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I have a question about cosmology. I have noticed in many published and home brewed worlds there are gods, good gods, evil gods and indifferent gods. These deities are often world specific.
There are also the LE devils, the NE Daemons, and the CE Demons. Ruling these evil things are the “Dukes of Hell who are all led by Asmodeus, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and the Demon princes Orcus Grazzt etc.
Asmodeus has recently been “promoted” to god status with the edition change.
I read that the Wotc Designers of 4e thought people would pay more attention to Asmodeus if he were a god.
If I may paraphrase Screw Tape of the Screw tape letters “ the smartest thing our father below ever did was to convince the world we don’t exist”. But enough I need to get to a point.
I will use the collective word fiends to describe all of the devils daemons and devils. Interestingly these entities are not world specific. They exist in campaign world after campaign world.
In my opinion if I may use Galoron as an example, it seems redundant to have Apollyon, the Archdaemon, Lord of locusts and disease, and the Horseman of pestilence, and Urgothoa the goddess of disease gluttony and death. If I come up with another example, Bane the god of Tyranny, and Asmodeus the patron of might and oppression is there room for both? Does one need both? . I could think of other examples.
I guess my thought is this: to me it seems redundant to have both a god and fiendish lord of the same thing. I think it would be simpler to have either evil gods with their fiendish servants, or Fiendish lords and their fiendish servants. What are your thoughts? Do people prefer to have both evil gods and fiendish lords? One or the other?
In my own home brewed game world, I have nine gods of alignments covering LG LN N NG CG. I have four elemental Titans with the CN alignment, and I have 13 evil powers Devils and Demons.
So I prefer to have both Gods and evil Fiends. This is merely a personal preference.
I guess at the end of the day Asmodeus Grazzt and Orccus resonate with me much more then Nerull, Merkull no Cyric No Kevemore do. the Fiendish lords seem to be much more the embodiment of Lawfull evil, Chaotic evil, and Neutral evil then the Evil gods do. Because they are portrayed much the same way across campaign worlds, where as the gods on the other hand are campaign specific and thus seem much less universal.
What do others think? Do you like having Evil Gods and Evil Fiendish lords in your campaign world, or do you prefer having either Evil gods with fiendish servants or Fiendish lords with fiendish servants?
What are your thoughts?
By the way, I like the idea that the Arch Daemons are the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Very cool.
At least in my own campaigns, I've gone with the following:
Archfiends and other similar planar lords are physical personifications of some universal quality or aspect of their native plane. Primus is a personification of order, Asmodeus a personification of tyranny, Harishek ap Thulkesh a personification of callous cruelty, etc. They personify some universal abstract that exists regardless of whether someone believes in it or not. They're neither reliant upon nor altered by mortal belief or worship. As a god, Bane might be lawful evil and promote tyranny, but Asmodeus is tyranny made flesh.
Gods on the other hand are essentially overglorified personifications of a mortal conception of such abstracts. Sune would be the personification of the pooled mortal conception of beauty, etc. They're empowered by and typically created out of mortal belief and worship, and without it, they're soon to be drifting isles of rock in the Astral. Gods are insanely powerful, but they're also relatively young in terms of the age of the planes, and its oldest beings who might view them as powerful children at times.
In practice, there's not much difference between an archfiend and a god. Both are crazy powerful, and mortals stand little chance against even an avatar. Gods and planar lords interact certainly, but mostly they leave one another alone, largely because their spheres of influence and different and similar themed gods and planar lords usually reinforce one anothers' goals even when they're not on the best of terms.
As for archfiends and gods having similar themes and portfolios: it comes down to that whole different spheres of influence thing. The Oinoloth and its baernaloth "advisors" probably don't care in the slightest what happens to any given world on the prime material plane, but they certainly care about the long-term influence of abstract evil in the multiverse. Shar on the other hand shares a similar worldview to the 'loths, and is singularly concerned with the world of Toril, and likely uncaring about things on distant planes of existance. There's certainly room for both of them, so long as DMs keep in mind different methods of actions, different goals, different followers, etc. It's always fun to use rivalry between gods and planar lords to make for awkward bedfellows (like PC followers of Selune being aided by servitors of Mydianchlarus to stop a Sharran plot, for reasons not immediately certain on the fiends' part).
