Dungeon Fantasy Pantheons

[Captain-Captain]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Let's just say some of them wouldn't be good dinner guests. Unless you're actually having the elves over for dinner. "Og like elf. Good with mint. Must be green elf."


Good bet. The descriptions are there to set the tone, not to tell you how to play your character. They're about as detailed as the ones with the sample monsters in DF 2.

Or the cultured Cebrebral Slicer who wonders whether a '65 Harital or the '57 Boudelle goes better with fresh Mountain Halfling L'Orange...

[pnewman]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

Starting the campaign with a entire pantheon is like starting a campaign with the whole game world fleshet out. In most cases isn't neccessary.

But from a partial, incomplete, non-complementary viewpoint ("the natural perception of most mortals beings"), yang (essence, light, olimpic, heaven) can be viewed sometimes as oppossed to yin (substance, darkness, chtonic, earth), resulting in seeming clash and enemity.

Right, but I've also got it so that Grandmother and Grandfather gave birth to the other Gods - it was a 'mixed marriage' of Law and Chaos. Mother Earth got bored and started making mortals. When they saw this Grandmother and Grandfather got interested and they started making mortals, then Brother Moon stepped in too. This is why the setting has so many sophont races. Mother Earth creates Dragons, Grandfather creates Lawful Dragons, Grandfather creates Chaotic Dragons. Mother Earth creates humans, Grandfather creates Dwarves, Grandmother creates Elves. Repeat until nausea ensues.

Originally Posted by demonsbane

Voila! Here is the Fantasy motiff of the huge divine wars of "alignments" (law-order-light vs. chaos-potentiality-darkness powers) in the world.

Got it in one. None of the Gods, save the Comet Cults, are 'Evil'. Since sophisticated cosmology is too complicated for my concept of Dungeon Fantasy I wanted to create a clearly distinguishable Pantheon that was small enough to describe quickly, all of whom made suitable Gods for party members, but weren't antagonistic enough that they'd cause fights in the party.

I also to wanted to ensure that not all evil people worshiped evil gods, thus making them harder to identify. In terms of that other game a 'Lawful Neutral' God like Grandfather Sun can have both 'Lawful Good' Holy Warriors and 'Lawful Evil' Mongol style Hobgoblin steppe nomads follow him. Similarly a 'Chaotic Neutral' Goddess like Grandmother Chaos can have both 'Chaotic Good' Robin Hood style Scouts and 'Chaotic Evil' Dark Elves follow her.

I also wanted to reject the whole race and culture Gods shtick, it's too complicated. There aren't human gods and Dwarven Gods, or Greek Gods and Japanese Gods. The same Gods just have different names in different cultures. A Cleric of Grandfather Sun can call on Apollo, Amateratsu, Ra, Dazbog, or some made up name like Pelor and it makes no difference.

[blacksmith]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

Hm, at first "glance" 37 nonhuman races seems a lot, maybe even too many... I hope there will be space in the scarce 31-32 pages of the PDF for other cool and varied stuff.

Well that is not very many monster races.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by pnewman

Got it in one. None of the Gods, save the Comet Cults, are 'Evil'. Since sophisticated cosmology is too complicated for my concept of Dungeon Fantasy I wanted to create a clearly distinguishable Pantheon that was small enough to describe quickly, all of whom made suitable Gods for party members, but weren't antagonistic enough that they'd cause fights in the party.

Personally, I think that's too sophisticated a cosmology for a straight dungeon crawl game. Lots and lots and lots of gods scattering around silly artifacts and sponsoring ridiculous cults seems like a natural there. Really you hardly need to know anything about the gods. Probably not even the PCs - it's not like clerics or monks or paladins interact with an existing religious structure, live according to the strictures of a faith other than those they make up themselves, or make much effort to actually spread their faiths. In this genre most players wouldn't want to if you force them.

Make up gods as you need them. Let the players make up gods for their characters. And if it turns out later that the campaign backstory involves multiple mythologies which are completely contradictory, so what? There's nothing wrong with having a dozen different gods all of whom independently created and rule the universe. The story isn't about the creation of the universe. Quit asking which myth is true, go kill some orcs and loot their stuff.

