Rovagug taking the rest of the pantheon to put into the ground is like one of the few bits of Golarion lore I know.
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I don't have a problem with gods dying. They may be "beyond mortal comprehension" but they aren't special. Everything has a beginning and an end.
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I agree, and that's kind of why I don't really see much of an argument for "If it's stated people will kill it". So what. I mean, if you are playing that high level, and that's what the players want to do, why not.
Personally, for a fantasy setting like D&D or PF, I find the "You Lose", they are plot devices, and similar things very boring. That essentially makes them Pet DM NPCs. It doesn't add anything cool to the setting or game, it just tells people "No, you can't, just because".
I also get it that there are a lot of folks here very against it, and to them, I'd ask they not be those bad apples that ruins something they don't like and can easily ignore/not use for everyone else. Now, that being said, I know Paizo has no interest in doing such a book, and I know that man of the deities really are their Pet DM NPC, (or something kind of close to it), so I'm not really certain I'd want Paizo to do such a book.
However, that was in a setting of a previous edition of the World's Finest Roleplaying Game, not Pathfinder.
Here's the thing.
In Pathfinder, gods can die.
I even showed mechanically how Lamashtu might have pulled off her trick (I used the mass combat rules to do it).
A lot - and I mean a lot - of people really, really hate the idea of stats on gods. That's fair, and it's up to them to determine what they like and what they don't.
Paizo tends to agree with that stance, at least publicly. And, for my purposes, that's really unfortunate, because I feel exactly the opposite - I think it's a phenomenal idea that has great merit and can do awesome things.
But that's just how it goes, I suppose. And for those people that aren't me, that's pretty cool. I do hope we get them at some point, but, eh, fandoms are reactionary jerks sometimes - simply looking at mythic and peoples' reactions to Iomedae shows that you not only can't please everyone, but you'll royally tick someone off if you mess with the head-canon they've built up around things.
Ret-cons and overly punative nerfs affect me similarly, so I can't say that I don't understand how people feel.
That's just how people do.
I hold out hope, nonetheless, that we will eventually get god stats, even if, like occult/psychic magic compared to psionics, it's kind of disappointing and painful, by comparison.
And let me be clear - I'll be very glad to have official stats for things like gods, even if it's disappointing, by comparison, to what I hope for, like occult/psychic magic being the replacement for psionics. Because, much as I like the old stuff, I also like some of the things that they've done with the new stuff, and find it a worthy inclusion on its own merits. And I know with the incredible talent at Paizo's disposal, whatever they end up with will be a really solid product.
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I think it's a phenomenal idea that has great merit and can do awesome things.
I don't really care one way or the other, but I'm curious about this. Other than "get them killed", what awesome things can come of the gods having printed statblocks?
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Gods get statted, what happens:
1. Ravingdork comes up with a level 10 PC that one-shots one of the deities because 3.5ed is like that a couple years down the development cycle. Lots of "lol Paizo more like Failzo" around.
2. Beckett gets upset that LG deities aren't smarter/stronger than CG deities.
3. AlgaeNymph breaks down because Good deities aren't smarter/wiser/prettier than Evil deities.
4. The Erastil flamewar returns.
5. The Iomedae flamewar returns.
6. Ravingdork kills the second deity. A 2342-post thread "Does Paizo really care about math and balance any more?" goes off with the usual results.
7. James Jacobs regrets doing the whole thing in the first place.
8. A "You've statted the gods, I'm done with Paizo" threads reaches the fifth page. WotC doesn't mind.
9. CET wakes up, Gorbacz sees the flames. He dons the asbestos suit and wades in, which ends like it always does.
10. Tacticslion posts a nice eulogy for the idea and asks what's the next great thing to happen.
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ahhh, check out the original Deities and Demigods... they had ability scores. Has-xxx-tur's stomp was legendary. {don't say that name!} lol
In the run of Strange Aeon's I'm in we've taken to calling him Assturd, since we can't say his name but we don't want to show him any respect. (like calling Voldie You-Know-Who). So we've taken out the fear of the name without being stupid since Assturd /can/ hear you if you say his name three times. (unless you make up an insulting nickname for him)
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We already have an instance in the Serpent's Skull AP of an actual god having stats. And the PCs actually annihilating that god is on the table.
