Stats for Gods

[Evil Lincoln]

Spinoff from here.

This is an annoyingly divisive issue.

I have two perspectives. From a GM perspective, I accept the argument that "if the players battle a god, they lose, unless the story/macguffin demands otherwise."

From a product perspective, I think there is much to know about the gods that can be communicated through stats, that they can remain unkillable by PCs, but I might like to know how the perform relative to eachother.

It's not a thing we /need/, but I am tired of the argument that introducing this will instantly break the game.

I chose PFRPG forum and not campaign setting deliberately. This is an issue that ought to be decided on a setting-by-setting basis, so whatever rules for gods that would conceivably emerge should be used or passed on by Golarion as the creative staff sees fit.

People clearly have deeply held beliefs on this issues, so please keep it civilized.

[Evil Lincoln]

My basic point is that it shouldn't be dismissed out of hand. It has a fine tradition in the hobby, and Paizo could bring something new to the table that scratched the "bestiary" itch without many of the issues GMs have historically had with this material.

A god need not be invincible. Many mythological pantheons were anything but.

[LazarX]

Evil Lincoln wrote:

From a product perspective, I think there is much to know about the gods that can be communicated through stats, that they can remain unkillable by PCs, but I might like to know how the perform relative to each other.

You don't need stats to do that. That's what story history does. When you read Times of Trouble, Forgotten Realms series you didn't need Helm or Mystra's stats to see that one seriously outclassed the other on the given field. Or if you read that Talos frequently raises mortals to divinity in order to consume them lets you know right off that he's in a vastly superior position to them.

Outside of raw mano to mano contests, everything else that goes on between dieties usually boils down to politics, which is a again a matter of storyflow, not wargaming mechanics.

Even better example, Piers Anthony's Incarnations series. Do your really thing that you'd get a better idea on how the Incarnations work if gaming stats were put on them, rather than by reading the novels?

There's not much diety novel action in Golarion, but the Faiths books should get you a basic idea on how the divine pecking orders work out.

[Evil Lincoln]

You don't need stats to do much at all in the game, and yet we like to have them.

You basically reiterated the GM perspective from my OP, which I agree with.

And yet, I don't think it would be so bad. It would be an interesting variation on the Bestiary/NPC Codex format. People love those books as straight reading material.

In fact, it's something of a tradition.

[ciretose]

Interesting topic.

I think it depends on how you define "God", given the nature of Gods in the 3.5 universe.

When you consider how many pantheons there are, "Gods" are less the omnipotent being many envision and more a really, really powerful being granted a pantheon.

I mean, at least three humans have risen to divinity by touching a rock. :)

And more importantly in Golarion, Tar Baphon taught us Gods (or at least Demigods) could be killed.

When you define divinity in these somewhat less divine terms, it is reasonable for a player to consider Godhood attainable, and therefore for the gods to be something they could aspire to confront and even defeat.

Would this be open to abuse. Yes.

Would people abuse it? Yes.

But like many flavorful options, I don't think we can let that get in the way of making the effort.

But I would also defer to the writers of the setting, in the case of Golarion these are James and SKR's babies. Maybe they don't want to hear over and over again at each convention all the stories of the various Godslayers.

I would like the book. I would hate dealing with people on here abusing the book, but I would still like the book.

[Evil Lincoln]

ciretose wrote:

Would this be open to abuse. Yes.

Would people abuse it? Yes.

What's abuse though? Violating the sanctity of a game setting?

Isn't that for the individual group to decide?

If a game group has the rules for god stats and they all decide on deicide as the shortest path to a memorable campaign, then that's pretty much how they would have played anyway. And stats don't necessarily make that easy.

A reminder: I'm not actually agitating that this product should be made. I'm challenging the accepted wisdom that it would automatically be a horrible thing.

[Touc]

Gods aren't limited by mental or physical limitations, so statting them doesn't add value to how they perform.

