D&D 5E [Forgotten Realms] The Wall of the Faithless

[Celtavian]

People keep repeating this and it's so obnoxiously false. Earnestly worshipping something is not simply making a few prayers and sacrificing a few coins. Doing just those things is not earnest worship. I can't see how anyone would consider that earnest worship. "Oh yeah I tossed some coins in the well and said a couple Hail Mary's, I'm good for the next month." That is the definition of lip service. More than that, every god has different requirements, there are codes, whole systems of beliefs and rules that their worshippers need to follow.

The return isn't that great either. "Eternal paradise"....well every god offers that. It's not exactly like its hard to come by. There are so many FR gods each with their own private paradise, and I hate to tangent into real life, but the Wall and FR gods in general is a very judeo-christian conceptualization of polytheism, you ignore the costs in the now in favor of the rewards in the then. In classic polytheism, worship was less important than being a respectable person. Gods recognized and rewarded heroic, honorable, noble deeds for worthy causes regardless of if you prayed to them.

That's not true. You had to make sacrifices and practice rituals. In general, no one denied the existence of the gods in the society that was deemed respectable. In Greek society, the gods were extremely respected and powerful. They had rituals and holidays to honor the gods. You were expected practice those rituals and offer sacrifices and prayers or you would suffer the gods displeasure. It was the same in the Norse religions.

A lot of what you claim with rewarding noble and honorable deeds was after the fact. Oh, so and so was so brave, he must have been inspired by such and such god. He will be rewarded in the afterlife. Certain behaviors were deemed admirable by the gods and to be rewarded by the gods of the Greeks, not by other gods because everyone was assumed to be worshiping the Greek Gods.

Judeo-Christians did not start religious exclusivity at all. That game was played for ages. The only difference was pantheons rather than monotheistic entities. You picked the appropriate god to pray to for the thing you wanted.

The one idea that isn't well represented in the Forgotten Realms is the idea of a single realm where all the gods live is the place where the dead go to reside. In Greek myth, you didn't go to each gods realm. There was but one great realm where the Gods lived and one Underworld ruled by Hades. The Gods were part of a pantheon that the Greek people worshiped as a whole. That is not well developed in modern D&D polytheism.

Then again D&D is has its own religious structure. That structure doesn't have much verisimilitude if the faithless in essence get a free pass for being faithless based on their actions. That renders the gods impotent. No deity with actual power would allow such a thing. At their core gods are selfish and power hungry, that is why they demand worship and manipulate the affairs of men. They give with the expectation they will receive rather than give freely. In the D&D world, you either become immortal, become a god, choose one to worship so you have an appropriate afterlife, or suffer the consequences of faithlessness.

 

[Jester David]

People keep repeating this and it's so obnoxiously false. Earnestly worshipping something is not simply making a few prayers and sacrificing a few coins. Doing just those things is not earnest worship. I can't see how anyone would consider that earnest worship. "Oh yeah I tossed some coins in the well and said a couple Hail Mary's, I'm good for the next month." That is the definition of lip service. More than that, every god has different requirements, there are codes, whole systems of beliefs and rules that their worshippers need to follow.

The thing is, it can be earnest worship. Earnest worship isn't hard, you just need to believe. You need to honestly commit to your beliefs. Which, generally, isn't that hard. People do it all the damn time. The world is chock full of people who believe ardently and we don't know for sure there is a god. It'd be easier if your god literally walked the world and could answer pesky dogma questions at the cost of a single 5th level spell slot.

If those few coins were an appropriate tribute and you say the Hail Marys without sarcasm then that really is all it takes. It really is just that easy.

Faith isn't that hard. Not really. I mean, I believe weird stuff. Really weird.
I believe that the universe is made out of one dimensional threads folded into two dimensions and vibrating in a third with the rate of vibrating determines if clusters of the strands are energy or matter. Or superstrings. And I believe that despite very little experimental evidence because people I'm told are way smarter say that's how our universe works. That's messed up. That's really, really messed up.
Heck, when you get right down to it, I probably couldn't explain electromagnetic field theory, the difference between alternating and direct current, or transistors but I still plug in my iPad every day.
I take so much on faith every moment of every day for a heck of a lot less evidence than the average person in the Realms.

The return isn't that great either. "Eternal paradise"....well every god offers that. It's not exactly like its hard to come by.

IF you're willing to earnestly believe. As you say, easy to come by. It's easy to find a god that really works with your values. There's so many gods it should be easy to find one that's perfect for you, that you don't just have to venerate but want to venerate.
And, if you pray hard enough, you get superpowers. Why wouldn't you worship?

There are so many FR gods each with their own private paradise, and I hate to tangent into real life, but the Wall and FR gods in general is a very judeo-christian conceptualization of polytheism, you ignore the costs in the now in favor of the rewards in the then.

