| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
No, that only applies to Planescape or Forgotten Realms.
It does bring up the topic of why worshippers then? I remember Baba Yaga having the opinion that just being able to go around as you please and not getting tied down doing deity stuff is better.
Plus Sandman series has done some rather good stories on such things. Like don't be horrible to your worshippers because being at their mercy when you are diminished is a bad thing.
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
It does bring up the topic of why worshippers then? I remember Baba Yaga having the opinion that just being able to go around as you please and not getting tied down doing deity stuff is better.
All deities have agendas, but they rely on mortal agents to influence the mortal realms.
Deities don't manifest themselves on the Material Plane and dramatically intervene because they learned this leads to chaos and destruction. And deities who like that sort of thing don't do it because the other deities will gang up on them, see Rovagug.
So they allow select mortals to channel their power as clerics, send dreams to the faithful, cut off clerics who commit anathema, and maybe use the deific boons and curses if your GM decides to.
In Doylist terms, if Pathfinder was a game about godlike beings beating each other up all of the time, there wouldn't be any room for Player Characters.
All deities have agendas, but they rely on mortal agents to influence the mortal realms.
Deities don't manifest and act themselves is that they learned this leads to chaos and destruction. And deities who like that sort of thing don't do it because the other deities will gang up on you, see Rovagug.
In Doylist terms, if Pathfinder was a game about godlike beings beating each other up all of the time, there wouldn't be any room for Player Characters.
Time to break out EXALTED for divine wuxia action!
Creative Director
|
| 9 people marked this as a favorite. |
Worshipers are how a deity influences the Material Plane, since they don't generally step in there and get personally involved. Worshipers are also a nice bit of ego boost. It's nice, for example, to be admired by people, but if you're not admired by people you're not going to shrivel up and die.
And there's also an element of the unknown at play. The more we explain EXACTLY how deities work (and thus quantify them with rules), the more mundane they get.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I believe there's also the fact that if a deity has worshippers, they can put a claim on the souls of these worshippers. And since most of the deities reside on the Outer Planes, where everything is made of soul matter, having more souls means larger planar domains. If a deity doesn't have worshippers, their planar domain will eventually get eroded by the Maelstrom. It doesn't kill the deity, but it needs to find a new place to live.
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
It does bring up the topic of why worshippers then? I remember Baba Yaga having the opinion that just being able to go around as you please and not getting tied down doing deity stuff is better.
In regards to Baba Yaga, it's been made clear that deities can't just walk into the material plane and murder people or conquer countries because they feel like it. Baba Yaga really enjoys her freedom to do precisely that, which is why she's avoided godhood.
For her, it's not about the worshipers, but the behavioral restrictions.
Heck, Baba Yaga has worshipers, being worshiped as one of the Eldest sometimes. That just doesn't make her a God.
|
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
And she'd probably give those worshippers the finger if she met them in person...or just eat them or something.
She might. Or she might laugh and help them in some way (possibly a way that's appalling when examined). Consistency is not one of Baba Yaga's more prominent character traits. :)
Caiden actually seems to be the one deity least concerned about having worshippers since he is big on freedom and such. 'Stop worshipping me!' and all. Or actively hiding/traveling the multiverse.
"Wait, I can't go down and help rescue people/party down in Varisa/pants Queen Abigail? I'm outta here, mortality here I come."
|
Creative Director
|
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
As mentioned above, the fact that a god's domain in the Great Beyond is directly influenced by the influx of worshiper souls is another reason why they foster faith. In the afterlife, the faithful become the population of their realm, and in time actually BECOME the realm.
A deity with less worshipers will have a smaller domain. This won't impact their personal power at all, but will impact their "divine political" power. But again, since we don't publish rules for that, it's mostly storyline facing stuff that is quantified by the needs of the plot.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I guess it's a bit like politicians. If people stop voting for Politician X, he's no longer in power and can't do much in the real world, except behind the scenes and through his coterie of the faithful. But he's not dead and might come back.
To stretch the analogy a bit too far, Politician X still has genuine personal power because he knows where all the bodies are buried, but as soon as he tries that, he's going to get stamped on hard by Politicians A-W, Y and Z.
Suddenly I remember an old 1st edition Deities and Demigods rule that was parodied in Murphy's Rules that might be interesting to use.
Something about how a person can believe in a concept and get low-level spells. I'm fuzzy since it was decades ago. Murphy's Rules parodied it by saying you could worship yourself and thus get 1-2 level spells.
So maybe pull a Order of the Stick and Keep around a small doll.
"Holy Banjo! Please grant me cure light wounds to heal my friend!"
(Looks in mirror) "Oh my goodness, you look divine! Let there be light!"
So someone worshipping themselves might get a real comfy chair to sit in.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
"In the name of Me, Myself and the Holy I!"
Having an ego big enough to have its own gravity and bend the fabric of the astral plane seems like a prerequisite to become a divinity anyway.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I guess it's a bit like politicians. If people stop voting for Politician X, he's no longer in power and can't do much in the real world, except behind the scenes and through his coterie of the faithful. But he's not dead and might come back.
To stretch the analogy a bit too far, Politician X still has genuine personal power because he knows where all the bodies are buried, but as soon as he tries that, he's going to get stamped on hard by Politicians A-W, Y and Z.
Politician X sounds like the name of a comic book villain.