Deity Ranks: Quasideities, Lesser Deities, Greater Deities

[Sword of Spirit]

It's also best to remember there are only two types of True God now.

Lesser Gods. Who can be interacted with and dwell in the Planes.
Greater Gods. Who are a level above that and can only be interacted with via their avatars.

The DMG lies. (Or else every supplement since then does.) Volo's Guide to Monsters page 199 contradicts it when it talks about a Demigod as an actual god. And this isn't the only place it does that either. There are other 5e sources that refer to Demigods with actual divine power, not just a divine parent (usually with no indication they were "half-god", but instead treating them just like 2e-3e demigods). If I had all 5e content in a searchable database I could look up "demigod" and find at least 2 or 3 sources other than Volo's Guide that contradict the DMG and seem to present the view I'm attributing to the non-DMG source. If I didn't have other things to do, I'd page through all of the books to locate them. I paid great attention to them when I was first reading the materials, and am well aware of their existence.

 

[Yaarel]

Gods: epic ranks 1-4; demigods (1), lesser gods (2), intermediate gods (3), greater gods (4)
Archfiends: epic ranks 1-3
Archfey: epic ranks 1-3
Primordials: epic ranks 3-6
Archmentals: epic ranks 1-2
Celestials (archcelestials?): epic ranks 0-3
Dragons: epic ranks 0-2 (with tiamat and bahamut being rank 3 or 4)
Titans: epic ranks 1-3
etc.

‘gods’ → archcelestials

 

[gyor]

‘gods’ → archcelestials

What about nuetral and evil gods?

 

[dave2008]

‘gods’ → archcelestials

I was think more along the the lines of Talisid and his Companions, and entities of similar stature

 

[Staffan]

Divine ranks was a bit of an issue between 1e and 2e.

In 1e's Deities & Demigods, gods were ranked as demigods, lesser gods, or greater gods. As a PC, the main difference between them was what level of spells they could grant (demigods up to 5th, lesser up to 6th, and only greater gods could grant 7th level spells - clerics couldn't go higher than 7th back then). Each pantheon had a smattering of gods at each rank - for example, the Greek pantheon listed Zeus, Aphrodite, Apollo, Ares, Athena, Dionysus, Hades, Hera, Hermes, and Poseidon as greater gods.

Then in 2e you got Legends & Lore, where someone decided that the rank of Greater god should be reserved for the real bigwigs, mainly the heads of the pantheons. But a rank was still needed to distinguish the other "senior" deities from beings like Pan, Tyche, or Hephaestus. So the rank of Intermediate deity was introduced, and in the Greek pantheon only Zeus and Hera (plus some of their titan precursors) kept the rank of Greater god, with the rest "demoted" to Intermediate. So Intermediate basically means "powerful enough to have strong independence, but not the head of the pantheon or a creator-type". Notably for PCs, Intermediate deities could still grant 7th level cleric spells.

But of course, along came Forgotten Realms to blur the issue. Back in 1e, the Faerûnean pantheon mostly stuck with the example set by D&DG: plenty of Greater gods along with a smattering of Lesser and Demigods. In the first 2e description of the pantheon, Forgotten Realms Adventures, those descriptions mostly stuck (probably because FRA preceded Legends & Lore so the Intermediate designation didn't exist yet). But by the time of the 2e FR box set, and particularly by the time of Faiths & Avatars, Intermediate gods were definitely a thing.

Except: unlike most real-world pantheons, there's no boss in the FR pantheon. Well, there's Ao, but they are primarily the god of gods, and don't listen to mortal prayer. So while there are certainly the occasional hierarchies in FR's pantheon (e.g. Tyr being the boss of Torm, or Mystra the boss of Azuth), there's no over-all leader. So who gets to stay a Greater god, and who gets demoted to Intermediate?

Well, turns out that in FR they did it the other way around instead. All the Greater gods kept being Greater, and all (or at least almost all) the gods below got promotions - Lessers became Intermediate, and many (but not all) Demigods became Lesser gods. Oh, and in FR all the gods can grant 7th level spells - the Red Knight may have a significantly smaller amount of power than Tempus, but she also has far fewer clergy to supply.

So that's why FR's divine power structure is wonky compared to other pantheons, and why there's disagreement between sources on which god belongs where. Well, that and the fact that the FR pantheon is an ongoing soap opera that has served as plot in way too many novels.

 

[Shiroiken]

One of the differences between deities and other Cosmic beings is deities, even quasideities, gain power from being worship. Demogorgon has uses for Worshippers, it may even feed his ego, but Demigorgon does not gain power from the worship itself and it won't make him a God, an Empyrean on the other hand might not be as powerful as the Prince of Demons, but does gain power from being worshipped which if it grows large enough can become lesser gods.

The question becomes "why." WHY do certain being gain power from worshipers, but not others? It's an arbitrary reasoning, one that (as far as I can tell) came about because of the Time of Troubles in the Realms (which only then limited the god's power to be based on worship).

 

[gyor]

Divine ranks was a bit of an issue between 1e and 2e.

