Divine intrigue overused...!

[rounser]

Look at the campaign setting mailing lists and the threads on this board, and you quickly realise that DMs love their deities.

As an observer of the plots and story arcs of DMs both online and offline, I ask; do too many plotlines hinge around the gods and their doings? Does the divine soap opera need to intrude as much as it does in some campaigns?

Such divine meddling serving as a constant McGuffin seems to be very popular with DMs running homebrew and FR campaigns in particular. I'm playing in a campaign which has a story arc fully driven by gods and their churches, for example...it is not the first, nor do I think it will be the last of it's kind.

For me, too much involvement from the gods has big flavour repercussions for the campaign - not all of them positive, and some of which run at odds with how I envision the "feel" of (for example) Faerun.

For the rest of you: How much divine derring-do is too much...or is there no such thing as too much of a godly driven plot? And, does the preferable amount of deity focus in a campaign differ depending on whether you're on Toril, Oerth, or a homebrew world?

 

[Valmur_Dwur]

I play in Greyhawk and my latest campaign does have a Gods driven theme. But I think it allows for more background noise rather than "IT will be Done". For me it allows me to tie in all the different monsters and main bad guys who also have goals given to them though their idea of gods. Perhaps I don't fully understand what you mean but I would think unless it is a localize setting(like a city) the gods would take part in it (As in RL)?

 

[Teflon Billy]

I'm not wild about it, but if you extrapolate the effects of their presence properly every nation in D&D should be a theocracy of a good-aligned god.

The power to heal all ills would endear them to the populace, and clerics are (arguably) the best fighters in the game (or close to it). I'm not interested in an entirely Gods-driven game, but it's easy to see how they keep cropping up.

I have a different cleric class in my campaign to explain a little better why they don't rule everything.

I think FR has really corrupted D&D on the "Gods involved in everthing" front. Almost none of the fantasy fiction I try to emulate with my game has any of that sort of thing.

 

[Tonguez]

I'm not wild about it, but if you extrapolate the effects of their presence properly every nation in D&D should be a theocracy of a good-aligned god.

And indeed they should.

Take the history of Earth. Until recently every nation on earth was a theocracy of a good aligned god - the Catholic Church dominated Medieval Europe, the Holy Land is named such for a good reason, Islam still domiantes the Middle East, the Ancient Civilisations were all theocratic (Egypt, Babylon, Aztecs etc - even decadent Rome) and all tribal peoples had various gods and spirits involved in their lives (even the secular US is constituted under God).
In a world where gods and spirits are real lots of things should involve them - at least indirectly.

The two problems as I see them is first that the Published Gods are seen through Judeo-Christian monotheist western eyes and presented in this way, rather than in a manner more appropriate to a Polytheisitic world of many co-equal gods
The second problem is in difficulties (or reluctances) portraying convincing religions and religious institutions and having Clerics play as agents of their faith and not simply fighting medics who can turn undead

My worlds are resplendent with religion in which PCs consult Mediums before they embark on an adventure, where Feindish eels dwelling in the local river are placated by sacrificial chickens and an NPC is as likely to be an outsider as they are a Dragon or a normal human-being...

 

[Piratecat]

Lord knows I'm occasionally guilty of this.

Religion-driven plots works wonderfully because it gives you an excuse for lots of nameless villains who all hate the PCs for a good reason. When you're doing the work of the Lord (whichever God that might be), you're usually fanatical about it, and that can make for fun adventures. Ironically, I turned to this because my players complained that all the bad guys in the game were powerful wizards. After that, I had some kickbutt fighter-types as the villains, and now I'm angling towards a sort of religious plot.

Teflon Billy is absolutely right. Clerics should control the world. They have control over who gets healing and who doesn't; if your wife is pregnant and you don't want to risk her death in childbirth, or if the summer plague is making its rounds, do YOU think you should irratate the religious status quo? Nah, I didn't think so.

I don't think religious plots are overdone, though. As long as you minimize gratuitous appearances of the Gods and emphasize people and religious differences, you can have a great campaign arc.

 

[LostSoul]

I'm not wild about it, but if you extrapolate the effects of their presence properly every nation in D&D should be a theocracy of a good-aligned god.

Why not Evil gods?

Evil gods don't care what you've done; they just want you to worship them. Good gods are strict. They won't help Evil people.

Chaotic Evil gods won't have any rules or regulations about anything. If you get a bunch of smart, wise, Chaotic Evil clerics together, they could start a new religion. Start off small, spreading the world, helping everyone. Good and evil. Lawful and Chaotic. This way, they gain worshippers - people looking for the "easy answer". As long as they side with the mob - not justice or anything, just whatever is going to get them more worshippers - after a while they'll have a strong force.

They'll have to be able to trick others into thinking their god is Good; but they can lie and twist the truth in a way that a Good cleric probably isn't willing to do.

Then, one day, the people wake up to a totalitarian regime run by an Evil god and his sick and twisted worshippers.

(This may not be the way it would work; but it's an interesting plot/campaign hook.)

 

[Altin]

I don't think religious plots are overdone, though. As long as you minimize gratuitous appearances of the Gods.

Says the man who just last week gave us "I Am Wroth". Still, I think we can let PC off the hook given that the Gods are one of the few beings the Defenders can't (easily) outwit or beat the tar out off. This might be a reason they are popular sources of adversity/patronage as the levels skyrocket -- getting the better of them tends to remain an impressive challenge no matter the power level of pcs.

But another reason is most definitely that the Gods who populate the D&D multiverse tend to be beings who essentially care about what humanity gets up to. Probably in imitation of the Judeo-Christian deity, their activity is generally quite intimately connected to that of mortal races (ie. their primary function is the creator/guide/judge of man , they are rarely described as having any extra-human interests or pursuits).

If the Divine soap opera bothers you, try going back to the feel of a Greek pantheon where the Gods either remain aloof from mortals or screw with them for their own amusement (both in the Zeus sense, which would offend Eric's Grandmother, and the Poseidon sense, which involves tossing Odysseus around the seas for umpteen years because you felt like it). Create God who have concerns of their own whose importance their creations can't begin to fathom -- try making Gods who embody the Law/Chaos dichotomy instead of the Good/Evil one. Absolute Law and Absolute Chaos are difficult concepts to get your head around, let alone worship in any meaningfull fashion, and their concerns not likely to feature directly in the lives of men.

To get back to your question, I think the Divine drama which dominates games is a logical consequence of the humanised, empathic Gods found in most fantasy settings. Whether this is a bad thing or not is up to the individual person, I should imagine, but if it is a problem it is one fixed easily enough by dehumanising the source of divine power in games.

Yours,
Altin

 

[Piratecat]

Yeah, it was meant to be an exception, and that much more important thereby. Go figure.

I have a nation in my world which does have its own gods. They are very like the Greek Gods, very interfering and in-your-face, and they only have power within the country's borders. It's a fun place to visit!

 

[Nightfall]

Rouncer, well it's kind of hard NOT to involve the gods since they were what caused the Divine War. That said, it's still pretty easy for me to just have some regular Pcs fight against the swarms of Titanspawn.

As for how gods interact, most are held by the Divine Truce, since they are of equal power. (I know not everyone agrees with that idea but I think it's very true.) Clerics are the only source of divine conflict...but then so are planar beings as well.

 

[333 Dave]

What, you want me to believe that a non-religious force controlls the world? Not for another century I fear.