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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jesse Day" data-source="post: 712245" data-attributes="member: 10551">Very good point. On the preparation/character creation session before the first 3e campaign I ran, the players were looking through the books, and one of them opened the PHB to page 31 and started incredulously reading off the names of some of the gods, and we all started cracking up at how utterly stupid they are. (Well, I knew what to expect, so I just kinda smirked a little bit, but still...)Heironeous, Wee Jas, and Hextor, of the ones you mentioned, were all soundly laughed at, as were Kord (they say he's the God of Strength, but I know that he's just a length of rope, twine, or wire), Fharlanghn (this might work in a setting with the right sort of... what is it, Celtic? flavor, but it just looks bizarre lumped in with the rest... and besides, God of ROADS? like there's enough spiritual significance dedicated to ROADS that they need their own patron deity. I mean, really now, at least write "God of Travellers" or something instead. Roads. Sheesh.), Obad-Hai (like F's name, it just sounds out-of-place and ugly when mixed with the rest), and St. Cuthbert (what the heck is a Christian saint doing listed as a God among a polytheistic list like this? and no supreme being should EVER have a name ending in -bert. It's too mortal-sounding, like having a deity named "Wallace" or "Thomas" or "Frederick". Just doesn't work.). Maybe knowing the Greyhawkian background of these deities makes the names seem less stupid, but my players (and probably a good 50-75% of other players) know only what they see in the PHB.Even Pelor, Boccob, Erythnul and Nerull are pretty so-so, like they fell off the wrong end of a random syllable generator. The FRCS has some deities with mediocre names, and a few that are outright ridiculous, but it's hard to match the PHB list for outrageousness.Why even have example deities at all? Why not just give the domains, and mention that the nature of deity your character worships will determine what domains are available... i.e. if you want the Fire domain, don't worship an ocean god; if you want the War domain, don't worship a god of peace, etc. Then throw in a section in the DMG about designing a pantheon, which couldn't be expected to cover more than two or three extra pages at most (and certainly you could make up the room for that in other areas). This would perhaps create the problem of players trying to mix-and-match the "best" two domains, then justify it in reverse (unless the DM laid out a clear pantheon), but in allowing deityless clerics, that's already an option anyway....Wee Jas is the worst. It makes me cringe in disgust.</blockquote>

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