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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Faolyn" data-source="post: 8408557" data-attributes="member: 6915329">You're not keeping the record straight. You're nitpicking about something that nobody else really cares about.And... what, one person said that all settings are homebrew? Maybe two people? And here you're nitpicking one person's beliefs as if they're some sort of universal truth that everyone else clearly must also believe, and not accepting that whether or not that's the truth has no bearing on anything else.I, for one, literally don't care that someone thinks that all published settings are homebrew. I doubt anyone but that person cares.No, I really don't. The gods who would fight over Murder are already murderous. They're already willing to use violence to get what they want. But the gods who are interested in Truth are not the type of beings who would shed blood over the concept, unless they felt that a god was trying to take Truth in order to pervert it."Every writer" is the important part here. Dozens of people have written about Vecna, bringing their own beliefs and misconceptions about him. Do you really think that they all collaborated with other to make sure his portfolio was consistent? That there was some sort of board on the wall that contained all the info that must be kept canon no matter what and everyone was required to memorize it? I went to some TSR offices once, in the early 90s (they gave me some Monstrous Compendium Appendices!), and while I have a crappy memory I don't recall any such info boards.And in-universe, people can think he's the god of magical secrets and be wrong.No, the debate is on whether or not evil gods are necessary and if so, what's their role and purpose.And it doesn't happen--in Maxperson's campaign. But it could happen in our campaign, or in mine. (Do people need to preface every comment with "in my campaign"?)So let's go with Maxperson's assertion that Flowers would be unclaimed, because neither Agriculture nor Wild Nature is Flowers, although flowers exist in wild nature and can be grown.The existence of Pistil doesn't mean that either Chauntea or Silvanus lost control of flowers. Chauntea can make a field of sunflowers produce wonderful seeds; Silvanus can make a sylvan glen burst with floral colors. But if Chauntea wanted to turn a particular wildflower pink while Pistil wanted to turn the same flower yellow and it turned into a conflict of some sort, Pistil would likely win that conflict, because Pistil has dominion over flowers. This is literally no different than if Chauntea wanted to make a wild strawberry as big and tasty as a domesticated strawberry and Silvanus said no. Of course, since Chauntea is good aligned, and presumably Pistil is as well, any conflict between them would likely be minimal. Now, this isn't 100% the case. Chauntea, being older and more powerful than Pistil, may very well be able to assert her will over Pistil's and turn the flower pink. And if it a flower on a domesticated plant, then Chauntea might have enough dominion over it that she would have full control over it even without the power difference.Now let's assume that Maxperson is wrong and that the portfolio of Flowers had been claimed, partly by Chauntea and partly by Silvanus. Pistil is created, took the portfolio for herself, and now Chauntea and Silvanus are slightly weakened. OK. Well, how they respond depends entirely on their personality. They may very well be OK with Pistil taking a bit of their power, in the same that that good parents don't mind if their children outshine them. Or, they may be furious at this intrusion. Or they might not truly be able to understand what happened, because their internal "script"--their divine DNA, if you will--has been rewritten, removing "flowers" from their makeup. Once Pistil appears, Chauntea and Silvanus may be able to remember having had flowers as part of their portfolio, but have no emotional or magical connection to them anymore. Perhaps, if Pistil were to die, Flowers would then return to Chauntea and Silvanus. Or perhaps it would be its own thing and not have an attached god until one took the portfolio. Or perhaps there's no cosmic order and no single unit of a portfolio, and as many gods can claim an aspect as want to. Silvanus, Chauntea, and Pistil can all coexist without sharing portfolios, even if they have the same aspects. Just within the concept of War, there's a ton of overlap. Arvoreen, Gaerdal Ironhand, and Gorm Gulthryn are all gods of vigilance. Selvatarm, Tethrin Veralde, and Haela Brightaxe are gods of combat prowess. Ilnevil and the Red Knight are gods of strategy. And so forth. This number only increases when you include different settings. And this is without any suddenly-appearing ex-mortals-turned-god popping up.See, the thing is, there's no single, canonical answer. Any of the above are perfectly acceptable answers. There are probably many other possibilities. It's ridiculous to assume that every gamer needs to use the same rule.Cuthbert is more widely worshiped than Heironeous. Perhaps he's older. And paladins may indeed be super big into honesty--but honesty isn't limited to paladins. Heironeous is the god of paladins, not the God of a Trait That Paladins Are Super Into.Nobody has claimed that you said that. Where are you getting this idea?So, you're done in this thread then, right? You said your piece and in your mind, the discussion is over. What else are you here for?I have not "jumped" on you for debating homebrew anything. However, you seem to think there is or should be a single answer that everyone should adhere to and that your claim that there are redundancies means that the discussion is over.In which case, the answers are: no. You don't get to dictate that your way is the only way and no other discussion should be held.OK. So what? You have established that the evil gods and the archfiends can do the same job. (Presumably, that means that you also believe that elven gods, and non-elven gods of nature, luck, the arts, and maybe even magic are redundant with archfey). Now what? You clearly think that the discussion should be over. So... is it bothering you that people are continuing to discuss the matter? Is it bothering you that people disagree with what you're saying? It certainly sounds like it.So again, we have another problem. And that is, you are outright saying "They're redundant! There's no reason to have both! They do the same thing!" But other people are saying "Well, no, they're not. And here's why." And instead of saying "Huh, those are interesting ideas I personally wouldn't use," you're going off on tangents and insisting that everyone follow your lead on it because you seem to think that there can be only one true answer, discussion over.In reality, there are either no canon differences between evil gods and archfiends, or there are lots of differences that have been presented in one book or another over the editions or that people have made up for themselves. Both of these statements are true, depending on which edition you're using, how you define god and archfiend (perhaps Orcus is a actually a god but everyone incorrectly thinks he's an archfiend), and how you want spells to be granted.</blockquote>

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