RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Ok - scattered thought - so bear with me. There are some very thoughtful and creative people on these boards, and I'm interested in all opinions.
So - Can you redefine a God's portfolio? Gods in D&D all have domains, spheres of influence, things they just basically "stand for" or are characterized by.
But, (and correct me if I'm wrong) - I think that Gods lose power, and essentially fade away, if their mortal followers, well...stop following them. So, if this is true, then mortals have some power over the Gods, yes? Mortals choose how and who to venerate and worship. I don't know if Gods truly die when they have no worshippers left, or are forgotten, but they certainly lose quite a bit of power.
So - what if worshippers don't want to venerate a God in a particular way anymore? Can mortals effectively strip a God of one of their domains? Can they "give" this domain to another God?
What if - say we have a Goddess of Love - who through whatever means, loses a large body of worshippers, and it is decided that the Goddess is now the Goddess of Prostitution, or Lust, or some such thing? Can mortals do this? Can they reshape a God's portfolio in this way?
Specifically - I'm working on a campaign arc (very very formative stages) where a civilization conquers another, basically whole sale slaughter. Most of the conquered people's religion is destroyed, forgotten, etc. As an insult to injury, the conquering civilization denounces the conquered civilization's gods and debases them - the Goddess of love is now the goddess of whores, lust, etc. Over time, she is seen and worshipped this way.
Alternatively, an evil god/demon's cult goes on a PR mission - attracting worshippers to their "wrongfully" maligned patron's service with grandiose acts of kindness, attempting to hijack a benevolent god's portfolio. A whole series of adventures could be based around the PCs being in the know of how things are truly supposed to be, and setting these things right and getting the word out on this entity.
(I kind of got the idea from how General MacArthur made the emperor of Japan go on the radio and denounce his divinity - reshaping what the Japanese people had believed and how they saw their "former god.")
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So - Can you redefine a God's portfolio?
Absolutely. I'm a huge Forgotten Realms fan and you see things like this happening all the time in the Realms history. However, a portfolio is something that can be taken by force as well (evidently). If a god slays another god, they are able to subsume all of the slain god's portfolio unless another force intervenes. It would not be difficult to believe that the mortals who worship the god could alter the god's portfolio by altering their worship.
Yes. A god's power comes from their worshippers, and if their worshippers come to a different PoV about their god, then I think they could change, radically even. A good example is when Kelemvor took over Cyric's control of Death in the FR - Death became more neutral as opposed to the negative overtones of Necromancy that it had.
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I was reading about Bast on the internet somewhere. She started out as the lion-headed sun goddess of one crew of people, then she just became the cat goddess when the Egyptians took them over. THEN, the Greeks were the ones who decided she had something or other to do with the moon.
So,....yes you can; happens all the time. ;)
I also think Heracules was an ancestor/legendking of the Spartans; seems he got severely retconned. I don't have all the details on that one.
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RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Interesting.
So, continuing with the Campaign Arc rough idea - some demon lord is attempting to achieve a measure of godhood the old fashioned way - by lying, cheating, and stealing it.
What if his/her cult debases a Good god, and then people slowly start to venerate the demon under the "stolen" portfolio/domain?
Heck, I'm even seeing thralls of that demon being known (secretly) as The Deceivers - they actively go out and proselytize, commit staged good acts, discredit the god, etc. to sway worshippers (even clerics!) from that god.
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Heck, I'm even seeing thralls of that demon being known (secretly) as The Deceivers - they actively go out and proselytize, commit staged good acts, discredit the god, etc. to sway worshippers (even clerics!) from that god.
That's kind of what the Thralls of Fraz-Urb'luu do. They masquerade as good clerics, eventually convincing some poor slob to sacrifice himself for the "good" of the church. That persons soul then goes to Fraz-Urb'luu domain, where the prince torments the hell out it before devouring the soul.
As for your original topic, one of the best real-world examples of redefined deities is in the Indian Sub-continent. They had the pre-Vedic age, then the Vedic age which morphed into modern Hinduism.
Here is a pretty good write up on the subject.
Deities in D&D are worshipped in the guise that their followers imagine them to have. We see Boccob as this Merlin-like figure with a robe, a beard and a lot of books. If a kuo-toa civilization worships Boccob, they see him as a kuo-toa, imagine that he engraves his spells into seashells, and give him a different name.
