10 Eldritch Beings, Pretender Gods, And Uncanny Entities

Hello there my lovelies,

Previously I discussed the pantheon of gods I tend to use in my settings, describing each in turn. Today I am discussing the nascent gods of the world and the forms they take. To reiterate, I perceive gods as powerful beings of uncanny nature and alien designs. They have more in common with the Lovecraftian entities of the mythos than the gods of mythology like the Greek or Norse pantheon.

The masses ordain the divinity of the gods I have through their worship and acts of devotion. It also means that no matter how powerful a god seems, they are ultimately finite. They are not the omniscient, omnipotent god (with a capital G) of the Abrahamic religions. Therefore they can be diminished, overthrown, or even killed (as unlikely as that is).

So the question begs, where do the gods come from? What were they before they ascended to godhood?

The answer is that they are unexplainable eldritch beings, all of whom defy the laws of nature and exist in strange and dangerous forms. They are found in the deepest, darkest corners of the hidden earth, or birthed in the gaps between the stars. If the foolhardy or ambitious dig too deep or uncover forbidden knowledge, these beings may be revealed. Rarely are they benign, or even benevolent, mostly however they are capricious and pitiless.

Below is the list of pretender gods I tend to use most often.

The General Rules I Have for My Pretender Gods Are as Follows:

• The name should evoke themes and a mental image.
• It should have something unsettling about its appearance or mannerisms.
• Its worshippers are strangely affected by the god, either through compulsion or physical change.

Who Are These Pretender Gods? (D10)

Roll	History
1	The True Sight: It takes the form of a giant eyeball that opens up into a maw of gnashing teeth. Has uncanny knowledge of the deepest secrets of the world. It grants its worshipers the gift of true sight, to see others' secrets in exchange for that person’s eyes.
2	The Whispering God: No true form of The Whispering God has ever been observed. It appears as a whispering voice that emerges out of cracks in walls. Seeks to guide emerging races and civilizations into enlightenment. Worshipers bring lost knowledge of the old world.
3	The Glutton of Souls: Takes the form of a spindly blue-skinned humanoid with a distended belly. A single animated eye hovers where its head should be. It consumes the souls of the dead, never sated, and bids its followers to bring victims to sate its hunger. The most loyal worshipers may be given the gift of the eldritch eye. However, this replaces their head, and they will forever hunger for the souls of the dead.
4	Butcher’s Maw: Where the Glutton of Souls hungers for souls, the Butcher’s Maw hungers for flesh. It takes the form of a giant obese humanoid with no eyes, just a great maw. Worshippers quickly succumb to a similar desire for flesh, rapidly descending into cannibalism. Its desire to feast is infectious. Individuals who spend too long in its domain will slowly succumb to the taboo of cannibalism.
5	The Golden Creeper: Takes the form of a central mass from which sprouts a thousand arms, grossly long and with too many joints. Upon each arm is a thousand eyes that twitch and swivel constantly in all directions with paranoid desperation. It only appears at sunset and will only crawl, and crawl and crawl. The Golden Creeper wants to explore and learn. It collects all things it finds curious. So be careful not to draw its interest, and if you do, make sure to keep moving until dark. Lest a thousand hands on a thousand arms take you.
6	Light of Ages: A second sun has appeared in the skies. It is small and distant for now. It moves slowly towards the heart of the solar system intent on supplanting the sun and having all bask in its glow. Its worshipers cover themselves head to toe in thick cloth so that the impure light of the old sun does not sully their flesh. By staring into the light of this strange new sun, one might just be able to hear it. If you do not go blind first.
7	Simularcurm: Simularcurm has no true intent or motive. It merely copies, follows, and observes. It has no true form but can take the form of any entity it witnesses. It will follow them, copy them, and observe their every movement. Sometimes, like a protoplasmic ooze, it will envelop what it has copied and consume them utterly.
8	Mother’s Embrace: It takes the form of a giant elderly woman swaddled in thousands of layers of rags and cloth. It is impossible to see (her?) true form beneath all the fabric. Her psychic emanations spread far and wide, and those susceptible will feel a deep instinctual need to be surrounded and protected. They will go on pilgrimage, seeking her place of slumber. She mostly sleeps in deep forgotten places with hundreds of folk from all over wrapping themselves in her fabric, feeling eternally safe and comforted. This sense of comfort overwhelms all other senses, and ultimately her followers die of thirst or starve to death.
9	Parliament of Bronze: The Parliament of Bronze inhabits the metal tin. Unlike the other pretender gods, it is a tiny hivemind hidden in tin ore deep in the earth. Once smelted and made into the alloy Bronze, it animates. It takes the form of thousands of bronze automatons, each unique, some ferocious, some artistic. The parliament votes on a series of actions of their uncanny design. Once votes are ratified, they impose these legislative outcomes on the world around them. Worshippers follow their laws slavishly, no matter how absurd or self-destructive they may be. Certain that the parliament is infallible.
10	. Ten Score Eyes: Ten Score Eyes lives deep in space. It silently observes the world. It takes notes, it remembers. Its existence is a revelation to most as the Ten Score Eye is so hidden and so far removed. Its worshipers go to tremendous lengths to build arcane observatories so that they may glimpse the being. They long one day to communicate with it, to learn its secrets.

