PC Ascending to Deity! Need Some Help

[Aluvial]

I have a character who is going to ascend to divine status.

He is a 25th level character, essentially he is a Dwarf, 15th level fighter, 10th level Stonelord.

I have some comments/questions about this character gaining divine ranks. I know that I want him to have at least a divine rank of 1. I thought for a while that I would just take him to 0 (hero-god), but now I realize that I might go as high as 3 or 4, but only if I understand the process better.

Here are some of the relevent conditions. The character is gaining divine status from two sources at the same time!

1) First, he's drawing power from an imprisoned greater god, divine rank 20.

1a) How many divine ranks might an imprisoned greater god give (if you consider that the guy will have to take at least one domain from him)? I know that this is very subjective, but I would like some opinions. Might the greater god give a little of himself just to allow an "aspect" of him be free, especially if this god is evil, and the corruption given will influence this new divine power?

2) I noticed that most (but not all) of the gods had 20 HD of outsider... Should I give my character that?

3) The character might gain some status (one divine rank) from Moradin, who he worshipped. This character was essentially the offspring of Moradin and then made mortal to "prove" his worth. He has. One rank seems reasonable to me... how about you?

4) What other things should I be considering here?

Thanks for the help, this is definitely new territory for me, just as much as Epic was...

Aluvial

 

[Salthorae]

As much as I love power in my games, I actually hate to admit that I've had to go through this process a few times in games I've played in... it can be intimidating to up your char to godhood!

1) First, he's drawing power from an imprisoned greater god, divine rank 20.

1a) How many divine ranks might an imprisoned greater god give (if you consider that the guy will have to take at least one domain from him)?...Might the greater god give a little of himself just to allow an "aspect" of him be free, especially if this god is evil, and the corruption given will influence this new divine power?

These would both depend on how is your character "drawing" the power? Is it freely given by the Greater diety? Is your character "siphoning" off divine ranks? If it is freely given divine energy, then the DM should be able to tell you how many ranks that gets you. If you are siphoning off...well I guess it's the same, DM should tell you. I would think no diety would give more than 3 ranks away though, unless they were compelled to do so.

2) I noticed that most (but not all) of the gods had 20 HD of outsider... Should I give my character that?

You shouldn't do that, no. Things that start out as dieties are created that way with 20 outsider HD + 40'ish class levels. Creatures that ascend just have their class levels (unless your DM really wants to sup' you up!).

3) The character might gain some status (one divine rank) from Moradin, who he worshipped. This character was essentially the offspring of Moradin and then made mortal to "prove" his worth. He has. One rank seems reasonable to me... how about you?

I'd say more than enough! this would put you at Divine Rank 4 (with 5 Salient divine abilities, not bad for someone who was a mortal yesterday!)

4) What other things should I be considering here?

Earth Mastery Salient ability! One of the coolest/most useful ones out there!

 

[Aluvial]

Thanks for the response. Just to let you know, I am the DM.

Ok, so how do you advance if you are a god? Can it be based on worshippers?

If so, how do you determine how many you have/can get and what is the divine rank breakdown?

To me 100,000 worshipers is about 1 divine rank. St. Cuthbert has a rank of 15, I would assume he has 1,500,000 worshipers...

Ok, maybe 100,000 is too many... how about 50,000?

Aluvial

 

[Gerion of Mercadia]

Ok, first off you are largely on your own here. The only book that even discusses this is Deities and Demigods.

To answer the specfic question:

2) I noticed that most (but not all) of the gods had 20 HD of outsider... Should I give my character that?

The book does not take into account the Epic Level Handbook, as it was published by WotC to be used as a "stand alone" product. You shouldn't just award the HD.

This is a realm where you have to tread carefully. Who are the Deities in your campaign? How do they interact? You can't even begin to answer any of these questions because the information you need is setting specific. Are you in Greyhawk - FRCS, Ebberon?

 

[Aluvial]

Ok, first off you are largely on your own here. The only book that even discusses this is Deities and Demigods.

To answer the specfic question:

2) I noticed that most (but not all) of the gods had 20 HD of outsider... Should I give my character that?

The book does not take into account the Epic Level Handbook, as it was published by WotC to be used as a "stand alone" product. You shouldn't just award the HD.

This is a realm where you have to tread carefully. Who are the Deities in your campaign? How do they interact? You can't even begin to answer any of these questions because the information you need is setting specific. Are you in Greyhawk - FRCS, Ebberon?