Thus, if the followers of Kord change so that he's conceived of a violent conqueror, Kord really is more violent. If changes in pronunciation over centuries render his name as Kurrid, that's his name. Deities are generally beyond the ken of humans, and things like human appearances and names are merely titles. If the deity's own beliefs conflict with his worshippers, he can always inspire a prophet to keep things in line.
In FR and Greyhawk most gods lose power when their followers all die off or stop following the god in question. The gods change portfolios constantly and are constantly being redefined. In Krynn and Eberron gods don't get their power from worshippers (though Krynn is a bit more complicated in this regard than Eberron), though their portfolios and powers they grant clerics are probably still highly mutable.
I'm not sure what the Pathfinder gods are going to be like in this regard, but the Paizo staff will probably go down the Greyhawk path given Eric Mona's love for the setting.
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As pointed out, gods work by different rules in different worlds. As for my own homebrew, I prefer the "many paths to power" approach.
1. Some gods gain the majority of their power from worshippers, and are mutable depending on how they are perceived by mortals. They spend all their energy and attention on the material plane, promoting themselves to retain or enhance their power. These gods can grant spells for uses vaguely or indirectly in line with the god's dogma.
2. Some gods gain only a portion of their power through their followers, and so it's in their best interest to look after their flock, but not essential or perhaps not their first and only concern. These gods usually grant spells for uses directly benefitting its own religion or dogma.
3. Some gods have power all their own, requiring nothing of mortals and usually caring little about the material plane. Some of these gods do have interest in mortals for other reasons, and grant spells to clerics who view them as the most benevolent or terrible of all gods. Depending on the god, the uses of this divine power can be very strict or nearly frivolous in nature.
Well, I would suggest that you have a few types of dieties so that things to get to codified in the minds of any pc, the dieties after all should be somewhat mysterioius.
I suggest you have some primal dieties that exist outside of any need for mortal worshipers, though they certainly might desire such worship; they dont require it for existance. These would tend to be the dieties that keep the basic mechanics of entropy at bay and basic order in place as well as their counterparts that are basic chaos or desire for things to breakdown and return to a less codified existance of chaos or greater probability or possibility of things opposed to law. Some of these would need to be creation dieties who exister prior to any mortals and who perhaps had a hand in the creation of the various races for who knows what purpose. This group would be very removed from comprehension of nearly any sane mortal, yet have much direct control perhaps over other lesser dieties and basic reality.
Beneath these dieties I would suggest that you have some intermediate dieties who are more or less the icons of basic ideals or primal urges of any mortal; ie, dieties of things a bit esoteric such as truth, justice, vengance, accumulation of power; greed, love, and so on; these dieties certainly need mortals to exists; but not necessarily direct worshipers as as long as any of these concepts endure; so do the dieties who are the living embodyment of these ideals; this group would not be so removed from interaction with mortals as the first group, yet still a bit alien, but certainly within the grasp of some devoted who identify with any of these particular dieties ethics. Killing vast number of any who believe in these certain ethics would be somewhat effective, but these ideal are so ingrained in everyone from creation; that these dieties would be very difficult to cut off from the world.
Least dieties would be those of direct causes or champions of certain societies or various groups; these demigod and lesser dieties would be the most interactive with their followers as if their particular cults or societes or perhaps cities; are geographical regions are destroyed, they would fade from existance; though could be reborn or reawaken if their cults or places once again become a force strong enough for their existance; you must decide how much worship power any group provides for these dieites; a war perhaps that kills of of the priests of these dieties might cut the strings of interaction between one of these dieties and its followers; ie loss of clerical powers.
hence, using this plan; you could redefine dieties at will as some dieties from the third group might change ethics to find more numerous or relevant worshipers or some might only want a few worships who believe so strongly their faith cannot be shaken; then of course the way a mortal might define a diety from one of hte upper groups might change over time as more is learned about the diety and the subject matter through revelation or philosophy and general advancement of learning.
with this system you could have a many or few dieties as you desire and add or delete them as they become or lose relavance.
hope that is not to long winded for you :)
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RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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hope that is not to long winded for you :)
No...much appreciated actually. There have been a lot of really good responses to this thread, and I've been given a lot to consider.
That's the main reason why I love these boards so much - it is such an incredible pool of talented, creative people who are willing to help brainstorm.