Mythological Pantheon for your games or the Gods of the settings

[Madnick]

Greetings my friends,

Since the creation of our personal campaign setting, which is based on the adventures of my dedicated party the last 15 years and many more friends joining from times to times, we came up with an Idea that stayed in our heads for quite some time. But because of its nature I cannot say I can finalize on implementing it or not. Your help will be invaluable.
Let me elaborate so you can have a complete image of this question. We decided that instead of using the Pantheon of each and every campaign setting we had been using the past years, to create a new Pantheon that we will be established for all the adventures to come. This Pantheon will be created on the original Mythological Gods all other pantheons we know so far were created. The Norse Gods, the Greek Gods the Egyptian Gods and so on .

The idea is to create one God for each alignment plus 3 more for the most used alignments, in total 12 Gods. The deities we are thinking of using are amongst others Thor, Artemis, Loci, Anubis, Odin, Zeus, and plenty more in the pool we have to pick from.
The question finally to you is the following.

A pantheon for your D&D, Pathfinder game with known Gods from our mythologies will make the playing experience better by using known and closer to your understanding deities, hence you will always remember the portfolio and make it easier to use gods on your campaigns instead of using unknown new gods every time you change a setting, or will it make it alienated because those gods are way to familiar to you hence they have nothing new to offer and it will make the whole idea uninteresting for your taste.

Some details I must provide to make you make up your mind is that the story of the Gods is easily combined with the story of the setting, so don’t think that using Mythical gods will create a hole in the settings creation because it is already thought and answered. Plus the obvious answer which of course matters the most is whatever my players think. I do have plenty of parties joining this particular setting and I do value their opinion and counted towards my thoughts on the enquiry, but I feel this community is highly grown and the input on the matter will help me very much by pointing out things I might lost on my thoughts.

Thank you in advance fellow gamers
Madnick.

[Xervous]

Have you ever heard of the Planescape (http://www.planewalker.com/)setting? It includes many gods from the real world, in addition to the classic DnD gods, and more.

[CaladanMoonblad]

To reduce the question down to its basics;

"Do you prefer stereotypes or unique deities?"

Is this fair or how would you ask the question more simply?



If the above is fair, then I prefer deities that are unknown to players for the simple fact that stereotypes based on real world religions of earth's past (and present, be careful, there are still actual worshippers of the named deities in the original post)... because that way, meta-gaming is curbed.

Example; If I describe a Priest of Pelor to my players, they are all well acquainted with the core D&D pantheon to know what to expect in terms of that priest's conduct. However, if I introduce a Priest of Agathus (my own homebrewed Sun god), then they are less sure. My players will probe the priest for what his deity advocates (such as execution by exposure over 3 days). Without ranks in Knowledge (Religion), the Characters that my players play have just as much ambiguity on such subjects as the real people playing those characters.

In sum, I try to mitigate metagaming and encourage role-playing, and I find it useful to use a new set of deities between campaign worlds.

[Talya]

You need a sexy CG goddess of love, beauty, passion and hedonism.

[Gildedragon]

What I've done to figure out new gods is to randomly assign 3-6 (1d4+2) domains and portfolios; with some post-facto tinkering and rerolling
It makes for unexpected deities and novel feeling societies. What happens when the deity of love is CN or CE. It's somewhat like rolling for stats and description in that you can get things you never expected and diverge from the cliches.

Albeit this only really matters if you have clerics in your party or if the party is meeting the gods. Both are rarities in the games I DM, and as such have slowly stopped statting out my deities

[Madnick]

Thank you all for your input, this is what i was looking for i want to get as many opinions on the matter as possible so i can compare them with my friends opinions and finally reach a decision

[Man on Fire]

You need a sexy CG goddess of love, beauty, passion and hedonism.

Sigil No, every setting has female godess of love and male god of war, it's just...boring and tired.
I have better suggestion for diety of love. This guy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMdkm4NmzfY)

Okay, now to actually help the OP:

I give you Demogorgon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demogorgon), through little is known about him, except his very hname has been a taboo. Idea of genesis of the name being corruption of "demiurge" however gives some interesting ideas. What if this world has been created by Demogorgon, mad demiurge, who had been take down by other dieties? How, having been cast down to Tartarrus Abyss he is trapped there and waits a chance to escape, with hordes of demons he creates with his power of making things from nothing, each more powerful and twisted than the previous one?

