Author Topic: Gods  (Read 44884 times)

Offline oslecamo

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Gods
« on: September 05, 2012, 06:31:48 PM »
Gods


What is a god?
Are they  beings of great power? No, weak gods do exist, while there's also mighty beings that cannot call themselves gods at all.
Are they eternal beings that created reality and will eventually destroy it? No, gods do die, and the ancient aboleths even remember a time when they didn't exist at all.
Are they those that are worshiped by the masses? Yes, that's the true sign of a god, a being that channels the faith from her worshipers.

Faith
"Gods are served and adored, while monsters are hunted and hated. Why? Because the people choose to call some monsters gods and worship them."-Byakurin, Purple Mage Heretic

Everybody knows that there's some intrinsic power in belief, but few realize just how much power it actually has. Gods know that better than anyone else, because they're themselves fuelled by Faith, pure blind belief. When a being finds himself the target of mortal attentions, it will ascend into an higher, divine form, able to focus and channel the Faith directed at her to perform all form of wondrous and terrible things. And should said being find herself whitout faithful, she'll lose her godly powers. Thus the gods have forever waged wars and ploted on the material plane to see who can gather the more worshipers.

Faith itself is the act of believing in something more than anything else. The most faithful are those that don't let such petty things as facts stand between them and their god. Faith is greatly reinforced by acts following your god's dogma, and group rituals are particularly strong sources of faith, specially if performed in temples built for that kind of act.

An interesting aspect of Faith is that only frail mortals on the material plane seem capable of producing it. An angelic choir or demonic cacophony has no real divine power, but a simple devoted human village can provides the basis of a god's sustenance. This isn't to mean that there's no mighty clerics and prophets among the more powerful races, but these eventually gather lesser mortal followers to worship their gods.



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God(prc)

“Gods? Perfect? Where did you get that idea? You haven't met a lot of gods, have you? ”
—Yune, Radiant Dawn Chaos goddess


Prerequisites:
-Must have Cha 13+
-Must have a certain amount of worshipers depending on her divinity tier, as described on the class. Should her faithful drop below this treshold, the character loses her god levels above that tier until she recovers enough faithful again.
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Hit Die:d6
Level Bab Fort Ref Will FeatureManeuvers KnownManeuvers ReadiedStances Known
1+0+0+0+2Demigod, God Body, Divine Rank, Portfolio, Divine Characteristic,  Grant Spells, Godly Realm, Salient Divine Ability,  Maneuvers321
2+1+0+0+3 Holy Day421
3+1+ 1+1+3Higher Existence521
4+2+1+1+4Higher Existence531
5+2+1+1+4Extra Salient Divine Ability 632
6+3+2+2+5 Lesser Deity632
7+3 + 2+2+5Higher Existence732
8+4 + 2+2+6 Higher Existence742
9+4 + 3+3+6 Higher Existence842
10+5 +3+3+7Extra Salient Divine Ability 842
11+5 +3+3+7 Intermediate Deity953
12+6 +4+4+8 Word of God953
13+6 + 4+4+8 Higher Existence1053
14+7 + 4+4+9 Higher Existence1053
15+7 +5+5+9Extra Salient Divine Ability1154
16+8+5+5+10 Greater Deity1164
17+8+5+5+10 Ancient Field1265
18+9+6+6+11  Higher Existence1265
19+10+6+6+11Extra Salient Divine Ability1376
20+10 +6+6+12Extra Salient Divine Ability, Higher Existence1476


Class Skills: (2+ Int. Modifier, quadruple at first level).  A Demigod's class skills are all previous class skills she had, plus Bluff, Craft, Concentration, Diplomacy, Gather Information, Intimidate, Knowledge(any), Perform, and Profession.

Proficiencies: A god gains proficiency with unarmed strikes only.

Class Features

Demigod: The weakest tier of gods, usually just overseeing a small village or forest, but still a step above simple mortals. In order to take the first steps in godhood, the character must have at least 500 dedicated worshipers.

