Friday, September 6, 2013

30-Day D&D Challenge - Day 6: Favorite Diety

For this one I'll have to go with Lathander Morninglord of the Forgotten Realms. His Domains are: Good, Protection, Sun, Strength, Nobility, and Renewal. He's the current incarnation of the Netherese-ian (Ancient Magic Super-People of Forgotten Realms) sun god Amaunator.  He likes fertility rituals, sunlight, and hates undead. All the good stuff you want out of a diety.  Also his clerics specialize in hunting undead and are called Dawnbringers, which is a pretty sweet title if you ask me.  His symbol is a sun over a lush field.  Universal good-guy kind of symbology. (which is probably why politicians like to steal the design). 
Another reason Lathander is my preferred D&Diety is because he was one of the few good dieties worshiped by the oppressed peasants of Ravenloft. The aforementioned elf vampire Jander Sunstar resurrected the Morninglord religion in Bavaria after saving a kid who had mistaken Jander for the sun god (and who later became the first priest of the Morninglord in Ravenloft).
As far as mechanical benefits go, when you make a cleric of the Morninglord in AD&D you gain all your spells each day automatically at dawn, rather than only after praying for an hour.  That just seems like a major time-saver to me.  I prefer my religious spell-blessings to be consistent and convenient for my busy schedule, rather than dependent on whether I've breathed in enough holy smoke that morning.

5 comments:

brando said...

Very nice. You can't go wrong with ole Lathander.

I've never really thought about what my favorite deity is. I suppose I'll say Helm, only because there was a resurrection station SE of Neverwinter.

brando said...

This is really fun, btw.

Cory said...

Ah, Helm's Hospitalers. Resurrecting reckless Magic-Users 1,000 gp at a time. Oh, and don't forget the -1 level charge.

I like how there's a Diety Domain of "Good." I would imagine every single cleric would interpret their deity's primary Domain is "Good." Even like, lawful evil Priests of Asmodeus think they have the "Good" domain, because only they "know what's best" for "the people." Heck, I would expect most Forgotten Realms churches probably have gone to war over who has the "Good"-est domain access.

brando said...

oooh. I don't know about that. Llothers know that they're eviiieeeel.

I like my bad guys to know that they're bad. And they stink. They pin striped suits, twirl their mustaches, and have lute-cases full of poisoned hand quarrels. (Actually that's a good idea. A bard with a lute case that's actually gnomish repeating crossbow. He doesn't drink mead, just ... I dunno... whatever coke is.)



The evil priests wear goat leggings and announce they're against Goodness and Niceity.

Cory said...

That Bard description sounds like he'd make a good character for a movie:

"Once Upon a Time in Calimshan" or maybe "Dwarfsperado"

Obviously Llothians know they're evil. They're elves. Elves are evil. We know this because of their refusal to make amends for their crimes during the War of the Beard.