D&D General The Role and Purpose of Evil Gods

[Maxperson]

No, my response rather perfectly followed what you were saying. You seemed to be upset that somehow a conversation you were having with me originated with me discussing with Helldritch.

Completely wrong, which would prove pretty definitively that you did not perfectly follow what I said. I was in fact not upset that the conversation started between you and @Helldritch. Where the conversation started had nothing to do with what I said to you.

But they aren't homebrew either, so clearly the game was designed to allow for it to happen.

If you opt in, sure. Since optional rules are not the default, they cannot be assumed to be in play during discussions about the game. They are by definition out of play, since the default does not include them.

Who is providing the divine spells of the Cult Fanatic NPC? Cultists are specifically listed in DnD 5e, in the MM on PG 345 as worshipping Elemental Princes, Demon Lords or Archdevils. Yet, they have clerical spells.

By RAW clerics require a god. I think it's a shame that they removed the ability to follow an ideal, but that seems to be gone.

"Clerics are intermediaries between the mortal world and the distant planes of the gods."

You weren't referencing anything religious. Also, since we might as well, go full on definitions

Some followers are religious. Many are not. Especially when it comes to fiends. Let me ask you this. Kim Kardashian has 228 million followers on Instagram. How many of those do you estimate worship her?

One of us might be moving goalposts, but I don't think its me.

That's the problem.

Then they could have written it for all of them.

That would have been........................................redundant

Published. I've gone through lists before, there aren't thousands published.

There aren't hundreds published, either. At least not official D&D ones. No idea how many third party archfiends there are.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

And, as has been discussed repeatedly, "what they bring to the game" doesn't seem to be anything that can't be achieved by an Archfiend. Same with "what role do they play".

It devolved into rules, because people began claiming that the rules prevented archfiends from doing certain things, which we then have found examples of them doing.

Now, we discuss the "intellectual question" as you put it, but I don't see anything that an evil god can bring to the table that an archfiend can't, especially if we open up to discussing homebrew ideas.

Not at all disagreeing with you. I agree with @pemerton making the same point as well. Actually this is one of the reasons I kind of liked 4e's spin on devils. Its very trad (they are 'fallen' angels) and they are very much a part of the divine hierarchy, with Asmodeus being indisputably a god (though 4e's take on what it means to be a god may or may not be somewhat different from 5e's in some ways, you can kind of spin that how you want).

 

[Faolyn]

If you have an opinion on what the books say, and you think that that opinion contradicts what I see the books saying, then we can discuss it.

If you want to hop in and say "well, nothing in the books says anything, but you could make up this" when we are trying to discuss what the books say, well, that is an interesting idea, but it is just as irrelevant as bringing up Michael Jordan.

Is Michael Jordan a D&D god or arch-thing? No? He has nothing to do with D&D. However, discussing different ways to use and understand D&D gods, including completely homebrew ideas, is totally relevant.

I'm not super familiar with all of the details. I do think that there was a God who ended up with Winter and Death, which are complimentary, but they very much got them because that was available at the time.

So, maybe two times a god has claimed another portfolio, and in this case, it wasn't one like "Truth" that had nothing to do with its previous portfolio; rather, it was one that was complimentary to its own.

But frankly, as much as we talk about the portfolios changing hands, it actually is a fairly rare event. Because there aren't any free portfolios.

So actually the gods don't squabble over the "constantly," like you said.

And new gods have "appeared" in the Realms often--by which I mean, the writers came up with them and inserted them into a book or adventure or novel. Those new gods each had portfolios which were new to the Realms. So the portfolios exist. You aren't aware of them until some god is written for them. It's not like there's a list of portfolios you get to cross off when you assign one.

No exception was made for being of a different pantheon, in fact, with references to Overgods, it could be assumed that this is interpantheonic and applies to all pantheons. So ,being a goddess of specific pantheon had nothing to do with the claim.

So, we have a being who has "Magic needs to always be balanced"/"Knowledge above all" and "Magic used to gain power"/"Necromancy". If this is the cosmic order, which it would have been before Vecna ascended, then Vecna suddenly having "The secrets of magic" as part of his deal seems to me that he had to take it from those areas.

Again, show that this is the case. You are claiming that portfolios aren't just laying around for the taking. Show that Vecna stole or was granted the portfolio "secrets of magic" from some other god.