I hope you find that useful! As always take, cannablise and steal the ideas here and use them as you please. Next time I will present a quick a dirty generator to make a god or pretender god of your own!

Much Love

The Civil Tea-Set

A Pantheon Presented Plainly

A Premade Pantheon Presented Plainly

All gods know ladies cannot resist a sexy swan

Hello there my lovelies,

Today I present to you a pantheon of gods. These gods are the standard gods I have in most settings. The topic of gods in mythology and fiction is a subject you could write a PhD on, so I shall try and keep this post concise and focused. I will describe my philosophy, as to how to design and use gods in a setting as well as an overview of how religion should integrate into any crafted world.

The Tea-Sets Theology List

1. The gods are distant beings. They rarely directly interact with the world. Their followers bring change in the world; they do not.
2. There should always be something unsettling or uncanny about them. They may be worshipped by millions of beings but should always be something that puts you at slight unease when you delve into them more deeply.
3. Their domain (what they are a god of) is rarely intuitive. If their nature can be summarized neatly in one sentence, then there are hidden aspects to the god that require further explanation.
4. Direct communication with them should almost never happen, maybe at most only a handful of times in a grand campaign. This should only happen in moments of the direst need (to heighten drama), or only in the most sacred of places.
5. There should always be followers who are zealots. That takes their beliefs beyond the reasonable, to the extreme. Violence and cruelty are done too often in the name of religion.
6. The gods are rarely malevolent, but also not entirely benign.
7. The vast majority of people in our world claim some form of religious belief. This should be the same in any other world.
8. Settlements should nearly always have some place of worship, be it a cathedral, temple, or shrine.
9. Reward devotion; it doesn't have to be a big reward. A splash of holy water here, or a one-time bonus to a roll there. Roleplay of a devoted follower should pay dividends.

Aresstus
Dominion: Freedom and Revolution
Appearance: A series of interlocking rings constantly revolving. Upon each ring are a multitude of eyes. Each eye is restless, looking and observing.
About: Aresstus demands freedom for freedom’s sake alone. As a result of this, Aresstus is the patron of the oppressed, imprisoned, and enslaved. The followers of Aresstus often act with moral certainty that their actions are for the good. The darker flip side to this god is the spirit of pure anarchy and rabid individual sovereignty that it inspires in its most zealous followers. All government is a form of oppression, in the eyes of its followers. All authority figures are corrupt, and all institutions are rotten to the core, and therefore they must all be taken down and destroyed. Aresstian anarchists constantly foment unrest in all civilizations in a holy crusade to bring to an end all forms of rule. So that peoples of all kinds may stand as equals in the utopia of noble savages that only Jean-Jacques Rousseau could dream of.

Batt
Dominion: Change and Catharsis
Appearance: Batt appears as a colossal floating black pyramid. On one face is a great unblinking eye that carefully surveys all that it sees. A hundred thousand black tentacles from its base grasp and reshape anything within reach.
About: Batt never communicates in any meaningful way. Batt is the representation of change and entropy. Batt does not favour any outcome over any other, it just desires that the status quo is overthrown. Very few people worship Batt directly, they do not need to as change is a constant in life. However, Batt is also the bringer of catharsis. Those who have lived through turbulent times in their life are said to receive its blessings. The clarity of thought that comes with overcoming personal upheaval.

