Let's take this back to something you said way back on page 1...
No specific god is mentioned. No details are given at all to work off of. Meanwhile, despite this topic being covered many many times, not just in video games but also in both classic and modern literature, you seem to want an answer that no one else has thought of before.
"Get that legendary thing" is among the solutions seemingly deemed un-creative.
It begs the question as to what you are actually looking for in an answer here.
Also back on page 1, you said
Given that, it is really as simple as saying 'I look at the god funny and they die from an overload of righteous indignation.'
When there is effectively no DM, you simply win.
And if you are expecting any of us to come up with some completely new, unique method, again, completely without any further details or context, it is probably best not to expect much.
Oh no doubt that my hopes for this thread have changed a bit since the first posting. The ideas have started to bend more towards DM ways to make it work, and less PC ways.
That's because PC's do not have the power to kill gods as a part of their portfolio in 5e. There's no stats for gods and no weapons, features, or spells that say "you can kill a god with this". Killing a god is entirely up to the DM creating a situation that makes it possible, not the PC's coming up with some clever trick within the RAW of the game.
I would do it story driven based on the group. Maybe start with an avatar fight a la RotFM to banish the physical presence, then work on weakening their power by reducing their religious base somehow, then a planar questline to find the one weakness or item, plus a quest to obtain a divine spark to give the players quasi-divine status, then the final assault onto the gods home plane. The actual battle with the god wouldn't be a straight stat block, but more of an event where they have to complete some task while they take excessive amounts of damage/control each round representing the god controlling the reality of the plane.
Another idea: Create a spell that uses a god's avatar to drag them through to the material plane and bind them temporarily. Then, while they're there, in order for this concept to make sense, they are rendered mortal and you kill them lol.
Imagine a simple tiered structure with god-world/Olympus on top, the material plane in the middle, and the underworld/hell at the bottom. A god reaches their hand down in the form of an avatar, which is metaphysically connected back to the god. The avatar gets dunked into hell, causing the god to fall into the material plane.
It doesn't really fit the cosmology we're used to in D&D, but in the cosmology we're used to, there's no way to kill a god anyway. So.
You'd need to collaborate with the most powerful Wizards. Maybe Clerics too, because you'd need to hide your research and experiments from the gods, which I believe only other gods can do. And you'd need something approximating an avatar, on which to test the spell repeatedly. It might also be wise to charter a space in hell where no one will be looking. You don't want devils selling out your plans.
So, the plan would look like this: 1) Acquire the trust of the followers of the god of secrets, probably by doing some sort of espionage. 2) Enter the ruins of the result of the most heretical thing to have happened in history. Karsus's Folly perhaps? Find out how to synthesize an avatar. 3) Get the assistance of the best Wizards, probably by getting them dates. 4) Go to the underworld and find a place nobody in the underworld wants to go. Go there, ensure it's safe to send your avatar there. 5) Spend a long time developing the spell in secret. 6) Wait for god to create avatar. You may need to discover immortality also lol. 7) Cast spell. 8) Kill god.
That's because PC's do not have the power to kill gods as a part of their portfolio in 5e. There's no stats for gods and no weapons, features, or spells that say "you can kill a god with this". Killing a god is entirely up to the DM creating a situation that makes it possible, not the PC's coming up with some clever trick within the RAW of the game.
Cool.
So come up with something that doesn't use PCs. Come up with an idea that has a (non God level) being able to kill a god. Make it sudo "believable" and interesting enough that you/the other people at your table would be interested enough to pursue the storyline. The whole point is a though exercise to see how people would deal with a complex issue, that's not simply taking the most direct, simple, and overused route.
Hell i could have changed the frame work to something stupid simple like "how would you get past a locked door that can never be opened/damaged/destroyed?". Same basic concept, you are put up against a thing that is 'impossible to do'; but anyone who can think a little outside of the box, could come up with a work around.
That's because PC's do not have the power to kill gods as a part of their portfolio in 5e. There's no stats for gods and no weapons, features, or spells that say "you can kill a god with this". Killing a god is entirely up to the DM creating a situation that makes it possible, not the PC's coming up with some clever trick within the RAW of the game.
Cool.
So come up with something that doesn't use PCs. Come up with an idea that has a (non God level) being able to kill a god. Make it sudo "believable" and interesting enough that you/the other people at your table would be interested enough to pursue the storyline. The whole point is a though exercise to see how people would deal with a complex issue, that's not simply taking the most direct, simple, and overused route.
Hell i could have changed the frame work to something stupid simple like "how would you get past a locked door that can never be opened/damaged/destroyed?". Same basic concept, you are put up against a thing that is 'impossible to do'; but anyone who can think a little outside of the box, could come up with a work around.
