[Dragonlance/Faerun] Anyone here met any Cataclysm/Wall of the Faithless defenders?

[Mechalich]

I don't know about that reading.

Say you ask someone in Faerûn about their faith and they open to you. "Most of my family is Lathanderian, with quite a few Selûnites on my mother's side. Of course, we honor other gods as appropriate: Chauntea for a good harvest, Tempus so that our nation's defenders be victorious, and so on. Talos? When a storm is upon us, yes, we pray to appease him. Who doesn't? But me, personally, I don't really have a preference. There are just so many gods, each so powerful in their domain, and I guess I just have never felt that special connection I keep hearing about."

The character does not put in question the existence of Lathander, nor the fact that Lathander is a god. And if they became a truly devout follower of the Morninglord, they would not be expected to denounce any of the others as myths or false gods. At most, their new faith in Lathander would give them the nerve to want none of Talos' mercy.

But if they were to die now, would any psychopomp scouring the Fugue Plane see their soul and think "Eh, good enough"?

Yes, because that's how the system is supposed to work. Wavering back and forth and honoring various gods at different times without committing to a cleric-like level of devotion to a single one does not a faithless make. For example, many male drow are notable for absolutely hating Lloth and wishing she'd choke on her own spider venom and never offering her anything but spite, but they still get taken to the Demonweb Pits to spend eternity in the Spider Queen's glory all the same.

It's not easy to be Faithless in the Realms (at least under the 2e version, which should be considered the best, because in general 2e fluff was considered far more seriously than later editions, which mostly just tweaked the 2e baseline). It required explicitly rejecting the authority of the gods or outright denying their existence in a world where they verifiably exist and demonstrably intervene. Heck 'Wall' of the Faithless might be overstating the case. Personally I figure the Faithless occur at something like a one in a million frequency - which means that only around 20 people end up in the Wall each year (assuming around 1 billion people on Toril and an average 50 year lifespan).

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Vahnavoi
This said, what people often seem to forget is that D&D has always had a strong undercurrent of horror in it. Survival horror, gothic horror, body horror, religious horror, cosmic horror, it's all been there practically from the start.

Originally Posted by Willie the Duck
D&D is a game inspired by pulp fiction and hammer horror movies….

For the record, these are the folks who brought up the horror aspect, and I’m a little surprised to see myself being quoted as if I originated the topic.

That said, I also don’t disagree with them. I would add that while the game also owes a great deal to Tolkien, even some aspects of Lord of the Rings have elements of horror to them, and that surely filtered into the DNA of the game.

.

[Quertus]

Most of my characters have, as/among their goals, "kill & replace the gods". Or, perhaps, merely have that act as a necessary step in their goal of "fix the world".

The Wall of the Faithless is one of the best reasons IMO for hating the gods and planning mass deicide.

Nonetheless, I *have* seen people defend the Wall of Shame before; senility willing, I might search the forum for those posts and QUOTE them here.

[LibraryOgre]

I don't know about that reading.

Say you ask someone in Faerûn about their faith and they open to you. "Most of my family is Lathanderian, with quite a few Selûnites on my mother's side. Of course, we honor other gods as appropriate: Chauntea for a good harvest, Tempus so that our nation's defenders be victorious, and so on. Talos? When a storm is upon us, yes, we pray to appease him. Who doesn't? But me, personally, I don't really have a preference. There are just so many gods, each so powerful in their domain, and I guess I just have never felt that special connection I keep hearing about."

The character does not put in question the existence of Lathander, nor the fact that Lathander is a god. And if they became a truly devout follower of the Morninglord, they would not be expected to denounce any of the others as myths or false gods. At most, their new faith in Lathander would give them the nerve to want none of Talos' mercy.

Nope, that person would not be Faithless; while they have no explicit patron, nor do they deny that any of the gods are real, and they really worship them when they do. That is, in fact, the default of most within the world, according to Faiths and Avatars. (even if you don't want to buy the book, take a look at the Full Sized Preview, which is the pages I'm reading about this).

[Telok]

I don't know about that reading.
...
But if they were to die now, would any psychopomp scouring the Fugue Plane see their soul and think "Eh, good enough"?