I don't mind overlapping divinities, and I like the perhaps paradoxical juxtaposition of gods being not that different in practice from archfiends, but at a core level being distinctly different creatures. I also don't like gods or archfiends having stats (but go wild with avatars).
Of course, this is true for my own games, and might not mesh with others' take on the topic (certainly not WotC's 'Orcus is a big monster to fight in an extraplanar dungeon' thing they're going off on). My formative experiences with the planes of D&D were pure Planescape, so I lack the earlier viewpoint that some others might have. So take my perspective as just that, a personal perspective that I prefer but in no way expect to be true for everyone.
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I would have to say I use the same method as Todd. The only difference I would have with any of it, is I choose not to use any of the "real world" aspects. What I mean is the actual Demon's from the christian belief in Hell. I have seen, with groups i've gamed with, this can be an issue with some peoples real world belief's. Now I do realize they are many other faiths out there in the world, I myself being Pagan, but when I do get diverse players I ensure the uses of the other Human pantheons don't offend anyone.
The easiest solution I use for this is using a realm specific pantheon. I generally also stay away from the hells, I prefer using the Abyssal Fiends anyway...just think they are more fun. :)
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Gods on the other hand are essentially overglorified personifications of a mortal conception of such abstracts. Sune would be the personification of the pooled mortal conception of beauty, etc. They're empowered by and typically created out of mortal belief and worship, and without it, they're soon to be drifting isles of rock in the Astral. Gods are insanely powerful, but they're also relatively young in terms of the age of the planes, and its oldest beings who might view them as powerful children at times.
I first came across that concept in Pratchett (where it was funny) but when they introduced it in FR with the Time Of Troubles it left me a bit cold.
I prefer a more Olympian model of deities, not with the "all one big family element" but with the "often we're not that interested, you can't touch us anyway" bit.
But then I don't like seeing stats for gods, i like them to function on a different level to mere mortals.
Big difference I see between evil deities and fiend lords is highlighted some by the blog regarding "He Who Walks In Blood"...deities can only be killed by other deific level beings. This is a big gap between deity and demon prince/inferal arch-duke. I personally like this distinction that mortals cannot kill a deity (except possibly through extreme circumstances).
-Weylin Stormcrowe
Asmodeus was, in fact, demoted. In Planes of Chaos it was stated that he and the godess of quatl in fact created order from Chaos and demarcated the planes on the Great Wheel. Asmodeus was more powerful than any god.
Not quite. That was a theory from "Guide to Hell". That sort of quasi-Zoroastrian duality between Asmodeus and Jazirian never subsequently appeared beyond that book, nor the idea of Asmodeus having a role in the creation of the current planar structure. The only thing to really carry on to subsequent material was the rumored idea of Asmodeus having a true form different from his traditional image, and having fallen from true law into lawful evil.
Technically, GtH never said he was more powerful than any other god either. It just gave him the status of a greater god without actually -being- a greater god. But the idea of the archfiends being equivalent but different from gods (and more or less powerful depending on circumstances) was peppered throughout various 2e sources.
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In my homebrews I have always employed the following strata:
Creator Gods: Usually one or two gods (Montheism or Dualism) that have existed since the beginning of time, one might argue that they created time. These are insanely powerful forces untouchable by lesser beings. These gods require no worshippers, and may choose to have no portfolio, they simply exist. In rare cases a Creator God may come into existence later in cosmic time (since time has no meaning for them).
Lesser Gods: These are the typical D&D pantheons, of any number and purpose. The gods were created by the Creator Gods for the purpose of controlling and serving the world and creatures in it (very similar to the Forgotten Realms idea). These gods require worshippers to remain relevant and a portfolio to function.
Immortals: This is the group of extremely powerful beings who are immensely powerful but serve no divine purpose - they do not create new things in the world and may in fact serve a god. Typically this group includes the Fiends and Angels, but also more importantly includes some Dragons (those worthy who live to Ancient Wyrm).
