Why don't the gods just solve problems themselves instead of having priests do it...

The mortal plane will infect them with mortality.

They gotta keep watch 24/7 or Eldritch Horrors will swallow the plane from outside.

They exist outside of time and know that this is the best possible scenario long-term.

They will infect the mortals with immortality.

All clerics will lose their power and Army of Zombies kept under Deific Seals will break out. They can fix it, but not instantly and it's probably going to destroy at least a half of the plane.

They literally can't act and only lend power, because the plane IS them. You can't do shit against your gastric parasites.

It's considered uncool, and white-knighting for your followers WILL get you expelled from the Fancy God's Table.

same reason why Russia and America just used proxy wars and spies instead of going completely in themselves

Mutually assured destruction
you know Ragnarok you know what the deal is.

Stupid OP? Stupid OP. Let's have fun, instead.

The Queen of the Great Greed Highway rules intercontinental trade from high within a tower carved from a monolithic pillar of bowenite. She lusts for something different each and every night. What she desires tonight is (roll 1d20):

01-Three young elves, preferably male.
02-The finest blood soup.
03-Two dozen pig's ear and locust burgers.
04-Freshly picked lava flowers.
05-Her mother's milk.
06-A dozen gamboling sphinx apes.
07-A basket full of the finest chanterelles.
08-Smelling salts pilfered from the Flamingo Lake City.
09-Diced stegosaurus liver.
10-The stewed hearts of a rude pauper and a diabolical nobleman.
11-The deep fried brain of a rebellious devil.
12-A dancer pregnant with octuplets from the Lightless Forest.
13-You.
14-A book of poems written by a Being of Ib.
15-A bathrobe sewn from the skins of vampires.
16-The fossilized skull of a gug.
17-The dying breath of an ancient king.
18-Eleven dog-riding thugs for a gladiatorial event.
19-Sap wine from a new moon willow.
20-Two orphans to breastfeed.

Very good. I gift you one glass bottle of Coca-Cola.

Gods solve problems in exchange for faith, priests guarantee a steady inflow of faith.

Gods don't have a problem. Humans do.

Rolled 11 (1d20)

Stupid user? Stupid user. Let's ignore this thread, instead.

Because then the evil gods whose follower or followers just got eradicated escalates it by going to kill some of their followers in person, and then you just get constant escalation of aggression on both sides as creation crumbles.

>Very good. I gift you one glass bottle of Coca-Cola.

>be god
>shit hits the fan
Now you have two options
>just solve the problem yourself
or
>give some poor fucks powers and watch shit hit the fan
It's like you hate fun

>if I destroy their ant farm they can just get a new one
>why should they care?

Are you not familiar with 's reference?

Google the phrase.

The divine mandate

Should 2 gods have opposing goals, they invoke the divine mandate, which prevents direct interference beyond vague hints to their respective faithful and providing power to clerics and paladins as normal.

The alternative is eventual escalation to the nuclear option, which tends to mess up stuff other gods are invested in, so violating the mandate is a great way to invite a bitch slap from any other gods with a grudge.

Unless... you recognize the coke bottle's role in the loss of innocence and it is I who is the moron.

>why don't gods do nuffin huh

they sent you

(so they are worse than useles)

This. Mortals can't make up their mind.
Also they need struggles to overcome to make their lives meaningful or something probably.

I like to imagine gods, especially ones that were once mortal, being essentially as slow as mortals.

Like, picture being a sea god. You have phenomenal powers of water magic and the like, but that's more or less it. You are god of all of the sea, and as part of your godhood, must attend to every aspect of it. You don't have to answer every prayer of a sailor, but you do have to listen to them.

And you have to be there to releases the kraken or call the storm in retaliation for divine grievances.

So sure, you might be able to swim super fast to every place or ride the waves or something like that, but you have to realistically address it, even as a god, and consciously act as divine.

So even threats worth considering can take a while.

Can gods conduct trade?
Or would they be favors?
Could there be like a favor market for gods?
Like honest gods could issue securities for their word of honor or something?

Maybe thats where cleric scrolls come from. Particularly ancient beings with vast powers bargain for divine miracles like currency, and honest gods have to answer them regardless of who holds them...

For some, its a matter of practicality. If you don't honor your debts to other gods whos powers you find useful, they will stop honoring yours. Certain gods won't trade in certain script because their domains are oppisitely aligned, so they have to go through middlemen.. and thats how you get cursed scrolls!

they have to honor the word of the agreement, but not how its lettered.

Or the letter, but not the word.

Not honoring somebodies currency due to their nationality is permitted, not honoring currency due to their culture is not.

