I will admit, I’m kind of confused by your statement.
How is having a religion making the races less “exotic”? I’ll fully own up to ending up with more “monocultures” for my races (it’s a shortcut I’m ashamed to have taken, but I make myself feel better by imagining that things are more complex off screen) but having a unique faith system helps make them different from humans.
Humans, in my homebrew, are the most classically religious of the races. They have 13 major deities (currently) and a host of minor deities that may only be worshipped in a unique local area. They build elaborate chapels and “The Church” is a big concept for them.
Dwarves fall a bit closer to what I envision is Roman Catholcism. They have two deities, Moradin who crafted them and his Wife, while the rest of the “pantheon” is filled with “saints”. Dwarves or “Firstborn” who achieved great things or where punished and serve as divine messages and warnings. Making things is a big deal for Dwarves, it is a religious excersise, but most of the things they make end up in a treasure hoard devoted to Moradin, so he can look upon their works.
Orcs are vicious and warlike, but that is because they follow Gruumsh who laid down the laws of their people, they are tribal and strength rules, but I’ve also greatly toned down their “EVIL” vibe because I prefer just taking half-orcs and making them orcs, and worship of their gods takes the form of more devoting a hunting trophy or building a small shrine in the middle of the village.
Elves are more about training and discipline, and they don’t really have temples or shrines as much as they have monasteries and meditation techniques.
Dragonborn never call upon their gods, for their gods represent primal good and evil, it is more like the Chinese philosophy of Yin and Yang, they exist and effect the world, but you don’t call upon them or worship them, you acknowledge them and try to find personal balance.
I’m glossing over, but adding a faith system that is different from the human base makes them different. And, frankly, most intelligent species in DnD are going to be some version of humanity. We can’t do something too exotic or foreign to our own senses.
And, I also switch things up occasionally with different types of beings. Trolls are literally tiny pieces and sort of clones of Vaprak, who is a demon lord, and they don’t worship him. Minotaurs are created through cults of Baphomet, so they worship him, by continuing the same bloody rites that created them.
It’s all different in a way, but the more I type the more I think this isn’t what you are referring to. What kind of exotic races should be more exoctic? I’m partial to elves as plants and dwarves as beings of stone and metal, but that’s not exactly something I could homebrew and I doubt my players would be happy, they’re looking for some more traditional bodies at the very least.
You're right that religion is only part of what bothers me. Just giving them a list of gods like the other races seems like such a cop out. I would view orcs and goblin kin, if religious at all, to be much more primitive. Of course, warlocks didn't exist in the game then, but numerous shaman or witch doctor variations did. Having them worship a spirit world, or working backwards from them being an entirely warlike race, how would their religion have developed. For example, would they bury their dead? One option is to bury them with a weapon for their battle in eternal life, but why would they believe in eternal life? I think they are more brutal than that - why waste a good weapon by burying it? If they don't believe in eternal life, or even that there is "good" in the world, because "good" isn't good. Putting their head on a stake could be seen as both respectful and as a statement of power of the new chief. If they use magic at all, I seem to recall before their gods were published in Dragon magazine, that they were listed as having shamans or witch doctors (or both). There are so many possibilities rather than just another list of polytheistic gods.
It does go beyond that for me. Dragonborn are the prime example for me, although the design goes back to Dragonlance (the stupid Saurians in the Realms are another example). They are all designed basically as humans in a dragon suit. Or humans in a dinosaur suit. They stand entirely upright, with proportions that apparently match a human since they can wear the same armor. Some have tails, which would be absurd with that posture, and they act like humans.
If I recall, the dragonborn city that landed in Unther had granaries, outlying farms, etc. They are
carnivores. They don't even have teeth (and most likely not a digestive system) that can process grain. I would make dragonborn (draconians, whatever), lizard folk, troglodytes, saurians (if I bothered) and any other reptilian-based race capable of being bipedal and quadrupedal. They need to be able to stand tall to see around, but the quadruped posture makes them faster, usually better at climbing.
Lizard folk in my campaign use primitive stone or bone weapons, or metal weapons that they get from victims. Living in swamps, their primary tactics are ambush and drown. Turtleshell shields, spears or javelins, bows, that sort of thing, maybe some armor pieces as protection. They have primitive religion (if at all, most of the time it doesn't come into play). A hunter-warrior based society. Note that their culture would have developed out of competition with other tribes of their kind, and their hunting territories. They don't have many natural enemies in great swamplands. They bear a lot of similarities to alligators or crocodiles.
