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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Upper_Krust" data-source="post: 9523139" data-attributes="member: 326">Well from what I know at the time of Deities & Demigods being written, Gary was in Hollywood trying to get a Dungeons & Dragons movie made (or something of that nature)...the failed development of which eventually morphed into the Krull movie.So Gary didn't have any input into that book and in fact reportedly (by Jim Ward) didn't like the book because it didn't include Quasi and Hero-deity transitional ranks.Yes because if the world at large doesn't have a problem with 1000+ books on mythology including the Hindu gods and the Native American gods, so why do you? <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f914.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":unsure:" title="Unsure    :unsure:"  data-smilie="24"data-shortname=":unsure:" />Prior to your post most people (AFAIR) in this thread (those in favour of ANY stats for deities that is) seem okay with stats for Monotheistic Gods. So any argument of "if Vishnu can have stats why can't Yahweh" is superfluous - they both can.So what exactly are you getting at...that 44 years ago creators made a smart business decision not to include stats for GOD? ...which was in 1980 the main religion of the country where 90% of their market was located - so clearly it was a wise business decision NOT to include stats for "GOD".Was it biased - almost certainly, why anger 90% of your market.Was it mechanically redundant (as I pointed out similar to stats for AO ) - almost certainly.Were they seeking to offend anyone by having stats for Hindu gods or whatever - no more so than any Mythology book published before or after.Given what we know about 'the angry mothers from heck' history of TSR in the 80's do you think having stats for "GOD" in Deities & Demigods would have been a wise business decision when 90% of your market is located in the United States where the main religion is Christianity. Have a guess.D&D is for Ages 11 & UP (or thereabouts), I don't think its appropriate for consumption by younger audiences (without parental consent) as very young kids are easily impressionable and that could lead to them doing something silly.I suspected as much.We can only speculate as to the thrust of your posts.Thousands of Books of Mythology exist.Creators take characters from Mythology books for D&D.44 years later suddenly we must feel ashamed (on behalf of someone else - likely an imaginary person), despite thousands of mythology books still existing and animated and live action series and movies about those gods being made all the time.Original D&D Creators blamed for being biased - even though everyone has some degree of bias....something about letting those without sin cast the first stone seems apropos here...Thanks.It didn't need to.1. It used Mythological figures.2. Mechanically stats for Overgods were fundamentally useless without full rules for Player Divine Ascension.3. It would have been a stupid business decision to include stats for "GOD" and potentially piss off the families of a large part of your market at a time when D&D was already under fire for its depictions of Devils such as Asmodeus.Everything is biased to some degree, the creators of the original book went out of their way to show all all Pantheons of these mythological figures from ALL cultures were EQUAL.Logically a Monotheistic deity commanding the same presence as an entire Pantheon of gods would be more powerful than any individual within the Polytheistic Pantheon.Epic Boons do not give the type of power required to rival gods, let alone those above Challenge Rating 30. They do not even give the power of an extra level. I just finished a campaign where my character had worked their way up from 5th level to 20th level with 8 epic boons - I know what I am talking about.Yes, follow the Logic.Its the same reason why all the Pantheon Heads in the original book were given 400 Hit Points - to give them Parity.Thus GOD would not be competing with Zeus but with the entire Pantheon of Greek Gods. Thus he would be more powerful. Its not Gods balanced against Gods its Religions balanced against each other.The book does not show all gods as equals but IT DOES show ALL RELIGIONS are (culturally) EQUAL.I mean arguably (like the Marvel comics) you could just have added the Canaanite Pantheon of Gods - I think one 3rd Party product for AD&D did that (have it on my bookshelf somewhere).FWIW Gary did have a character called the Archdeva in his Gord the Rogue series of novels who was in charge of the Angels (Solars, Planetars and Devas) and seemed to be the counterpart to Nerull. The Archdeva might have been Pelor by another name though.It does follow a logical structure, but you are not interested in the intricacies and logic of the tiers of divinity across the editions, nor the balancing of the Pantheons.I outlined the reasons.1. They used figures from mythology books.2. Irrelevant mechanically to have Overgods without Player Divine Ascension.3. Stupid business decision.More likely because of sound business reasons and not wanting to stir up more controversy among 90% of your audience's families.</blockquote>

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