G is for Gods

To the pre-modern mind, the existence of gods and goddess, of supernatural powers of all types, is not in doubt.   The exact nature of deities is unknown to mortals.  Although arguably immortal from a human standpoint, gods have been known to die in battle with other gods – some sages claim that these slain gods were only quasi-deities.  Other sages point out that death to a god is not the same thing as death to mortals.  Dead gods have been known to return.

The denizens of d20 System worlds often supposed that deities are Outsiders, in the same way that their servitors on the non-material planes are.  Within my own campaigns, however, deities are actually extra-dimensional entities that exist not only on more than one plane at any given time, but also in more than one cosmology as well.  Their presence on any given plane is felt most often as a disembodied awareness, which can not only communicate with beings on that plane, but can impart spells and spell-like powers to beings, items, and locations.  The divine essence can be focused through the chosen to turn or control the undead, impart divine location and item feats, and counter the affects of other divine energies.

The official d20 System word on the divine appears in Wizard of the Coast’s Deities & Demi-Gods tome (2002).  This book envisions the gods more like super-characters than divinities.  To me, this represents a step back from the way that the 2^nd Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons game dealt with both gods and priests. 

When I began work on the Mêdterra campaign, I wanted the world to be one in which the players felt that their characters constantly interacted with the gods.  I wanted the gods to be important – in fact, central to the world – but I also wanted their interaction with the world to be very different from that of player characters or monsters.  Rather than having the gods being simply more powerful, I wanted them to feel like something different from anything else.  In short, I wanted the characters in Mêdterra to have an experience of the numinous.

The following is the initial information given to my players in the Lakelands region of Mêdterra.  Astute readers will undoubtedly recognize the sources for most, if not all, of these deities.

Religions in Mêdterra

Many people in the Lakelands follow the High Church of the Seven Good Gods:  Mardan, Mellador, Aedor, Belanus, Uarthos, Amaethon, and Brigit.  Others follow the druidic faith.  The Lakashi and a few others worship the Beast Lords or their own ancestors.  It should be remembered that, in the Lakelands, deities are real.  They can reward their devout followers, and punish those who displease them.

These are some of the more common deities/faiths a character can worship: 

• Aedor:  Aedor, God of Blacksmiths, Artisans, Craftsmen, and Mechanics, is lawful good.  He appears as a majestically bearded dwarf of heroic proportions.  He is said to work the Godforge, creating the thunderbolts of Mardan.  He is worshipped by dwarves, as well as by smiths and artificers of all types.  The domains he is associated with are Earth, Fire, Strength, and War.  His favoured weapon is the hammer.  He is one of the Seven Good Gods.

• Amaethon:  Amaethon, Lord of the Harvest, is neutral good.  Vine leaves entangle his short hair and fall about his shoulders like a mantle.  He cradles a large sheaf of grain in his arms.  Amaethon is often depicted dressed as a peasant farmer, with a stylized tree upon his tunic.  Farmers, vintners, and those who cultivate the land worship him.  The domains he is associated with are Animal, Earth, and Plant.  His favoured weapon is the scythe.  He is one of the Seven Good Gods.

 

• Ancestral Worship:  Ancestor worship is common among the Lakashi, the Alderhald, and the goblinoid races.  Even some civilized human and dwarven families worship their illustrious ancestors.  Shamans and clerics of ancestors can be any alignment, so long as they are not more than one step removed from the alignments of the ancestors they worship.  For clerics, ancestors are generally associated with the Death, Knowledge, Protection, and Trickery domains.  Favoured weapons may be assigned based upon historical precedent.

 

• Artemis:  The Goddess of the Hunt, Artemis is chaotic neutral.  She is depicted as an incredibly beautiful young girl armed with a bow.  She is often shown riding a doe with stag’s horns, or is depicted with stag’s horns herself.  Although many hunters, foresters, and rangers worship (or placate) her, she only allows human, elven, or half-elven females into her priesthood.  The domains associated with Artemis are Animal, Travel, and Trickery.  Her favoured weapon is the longbow.

 

• Badur:  Badur, the Judge of the Dead, is neutral.  He is depicted as a dark, faceless man wearing dark robes, and bearing a greatsword made of dark stone.  He is sometimes called the Bonewarden.  Few worship him, save undertakers and those who pray for the dead, though many pay him heed. It is Badur whose task it is to assign the dead to the heavens or hells, or to gray limbo.  His priests often seek out the undead, to deliver them to their Grim Lord’s judgement.  They may also “borrow the dead” from Badur to perform tasks in the world of the living.  The domains he is associated with are Death, Knowledge, and Protection.  His favoured weapon is the greatsword.

 

• Baerbeth:  Goddess of Cats, Pleasure, and the Night, Baerbeth is chaotic neutral.  She is depicted sometimes as a female humanoid with cat-like qualities, and sometimes as a great cat.  The domains she is associated with are Animal, Luck, Magic, and Trickery.  Her favoured weapon is the kukri.