All worldbuilding evokes some elements of the real world, mixing and matching beliefs and ideas.
There's no new ideas left. The last original idea anyone ever had was casting Schwarzenegger and DeVito as Twins. Prior to that you need to go back to Shakespeare*.

In classic polytheism, worship was less important than being a respectable person. Gods recognized and rewarded heroic, honorable, noble deeds for worthy causes regardless of if you prayed to them.

Most myths like that don't tend to have atheists. There's not a lot of people who deny the gods in Greek Mythology. Well, except maybe in the "you're not my real dad!!" kinda way.


*even this joke wasn't original and is flagrantly stolen from a Peter David comic.

 

[Celtavian]

People keep throwing the phrase "political correctness for atheists", but that's not what this is about.

This isn't me being worried that my fictional character is worshiping a deity - generally I'm fine with that, even with the gods that FR is stuck with.

This is about a torture device that was created by a mortal ascended to godhood for the explicit purpose of terrifying mortals into giving worship being a part of a system that "Good" gods are gaining power from.

There was some point where Kelemvor did away with the wall and started judging and treating people who ended up with him (ie - false and faithless) according to their goodness in life. Enough of Faerun knew about this change to the afterlife that good people stopped going off with good gods (so they could relax in Kelemvor's paradise) and evil people followed evil gods scrupulously (so that they wouldn't be judged by Kelemvor). The change was enough that it affected the balance between good and evil deities.

So apparently the process of the afterlife is plastered on billboards in Waterdeep or something.

Also note that ceasing to use the wall didn't cause any problems in itself. The problems were caused by Faerunians gaming Kelemvor's flawed rules for the afterlife. *

So, yeah, the afterlife is apparently transparent enough that PCs are likely to know how it works, including the existence and use of the wall. That should heavily affect the morals of every good, neutral or chaotic character that follows a god, and weigh heavily on anyone who understands that following a god "or else" isn't really being faithful so much as fearful.

(*) My understanding of the novels where this occurs also include Kelemvor ceasing use of the wall, determined that noone in his realm will be either punished OR rewarded... but apparently in 5e, he's started the wall up again?

You have to let people know how things work to maintain power when in competition for souls.

 

[pemerton]

This isn't me being worried that my fictional character is worshiping a deity - generally I'm fine with that, even with the gods that FR is stuck with.

This is about a torture device that was created by a mortal ascended to godhood for the explicit purpose of terrifying mortals into giving worship being a part of a system that "Good" gods are gaining power from.

I've often seen it posted in alignment threads that the GM gets to define "good" and "evil" for his/her campaign world. So maybe the authors of the FR have stipulated that the system you describe is compatible with goodness.

Another option is the one that [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] and [MENTION=6749563]JohnLynch[/MENTION] have outlined upthread - where the "torture device" is a necessary evil given the metaphysics of the world.

Yet another option would be the one that [MENTION=2067]I'm A Banana[/MENTION] mentioned way upthread (in the OP?) - a campaign focused on the PCs overthrowing the so-called "good" gods who in fact conspire in this system with fear and torture at its core.

And yet another option would be changing this detail of the campaign setting, or not using the setting at all! No one is being forced to play in FR exactly as it is written. (Are they?)

 

[garnuk]

I kind of like the idea of saying that in truth Kelemvor judges them and can send them wherever he wants. If they were NG but none of the FR deities floated their boat, he can just send their souls to Elysium and let them wanderer around figuring out what they want to do with their afterlife.

But it might be interesting to say that the way the books present it is how FR natives believe that it works. Just because Kelemvor isn't a jerk doesn't mean he wants to increase his workload by telling people they don't have to get their stuff figured out before they show up.

I think Kelemvor got tired of judging people, and now he just administers Buzzfeed quizzes to find out which afterlife one belongs to. The results will surprise you!

 

[Pauper]

There was some point where Kelemvor did away with the wall and started judging and treating people who ended up with him (ie - false and faithless) according to their goodness in life. Enough of Faerun knew about this change to the afterlife that good people stopped going off with good gods (so they could relax in Kelemvor's paradise) and evil people followed evil gods scrupulously (so that they wouldn't be judged by Kelemvor). The change was enough that it affected the balance between good and evil deities.

This is a bit off -- you should read (or re-read) "Crucible: the Trial of Cyric the Mad".

Executive summary: Once Kelemvor became Lord of the Dead, he decided that death shouldn't be a scary, intimidating thing. However, in granting positive judgements to heroic souls, those souls remaining in Faerun no longer feared death and tended to throw their lives away in mindless heroism, trusting in Kelemvor's reward. Kelemvor was accused by Cyric of 'Innocence by Reason of Humanity' and tried before the pantheon; Kelemvor realized that Cyric was right before an official judgment could be made. To demonstrate his resolve, Kelemvor made the realms of death grey and joyless, so no mortal soul would prefer it over life.

