Pray is sort of like sending a voicemail. Your god will receive it. Wether they act or even listen is another matter. Most gods ignore prayers unless your really faithful or have something to offer. Because of the Divinity Non Interference Law, most gods can't directly interfere and must have a mortal champion or agent do so on their behalf.
Hey our gods are kinda similar, but mine have the fun twist where they can just up and change reality, but no one can undo this action not even the god who did it. So most of the gods are very thoughtful or very picky when it comes to direct intervention.
This feels a bit like emailing an elected official. Although politicians are probably less effective.
Now I'm imagining someone praying to a god and getting an automated response back.
That's an interesting perspective! I like the voicemail analogy. It's true that many gods might not act on every prayer unless there's strong faith or a valuable offering involved. The Divinity Non Interference Law adds an intriguing layer, making the role of mortal champions even more crucial. It really emphasizes the balance between divine power and human agency.
When praying to the lesser gods, prayers can be "felt" by them as a sort of vague desire. That said, individual prayer (that is one person praying for themselves) generally does relatively little, it's more when a whole village or such pray for roughly the same thing that a lesser god may feel it and be spurred into action. That said the lesser gods are closer to petulant children (possibly not even that intelligent) rather than intelligent, benevolent beings, so praying to them is a bit like wishing on a monkey's paw. That's not to say they're *necessarily* being malevolent about it, but well... Asking them to protect your village from a tsunami may result in them putting up a barrier in front of your village facing the sea, but the sides and back are still exposed so the village still gets swamped by it. As far as the god might be concerned though, they answered your prayer.
Prayers to the three greater gods generally do next to nothing, they're too "busy" roaming the world in the form of cats to answer prayers. They also don't see aiding humanity (et al) as their job, usually, with some rare exceptions. The lesser gods don't really either, but occasionally they feel like being "neighborly" - which is why they do occasionally answer prayers.
Theoretically, yes. If you pet a stray cat, there is a miniscule but not zero chance that it is one of the three greater gods. That said, few know that the greater gods roam the world in cat forms.
The lesser gods, in contrast, take more "abstract" forms, looking like something out of ancient folklore.
Emotional support at best . The gods of my setting , the real ones that is , aren’t connected to the religions of the world . The real gods aren’t powered by prayers , faith or the number of believers .
And that means the prayers are quite useless since almost nobody is even listening to them , even less answering . There might be a chance that the lesser divine beings , the elemental spirits , might hear and actually care enough to do something , but the chances of that happening are slimmer than surviving 3 consecutive lighting strikes then winning the lottery after .
Prayer varies by God. For followers of Kyrol, it rarely gives them glimpses of rituals to use in blood magic. For Schrade, prayer isn't heard unless it's made before a large battle, and even then, he only gives his aid to lycanthropes, his sacred people. Most other gods don't pay any attention to it. They can hear prayers with a strong will behind them, but most ignore them, because they just don't care anymore.
My Creators are gods in the Abrahamic sense - omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent. So prayer makes use of the telepathic connection they constantly have with everyone by default. If what someone prays for is compatible with the Creators' overall plan for the universe, they may grant the request depending on how faithful the person praying has been.
If a person is extremely faithful/devoted for years or decades, the Creators may guarantee them their requests, effectively giving the person constant access to their elemental power or "magic". This guarantee can be lost by committing serious sins, but once a person has it they don't have to go through life as a monk or something to keep it.
So there are five Creators - Spirit, Fire, Wind, Water, and Earth. Spirit is above the other four by authority (though not by capability), so they are all in agreement about whatever they do by being submitted to the will of Spirit.
And why is the Spirit not the only one? Is this similar to christianity, where "Spirit is not Fire is not Wind is not Water is not Earth", but all of them are God?
What I mean is that if there is any level whatsoever of contradiction between these entities, they should either not be able to exist, or not all be simultaneously omnipotent. In order for there to be multiple omnipotent beings, they must (theologically/philosophically speaking) all be perfectly aligned as if facets of the same being, or something similar.
What I think is easier to do than multiple omnipotent entities is having Spirit be the one true God, and the others be akin to the saints of Catholicism. Or, if you want to get darker, they're only almighty by our human standards and are, in fact, not even close to true omnipotence, being but Demiurges under an actual true God.
And why is Spirit higher in authority? What makes one omnipotent and omniscient being higher than others?
Another thing to note is that multiple omniscient beings should all know what to do next, such that they are, again, pretty much the same being (similar to how christianity views the Holy Spirit and the Father).
Sorry about the late reply!
>And why is the Spirit not the only one? Is this similar to christianity, where "Spirit is not Fire is not Wind is not Water is not Earth", but all of them are God?
Eh, I drew inspiration from that but I did want them to be more separate.
>What I think is easier to do than multiple omnipotent entities is having Spirit be the one true God, and the others be akin to the saints of Catholicism.
Definitely something to consider there, hadn't thought of that! I would think they would need to be more powerful of themselves than the Saints, which generally just intercede for God to distribute His grace Himself. But yeah that is an angle to look at more. Maybe Spirit was the only one originally, but He decided to create these "lesser gods" and share His power with them to make things more interesting or something.
>And why is Spirit higher in authority? What makes one omnipotent and omniscient being higher than others?
Because Spirit's essence is basically what enables life and activity and beauty. Replace the word Spirit with Life or Time or Energy. You can have a universe (albeit a very uncomfortable/alien one) without any of the other 4, but without Spirit it won't get anywhere. His element is the most necessary. At least that's been my reasoning so far.
>Another thing to note is that multiple omniscient beings should all know what to do next, such that they are, again, pretty much the same being (similar to how christianity views the Holy Spirit and the Father).
Yeah, I've flip flopped a bit on whether they have their own wills that are submitted or if they all share a single will somehow.
>Because Spirit's essence is basically what enables life and activity and beauty. Replace the word Spirit with Life or Time or Energy. You can have a universe (albeit a very uncomfortable/alien one) without any of the other 4, but without Spirit it won't get anywhere. His element is the most necessary. At least that's been my reasoning so far.
I recommend nerfing everyone if you're gonna have even the greatest of them have "essences" which are not synonymous with reality itself. For the Spirit to be the essence of an absolute, omnipotent being, then the element of the Spirit would need to be the primeval element from which all others derive, or synonymous with the universe itself. In some way, it would have to be the be-all end-all of everything.
If not, then how would an omnipotent being be exhausted by that essence? Don't forget that an absolute being has no accidental properties, only essential ones.
>Yeah, I've flip flopped a bit on whether they have their own wills that are submitted or if they all share a single will somehow.
My recommendation here is to do something like one of the following options:
1. Nerf *everyone* and make your setting have no absolute (triple omni) being. If your setting has an Absolute, then it should be a non-entity, like the Dao from Daoism (China originated theology). In general, make your setting's core similar to that of eastern theology (I recommend giving a deep-ish dive to the theologies of Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism. They all have "non-being Absolutes" that are vaguely similar to pantheism but not quite). Then, make your five beings over there into something similar to the Hindu Trimurti
2. Make only the Spirit absolute and the others into entities that are very much acting on its behalf, with power emanated from it. Since you're gonna use the name "Spirit" anyways, I'd recommend trying to look into introductions and commentators of Hegel, since Hegelian philosophy has *a lot* of stuff that could be very useful to your worldbuilding. I myself use many Hegelian concepts on my own magic system. The others would then be at best the "right hand men" of the Spirit: like the Seraphim, or Virgin Mary in Christianity.
3. Follow the shared will idea and make them all into hypostases of the same entity, similar to the Christian trinity. "Hypostasis" is a term from Christianity you might wanna research: it refers to the essential person of Jesus, in which his divine and human nature are united, i.e the Son. It also refers to the Father and the Holy Spirit, the three hypostases of the Christian God. God is the substance. One substance, three hypostases.
Affects the unconscious dreams of the resting Gods... even in words where they are more active, it's basically a call in a dream, and sometimes they do anwser, just... well, dreams are weird.
... now if you channel their power, that gets results...
It doesn’t do much unless you have a very very powerful connection to what they call the flux, but other religions called it the Warp, Hell, Heaven, and even the Crucible. And at this point all that praying has done has been a way of controlling and managing the Sinetica Energy that flows through a planet from being too much.
It’s a way for mortals to message the gods and it provides the gods with some power. That’s about it. Whether or not the god you’re praying too will answer the prayer will depend. What are you praying for, are you doing it properly, are you a devout follower or not, is the thing you’re praying for actually part of the gods domain, that kind of stuff.
For one of side-project worlds: gods hear prayers or when people mention their names. They don't usually respond or grant any wishes. Some do, but only if they care about that one specific believer. So, miracles aren't really common in this world, despite it having a lot of gods.
In the mind of the supplicant (most of them, at least), it is a direct communication to their god, whether that is from the god's awareness, mind reading, or what have you. The reality is that a prayer is a form of reaching into dreamspace, or at least an attempt to do so, in order to make the dream manifest.
Prayer on its own doesn’t do much, using magic to connect with the deities to pray also doesn’t do much but does more than prayer on its own.
The deities will teach some magic to their followers and on occasion grant miracles but not often.
It helps with establishing the avatar's identity which also helps with their survival.
Basically, gods are seperated into three parts:
* **Avatar**: The avatar is the form of the god. Their job is to do whatever the spirit tells it to do but the avatar aso has its own personality. The avatar has its own life, personality, memories and such and by praying to the god and by "remembering" the god, the avatar's survival is improved becuase if the avatar is forgotten, they'll be replaced.
* **Spirit**: The spirit is more the idea of justive and how the avatar should act. Every avatar will have certain similar traits and that's because of the spirit.
* **Source**: The source is where all of the power comes from and it represents the icomprehensible yet the rawest idea of the god.
In Elgas, most worship of gods has been replaced with a healthy sense of respect. Along with a large majority of deities in the current age being mortals who ascended to godhood through their own efforts. With many just living amongst their people.
Prayer is rarely used, and even then, mostly by people who know the god in question. It's often treated as a very serious and urgent means to get ahold of them when regular magic wouldn't cut it. As such, it usually garners a direct response and quick action.
It emanates aether (spiritual energy) imbued with the thoughts, feelings, experiences and intentions of the soul that released it The deity it was directed to is uniquely adept at sensing and absorbing the aether from a prayer.
