DM needs Gods

[XenoGeno]

Okay, so in my campaign world, divine magic is... different.

If you meet in a Fellini's Pizza in Georgia to play D&D, you're probably in my group, so stop reading, please.

Spoiler

Show

There are no gods in the normal D&D sense. The Prime material plane is basically the dream of one overdeity, made real. (Zelda spoiler ahoy!)

Spoiler

Show

Think the Wind Fish from Link's Awakening. Not sure this needs spoilering, but meh, better safe than sorry.

See, this god tried being an interfering god, he ended up being like Bender from that one Futurama episode where he becomes god, and he decides it's better to sleep and let his power make a world without his interference. This old world becomes this world's plane of shadow. Anyway, divine magic works fine, the clerics tap into the real god, but they think it's from some other god. Now, some of these gods are completely the by-product of human (or whatever) imagination, explaining how they can use divine energy, blahblahblah. However, there are some super-powerful beings who are worshipped as gods. These beings generally have a few templates added to them to enhance their uniqueness. I need some more of these. I have two right now: a half-fiendish medusa/gorgon tauric who is worshipped as an earth goddess by minotaurs, and a wereroc storm giant with a strength score in the low 80s worshipped by islanders he protects. Now, I need more guys like these, and want to see what other people would use here. I don't need any specific type of god, just something powerful, but if we could keep things pre-epic (in terms of CR, anyway), that would be preferred. And no Damn Crabs or Emerald Legions, but otherwise they can be cheesy as all get out. The BBEG is a miracle-abusing Shadowcraft mage, after all.

So, any ideas would be great, thanks.

[cezyou]

Hmm....This is most definitely not preepic, so reject it if you so wish. Also not very original.
Hows about's a Colossal hydra with 50 heads that's worshiped by a local tribe (or kingdom, if you wish) of lizardfolk (whatever kind you like)?

[AslanCross]

You could have the bound spirit of a very powerful Rakshasa (preferrably of the Ak'Chazar variety; see MM3) scattered throughout an immense number of shards of mirror glass, all glued on walls to form a huge gallery.

He could be worshipped as a god of knowledge (being purportedly all-seeing), or god of magic.

You could also get inspiration from the Hindu epic Ramayana and think of something like Ravana.
Demon lords are always a fantasy staple.

You could even have a sentient, city-sized magical machine created by an ancient empire that is so vast that people don't really understand it or know how it works; this might be worshipped as the god of artifice and invention.

[thegurullamen]

In one of the later MMs there's a special hunter character who does nothing but hunt high-CR quarry with his wolf that inflicts Dimensional Anchor with his bite. He's unique and high CR and fully stated out already, so look him up. The hook's obvious with him.

A pseudonatural illithid makes for a good cosmic horror that inflicts long-term insanity on anyone who ventures into X area. Add some more status effects onto the stunning mind blast to really screw with people. Throw in some illithid cannibalism for the fun of it.

A dragonwrought kobold would be like a god to the rest of the kobolds around him, second only to an actual dragon. Have fun with elemental and paraelemental templates to make all sorts of god-warlords for the kobold factions. For further awe, have one of them keep a rabid, feral dragon locked away as a "pet".

A spellstitched, mummified half-dragon human imprisoned in an evil, sentient war construct could be a great overlord/god for a large area of nomadic tribes and isolated villages (say, in the mountains?) He can go anywhere with magic and scare the populous into obeying/quash any rebellion.

[Prometheus]

A Half-Celestial, Half-Clay Golem, Shambling Mound (CR ~11) (A moving ruined statue with half a wing and the wisdom of old times) or a Half Fiendish, Half-Brass Golem Azer (CR ~8) (the embodiment of the furnace) would be great characters that you could always add class levels to improve.

A Vampiric Kraken would be CR 20, but a Half-Vampire Kraken would be only CR 14. In either case, an even harder to kill creature of the sea that drains blood (and possibly also lifeforce) as it mercilessly constricts it's foes it too good of an image to pass up. Of course, you'd probably have to wave the whole "death by running water" thing (perhaps death by exposure to any air?).