That would change the cosmic balance. This would disprove the assertion that the Gods maintain the cosmic balance and that ascended mortals never change the cosmic balance. Which was the assertion I was arguing against.

Show us the cosmic balance. Then, show us that when, a mortal ascends, it unbalances the cosmos. Unless you have some source I don't know about, you have no idea how much is needed to unbalance the cosmos. Prove that the ascension of a mortal will change its balance, especially to the point that other people (possibly including mortals) will even notice.

For all you know, it may take two, ten, hundreds, maybe thousands of mortals ascending to godhood to change the cosmic balance--if the cosmic balance can even be changed in this manner. And maybe it can't. The third layer of Arcadia was, thanks to the Harmonium, changed from Lawful Neutral Good (or possibly LGN) to Lawful Neutral and got sucked out of Arcadia and became a cog in Mechanus--and the balance of the cosmos remained unchanged. Sure, people got really pissed at the Harmonium and worried about what would happen if things got worse, but the Great Wheel keeps chugging along. At least until 4th edition, but it's back in shape now.

Ravenloft, once a demiplane in the Ethereal, got moved to the Shadowfell. The paraelemental and quasilemental planes got turned into a single unit, the Elemental Chaos. Entire new Material Planes come into existence, not only with the creation of each new setting but with the start of each new game. The cosmos contains an infinite number of infinite layers. But the Great Wheel keeps chugging.

One mortal becoming a god is literally nothing in comparison to that.

I don't care if it isn't the most interesting way to you to have this discussion, it is the discussion we are having.

I wasn't talking about the discussion we're having. I was talking about creating gods and sticking them in the pantheon, and you insisted that it has to be done by determining their role and purpose first ("you're doing it backwards," which is literally the same as "you're doing it wrong.") and then only using them if they're "necessary" (i.e., if you're using them when they're not necessary, you're doing it wrong").

Not "I personally think it should be done role/purpose first." Instead, you outright said I was doing it wrong because I wasn't doing it your way.

Nothing.

Now, right here and right now, tell me where I have ever said that people can't have redundant gods? Even if you find one example, I've stated a half dozen times in the past two days that people can do whatever they want, my entire argument is just to show that they are redundant.

Pretty much everything you've said has been against having redundant gods. Even the bit you misunderstood above was you saying that having redundant gods was unnecessary.

So, if you don't care if redundant gods exist, and you don't care that people have them in their games, then what's your purpose in harping on their redundancy? Are you simply not going to be happy until everyone participating in this thread says "Yes! These gods are redundant!"

What preferences? Maxperson and Helldritch are arguing that their answers are right via Canon. Max has multiple times written "RULES" to prove that he is correct and that anything that goes against what he is saying is wrong according THE RULES (his emphasis). You seem to have missed this, and that is why this conversation with you is so frustrating, because you keep yelling at me for attacking preferences, when I'm arguing points that are being claimed to be official canon, not preferences.

I'm pretty sure that they've both either posted quotes from books that support their stance, or that other people have posted those quotes. In other words, their RULES have textural support. As opposed to your "it stands to reason" claims.

I mean, the gods of Greyhawk and the gods of the Realms work differently--there's no Ao telling the Greyhawk gods they can't have two gods with the same portfolio--and you're treating them like they're the same!

In the absence of "magical secrets" (which is the state before Vecna becomes a god) do you honestly think it makes logical sense that "Magical Knowledge" doesn't include secrets of magic? The entire idea of magic is that it is unknown and secretive.

Again, you want to focus on personality, but that has nothing to do with anything being claimed.

Personality has everything to do with the gods. Its why you have war gods that are good, evil, lawful, chaotic, and neutral.

And yes, Boccob, like probably all other D&D gods, is not omniscient. His goal is to learn all that there is to know about magic. This means that his knowledge is incomplete. That's where Vecna steps in. His goal is to obfuscate information about magic and other things. Boccob uncovers magical knowledge where he can, makes it so others can learn it. Vecna hides magical knowledge where he can.

First, I'm not sure how the dozens of examples, book quotes and ect quoted by myself, Pemerton and others somehow isn't evidence. Would you mind explaining why you can dismiss all of that while accepted the same sort of evidence from Max and others?