Avatar stats were the rage in 1st/2nd edition, and that's the only way to really stat a diety, albeit a manifestation. In Dragonlance, the designers did away with that nonsense by statting the physical manifestations so absurdly no one would ever use them. The gods had stats like "Wizard 40, Cleric 40, 1000hp, makes all saves, always hits, does 1-1000 damage each hit, chosen by the god." I never heard of anyone actually using the stats; just a page-waster. No player was going to survive such an encounter, and no players "played" gods, so why build it?

[LazarX]

Here's the problem with stating up gods.

The real issue is that mythic or epic rules pretty much blow open the door on how high powered mortals get.

You really can't define your gods unless you put a ceiling on what it is to be mortal. If you define Gods to be 30th level or above, they start paling if your mythic rules put mortals up to 40. If mortals have no ceiling that the gods must be something different to command reverence... (or fear)

But on the other hand gods are frequently idiosyncratically vulnerable to certain things. Balder was killed by a sprig of mistletoe t hrown as a game by a blind god who ordinarily couldn't hit the broadside of a barn. This isn't something that you can represent by "stats".

What makes Gods gods as opposed to hyped up mortals IS that they are inherently different. And operate by different rules which frequently vary from one god to another.

[Artanthos]

What exactly is the difference between a god and a 10,000 year old wizard with a penchant for meddling?

[LazarX]

Evil Lincoln wrote:

You don't need stats to do much at all in the game, and yet we like to have them.

You basically reiterated the GM perspective from my OP, which I agree with.

And yet, I don't think it would be so bad. It would be an interesting variation on the Bestiary/NPC Codex format. People love those books as straight reading material.

In fact, it's something of a tradition.

Yes it is and even back then as one reviewer noted, I felt that the original book was nothing more than a super charged Monster Manual. The only improvements to the later books was they finally got rid of that incredibly stupid idea of Lolth only having 66 hit points.

[Brain in a Jar]

Does it really hurt to have deities with Stats?

No it doesn't because the only time a player could even reach that level is if the group and GM were playing beyond level 20. Which at that point the players could reach demi-god or god-like powers.

In most settings the gods are not all powerful deities and can be killed. Some people enjoy having stats for deities in the event that they might have the PCs fight a deity. Hell, look at the Age of Worms Adventure Path for a great example of that.

To those of you who say; "Gods can't be killed and it's a waste of time and books to stats them...etc."

I ask you this. So? Does the fact that a few people don't like it mean that it should never be made? Pathfinder is great because you get to choose what you want to use.

The only thing that makes it "horrible" to some people is there own biased opinion on deities being all powerful and all knowing, more than likely a hang over from really life.

[Lord Embok]

I would absolutely like to see stats. Them 'operating by different rules' is fine because that's not any different than monsters having special abilities. Gods would just have more of them, and stronger ones.

It in no way harms the game to have such stats. GMs can use them as guidelines, changing what they want. Or they can choose to not use the stats at all. The only issue that could possibly come up is if a player complains you're not doing things by the stats, but that kind of player will be problematic even without god stats.

With that said, it's almost certainly not worth the effort for Paizo to release such a book. Maybe if Mythic and the adventure path massively exceed expectations.

[LazarX]

Brain in a Jar wrote:

I ask you this. So? Does the fact that a few people don't like it mean that it should never be made? Pathfinder is great because you get to choose what you want to use.

No...pretty much the only riding factor on the publication of a book is whether or not it would sell. And that's something that Paizo will decide, not you or I.

With the Three Faiths books already out, I don't see any reason why I'd pay for another book which would only be a hyped out monster manual. The Faiths books and other material already have all the material I need for dealing with Golarion's gods. I simply would have no reason to purchase a Monster Manual of the Gods as it would have no value for me.

[Brain in a Jar]

LazarX wrote:

Brain in a Jar wrote:

I ask you this. So? Does the fact that a few people don't like it mean that it should never be made? Pathfinder is great because you get to choose what you want to use.