So the actual answer to the question is "Paizo will stat a god if the adventure's story line calls for a god being in a position where PCs can stab it to death." If a god is being statted up, it's explicitly because that god has been put into a position of vulnerability.
Though whether we'll ever see that again is fairly unlikely, since Paizo's pretty much done with Mythic. (Though I'll be surprised if Legendary Games's mythic AP doesn't end in an act of deicide.)
Outside of those circumstances, the true gods are simply plot devices with personalities.
(Demigods like the Four Horsemen fill a role of epic final boss for a campaign - their being extremely powerful but actually assailable is part of the point. (Though even then... sticking with the Four Horsemen - truly getting rid of the Four Horseman is impossible. You may permanently destroy Charon, but a new Horseman of Death will immediately be selected by the plane of Abaddon. You can slay the current holder of the crown, but the crown itself will never die...)
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Paizo tends to agree with that stance, at least publicly. And, for my purposes, that's really unfortunate, because I feel exactly the opposite - I think it's a phenomenal idea that has great merit and can do awesome things.
I think it's fundamentally a question of ownership of the setting. Paizo is correct to not want to invalidate the stories that people tell at their own tables, so an NPC they set up to get killed is an NPC they should avoid using in the future.
So if an individual GM wants to stat up Rovagug and have the PCs murk him, thus ending an existential threat to Golarion, that's fine. They did extra work to go off on their own and thus probably understand that Paizo isn't going to understand or respect what they did in future publications.
But if Paizo were to make it easy on GMs to have the Rough Beast put down for good by providing a stat block and key weaknesses that could be exploited by clever PCs, I'm reasonably certain that there are fans that will be annoyed when Paizo leaves him alive because "obviously they wanted us to kill him" or something. This isn't rational, but you know how fans get these days (particularly on the internet).
So I think it's in Paizo's best interest to not print materials to make it easy for individual tables to wreck Paizo's metaplot, since some people might not be able to handle that.
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I think it's a phenomenal idea that has great merit and can do awesome things.
I don't really care one way or the other, but I'm curious about this. Other than "get them killed", what awesome things can come of the gods having printed statblocks?
It helps create narrative cohesion and a comprehensible, reconcilable, internally-consistent world.
I like this, and it provides potential that has never been fully realized.
This is suuuuuuuuuuuuper not important to a whole host of people, which is fair.
I'm reasonably certain that there are fans that will be annoyed when Paizo leaves him alive because "obviously they wanted us to kill him" or something. This isn't rational, but you know how fans getthese days(particularly on the internet).
I helped the conversation!
So I think it's in Paizo's best interest to not print materials to make it easy for individual tables to wreck Paizo's metaplot, since some people might not be able to handle that.
Again, this is fair. It really, really sucks for me, because I like nice lines to color in. Others find it restrictive. Paizo has made their stance generally against it.
Gods get statted, what happens:
1. Ravingdork comes up with a level 10 PC that one-shots one of the deities because 3.5ed is like that a couple years down the development cycle. Lots of "lol Paizo more like Failzo" around.
2. Beckett gets upset that LG deities aren't smarter/stronger than CG deities.
3. AlgaeNymph breaks down because Good deities aren't smarter/wiser/prettier than Evil deities.
4. The Erastil flamewar returns.
5. The Iomedae flamewar returns.
6. Ravingdork kills the second deity. A 2342-post thread "Does Paizo really care about math and balance any more?" goes off with the usual results.
7. James Jacobs regrets doing the whole thing in the first place.
8. A "You've statted the gods, I'm done with Paizo" threads reaches the fifth page. WotC doesn't mind.
9. CET wakes up, Gorbacz sees the flames. He dons the asbestos suit and wades in, which ends like it always does.
10. Tacticslion posts a nice eulogy for the idea and asks what's the next great thing to happen.
This is both ridiculous and absurd!
Absolutely not possible!
My eulogy would by sucky and way-too-wordy, and you know it!
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It could be nice and way too wordy
I think there is room to meet in the middle here guys!
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We already have an instance in the Serpent's Skull AP of an actual god having stats. And the PCs actually annihilating that god is on the table.
This actually isn't true. The enemy in question is an avatar of a God, not the god itself. The god even specifically lives after that encounter, they PCs just stop the threat of him returning anytime soon.
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We already have an instance in the Serpent's Skull AP of an actual god having stats. And the PCs actually annihilating that god is on the table.This actually isn't true. The enemy in question is an avatar of a God, not the god itself. The god even specifically lives after that encounter, they PCs just stop the threat of him returning anytime soon.