 

• Beast Lords:  In the Lakelands, every animal type has a Beast Lord, a creature that is a perfect representative of its species type.  Many Beast Lords are also depicted in human, or semi-human, form.  The Beast Lords are worshipped mainly by intelligent and/or awakened animals, faerie animals, shapechangers, and humanoids whose forms mirror the Beast Lord they worship.  Some Beast Lords have cults with human followings, however, and some Beast Lords have created “elevated” humanoid animals to worship them.  In general, Beast Lords are neutral.  All are associated with the Animal domain.  Most have one other associated domain related to their nature (i.e., the Bear Lord and Ox Lords are associated with the Strength domain, while the Turtle Lord is associated with Protection and the Otter Lord with Water).  Beast Lords have no favoured weapons.

 

• Belanus:  Lithe Belanus, beloved of the elves, is chaotic good.  He is often depicted as a young human, elf, or half-elf, with a lyre.  An olive wreath crowns his head, holding long hair away from his laughing face.  Belanus is the God of the Sun, Music, Healing, and Prophesy, known also as the Ward Against Undead.  The domains he is associated with are Healing, Knowledge, and Sun.  His favoured weapon is the longbow.  He is one of the Seven Good Gods.

 

• Brigit:  Fair Brigit is the Goddess of Hearth, Fire, Poetry, and Community.  She is lawful good.  She is depicted as a young girl, clean of limb and bare of breast, unadorned save for a circlet of gold inlaid upon her brow.  She is also known as the Virgin Goddess, for the priestesses who keep her communal hearths are sworn to remain virginal throughout the length of their service.  Clerics dedicated to Brigit do not have to be female, only her hearthwards do.  The domains she is associated with are Fire, Luck, and Protection.  Her favoured weapon is the longsword.  She is one of the Seven Good Gods.

 

• Druidic Faith:  Druids are as described in the Player’s Handbook, and gain spells accordingly.  In the Lakelands, druids recognize Celene (represented by the moon) as the female principle of nature, and Herne (represented by a stag-horned man) as the male.  To the druids, all living things have an animus, life-energy that drives the world of the living, as well as providing the divine energy for druidic spells.  Death is also part of the cycle of life, where the animus loses its differentiated form and goes back into the breath of the world.  Still, druids gain power from the living world, and most shun the world of the dead.

 

• Julius Invincible:  Julius Invincible, Lord of Victory By Any Means, is lawful evil.  He began as a warlord among the Parthelonians, who came to power by slaughtering his own father.  He is depicted as a cruel-faced man wearing blood-soaked armour.  Barbarians, fighters, evil rangers, and monks may all worship Julius Invincible.  His cult appeals to the ruthless.  The domains he is associated with are Destruction, Strength, and War.  His favoured weapon is the longsword.

 

• Mardan:  Mardan, the Bringer of the Law and chief of the Seven Good Gods, is lawful good.  He is worshipped by paladins, fighters, monks and those who prefer civilized order to chaos.  Mardan is depicted as a jet-black man with four arms and green eyes.  He is said to hurl thunderbolts in judgement, and is often depicted with two thunderbolts, a morningstar, and the Book of Law.  The domains he is associated with are Air, Law, Protection, and War.  His favoured weapon is the morningstar.  He is one of the Seven Good Gods.

 

• Mellador:  Mellador is neutral good.  The Goddess of Mercy, Shipwrecked Sailors, and Fertility, she is often depicted with a serpent-staff, her right hand raised in benediction, as though to heal the wounded onlooker.  Mothers, sailors, fishermen, and healers worship her, though many others come to her for aid.  The domains she is associated with are Healing, Good, and Protection.  She has no favoured weapon.  She is one of the Seven Good Gods.

 

• Mellythese:  The Great Spider is the Goddess of Spiders, Treachery, Venom, and Deceit.  She is chaotic evil.  Mellythese is depicted as a gigantic black and red spider with cunning, evil eyes.  She is worshipped by the treacherous, by those bent to evil in their quest for vengeance, and by magicians who are seduced by the false lure of easy power.  The domains she is associated with are Death, Evil, Knowledge, and Trickery.  Her favoured weapon is the net.

 

• The Seven Good Gods:  Although clerics may worship them separately, many clerics in the High Church of the Seven Good Gods worship all of the gods together.  In this case, the cleric may be of any non-evil alignment (though most are good).  The domains they have access to are Fire, Good, Healing, Law (unless they have a chaotic alignment), Protection, and Sun.  They do not gain the benefits of a favoured weapon.

 

• Uarthos:  Called the Sleeping God, Uarthos is the chaotic good God of Sleep, Dreams, Healing, and Inspiration.  He is worshipped by poets, lovers, and dreamers of all sorts.  He is often depicted as a well-formed giant, with serene features, meditating or asleep.  The domains he is associated with are Chaos, Healing, Knowledge, and Travel.  He has no favoured weapon.  Uarthos is one of the Seven Good Gods.