No...pretty much the only riding factor on the publication of a book is whether or not it would sell. And that's something that Paizo will decide, not you or I.

With the Three Faiths books already out, I don't see any reason why I'd pay for another book which would only be a hyped out monster manual. The Faiths books and other material already have all the material I need for dealing with Golarion's gods. I simply would have no reason to purchase a Monster Manual of the Gods as it would have no value for me.

I only meant some people would rather it never made because they don't like it.

But it's more likely a matter of time before it happens. Past books that had deity stats sold and there are many editions of them.

[Kazaan]

"If you stat it, they will kill it" -The Spoony One.

If you want something to "stand above", something to be a God, you cannot stat it. You must not stat it. A God doesn't have finite stats; a God has infinite stats. If it has finite stats, it isn't a God. It may be incredibly powerful; more powerful than any other entity... but it's still just that, a powerful entity.

[memorax]

Brain in a Jar wrote:

Does it really hurt to have deities with Stats?

No it doesn't because the only time a player could even reach that level is if the group and GM were playing beyond level 20. Which at that point the players could reach demi-god or god-like powers.

In most settings the gods are not all powerful deities and can be killed. Some people enjoy having stats for deities in the event that they might have the PCs fight a deity. Hell, look at the Age of Worms Adventure Path for a great example of that.

To those of you who say; "Gods can't be killed and it's a waste of time and books to stats them...etc."

I ask you this. So? Does the fact that a few people don't like it mean that it should never be made? Pathfinder is great because you get to choose what you want to use.

The only thing that makes it "horrible" to some people is there own biased opinion on deities being all powerful and all knowing, more than likely a hang over from really life.

Agreed and seconded on all points. Why not stat them. And if some of the fanbase do not want gods to have stats. They dont have to buy the product. I remmber the same thing being said about the races guide. The Mythic rules and psionic rules if Paizo ever publishes them .

[Gorbacz]

I can assure you that if deity stats gets posted, Ravingdork will post a level 6 build that capable of killing some god in 4 rounds within 48 hours of those stats going online.

Also, I think James Jacobs will love to find out that his notion of gods being un-killable by PCs is a biased hang over from his real life :D

[Eryx_UK]

I'm in the camp that says you don't need stats for gods. They are gods. They can do whatever they want depending (perhaps) on their spheres of influence. Player characters would just be splattered in a fight regardless. Demigods, IMO, are different and could be statted but should still be very powerful.

[xevious573]

My own opinion is this. It's difficult to stat up gods without giving a crazy long list of immunities and resistances and very, very high stats.

That's not to say that I don't agree that Gods should be stated up and killable. I do believe this should be valid campaign goals and such. It's just that it was difficult to really get stating Gods up without making nearly every single option nearly impossible.

The stats of previous editions were nearly the same as "I win" buttons (apparently some exceptions exist). I don't want "I Win" buttons but at the same time I don't the Gods to be pansies or necessarily on the same tier as mortals or demi-gods or demon lords.

I feel there is room in game design to not only include god killing as a campaign goal but also room for running the players through stories after they themselves have become gods.

The appeal of the old Epic idea is that a campaign need not end necessarily. You're PCs could keep adventuring and keep leveling up and there was no ending necessarily unless your group decided to end. Mythic doesn't necessarily give that option but it still can act as an extension of the game, a sort of expansion pack. I think once godhood for PCs and deicide as a PC goal comes about, a new expansion pack to the PF RPG or a new game that interacts with the Pathfinder rules in meaningful ways while not following all of the paradigms of the PF RPG would probably be the best ways to represent that.

TL;DR: Mythic could just be the 1st major expansion pack to PF RPG system as a whole and God Stating up could be the 2nd major expansion pack to the PF RPG.

