Gnome Priests

Coppersocket wrote:Troll druids aren't druids in the same aspect a Elf druid is a druid either. Troll Druids are Trolls that take the aspect of the Loa.

WRONG. They are druids, and this pisses off the Loa.

You're right, in a sense, and this thread has little to no practical implications -- but still.

Religion is the butt of a cosmic joke forced upon this particular world by game mechanics and sneaky developers.

In that sense I find it a little offensive. The fact that, when all the consequences have been thought out untill the extremes, we get the consequence Melnerag so aptly pointed out. It makes me feel a little deflated and bummed out. Nothing heart-breaking, but still a little disheartening.

Dréfurion wrote:

Coppersocket wrote:Troll druids aren't druids in the same aspect a Elf druid is a druid either. Troll Druids are Trolls that take the aspect of the Loa.

WRONG. They are druids, and this pisses off the Loa.

Huh. That I didn't actually know. Well, the more you know. (Guess I should've payed more attention during the retaking of Echo Isles)

Paozi/Thelos wrote:You're right, in a sense, and this thread has little to no practical implications -- but still.

Religion is the butt of a cosmic joke forced upon this particular world by game mechanics and sneaky developers.

In that sense I find it a little offensive. The fact that, when all the consequences have been thought out untill the extremes, we get the consequence Melnerag so aptly pointed out. It makes me feel a little deflated and bummed out. Nothing heart-breaking, but still a little disheartening.

I think the problem is the creators are likely to not be very religious themselves, they are simply not fit to deal with the mysticism of a religion. The best thing they can do is remain vague, I geuss, but they might've already said too much.

Coppersocket wrote:

Dréfurion wrote:

Coppersocket wrote:
Troll druids aren't druids in the same aspect a Elf druid is a druid either. Troll Druids are Trolls that take the aspect of the Loa.

WRONG. They are druids, and this pisses off the Loa.

Huh. That I didn't actually know. Well, the more you know. (Guess I should've payed more attention during the retaking of Echo Isles)

In the first few levels of a Troll druid it's explained. I forget the Loa's name but one of them makes them embrace all of da nature, rather than binding themselves to just one of da Loa.

Paozi/Thelos wrote:I am tempted to discredit forum posts and off-hand twitter comments made by Blizzard employees completely. Taking them to be the word of God and trying to divine consistency and Law in them is the road to madness. I doubt whether they've gone trough the same amount of scrutiny as we treat them with now.

Maybe I'm just not smart enough to see something logical that you all clearly percieve on how Gnomish priests are being portrayed, but to me, it's nonsensical and bordering on offensive.

I'm just not seeing it. Priests without religion, no matter how you spin it, is just a conceptual impossibility. Maybe I should start thinking of Gnomish Priests in seculair terms and just refute that they use the Light at all. That would safe me a lot of anguish.

Gnomes researching the cosmos and then casting Light spells and treating it as nothing but "Healing Magic" to me is like Goblins leveling entire forests to produce explosions and calling it druidism.

"What? It's nature magic, isn't it? It comes from nature."

Blizzard wrote:So hang on, the Holdout Medics, gnome priests in Gnomeregan who were there before you started playing the game even... they make no sense lore wise? :-) The North Fleet Medics... also gnome priests... happily healing away in Howling Fjord... they make no sense lore wise? Let's see how playable gnome priests are introduced to us in the game, but let's not pretend they've been stuck in as some kind of afterthought.

"They were already in the game, therefore, are fine lorewise".

Screw you, Blizzard. Just...

Screw you.

I'm unhappy now.

Thelos, I bolded where you're stuck.
The Light, and the powers it gives you, isn't a problem of Religion, but of Faith. The picture you get from Blizzard all the time is that the faith is that matters.
The reason why you only find t among priests and paladins is because those are one, the most faithful among society. And two, the only groups that BELIEVE that they'll have said powers. They don't know it. Rather, they know that it might fail them at ANY time, so they believe and hope their godlike entety won't abandon them.
They do the sacraments etc to make their faith firmer, not so much for the Light itself, but for their faith in the light. (Even if they think they do it for the light itself).

