D&D 5E Are "evil gods" necessary? [THREAD NECRO]

[Hexmage-EN]

It's not wrong that "evil gods" is comes from a very specific and polarized view of the world. Your gods are never evil; it's that band of Other People who worship evil gods and false idols. All the more reason to kill them and take their stuff, or at the very least force them to convert to a true faith. For their own good of course.

If I were going to design a setting from scratch... yeah I'd totally do away with evil gods that only monsters and villains worship. Which is not to say that all gods will be good. No, I'd set it up so you have a united pantheon of gods that are generally respected as a whole. Just the one, no racial gods. Some are more benevolent and are begged for favors. Others are less nice and people pray to them to avoid misfortune or avert their attention. But the gods are the gods, and while many variant expressions of faith exist everyone agrees they're all worshiping the same pantheon. It's those lousy archfiends that sponsor malign cultists who have to be thwarted by brave heroes before they unleash monsters and destruction. Everyone can agree that those guys suck.

That's pretty much how most of the gods worked in 4E's default setting.

Even the Dawn War of 4E and the Founding Myth of Exandria can easily be interpreted as "the gods showed up, saw the world the primordials were making, created their own races to colonize it, and committed genocide against the primordials when they fought back against the divinely sponsored invasion". Heck, maybe even some of the so-called Betrayer Gods joined the side of the primordials because they realized their counterparts among the Prime Deities were more-or-less colonialist conquerors.

In particular, I find the Betrayer Gods category very suspect when it implies the Lawful Asmodeus and Bane were working alongside the likes of the Chaotic Lolth and Zehir. Plus, if Torog's origin in Exandria is anything like his origin in 4E, he was pretty much just a god of healing fighting a primordial in the Underdark during the war who was cursed by his opponent to be trapped in the Underdark, causing the other gods to assume he'd just died or something until he started going crazy and dragging whole cities underground to torture people. Couple that with the Exandrian lore that Torog was defeated by the Prime Deities in the Calamity and imprisoned in the Far Realm and you've got a very tragic backstory for a "Betrayer God".

EDIT: I've hardly listened to any of Critical Role but I suddenly really want to pick Matt Mercer's brain concerning the Betrayer Gods and the Primordials. I don't guess anyone know if he does AMAs or anything? Maybe I should post a thread on the Critical Role reddit.

 

[Legatus Legionis]

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[Reynard]

So long as we use Alignments, so long as we use deities, then YES.

Every ying need its yang.

Every positive needs a negative.

Without evil, what is good to compare to?

DragonLance needs it Paladin and Takhisis.

Greyhawks needs it St.Cuthbert and Iuz.

Every Resistance needs it Galactic Empire.

In a multiverse of absolute alignments, you don't actuall need that at all. Good is Good regardless of the existence of Evil. Only realities dependent on relative morality require Evil to exist for Good to exist. And when that is true, good isn't really Good it is just the opposing force of Evil and vice versa. Good is the opposite of whatever Evil is and that's the extent of it.

 

[Laurefindel]

"Come quickly! Acolytes of Talos are summoning a terrible storm that threatens the village!"
"Come quickly! Cultists of Orcus are summoning a terrible demon that threatens the village!"

I don't see much difference.

I do, because it allows the possibility of...

"Come quickly! We need to assist (our enemies) the acolytes of Talos that are defending the village from the cultist to Orcus summoning a terrible demon!"

or

"Come quickly! We need to convince the cultist of Orcus to help us prevent the acolytes of Talos from summoning a terrible storm!"

But more to the point of the OP, most of the pantheons that inspired fantasy religion have benevolent and malevolent gods/entities, as well as some (many?) that were little more than very powerful bullies, dangerous pricks, or just plain jerks. Would those qualify as evil in a D&D paradigm? Most probably would.

In the defense of the OP, D&D does have a place for "bad souls" to go without the absolute need of evil gods, with the Nine Hells and the Abyss and all. But with the same logic, the Upper planes also do exist independently from the good gods, populated by angels instead of demons/devils. So I don't know. Evil gods are probably not necessary but I think they are part of D&D's identity.

 

[jasper]

Good point. Better strip them out.

Strip out the clerics too.

 

[Laurefindel]

Strip out the clerics too.

Clerics are a fun class and play a dynamic role in D&D tactics. Just strip religious connotations from them (and their spells)

 

[Reynard]

But more to the point of the OP, most of the pantheons that inspired fantasy religion have benevolent and malevolent gods/entities, as well as some (many?) that were little more than very powerful bullies, dangerous pricks, or just plain jerks. Would those qualify as evil in a D&D paradigm? Most probably would.

Generally speaking, I don't think it is that clear cut. Apollo is pretty much the epitome of a "good" D&D god. Yet, when confronted with a faun that showed hbris he skinned the poor bastard alive. When you have absolute alignments you can't really make a god like Apollo fit into D&D.

 

[Tonguez]

Its possible and sometimes leads to better roleplaying too, the important thing is to have conflict between gods (or their followers) not for the gods to be aligned.

The Romans had no true evil god and even Orcus was an aspect of Hades/Pluto who tormented evildoers (Horkos in Greek myth was the diety that enforced oaths and punished oathbreakers).
Many also forget that Apollo god of the sun was also a plague god whose arrows caused disease. Mesopotamian Nergal was also a sun god, in his case representing the mid summer heat to sunset - in Mesopotamia the heat made this a 'dead' season and thus Nergal also became a Death god.
The Hindu Religion also lacks any 'evil' gods, though it does have dieties that oppose each other and deities of Destruction and Death etc

 

[Eltab]

The Greek myths help envision a Chaotic society more than Good/Evil. The gods do what they want when they can (which is almost always, especially when dealing with mortals) and restrain themselves when they must (usually because they are about to step on a greater god's toes). To me, they read like an up-powered version of the barbarian people who would eventually settle in place and become the Classical Age Greeks.

 

[Tonguez]

Clerics are a fun class and play a dynamic role in D&D tactics. Just strip religious connotations from them (and their spells)

Interestingly the indigenous peoples of Paraguay had a clergy of prophets who didn't worship gods, instead the Prophets taught that the World was evil and that a Land without Evil existed beyond the mountains - these prophets would go from village to village gathering followers for the next migration. There were a few migrations noted by the Spanish (such as from Brazil to Peru in 1539) which lead to Spanish beleif in El Dorado