D&D General Gods: What role do they play in your campaigns?
Li Shenron
Legend
Glad you asked.
I always make deities far beyond the comprehension of mortals. In fact, I make them even mostly non-definable in the sense that it's not obvious what a deity is, and "where does it start or end". Who is the god(dess) of magic, is it Mystra, Boccob or Hecate? There is no clear answer, and if it bothers you, it's your problem not mine. What matters, is whether in the fantasy world there is a religion of Mystra or Boccob or Hecate, or all three! It might as well be one deity with three aspect, or three deities in competition, or both. A deity is not the same as individual.
I often equate deities with concepts and ideas, and say "the god(dess) of magic IS magic, just like the god(dess) or war IS war". You can't kill the deity of war, unless perhaps you find a way to end all wars for good, and then make even the idea of war disappear from the universe. You are welcome to try.
When things are left undefined, everything is possible for the DM. Do I want the god(dess) of war to actually descend to earth and lead an army? Do I want the PCs get an audience with the god(dess) of magic? Sure why not? You'll never know if you are actually in front of the deity themselves. You may try to attack one, and you might even let you apparently kill it in battle, but you'll never know what it really was... An avatar? An impostor? An illusion?
As a matter of fact, religions are one of the primary sources of ideas in my campaigns, if not the greatest one! Avatars, omens, uncanny events, creatures, spells, magic items, weather & natural phenomena, dreams and visions, and of course the churches and their faithful, are the plentiful ways deities interact with the fantasy world.
Leaving things undefined or ambiguous only adds more possibility to the game for me, including the option to always incorporate more deities and pantheons as I wish.
I always make deities far beyond the comprehension of mortals. In fact, I make them even mostly non-definable in the sense that it's not obvious what a deity is, and "where does it start or end". Who is the god(dess) of magic, is it Mystra, Boccob or Hecate? There is no clear answer, and if it bothers you, it's your problem not mine. What matters, is whether in the fantasy world there is a religion of Mystra or Boccob or Hecate, or all three! It might as well be one deity with three aspect, or three deities in competition, or both. A deity is not the same as individual.
I often equate deities with concepts and ideas, and say "the god(dess) of magic IS magic, just like the god(dess) or war IS war". You can't kill the deity of war, unless perhaps you find a way to end all wars for good, and then make even the idea of war disappear from the universe. You are welcome to try.
When things are left undefined, everything is possible for the DM. Do I want the god(dess) of war to actually descend to earth and lead an army? Do I want the PCs get an audience with the god(dess) of magic? Sure why not? You'll never know if you are actually in front of the deity themselves. You may try to attack one, and you might even let you apparently kill it in battle, but you'll never know what it really was... An avatar? An impostor? An illusion?
As a matter of fact, religions are one of the primary sources of ideas in my campaigns, if not the greatest one! Avatars, omens, uncanny events, creatures, spells, magic items, weather & natural phenomena, dreams and visions, and of course the churches and their faithful, are the plentiful ways deities interact with the fantasy world.
Leaving things undefined or ambiguous only adds more possibility to the game for me, including the option to always incorporate more deities and pantheons as I wish.
hopeless
Adventurer
Didn't get far enough.
In the game I ran I was going to reveal a major bad guy sealed them away so they could only work via their followers and even then the link between them was tenuous with the one exception being an isolated former Lantern Archon trapped within an artefact that allowed her to manifest and be able to act.
None of the players reacted when every time she was summoned she literally busted open the divine gates to alert the relevant god that they were needed forcing them to act!
The first time she cat called Pelor and made the Stormlord laugh so much that he dropped a permanent thunder storm on the Dawnfather Cathedral in Gilieam!
The second time she cat called Melora as her temple had been taken over by members of the Cloaked Serpent Cult and Melora responded by collapsing the Cult's hidden temple and various portals they were using to travel undetected through the fishing village of Wrenn.
By themselves nothing to think about, but the Cleric played hasn't really been getting involved in the game and the Paladin's player despite running a Folk Hero doesn't understand why he's a member of the Free Knights despite me pointing out they could ask me questions about the game throughout all the sessions I ran this.
None of them asked a thing other than when I asked them about details about their characters...
So the only PC who I don't know what happened to his parents was the Cleric and I doubt they're alive either!
In the game I ran I was going to reveal a major bad guy sealed them away so they could only work via their followers and even then the link between them was tenuous with the one exception being an isolated former Lantern Archon trapped within an artefact that allowed her to manifest and be able to act.
None of the players reacted when every time she was summoned she literally busted open the divine gates to alert the relevant god that they were needed forcing them to act!
The first time she cat called Pelor and made the Stormlord laugh so much that he dropped a permanent thunder storm on the Dawnfather Cathedral in Gilieam!
The second time she cat called Melora as her temple had been taken over by members of the Cloaked Serpent Cult and Melora responded by collapsing the Cult's hidden temple and various portals they were using to travel undetected through the fishing village of Wrenn.