Also, there is a complete series of articles written about various interesting applications of templates that you might want to peruse.

[Totally Guy]

In my game Religion has taken centre stage.

There are four religions that are worshipped together in several areas of the world.

These are religions as concepts, followers choose and worship either Love,
Peace, Plenty and Truth each one appealing to a particular type of person. The various states work very hard to keep people worshipping these four Idols.

But the religions are false. The state leaders are part of a larger cartel that possess a genie lamp. It's not a traditional 3 wishes genie it's more like a ghost that adds a template to the subject and then controls their actions according to his master's wishes. The religions are a way that the states can channel faith to this genie making him more powerful. And subsequently improving things for the citizens.

One of the villainous world leaders pulled off an amazing trick to play the four religions against one another. Then when it was in a state of perpetual worship the villain decided that that was enough to secure himself a good lifestyle forever more and became lazy. The players loved interacting with a chronically lazy villain it was a fun non-threatening shtick.

Anyway a nastier villain has stepped in and is trying to pull off this trick himself and steal the lamp for his own selfish ends. It's made a pretty good arch and you're welcome to take anything that sounds good for yourself.

EDIT: I just remembered this amazing scene I did where the followers of the "new gods" (the genie)had a debate with those of the "old gods" (PHB listed ones). The new gods debate represented the pros of 4E and the old god followers represented the upset fan reaction to 4E. That was hilarious when the players spotted the parallel.

[TheCountAlucard]

Of course, you'd probably have to wave the whole "death by running water" thing...

You're forgetting the bit where if it has a swim speed, it ignores the "death by running water" thing...

[Pronounceable]

One can go wild with such a concept. Hmm:

-Some powerful, magical beast from the dawn of time that can mate with anything including humans. It wanders the wilds of the world doing nothing but eating and mating without a care. It can control wild animals, and so can its human offspring. Its animal offspring become very powerful and intelligent specimens (paragons, maybe?) that are also able to control animals. Barbaric human tribes inhabiting the land of X worship it as a god of animals, hunt and hunters, offering shinies, meat and daughters. The human offspring of the beast are always physically very powerful in addition to their inborn supernatural powers, and all rise to positions of prominence in barbaric society.

-A dragon. Really, when you get down to it, a dragon is as godly as it gets for small humanoid critters. Kobolds worshipping an ancient dragon is too cliched nowadays, but make it HALFLINGS worshipping an ancient dragon and it becomes refreshingly cool. Especially a militant, expansionist halfling empire that has cut a swath through their not so organized (and also small sized) gnome and goblin neighbors and enslaved them. An old beyond reckoning dragon as the cruel god of might is fitting. A LE halfling empire that taxes its peasants and exploits its enslaved races to death to pile riches beneath the claws of its greedy god is too good to pass up IMO. You can have nobles and generals and whatnot imitating their god's peculiar habits for the extra awesome of halflings sleeping on piles of gold.

-I also fully support illithids as gods in some form or other. Maybe not directly, but as having psionically enslaved the high ranks of some church or other making them see it as the avatar of whatever it is they worship.

-King Kong! Yep, exactly like in the original movie.

-A powerful and immortal creature (rakshasa, genie, whatever) with a penchant for mischief wanders the big cities of mortals, playing pranks ranging or commiting blatantly impossible crimes. Deeply in love with the arts of thievery and skullduggery, the "trickster god" has been messing with mortals since time immemorial. When they put together a few huts surrounded by a crude stone barrier for the first time, he was there to shear all of their sheep and steal the wood overnight. When the massive tower of sorcery was erected and festivities officially started in the town of Y, he was selling the archmage's pointy hat to a farmer a few miles away. When the tyrant Z was entering the conquered capitol of his enemy at the head of his army, he was hit on the head with a thrown rotten egg... All manner of outlandish stories and myths surround this shadowy character, and has turned him into the central figure of a religion founded by some unknown thief. Some stories say that was actually the god himself trying to piss off the local church, but then took a liking to his "church"...