There is also Chernobog (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobog) the Black God. Little is known about him, through. Theories are that he is opposing diety to Belebog (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belobog) and even other theories say they're really two aspects of the same solar diety, Dazhbog (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazhbog), representing his aspects as belevolent sun during the day and chaotic sun in the underworld during the night. I suggest combining this with Egyptian mythology and god Ra/ Amon Re who travels the sky on his sun ark and goes to the underwold at night, where at the end of every night he slays snake god Aphopis. How about making it like this - Re the Dazhbog is the main diety of the pantheon, he slayed Demogorgon and casted him to Tartarrus Abyss. Every day he travels the sky in his sun ark, to give people light and protect them from demons. In this form he is Ra the Belebog, belevolent but strict and hard diety. Ad dawn however his ship enters Tararrus Abyss, where he battles demons and defeats Demogorgon again at the end of every night, during this time he casts away his belevolent form and becomes Amon the Charnobog, dark and chaotic diety who lives only to fight Demogorgon. That moment when the setting sun looks like it's red is when the transformation occurs. Eclipse is a rare time when Re becomes Chernobog in human world, to remind mortals how much he sacrifices for them.

Amatsu Mikaboshi (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=15381652) the August Star of Heaven, Japanese god of Evil and Stars. Funny thing, part of his name can also mean tentacle. Mikaboshi could be god of unknow, dreaded pole star at the edge of the universe, around which all Aberrations live. He is sort of main villain, somebody who is oppsoed by the rest of the pantheon, while Re fights Demogogon.

Alignment:
Re the Dazbog: N
Ra the Belebog: LN
Amon the Chernobog: CN
Amatsu-Mikaboshi: CE
Demogorgon: CE

I would also suggest keeping Athena as diety of war, just because I dislike how this position is always male.

[Madnick]

Awesome insight for the Demogorgon and Chernobog man thanks a lot. i love the ideas of a Ra/Amon Re alternative. Amatsu is already into the pool of Gods to use. I like the idea of a female war of God indeed this spot is occupied by males way to long!!

Thanks again!!

[Jeff the Green]

Guys, remember that discussion of real-life religion is verboten here, regardless of whether the religion has any modern adherents.

Personally, I prefer unique deities. In one "pantheon" in my setting (actually a system of hagiolatry) several of the saints are more or less veiled allusions to more or less obscure works of literature, myths, and history, but never exactly as you'd expect. Otherwise everything is brand-spanking new.

[Piggy Knowles]

Something I started in the last campaign I ran (and that I'd like to expand more one day) is the idea of unaligned gods. Gods don't possess an alignment. They are not lawful, chaotic, good, evil or even neutral. Clerics can pick an alignment domain that matches their own alignment (so an evil cleric can still have the Evil domain if she so chooses), but it's no longer based on the deity's alignment. Most gods have followers of all different alignments, although some particular churches tend to draw from one end of the alignment pool or another.

I pretty much always design my own pantheon when I'm designing a world, unless it's meant to fit into an existing setting. Some players have found it annoying, though, especially when they have a char concept in mind that revolves around worship of a particular deity, only to find it doesn't exist. In instances like that I usually try to accommodate them by creating an archon of an existing deity that matches what they were going for.

[Shining Wrath]

Divine Ranks and Powers (SRD) (http://www.d20srd.org/indexes/divineRanksPowers.htm)

If you're going to roll your own, start there.

For advice, consider the idea of randomly picking a group of domains, and then imagining a deity that would combine those domains coherently.

[Abemad]

Pantheon Generator (http://chaoticshiny.com/pangen.php)

[BWR]

You need a sexy CG goddess of love, beauty, passion and hedonism.

Valerias, the Girder on of Weapons. In short, she loves a good love story. Beauty, love, sex, hedonism; these are secondary to a good passionate story.
A love story where the two find eachother and have no major obstacles might be sweet, but definitely boring.
So there must be passion. Drama! Something like "Romeo and Juliette" is right up her ally. Lots of passion, little sense. In order to promote a good story she might give a young person a little push in the right direction (such as granting weapons to a young man so he can quest to save his kidnapped interest).