I would also say Melnerag has a very good thing on the limit between the pious and the people wanting power and figure out the secret behind it. Once they know the secret, it's not faith. Telling the secret to someone actually pious would make them scoff at you at best, accuse you of herecy at worst.

So, you're to stuck in the religion part of the Holy Light, so you're forgeting the pure Faith aspects. They are far from the same things.
Thus how you can be a divine practisioner without doing any of the rituals. Or you can be a Clergyman without any of the divine powers. One trusts and has faith enough, one's just a jobb for a slighly pious man.

Dréfurion wrote:
I think the problem is the creators are likely to not be very religious themselves, they are simply not fit to deal with the mysticism of a religion. The best thing they can do is remain vague, I geuss, but they might've already said too much.

Thank you, Dréfurion, I think you've managed to quite aptly point out the gist of my problem, more accurately than I ever could have done by myself.

It raises an interesting question though about whether not very religious people can accurately portray religious characters, but perhaps that's a sensetive that's best left unasked, because it could lead to some sensetive arguments.

A lot of these intricate problems and investigations of the minutiae of the game world are the floating left over bits of trying to fit actual logic, or reason, or sense to a story (as in the whole of the lore, macro and micro) written by many different people which itself is based on a number of mechanics (some of them 10+ years old) which either cannot evolve or change much slower and in a limited way.

Plus the game has to balance for other reasons, PVP/PVE etc, and just for "fun" and even... *gasp* as a business that works...

Some of these unfortunately don't always work together that well. Like introducing new class/race combos (the only "real" reason for many of those was balance as a game, not for lore reasons, if we're honest... there are more pressing/easier/larger lore "fixes and changes" really).

However, just do what I do when deflated by Gnomish annoyances...

Find one and kill it. Always helps.

And, maybe we are Grim, maybe we are. I've never actually seen you in the same room as myself. So I think that's pretty conclusive proof right there...



Edit:

Paozi/Thelos wrote:
It raises an interesting question though about whether not very religious people can accurately portray religious characters, but perhaps that's a sensetive that's best left unasked, because it could lead to some sensetive arguments.

This is interesting. I was raised Roman Catholic (I'd say lapsed, but you can never lapse a Catholic... Dave Allen joke, probably not easy to explain...). And I do think my views on religion and belief (that's important to see as two things, in WOW like in life) influence my ideas in game. Of course they do, like my views on many, many things!

But can people accurately portray without "belief"? Yes, they can. Because they portray with imagination. And the latter always wins out, when it comes to story telling. Even though the former might form or influence, the latter moulds and gives life to it...

And that makes no sense... and is drivel. But hey ho!

And, maybe we are Grim, maybe we are. I've never actually seen you in the same room as myself. So I think that's pretty conclusive proof right there...

The plot thickens...

And I hate getting the last post of a page, I always feel as it get lost in the flow.

To respond to you in brief, Muzjhath, I am not blind to the distinction between Faith and Religion; on the contrary, I am very conscious of it, and the implications for WoW, too. However, we are here talking about priests and priesthoods in particular which is most often defined in terms of Religion, not in terms of Faith. Faith is not what seperates Priests from his flock, after all, but rather his expertise in matters Religious and the powers bestowed upon him by the Sacred.

Anyone who understands why a person might believe/be a part of a religion could accurately portray one I'd imagine. I am a hopeful atheist, raised in a Catholic school where I had to endure countless masses so I could easily draw from that and my understanding of priests IRL into a character.

Well, my point was that you personally put to much down on the religion aspects of it.
Wheras the Light as an entety most likely don't care. It just notices that "wham, these people they really believe and trust in me. I help them!" If it's even that coherent.