[Moose Fisher]

Let's see....

-Half-Dragon (Shadow) Tarrasque: I think that would give it a fly speed and breath weapon, making it extra formidable. Shadow Template for extra challenge. Most likely worshiped as a being of destruction. The Shadow Template would make it a being of renewal, having destroyed the original world to make way for the current one. Worshiped by doom cults and nihilists.

-A Swarm/Mob of Grues (DMG2 and CA may be needed): Representing the elemental force of darkness. Worshiped by evil druids.

-(Advanced) Ragewalker (MM3): These things are nasty. An advanced one can be an avatar of war, sweeping through battlefields. If smart enough, it could pull strings to create war. Worshiped by war-like races.

-Large Celestial Blink Dog: Roaming the countryside, dispensing justice. Worshiped by paladins, possibly having a role in the creation of a nomadic order of paladins.

-Large Rust Monster Ghost: Despite it being dead, it can still rust metal. It could be worshiped as a being of peace, destroying the instruments of war.

-A titan: Ruling over a nation of.... Gnomes.

- 2 Medium Awakened Half-Dragon Shocker Lizard Liches: Mostly because I've never seen these things used and they'll raise the eyebrows of your players. They are worshiped as elven storm gods and are given sacrifices to ward away violent storms. Remove the Half-Dragon template for extra Wizard/Sorcerer/Cleric levels.

[An Enemy Spy]

An infant that sopposedly has the spirit of a god in it. When it reaches a certain age, it is sacrificed and replaced with a new infant that the god supposedly inhabits.

[AslanCross]

In one of the later MMs there's a special hunter character who does nothing but hunt high-CR quarry with his wolf that inflicts Dimensional Anchor with his bite. He's unique and high CR and fully stated out already, so look him up. The hook's obvious with him.

Master of the Hunt from MM5? Yeah, he'd make a very interesting "god." I'd probably make him either a fey overlord or a champion thereof.

[TheCountAlucard]

Unholy scion kobold with levels in Dread Necromancer?

[bosssmiley]

You want small gods?

Emergent Demigods

From the article:

One of my favourite D&D tropes is the idea that if an individual being gains a group of worshippers, it can attain divinity. This makes religion a very chaotic, ad hoc, and above all tangible thing; unlike in the monotheistic religions of our world where Gods stand aloof, D&D powers' fate is inextricably bound up in the fortunes and vagaries of their followers.
{...}
This approach allows for a much more localised, cultish and fertile religious climate, something akin to how I imagine a trawl through pagan Europe would have been: each group of villages has its own local deity, each cave its shrine to the mountain spirit, each river its sprite, and each boulder its guardian - the major difference being that in a D&D world, those things are real, which is infinitely better.

Related:
Old Johnny in the Lake, the Crayfish Demigod
Govgim Dahl, the Reluctant Demigod
Some Local Gods
Pillaging the Gods

Semi-related, but useful:
Gods of Thool
Old School Pantheon Design Part 1 and Part 2
The Pantheonator - quick pick-and-mix pantheons

My own suggestion. Older editions of D&D used to say that the first few levels of divine spell ability (1-2 IIRC) came from the faith of the cleric, rather than being dished out on a per diem basis by their god. Why not update this to 3E for the Adapt NPC class? Just slap Divine Rank 0 on the focus of their devotion (which can be anything from a dire crawdad to a giant ape to a colossal black pudding to an ancient sorcerer-queen) and, Krusk's Yer Uncle, instant swords-and-sorcery weird cults.

[Swooper]

You're forgetting the bit where if it has a swim speed, it ignores the "death by running water" thing...

Which is completely irrelevant for a Kraken anyway, since I don't think the ocean counts as running water. But that's nitpicking.

