Apparently coming up with your own pantheon is hard… who knew?

[Phantonym]

Currently I am working on putting together my own pantheon and non LitRPG power system but it’s a bit harder than I thought it would be… so far I have 6/7 gods I wanted in my pantheon and I think it’s going well… until I get to putting together the lore XD
Here are the gods I have so far!

Nobel King of the Gods, God if Wisdom and Order.
Harmony Queen of the Gods, Goddess of the Balance.
Forge God of Innovation and Industry
Geo God of Nature
Malroth God of War and Death
- Goddess of Fate
- Goddess of -

I am trying to come up with a 7th one that will be a goddess but I’m stuck tryna figure out what she will be the goddess of. At first I thought Love and Families but I don’t think that really fits in the plot… The gods will pop up in chapter one so this is why I’m delaying it for so long

 

[RainingFish]

Well, I can name a bunch of things and see if anything sticks. Chivalry, fertility, nobility, handicrafts, craftsmanship, revenge, hunting and justice.

 

[Phantonym]

I see forge as over crafting and the like

Well, I can name a bunch of things and see if anything sticks. Chivalry, fertility, nobility, handicrafts, craftsmanship, revenge, hunting and justice.

 

[RainingFish]

I see forge as over crafting and the like

Fair point. If none of those are good I can try a few more. Emotion, peace, harvest, arts and magic.

 

[LesserSarcasm]

Why stick with common themes mix and match harmony goddes of fishing and war and making floral wreaths out of animal bones. Try adding negatives to their characters as gods are typically based on exactuated human actions or emotions. Make gods name the opposite of their domain like live in harmony or face my wrath type of thing. Alina goddes of the hunt, eating things which aren't and shouldn't be named and polka dots. See easy.

 

[VertisGuguChalimoth]

Trade and Commerce ?

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

Trade and Commerce ?

Mercator. The god of fraudulent merchants.

 

[laccoff_mawning]

Hmm maybe misfortune? You could depict her as the sister of fate.

 

[Naash]

A god of the End ? Something more than death. Not an evil god, but something that the other gods deny the existence of.
Even its very concept.

It would also fit lore-wise as a form of unbalance.
Your six other gods make up three pairs, but the End is also lurking even if no-one sees it.

 

[Arkus86]

Wine and music

 

[RainingFish]

A god of the End ? Something more than death. Not an evil god.
But something that the other gods deny the existence of. Even its very concept.

Interesting. Maybe something like the god of beginnings and endings.

 

[Naash]

Interesting. Maybe something like the god of beginnings and endings.

Yep. I've always liked this kind of trope : The End being something unique among deities.

My own novel uses a pantheon I spend nights to think of, so it reminded me of that.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

My world had a fairly simple pantheon ... sort of (well, it also permitted the players to choose any gods from Deities and Demigods and they suddenly had a presence but that's another issue...).

• Selaria, Goddess of the Twin Sons
• Coriddion, Ascended Moon God and God of Heroes, her mate
• S'Senarch, God of the World and Reptiles, sometimes called The First God
• Cyrannon the Entertainer, God of the Arts
• The Four Siblings (Children of Selaria and Coriddion) - who reside on the Elemental Band within the hollow world; each one bears the Mantle of the Season for ninety-one days, giving them power on par with their mother, otherwise they are among the weakest of the gods)
  • Khohl, the Harvester, God of Earth, Autumn and the Dead
  • Danae Lifebringer, Goddess of Water, Spring and Birth
  • (have forgotten the names of the other two; would need to find my old notes), Goddess of Fire, Summer and Life/Healing
  • (Forgotten name), God of Winter, The Hunt, and Death (distinct from The Dead - the Harvester issues them from this world, his brother oversees their passing but does not concern himself with them after)
• The Creator, an entity who set everything in motion, and then stepped away. Some believe he moved on to other worlds and universes, some believe she died, others that The Creator still meddles in mortal affairs under multiple guises, the most common being the half-elf "inventor" D'Anellian.

Whenever I needed another god, I created it or stole it whole cloth from another setting (my Goddess of Luck came from the pantheon of the Forgotten Realms; for example).
Some later additions were:

• Ianuth, Father of Magic
• Ksalon, The Mindlord, an ascended human who was the first to unlock "psionic" powers

And then there were the Outsider Gods - the Cthulhu Mythos, all of whom were repelled at one time in the First Godswar, save one, but still have a presence in the form of The Prisoner, for trapped in the center of the Elemental Band is the entity Ygaruth, the Abomination, God of Blasphemies.

Edit: And I kind of lost my point.
Start with a few core entities, the ones who either "everyone" (in world) knows about, or who will play a role in the story in some way. If you find you need more, create them at that point, or borrow them from an existing real or fictional world's mythology (ideally with a new name and appearance if you have time for it but... real world mythology, the god Apollo appeared under that name in three distinct cultures; the god Tyr from the Norse Pantheon is part of the Forgotten Realms pantheon in the same role in both. Some of the early "evil beings" of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic faith were "imports" from hostile tribes (Gog, Magog, even Satan himself).

