What religious pantheon do you use?

[Gilladian]

In my homebrew world I have a pantheon that has grown up and been modified (and will continue to be so) as I needed it. However, I've decided certain things. All races and societies worship the same gods, even though they may not realize it.

Nelora the human mother goddess in one area is Elanora, Elka to the dwarves, Ellerani to the elves, etc...

Their positions, titles and portfolios shift a bit, and the alignments of their worshipers likewise.

I also have lesser gods, saints, and minor local "gods". They may come and go, fade out of existence, or grow to greater power, and even eventually replace a greater god.

The truth is that NO god is a true deity. Such things don't exist. ALL are really mortal beings who have risen to immense power and then taken on worshippers (or have killed a "god" and stolen his worshippers). This has been happening for so many cycles that most "mortals" don't realize it any more.

Since planar travel and communication beyond the very closest planes is VERY rare, this works fine. You can find some of my musings on my world here: Vishteer Campaign / Musings

and my gods here: Vishteer Campaign / VishteerGods

 

[Hungry Like The Wolf]

I like to use Celtic Tree Worship alot.

I also like to mix Eastern and Western religions. In my current homebrew I have a church based on Christianity, if Christ was Buddha. I also combined the Lady of the Lake with Diana and Kwan Yin (with Shinto\sacrifice inspired rituals).

Another feature is the Horned God. I've tweaked the Horned God for all my games set in Greyhawk.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It is funny, WAY back in the mid-80's when we were running 1e I went through basically the same thought process as KingSoft. Since I have basically run the same homebrew since then it has stuck. The funny part about it is how parallel the whole thing is to what is now the 4e PoL world canon. I just figured "gods are gods" and it makes no sense that there would be a pantheon for these guys over here and one for those guys over there, etc. So I just created my own original set of deities from whole cloth.

The Elder Gods are basically cthonic, they represent the elements and raw building blocks of the world. Ergh is the earth, Eth is the air, etc. These gods are not actively worshiped in general but there are sites dedicated to them. Now and then they may be propitiated but they are distant from mortal concerns. They came first, built the world and then warred with the Younger Gods.

The Younger Gods are the ordinary deities that are worshiped by mortal races. They are the children of the Elder Gods. The mythology is parallel to Greek myth where Atur, the king of the gods overthrew the Elder Gods long ago. The younger gods aren't race specific but some of them are identified with specific races. I merged in a few gods that originated in various D&D settings here (mostly because players insisted on having them, lol). So there is Atur the King, Gelin the Just, Nomok the war god, Teala the god of civilization, Otillis the Hunter, etc etc etc. Gruumsh, Corelon, and Moradin serve as gods specific to their races and there are an open list of others as needed.

Like I say, very funny how parallel the whole thing ends up being to the now standard 4e stuff. It seems to serve well and I can see why PoL ended up with a pretty similar setup. It easily lends itself to myths and legends surrounding the gods themselves and gives you wide scope to fit different things in.

 

[IronWolf]

I run nearly all of my games in a published setting of some sort - these days either the Realms or Golarion. So my work is typically done and I use the pantheon already present in the campaign setting I am using. Apparently my methodology is quite boring compared to some of the thought others have put into their settings!

 

[theemrys]

I have for a while now been running my games in Kingdoms of Kalamar setting and part of my love for the setting is the pantheon they have. There are a LOT of gods that cover many aspects.. .but what I like about it is that they are the same ones for ALL races... they just go by different names. It doesn't matter if you are an elf, a human, an orc, or whatever... there is just one god of magic... one of scorn... one of valour. That was a big appeal for me as I never liked the idea of racial pantheons.

 

[ghrezdd]

In my current campaign world (which has been running for 9 years now) I came up with a weird sort of cosmology/mythology inspired by many sources. In the beginning there was Nothinginess. Then the Elven Gods came to this plane (along with their children) and created the world. During the process the Nothingness (which had gained awareness during the acts of creation) was unknowingly imprisoned. During the eons that passed, the Nothingness seethed with hatred for all of Creation and became the Great Evil - a Chaotic Evil God of Primal Destruction, a sentient and malevolent super massive singularity. But it was young and unfocused. Then during the golden age, the Elves (in pursuit of more knowledge and power) discovered this primordial Evil Being and tapped into it for more power. By interacting with that power, the elves gave the Nothingness a sense of identity and they matured it and of course when the Nothingness revealed itself, the Elves named it Lolth. The Elven gods then re-imprisoned the Nothingness and bound it in a fitfull sleep.