There are spells already in the game for bypassing such an obstacle. And, as others have said, “thinking outside the box” only takes a player so far within the rules based structure of a game and is almost always contingent on the DM approving it, so the abstract question is of limited purpose and applicability since the actual result is highly variable and subjective.
And, once more, I did previously describe a method for killing a god. It did ultimately boil down to “have the DM set up the means”, but that is literally how you accomplish any major working in the game. The capabilities that players are expressly given to exercise at their discretion are limited in scope, and deicide falls well outside that scope. That’s not to say anything else is completely impossible, just that for those things you need to sit down with your DM and ask them if and how the characters could accomplish such a thing. You can’t just come up with an idea and declare it will work.
I think your memory is more about your group of friends and less about published materials.
Gary Gygax published the D&D boxed sets which took players from future hero to god killing other gods, all with game mechanics provided. I'm sure the spelling is off but this D&D took place in a world called "Mystara". While the newer versions of D&D have many great attributes, there has never been a better set of rules to handle kingdom building or god slaying.
Greyhawk was the AD&D 1e campaign setting created by Gary Gygax. In 1st edition there were several different types of deities. Quasi Deities were mortals who became gods. Some even manage to move higher up the ranks within the system for Gods to gain and lose power. While the rules for god slaying were mostly left to the imagination of the players, this is the system that spawned Dragon Lance and Forgotten Realms. Both of those settings were created by early AD&D 1e authors based upon their home campaigns, where god killing was a part of the story.
I created my first homebrew campaign setting when I was either 7 or 8 years old. My memory is a bit fuzzy on the details. Since then I have used many official campaign settings, and created my own. There are benefits to using a world that your players know because it was published. There are benefits to a fully homebrew world. Lately my sweet spot has been a hybrid of standard and custom.
It takes a tremendous amount of time to self publish all the lore the players should know about the homebrew world where they grew up. It takes serious time to create maps, monsters, NPCs, and villains. I generally prefer to use maps created by others, but often times I have trouble finding any that offer the creative and challenging obstacles I like to include.
If you want gods that die then create a whole pantheon of them.
The Greek and Roman gods killed each other. The Viking pantheon is the same. I am sure their are more out there but you get the idea.
Create a whole new pantheon that lets gods kill each other. Once you have that then it should be far more feasible for a really really high level player to make a stab, so to speak, at it.
And as for AD&D1 they did have write ups for those gods and deities. Their equivalent levels were WAY higher than 20. Most had 5 different classes and they would have levels ranging from 10 to 20 in each class. Add in their special powers and their choice of magic items and you have a pretty formidable being. AD&D also had the proviso for gods that were not killed on their own plane of power. They were not killed, just sent back to their plane of power to instantly form a new body. If somehow they were killed on their personal plane of power then they would be dead. Unless another god protected them and or brought them back.
"the DMG material for gods talks about them as simply a part of the setting, like the landscape. "
You are putting a large amount of weight on one sentence in the DMG, while ignoring a bunch of stuff included in official 5e rules which can be bought right here on DND Beyond.
I don't want to give away any spoilers, so I will just mention that the "Time of Troubles" is mentioned in one of the rule books. In another time travel is mentioned.
According to 5e RAW it is possible to travel back in time with a group of heroes and the correct gear, then kill a god when you know where they will be. Time paradoxes can be complicated, but it doesn't prevent the basic plan from working.
Modules contain monsters and magical items not found in the core rules. Who is to say Gods that haven't appeared in the core rules can't have a stat block?
I've specifically acknowledged the Time of Troubles as a "plot device" mechanism for killing gods. Time travel is the same deal. I have repeatedly stated that it is entirely possible to have a story that involves deicide, but it needs to be something the DM tees up for the players, it's not something the players can make happen on their own initiative. Also, even outside of the core rules, I'm not familiar with any monsters or items in 5e that are described as being capable of killing gods. That doesn't mean you can't homebrew up you own +5 god slaying sword or whatever, but there's no material that supports the idea deities are something sufficiently skilled players could successfully take a run at in the same manner as a being like Zariel or Graz'zt. Once more, I'm not saying it's completely out of the question and should not be done, but the answer to the question of "how would you kill a god" basically boils down to "however your DM tells you to do it".
But its up to the DM to write them up. WoTC seems a little reluctant to write them up themselves.
"According to 5e RAW it is possible to travel back in time with a group of heroes and the correct gear, then kill a god when you know where they will be. Time paradoxes can be complicated, but it doesn't prevent the basic plan from working. " Yes and gods have that very same ability. So why would they even let a character live if they tried something like that. They will live through the attack if it takes more than one round so, unless you can follow them through the planes, and they will then go back in time and eliminate that character from existence before they make the attack on the god. And if not that god the others will not let it stand they will just kill the party ASAP.