 

[IanWhite2105]

It kinda isn't.

 

[Rhaps]

You can look at Lord of the Mysteries and its copies for inspiration.

 

[CheertheSecond]

Currently I am working on putting together my own pantheon and non LitRPG power system but it’s a bit harder than I thought it would be… so far I have 6/7 gods I wanted in my pantheon and I think it’s going well… until I get to putting together the lore XD
Here are the gods I have so far!

Nobel King of the Gods, God if Wisdom and Order.
Harmony Queen of the Gods, Goddess of the Balance.
Forge God of Innovation and Industry
Geo God of Nature
Malroth God of War and Death
- Goddess of Fate
- Goddess of -

I am trying to come up with a 7th one that will be a goddess but I’m stuck tryna figure out what she will be the goddess of. At first I thought Love and Families but I don’t think that really fits in the plot… The gods will pop up in chapter one so this is why I’m delaying it for so long

Is it really that difficult? There are some many things that a god can be.

Eros for example is a god of love, patron of gays while Aphrodite is goddess of beauty and love and patron of lesbians.

Then we have big EROS. Not the minor god of love on Olympus but the primordial of procreation.

There is also Sobek, protector of army, patron of military might, god of fertility, lord of the Nile.


For my latest fanfic which set in the futuristic 70th century, there are:

Belial - Patron of the worthless
Satan - the Divine Judge


Then we can have lots of other things: Whisperer of Tales (as a deity of story telling) or IF the master of what could be (as a deity of ideas).


For me, it's best not to be constraint by overly popular aspects like war, time, life, death, space, magic and time. There are a lot more to it. Often times, you will need to think of more intimate aspects since it is these aspects that shape culture and history not universal concept like elementals or fundamental forces.

 

[Tyranomaster]

I tried it twice for D&D campaigns I worked on, and it was brutal and not worth it. I only dig into it if I need to. The good news for a LitRPG is that you have a lot more flexibility in what needs to exist.

 

[Zagaroth]

It helps if you already get into mythology stories IRL. Here's my current list, though I should note that several of them are lifted in part or in whole from real myth, but that does fit my setting as the creation story involves an alliance of gods from disparate other realities coming together to create this one.

Zagaroth, dragon god, primary creator deity, Emperor of the Gods, Father of Ozuran and Sakiya
Amirume, kitsune goddess of the sun, mother of Zagaroth’s daughter
Mericume, kitsune goddess of the moon, mother of Zagaroth’s son
Sakiya, lady of passions, Zagaroth’s daughter
Ozuran, lord of shadows, Zagaroth’s son
Li Zarb; The Shattered One, chaos incarnate, protector of children and the child-like

Danu; elven goddess, queen of the elven pantheon

Brogtin Thraxstone; The Smith, leader of the dwarven pantheon
Hanarr; Dwarven god of Craftsmen and Artisans

Yamaraja; judge of the dead, husband of Kikoi Muerte
Kikoi Muerte; goddess of the transition between life and death, wife of Yamaraja

Bedelia; phoenix, elemental goddess of fire
Fisaga; sylph, elemental goddess of air
Kamatha; tortoise, elemental god of earth
Yu-kiang; leviathan, elemental god of water
Lutomose; the Great Hippo, elemental god of mud
Souflia; the fire salamander, elemental god of lava
Betieau; the automaton, elemental god of metal

Xiyual; demon-slaying hero risen to become a god
Dormire; a risen human god, believes in acquiring power through almost any means above all else
Diasthian; a risen human goddess of protection, community, and loyalty

Lunari; Goddess of Thresholds, Boundaries, and Transitions

Thoth; The Scholar, god of knowledge
Sun Wukong; The Wanderer, god of adventure

 

[Jerynboe]

How many gods do you really need, and how many are important? A whole pantheon of lesser deities can be implied while you focus on the big bois that are actual characters, bringing up new ones as the plot demands. Sorta like countries in that way. Don't bother with gods that you don’t have plans for.

I am very fond of my own go-to trinity, the three sisters.
She Who Promises Hope, goddess of birth and ambition
She Who Demands Change, goddess of life and pain
She Who Brings Peace, goddess of death and community

 

[John_Owl]

- Goddess of Fate
- Goddess of -

I have 2 in one of my stories thus far that you're welcome to borrow. If you want, that is. Karma and Fate. You can assign them however you want, but in my story, the idea is that Karma decides the body and fate finds it through both space and time. Karma decides if you should get a better life or the life of a dung beetle. Then once that's been decided, Fate searches for the body and brings you to it.

I don't know much about your story, so they could be central to the plot. But I usually just come up with them as needed. Pantheons don't have to be a difficult chore so much as a fun and exciting means to expand your world.