What is a 'God' in D&D?

[Snoweel]

I've been giving some thought to homebrew creation.

In my opinion, the cosmology is the key element determining the kinds of campaigns and adventures you can run in a home-brewed world, so obviously it's an area I feel needs to be done right.

I got to wondering what exactly is a god, in D&D 4e, and what isn't. What is the link between the religion(s) of the gameworld, and its deities? Are all gods in the setting worshipped? Are all objects of worship gods?

How do the game mechanics of religion (classes, prayers, rituals, etc) support or interfere with these ideas?

Your thoughts?

 

[Hunter In Darkness]

Can't say anything on 4e, but it boils down to your setting. How do you want gods to be.
Faraway , as not know if there real or not never having them really contact you?
More greek style, all meddling with mortals and such
Go all biblical and say there beyond mortal understanding[can't be killed]
May be god's arnt god's but powerful beings such as arch devils and titans


Another thing to ask is did my god's make this world or did they come here.
As for religion that be based on a culture as to how they inter react

 

[Whisper72]

Can't say what is or isn't canon, as indeed this depends upon the specifics of the gameworld. I can give an example of how I usually deal with this in my own worlds.

I generally have several 'tiers' or 'types' of gods:

- Creator God(s): often only one or two (male/female), kinda like AO. Usually the PC's / general population is not even aware of these entities' existence and they do not interfere in the world much/at all. If they interfere it is at the level of 'chastising' Elder or Greater gods.

- Elder Gods: sorta the original children of the creator Gods or Gods whose power comes from their heritage or themselves. Often 'paragon / elite' types of the 'first races', responsible for their creation (Tiamat, Corellon, Moradin etc.) or linked to the primal elements of the cosmology (water, fire, earth, air, time, space, spirit etc.). Generally interfere little to none in the world, most people are not really aware of these beings although they may be part of ancient legends and myths. Generally not worshipped in temples etc.

- Greater or True Gods: gods who have real and impactful portfolio's claimed of a high aggregational level (think 'death', 'love', 'war', 'magic' etc.). Generally their portfolio is such that their power is not dependent upon worship, they feed off the emotion or actions themselves. I.e. a god of death is fed by each death, regardless who perpetrates it. Usually have temples and vast priesthoods and are meddlers 'at arm's length' using their worshippers as tools.

- Lesser Gods / Ascendants: gods with limited or without portfolio's, generally once mortals who have claimed godhood through amassing vast power and/or worshippers and undergoing certain rituals / adoption by Elder or True Gods etc. These beings sometimes interfere 'in person' either truly or through Avatars. For this level think of the god of thieves (who could be an insanely powerful and canny thief of the past who ascended), the 'first mage' who 'invented' magic as usuable by mortals etc.

- Heroes (with capital H): beings of vast power, on the edge of ascendancy, who are movers and shaker of the world. The PC's will become part of this group near the end of their careers.

Hope this helps some to form your own ideas.

 

[Khuxan]

I'd say the question is: Does the entity grant a unique ability to its cleric and paladin followers? If yes, it's a god. If not, it's not.

That might not help, but I think it's a reasonable benchmark. If the object of worship has enough worshippers that you can be bothered designing a Channel Divinity feat, then it's a god.

 

[Goblyns Hoard]

Hunter has this completely right – it depends on the world. However that may not be that helpful to you, so I’ll tell you what the gods are in my world.

For my homebrew I came to the same conclusion as you – the pantheon/cosmology defines the world. If the gods actually created the world then it needs to reflect their combined personalities. The races in it were created by the gods and their cultures reflect that, obviously with some aligned with certain gods more than others.

I went with a sort of Greek-pantheon feel. 12 gods, 6 male, 6 female. Each rules over a month and the 4 ‘greater’ gods rule over a season as well. They don’t have the Greek pantheon feel in terms of actually coming down to the world and messing around with mortals, but in terms of them being a pantheon with complex interactions between them. Sometimes they will ally with each other based on seasons, sometimes on gender, sometimes on personality. They each have a ‘partner’ in the heavens (spouse, lover, sibling, etc.) so will often work with them, though that may also be a major rift.

I also wanted to discard the concept of ‘worldly’ races being inherently evil, so no more evil orcs, just vicious, barbaric ones. As far as the elves whose coast lines they raid the orcs are evil, but then the Saxons thought the same thing of the Vikings that came over from Scandanavia to rape and pillage.