Not quiet. He is fully killable (though the knowledge of how to do it isn't just given to the PCs). It's more that his divine essence continues working and granting powers to priests unless he is finished off.
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This actually isn't true. The enemy in question is an avatar of a God, not the god itself. The god even specifically lives after that encounter, they PCs just stop the threat of him returning anytime soon.We already have an instance in the Serpent's Skull AP of an actual god having stats. And the PCs actually annihilating that god is on the table.
Well, actually
Much more importantly, one of the continuing the campaign options is to bring the Skull and the Body to Pharasma's Court. Where if you reunite them to revive Ydersius, and then slay him before Pharasma, she can pass judgment on him, eliminating him for good. (Though the GM in encouraged to scale up Ydersius if he's revived in the Court for a harder encounter.)
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It helps create narrative cohesion and a comprehensible, reconcilable, internally-consistent world.
I like this, and it provides potential that has never been fully realized.
Yes! This exactly summarizes my feelings as well.
But I also understand that the Paizo staff tend to be driven more by story needs than by internal consistency, so there you go.
That "DM fiat" though was me.
With my sword.
I don't know why people keep calling her "DM Fiat" though - that's not what I called her.
But regardless, she was a great sword, and pretty cool - there were more powerful weapons out there, but, it turns out you don't really need one more powerful. She was just right.
So... 'meh'...
The main disadvantage of not statting up gods, in my view, is that you don't have much of a post-level 20 endgame.
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The main disadvantage of not statting up gods, in my view, is that you don't have much of a post-level 20 endgame.
<_< Gotta bit disagree about that since all questi-deities and demigods are in cr 21-30 range. And by time you have level 20 mythic tier 10 characters fighting Pazuzu, campaign is pretty much over anyway.
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I think, with Paizo's particular storytelling style, giving anything more than those vague, non-answers would probably be detrimental to the creative impulses of many of their offers. To me, it's a different story, entirely! I like having those lines, that consistency, that rationale behind everything happening. But, I can see why others might have a different take on that!
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However, that was in a setting of a previous edition of the World's Finest Roleplaying Game, not Pathfinder.
True, true. . . <Pats Wei Ji on the shoulder>.
Yes, Pathfinder has so, soo far tongo, but one day it will get there. One day, Pathfinder will give up on these stupid things and get there. One day.
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If they have a reason to want to kill a god in particular, certainly.Generally speaking, most players generally don't just spontaneously declare they want to kill some random person completely unrelated to what they've been doing for the past 50 game sessions.
I used to have this kind of confidence in my gaming group. Then one player mentioned that she had assumed gods to be standard mid-late-game bosses, and wasn't it normal to expect to start killing off most of the evil gods in the setting by level 15 or so? I figured this was an anomaly until a different player reacted to a herald of a similarly-aligned deity appearing with "hey, bet we can take this guy?"
So, yes, I think enough players will spontaneously want to kill some random person just because they can, if it's presented as sufficiently unlikely.
I'm with Paizo on this. Doesn't work for the kind of story they want to tell and the game system is designed for telling.
It certainly doesn't work for their story-telling style, but it certainly works for the game system we all play.
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It certainly doesn't work for their story-telling style, but it certainly works for the game system we all play.
So-so... IMHO, the developers' emphasis on story needs vs. internal consistency shows itself in the rules as well. That's why you can, by the rules, easily summon and control enough powerful magic minions to conquer any of a number of other planes, but aren't supposed to actually do that because story.
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It certainly doesn't work for their story-telling style, but it certainly works for the game system we all play.So-so... IMHO, the developers' emphasis on story needs vs. internal consistency shows itself in the rules as well. That's why you can, by the rules, easily summon and control enough powerful magic minions to conquer any of a number of other planes, but aren't supposed to actually do that because story.
To some extent, but I think that is an artifact of how it's used, not how it exists. Again, the system allows for awesome stories, even rivaling powers that are otherwise attributed to deities themselves - and this isn't a bad thing. But because of, "meh, story" the system isn't allowed to address itself as relevant to its own ability to have excellent internal consistency.
Now balance is another issue entirely, but I understand your house rules rock the - er - house, as it were, on that score.