Well, I play in a modified Greyhawk. Modified, mainly because it has been my campaign world for 16 years. We started the campaign with 1st edition rules. I thought my players would string me up when we took on 2nd edition (I don't want to talk about what they did when I switched them up to 3rd and then 3.5!). Anyway, I mention this because they always knew that if they excelled in play they could match the other great NPC's of the land, perhaps even become hero-gods, or even DEMI-GODS!!!

So, when our campaign entered epic levels, that was the highest any character had ever seen in play. Level 22! They were gods amoung men anyway. Heroes of reknown. Anyhow, in previous editions, they never got close to 15th level... and that was fine. Mordekainen was 18th level IMC and no one would touch him (he's 26 in my campaign now).

So, epic play results in epic adventure. I had the group as the campaign ended face off against a heavily modified Return to the Tomb of Horrors adventure. In this, I had Acererak draw his power from multiple tombs of power, scattered across many material planes. Souls were collected and were to be sacrificed to Tharizdun, in his prison, to gain a portion of his trapped essence. The PC's had a history with Unmentionable, because I had run them through Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil (another Return to...) before. So, IMC Acererak is envious of T's power and seeks to draw some of it away.

The player who is about to ascend to divinity, got in the way of the process, taking upon the "seed" that was to go to Acererak. This seed is 1 to 3 divine levels in my mind...

In addition, the character in question had this very cool backstory about being partially of divine origin to begin with. He is the direct offsping of Moradin, who in my campaign, it thought to have actually created the mountains of the world. The PC, named Stoneheart, was in essence the Heart of the Mountain. He was made mortal to claim his own divine status and during his travels, gained sense of who he was, what his destiny might contain. This was all done under the shadow of Tharizdun, who tainted his visions with scenes of "devouring" (Acererak) the mountains.... laying level the world... This taint actually took on some physical sense as the characters faced the horrors of an insane god...

So, Stoneheart the PC takes on part of the dark god. It would be ironic if it weren't planned to some degree from the very start 5 years ago when we started the campaign...

Now I have to finally give out what I promised the players could some day achieve. This is the best way to do this.

My questions are basically trying to figure out what to do...


Aluvial

 

[Alzrius]

In all honesty, this probably won't be of much help to you right now (as the book isn't completely finished yet) but The Immortal's Handbook: Ascension is probably the book for you. It's a new version of the d20 divinity rules, which a much larger scale, having rules for deities far weaker than even quasi-gods, and much stronger than even overgods. It uses a series of templates to represent divinity, and unlike WotC's own Deities and Demigods, it approaches it from a standpoint of PCs becoming gods; not just NPCs.

Check out the website of the author, Upper_Krust for more information.

 

[Aluvial]

In all honesty, this probably won't be of much help to you right now (as the book isn't completely finished yet) but The Immortal's Handbook: Ascension is probably the book for you. It's a new version of the d20 divinity rules, which a much larger scale, having rules for deities far weaker than even quasi-gods, and much stronger than even overgods. It uses a series of templates to represent divinity, and unlike WotC's own Deities and Demigods, it approaches it from a standpoint of PCs becoming gods; not just NPCs.

Check out the website of the author, Upper_Krust for more information.

Well, that book looks like it would help... thanks for the info.

Aluvial

 

[Salthorae]

...I am the DM. Ok, so how do you advance if you are a god? Can it be based on worshippers? To me 100,000 worshipers is about 1 divine rank. St. Cuthbert has a rank of 15, I would assume he has 1,500,000 worshipers... Ok, maybe 100,000 is too many... how about 50,000?

It definitely IS based on worshippers in Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk I'm not sure about but you can always do it that way. I'll have to look in my FR books to see if they give scales for advancement based on #'s of worshipers.

Personally, the Immortal's Handbook project always seemed overly complicated to me. My group has used the Dieties and Demigods in conjunction with ELH a couple of times now with no real problems. The biggest problem we have at those levels (especially once Divine Ranks started getting added to the characters, was it took so long to figure out what our characters wanted to do in combat (even the fighters) because there were so many options...

If you feel like the Player should get 1-3 from the seed he intercepted, why not split the difference and give him 2? Maybe he gets three, but then that 3rd one corrupts him a little bit because it's from T? Moradin could give him 2 divine ranks with one counter acting the corruption of T to leave him with 3 DR's overall as 2 of them effectively burn each other out? Maybe make that part of their next quest? to Reach Moradin before the taint consumes teh character?

But Definitely, Definitely get the player to take Divine Earth Mastery...best Salient ability out there (and it makes sense given that he is the "heart of the mountain")

 

[Plane Sailing]

I wonder whether it would be helpful to get Basic D&D Immortals set? I've never seen it, but it was the original 'ascend to goodhood' book. I see that it is available as pdf scan from RPGnow