How do D&D gods learn to be gods?

[Velaryon]

How does a newly-minted D&D god learn how to do godly things? They have to do god things like take care of their portfolio, grant spells (or not) to their clerics, maybe pick a Chosen and some Favored Souls, and whatever other godly duties they have. The question I have is, how do they know how to do these things? Does the knowledge of how to fulfill their divine duties come intrinsically with having divine rank? Does Ao (or the equivalent in other settings) take them away for a divine training montage? Do they get knowledge downloaded into their head like Neo learning the Matrix? Do they bumble around practicing their powers and obliterating landscapes by accident until they learn to control their powers? Is there even a canon answer to this question?

[False God]

As far as I'm aware, these are all applicable answers depending on the specific method of ascension.

In a game sense, it works just like classes. You gain a level, you learn how to do things. You gain divinity, you learn how to do divine things. You gain divine feats and other special abilities as you rank up just like you were gaining levels in a class.

[Jophiel]

Way back in 1e, Gygax laid out that deities were only responsible for granting clerics higher level spells. Lower level clerical magic was handled by the deity's host of divine extra-planar critters. By that token, I'd suggest that some of the god's duties are offloaded onto these beings so people keep getting sick while a newly minted Plague Lord is learning the rope or babies keep being born while the Fertility Queen is learning where the bathrooms are. Higher level agents of the deity could also help the new god get situated. Unless the new god is one of those jerk gods in a pantheon who no one likes, they'll probably have some divine allies who can assist. Even for the evil side of the pantheon, you'd want to get your new guy up to speed so the good guys don't exploit your side's weakness.

On a smaller scale, I'm reminded of the Piers Anthony Incarnations of Immortality series where most of the novels started with a new person becoming Death or Time or whoever and generally having some sort of household staff or agent of the office who assisted them; loyal to the office more so than to the individual holder. Also the other Incarnations would help. Partially out of helpfulness/friendship but also because an Incarnation mucking up their job was just going to make things harder for the rest down the line.

Or you just make a divine pantheon where they don't die and not worry about it.

[Anonymouswizard]

In 3.X at least I remember Divine Rank 0 not giving much in the way of power and responsibility, so I guess that every newly ascended god gets taught enough to deal with their duties and are mostly expected to pick it up as they gain status.

I also expect a Divine Rank 0 or 1 deity is involved with the preparation of all their Cleric's spells, but they might not be taught how right away. As they gain ranks and more than about six Clerics they'll start getting divine minions to deal with the minor stuff

[Vahnavoi]

There are multiple valid answers depending on setting and exact ruleset. Sometimes several apply to a single setting because D&D allows for multiple different types of gods. It's good to remember D&D draws from multiple contradictory source inspirations, so often you're better off going outside of D&D and picking one source inspiration to serve as "canon" instead of trying to fit everything D&D in a single game.

First, if you're an ascending mortal like BECMI Immortal or a d20 Epic character aiming for godhood, the process starts long before you actually become a god. It starts with you coming up with a religion or philosophy, performing heroic deeds, rallying people under your banner, all the usual stuff you're aspiring to from level 1. Chances are you will have been a mortal god-king long before you ascend to divinity. People will have been praising your name and coming to you with their prayers for years. Now, you just answer on a metaphysical as well as physical level. Your celestial (or infernal) court will be a reflection of your material one. That which is below is like that which is above, and that which is above is like that which is below.

Second, you have gods that spawn to being or are influences by beliefs of mortals, such as in Planescape or custom cosmology of Order of the Stick. In these cases, you have people coming up with an idea of a god first. When enough people have congruent beliefs of what kind of a god is born, such a god is spawned in the Astral Plane and they found their domain on one of the Outside planes. These gods "know" what they are supposed to do by virtue of people already "knowing" what they are supposed to do. It then forms a full circle when these gods reach back into the material world and start influencing how people (and worlds) function.

Third, there are gods who are eternal. They don't become and they don't learn; they are outside of time, all they are and know has been inscribed into the foundations of the world from before there was a world. Such gods aren't people in the same sense their worshippers are and any stories of them learning or doing things are purely allegorical.

List isn't exhaustive.

[DigoDragon]

I take a page from the OotS comic; the gods talk with each other about deity things, and some have hotlines to call with questions. :3

If a new god show up, I'm sure some of the older gods would petition to sponsor them.