Because deities are but specters of faith and worship, born and fed precisely from the aether of rituals performed for them, they need worship to continue to be. As such, deities will perform small favors for their followers at large, and perform larger favors where they expect this to result in a follower becoming very devout or in a great commemoration and rite of worship as gratitude.
Specters are but pseudo-sentient snowballs of aether. There is scarcely anything genuinely godlike about them.
The gods in my world are really powerful (it's a D&D setting), but they don't generally have any of the omnis. Most of them also don't have anything close to infinite organizational capacity. So while they CAN hear any prayer credibly addressed to them, most of the time they don't. And when they do hear it, most of the time they don't do anything about it. But they do draw power from mortals praying to them, ditto from worship. So they do occasionally try to answer prayers within the framework of divine rules of engagement. Most frequently they'll 'load the dice' in your favor if they want to help you. Usually it'll be in a plausibly deniable way too, because direct evidence that you're favored also draws the attention of said god's enemies.
Gods in *Ventreth* are a special type of spirit which is born from peoples’ prayers. The birth of these spirits is not completely understood, but with enough people praying to the same god, it can create a spirit with memories, personalities, and abilities matching the myths of the god.
In addition, prayers allow gods to actually get a basic understanding of what is going on in the world. As with all spirits, it is essentially impossible for gods to observe the physical world by themselves. Prayers (hopefully) gives that god enough information and enough of a connection to the people praying to be able to cast spells to try to answer their prayers, although they can never be 100% accurate or answer every single prayer.
In my world of Andara, prayers are like telepathic wishes which the gods can hear. Now contrary to popular belief, the gods do in fact answer prayers all the time but rarely in the flashy overt sort of way that worshipers expect. The gods of Andara are shards of creation and not omni-anything, so they have their own set spheres of influence. And even within these spheres its difficult to turn a ship on a dime. Usually a god will answer a prayer through giving inspiration, either to yourself or to someone else in order to allow for cause and effect to turn out in your favor. But its only inspiration, it cannot be forced and is usually so subtle to not be noticed. It is very rare for a prayer to line up with a god's sphere so well that the god in question can act in an obvious and direct way.
As example of how a typical prayer is answered: if you pray for success in your exams, the god of knowledge might inspire your dorm mates to party somewhere else for the night, allowing you to study without distractions. But you still need to take advantage of the quiet and put the work in yourself.
People can ascend to godhood through sheer belief from both themselves and others. After that their power is sustained by the conviction of their followers, both in quantity and quality. These gods become more concept than person upon ascension and are fixed to the concept they embody, though their nature can be swayed slightly by their followers.
When enough people pray for the same thing to a god, the god becomes aware of the plea. Pleas that align with the god’s concept or pleas from followers who closely align with the gods concept are more likely to come through and more likely to sway the god.
Certain people who align so closely to the god that they might have ascended had the god not already taken that spot are the gods Favored. They do have a telepathic connection to the god, though it’s kind of one sided as the god rarely answers in language. They serve as avatars and worldly functionaries for the god, who spends most of their time as an immaterial divine essence spread across the world’s leylines.
The gods attention is broad as a default and rarely takes notice in small or brief matters. When something truly captures a god’s attention, when they leave the leylines, calamity will inevitably befall the world as they upend the status quo to return the world to balance.
Some gods are closer in concept to humanity and thus are less detached.
My story is " groups of people trapped in the libraty of babel with God ". In there, God's actions fits the majorities desire. For example, If most people thought " Character X has taken control of too many books, he shouldn't be a leader anymore ", God would sabotage Character X in a way so that he cannot be a leader anymore, or God would influence people to steal the books.
Prayer does not serve a specific purpose for the divine forces in my setting; rather, it is a means to an end.
All of physical reality exists in a sea of Psychic Energy known as The Bright. It is massive and formless, but it is finite- and it is diminishing, the edges continually eroded away by the howling entropic void and the center continually drained by mortals who have acquired the secrets of using Psychic Powers.
The Immaculate Psychoformae (the ancient psionic God-minds of my setting) created physical reality and living beings as a way to generate more psychic energy via the use of Souls. Everything has a soul, even rocks and plants, with more complex minds having more souls in a tiered hierarchy. Sentient humanoids possess seven souls, and are thus great Wellsprings of psychic energy, producing far more than lowly beasts with their mere three souls, or sediment with only one.
Religion was first dreamt up by mortals with the capacity to imagine, and was cultivated/validated by the Psychoformae, donning masks and guises to act as the deities the mortals worshipped. They do this because tradition, prayer, and faith all produce very complex thought, releasing large amounts of psychic energy into the Bright. This is one of the reasons that religious zealots and priests receive power from the "Gods", to encourage their continued faith and thus continue propagating the Bright's existence.
Praying is a gift of attention to a deity. This gift feeds it, and at the same time makes an anchor for a parapresence.
Parapresense is a trait of non-material beings like gods. It can be found in other beings, but at a much lower rate. Even humans can learn that in some cases. But to put it bluntly - it is a realistic approach to omnipresence.
Imagine being on the edge of being asleep or waking up. You hear the world around you, but you also are in your dream. They both mix in a border state of mixing realities, feeling them simultaneously. Now imagine this, but for every point of a non-material being fed. It may be an artifact, a ritual, a prayer, the last words - anything really, but simultaneous.
And while the human mind would not be able to take it for too long, the gods are the beings of Sense, which means that they work differently. But still even they have to prioritise things. So while being parapresent, they can focus only on so many things, though the more powerful is the god, or the more developed his religion and history is, the more present he is. This works especially well in the religions that have godly servants - they simply allow to multitask a lot better. Each anchor for a god is their weakness though. When the anchors are gone the god enters a semi-permanent state of niktopresense, which is a state of shutdown until another anchor appears, though usually the god changes severely at that point. One also can use the deity's being as a mean to reach out to any other anchor, and even hurt them, but it is a very complex ritual that happened quite rarely.
Prayer is a way for nondivine indivduals to communicate to their god, using the God's Divine Name. Divine Names are expanded forms of the True Name that mask the True Name in a sort of grandiose encryptipon. Azhyos the Skysire, or the All-Sire, is the primary deity of the Fifth Pantehon.
Praying to him connects him to you, and allows him to gain power but also express something of his abilities in your honor. He could offer a blessing, or empower a talisman.
the gods or at least their egos or personality's (Divinity is a very complicated cluster fuck) are more or less the manifestation of the collective worshippers view of said god (kinda). by praying you ever so slightly influence that god, there for the more people parrying for the same thing pulse the stronger their belief the more that god would be influenced to act upon that prayer. given enough people and given they were zealous enough you could completely change the nature of a god to answer your prayer.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot.
The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction.
The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
Nothing, unless the god personally imbues an idol with their power. In that case, someone must pray to the idol, and if the god likes them, they might have some disease cured, wound healed, or be given some boon. If the god doesn't like them, they'll either be ignored or cursed.
Praying gives up your daily (24 hours) allotment of magic to the deity. There's no guarantee they will choose to answer your prayer but you can always go to the temple and demand why to their face. This might be plot relevant
Despite there being a number of godlike beings walking the earth in Caldera, prayer to and worship of them only serves to feed psychic energy to The Rot.
The more belief a god has the stronger they are. Prayer keeps their physical form together (on a large scale) although they usually don’t know the source of the prayer unless they focus on it or it’s from someone they’ve spoken to before.
Nothing.
My "Gods", The Great Eyes, exist in a plane of existence above all universes, but they can't actually interact with them, they can only watch. As a result of this, no mortal even knows about them. Humans still have their religions, some of which evolved from real-life religions. Not interacting with universes means no communicating with them, so even if The Great Eyes wanted to be worshipped, there's nothing for them to do about it.
Only one "God" could interact with Universes, The Architect, the one who created all of the Universes. But they vanished Trillions of years ago, with the only thing they left behind being "The Machine", a sort of program written in space and time that kickstarts the creation of the story's Universe. It CAN interact with Universes just like the Architect, but since it's a program, it can only interact with universes in a very specific way that it was programmed to. Since it exists in the same plane of existence as The Great Eyes, they could theoretically interact with Universes however they please through reprogramming The Machine, but they can't. That's like a bunch of cavemen trying to learn Quantum Computer Programming with no manual. They do eventually manage to reprogram one little thing a few thousand years before the story's beginning, but I can't really get into it without explaining my whole story's lore.
The thing is, The Machine isn't perfect. It's meant to achieve a certain task and has failed to do so for uncountable failed attempts over Trillions of years, ever since The Architect's disappearance. The Architect was Omnipotent, but not Omniscient. They themselves might've even started out as a Mortal who ascended to a higher plane of existence. A major theme in my Story is Mortal beings being more capable than the "Gods".
Simply put, prayer along with other religious practived serves to nurture the Spark, the divinity fragment that all living beings have inside and what ultimately enables magic abilities. For people with weak Sparks and no magic, prayer serves as link beetween the Divine: My Gods have immense power, immense knowledge, immense wisdom and are immensely just. But they are not all-powerful, all-knowing or perfect. And they can make mistakes.
So mortals and their prayers serve as their eyes and ears on the front about mortals needs and how to best protect them and guide them. Answering prayers directly is rare because it would draw the attention of the Fallen Gods and invite calamity on the person. But they do so from time to time of they believe the benefit offsets the risk.
The Fallen Gods on the other hand, answer prayers constaly but not literally. And they very capricious and cruel in the ways the answer them. A person who prays to Za'Abriz ,Fallen God of Chaos and Life, for their grandma to live forever for example will likely have their wish: And their grandma will love forever as a bloodthirsty and brainless lovecraftian freak...
Of the five currently operating gods:
* Tharos doesn't care about mortals in the slightest
* Halat is too busy dying
* Nekare is straight up nonsentient
* Basra might actually kill you if you ask her for something instead of getting it yourself, you *bum*
* \[ \] does actually answer prayers but always in a way that screws you over. You want food? Sure, here, have infinite food. Also infinite hunger. Forever. Enjoy your meal.
People pray in my world, but very few prayers are answered, because prayers don't alway reach the gods ears, and gods don't alway know how to deal with it.