Admittedly a single coherent pantheon lends itself better to "high level" games where the PCs are participating in divine politics and genuinely do get to kill gods and destroy the universe, but this is bordering on the high fantasy epic genre, which has different rules.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by malloyd

Personally, I think that's too sophisticated a cosmology for a straight dungeon crawl game. Lots and lots and lots of gods scattering around silly artifacts and sponsoring ridiculous cults seems like a natural there. [...] Quit asking which myth is true, go kill some orcs and loot their stuff.

Exactly. DF assumes the existence of four sets of gods:

1. Good Gods. These are the deities that clerics and holy warriors serve, and who bless holy water. They heal and protect. They're mostly interchangeable.
2. Evil Gods. These are the bosses of demons. They create cursed items and places. They might have a few evil clerics and unholy warriors. They're mostly interchangeable.
3. Nature Gods. These are the entities that druids serve. They rule plants and animals, and remain neutral in the Good-Evil dispute. They're mostly interchangeable.
4. Elder Gods. These are the gods of lost civilizations, served by insane NPC cultists. They're from Outside Time and Space, and transcend the Good-Evil dispute. They're mostly interchangeable.

Further details are strictly roleplaying. For game purposes, any altar of Good will serve any good cleric well, any altar of Evil will serve any evil cleric equally well, and so on.

In Powers terms, we're talking about two Moral powers, a single Nature power, and a Cosmic power, respectively. There are no truly Divine powers; the setup is more "Moral Forces" than "The Pantheon" (Powers, p. 30), but the Moral powers are identified as "divine" by those who wield them. (And there are also Chi and Magical powers, and maybe Psi powers, but none of those have to do with gods at all.)

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Exactly. DF assumes the existence of four sets of gods:

I love your lists!

Really. Maybe this is interesting for inclusion in some DF material, for clearity or curiosity.

(OK, I don't want to make you cut more words but...)

I wonder what is the relation of DF Elder Gods with altars and similar things.

Originally Posted by Kromm

Elder Gods. These are the gods of lost civilizations, served by insane NPC cultists. They're from Outside Time and Space, and transcend the Good-Evil dispute.(...)

In Powers terms, we're talking about two Moral powers, a single Nature power, and a Cosmic power, respectively.

Since Elder Gods are stuff of inimaginable horror (mainly to the evil side of the spectrum, but correct me if I'm wrong with this, please), and they trascend other forces (Cosmic scale), I wonder if Dungeon Fantasy is assuming a maltheistic (3e Religion, p.137; 4e Fantasy, p32) or dystheistic bottom background? ;-)

[blacksmith]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

Since Elder Gods are stuff of inimaginable horror (mainly to the evil side of the spectrum, but correct me if I'm wrong with this, please), and they trascend other forces (Cosmic scale), I wonder if Dungeon Fantasy is assuming a maltheistic (3e Religion, p.137; 4e Fantasy, p32) or dystheistic bottom background? ;-)

I don't know, I might run Elder Gods not too different from how they are in the Malazan Book of the Fallen world. They might not be evil, but as their ceremonies might well be intrinsicialy linked to say blood sacrifices there might not be much that they can do to change their perception, even if they don't personaly care much for such things.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by pnewman

Got it in one. None of the Gods, save the Comet Cults, are 'Evil'. Since sophisticated cosmology is too complicated for my concept of Dungeon Fantasy I wanted to create a clearly distinguishable Pantheon that was small enough to describe quickly, all of whom made suitable Gods for party members, but weren't antagonistic enough that they'd cause fights in the party.

Your paragraph seems ok for me. Speaking from the "campaign world" (The DF Town!) viewpoint (not from an intra-party perspective) even if these gods aren't really enemies, the mortal beings hindranced, perhaps wrong and partial perception of these entities or of their internal relationships can make them to interpret or believe that.

Or even the personal goals of people can to make them falsely interpret whatever they want about gods, too, giving birth to different "sects" each one enforcing conflicting interpretations about these gods... For instance, someone wanting war, could claim revelation for the awareness of a inner clash between gods.