By themselves nothing to think about, but the Cleric played hasn't really been getting involved in the game and the Paladin's player despite running a Folk Hero doesn't understand why he's a member of the Free Knights despite me pointing out they could ask me questions about the game throughout all the sessions I ran this.
None of them asked a thing other than when I asked them about details about their characters...
So the only PC who I don't know what happened to his parents was the Cleric and I doubt they're alive either!
It depends on the setting, but usually Aloof.
In my current setting, the Ashen Lands, deities are kind of... mixed.
6 of the primary pantheon deities are gods in identification only. They have no form, no identity, no personality, no name. They're gods of Crisis that you turn to when you're in trouble and they offer comfort through their presence, which is so diffuse as to be in -every- church and temple whenever you need them. And when I say "Comfort" I literally mean that walking into the temple of The Unloved makes every person feel emotionally swaddled and cared for, doted upon and held. The presence of the Unloved is -tangible-, even for nonbelievers.
Three of them, however, are Ideals. Champions. They don't have specific names because they walk among mortals in a thousand different forms in a thousand different lives. The Warrior, for example, may be -any- warrior, soldier, or guard you meet. They could be possessed by his presence, or him in an assumed form. The Ideals are interventionist deities who actively challenge those who hold to their ideals to be better at what their chosen field is. But they're not -good- deities. So they challenge Evil Warriors to be more violent just as often as Good Warriors to be more protective.
And the last 3 gods of the pantheon are Manifest deities. They do not live in our world, do not touch it directly, anymore. They work through mortal agents like your standard deities.
But Clerics of the Pantheon, as well as Paladins and others who hold a divine spark, have an abject and palpable -aura- of Divinity around them which cannot be hidden. So it is very hard to be a full on atheist in the setting. Antitheist, yes. But the gods are real and you can feel their presence...
Also there are other gods... But they're mostly worshipped by cults because the Imperial Conquest of Iobaria resulted in local and subcultural religions being intentionally destroyed, by and large. But there's still a few out there... weakened by lack of worship. Or finding worship in -other- places.
In my current setting, the Ashen Lands, deities are kind of... mixed.
6 of the primary pantheon deities are gods in identification only. They have no form, no identity, no personality, no name. They're gods of Crisis that you turn to when you're in trouble and they offer comfort through their presence, which is so diffuse as to be in -every- church and temple whenever you need them. And when I say "Comfort" I literally mean that walking into the temple of The Unloved makes every person feel emotionally swaddled and cared for, doted upon and held. The presence of the Unloved is -tangible-, even for nonbelievers.
Three of them, however, are Ideals. Champions. They don't have specific names because they walk among mortals in a thousand different forms in a thousand different lives. The Warrior, for example, may be -any- warrior, soldier, or guard you meet. They could be possessed by his presence, or him in an assumed form. The Ideals are interventionist deities who actively challenge those who hold to their ideals to be better at what their chosen field is. But they're not -good- deities. So they challenge Evil Warriors to be more violent just as often as Good Warriors to be more protective.
And the last 3 gods of the pantheon are Manifest deities. They do not live in our world, do not touch it directly, anymore. They work through mortal agents like your standard deities.
But Clerics of the Pantheon, as well as Paladins and others who hold a divine spark, have an abject and palpable -aura- of Divinity around them which cannot be hidden. So it is very hard to be a full on atheist in the setting. Antitheist, yes. But the gods are real and you can feel their presence...
Also there are other gods... But they're mostly worshipped by cults because the Imperial Conquest of Iobaria resulted in local and subcultural religions being intentionally destroyed, by and large. But there's still a few out there... weakened by lack of worship. Or finding worship in -other- places.
In most of my D&D campaigns, it is not clear to PCs or the mortal world in general whether the gods exist. I don't use a cosmology in which mortal magics can reach whatever home the gods have.
So, the mortals don't know if the goods are meddling or not.
Bitbrain
Lost in Dark Sun
In my Eberron games, the gods (Sovereign Host and Dark Six) are so aloof as to be non-entities. Gazing into the light of the Silver Flame will make you feel happy, increase your ability to empathize with others, and possibly grant you visions of the future, but it doesn’t exactly speak directly to you.
In my Dark Sun games, the gods were defeated and banished forever by the elemental spirits. The elementals themselves are quite involved in affairs on Athas, but (individually) their influence is more regional and localized, rather than omnipresent.
If I were to run a game in Mystara, I’d probably have the Immortals get involved in the campaign only as NPCs. They might help or oppose the party, but only while disguised as either regular mortals or unique monstrous creatures.
If I were to run a game in Dragonlance... I would probably have the gods feel like something almost out of cosmic horror.
As if it wasn’t enough that the various settlements each have to fight off a Dragon-Army that wants to enslave them in service to the “Ancient Gods of Evil”, they also have to deal with the fact that entire sections of their population have apparently gone insane, seemingly the victims of some sort of mass delusion.