[Brain in a Jar]

Gorbacz wrote:

I can assure you that if deity stats gets posted, Ravingdork will post a level 6 build that capable of killing some god in 4 rounds within 48 hours of those stats going online.

Also, I think James Jacobs will love to find out that his notion of gods being un-killable by PCs is a biased hang over from his real life :D

I said that about people who don't want stats. Even with stats a PC can kill a deity only if the GM lets it happen by reaching that point.

In the same way a Tarrasque has stats but the only way PCs will kill it is if the campaign reaches that point. :)

[ElyasRavenwood]

Well, I don't think stating the gods up would destroy them......perhaps confine them.....but not destroy them nor the game.

I guess I don't see the need for such stats.

One thing i do like about Golarion is its "kitchen Sink" approach. Varisia and the area around Absalom seem to follow a more traditional fantasy model.

The further you get away from those "traditional" areas you get variations Ie:
Land of the linorm Kings: Vikings....
Irrisien: White witch CS Lewis......
Lands of the Mammoth Lords: commerian barbarians and Pleistocene megafauna...with a dinosaur or two wedged in undergorund hot spots.....
World Wound &Mendev: Demon infested wastland with Crusading priests paladins Hellknights and briggands fighting against the demon incursion.
Numeria: crashed spaceship and future tex robots etc: Expedition to the barrier peaks etc....
Ustalav: land haunted by evil vampires were wolves ghosts etc gothic horror.
Mwangi expanse: dinosaurs apes canibal stew pots...
Allenkenstar: guns.....guns guns..

So in short there is something for everyone, but if you don't like something you don't need to include it...for example in my home campaigns, I personally don't like guns, so they remain in alkenstar....

Now by extension, the Gods have a variety of means of coming into being.

Some of the gods, IE Pharasma seem to possibly be pre human gods and they may have always existed. Others Sarenrae for example was an empyreal lord who ascended during the divine war to imprision rogavug.

Others achieved Apotheosis by passing the test of the star stone.

And then there is Iorori who achieved apotheosis by meditating and achieving enlightenment.

And also the gods can apearently be killed. Aranzi was killed by Tar Baphon....the red mantis god i think is supposed to be some sort of divine assasin.

Oh and I almost forgot Aroden.....the big campain question is who did the deed and how was Aroden killed?

Do all of these things need to be spelled out? I suppose I prefer the mystery

Will adding stats for deities break the game? I don't think so but also I don't think it will add much to the game either.

[Mikaze]

I remember being >:( when some book quantified just three aspects of the Lady of Pain. That's always bugged me when beings like that get any form of statwork; if you quantify it, you limit it.

[TimD]

Evil L,

For purposes of this discussion are you equating an avatar of a deity to the deity itself?

Touc,

I can recall at least six different game groups off of the top of my head that I know for a fact used the DragonLance deity stats. Of course, that was in a very different edition and game system than Pathfinder.

-TimD

[Ravingdork]

Gorbacz wrote:

I can assure you that if deity stats gets posted, Ravingdork will post a level 6 build that is capable of killing some god in 4 rounds within 48 hours of those stats going online.

;D

[Evil Lincoln]

TimD wrote:

Evil L,

For purposes of this discussion are you equating an avatar of a deity to the deity itself?

Touc,

I suppose not. The concept of "avatars" or any of the traditional means of statting are optional to the discussion, I think.

I mean to confront the aversion to using stats to describe the gods in any way. We already have this, to some extent, with domains and the different things that different levels of gods get.

It could be entirely non-traditional, in that that gods have different stats altogether. It could be basically along the lines of Deities and Demigods. All I'm taking issue with is this sentiment that it absolutely should not be done, or could not be done right.

I really don't feel all that strongly about it, but I do disagree with the seemingly unanimous sentiment that it would be awful for the game. I can see myself in the future casually perusing a hardback, bestiary-style treatment of various pantheons with the Paizo are and some stats to ruminate on, and being a happy customer.