Yes. Because when you're feverently praying that a tornado doesn't turn you into a splat on the landscape you're being pretty darn believing. The fact that the person dosen't burn with total devotion doesn't mean that they don't believe. They know the gods exist, perform the rites to appease them, they're fine.

[Mechalich]

It's probably worth mentioning that, prior to the Time of Troubles in FR, essentially all the deities, including the nominally good ones, just left their dead worshippers on the Fugue Plane to sit there because there was nothing in the divine system that obligated, or even suggested, that they do anything else with them. At the same time, they were pretty much explicitly forgiven from caring about the fate of the Faithless, as those who chose not to worship anyone were completely outside their purview. Instead, it fell to various gods of death to decide what to do with them and apparently Myrkul came up with the idea of the Wall of the Faithless upon becoming the god of death, which only happened a few millennia in the past (Myrkul apparently lived as a mortal sometime during the Age of Netheril). Presumably Jergal, the god of death prior to that, did something else with the Faithless. If the Wall of Faithless only existed for ~4000 years, it's entirely possible that only around 100,000 people have ever been mortared into it.

There's an interesting question of what the god of death should do with the Faithless in FR. The structure of the cosmology functionally forbids them being sent to any divine realm. The best they could possibly hope for is being stuck of the Fugue Plane for all eternity. That's probably reasonable: 'you believed in nothing so you get nothing' and all that. The current choice is ultimately to obliterate them, which suggests that being mortared into the wall is simply a particularly graphic means of storing the souls of the faithless until enough time has passed that it can be presumed that no god might have any reason to query them for information - rather like how governments maintain old records for a certain number of years before they can be incinerated. It would be simpler to just place them in stasis until the clock runs out

[NorthernPhoenix]

I'm not super passionate about the specific details of the Wall of the Faithless, but i think it's as good a contrivance as any to tell people "please don't make/play as an atheist in this setting where the gods are super real, even if you are one in real life".

[noob]

I'm not super passionate about the specific details of the Wall of the Faithless, but i think it's as good a contrivance as any to tell people "please don't make/play as an atheist in this setting where the gods are super real, even if you are one in real life".

But the wall is The reason I will play an atheist if I ever play in the forgotten realms.

[NorthernPhoenix]

But the wall is The reason I will play an atheist if I ever play in the forgotten realms.

To me that seems excessively contrarian.

[noob]

To me that seems excessively contrarian.

Had they made one deity not be extremely awful(through inaction against the wall and awful actions) then I would pick that deity.
Kelemvor is inactive against the wall and now consider they were wrong to oppose it and so is sadly not a god I would have one of my characters pick.
There is no good god to pick: all of them not only did awful actions but also are not trying anything against the wall or actively support the wall and in all the cases they all think the wall is a good thing now which is why none of my characters would ever pick a FR god.
Essentially the way the gods managed the wall makes them all even more incredibly awful than they were.
If one dnd character did behave the way a FR god behave a normal gm would write CE on their alignment sheet and probably kick the player playing it out of their table for excessive murderhoboness or for them being a backstabbing betrayer.
The walls adds up to their awfullness to a point it is critical and that they no longer feel likes relatable beings to me.

[Warder]

Had they made one deity not be extremely awful(through inaction against the wall and awful actions) then I would pick that deity.
Kelemvor is inactive against the wall and now consider they were wrong to oppose it and so is sadly not a god I would have one of my characters pick.
There is no good god to pick: all of them not only did awful actions but also are not trying anything against the wall or actively support the wall and in all the cases they all think the wall is a good thing now which is why none of my characters would ever pick a FR god.

Your character would probably have no idea the wall even exists. People in the Realms don't worship the gods because of the threat of the wall if they don't, they worship because doing so can actually impact their lives, for the better.

[Keltest]

To me that seems excessively contrarian.

Agreed. Unlike the Cataclysm, which is an active attack against logic and morality, the Wall of the Faithless mostly just is. I dont really get people being actively offended by it. All the other afterlives eventually eat away at your soul as well.