Because honestly, your sources have mostly been pretty weak, along the lines of "hah, the archfiends grant 7th-level spells back in 1e, therefore they're just like gods!" (I literally do not care if they also granted 9th-level spells in 3e.)

Secondly, it isn't that hard to understand. Max is a person who believes in the ultimate an unquestioned authority of the DM to change literally anything. He is of course going to say that any DM can change canon if they feel like it. Meanwhile, he will also continue pointing out that he has the canon answer, and that he is following it, and supported by the books. Just because he isn't saying people must be bound by his answer doesn't mean he isn't arguing Canon.

Yes? I don't see the issues here. Just because he has a canon answer that he's following doesn't mean that he's wrong when he says DMs can change anything they like, or that he isn't arguing canon. I fail to see the problem here.

Back when Heironeous was conceived, before St. Cuthbert,

According to this, Cuthbert was first mentioned in The Dragon #2, in '76, whereas Heironeous didn't appear into Dragon #67, in '82.

Paladins would lose all of their powers if they lied. They were no longer paladins. So, a more accurate comparison rather than the god and food and ranches, would be the god of food and Calories. Because just like without honesty you are not a paladin, without some number of calories, you aren't food.

Nope. Because Caoimhin still isn't the god of calories. He's the god of food. And that's just moving the goalposts. Honesty was an aspect of being a paladin, but not the only one. And the fact that Boccob and Cuthbert both share honesty doesn't mean one is stepping on the other's toes. It just means they have a trait in common.

And since the question at hand is "Did Cuthbert's apotheosis into a god alter the cosmic balance" not "who is more powerful" again, it has no relevance to the point.

Well, Gygax strongly hinted that Cuthbert got apotheosed here on Earth and then went to Oerth, so if there was any sort of alteration to any cosmic balance, it wouldn't be on Greyhawk. Because he was already a god when he arrived.

I "complain" when people either

A) Completely ignore the discussion to begin making wild tangents
B) Claim my position is wrong, and provide textual evidence to try and prove their answer canonically correct.

So, you get annoyed that the conversation isn't 100% focused on what you want it to be, and when people use facts to back up their assertions. So you want people to pay attention to you and only you, and to believe everything you say without question or opinion of their own.

Oh-kay....

So you are literally saying that there is no reason to actually try to communicate with you, unless it's to, what, to tell you that you're right?

 

[pemerton]

I completely agree with that point. That is different though than saying D&D texts have never made a clear distinction. As I said before "This has varied across time and source and edition."


And 2e D&D also has the Guide to Hell which says the archdevils do not grant cleric spells.

Page 37: "The Lords of the Nine are devils of incredible power. While many gods have a domain to rule, each lord has an entire layer of Hell under his or her command. Despite this power and prestige, the lords are not gods-at least, the lords of the first eight layers are not. Asmodeus is a special case; he is dealt with at the end of this chapter. For the purpose of the following discussion, ”the lords” refers to the lords of the first eight layers.
The nature of the lords is a topic of continued discussion throughout the planes. While they are obviously not powers in the traditional sense (after all, they have no mortal followers), they seem to have near total control over entire layers of Hell. Some scholars think it’s only a matter of time before the lords become true powers, while others think they belong to a separate category of higher power altogether. The truth is, the lords themselves don’t even know the answers to these questions. Some of them think they know, but only Asmodeus understands the true state of affairs."

The lords of the nine are the archdevils.

Page 48: "In truth, Asmodeus is a greater power, just like Jazirian. However, the Twin Serpents predate the rule of belief in the planes. They neither gain power from the adoration of mortals, nor lose it from lack of worship. They have no priests and can grant no spells."

Sure. But how is this more canonical than the scenario in City of GH boxed set? Or the cleric of Orcus in the Dead Gods module?

I mean, it's all just stuff that is being published. And what is shows is that, when the rubber hits the road - ie when authors of scenarios want cult leaders and evil high priest-types and the like - they do not hesitate to have them be clerics of Asmodeus or of Orcus, even if there is some other book published, or going to be published in the future, that tells them not to.

And who would blame them? Orcus is one of the most evocative beings conceived of across the D&D corpus. Why not put him to work! Likewise for many of the other demon princes and archdevils.