[Telonius]

I take a page from the OotS comic; the gods talk with each other about deity things, and some have hotlines to call with questions. :3

If a new god show up, I'm sure some of the older gods would petition to sponsor them.

Stealing this. The hotline is hosted by two epic-level Clerics of Fharlanghn. "Hello, you're on GodTalk."

[Imbalance]

There's a forced tutorial level with cutscenes and QTE, but it's procedurally generated and littered with secrets and easter eggs so that even the old gods come back for a replay now and again. You have to beat the whole thing on the highest difficulty to unlock all the cheats, though.

[LibraryOgre]

I know earlier editions, apotheosis usually required a divine sponsor... didn't get to be a god without someone to show you the ropes.

[RedMage125]

How does a newly-minted D&D god learn how to do godly things? They have to do god things like take care of their portfolio, grant spells (or not) to their clerics, maybe pick a Chosen and some Favored Souls, and whatever other godly duties they have. The question I have is, how do they know how to do these things? Does the knowledge of how to fulfill their divine duties come intrinsically with having divine rank? Does Ao (or the equivalent in other settings) take them away for a divine training montage? Do they get knowledge downloaded into their head like Neo learning the Matrix? Do they bumble around practicing their powers and obliterating landscapes by accident until they learn to control their powers? Is there even a canon answer to this question?

I'm not sure about older editions, because I don't remember as well, but in 3e, IIRC, deities had a salient ability that allowed them to sense a certain amount of information regarding their portfolios. Like a certain amount of limited omniscience.

On a smaller scale, I'm reminded of the Piers Anthony Incarnations of Immortality series where most of the novels started with a new person becoming Death or Time or whoever and generally having some sort of household staff or agent of the office who assisted them; loyal to the office more so than to the individual holder. Also the other Incarnations would help. Partially out of helpfulness/friendship but also because an Incarnation mucking up their job was just going to make things harder for the rest down the line.

As an aside, I loved that series. I know people crap on Anthony (mostly for the Xanth series, which did become more and more childish and ridiculous), but I really liked that series. Never got around to reading the very last one, about Nyx. Also, they helped each other because they didn't understand that Good and Evil were offices with mortal incarnations, just like themselves, and they were constantly opposing those of Evil, who was, to be fair, often mucking around with all of them.

And it calls to mind what I was talking about, too. When War takes up his mantle, he is immediately aware of conflict all over the world. Death could sense when someone's time was up, and so on and so forth.

[KorvinStarmast]

How do D&D gods learn to be gods??

Why do you assume that they need to? Deities are not mortals. In some cases, they simply are. In other cases, they are the embodiment of a natural phenomenon (Goddess of the Storm, Goddess of the Moon, God of the Sea, and so on). Question is based on a flawed premise.

As Jophiel said:

Or you just make a divine pantheon where they don't die and not worry about it.

[JNAProductions]

Why do you assume that they need to? Deities are not mortals. In some cases, they simply are. In other cases, they are the embodiment of a natural phenomenon (Goddess of the Storm, Goddess of the Moon, God of the Sea, and so on). Question is based on a flawed premise.

As Jophiel said:

What about when mortals become deities? That's a thing in at least some D&D settings.

[KorvinStarmast]

What about when mortals become deities? That's a thing in at least some D&D settings.

That isn't what was asked and is a very valid, but separate, question.

[Velaryon]

Why do you assume that they need to? Deities are not mortals. In some cases, they simply are. In other cases, they are the embodiment of a natural phenomenon (Goddess of the Storm, Goddess of the Moon, God of the Sea, and so on). Question is based on a flawed premise.

I disagree that the premise is flawed. "They didn't have to learn, they've always possessed the knowledge" is absolutely a valid answer to the question, as is "they're born/created already knowing what they need to know."

What about when mortals become deities? That's a thing in at least some D&D settings.

This is actually what I had in mind when I decided to ask the question. I didn't want to necessarily limit responses to ascended mortals, but it's definitely part of the question that I'm interested in.

[Misereor]

How does a newly-minted D&D god learn how to do godly things? They have to do god things like take care of their portfolio, grant spells (or not) to their clerics, maybe pick a Chosen and some Favored Souls, and whatever other godly duties they have. The question I have is, how do they know how to do these things? Does the knowledge of how to fulfill their divine duties come intrinsically with having divine rank? Does Ao (or the equivalent in other settings) take them away for a divine training montage? Do they get knowledge downloaded into their head like Neo learning the Matrix? Do they bumble around practicing their powers and obliterating landscapes by accident until they learn to control their powers? Is there even a canon answer to this question?

