Diversity and Detail In Religions!

[Psion]

This is, in great part, why I was so disappointed in Deities & Demigods 3e.

The 2e FR deity books were a smash hit. Yeah they had details like avatar stats, specialty priests and so on. But they also had richly detailed description of the organization of the churches, dogma, garb, holy days, and so on.

Yet for some reason, WotC decided to ignore the success of the 2e books and go with a deific monster manual like the 1e books.

 

[Nightfall]

Well I can understand people's dislike of D&Dmg for not detailing religions, but I also think that's not the D&Dmg job. That's something up to each and every individual Dm/Gm out there. I mean will everyone have the same kind of religious order for Thor? For Heironius? I have my doubts. That's why I think GR has a winner, for me and other Gms, with Book of the Righteous. I think it will be another smash hit (like there's any other with GR? ) for helping breath life into a religion as well as giving the Dm/Gms some breathing room about HOW such things are done.

 

[ATO_DM]

I couldn't agree more. I was excited at the prospect of Deities and Demigods 3e. I was hoping it would do a lot of the work for me as far as rituals, belief systems, holy days, structures, dress style, etc. But, I think it's utter crap. Why is it necessary to quantify the powers and abilities of GODS. There is NO REASON that there should be pages and pages of deity feats. It just seems to me like D+D is just putting out books at this point, just for the sake of putting out books.

I don't want Stat Blocks on THOR and his HAMMER. He's a GOD you don't need stats, if players want to try and fight a god that's exactly what they'll do. They'll TRY and then they'll DIE.
<whew!>
<End Rant>

 

[Corinth]

That's not a universal quality. Gods can be maimed, injured and even killed by mortals in many a culture's mythology.

 

[Psion]

That's not a universal quality. Gods can be maimed, injured and even killed by mortals in many a culture's mythology.

Oh, I agree.

However, how many times are you actually going use this information? Seldom enough, I think, that a simpler system with some basic templates would have been more warranted (and more adaptable to one's particular pantheon) than an exhaustive listing of specific deities.

Information on the religions would have seen much more use. Sure, much like the deities, not everyone uses the same ones. But at least it is the sort of thing that is interesting, functional, and useful from level 1.

 

[mmadsen]

I was excited at the prospect of Deities and Demigods 3e. I was hoping it would do a lot of the work for me as far as rituals, belief systems, holy days, structures, dress style, etc. But, I think it's utter crap.

Knowing previous editions of Deities and Demigods, why would you expect anything more than a monster manual full of gods?

Why is it necessary to quantify the powers and abilities of GODS. There is NO REASON that there should be pages and pages of deity feats.

I'm not impressed with how they implemented gods, but the notion of statting them out isn't stupid. The book doesn't stat out the omnipotent God of a quasi-Christian religion; it stats out the superheroes of Greek and Norse myth. Those gods were quite human -- capricious and emotional, subject to injuries (Tyr's hand gets bit off, Baldur dies, Thor fights giants), etc. In fact, if anything, they made the gods too uniformly superhuman in ways that they weren't in the original stories -- high Wis scores, immunity to acid and poison, etc.

 

[SHARK]

Greetings!

Indeed, I think that having gods as a Christian-based omnipotent deity has many virtues, as they are *gods* after all, and in my own campaigns I rarely, if ever, have players encountering gods dirtectly. It just strikes me as strange, and unrealistic concerning divine beings, certainly of god-level. However, as mmadsen, my friend points out, the schema that gods can be integrated into the campaign doesn't have to follow such an over-powering overlay.

Having said that, though, I think including stats for gods is fine. One can use them--or not--as desired. I wish they would have done up the book though with many more pantheons, instead of just the four or so they included. As it is, while generally cool, it feels somewhat *incomplete* to my mind.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[mmadsen]

Indeed, I think that having gods as a Christian-based omnipotent deity has many virtues, as they are *gods* after all, and in my own campaigns I rarely, if ever, have players encountering gods dirtectly. It just strikes me as strange, and unrealistic concerning divine beings, certainly of god-level.

Of course, with a quasi-Christian religion, you don't necessarily encounter the top dog, but you do encounter angels, saints, etc. A lesser deity by any other name...

I wish they would have done up the book though with many more pantheons, instead of just the four or so they included.

That's what happens when your game system implements "more powerful" as "more individually labelled powers". Each god's write-up is huge. No wonder they didn't have room for more pantheons -- or time to write them up in all their complexity!

 

[mmadsen]

In another thread, long ago, someone pointed out an important difference between D&D polytheism and real-life polytheism. In D&D, each god is more-or-less opposed, depending on alignment, and a cleric worships one of the gods in the pantheon. In a typical real-world polytheistic religion, like that of the Greeks or Norsemen, everyone worships all of the gods; you just pray to the most appropriate god for whatever help you need. If you're hoping to conceive a child, you pray to the fertility goddess. If you're going into battle, you pray to the war god. If you're weighing an important decision, you pray to the goddess of wisdom. If you're traveling, you pray to the god of wayfarers.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Deities and Demigods was a dissapointment for me, not nessecarily because of the stats (though, certainly, it pained me to see them) and not nessecarily because of the lack of pantheons (heck, it annoyed me, but they had to keep the page count down. Anybody want a god? I can probably dig it up from my massive database. )

More because of the following:

A: The gods were distanced from their real-world inspiration too greatly. I understand why they did this, but it nukes a lot of flavor and style from the various pantheons. Loki isn't *universally* Chaotic Evil, and other than The Persephone Incident, Hades usually isn't so bad a guy. Certainly, Aphrodite being called "Good" is a stretch. I wanted to use these gods because they're evocative in their original setting. I don't want a game designer telling me that my Celtic pantheon doesn't have any figure for Monks to worship, so Fhargaldiniobulan (or whatever) has to be Lawful Neutral. So now I have to make adjustments so that Ares isn't nessecarily evil, so Aphrodite is still a smut, and so Hephaestus can be thrown out of Olympus for being oogly.

On a similar note: Boo for enforcing D&D morality. E.g.: "Hugging trees is good! Death is Bad!" I'm glad they included the Repose domain, but does every god of death outside of the Pharonic pantheon have to be evil?

Oh, and...
B: Not enough information on how these odd gods interacted with a pseudo-medieval world. Yeah....so....my gnomish architect worships Imhoptep. Suddenly, he's shaving himself bald and building pyramids and....huh?

Back on topic, I find it more evocative to draw theories on the kinds of people who would worship gods and go from there. As an amateur mythographer, doing this to not-real deities is a bit of a blast for me, and I can figure out the way various sides interpret the "real events." Plus, it helps me rationalize why Correlon Larethian wears eyeshadow.

I also tend to think the other way -- if someone believed a something, what kind of gods would they worship?

Really helps pull my religions out of "Healing Factories".