Was this really entirely necessary?
Holy effects were already pretty powerful. This is kind of approaching the point where I'm wondering why it is ever within a magus' interest not to pursue the Divine and expunge themselves of Sinful (read: non-Divine-related behavior.)
Sometimes it seems that the material is putting a lot of pressure on players to have their characters adhere more firmly to the Divine or else. Particularly glaring when the material is wholly contradictory (the all-loving God who urges genocide and sends forth Divine plagues) or plain weird (the Divine is not solely religious, yet the religious beliefs of the three Abrahamic religions figure prominently into the workings of the Divine and bear its sanction, INCLUDING when operating against each other. AND Zoroastrians and an obscure group of Canary islands practitioners are also Divine?)
I will concede that it does indicate that 'no one religion has a monopoly on the truth' but it also puts a weird sort of 'Gods hands are tied' spin on the whole thing. This in itself is not a bad thing, indeed, I find it an interesting thing to put into a game, an excellent sort of thing to let player characters ponder over... if it were not backed up by explicit official support in the very same book: The Divine as the Ultimate Truth and the One Ultimate Thing. And through it all, I wonder: Why did it need to be explicitly stated? Was there really no possibility that this couldn't have, on the official level, been left up more to player and GM imagination?
My primary issues here, from a gaming perspective, are twofold:
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The Divine is so powerful as to make it little more than a storyguide's tool and curtail stories in which figures contest the Divine. Including in areas where it would be morally praiseworthy to do so (preventing Crusaders from massacring innocents, stopping the advance of a divine plague, preventing an Angel from exploding a town.) Some angels are so spectacularly powerful as to make opposing them entirely pointless ('Yeah, the angel channels a handful of might points, making a ritual effect that bypasses your MR completely. Or he'll just erect walls and mock your attempts or something, I dunno, I can do whatever I like with him.) It also puts pressure on the storyguide to come to grips themselves with the issues of the motives of an omnipotent being that nevertheless acts through agents - except when it wants to.
This A) forces the GM to bend over backwards to basically handfeed victories to the players or simply slap them into submission and B) belies one of the things that makes Ars Magica great: Studied approach to problems and putting power in the player's hands to come up with stories and unique solutions to problems. Any Divine storyline must be entirely artificial in one way or another.
And of course, when I say 'morally praiseworthy,' I realize I am running directly counter to the notion that what God does is immediately moral. I've been told to my face that the slaughter of First Borns in Egypt and genocide in the name of God are morally praiseworthy acts, so I'm keenly aware of the dichotomy. -
By explicitly placing the One Creator as the architect of Creation, the controller, and the only source of salvation, it puts Out of Character pressure on players. They have to deal with the uncomfortable reality of the setting that God is the only true god and the polytheists they might want to play are probably going to hell, especially if their god has (in all likelihood) been replaced with infernal trickery. Speaking of, some of the things in the Infernal book are downright absurd, unless one happens to be running a horror-themed game (in which case they are entirely appropriate.) Examples: Botching in infernal auras leading to irrevocable taint, and you have no recourse but to completely renounce the tainted power! Spirit summoning hedge magic always being tainted (and so bloody powerful that there's really no reason for the GM to turn that off.) Infernal vis being completely undetectable unless you happen to be looking for it and know that you can look for it - which is really just a GM's way of going 'hah hah! Got you there.' Again, this is official sanction for what is essentially a GM going 'I can do whatever I want when I want it,' which is ultimately bad GMing.
I suppose it might fairly be said that I'm just blowing hot air, since it's not likely that changes are going to be made, but I love this line.
Ars Magica is, quite simply, my favorite RPG system and not even all the complaints I've leveled here change that (and I know I've complained about Faeries, too - it still doesn't change that the system is wonderfully written and tons of fun to play in.)
It really is something that, as a GM and player, bothers me a great deal. Looking at my neat little stack of lovingly cared for Ars titles, I'm always aware when I crack one open that these are issues I need to deal with in play, because it's such a major part of the setting, and one that makes me feel dramatically uncomfortable. Not least because there's simply no wiggle room in the official literature.
I feel like my Divine and Infernal copies are made up of huge sections which are, for me, completely unusable as a GM as a consequence, I feel like I've wasted effort studying them. (With some notable exceptions. The portions on Mythic Islam and Mythic Judaism are pure gold. I feel these sections in particular have enriched my understanding of the setting and led to many great story elements.) I don't hate Christianity, Islam, and the like - I would dearly love to use elements from them in stories about Mythic Europe, but using elements from the books feels like I'm giving a sermon or teaching Sunday School. I also feel it places a cooling effect on other GMs and players: If you want an alternative explanation, you receive no official help!
I should note that I am an ardent believer in the Europa Universalis modding message: If you don't like it, fix it yourself. I happily and handily lend myself to DIY fixes. (One modification I'm proud of is attaching a Pride statistic to every infernal being or thing (usually 1/5 might or number of infernal vis in a pile or something like that), where essentially it has to check against that in order not to reveal itself in some way in a burst of Hubris. Another modification is not allowing traits to be Tainted unwillingly.)
But I feel like I'm charging into it blind and more, stabbing the very people whose hand I feed out of, if you catch my meaning: Diverting from the official explanation, including personally created injunctions against an official ruling, feels like I'm taking shots at such a great setting and the writers whose work - even when I disagree about that work, yes, even much of the material in RoPs The Divine and The Infernal - I feel to be excellent and an enduring example of exemplary game design and lore.
Even if it doesn't lead to any real changes, I feel that it's important to say, at the least. (Forgive me if feathers were ruffled, the passion in here was not guided for offensive purposes!)
(I ought to apologize for ranting in general, really. It's just that this issue has been my biggest beef since the very beginning in a system I want to support fully.)
What do you, personally, feel about things like this in Ars Magica, and in games in general? I understand that my viewpoint may even be uncommon.
Ahhh my mistake. Based upon the title of the post, I thought your objection referred to the most recent piece of errata which (quite sensibly IMO) absolved certain guidelines from the blanket errata that flipped the integers for most of the General guidelines.