Has there ever been a false god in your setting with a large following?
>>46234901
What, like all of them?
>>46234954
This
>>46234901
Pretty much the entire Dragon Civilization was made of false gods. Their human slaves were ordered to worship them, blah blah... Pretty shitty stuff because dragons in the setting tend to be assholes.
Luckly, their civilization has long collapsed.
>>46234901
I actually hadn't considered the possibility of False Gods in a setting where there's a hundred real ones.
I wonder how they'd interplay with other gods, or if they're straight just worshipping mortals and stone carvings instead of something with actual power, or some powerful creature distinctly not anything close to being a deity.
>>46235115
In Faerun, there's a cult that worships a Sphere of Annihilation as a god, and they actually do gain clerical powers from worshiping it. But, that's because Tiamat saw the opportunity to gain some new followers and effectively made the Sphere an aspect of herself, so that they inadvertently worship her and she is the one who answers their prayers and guides them.
I'd expect that's how most false gods would work in a setting with real ones. If the cult didn't gain any magic or favors from worshiping the false god, they would quickly turn towards a real one unless they had some other way of gaining a measure of power, like their cult was dedicated to magical research or physical gains.
>>46235115
>I wonder how they'd interplay with other gods, or if they're straight just worshipping mortals and stone carvings instead of something with actual power, or some powerful creature distinctly not anything close to being a deity.
I almost always run religions (backed by real gods) as monotheistic.
Not henothestic or monolatristic, straight up monotheistic.
Aside from the plane they live in, any given god has only a vague awareness of the outer planes.
Added to that, gods are completely incapable of noticing the existences or influences of eachother.
As far as any god is concerned, everyone who worships them is serving a "false god".
I've actually never run that with actual false gods thrown into the mix.
Could be interesting.
>>46234901
I once designed a campaign concept that ran a growing religion of a new deity in the background of whatever adventures were going on that ends in the new religion gaining so much following that it steals the worshippers of the best-known big good god... Then flips the table because it's actually an evil deity that then proceeds to kill that god that's been weakened by the huge blow to its following.
>>46234901
The hobgoblins in our most recent setting don't follow the same pantheon as the PC races, preferring to worship their dead emperors.
The fact their divine magic still WORKS despite their faith seeming self-evidently absurd to other civilizations is philosophically troubling to many clerics.
>>46235115
I figure it would either go the way gods deal with atheists in discworld, so lightning bolt, smite, and a note saying "no you aren't" or "it's a lie" or go the route where faith = power for a god so a false god with enough believers can become a god and in the event of an overlap of domains with another god, big holy war
>>46234901
My PC created one. Or not.
Ended up with a large following by the end of the campaign, with me being the prophet of the god of Secrets, Plans, and Dreams.
Backstory was that my character was a slightly crazy old cleric who though the voices in his head were the whisperings of a deity.
They weren't, but no one knew this. Therefore, whenever anyone heard him speak of the "Great Geheimnis" they though of some unknown god, and the portfolio built itself over the years, gaining a large following, with him added to the land's official pantheon.
Was pretty cool.
For Great Geheimnis whispers in the ears of man, and tells him of what must be done, even if man knows not of his existance.Just as planned.
All day everyday, because I run exalted. I've had PCs worshiped as gods, having shape shifters pretending to be gods, and demons who were in fact, not gods and just asshole gods that are running slave cities so they can make bank on opium.
>>46234901
That scene is better animated than I remember it. Also Syaro getting swole, worshipping that rabbit AND begging it to go away. Quite efficient.
>>46234901
I have a homebrew setting where there are essentially two pantheons. One is the new gods, who are akin to modern deities: very hands off, and doubt of their existence is common.
Then there's the original gods, which are actually very powerful dimension-hopping eldritch beings. The best way I can think of to summarily describe them is like the daedric princes from Elder Scrolls (though that wasn't what I had in mind when I created the setting). They aren't malevolent, but are definitely more demanding of their followers. However they're also more likely to interact with mortals. They've been absent for a long time though, essentially they've just lost interest. I do plan to bring them back as the instigators of a campaign though. Though not as the bbeg
Not yet. Got a villain who's working on it, though.
>>46235482
Did they name the sphere anything fancy, or was it just Zappy?
>>46234954
Athar, pls go
Well, yes.
There are lot of gods, mostly pretty minor ones and occasional big ones. Divine acts are actually rare.
Some religion flaunt their confirmed miracles and whatnot, but people don't need them to be convinced.
Majority of gods have naturally a strong distaste for life, anyways. Lot are just there to manipulate and whatnot. Very, very few gods are legimately benelovent.
Thankfully, they don't really act on it since they mostly know how futile it is.
>>46239772
Yes, Zappy the Hungry.
>>46239772
I think they called it "Entropy."
>>46234901
>Has there ever been a false god in your setting with a large following?
No. There's veneration of the Resplendent Court which are fairly real and veneration of other gods which may or may not be, but any non-Court faiths are largely animistic or spiritistic so it's hard to tell.
>>46235482
>cult ... dedicated to ... physical gains
That's the false god in my setting right there.It's a down-to-earth modern gangs game.
No, but I did something in the same vein for a character I played in an Iron Heroes game.
'Ras-Chang, the Undying Sorceror-King. Master of the Twelve Empyrean Mysteries and Five Paths of Calginous Thaumaturgy. It is rumored that he cannot be slain by mortal hand.'
He was really just a big pseduo-Mongolian Thulsa Doom-looking minor warlord who was coasting on some good press, a shocking capacity for withstanding physical trauma and a lot of lies and tricks. Blinding an assassin sent to kill him by spitting snake venom from a capsule into his face then claiming it was sorcery and that sort of thing.
>>46234901
Not-Japan's Imperial Family were worshipped as gods.
They were all dragons, not even in disguise, and didn't make anything up. They are amazingly benevolent and cared for their nation that the people just took to worshipping them.Twist: Great, Great... etc Grandmother Dragon Empress, who founded Not-Japan actually was one of the Dragon GoddessesShe openly discouraged worship as she saw it an insult that non-Dragon races would worship a Dragon deity
Well there are large Islam, Christian and Buddhist communities, my own character is even Anglican.
Hunter game. We found a serial killer with some freaky powers, who has managed convince a lot of insane homeless people that he's the second coming of Christ. So far the death toll of "demons" slain by his followers clocks in at around 37 and grows by the day. We estimate he has around 70 followers all over the east coast of the US, and gains more due to his ability to affect the minds of the mentally ill. The current growth rate seems stable at around 8 new followers per week.
We're worried about one player who's a little messed up in the head. He's our ace inventor and problem solver with a seriously formidable skillset. The worry is that if we get close to this guy, he'll convert our brilliant inventor and turn him into a frightening terminator.
>>46235482
You could consider being like demon lords and archdevils as "false gods" because they're not true deities but are still powerful enough to grant their worshipers powers.
