Releasing the captive could be even more beneficial to our following. We have the strength to bring a warring tribe to the brink (we'll just piggyback on events for now), but also the strength to let them live.

Refuse the sacrifice. Our benevolence will even more greatly solidify ourselves as an individual worth worshiping.

>>860112
I mean, if you accept their sacrifice, the next thing you know, they’ll be trying to sacrifice themselves, which would consist of their criminals (including the ones that did minor crimes that shouldn’t be worthy of the death penalty), their elderly that willingly offer their lives because they know they’re about to die of old age and want their final act on this world to please you, start sacrificing their virgins to you (which is honestly kinda weird), etc.

Accepting living sacrifices is the first step towards becoming an evil cult god and having some “heroes” come and kill the entire cult to get rid of their “evil”, which would leave you with no followers and you’d be right back where you started.

So, I say you should be a Benevolent God. Try completely turning off your divine flame when they attempt to sacrifice that guy.

You could probably somehow announce that they only wanted help to defeat their enemies and that’s what they got. It might be easier to say this to your prophet, Jissut, as she is currently the one you’ve got a connection with.

>>860127
Perhaps showing mercy to their enemy will let you convert them? Because if I was that guy and my enemy’s god refused to take me as a sacrifice, then I would definitely get on my knees and worship that god.

Benevolent

How many famous gods do you know that accept living sacrifices?

How many do you know that openly reject such things?

Remember, the Cool Kids Club actively attacks other gods that do things they don't like.

What? Benevolent or Dark is actually imposed? Are we sure about this? I never did trust that Fount...

I feel as though the living sacrifices boat has sort of sailed. You say that you are not used to that business, but you do remember why we are here with you? And why you didn't have any followers? And how you escaped your own mortality? But that was your old religion, this is an opportunity to change!

If your really are forced to take a side, then think about the differences. Both sides are prone to back-stabbing, either over doctrinal differences or power plays regardless of how benevolent or pragmatic they claim to be. Both tend to have some priesthood that claims all the power for themselves. Dark is prone to preaching empowerment of the mighty while Benny tends to preach austerity in living and generosity to the cause...

Ugh, I say benevolent because it'll be easier to inspire public works and healthy living conditions for a larger population.

But even better than that, just be yourself and ignore all this benny versus dark stuff. Tell your followers to wait a tick. Read the sacrifice's heart and see if you like them or not and if they are likely to be a problem. You can be one of those purifying flames gods that judges and punishes. But in your case you really will judge, rather than just using it as an excuse to kill political rivals and minorities. Maybe you can develop some sort of purifying flame that only burns people who use naughty words...

>>860117
I’m all for the Neutral route of leaving the guy’s fate up to a test of repentance and courage. Not sure how to convey this, though. Are we powerful enough to talk directly to our prophet? If we can, make it clear that they can sacrifice his corpse if he fails. And maybe request somehow that more naps near the altar will be appreciated.

Only accept willing sacrifices. All the followers that helped you ascend did so willingly, and you sacrificed your living form willingly. Be benevolent, but if someone wants to sacrifice themselves then they may do so.

Its not like you are going to gain a lot of followers by sparing the last survivors of them, I say we burn him, and use the god-fuel to convince other tribes, give the prophet some lame fire powers to go all miracles on them. We should be peaceful with people that are peaceful to us, having a living sacrifice from time to time from an hostile tribe is not going to make as Vecna-like evil, and if later we prefer to became fuul good, we can always go New Testament later.

but don't go full evil, never go full evil.

>>860164
Ooh, I like this. Willing sacrifices only.

Willing Sacrifices only
Thank them for the blessing but point out that you know you don't want non-willing sacrifices

it just upsets the other gods and you are a dragon god damn it! You have standards

Sure I'll hop on the "willing sacrifices only" bandwagon. That's FAR closer to your original ritual anyway!

We already saw the problem inherent in willing sacrifices once. Suicide cults are a literal dead-end...

>>860214
It works in Amonkhet, it could work here too.

No willing sacrifices! That’s what happened last time and we had no power! And we don’t need everyone throwing themselves into the fire because we’ll have no worshippers again!

>>860226
Last time it was a large quantity of sacrifices in order to attain divinity. That's understandably a lot more difficult than simply gaining power as a god.

Speak to your prophet.
"I ask not of your prisoners but your wicked, your evil and irredeemable. Leave this one bound to my altar. I will decide his fate."

Okay first what was that about burning down the village? Did we do that? Font explain.

