Gods

Are there any examples of a fantasy setting where gods aren't actually real? Are there any examples (aside from 40k) of a sci-fi setting where gods are real?

What about ancient Japanese settings where "gods" were just super stronk spirits, and were essentially just another race?

define 'gods' senpai

"god" is just a classification of power, same as "titan"

Even in Christianity the ontological proof states that "God is the greatest being of which we can conceive." It doesn't say "this is God, here are his powers" it says "God means he's the biggest and the stompiest"
God as the creator means that as the understanding of creation expands, so too does the conception of that greatest being.

The issue is people thinking words have the same implied meaning across languages. "gods" in English, and many European languages, is linked to God, and people get dumb about what it means.
Meanwhile "deus" or "theós" only has the implied link to christianity because of the Roman Catholics.

We go to something like pre-contact Nahuatl, and their idea of gods as a classification of being is entirely different.

In short, you can't have a setting "without gods" because anything strong enough might be considered a god, or by virtue of creation existing, the assumed creator might be a god.

I'm not entirely sure, but I guess what I had in mind was beings which are worshiped and gain strength and/or give rewards on the basis of that worship. Which isn't particularly satisfying- a person could be worshiped and give out rewards to those who worshiped them, but that wouldn't make them a god in my mind. So some sort of immortality and super-natural element is required too I suppose. Rewards along the lines of "this farmer made a tribute which satisfied me so I will bless him with a bountiful crop."

>Are there any examples (aside from 40k) of a sci-fi setting where gods are real?

If I remember correctly that was the big plot twist in Pillars of Eternity.

Dark Souls?

The weird thing about that one is that the gods were still powerful extraplanar beings that performed miracles when you prayed to them and could grant you divine power, it's just that they came from a different place than people thought they came from and the game has everyone act like this invalidates their existence as gods for some reason.

mythological figures of worship thought to have power over creation and/or the world

While Gwyn & Co wouldn't measure up to your everyday omnipotent monotheistic god, they're certainly up to standards for many older, polytheistic mythologies. The Norse gods for example weren't even inherently immune to old age, they just had the apple tree of youth growing in their back yard. Without it they'd age and die like any other mortal.

Yeah but they're at a low enough power level that a distinctly not divine undead knight can still stab them to death with moderate effort and some trial and error

It's kind of the same thing as Stargate, isn't it? Instead of gods, they're parasitic alien space worms with technology advanced enough to make it look like magic to the primitive people they rule.

And Balder was slain by a single wooden arrow.

touhou ?

>Are there any examples of a fantasy setting where gods aren't actually real?
Not really, no. A big part of it is that you have casters like Clerics and Paladins (depending on the game) whose powers come from the gods, meaning they're real, but the obvious work-around on that is to just say that their powers just come from another source or maybe just from themselves and their beliefs and convictions are what really powers them and not a god.

>Are there any examples (aside from 40k) of a sci-fi setting where gods are real?
Hmm. Well, the Force is real in Star Wars, but that's not really a god. Nah, I can't really think of any settings where this is true.

>Not having every Paladin and Cleric in your setting being deluded mages

Gods are what you make of them. If something is worshiped and revered as above all other things it's a god in the eyes of those people.

Like Cthulhu may as well be a god to his cultists

>Are there any examples of a fantasy setting where gods aren't actually real?

Katherine Kerr's Deverry series.

Don't bother reading it.

And, funnily enough, he's a priest of what I guess we could call the true gods there.

How does one become a god in fantasy universes? Does one just have to get enough magical power?

depends on the setting

I once had a campaign setting where the main gods of the Atrahki nation (basically the Netherlands plus a bit of Germany) where twins, brother and sister. They were real people who founded the nation in the middle of a war with a neighboring country that was basically Switzerland. The sister inspired the Atrakhi to join together to kill the invading Not!Swiss, and the brother basically started an industrial revolution that tied the whole country together economically for the first time ever. Ever since they've been worshiped in a decentralized faith, kept alive by provincial chieftains and shamans. They're invoked pretty often in daily prayers, like they're a combination of Joan of Arc and Thomas Edison.

Be powerful. Be worshiped

Or if the setting already has Gods I guess they could say 'You're a demi God now'


I'm going this 'deluded mages' thing. Magic is kind of a physical force which is drawn to emotions; so a cleric devoted to his god will be able to do it, and the magic manifests differently to how it does in a Wizard who has studied it as a science.

Balder was slain by said arrow because it was his only actual weakness

Well it sort of does, because it shows that the gods aren't the creators but the created. So there's concrete proof that they're not all-powerful or particularly godlike. Just like, super-powerful amalgamations of souls, more or less

>Are there any examples (aside from 40k) of a sci-fi setting where gods are real?
Destiny has the Traveler (which may or may not be a god) and the Worm Gods, which are most certainly real. There's even a whole religious text for them called the Books of Sorrow.

I believe the existence of Gods is largely left up to the reader in the Witcher series.

Well, both the Traveller and the Worm Gods are more like vessels, avatars, or otherwise empowered mortal servants of the real gods. Light and Dark go around bestowing power and various entities.

>Are there any examples (aside from 40k) of a sci-fi setting where gods are real?
The Greek gods are canon to Star Trek.