Picrelated is why every single god except for Kelemvor in Forgotten Realms should be evil. Every single one. Somehow the "good", the "neutral" and the "evil" gods all share one trait - insane lust for power - power that can be gained by worshippers. Now, if you were a god, you would probably try to create the most attractive religion for your followers, a good afterlife and do shit like this, right? Well, gods of Faerun are not like you. Simply gaining true believers is not enough - no, they must blackmail the entire world's population into contributing into their power games. If you don't know, pic related is the Wall of Faithless - if you refuse to follow a god or fail to be fanatical enough for his tastes, you end up shoved into it and suffer. Forever. Somehow every god, including gods of justice and mercy, is okay with it. Except Kelemvor, the god of the dead. He (rightly) decided that it's cruel and evil, so he changed the rules - the Wall was no longer your fate. If you refused to follow a god, you ended up in Kelemvor's afterlife. The results followed immediately - people started dropping their religions left, right and center, because they knew they no longer had to suck it up to heavenly bullies - Kelemvor had their back. So every god - including good gods, mind you - walked up to Kelemvor's front door and forced him to reinstate the wall. Because nobody would actually follow them, unless they were forced to. Let me repeat it again - the gods were so hungry for power, they decided to use every single mortal to fuel themselves. Weren't interested in their squabbles? Were sane enough to see through their petty facades? Fuck you! You'll be tortured forever. That'll teach you to think that gods are evil pricks!
Every single god in Faerun except for Kelemvor should be evil.
Jeremiah Peterson
It exists because author fiat and no one is allowed to change it because author fiat
Blake Jenkins
Alignments are palpable forces in FR (and D&D), no less real than color, density or polarity. Just because the god of Good goes around sentencing people to an eternity of torture for arbitrary reasons doesn't make them not Good.
Having said that, oh YEAH, everyone who participates in this divine blackmail is a huge cockwaffle who should have some post-epic adventurers set their hair on fire and enforce some real, equitable rules for an afterlife.
Andrew Bell
>If you refused to follow a god, you ended up in Kelemvor's afterlife. Bit worse than that, only the good and honorable who died heroically got that ending if they followed no god. And that was just FUCKING UNACCEPTABLE M8.
Jason Sullivan
Correct.
Brainwashed.
Jace Gonzalez
> Brave sexy independent Atheist edgelord who don't need no god detected.
Lucas Hughes
Brainwashed because alignments don't follow every single person's unique definition of morality? He even agreed with you, that it's a completely asshole thing to do on the Gods' parts.
Thomas Evans
> Extortion and blackmail are okay, if you're a god
Grayson Powell
>atheist I think any character that opposes the gods in DnD is just right up an anti-theist, it's a bit ridiculous to not believe in the god's existence in a magical realm, but you can be against them
And in DnD, opposing the gods apparently means your asshole is open for business, even to the good forgiving gods
Liam Thomas
It's not as ridiculous in Eberron. Gods may or may not exist there, you can't know for sure.
Colton Rodriguez
...
Blake Perez
In a setting like DnD with ghosts and souls and evidence of the real and unmistakably true prospect of the afterlife, people would behave much differently. No one except the truly insane would fuck around with magic or monsters if there was a possibility of a fate worse than death, such as having your soul tortured for all eternity.
And having good-aligned gods be okay with eternal torture to their enemies creates the Euthyphro paradox, where you have to ask: Is it Lawful Good because Heironeous says so, or is Heironeous exemplifying some extrinsic virtue called Lawful Good?
Henry Stewart
>No one except the truly insane Or the insanely brave, which DnD has in spades
Daniel Ramirez
Actually, you go to the afterlife and deity most suited to your personality and actions before you turn to the Wall of the Faithless. The Wall of the Faithless is for the TRULT faithless, who believed in nothing and no one and who had no principles whatsoever, even on a personal level. Basically absolute nihilists get to go to the Wall, which is kinda funny because in one of those FR Neverwinter games you meet one of them both before and after he goes into it and he's actually okay with the whole thing because it suits his nihilistic beliefs.
Leo Moore
Magic isn't particularly dangerous for the practitioner, no more so than working with horses or going hunting with you drunk father-in-law for example. Now, if you start messing with demons, devils, and abominations? Sure, you're likely gonna end up the rest of eternity with nails through your every pore. Casting magic missile or scrying for the location of the kobold raiders? Not so dangerous.
Jacob Harris
God damn it, D&D magic is so boring. Yes, casting magic missile is safe, but it shouldn't be! One thing that for example 40k got right was: every single time you use magic, there's a significant risk that you go insane or turn into a demon etc etc. Of course such a thing would need to be modulated for a tabletop game. But still, magic, even low level magic, should be risky. You're fucking around with reality itself, after all.
Josiah Lopez
The gods don't have to be evil, they just have to be the least worst option.
Camden Lee
Eh, risk should scale with both the power/ability of the user, and the power of the spell.
For example, say you're the world's most powerful wizard trying to light a simple campfire. You get distracted for a bit and instead of a campfire, you channel all your magical power into it and instead you end up with greater hellfire scorching everything in a 1d4 mile radius.
Say you're a weak-ass malnourished wizard trying to cast greater hellfire to cook his scavenged food with style. The hunger pains distract you, and instead of greater campfire from hell you end casting greater hellfire in your brain. Roll 1d1000 to see if you get off with merely an effective lobotomy. Must roll 1000.
Say the previous wizard tries to cast instead a simple lesser fire spell. Instead of fucking up and scorching your brain, you just end up with a fuzzy warm feeling. Roll 1d100 to see how much hair is left
Noah Bell
>high level wizard can accidentally an entire city I like it :D
Gavin Lewis
But that's not true. MOTB even has Kaelyn talk about whole planes that never even knew of gods getting dumped into the wall.
Thomas Fisher
Good gods once left mortals to their own devices. This eventually fucked the world so hard that the Overgod changed the rules so that gods need worshipers to live, ensuring that a)evil goods have to take care of their flock and b)good gods have to get their hands dirty. Mortals that don't swear allegiance to a deity get caught on this giant flypaper and rot there in agony rather than landing in the hands of demons and devils.
The Wall is an imbecilic creation of an incompetent writer, but it serves an important function in-setting.
>whole planes that never even knew of gods getting dumped into the wall So is Arcanum secretly a FR setting?