And secondly though I what us to be a benevolent god this dude just lost his whole tribe and village, everyone he cared for, dead. Not only will he hold a grudge but it would be cruel to force him to worship us.
We will take the sacrifice this one time and this one time only!

>>860368
I think that was a random fire in the middle of the conflict, that our followers took as a divine act

>>860165
I vote this. Even if we spare the guy, he won't eagerly forgive our followers for burning his village and everyone on it.

Benevolence.

Followers are a precious commodity, which makes sacrifices an even more precious commodity. Let the prisoner be the first to be 'saved' by your flames, and teach them that to be called to your fire is the greatest blessing. They have to be sure it's you, though: maybe you can project some symbol, a seal of approval so they know it's time. Something hard for mortals to mistake, like a will-o-wisp in your shape.
tl;dr angle towards (mostly) voluntary sacrifices, but only when you give the go-ahead.

Offer the prisoner the opportunity to become your acolyte and serve your prophet. If he refuses or hesitates, burn him.

>>860272
This.

>>860737
If we can do it then I choose this.

>>860272

Ignore my earlier opinion, this is clearly better. Do it if you can.

>>860272
I'd vote this as well, and if he were spared, it may be better in the long run than a sacrifice

Yeah, I'd say if possible, leave him chained here for a night or two and let's read his heart. Depending on what we see, we BURN him or SPARE him.

Sound good to everyone else?

>>866311
We set him ablaze either way. Whether he ends up as ash or as a born-again believer will be what’s up to him.

Not sure what this counts as, but I like to think it’s on the good-er side of things.

>>860272
I like it, not Dark but RIGHTEOUS fury.

I still prefer the "willing sacrifices only" schtick, it fits well with our godly origin.

Benevolent fits how we became a god: we should aim for willing sacrifices. It's "on-brand."

We all willingly sacrificed ourselves, all of us, that's the problem. The "Brand" is failure, a self-inflicted coma because nobody thought "if sacrificing yourself is such a good idea, why not let everyone do it!"... We already saw how willing sacrifices went and it was not good. We want people willing to sacrifice themselves who choose to put that devotion into more persistent endeavours.

If our god can hook up some sort of mind probe. Get a well-done snack from the people who are a problem, and just mildly warm the people who are useful to keep around, then suddenly they have a way to be relevant to people's lives and get a bunch of sacrifices that weren't going to be helpful to anyone anyway.

For now, do it manually. Perform the deepest scan of their mind that you can, make some sort of show of your power, like a burst of flame from the pyre, then see if they are in any way willing to respect you as a god(devotion not necessary, but if they plan to run off to their own gods and plot an attack or something...) and have a basic willingness to live in peace with your people, then have your flames burn without heat...

Ixnay on the burninate. We need the power sure, but the long term profits are slim.
Live sacrifices are fine, sure, but if a follower willingly giving up something close to them already provides a fair bit of power, how much better still is a follower willingly sacrificing themselves?

And you know what kind of people are most disposed towards doing so? People seeking redemption! Something to make their existence have had meaning. That means the down trodden, the oppressed and criminals and what have you.

Give this guy a chance to convert to beleiving in you if he wants to live. If you get this chump to do so, you set a precedent.
More people will be willing to turn to you in their darkest hour.

More people who feel like they owe you everything, even their very will to keep living. Not only are they fanatically faithful, but endlessly useful. We can worry about sacrifices later, for now we want a strong foundation. Play the slow game, the long con, and you can't go wrong.

Sacrifices with a twist: every sacrificee gets to declare one person off-limits to the sacrifice, forever. That way you retain at least 50% of your worship base.

Extinguish the flame as a way to deny their sacrifice.

>>970624
Holy necro, batman!

??? Kaed 2020/09/19(Sat)16:19 No. 976745 ID: 147147
File 160055756415.gif - (969.24KB , 748x782 , Rejected.gif )

>>860118
>>869351
>>860724
>>860128

It seemed like the best course of action was to refuse the sacrificial Longclaw survivor - at least for now. Perhaps at a later date I could request willing sacrifices, and perhaps try to convert this prisoner and future others to devotion of me under threat of firey doom.

But that also left me with the problem of communicating my wishes to my followers. As had already become clear, I was limited thus far to to reliable forms of communication - crude manifestations of fire and speaking to my prophet via dreams. I could not simply manifest some chains to indicate I wished the Longclaw restrained at my temple, nor could I think of a way to simply speak to them in out loud in regards to my wishes.