God Body:The god retains all of her previous racial traits and stops aging, becoming an immortal outsider(native) if she wasn't already. She does not need to eat, sleep, or breathe. However if the god was an undead, they instead remain so.  A god is immune to polymorphing, petrification, or any other attack that alters its form. Any shape-altering powers the deity might have work normally on herself. Those are all extraordinary abilities. No abilities of the Demigod, Lesser/Intermediate/Greater Deity may be replicated by other class abilities/spells/powers/abilities/similar, neither can such beings be made into followers/cohorts/companions/similar. The god also becomes immune to Psychic Reformation.

In addition the god gains the alignment subtypes of her own alignment and her attacks always count as that alignment, plus a bonus to Nat armor equal to 1+half her Divine Rank (see below). If she has 20 or more HD, then her Nat armor is instead equal to her full divine rank. If she already had Nat Armor, use the best value. If her older value was better, also increase it by 1.

Divine Rank:The god has a Divine Rank equal to her god level, which determine the power of several of her godly abilities. Divine Rank cannot be boosted by any other means, including bloodlines and similar, unless the ability specifically says it increases your Divine Rank, both words.

Portfolio: At first level the god chooses a portfolio over which she will focus, like Love or Farming or Murder. She gains an insight bonus equal to 2+1/2 HD on all Craft, Knowledge, Profession, and Perform checks directly related to her portfolio. When the god levels up (or suffers another important event, such as alignment change), she may change her portfolio and all related abilities. In addition her portfolio grants her the following abilities, which are Extraordinary unless noticed otherwise.

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Divine Characteristic:The faith bestowed upon a god makes them far superior to regular mortals. At each god level pick one of the following options. None can be taken more than once and they're extraordinary abilities, unless noted otherwise.

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Grant Spells: A god automatically grants spells and domain powers to mortal divine spellcasters who pray to she. Deities can grant spells from any divine spell list. A deity can withhold spells from any particular mortal as a free action. Even spells already granted can be retaken like that.

Godly Realm: The god  has a location that serves as a workplace, personal residence, audience chamber, and sometimes as a retreat or fortress. A god is at its most powerful within her godly realm. A god has at least modest control over the environment within its realm, controlling the temperature and minor elements of the environment. The radius of this control is 10 feet per divine rank (or 100 feet per rank for a god with 20 HD or more), and once the location is chosen, you need one week of meditation of it to make it your own. The god must be in the chosen area to activate this ability, and can only have one godly realm at a time. Any previous godly realm you've altered reverts to its original characteristics when you abandon it.

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Salient Divine Ability: The god gains a Divine Salient Divine ability from the below list for each god level, plus an extra one at levels 5, 10, 15, 19, 20. Using them is a standard action unless noted otherwise, and they don't provoke attacks of opportunity, aren't subject to spell resistance and work normally inside an antimagic field, but they otherwise count as supernatural abilities. Some abilities require the god to rest afterward. A resting god can engage in light activities such as talking or walking at half speed. When attempting anything more strenuous than that, the god can only take partial actions and suffers a -6 penalty on all attack rolls, saves, and checks. The god cannot use another ability that requires rest until its current rest requirement is fulfilled. Any time the god spends performing strenuous activities does not count toward the required rest time.  Unless otherwise noticed, any Salient Divine Ability with a duration other than instantaneous can be ended earlier as a fullround action. Also, whenever you use a salient divine ability, you may choose to leave behind your personal symbol carved on the area or subject affected. This is always just a small cosmetic change, and can be removed with some effort.

Maneuvers: The god learns and readies maneuvers of the Venerable Battlefield school as shown in the table. If the god knew maneuvers from other schools before, she may learn maneuvers and stances from those other schools as well. Her iniator level is equal to her god level plus half other levels and she can only learn maneuvers of a level no bigger than half (IL+1), rounded down.  Every time the god exits a stance whitout entering a new one, she may recover all her expended maneuvers.

The god can choose and prepare its readied maneuvers with 5 minutes of meditation, or by 1 minute of actively engaging on an act directly related to her portfolio just for the sake of it.

At 4th level, and every even-numbered level afterwards, the god can swap  one of his older maneuvers with a new one he qualifies for from the same school.

In addition pick a weapon you're proficient with (which can be a natural weapon). That becomes your favored weapon. If you don't have proficiency with any weapons, you may pick a simple weapon to become your favorite weapon, in which case you gain proficiency with it.

Holy day: It's usual for mortals to dedicate certain days to certain gods.  At 2nd level pick a day of the year. During that day, your Divine Rank increases by 1.

