Help with religons?

[penguinreich]

I'm kind of stumped on a religion(s) for my world and i thought maybe someone here would like to spit out a few tips, words of advice, or concepts. I'm sorry if this is in the wrong place.

Here's some ground info on my world. Single Continent (so far) The continent is divided down the middle by a very large forest and mountain range.

The humans live east of the mountains in numerous kingdoms which where mostly part of a larger empire a long time ago.
The gnomes in the west of the forest are all born with sorcery to a limited extent. Some travel the world teaching other would-be sorcerers about their gift. The gnomes are bordered on their east by a very large desert.
The dwarfs live in the mountains( how original of me) and are divided in a strict clan system.
The elves live in the forest in numerous cities, some blend with the environment and some are large and made from stone. Most elves are hospitable but some renegaded have formed anti-foreign terrorist groups.
The halflings are sea-farers, making a large profit off of the sea trade. They are generally honorable when dealing with halflings of the same family as them. The family unit is very important to them.
The orcs live deep in the jungle with the elves. People consider them uncivilized, but there great cities and great religious ceremonious don't support that.

I'm thinking a quasi-different religion for each race, to much? Any suggestions on what kind of religions i should build. Thanks for your time.

[Mick_the_Rogue]

Well, you could always limit it down further...

You could have one god (or three, that seems to be a cool number of deities) and have the various races worship different aspects of him or them, worshipping the parts that they like the most. Much like how Muslims, Christians and Jews all worship the same god

[Roderick_BR]

Something interesting to do: Make one pantheon for each race.
For elves, halflings, gnomes, and dwarves, you could get 1 main god and two lesser gods, each representing a part of their society.
For the humans, you could have around 3 or 4 major gods, representing the moral balances (good, evil, etc), usually tied to some cultural history.

[Matthew]

Depends entirely on the flavour you are going for. It is usual to have one or more Deities for each Race, but you might try using overlapping Deities. Instead of a Deity of the Elves, a Deity worshipped by X, Y and Z.

Fantasy Religions can be as superficial or as detailed as you want. I like very detailed Fantasy Religions, as it helps to build suspension of disbelief. Tou should probably=y think about whether you want an over God, whether people *know* what the reality is, what source the Deities derive their power from, how Animism and Ancestor Worship might interact with the world, the nature of 'Evil' and why it exists, and so on...

[knightsaline]

If the Dwarves are heavily clan based, make them worship their ancestors (or what clan history shows that the Ancestor did to gain veneration)

Halflings should worship some great sea being, like the Leviathan or some epic water creature.

If you wanted, you could make the 4 races worship various elements. Humans to Earth, Dwarves with Fire, Halflings with Water and Elves with Air. I know this is ripping off the sovereign stone trilogy, but it seems to work