As for time travel. Don't let unlimited time travel, back in time especially, get into anything. It gives the traveler the power of the gods. Unlimited power over everything and everyone.
If I let time travel into a game I was DMing I would limit it to a spell that would let you sleep/cold storage/stasis into the future and only let time travel back in time to a very limited amount line a few minutes at most.or a few rounds to let a few die rolls be redone to change a resent outcome. Unlimited time travel backwards would make the first god to discover it the most powerful one of them all. Why let the others gain the ability?
I have repeatedly stated that it is entirely possible to have a story that involves deicide, but it needs to be something the DM tees up for the players, it's not something the players can make happen on their own initiative.
I think you'd get more out of this thread if you interpreted OP's question as "if you were the DM and you wanted it to be possible for the players to kill a god, how would you have it work?"
Unlimited time travel backwards would make the first god to discover it the most powerful one of them all. Why let the others gain the ability?
I know of the time travel effect that Pheralanpathfinder was referencing. Without risking spoilers, I'll just say, it's not unlimited time travel backwards. It would be more accurate to compare it to a one-way shuttle. It goes to one particular time.
However, Sphinxes can freely send you back in time. Here's an excerpt from the Androsphinx's lair actions in the Monster Manual: "The flow of time within the lair is altered such that everything within moves up to 10 years forward or backward (sphinx’s choice)." There's nothing preventing him from doing it again and again. Say, every minute. Presumably it wouldn't work if he tried to go to a time before his lair was there. But I digress.
From the sphinx's lore entry in the Monster Manual: "Some sphinxes are high priests of the gods that create them[.]" So it's possible for a god to create a sphinx. And it's possible for a sphinx to go back in time and take along whoever's around. So the only two remaining question, are, 1) is it possible for a god to go inside a sphinx's lair?, and 2) is it possible for a god to command or persuade a sphinx to use its power? I don't see why not, and I've not seen any evidence to the contrary, so guess what, gods DO have access to time travel. If that's true, then you're wrong about what would happen.
I think it's compelling to suggest that the gods' free access to time travel is the reason the future-telling spells like Augury are on the Cleric spell list. It suggests that the gods are all locked into some kind of predetermined sequence of events, not because they lack free will, but because they've all already maneuvered everything as best they can using time travel to benefit themselves and to avoid harm. From their perspective, the game is already finished, but there's also versions of themselves, presumably, at many junctions, who are still playing. Time travel is confusing.
Nothing can be proposed by a player without the DM first forming a world that its possible in. Then the DM has to agree that the idea of the player is possible and agrees with it.
Asking how a player would do it is not in any way possible to answer.
Its not true that the game has to be played the way a player wants but instead is played the way the DM wants.( the player needs to convince the DM first if he wants something)
A better question would have been. As a DM how would you allow the players to kill a god? And how would you write up that god as an NPC?
I was asking as a player. With what I assumed was the implied idea that you could do anything, and it would fit within this imaginary DM’s world. Maybe your character is an “extra” MF who would try to kill a God via crushing them under “infinite” rose petals. I assumed since you are killing them, the God would be evil, or at least a God your character had issues with.
I’m looking for a personal flourish, some unbound creativity. And honestly, I’m not impressed by the answers thus far. (Though Geann’s idea for a level 50 Sorc does spring new ideas/questions to mind.)
Looking back on it, what I suggested a moment ago absolutely isn't what OP was getting at. (Also, that was nearly 2 years ago?) That said, I don't think there's really a lot to say for OP's initial question -- restriction breeds creativity, after all --, so we might as well shift the topic. Well, we've already shifted it, but we could do so with more intentionality.
Just because its in an official book does not mean every DM needs to accept it into their world. Or even the power of time travel for that sphinx.
And your right. Time travel is confusing. Thats why I leave it out. It has ruined every story line its ever been introduced to unless the story is about time travel like Dr Who.
And if this thread has finally been reduced to talking about time travel as one of the very few ways to even make it possible to kill a god then its pretty much over for me.
I have repeatedly stated that it is entirely possible to have a story that involves deicide, but it needs to be something the DM tees up for the players, it's not something the players can make happen on their own initiative.
I think you'd get more out of this thread if you interpreted OP's question as "if you were the DM and you wanted it to be possible for the players to kill a god, how would you have it work?"
