Influence: Stargate: SG-1

(The second installment of my three-part series on what's currently influencing my interpretation of Ronn McCarrick's Baenrahl setting.)

Stargate: SG-1 has many great things that can energize an RPG.

For one, there's a team of heroes, each with their own specialty, each with a chance to shine in the adventure. Certainly something that would make an RPG work well. This is good, but it's not the influence I'm thinking of.

Stargate: SG-1 also features specific missions that turn out to be rife with adventure. Missions with objectives help organize a game session, as well as get and keep things moving. This, too, is good. But again, not the influence I'm thinking of.

What makes SG-1 an influence on my vision is the most obvious thing, and that which was likely an influence on the setting originally.

In SG-1, there are false gods, there are worshippers, and there are misled minions. And I don't actually mean the Goa'uld. I'm referring, in fact, to the Ori.

The Ori had "Priors" that wielded great power and fought SG-1, all the while subjugating the populace of many worlds. This is the influence that I see.

The Templars of the various Urathear are analogous to the Priors. The Templars wield great power, will fight the heroes, and work to subjugate the populace.

The powers of the Templars are likely not going to change too much, unless my research reveals that the current setup just won't hack it. Basically, according to the Baenrahl Templar page, Templars are Clerics that are aligned to a Urathear, with the Commandment power substituting for the Turn Undead power. I'll see if that jives with the ruleset I'm going to use (Castles & Crusades).

In addition, I'm going to make sure they have the thing that I seem to remember they had in the previous campaign: a weapon of some sort. I view the templars as a kind of cross between the Priors and the Jaffa, which means they should have some sort of energy-shooting staff or something. I'm sure it will change from Urathear to Urathear; each group should be unique.

But the thrust is that the Templars are the direct opposition to the heroes. They are the ones that the heroes will encounter when trying to hassle the Urathear, that will show up just when they think that they've gotten away with it, and that will likely eventually start trying to track them down.

I have to say that I love the idea of the rigid, implacable, cruel, uniformed, and powerful priests as the villains of the story. It puts the focus off the regular folks and onto a recognizable enemy that will plague the heroes.

Next up: I talk about the influence of Barsoom. Yep, John Carter of Mars.