Have you ever tried to make more of them? Or incorporated one philosophy from a non-D&D source?
Do you think the philosophies from Pathfinder could work - the Whispering Way, Diabolism, and the Green Faith is almost the same as the Old Faith of Oerth
@sciborg2 I really like the Fate Breakers! Tons of potential for use as an ally or adversary, depending on circumstances. I imagine they'd overlap quite a bit with the Athar?
@Cromlich In my old PS campaign I had a sect called the Steep Ascent which rejected the notion of eternal damnation and sought to redeem the fiends, starting with the baatezu. They would keep secret portals from between the lower planes and Mt. Celestia, serve as advocates for "wronged fiends", abduct fiends for re-education, engineer tests of character for tieflings and other fiendish half-breeds, and smuggle succubi (reneging on the terms of their contract with arch-fiends) to safety. Their leader was Examander, the astral deva of hope, and he was assisted/manipulated by the erinyes "social engineer" Arelesh Mitazzel.
Thanks! Ideally I'll have some actual powers made up for Fate Breakers someday.
Ari Marmell had a book out called Planar Factions - IIRC overall these were less philosophical, or at least less open than the sects and factions based around more abstract ideals.
You're right in Planar Factions book none of the organizations had a philosophy in the style of Sigil's factions. Except the guys that make mythical heroes out of people I was disappointed with that product.
I like the Architects of Infinity, I was once in a time travel campaign that had a similar theme. It involved the fey and immortal megaliths. Tough maybe a less impossible goal, that they study the concept of infinity - like the moigno are obsessed with pi. The Fate Breakers are also very interesting, I think prophecies are among the greatest cliches, they should be broken. They would be one of the main suspects for Aroden's disappearance.
Quickleaf, I like the idea, especially for tieflings and education prisons. Tough personally I'd have the number of redeemed fiends very small.
the sects that I've tried to use –
Fool's Guild: they believe life is a game, it's a ride, when you view any problem from that perspective it becomes a lot easier to solve.
Deviants: the philosophy is simply ''crime pays'', the society is corrupted enough anyway. For a thief's guild I wanted to make.
Charmers: who search for universal esthetics, that it isn't only in the eye of the beholder, that even fiends and celestials could agree on some things. Inspired by the Beatification League.
Jumblers – stupid name? – inspired by the Zactars – they believe Sigil's purpose is the creation of a perfect being or race – some think that it will be achieved through eugenics, various combinations of prime and extraplanar blood, others through transmutation magics, alchemy, hag rituals, or just belief.
Inspired by non-D&D sources -
Bravers – or bravos – who believe fear is the cause of what's wrong, the mindkiller, the seed of the lower planes, and that it must be faced. Better to fail than do nothing.
Empaths – again not sure about the name – inspired by the Sith from Star Wars, who find strength in emotions, not limited to evil, any emotion, any alignment.
Tekne Society – inspired by the Second Apocalypse novels – occult scientists, they imitate magic with technology, they think magic will be gone one day, they search for hidden power in the Spire.
Nameless Ones – from Malazan novels – order that serves the Azath construct race, they trap powerful creatures into the Azath houses. Like Carceri or the Wells of Darkness. Still needs work adapting.
@sciborg- I’d be interested in hearing more about the Fate Breakers. Warring against destiny is the kind of thing whole campaigns are made of. As for the Architects and Reversers, I’ve often thought about apocalyptic scenarios where those goals were brought about by accident, through experiments with artificial portal generation, the kind of thing that gets people lynched, mazed, or flayed.
@quickleaf- I like the Steep Ascent a lot, and personally I’d have the number of fiends ‘rehabilitated’ be surprisingly high-- although they’d always face the question of whether or not their repentance was sincere.
@cromlich- The Tekne Society sounds interesting, did you do anything more with that? I like the driving concepts of the Fool’s Guild, Charmers, and Empaths, too.
Here’s some that I’ve been using.
Former Faction*: The Manifold (The Many)- ‘There’s a purpose behind this existence, and the sooner we all knuckle down and stop fighting each other, the sooner we’ll find out what it is.’
All divisions are arbitrary and artificial, and should be ignored, or in the case of more extremist members, dissolved entirely. There is no meaning of life, but everything has a purpose-- in the deterministic sense, rather than the spiritual-- and a duty to utilize that purpose to the greatest benefit of others. The faction aspires to unite all people under its banner, but is hamstrung by its popularity with some races driving off their ‘natural’ enemies: devils and archons, elves and orcs, gith and gith.