[NorthernPhoenix]

Had they made one deity not be extremely awful(through inaction against the wall and awful actions) then I would pick that deity.
Kelemvor is inactive against the wall and now consider they were wrong to oppose it and so is sadly not a god I would have one of my characters pick.
There is no good god to pick: all of them not only did awful actions but also are not trying anything against the wall or actively support the wall and in all the cases they all think the wall is a good thing now which is why none of my characters would ever pick a FR god.

Most people in-universe don't even know about the concept. They just pray to any god that is relevant to the culture they were raised in because it's as natural to them as eating or taking a dump. You have to go out of your way to create an atheist character in this setting, and the reasoning seems to be entirely ooc unless every character you make is some kind of sage of the greater divinities out of the gate.

[noob]

Your character would probably have no idea the wall even exists. People in the Realms don't worship the gods because of the threat of the wall if they don't, they worship because doing so can actually impact their lives, for the better.

The reason it impacts their lives for the better is that the gods would be sent down by ao to kill all the people if they stopped being worshipped.(the last time ao did see the gods did not care about mortal worship and were not getting any ao did send the gods to the earth and during that time all of the gods went full murderhobo)
It is a "protection" racket managed by the gods.

My character might have no idea the gods did wrong things(although it probably can be known just with a knowledge religion check) but I was saying that I(aka me) would not want my character to worship an absolutely awful creature.

[NorthernPhoenix]

The reason it impacts their lives for the better is that the gods would be sent down by ao to kill all the people if they stopped being worshipped.
It is a "protection" racket managed by the gods.

The latter part is sort of true (the gods actually do help people though, no matter why) but the vast majority of people in-universe neither know nor care about this. They just live their lives, and in these lives not praying to the super-real and easily proven so gods is as unnatural as trying to live life without eating on our earth.

[noob]

The latter part is sort of true (the gods actually do help people though, no matter why) but the vast majority of people in-universe neither know nor care about this. They just live their lives, and in these lives not praying to the super-real and easily proven so gods is as unnatural as trying to live life without eating on our earth.

Would you want to consider as an example of how you would want to behave someone who killed thousands or betrayed their best friends or represent ideals that are radically opposed to yours?
Because I would not pick as an example of how I should behave such an individual: the best I could do would be presenting the facade of respect and hiding the fact I do not want to be close to them.

[Warder]

The only reason it impacts their lives for the better is that the gods would be sent down by ao to kill all the people if they stopped being worshipped.
It is a "protection" racket managed by the gods.

Sure, in some way it is. But the thing about the gods in the Forgotten Realms is that they're people, and fallible. They're not manifestations of their alignment. At least as of the Time of Troubles, most of them seemed to not even have a clear idea of who Ao really was, or of the "big picture". The ones who claim to be Good are, for the most part. They do good things. If a devout farmer has a bad year where their barn burns to the ground and the drought takes their crops, the chances of a cleric of Chauntea feeling an urge to wander in that direction increases. At the same time, even the good gods have done awful things, like Labelas Enoreth straight up murdering people because they annoyed him during the Time of Troubles.

But, to nearly everyone in the Forgotten Realms, that isn't known or simply doesn't matter. They know that the gods exist, they intervene and your life improves if you're devout. That there's a soul-eating Wall waiting for you in the afterlife if you don't simply isn't part of their relationship with the gods, at all.

Edit:

My character might have no idea the gods did wrong things(although it probably can be known just with a knowledge religion check) but I was saying that I(aka me) would not want my character to worship an absolutely awful creature.

I get that. I don't play the game like that, but I get it. My characters know what they know, and I know what I know. I've had my characters worship some truly vile gods, but that's okay because it's just my character. I have no issue with them worshipping hypocritical gods either, for that same reason.

[noob]

Sure, in some way it is. But the thing about the gods in the Forgotten Realms is that they're people, and fallible. They're not manifestations of their alignment. At least as of the Time of Troubles, most of them seemed to not even have a clear idea of who Ao really was, or of the "big picture". The ones who claim to be Good are, for the most part. They do good things. If a devout farmer has a bad year where their barn burns to the ground and the drought takes their crops, the chances of a cleric of Chauntea feeling an urge to wander in that direction increases. At the same time, even the good gods have done awful things, like Labelas Enoreth straight up murdering people because they annoyed him during the Time of Troubles.

