Elminster's Guide to Deities and Avatars

neogod22 · May 30, 2018

Amiel said:
I don't think I agree that high CR monsters, especially the avatars of greater gods would necessarily give a fair fight. As avatars of greater gods, this already means fairness is on the low-rung of any scale. Combats involving them aren't necessarily going to be fair and survivable.
Again, in a combat situation with an avatar of a greater god, you'll need to have a lot of resources and investment and as cbwjm said

This is where I think you're wrong. A God is unwinnable fight by any standard, since a mortal can never slay one which is why they never give Gods stats, or primordials for that matter. Avatars are merely a part of a God's essence and can be killed. The exception of course are Demigods who are so weak, they can be killed by very powerful mortals. Again, the part a DM plays in the story is to bring challenging scenarios, not hopeless ones.

cbwjm · May 30, 2018

neogod22 said:
This is where I think you're wrong. A God is unwinnable fight by any standard, since a mortal can never slay one which is why they never give Gods stats, or primordials for that matter. Avatars are merely a part of a God's essence and can be killed. The exception of course are Demigods who are so weak, they can be killed by very powerful mortals. Again, the part a DM plays in the story is to bring challenging scenarios, not hopeless ones.

Which is exactly why the campaign will provide the means to overcome the avatar of whichever god is the focus of the campaign. If the DM doesn't provide a means for the party to somehow even the playing field then they are doing a poor job of running the game.

dave2008 · May 31, 2018

Eltab said:
Some true Villains, and some of the sort that stumble across my path

- Bane (greater god, 4e version, not the earlier one that had Strife in his portfolio)
- Tempus
- Loviatar
- revised Tiamat with experience from Tyranny of Dragons 'final fights' added (if you have that data)
- Maglubiyet (sp?) In order to stop the overwhelmingly numerous conquering hobgoblins you have to beat up their god to make HIM cry 'Uncle' and tell them to stop
- the god of winds and storms, who is prone to just going off for no apparent reason
- Un-spell-able Elven god of forests, starts with letter R
- Cyric
- Bhaal (because after playing Murder in Balder's Gate, I want to solve the problem not chase around behind the symptoms)

I have Bane, Tiamat, and Maglubiyet over at my 5e Epic Monster Updates thread, so I would prefer he/she take a stab at some of the others.

dave2008 · May 31, 2018

Amiel said:
Gods and avatars are at the heart of this thread – which category of divinity they fall into, how they express their portfolios, how they envision their avatars, what spheres of influence they tend to. In the Forgotten Realms, the deities are defined and shaped by mortal worship, and divine intervention and miracles are simply a fact of life. The deities of this world plot, war, engage in intrigue and ally among themselves, between themselves and a host of other creatures seeking ever to sustain and elevate themselves, for if they lose the strength of worship a deity can dwindle away and be forgotten and eventually die.

Very cool, and thank you for sharing. If your interested I have some first drafts of epic monsters, including gods, over at my 5e Epic Monster Updates thread. There are over 150 epic level monsters.

Those first drafts are not RAW, but RAW adjacent

I was trying to compensate for some of the flaws I believe are inherent with high level monsters. Ultimately I don't think it was completely successful. I will be working on a revised approach in the 2nd drafts. I hope to role those out later in the summer or early fall. I would love to add some of the content you develop in this thread if your interested.

dave2008 · May 31, 2018

neogod22 said:
A God is unwinnable fight by any standard, since a mortal can never slay one which is why they never give Gods stats, or primordials for that matter.

I don't agree with this. I firmly believe a god can have stats and be an unwinnable fight for mortals. It is kind of a foundation of D&D actually. 1e had stats for Gods, 3e had stats for gods, 4e had stats for gods, and 5e has stats for gods. 1e, 3e, & 4e (debatable) had stats for greater gods, but apparently that will not be a thing in 5e.

neogod22 · May 31, 2018

dave2008 said:
I don't agree with this. I firmly believe a god can have stats and be an unwinnable fight for mortals. It is kind of a foundation of D&D actually. 1e had stats for Gods, 3e had stats for gods, 4e had stats for gods, and 5e has stats for gods. 1e, 3e, & 4e (debatable) had stats for greater gods, but apparently that will not be a thing in 5e.

I haven't played 3rd, so I won't speak on it, but 1st edition's stats for gods were weak. 2nd edition had stats for avatars only, and same with 5th right now. No stats are for the gods themselves, only their avatars. Demonlords are not gods. Arch Devils are not gods (except Asmodeous), the Princes of the Apocalypse are not gods, or primordials for that matter. D&D does not give Gods stats for the simple fact that according to their rules, a God can only be killed by a God of equal or greater power in his domain where he is all powerful. They are all pretty much immune to mortal magic, and all but the most powerful artifacts, can create any spell at will, and literally warps reality around them.
3rd and 4th edition may have had stats for gods, but they had all of the 20+ shenanigans with the prestige classes and epic destiny nonsense.n 5th edition doesn't. At least not yet, and as far as I know, don't plan on making anything past 20 anytime soon. If you hadn't noticed, all of their campaigns they've been putting out only goes to 10. They are purposely keeping the game geared towards lower levels.

dave2008 · May 31, 2018

OK, I am break this down a little

neogod22 said:
I haven't played 3rd, so I won't speak on it, but 1st edition's stats for gods were weak.

It doesn't matter if you think they were weak or not, they had stats for gods, including greater gods. The heads of pantheons had 400 hp (2x as much as demogorgon) and a host of class levels and other abilites. Heck, Thor's hammmer did 100 damage on a hit (+ strength bonus).

neogod22 said:
2nd edition had stats for avatars only, and same with 5th right now. No stats are for the gods themselves, only their avatars.

