I'm starting my own campaign of Kingmaker after the holidays and had a sit down with my players last week to go over character creation and to give out a bit of info on the adventure path. My players thankfully worked together on creation and came up with a pretty rounded group covering all the bases and doubling up on a few critical ones.
My concern though is that 3 of the 6 players are choosing to be athiest and incorporating that heavily into their backstories. A 4th had chosen to only pay lip service to a diety, and that mostly because of a requirement of a prestige class he wants to dip into later. Only my cleric and druid have characters interested in the Gods, and neither of them chose one of the core dieties of the area. I dont wanna force the others into religious characters but feel they may miss out on a bunch of the fun I planned regarding Gorum, Torag and Erastil.
As a very green GM, not really sure how I should handle it.
Can you please explain what "atheist" means in the context of your campaign? Do those players not believe in deities despite the fact that divine magic exists and is observable in the world? Or is this more of a rejection of the gods and their ideologies? If an undefined "atheism" is just a result of the players not wanting to worry about that party of their backgrounds, then you can let them define what the word means.
My first piece of advice is to make sure that the players know that certain faiths (especially Erastil) are very popular among he humans of the area -- assuming that's the case for your campaign. Then you could absolutely play into that difference and see how the nation's citizens take to be ruled by people of wildly different faiths. There are even "atheist nations in Golarion, one of which is nearby, so it's very possible that the rulers' views on religion will influence some of the populace and cause dissent among the others. Who knows, after they encounter the Temple of the Elk or the Shrine to Erastil or Jhod Kavken, the players may change their views.
I dont wanna force the others into religious characters but feel they may miss out on a bunch of the fun I planned regarding Gorum, Torag and Erastil.
Consider changing your plans, then. A common practice of GMs is to work the PC's backstories into the campaign, and I don't see any reason that shouldn't include the PC's beliefs as well. It might make sense to change the deities your working with to the two that your religious PCs worship. Alternatively, you can stick with the common deities and then play up how much relevant events mean to the nation's citizens.
You may get more specific advice on this if you share what the plans are.
Sorry. By athiest I mean more so that their response was...Hey I'm a fighter, I dont need the Gods and they chose to work that into their backstory. What I'm thinking I might do is have them come from a family of devout followers of one of the deities I was looking to expand on, and have NPC's come up with quests or whatnot to try to pull them back into the church. I'll think about it. Still got a few weeks to go until we start and who knows how long until they actually get to building the kingdom. Maybe as you suggested they'll find their Gods on the way there.
As a side note, some of the Ideas I had in mind were to bring in some of the side quests for the Owlcat RPG game that came out a few months back. Harrims story in paticular is of interest. I was hoping to use a PC to fill in for his role in those stories...and perhaps I still could. I'll talk to my players to see if any would at least be willing to say..."Hey, I used to follow Torag but XYZ happend so screw the Gods" That will allow them to keep their backstory but give me some hooks for future content.
The very best thing you could do as a DM is to directly ask the players what plot hooks they want the chance to play out with their characters. Which might be nothing, it could be they just want to hang out and kill stuff. If they're not interested in having a backstory, they're not interested and pushing it on them will leave everyone (especially you) unsatisfied. You, as the DM, get to decide the overarching plot and how it interacts with the characters' stories. The players get to decide what their characters' personal stories are, or at least how they begin.
Thanks for the responses. Honestly, I've played with most of these guys for several years and they've always been a very roleplaying heavy group. I guess it was just shocking that so many of them are choosing backstories to spurn the Gods :) Perhaps even that can play into their kingdom. IE crops failing or natural disasters, etc...I dont wanna over do it though and make them resent it.
Perhaps even that can play into their kingdom. IE crops failing or natural disasters, etc...I dont wanna over do it though and make them resent it.
Balance it between negative events and positive events. I don't think gods in Golarion really get upset if you ignore them. It's only when you actively work against them.