I can think of one advantage in the 3.5 PH rules for clerics though if you are not worshipping a god and your power instead actually comes from a force like Chaos and Evil. You do not risk violating the code of conduct of your god and becoming an ex-cleric:

3.5 PH page 33:

"A cleric who grossly violates the code of conduct required by his god (generally by acting in ways opposed to the god’s alignment or purposes) loses all spells and class features, except for armor and shield proficiencies and proficiency with simple weapons. He cannot thereafter gain levels as a cleric of that god until he atones (see the atonement spell description, page 201)."

In older editions (1e comes to mind) gods can be more directly involved with their clerics and even redirect what spells a cleric memorizes, either out of divine wisdom of what they will need or withholding spells as punishments for transgressions.

1e DMG page 38: "If they have not been faithful to their teachings, followed the aims of their deity, contributed freely to the cause, and otherwise acted according to the tenets of their faith, it becomes unlikely that they will receive intermediary aid unless they make proper atonement and sacrifice. There can be no question that such clerics must be absolutely exemplary in their activities, expressions, and attitudes if they dare to contact their deity directly! In the former case, where the unfaithful cleric desires third through fifth level spells, the minions (angels, demi-gods, or whatever) will be likely to require the cleric to spend 2-8 days in prayer, fasting, and contemplation of his or her transgressions, making whatever sacrifices and atonement are necessary thereafter, before freely granting those powers once again. Sacrifice and atonement will probably be left to the discretion of the cleric, and it is possible that the minions of the deity will empower him or her with spells to complete these steps, but the cleric had better do the correct thing, or face the consequences."

Well, my guess is that the number of PC clerics of Orcus who were really drawing power from the Chaos and Evil of the Abyss, and hence were protected from the "ex-cleric" rule, is pretty low. Even back in the AD&D days, I doubt that the GM enforcement provisions on p 38 of the DMG were widely used against players of evil high priests whose characters weren't being sufficiently cruel or venal!

I don't think anything meaningful changes, in the typical play experience, by supposing that the cleric of Orcus is really empowered by the Abyss without demonic mediation.

But then we come to the Deathpriest Hierophant from the 4e Monster Manual page 209:
"CULTISTS OF ORCUS ARE DEMENTED INDIVIDUALS, and this deathpriest has risen to their highest ranks. He is not a cleric, since Orcus lives in the Abyss and cannot grant divine magic to his priests." He gets three powers, an Aura of Decay, a Vision of Death, and a Word of Orcus. He does wield a mace like a cleric (or a warlock). Not sure I'd say his powers are clearly evoking 4e cleric themes over warlock ones or whether it is just monster power because monsters and NPCs are explicitly built on different rules than PCs.

The Deathpriest of Orcus on page 210 has powers of a Death's Embrace aura, an at will Ray of Black Fire, and a Dark Blessing. Also armed with a mace. The Deathpriest looks more like a 4e warlock than a cleric to me with the at will ray.

4e of course has its own lore distinctions of gods being tied to the Astral Sea and ideas and belief which are different from other editions of D&D.

Right, he's not a cleric. But he's not a warlock - there is no curse; and in 4e more generally there is no demonic pact (cf infernal pact) warlock (unless you include the dark pact), and the only extent demonic warlock I know of is Maldrick Scarmaker (who is a star pact warlock and has the curse etc).

Here's the text for Deathpriest Hierophant (p 209 of the MM):

Cultists of Orcus are demented individuals, and this deathpriest has risen to their highest ranks. He is not a cleric, since Orcus lives in the Abyss and cannot grant divine magic to his priests. Nevertheless, he is blessed with great power from his demonic master, and himself teeters on the edge between life and death. . . .

Deathpriest hierophants are among Orcus's most powerful worshippers. A few of them no the ritual to summon an aspect of Orcus. . . .

A deathpriest hierophant usually leads a cult of several under members, spread out over a large area. He appoints lesser deathpriests to lead smaller groups within the cult, and each group is usually tasked with a specific goal, such as desecrating a temple, stealing bones from a king's tomb, or poisoning a village's water supply.​

And there is (on p 210) a whole entry on Cults of Orcus above stats for Deathpriests and Crimson Acolytes. It doesn't add a great deal more that is relevant to the current discussion, other than referring to "devotees", "followers" and "worshippers", and describing blood sacrifices including the following: "His cultists . . . say that Orcus tastes the blood his worshippers drink."