My first answer would be "very carefully".
In original D&D you had to be level 30-something and have a divine sponsor (which incidentally meant that only Humans could ascend because racial level maximums).
Subsequently you ascended to divinity, where you had to choose a form and a few other things, and then you could start earning XP for your divine levels.
Everything since then, and it basically depends on the setting's cosmology.

My favorite hypothesis is not actually described anywhere, only hinted at in dozens, if not hundreds of materials spanning from the old TSR days to the present.
It basically goes like:

1. A pocket forms from primordial chaos that is closed off and unaffected by the rest of the chaos.
2. One or more beings form from the base chaotic sentience present in the pocket and start manipulating the substance of the pocket, inadvertently or not, thereby creating natural laws and different elements with different properties
3. Eventually meaningful reality, as we comprehend it, forms.
4. Over time more beings form, taking on the form and properties of the present elements. Olders ones are things like water and earth, younger ones, storms, volcanic eruptions, plants, and so forth.
5. Beings that can feed on other beings form. Death is born around this time.
6. One being discovers that it can feed not only upon elements and the substance of other beings, but also on the spiritual energy they release, thereby discovering divinity.
7. Eventually one or more beings begin to create beings to worship them, thus causing conflict with other beings who find this annoying, abhorrent, or even dangerous.
8. Divine beings decide to shape existence to be constant and beneficial to their followers. Conflict with more fluent entities occurs. Law and chaos take definite shape.
9. Creator entities eventually win the war and continue shaping existence. New conflict with conservative entities that do not wish to consume spiritual energy erupt from time to time. Original entities split into groups of elementals, primordials, and deities.
10. Some beings discover that they can grow souls and thus harvest more energy from their followers by causing inspiration, suffering or other strong feelings. Good and evil come into being.
11. Deities limit the lifespans of their creations to prevent too many new deities from forming. Old age becomes a thing.
12. Over time, as the created races develop, so does the spiritual energy they provide. Portfolios go from simple natural concepts like rock, sky, and death, to advanced ones like technology, litterature, love, and so forth.
13. It is realized that at some unknown prior point, the deity/follower relationship has become symbiotic. When followers change, their deity changes with them and vice versa. Deities start becoming much more diverse and portfolio oriented. Sometimes as their followers change, deities change sexes, names, the forms of their avatars and how they manifest, or even their alignments.
14. Sometimes when followers split into groups, the gods split too, usually becoming siblings or offspring. Some deities are aware of this, others are not. Sometimes time and space even seem to change backwards in order to accomodate the new reality. This causes the RetCon to be born, to the unnmitigated joy of the mysterious creatures known only as "authors".
15. Also, at some unknown point an Obyrith shard was introduced to the pocket of now heavily modified chaos known as reality. It consists mostly of cool, new monsters being introduced for the amusement of the players, but for the purpose of this thread it's relevant mostly because prior realities are hinted at, almost OotS or "Shattered Spheres" (hat tip to World of Darkness) style.


So if one goes with that particular cosmological model, all divinity really entails is learning how to absorb and use spiritual/faith energy.
Divine sponsors make sense in the same way that a Sensei will help you master martial arts better than practicing by yourself. Having to be at a certain power level to ascend also makes sense, because you need to be strong enough to contain and manipulate the energy. The Forgotten Realms legend of the Dark Three makes sense, because their plan consisted of siphoning off the power of a bunch of semi-divine beings and working their way up to a deity. Elementals and Primodrials make sense. Legends of failed first-races make sense. Wars of Law/Chaos and Good/Evil make sense. Gods and faiths changing all the time makes sense. Ancient gods being wilder, more dangerous, and less caring than younger ones makes sense. It really makes for a seting where it is possible for a DM to fit in an amazing variety of stuff without having to contradict themselves too often.

[Willie the Duck]

My first answer would be "very carefully".
In original D&D you had to be level 30-something and have a divine sponsor (which incidentally meant that only Humans could ascend because racial level maximums).
Subsequently you ascended to divinity, where you had to choose a form and a few other things, and then you could start earning XP for your divine levels.

