Evolving Deities

[Buufreak]

A strange thought occurred to me, and I was wondering what you guys thought, or if there was precedence. Has there ever been, or would it be possible for a deity to change over time? I'm sure depending on campaigns they have different long term goals, but I mean something more drastic. Like what if Morridin became less orderly, or less good? Could the long time rivalry or dwarf and orc bring him away from his very polar alignment? Or even some major event that would change a deity's domains, other than the death and assimilation of another god and his/her domains?

[noob]

Yes deities can evolve but the deities in most dnd pantheons are usually completely dumb and nonsensical and so saying they are individuals is borderline: it is like saying that a circle is someone.
But that is another story.

[johnbragg]

It's a neat concept, but you'd have to first establish how deities and priesthoods and worshippers interact in your setting. Those might be the wrong questions, but you'd have to establish rules or explanations for why and how the deities are the way they are, to explain how and why they'd change over time.

D&D usually doesn't put that much thought in. Can't blame them, it's not easily monetizable. And it's the sort of backstage campaign-building stuff that, no matter how hard a DM works on it, the players rarely interact with. And if they don't interact with it, it's hard to care about it. You can decide that gods are entirely dependent on the energy of their worshippers, to the extent that they are a consensual reality--they ARE in fact whatever their supporters believe they are (and possibly to some extent what other sentients *fear* they are.) And then you sketch out your pantheon and at least a vague mechanic for how this plays out. And it's all pretty much completely invisible to your players. The non-clerics don't care much if they get healed by priests of Hera or Isis or Ishtar or Thor or Meilikki, so there's a decent shot they don't even notice that in one town they get healed by LN priests of Jupiter Dominus Rex and in the next town over by CG priests of Zeus Martius Lord of Battles. You'd have to build an adventure path around the idea that the Red God of the Orcs of Not-Germania is in fact the being who was, until very recently, the Mars/Ares/Herakles of Not-the-Greco-Roman Empire, and that therefore the players have to recover the Club of Herakles and NEmean Lion Skin from the new high priest of the Red God to blunt the force of the orc horde invasion.

No, I never designed that campaign/setting and saw it fizzle after one and a half sessions, why do you ask. It was fun to design, though.

[Malimar]

In my setting, deities can change depending on what their worshippers believe about them. As an extreme example, two gods once merged into one god when their congregations merged.

But I don't know if that's a very common interpretation of divinity.

[Geddy2112]

It has happened in the pathfinder pantheon quite a bit. As some gods have been killed, others just kind of appeared, and 5 mortals ascended to godhood by various means. Nethys ascended through magical mastery, and he frequently fluxes between good and evil, order and chaos, and some even weirder stuff. Pharasma used to be the goddess of prophecy, but she kinda just stopped caring about that. Norgorber has four separate and very different aspects, with subcults on subcults on subcults. Zon-Kuthon went from Neutral Good to Lawful Evil after he went on vacation in the weird side of the universe. He got the darkness domain when Abdar gave him shadow from the first vault, cause of some deal. So yes, this stuff happens.

It is pretty rare that a deity would change alignment, even if their actions started leaning one way or another, to hard shift is incredibly extreme, but happens(Zon Kuthon) and theoretically, he could shift back...at least his sister thinks so.

[Werephilosopher]

Araushnee was once Chaotic Good, but fell into Evil and was transformed into Lolth.

[Red Fel]

A strange thought occurred to me, and I was wondering what you guys thought, or if there was precedence. Has there ever been, or would it be possible for a deity to change over time? I'm sure depending on campaigns they have different long term goals, but I mean something more drastic. Like what if Morridin became less orderly, or less good? Could the long time rivalry or dwarf and orc bring him away from his very polar alignment? Or even some major event that would change a deity's domains, other than the death and assimilation of another god and his/her domains?

It has happened. Perfect illustration, Wee Jas.

Wee Jas was originally the Suel goddess of magic. Since the Suel were pretty big on magic, that made her pretty darn important. Then, of course, came the Rain of Colorless Fire, which annihilated the Suel empire. So now you have this imperial goddess - beauty, vanity, power - associated with magic, whose empire is suddenly, intimately, associated with death. Complete and total desolation. Not reapy-murdery death like Nerull, but just stillness-death. Gone.

So her portfolio, and her emphasis, evolved. From being a cold, regal sorceress queen, she became a cold, regal sorceress queen of the dead. This simply got integrated into her portfolio, and into her personality.

[Bad Wolf]

Lolth was formerly Araushnee, elven goddess of destiny and Weavers. Also was a consort of Corellon Larethian, before she became corrupted and power-hungry and was turned into a spider demon. Then she became a deity again.

[Milo v3]

Even without some cataclysmic event, deities are still individuals and can choose to change their alignment without issue.

[VoxRationis]

They are very much that way in my 3.5 setting, but it doesn't really follow established 3.5 deity rules, so I suppose one must take that with a grain of salt.

[Bronk]

There's a lot of deific evolution that happens over in faerun as well, partly because the gods over there have a lot of turnover, partly because they fight each other for or steal each other's portfolios and/or worshipers, or they go deep undercover.

You've got Lathander, who may or may not be the modern incarnation of a supposedly dead Netherese sun god (later editions decide that this is true).