Rogues: Finally, this last group includes powerful beings who can function as gods but do not work in the main pantheon. These creatues can grant spells, possess a portfolio, and even work against the Creator and Lesser Gods - for all intents they are a seperate pantheon (of varying number). The main difference is that these beings were not part of the original universal design. This group usually includes PCs or NPCs that have achieved epic status and carve a place for themselves.
Gotta go!
I have a question about cosmology. I have noticed in many published and home brewed worlds there are gods, good gods, evil gods and indifferent gods. These deities are often world specific.
There are also the LE devils, the NE Daemons, and the CE Demons. Ruling these evil things are the Dukes of Hell who are all led by Asmodeus, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and the Demon princes Orcus Grazzt etc.
Cosmologies and mythological underpinnings are, by their nature, mostly setting specific. That said, there's nothing inherently against using the Divine and Profane Hosts of Zoraster (IIRC) at the same time as polytheistic deities (who may or may not be related or thematically organized). Basically, the way D&D has tended to handle it is to have the deities concentrate on worshipers and sentinent creatures, to the point where they resemble sentinent beings writ large (like most polytheistic myths), while the Divine and Profane Hosts (celestals and fiends) are more... elemental. For example, in Golarion, Urgothoa would focus on her worshippers developing and speading diseases among non-worshippers; Apollyon, however, would likely focus on disease and pestillence itself, indifferent to its effect or lack of effect on sentinent beings (he'd be as interested in killing plants as people).
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Thank you all for your thoughts. I guess at the end of the day, what I like about the D&D game is that it is broad enough to cover a variety of tastes. I like that one has the freedom when creating a “home brewed” world to set things up as they like.
Some people like the idea that the gods are brought into existence by the imagination of their worshipers and grow more powerful through an expanding base of worshipers. It explains why a powerful god would be interested in his/her followers, and why clerics of a particular faith would be evangelistic self interest being at the core of this cosmological paradigm.
Others prefer a different approach. Some people prefer the gods to exist as independent entities not dependent upon mortal belief or perception. Of course the question that then arises is this: what interest would such beings have in mortals?
There are probably as many different answers as there are home brewed worlds.
The answer I put forth in my own hombrew campaign, is that the Creator cast the spirits of the gods upon the wheel of time so they would live 10,0000 mortal lives and die 10,000 mortal deaths. This way the gods have literally walked in the shoes of their mortal charges, and they would then care for them out of sympathy and compassion.
Everyone has a different answer and more importantly everyone probably asks different questions.
Again thank you for your thoughts, this is proving to be an interesting thread.
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Excuse me Dragon Chess Player
I don’t think I read your post while writing my previous response to the earlier posters.
It seems you were uploading your post, while I was writing my post in response to the previous posters. You hit upon an interesting point. Let me see if I understand the distinction. Urgothoa, for example would be interested in sentient worshipers, and would be therefore interested in disease that affects sentiments.
Where as Appollyon, one of the “Daemons” Horsemen of the Apocalypse, would be interested in Disease for its own sake, weather it infected plants animals or what ever else. Have I got the distinction down?
Thanks
In my campaign(s), gods are generally distant and abstract. You can't Plane Shift to the Seven Mounting Heavens and try to punch Heironeous, for instance, because he's not there. There might be some Solars there representing him, but even they have never seen the Big Guy in person.
On the other hand, [demon|devil] lords are basically unique, overgrown [balors|pit fiends]. They can be attacked, talked to personally (not through intermediaries), bargained with, etc.
Let me see if I understand the distinction. Urgothoa, for example would be interested in sentient worshipers, and would be therefore interested in disease that affects sentiments.
Where as Appollyon, one of the Daemon Horsemen of the Apocalypse, would be interested in Disease for its own sake, weather it infected plants animals or what ever else. Have I got the distinction down?
Mostly.
Deities, by their nature in D&D (based on real world myth), are mostly concerned with increasing the number of sentinents that worship them and/or reducing the number that worship their enemies/rivals. There may be deities that don't care much about worship, but they have little effect on the day-to-day actions of mortals and are seldom worshipped to any large degree.
