@Niara In regard to the first point I guess I'm not so married to continuity, especially in universes with so many hands in the cookie jar.
As per my previous comment, what exactly is entailed in the term "Greater Deity" is open for debate, it's mechanical meaning on our end as interpreted into in-universe information.
She is very a much a "Greater Deity" both in the sense of mechanicalisms and setting presence. People of Faerun see her when they look at the changing moon the same way they'd look at the the stormy seas and think Umberlee, or look at thunderous lightning and see Talos. She is central to their mythology to the point of being the Adversary in one of the main creation/apocalypse conflicts of their faith. People see her see her personified in the dark of every night and night sky. Shar has much the same place in the minds of the common Faerunian that the wolf chasing the sun (who will usher in Ragnarok when he finally catches up to and swallow it) had to the ancient Norse -- except while the "sun wolf" is visible only as a rare light phenomena, the battle between Shar and Selune is visibly playing out on an every night basis as the moon waxes and wanes (and that's completely disregarding that time just around a 100 years ago when the two deities became literal flesh and blood and did literal battle in the streets of Waterderp!).
If we put the mechanicalisms of what "Greater Deity" to the side and focus only on how people in the setting think of and experience her: Shar is still a very big deal.
Originally Posted by robertthebard
You're right, it's not. It's about how a reaction that some players will find perfectly logical being in a dialog, where the OP is acting like it's the only option available.
No, OP is saying that none of the responses made sense to them, because the gravity of the situation -- that the narrative clearly expects you to feel in how it presents it -- had not been established. They don't understand why they wouldn't want a Sharite in their party. They don't understand why simply not mentioning who their deity is should feel like they've been lied to. The narrative of the game clearly expects a reaction to this reveal, but the narrative of the game has not previously made the ground work for any kind of reaction.
And the rest of us is saying that this is unfortunate, because because of this lack of establishment of who Shar is pre-emptively to the reveal means that the player is not empowered to make an informed role-playing choice about their character reaction to Shadowheart's reveal (unless they are already familiar with the setting through outside means -- which is, in turn, bad storytelling, because stories should be self-contained enough not to rely on outside knowledge for important character moments). This causes a big clash between what the narrative have presented to you so far and what the narrative suddenly expects you to know about Shar.
I'd be down for that, if one of the responses didn't say "I don't care". Information is provided, it was just inconvenient, I guess? That's the problem with cherry picking part of a post to reply to, you leave out context that may well flesh out an idea in a particular sentence. I've asked this before, but just how much information do we need at the start of the game, in a new IP, and the OP is stating that DnD is a new IP for them? A "the story so far" tutorial could be longer than some games, we're talking about 50 years of lore. There are at least two books that can be picked up/read in game, possibly before you get to where you have the discussion in question. One of them is at the temple just after you can recruit Gale. Even one of those books will highlight "evil Goddess". If that's not enough information to make one pause, then we're looking at needing some really in depth explanation, and that can be really long. If reading books that are provided as contextual lore to a game is inconvenient or immersion breaking, what is a hyperlink, or even narration going to be? It's not like there's a thread to get rid of the narrator, or reduce the narration. Wait, there is one. So some people think it's an overused mechanic already, but you want to add to it, because someone didn't read, or understand, a lore book?
Again: At some point it's up to the player to fill in gaps in lore, especially if they're new to a franchise that's been around for a long time. In this case, it's about 50 years. Providing basic knowledge is met, with books that can be picked up in game. This isn't a TT session where the player can ask the DM what something means, but even that requires that the player do just that, actually do some footwork to become better informed, if they're interested in being better informed. I love all the "do you really expect players at TT sessions to actually use all the materials that were created for players at a TT session to use" questions. It's hilarious to think that people actually believe that the only resource should be the DM. Why even spend the money creating all of those player specific resources then?