Higher Existence:At levels  3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 13 14, 18 and 20 you gain a permanent +1 to an ability score of your choice. You cannot pick the same ability score twice in a row with this ability.

Lesser Deity:To pick the 6th level of God you need at least 5000 worshipers. You now impose some respect on godly politics, and gain a +2 bonus on all charisma-based skill checks against demigods.

Intermediate Deity:To pick the 11th level of God you need at least 100 000 worshipers. You now impose serious respect on godly politics, and gain a +4 bonus on all charisma-based skill checks against demigods and +2 bonus on charisma-based skill checks against Lesser Deities.

Word of God: You have enough reputation for normal people to believe pretty much anything you say. At 12th level you gain a +6 bonus on all charisma-based skill checks against mortals.

Greater Deity:To pick the 16th level of God you need at least 1 000 000 worshipers. Smaller gods treat you as mortals treat the gods. You gain a +6 bonus on all charisma-based skill checks against demigods, a +4 bonus on charisma-based skill checks against Lesser Deities and a +2 bonus on all charisma-based skill checks against Intermediate deities.

Ancient Field:At 17th level you can now remain in two Venerable Battlefield stances at the same time.


Comments
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« Last Edit: April 01, 2019, 09:54:04 AM by oslecamo »

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #1 on: September 05, 2012, 06:32:44 PM »
List of Salient Divine Abilities(A-E)

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« Last Edit: March 11, 2019, 06:25:30 AM by oslecamo »

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #2 on: September 05, 2012, 06:32:55 PM »
List of Salient Divine Abilities(F-W)

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« Last Edit: March 11, 2019, 06:28:07 AM by oslecamo »

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #3 on: September 05, 2012, 06:33:06 PM »
And another for good luck.

Offline sirpercival

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Re: Gods
« Reply #4 on: September 05, 2012, 06:40:19 PM »
This looks completely awesome.  Question: what's the expected entry ECL for this?  Because if you can get 500 worshippers, you can theoretically enter at level 1...
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Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #5 on: September 05, 2012, 06:46:29 PM »
Intended to be entereable at lv1. Gods know how hard I worked to make it playable from the start (pun intended). Altough keeping your minimum quota of worshipers may prove complicated if you don't have anything else to support you.

Offline Nanshork

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Re: Gods
« Reply #6 on: September 05, 2012, 07:41:26 PM »
Iiiiinteresting, I'll have to read this thoroughly.   :D

Edit:
Quote
Divine Characteristic:The faith bestowed upon a god makes them far superior to regular mortals. At each Demigod level pick one of the following options. None can be taken more than once and they're extraordinary abilities, unless noted otherwise.
As written you would only get to pick one at levels 1-5 because after that you stop being a Demigod.  Just making sure that was intended.

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #7 on: September 06, 2012, 06:43:07 AM »
It's suposed to be one Divine characteristic per level, fixed.

Offline Nanshork

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Re: Gods
« Reply #8 on: September 06, 2012, 10:09:09 AM »
I like it.  It's obviously not supposed to be a class to take, you need to either be the DM or have DM approval given the high number of active worshippers required.  That seems to be an effective balancing mechanism.

Offline littha

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Re: Gods
« Reply #9 on: September 06, 2012, 11:18:44 AM »
There should probably be an option of advancing casting/psionics etc rather than the martial manuver progression because as it stands the god of magic will have 20 levels of not progressing casting. As this is going to be a heavily DM centric class anyway you could just offer the option of 20/20 casting progression for gods with related portfolios instead of the manuvers. Maneuvers feel more like a god of war/battle/honour thing than a general trait of all deific beings though even with that discipline.

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #10 on: September 06, 2012, 12:09:58 PM »
The Divine Battlefield school was specifically designed to be more broad than usual to fit diferent kinds of gods. And as they say, if it has stats, the PCs will try to fight her, so she better be able to defend herself. :p

Either way, even with the limitations, full casting progression is just plain superior to full maneuver progression. So added two new salient Divine Abilities, Divine Spell and Divine Spellcasting. The first one gives you the CL and is a prerequisite for the second one, that grants you the spells and spell slots but you don't gain any maneuver/stance/IL progression for that level. Capped so at best you get 19/20 casting progression in return for maneuvers and 20 salient divine abilities. You still get the divine characteristics, 5 salient divine abilities and a bunch of other goodies, so not too shabby.