Oh sure, the ones that apparently worship the so-called “Ancient Gods of Good” are stable enough. Yeah, it gets a little annoying to hear them invoke their chosen deity constantly, but at least they’re contributing to fight against the Dragon-Armies. Not like the ones that worship the “Ancient Gods of Neutrality” and seem more interested in doing things for gits and shiggles than anything else.
In my Dark Sun games, the gods were defeated and banished forever by the elemental spirits. The elementals themselves are quite involved in affairs on Athas, but (individually) their influence is more regional and localized, rather than omnipresent.
If I were to run a game in Mystara, I’d probably have the Immortals get involved in the campaign only as NPCs. They might help or oppose the party, but only while disguised as either regular mortals or unique monstrous creatures.
If I were to run a game in Dragonlance... I would probably have the gods feel like something almost out of cosmic horror.
As if it wasn’t enough that the various settlements each have to fight off a Dragon-Army that wants to enslave them in service to the “Ancient Gods of Evil”, they also have to deal with the fact that entire sections of their population have apparently gone insane, seemingly the victims of some sort of mass delusion.
Oh sure, the ones that apparently worship the so-called “Ancient Gods of Good” are stable enough. Yeah, it gets a little annoying to hear them invoke their chosen deity constantly, but at least they’re contributing to fight against the Dragon-Armies. Not like the ones that worship the “Ancient Gods of Neutrality” and seem more interested in doing things for gits and shiggles than anything else.
Last edited:
Oofta
Legend
I have my own campaign world, the region most campaigns take place in is dominated by mythology loosely based on Norse mythology + demi-human deities from Greyhawk.
The gods are sort of active, the PCs may be given visions or signs. Perhaps visited or assisted by an intermediary valkyrie. In a previous campaign, a war between the gods caused great destruction in the real world.
On the other hand, no one has ever or will ever see an actual god. I limit plane shift, you can't just pop into Valhalla to have lunch with Odin. In many ways, the gods are more interested in their own internal conflicts than the lives of mortals, the lower level servants are more likely to directly interfere. Odin for example is consumed by thoughts of the oncoming end war Ragnarok and some people believe he stirs up war between nations so that he will have more einherjar (spirits of warriors who die in battle) for the war.
So the gods are kind of like distant politicians that say things people want to hear but really pursue their own desires. If you happen to be a useful tool, so be it.
The gods are sort of active, the PCs may be given visions or signs. Perhaps visited or assisted by an intermediary valkyrie. In a previous campaign, a war between the gods caused great destruction in the real world.
On the other hand, no one has ever or will ever see an actual god. I limit plane shift, you can't just pop into Valhalla to have lunch with Odin. In many ways, the gods are more interested in their own internal conflicts than the lives of mortals, the lower level servants are more likely to directly interfere. Odin for example is consumed by thoughts of the oncoming end war Ragnarok and some people believe he stirs up war between nations so that he will have more einherjar (spirits of warriors who die in battle) for the war.
So the gods are kind of like distant politicians that say things people want to hear but really pursue their own desires. If you happen to be a useful tool, so be it.
Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Depends on the god. The celestial gods are distant, though their worshippers see their influence all over the place. The elven gods reside in the Faewild and basically have no interest in the material world. The elder dragons undeniably exist in the world, though many believe their worshippers fools who mistake powerful dragons for gods.
el-remmen
Moderator Emeritus
In my current homebrew setting, I guess "aloof" covers it.
Essentially, currently characters of any alignment can worship (or even be clerics!) of any god. There is no losing powers for not following an ethos or whatever, that is for mortal churches to work out among themselves (causing splinter groups, internecine war, excommunications, executions, re-education, etc). What that means about the gods themselves I have not figured out yet and may not bother figuring out. It being an unknowable mystery is kind of the point.
Essentially, currently characters of any alignment can worship (or even be clerics!) of any god. There is no losing powers for not following an ethos or whatever, that is for mortal churches to work out among themselves (causing splinter groups, internecine war, excommunications, executions, re-education, etc). What that means about the gods themselves I have not figured out yet and may not bother figuring out. It being an unknowable mystery is kind of the point.
ccs
41st lv DM
They're there. They're important culturally & as the source of power for certain followers (clerics, paladins, etc). I suppose they're technically NPCS.....
And of course there's all sorts of myths & tales of them directly interacting in mortal affairs.
But in reality? Playwise? The closest interactions players have ever had with any is: on the other end of assorted divinations, now & then a true herald of some type might be encountered, and on occasion when it's necessary to strip a truly wayward paladin (even in 5e) of thier powers.
I've never yet run anything where the gods actually come down & stomp around the Realms like divine kaigou.
Or where the players directly interact with these beings.
Probably never will.
And of course there's all sorts of myths & tales of them directly interacting in mortal affairs.
But in reality? Playwise? The closest interactions players have ever had with any is: on the other end of assorted divinations, now & then a true herald of some type might be encountered, and on occasion when it's necessary to strip a truly wayward paladin (even in 5e) of thier powers.
I've never yet run anything where the gods actually come down & stomp around the Realms like divine kaigou.
Or where the players directly interact with these beings.
Probably never will.
Similar Threads
