New way of doing divine magic?

[Keeindron]

I'm currently working on a world where divine beings are made by people, not the other way around. I can't think of how to reflavor clerics and their ilk to match. Can somebody smarter that me help me out here?

[DonDuckie]

Terry Pratchett did something like this in discworld: in Hogfather, a creature of faith is 'killed' and the surplus belief begins to create new deities by simply mentioning them or wondering if they could exist, eg. the God of Hangovers, and sock-stealing faeries:smallbiggrin:

A way of doing this could be using the "Cleric of Concepts" option. Have the players describe their beliefs(domains) and then you(GM) manifest a deity, and instead of praying for spells, they spend a good hour regaining spells by taking their way of life to an extreme

example: a cleric of Lust and Festivals wakes up at dawn, then she goes drinking and whoring for an hour, but rather than being drunk, hungover, or the owner of a brand new STD, she has her daily allotment of spells:smalltongue:

This could of course make clerics of Murder and Torture quite unpopular. BOOM - that's why most people are good:smallcool:

How's that?

[Shadowleaf]

I'm currently working on a world where divine beings are made by people, not the other way around. I can't think of how to reflavor clerics and their ilk to match. Can somebody smarter that me help me out here?First off, Divine rank = number of worshippers. Most people would probably worship a God(dess) of Life, so s/he would be the most powerful Deity.
I suggest a pantheon of deities whom commoners call on in different situations - a God(dess) of the Sea for water travel, a God(dess) of Fertility/Life for good harvest, a God(dess) of law for trials and so forth. Any concept common enough would have a Deity to manage it, and minor concepts might either be an aspect of an existing deity or have an angel appointed (for example the God of Thieves and Angels of Burglary, Stealth and Assassination).

As for your actual question on how to do the Divine Magic, I would probably leave it almost as it is. You might make it possible for a Cleric to devote himself to a specific Angel for more specialized Domains or Domain spells (A Cleric of the God of Thieves might get Shadow Walk instead of False Vision if devoted to the Angel of Stealth), perhaps giving up something else in return (such as being required to do a daily ritual to the Angel).

Now, if you are looking to sort of phase out Gods as beings, you should totally just go for the Clerics of causes approach. Instead of being a Cleric of the God(dess) of Harvest, you are simply a Cleric of Harvest (or life, law or what not).