* In my game, the Manifold was a prime populist movement that eventually spread to other worlds and Sigil, much like the Harmonium. They eventually overreached themselves (those experiments with portals I mentioned), and the Lady of Pain banned them from Sigil, flaying or mazing a great many of them beforehand.
Sect: The Quorum (Lawgivers)- ‘We are all as strong as the best of us, and the weakness of one is the weakness of all.’
Rulership is a burden which should be suffered by as few people as possible, but it is a necessary evil if one wants to achieve lasting order. Power comes with its rewards, but it only corrupts those who were corrupt already. Ideally, authority across the planes should be centralized in the hands of a small few, planar ‘patriots’ able to rein in local populations and ensure the status quo is not badly disrupted. Based on the Outlands, they have a vested interest in ensuring that all of the gate-towns stay where they are.
Sect: Arms Before the Deity (Unmakers)- A more militant version of the Athar, and sort of the opposite of the Planarists, though they were founded without knowledge of either. A prime-based army locked in a war with the archons and devas, they seek to oust the powers from their worlds. Heavily industrialized, and capable of manufacturing nonmagical weapons which can apparently destroy outsiders, especially angels, making the sect of particular interest to fiends.
Sect: Metro Circle- Neo-luddite urban druids dedicated to seeding new life in cities. Toasted in high society in some places, forced underground in others, members are as likely to be found tending lush gardens in places that welcome them, as they are to be wanted by local authorities for sabotaging factories and ambushing workers and guards. Full of wild-eyed idealists, the sect attracts a lot of young people, as well as disillusioned old factioneers looking for a stronger sense of belonging.
Sect: War Bringers - A barmy yet canny bunch, inspired by the endless Blood War to bring war to all corners of the Planes and eventually the entire multiverse. They typically work behind the scenes, influencing key individuals on either side of a conflict they wish to provoke. Individuals who join this sect are lovers of conflict, the manipulation of others and general misery. As such, this sect sports a number of fiends within its ranks as well as a fair number of celestials. This sect holds a friendly relationship with the Merkhants, who profit from the wars that erupt.
@cromlich- The Tekne Society sounds interesting, did you do anything more with that? I like the driving concepts of the Fool’s Guild, Charmers, and Empaths, too.
Not much, just a few notes
- your Arms Before Deity sect is not so different from them.
- they originate from an alternate prime-crystal sphere where gods damn to hell anyone who uses magic.
- they believe in the Clarke's law - any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic – in a way that all superstitions, magic, abstract concepts given form, and gods will one day vanish when the truth, basic Tekne principles, are discovered.
- they believe the Spire was built by the ''Old science'' - advanced technology built in way it does not malfunction near magic, or can be made to work together with magic.
- after they've discovered the Outside (the planes) some have fallen under loth influence, that means horrible bio-engineered monsters and diseases
- they have plans for a part of the Hive, to raise its technology level and use the cheap labor
-they've offered technological and bio grafts to the Mercykillers for their hard labor punishments
- for game mechanics it's best to use Blackmoor's Clock & Steam sourcebook, and The Fantastic Science: A Technologist Sourcebook.
- and found a lot of pictures for them
They could believe in that myth that war is good for the economy and technological advances.
The Unmakers are somewhat similar in method, if not ideology. What you're talking about with the Tekne Society is actually closer to how I ran the Many-- a very old faction, disbanded thousands of years ago, littering pieces of itself across the prime and the planes. They didn't build the Spire, but they studied it, as part of their research into weakening planar barriers, which they believed to be intrinsically magical-- magic being the power of belief made manifest, and what with the Spire nullifying magic, they theorized that the reason for Sigil's multitudes of portals had to do with its proximity to the Spire.
They were interested in using magic to create nonmagical machinery-- devices which would have been impossible to create without magic, yet required no magic to function, and could thus be used by anyone.
Part of the raison d'etre of the Many was to provide parallels to other factions, to appear to be a reasonable alternative for everyone. Like the Harmonium, they believe everyone should be a member of their faction, that there shouldn't even *be* any other factions, although unlike the Harmonium the Many's was a stance of moral relativism rather than absolute absolutes. The faction was also big on equality-- having power didn't make you intrinsically better than anyone else, just older, harder-working, or just luckier. You owed the world something for what you had. Naturally this idea didn't sit well with all of the powers, or most kings and rulers.