All of the other gods are the dreams (other evil gods) and nightmares (other good gods) of Lolth.

The Elven pantheon I left intentionally vague, basically described them as a host of primal spirits – the god of rivers, the goddess of a particular lake, etc. That way the players could name a god themselves to worship if they were an elf. As a side effect, I was able to say that Druids were those that worshipped a debased form of the elven pantheon – a sort of Elven Gods for Dummies.

For the Humans, I used the Seven Who Are One (and the One who is Seven) from GRRM A Song of Ice and Fire for the Humans. The Gods (or facets) are: The Father, The Mother, The Smith, The Warrior, The Maid, The Crone and the Stranger. They are young gods and from the nightmares of the Nothingness. The Humans also have an evil god known as Lucifer or Shaitan and it is a dream of the Nothingness.

For the Dwarves, I had them worship the seven founding clan fathers and they had one true goddess, the Earth Mother (who had created the 7 clan fathers as she was lonely). There is even an official evil goddess that they all bribe to avoid her wrath. The Dwarves know the Nothingness as 4 separate gods – Nurgle, Khorne, Slaanesh and Tzeentch of Warhammer fame. The Earth Goddess was a lost elven god.

For the Halflings, they worshipped a guardian/trixter goddess who’s orgins are obscure.

I added more pantheons or expanded the existing ones as needed.

Hope this helps

 

[Jor-El]

In my homebrew, I started long ago with the classic mythological pantheons and modified and altered them until I was comfortable with the end result. Each major group of races has their own pantheon, but the largest group (for humans) is based somewhat on the Norse gods.

A second continent with psuedo Middle-Eastern and Far-Eastern cultures have a pantheon that is loosely based on the Egyptian and Sumerian pantheons.

I tried to build and shape them according to a more realistic pattern rather than trying to fill in a grid for each class and alignment.

I also have a religion that fancies itself as a universal faith that reveres all the gods, but puts alot of emphasis on saints, martyrs, and heroes.

 

[El Mahdi]

I use a demagogic theocracy with myself as the head. (Hey, I use a messianic screen name...what else would you expect!)




In all seriousness, my current campaign is set in real world 12th century England, so I use real world religions of the time (Medieval Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Islam; Medival Christian Heretical Sects; Buddhism (and it's various versions); Taoism; Shinto spiritualism; and Zoroastrianism).

 

[Shades of Green]

Very cool idea! I like the concept

Thanks for liking my setting!

If you wish to read more about it and its cosmology, go HERE.

I built this cosmology since I wanted to try something different than the polytheistic pantheons and Good vs. Evil axis I've used in the past. I also did not want to have proactive gods running around my world and stealing the spotlight from the heroes (i.e. the PCs). So I ended up with a glacial-pace cosmic conflict of Nature (Chaos) vs. Civilization (Law), with the alignments being Chaotic, Neutral and Lawful and most mortals (and a good number of spirits) being Neutral. The two Great Gods are enormous in scope and power, but do not interfere with the world very directly, and most mortals prefer to deal with more personable spirits (especially ancestors) rather than embrace the numbingly inhuman nature of the Great Gods.

Worshiping the Mother Goddess is worshiping untamed, bestial nature in its coldest form. Worshiping the Clockwork God is worshiping an emotionless machine. Spirits tend to be far more familiar and approachable to the average mortal.

 

[lutecius]

My homebrew has 4 dominant cultures (western, northern…) and each has its own pantheon, loosely based on RW mythologies with a heavily syncretist approach (i.e. my northern god of thunder is a mix of Taranis, Thor and Perun my southern sun-god is Ra-Tonatiuh...)

each pantheon consists of 13 gods and 13 goddesses. that may seem like a lot but mechanically it's just 13 different themes and power suites (e.g. Hel, Hades, Yama and Ereshkigal are all "rulers of the underworld"; Freyja, Venus and Astarte are "whore goddesses"…)

I don't have racial pantheons. in the west, high elves usually worship Apollo, wood elves follow Artemis and dwarves serve Sethlans (Hephaestus). in the north it's Freyja, Freyr and Völundr, respectively…