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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ilbranteloth" data-source="post: 6784555" data-attributes="member: 6778044">Wow, this is a long thread, and haven't been through all of it yet, but...There are obviously lots of people in the Realms that believe something like this based on the fact that there's enough of them to build a wall.The way I look at it is like this: As a player you know how the afterlife is designed in this world. You may like it or not, but there it is (assuming your DM goes along with it).As a character, though, they only know what they know. They may or may not have learned of the wall, and if they have they have opted to ignore the warnings. Whether that comes back at them when they die won't really be known until that point. And if the character feels that strongly about the state of the divine beings in the universe, then go with it.From the character's perspective it's not any different than somebody on this world being an atheist, and after they die finding out that they'e right or, worse, "whoops, my bad!" they were wrong. The only difference is that in the game world, you as a player know exactly what's in store, and the character doesn't. In this world the atheist won't know if they are right or wrong any more than the rest of us until they die. Quite frankly, like the rest of my Forgotten Realms campaign, the published material gives a shared resource for the players and me alike to learn about the realms. But the players will never know (or at least not without directly verifying it themselves) if that's the way is in my Forgotten Realms. Ao isn't in Ed's Realms, he was created by TSR. He may have added him, that I don't know. Don't know about the wall, etc. But as far as I'm concerned, they characters and the players should never know how the universe/multiverse works until they go exploring.As for the specific reasons that you listed for a person of the Realms choosing not to worship the Deities? They all sound somewhat reasonable to me. But if you live in a world where those squabbling, ultra-powerful ex-mortals that don't need your worship, and are unworthy of your worship, they still get to decide what happens to your soul for the rest of eternity. So that's a risk you choose to take. It's certainly a common concept in fantasy that the Gods themselves are really no better than the people of the world, just more powerful. But one of those powers happens to be what happens to the people of the world when they die. If the afterlife is that big a part in your campaign, it could be the basis for a very interesting campaign with a lifelong struggle to change it. In the realms, various Gods have answered prayers for other dead Gods. It certainly seems plausible that at least one of the existing deities (particularly one like Cyric) would look for ways to gather more faithful, such as granting powers to a group that has a specific philosophy, or looking for a way to increase his take of the souls by stealing those that would previously be bound for the wall. Especially if this weakens Kelemvor in turn.Because Realmsfolk worship all of the gods, I don't particularly care as a DM whether the player selects a patron unless they are a divine spell caster. In the Realms divine spell casting comes from the Gods. Just like I'd expect a Warlock to select a patron. Their powers derive from another source as well. But it's also not unheard of in the Realms for a God to answer the prayers (or grant spells) on behalf of a dead God, and it wouldn't be beyond the realm of plausibility for them to support a group of a particular philosophy. To some degree that sounds like a step halfway between a Warlock patron and a God. There are certainly many powerful creatures looking for a way to increase their power in the Realms and perhaps they've found a way to do such a thing. Sounds like an interesting idea for a campaign.Ilbranteloth</blockquote>

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