(For myself, I'd just turn everyone over to psionics, though not that ridiculous (and amaaaaaaazing) "arcane erudite" variant by WotC on the web - though, you know, I wouldn't mind playing one... >.>)
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Paizo has been very clear that they're not going to stat up gods. Gods are gods and outside what mortals can comprehend. Similar to how the test of the Starstone is not explicitly spelled out. Immortality and absolute power is easy (hello Wizard!), even granting spells is available (Divine Source), but divinity is something completely different.
Now, that being said, I have seen someone's idea for Gorum that I really loved and wouldn't mind seeing statted out. Gorum is just the strongest warrior in the world. Once they hit their peak they get to fight the old Gorum (before they became a god) and whoever wins becomes the new Gorum. But that's just some kind of high level martial. Might be interesting to see what Paizo thinks a good high level martial looks like though.
Probably a wizard.
I would just be disappointed if they were statted out since they wouldn't live up to my expectation.
Some powergamers may even claim the right to have worshippers...
Gods get statted, what happens:
1. Ravingdork comes up with a level 10 PC that one-shots one of the deities because 3.5ed is like that a couple years down the development cycle. Lots of "lol Paizo more like Failzo" around.
2. Beckett gets upset that LG deities aren't smarter/stronger than CG deities.
3. AlgaeNymph breaks down because Good deities aren't smarter/wiser/prettier than Evil deities.
4. The Erastil flamewar returns.
5. The Iomedae flamewar returns.
6. Ravingdork kills the second deity. A 2342-post thread "Does Paizo really care about math and balance any more?" goes off with the usual results.
7. James Jacobs regrets doing the whole thing in the first place.
8. A "You've statted the gods, I'm done with Paizo" threads reaches the fifth page. WotC doesn't mind.
9. CET wakes up, Gorbacz sees the flames. He dons the asbestos suit and wades in, which ends like it always does.
10. Tacticslion posts a nice eulogy for the idea and asks what's the next great thing to happen.
It always depresses me when the cynics are correct...
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IMHO, the developers' emphasis on story needs vs. internal consistency shows itself in the rules as well. That's why you can, by the rules, easily summon and control enough powerful magic minions to conquer any of a number of other planes, but aren't supposed to actually do that because story.
Which is how it should be, as the rules aren't the underlying laws of a game setting but merely an approximation of those laws. The good thing is that you can take those rules and apply them in any way you want to your homebrew.
But why should Paizo stat up the deities for their own setting when they do not even pretend to intend telling stories around those stats? You simply don't need them to play in the usual CR range the Paizo APs are built around.
Back then, I loved James Jacob's Demonomicon of Iggwilv series. But while I didn't mind him statting up all the demons (Still think it was a huge waste of space that he could have easily filled with more awesome lore but that's just me^^), I would have never used them because I would never have run an epic level game, and that was at the time when there existed actual rules for this type of play. Which is not the case for Pathfinder (ok, there are the mythic rules, but given the reception, unluckily they seem to be very much done with that.
And apart from the story reasons I do not even agree with the "internal consistency" thing. Golarion might have some problems on that front, but this is certainly not one of them. There's simply no reason why the deities should have stats from a setting perspective and there's also no reason why they should include those just for the existence of part of the rules that are very much not relevant for play in the setting.
Apart from your taste, that is, and as said in a former post, i could ignore such stuff easily enough, so I'm not advocating against doing it; I would hate though if they tried to retroactively change the setting for those stats to make any sense.
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Gods get statted, what happens:
1. Ravingdork comes up with a level 10 PC that one-shots one of the deities because 3.5ed is like that a couple years down the development cycle. Lots of "lol Paizo more like Failzo" around.
2. Beckett gets upset that LG deities aren't smarter/stronger than CG deities.
3. AlgaeNymph breaks down because Good deities aren't smarter/wiser/prettier than Evil deities.
4. The Erastil flamewar returns.
5. The Iomedae flamewar returns.
6. Ravingdork kills the second deity. A 2342-post thread "Does Paizo really care about math and balance any more?" goes off with the usual results.
7. James Jacobs regrets doing the whole thing in the first place.
8. A "You've statted the gods, I'm done with Paizo" threads reaches the fifth page. WotC doesn't mind.
9. CET wakes up, Gorbacz sees the flames. He dons the asbestos suit and wades in, which ends like it always does.
10. Tacticslion posts a nice eulogy for the idea and asks what's the next great thing to happen.
ALSO BARBARIAN SMASH GOD, DECLARE SELF WINNER.