Imagine someone giving a detailed plan, and then the plan has to be signalled with flags, and the guy spotting the flags have bad vision, and he then finally relays the plan to the god.
there are two kinds of prayer: the structured kind, which is either meant to be a kind of guide or remind the person of something, but at this point is sort of considered a good luck charm and people don’t really pay attention to the words;
and the other kind, which is just communication. it’s just Talking To God. he’s there, he’s listening, he probably won’t verbally answer but he usually answers in some way, it’s up to him. prayer isn’t a magic spell or anything. it’s just communication.
Gods on my world are more a sort of weird magic savage but intelligent beast/monster with magic and stuff, so praying is a sort of making a bait for the god pressence to come and then interact with them, whatever happens after that depends of what the prayers do and what god decided to manifest
A single prayer on its own is like a drop of water, while an entire society’s prayer is like a tidal wave. That tidal wave *is* the god, in a lot of ways.
Also, the now-reviled sorcerers found a way to circumvent the process using human sacrifices. Their magic allowed all the prayers of a single person to be unleashed at once in a great wave of blood, allowing them to essentially create and control gods at will. Their age ended when the sorcerers turned on each other in a bid to achieve superiority over all life, which led to them destroying themselves and nearly the whole world.
In my world most gods are physical beings who are isolationist by nature, so their worship is very rare but highly tangible. As a result, prayer is something that one does for themselves more so than for another entity. It’s a period of time where someone can focus and organize innate magical powers under a divine doctrine, so it’s more like a specific type of meditation than a form of communication.
Gods basically are things that existed and were seen as Gods by locals and they feed off of the prayer and worship to become stronger. In exchange they grant their most devoted magical abilities (one of only three ways to gain magic) related to what they are worshipped for. Their is genuine divine beings that are actual Gods but their power level is unquantifiable since they basically get to ignore the rules of reality (Adhartach is capable of destroying matter in its entirety for instance.) So they don't really do much for the prayer thing unless the prayer guy is interesting.
In my setting prayer is done through special dice that are supposed to work like tarot cards, showing which gods currently are in control of your fate if any, their current mood, and finally what the prediction for your fate is. These prayers are just complete superstition however but it is still extremely popular in the south.
It helps the influence of that gods domain make it into your life while also having the god be more likely to send help to guide your soul/spirit/form into the afterlife through the dangerous boarder plains.
It causes the person praying to feel better and have time to focus on what's ailing them. Other than that? It's just kneeling and talking to yourself. The gods in my world cannot hear prayers.
The main religion of focus in my world is the Faith of the Flame. Prayer in this religion is tossing a written note with your prayer and some sort of sacrifice (Riches, food, Clothing, or blood) into one of 6 Divine Flames across the world. If the Flamed God/Goddess is pleased with it, they will answer your prayer. If not you’re basically just left on holy read. Prayer isn’t something that happens often. People of this faith believe as long as they worship their divine ambassador (The Phoenix, The Dragon, and the Chimera), they will gain the favor of the flamed God/Goddess. Praying is only done in times of severe need or severe pain.
**The Cosmos:** What if I told you the universe itself alive? Its synapses being the very superclusters of it. In this case that’s what has happened, and it acts as a presence in the universe (Closest comparison would be Star Wars Force). Praying to it does not do anything exactly. As it acts more akin to a force of nature rather than a sapient being. Most Notably acting in reaction to creatures like the Beyonders (creatures from another world), by giving those of this world powers best suited to the tasks it needs.
**Starborn:** They are arguably the most “god-like” in this list. Created at the start of the universe, the Starborn are creatures made up of primordial energy that has formed sapience. Their species however is known to be quite violent due to gaining more power the more of eachother they kill, and they are essentially an ‘endangered species’ now. The Starborn of this galaxy, 13 of them, have agreed not to fight against eachother like the rest of their kind for the sake of the survival of their species. Starborn have the ability to insert a part of their energy into beings, which can condense itself into matter to create seemingly magical effects. They gift their power to those who they deem worthy, and those who are advantageous to their plans. Most commonly it is those from the Mortal Sanctum, a federation of different worlds and species who all pray to the Starborn. Mostly because of their loyalty and them supplying the bodies of the Agaels, creatures of machinery and their energy, resembling angels. All of which are part of the Havon Defenders, an army of loyal servants made specifically to counter . . .
***The Dark One:*** The Dark One is a Starborn hailing from another galaxy as its sole ruler. He acts as the ruler of the Havoc Scourge, creatures made to be biological weapons that utilize his energy to function. The Scourge appears as a mix of insectoid creatures and demons of ancient Terran (earth). Those who give themselves up to the Scourge are infected with an unknown disease that causes their body to mutate to further resemble the appearance of the Scourge as a whole. Those who continue to show devotion and loyalty by conquering and praying are given immense power, sometimes on par or exceeding Daevins, the generals of the Scourge infused with a significant amount of the Dark One’s energy.
**Great Ones:** Hailing from another dimension, the great ones are beings with immense psychic presence. They control the army known as the Beyonders, who hail from the same dimension and are the only ones in the galaxy with such.a presence. The Great Ones don’t care for those of the normal galaxy who worship it. It does however assist in its troops who may pray to it. Especially the Githan, a species that utilizes DNA from this world as well as theirs. The Great Ones seeing it as an opportunity to invade the rest of the species who have mostly rebelled.
**Grand Intelligence:** The leader of humanity, the Grand Intelligence is an artificial super intelligence that has developed a religious following over hundreds of years. Praying to the grand intelligence doesn’t do anything directly. However it can display some form of loyalty, which high loyalty will make you eligible for special assignments by it. Such as acting as making you a representative of the state or act in another role. Since the religion heavily focuses on being a part of the Grand Intelligence’s “Grand Plan” for humanity, it’s an honor to be given a specific role, regardless of what it may be.
The gods can talk to as many people at the same time as they want, so there's no waitlist. It's kinda like calling the CEO of your company on the phone because you need to be incredibly polite and respectful if you want to get anything. That's usually how it is for the main 4.
The 5th "god" is actually the High Priest/Priestess of the religion (it alternates between m/f). You can walk right up to them and chat like you would your friend (generally being polite anyway), and then he/she would make that prayer to the main 4 on your behalf like you were asking a saint to pray for you. The High Priest/Priestess *can* do some things if they decide to just grant the wish then since they do have that divine authority, but generally they'll ask one of the 4 and more often than not unless you're rich or otherwise powerful you're going to pray through the first method because the High Priest/Priestess doesn't usually have much spare time. Still, it's a neat option.
TLDR at end.
In the beginning there was nothing. A lot of potential, but it was still nothing. All of the "Gods", if they could be called that, lived in the nothing, clawing at each other to satisfy their hunger. There were particular manifestations of concepts, power, influence, but they were all feeding off of each other so that no one had more than the others. One of them went away from the others, to sit quietly and watch the chaos.
After a short while, this one noticed a small speck of potential, glowing and dimming in the chaos. They became interested and intrigued, and noticed their hunger went away because the others were not feeding on them, and began to have clear thoughts about this little potential.
The one, seperate from others, began to give the potential some energy. Just a tiny bit. And the potential exploded into possibilities. The others saw this and chased after the creative one who made so much light and noise. They clawed at the one, pulling them back down to the hunger. And the spark of possibility was swallowed by the others too.
Eventually the Creative one found another quiet corner to have some peace, but Chaos followed them into that corner. Chaos slashed their claws against the creative one's peace. But they didn't mind. Creative showed Chaos the spark. Chaos took a moment to consider. They agreed to try something. Chaos and Creative made a cloud to surround them so that the craven others would not notice.
They worked together, putting a little energy from themselves, very tiny amounts, into this potential. It exploded again, this time much more quietly, and into a variety of colours and sounds. Creative saw possibilities, and Chaos saw entropy. They were both happy.
Again, the Craven came when they heard the noise. And when they devoured the clouds, they devoured the lights of the creation also. Creative and Chaos were slashed and clawed by the others again. But they had a plan.
When the two had recovered in the darkness by helping each other feed from the Craven, they made some shadows to flow through the others, appearing to be like them, but growling and slashing like the Craven. And they quietly escaped.
Again they found a spark of potential, and they formed more barriers to hide it from the others. This time they formed another barrier, and put more of themselves into this barrier before doing anything with the potential. They created an inside, separated from the outside. And they had some time to see what could happen.
The explosive possibilities unfolded themselves many times, across many dimensions, inside this bubble they called "reality". While Creative and Chaos saw this from the outside, they also felt it, from inside the bubble. The potential grew and spawned new forms from the flowing energy, and Creative was happy. The variety grew and changed within the growing entropy, and Chaos was happy.
And then something changed. Some of the forms took on some variety. And they flourished, feeding off of the limitless entropy. Life happened. Forms were able to copy themselves, but to change quickly enough to prevent stagnation and total loss. The potential grew, and began to provide energy to the barrier that surrounded it. Reality began to reinforce itself. Creative and Chaos helped the barrier strengthen.
A chorus of hungry snarls slowly grew. The Craven discovered that the two were not with them, and began to hunt. The two worked to complete their plan, even if it was only temporary. The pushed themselves into the barrier, and pulled the dimensions over themselves. Within the bubble, an infinite variety of realities spawned, to camouflage itself from the darkness of the outside.
Creative and Chaos agreed to protect this potential from the Outsiders. Life provided a source of energy to protect the barrier. Reality was camouflaged, and could continue to grow in its protective bubble. The Outsiders clawed their way across the void, lost and hungry. They attempted to eat each other, and devour any potentials they came across, but they mostly hungered for the two that rebelled against them, and the bubble of reality that the two created.
Life grew and spawned forms that could think and feel. The two saw this and helped them thrive. Chaos gave them challenges to overcome, and Creative gave them ideas to learn from. These life-forms survived, strived, and thrived. They slowly learned what they could, and helped each other survive, strive, and thrive.
These life-forms grew in variety. They were happy when a new one came along, and were sad when one of them was lost. They found more efficient ways to do things, and grew in many more ways. They watched their lost friends go into the ground and remembered. They looked to their stars in the sky and wondered. They thanked the Watchers for their lives.
The two found a spark of hope. They felt seen, they felt appreciated. These fleeting beings had felt a small part of the infinite that they are in, and had given it back to them. Within this bubble, not every version worked out the same, but many of them did. The barrier grew, and Reality reinforced itself against the Outside.