Troglodytes are similar, just underground versions. They are slim and have warrens that are filled with small winding tunnels that humans can't fit through. They carry javelins (weapons that are short enough to work in their tunnels), and metal weapons they can find and slings. Their tactics are to use ranged weapon attacks, then disappear into tunnels to come out someplace else and attack again. When their prey is weakened enough, they'll move in to attack with their natural attacks for the kill. They are carnivorous and warlike since food is scarce. Again, hunter warriors, but in this case they are also fighting goblin kin, orcs, dwarves, and other underdark races. So I think they would be hunter-scavengers-thieves. Their tunnel tactics are fantastic for this, because they can make it difficult for another predator to keep their kill, harassing them mercilessly. I also have them capable of climbing (even upside down) in their caverns. So in large caverns, you'll often see scouts high on a wall, then scurry away - a lot like my daughter chasing lizards at Myrtle Beach.
They are more serpentine, closer to the old Ral Partha troglodytes:
http://forum.reapermini.com/uploads/monthly_05_2016/post-1758-0-48418600-1462636349.jpg
Being primitive carnivores, they never developed civilizations like man. Civilization grew out of agriculture, the ability to stay in one place and still have plentiful food. Without a stationary civilization, they never developed the tools and processes like mining, forging, and stuff like that required to develop metal weapons. So no mining, no forging, and in the case of lizardfolk, steel weapons and armor are of almost no long-term use because they'd rust.
If I did saurians, then they'd first look more like dinosaurs (posture, etc.) and there are herbivores, so developing agriculture, basic mining etc. For interest, it would probably be bronze age technology. The carnivores are more intelligent, so agriculture would be based on enough food for raising great herds of herbivores. Armor and weapons as we use would be of limited use for such capable carnivores, and might not have developed at all. It would be a question of developing enough of a culture where they recognize that one sauropod will feed a lot of theropods if they develop the means to have a ready supply, and not allow the meat to go to waste. Religion? Again, I'm not sure it would develop at all, but certainly not in the same way as humans.
Dragonborn, again, more draconic. In the 4e dragonborn lore, they were slaves to dragons. Where can you get away from dragons? In caves too small for the dragon to fit. You're definitely not going to suddenly decide to build a farm and grow wheat, ignoring the fact that wheat's not even food for now. Wings or no wings? Either way, I think you'd develop into a hunter-warrior race, with ambush tactics to avoid the dragons and potentially fight them. You might develop a civilization where you nest together in a central cavern, and you're intelligent enough to share food. Perhaps even learn to raise food, like bat farming, perhaps. A "herd" of several hundred thousand bats would provide a ready source of food, along with perhaps underwater fishing. Oh, and, you know, weaker things. Like orcs and goblins and such. Being slaves themselves, I could easily see them being slavers as well, taking kobolds (the next draconic race down the rung), and using them as farmers, fishers, and such to raise food for the dragonborn.
Not sure they would be a mining race, although they could certainly use slaves for that. Weapon and armor use is dependent upon questions like can they fly? Traders eager to trade with their new neighbors in the Realms? First of all, what would they trade? My orcs, goblin kin, troglodytes, and lizard folk are all hunter-warriors. They might, just might, choose to form an alliance with a neighboring tribe, and trade symbolic gifts. A weapon, probably. They certainly haven't developed a coin-based economy. To an orc, coins are useless. Kill a human, take weapons and armor. Maybe jewelry if you're into shiny things.
Regardless, I don't have a need to develop dragonborn more, because I don't use them. The Realms (or at least mine) has half-dragons, born from unions of a male dragon in humanoid form, and a female of another humanoid race. I tend to make them fertile only with elves (including drow) and humans. They look elvish, although with potentially slightly different features, and grow up in human/elvish cultures. They very well could be the source of sorcerous magic (who are many generations removed), as that's the natural magic of dragons (although they can learn arcane wizardly magic as well). Dwarves and halflings cannot be sorcerers in my Realms, although they still have magic resistance (part of the reason they can't be sorcerers). Their abilities (and existence) consists of much rumor and myth.
So what it comes down to for me, when it comes to religion, is what religion would develop based on these histories and cultures? A hobgoblin military academy as in VGtM? Wait, what?!
Now there are regions in the Realms that Greenwood has specifically developed as ruled by monsters, such as the beast-men of Thar. I can go with that - a land where hobgoblins and ogres have evolved enough to build something more like a civilization. I'm not sure if I would go with them as different races (it's well beyond any area explored by any of my PCs). They trade with neighboring human realms to some degree.