Other immortals in D&D are more concerned with causes and/or methods; their interactions with mortals determined by their nature. The Horsemen, for instance, are dedicated to the death of everything; each pursues a chosen method to bring about this goal. They would be indifferent to mortal worship and would be as likely to kill their worshipers as they would non-worshipers.
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Dragon chess,
So from what I understand, most D&D cosmologies are often based on real world pantheons I.e. Greek, Egyptian, Norse Etc., (and to some I realize these pantheons are real, because that is what they believe in.), and are also often composed of created, written cosmologies made just for a campaign setting or home brewed world. There is often a mixture of real world inspired mythology and mythology written just for the game.
One common system that many people use is this: the gods are essentially the creation of mankind’s (or elf dwarf orc etc) imaginations, and they exist through the collective beliefs of their mortal worshipers. The more worshipers the deity has, the more powerful it is and in turn the greater power the deity can bestow on its moral followers. In turn the mortals worship in transactional exchange for power, namely the divine magic described in the game. In this system a god grows more powerful through evangelism, through attracting more worshipers, and conversely a god grows weaker through the loss of worshipers, and if this tread continues, becomes greatly dimished through the lack of worshipers and can cease to exist with a complete lack of worshipers. With no worshipers believing in a god’s existence, it no longer exists.
Thus the gods need worshipers for their survival and power, and the worshipers need the gods for the divine power (magic) that is bestowed on the god’s priesthood. This explains why a) gods are interested in their followers because their survival is tied to the beliefs of their followers, and b) their worshipers worship, in exchange for divine magic, and c) it explains evangelism, namely the spread of worship of a particular faith (I seem to remember evangelism means “spreading the good news” but I am not sure)
Now the Abyssal lords, and the Dukes of Hell, rulers of the 9 layers, and presumably the Daemonic Horsemen of the Apocalypse, on the other hand, I think get their power through the planes they rule. In a Platonic sense they are the “perfect example” of the idea or concept that they represent. Thus they are more universal.
Since there is presumably there are multiple “prime material planes” and thus many gods.
Supposedly there is one great wheel, which has all of the outer planes, be they Upper “Celestial” or Lower “ Abyssal, Infernal etc” or Inner namely the Elemental planes All of the planes are connected by various transitive planes. The prime material plane is connected to the outer planes (the Upper celestial planes and Lower fiendish planes and the Lawful planes like Mechanus and Chaotic planes like limbo) by the astral plane. The astral Plane also connects the Outer planes to each other. All of these outer planes are on a “great wheel” The Prime material plane is also connected by the ethereal plane to the Inner Planes (composed of the Elemental and Para elemental planes as well as the Positive and negative energy planes).
The immortal beings that rule these planes such as Orcus, Grazzt, Mephistopheles, Amadeus etc. draw their power from the planes that they rule. They are “perfect examples “ in a platonic sense of what they represent.
I am sure I am leaving some people out like the plane of Mechanus and Primus and his Modrons. Among others like the Planes of Limbo pandemonium and the hopping croaking frog like Slaadi.
If there is a point here I have forgotten it. Lets see: the gods exist through belief in their existence by their worshipers, and ascend and descend in power according to the numbers of worshipers they have.
And the more “planar entities’ like Orcus, Primus, Amadeus, Mephistopolese, Grazzt etc, are somewhat like Platonic perfect expressions of what they embody, and get their power from the planes they rule.
Is this the distinction you were thinking of, or have I wandered off into a briar patch and gotten stuck there. Oh bother.
Now of course the beauty of D&D is that it allows one the freedom to craft the cosmology of their home brewed world however they want.
Well thank you for putting up with my long rambling and probably pointless post.
Elyas
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In my campaign(s), gods are generally distant and abstract. You can't Plane Shift to the Seven Mounting Heavens and try to punch Heironeous, for instance, because he's not there. There might be some Solars there representing him, but even they have never seen the Big Guy in person.
On the other hand, [demon|devil] lords are basically unique, overgrown [balors|pit fiends]. They can be attacked, talked to personally (not through intermediaries), bargained with, etc.
