D&D General where did the gods come from?

[Maxperson]

where they born from belief, or did they always exist?

In my game they are born from and survive by belief. Except for the overgods like Ao.

 

[cbwjm]

In my versions of things for my homebrew, I ended up making two assertions. 1) There are other beings of equal power to Gods, that are not Gods. This covers fiendish entities, archomentals, Great Old Ones, The Fey Queens, ect. Beings who are traditionally enemies or equals to the gods. 2) Gods are connected to communities.

I did something similar in my homebrew, though arranging things differently. I have the gods at the top (CR30+, Immortals who gathered the cornerstones of reality to ascend to godhood), they stopped a war between Primordials (CR30, elementals), Titans (CR30, Siblings of the gods who sought their own source of power), and Dragon Elders (CR 30). These 3 groups are generally the only ones able to truly challenge the gods. I use CR as just a general ranking of power, I don't actually create stats for all of them.

 

[jgsugden]

In my setting:

Ao (the Universe) created the Positive (the Light) and Negative (the Dark) Energy Planes. These can be worshipped like Gods, but are not beings in a practical sense. However, the collision between the Light and Dark did spawn Bahamut, Tiamat and Vorel, the first three beings (the Prime Gods). They battled and the debris from their fights created the matter of the universe. In that matter spawned Primordials, Dragons and Giants. Those beings founded cultures and some of them discovered places of power and rose up as the first 12 Greater Gods. They in turn created other Gods to serve them, as well as Angels, Dwarves and Elves as Servants.

These Gods eventually discovered that giving mortal beings free will and having them worship you also gave you power, so the Gods created their own varities of mortals and the 'Worship Arms Race' was on. Some beings, such as Fey Lords and Archfiends, used contracts as an alternative to faith to gain power.

Then, the Far Realms collided with the Known Universe, shattering it. This created the Transitive Planes, allowed access to the Elder Gods, and twisted many creatures into Aberrations and Demons.

 

[Chaosmancer]

have you considered worship is to try to get the god to do something as from what we can gather that is a popular reason to pray so it likely comes up?

Sure, that is a reason why people may worship Gods. But that doesn't explain why Gods would actively seek worshipers or welcome conversions. In fact, converting someone to their religion would be the worst thing, because that is more people who just are going to be spending their time begging for help.

If this was the only reason, then the Gods would despise worshipers, because their only relationship would be "that guy who keeps trying to convince me to help him, every. single. day." It doesn't fit the relationship we generally see.

look if a god stops being a god because people no longer believe in them then they are closer to nation or ideas which only works from a materialist point of view in a setting with non-objective gods, as it kind of takes the divine and mystical if we can kill them by removing all their followers.

You are using a lot of jargon that I have no idea what you mean by. What is a non-objective god? How is it that "gods need to eat Faith energy" only works from a materialist point of view, whatever that is? How does it take anything divine or mystical out of the equation?

And again, sure, there is the theory that under this set-up you can kill the God by killing every single person who believes in them. And again, do you know how many times people have tried that? It really is like a nation, if all you have to do to kill a nation is kill every single person who declares allegiance to that nation, then quite frankly that nation will never die, because it is an impossible task. Especially since God's are active and intelligent forces, not passive ideas that cannot react to their own self-interest. You are literally talking about killing an idea (considered impossible) while that idea can actively seek its own survival. It is an "in theory" sort of proposal, not something that can actually be accomplished.

I suspect it was partly invented to have gods depend on worship because people could not figure out why they would care about us non-maliciously.

Literally the problem I'm bringing up....

 

[Chaosmancer]

I did something similar in my homebrew, though arranging things differently. I have the gods at the top (CR30+, Immortals who gathered the cornerstones of reality to ascend to godhood), they stopped a war between Primordials (CR30, elementals), Titans (CR30, Siblings of the gods who sought their own source of power), and Dragon Elders (CR 30). These 3 groups are generally the only ones able to truly challenge the gods. I use CR as just a general ranking of power, I don't actually create stats for all of them.

