Share Your Custom Pantheons

Share a pantheon or a god or 2 from your custom Faiths

Hm. My homebrew world has basically all the gods, everywhere, all the time. In other words: There are nature spirits all over, all of them minor gods. There are regional gods of all types - like, any island or river will have it's resident god. Anything a number of people revere over a period of time will eventually spawn a god. Gods can be created through sacrifice. So, again, there are many. 

On the other hand, there are no major deities. No Lathanders, no Bahamuts, none of that stuff. Also, the metaphysics associated with greater dieties isn't a thing: No Kelemvor to carry you to your proper destination, no supplicants or hell or heaven. When you die, you go to your god, if he or she or it can claim you - if not, you become food for who- or whatever can.

Also, temples are places of business. Sure, the local volcano god may have her own temple, but you can go to any shrine and worship any god, and the resident priest will sell you candles and myrrh and mistletoe and flowers and assorted holy symbols. 

In practical terms that means players are free to create any god they like - and also, I get to play with each location, and decide what resides there, and whether it takes an interest.

And then, there are the Other Gods. These are forbidden gods, unspoken - secret even. They are the Nine, and they have no shrines, no temples, no priests, and they grant no spells. However, if you can get in contact with them, they are willing to trade. They are not, as one might think, cthulean monsters from the void beyond. Rather, they are simply former mortals who have transcended and become .. more. The gods fear them, and what they might become, for which reason worship of them is harshly persecuted by the faithful.

My homebrew world technically has 4 death gods. The first one is the Psychopomp who guides dead souls to the Iudicium which is the place where souls get sorted into afterlifes. They are calm and trustworthy and used to appear as a young person in traveling gear. After they lost their body their form is now one of a ghost with the traveling gear forsaken for a set of temple robes. Their clerics are known for being healers traveling the land and bringing back people from the brink of death and sometimes even after they died. 

The second you will meet is the Judge who always appears as the person you would never lie to. Her true form is a lady in judges robes with bone white skin which appears translucent and white hair. She judges each soul fairly and impartially never succumbing to emotion and her moths guide the travelers to their judged afterlife. Her clerics protect order and are often called upon to give blessing to those who are nearly dead so that The Judge will look fondly upon them.

Now is where things get interesting. Some souls are deemed either by the judge or by the gods to be fully evil and to much of a threat to be in the nine hells or a soul is so blighted that they cannot be allowed to remain on alive in any way they must go the last member of the trio. There are two Executioners one deposed and the story behind that is only spoken of by truly brave people.

The first Executioner is trapped in the most secure place in Carceri by a thousand different chains due to committing the crime of slaughtering souls that had already been judged to go to an afterlife. Supposedly he appear as a ram skull atop a body covered in armor with smoke occasionally going out of the cracks in the armor. He is not worshipped openly but his clerics are mostly evil with a penchant for both violence and corruption believing that he is slowly breaking free of his prison and they need to send him souls to hasten the process.

The second Executioner was created after the firsts corruption. To create him The Psychopomp broke apart their body from their soul leaving half their power within it and watched as the body slowly decayed. Both The Judge and The Psychopomp believed it hadn't worked and prepared to try to return the body to a state where The Psychopomp could go back in it. Then the new Executioner rose appearing as a rotted corpse with glowing fungi all over him. He took over The Executioner's role and title and was also deemed the Necrose Baron due to how he was created. His clerics were often thought of as strange and dedicated themselves to studying decay and finding ways to accept it, hasten it and occasionally reverse it.

The main pantheon of my world consists of:

Athena, LG goddess of wisdom and strategy
Avidor, NG god of valor
Chymir, CG god of hospitality and fellowship
Elphion, N goddess of plants and nature
Helio, LN god of the sun, stars, and light
Hermes, CN god of travelers and chance
Ioun, CN goddess of knowledge and invention
Osmera, LN goddess of death and the grave
Umberlee, CN goddess of the sea and storms
Urasil, NE god of wealth and earth

There’s also a group of titled minor gods:

Ilera Bala’eid the Cardreader, CG goddess of fate
Taka Bala’eid the Bloodking, NE god of blood or NG god of sacrifice (depending on date in-universe)
Renato the Loremaster, N god of arcane magic and mysteries
Eriandor the Grovelord, CN god of the fey
Velaj the Lawbringer, LN goddess of law and civilization
Ari the Fieldwalker, NG god of agriculture and fertility
Sendil’rah the Shieldmaiden, LG goddess of protection

More™️ gods:

Bahamut, LG god of metallic dragons and justice
Ilneval, NG god of orcs and wisdom
Kurtulmak, CN god of kobolds and learning
Maglubiyet, LE god of goblinoids and military might