In 1e's Deities & Demigods, gods were ranked as demigods, lesser gods, or greater gods. As a PC, the main difference between them was what level of spells they could grant (demigods up to 5th, lesser up to 6th, and only greater gods could grant 7th level spells - clerics couldn't go higher than 7th back then). Each pantheon had a smattering of gods at each rank - for example, the Greek pantheon listed Zeus, Aphrodite, Apollo, Ares, Athena, Dionysus, Hades, Hera, Hermes, and Poseidon as greater gods.

Then in 2e you got Legends & Lore, where someone decided that the rank of Greater god should be reserved for the real bigwigs, mainly the heads of the pantheons. But a rank was still needed to distinguish the other "senior" deities from beings like Pan, Tyche, or Hephaestus. So the rank of Intermediate deity was introduced, and in the Greek pantheon only Zeus and Hera (plus some of their titan precursors) kept the rank of Greater god, with the rest "demoted" to Intermediate. So Intermediate basically means "powerful enough to have strong independence, but not the head of the pantheon or a creator-type". Notably for PCs, Intermediate deities could still grant 7th level cleric spells.

But of course, along came Forgotten Realms to blur the issue. Back in 1e, the Faerûnean pantheon mostly stuck with the example set by D&DG: plenty of Greater gods along with a smattering of Lesser and Demigods. In the first 2e description of the pantheon, Forgotten Realms Adventures, those descriptions mostly stuck (probably because FRA preceded Legends & Lore so the Intermediate designation didn't exist yet). But by the time of the 2e FR box set, and particularly by the time of Faiths & Avatars, Intermediate gods were definitely a thing.

Except: unlike most real-world pantheons, there's no boss in the FR pantheon. Well, there's Ao, but they are primarily the god of gods, and don't listen to mortal prayer. So while there are certainly the occasional hierarchies in FR's pantheon (e.g. Tyr being the boss of Torm, or Mystra the boss of Azuth), there's no over-all leader. So who gets to stay a Greater god, and who gets demoted to Intermediate?

Well, turns out that in FR they did it the other way around instead. All the Greater gods kept being Greater, and all (or at least almost all) the gods below got promotions - Lessers became Intermediate, and many (but not all) Demigods became Lesser gods. Oh, and in FR all the gods can grant 7th level spells - the Red Knight may have a significantly smaller amount of power than Tempus, but she also has far fewer clergy to supply.

So that's why FR's divine power structure is wonky compared to other pantheons, and why there's disagreement between sources on which god belongs where. Well, that and the fact that the FR pantheon is an ongoing soap opera that has served as plot in way too many novels.

The reason the Faerun Pantheon is the way it is, is because its actually a bunch of Pantheons that got merged as the continient of Faerun became more Cosmopololitian.

So the Netherese Pantheon, Merged with the Talfar Pantheon, which merged with the Jhaamdath Pantheon, and so on, with various Gods being forgotten along the way, plus other deities immigrated to Faerun.

So instead of a Single Greater God or a Dualopy of Greater Gods, you have a Council of Greater Gods, which rules very losely over the rest of the Pantheon and that Council answers to AO.

Of course the Faerun Pantheon is not the only Pantheon in FR, there are the the Seldarine Pantheon, Dark Seldarine Pantheon, Gnomish Pantheon, Halfling Pantheon, the Draconic Pantheon, Giant Pantheon, Gobliniod Pantheon, Dwarf Pantheon, Fey Pantheon, Scaly One Pantheon, Orc Pantheon, Individual Monster Gods, Untherite Pantheon, Mulhorand Pantheon, Celestial Buracracy, Zakharan Enlightened Gods, Ubtao of Chult, Maztican Pantheon (does the Cat Lord count as a part of the Maztican Pantheon or have all the Beast Lords become Gods?), Lords of Creation from Maltra (sort of quasi Vedic Pantheon), Duergar Pantheons, but most of these only have one or two Greater Gods, or even no Greater Gods and others are unknown.

 

[gyor]

The question becomes "why." WHY do certain being gain power from worshipers, but not others? It's an arbitrary reasoning, one that (as far as I can tell) came about because of the Time of Troubles in the Realms (which only then limited the god's power to be based on worship).

The IC reason is that to gain power from being worshipped one requires, a divine spark, godhood basically, which is the source of a Gods divine power. Greater Gods Divine Spark is well fed and the most powerful, a Demigods the weakest, too weak to grant spells to Clerics, or usually to hear prayers, but still strong enough to grant them some Divine Abilities including Immortality. Everyone Else, Lesser Gods, Titans, Vestiages are all some where inbetween.

 

[cbwjm]

I never really liked the worshipper requirement that came about from FR. It seemed to be a core concept of planescape as well. Lose your worshippers and end up as a floating corpse in the Astral.

 

[gyor]

https://youtu.be/W50q_rOmwoE

This lore you should know refers to this section of the DMG is in the third act.[video=youtube_share;W50q_rOmwoE]https://youtu.be/W50q_rOmwoE[/video]