But, to nearly everyone in the Forgotten Realms, that isn't known or simply doesn't matter. They know that the gods exist, they intervene and your life improves if you're devout. That there's a soul-eating Wall waiting for you in the afterlife if you don't simply isn't part of their relationship with the gods, at all.

So the wall of the faithless is doubly inefficient at preventing atheistic (as in they consider the gods are not actually gods worthy of worship but rather very strong creatures) characters.
1: The characters does not know it exists so they would not fear the punishment of worshipping no god.
2: The wall actively makes players angry at the gods.

It is the opposite of what would be needed for the wall to encourage not being atheistic: have the wall be here against the will of the gods and have most gods opposing it(thus making it a simple way to make the players respect the gods for their cosmic fight) and have most of the characters know about the wall thus justifying characters not wanting to be atheistic

[Warder]

So the wall of the faithless is doubly inefficient at preventing atheistic (as in they consider the gods are not actually gods worthy of worship but rather very strong creatures) characters.
1: The characters does not know it exists so they would not fear the punishment of worshipping no god.
2: The wall actively makes players angry at the gods.

I dunno, I don't really accept either of those premises (though I wasn't the one who said it was a way to make characters not be atheists, btw).

For 1, I think it doesn't really matter anyway. People in FR worship the gods, that's how it is. If a PC wants to make an atheist, I doubt the player would be deterred by something so abstract as the potential of the Wall having an effect on their afterlife.

And for 2, I don't think it makes players angry. I get that you are, and I get that some others here are as well, but I think most players simply don't care, or don't care to use meta-knowledge to decide religion for their characters, at least.

[NorthernPhoenix]

So the wall of the faithless is doubly inefficient at preventing atheistic (as in they consider the gods are not actually gods worthy of worship but rather very strong creatures) characters.
1: The characters does not know it exists so they would not fear the punishment of worshipping no god.
2: The wall actively makes players angry at the gods.

It is the opposite of what would be needed for the wall to encourage not being atheistic: have the wall be here against the will of the gods and have most gods opposing it(thus making it a simple way to make the players respect the gods for their cosmic fight) and have most of the characters know about the wall thus justifying characters not wanting to be atheistic

The gods don't really struggle with atheists in number in the Forgotten Realms. If someone isn't worshipping you (a god) they're almost certainly worshipping a different one. The wall mostly exists as a rare and special dunk on rare and special people in universe, and a out of universe as dunk on people who insist on making atheist characters in a setting defined by the gods and the relationships between their mortal worshippers.

It's not like you have to be super religious either. Answering "who is your characters favorite god?" with "The war one duh, I'm a barbarian" rather than "none, I'm an ATHEIST who defies and denies all "gods"" is sufficient to put you in the home free.

[noob]

The gods don't really struggle with atheists in number in the Forgotten Realms. If someone isn't worshipping you (a god) they're almost certainly worshipping a different one. The wall mostly exists as a rare and special dunk on rare and special people in universe, and a out of universe as dunk on people who insist on making atheist characters in a setting defined by the gods and the relationships between their mortal worshippers.

Except that most FR people would want to be atheists: the proof of that is that when kelemvor told "if someone is an atheist they will get to be judged by me instead of being sent to the wall of the faithless" it caused a massive amount of people becoming atheists and good winning over evil in the setting.
You are saying things in contradiction with the lore: people in FR wants to be atheists as soon as a god tells them "If you are atheist you will be rewarded or punished in function of your goodness" while people also knows that if they worship a god they will be rewarded too.
Unless you are telling me the good gods have afterlives so awfully bad that kelemvor's afterlife for atheists was better than all the others including the afterlive kelemvor grants to its own worshippers.

So no the true default is that people in FR wants to be atheists if it grants them a cool afterlife program (if and only if they are good) according to the lore.
So FR people knows about their afterlives options and about the wall or else the speech of kelemvor would not have had such an influance.