Me too. I like the !If you actually saw a god your mind would explode! approach. Which also features the !Happily your mind and senses cannot process the divine, so you're okay.! angle
I once put it to a player like this; "Your character perceives 4 dimensions. The gods perceive and interact with an infinite number of dimensions - if you can't even see time, how are you going to talk to a god?"
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Your take on things GeriantElberion and Hogarth is that the gods, are distant and so far above us, we simply couldn’t interact with them. Perhaps this is a bad example, but it would be somewhat like a single celled organism trying to hold a conversation with a human being.
The fiendish lords however are simply overgrown monsters, with CRs, Lairs, Tresurer, and they can be killed and their treasure looted. Although I have no Idea what price Orcus’s wand, or Asmodeus’s secpter would fetch on the open market ☺
I have plagerized from the “book of the Righteous “ published by Green ronin.
I liked the format in which the gods were presented. Fist there was a legend associated with the god, then the docterine and faith were described, symbols of faith, how the clergy was constructed, and what the clergy did in society. Various different interpretations of the “gods” philosophy were also introduced as well. I liked that kind of format and imformaiton. I did not feel gods had any need of stats, since the heroic PCs would never be facing the gods in combat, but fiends. Well there we are.
In my own game world the gods exist, are immortal, and vastly powerful. Their existence and power are not dependent upon mortal belief. They tend and care for their mortal charges, because the creator god, had the other gods incarnated, and they lived 10,000 mortal lives. These gods have literally walked in mortal shoes. So they care out of sympathy and shared experience.
The Titans and fiends are the losers are losers of a devine war, where they rebelled against the creator. Both the gods and fiendish lords and Titans for that matter, grant spells to their followers. From the perspective of a mortal there is not much difference in terms of game mechanics, except the fiends can be killed where as the gods are immortal.
I usually have cultists of the fiendish lords, refer to their masters as gods, and the clerics of the gods, of course vehemently deny that the fiendish lords are Devine. A matter of theology.
Thank you all for sharing your thoughts. I appreciate getting others points of view on how they run their games.
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I've been building a homebrew for PFRPG loosely modeled after a stone/bronze age Mediterranean world view. Numerous city states, geographically isolated empires, and large expanses of uncivilized regions. Historically, civilizations from this time period believed that their gods were much more active, some like the Sumerians actually believed that their god lived in their city's ziggurat. A side effect of these beliefs were a plethora of demipowers, mystery cults, and sundry divine servitors (that were themselves minor gods).
Now, when I approached my pantheon I decided to utilize the Law-Chaos axis rather than the good-evil axis as the primary division among the divine powers. Thus, my cosmology shakes out into the following categories:
The Gods - 12 deities of lesser to greater status that cover the major alignments and every OGL domain. They are not the world's creators, as the world formed out of the primal chaos and was 1st shaped by powerful non-divine beings (Titans and drakes, etc...). The gods were born in response to the desperate faith and prayer of mortals in this dangerous early world. The gods, whether good, evil, lawful or chaotic all serve LAW and ORDER, as they maintain the cohesion of existence. These deities are worshiped by all races.
The Aspirants - literally hundreds of beings, some mortals others outsiders who strive to claim their own divine power. Most of these are capable of granting spells, and some have already breached the divine barrier as least demi-gods (divine rank 1). Racial and regional gods fall into this category. The beings in this group do not care about the cosmic balance as much as they do their own power. It is conceivable that a deity from this group could ascend to the core pantheon at some point.
The Mystery Cults - Demons, titans and elemental lords of chaos, as well as unique elder beings fall into this category. The mystery cults spring up in many cultures and cities. These cults are typically illegal and hide in the shadows of society. The beings worshiped in this group do not seek admittance to the core pantheon, and in fact care little for their followers. Universally, they seek to undermine the works of the gods and tear down creation so they can remake it in their own image.
Thus while there are gods of evil in my campaign, they tend to focus on concepts that fit within human society. They may advocate behaviors harmful or selfish, but they work within the divine system. Think f Set from Egyptian mythology. The demons and chaotic outsiders that fall into the Mystery cults tend to embody more destructive sources of evil, like Apep (egyptian) or the titans (greek mythology).
