D&D General The Generic Deities of D&D

[jasper]

"Faith powers the Gods" No matter how well written the argument to support this idea; I view is as "Gawds are batteries recharged by worship". I find the whole concept silly. Gawds help worshippers because they are Gawds.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

"Faith powers the Gods" No matter how well written the argument to support this idea; I view is as "Gawds are batteries recharged by worship". I find the whole concept silly. Gawds help worshippers because they are Gawds.

I think the more reductive and simplistic the approach, the more silly it seems. There are settings where it's basically as simple as that (but they always fail to have a god of "Being well-fed, attractive, in good health, fertile, and unmolested by wars" as the most powerful god by miles, even though that would surely be the case in any setting where humans were the most common race!), and yeah they seem silly. But there are related approaches that make more sense, and if you develop from that place, you can come up with some very complex and interesting metaphysical scenarios (the Pillars of Eternity games revolve around one such scenario).

 

[dave2008]

"Faith powers the Gods" No matter how well written the argument to support this idea; I view is as "Gawds are batteries recharged by worship". I find the whole concept silly. Gawds help worshippers because they are Gawds.

I generally agree with you, but I can see it like this: if devils / demons can get power from mortal souls, then the act of worship is like giving part of your living mortal soul to a deity. Therefore, though I too believe gods do not need mortal worshipers, they can use the soul-stuff that is given through worship to do a great many things to advance their causes.

 

[Hoffmand]

"Faith powers the Gods" No matter how well written the argument to support this idea; I view is as "Gawds are batteries recharged by worship". I find the whole concept silly. Gawds help worshippers because they are Gawds.

Not in greyhawk. They don’t need worshippers for their power

 

[Chaosmancer]

"Faith powers the Gods" No matter how well written the argument to support this idea; I view is as "Gawds are batteries recharged by worship". I find the whole concept silly. Gawds help worshippers because they are Gawds.

I remember a story I was reading that did a really interesting take on it.

The minor goddess (she had one worshipper at the start of the story) made an off-hand comment about how good the souls of the people around her tasted.

After some freaking out, it was revealed that the Gods of this setting eat the vibrations of the souls that worship them. As a sort of supernatural photosynthesis.

I like the concept, because I like the gods having a reason to be invested in their followers. They care about the people who believe in them, and it also helps explain clerics in the DnD context. Why grant powers to people to spread your faith? Because spreading your faith has a benefit to you.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

If I were writing generic D&D rules, I'd just use the Greek gods. Most people in the English-speaking world already have a passing familiarity with their stories, so you can just say "Ares, God of War" and they're up to speed without further exposition. No need to reinvent the wheel.

Gets a little fiddly when you try to figure out how the gods relate to the heavily Judeo-Christian celestials and fiends, but, well, it wouldn't exactly be the first time this game has experienced friction from contrasting underlying mythoi.

 

[Minigiant]

I think we have to consider which version of 40K's GE we're discussing here. The 1980s and 1990s version was pretty clearly LE by D&D standards, because he required constant human sacrifices (literally constant - sometimes a conveyor belt was involved - it seems like many or all, depending on source, were unwilling, too) to maintain his power, and his agents, working in his name, and with his full apparent divine support, would do things like murder planets with billions of human inhabitants, often on somewhat flimsy reasoning.

He's far beyond any line which could reasonably be considered LN, because sheer enormity of the acts of genocide and mass destruction committed directly in his name makes the greatest devils of D&D look like friendly puppies by comparison. Asmodeus would blanch at some of that stuff, even.

Yet it is all to a very specific order and purpose - so clearly he's Lawful.

More recently, some depictions have attempted to tone this down, with stuff like him requiring far fewer or no human sacrifices (again depending on source), or them all being willing sacrifices, and Exterminatus and the like being used far more cautiously and with a lot more hand-wringing, and you might, if you took the most generous possible take on all of those, get to LN. It's all a bit of a giant retcon and still inconsistent, though.

But it's the Blood War, essentially. LE vs CE, because Chaos is most assuredly CE. LN would be more like the Tau, who are not involved in the same kind of genocide and mass-murder as a matter of course (whereas it is literally how the Emperor and his empire work), but do some incredibly creepy things in the name of order (mass sterilization of humans in their space, for example).

Literally no currently existing faction in 40K could be seen as Good in the D&D sense, I'd argue. You might have been able to have Squats as LG when they were still around, but no more. Individuals can be, of course.

I would agree with your general point that the Emperor started LG, then became LN out of necessity, but in many/most portrayals, I would say he is clearly LE. This is the result of the extreme actions he's had to take to stay "alive" and to fight Chaos, sure, but it's clearly that he's been brought down to the level of Chaos, despite better intentions. Without such powerful adversaries, he'd probably go back to being LG, as you say.

Well a lot of this is his church and followers not him. The worst and most "unjustified" things are done in his name. GE is half dead and unresponsive.

So he'sa LG deity that goes LN to survive but his church is LE without his guidance. Kindamatches up how some D&D human soceities's act. Good folk who quickly go crusaderish or tyrannical if pushed.

Kinda feels that it would be a better if Humans was a combined effort of multiple gods making a race together.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Well a lot of this is his church and followers not him. The worst and most "unjustified" things are done in his name. GE is half dead and unresponsive.

So he'sa LG deity that goes LN to survive but his church is LE without his guidance. Kindamatches up how some D&D human soceities's act. Good folk who quickly go crusaderish or tyrannical if pushed.

Kinda feels that it would be a better if Humans was a combined effort of multiple gods making a race together.

I don't think you can really separate the Emperor from his church like that. Either he's dead and doesn't have an alignment, or effectively brain-dead, and doesn't have an alignment, or he's at least semi-conscious, aware of what is happening, and happy enough for it to continue that he doesn't self-destruct or expend some of the massive psychic energy smiting his "bad" followers.

I just don't think labeling a god to whom thousands (or more) of people are unwillingly sacrificed daily as "LN" is really going to fly. The best you can say is "He was LN before he died".

 

[Minigiant]

I don't think you can really separate the Emperor from his church like that. Either he's dead and doesn't have an alignment, or effectively brain-dead, and doesn't have an alignment, or he's at least semi-conscious, aware of what is happening, and happy enough for it to continue that he doesn't self-destruct or expend some of the massive psychic energy smiting his "bad" followers.

I just don't think labeling a god to whom thousands (or more) of people are unwillingly sacrificed daily as "LN" is really going to fly. The best you can say is "He was LN before he died".

Oh he's effectively braidead at this point and has no alignment.The evilis done in his name under his absence.

It's standard fantasy trope for humans. Big in D&D.


The human god is dead, weak, or absent. This allows for humans to worship other gods and create evil cults.
The demihuman gods are alive, strong, and/or active gods. Demihuman society is full of clones of their god(s).

 

[Hoffmand]

I thought Odin created human. I read that somewhere