...
As for the Unmakers, technology itself is just a means to an end. While they don’t have a problem with either magic or science, they don’t believe in any inherent superiority to either. Their ‘crusade’ isn’t, and never was. They’re not seeking converts, and at least at first, they didn’t even hate the gods, per se. At first, they were simply a world that had stopped believing in gods, bit by bit, and the gods refused to let them go; they refused to die that slow death of the soul. The power fought for their survival, the people fought for their freedom, matters got heated... Hence the Unmakers.
It’s long been a defensive war, because the angels kept right on fighting well after many of the gods had receded from the contested spheres, or even faded out onto the Astral. The angels want divine justice, and the Unmakers fight on, aware that they could lose the very worlds they’d fought so hard to free. The sect is right to be worried-- departing gods have seared whole continents as they left, by way of a parting shot.
Actual Athar make most Unmakers uneasy. The sect has enough divine enemies as it is, and while the Athar are impressed by sect’s astral body count (not a high number, but these are powers we’re talking about, even if they are lesser ones), the Unmakers’ main concern is for the safety of their worlds and their personal freedom. Of course, war changes a body, and a growing number within the sect would be happy to take the war across the planes.
…
The War Bringers sound like they could be arms dealers working with the yugoloths, or potential recruits for Pentar’s ‘fast camp’ in the Doomguard, disavowable assets like the Tacharim. They work their peculiar magic on peaceful primes, both for practice and as a source of profit for a long con against the Outer Planes. They might spark the archons’ general disdain for the eladrin into vocal disapproval-- sanctions, oversight, interference with the Elven Imperium in wildspace. Perhaps they could utilize the legendary rivalry of the devas and asuras, and goad other celestials and pantheons into choosing sides?
The heavens go to war with each other, the guardinals are stuck in the middle trying to push both sides apart, and the Merkhants (and yugoloths) are laughing all the way to the bank.
Arms dealers in some cases, enlightened advisers in others. The road to war is paved in many ways, they say. They don't particularly care about making money from their enterprises, though it's definitely a means to an end. I wouldn't be surprised to find some of their members giving their wealth away to the poorest people in a kingdom if it suited their long term aims. The only aim of the sect is to cause war, whether just or oppressive, whether it frees a people or causes untold misery.
I envision the War Bringers as background antagonists and agents, I suppose a bit like the League of Shadows from the Batman universe. The low level members are agent provocateurs, receiving orders from cell leaders. The higher ups coordinate the efforts of the different cells and receive orders from the leaders of the sect. They'd be based out of the Outlands, close to the Spire to take advantage of the enforced powerlessness. I'm not sure what kind of figure might head the sect though.
Lots of great stuff.
Quick thoughts ->
Charmers and their search for Platonic beauty reminds of the angels of Nobilis, who are dedicated to fighting for the beauty in creation, which IIRC means physical/spiritual/emotional/etc.
I like the idea of the War Bringers, especially if it's a faction that seeks turn the Multiverse into a perpetual battlefield where either no one can win or there ends being an ultimate resolution to both the Alignment and Elemental wars.
Unsung, I wasn't sure about the Many at first, now with the research of planar barriers and the relativism, they are excellent.
@cromlich- Thanks kindly. 
@Wicke- A city or fortress built in the shadow of the Spire is a fascinating idea. No magic used, no magic allowed-- no magic that can stop them.
The True: a faction who's members are not scared to be themselves.
The Golden Mean: based on greek and buddhist philosophy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_mean_(philosophy)
Good idea, there was almost the same sect called the Moderates.
Well, I had a couple factions for the Metaverse (aggregate alternate Wheels) in the Parallel Wheels thread.
Here's a quick rundown of some:
Fate Breakers - Dedicated to cheating, and helping people cheat, destiny. They war against prophecies and oppose beings claiming to serve Fate.
Architects of Infinity - Obsessed with creating an infinite plane, rather than finite demiplanes. The idea is to make their own Multiverse, but they haven't managed to make anything that is actually infinite.
Swimmers in the Song - Very similar to Ciphers, though also sort of like Chaosmen. They follow the flow of the planes, but aren't necessarily dedicated to Xaos or putting action/intuition before thinking. Perhaps they are like people following the Tao, but my own knowledge of Taoism is too limited.
Reversers of Dissolution - The idea here was to combine all the Multiverses into one Wheel, but you could instead make it so they want all Alternate Primes combined into a single Prime Material Plane.
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