Gods often forbidden from worship:

Lolth, CE goddess of darkness
Vecna, LE god of undeath and secrets
Tiamat, CE goddess of chromatic dragons, destruction, and wealth
Bane, LE god of tyranny

Two gods are so powerful and ineffable that they are considered Primordials. These include Hadē (LN) and Thithdrihl (N), the gods of the afterlife and the sky, respectively.

not so much a pantheon but an additional deity replacing/adding into the Faerunian pantheon. Dragonheart - Deity of Travelers, outsiders, halfbreeds and surface drow. As a 20th level character years ago (L3 monk/L17 Ranger) he accidentally (on purpose) killed Lolth in the Demonweb pits gaining her deific energies. Unfortuneatly I moved just aftre that never to return to that campaign but taking my characters with me. after trying to fit my characters into a couple of other folks campaigns and then moving again and again I tried creating my own campaign for them to be situated in but the workload of a pure homebrew was too much so I moved them into a FR campaign that I could modify and used them mostly as NPCs and background high level world modifying events. He, and my other original characters (now all epic) took over Teshendale, Freed Waukeen, drove the Zhentarim out of Zhentil Keep and estyablished a continent wide trade coster. In the process he became a CHosen of SHandukul, Converted the surface drow of Cormanthor to original Dark elves and converting them to be his followers in the process, generated the silence of Lolth by his very presence in the world causing Ellistraee to discover him and the fact that he was managing to clean lolth's taint from the deific energies he had absorbed she transfered Vhaeraunn's to him for cleansing when she absorbed them then transfereed her own essences to him when she in turn was killed. Eventuyally SHandukul Turned over his deific Powers to Dragonheart and he was elevated to god hood by Ao and given the portfolios of the halfbloods, travelors and outsiders in general as well as surface drow and dark elves - especially the males. He was required to spin off a cleansed Vhaeraunn who has the male drow of the underdark  as a portfolio. His worshippers include half elves, halforcs, surface drow and dark elveen males, rangers, travelers, dragonborn and outsiders  as well as the citizens of Teshendale. he is a god of middling power earning a name still across Faerun. As an adventurer he is well known  and his coster (the Dragonshield coster) is one of the great costers of the land today.

The most common religion in a couple of my lands are the constellations.

• The constellations are the deities. The planets are not named for deities.
• Astrology is real. Character creation involves astrology, but unlike common IRL astrology, it doesn't affect the personality of the character but can affect what happens on very rare occasions.
• The deities ally with and oppose each other based on geometric positioning from each other in the sky.
• Characters born under opposing deities might find themselves as unwilling pawns in a war, but this is just a player character backstory hook and PvP is discouraged.
• The typical pantheons of the Realms are not involved in the astrologic deities settings.
• It is common for populations to base their practices heavily on astrology, but the practices can vary wildly for the same deity from place to place.
• Everything has good and bad aspects with some deities tending towards one or the other and some being a balance between them.
• Planets in the system affect the deities' moods and temperaments.
• Of course, the deities are heavily tied to the seasons, but the more difficult seasons are not considered evil outright as the moderate seasons are not considered good outright.
• EDIT: I have them in multiples of 12 (12, 24, and 36). It creates an even distribution of good, bad, and balance for four seasons. 24 allows for major and minor. 36 allows for 3 tiers of hierarchy.

This is just a framework for anyone to use. The fleshed out versions I have would be serious walls of text of stories about the creation of the world, how the deities came to be constellations, the intrigue behind the alliances and enmities (even though the alliance status between them never changes), why certain populations practice worship in different ways, etc.

Athena?wait I know that gal!

I have a certain pride in The Nine (which I mentioned in a previous post already). At least I tell myself there isn't really another, similar pantheon out there.

The Nine are a secret religion. It's the official state religion of the Empire of Thûul-Abban, and there are large, fancy cathedrals in all major cities. Hardly anyone comes here, and they are basically unmanned - except for two yearly religious holidays, when everyone is expected to come, say a prayer and give a small offering. On these occasions, masked bishops will hold fiery sermons, and the 'faithful' will be out in massive, massive numbers. 

As one might expect, there are nine gods in the pantheon. Their names are secret, as are their titles domains. The faith doesn't attract followers, and you cannot decide to become a priest. Or ... you can, but you really have to work for it. 

First of all, you need to somehow find the name of one of the gods. This will almost invariably be Ashûram, First of the Nine, the Key and the Gate. Since hardly anyone knows, that's a bit tricky. You have to find one of those that do know, and convince them to tell you.

