Death of Gods

[Lukterran]

Just wondering how many other people have had a god get killed or defeated in their campaigns? Which ones? How?

[MaxxSterling]

I've had parties kill lower level, low mdc/sdc gods a few times before. I figure if they are smart enough/powerful enough to do it, awesome. They have stats, use them! However, you usually have to deal with a lot of defenders, other gods or powerful beings who are friends and possibly an entire pantheon. So it is somewhat likely depending on the god/situation that other gods will show up and stomp them into oblivion.

I don't remember which gods specifically, but they weren't like Zeus or anything like that. As for repercussions, obviously all the priests lose their powers and the followers will feel foresaken but in time, should move on to other gods and in much time, the god will be forgotten. But generally speaking it is very hard to kill an actual god due to res spells and stuff like that.

And any time they'd defeated the god, it was through some planning, getting them stuck somewhere they can't escape from and then hammering them with shear brute force repeatedly. And these are obviously high level characters with lots of power at their disposal. These are type of things that happen at 14th/15th level when campaigns are nearing an end and they really want to just go out with a bang, from what I generally find.

My 2 cents for what it's worth.

[glitterboy2098]

"well, gods do die. it generally doesn't make them less dangerous" -Murai, priestess of the Veiled.*


*from a wonderful little comic called Digger. a wombat. a dead god. one very peculiar epic.

it's not really possible to kill a god with active worshippers. even if you slay the physical body, the energy from all that worship will keep the gods essence alive and well. eventually that god is going to come back.. and ticked off at the characters. IIRC dragons and gods talks about this a bit.

[Stone Gargoyle]

Gods can only be killed in their home realm of existence. If you kill a god, he will come back later unless you kill him on his home turf.

[kiralon]

I had an adventure that was based around the return of the old ones and a fair few gods did die (but mostly cxame back)
When heim died an area about 20 miles across turned into thick forest

[Tor]

Since it's such a useful way of god-killing in other games... does anyone know if any kinds of explosives exist in PF? Like perhaps if Dwarves have any they might use in mining ores? I don't know if it would be dynamite or anything, but just SOMETHING. Like I'm watching this show called 'Strange Empire' and miners were using explosives in pioneering times.

I know PF isn't quite up to there yet (no guns) but explosives have been around longer than guns, with Chinese using fireworks and what-not, makes me wonder if they might be in some world book and I just overlooked them?

When I think of Warcraft, they introduced the "Dwarven Demolition" (along with Goblin Sappers) in Tides of Darkness prior to the introduction of Riflemen in Reign of Chaos, so I think having explosives in a non-rifle world might not upset the genre too much.

They should probable be less effective and more dangerous than dynamite and similar we see in HU/Nightbane though. Kind of like what black powder weapons are to modern guns.

[Library Ogre]

To my recollection, no non-magical explosives have been introduced in PF, yet.

I've had players kill gods, but that was back in 1st edition and me being 13.

[eliakon]

I have had one god get killed in the course of my gaming as a direct result of player actions (as opposed to Death By Plot). The players had gotten a personal vendetta with the god, organized a counter cult, arranged for assassinations of key members of the faith, burned shrines and temples, organized simultaneous invasions of all the nations that followed him by rampaging armies, and otherwise damaged the faith of the people in him. The loss of faith weakened him enough that his divine foes pounced. Note that this was done over the course of decades (I think it was closer to two=three centuries if I recall. Its BEEN decades now so my memory on the details is a bit fuzzy.)

[Reagren Wright]

First edition made it feasible to kill a god. 2nd Edition really hard thanks to deific powers and some very powerful
weapons and special abilities. Had an adventure in which the goddess Hel made a contest between a player
character and herself, and he nearly killed her until she had to cheat and thus the contract between them was
broken and he was given his soul back.

[Tor]

There are ways around deific powers, though a lot of the limitations is in a gods' personality not to use them to their best tactical possibility. A logical cowardly god would just mass-cast 'Banish' against all enemies indirectly through minions to remove a lot of inter-dimensional threats.

Biggest problem is the ease at which gods can be brought back to life. Not as scary if the notes under Annihilation/Discorporation are interpreted as only applying to those who intentionally self-terminate, but even without that problem-free resurrection, they can still come back easily with less PPE if another deity wants to help.

The easiest targets are gods who have no deific allies to bring them back to life or bail them out. Guys like Kirgi or that dog guy.

[Lukterran]

Gods that have died in my campaigns listed below:

Ra - Summoner was attempting to create a new power circle. Basically a cross between a create rift circle and a summon dragons. Instead it tore a piece of the dragon god's Styphon home realm and transplaneted it into the summoning chamber in Palladium, along with the two other gods he was battling at the time Ra and Isis. That caught all the gods unexpectedly and offered Styphon the oppurtunity to land the killing blow against Ra. Afterward Styhon dimensionally teleported away. Leaving the summoner to deal with a very anger goddess. Ra was later restored to life.

Pith - An entry campaign was based on facing off against this Deity. During final battle at the end of the adventure and he was finally defeat by the last party member with his rune sword Gilgimesh. The other party members had all be taken out my the assassin gods powerful traps and magic.

Anhur & Yin-Sloth - Both were killed of in a single battle. The arch angel and servant of Ra began a rebellion of angels against the gods to purify the world of evil. The final battle was epic and many angelic, mortals and supernatural forces died on the battlefield. Many other Gods were envolved but they all lived. Anhur was eventually bought back by his Pantheon. However, Yin-Sloth was allowed to stay dead.

Hoknar - He didn't really die. However, he was trapped in another dimension with a alien intellegence with nearly limitless power. After the player character was given one wish to call upon any one alley he wanted to help him, Hoknar was his choice. The player later was able to escape that realm. Hoknar stayed behind to protect the player against a "Death" like figure that was the guarding the only passage way in or out of the realm. Hoknar remains trapped unable to defeat the undying creature and it unable to best Hoknar as well.

[Tor]

Hoknar - He didn't really die. However, he was trapped in another dimension with a alien intellegence with nearly limitless power. After the player character was given one wish to call upon any one alley he wanted to help him, Hoknar was his choice. The player later was able to escape that realm. Hoknar stayed behind to protect the player against a "Death" like figure that was the guarding the only passage way in or out of the realm. Hoknar remains trapped unable to defeat the undying creature and it unable to best Hoknar as well.

This just made me smile because of how he made Epim upset. It's Dwarf-god time!

[Cybermancer]

Osiris always starts out dead in my games and while I hesitate to make any definite declarations, Satan hasn't been seen since second edition came out.

Kidding aside, I've never seen a real god get killed in any game. I think the closest that it came to was one I was a player in. We managed to kill Mormor on the mortal plane, which of course didn't stick. His minions got pretty annoying after that. To the point where we considering going after him on his own plane. The campaign ended to the group moving to different parts of the country so it never got that far. It was also a very high level game. One character was a 14 level wizard, 6 level diabolist and 3rd level summoner (care to guess what their long term goal was?). The lowest level character was around 8th or 9th and most of us were around 12th.

[The Dark Elf]

Soldier of Od killed Mictla (but 1st edition as others said)