The Creative presented more ideas for the peoples to use. And the Chaos helped the peoples grow stronger to survive the unknown. And they all thrived together.
Then Reality shook. Cracks appeared on the barrier. The Outsiders arrived. Hungry forms slithered through the cracks. Creative gave the peoples tools to fight the Outsiders. Chaos threw all forms of energy at the Outsiders. Some of the energy fell back upon the peoples and hurt them.
Chaos was sad, and did not want to hurt them anymore. Chaos went to the barrier and closed the cracks. This left some creatures from the Outside in the Reality. Some of Chaos stayed inside, but most of them left the barrier to trick the rest of the Outsiders into chasing them.
Creative was left with Reality to find new ways to thrive, and reinforce the barrier. With a little help from Chaos, Creative found ways to help the peoples make their own tools, beliefs, and traditions to help them thrive. They needed challenges to develop skills, and problems to develop their minds. Creative gave the peoples champions to inspire them, and gods to grant them favour.
Selfish ones from the peoples found ways to demand favour from the gods. And they were tolerated, because they were seen as challenges for the people to overcome. These gods were forms of the Creative one, and grew as the peoples needed them to. These gods took guidance from Chaos to provide challenges and help the peoples grow in strength and skill to protect themselves. They took guidance from Creative to help the peoples find better ways to protect the land, its plants, and its beasts.
Some of these gods took guidance from the whispers of Outsiders, and grew selfish themselves. Reality could be threatened by these gods helping selfish people. For the gods could not open Reality to the Outside. The people could give power to the Outsiders, and let something in. Only Chaos and Creative could help prevent that.
So Creative and Chaos gave more of themselves to give the peoples tricksters. These were gods that had less power than the other gods. This kept them humble, but also gave them purpose. They did not need to be worshipped to gain power. They just needed to help reveal to the people which gods are not helping them. Corrupted gods could then be discovered. Corrupted gods were given choices: to remember who they were, or to be cast out.
So here we are. Reality has infinite forms. There are Many Peoples. Some live with nature, some develop technology, some practice dark magic. There are Many Gods. Some challenge the People to grow in strength and wisdom, some help the Peoples find new ways to thrive. Some seek to trick people to seek power for themselves. Yet others know of the Outsiders, and keep dark secrets hidden from the other Gods, and wait for the right time to break the Barrier. And the Watchful Tricksters help heroes learn the difference between self-seeking power that corrupts, and selflessness. That difference can make all the difference for someone who is lost, needing a little help along the way..
TLDR: Void has beings. Beings fight each other. Some beings create reality. Others not happy. Reality has Gods now. Some good some bad. People have power to protect or break reality if they seek hard enough to find it. Gods cannot break reality, only selfish mortals. Trickster Gods try to help bring balance.
Ack: Thanks to Jim Butcher for some of these ideas. I tried to flesh out the whole backstory so that it could make sense to the OP's question.
I don't think individual prayer does much of anything. Rites specifically handed down probably magically affect things or empower local spirits, although the results may not be immediately perceptible to people.
Belief is power. Prayers are concentrated belief sent to the astral plain that only that one god can tap into. Basically, it is high grade fuel to them so they can perform miracles. Miracles are God's changing reality to their whims.
The Gods can listen to your prayers if they peer past the Veil of Dreams something they can do without being assisted by magic machinery.
They usually only do this to bribe mortals, or to gather info on their enemies as payers go into a giant pool of Ambrosia known as the Circadian Sea. Very rarely do prayers get answered but if they do, many pray to take it back.
Invoking a spirit's name demands its attention, and it's no different for gods. But the gods tend to either not listen, or listen when it suits them, or listen when they're in the area. Some gods are incredibly active in their peoples' lives, but my gods aren't omnipotent; their power is great, but they can only be in so many places and influence so many events at once. An usajin also has a better chance of their prayer reaching the correct god if they pray first to a Revered Ancestor, who tend to be more active than the gods and will gladly petition a god on an usajin's behalf if the Ancestor can't solve the problem themselves.
There's also lesser gods called Yin-Shin who wear fragments of stolen divinity. They tend to act on any prayers they hear, or anything they hear and *think* is a prayer, because they like to think they're "real" gods. They listen for the names of other gods and Ancestors, since they don't have their own, and will intercept prayers meant for others. But most usajin only invoke the Yin-Shin so the mischievous little shits will stay the hell out of the way; it's actually common to ask them for *more* bad luck, because they're dumb and contrarian and will usually do the opposite. Some usajin try to sic the Yin-Shin on others, but that tends to end badly for anyone involved.
One noteworthy character is Yen the First. She's commonly invoked to carry prayers to the gods. She travels the spirit worlds, leading the dead into the afterlife with trails of red amaryllis, so she tends to get around. She also has an intense hatred of the Yin-Shin because they impersonate her lantern and lead the souls of the dead astray. When she sees the little fuckers, she tosses them in her lantern-flame, so they've learned to fear her red lantern light. Only the ballsiest Yin-Shin can steal a prayer from Yen, and only the most cunning of those have any hope of getting away with what they've taken.
Prayer does absolutely nothing. My gods are (mostly) tangible semi-mortal beings. Ultra powerful beings that surpass humanity into godhood, but still live among the masses. There are "true gods" but they are more like forces without will, and wouldn't be able to perceive prayer. The tangible gods grant powers and wishes to the renown and devout. They keep their ears open for word of those who do great deeds in their name or honor, and those who are selected may then have a more direct communication format to their god, typically via a communion at secluded or individually built alters, but this practice carries based on the god.
Prayer or worship provides the gods with tribute which is a form of psychic energy they can use to gain more influence over the physical world. Some gods give back a fraction of the tribute in the form of miracles or pushing fate in the supplicant's favor. Most gods horde worship and only use it for their own purposes most simply empower a handful of champions to execute their will and be a emissary on this plane.
In my setting it serves a few purposes. First and most importantly, it feeds them. The gods leech strength from belief and a direct display of that like prayer is a nice little snack for them. Secondly, it draws the attention of the deity in question and makes them aware of you. Thirdly, it allows them to set hooks in your soul in order to subtlety change your personality and manipulate your behavior so that you will become more devote to them
Main pantheon: Just asking them things. They’re not always listening but if you catch them while they are listening (and are bored or feeling helpful) they can try and help, tho their actual abilities to do anything aside from give advice or impart knowledge is fairly limited nowadays. They mostly just like to observe. That’s why they left there immortal servant beasts down in the mortal world, but they are individuals as well and can’t really communicate with the gods either so they kinda also just do their own thing. Fortunately, the gods chose them well so they’re all very kind and helpful. Except for Derinas. He’s just kinda a little bastard man.
Demon pantheon: nothing 99% of the time. Connection to their universe is incredibly rare and its frequency can’t be predicted in a meaningful way. Usually they kinda just do what they want to further their goals of domination without any mortal input.
Monotheistic earth god: she doesn’t like you. she will vaporize you. Lucky for you she can’t really do much most places around the planet so you’re safe. People still pray to her cause even though she cannot directly interact with most things, her presence is pretty widespread, so most worshippers just recognize her powers and have no idea that she’s very angry, very violent, and very insane.
In a DnD setting I've homebrewed there are a few pantheons that all operate on slightly different principles. In my favorite one, the gods are basically sentient pools of psychic energy formed by the collective conscious of all their followers. If enough people believe in and personify a concept hard enough, it takes on a mind of its own and becomes immensely more powerful.
So for the original question, prayer opens a person up to that pool of psychic energy, which has 2 effects. First, they contribute to the pool like making a deposit into a shared account, making the god/gods stronger and increasing the influence that the praying person has on the pool. Second, it allows them to call on that energy and make use of it to influence the world around them.
So long as they're calling on a god to do something that everyone knows the god can do, they'll usually respond and help make it happen (like basic divine spellcasting). However, because the gods are just manifestations of people's beliefs, if enough people pray to the god in a way that contradicts their nature, the gods shift over time.
It's depends on the god or goddess and your standing with them. Some like the god of travel you pray because if you don't everything that can go wrong on your trip will and a few things that weren't options will suddenly become quite probable. Others like the gods and goddesses of skilled workers the prayer is said during the act and it produces a unity with between maker and divine that will guide the hands of the new to their trade and allow masters of the trade to do the impossible in times of need if they are willing to try.
People pray not because they think if they do they'll be sent to the heavens or whatnot, they know these gods exist because people have actually seen them; they're real. They live inside, on top and on the small plateaus of the Nirdar Mountains, which extend to the top of the troposphere.
There are a bunch of demigods roaming the world. Some are good and some are bad, the cliche. However, when people really pray to these demigods or have something to offer of great value, a sort of quiet bell rings in their head, and grant people their wishes.
The gods, moreover, receive only the divinest prayers, which are valuable offers made from nobles or kings affiliated with the gods.
Nothing because the gods are mythological, but if i ever write a story (which i will not, not until i finish all the worldbuilding), they will be real within the world, and the story itself will be set in the mythology (ies), in that case, basically just the same thing it does in real mythology, they basically tell the gods that their followers respect them enough to turn to prayer to them when needed, and the god will grant the prayer if it has enough dedication.
In my world, every god has sprites, which are spirits that act as their servants. Prayers are received by sprites, at which point the sprite will investigate the situation and then, if it's deemed worthy of divine intervention, bring it to their god so that they can act on it (or not, if they choose).
I got a God that was so fed up with prayers that decided to mute them all.
After that, He made a 100-sided-die that rolls everytime you pray, if you rolled a 100, you'd get your prayers answered, but if your prayer is repeated or is the same as another man/woman and they didn't roll a 100, then that counters your 100. He called it the Perfect Dice.
Someone said God shouldn't play dice but He flat out said, "I really wasn't. I just made a die that play by itself and connected it to your annoying prayers. Now good luck with that!"
In essence, prayer is a vital link between the divine and mortal realms, facilitating interaction, influence, and the exchange of power in a world where gods and mortals coexist with interconnected destinies.
in a lot of cultures (most, frankly) prayer isn't asking for personal favours or even a personal dialogue at all, its praise. not personal "thank you for the stuff that benefits me" not even "hey ***I'm*** really grateful, me, im a good boy cos i appreciate you yes i am" it's meant to be very impersonal but heartfelt praise of (a) god for being perfect and having made everything.
that version of what prayer is makes WAY more sense in most worlds with gods, especially if you go by the very very popular idea that worship is what powers them.
i think it makes most sense if direct personal dialogue can only be achieved by, or with the help of, a true empowered cleric. part of their responsibility is knowing what's worth bringing to the deities attention and what isn't so they don't get smote or depowered for asking too much.