Anyway, may I propose a Pseudonatural Fiendish Paragon Dire Boar? Once a proud god of the forest, now corrupted beyond saving...

[TheCountAlucard]

Anyway, may I propose a Pseudonatural Fiendish Paragon Dire Boar? Once a proud god of the forest, now corrupted beyond saving...

Congratulations on the Princess Mononoke reference... if I had an Internet to give, it would surely be yours...

[Dyllan]

How about a low level illusionist who has convinced a barbarian tribe he is a god (think "Wizard of Oz"). He doesn't have to be anything special at all, just a good actor with a few illusion spells.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Really, it's a cool setting concept you've got there, though you could've stood to being more succinct.

It's a setting that's literally the dream of one all-powerful god, who is a non-interventionist diety. (Sort of like that Hinduist idea that reality is a transient dream of a god.) Plenty of lesser gods take credit for what the "true" god does.

Your setting begs the question of what makes divine magic so special. Since arcane magic is presumably just harnassing the same sort of power from the universe, there's nothing to differentiate it from divine magic. This diety simply can't be bothered to grant spells and answer prayers. It doesn't play favorites.

Is "divine" magic the same thing as "arcane" magic, except that it's intuitively known by god-like aliens?

Still, I like the feel of the "sufficiently advanced aliens are gods" Conan feel.

How about a god of Dopplegangers? Can't go wrong with Dopplegangers. They're mysterious, alien and have a hidden agenda.

[Swooper]

Congratulations on the Princess Mononoke reference... if I had an Internet to give, it would surely be yours...

Awesome. I knew someone would get that. It's the thought that counts, eh?

I love this thread. I've been meaning to do work something like this into a setting for years, this is the perfect opportunity to nick some ideas and do that

[XenoGeno]

Really, it's a cool setting concept you've got there, though you could've stood to being more succinct.

Thanks. And yeah, Language and I aren't on speaking terms right now.

Your setting begs the question of what makes divine magic so special. Since arcane magic is presumably just harnassing the same sort of power from the universe, there's nothing to differentiate it from divine magic. This diety simply can't be bothered to grant spells and answer prayers. It doesn't play favorites.

Is "divine" magic the same thing as "arcane" magic, except that it's intuitively known by god-like aliens?

In this setting, divine magic is more like harnessing the power of the sleeping god, while arcane magic is like understanding where the cracks are, and how to break them open (though arcane casters don't know that themselves).


Also, thanks for all the ideas so far; I think I might add some of these. Unfortunately, I don't have access to all the books above, but enough that they'll work. But if you have more ideas, keep them coming.

Oh, I do want to add a couple of caveats to what I'm looking for: I need the gods to be mobile, and I need them to be at least relatively intelligent. Unfortunately, this rules out some of the ideas... but I'm still going to use them as enemies anyway.

[kopout]

How about a low level illusionist who has convinced a barbarian tribe he is a god (think "Wizard of Oz"). He doesn't have to be anything special at all, just a good actor with a few illusion spells.

Ah, but under Bosssmiley's "small gods" rules he is now a god with DR 0 regardless of how he started out

[Atamasama]

An idea from real mythology (Celtic I believe?) is that of a dark rider on a horse, with a full helm covered with antlers. He leads a pack of hounds and chases people down like one would a fox. I've seen that kind of villain in numerous stories and while not completely original I've always thought it was classy. To mix it up a bit, instead of being a rider make him a centaur, and make the horns grow right out of his head.

He'd be worshipped as a protector of nature and/or god of the hunt, and he'd be prayed to by those who want success when hunting or safety traveling through the woods.

[mostlyharmful]

Wish Living Spell, confine it to a certain hard to access valley with a magical ward adn it's a very effective capricious God of Blessings and Curses

[jcsw]

A benevolent orcwort. (Possibly half celestial so it doesn't need to eat.)