Basically, she will use mortals to play out any plot in a romance novel.

[Clistenes]

If you are willing to have a huge pantheon, I suggest to split it into four different kinds of gods:

Nature Deities: The "souls" of the greatest elements/phenomena/objects of nature, like the sun, air, earth, water/ocean, fire, winter/cold, death, diseases...etc. Those tend to have a neutral element in their alignment (they can be N, NG, NE, LN or CN) get little benefit from worship, but some of them take an interest on mortals out of pure love or hate.

Ethical/Moral Deities: The living embodiments of a virtue of vice. They are rarely true neutral. They get stronger when their portafolio is promoted, and can lose their divinity if their portafolio gets severely weakened.

Deities of Mortal Activities: Like blacksmithing, music, writing,...etc. They get stronger when their portafolio is promoted, but they also rely a lot on worship to remain divine.

Racial Deities: Like Moradin, Corellon Larethian, Bahamut...etc. Get stronger when their people gets stronger. They rely a lot on their worship.

[Gildedragon]

Valerias, the Girder on of Weapons. In short, she loves a good love story. Beauty, love, sex, hedonism; these are secondary to a good passionate story.
A love story where the two find eachother and have no major obstacles might be sweet, but definitely boring.
So there must be passion. Drama! Something like "Romeo and Juliette" is right up her ally. Lots of passion, little sense. In order to promote a good story she might give a young person a little push in the right direction (such as granting weapons to a young man so he can quest to save his kidnapped interest).

Basically, she will use mortals to play out any plot in a romance novel.

This one sounds CN or even CE
Dance mortals dance to my song and amusement!
Invoked to find love and prayed to to not take an interest in your relationship?
Priests and rites are always single; once love is found she is a liability and one would do well to ward against her

[Gildedragon]

If you are willing to have a huge pantheon, I suggest to split it into four different kinds of gods:

Nature Deities: The "souls" of the greatest elements/phenomena/objects of nature, like the sun, air, earth, water/ocean, fire, winter/cold, death, diseases...etc. Those tend to have a neutral element in their alignment (they can be N, NG, NE, LN or CN) get little benefit from worship, but some of them take an interest on mortals out of pure love or hate.

Ethical/Moral Deities: The living embodiments of a virtue of vice. They are rarely true neutral. They get stronger when their portafolio is promoted, and can lose their divinity if their portafolio gets severely weakened.

Deities of Mortal Activities: Like blacksmithing, music, writing,...etc. They get stronger when their portafolio is promoted, but they also rely a lot on worship to remain divine.

Racial Deities: Like Moradin, Corellon Larethian, Bahamut...etc. Get stronger when their people gets stronger. They rely a lot on their worship.

This is a cool idea though it can make gods a bit flat to fit in only one of these realms. Alt (excluding racial): lesser gods have their whole portfolio in 1 category, intermediate in 2, greater in 3. Racialness means a more niche approach, so it is a freebie.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by CaladanMoonblade
In sum, I try to mitigate metagaming and encourage role-playing, and I find it useful to use a new set of deities between campaign worlds.

I like this idea, for all the reasons you've mentioned. Most of my campaigns are set in the Forgotten Realms, but by some trick of chance I've never had players who were dyed-in-the-wool devotees of the Realms, so the Faerûnian pantheon was still new to them. That said, I really like your approach and reasoning here.


Originally Posted by Talya
You need a sexy CG goddess of love, beauty, passion and hedonism.

Don't we all.

:smalltongue:

[Man on Fire]

Guys, remember that discussion of real-life religion is verboten here, regardless of whether the religion has any modern adherents.

I'm pretty sure it doesn't count when it's for purposes of the game, as long as we keep it up to the gaming.

[Clistenes]

I'm pretty sure it doesn't count when it's for purposes of the game, as long as we keep it up to the gaming.

You can speak about the stats of the gods in Deities & Demigods and about settings in which they are worshipped, but you can't speak about their worshippers and religion in real life. I was told not to speak about Moloch and Baal despite them not being worshipped since almost two thousand years ago.