Ok, to recap. I said there should be no conflict between the churches beyond mortal politics and genial competition (because everyone needs followers and so each church will try and entice people to join)
And you said you disagree, they have nothing to fight over so they won’t end up fighting.
Are you agreeing with me or disagreeing? And is you actually do disagree, do you think that two powerful forces like the High Priest of Torm and the High Priest of Mystara won’t end up in political situations where one tries to get an advantage from the King over the other? Perhaps in the allocation of taxes towards a project that could be significant.
I mean, people are people. Once a government exists and powerful people exist, powerful people are going to get involved in politics to one degree or another. It has nothing to do with the religion and everything to do with the locals and the land.
I agree with this, but the politics often brings religion into the conflict, because religion moves people of faith more. Even Hitler used religion as a basis for his regime.
For the majority of the evil gods I have come across, they could be easily replaced by either the Demon Lords or the Archdevils. We could argue mechanics or power levels but this is mostly about the narrative niche. You come across an order of assassins who worship a dark otherworldly master who demands they kill in his honor. Does it matter if the group follows Bhaal or Yeenoghu, both are blood-thirsty other worldly beings who would demand murder from their followers. Yeenoghu is admittedly more about also desecrating the corpses, but Bhaal’s belief looks like it also condones leaving a massive mess behind to make the murder more appealing.
How about a group of necromancers serving a dark lord to bring about an age of undeath and terror. Nerull or Orcus could both work here, though I admit I don’t know Nerull’s stance on the Undead.
A god of Madness and Lies, Demogorgon fits that decently well doesn’t he?
God of Tyranny, Asmodeus.
God of Torture, Graz’zt can hang with that, or maybe pull in Glasya
The narrative niche that these gods fill in the campaign, could be easily filled by any number of the Demon Lords or Archdevils. The only thing you may potentially lose is the cleric spell list, and that’s only if you are a real stickler about it, which it looks like 5e is not.
Absolutely. I don't even think you necessarily need to lost the cleric spell list, that really just dependent on how you want to provide divine magic, which isn't really a thing in 5e anymore. However, even in the background, the gods and the religions are kind on an integral part of the Realms. Does it mean it's not the Realms if you don't use them? No. But I probably wouldn't remove them.
Asmodeus is a god in the Realms now anyway. Lolth has been for a long time. So the addition of others really isn't a big deal. And with the way the gods have been used officially, changing things wholesale could easily be accomplished.
Yeah, you said “That’s not his job” and “The company that makes the game said everyone has a purpose so the Gods aren’t going to do that”.
Neither is a satisfactory in-world answer, not really. The Demons and Devils are expressly portrayed as the enemies of the gods, often desiring to tear down the heavens and destroy everything that has been made and either dance on the ashes or remake it in their image.
And the gods are just cool with letting them be? If the gods are as powerful as you say it would take them minutes to destroy these serious threats, but they don’t.
So, I don't recall anything about the fiends being portrayed as enemies of the gods and trying to destroy what they have. Most of the time they are involved in the Blood Wars against themselves, and trying (for some reason) to get to the material plane. My reasoning has always been one of souls. If faith provides power to the gods (but not fiends), then stealing (killing) a soul not only weakens a god, but could potentially be used as power in the lower planes. Or something along those lines.
Also, the gods in the Realms are specifically
not all powerful. That was one of the driving designs that Ed had at the beginning. His was based on the idea of a goddess of magic. The goddess of magic would be the most powerful, because not only could she shape magic to do anything she'd want, but she could deny the other gods the use of the magic. If that's the case, why are there other gods? So he created the chosen of Mystra, free-willed mortals that hold a bit of her magic. She can't control them, she can't take back the magic, and the magic lives in them and other places outside of her, so she can't prevent the other gods from accessing magic. So she's no longer all-powerful, and neither are the other gods. Together, perhaps, they'd have the resources to kill the fiends, but they are petty, scheming beings just like humans and can't agree on that. Moreso, they don't really care. I don't think they are that much more powerful than the fiends, if at all, and certainly not against the massed armies of the fiends. In fact, to tie into your questions as to why the fiends aren't/can't be gods, perhaps it's just because they haven't been able to be organized enough to amass enough followers. So Asmodeus, being a devil (and lawful good) has been able to take enough control of the hells, that he has achieved godhood. Lolth achieved it through the worship of a single race, in the Realms and other material planes.
The gods of the Realms are focused on Toril, because that's where their power comes from. If anything, I'd compare it to a cold war where neither side has the power to take out the other without mutual destruction. And while gods have been killed, it's become clear that that often isn't permanent.