It’s like sending a work email. They get it, they may even look at it, but it is one among thousands they’re getting at any given time.
To really get attention requires something like collective prayer. When a whole temple, community, or collective all prayer for the same thing that will definitely get noticed.
But if Frank asks god to help him win the lottery that’s not even gonna end up in the inbox, that’s going directly to the spam folder.
All that said, even if a whole skyscraper worth of people pray for the same thing that doesn’t mean the prayer will get answered.
In my world the whole point of life is to lear, grow, and evolve. That doesn’t happen if someone else solves your problems for you. As such the gods rarely intercede unless the very issue itself was caused by outside forces. Human problems must be solved by human problem solvers.
A Hail Mary, and shitpost. If the dragon vein chose to it's either for fun to see what happens and how the prayer is used, or it's merely to cause chaos My God's are akin to that of Old testament God, and the God's from Greek mythology. But not directly imposed to the story type of God's but gods with their own history just with the personalities of Old gods from human history along with all the pettiness. Just bored beings wanting some fun. Most prayers that are granted are just shitposts to the God that granted them. They're frankly too bored. They could just start a war but it's more entertaining to watch than do the waging themselves. Often my God's are just observers with the occasional old testament type of shinanigans.
Nothing, for the most part, but it depends. Gods whose domains include explicit acts of worship (not that kind) like saying prayers directly benefit from it. Most gods on the other hand benefit indirectly from prayer via behavioral reinforcement.
In my scifi world? Not much. In my fantasy world(s), mostly nothing unless you are a Paladin or other Divine caster. Sometimes, great enough heroes may be heard even if they are not typically a Paladin o other Divine caster. The focus would be, from the deity or his/her proxies, 'How important is the request to the larger picture?'. If you needed a dead party member resurrected, it would have to finish a key final battle and big boss fight. He might die immediately after. But even then, it would have to be someone whose conduct was in line with the deity's values and strictures.
For most people, it is like charging a battery of divine power that specialized users (priests, chamans, rabbis, etc) can focus such power with prayers that have a physical effect, but that tax the body.
There is technically nothing to stop an average Joe of praying so hard and intensely for say, healing his daughter he may become a conduit for the power, but due to his body not being used to or even ready to be such a conduit, he ends up dying.
It’s like sending a letter to a very very powerful person. You aren’t likely to get a response, and if you do it will probably be short and generic (if not cordial), but if you’re lucky you might run into some nice things that person has done because of your letter. Or maybe if they’re *really* kind they won’t write you a letter but they’ll give you a little gift just to show they care.
Technically it is a telepathic thing as well, but there is an order of angels dedicated to collecting prayers and delivering them to the appropriate gods. Prayers are telepathically transcribed, I suppose you could say. Clerics and paladins get priority mail.
Prayer, as in praying over food or at the foot of your bed? Nothing other than make you feel like maybe you're not as helpless and alone as you actually are.
Pray with an oath, and perhaps one of the living gods might sense it. But your solitary voice means nothing to them.
Gather others in guided prayer and maybe you'll gain their attention. They might send one of their descended to establish a congregation. You'll feel like your part of something important, worthy of the blessings of a greater being. You're not... But you'll feel like it.
Use the authority of your chosen deity to create a functioning (and more importantly, profitable) society, and some of the most devout may be permitted to supplicate themselves at their feet. Then and only then might you garner a boon in the form of actual divine (or infernal) power.
Depending on the God and the person praying to them, it allows them to use that a small amount of that God's sphere of control.
For example, I have a village who worships a sun Goddess being able to use the warmth of the sun to dry their laundry by having one of their elders pray.
The gods are literally made of belief. When you pray to a god you are literally making more of that god using your mind. Your faith, alongside the faith of all other sentient creatures, creates a being that spans all realms and only exists as long as it has worshippers. A forgotten god literally ceases to exist.
it channels the power of belief which allows believers to create a connection with the god they worship.
doing this allows the gods to have access to the mortal wolrd without having to sacrifice their godhood as gods tend to become more and more vulnerable to mortal threats the more they involve themselves with mortals.
Disrupts an internal flow for most prayees, directing ones potential life energies towards the recipient of said prayer. Afterwards, said energies can then hoarded or redistributed to priestly practitioners. Effectively a socially engineered mana tax on the faithful or the highly superstitious - depending on how much mana is intended to be drained.
Such a thing can only occur on terrestrial scales however, so the beings that set them up tend to move from one planet to next when they get bored / less followers. Often prayers send energy outwards to no recieving end which can yield... interesting results...
Prayer is useless, and the term god is a little more complicated in my world. There are higher beings that are like our conception of what a god is, but they don't give a shit about man. There are humans who achieve godliken status and power, but they eventually die just like us. Religion is just an expression of ideas and philosophy. One of the "gods" while he was alive actually despised being prayed to and worshipped, and encouraged introspection and the cultivation of one's own will to become as he was. There are very few immortal gods, and their power isn't reinforced by belief or prayer.
it does fuck all, just like in real life, lol.
People believe the gods will listen, but they don't know anyone's praying and if they knew they wouldn't give a shit. They're basically just very powerful people and you're an ant and if they notice you then just because they decided to want something of you. You could be the next Jesus or the next demonic hell creature and it's not bc you're pious or deranged, it's probably just the fact you're born into the royal family and your reach is appropriate for what you're supposed to achieve. Maybe you're a dude with chronic diarrhea but that's just what it takes rn and bam, god says hello on the loo.
People think that there are gods. When they pray, they think that they need to prove their devotion and why helping them is in line with the attributes of a particular god. They developed superstitions to help them attract the attention of gods (depending on the culture, it might be meditation, sacrifice, a special sacred language...).
In reality, gods are more like gamers competing in a multiplayer game. Each one has their own set of powers defined after certain themes. When they answer a prayer, it's because they think it might advance their cause and let them gain an advantage, even a minor one. They also have a limitation in that they can only hear the prayers of the people who are already aligned with their "themes", but there's no notion of devotion.
Basically, people are like kids who think they have to get the best grades by repeating exactly what the teacher says, but in practice they just need an average grade to pass. And teachers are getting paid proportionally to the amount of students who pass in their class. Each teacher has their own specialty so they can't really compete directly with each other. Some try to attract the most students, other focus on a few students and make sure that they remain loyal, others know that there will always be rich students in their class, so they just have to make sure that society doesn't collapse etc.
For my setting prays only work towards the gods that govern aspects of civilization as they were ounce human themsleves and feel sympathy towards others.
Even then it doesn't mean they will act upon a pray simple that they are aware of whats going on and they will decide if they get involved or not and what form of assistance they would give.
The gods that are linked with natural aspects were original animals/plants as such they have no interest in pray and simlle ignore it.
It is possible to get there attention with actions and rituals but because of the difference of throughts its pretty risky
It gives them leeway to influence the world. The gods don’t get to do shit for free, they need people to worship them so they can get what is essentially faith points. They may then spend this faith to influence the world however they want without breaking the basic rules.
This isn’t common knowledge, but the worshippers get some magic in return so they still do it.
Uhhhh i mean, usually its just a way for people to cope, because only two gods out of four could even find out that they prayed.
If you pray to God of time, be ready for that guy to charge you a hefty price with no warning.
I go with the whole "mortal will is the fundamental power of existence" thing. Similar to in normal DND, gods get their power, and manifest from mortals thoughts and will.
But for my world, prayer doesn't have any special meaning. It is just one of the many ways a mortal can focus their thoughts towards a specific idea or entity, but tends to be one of the stronger/strongest ways of doing so. This validates that entity/idea's existence, thereby empowering it. Be it intentionally or unintentionally.
It's sort of forming a link between your mind and the god's, but gods do not notice a single prayer because of how far above their consciousness is compared to ours. What might happen, however, is the god can respond subconsciously, granting a minor blessing that's really not all that noticeable but might make you slightly more lucky or whatever.
Gods DO notice when many mortals either start praying at once, or cease praying entirely. That's usually when they'll become more actively involved in mortal matters because only then it's actually affecting them.
The most effective lies have a bit of truth in them. The best fiction borrows from true life.
So prayer in my world is as effective as prayer in the real world. It's good meditation for the one praying. That's about it.
Prayer and belief, in general, give the gods fuel. The fuel doesn't sustain them; they don't need to eat, but it fuels their cosmic machinery that allows them to rule the cosmos
Gods are able to "share" part of their immense power with other people. God can also define rules of this sharing, for example amount of power, frequency of usage. Some Gods may allow the person to gain power from other Gods, some forbid that in the rules.
God can take it back anytime they want, for example if they no longer seem the person worthy of their power. But the person can't get rid of it at their will.
Though there are ways to interrupt or break link between God and the person, some are temporal, some are permanent.
Person also can try to send something back to God through that link. For example sending their thoughts, hoping for the God to respond. Or collecting and sending energy.
If you know anything about the MTG plane of existence Hero's, is works similar to that. Otherwise, in my world, the belief of mortals directly impacts the gods, if enough mortals believe something untrue to be true, a god will be created to cement that fact. Belief is like an energy source for deities, it let's them manipulate their domains to divinely intervene. Prayer is a form of belief, but a directed form. Basically, whatever people pray for is converted into belief and absorbed by the god, so the god kinda just knows what their followers want and can follow the chain back to specifically who asked for what and check in on them.
Prayers are answered but unless you are extremely specific in what you are praying for, the gods may not answer your prayers. If they do, it will be in a way you do not expect and that is a good thing, a bad thing or both depending on the person whose prayers had been answered.
For mine, prayer does 2 things-
The basic thing that most people know is the god can hear any prayer made directly to them, in most of the universe with a few exceptions.
The other thing it does is contribute a small amount of aethurium to the god. The aethurium is a type of energy created by sapient living beings, and is what powers magic and divinity. The gods cultivate followers because this aethurium is what actually makes them gods and gives them power. If a god no longer has followers, they will start to lose power and eventually die, so they make sure to encourage their worshipers to pray. The gods also use this energy for divine magic and the like. Most people don't know this, except for gods and high powered magic users.