[Luna_Silvertear]

Mikaze wrote:

I remember being >:( when some book quantified just three aspects of the Lady of Pain. That's always bugged me when beings like that get any form of statwork; if you quantify it, you limit it.

I suppose I'll have to hop on the bandwagon with this one. I remember having a old copy of AD&D Deities and Demigods. I remember as a young one leafing through it and finding the gods(esses)I read about and love to be honestly reduced to nothing more than a stack of numbers. Now, I will say that I am absolutely for the ability to kill deities, but that should remain the sole provence of individual GMs and it shouldn't be a product. If it IS made into a product, it should be something like "Hey, this is how you would go about stating a god" not "Here are Shelyn's stats, now go kill her and do unspeakable things to her corpse". Ya feel me?

[LazarX]

xevious573 wrote:

The appeal of the old Epic idea is that a campaign need not end necessarily. You're PCs could keep adventuring and keep leveling up and there was no ending necessarily unless your group decided to end. Mythic doesn't necessarily give that option but it still can act as an extension of the game, a sort of expansion pack. I think once godhood for PCs and deicide as a PC goal comes about, a new expansion pack to the PF RPG or a new game that interacts with the Pathfinder rules in meaningful ways while not following all of the paradigms of the PF RPG would probably be the best ways to represent that.

My response to that is that campaigns don't have to end just because the leveling stops. Players can instead focus on different goals rather than the accumulation of experience points.

[Chemlak]

My personal view is that deities themselves should not have stats - if the story needs a deity to die, then it should die, but not just because someone managed to create a build that is able to whittle away at an insanely high number of hit points.

However, having said that, I see a good reason for stats to be given for deific manifestations of various forms (probably in the form of templates), ranging from "divine messenger" (an animal being used by the deity to send a specific message), through "divine possession" (an intelligent mortal possessed by the deity's will), with options on "herald" (an intelligent being imbued with power by the deity, but still acting under their own volition), "divine proxy" (a creature granted a portion of divine power under tight control of the deity), and "avatar" (a physical manifestation of the deity itself).

That, I'd lap up.

[Corathon]

IMO, the gods are not unbeatable, just powerful. The gods of the ancients weren't regarded as omnipotent or omniscient. The Norse gods faced eventual defeat and destruction at Ragnarok, Zeus wanted the Trojans to win against the Greeks but the Fates decreed otherwise, etc, etc.

Plus, a lot of the fantasy that underlies Pathfinder involved humans fighting gods. The Eternal Champion is often in conflict with deities, and sometimes kills them (although that is merely a banishment rather than total destruction). Its sort of the point of the Silmarillion that elves and men cannot triumph over Morgoth without the help of the Valar - but Fingolfin fights Morgoth and gives a pretty good account of himself before being defeated. And so on...

That said, I don't think that I've ever needed a god's statistics in 32 years of gaming. The nature of their religions is more important.

[TimD]

I would honestly prefer some sort of "ranking system" in any situation where all things are not created equally. I remember how perpetually annoyed I was that Cyric the Whining God ever existed in the FR as anything more than a speed bump, replacing relatively flavorful dieties like Bhaal, Bane & Myrkul with a horribly ghost written book series designed to incorporate reactive marketing changes in a campaign setting.

Having an idea of scale is a good thing for me as a GM, especially when ranking opposing factions. Does the leader of the orc gods fear another run-in with the leader of the elven gods? Does the elimination of the entirety of their worshippers diminish the power of a deity? Does the worship of a demon or devil elevate them to divinity or is some other mechanic necessary? Answering all of these leads in some way towards "stats" even if not hitpoints.

Also, I like having the occassional conflict with or interaction with avatars, especially of minor deities in higher level campaigns. The defeat of an avater does not equate to killing and becoming a god in most games I've been involved with, however, and it's usually the avatar gunning for the PCs, not vice-versa.