So "godly enemity" can be put down to the human sphere of beliefs and interpretations if one wants to do that. And then that enemity of cults is real in the world's history.

Of course, all this is "fluff" roleplaying stuff ;)

Originally Posted by pnewman

I also wanted to reject the whole race and culture Gods shtick, it's too complicated. There aren't human gods and Dwarven Gods, or Greek Gods and Japanese Gods.

I agree with that, myself not being fond of race specific pantheons (ok, this would need some nuances -different races worshipping or relating with different aspects/names of the same divine entity-, but not now). These multiple pantheons (that goes beyond the idea of polyteism) add a non needed degree of IMO nonsensical complexity (even for a straight Fantasy non-dungeon game), a purely quantitative pluralism difficult to handle with some sense.

Instad, the interchangeability factor of Kromm here is very well suited here, and enough generic.

Originally Posted by malloyd

And if it turns out later that the campaign backstory involves multiple mythologies which are completely contradictory, so what? There's nothing wrong with having a dozen different gods all of whom independently created and rule the universe. The story isn't about the creation of the universe. Quit asking which myth is true, go kill some orcs and loot their stuff.

Well, that is another approach. But when I think about DF material I expect it to have some degree of sense for being useful in a non-dungeons Fantasy campaign too ;-) I know, that is my personal bias.

Anyway, nothing stops a GM from integrating all that maddening Forgotten Realms Faiths & Pantheons plurality of player & GM created gods in an almost effortless way in the middle of the course of a given campaign for suiting the view offered by pneuman:

Originally Posted by pnewman

The same Gods just have different names in different cultures. A Cleric of Grandfather Sun can call on Apollo, Amateratsu, Ra, Dazbog, or some made up name like Pelor and it makes no difference.

If you have a lot of gods hanging around in the campaign world, I prefer this approach because it turns all that complex and nonsensical pluralism of entities back to a sort of "simplicity". But this remains as a matter of taste.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by blacksmith

They might not be evil, but

I understand, and I appretiate your answer.

I remain interested in Kromm's take about this point. Even if it is the simplified DF one.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

I agree with that, myself not being fond of race specific pantheons (ok, this would need some nuances -different races worshipping or relating with different aspects/names of the same divine entity-, but not now).

Well, here I go again thanks to pnewman is providing good examples for this:

Originally Posted by pnewman

I also to wanted to ensure that not all evil people worshiped evil gods, thus making them harder to identify. In terms of that other game a 'Lawful Neutral' God like Grandfather Sun can have both 'Lawful Good' Holy Warriors and 'Lawful Evil' Mongol style Hobgoblin steppe nomads follow him.

Similarly a 'Chaotic Neutral' Goddess like Grandmother Chaos can have both 'Chaotic Good' Robin Hood style Scouts and 'Chaotic Evil' Dark Elves follow her.

Again, Chaos, Darkness, Evil are names or aspects of the pure potentiality. (1)

On the other hand, Unbound (absence of restraint) and Freedom are aspects of it, too.

So Dark Elves perceiving and worshipping the pure potentiality (or potentia) as their Grandmother Chaos "Llolth", and Robin Hood's scouts honoring that anarchical (sometimes righteous, too) Grandmother Chaosin their fighting for freedom, are great examples of different races & cultures worshipping the same entity (I prefer to think here about impersonal universal principles, however) under some different chosen set of its own multiple aspects (2).



(1) "Chaotic neutral" is, inside of the limited "D&D terminology", the best suited, most impartial and comprehensive "name" for that universal principle that is, after all, the "stuff" of the Infinite.

(2) By the same token, regarding these 'Lawful Good' Holy Warriors and 'Lawful Evil' Mongol style Hobgoblins, as you say both would be related to the Yang principle (universal essence) oppossed & complementary to yin (universal substance): Granfather Sun has, between its (or His) names, Love and Justice (the names-aspects chosen by these "lawful good" Holy Warriors), while it has too the names of Implacable Order and Harsh Rigour, in line with the "lawful evil" Genghis Khan's hobgoblins.