If the GM decides to make gods that are weaker than mortals can become, that's the GM's problem. Why did they do that?

There's nothing wrong with PCs ascending to divinity and/or duking it out with gods, and there are a lot of "levels" of deities. A god might just be some dude on a throne. Maybe an immortal dude. Maybe an immortal and fairly powerful dude. Or a really big monster. Or it might be being as old as the cosmos.

A PC who ascends probably either gains access to or becomes a source of divine power. Divine magic coming from gods is an assumption or decision in world-building, anyway; there's nothing in D&D that necessiates that, and it was only AD&D that brought in that whole "gods give clerics magic" thing.

The notion that gods even have any measurable power level is an assumption, too, both mechanical and setting. Even if you're playing D&D 3.5, why would you give gods stats unless you're willing to accept that, at the very least, the players can build characters that, absent divine ranks, could kick the gods' assess? (Of course, any god with any good sense would be an Epic caster with access to far more consequence-free mitigation, time, and resources than the PCs will have ain any realistic campaign.)

How powerful is Issek the Jug, worshipped in Lankhmar? How powerful is the Highlord in The Deed of Paksenarrion? How powerful is R'hllor in ASOIAF? Those questions have no meaningful answer - they're gods, they don't operate on the same level with mortals.

But maybe you want your PCs to be Gilgamesh and Marduk, facing gods, or Harrek the Berserk skinning the White Bear, and so on. In which case the answer is "you kick that sorry punk's ass and take away his power and worshippers (and wear his soul as a cloak)."

Quote Originally Posted by BWR View Post
The problem is "how does a cleric, who gets his power from a god, become more powerful than the god giving him his power?"
Taking the assumptions as given, the answer is, of course, "get more power from somewhere else."