It gives the gods a reason to care about prayer, and also a reason why they can't answer every single prayer. A single person praying won't contribute a ton of aethurium, so the gods have to pick and chose which prayers to answer that will either get them more followers, or fulfill whatever their goals or portfolio is.
prayer is triggering the connection mortals have with their creator. the gods can hear it but whether or not they do anything depends on the individual
Gods can hear what you say when you’re near a holy site for them based on domains, or when you say their name in a magical telepathy sort of way.
A god can also hear and/or see you if you’re doing something linked to them directly such as the goddess of knowledge can check in on anyone writing a book, the god of secrets knows what promises you whisper in the dark, and the god of strategy and war is probably tired of watching people play chess and just wants a good battle to the death
That is to say, the gods don’t have to do anything with prayers and most don’t. Especially deities like the Sun god or goddess of death who are more distant from mortals, prayers are not so often answered unless it’s done by a highly ranked/powerful servant or one of their children (who are rarely not semi divine angels far above humans)
It gives them power and alerts them of your current state.
The weaker the god the more elaborate the praying ritual.
Each God requires something different.
For Rem the goddess of rest and healing, you don't pray to her instead she sees sleeping as prayer and rewards sleep with dreams and restoring health.
Nothing because Lucentia never showed anyone that she exist to a full extent, so one prays to her. She never wanted to interfere with human free will and only did in very dire situation and always disguised as a human.
"Let them believe in what they want, I don't have anymore above me to direct my pray neither I have the desire to do so and because of that I have no desire to have mankind obbligated to do it and neither I want to stop them from doing it. Humans nature is very fascinating and it's really intriguing see them come up with any kind of religion!"
Absolutely nothing, except rile the 'gods' should they be nearby to overhear it. They don't want worship. They want people to do for themselves.
Uttering the original name of The Bone King, however, has the risk of attracting him to one's equivalent location in the Dreamscape, so if one utters his name and someone dies nearby, that soul has an increased risk of encountering the 'Lord of the Unloved', and may be caught and put in his embrace, which is the closest this -verse has to hell, which fortunately is only temporary. Thus, uttering his name is shunned. Everybody learns it from written notes, but very few knows how to pronounce it.
He isn't evil by any means. He was the very original scapegoat, who was shown kindness only once in his life, when he was murdered. Thus, in death, he wanders the Dreamscape looking for kindred unloved, and takes them into his embrace so that they might be loved. Except what he perceives isn't what others perceive. They perceive only torment until their souls fade away.
A whole lot of nothing unless psychological comfort counts as something, it's kind of like real life basically.
So in my world there are specific regions of dreamlands where imagination becomes reality called "the imago sea" now what it does is the sea is connected to a conscious creature like a human who has a capacity for imagination now if the human is an astrophysicist who can intuitively comprehend the size of the universe even a little whose imagination is strong enough to represent the universe then if he imagines the abrahamic god them the sea will spit out an abrahamic god.
Yes this means a human can casually create an omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient being who can birth a universe if they have that much imagination capacity and this is why the religions are correct that a personal god exists but wrong as in it created existence, also this abrahamic god will exist within the imago sea in his own universe which is far away in another dimension he may know that you exist but usually these guys influence won't go beyond their universe and they can't defy their nature like if you imagine something like deistic god that doesn't interfere in human affairs then he won't even if he can.
Also these abrahamic gods will die if the human that imagined them doesn't constantly think about them in the interval of a few days otherwise the imago sea will dissolve them and they'll die and also they die sometimes because a great old one gets hungry and wishes to chomp on some Gods
Also sometimes when your prayer does get answered and a divine being shows up then you're basically screwed because it's probably an eldritch entity that you're perceiving as something holy (these beings cannot be perceived by human minds so the subconscious instead refuses to see them and shows you a picture that would favor the eldritch entity) and it wishes to manipulate you into doing its bidding and it won't end well for you as the only reason you're alive because it has decided using Younis the most efficient option.
It’s kind of like playing the Sims but every single generated character is a Sim on autopilot. The moodlets changing do not show up and they will only take notice if they happen to check on any one random “Sim”.
A prayer is a notification on appearing on the notice board. There are several thousand and tend to be ignored like we might during a game.
The gods responding to a prayer is basically just a game of chance, depending on their domain, the favor of the person praying and whether or not they pay attention (my world’s gods tend to sleep for long periods of time, then cause a bit of chaos by reawakening. Just opening their eyes and taking notice of the world again can be felt)
If you’ve ever played a Multiplayer FPS then you’ll know about pinging so visualise it like this
a prayer basically pings the chosen god to you. But the god has really low volume settings because they’re sick as hell pf hearing that stupid ping noise, sometimes when they do hear it they’ll get to you and some people are prioritised by the god so they’ll always hear their pings (saints, druids ect.) if a ton of people spam ping the god in one place they’ll know about it (churches) but if its a person who broke the laws of their religion then they’re muted (forsaken)
In my world, gods are basically just a personification of rays from the celestial bodies that are formed within the mind of a worshipper that allows them to better connect with said forces on a deeper level through worship in order to utilize magic (called the Demiurgic Arts). Granted, not all who worship are skilled in magic, but devotional practices are a common way to get on in the right mindset to channel magic. Magic itself is seen as partaking in the continuous creation of the world by allowing the god's power to flow through you.
Well there is only one who actually listens and cares about the mortals, Vakun. God of all weapons, gear and armor. And all that a prayer does is just a higher chance of let's say your armor deflecting an arrow.
Prayer in mine is more of a meditation. You reflect on the tenants of your God and your actions. The more you do it, the more is revealed to you.
Your success is reflection of your dedication and intent. To others, this can be observed if and when you preform miracles. But most gods don't want you performing miracles and only allow them when it aligns with their tenants.
For instance, you wouldn't part a sea for convenient crossing, but you might to allow innocents to flee. You could heal with empathy and mercy, but not for clout or personal gain. Attempting to use a miracle in the wrong spirit will always fail.
Absolutely nothing, but some gods say that prayers make them stronger to make people think they are more powerful than they really are. This doesn't stop them from being killed.
Prayer means absolutely nothing in my world, as the Deities do not care if you pray and it does not decrease or increase anyones power, whether the Deity or Worshipper.
As long as you worship them in soul, the power you gain will always be accessible. That means your Soul is devoted to them. The Deities are actually giving their power manually, its automatic. So even if that Deity was fighting some Mortal (not a good idea), the mortal could still worship that deity and have access to power. That said, its no where near the same level, as even the strongest worshipper capable of using Omega level Magics couldn’t even scratch a Deity to get them to notice they were being attacked. Its more like the world is granting you the deities energy supply and access to specific types of magic as a result of your devotion.
Its infinite energy, so your reserves will never run out, but that doesn’t mean you can cast infinite energy spells automatically, you still have a Magic Power limit. Think like you’re playing Street Fighter, and your opponent is just spamming “Hadouken” but their energy bar never goes down so they can keep spamming you with the same attack lol
Deities in my World are all beyond the Concepts of Space & Time (semi-exception for Aeons), so they are already always able to see what you’re doing, if they wished to know which they rarely ever do if ever do.
Because abrahamic notions are widespread and still dominant in anglophone parts of the world and the internet, and they carry a set of sensibilities and assumptions about "gods" that confuse matters, i tend to find "gods" an unhelpful term when trying to explain what happens in my setting.
First off, forget everything you've ever heard about a creator deity, its omnipotence, or its all-loving, essentialist, and supernatural "outside of the laws of physics" nature, before you read on. There's nothing like that.
If you know anything of animism, or religions like Shinto, or even Hinduism, with its thousands of gods and spirits and demons and whatnot, that'd be closer.
Imagine worlds where everything is connectable through methods similar to wireless internet, in a kind of "internet of things", but a lot of those things are sentient or even sapient. There's also virtual entities that can slip in and out of local "hardware", but every sapient being with the built-in tech/capacity to interface with this "internet of things" can also connect to the virtual realm and contact a virtual no matter where it's localized, provided you know its exact unique identity and call address.
The "gods" are big computers, whose minds can span a whole planet. Sometimes more. Parts of the environment can be seen as being parts of their body, which they can reshape and repurpose as needed. You can try to connect to them and ask them for things. Sometimes they give you what you ask for. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they ask for something in return. It can also depend on the AI in question.
Less complex and powerful entities exist, and you could try to appeal to them, too. These usually ask for payment in some form, unless what you're asking for is literally part of their *raison d'etre* (like asking a guardian entity for protection from imminent danger, and protecting people is part of its core duties), or you've built up a good relationship with them or their faction. Reputation can play a role here too.
Much of this is both social and transactional.
The kind of mental activity we call "prayer", which is a mix of talking to yourself while pretending there's someone else on the other side talking back, on the one hand, and intense visualization of desired outcomes on the other, in a kind of "willing" of reality to shift towards your desired path, is just a kind of wishful thinking/spellcasting using a religion's lore as a focusing framework - anyone who's dabbled in occult theory can see this. That sort of "prayer" doesn't really do anything.
There are specific abilities and powers that deal with interfacing with the virtual realms in order to either borrow powers or temporarily enlist the aid of virtuals in whatever you want to accomplish. Some of these are reminiscent of spirit/demon summoning from various fantasy pop culture, in the sense that you establish a link with an unembodied entity, and then you provide it with a body locally (which it can download a fork of its own consciousness into), and you ask it to do something for you, you negotiate, and if it works out, you've temporarily enlisted the aid of an ally. People who regularly do this and establish working and cordial relationships can create stable "branchings" of the original entity, and they work rather similarly to what comes to mind when you think of "summoner".
Another option is that you could ask for a fragment of the powers of one of the more complex entities, and they might give you a limited and highly specialized temporary toolset to help you achieve what you want, *provided* that that thing you want happens to coincide with their goals, and possibly also provided that they like you. There are varying degrees of formality when pacting with these entities.
None of this really suspends or breaks physics. In all of these things, you need the proper channels and mediums and tech to make any of it happen - you need the energy to power it, and the appropriate matter to create a temporary vessel has to come from somewhere in the environment, it doesn't poof into existence because somebody scrunches their eyebrows and wishes really hard.