-TimD

[The Orc]

Well I'm for the idea of stating demigods and minor gods in a general sense but the only way this idea would work is given the idea that the mythic rules would have to be applied before a character could even be close to such an idea as to challenge the gods. But with that being said, there would inadvertently need to be rules on how to obtain godhood and how that, in and of itself would change the interaction of the newly found god to NPCs of both normal and godly levels and its interaction with the multiverse by its deity level.
The biggest issue of these rules is if some started at 1st level, demi god would be a minimum of 25, considering that most stated demon lords are CR 25 (ex. Balor lords in beastiry 1) and not many people ever reach a character to such level. So what level would be an appropriate CR for other levels of divinity? And how many would use such rules? (I would personally but that's cause I'll run a character tell there is no more story lol)

[The Orc]

Another issue with this is do all gods remain reachable in the planes or do some live outside of space and time? And if some are outside of these parameters how do the interact? And do we stop PCs for goin outside space time or is it possible, by design or fluke, to be outside space time and what that means for the PC? Does it mean they become a vestige (Tome of Magic/ Pact Magic Unbound, D&D 3.5/ Radiance house)?

[Drejk]

Gorbacz wrote:

I can assure you that if deity stats gets posted, Ravingdork will post a level 6 build that capable of killing some god in 4 rounds within 48 hours of those stats going online.

72 hours and it will be 10th level. Or 7th level with three mythic tiers.

[Tels]

To be fair, Arazni was a demigod, and with the release of Mythic Rules, one of the goals is to allow PCs to be able to kill Demigods and similar powered beings, like Demon Lords, the Four Horsemen, Archdevils etc.

So Arazni wasn't a Deity like Pharasma, she was a Demigod, a very powerful entity, yet one that could still be slain by a mortal.

Also, when Mystra went up against Helm in the Time of Troubles, Mystra was, essentially, a mortal with a fraction of a Gods power, while Helm was a full God. Talos raising mortals to divinity to consume them doesn't necessarily mean he was more powerful than Mystra, or Kelemvor or any of the other Greater Deities. Forgotten Realms had the concept of lesser/greater demigods and lesser/greater Gods and the Divine Rank on top of that. I never read the Divine Rank part, but my understanding was that a being with a rank of 5 was a lot more powerful than a being with a rank of 4. So if Talos were to raise a mortal to a rank of 1, he'd have achieved divinity, at which point Talos would consume him.

Sometimes, things have to be kept in perspective of what the other beings around you are, and what they are capable of.

Heracles, for all his great strength, incredible feats, and battle prowess, would never be able to kill a God like Athena, or Dionysus. But he was able to challenge and beat lesser Gods that he encountered, because he himself was a demigod, and those lesser Gods weren't much more powerful than a demigod if that.

Baldur, the most beloved of all the Norse Gods, was absolutely invulnerable to every substance on the planet, except mistletoe. He was killed by a blind god, using a dart of mistletoe in a game that the Gods frequently played.

Based on teasers of Mythic Rules, it sounds like maybe Baldur could have been a 10th Tier Mythic being, as one of the hinted abilities is at 10th tier, you become a demigod. Mythic beings, have a weakness though, like Baldur and mistletoe, and Achilles and his heel. Both incredibly powerful beings, defeated by a seemingly harmless blow or item.

====================================

An issue with stating up Gods is whether to make it a System Neutral book, or a Golarion book. Paizo doesn't want to give stats to the Golarion Gods because they really are a 'Gods Win' type of pantheon. So since they can't make it a Golarion book, they have to make it a System Neutral book, but now they don't have any gods to actually stat up.

One of the only things that comes to mind to get around this, is, basically, a Divine version of the Core Rule Book. Basically, a 'Build Your Own God' book for GMs. That way, if someone wanted to fight and kill Asmodeus in their home game, they could build an Asmosdeus to use in their game. This would let people who want Gods stats to have them, but also keep Golarion Gods from having stats as well.