This is incorrect (for 5e). Lesser gods can specifically be stated in 5e and we already have stats for Tiamat. Now, personally, i treat those stats as an avatar, but by RAW they are her full stats, not an avatar.

neogod22 said:
D&D does not give Gods stats for the simple fact that according to their rules, a God can only be killed by a God of equal or greater power in his domain where he is all powerful. They are all pretty much immune to mortal magic, and all but the most powerful artifacts, can create any spell at will, and literally warps reality around them.

This is not true either. There is no rule in D&D that a god can only be killed by a god of equal or greater power in its domain. That doesn't fit with the rules by RAW or the lore (if your not familiar, several gods have been killed in D&D lore, and not be other gods). I god would, in theory, need to be killed in its domain, but the rest is just not true.

neogod22 said:
3rd and 4th edition may have had stats for gods, but they had all of the 20+ shenanigans with the prestige classes and epic destiny nonsense.n 5th edition doesn't. At least not yet, and as far as I know, don't plan on making anything past 20 anytime soon.

I'm not sure what your point is with this statement. I also don't know why you continue to ignore 1e.

neogod22 said:
If you hadn't noticed, all of their campaigns they've been putting out only goes to 10. They are purposely keeping the game geared towards lower levels.

I agree with the general thought, but you got the details wrong, several AP got to level 15: HotDQ + RoT = lvl 1-15, PoA = lvl 1-15, & OotA = lvl 1-15

So, though you may not like it, D&D has almost always provided stats for gods, the only exception being 2e. 1e, 3e, 4e, and 5e have had stats for gods. It is just part of D&D. You can argue that sometimes the "official" stats are not as powerful as you would want for a god (and I would agree), but claiming D&D doesn't provide stats for gods is just false.

Elderbrain · Jun 1, 2018

The rules for gods in 5th edition are given in a sidebar in the DMG. Per the rules there, demigods can't grant divine spells and don't have clerics, so that Valkur (for instance) would receive a "promotion" in 5e to a lesser god. Lesser gods have physical bodies that can be slain by mortals, but if they die anywhere other than their home plane, they merely discorporate and reform in their divine realm (thus, if the heroes killed Tiamat when she was trying to enter Faerun, she didn't die for good.) As far as I can tell, lesser gods don't get avatars. Greater deities can form physical bodies equivalent to that of a lesser god, called an avatar, but slaying the avatar anywhere has no effect on the greater god. Also, since Tiamat was classed as a Fiend, I would class any non-evil deity as a Celestial, in game terms. Nor would Valkur's form count as an avatar, and his divine rank of 3 seems to reference the 3e rules, which wouldn't apply here. But that's my take.

To convert the rank of a god from previous editions into 5e, I suggest the following: Demigods and Lesser gods = Lesser god in 5e. Intermediate and Greater gods = Greater god in 5e. Also, in the DMG under the Artifacts section it mentions using an Empyrean to represent a deity/avatar - handy if (like most gods) the deity is shaped like a humanoid and you don't have time to cook up god stats on the fly.

neogod22 · Jun 1, 2018

Elderbrain said:
The rules for gods in 5th edition are given in a sidebar in the DMG. Per the rules there, demigods can't grant divine spells and don't have clerics, so that Valkur (for instance) would receive a "promotion" in 5e to a lesser god. Lesser gods have physical bodies that can be slain by mortals, but if they die anywhere other than their home plane, they merely discorporate and reform in their divine realm (thus, if the heroes killed Tiamat when she was trying to enter Faerun, she didn't die for good.) As far as I can tell, lesser gods don't get avatars. Greater deities can form physical bodies equivalent to that of a lesser god, called an avatar, but slaying the avatar anywhere has no effect on the greater god. Also, since Tiamat was classed as a Fiend, I would class any non-evil deity as a Celestial, in game terms. Nor would Valkur's form count as an avatar, and his divine rank of 3 seems to reference the 3e rules, which wouldn't apply here. But that's my take.

To convert the rank of a god from previous editions into 5e, I suggest the following: Demigods and Lesser gods = Lesser god in 5e. Intermediate and Greater gods = Greater god in 5e. Also, in the DMG under the Artifacts section it mentions using an Empyrean to represent a deity/avatar - handy if (like most gods) the deity is shaped like a humanoid and you don't have time to cook up god stats on the fly.

What page is this on, I don't remember seeing this about lesser and Demigods.

Ash Mantle · Jun 6, 2018

Eltab said:
Some true Villains, and some of the sort that stumble across my path

- Bane (greater god, 4e version, not the earlier one that had Strife in his portfolio)
- Tempus
- Loviatar
- revised Tiamat with experience from Tyranny of Dragons 'final fights' added (if you have that data)
- Maglubiyet (sp?) In order to stop the overwhelmingly numerous conquering hobgoblins you have to beat up their god to make HIM cry 'Uncle' and tell them to stop
- the god of winds and storms, who is prone to just going off for no apparent reason
- Un-spell-able Elven god of forests, starts with letter R
- Cyric
- Bhaal (because after playing Murder in Balder's Gate, I want to solve the problem not chase around behind the symptoms)

By the 4e version of Bane, do you still mean the FR Bane or do you also mean the Nentir Vale Bane?
Way back when I was homebrewing for 3.5e, I actually made some stats for Tempus and Maglubiyet. They can be found in this thread http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?111306-Of-Deities-and-Demigods
I may put the design of those gods on the backburner for the time being and instead focus on others.

What do you mean by 'with experience from the Tyranny of Dragon final fights?

I may try my hand at Cyric, as a point of difference between his status as a greater god and a demigod like Valkur. Just so I'll more clued in to the status of the FR gods in 5e, he's since lost his portfolios of murder to Bhaal and illusion to Leira, retaining the portfolios of madness, strife, lies, and deception?