[Madnick]

This post has nothing to do with real Gods and religious beliefs.This post has been really informative and i would like to thank you all for taking the time and sharing your thoughts on the subject.

I do like a lot of your ideas and i do agree with some of you.The most important thing for me is to make a pantheon that players find it natural to connect.To create the mythological background on this setting so the Gods don't seem like the fell from the sky with no back story or purpose.

But i feel people that do care about playing divine casters would be way more easier to follow a god that they know from their real life than having to read and memorize informations from the campaign setting guides.

And i ahve to admit that i am thinking like this because i am a part of this ''problem'',i have learned all the gods of 3ed edition dnd. Knew everything about them and all my players too.

when we moved to pathfinder we didn't bother learning the Pantheon there we just moved the 3rd edition that we knew and loved.This is cool because no major problem arises but if you do change the world you are in, why not do it properly,and create everything from scratch.I hope it make sense what i am saying..anyways big thanks to all for participating and keep them coming love to read your takes on the subject.

[Clistenes]

This is a cool idea though it can make gods a bit flat to fit in only one of these realms. Alt (excluding racial): lesser gods have their whole portfolio in 1 category, intermediate in 2, greater in 3. Racialness means a more niche approach, so it is a freebie.

I was thinking more about making the gods having different origins, with different views on mortals and different behaviours and approaches to their churches. The Earth Goddess (which may also be the patron goddess of say Motherhood, Food, Agriculture and Plant Life) may not worry too much about the mortal's alignment, and selfessly give her gifts to those so long as they don't grossly defile Nature, but the gods of Freedom, Justice, Truth, Deceit, Tyranny...etc., would be all about their alignment and moral behaviour (the god of Justice could be the patron god of Honesty, Honor, Truth and Paladins).

The Nature Gods would be Greater Spirits from the Prime Material Plane, while the Moral/Ethical Gods would be very powerful Outsiders from the Outer Planes.

The gods of mortal activities would be very human-like in all aspects, and could in fact be ascended mortals, who received worship due to their accomplishments. You could have a goddess similar to Athena, who would be patroness of Intelligence, Law, Cities, Civilization, Strategy and Crafts, as one of the strongest, and the weakest ones would be petty gods with very narrow portafolios (like locksmiths, astrologists, alchemists or clockmakers)

[Jeff the Green]

Valerias, the Girder on of Weapons. In short, she loves a good love story. Beauty, love, sex, hedonism; these are secondary to a good passionate story.
A love story where the two find eachother and have no major obstacles might be sweet, but definitely boring.
So there must be passion. Drama! Something like "Romeo and Juliette" is right up her ally. Lots of passion, little sense. In order to promote a good story she might give a young person a little push in the right direction (such as granting weapons to a young man so he can quest to save his kidnapped interest).

Basically, she will use mortals to play out any plot in a romance novel.

Oooh, I like this one! Mind if I steal it? (With credit, of course.)

[BWR]

Dragonstar went the exact opposite route and created the Unification Church.
The basic idea is that throughout their discovery of other worlds, the Dragon Empire came across hundreds of different gods and all the gods, despite their names, seemed to be the same ones: protector god, warrior god, love goddess, care/nurture goddess, etc.

So after centuries of theological debate and a little religious violence, they came to the conclusion that there were 12 gods, whom they gave titles like the Destroyer, the Warrior, the Father, the Lover, etc. and all other gods were merely aspects or interpretations of these. And guess what? Praying to the Unification gods works.
Then you have the Dualist Heresy, which got it into their heads that there are two gods, which are Good and Evil. Proponents of this idea aren't very popular in the Dragon Empire. Yet they seem to get spells too...

[Vaz]

I have a sexy shoeless god of war in mine. Literally.

He is similar to slaanesh in warhammer, he espouses sensation, and that there is no other eensation like combat. Feeling the gravel under your feat as you walk is just another way of doing it. He is the neutral god while his sister is the god of oversensation, where it is taken to perversion.

[BWR]

Oooh, I like this one! Mind if I steal it? (With credit, of course.)

She's an Immortal from the Mystara setting, so I don't really have any say. :smallwink: