Gods of the Multiverse
Source: Player’s Handbook (2014), p. 293
Religion is an important part of life in the worlds of the D&D multiverse. When gods walk the world, clerics channel divine power, evil cults perform dark sacrifices in subterranean lairs, and shining paladins stand like beacons against the darkness, it’s hard to be ambivalent about the deities and deny their existence.
Many people in the worlds of D&D worship different gods at different times and circumstances. People in the Forgotten Realms, for example, might pray to Sune for luck in love, make an offering to Waukeen before heading to the market, and pray to appease Talos when a severe storm blows in—all in the same day. Many people have a favorite among the gods, one whose ideals and teachings they make their own. And a few people dedicate themselves entirely to a single god, usually serving as a priest or champion of that god’s ideals. Your DM determines which gods, if any, are worshiped in his or her campaign. From among the gods available, you can choose a single deity for your character to serve, worship, or pay lip service to. Or you can pick a few that your character prays to most often. Or just make a mental note of the gods who are revered in your DM’s campaign so you can invoke their names when appropriate. If you’re playing a cleric or a character with the Acolyte background, decide which god your deity serves or served, and consider the deity’s suggested domains when selecting your character’s domain.
The Life and Death Domains
Many deities in this section suggest the Life domain, particularly if they are closely associated with healing, protection, childbirth, nurturing, or fertility. As described in the chapter 3, though, the Life domain is incredibly broad, and a cleric of any non-evil deity can choose it.
A number of other deities, mostly evil ones, suggest the Death domain, which is detailed in the Dungeon Master’s Guide. Most clerics who choose this domain are evil NPCs, but if you want to worship a god of death, consult your Dungeon Master.
D&D Pantheons
Each world in the D&D multiverse has its own pantheons of deities, ranging in size from the teeming pantheons of the Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk to the more focused religions of Eberron and Dragonlance. Many of the nonhuman races worship the same gods on different worlds—Moradin, for example, is revered by dwarves of the Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, and many other worlds.
The Forgotten Realms
Dozens of deities are revered, worshiped, and feared throughout the world of the Forgotten Realms. At least thirty deities are widely known across the Realms, and many more are worshiped locally, by individual tribes, small cults, or certain sects of larger religious temples.
Greyhawk
The gods of Greyhawk come from at least four different pantheons, representing the faiths of the various ethnic groups that populated the continent of Oerik over the ages. As a result, there’s a great deal of overlap in their portfolios: Pelor is the Flan god of the sun and Pholtus is the Oeridian sun god, for example.
Dragonlance
The gods of the world of Krynn are three families: seven gods of good headed by Paladine and Mishakal, seven of neutrality headed by Gilean, and seven of evil headed by Takhisis and Sargonnas. These deities have been called by many different names and held in varying levels of esteem by different peoples and cultures through the world’s history, but they are the only gods of this world—their place fixed in the stars as constellations.
Eberron
The world of Eberron has many different religions, but the most important revolves around a pantheon called the Sovereign Host and their malign shadow, the Dark Six. The gods of the Sovereign Host are thought to have dominion over every aspect of existence, and to speak with a unified voice. But the Dark Six are the primitive, bloody, and cruel gods who offer a dissenting voice. Eberron’s other religions are very different from the traditional D&D pantheons. The monotheistic Church of the Silver Flame is devoted to fighting against evil in the world, but plagued by corruption in its own ranks. The philosophy of the Blood of Vol teaches that divinity lies within all mortal beings and reveres the undead who have secured that immortality. Various mad cults are devoted to the demons and horrors imprisoned in Eberron’s Underdark (called Khyber, the Dragon Below). The followers of the Path of Light believe that the world is heading toward a glorious future where the shadows that cloud this world will be transformed into light. And two related nations of elves revere their ancestral spirits: the Undying Court, preserved as spirits or even undead forms, and the glorified Spirits of the Past, the great heroes of ancient wars.
Deities of Eberron
Nonhuman Deities
Certain gods closely associated with nonhuman races are revered on many different worlds, though not always in the same way. The nonhuman races of the Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk share these deities.
Nonhuman races often have whole pantheons of their own. Besides Moradin, for example, the dwarf gods include Moradin’s wife, Berronar Truesilver, and a number of other gods thought to be their children and grandchildren: Abbathor, Clangeddin Silverbeard, Dugmaren Brightmantle, Dumathoin, Gorm Gulthyn, Haela Brightaxe, Marthammor Duin, Sharindlar, Thard Harr, and Vergadain. Individual clans and kingdoms of dwarves might revere some, all, or none of these deities, and some have other gods unknown (or known by other names) to outsiders.
Fantasy-Historical Pantheons
The Celtic, Egyptian, Greek, and Norse pantheons are fantasy interpretations of historical religions from our world’s ancient times. They include deities that are most appropriate for use in a D&D game, divorced from their historical context in the real world and united into pantheons that serve the needs of the game.
The Celtic Pantheon
It’s said that something wild lurks in the heart of every soul, a space that thrills to the sound of geese calling at night, to the whispering wind through the pines, to the unexpected red of mistletoe on an oak—and it is in this space that the Celtic gods dwell. They sprang from the brook and stream, their might heightened by the strength of the oak and the beauty of the woodlands and open moor. When the first forester dared put a name to the face seen in the bole of a tree or the voice babbling in a brook, these gods forced themselves into being. The Celtic gods are as often served by druids as by clerics, for they are closely aligned with the forces of nature that druids revere.
The Greek Pantheon
The gods of Olympus make themselves known with the gentle lap of waves against the shores and the crash of the thunder among the cloud—enshrouded peaks. The thick boar-infested woods and the sere, olive-covered hillsides hold evidence of their passing. Every aspect of nature echoes with their presence, and they’ve made a place for themselves inside the human heart, too.
The Egyptian Pantheon
These gods are a young dynasty of an ancient divine family, heirs to the rulership of the cosmos and the maintenance of the divine principle of Ma’at—the fundamental order of truth, justice, law, and order that puts gods, mortal pharaohs, and ordinary men and women in their logical and rightful place in the universe.
The Egyptian pantheon is unusual in having three gods with the Death domain of different alignments.
Anubis is the lawful neutral god of the afterlife, who judges the souls of the dead. Set is a chaotic evil god of murder, perhaps best known for killing his brother Osiris. And Nephthys is a chaotic good goddess of mourning. Thus, although most clerics of the Death domain (found in the Dungeon Master’s Guide) are villainous characters, clerics who serve Anubis or Nephthys need not be.
The Norse Pantheon
Where the land plummets from the snowy hills into the icy fjords below, where the longboats draw up on to the beach, where the glaciers flow forward and retreat with every fall and spring—this is the land of the Vikings, the home of the Norse pantheon. It’s a brutal clime, and one that calls for brutal living. The warriors of the land have had to adapt to the harsh conditions in order to survive, but they haven’t been too twisted by the needs of their environment. Given the necessity of raiding for food and wealth, it’s surprising the mortals turned out as well as they did. Their powers reflect the need these warriors had for strong leadership and decisive action. Thus, they see their deities in every bend of a river, hear them in the crash of the thunder and the booming of the glaciers, and smell them in the smoke of a burning longhouse.
The Norse pantheon includes two main families, the Aesir (deities of war and destiny) and the Vanir (gods of fertility and prosperity). Once enemies, these two families are now closely allied against their common enemies, the giants (including the gods Surtur and Thrym). Like the gods of Greyhawk, gods in different families sometimes have overlap in their spheres of influence: Frey (of the Vanir) and Odur (of the Aesir) are both associated with the sun, for example.