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ALSO BARBARIAN SMASH GOD, DECLARE SELF WINNER.Gods get statted, what happens:
1. Ravingdork comes up with a level 10 PC that one-shots one of the deities because 3.5ed is like that a couple years down the development cycle. Lots of "lol Paizo more like Failzo" around.
2. Beckett gets upset that LG deities aren't smarter/stronger than CG deities.
3. AlgaeNymph breaks down because Good deities aren't smarter/wiser/prettier than Evil deities.
4. The Erastil flamewar returns.
5. The Iomedae flamewar returns.
6. Ravingdork kills the second deity. A 2342-post thread "Does Paizo really care about math and balance any more?" goes off with the usual results.
7. James Jacobs regrets doing the whole thing in the first place.
8. A "You've statted the gods, I'm done with Paizo" threads reaches the fifth page. WotC doesn't mind.
9. CET wakes up, Gorbacz sees the flames. He dons the asbestos suit and wades in, which ends like it always does.
10. Tacticslion posts a nice eulogy for the idea and asks what's the next great thing to happen.
Really goes without saying.
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But it's so good to hear, anyway!
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It wouldn't be a major offense to stat them. Would I use them? Probably not. I never got the stats for the 3E deities, and I wouldn't have had a use for them, either.
Would I mind more information about what sort of things deities can do (not stats, but descriptions)? Absolutely. I've never been too clear on how often a deity might intervene in the life/death of their worshiper, for example. But I'm perfectly fine with the true deities remaining beings of pure narrative potential.
I never used statistics from 3rd editions deities and demigods. I found them useless because the stats they had were way too much. That was a problem with a lot of 3rd edition. Remember values like DR50/+3 on a golem? Yeah...
Statting out deities isn't necessarily putting limitations on them, per say, it's all about how their abilities are handled. Take Wish and Miracle, for example, they are open ended powers that could potentially do anything. I feel like them having powers that are open to GM discretion would be handy in making these beings.
Like if a God of Strength were to have an ability that allows him to lift and hurl an object at their target regardless of size category and range, what's stopping him from throwing the planet into another? Well, the GM using him. This wouldn't require some ungodly strength score to use this ability in any case, hence my point about statting deities and not necessarily limiting them to their statistics.
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I never used statistics from 3rd editions deities and demigods. I found them useless because the stats they had were way too much. That was a problem with a lot of 3rd edition. Remember values like DR50/+3 on a golem? Yeah...
Really, 3.0 DR values weren't too much. Remember, that same golem in 2e AD&D or before would have said something along the lines of "requires a +3 weapon to hit", meaning that under no circumstances could you damage the golem with a +2 or lower weapon. At least in 3.0, you could potentially do a bit of damage if you didn't have the appropriate weapon.
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Which is how it should be, as the rules aren't the underlying laws of a game setting but merely an approximation of those laws.
I'd be OK with a halfway-decent approximation; no need to make perfect be the enemy of good. But in many cases the rules run directly counter to the unwritten laws that have to be followed to get the game to function, and that really bugs me.
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Which is how it should be, as the rules aren't the underlying laws of a game setting but merely an approximation of those laws.I'd be OK with a halfway-decent approximation; no need to make perfect be the enemy of good. But in many cases the rules run directly counter to the unwritten laws that have to be followed to get the game to function, and that really bugs me.
I think it's necessary that the rules are merely an approximation of the physics of the setting, and that as more systems of rules are published the approximation gets better. After all, it was always possible to have large scale naval battles on Golarion, but there weren't rules for it before Skull and Shackles. You improve the approximation by printing rules that cover cases the existing rules don't (or don't well.)
But this right here is the rub for me. If we want the Gods to both be 'fully stated entities' and 'also faithful to the fiction' then you're going to need to add a lot of additional systems and subsystems, so you can have things like "Rovagug is an existential threat to reality". You could do stuff like "Rovagug destroys 1d3 planes of reality per minute" but I don't think that would be very satisfying. So I think it would be a lot of additional rules to make the gods feel godlike, and in terms of column inches in print that's probably not as actually useful to people's games as any number of other things they could print.
Plus there are a bunch of entities that are more interesting by virtue of being mysterious, and I don't know how you'd do a God-Bestiary entity for Groetus and not spoil the mystery.