I've discussed it some from that perspective, but the lore is sparse enough that it all typically just boils down to "find/create the god slaying MacGuffin, kill the god with it, ???, profit". There's also the old "wipe out their followers" bit, but considering there's already a couple evil gods who have that as their ideal endgame for the multiverse, it seems like a bit much that the party is going to pull it off when armies and vast conspiracies haven't made much headway. Plus genocide is not really a great look, even if it's "sanctioned" genocide against "evildoers".
I dunno, the material on gods is so limited it's hard to actually brainstorm something that engages with the setting and concepts rather than just being a very overt MacGuffin/deus ex.
In regards Time Travel, I think the only story I actually appreciated it in was the first Terminator, where you realize at the end that the initial choice to time travel is what led to the story being possible in the first place. Overall I’ve found time travel to just turn stories into loose piles of Swiss cheese that comes apart on even a casual inspection.
Nothing can be proposed by a player without the DM first forming a world that its possible in. Then the DM has to agree that the idea of the player is possible and agrees with it.
Asking how a player would do it is not in any way possible to answer.
Its not true that the game has to be played the way a player wants but instead is played the way the DM wants.( the player needs to convince the DM first if he wants something)
A better question would have been. As a DM how would you allow the players to kill a god? And how would you write up that god as an NPC?
You ALMOST had the point.
Yes, the DM has to make a world where it's possible to fight and kill a god (feel like the frame work of the question already implies that the DM has done this). Yes the DM has to agree with the way the player chooses to go about doing that. BUT, and this is a big but, the player has to actually pitch an idea to the DM, before the DM can agree or disagree with that method working.
No DM is going to just write their players a blank check to kill a god (that's how you get '(player) gives God a very sassy look, and God dropping dead' for your "epic" final battle). Nor should they railroad the players into finding the "MacGuffin of God-killing. The well known, one-of-a-kind, legendary thing that was once (or perhaps multiple times) been used to kill a different god at some point in the past.... and that the other gods have just kind of 'let continue to free float around the world/planes' for (amount of time) since the last mortal KILLED A GOD."
So lets focus on that part where the player pitches an idea. Sure it might not work for every game, but that's part of the fun.
Heck i've even said that it doesn't have to be a PC directly doing most of the work. So you can kind of circumvent a lot of the limitations that come with a "limited" list of spells. I mean let's be honest. Most high level NPCs (specifically NPC casters) have access to stuff that that doesn't directly connect to a canon spell. Much less a canon spell, that is canonically attached to a canon item.
Just because its in an official book does not mean every DM needs to accept it into their world. Or even the power of time travel for that sphinx.
Sure, but presumably the sphinx and the gods were written to coexist. I mean, the text for the sphinx literally references gods, so obviously they were. With that being the case, we can judge that it's not an immutable conclusion that time travel = one god above all others. You could certainly run a game where time travel does result in one god dominating the others, and you could run one where time travel doesn't exist, but you don't HAVE to run one where time travel doesn't exist just because you're NOT running one where one god dominates the others. You follow me?
Usually in stories with time travel, there's some specific circumstances where it's impossible for the person with all the power to see the outcome of something. I'm gonna call it an event horizon. Be it the power of human free will, or the power of love, or sometimes the witness doesn't exist past a certain point in time so they can't see past that point... You'd need something like this if you wanted to have a god-killing adventure in a setting where the gods can time travel. The only other way, as far as I can see it, is if the god accepts its death as part of its grand cosmic plans. Maybe as a necessary step in the plan, or maybe just as an inevitable price to pay. But this wouldn't pose a challenge to the players. It would deprive them of the ultimate payoff of a god-killing adventure. The god would have no reason to fight back in earnest. Plus, the god basically wins in this scenario, even if it dies. That's no fun. So we need an event horizon.
No event horizon truly holds up to scrutiny, but in a good story, you're not inclined to care about that. It just needs to FEEL appropriate. So we ought to begin with why this adventure is about killing a god in the first place. What does a god represent in this tale, and what does it mean to kill it? Unfortunately, we're writing in a vacuum here. We don't know.
I think the common things a god represents are "determinism," "oppression," and "gatekeepers." In other words, defeating a god means one of three things most of the time: 1) You matter, you have agency. 2) Justice and fairness are real, crime doesn't pay. Or, 3) You did it, you won in the biggest way possible.
I would guess it's usually more than one of those, but probably you can focus on one. Let's pick determinism. In the hypothetical scenario for today, the god is a reflection of the void. It exists to say, "things cannot change, you mean nothing, give up," and we kill it to refute this. Okay. An event horizon that fits this would be one like in The Matrix: The gods think they know exactly how any mortal would respond to a particular scenario, so they don't bother planning for the alternative. Let's say the various choices mortals make create an infinite web of branching timelines, so naturally a god has to narrow down which ones to pay attention to and travel between. Ta-da!
I think the biggest issue to me - which was very fairly pointed out earlier in this thread - is the difficulty with entering the planar domain of a god that doesn’t want to allow you access. The only real way I can see around this is by treating the god as something along the lines of a Lich: destroy their Prime Avatar on a neutral plane (I think there’s supposed to be a plane that negates all divine power but it’s been awhile (Spire in the Concordant Opposition of the Out- lands?) or the Prime Material, and after that assail the gods home plane while they’re regenerating. I don’t really like that personally though. You could also maybe have the players find someway to disguise themselves when trying to enter the domain, IDK.
Nothing can be proposed by a player without the DM first forming a world that its possible in. Then the DM has to agree that the idea of the player is possible and agrees with it.
Asking how a player would do it is not in any way possible to answer.
Its not true that the game has to be played the way a player wants but instead is played the way the DM wants.( the player needs to convince the DM first if he wants something)
A better question would have been. As a DM how would you allow the players to kill a god? And how would you write up that god as an NPC?
You ALMOST had the point.
Yes, the DM has to make a world where it's possible to fight and kill a god (feel like the frame work of the question already implies that the DM has done this). Yes the DM has to agree with the way the player chooses to go about doing that. BUT, and this is a big but, the player has to actually pitch an idea to the DM, before the DM can agree or disagree with that method working.
No DM is going to just write their players a blank check to kill a god (that's how you get '(player) gives God a very sassy look, and God dropping dead' for your "epic" final battle). Nor should they railroad the players into finding the "MacGuffin of God-killing. The well known, one-of-a-kind, legendary thing that was once (or perhaps multiple times) been used to kill a different god at some point in the past.... and that the other gods have just kind of 'let continue to free float around the world/planes' for (amount of time) since the last mortal KILLED A GOD."
So lets focus on that part where the player pitches an idea. Sure it might not work for every game, but that's part of the fun.
Heck i've even said that it doesn't have to be a PC directly doing most of the work. So you can kind of circumvent a lot of the limitations that come with a "limited" list of spells. I mean let's be honest. Most high level NPCs (specifically NPC casters) have access to stuff that that doesn't directly connect to a canon spell. Much less a canon spell, that is canonically attached to a canon item.
Alternatively, the DM might decide on the method from the outset. Honestly, I'd be judicious on players looking to describe that much of the arc for something this big; those kind of asks tend to mean that player is looking to showboat. Besides, from a player perspective, I think it's more fun when you don't know how the whole arc is going to play out already.
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That's because PC's do not have the power to kill gods as a part of their portfolio in 5e. There's no stats for gods and no weapons, features, or spells that say "you can kill a god with this". Killing a god is entirely up to the DM creating a situation that makes it possible, not the PC's coming up with some clever trick within the RAW of the game.
I would do it story driven based on the group. Maybe start with an avatar fight a la RotFM to banish the physical presence, then work on weakening their power by reducing their religious base somehow, then a planar questline to find the one weakness or item, plus a quest to obtain a divine spark to give the players quasi-divine status, then the final assault onto the gods home plane. The actual battle with the god wouldn't be a straight stat block, but more of an event where they have to complete some task while they take excessive amounts of damage/control each round representing the god controlling the reality of the plane.
Another idea: Create a spell that uses a god's avatar to drag them through to the material plane and bind them temporarily. Then, while they're there, in order for this concept to make sense, they are rendered mortal and you kill them lol.
Imagine a simple tiered structure with god-world/Olympus on top, the material plane in the middle, and the underworld/hell at the bottom. A god reaches their hand down in the form of an avatar, which is metaphysically connected back to the god. The avatar gets dunked into hell, causing the god to fall into the material plane.
It doesn't really fit the cosmology we're used to in D&D, but in the cosmology we're used to, there's no way to kill a god anyway. So.
You'd need to collaborate with the most powerful Wizards. Maybe Clerics too, because you'd need to hide your research and experiments from the gods, which I believe only other gods can do. And you'd need something approximating an avatar, on which to test the spell repeatedly. It might also be wise to charter a space in hell where no one will be looking. You don't want devils selling out your plans.
So, the plan would look like this: 1) Acquire the trust of the followers of the god of secrets, probably by doing some sort of espionage. 2) Enter the ruins of the result of the most heretical thing to have happened in history. Karsus's Folly perhaps? Find out how to synthesize an avatar. 3) Get the assistance of the best Wizards, probably by getting them dates. 4) Go to the underworld and find a place nobody in the underworld wants to go. Go there, ensure it's safe to send your avatar there. 5) Spend a long time developing the spell in secret. 6) Wait for god to create avatar. You may need to discover immortality also lol. 7) Cast spell. 8) Kill god.