None of that seems consistent to me with the notion that Orcus (and like fiends) do not have worshippers, do not empower their followers except via warlock-style pacts, etc.

The deathpriest hierophant is equipped with a censer - a clerical item if ever there was one. The deathpriest and the hierophant both wear heavy armour (mail and plate respectively) and use maces, the quintessential D&D cleric weapon. They both have aura and AoE debuffs (for the deathpriest but not the hierophant this also grants an AC buff to allies). The deathpriest also has a necrotic ray - an evil version of Lance of Faith, in effect - and the hierophant has Vision of Death, a ranged psychic attack which I think would benefit from the Fear keyword.

Both are controllers, not skirmishers; the DMG, in its discussion of NPCs, classes clerics as controllers and warlocks as skirmishers.

To me, that all speaks strongly of clerics in functional terms, even though - consistently with the 4e cosmology - they are not literally clerics because getting their power from Orcus and not a god.

Or to put it another way: if someone wanted an illustration of the difference between evil gods and their worshippers, and demon princes and their worshippers, I don't see how this part of the 4e MM would help!

 

[pemerton]

You and Permeton keeps bringing Orcus and Asmodeus and what not as omnipresent gods, yet, there not. No Orcus or Asmodeus Dragonlance which is an official campaign. Some of them are not even present in Eberron either.

I've not said anything about any settings except GH, core/default 4e, and some critical remarks about Planescape.

I don't know what you mean be omnipresent - normally that means a being who is present at all parts of the universe, which is not true of any god as presented in any D&D material, to the best of my knowledge - and I don't know what you think it tells us about any differences between archfiends and evil gods.

 

[Lanefan]

Then since they have really done nothing (and statting them out in older editions doesn't help us in 5e) I see no reason for them to be any more core than the 8 million Kami of Shinto. Or the Atua of the Polynesian people.

It's a D&D-General thread therefore older-edition material is, I think, fair game.

And why wouldn't it help you in 5e? Even if nothing else, DDG gives you some basic info about each deity and a comparision of relative power levels etc. vs each other; though if your intent is to port these deities/pantheons into 5e obviously you'd need to change the actual numbers a bit.

That said, there's a few TSR-official 2e books which are even better. Faiths and Avatars is one, and I forget the title of the other: one book deals with human pantheons and deities while the other looks at demihuman pantheons and deities.

 

[Lanefan]

Lordy lordy lordy lordy....

...

Yes, I think that is the topic at hand; but only if they're evil...

 

[Lanefan]

And this feeds into my larger point in this thread - which is not that large a point: over the history of the published materials for D&D, evil gods and archfiends have frequently been interchangeable in the roles that the play.

Agreed; which is why I simply take those major archfiends and make some of them into outright deities while the rest become just powerful immortal beings who aren't deities. Trying to make sense of the various editions' sum total of canon on this is the road to madness.

There has been no systematic difference pertaining eg to cosmological function or status; to their status as objects of worship; in whether or not they have clerics; etc.

Again, this is something that can very easily be systematized if one's willing to do a bit of homebrew thinking.

Step one: decide which of the archfiends etc. in your setting will (or are able to) support Clerics.
Step two: those who support Clerics become outright deities on par with the neutral and good deities; the rest do not.

Done.

The key is to make support of Clerics be the key (and perhaps only!) differentiating feature which makes a deity a deity instead of an immortal or something else. Mortals can worship who/whatever they like but if what they're worshipping doesn't support Clerics, it ain't a deity.

 

[Lanefan]

But frankly, as much as we talk about the portfolios changing hands, it actually is a fairly rare event. Because there aren't any free portfolios.

The claim was made, since you seem to keep losing sight of this, that the ascended mortals don't disrupt the cosmic balance because they take portfolio's that no one was holding.

Personally, I have no problem with the idea of a Deity Without Portfolio.

 

[pemerton]

At best you and @pemerton have found a few things that bring the lines closer together, but the fact remains that in most editions, the rules say that archfiends cannot grant spells unless the DM changes it. I'm really not sure why you think that finding a very few examples of such changes in adventures and such think that it means that archfiend = god in all ways. The rules are clear that they are not the same, even if they have similarities. Even Pemerton is only arguing that those examples blur the lines.