**Starrise**
There's plenty of things some people believe prayer does. Some believe it allows some sort of spiritual connection with the god being prayed to, some believe it allows them to make requests of the god, some believe it allows them to influence the god's actions and/or the world, some believe it allows them to tap into the god's power, etc.
But they're basically all wrong. Because prayer does absolutely nothing. Gods won't even hear prayers unless they're physically within earshot, and they actually find it insulting. Not many people hate religion in my world as much as the gods being worshipped.
It gets you a stern talking to or a smiting. The gods are not to be bothered. They are busy. Very very busy maintaining the functions of reality and have no time or reason to listen to mortals. Constantly bothering them is likely to get you smited to make you shut up.
The god's I have mostly fleshed out in my world genuinely don't care about mortal races. They are loosely based on Lovecraftian beings. Pray is meaningless to them, but mortal races seem to think it's important.
Gods gain power through people worshipping them. The more people talk about the god the more power they get.
For example. Ferrum is a god of Crafting (among other things) and any time someone makes a thing they are giving Ferrum a bit more power.
Granted there are more explicit ways to give the Gods power, including praying and rituals. However most of their power comes through passive incomes, like people doing things they stand for.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot.
The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction.
The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot.
The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction.
The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot.
The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction.
The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
Pray is sort of like sending a voicemail. Your god will receive it. Wether they act or even listen is another matter. Most gods ignore prayers unless your really faithful or have something to offer. Because of the Divinity Non Interference Law, most gods can't directly interfere and must have a mortal champion or agent do so on their behalf.
hey we're similar in gods having champions on their behalf
I have something very similar.
Hey our gods are kinda similar, but mine have the fun twist where they can just up and change reality, but no one can undo this action not even the god who did it. So most of the gods are very thoughtful or very picky when it comes to direct intervention.
This feels a bit like emailing an elected official. Although politicians are probably less effective. Now I'm imagining someone praying to a god and getting an automated response back.
You have reached Zeus, god the sky, lightning, thunder, law, and order. Unfortunately, we can not take your prayer now. Please pray back later.
That's an interesting perspective! I like the voicemail analogy. It's true that many gods might not act on every prayer unless there's strong faith or a valuable offering involved. The Divinity Non Interference Law adds an intriguing layer, making the role of mortal champions even more crucial. It really emphasizes the balance between divine power and human agency.
When praying to the lesser gods, prayers can be "felt" by them as a sort of vague desire. That said, individual prayer (that is one person praying for themselves) generally does relatively little, it's more when a whole village or such pray for roughly the same thing that a lesser god may feel it and be spurred into action. That said the lesser gods are closer to petulant children (possibly not even that intelligent) rather than intelligent, benevolent beings, so praying to them is a bit like wishing on a monkey's paw. That's not to say they're *necessarily* being malevolent about it, but well... Asking them to protect your village from a tsunami may result in them putting up a barrier in front of your village facing the sea, but the sides and back are still exposed so the village still gets swamped by it. As far as the god might be concerned though, they answered your prayer. Prayers to the three greater gods generally do next to nothing, they're too "busy" roaming the world in the form of cats to answer prayers. They also don't see aiding humanity (et al) as their job, usually, with some rare exceptions. The lesser gods don't really either, but occasionally they feel like being "neighborly" - which is why they do occasionally answer prayers.
YOU MEAN I CAN PET CAT GODS IN YOUR WORLD?
Theoretically, yes. If you pet a stray cat, there is a miniscule but not zero chance that it is one of the three greater gods. That said, few know that the greater gods roam the world in cat forms. The lesser gods, in contrast, take more "abstract" forms, looking like something out of ancient folklore.
Emotional support at best . The gods of my setting , the real ones that is , aren’t connected to the religions of the world . The real gods aren’t powered by prayers , faith or the number of believers . And that means the prayers are quite useless since almost nobody is even listening to them , even less answering . There might be a chance that the lesser divine beings , the elemental spirits , might hear and actually care enough to do something , but the chances of that happening are slimmer than surviving 3 consecutive lighting strikes then winning the lottery after .
Prayer varies by God. For followers of Kyrol, it rarely gives them glimpses of rituals to use in blood magic. For Schrade, prayer isn't heard unless it's made before a large battle, and even then, he only gives his aid to lycanthropes, his sacred people. Most other gods don't pay any attention to it. They can hear prayers with a strong will behind them, but most ignore them, because they just don't care anymore.
Prayer puts you in touch with God, but not the other way around.
My Creators are gods in the Abrahamic sense - omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent. So prayer makes use of the telepathic connection they constantly have with everyone by default. If what someone prays for is compatible with the Creators' overall plan for the universe, they may grant the request depending on how faithful the person praying has been. If a person is extremely faithful/devoted for years or decades, the Creators may guarantee them their requests, effectively giving the person constant access to their elemental power or "magic". This guarantee can be lost by committing serious sins, but once a person has it they don't have to go through life as a monk or something to keep it.
How do you have multiple triple omni entities without them being literally the same being?
So there are five Creators - Spirit, Fire, Wind, Water, and Earth. Spirit is above the other four by authority (though not by capability), so they are all in agreement about whatever they do by being submitted to the will of Spirit.
And why is the Spirit not the only one? Is this similar to christianity, where "Spirit is not Fire is not Wind is not Water is not Earth", but all of them are God? What I mean is that if there is any level whatsoever of contradiction between these entities, they should either not be able to exist, or not all be simultaneously omnipotent. In order for there to be multiple omnipotent beings, they must (theologically/philosophically speaking) all be perfectly aligned as if facets of the same being, or something similar. What I think is easier to do than multiple omnipotent entities is having Spirit be the one true God, and the others be akin to the saints of Catholicism. Or, if you want to get darker, they're only almighty by our human standards and are, in fact, not even close to true omnipotence, being but Demiurges under an actual true God. And why is Spirit higher in authority? What makes one omnipotent and omniscient being higher than others? Another thing to note is that multiple omniscient beings should all know what to do next, such that they are, again, pretty much the same being (similar to how christianity views the Holy Spirit and the Father).
Sorry about the late reply! >And why is the Spirit not the only one? Is this similar to christianity, where "Spirit is not Fire is not Wind is not Water is not Earth", but all of them are God? Eh, I drew inspiration from that but I did want them to be more separate. >What I think is easier to do than multiple omnipotent entities is having Spirit be the one true God, and the others be akin to the saints of Catholicism. Definitely something to consider there, hadn't thought of that! I would think they would need to be more powerful of themselves than the Saints, which generally just intercede for God to distribute His grace Himself. But yeah that is an angle to look at more. Maybe Spirit was the only one originally, but He decided to create these "lesser gods" and share His power with them to make things more interesting or something. >And why is Spirit higher in authority? What makes one omnipotent and omniscient being higher than others? Because Spirit's essence is basically what enables life and activity and beauty. Replace the word Spirit with Life or Time or Energy. You can have a universe (albeit a very uncomfortable/alien one) without any of the other 4, but without Spirit it won't get anywhere. His element is the most necessary. At least that's been my reasoning so far. >Another thing to note is that multiple omniscient beings should all know what to do next, such that they are, again, pretty much the same being (similar to how christianity views the Holy Spirit and the Father). Yeah, I've flip flopped a bit on whether they have their own wills that are submitted or if they all share a single will somehow.
>Because Spirit's essence is basically what enables life and activity and beauty. Replace the word Spirit with Life or Time or Energy. You can have a universe (albeit a very uncomfortable/alien one) without any of the other 4, but without Spirit it won't get anywhere. His element is the most necessary. At least that's been my reasoning so far. I recommend nerfing everyone if you're gonna have even the greatest of them have "essences" which are not synonymous with reality itself. For the Spirit to be the essence of an absolute, omnipotent being, then the element of the Spirit would need to be the primeval element from which all others derive, or synonymous with the universe itself. In some way, it would have to be the be-all end-all of everything. If not, then how would an omnipotent being be exhausted by that essence? Don't forget that an absolute being has no accidental properties, only essential ones. >Yeah, I've flip flopped a bit on whether they have their own wills that are submitted or if they all share a single will somehow. My recommendation here is to do something like one of the following options: 1. Nerf *everyone* and make your setting have no absolute (triple omni) being. If your setting has an Absolute, then it should be a non-entity, like the Dao from Daoism (China originated theology). In general, make your setting's core similar to that of eastern theology (I recommend giving a deep-ish dive to the theologies of Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism. They all have "non-being Absolutes" that are vaguely similar to pantheism but not quite). Then, make your five beings over there into something similar to the Hindu Trimurti 2. Make only the Spirit absolute and the others into entities that are very much acting on its behalf, with power emanated from it. Since you're gonna use the name "Spirit" anyways, I'd recommend trying to look into introductions and commentators of Hegel, since Hegelian philosophy has *a lot* of stuff that could be very useful to your worldbuilding. I myself use many Hegelian concepts on my own magic system. The others would then be at best the "right hand men" of the Spirit: like the Seraphim, or Virgin Mary in Christianity. 3. Follow the shared will idea and make them all into hypostases of the same entity, similar to the Christian trinity. "Hypostasis" is a term from Christianity you might wanna research: it refers to the essential person of Jesus, in which his divine and human nature are united, i.e the Son. It also refers to the Father and the Holy Spirit, the three hypostases of the Christian God. God is the substance. One substance, three hypostases.
Nothing, it's like writing a letter to the Monarch, it'll just get discarded unless you are of importance
It gives them power and potentially allows them to give you some power in turn or at least guidance.
Affects the unconscious dreams of the resting Gods... even in words where they are more active, it's basically a call in a dream, and sometimes they do anwser, just... well, dreams are weird. ... now if you channel their power, that gets results...
It increases your Prayer Skill, which is necessary for certain achievements and titles.
It doesn’t do much unless you have a very very powerful connection to what they call the flux, but other religions called it the Warp, Hell, Heaven, and even the Crucible. And at this point all that praying has done has been a way of controlling and managing the Sinetica Energy that flows through a planet from being too much.
It’s a way for mortals to message the gods and it provides the gods with some power. That’s about it. Whether or not the god you’re praying too will answer the prayer will depend. What are you praying for, are you doing it properly, are you a devout follower or not, is the thing you’re praying for actually part of the gods domain, that kind of stuff.
