Elven Gods in RotW

[arkol]

I like enjoy the Races of books. One aspect that I find interesting is the religion section which gives us a few minor gods with diferent alignements and domains then the regular Patron-Gods of the demi-humans.

But out of all the elven gods only Loth and some random LN guy are NOT CG. I mean... what's the deal with that. Are the elves SO CG that 75% of their gods are CG too? Anyone else finds this strange?

[Jayabalard]

I don't find it odd that a race of non-humans dont show a whole lot of variation in their philosophies.

[AslanCross]

Compare: Orcs.
I'm pretty sure all their deities are either CE or NE. (in Forgotten Realms, where they have deities other than Gruumsh)

It's pretty typical of the default setting to typecast non-human races as being universally similar in outlook and social norms.

[arkol]

Halflings get:
LG x3 (including patron deity)
CN x1
LN x1
N x2

Dwarfs get:
LG x1 (including patron deity)
LN x1
LE x1
CN x1
NG x1
NE x1
N x2

Gnomes get:
NG x1 (including patron deity)
N x1
CN x1
CE x1
CG x1
LN x1

[Devils_Advocate]

Oddly, Races of the Wild appears to largely reprint the same racial pantheons as appear in Greyhawk and the Forgotten Realms, while Races of Stone largely details new dwarven and gnomish gods with most of the traditional ones nowhere in sight.

What's up with that?

[TheThan]

Personally I think that elves should worship nature and have druids as holypeople instead of clerics.

Orcs should have a strong shamanistic (sp?) belief system that centers on spirits of nature and whatnot. Something like the spirit shaman would work for holypeople.

Humans can have a plethora of gods, but their gods should be gods of a concept like “good” and “evil” not the very mundane (and specific) things like thievery and cakes.

Dwarves should have a very small pantheon of gods, probably no more than three.

I haven’t decided what gnomes and halfings should have yet.

[Starscream]

Halflings get:
LG x3 (including patron deity)
CN x1
LN x1
N x2

The sweet thing about halflings is that their CN deity is the same person as their patron LG deity. After Yondalla stole the best bits from all the other species to make the halflings, the other gods insisted that she expunge the larcenous streak from her soul.

She she split into the LG Yondalla and the CN Dallah Thaun. They are still technically the same individual in two different bodies. What one knows the other knows, and what one does affects the other. This is why you get so many CN halfling rogues who can still claim with a straight face (even under magical compulsion) to worship a lawful good deity.

This is pretty much the coolest thing ever, IMO.

[Talya]

Dwarfs get:
LG x1 (including patron deity)
LN x1
LE x1
CN x1
NG x1
NE x1
N x2

Off the top of my head, I know this is wrong. Moradin and Clangeddin are both LG. There may be others, I didn't look before posting.

Edit: Also (now that i'm checking the book), Berronar Truesilver & Gorm Gulthyn are LG, bringing the total to four. They certainly have more variety in the dwarven pantheon than the Seldarine, but there's a lot more lawful goods than you listed.

As for the Seldarine: so far as I can see, the entire Seldarine and Dark Seldarine are Chaotic. Within that, they vary as to good-neutral-evil, but they're all chaotic. I guess RotW has that one lawful exception, I don't think she's in other books...and even she only became lawful as a result of trauma. :p

[Devils_Advocate]

Talya, arkol is probably talking about the dwarven pantheon in Races of Stone. Like I mentioned, it's different from the one from the actual campaign settings for no obvious reason.

[Tsotha-lanti]

But out of all the elven gods only Loth and some random LN guy are NOT CG. I mean... what's the deal with that. Are the elves SO CG that 75% of their gods are CG too? Anyone else finds this strange?

Why would the alignments of the elves inform the alignments of their deities? Surely it's the other way around.

[wadledo]

The sweet thing about halflings is that their CN deity is the same person as their patron LG deity. After Yondalla stole the best bits from all the other species to make the halflings, the other gods insisted that she expunge the larcenous streak from her soul.

She she split into the LG Yondalla and the CN Dallah Thaun. They are still technically the same individual in two different bodies. What one knows the other knows, and what one does affects the other. This is why you get so many CN halfling rogues who can still claim with a straight face (even under magical compulsion) to worship a lawful good deity.

This is pretty much the coolest thing ever, IMO.

I must now play a halfling.
*Whoosh*

[Sstoopidtallkid]

I don't find it odd that a race of non-humans dont show a whole lot of variation in their philosophies.

I do. In theory, any sapient race should show similar levels of variation to humans, simply due to the fact that their individuals will probably have as many and as varied upbringings and genetics as humans do.

Though maybe...a campaign stting with no humans, where the races are all part of the same species and able to interbreed, and are just different aspects of the traits of the species. You'd probably need a saner race system than D&D(better differentiate what traits are upbringing and which are genetic, more half-Xs that don't need human blood), but it could work.

[Devils_Advocate]

I do. In theory, any sapient race should show similar levels of variation to humans, simply due to the fact that their individuals will probably have as many and as varied upbringings and genetics as humans do.

On what basis do you conclude that that's probable?

where the races are all part of the same species and able to interbreed, and are just different aspects of the traits of the species.

This is pretty much how it works in D&D. All of the demihumans (including humans) can interbreed. (That's how you get mongrelfolk.)

How does that make more sense, though? Shouldn't races be more similar to each other the more closely related they are, and thus less inclined to have their own distinct niches?

[arkol]

Off the top of my head, I know this is wrong. Moradin and Clangeddin are both LG. There may be others, I didn't look before posting.

Talya, arkol is probably talking about the dwarven pantheon in Races of Stone.

What he said.

[bosssmiley]

I like enjoy the Races of books. One aspect that I find interesting is the religion section which gives us a few minor gods with different alignments and domains then the regular Patron-Gods of the demi-humans.

But out of all the elven gods only Loth and some random LN guy are NOT CG. I mean... what's the deal with that. Are the elves SO CG that 75% of their gods are CG too? Anyone else finds this strange?

If the elven gods weren't all CG then they couldn't all live together like some dirty great celestial hippy commune in Arvandor (or whatever that Elven Berkeley/one-cal Olympus realm was called).

Great Wheel cosmology: in the hands of talented writers the strictures discipline and enhance creativity. In the hands of hacks who consider "alignment=destiny", not so much.

[BobVosh]

I miss Frey. He was an awesome god in first ed. To worship him was to worship sunshine and elves, what could be better?

[Optimystik]

But out of all the elven gods only Loth and some random LN guy are NOT CG. I mean... what's the deal with that. Are the elves SO CG that 75% of their gods are CG too? Anyone else finds this strange?

For the most part... yes. That's why the major deities (Oghma, Ilmater, Helm etc.) exist; so that individuals can pursue non-racial philosophies.

Of course, odd issues do arise, such as Corellon having an order of elven paladins. But then, Sune has paladins too. That's why I like the paladin variants in UA; A Paladin of Freedom is exactly what I envision a Paladin of Corellon to be like.

I miss Frey. He was an awesome god in first ed. To worship him was to worship sunshine and elves, what could be better?

Did his clerics skip through the meadow with butterflies swirling around them too?

Nah, that sounds way too "elfin" to me. I'll take Corellon's orc-slaying badassery any day.