? re Polytheistic Worlds

[Edgewood]

In my world, gods don't compete for worshippers. Only clerics or paladins or other extremely religious types focus on a single god. Most people worship the god who applies to the situation. This is (as far as anyone can tell today) how it was in ancient Greece and Rome.

This my approach to the whole situation. I think that the commoners would appeal to the God of Agriculture for example for a bountiful harvest and and later prey to the God of Nature and Wild Beasts for a succesful hunt in the woods for small game.

I guess it's all a matter of GM perception. Monotheistic worlds can be very interesting. The church in a monotheistic religion would be so powerful that they would have a strong influence over the state, much as it was in the medieval times.

Ahh...comparative religion...

 

[jasper]

Power from the peons! Um worshippers. Yeah Right! I always hated this idea. Oh there an ancient evil god name Kool Thru loo. Big fat hairy deal! We will just kill his last worshipper Larry the Lich and tinkle on his altar.

 

[EdL]

Paying homage is the equivalent of a single tithe, or one prayer at the right moment (which needs a tithe to work, right ). A farmer who prays nightly to the god of agriculture to help look after his crops, whether he has any planted or not, worships fully the god of agriculture. A farmer who prays to the god of roads on market day does not fully worship the god of roads. Paying homage for an individual event or favour is different to having a solid working relationship, if you can put it that way.

And why can't the farmer pray equally to the gods of agriculture and the weather? In fact, he'd be pretty dumb not to. As a farmer, you really don't want to get either one of them pissed off at you.

 

[Zeppelin]

This whole thing reminds me of an Indy comic I read once about a little girl with her own patron deity. She was his only worshiper though, so he wasn't all that powerful, but he was still a god, so he was much more powerful than any old mortal. Plus, he only had one worshiper to look after, so the little girl basically had her god at beck and call. It was kind of cool, really.

 

[WayneLigon]

Generally I'll have people worship the entire pantheon of gods in some sense. They will regularly attend services to one god that they favor above others. It might be because he's the patron of their craft, or something else equally important to them. It might be because they are inspired by him, or whatever. Most people will devote themselves to a couple gods that they like, attend festivals and make sacrifice to the others when the time is approriate, or they want to ask for a boon.

I have used the 'worshippers power the gods' paradigm, and it worked quite well. The gods look at every thinking mortal soul as a gold peice. He who has the most when the universe ends is the winner. They compete and backstab each other but usually over entire ethnic groups - the Organians all worship God A, while their hated enemies worship God B. The two groups fight all the time because each god wants those worshippers.

I have gone with one campaign where the gods were very aloof; even the best of them really didn't care much for common mortals. Only when you were blessed or gained a lot of personal power did they even bother to notice individual people. Swaying an important king or famous adventurer to their worship was a major coup; the god gained a kind of status among it's fellows and they would watch thatperson for a time. That was generally considered bad for the person because the gods got bored easily.

I did another game that was similar. Most things did not have souls. Only when you did something really meaningful could you even start gaining a soul. Adventurers had souls. Farmers usually did not; there was no afterlife for them, they just kinda dissolved back into the background noise of the universe. Maybe part of that soul-stuff would reincarnate, but even so it would never have any hint of the old personality. Spells and such only worked for people with souls. Others could be clerics and the like, but they were at best playing pretend compared to a real, empowered priest.

 

[Li Shenron]

They tend to look after their portfolios, not their faithful. The faithful are only useful and supported to the extent they further the portfolio and interests of the deity.
A god of murder wants more murder to be done.

I often use the same approach. Instead of Pratchett's idea that what matter is people's prayers, I decide that what matters is people's deeds. So a god of war is stronger in times of war, and therefore he'll dictate their priests to spread the ideas that war is a good way to solve disputes. A god of lies grows in power the more lies are used as a key to success by the people.

Worship isn't completely out of the fray, but it's more blurred.
The goddess of earth may have the largest amount of followers who pray her for good harvest, good weather, health, etc. But if the people only prayed and didn't work the ground anymore, she would probably wane.
OTOH an evil god of death doesn't have more than a handful of worshippers, but it may be feared by lots of commoners, and this may also plays some part in keeping him powerful. Maybe sometimes, a commoner's son is striken with disease; afraid he may die, the parents pray the good gods to save him, but prayers seem unanswered, so they secretely slip in the cellar and sacrifice a few farm animals to the evil death god to "take the animals' lives instead of the son's".

Overall, it could be a mix of both. Anyway, it doesn't have to be necessarily understood how it works.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

Overall, it could be a mix of both. Anyway, it doesn't have to be necessarily understood how it works.

this is a crucial bit to me. remember that the religion of the common man, the theology of the learned clerics and the cosmology of the campaign world don't have to all be identical, or even close for that matter. Maybe its not worship per se that fuels the gods but belief or attention. If two gods spread to their followers that they are in opposition, they get two sets of believers each for the price of one, because every new follower of the orc god is taught to revile the elf god and vice versa.

 

[mythusmage]

Since I'm including religion and religious practices in my continuence of this topic, I've moved it over here. If religious discussions, even in an RPG context, bug you, I would strongly advise against following the link.

My thanks to all who participated in this portion of the topic. You have helped me consolidate my feces regarding the question I originally posed.

Forgot This: You do have to register to comment at Mythusmage Opines. Anti-spam measure.

 

[Umbran]

Thor was the most popular of the Gods among the Norse but he is not their leader, Odin is. Therefore worship does not necessarily equate to power.

An interesting point, though, that whether or not worship has anything to do with it, culture does. For the early Norse people, Odin was not the leader of the gods. That role was filled by Tiwaz (from whom we get Tiwaz-day, or Tuesday), who these days we'd call Tyr. As the viking cuture developed, the whole "justice" angle didn't fit well anymore, so they shifted the leadership...

Odin in Ragnarok will be slain by the Fenris wolf (one his sons immidiately afterwards rips Fenris in half by the Jaws). Tyr will kill the beast Garm but will die of wounds shortly afterward. Heimdall and Loki will fall simultaneously in battle while fighting each other. Thor will die as the World Serpeants poison works through him immidiatley after killing it. And Freyr will fall fighting the Fire Giant Surt after wounding him with an antler. And then Surt burns the cosmos.

We must be a bit careful here - there's some solid questions out there as to whether the Norse always thought of this as prophecy. It is possible that it was viewed as history. After all, Ragnarok is not the end of the world, it is merely the final battle of the gods. Afterwards there's still a man and a woman standing under Yggsdrasil...

 

[Aust Diamondew]

We must be a bit careful here - there's some solid questions out there as to whether the Norse always thought of this as prophecy. It is possible that it was viewed as history. After all, Ragnarok is not the end of the world, it is merely the final battle of the gods. Afterwards there's still a man and a woman standing under Yggsdrasil...

True. But in any case my point was that worship does not necessarily equal power I just got a tad side tracked (otherwise all of the Gods would have defeated their foes because they had worshippers and they did not).