That's not from original D&D. It's from the BECMI* version of the basic/classic line. oD&D and the two basic/classic lines preceding BECMI didn't have specific rules for the situation. oD&D would not have wanted a route to attain godhood. That's the one where they published Gods, Demi-Gods, and Heroes as the example of what you are not supposed to achieve**.
*The red-blue-teal-black-gold boxed sets or Rules Cyclopedia
** Hence Tim Kask's line, "This volume is something else, also: our last attempt to reach the "Monty Hall" DM's. Perhaps now some of the 'giveaway' campaigns will look as foolish as they truly are. This is our last attempt to delineate the absurdity of 40+ level characters. When Odin, the All-Father has only(?) 300 hit points, who can take a 44th level Lord seriously?"

Everything since then, and it basically depends on the setting's cosmology.

Definitely this, though, for the rest of TSR (where it was addressed at all). Don't recall if where it is located in 3e and 4e.

[KorvinStarmast]

** Hence Rob Kuntz's line, "This volume is something else, also: our last attempt to reach the "Monty Hall" DM's. Perhaps now some of the 'giveaway' campaigns will look as foolish as they truly are. This is our last attempt to delineate the absurdity of 40+ level characters. When Odin, the All-Father has only(?) 300 hit points, who can take a 44th level Lord seriously?"[/SIZE]

Pretty sure that was Tim Kask's line. (It's in the Foreword). _{(But maybe he borrowed that phrasing from Kuntz? Who knows?)}

[Willie the Duck]

Pretty sure that was Tim Kask's line. (It's in the Foreword). _{(But maybe he borrowed that phrasing from Kuntz? Who knows?)}

Good lord, had it right in front of me and it didn't register. Probably because Kask isn't listed as an author on front. I have corrected it, thanks for the catch!

[PhoenixPhyre]

(blue, but mobile, but also serious) By trial and error, mostly error. That's why they've made such a hash of things. I mean... They let <insert least favorite edition> happen! (/Blue)

[Willie the Duck]

By trial and error, mostly error. That's why they've made such a hash of things. I mean... They let <insert least favorite edition> happen!

Taking the serious part of that -- it is a good point that, perhaps, there isn't a standard method by which new gods learn how to god because (in many-to-most settings) mortals ascending or gods dying and leaving their portfolios to others or whatever isn't supposed to be a regular thing. Or, particularly in settings like FR (where the gods are supposedly static but in the past generation or two have seen more churn in their ranks than a professional sportsball team), gods coming and going is a semi-common thing, but no god is going to admit such a thing ('what? No. Those were just... really unusual circumstances... which yes come up every 5-7 years') because that's a public acknowledgement to the tenuous nature of their positions.

[LibraryOgre]

Like most jobs, "God" has a very poor onboarding system, with inadequate training in your duties.

[noob]

In the forgotten realms the answer is "they do not learn to do it" they just act like jerks and do whatever they want often disregarding their portfolios entirely (ex: times of troubles).
"hey you are now a good aligned god of life" "ok, I will now eat babies" is the standard of behaviour forgotten realms gods are held to.

[Kurt Kurageous]

At the You-Deo-Versity of course!

[KorvinStarmast]

Like most jobs, "God" has a very poor onboarding system, with inadequate training in your duties.

+ eleventy-five

In the forgotten realms the answer is "they do not learn to do it" they just act like jerks and do whatever they want often disregarding their portfolios entirely (ex: times of troubles).
"hey you are now a good aligned god of life" "ok, I will now eat babies" is the standard of behaviour forgotten realms gods are held to.

Sad but true.

At the You-Deo-Versity of course!

*Groan!*

[donalexinder24]

I also believe a Divine Rank 0 or 1 god is engaged in the production of all of their Cleric's spells, albeit they may not be taught how straight immediately. As they advance in rank and have more than six Clerics, they will begin to summon divine minions to cope with small issues.

[Leon]

By having some Faith in what they do

[gijoemike]

Let's take Forgotten Realms, specifically Kelemvor, as an example of a mortal becomes a deity.

You start off with all the same believes and goals as a mortal but lots of power. You then screw everything to hell and back specifically because you are taking a mortal viewpoint. Almost every action you take screws up balance in a cosmic sense far far outside of your ability to actually perceive. Eventually multiple other deities show up and inform you how badly you have screwed the pooch. In Kelemovors case, he was placed on trail and found guilty of "Incompetence by Humanity."

You learn by every mistake made, which are many.