The RULE is that they don't grant spells. Optional rules are the equivalent of homebrew/house rules. Those don't apply to the default of the game, which is that archfiends do not grant spells. I'm not sure why you so obstinately want to ignore the explicit rules.

There is no such rule in AD&D materials up to and including the original MotP. There was no such rule in early AD&D 2nd ed, when the Greyhawk City boxed set was published. There is no such rule in 4e D&D.

Those are not trivial portions of the history of published D&D material.

And the only rules that I've been pointed to are in sourcebooks like Fiendish Codex, BoVd, and Guide to the Hells, none of which I have reason to think are more authoritative than (say) the Sahuagin entry in the original MM, or the description of the Horned Society as devil-worshippers in the original GH folio and boxed set.

The archfiends are gathering followers, not worshippers. They just want the souls. That's why book after book after book after book in edition after edition after edition all say that they have few worshippers.

Sahuagin are described as devil worshippers. Likewise the Horned Society. In the original DDG, the Ixitxachitl are described as worshipping Demogorgon. In the 4e MM, in the passages I've quoted just upthread, the terms devotee, follower and worshipper are used interchangeably in relation to Orcus and his cults.

Archdevils exist to tempt mortals and collect souls that way, as well as rule layers of Hell, which takes a lot of time and effort. They don't act like or want to be setting gods(excepting Asmodeus) and don't occupy those roles, even if you give them the same sort of portfolio.

I don't know where this is stated. Not in the AD&D MM or MM2. Not in the original DDG or MotP.

The 4e MM says this about devils (p 60):

Devils lust for the souls of mortals; each mortal spirit devils enslave undermines the gods' sway over mortalkind and adds to the Nine Hells' power. . . . Some evils seek to drive mortals into surrendering their souls through tyranny, despair, or terror; some seek to destroy the servants of the good-aligned gods and tear down their works; and still others are tempters and deceivers who inflame mortal ambitions, desire, greed, or pride.​

Here is some of the text about Nerrul in the Guide to the World of Greyhawk from the boxed set (p 72):

The dreaded Nerull is the Foe of all Good, Hater of Life, Bringer of Darkness, King of All Gloom, Reaper of Flesh. He is the deity of all those who seek greatest evil for their enjoyment and gain. . . .

Many humans of evil nature, and some humanoids as well, pay homage to Nerull. Assassins and thieves often regard this deity as patron. . . . His clerics dress in rust red or blackish-rust garments, carry staves, and somewhere bear the unholy skull and scythe symbol. . . .

The worship of Nerull is done in full darkness. The litany is ghastly, being of death and suffering. Human sacrifice is common.​

When I compare the text about Nerull to the text I quoted just upthread about Orcus, and compare both to the text about devils, I don't see any profound difference. Orcus and Nerull both have cults that involve bloody sacrifice. I'm pretty sure that the Orcus litany is as ghastly as Nerull's. And I'm sure that someone who seeks greatest evil for their enjoyment and gain might turn to a devil as much as to Nerull!

If someone wants to read in some deeper distinction between fiends and evil gods, or rely on some other published work I'm not familiar with, of course that's their prerogative. I'm just pointing out that those distinctions are not to be found in many of these D&D texts, both foundational ones like T1, GH, etc, and the original AD&D books including DDG; nor in the core books for 4e. Nor as far as I know in the core for 2nd ed AD&D or 3E either.

EDIT:

And ignoring what Hextor actually is in the process.

Hextor has no reality beyond what is published in certain texts.

Hextor in the WotG is interchangeable with various other gods (from DDG) and fiends. I know because I've done the changes/equivalences when running GH-based campaigns and it didn't matter! From p 69 of the Guide to the WoGH, "Hextor, Champion of Evil, Herald of Hell, Scourge of Battle" - he could be substituted for Bane, or treated as an archdevil, or even a demon in a campaign that is more casual about the Lower Planes, and it wouldn't change his core. His core being that (i) he has six arms and (ii) he is brother and rival of Heironeous. (I've just looked at the description on p 91 of the 3E PHB. It conforms entirely to what I've just said. And this is the sole premise for Speaker in Dreams.)