The Grave Warden
Dominion: Peace in death
Appearance: The Grave Warden takes the form of a heavily robed human, with an oversized hood large enough to hide all of The Grave Warden’s features. A single large brass bell is extending from the sleeve of one of The Grave Warden’s voluminous sleeves. The Grave Warden will ring this regularly to call the dead to its side.
About: The ignorant call The Grave Warden the god of death, or the god of the dead. The Grave Warden is invoked to protect the dead in their eternal rest. The symbol of the brass bell is found throughout graveyards, tombs, and mausoleums. Undeath is abhorrent to The Grave Warden. To interfere with the ultimate fate of a living being is to defile it.

Ling-Gol
Dominion: Ambition, Architecture, and Obsession
Appearance: Ling-Gol is usually depicted as a city with a grand cathedral at its heart. Upon this cathedral is an unblinking, ever-searching eye.
About: Ling-Gol is the god of the academic and craftsman and is otherwise known as the Infinite City because worship of it inspires complexity of thought beyond rational bounds. Ling-Gol’s followers strive to achieve great things, but the obsessiveness it inspires in its followers can become all-consuming for the most zealous. Yes, Ling-Gol’s acolytes do create great things, but often at the cost of their minds, or family and friends.

Lumina
Dominion: The sun, Wisdom, and Healing
Appearance: Lumina takes two forms. First as that of the sun. The second is that of a golden-haired woman with an irrepressible smile. Usually depicted in traditional dress or mirror-like armour.
About: Lumina is the most accessible of all the gods. Her appearance and creed is clear and understandable. Therefore Lumina is not just the goddess of the sun but also civilization itself, as the sun gives life to the land, to the crops and respite to the weary. Her worshippers are largely charitable and seek to better themselves through good deeds and words. However, her most zealous followers are often struck blind by staring too long into her glory. She is beautiful and kind, but she is also smothering and all-encompassing.

Nyla
Dominion: Lies and Pain
Appearance: Nyla takes one of two forms. The first is that of the moon, the second is that of an old matronly woman, white of hair and sad of smile.
About: Nyla has two sides to her. One is a being that revels in the shadow of human nature, the manipulations, the lies, and the cruelties. The other side of her is someone who understands the pain people do to each other, and the damage lies inflict. She offers understanding and soothing from this suffering. For the few of those who do worship her, they consider her the most human of all the gods.

Orchidnidus
Dominion: The duality of nature
Appearance: She takes the appearance of a giant blossoming flower or that of a young woman with vines for hair. She is heavily pregnant, and her hands are covered in blood. One hand rests upon her belly, the other carries the decapitated head of a foe.
About: Also known as the Red and Green Woman. Orchidnidus is the goddess of nature, who revels in the stark truth of the natural world. She represents the duality of nature, one side that creates and fosters life, and the other side which is about brutal, pitiless survival. Orchidnidus creates life, but she also destroys it; such is the cycle of nature.

Verus
Dominion: Bureaucracy and Law
Appearance: Verus takes the image of a great green obelisk covered with all the laws of all nations. Verus also occasionally takes the form of a jade-green animated statue. He wields books and scrolls as great weapons of war.
About: Verus is sometimes referred to as the god of complexity or thought of as a sadistic god, as nothing is more labyrinthine or as frustrating as dealing with the processes and vagaries of institutions. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Verus loves and understands humanity in a way that perhaps only Nyla can appreciate. Systems and laws exist only abstractly, and this fascinates him. His followers seek to create the perfect system, a streamlined and frictionless organization. Perhaps it is more precise to call Verus the god of efficiency.

Conclusion

Crafting a pantheon of gods is an excellent way to really stamp your personality onto the setting, both the gods and the relgions following them wil add flavor and depth to your world. Use my gods or my guildlines as you like,or steal as you want. Just remember, keep them distant, keep them a bit weird, and make thier followers sometimes VERY dangerous.

Much Love,
The Civil Tea-Set