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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jfdlsjfd" data-source="post: 9743692" data-attributes="member: 42856">I think the problem is the other way round. D&D's initial approach to religion was inspired by polytheistic gods as superficially understood by the writers.It is correct that there were dedicated clerics in the ancient worlds to a single god. If you were a flamen dialis, you were tasked to ensure that proper worship was given to Jupiter, and you wouldn't do religious ceremonies involving Mars, there were dedicated priests for other gods. But this view somehow leaked in a way that D&D priests now sounds more like monotheists priest of their god. A flamen dialis wouldn't conduct worship for Mars, but they'd offer sacrifices and honor Mars, and all the other gods, whenever it was appropriate. They'd propitiate Neptune before travelling at sea, like every other worshipper of the pantheon. With the FR idea that each god took care of their worshipper's afterlife, the "concurrent monotheisms" model, more akin to henotheism, was applied to basically everyone in the setting. This lessened the logic of pantheons, since you necessarily placed the god that will take you to your afterlife above the other members of the pantheon and not worship the complete pantheons as ancient romans or greek would have. I feel the shoehorning happened more with regular worshippers than priests.I'd also not be surprised if a priest of Lathander, or most god characters, didn't make an offering to Umberlee before embarking on a ship, given how they are mostly played, thinking of evil gods as enemies, despite them being members of the same pantheon and deserving equal worship.Some campaign actively set this up. Rime of the Frostmaiden has humans actively countering Auril's plans. Yet she's a member of the Faerûnian pantheon and the game doesn't really explore how to propitiate her.What makes you feel that pantheons don't feel like one is this lack of overarching cohesiveness. Gods within a pantheon can be at war, it happened during the Trojan War. But that doesn't mean that Agammemnon could taunt and threaten a priest of Apollo, and the god's retaliation was expected and the pro-Greek gods didn't intervene to prevent Apollo killing livestocks and sending a plague to the Greek camp.</blockquote>

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