Cool.
So come up with something that doesn't use PCs. Come up with an idea that has a (non God level) being able to kill a god. Make it sudo "believable" and interesting enough that you/the other people at your table would be interested enough to pursue the storyline. The whole point is a though exercise to see how people would deal with a complex issue, that's not simply taking the most direct, simple, and overused route.
Hell i could have changed the frame work to something stupid simple like "how would you get past a locked door that can never be opened/damaged/destroyed?". Same basic concept, you are put up against a thing that is 'impossible to do'; but anyone who can think a little outside of the box, could come up with a work around.
There are spells already in the game for bypassing such an obstacle. And, as others have said, “thinking outside the box” only takes a player so far within the rules based structure of a game and is almost always contingent on the DM approving it, so the abstract question is of limited purpose and applicability since the actual result is highly variable and subjective.
And, once more, I did previously describe a method for killing a god. It did ultimately boil down to “have the DM set up the means”, but that is literally how you accomplish any major working in the game. The capabilities that players are expressly given to exercise at their discretion are limited in scope, and deicide falls well outside that scope. That’s not to say anything else is completely impossible, just that for those things you need to sit down with your DM and ask them if and how the characters could accomplish such a thing. You can’t just come up with an idea and declare it will work.
I think your memory is more about your group of friends and less about published materials.
Gary Gygax published the D&D boxed sets which took players from future hero to god killing other gods, all with game mechanics provided. I'm sure the spelling is off but this D&D took place in a world called "Mystara". While the newer versions of D&D have many great attributes, there has never been a better set of rules to handle kingdom building or god slaying.
Greyhawk was the AD&D 1e campaign setting created by Gary Gygax. In 1st edition there were several different types of deities. Quasi Deities were mortals who became gods. Some even manage to move higher up the ranks within the system for Gods to gain and lose power. While the rules for god slaying were mostly left to the imagination of the players, this is the system that spawned Dragon Lance and Forgotten Realms. Both of those settings were created by early AD&D 1e authors based upon their home campaigns, where god killing was a part of the story.
I created my first homebrew campaign setting when I was either 7 or 8 years old. My memory is a bit fuzzy on the details. Since then I have used many official campaign settings, and created my own. There are benefits to using a world that your players know because it was published. There are benefits to a fully homebrew world. Lately my sweet spot has been a hybrid of standard and custom.
It takes a tremendous amount of time to self publish all the lore the players should know about the homebrew world where they grew up. It takes serious time to create maps, monsters, NPCs, and villains. I generally prefer to use maps created by others, but often times I have trouble finding any that offer the creative and challenging obstacles I like to include.
If you want gods that die then create a whole pantheon of them.
The Greek and Roman gods killed each other. The Viking pantheon is the same. I am sure their are more out there but you get the idea.
Create a whole new pantheon that lets gods kill each other. Once you have that then it should be far more feasible for a really really high level player to make a stab, so to speak, at it.
And as for AD&D1 they did have write ups for those gods and deities. Their equivalent levels were WAY higher than 20. Most had 5 different classes and they would have levels ranging from 10 to 20 in each class. Add in their special powers and their choice of magic items and you have a pretty formidable being.
AD&D also had the proviso for gods that were not killed on their own plane of power. They were not killed, just sent back to their plane of power to instantly form a new body.
If somehow they were killed on their personal plane of power then they would be dead. Unless another god protected them and or brought them back.
That god club is pretty tight.
"the DMG material for gods talks about them as simply a part of the setting, like the landscape. "
You are putting a large amount of weight on one sentence in the DMG, while ignoring a bunch of stuff included in official 5e rules which can be bought right here on DND Beyond.
I don't want to give away any spoilers, so I will just mention that the "Time of Troubles" is mentioned in one of the rule books. In another time travel is mentioned.
According to 5e RAW it is possible to travel back in time with a group of heroes and the correct gear, then kill a god when you know where they will be. Time paradoxes can be complicated, but it doesn't prevent the basic plan from working.
Modules contain monsters and magical items not found in the core rules. Who is to say Gods that haven't appeared in the core rules can't have a stat block?
I've specifically acknowledged the Time of Troubles as a "plot device" mechanism for killing gods. Time travel is the same deal. I have repeatedly stated that it is entirely possible to have a story that involves deicide, but it needs to be something the DM tees up for the players, it's not something the players can make happen on their own initiative. Also, even outside of the core rules, I'm not familiar with any monsters or items in 5e that are described as being capable of killing gods. That doesn't mean you can't homebrew up you own +5 god slaying sword or whatever, but there's no material that supports the idea deities are something sufficiently skilled players could successfully take a run at in the same manner as a being like Zariel or Graz'zt. Once more, I'm not saying it's completely out of the question and should not be done, but the answer to the question of "how would you kill a god" basically boils down to "however your DM tells you to do it".