To get around the Mortal Cap issue, you simply have something like "whatever the mortal cap is, Gods are X higher" and leave it at that. This way, Gods would still be more powerful than any Mortal, but a group of Mortals may find away to challenge a single God. Granted, they could probably only do it once, no retries, but still.

[Azaelas Fayth]

I honestly would love to see a system for making Deities as potential enemies like how Deities and Demigods was and a System for making Deities similar to the Settlement building rules in the Gamemastery Guide.

[Kthulhu]

Ravingdork wrote:

Gorbacz wrote:

I can assure you that if deity stats gets posted, Ravingdork will post a level 6 build that is capable of killing some god in 4 rounds within 48 hours of those stats going online.

;D

And it will be a damned dwarf too, just to really piss James off.

[TOZ]

My deities are 20th level characters.

[Harrison]

Artanthos wrote:

What exactly is the difference between a god and a 10,000 year old wizard with a penchant for meddling?

Apparently not much, because the Whispering Tyrant wiped the floor with Arazni, and she was a deity even before Aroden came around.

[Kthulhu]

I just don't think you should be able to get powerful enough to kill a god just by killing a bunch of orcs (ie, gaining a crapload of XP).

If I were to absolutely HAVE to give divine beings stats, then the lowest level demigods would START at approximately the absolute height of power that mortals could attain. For example, if the absolute maximum is 20 levels and 10 mythic tiers, then the weakest demon lord in the entire Abyss would be at least the equivalent of a character with 20 levels and 10 mythic tiers. And heavy hitters among the demigods like Orcus would pretty much be able to mop the floor with a dozen characters of that level of power.

[Lilith]

I have an intense dislike for gods with stats (at least under d20 with Epic rules). It's everything that I disliked about d20 Epic rules, turned up to 11. It's a terrible and horrible way to make an encounter that *should* be memorable and exciting and unique and turn it into a game of numbers.

Bleh.

[Azaelas Fayth]

Hence why I said 2 systems one for each crowd.

[Mergy]

I like the idea of statting out gods, not because I want players to kill gods, but because I like the idea of a campaign where players achieve divinity, yet the campaign continues.

Once the PCs have achieved divinity, if the gods aren't statted out, who do they fight?

There is the option of scaling things down I suppose. Perhaps while Rovagug is unkillable by any mortal hand, in god terms he is a barbarian 4/anti-paladin 6? It's just a matter of scale, and the fact that you could take a level 20 mortal fighter and he would stack up as a level 1 commoner in god terms.

[Azaelas Fayth]

Hmm... I have played a campaign where the players achieved Deification. I had it to where their characters were totally reborn and made into Level 1 characters in a new world and had bonuses from their previous life.

[Caderyn]

For a gods stats you would have to take several steps up from named demons like Treerazer (CR25) who is just a nascent demon lord, which is defined as weaker than a true demonlord which are basically deity level beings.

[Starsunder]

Cross-posted from the Mythic thread.

That's one way, sure. But certainly not the only way, and introduces its own problems: why haven't any number of powerful beings throughout history gotten their paws on this McGuffin and carved their way to godhood? That's really a rhetorical question by the way, since the reason could be whatever the DM/GM wanted, same as if there is no McGuffin at all and the party, after a cataclysmic battle, overcomes a god. Bottom line is, there's absolutely no reason why there couldn't be statted deities. I'm not saying Paizo will stat them (I think it's clear they won't, based on previous responses), but that's their creative choice, not some hard rule for all GMs. Plenty of examples in mythology, pop culture, books, etc. of those types of battles. You and your group may not like the idea of them, but statted gods are no more ridiculous that saying "nope! god TPKs your group by smiling!", which I find boring and lacking in imagination.

But hey, to each their own. I'm just glad to finally be getting mythic rules!

