Worlds of Design: How Powerful Are Your Gods?

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Picture couresty of Pixabay.
Gods die. And when they truly die they are unmourned and unremembered.” Neil Gaiman

What Flavor of God?​

Are your fantasy role-playing game gods all-powerful, and are they omniscient (they know everything, which implies they are omnipresent as well)? Monotheistic religions tend to have one deity along these lines, but that's not how many of the ancients thought. The gods of the ancients tended to be something like very powerful humans or like comic book superheroes, in groups (there is also a point of view called monolatry, belief in the existence of many gods but with a consistent worship of only one deity). Here’s a list of characteristics to consider when creating your fantasy pantheon:
  • Extent of their knowledge (which includes, their presence)
  • Limits of their power (if any)
  • On a scale from benign to malign, where are they (See “RPG Gods Benign or Malign”)?
  • On a scale from engaged to aloof, where are they? That is, do the deities meddle in the affairs or mortals (Greek Gods), or do they rarely if ever engage with them (Cthulhu)?
  • What is the relationship with other gods?
  • Nature of worshippers (if no worshippers, can the “gods” truly be gods?)
  • How do they treat their worshippers? Are they merely a a means to an end, or do they love, honor, and care for their worshippers?
  • How do they treat their “spokesmen” (priests)?
  • Are they absolutely immortality (cannot be destroyed). or conditionally immortal (can be killed (with much difficulty) but won’t die naturally) or not immortal at all?
  • Can a god be stuck in one plane of existence, or does the god need to be able to travel to many planes, or perhaps to anyplace within a plane?

Divine Traits​

When you draw the line between gods and not-gods, immortality is the first thing that comes to mind. And yet, J.R.R. Tolkien’s high elves had a form of “conditional” immortality, living until someone killed them. Unusually, Tolkien’s elves continue to exist after they are killed, in a sort of waiting area in Valinor. And in some cases “gods” can die, e.g. Baldur in the Norse mythos. But gods are usually immortal until someone kills them, just like Tolkien’s elves. And their worshippers are necessarily “mortals.”

The second criterion for godhood that comes to mind after immortality is great power. So are all very powerful monsters also gods? Some of these are only conditionally immortal, some may be subject to death by very old age (dragons, in most cases). Is a thousand years close enough to immortal? Or can we not care about immortality if the “monster” is sufficiently powerful?

What about gods as “monsters,” that is, as opposition for adventurers? I don’t let player characters gain godlike powers, so I don’t put them up against godlike opposition. On the other hand, you could say that if a “god” is so wimpy that mortal adventurers can defeat it, it isn’t much of a god (Hulk: “Puny god.")! Some GMs may prefer to have their adventurers fight “gods” sooner or later.

Edge Cases​

This brings to mind my “monster” Elemental Princes of Evil that originally appeared in the Fiend Folio. Are they gods? They’re immortal, perhaps more than conditionally (that is, they respawn if killed). They’re very powerful, such that the only time my player character in a powerful party ran into one of them, we grabbed what we came for and fled post-haste. Do they have worshippers? There’s a tradition in fantasy that “old gods” who no longer have worshippers either fade away, or hang around in obscure ways – as “monsters,” more or less. Or in this case, never had worshippers, so they’re monsters, not gods?

We can also talk about Demigods. These are common in ancient Greek/Roman mythology, the result of a union between god and human, such as Hercules. In most cases they are conditionally immortal, but much less powerful than full gods, resembling comic book superheroes, or demons. So sometimes they’re treated as mortals, sometimes as gods.

Choose Wisely​

Defining your deities and the extent of their influence will have significant repercussions on your campaign: for your divine spellcasters, for your fiendish and celestial monsters, and if the player characters are powerful enough, even as potential foes.

Your Turn: How powerful are the gods in your campaign?
 

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Lewis Pulsipher

Lewis Pulsipher

Dragon, White Dwarf, Fiend Folio
I've written settings with no gods but faith based power, seemingly absent gods, meddling immortals, (in the used to be mortal sense,) with peak human limits while manifest, and traditional fantasy game gods with agendas and occasional meddling.This is all good to think about when world building. Your points that powerful monsters can be gods in a vacuum and gods becoming monsters out of context are well made as well.
Absent gods tend to be my go to in anything but high fantasy, because it injects agency and responsibility into the party. It is part of what makes Conan stories so enjoyable, they don't have any more proof of the afterlife than we do and that demon cult is responsible for the wave of darkness, not their demonic god. Even if there is an entity driving them, the people responsible are still people and can be dealt with.
 



The gods in my campaign act primarily as avatars that the players will likely never interact with unless the campaign reaches tier 4. They are off doing their godly things that are beyond mortal understanding.
 

The other option I like is how Primeval Thule does it. The gods are distant. There is zero interaction. Clergy are cabalistic - teaching new clerics how to do divine magic, more or less wizards with a better organization.

This makes things like heresy and internal conflict writhing faiths a major element. It’s not like clerics can ask the gods what they mean. Even celestials have no direct contact with the divine. Faith becomes a much bigger issue rather than belief.
 

I tend to not have much involvement by the gods in my games. I want the PCs to be the heroes and not rely on some big brother watching over them. I suppose they are there and if a PC wanted to try and go visit them they could. We tend to not play they high of a level games though.
 

I tend to play gods much as they were in core 4th Edition--they neither omniscient nor omnipotent, but they will kick your ass if you try to start a fight with them and aren't at least 21st level.
 

I don’t have a clear line between gods and the Outsider spirits like celestials, fiends, modrons, and so on. In general, most outsiders need a “body” of some sort to act in the mortal world, be it a magically created one, a creature or object they possess, or a least an ethereal locus of power. Once a spirit start being able to cause things to happen without an identifiable presence, and when using a body is more an inconvenience than a tool, then they can generally call themselves a god without complaints.
 

My gods are pretty damn powerful, but not all powerful.
  • They belong to a race of immortals, a celestial race from the upper planes of exisitence. They gained true godhead when they seized the pillars of creation and ascended.
  • They don't know everything, but they do know a lot, mostly due to a long life.
  • They can be challenged by others such as elder dragons (the first dragons), primordials (powerful elementals) and titans (their brothers and sisters who gained power through harnessing raw elemental power).
  • They don't really meddle on mortal affairs and individual faiths and pantheons have sprung up around them.
  • They can go where they like but tend to remain in Godsheim, guarding the prison of the titans and keeping an eye on the fiends of the lower planes in case they try to invade the upper planes again. Typically, they traverse the planes using interplanar pathways.
 

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