Offline estradus

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Re: Gods
« Reply #11 on: September 07, 2012, 01:18:32 PM »
Some quick things I noticed that might need to be fixed...

The gift of life ability says it works as true resurrection usable however many times per day, but then it says "At 7 HD you can replicate Reincarnation as a SLA instead with two uses. At 9 HD Raise Dead as a SLA instead with three uses. At 13 HD Ressurection as a SLA instead with four uses. At 17 HD True Ressurection instead with five uses. The casting time is equal to the one of the spell in those cases, CL=HD."
So by trading 5 uses of true resurrection, I get true resurrection?

Some salient divine abilities are very difficult to get due to high base attack bonus requirements. This is a pointless argement you're playing gestalt or multiclass a lot; but if you're just taking god levels you'll have to be level 20 to get the wound enemy ability, and its impossible to get annihilating strike because base attack doesnt increase in epic levels. The God Smite divine characteristic lets a combat oriented god make up for their low base attack in combat, but it doesn't let him take things like annihilating strike any easier.

Last thing I wasn't sure about was the fact that it doesn't mention getting d12 hit dice for the undead traits ability. I wasn't sure if this was on purpose, but leaving them with d6 hit die and no con score seems cruel and unusual.

Also on the undead traits ability (this is less a complaint and more an observation) is it mentions mindless undead don't heal naturally. Under what circumstances would one play a mindless skeleton divinity?  :tongue

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #12 on: September 07, 2012, 01:47:23 PM »
-Gift of life basic ability only works on creatures that have been dead no longer than 1 hour per Rank (until you get 20 HD at least). The other abilities allows you thus to bring back creatures that have been dead for a lot longer before you get into epic levels.

-As for Bab requirements, the idea was that those are for warrior dudes that take some full Bab levels before going into God. Altough I can see the argument that it is too much of a limitation and reduce/remove them if you think it would be better.

-Leaving an undead god with d6 HD isn't that cruel when you remember there's a feat out there to give undeads their Cha mod in HP to each HD as the living do with their Con scores. More in particular the god can easily maximize her own HD.

-Mindless skeleton god? Hmm, that would make for an interesting BBEG! :p
But you're right, it's kinda copy-paste leftover so removed it.


Thanks for the more detailed critique. This is a pretty big class so it's important to point out anything that seems out of place.

Also if anyone has ideas for Salient Divine abilities, feel free to sugest them!

Offline littha

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Re: Gods
« Reply #13 on: September 07, 2012, 02:25:36 PM »
Generally with the way gods are portrayed in D&D and most other media they would either have to be super awesome at everything (not a great class idea) or basically a super version of a mortal. The god of magic should be completely unmatched at spellcasting, same with the god of war and fighting.

I don't think it is possible to make a god balanced if you go anywhere near anything they are supposed to be able to do (pre epic) so I would be tempted to make them super powerful but become your first epic only class. That way you can do justice to the power of the concept without having to write an enormous amount of variants for each portfolio.

The other idea is to come up with portfolio areas that define the abilities of the class. This way the god of War is part of the Combat group and gains Full BAB/d10 HD and manuevers but the god of Illusions would be part of the magic group and would have 1/2 BAB/d4 HD and spellcasting progression for example. Probably a lot of work unless you can pin the concepts down to a few variations....



Also you put way too much emphasis on the balancing factor of BAB. BAB is near worthless to a lot of concepts and this class would not be noticably increased in power with full BAB and a d12 hd because the abilities are so strong. The concept that BAB and HD size balance strong abilities is something that should have died off with WotCs supplements.
« Last Edit: September 07, 2012, 02:28:42 PM by littha »

Offline altpersona

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Re: Gods
« Reply #14 on: September 07, 2012, 02:54:56 PM »
now, i wanna know how to make a 'regular' mindless skeletal god.... most of the usual methods take class progression of some sort right? beyond the DM just making a god..
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Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #15 on: September 07, 2012, 04:30:21 PM »
Generally with the way gods are portrayed in D&D and most other media they would either have to be super awesome at everything (not a great class idea) or basically a super version of a mortal. The god of magic should be completely unmatched at spellcasting, same with the god of war and fighting.
I must say you need to expand your media knowledge then. Gods are never super awesome at everything (except perhaps monotheism religions), quite the contrary they're usually riddled with super flaws and are indeed beaten by the top mortals.

