Sorry to take so long answering all these threads, but work has kept me busy and I don't yet have internet at home. In fact, I'm supposed to be doing that right now, but here I am. One Essence each for Fleurity and Vapula.
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Originally Posted by ISNorden
That's exactly why I changed the rules for Theurgists/pagan Sorcerers and Interventions. To give Hell that much power over them (especially with friendly angels or Ethereals running interference) makes little sense: in the right mortal hands, "magic" can be wielded to thwart the aims of Hell, so demons shouldn't want to improve the results of an outsider's ritual.
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It can be used for good, but IMHO it's still "My world, my rules." In my game the non-damned are so rare that younger, greener Malakim will kill one on sight, or at most get a friendly Sword-Seraph to make sure before whacking the poor unfortunate. Hell (forgive the pun), most angels will kill them or at least hound them out of town on the slightest excuse.
I also feel/play that a sorcerer who is not Hellsworn is still going to be very high maintenance for those friendly angels or Ethereals. The philosophy behind it is so selfish...so I can see wanting to build a Divine counterpart. Outside of priestly exorcists, though, I don't see how it would work. Kudos to your superior imagination then.
In a darker, lower contrast game the angels might decide that keeping a sorcerer on the straight-and-narrow isn't cost effective, and whack him as a precaution.
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Originally Posted by Omegonthesane
Ultimately, "whatever floats your boat" needs to be said depressingly often in this sort of argument, but I feel you are reducing the number and quality of games that can be run in your setting if you turn every case of Sorcery into an actual alignment flag rather than a mere strong correlation.
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An extremely strong correlation.
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Originally Posted by Omegonthesane
I frankly feel it deeply damages the themes and intent of In Nomine if you have any way of selecting an afterlife destination other than "achieve Destiny" or "meet Fate". That being said before my group got the supplements clarifying that Hellsworn are damned because physics, we just kind of assumed Hellsworn were damned because "knowingly and willingly offering yourself to Hell in full knowledge of its agenda" was enough to make you count as Fated.
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If that's doing it with Infernal Pact, fair enough, but being able to put the "your soul goes to Hell" wording into the fine print of Symphonic Awakening explicitly does not work, and should not work. In Nomine's entire "prove humans are/n't worthy of saving" conflict fails if there is any, any way to get into Hell where the blame does not rest squarely on the damned soul's shoulders. No matter how obscure.
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That's where my real life gets in the way. Looking at the RL analog to an Oathtaking (and I suspect I'm not the only one here with this experience), I can very easily see an infernal oath slipped into the fine print. Let's say that during your ritual you're supposed to chant certain things, including promises to honor and serve a long litany of names. Now you've been told numerous times during your training that you don't ever promise something to a being you don't know, and you don't ever recite words you don't understand. Big Bozo no-no, yet here you are...in the middle of the ceremony, bonfire blazing, all your brother superiors around you with their ceremonial weapons, and you get handed a text that includes 20 names, only fifteen of which you remember reading about. Are you going to admit, in that place, that you didn't do your homework? Probably not. You're going to read the names, make the promises under peer pressure, and trust your (damned, all of them) brothers not to slip a Mickey into that list.
See how easy that was? The initiate is not an innocent--he knows not to say those words, but he folds under very considerable pressure. The blame falls squarely on his shoulders for trusting those idiots and putting himself in that position.
YMMV
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Originally Posted by Jason
Along similar lines, I have been considering approaching sorcery less as another way of manipulating reality directly (which is what we have Songs for) and more as theurgy/goetia -- that is, invoking otherworldly forces to exert your will, rather than exerting some inner power. ...Like sorcery rules as written, though, it still requires a great deal of Will (or Perception, for theurgists..?), but I might waive the Sorcery attunement requirement in exchange for some recognition of increased risk: Anytime you invoke otherworldly powers, there's a chance you might catch some superior being on a bad day, and suffer negative effects in addition to what you asked for. (Ever read that Hellboy comic in which a magician asks for a favor from a demon, not realizing he's lost his protective symbol? Shortly after being safely sealed behind a wall, he's turned into an animal... As another demon had warned him, "His favors come at too high a price.")
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Curiously enough, when I wrote my B.A. Philosophy paper, this is exactly where I drew the line between magic and prayer. One demands the universe do what you tell it, the other asks a greater being to bend the rules on your behalf. And yeah, very risky. I would treat it basically as a Rite in game mechanics, except you're calling something other than an AA/DP.