of the temple being cleansed, with areas closer to the dark altar (or w/e) requiring more successful rounds of the challenge to complete.

You probably will intersperse normal combat, trap disarmament, or other things with the skill challenge rounds, depending on what the penalty for failing a round is. If every time a round is failed 10 more demons and evil spirits show up, then you're definitely going to have a combat.

[1] There were significant changes to the game mechanical details of skill challenges over the course of 4th edition, but we can ignore all the game mechanics anyways since this isn't D&D 4e, I'm just using the idea as inspiration.

[tbone]

Originally Posted by Bruno

The problem with someone having to perform an extended action (exorcise the evil, disarm the deathtrap, unlock the gates so reinforcements can get in, close the portal to the realm of the dead, whatever) while the rest of the party defends them from waves of mooks is that it's usually quite boring for the person performing the extended action. Your turn tends to be "I do the thing" again and again and again.

Definitely, which is why I was thinking some of the threats would have to be of the supernatural sort that only the cleric can battle. Still, that would be only some of the time, and you're right that the rest of the time the cleric player would be bored. ("My turn? Again, I pray and chant while everyone else smashes demons. Sigh.")

But mainly, I was thinking that this long action of exorcism would take place after the whole party has battled the dangers and thoroughly secured the area (after all, it's three hours). The actual exorcism can then take place in just a few minutes of game time (while all the PCs get some rest, patch wounds, etc. ).

Or the cleric could be doing something much faster than a full exorcism in each room: marking walls with runes, or de-powering some evil idol with a special holy item (provided by the church or other patron), or engaging in a spiritual mini-battle with that room's mini-demon. Something specific to this adventure that takes just a handful or rounds or two and involves interesting rolls for the cleric, while the other PCs swat away attackers. Once all that prep is done, everyone can head to the Final Boss Room* and defeat the Big Boss, so the cleric can perform the Big Three-Hour Exorcism that completes the mission.

Or... the key cleric could be an NPC. Let him do the multiple boring exorcisms while the PCs fight to keep him alive! Any cleric PC would still have a bit of a special role in fending off supernatural threats, and aiding some of the exorcism and ritual stuff.

Lots of ways to work it.

* Yeah, it all sounds a little video game-like IMO, in a good way. Complete a mini-mission in each room, which unlocks (or at least greatly aids) the ability to perform the final mission. All highly dependent on one particular resource that has to be protected at all cost (the cleric(s)).

[lvalero]

You might want to use some sort of customized "Technical grapple" between the exorcist and the "evil spirit" of the temple. If you inflict enough "control points" you may force the spirit to manifest himself in order to be defeated by the group.

http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/books/M...icalgrappling/

But beware! The spirit can attack you with his own version of "technical grapple" and he can "inmovilize" your will and control hour mind or he can trade control points for damage or even corruption points!

Friends can aid to the "grapple" making a circle or defending the exorcist from the hordes of enemies.

Maybe the grapple is both phisical and spiritual. As soon as the exorcist begin to chant the spirit appear but it is so powerful that only a combination of "grappling" and sheer force of the party can defeat him