[NorthernPhoenix]

Except that most FR people would want to be atheists: the proof of that is that when kelemvor told "if someone is an atheist they will get to be judged by me instead of being sent to the wall of the faithless" it caused a massive amount of people becoming atheists and good winning over evil in the setting.
You are saying things in contradiction with the lore: people in FR wants to be atheists as soon as a god tells them "If you are atheist you will be rewarded or punished in function of your goodness" while people also knows that if they worship a god they will be rewarded too.
Unless you are telling me the good gods have afterlives so awfully bad that kelemvor's afterlife for atheists was better than all the others including the afterlive kelemvor grants to its own worshippers.

That's certainly not how i interpret things.

[noob]

That's certainly not how i interpret things.

Then explain why AO told that it was bad that kelemvor was making good side triumph if his afterlife program did not actually change in any way the worshipping habits and behavioural habits of the people?

Kelemvor, however, was more lenient on those Faithless and False who were virtuous and honorable in life, while the ones who were cowardly or capricious were severely punished. Those souls judged as noble were sent to the then merrier and heaven-like parts in the City of Death, such as the Singing City or Pax Cloister, while for thieves and cowards there were hell-like parts of the City such as the Acid Swamps.[21]

As a result, honorable and brave mortals no longer feared death, and recklessly threw their lives away, trusting in Kelemvor's judgment rather than in benevolent gods. The cowardly and crafty mortals became too fearful to do much, lest they die and find themselves before Kelemvor.

so yes it is crystal clear that people decided to be false and faithless because their afterlife options were better according to the lore since kelemvor did judge only the faithless and false souls differently.
(the other souls are managed by their own gods)

So people spontaneously becoming false or faithless all of a sudden when they stop fearing the wall is a thing.

[Keltest]

Then explain why AO told that it was bad that kelemvor was making good side triumph if his afterlife program did not actually change in any way the worshipping habits and behavioural habits of the people?

Its been a bit since ive read that book, but it wasnt Ao who forced Kelemvor to change, but the other gods. They claimed that by only placing good souls into a desirable afterlife, he was failing his duties as the god of the dead. He was judging them based on his own convictions rather than the actual system that he was supposed to be using. Ditto with Mystra favoring good aligned magic users and denying power to evil aligned ones.

[Vahnavoi]

... but i think it's as good a contrivance as any to tell people "please don't make/play as an atheist in this setting where the gods are super real, even if you are one in real life".

Eh?

That's not the function of the Wall. It's not even a function. Explanation for what happens to particular sort of people in context of a setting, even if negative, does not constitute a request for players to abstain from playing such characters. In fact, since the Wall is an afterlife and most characters are played while they are alive, its existence doesn't even particularly discourage playing atheists, because you can play entire games with such characters without it coming up.

[noob]

Its been a bit since ive read that book, but it wasnt Ao who forced Kelemvor to change, but the other gods. They claimed that by only placing good souls into a desirable afterlife, he was failing his duties as the god of the dead. He was judging them based on his own convictions rather than the actual system that he was supposed to be using. Ditto with Mystra favoring good aligned magic users and denying power to evil aligned ones.

I added a second part to my previous post including a quote from here:
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/w...lemvor#Godhood

[Keltest]

I added a second part to my previous post including a quote from here:
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/w...lemvor#Godhood

You should keep reading then. Kelemvor changed himself voluntarily as a consequence of the negative judgement of the other gods.

[noob]

You should keep reading then. Kelemvor changed himself voluntarily as a consequence of the negative judgement of the other gods.

And it does not matter: it says mortals including the evil ones(for mysterious reasons) suddenly became faithless or false as soon as kelemvor started judging differently the faithless and false.
It is not contradicted by the rest of the text.

[Keltest]

And it does not matter: it says mortals including the evil ones(for mysterious reasons) suddenly became faithless or false as soon as kelemvor started judging differently the faithless and false.
It is not contradicted by the rest of the text.

It doesnt though. It says that they had faith in kelemvor and his judgement.

[noob]

It doesnt though. It says that they had faith in kelemvor and his judgement.

Then why would the evil ones be scared of kelemvor judgement if they were not going to be judged by this system of kelemvor anyway due to worshipping other gods?
It seems incoherent with them not being faithless or false.