Trying To Do Better

In the case of the Lakelands/Mêdterra mythos, creating a sense of the numinous was a mixed success.  On one hand, I had various priesthoods and clerics active in the milieu.  At one point, the (relatively low-level) PCs even encountered a bound Elder God called Baloraz of the Baleful Eye, or Baloraz, the Seated One.

Baloraz appeared as a seated humanoid creature, and would be nearly 80 feet tall if it stood.  It’s body was manlike, and handsomely build, except its head, which was dominated by a gigantic lidless eye like that of a cat.  Its leering face was transparent, showing bone and blobs of soft yellow fat beneath, as well as the pulsing ichor which fed its massive brain.  Slime drooled from between its pointed teeth, but only its eye moved, free to perceive within its trapped body.  Baloraz could speak via telepathy to any it could see; its voice oozing into the mind like a high-pitched whisper.

Because Baloraz was seated and unmoving, the PCs could interact with the bound god – although this was a fearful prospect indeed.  Should the gaze of Baloraz actually fall upon one, it could use a powerful telekinesis effect, either to draw one closer….or to flay one alive.

On the other hand, because I was using a modified version of the 3^rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons rules, I missed the level of customization afforded by the preceding edition.  This affected my design for clerics in Raven Crowking’s Fantasy Game (RCFG), my ongoing project.  I included this optional rule:

Optional Rule: SPECIALITY PRIESTS:  The cleric is a generic form of priest, suitable for the “average priest” in the average campaign world.  However, GMs (or players, with the GM’s approval) are encouraged to create specialty priests for specific Powers.

Some examples of specialty priests appear in The Big Book of Monsters and the Encyclopaedia of Powers & Avatars – these can be used for inspiration.

The easiest way to create specialty priests is to change the abilities granted by Focus Divine Power and Aura of Faith. Another method is to create unique spell lists for a given priesthood. Finally, if the Power is associated with a particular slashing or piercing weapon, the speciality priest should not be limited in using that weapon.
  

A speciality priest may have the same level of overall power as a cleric, or it may have slightly more power in exchange for a much narrower focus. The GM is cautioned to avoid creating a specialty priest that is obviously a better choice than a standard cleric.

Conclusion

Deities and Powers of all sorts are an important part to the feel of a fantasy world.  I’ve worked hard to include these beings as an integral part of the setting, but I feel that my attempts have always fallen somewhat short of the mark.

How about you, Gentle Readers?  What have you done to make the gods “live and breath” in your campaign milieus?

B is for Bennies Before Balance

I have recently heard someone complain that “sandbox” was an elitist term….which, frankly, left me nonplussed.  In my not-so-humble opinion, games are either driven by the decisions of the players (sandbox games) or the needs of an overarching plot (plot-driven games).  As a big advocate of a GM’s right (and responsibility) to say No, I fully endorse that any GM should run the type of game he or she prefers.  So long as you can find interested players, no one can tell you you’re wrong!

What I’d like to talk about today is Bennies – those little, unexpected, bonuses that come about through playing role-playing games.  In early editions of D&D, these bennies might have included finding a special magic item, or special gear, that makes your character more powerful.  In the early, sandbox-ier, days of rpgs, this sort of benny made perfect sense.  Playing more, and playing better, meant more and better rewards.  In addition, earlier systems used a shallower power curve and the sort of broad-based balance that easily supported these extras.

(In my own home game, I recently decided that the participating characters all became Trained in Profession: Sailor as a result of in-game action.  Although this “benny” is equivalent to only 1 skill point in game terms, it negates a -4 penalty to related skill checks, and was well received at the table.)

Some more recent games – most notably the WotC versions of D&D – have taken a narrower view of balance, with specific guidelines as to what characters at any particular level should have.  This would seem to work counter to the idea of bennies, because any benny sufficient to have an in-game effect is also perforce sufficient to “throw off the math”.

I would like to suggest that this need not be so.  Indeed, that it need not be important, even if it is so.

Especially if you are running an “adventure path” type scenario, rather than a sandbox, there is very little cost to granting bennies.  After all, if you run through a campaign over a period of six months, when the seventh starts, you start with a fresh slate.  Meanwhile, so what if a few fights are easier (and take less time!) than expected?  So what if the players can bypass your skill challenge?  There is no point to giving bennies that don’t have some effect on how the game plays.  And, when earlier clever play means you get an additional boost now, the players get a sort of shiny, glowing feeling.

The converse, of course, is that, if they don’t do well, they don’t get the benny.  Maybe they don’t even get the wealth-by-level guideline treasure.  And that is cool, too.  Consider it a “negative benny”, if you will.  Decisions mean more when they have ramifications down the line.  Even if that does mean that things are that much harder later.  Even if it does mean that the PCs lose.

Balance only takes you so far, in my experience and in my opinion.  At the end of the day, as a player, I want my decisions to have consequences, good and bad, both for me and for the campaign world.  Bennies are more important than balance.  But you need to strike a “balance” between the two!

(Sorry....this is a bit of a wandering post.  I suppose I should have called it "B is for Blathering"!)