No one is saying they can not.
But its up to the DM to write them up. WoTC seems a little reluctant to write them up themselves.
"According to 5e RAW it is possible to travel back in time with a group of heroes and the correct gear, then kill a god when you know where they will be. Time paradoxes can be complicated, but it doesn't prevent the basic plan from working. "
Yes and gods have that very same ability. So why would they even let a character live if they tried something like that.
They will live through the attack if it takes more than one round so, unless you can follow them through the planes, and they will then go back in time and eliminate that character from existence before they make the attack on the god.
And if not that god the others will not let it stand they will just kill the party ASAP.
As for time travel.
Don't let unlimited time travel, back in time especially, get into anything. It gives the traveler the power of the gods. Unlimited power over everything and everyone.
If I let time travel into a game I was DMing I would limit it to a spell that would let you sleep/cold storage/stasis into the future and only let time travel back in time to a very limited amount line a few minutes at most.or a few rounds to let a few die rolls be redone to change a resent outcome.
Unlimited time travel backwards would make the first god to discover it the most powerful one of them all. Why let the others gain the ability?
I think you'd get more out of this thread if you interpreted OP's question as "if you were the DM and you wanted it to be possible for the players to kill a god, how would you have it work?"
I know of the time travel effect that Pheralanpathfinder was referencing. Without risking spoilers, I'll just say, it's not unlimited time travel backwards. It would be more accurate to compare it to a one-way shuttle. It goes to one particular time.
However, Sphinxes can freely send you back in time. Here's an excerpt from the Androsphinx's lair actions in the Monster Manual: "The flow of time within the lair is altered such that everything within moves up to 10 years forward or backward (sphinx’s choice)." There's nothing preventing him from doing it again and again. Say, every minute. Presumably it wouldn't work if he tried to go to a time before his lair was there. But I digress.
From the sphinx's lore entry in the Monster Manual: "Some sphinxes are high priests of the gods that create them[.]" So it's possible for a god to create a sphinx. And it's possible for a sphinx to go back in time and take along whoever's around. So the only two remaining question, are, 1) is it possible for a god to go inside a sphinx's lair?, and 2) is it possible for a god to command or persuade a sphinx to use its power? I don't see why not, and I've not seen any evidence to the contrary, so guess what, gods DO have access to time travel. If that's true, then you're wrong about what would happen.
I think it's compelling to suggest that the gods' free access to time travel is the reason the future-telling spells like Augury are on the Cleric spell list. It suggests that the gods are all locked into some kind of predetermined sequence of events, not because they lack free will, but because they've all already maneuvered everything as best they can using time travel to benefit themselves and to avoid harm. From their perspective, the game is already finished, but there's also versions of themselves, presumably, at many junctions, who are still playing. Time travel is confusing.
I agree with the The_Ace_of_Rogues here.
Nothing can be proposed by a player without the DM first forming a world that its possible in. Then the DM has to agree that the idea of the player is possible and agrees with it.
Asking how a player would do it is not in any way possible to answer.
Its not true that the game has to be played the way a player wants but instead is played the way the DM wants.( the player needs to convince the DM first if he wants something)
A better question would have been.
As a DM how would you allow the players to kill a god? And how would you write up that god as an NPC?
Looking back on it, what I suggested a moment ago absolutely isn't what OP was getting at. (Also, that was nearly 2 years ago?) That said, I don't think there's really a lot to say for OP's initial question -- restriction breeds creativity, after all --, so we might as well shift the topic. Well, we've already shifted it, but we could do so with more intentionality.
ChoirOfFire
Just because its in an official book does not mean every DM needs to accept it into their world.
Or even the power of time travel for that sphinx.
And your right. Time travel is confusing. Thats why I leave it out.
It has ruined every story line its ever been introduced to unless the story is about time travel like Dr Who.
And if this thread has finally been reduced to talking about time travel as one of the very few ways to even make it possible to kill a god then its pretty much over for me.
I've discussed it some from that perspective, but the lore is sparse enough that it all typically just boils down to "find/create the god slaying MacGuffin, kill the god with it, ???, profit". There's also the old "wipe out their followers" bit, but considering there's already a couple evil gods who have that as their ideal endgame for the multiverse, it seems like a bit much that the party is going to pull it off when armies and vast conspiracies haven't made much headway. Plus genocide is not really a great look, even if it's "sanctioned" genocide against "evildoers".
I dunno, the material on gods is so limited it's hard to actually brainstorm something that engages with the setting and concepts rather than just being a very overt MacGuffin/deus ex.
