Most fantasy worlds are based on a polytheistic culture. There are gods for many different aspects of life, such as love, war, trickery, and even races like the god of Elves. This is much like the ancient Greek mythology. I am also sure that there are a few fantasy worlds also based on a monotheistic culture, but I have yet to see one published.



Before I go into the concept that I am going to propose to you, I will tell you where I got the inspiration for this. First, I was reading the Dungeoncraft column out of Dragon magazine (highly recommended read…can also be found on the Wizards web site). The second rule of Dungeoncraft is to create a secret for every aspect of your game. If you create a new land, make a secret about it. In this case I used religion as my aspect to work with in the world I am creating.



As was said before, most worlds are polytheistic. So is mine, so to say. I will not, however, use the gods out of the book. I do not like to use generic gods for a specialized world. To create my pantheon, I was going to use Greek mythology as my base, because it is very easy to research.



But thinking about Greek mythology, I eventually realized that it is simply a collection of stories told from one generation to the next. As is all religion. And like any collection of stories that gets told over time, they get mutated until they eventually contradict each other.



I, being the thinking person I am, tried to figure out where the truth should lie regarding these contradictions. Is it one side of the story? Probably not. Is it the other side of the story? Again, no. The truth can usually be found somewhere in between the two stories. But what if the truth is nowhere to be found? What if the people are worshipping a collection of stories told throughout the ages?



People make up stories to explain what they cannot explain. In modern times, people claim that they see UFO’s if there is a strange light in the sky that they do not recognize. Or, in the Greeks’ case, they made up stories of gods living on top of Mt. Olympus to explain why crops grow well one season and not the next, why people fall in love, what happens after death, and more. But in the end, the backwoods man that saw the UFO and Ancient Greece has that one thing in common: they really don’t KNOW what’s going on.



To make use of this in a game, create a pantheon of gods, or use the one in a book, it does not matter. But create holes in your stories. Have them contradict each other from one land to the next, or even one house to the next. But there are only a few people in the world who know the truth: there is only one god.



And this one god does not like to meddle in mortal affairs. This god is not mentioned at all in the stories told around the campfire. The few people that do know actually stumbled upon the truth. Some may have tried to spread the truth, but nobody listened because the people “know” that there are many gods. The ones that talked were probably killed for being blasphemous.



The priests of the world get their spells through themselves. But the only way to “get” the spells is through worship. This “worship” gives them the focus necessary to draw the power from within themselves.



What affect can this have on your game? Theoretically, none. But it can also have a very profound affect on your game. What if the priest in the party attempts to piece together an accurate religious history of the world? After determining that the task is impossible, he may stumble across the truth about the gods. This could open up a whole set of adventures for you.