[Azaelas Fayth]

Personally, I can see a sword that can slay a god in a single slice and transfer their power into you. Or an item that infuses you with Cosmic Power and turns you into a God. The only thing is in order to get to it you have to prove yourself by being Level 20 and pass through encounters based around CR20 to CR30 alone without Leveling up passed 20.

[Tels]

Harrison wrote:

Artanthos wrote:

What exactly is the difference between a god and a 10,000 year old wizard with a penchant for meddling?

Apparently not much, because the Whispering Tyrant wiped the floor with Arazni, and she was a deity even before Aroden came around.

Arazni was a Demigod, not a true Deity.

Caderyn wrote:

For a gods stats you would have to take several steps up from named demons like Treerazer (CR25) who is just a nascent demon lord, which is defined as weaker than a true demonlord which are basically deity level beings.

That's incorrect, Demon Lords are equivalent in power to Demigods.

James Jacobs wrote:

There's essentially three categories of god on Golarion.

Deity: A deity doesn't have a stat block because they can't be killed by mortals and things that need stat blocks to do stuff. Deities grant their worshipers 5 domain choices.

Demigod: This is a less powerful god; it has a stat block (generally from about CR 26 to 36 or thereabouts), and can be killed by mortals. Demigods generally offer 5 domain choices.

Planar Ruler: This category includes demon lords, the horsemen of the apocalypse, arch devils, elemental lords, empyrial lords, and the like. These creatures are generally as powerful as demigods (CR 26–36), but only grant their worshipers 4 domain choices.

EDIT: There's actaully a 4th category. The Great Old Ones/Outer Gods like Yog-Sothoth and Azathoth do exist in Golarion, but they don't generally care about their worshipers. Those who worship them follow the Old Cults and they get access to the domains of Chaos, Destruction, Madness, Rune, and Void, IIRC; their domain choices don't change depending on which specific creature they worship since clerics of the Old Cults have more in common with clerics who don't worship deities than those who do. BUT! This category's a weird one and sort of exists outside of the Deity/Demigod/Planar Ruler triad, so it usually goes uncommented upon.

If you absolutely feel an urge to stat out a Deity, a good place to start is CR 40. It's more powerful than the range that Demigods or Planar Rules will fall into, and high enough that even a 20th level 10th tier party would get smoked by them.

[Edit] Blog post by James Jacobs

James Jacobs Blog Post wrote:

Oh... hmm. Art. Yeah. Ummm... since this blog post is something of a preview of The Inner Sea World Guide, and since she was once a demigod herself (although not anymore; she lost that status when she died and got turned into a lich), here's Arazni, the Harlot Queen of Geb!

It's been mentioned in other places several times, but this is the first one I found without doing a bunch of forum searching.

[Morain]

I definately want stats for gods, because I do want to kill them.

In my favourite campaign ever we used Epic level handbook, and some players had Divine ranks.

The kind of stories that can be told in such a setting is what I like most in fantasy roleplaying.

[Azaelas Fayth]

I love fighting either as or against the Heracles and Achilles type.

[ciretose]

Evil Lincoln wrote:

ciretose wrote:

Would this be open to abuse. Yes.

Would people abuse it? Yes.

What's abuse though? Violating the sanctity of a game setting?

Isn't that for the individual group to decide?

If a game group has the rules for god stats and they all decide on deicide as the shortest path to a memorable campaign, then that's pretty much how they would have played anyway. And stats don't necessarily make that easy.

A reminder: I'm not actually agitating that this product should be made. I'm challenging the accepted wisdom that it would automatically be a horrible thing.

It is up to individual groups to decide. However we all know when a rule set is introduced with an overpowered feature, power creep is an inevitable consequence. And power creep effects, well...creep.

We'll see what they do with the Mythic Rules, but if you are doing a stat for Gods, that is going to by definition have to include god like abilities.

We'll see what they do with Mythic rules, but I'm hopeful it will include some red lines that keep god like powers confined to god-like levels.