-In ancient Greek Mythology, the god of weaving is beaten in a weaving contest by a simple mortal. Ares, god of war, runs away from battles left and right. Overall the olympian gods are quite jealous of the deeds of heroic mortals. Actually male gods seem to prefer mortal women over the female goddesses. Not to mention they themselves are the 3rd generation of gods after murdering their own godly parents with the help of the first generation.

-In the Marvel universe Thor and other gods get beaten by mortal heroes every other sunday.

-In the quite popular God of War series we have Kratos, spartan soldier, murderizing most of the greek pantheon. He not only outfights Ares, outkills Hades, outruns Hermes, etc, etc

-In D&D itself we have dead god corpses littering the astral plane in such amounts you can use them as basic construction materials. We have mortals enslaving gods, stuff like thieves trolling Oladimmara in the trickery department, and abominations murderizing whole pantheons. There's also the Deities and Demigods fluff itself stating that "The most powerful of greater deities rule over other deities just as mortal sovereigns rule over commoners.". Which means that there's a hell lot of gods out there.

-If we tap in more eastern sources, gods are indeed quite plentifful and varied in all aspects.

I don't think it is possible to make a god balanced if you go anywhere near anything they are supposed to be able to do (pre epic) so I would be tempted to make them super powerful but become your first epic only class. That way you can do justice to the power of the concept without having to write an enormous amount of variants for each portfolio.

The other idea is to come up with portfolio areas that define the abilities of the class. This way the god of War is part of the Combat group and gains Full BAB/d10 HD and manuevers but the god of Illusions would be part of the magic group and would have 1/2 BAB/d4 HD and spellcasting progression for example. Probably a lot of work unless you can pin the concepts down to a few variations....
The point of this class was never to make "super powerful dude that's the best at something". That's for what the Paragon is for if anything.

In case I still didn't make it clear, I choose to tackle the god as a patron of a portfolio. He may not be the best at it, but he knows more than anyone else about the subject and how to grant it to others. Think about it. Gods rarely go out there and dirty their own hands. They usually sit in their high(or low) thrones and act at great distances or trough special agents. When gods are forced to face challenges head on, they usually fare poorly, that's why the low Bab, d6 HD and bad Reflex/Fort. Sure we have more "frontline" gods like Thor in the media, but those are also usually ranked lower in the divine hierarachy, probably meaning they have actually few levels of god and more levels of actual warrior dude.

Thus the god prc grants you a lot of high range effects and defensive stuff. The god of war doesn't face you head on. he teleports back inside his realm, gathers followers, buffs the hell out of them with combat abilities and then ambushes you when you're busy with something else. That's how he stays god of war while the other guy simply goes down in history as a big warrior. :p

Also you put way too much emphasis on the balancing factor of BAB. BAB is near worthless to a lot of concepts and this class would not be noticably increased in power with full BAB and a d12 hd because the abilities are so strong. The concept that BAB and HD size balance strong abilities is something that should have died off with WotCs supplements.
Meh, there's a lot homebrew out there that puts an heavy emphasis on benefiting high Bab, including some of mine.

now, i wanna know how to make a 'regular' mindless skeletal god.... most of the usual methods take class progression of some sort right? beyond the DM just making a god..
Good luck with that. Mindless creatures can't take class levels, and Deities and Demigods has no actual rules on how something or someone becomes a god, so only the DM can do it really.

