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

[Lanefan]

I was responding back to @Lanefan who said that it was a requirement that clerics follow the alignment of the gods.

I place a significant difference between Clerics and (lay followers or worshippers, same thing). Clerics are expected to follow the general ethos (expressed as alignment) of their deity, in return for the various powers they are granted by said deity. Worshippers, who don't gain such powers, are much more free to do what they like and choose who they worship.

 

[Maxperson]

Even if we accept that posit, I think then the real question is whether all cultures will necessarily have those as domains represented in their pantheons.

Like, death happens. But that doesn't mean there is a God of Death. It may be that instead the culture has a god of protection or the home or the family they turn to when they are grieving, and Death itself doesn't have a deific personification.

That's why belief is so powerful. It's not just conscious belief like the god of protection that they turn to. If they believe in death as a concept, that belief will usually an unintentionally spawn a god of death. If the culture view death as bad, that god of death will almost surely be bad as well. If they view it as a good thing(not dying, but the afterlife) like the Egyptians, you can get a good god of death like Osiris.

 

[Maxperson]

Nope. Both are war gods, Athene just had better PR.

War gods were not universally seen negatively. There can be defensive wars, and there arguably can be justified offensive wars. Granted many times historically people's justifications have been questionable, but still. Whether given war is "justified" is often debated, and flattening such complex concepts into childish dichotomies of good and evil will just make your fantasy setting less nuanced.

War has different aspects. A pantheon will often have a god that revels in battle and war, and usually that god will be evil. Wanton war is bad. That same pantheon will sometimes have gods of aspects of war, battles(not inherently evil), strategy(not necessarily evil), valor in battle(not necessarily evil) and so on. Those more limited aspects are typically weaker, being demigods and lesser gods the vast majority of the time. The more general war god is usually an intermediate or greater god. Using 3e divine rank categories.

 

[Maxperson]

The Greeks hated Ares and thought of him as a thug (and enjoyed stories that made him look like an idiot and a cuckold).

However the Romans genuinely loved Mars. He was as close as possible to a state god, especially in the early days. However I think Mars was more a patron of glorious conquest than being like the mindless violence of Ares.

That makes sense given the frequency that Rome went to war to expand the empire. It's kinda hard to view your war god as a BBEG and still want to go start a ton of wars. You're sort of obligated to see the war god in a better light in order to see yourselves in that same light.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

That makes sense given the frequency that Rome went to war to expand the empire. It's kinda hard to view your war god as a BBEG and still want to go start a ton of wars. You're sort of obligated to see the war god in a better light in order to see yourselves in that same light.

I think Mars was originally a harvest god too. Interestingly he may have acquired war as the Romans got a taste for it, since their first army was a bunch of citizen farmers conscripted to fight other Italian cities.

 

[Umbran]

If they believe in death as a concept, that belief will usually an unintentionally spawn a god of death.

That's the common narrative, sure. But asserting it doesn't make it so.

 

[Maxperson]

That's the common narrative, sure. But asserting it doesn't make it so.

For sure. That's just the default stance of D&D. Variations are encouraged by the DMG and there are lots of ways to do it.

 

[Minigiant]

For sure. That's just the default stance of D&D. Variations are encouraged by the DMG and there are lots of ways to do it.

Yup
The default stance of 5th edition D&D is that if your world has gods and mortals, the following domains exist

Death
Knowledge
Life
Light
Nature
Tempest
Trickery
War

The PHB and DMG cleric domains.

And one or more gods will claim these domains. Whether domains can be shared by gods under different aspects and whether they are Good or Evil is a DM or WB choice.

Until the DM says there isn't a god of these domains, a person is allowed to assume that at east one gods is alive and claims the Death domain.

 

[Voadam]

5e is more than a little vague and ambiguous and contradictory on the nature of gods and domains.

Domains are mostly a choice of the player to pick something related to their god with some suggested domains to be associated for a particular deity. When there is a suggested domain the PH only says for players to consider it.

"If you're playing a cleric or a character with the Acolyte background, decide which god your deity serves or served, and consider the deity's suggested domains when selecting your character's domain."

"DIVINE DOMAIN
Choose one domain related to your deity: Knowledge, Life, Light, Nature, Tempest, Trickery, or War. Each domain is detailed at the end of the class description, and each one provides examples of gods associated with it."

My reading of that is that a domain that is related to the deity in some way but not on the suggested list is still a valid cleric choice of domain RAW. If you wanted to think of Athena's strategic war aspects being a good fit for trickery that seems to work even with knowledge and war being the suggested domains for her. Domains are a PC power category that at least somewhat narratively fits the deity, not a defining aspect of the deity, in 5e.

Another reading of that could be that the DM, or even the suggested domains, determine what domains are related to a deity and so limits the PC clerical choices.

The DMG also says though that as a default "Gods Oversee the World. The gods are real and embody a variety of beliefs, with each god claiming dominion over an aspect of the world, such as war, forests, or the sea."

and that "In rules terms, clerics choose domains, not deities, so your world can associate domains with deities in any way you choose." So you can focus on the clerics choosing their domains part of that or on the DM associating domains with deities to determine the range of choices and get to different results.

Whether the gods are spawned by belief or powered by it as opposed to just embodying beliefs as a default seems undefined in 5e to me. The occasional reference like for vestiges seems to indicate that might be a mortal only perspective.

"Vestiges are deities who have lost nearly all their worshipers and are considered dead, from a mortal perspective. Esoteric rituals can sometimes contact these beings and draw on their latent power."