In my own homebrew (and injected into most campaigns) is my idea of a singular force of creation. Basically before the beginning of time, there was only swirling chaos...not the chaos that mortals know but truthfully any and all things possible. Order, truth, thought, and the like simply did not exist for more than a flash at a time. True chaos having the possibility of anything happening lead to the inevitable...something was created that could permanently withstand the ever-changing chaos. The first thinking being was formed in a flash and consciousness, time, and the multiverse was created within this being.
Now I have to pause for a moment to clarify a point...everything in this being (the multiverse) has a bottom-up view of things rather than a top-down. The "gods" are further separated from this being than we are from the "gods".
The multiverse itself pulls gods up and also drags them down. The gods have power within the multiverse because they have a specific purpose that the creator being wants done. Basically the gods are mid-level bureaucrats paid on commission. Yes they are powerful, but only powerful towards a specific purpose. They may endure forever or endure until the task which they were meant to do is done.
Now their are other immortals that exist outside this bureaucratic system of "godhood" such as the fiends, titans, whatnot. They might be less powerful but don't follow the same kind of bureaucratic restraints as the gods do, for the gods may well know wandering too far from the path set in front of them could be the end of them, possibly even being cast off into that horrible sea of chaos and a new god promoted in their place.
They may be older than many of the gods. They may even be ancient enough to know what the gods can and cannot do...what paths these gods can walk and where they fear to tread. They may know truths about the multiverse some of the gods do not. This freedom gives them a power even greater than the gods in many aspects. Perhaps some of these immortals (especially the evil ones) get a specific amount of joy seeing these gods get "fired".
In my campaigns, this structure gives more than enough room for all sorts, and also makes an interesting dynamic for high level play.
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Thank you Underling and Dave Jackson, both for your thoughts. I enjoyed reading both of your posts about you home brewed cosmologies.
Underling, is your campaign’s technological level at the Stone/bronze age level? Or do the players have access to plate male and steel weapons?
The concept of divinity being tied to place, namely that the god actually lived in the Ziggurat/ temple, and the Statue was the “god”, was a very wide spread belief during those times.
Dave Jackson, I enjoyed your concept of the gods being mid level functionaries, who could get tossed out if they strayed too far.
Thanks for sharing your Ideas; I am enjoying reading these posts.
It may just be me, but to my limited perspective, there seems to be a little less flaming (is that the right term?) occurring on these boards then I have experienced on some other boards. Do you find this to be the case, or am I just wearing some blinders?
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Thank you Underling and Dave Jackson, both for your thoughts. I enjoyed reading both of your posts about you home brewed cosmologies.
Underling, is your campaign’s technological level at the Stone/bronze age level? Or do the players have access to plate male and steel weapons?The concept of divinity being tied to place, namely that the god actually lived in the Ziggurat/ temple, and the Statue was the “god”, was a very wide spread belief during those times.
It may just be me, but to my limited perspective, there seems to be a little less flaming (is that the right term?) occurring on these boards then I have experienced on some other boards. Do you find this to be the case, or am I just wearing some blinders?
We tend to have a pretty friendly community here. We have had our flame wars, but they seem to have faded since the announcement of PFRPG. The community has expanded greatly over the past few months, so who knows where it will go in the future?
Technology is limited to a modified bronze/stone age. I though long and hard on how the existence of magic and multiple races would skew technological development. Players, and the vast majority of NPCs use bronze weapons and armor. Besides a lower hardness, & HP, bronze weapons break on a natural 1. This mechanic seems to work pretty well. Most weapons and armors that could conceivably exist before 500BC, do. After all, greatswords, scalemail, breastplates, tower shields, and even composite bows existed very early in history in one form or another.
The bronze age feel really comes in when you look at the nations, large tribal areas, and dungeon environment. Nations are separated by sparsely populated areas of wilderness, and populations are uniformly low. Since there really was no lost golden age, dungeons are mostly recent developments. Typically, the whole "lost city" trope doesn't work well in this settings.
Anyway, the divinities reflect this "newness", as the pantheon is designed to have numerous unclaimed divine ranks and portfolios. Rather than a monolithic pantheon, fully described and detailed, the one I use is far more fluid. The players should see religions appear and fade away in the course of a single campaign.