Offline altpersona

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Re: Gods
« Reply #16 on: September 07, 2012, 04:33:47 PM »
they have rules to pickup divine rank 0 (i thought), but it takes some work that requires a mind (generally)

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Offline littha

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Re: Gods
« Reply #17 on: September 07, 2012, 05:10:29 PM »
I must say you need to expand your media knowledge then. Gods are never super awesome at everything (except perhaps monotheism religions), quite the contrary they're usually riddled with super flaws and are indeed beaten by the top mortals.
Not so much super awesome at everything but more along the lines of being flat better than humans in their base statistics. Finding it hard to explain this to my satisfaction... Something like the monkey king who probably doesn't have War as part of his portfolio defeating 100,000 celestial warriors (who were no pushovers).
Quote
-In ancient Greek Mythology, the god of weaving is beaten in a weaving contest by a simple mortal. Ares, god of war, runs away from battles left and right. Overall the olympian gods are quite jealous of the deeds of heroic mortals. Actually male gods seem to prefer mortal women over the female goddesses. Not to mention they themselves are the 3rd generation of gods after murdering their own godly parents with the help of the first generation.
The greek gods are rather interesting in this regard actually.

Quote
-In the Marvel universe Thor and other gods get beaten by mortal heroes every other sunday.
That is more a product of the marvel universe than anything else. In the Norse myths I am not even sure if Thor fights against a mortal at any point. (Besides the fact that he kills Jörmungandr which is long enough to encircle the earth). If you were after a "True" god in the marvel universe you probably want the Celestials or the One Above All.

Quote
-In the quite popular God of War series we have Kratos, spartan soldier, murderizing most of the greek pantheon. He not only outfights Ares, outkills Hades, outruns Hermes, etc, etc
This is just more of the greek stuff. Again they are at an interesting point in power for gods.

Quote
-In D&D itself we have dead god corpses littering the astral plane in such amounts you can use them as basic construction materials. We have mortals enslaving gods, stuff like thieves trolling Oladimmara in the trickery department, and abominations murderizing whole pantheons. There's also the Deities and Demigods fluff itself stating that "The most powerful of greater deities rule over other deities just as mortal sovereigns rule over commoners.". Which means that there's a hell lot of gods out there.
Most all of the dead gods were killed by other gods, Eldrich abominations or epic level characters, none of which I would classify as mortal.
Quote
-If we tap in more eastern sources, gods are indeed quite plentifful and varied in all aspects.
I doubt there are any that have lost a fight to a mortal or if there are there will be very few.

Quote
In case I still didn't make it clear, I choose to tackle the god as a patron of a portfolio. He may not be the best at it, but he knows more than anyone else about the subject and how to grant it to others.
An interesting idea but it doesn't mesh with nearly every god out there. The greek gods are an exception but Thor is renowned as one of the mightiest warriors in existence in norse myth.

Offline estradus

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Re: Gods
« Reply #18 on: September 07, 2012, 06:23:33 PM »
-Gift of life basic ability only works on creatures that have been dead no longer than 1 hour per Rank (until you get 20 HD at least). The other abilities allows you thus to bring back creatures that have been dead for a lot longer before you get into epic levels.

-Leaving an undead god with d6 HD isn't that cruel when you remember there's a feat out there to give undeads their Cha mod in HP to each HD as the living do with their Con scores. More in particular the god can easily maximize her own HD.

Oh, I didn't see the bit on gift of life about the hour duration thing. Whats the source on the feat for the undead with cha to hp? I have a feat like that, but its from one of the warcraft d20 rpg thing books so probably a questionable source, that.

On the comment of more options for salient divine abilities... I'm not sure if I'd be very good at actually making them, but I remember every time I tried to make something with them even in the original, there was never anything good for gods of necromancy. The only character I have that's elligable for attaining divinity (she already built a whole city just for the worshipers) is a necromancer, but there isn't much good she could do with said powers... Aside from the control undead, which is mostly useless for her. I'm not at all sure what kind of powers I could suggest for this gap; its just one that has always annoyed me, as someone who has like 4 attempted to stat out homebrew or ascended undeath gods. No idea what they might get though, and I guess that the domain access might have something in it... I'll let you know if I think of anything else though.

Offline oslecamo

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Re: Gods
« Reply #19 on: September 08, 2012, 09:14:40 AM »
I must say you need to expand your media knowledge then. Gods are never super awesome at everything (except perhaps monotheism religions), quite the contrary they're usually riddled with super flaws and are indeed beaten by the top mortals.
Not so much super awesome at everything but more along the lines of being flat better than humans in their base statistics. Finding it hard to explain this to my satisfaction... Something like the monkey king who probably doesn't have War as part of his portfolio defeating 100,000 celestial warriors (who were no pushovers).
Funny you mention that, because the Monkey King actually never ascended into godhood(that's why his title is the monkey king after all).