[Olo Demonsbane]

Wish Living Spell, confine it to a certain hard to access valley with a magical ward adn it's a very effective capricious God of Blessings and Curses

I am so using this. In my campaign, though, it can be a patron for the characters at high level, and can grant wishes as a reward .

Of course, if they fail...

[mostlyharmful]

I am so using this. In my campaign, though, it can be a patron for the characters at high level, and can grant wishes as a reward .

Of course, if they fail...

In that case you could come up with a table in honour of the great God Gygax, brainstorm every randomized weirdness you can think of (start on the rod of wonders table, add the Reincarnate table and go from there). I find it's always a little more fun for the DM to have a surprise or three as well, come up with a list of things that might happen to your players that are interesting but you're comfortable abour dealing with the consequences of and then try to forget what you put on the table untill after those percentage dice roll.

[cezyou]

Wait...Do Hydras count as intelligent? My MM has been nefariously stolen by one of my players, so I can't know. If they don't, then you could use mine if you upped it's Int....

And just so you know, Hydra encounters should always place the PCs in an acidic bog on a rickety boat (or a canoe) that would easily capsize and in the middle of crossing said bog before said Hydra bursts out from under them. (Hey, this sort of thing shouldn't be a problem if they're fighting a 50 headed Hydra.)

[Jarawara]

I like the 50 headed Hydra idea, but instead of the worshipers all praying to the Hydra, make it more specific. Have the worshipers all pray to Hydra Head #17. If any of the players ask why #17, have the usual amount of shock at the blasphemy of such a question, but then go to town with how Head #17 is so much better than all the other heads. Of course they all look and act the same.

You *could* set all the other religions right there, as there are 49 other heads awaiting worshipers, but I think that's get stale real quick - so I'd just have the cult of Head #17 and let the other religions be of more practical beings like Titans and Krakens and the like, and have the other religions acknowledge the rightful divinity of Head #17 of the great collosus Hydra.

Later on you could have a schism in the religion, where a breakaway group of clerics insist that Head #44 is the true god, and #17 was false. Have yourself a nice little religious war that way!

[rampaging-poet]

First thing that popped into my head on seeing this thread was a living reckless dweomer god of chaos, but then I remebered that that was second edition...

Oh well, there's still plenty of use for the living spell template. A living wish would be cool, as mostlyharmful pointed out. If you've got Frostburn a living Fimbulwinter (possibly celestial/fiendish/awakened with class levels) would make an pretty neat deity of ice. I've no idea what would happen to someone who got hit by the thing, but it affects an area and therefore qualifys for the template.

Hmm... how about an advanced Entropic Shadow Cloaker worshipped by some as a god of darkness and death?
A Will-o'-Wisp with levels in Beguiler, a master of deciet. It leads random passerby astray as per usual, but aids its followers by ensuring they benefit from this (leading them safely to the corpse of a drowned adventurer) or by exposing the lies of non-believers. Perhaps it has established ruleship of a massive swamp, preventing anyone from entering or leaving safely without its permmision through use of illusions.
Maybe a Paragon Ooze Otyugh, the Lord of Filth? No idea who would bother to worship it, but the option's there.

I'm about out of ideas for now, but I might check back if I think of anything else. Heck, I might check back even anyways just to snag some of this for my own campaign.

[Kommisar Engel]

A Half-Celestial Vampire Swarmform Death Knight Tiefling
A Half-Dragon Half-elf Lich
A Spell-stitched Death Knight

[kopout]

A Genius Loci might work . It has a CR of 30 with out any advancement and and if it was worshiped (ie,it didn't need to hunt and had food brought to it for several human generations ) it could be even larger than usual. I imagine being the Thrall would be a high honer and maybe even a hereditary post.

just think of the introduction " I am Jorgal avatar and high priest of the Land"

Also if you want to give your monsters extra kick I am working on a template called "Small God " that is sort of a list of the powers gained by a being worshiped as a god , even if it did not began as a god or even god like. And get this , they all qualify.