Jester Canuck notes that Mystra ended her friendship with Kelemvor over the latter's treatment of the Faithless -- it was actually one specific Faithless soul, their former adventuring companion Adon, who had gained Cyric's hatred of Mystra and thus died Faithless. (My favorite part of the book is when Cyric catches some of both Mystra's and Kelemvor's tears in a chalice and drinks them, claiming that the tears of brokenhearted lovers is the sweetest brew he knows.)

--
Pauper

 

[hawkeyefan]

[MENTION=17607]Pauper[/MENTION] Boy, Adon really got it rough, huh? Poor bastard. I either didn't know or had forgotten how it all played out for him.

As for the belief versus lip service...I don't know if simply believing in a god in Faerun is enough....their power is obvious. A person can even travel to a god's home and visit the petitioners there.

So there has to be more to it than just belief. I would think living one's life according to the tenets put forth by a god...practicing what the God celebrates or promotes. If an individual does that,, then they've likely earned a patron deity, whether they made a conscious decision about it or not.

So in that case, I would think it would vary from deity to deity. A god like Bane might expect total devotion or even full on zealotry from his followers. Mystra may simply ask for devotion to magic. Chauntea may just require that a person be a farmer or something similar. The level to which each God would demand specific devotion and petitioning would certainly vary.

I would think that if this somehow came up in game, the DM would have to fill in for Kelemvor and make a judgment about where the character would wind up in the afterlife.

I don't think that it should be as simple as "no patron deity selected= soul mortar for the Wall".

I could also see all kinds of immortal politics coming into play as the other gods seek to influence Kelemvor in his decision making. I can see that kind of story becoming a major part of a campaign. I think that'd have a lot of potential.

 

[Alzrius]

Pauper Boy, Adon really got it rough, huh? Poor bastard. I either didn't know or had forgotten how it all played out for him.

To be fair, it all did work out in the end for him.

 

[Pauper]

Boy, Adon really got it rough, huh? Poor bastard. I either didn't know or had forgotten how it all played out for him.

In Kelemvor's defense, Mystra wasn't the first deity Adon had turned his back on -- he was originally Adon of Sune, before a scar he suffered in the early days of the Avatar Crisis caused him to lose faith in and abandon Sune's worship. That Mystra saw fit to make him the high priest of her own faith, solely because he was once her adventuring companion as a mortal, was one of Cyric's points against Mystra in their mutual trial (and part of why Cyric exposed Adon to his madness to get the cleric to see Mystra as Cyric himself did).

Alzrius is right, though -- Kelemvor's last act before passing judgment on Adon was to allow Adon to see Mystra as Kelemvor saw her, which was kind of cheating, when you think about it. Adon went with Mystra in the end, at the cost of the brief relationship between the goddess of magic and the Lord of the Dead.

I could also see all kinds of immortal politics coming into play as the other gods seek to influence Kelemvor in his decision making. I can see that kind of story becoming a major part of a campaign. I think that'd have a lot of potential.

Read more: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...he-Wall-of-the-Faithless/page11#ixzz3rmMtSDhm

Agreed -- especially when you realize Kelemvor still has Jergal (the original 'I have zero f**ks to give' god of the dead**) as his advisor. Does Jergal have an ancient agenda that he only now is seeking to put into motion?

** - a brief summary of a story retold in the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide is useful here -- long ago, when Jergal was still Lord of the Dead, Bane, Bhaal, and Myrkul showed up on his doorstep as mortals and declared they were going to kill him and take his portfolio. Jergal's response (paraphrased): "You can have my portfolio, I'm tired of it. But you all have to play a game of skull-bowling to decide which of you gets what part of my portfolio." Dude gives zero f**ks.

--
Pauper

 

[Mephista]

I mean, the first thing I want to do when hearing about this wall is to have an adventure all about destroying it and slapping the collective pantheon in its face for thinking this was a good idea. Even supposedly "good" deities like Mystara and Ilmater are totally on board with punishing everyone who doesn't massage their egos on a regular basis.

Sounds like an awesome chronicle. In fact, it was the main story behind Neverwinter Nights 2 Mask of the Betrayer campaign. As for Mystara and Ilmater... they don't really have a choice but to be on board with it. Its what Ao decreed, and Ao isn't Good. Ao is True Neutral and a supporter of tyranny as well as freedom. So, you have the freedom to choose your tyrant. And, yes, in NW2 MotB we had an actual angel who felt the same way to the point she got kicked out of Mount Celestia.


Yeah, it can be annoying, but the gods hold as much sway over your story and plot that it only comes up if you make it. Take a look at the Brimstone Angels series. The dragonborn of Faerun don't worship gods, they think they're a bunch of tyrants, even the supposedly good ones. An entire society of aethists who are okay with ceasing to exist after they die.