I almost hit Post in the FOTF thread but I decided that the question was actually a suggestion, so I've put it here unedited:
The Dec 7th 2018 devlog speaks of a human town's demographic changing to 25% dwarven within 50 years and the dwarven minority influencing worship. Within this, for plot-hooks, are you planning to add the possibility of push-back by traditionalists against real or perceived changes?Currently there seems to be one reason to deface a temple. It's because you want to be "punished" with vampirism. But that's for players who don't mind the in-character consequences, not something npcs do (although it shouldn't be beyond the scope of a small proportion of npcs to do it for that reason). If there are entities worried about the influence or even superiority of their religion there's now another reason that someone would deface (or order/manipulate someone else into defacing) a temple despite the currently guaranteed holy retribution.
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I said unedited, so here are extra thoughts since.
Building on that, if it is possible for someone to have another do their dirty work, it should be possible for gods to have the option of punishing the "mastermind" behind the defacement with the curse instead of, or in addition to, the pawn. The god can be said to know the workings and leader of the plot by way of holy divination.
A human town has a nominal chief but the real power is a rich and powerful merchant. To the lay-people he is a respectable citizen whose achievements were earned fairly, but the ruling elite and the criminal underbelly know that he is simply the brutal winner of long and bloody machinations since villainous plots were implemented. Recently dwarves have started moving in and have brought with them their pantheon, one of whom is a god of charity, justice and volcanoes (because). The dwarven pantheon starts to gain a little influence among the general populace and that doesn't bother the merchant-king at all. But when the dwarven justice god's missionaries begin to convert some of the street thugs and criminals he begins to wonder where it might all end. So he orders one of his lackeys to have that gods temple burnt down statue pushed over, and that guy passes the order down the chain of command until eventually a poor beggar is tasked with the arson vandalism. He tries to demur, because he knows that all gods are real in DF and all gods immediately curse in DF and he doesn't want to be a vampire adventurer. He's told he has to do it or his wife and kids will be killed. He reluctantly agrees while mournfully wondering what blood will taste like in his future. That night a full-moon shines over the town as the beggar sneaks into the temple. He takes a deep breath, steels himself, then pushes the statue over and closes his eyes. Long moments pass as he waits nervously but nothing happens. He eventually opens one eye and checks his arms. Hairy, but no more than they were. He considers what he would like to eat when he gets home, and when he imagines gruel instead of a pulsing artery he decides he's not a vampire either. How peculiar. Maybe he hadn't toppled the statue in a heretical enough manner.
Meanwhile, on the rich side of town, a stentorian roar erupts as the merchant king interrupts a poetry recital by suddenly transforming into a weremammoth and proceeding to kill the attendants by order of their fleetness. Because this was a dwarven god of Justice, she concluded that it would be unfair to punish the beggar, and instead cursed the one truly responsible. The god's sense of justice did not extend to considering the fate of the were-creatures victims, of course. Downstream ramifications are not a deities concern when it comes to retribution. Most of the gathering is slaughtered, decimating the towns ruling class and setting back poetry as an artform, before the merchant-king-weremammoth stomps off into the wilderness, not yet cognizant enough to mull over what might have gone wrong.
Meanwhile, all the townspeople know is that a respectable citizen suddenly turned into a murderous beast despite there not even being a statue in the room, let alone one that had been knocked over. Soon it's heard that the local dwarf priest is asking for help to lift up the granite statue that's fallen over in his temple. The townsfolk put two and two together and reach a not fully-informed version of four. They decide that the god arbitrarily cursed one of their most distinguished citizens, and because the criminals who know the truth prefer it not get out, and because gods aren't yet good at or inclined to explain their mysterious ways, the gods priests struggle to refute the accusations. So the human populace rises up against the dwarves and eventually drives them out in bloody enough fashion that it sets off a war with the nearby mountain home.
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Topic: Religion demographic change as motive for temple defacement (Read 578 times)