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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James Gasik" data-source="post: 8947616" data-attributes="member: 6877472">The Wall of the Faithless addresses not just why you should have a patron God, but why you should act in a faithful way.  In the novels, one of the protagonists dies, ends up on the Fugue Plain, called out to Torm, but he had lost his faith.  So it's a little more than "you need to have a God", but that you earn the afterlife you get in life.  The problems are that you have to have faith in a particular God.  No worshipers of concepts or philosophies here!  No pantheon priests (more on this in a minute) either.  And upthread, I mused about what happens to those who have faith in dead Gods, usurper Gods, or Gods who don't want to be worshiped at all.If you read Realms lore (and oh boy, have I ever), you'll find snippets like how Umberlee isn't so much worshiped as she is feared, and sailors will offer tributes to her upon starting a voyage so that she won't sink their vessels.This doesn't make them her faithful!  In fact, they may worship other Gods, like Valkur.  They make offerings to Umberlee because it make sense.  In fact, in a society with so many Gods of different things, it makes logical sense to pay respect to the relevant deity.You don't pray to Tempus to heal the sick.  Or pray to Chauntea for protection in battle.  You don't pray to Gond when you're lost in the woods.  Nor do you pray to Mask to inspire you to create great works of art.  The common man offers to the relevant God.And thus, priests who serve whole pantheons would just make sense.  But they don't, because in the Realms, you have to have a patron deity.It gets better when classes that don't need to worship Gods are shoehorned into doing so as well.  Paladins, Rangers, even Druids have their own Gods that give them their powers (even the Earthmother was revealed to be another God in disguise- something that is quite common in the Realms).Of course that has waxed and waned over the years; Primal Druids and 4e Rangers didn't get powers from Gods.  And it looks like the new Druids won't either, but we'll just pretend that Druids devoted to Silvanus aren't a thing, lol.Ultimately, very few people should go to the Wall of the Faithless anyways; if you're evil, the forces of the lower planes aren't very picky about souls; you get dragged down to the depths, and if you're lucky, you might become a new demon or devil someday!Of course this means that the people in the Wall of the Faithless are GOOD and Neutral people who didn't hitch their wagon to a star.The Wall of the Faithless existing as a punishment isn't the real problem in of itself; if it takes beings of divine power to create afterlives, then it follows that you have to earn your place in one.And a God of the Dead getting all the souls that aren't claimed (or stolen, see my comment about fiends) is logical enough.The real issues with the Wall is that one, it presents a possibility for someone to fall through the cracks, and end up there for no Good reason.  And two, it tells the player that they have to select a made up God and present more than token faith to that God's precepts, or they can never be so much as revivified after falling in battle.Given that the Forgotten Realms is the premier setting of D&D these days, forcing made up religion on people is the exact kind of thing people who don't understand role-playing games will pounce upon.  It's no wonder Wizards won't acknowledge it one way or another!Nobody wants another Panic.</blockquote>

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