Too busy with the games of divinity/lost faith in humanity.

Gods in their age are lazy or they just want to sleep. They drown out the more banal whining prayers, and only answer the ones they really want to shut up.

Younger gods are loud, dancing in the moonlight atop mountains. That's why they try to prevent the coming of new gods. The hypocrisy is that they were once young, and usurped creation from their superiors who only wanted to rest eternal.

sounds like a metaphore for old age

They are a tad too strong, sometimes beyond what they can control. So for nothing short of miracles that even mortal magic can't attain, it's just better to let the clerics leech a minuscule part of their power.

Your second assertion has seen you through to the light of truth.

The Concordat of the Illimitable Tome

>At least big ones like dragons and stuff.

You think *dragons* are the worst things that gods have to worry about?

in my setting the gods used to walk among their creations and influence everything from politics, commerce, and culture

things similar to nation states rose up around gods as their leaders, which lead to wars, which lead to great and terrible suffering for the followers of the gods
it also lead to the near annihilation of the world and given the consequences of a war many years beforehand the gods had lost the ability to create life from scratch
in an effort to preserve their ant farm and not shatter the planet they left the physical world and now influence it from the metaphysical the vast majority of the time (on very rare occasions they will choose conduits for their divine powers to influence major events in history but they have strict rules on exactly how much they are allowed to do)
they are allowed to speak to their followers and do other acts of the divine to prove their existence but no longer physically dictate the flow of history

this is why they need followers to do their bidding for them

Way I see it, if the setting has physical gods, they can't be in so many places at once. They've gotta delegate. Their power is imparted to the faithful and they take care of all the petty problems.
As for actually stepping in, that probably won't happen until something that actually threatens their status of godhood or their dominion as rulers/guiding figures.
Guarantee you a chef washes his hands twice as thoroughly with a health inspector over his shoulder. Gods won't step in unless their job security is threatened, which, being gods, is really unlikely.

Well in your pic, they DID try to take care of the great celestial evil themselves, and succeeded in destroying the majority of it but a small piece survived and got away.

Stop playing DnD.

Fucking hell that image... I rarely cringe at such things but this one got me. That's just evil.

Same reason the King doesn't do everything himself

Just on a bigger scale

Well, that's how 'gods as big magic dudes' works

Some gods are all ineffable and mysterious and transcendent and inscrutable n shit

Because gods start worlds up as a means of entertaining themselves. It wouldn't be that fun if they could solve all of the problems themselves.

It would be like watching a show and deciding the villain just dies to stop there from being any conflict.

If they did everything themselves the mortals would learn nothing.

the questions stands for any high-fantasy system that has deities in it, not just DnD.

Because other gods oppose them so while they're kept busy fighting it out they try to send out their followers but the other god's followers oppose theirs so the followers send THEIR followers and so on down to the adventuring party themselves who can be any or a mix of legitimate followers, independent contractors, people whose interests/boss's interests overlap with the god, and some just along for the ride.
The party themselves are likewise opposed by mortal servants of the other gods and forces and often pass on duties themselves whenever possible.

They do. At least they used to. They interfered too much even.

Then THEIR gods punished them for it.
Now they can't do much anymore.
Be grateful they cared more than their own gods did.
Perhaps one day, we will create beings of our own and do better.

In my setting when gods directly interact with the material plane it's like a nuke going off complete with environment altering fallout

So they try hard to avoid warping their creation into some kind of bastardized abominable version of themselves

Luke?

For the same reason British food sucks.
>"We had an empire to run!"
>-John Cleese

Because they have empowered priests to handle that for them?
What a silly question.

>believe in several all powerful cosmic deities
>said deities have never been mortal beings and that means they can't relate to us in any way
>they're basically super powerful omnipotent ethereal cosmic psychopaths that have their eyes on you
>you pray to them to give you a small amount of aid in solving your problems not because you want them to help ( you do need the help ) but mostly because you're actually afraid of what they would do if they decide to get up and solve it themselves

Wise deities are not kings, but rather system administrators. If they were to solve everything, the people would cease trying to work through their own problems, thus creating even more work for the gods and taking their attentions away from the more important task of making sure the universe works as it should. It's a vicious cycle that is best done away with.

The same reason power countries sponsor small wars in distant countries instead of fighting directly.
You don't want to start Heaven's War 3, but you can send some "humanitarian aid" or advices to local murderhobos and kings that share your ideology.

That's against the rules and sets a dangerous precedent for turning whatever world their attention is currently set on into a sandbox.

what the fuck even happened in this image?