Information about the deities

. Continue to quick guide to the Deities (each individual deity site is rather large) . The details and descriptions provide a broad picture of the nature of each deity, their church, their followers and their role in society. Each culture and region, however, will vary in how they relate to and view these deities. The GM should feel free to tailor the deities to suit individual environments.

The Eight Houses: The deities are divided into eight 'houses', each headed by a major deity and populated with subordinate minor deities. These minor deities will often change by region, some having risen 'locally' or been absorbed from a native tradition. See the section on 'theology' for more information on how minor deities are brought into the pantheon.
Under each deity is large number of saints (or angels, the name can vary). These are almost invariably locally venerated and are not listed here.
Two symbols accompany each major deity, one is the simplified 'vestement' symbol - the other is a more complete symbol used in church/temple decorations (these symbols made by Robert Hornsey).

The deity descriptions contain the following:

Name: The name of each deity is listed along with some variant spellings.

Deity of: Lists the 'spheres of influence' of the deity.

Form: The represented physical form of the deity. This form is intentionally left 'racially-neutral' as the deity will be represented (in many cases) as resembling locals, or resembling the people that originally introduced the pantheon to an area. The form is useful mostly for descriptions of statues or for story-telling, but occasionally GMs may wish the deity to make an actual appearance (not recommended, but there is a time and a place for that sort of thing).

Colours: Each deity has colors associated with it for easy identification of their priests and for use in heraldry and other symbolic forms.

Cardinal Direction: Every house (major deity) has a direction on the compass associated with it. For more details, consult the section on Theology.

Alignment: For those that use alignment based RPGs. It should be noted that the alignments used in some games are not entirely accurate in defining these deities. The deity alignments given here were determining using the TetraQ RPG optional alignment rules, which builds an alignment from averaging a broad range of personality characteristics. This system allows for a few evil traits in basically good characters, and vice-versa. The alignment itself is determined by the overall trend and weight of the characteristics. For example, the honourable deity Seandac is 'Lawful Good', but is also the deity of revenge and war. Also, the deities Anacor and Dorenne are 'Neutral Neutral' but are almost complete opposites. View the alignments as an overall tendancy, not as hard and fast descriptions.
Followers of a deity only tend toward the alignment of the diety, under no circumstances should a GM force a character to accept a deity purely because of alignment (personal history is another matter, though). It is quite common for 'lawful good' people to follow Graal, a 'lawful evil' deity. Graal is primarily a lawful, conservative deity and only earned the 'evil' designation for being a bit too enthusiastic in supporting powerful interests and a 'realpolitick' attitude over principle in some circumstances.
If the GM uses a game world where people view each other in alignment terms (oh, don't talk to him - he's chaotic neutral) then some problems could arise. A suggestion is to place the deities 'above' alignment in the view of the populace.

Church and Following: A description of the relationship the clergy has with the populace, the role of the church, the teachings of the church and the position the church is likely to have in a culture.

Church and State: Relations between states and the followers of this deity. Also, there is an indication of how states run by the followers of a deity will function.

Relations within the Pantheon: This gives the GM and player an idea of how the followers of other houses in the pantheon will perceive a deity and followers. This can (and often should) be modified by local conditions and circumstances. There are times that can cause some interesting alliances...
It can always be assumed that the any and all deities followers in the Kendrish Pantheon will be firmly opposed to any other human-based religion. If your GM uses other species (elfs, dwarfs, etc.) and there are religions specifically for those species then relations will vary according to circumstance and GM decision.

The Deity and Priests: Details specifically related to priests of this deity.
.

Continue to the Quick Guide to the Deities