Hoping that a promotion and a rank amongst the gods would make him more manageable, the Jade Emperor invited Sun Wukong to Heaven, where the monkey believed he would receive an honorable place as one of the gods. Instead, he was made the Protector of the Horses to watch over the stables, which was the lowest job in heaven.

While the celestials warriors he beat up?

Sun Wukong later single-handedly defeated the Army of Heaven's 100,000 celestial warriors - each fight an equivalent of a cosmic embodiment


So yeah, we got the stable cleaner beating the crap of an army of fully fledged gods. :smirk


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-In ancient Greek Mythology, the god of weaving is beaten in a weaving contest by a simple mortal. Ares, god of war, runs away from battles left and right. Overall the olympian gods are quite jealous of the deeds of heroic mortals. Actually male gods seem to prefer mortal women over the female goddesses. Not to mention they themselves are the 3rd generation of gods after murdering their own godly parents with the help of the first generation.
The greek gods are rather interesting in this regard actually.
They're also one of the, if not the most popular pantheon out there.

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-In the Marvel universe Thor and other gods get beaten by mortal heroes every other sunday.
That is more a product of the marvel universe than anything else. In the Norse myths I am not even sure if Thor fights against a mortal at any point. (Besides the fact that he kills Jörmungandr which is long enough to encircle the earth). If you were after a "True" god in the marvel universe you probably want the Celestials or the One Above All.
Well Thor is renowed for his fights against Frost Giants. You know, the CR 9 monsters. So Thor is a tough dude in the myth yes, but far from the top power scale.

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-In the quite popular God of War series we have Kratos, spartan soldier, murderizing most of the greek pantheon. He not only outfights Ares, outkills Hades, outruns Hermes, etc, etc
This is just more of the greek stuff. Again they are at an interesting point in power for gods.
Oh, come on, since when do Hercules and Zeus and Ares have been downgraded to "an interesting point"?

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-In D&D itself we have dead god corpses littering the astral plane in such amounts you can use them as basic construction materials. We have mortals enslaving gods, stuff like thieves trolling Oladimmara in the trickery department, and abominations murderizing whole pantheons. There's also the Deities and Demigods fluff itself stating that "The most powerful of greater deities rule over other deities just as mortal sovereigns rule over commoners.". Which means that there's a hell lot of gods out there.
Most all of the dead gods were killed by other gods, Eldrich abominations or epic level characters, none of which I would classify as mortal.
Actually, a good bunch of them are stated to have died because they were forgoten and stoped being worshiped.

But the main point still stands. Heroic mortals, even if rare, can and do challenge the power of the gods, whitout being gods themselves.

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-If we tap in more eastern sources, gods are indeed quite plentifful and varied in all aspects.
I doubt there are any that have lost a fight to a mortal or if there are there will be very few.
Again, we have the Monkey King, that started as a simple monkey and ended up single-handedly beating most of Heaven. Ok, he tecnically become immortal between things, but only because he himself erased his name of the cycle of reincarnation.

There's also that story of the archer that shot down sun-gods in order to save the Earth. And the whole "If you find Buddha, kill the Buddha" philosophy, which basically translates that mortals have the potential to surpass the gods, and thus the gods are wary of powerful mortals.

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In case I still didn't make it clear, I choose to tackle the god as a patron of a portfolio. He may not be the best at it, but he knows more than anyone else about the subject and how to grant it to others.
An interesting idea but it doesn't mesh with nearly every god out there. The greek gods are an exception but Thor is renowned as one of the mightiest warriors in existence in norse myth.
The mightiest warrior in Norse Myth goes around fighting CR 9 dudes as his biggest achievment, that's not particularly impressive in the D&D power scale if you ask me (he only kills the world serpent in Marvel comics, but that's small work when you've got mutants burning down galaxy sectors).

Oh, I didn't see the bit on gift of life about the hour duration thing. Whats the source on the feat for the undead with cha to hp? I have a feat like that, but its from one of the warcraft d20 rpg thing books so probably a questionable source, that.
Libris mortis or heroes of Horror if I'm not mistaken.
« Last Edit: September 08, 2012, 09:17:08 AM by oslecamo »