Setting with No Gods
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2020 2:13 pm
In the General Discussions I talked about a setting that didn't have gods or planes. Because where I ended up is different from that discussion, I decided to start a new thread for this specific effort.
What started this is that I thought about working on a setting for my own use, anchored by a pantheon with its own flavor. But I basically realized that there is absolutely no point. Pretty much every variation has already been done. To death. Repeatedly. Plus, the way gods work in games like BFRPG are hugely anachronistic. (It is a medieval-ish setting using a bronze-age religious setup.) So, I thought about going in the completely opposite direction: what about a setting where there are no gods and no heaven or hell? From what I can tell, this has definitely NOT been done to death, so I tried to see where things could lead.
Through the other discussion, and as a result of working through some of these ideas, the results have migrated from where I started somewhat. However, it is fundamentally the same idea. I hope it is of interest to more than just me. But, even if not, I plan on making use of it going forward. I am going to initially put the file directly here in the discussion, but will eventually migrate it to the my part of the Showcase if there is no other input.
Rather than a definitive setting, this is more of a toolkit. It talks about how to implement a setting that has no other planes and no gods. While I will let the document speak for itself, I want to mention a couple things:
1) Note that even without actual gods, there can still be the belief in gods and as many established religions as you want. Just because there are no divine creatures doesn't mean belief in them doesn't exist.
2) While there are no planes, there are other worlds and, potentially, dimensions. If you go nuts with other dimensions, then the lack of planes can even be a completely mute point.
Other than that, I hope people find this useful.
What started this is that I thought about working on a setting for my own use, anchored by a pantheon with its own flavor. But I basically realized that there is absolutely no point. Pretty much every variation has already been done. To death. Repeatedly. Plus, the way gods work in games like BFRPG are hugely anachronistic. (It is a medieval-ish setting using a bronze-age religious setup.) So, I thought about going in the completely opposite direction: what about a setting where there are no gods and no heaven or hell? From what I can tell, this has definitely NOT been done to death, so I tried to see where things could lead.
Through the other discussion, and as a result of working through some of these ideas, the results have migrated from where I started somewhat. However, it is fundamentally the same idea. I hope it is of interest to more than just me. But, even if not, I plan on making use of it going forward. I am going to initially put the file directly here in the discussion, but will eventually migrate it to the my part of the Showcase if there is no other input.
Rather than a definitive setting, this is more of a toolkit. It talks about how to implement a setting that has no other planes and no gods. While I will let the document speak for itself, I want to mention a couple things:
1) Note that even without actual gods, there can still be the belief in gods and as many established religions as you want. Just because there are no divine creatures doesn't mean belief in them doesn't exist.
2) While there are no planes, there are other worlds and, potentially, dimensions. If you go nuts with other dimensions, then the lack of planes can even be a completely mute point.
Other than that, I hope people find this useful.