If said people are priests or not I've got no idea of.
I see neither Priests or Paladins as special due to any religious wordings or names. I see them special because they simply have more faith than the general congregation member.
For me, had your arguments been true, then the abilities of a priest or paladin would be something gained through training and study. You needed to learn how it works to use it, etc.
But it doesn't. Yes I'm quite sure you need to master it. But it's not something you study to get, you just realise one day you have it. Maybe it's in a priests case even before they take that path, and it in turn make's them take it.
Then after that you need to figure out how to master it so you can use it in a viable fashion.

So I'd say you see a step I don't. You see Faith -> Leads to certain lifestyle -> Divine Powers.
I look at it Faith -> Trust -> Divine Powers.

A thing I want to smuggle in here is the Alliance Pandaren SW Intro.

A Draenei vindicator remarks that Aysa is strong with the Light, while she simply has mastered her Chi.

Discipline is not a war that is won. It is a battle, constantly fought." - Master Feng
The way of the Tushui is one of a principled life. Followers of this discipline believe there is a moral certainty to the world: one correct path of right and wrong. These Values are immutable, and must be preserved no matter what the cost. Even if it means self sacrifice, or painful losses in the pursuit of a higher ideal.

That is the Tushui philosofy to which Aysa Cloudsinger adheres.

So we are left with two interessting possibilities:

Chi (inner life energy) that is harnessed through mental discipline and meditative focus is close, but not the same, as the Light.

Strong belief in a moral world is close, but not the same, as belief in the Holy Light.

Now look at those together. Aysa Cloudsinger believes in a moral world with Good and Evil, where wisdom is used to differentiate between the two and one decides on right and moral action to do Good and avert Evil. That is, in a nutshell, what Lighties are portrayed as.

So perhaps 'Faith in the Light' is specifically 'Faith in a mystical, magical power which abstractly represents the moral Good and is opposed to moral Evil'?

Once I have some time to formulate a better post Thelos, let me attempt to show you "The Light", or atleast another point of view between:

Faith - Religion

Priesthood and Divine-casters.

Muzjhath wrote:

So I'd say you see a step I don't. You see Faith -> Leads to certain lifestyle -> Divine Powers.
I look at it Faith -> Trust -> Divine Powers.

Not really my point.

My point is more that, in order to be a priest, you need to be a priest. Every idiot can be blessed by divine powers. In many religions, children and idiots are especially loved and blessed. But in order to be a priest you need at least some training in sacramental rites.

The relationship between priesthood and the ability in the divine has, in this thread, been thoroughly devestated. Priesthood and religion has been reduced to a superfluous psychological "tool" to gain more "Faith" so you can be a better Light-caster. It's something I object to both morally and asethetically, but I can't argue with the facts.

I can, however, use my own interpetation of how things ought to be in how I role-play my characters, which is exactly what I'll do. The complete cosmological picture isn't really as impotant as how our characters think and feel about things, after all. We role-play characters, not worlds.

Thank you for the discussion in this thread, everyone! It's been very enlightening. Please keep it up. I do love seeing different views on this complicated matter.

Thelos, for me it's not a tool to get more powers.
I see it as a thing of culture. "Only the priesthood has these powers. Thus I can't".
So people outside of said organization limit themselves subcounsiously. Yes, it's not a very good system, but come on, like the rest of WoW's world is.

Muzjhath wrote:Thelos, for me it's not a tool to get more powers.
I see it as a thing of culture. "Only the priesthood has these powers. Thus I can't".
So people outside of said organization limit themselves subcounsiously. Yes, it's not a very good system, but come on, like the rest of WoW's world is.

I don't think I understand what you are saying, but I think you are right -- however, I'd like to note that I prefer not to think of religious matters in psychological terms, such as "limiting themselves subconsciously" and would rather use proper theological terms like "losing or gaining favor", "salvation", "piety" etcetera.

That is basicly the gist of what I have been trying to say all along. I like role-playing religious characters in a religious fashion and I tend to resist any attempts to reduce it to psychological or physical (i.e magical) phenomena, accurate though they may factually be.

