Order of Eleazar? Cult of Light?

[mistshadow2k4]

Reading over my books again for books, stories, etc. for the list of art and literature in RL. Any ideas on what to do with these two faiths? Especially with the former, what domain do you think I should put that in? I guess the latter, from the sound of the NPCs who were members, could be a secrety society, but RL has too many secret societies already, I think.

[Rotipher of the FoS]

Think I'm getting senile; please, refresh my memory. Where did you find references to these faiths?

[mistshadow2k4]

"To Inherit Eternity" in Dark Tales & Disturbing Legends. Father Daniel Franklin is a cleric of the Order of Eleazar, and two other NPCs in the adventure are members of the Cult of Light. Absolutely no other info is given about either religion (if the latter is a religion -- it's a bit vague there). The adventure is supposed to take place somewhere in RL of the DM's choosing, so where are these three people following faiths supposed to come from? It doesn't say.

Also, one of the most important NPCs in the adventure has a distinctly Spanish name, Senor Ramirez. Now, I use Ricoba instead of Richemulot, but that's non-canon, so I wonder where Ramirez was supposed to have come from as well. Simply put, they say to place it in RL wherever you lke, but culturally it doesn't seem like it really belongs there at all.

[Jasper]

To Inherit Eternity is kind of a oddity in that book. Its a good adventure but other then a few references to Ezra and a few location names being droped the entire adventure has no real ties to any location in Ravenloft.

Just about everything in the adventure can be either concidered non-cannon or happening in a mist obblette(sp?) style area that only lightly touches ravenloft with the vast majority happening in some unkown prime material world.

[mistshadow2k4]

Yeah, I think you're definitely right, Jasper. It doesn't really fit in RL unless you change a few things, such as having the cleric be a cleric of Ezra instead. It's more of a RL-style adventure for a generic fantasy world. I was basically wondering if this stuff had been discussed and what the general consensus of what to do with it all might have been.

I'm not sure if I want to make a place for the Order of Eleazar or the Cult of Light in my RL or at this point. Neither really fits very well. Daniel Franklin is an English name, so far as I know; Mordent already has the Ezran faith, Zherisia has the Divinity of Mankind, and Tepest has Belenus, so the Order doesn't really fit anywhere with the possible exception of Locknar Cove (Book of Sacrifices). And the Cult of Light sounds too much like any other good secret society or good-based religion, so it doesn't really spark my interest.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

When the book first came out, someone proposed that the Order of Eleazer be a sect or society within the Church of Ezra, much like the Jesuits within the Catholic Church in the real world. Works for me... The Cult of Light? Who knows? replace it with the religion of your choice, or drop it anywhere as a small cult.

[DeepShadow of FoS]

Perhaps "Eleazar" is the male heretical form of Ezra, hinted at in some of the Books.

[mistshadow2k4]

That makes sense, especially as both Ezra and Eleazar are Biblical names as far as I know. I don't have my Ezran sects divided by alignments (smacks too much of game mechanics for me) so another order like the Eleazarites, who seek to preserve knowledge, could easily be fitted in there. Perhaps I could even have it that Eleazar was one of Ezra's early clerics, so they would be followers of Ezra with Eleazar being an honorary figure, as they're following his path to serve Ezra. So that just leaves the question of which domain they should be based in.