As such, I worked with what I had. The Fount had explained to me that all divine entities could alter their perception of time, and now that I knew about this, I could consciously utilize it with little effort. As they kicked the prisoner onto the flames, chanting praise, sped up my perception of time until the scene seemed to grind to a half, time all but stopped. Then I stretched out my influence and snuffed out the fire I had created.

As I brought my temporal perception back to 'normal' time, the Longclaw hit the ground in the flame basin, only to fine the flame underneath him had dissipated, leaving only a swirl of flame that swirled upwards and burst into sparks. This flair seemed to me to be sufficient to get my point across that the flame going out had been intentional.

But my followers became confused.

"The flames have gone out..."
"Have we displeased the fire spirit?"
"Why has it rejected us?"
"Perhaps... the sacrifice was too small?"
"The fire spirit must want more! Perhaps one of us?!"
"Yes! Speak to us, fire spirit, which of our bodies do you desire on the pyre?"
"Uhm... I'm not sure I want to jump in a fire?"
"Do you prefer the flame spirit curses us all for displeasing it?!"

Bother. At least they are eager, but perhaps a little too much. I needed to communicate the lack of desire for immediate sacrifice before they all killing themselves or each other in a grim parody of my old followers. The longclaw began to look around, surprised he was not dead yet, and going on the previous idea of restraining him, I cast a ring of flames around the sacrificial basin, blocking anything from entering or leaving. I made sure that it was far enough away from the prisoner to not burn them, but made it has hot as I could otherwise to make it clear no one was allowed to pass. With five enthusiastic followers, conjuring the flames was slightly easier, but still a bit of a strain, and I did not think I could hold it up and this hot for more than a few seconds.

But it got the point across, and even as the flames cooled down from searing to merely hot, my followers backed off, shouting in alarm.

"I don't understand! Why is it angry?"
"Does it not want our offering?"
"Perhaps.. it wants all of us to leap into the flames?"
"Maybe.. I believe it is trying to communicate it's displeasure somehow with with the sacrifice somehow."
"Is it protecting the Longclaw? Have we lost its favor?"
"Uh, I vote that it doesn't want any of us to jump in!"
"This isn't a vote, fool! We must find out what we have done wrong and make amends!"
"H-hey, just throwing this out there, maybe your flame spirit doesn't want to eat me and you should let me go?"
"Silence, prisoner! You have no say in the decisions of the mighty flame spirit!"

The display was just making them more confused, along with the Longclaw himself. I struggled to think of a way to convey my wishes with simple flame manifestations. I did not think I had quite the fine control to actually make flaming letters appear in the air, since just the circle was requiring a lot of focus to maintain, but there had to be something I could do...

>>976745
Uh. Okay.
How about you put some kind of indicator that the one saying nobody jumps in is the one that's correct. Like just point your flames at them.

>>976745
You know what? You should ask the Fount for advice on how to communicate with your followers. Make sure you speed up your perception of time again, so that you can have your conversation without worrying about your followers doing something before you make your decision.

>>976755
That might work. But it also might make everyone think we’re wanting that guy thrown in.

Of course, if they do try throwing that one in, we can always turn the flames off again. They might figure out what we’re saying if we do that again.

A flame that is not hot but gentle and warm may put the point across that you seek no harm to come from a sacrifice. Maybe have a wisp appear in front and circle around the one that said that we don’t want them to jump in.
To communicate you could go Up and down to say yes and side to side to say no with the wisp.

>>976755
>>976758
Maybe make a small spark or flicker of flame sprout above the heads of the prisoner and the one saying nobody jumps in for a brief second?

They are in disarray. Try to convey your resentment at their half-baked dedication; you will not accept a sacrifice until they ALL agree to the sacrifice.

The only choice is to wait until nighttime to speak to your prophet. In the meantime to ensure they don't resort to sacrificing the schmuck themselves, you'll need to make clear that he's in your hands, probably circling him with a fire barrier or something.

>>976864
>circling him with a fire barrier or something.
He just now did that already.

>>976830
Nope.

I propose creating a soft, warm non-consuming flame (which hopefully won't take too much energy), and using it to mark your five followers, starting with your prophet. Then after they've noticed, mark the sacrifice with it as well. HOPEFULLY the flame will come off as a sign of those who believe in you, and convey that we seek to convert the sacrifice, not kill him.

>>977002
smart symbolic enough and its nice ot have some new followers if we will get anywhere

>>977002
Now this is a suggestion. The prophet should get the more ornate or larger flame. The followers get a step down. Then make a show of the longclaw getting some cinders or a smaller ember.

What about making a heart-shaped flame?

I'm in full support of the heart shaped flame.