Thelos, I think what you're trying to do is see the Light/whatever as a power outside of the world of Azeroth (unlike Magic that is very much a part of it).
While I personally see the Light just as much of a part of it. It's not the same part, but it's there. It abides by rules in how it's used. You just can't study them per say, only abide by them.
At least, that's how I get it from your wording of things.

And personally I don't think the Light as an entity is aware enough of favour and things like that. It just feel's your belief and trust in it and desides to help because of that.

I see the difference between a member of a congregation and a leader of it as this:
A member has trust in the clergy. They know they'll hep them/get the light to help them. THe Clergy/User of Divine Member has trust in the Light.

Muzjhath wrote:Thelos, I think what you're trying to do is see the Light/whatever as a power outside of the world of Azeroth (unlike Magic that is very much a part of it).

That isn't what I am trying to say either; but my writing seems opaque and hard to decipher, so I'll try to boil my point down to a slogan:

We have the Light. How are we going to look at it? Psychologically and factually, or religiously? I prefer the latter over the former two, because I am interested in delving deep into spirituality and suprisingly WoW has given me an excellent platform to do exactly this. I find the religious mind and worldview to be imminently fascinating and one of the most underrated narrative and dramatic threads in modern fiction.

What I am not trying to do is to make any metaphysical statemetents of how the Light works or what it is. I'm not really interested in that. I am interested in spirituality in WoW and what it means to be a priest in Azeroth.

I'm sometimes suprised myself by this fascination I have. When reading the Brothers Kazmarov, for example, by far my favorite passages are those who deal with religion, and my favorite character and the one I identify with the most is Alyosha, the third brother.

Heh, that's where we differ. I see looking at it in a religious way as a spectrum of the psycological.

Grim wrote:I can't see troll priests wielding the Light lore-wise either. So instead I view it as something specifically trolly that has a similar effect to the Light.

We have a Loa for that. We have a Loa for everythig.

Paozi/Thelos wrote:

We have the Light. How are we going to look at it? Psychologically and factually, or religiously? I prefer the latter over the former two, because I am interested in delving deep into spirituality and suprisingly WoW has given me an excellent platform to do exactly this. I find the religious mind and worldview to be imminently fascinating and one of the most underrated narrative and dramatic threads in modern fiction.

What I am not trying to do is to make any metaphysical statemetents of how the Light works or what it is. I'm not really interested in that. I am interested in spirituality in WoW and what it means to be a priest in Azeroth.

I'm sometimes suprised myself by this fascination I have. When reading the Brothers Kazmarov, for example, by far my favorite passages are those who deal with religion, and my favorite character and the one I identify with the most is Alyosha, the third brother.

I would say this is a problem for any fantasy setting. While in the real world faith might be a willing belief or submission (not in a bad way) to a divine power that cannot be proven or falsified, in a fantasy setting this is often not the case. In WoW we deal with the factual presence of divine beings. Prayers tend to be answered with more than the 50% success rate of their real-world counterparts, for one. As such, a priest in a setting where a divine being is a very real thing is less concerned with faith as such (the belief in a higher power rather than the acknowledgement) and more with the ritualistic, factual aspect of it; Religion. Prayers, offerings and sacrifices become almost a bartering system and preaching to the flock becomes about teaching how to appease or praise this very real entity. In such a world the atheist is a madman or a very brave, if somewhat deluded, soul.

So in response to your question, I would say that there is no line between psychological and factual on one side, and religious on the other. They go hand in hand. Faith evolved to one step further. Rather than submitting to the idea that there's a divine entity in the first place, you put faith in assumption that a divine entity that is factually present will actually aid you in return for your prayer. And to ensure its aid, you perform religious rituals that have worked in the past for others. To me, that would be what being a priest in WoW would entail.

And yes, Paozi. You worry to much. Lighten up my friend.

(I refuse to apologize for that sad attempt at a joke. I regret nothing.)

Well, the problem is that the fact that a deity is real doesn't mean that one ought to worship it. All paladins are completely indifferent to Elune, the Loa, Elemental Spirits and Ancients.

In a fantasy world other things come into play, which probably existed IRL and still do outside of the Monotheistic churches.