Next problem is that ... now you need to get his attention. Prayers or sacrifices won't work - but if you've come this far, maybe you've only learned that the gods are transactional: Maybe you can offer something interesting. Maybe a spell or magic item - but really, knowledge works best. It's also the hardest to find, of course. 

So .. now, finally, you can summon Ashûram. Why are you doing this again? Anyways, you have his attention. The Nine are not great guys, so there's every chance he'll just take what you have and be off again. So if you planned ahead, you have more - but not with you. 

From there on, you may enter a sort of trade relationship with the god: Keep bringing goodies, and you can get boons. And the Nine, for all their moral flexibility, can grant some pretty neat boons. Anyways. These are The Nine: 

• Ashûram – First of the Nine, the Key and the Gate
• Bael-Zorath – The Silent Fire, the Veiled Watcher
• Ishmara – The Weeping Mother, Keeper of the Long Night
• Qorradûn – The Azure Tyrant, Master of the Unbroken Chain
• Valthyros – The Hollow King, He Who Walks Between
• Nammaris – The Whispering Judge, Herald of the Final Dawn
• Tzaphariel – The Storm-Warden, Keeper of the Hidden Path
• Zemekhet – The Pale Shadow, The Devourer of Names
• Orrakûn – The Blooded Harp, Singer of the Last Song

Who are these guys? Well, Orrakûn was the first Emperor. He gathered the lands of the Tûul-Abban plateau, not to become a ruler, but to force a religion on everyone, so he could become a god. Zemekhet is his son, who expanded from the plateau down throught the passes and out into the world. The others are further down the line - and not all have been emperors or empresses. But they are all members of the royal line. So the entire religion is kind of a sham, intended to provide these nine guys and gals with divine power. 

Since I've never really had to use them (it's really hard to use a secret religion very actively, while still keeping it secret) they're not totally fleshed out. I'm not sure all nine are still technically alive. I'm pretty sure they're not all buddy-buddy with each other. But anyways, they all still have agendas, and are looking in various ways to promote those. And of course they'd secretly all like to topple Orrakûn, but he's ingrained himself very solidly in the religion - and it's not sure it would survive without him. 

So technically, it's all symbolism, right? Orrakûn started wearing a golden mask, specifically so his priests could mimmick that. He's there in every line of text, every symbol and ritual. He's made himself the conduit of all that faith (lip service is still faith - or a sort). 

So ... anyways: That's The Nine. I really like them, but I'm not sure how much use they'll be for anyone else =)

So my homebrewed Spelljammer world/sphere had a typical pantheon, Dar the High Lord and his court and his brother, the evil god and his court.  Pretty cliche.  The gods went to war and in the end, Dar and his son, the God of Justice and War, called down a final strike to stop the evil gods from winning.  This resulted in the destruction of the world and the creation of a ring of planet fragments that could be used to fuel ongoing adventures.

In the mean time, The God of Justice and War had put part of his essence into the soul of his chief paladin and teleported him to a temple located on a city in space (think Bral's Rock).  The long term goal was that the paladin would continue to grow and evolve until he ascended and became the next High Lord.

Sadly, due to jobs and the real world the group came to an end before we got that far.

Good idea

My world has “The Dreamer” as its first cause/prime mover. Very little is known about the Dreamer, even whether they’re more properly a “who” or a “what”. The first creations were the prime Archons, the minds of concepts needed for things to exist in the first place: time, space, matter, motion, dimension, and others I’m sure should be in that list. The Dreamer contemplated what it would be like to be subject to these things, and begets the Archon of life. 

Under the archon of life, there comes about the derived Archons, for things like states of matter, units of time, and so on. Somewhere down the line, the spacial entities, that is, beings that need to exist in a certain point in space-time, are created. These include biological life forms, nature spirits, and the planar outsiders. 

In this time the archons of more “orderly” and “chaotic” natures start hanging up on eachother, breaking the intended harmony in a bid for dominance. Spacial entities start picking sides, bringing disaster to the heavenly and earthly spheres. This causes evil to exist, and because evil doesn’t have an archon, it becomes the Void, and fills itself by taking o the er beings to make its own. This necessitates the creation of the archon of death, so that evil and the Void will ultimately be temporary.

Still have things to work out and I don’t really have identities for any of the archons, but that’s the gist of it.

Still fleshing out the world, but I have a homebrew setting where each of the alignments has a goddess in the form of a massive sea creature who also doubles as a city. Lawful Good is a giant sea turtle and Chaotic Evil is a dolphin.

In the latest campaign I'm running, the gods abandoned the world, and an important faction built an artificial god called The Architect. The party destroyed The Architect, which attracted the attention of a god called Judgment Day and its 10 Dark Aeons.