D&D 4E Who / What will be the main gods of 4E?

[frankthedm]

Since Greyhawk is going away as the default setting, what D&D Icons willl fill the holes?

Hextor and Heironeous are actually pretty easy to replace, given that there is another iconic diety pair up along the Paladin Vs. Tyrant theme.

Boccob:
Nerull
Pelor
Ehlonna: Good fey?
Erythnul: Maybe give Yeenoghu the portfolio or?
Fharlanghn:
Heironeous: Bahamut
Hextor: Tiamat / Asmodeus
Kord: Heracles
Obad-Hai:
Olidammara: Neutral fey?
Saint Cuthbert:
Wee Jas: Dual faced Hel from Norse pantheon?
Vecna: He might stay as an ‘unnamed’ dark deity.

 

[Szatany]

They should cherry-pick gods from real religions. Greek pantheon, norse pantheon, egyptian pantheon, maybe hindu as well. Choose most interesting deities, say 18 (two per alignment). I want Thor, Ares, Aphrodite, Ra, Set, Anubis, Zeus, Freya.

They are much more interesting that some bland obad-hai and you can find a lot of stuff online.

 

[TerraDave]

I think the most straight forward approach would be to have Norse and Greek pantheons as examples, with ecouragment for DMs to do their own.

BUT: where does asmodeous fit in?

The original Deities and Demigods (and I guess Legends and Lore) had both the "earth" pantheons, and the non-human dieties. They could also do something like this.

With Asmodeus god of the Tieflings.

 

[Gundark]

While it would interesting, to gather from real world anicent religions (Norse, Egyptian). They should probably avoid real religions that people currently believe in (Hunduism).

I would prefer made up patheons (not real religion). Not for any reason other than I find FR or GH style deities more interesting

 

[Szatany]

While it would interesting, to gather from real world anicent religions (Norse, Egyptian). They should probably avoid real religions that people currently believe in (Hunduism).

Well, asmodeus is from Bible, and they are not avoiding him.

 

[Kaodi]

I don't want them to so much as cherry pick deities from real world pantheons as cherry pick pantheons from real world mythology.

Back in the very first 3e Dragon (RIP) I bought, there was an article by some dude named Steven Kenson that positted the make up of a bunch of real world religions for a D&D campaign. I suppose this was done somewhat with Legends & Lore from past editions, but I don't have that on hand to quote from.

The most well known pantheons in our collective mythological conscious are the Greek, Norse and Egyption pantheons, which he boiled down to:

Greek: Aphrodite, Apollo, Ares, Artemis, Athena, Demeter, Dionysus, Hades, Hecate, Hephaestus, Hera, Hermes, Hestia, Poseidon, Zeus

Egyptian: Ra, Anubis, Apep, Bast, Geb, Horus, Isis, Nephthys, Osiris, Seker, Set, Shu, Thoth

Norse: Odin, Balder, Bragi, Frey, Freya, Frigga, Heimdall, Hel, Loki, Sif, Surtur, Thor, Tyr, Thrym, Uller

Those, in turn, could be trimmed down to:

Aphrodite, Apollo, Ares, Artemis, Hades, Hephaestus, Hera, Hermes, Poseidon, Zeus
Ra, Anubis, Horus, Isis, Osiris, Set, Thoth
Odin, Frey, Freya, Loki, Sif, Surtur, Thor, Tyr, Thrym

I think those are probably our choices from real world pantheons for inclusion in the pantheon. I think perhaps that Hera, Zeus, Ra and Odin rule themselves out though because a D&D pantheon doesn't usually have a leader.

Boccob - Isis
Ehlonna - Artemis
Erythnul - Ares
Fharlanghn - Hermes
Heironeous - Tyr
Hextor - Asmodeus
Kord - Thor
Nerull - Hades
Obad-Hai - Poseidon
Olidammara - Loki
Pelor - Apollo
St. Cuthbert - Horus
Vecna - Set
Wee Jas - Osiris

Corellon Larethian - Frey
Garl Glittergold - Thoth
Moradin - Hephaestus
Gruumsh - Surtur
Yondalla - Freya

Not that those are necessarily translations, but just a prediction of who takes whos spot.

 

[Jer]

Since Greyhawk is going away as the default setting, what D&D Icons willl fill the holes?

Hextor and Heironeous are actually pretty easy to replace, given that there is another iconic diety pair up along the Paladin Vs. Tyrant theme.

Boccob:
Nerull
Pelor
Ehlonna: Good fey?
Erythnul: Maybe give Yeenoghu the portfolio or?
Fharlanghn:
Heironeous: Bahamut
Hextor: Tiamat / Asmodeus
Kord: Heracles
Obad-Hai:
Olidammara: Neutral fey?
Saint Cuthbert:
Wee Jas: Dual faced Hel from Norse pantheon?
Vecna: He might stay as an ‘unnamed’ dark deity.

I was wondering how much milage they'd be able to get by using just deities that are strongly tied to D&D already -- stepping into actual "real world" myth as little as possible. The only ones I could come up with were:

Asmodeus
Vecna
Lolth
Bahamut
Tiamat
Yeenghou
Gruumsh
Corellon Larethian
Kurtulmak
Garl Glittergold
Moradin
Yondalla

(Yes, I know that Bahamut, Tiamat and Asmodeus are all "real world" names, but they have specific identities tied to the D&D game that are "iconic" in ways that, say, Hercules or Thor are not.)

The problem is that there aren't very many "good" deities up there - most of the "good" ones are demihuman gods. I've been trying to think of some non-Greyhawk, non-FR deities that are both good and strongly tied to the D&D game and I've been coming up blank.

 

[gothmaugCC]

Well it was already mentioned by the developers that Asmodeous would NOT be appearing in the monster manual and instead would be elevated to god status in the Player's handbook.

Here's the quote from Enworld's 4ed page.
Chris Perkins -- "In case you're wondering, Asmodeus won't be joining Orcus in the new MM because, as I previously hinted, the Lord of the Ninth is getting a promotion to god status in 4E. His holy (unholy?) symbol will be among those appearing in the Player's Handbook"



Also Thor's name has been thrown around once or twice in interviews, but there's been no indication that we will see him in the PHB.

 

[jasin]

A question for the planar scholars: if Asmodeus were a god in 3E, what would his domains be? What's his schtick, beyond being all Evil and Lawful and devilish?

 

[ivocaliban]

They should cherry-pick gods from real religions. Greek pantheon, norse pantheon, egyptian pantheon, maybe hindu as well. Choose most interesting deities, say 18 (two per alignment). I want Thor, Ares, Aphrodite, Ra, Set, Anubis, Zeus, Freya.

They are much more interesting that some bland obad-hai and you can find a lot of stuff online.

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