Most of my games share a nebulous theology. There are vague deific entities who feed on human devotion. They perform miracles as a way of planting seeds for later harvest. I don’t put energy into crafting gods as agents in their own right because that pretty much never comes up. I do often create new religions for each game, because religion is a human foible, and something that will inform the world around the player characters. Those religions do not describe a metaphysical reality. It’s just people making shit up trying to understand the world around them. Deific entities then play into the expectations set by these religions so they can get their devotion fix.
(I’ve written before about Neve Canri, who is something of an exception to this rule.)
Dungeon Moon is a notable exception to that pattern. The gods of dungeon moon are not distant metaphysical entities. Divine power is neither so mysterious, nor far reaching. To be a god on Dungeon Moon one must be present on Dungeon Moon. Gods can be met, spoken to, touched. They are two steps removed from mortal existence, but no more so than that. They are weird, but comprehensible.
There is the Pale Jaguar, a cat larger than an elephant with forgotten knowledge inscribed on each strand of hair. It forbids any procreation by its adherents except by a ritual so complex that it must be personally overseen by the deity.
The Rot God is a fetid heap of decay which consumes life at a touch. It is bound to a pit by ancient holy magics. Fools throw it offerings of fabulous goldworks hoping to ward off disease and death. Their offerings sink into the god’s oozy body, ignored and unappreciated. The fly folk are its only true servants.
Shai wraps himself in a tattered brown blanket. The light from his eyes is blinding, giving visions of the true past to any who look into them. He fancies himself a “good” god, but is cautious to excess. He weighs options and ethics until it is too late to take effective action. He inserts himself everywhere as mediator, and his decisions carry the force of godly might–until his back is turned.
“Blender Head” is an impolite way to refer to That God Who Insists Names Are Beneath Their Dignity. When not enacting their own will, Blender Head moves so slowly that they might be mistaken for a statue, save for the constant creaking from their metal body. Their followers have a sort of roaming tent city with their god always at the center, moving one row of tents each day from the path behind the god, to the path before of the god. When compelled to act, Blender Head is faster than fast.
Mother Long Legs discovered a little town without its protective runes, filled with cowering peasants. She positioned herself over the town, with her eight legs around its edge, and set her spider-headed children to wrapping a wall of steel web from leg to leg, completely encircling the town. There is no kindness in her protection. She is omniscient within the town. She personally involves herself in the minutia of people’s lives, playing with them like dolls and devouring those who can’t be molded.
Corpse Seeker is a many-armed thing with a sense for where to find the dead. It interrogates corpses, and passes judgement over their lives. It has no power over what happens to their souls, but it wants them to know whether they have its approval or not. It may be convinced to ask slightly tangential questions if the answers would aid the living in a goal it approves of.
The gods of Dungeon Moon are not omnipotent. They are not omniscient. They can even be killed, though they have no hit points. Each god’s mortality is guarded by a trick. Some seemingly harmless non-sequiotor of an action which will destroy them. Like robots that can be rendered immobile when presented with a logical paradox; or aliens defeated by the common cold. Sometimes their weakness is ironic, other times it’s just random. It’s always a secret.