Is this supernatural being divine?
Those who believe in ghosts see them as supernatural, but not divine. They do not inspire awe, they do not fascinate on deep spiritual level, they do not command alliegence through sheer awe/dread.

Is this divine being worthy of worship?
Is it worth your while to bother swearing alliegence to this power, or is it uncaring or impotent? The stories of christenization show it in a very striking way. Christian missionary converts the king/lord/people not by convincing them with a silver tongue, but by entering a supernatural contest with a local shaman/pagan priest and having God beat the local god, thus proving that God is the greatest.

Paozi/Thelos wrote:
I think you can already see where I am going with this. To me, these two, let's call one “Priesthood” to honor the Oxford Dictionary and the other “Divine Caster” to acknowledge the fantasy element, are inseparable from one another. In my mind, you can't be a divine caster without also being a priest. Whether you can be a priest without being a divine caster is a question I find more difficult to answer; my instinct is to say “no” and to proclaim priesthood to be the most important aspect of being a priest in the World of Warcraft, which to be frank sounds almost tautological.

My main argument for this is that, if you treat these two aspects of priesthood as distinct, there no longer is any relevant difference between Divine Casters and...casters. If you can be a Divine Caster without abiding to any sort of moral philosophy or religion it loses all aspects that make the priest unique from the mage. If you treat the Divine as just another school of magic, you might as well call yourself a mage with Divine magic as your specialization. This is, I feel, how most Gnome priests approach their priesthood. They, much like magi, see their blessing as a sort of craft they can apply to manipulate and change the world in certain ways. What, if not for spirituality, ethics and religion, is the difference between smiting someone with holy fire and incinerating someone with a fireball? Nothing except some superficial differences in appearance.

Right, I think the misgivings stems from the bolded part of your argument.

Since as you claim; there are a myriad of different forms of Worship and religion in wow, and yet, they all follow the same class. the Priest.
Even if we disregard Paladins, Sunwalkers, Blood Knights etc from the equasion, them being clearly Divine Casters but not Priests(meaning, where your game-mechanics argument: Spells doesn't work, as their abilities are based on Divine Judgement as opposed to hymns, and atonements and prayer.)

As i'm trying to keep this concise, the overal very dumbed-down point would be: *Tyler durden voice*: You are not your class.

firstly, you have to acknowledged that the social and cultural differences between the Priesthood of Elune and the Church of the Holy Light alone are myriad, they way they worship is different, the manner of their rituals, their traditions, their teaching methods, their dogmas. They are vastly different but at the end both are Divine Casters, and priests.

Since as you say:

the power of ordained rites and sacraments has a tangible, physical force:

Yet, the Ordained rites and sacraments are completely different

So the question would be: Why is that possible, if the power comes from the rites and sacraments, that different herigates, different cultures, different methods and approached all result in the same thing? The obvious answer is Faith.

Basicaly, the rite itself isn't the source of Divine Power - Faith in the rite is the source of the divine power - the purpose of the rite is the source of the divine power.

Religion, in this sense -- to put it rather blunty -- is all about fostering this faith and this purpose Through Rites, through sacraments and songs. It is a form of teaching a form of learning and eventually a form of living, with the priests having "graduated".

Which brings us to Gnomes: Personally, I'd agree with you, that seeking the light because it is a tool cannot but end up as a failure. Since the Light Requires Faith for a person to manifest it.

But, your argument that just because they have no organised religion, no organised rites etc in the church sense, they cannot be divine casters is flawed.
since as said before, Rites get their power through faith and through purpose. So they can be Anything: From rearranging your medical tools in a certain order, to clean them with a specific liquid, to making the first incision from the same direction. All those little things, can become rites, can become "sacraments" In the same way as Priest says a small prayer. Because at the end of the day, there is nothing -absolutely- nothing more Light Orientated than the want to help people, to heal them, to give them another chance.

So yes they won't priests with the community organiser roles, but they damn sure well can be priests in the sense of Divine Casters

I think we hit the jackpot.