In regards Time Travel, I think the only story I actually appreciated it in was the first Terminator, where you realize at the end that the initial choice to time travel is what led to the story being possible in the first place. Overall I’ve found time travel to just turn stories into loose piles of Swiss cheese that comes apart on even a casual inspection.
You ALMOST had the point.
Yes, the DM has to make a world where it's possible to fight and kill a god (feel like the frame work of the question already implies that the DM has done this). Yes the DM has to agree with the way the player chooses to go about doing that. BUT, and this is a big but, the player has to actually pitch an idea to the DM, before the DM can agree or disagree with that method working.
No DM is going to just write their players a blank check to kill a god (that's how you get '(player) gives God a very sassy look, and God dropping dead' for your "epic" final battle). Nor should they railroad the players into finding the "MacGuffin of God-killing. The well known, one-of-a-kind, legendary thing that was once (or perhaps multiple times) been used to kill a different god at some point in the past.... and that the other gods have just kind of 'let continue to free float around the world/planes' for (amount of time) since the last mortal KILLED A GOD."
So lets focus on that part where the player pitches an idea. Sure it might not work for every game, but that's part of the fun.
Heck i've even said that it doesn't have to be a PC directly doing most of the work. So you can kind of circumvent a lot of the limitations that come with a "limited" list of spells. I mean let's be honest. Most high level NPCs (specifically NPC casters) have access to stuff that that doesn't directly connect to a canon spell. Much less a canon spell, that is canonically attached to a canon item.
Sure, but presumably the sphinx and the gods were written to coexist. I mean, the text for the sphinx literally references gods, so obviously they were. With that being the case, we can judge that it's not an immutable conclusion that time travel = one god above all others. You could certainly run a game where time travel does result in one god dominating the others, and you could run one where time travel doesn't exist, but you don't HAVE to run one where time travel doesn't exist just because you're NOT running one where one god dominates the others. You follow me?
Usually in stories with time travel, there's some specific circumstances where it's impossible for the person with all the power to see the outcome of something. I'm gonna call it an event horizon. Be it the power of human free will, or the power of love, or sometimes the witness doesn't exist past a certain point in time so they can't see past that point... You'd need something like this if you wanted to have a god-killing adventure in a setting where the gods can time travel. The only other way, as far as I can see it, is if the god accepts its death as part of its grand cosmic plans. Maybe as a necessary step in the plan, or maybe just as an inevitable price to pay. But this wouldn't pose a challenge to the players. It would deprive them of the ultimate payoff of a god-killing adventure. The god would have no reason to fight back in earnest. Plus, the god basically wins in this scenario, even if it dies. That's no fun. So we need an event horizon.
No event horizon truly holds up to scrutiny, but in a good story, you're not inclined to care about that. It just needs to FEEL appropriate. So we ought to begin with why this adventure is about killing a god in the first place. What does a god represent in this tale, and what does it mean to kill it? Unfortunately, we're writing in a vacuum here. We don't know.
I think the common things a god represents are "determinism," "oppression," and "gatekeepers." In other words, defeating a god means one of three things most of the time: 1) You matter, you have agency. 2) Justice and fairness are real, crime doesn't pay. Or, 3) You did it, you won in the biggest way possible.
I would guess it's usually more than one of those, but probably you can focus on one. Let's pick determinism. In the hypothetical scenario for today, the god is a reflection of the void. It exists to say, "things cannot change, you mean nothing, give up," and we kill it to refute this. Okay. An event horizon that fits this would be one like in The Matrix: The gods think they know exactly how any mortal would respond to a particular scenario, so they don't bother planning for the alternative. Let's say the various choices mortals make create an infinite web of branching timelines, so naturally a god has to narrow down which ones to pay attention to and travel between. Ta-da!
I need to go to sleep.
I think the biggest issue to me - which was very fairly pointed out earlier in this thread - is the difficulty with entering the planar domain of a god that doesn’t want to allow you access. The only real way I can see around this is by treating the god as something along the lines of a Lich: destroy their Prime Avatar on a neutral plane (I think there’s supposed to be a plane that negates all divine power but it’s been awhile (Spire in the Concordant Opposition of the Out- lands?) or the Prime Material, and after that assail the gods home plane while they’re regenerating. I don’t really like that personally though. You could also maybe have the players find someway to disguise themselves when trying to enter the domain, IDK.
Alternatively, the DM might decide on the method from the outset. Honestly, I'd be judicious on players looking to describe that much of the arc for something this big; those kind of asks tend to mean that player is looking to showboat. Besides, from a player perspective, I think it's more fun when you don't know how the whole arc is going to play out already.