So to reflect none of the gods have an alignment. This helps toward making them more likely to change allegiances. However to give them more personality each of them has both positive and negative values. Lymos (Lord of Summer) is the god of the sun, war and prejudice, Reaper (Lady of Autumn) is goddess of the harvest, consequences and gluttony. Good worshippers try to avoid/minimise the negative aspects of their deity, while evil worshippers revel in them. And this of course allows me to have holy wars between two groups of Lymos worshippers, or evil priests hiding within otherwise good churches, still able to perform miracles and concealing their more unsavoury activities. Ultimately this gives me more freedom to set up different adventures. Also many priests will be worshippers of the pantheon rather than of a single god, calling on a different god to bring light than to shroud it, but capable of both.

As to cosmology and what the gods are – they are the divine creators of this world. They are physically unreachable by mortals, but can communicate with them when they so choose. High level individuals (not always clerics) may very well be their chosen ones, who reflect their views on the mortal plane.

As to the planes – those are a separate thing. I’ve implemented the planes more as ‘alternate realities’ separated from this world by quantum distances, and by no means bound by anything like the same reality. This means the players can reach them and interact with them.

 

[Snoweel]

Can't say anything on 4e, but it boils down to your setting. How do you want gods to be.
Faraway , as not know if there real or not never having them really contact you?
More greek style, all meddling with mortals and such
Go all biblical and say there beyond mortal understanding[can't be killed]
May be god's arnt god's but powerful beings such as arch devils and titans


Another thing to ask is did my god's make this world or did they come here.
As for religion that be based on a culture as to how they inter react

Indeed there are so many possible questions.

I'm really more interested in narrowing down the questions but you raise a good point.

Can't say what is or isn't canon, as indeed this depends upon the specifics of the gameworld. I can give an example of how I usually deal with this in my own worlds.

I generally have several 'tiers' or 'types' of gods:
...

Hope this helps some to form your own ideas.

Thanks for your ideas.

This kind of categorisation leads to a strongly interactive pantheon which is always good for campaign ideas.

I'd say the question is: Does the entity grant a unique ability to its cleric and paladin followers? If yes, it's a god. If not, it's not.

That might not help, but I think it's a reasonable benchmark. If the object of worship has enough worshippers that you can be bothered designing a Channel Divinity feat, then it's a god.

Mate this is very helpful. One element of D&D gods I'm toying with at the moment is 'Do gods even need clerics or paladins?'

From a metagame point of view, it's clerics that require gods, not the other way around.

Realisitically, there only needs to be enough gods for PC clerics and paladins to serve (and at a stretch, you could have godless clerics and paladins - my 3e setting had all paladins in the service of a dead goddess they knew nothing about).

The majority of gods might not have clerics or paladins. To be honest, there are a few core deities that don't seem to fit thematically with the implied theme of the PHB cleric.

I'm leaning toward doing things this way - all the gods that do sponsor clerics will display traits relating to civilisation and militancy, have a strong anti-undead agenda and so on.

Other gods just won't have PHB clerics or paladins in their service.

All ideas and critique welcome. Share your homebrew take on gods and religion. Let's have a discussion.

 

[Snoweel]

However to give them more personality each of them has both positive and negative values. Lymos (Lord of Summer) is the god of the sun, war and prejudice, Reaper (Lady of Autumn) is goddess of the harvest, consequences and gluttony. Good worshippers try to avoid/minimise the negative aspects of their deity, while evil worshippers revel in them. And this of course allows me to have holy wars between two groups of Lymos worshippers, or evil priests hiding within otherwise good churches, still able to perform miracles and concealing their more unsavoury activities.

****ing cool.

 

[Wombat]

In most D&D games I have seen, gods are just really big NPCs.

In my own games, they are removed from the human sphere entirely -- to kill a god is to destroy an aspect of reality, creating gigantic, cataclysmic changes. They are fundamental building blocks of cosmic reality.

 

[ExploderWizard]

A few general guidelines can get you by if you don't want to do much work.

1) Gods don't have stats, they do what they want-no saving throws

2) Gods grant divine spells/ powers. Failure to adhere to the god's teachings will get your keys taken away.

3) If a hostile extraplanar being asks your character if he/she is a god, you say "yes".

 

[Umbran]

Your thoughts?

I think you are correct, that the cosmology and metaphysics do inform what kind of stories you'll be able to easily work with. But I view that as a setting element, not a rules-element.

I have yet to see an edition of D&D in which the game rules fix cosmology or metaphysics. I don't think they even strongly inform - 3e, for example, explicitly stated that you coudl have clerics that worship gods, or not. How hard can it be to flex the cosmology under that?

4e goes about the same way - so long as your cosmology/metaphysic allows clerics and other divine folks to have powers somehow (even if it is just through the power of their belief, without any actual divine entity involved), it'll work pretty well with the powers-based design.