You've got the entire pharaonic pantheon showing up and trying to fit in.

You've got the elven goddess Angharradh, who may be one goddess or a trio of other goddesses who sometimes band together (or, in later editions, is actually only one aspect of Selune?).

And you've got the extended Avatar series, where both Mystra and Kelemvore start out as human, gain godhood, and gradually lose their humanity over time. Cyric on the other hand, drives himself insane, then gains and loses portfolios as well.

Shar took over the shadow weave when the original Mystryl died at the fall of Netheril.

Lloth's changes have already been mentioned as well...

I'm sure there are more examples.

[atemu1234]

My games are weird. In my D&D world, deities are affected by how their followers perceive them, and can, over time, split into new and different deities or transform altogether.

[Red Fel]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the obvious evolution of Zarus, god of humanity and racial supremacy, into Pelor, the Burning Hate.

[Falcon X]

It has happened. Perfect illustration, Wee Jas.

Wee Jas was originally the Suel goddess of magic. Since the Suel were pretty big on magic, that made her pretty darn important. Then, of course, came the Rain of Colorless Fire, which annihilated the Suel empire. So now you have this imperial goddess - beauty, vanity, power - associated with magic, whose empire is suddenly, intimately, associated with death. Complete and total desolation. Not reapy-murdery death like Nerull, but just stillness-death. Gone.

So her portfolio, and her emphasis, evolved. From being a cold, regal sorceress queen, she became a cold, regal sorceress queen of the dead. This simply got integrated into her portfolio, and into her personality.
Excellent illustration.
So you know, my comments come from 2nd edition D&D, specifically Planescape. However, even though the pantheons and realms have changed since then, the core concepts are still the same (holding most true to Greyhawk).

Deities are believed to be born out of belief mixed with something tangible. Two things must be present to make a person a demigod:
1. A certain amount of followers. They could possibly just be people sworn to the concepts the person stands for. They could also be people who fear that person.
2. Sponsorship from a current deity.

Once those are fulfilled, and often at the person's death, they DO NOT become a deity.
The CONCEPT of them becomes a deity. Whatever it is about them that people respected or believed about them is what the god is. Usually, this is a very similar personality and consciousness, but not always. If a person was famous for his strength (In-game 18), people might have seen him as Strength 30, and thus the deity will have Strength 30. If Senator Palpatine achieved godhood at the beginning of the Empire, the god would have actually been a benevolent being, because that's what people believed him to be.

Belief is everything.
Thus, as illustrated with Wee-Jas, if all the followers of a god change what they believe about her, she might change as well.

However, changing a god becomes increasingly unlikely the older and stronger a god is.
1. They are likely gods in multiple worlds. Thus the ultimate change would be minor, or might produce a new god with the first one's sponsorship.
2. There is a certain factor of momentum. Theoretically (and this is really just what people say, not what they know), when a person dies, they become a petitioner in the god's realm, slowly getting more and more like-minded to the deity until they merge with either the deity or the deities realm, creating what could be considered a hive mind, but different (Christian trinity-esque perhaps). Thus, it would take a lot longer for the cycle of petitioners merging with the deity to change it at the end.

That is all to say, yes, a god is changable, but it is harder the more established a god is.

[Bronk]

Once those are fulfilled, and often at the person's death, they DO NOT become a deity.
The CONCEPT of them becomes a deity. Whatever it is about them that people respected or believed about them is what the god is. Usually, this is a very similar personality and consciousness, but not always.

Neat! It's the opposite in 3.5 though. The process is mostly undefined, but the one part that is defined is that it is indeed part of the original being that becomes the god, while the new god's former body is left behind to become an epic undead monstrosity called a hunefer.

[martixy]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the obvious evolution of Zarus, god of humanity and racial supremacy, into Pelor, the Burning Hate.

Cuz you didn't give us a chance. :smallbiggrin:

As Falcon noted, gods are in a major sense slaves, prisoners to their portfolio, their worshippers.

However this does present the amusing notion of a god dissatisfied with his station in creation, but unable to escape his fate. A clash between the essence of his godhood and the individual expression.

[Florian]

A strange thought occurred to me, and I was wondering what you guys thought, or if there was precedence. Has there ever been, or would it be possible for a deity to change over time? I'm sure depending on campaigns they have different long term goals, but I mean something more drastic. Like what if Morridin became less orderly, or less good? Could the long time rivalry or dwarf and orc bring him away from his very polar alignment? Or even some major event that would change a deity's domains, other than the death and assimilation of another god and his/her domains?

Define for yourself what the deity actually means. If a deity actually "is the thing", the deity changing will actually "change the thing".

For example, if the patron deity of the dwarven race will drop that domain and portfolio, that race will start to decline because their place in the divine pattern has been lost.

[Falcon X]

Cuz you didn't give us a chance. :smallbiggrin:

As Falcon noted, gods are in a major sense slaves, prisoners to their portfolio, their worshippers.

However this does present the amusing notion of a god dissatisfied with his station in creation, but unable to escape his fate. A clash between the essence of his godhood and the individual expression.
Of course, that begs the question of if a deity is capable of being dissatisfied with who they are (I don't have a clue, but I take it that a god of dissatisfaction might have an opinion on the matter).