Oh, I've never bothered to create stats for anything at this power level. The closest I got was making a stat-block for a portion of the power of a GOO I call the Deep Father. It was fought in an ancient rite, and could only match the power of the PCs due to the laws of the rite it invoked. Its plan involved throwing a moon at the planet, and it is a moon sized Beholder/Aboleth mixed style creature.

Once you get to the level of power mentioned here, it is really practically impossible to be killed by mundane means. And I include things like being stabbed by legendary weapons as "mundane" for these beings.

 

[Scribe]

In my setting:

Ao (the Universe) created the Positive (the Light) and Negative (the Dark) Energy Planes. These can be worshipped like Gods, but are not beings in a practical sense. However, the collision between the Light and Dark did spawn Bahamut, Tiamat and Vorel, the first three beings (the Prime Gods). They battled and the debris from their fights created the matter of the universe. In that matter spawned Primordials, Dragons and Giants. Those beings founded cultures and some of them discovered places of power and rose up as the first 12 Greater Gods. They in turn created other Gods to serve them, as well as Angels, Dwarves and Elves as Servants.

These Gods eventually discovered that giving mortal beings free will and having them worship you also gave you power, so the Gods created their own varities of mortals and the 'Worship Arms Race' was on. Some beings, such as Fey Lords and Archfiends, used contracts as an alternative to faith to gain power.

Then, the Far Realms collided with the Known Universe, shattering it. This created the Transitive Planes, allowed access to the Elder Gods, and twisted many creatures into Aberrations and Demons.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

Licensed god factories, imagined into being by an obscure entity said to be from another cosmos. Each god or goddess must be made according to exacting specifications, assigned a unique purpose, and stamped with an individual serial number. Failure to comply may result in revocation of DMing privileges.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

More on point, I don't use any consistent method in any of my game worlds. Some are born from cosmic forces, some arise from worship, some ascend to godhood from a variety of immortal or mortal races. Some are born to other gods. Sometimes particular events just cause them to form. Sometimes they can even be deliberately constructed by non-gods. I use whatever I feel best suits the story I'm trying to create.

I DO like the idea of worship affecting divine power; but I don't want to be bound exclusively by it. Also like the idea of prevalence of a particular "god or portfolio theme" affecting god power. So - the more murder is committed, the more powerful the Goddess of Murder becomes. The more storms there are, the more powerful the God of Storms becomes.

 

[Voadam]

where they born from belief, or did they always exist?

In most mythologies neither, they have specific non-belief origins. Zeus has parents. There was a time before Zeus. He was not created from belief.

Some cosmologies have an eternal god(s) who always existed. The Endless from the Sandman comics/Netflix show can change and differently incarnate but are eternal aspects of the Universe.

Going with belief can work with a Mage the Ascension type cosmology where belief shapes aspects of reality. I believe Terry Pratchett's Discworld has a similar thing for its fantasy gods, though I have not read the novel dealing with the gods issue.

 

[Shiroiken]

Sure, that is a reason why people may worship Gods. But that doesn't explain why Gods would actively seek worshipers or welcome conversions. In fact, converting someone to their religion would be the worst thing, because that is more people who just are going to be spending their time begging for help.

If this was the only reason, then the Gods would despise worshipers, because their only relationship would be "that guy who keeps trying to convince me to help him, every. single. day." It doesn't fit the relationship we generally see.

This is how you get Boccob, the Uncaring from Greyhawk. He literally doesn't care at all about mortals unless they create a brand new spell or magic item (he's the Archmage of the Gods, i.e. the god of magic). His blessings are given out by underlings, because he just doesn't have time to deal with those stupid mortals

Obviously Greyhawk doesn't run under the "gods need mortals" philosophy, as it predates the Time of Troubles. IMO, I felt this philosophy made sense in the Realms, because it was a punishment for the gods frivolity and direct interference. Outside of the Realms... not so much. In Dragonlance the gods were completely forgotten, but that didn't diminish their power in the slightest on they "returned."