But if you look at Mystra also from Forgotten Realms, same thing applies. The Mystra that was also friends with the mortal Kelemvor COMPLETELY screwed things up and was an embarrassment of the highest quality. Her High priest went insane (Cyric helped) and rejected not only her but all the deities for being nigh worthless. He made a really good argument too.

So, being 1/2 way decent at that godhood thing takes a long time and a lot of harsh guidance from the other deities.

[noob]

Let's take Forgotten Realms, specifically Kelemvor, as an example of a mortal becomes a deity.

You start off with all the same believes and goals as a mortal but lots of power. You then screw everything to hell and back specifically because you are taking a mortal viewpoint. Almost every action you take screws up balance in a cosmic sense far far outside of your ability to actually perceive. Eventually multiple other deities show up and inform you how badly you have screwed the pooch. In Kelemovors case, he was placed on trail and found guilty of "Incompetence by Humanity."

You learn by every mistake made, which are many.


But if you look at Mystra also from Forgotten Realms, same thing applies. The Mystra that was also friends with the mortal Kelemvor COMPLETELY screwed things up and was an embarrassment of the highest quality. Her High priest went insane (Cyric helped) and rejected not only her but all the deities for being nigh worthless. He made a really good argument too.

So, being 1/2 way decent at that godhood thing takes a long time and a lot of harsh guidance from the other deities.

They actually got to be worse people after being punished by Ao than before.
A lot of what you call mistakes I call good ideas.
Destroying the wall of the faithless? That was a good thing, the only reason Kelemvor got punished for it was that religion in the forgotten realms was a protection racket and Ao wanted that protection racket to keep going.
Rewarding or punishing dead people based on if they were trying to do good or trying to do bad things? That is how it works in 80% of the dnd settings with afterlives(in the rest it is generally "fantasy grimdark, you get punished forever or turn undead" or weird stuff), Kelemvor was punished for it because forgotten realms gods unlike the gods of many other settings were doing a protection racket.

The gods in FR needs worship only because Ao wanted them to need it: before they did not need it.
What happened afterwards is that they did set up a protection racket with the wall of the faithless in reaction to Ao's action therefore getting the worship Ao imposed for them to need.
Ao then defined cosmic balance as "nobody should be able to escape the divine protection racket" so of course going against this part cosmic balance is objectively good. Nobody could know the wall was part of the vision of cosmic balance Ao defined because Ao simply does not talks to anything in general so fighting his vision of cosmic balance is evaluated as bad solely because you get crushed by him by surprise because he did not tell anyone his vision of cosmic balance. Before kelemvor was crushed people could only evaluate his action as super good(except those benefiting from the protection racket which is considered useful only because Ao made worship required for life as a god).

You should not consider a decision was not good because after taking that decision information was revealed that you would get beaten up by an evil "neutral" guy for doing that action: it was still the best decision with the information you had.

The entire bad situation have been set up entirely by the repercussions of Ao actions and the overall awfulness of the gods, Ao even realised evil gods would risk to have too few worshippers and made exceptions for them specifically making them basically need nearly no worship.

If Ao had been any less awful, then Ao would have probably said in reaction to the gods being starved of worship "hey, I am going to lower required worship to live as a deity until you find a way to get more worship again" because Ao controls that perfectly.

And if Ao had not been here the plan of Mystra and Kelemvor would have worked perfectly and would have made the forgotten realms a better place because eventually non evil gods would have raised their standards due to not wanting to die of lack of worship and most things would have improved (evil gods would still be here because they barely need any worship so do remember that when becoming a FR god: register yourself as an evil god and you will need near no worship).

[Endarire]

I assumed that these deities simply know, kinda like how people instinctively breathe.

[Lord Arkon]

I would assume the basics, like smiting puny mortals, or creating avatars to interact with the world, are instinctual. But more complex things, like teaching followers how to build a just society, or building a functional ecosystem have to be taught or learned through trial and error. While the younger gods can learn from their elders, the elder gods only learned through their mistakes.

As a result of this, the multiverse is littered with the corpses of universes shaped by incompetent gods. This is also the root of many of the world's problems, and the reason many gods of the current age are so reluctant to intervene in the affairs of mortals. "Grrr, that high priest of mine is so annoying. Why must he teach my followers that I don't like grapes? Grapes are delicious! Ugh, but the last time I smote my high priest, those monkeys thought it was over hats. I don't want them to institute another death penalty for wearing hats. Maybe if I just deny him a few spells he'll get the hint."