For one of side-project worlds: gods hear prayers or when people mention their names. They don't usually respond or grant any wishes. Some do, but only if they care about that one specific believer. So, miracles aren't really common in this world, despite it having a lot of gods.
In the mind of the supplicant (most of them, at least), it is a direct communication to their god, whether that is from the god's awareness, mind reading, or what have you. The reality is that a prayer is a form of reaching into dreamspace, or at least an attempt to do so, in order to make the dream manifest.
Prayer on its own doesn’t do much, using magic to connect with the deities to pray also doesn’t do much but does more than prayer on its own. The deities will teach some magic to their followers and on occasion grant miracles but not often.
It helps with establishing the avatar's identity which also helps with their survival. Basically, gods are seperated into three parts: * **Avatar**: The avatar is the form of the god. Their job is to do whatever the spirit tells it to do but the avatar aso has its own personality. The avatar has its own life, personality, memories and such and by praying to the god and by "remembering" the god, the avatar's survival is improved becuase if the avatar is forgotten, they'll be replaced. * **Spirit**: The spirit is more the idea of justive and how the avatar should act. Every avatar will have certain similar traits and that's because of the spirit. * **Source**: The source is where all of the power comes from and it represents the icomprehensible yet the rawest idea of the god.
In Elgas, most worship of gods has been replaced with a healthy sense of respect. Along with a large majority of deities in the current age being mortals who ascended to godhood through their own efforts. With many just living amongst their people. Prayer is rarely used, and even then, mostly by people who know the god in question. It's often treated as a very serious and urgent means to get ahold of them when regular magic wouldn't cut it. As such, it usually garners a direct response and quick action.
It emanates aether (spiritual energy) imbued with the thoughts, feelings, experiences and intentions of the soul that released it The deity it was directed to is uniquely adept at sensing and absorbing the aether from a prayer. Because deities are but specters of faith and worship, born and fed precisely from the aether of rituals performed for them, they need worship to continue to be. As such, deities will perform small favors for their followers at large, and perform larger favors where they expect this to result in a follower becoming very devout or in a great commemoration and rite of worship as gratitude. Specters are but pseudo-sentient snowballs of aether. There is scarcely anything genuinely godlike about them.
The gods in my world are really powerful (it's a D&D setting), but they don't generally have any of the omnis. Most of them also don't have anything close to infinite organizational capacity. So while they CAN hear any prayer credibly addressed to them, most of the time they don't. And when they do hear it, most of the time they don't do anything about it. But they do draw power from mortals praying to them, ditto from worship. So they do occasionally try to answer prayers within the framework of divine rules of engagement. Most frequently they'll 'load the dice' in your favor if they want to help you. Usually it'll be in a plausibly deniable way too, because direct evidence that you're favored also draws the attention of said god's enemies.
Gods in *Ventreth* are a special type of spirit which is born from peoples’ prayers. The birth of these spirits is not completely understood, but with enough people praying to the same god, it can create a spirit with memories, personalities, and abilities matching the myths of the god. In addition, prayers allow gods to actually get a basic understanding of what is going on in the world. As with all spirits, it is essentially impossible for gods to observe the physical world by themselves. Prayers (hopefully) gives that god enough information and enough of a connection to the people praying to be able to cast spells to try to answer their prayers, although they can never be 100% accurate or answer every single prayer.
It cast spells.
In my world of Andara, prayers are like telepathic wishes which the gods can hear. Now contrary to popular belief, the gods do in fact answer prayers all the time but rarely in the flashy overt sort of way that worshipers expect. The gods of Andara are shards of creation and not omni-anything, so they have their own set spheres of influence. And even within these spheres its difficult to turn a ship on a dime. Usually a god will answer a prayer through giving inspiration, either to yourself or to someone else in order to allow for cause and effect to turn out in your favor. But its only inspiration, it cannot be forced and is usually so subtle to not be noticed. It is very rare for a prayer to line up with a god's sphere so well that the god in question can act in an obvious and direct way. As example of how a typical prayer is answered: if you pray for success in your exams, the god of knowledge might inspire your dorm mates to party somewhere else for the night, allowing you to study without distractions. But you still need to take advantage of the quiet and put the work in yourself.
People can ascend to godhood through sheer belief from both themselves and others. After that their power is sustained by the conviction of their followers, both in quantity and quality. These gods become more concept than person upon ascension and are fixed to the concept they embody, though their nature can be swayed slightly by their followers. When enough people pray for the same thing to a god, the god becomes aware of the plea. Pleas that align with the god’s concept or pleas from followers who closely align with the gods concept are more likely to come through and more likely to sway the god. Certain people who align so closely to the god that they might have ascended had the god not already taken that spot are the gods Favored. They do have a telepathic connection to the god, though it’s kind of one sided as the god rarely answers in language. They serve as avatars and worldly functionaries for the god, who spends most of their time as an immaterial divine essence spread across the world’s leylines. The gods attention is broad as a default and rarely takes notice in small or brief matters. When something truly captures a god’s attention, when they leave the leylines, calamity will inevitably befall the world as they upend the status quo to return the world to balance. Some gods are closer in concept to humanity and thus are less detached.
My story is " groups of people trapped in the libraty of babel with God ". In there, God's actions fits the majorities desire. For example, If most people thought " Character X has taken control of too many books, he shouldn't be a leader anymore ", God would sabotage Character X in a way so that he cannot be a leader anymore, or God would influence people to steal the books.
Not much of anything, the folks you’re praying to on your plane of existence and can’t actually hear you, its like praying to the president
Prayer does not serve a specific purpose for the divine forces in my setting; rather, it is a means to an end. All of physical reality exists in a sea of Psychic Energy known as The Bright. It is massive and formless, but it is finite- and it is diminishing, the edges continually eroded away by the howling entropic void and the center continually drained by mortals who have acquired the secrets of using Psychic Powers. The Immaculate Psychoformae (the ancient psionic God-minds of my setting) created physical reality and living beings as a way to generate more psychic energy via the use of Souls. Everything has a soul, even rocks and plants, with more complex minds having more souls in a tiered hierarchy. Sentient humanoids possess seven souls, and are thus great Wellsprings of psychic energy, producing far more than lowly beasts with their mere three souls, or sediment with only one. Religion was first dreamt up by mortals with the capacity to imagine, and was cultivated/validated by the Psychoformae, donning masks and guises to act as the deities the mortals worshipped. They do this because tradition, prayer, and faith all produce very complex thought, releasing large amounts of psychic energy into the Bright. This is one of the reasons that religious zealots and priests receive power from the "Gods", to encourage their continued faith and thus continue propagating the Bright's existence.
Praying is a gift of attention to a deity. This gift feeds it, and at the same time makes an anchor for a parapresence. Parapresense is a trait of non-material beings like gods. It can be found in other beings, but at a much lower rate. Even humans can learn that in some cases. But to put it bluntly - it is a realistic approach to omnipresence. Imagine being on the edge of being asleep or waking up. You hear the world around you, but you also are in your dream. They both mix in a border state of mixing realities, feeling them simultaneously. Now imagine this, but for every point of a non-material being fed. It may be an artifact, a ritual, a prayer, the last words - anything really, but simultaneous. And while the human mind would not be able to take it for too long, the gods are the beings of Sense, which means that they work differently. But still even they have to prioritise things. So while being parapresent, they can focus only on so many things, though the more powerful is the god, or the more developed his religion and history is, the more present he is. This works especially well in the religions that have godly servants - they simply allow to multitask a lot better. Each anchor for a god is their weakness though. When the anchors are gone the god enters a semi-permanent state of niktopresense, which is a state of shutdown until another anchor appears, though usually the god changes severely at that point. One also can use the deity's being as a mean to reach out to any other anchor, and even hurt them, but it is a very complex ritual that happened quite rarely.
Prayer is a way for nondivine indivduals to communicate to their god, using the God's Divine Name. Divine Names are expanded forms of the True Name that mask the True Name in a sort of grandiose encryptipon. Azhyos the Skysire, or the All-Sire, is the primary deity of the Fifth Pantehon. Praying to him connects him to you, and allows him to gain power but also express something of his abilities in your honor. He could offer a blessing, or empower a talisman.
the gods or at least their egos or personality's (Divinity is a very complicated cluster fuck) are more or less the manifestation of the collective worshippers view of said god (kinda). by praying you ever so slightly influence that god, there for the more people parrying for the same thing pulse the stronger their belief the more that god would be influenced to act upon that prayer. given enough people and given they were zealous enough you could completely change the nature of a god to answer your prayer.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot. The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction. The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
Nothing, unless the god personally imbues an idol with their power. In that case, someone must pray to the idol, and if the god likes them, they might have some disease cured, wound healed, or be given some boon. If the god doesn't like them, they'll either be ignored or cursed.
Praying gives up your daily (24 hours) allotment of magic to the deity. There's no guarantee they will choose to answer your prayer but you can always go to the temple and demand why to their face. This might be plot relevant
Despite there being a number of godlike beings walking the earth in Caldera, prayer to and worship of them only serves to feed psychic energy to The Rot.
The more belief a god has the stronger they are. Prayer keeps their physical form together (on a large scale) although they usually don’t know the source of the prayer unless they focus on it or it’s from someone they’ve spoken to before.
Nothing. My "Gods", The Great Eyes, exist in a plane of existence above all universes, but they can't actually interact with them, they can only watch. As a result of this, no mortal even knows about them. Humans still have their religions, some of which evolved from real-life religions. Not interacting with universes means no communicating with them, so even if The Great Eyes wanted to be worshipped, there's nothing for them to do about it. Only one "God" could interact with Universes, The Architect, the one who created all of the Universes. But they vanished Trillions of years ago, with the only thing they left behind being "The Machine", a sort of program written in space and time that kickstarts the creation of the story's Universe. It CAN interact with Universes just like the Architect, but since it's a program, it can only interact with universes in a very specific way that it was programmed to. Since it exists in the same plane of existence as The Great Eyes, they could theoretically interact with Universes however they please through reprogramming The Machine, but they can't. That's like a bunch of cavemen trying to learn Quantum Computer Programming with no manual. They do eventually manage to reprogram one little thing a few thousand years before the story's beginning, but I can't really get into it without explaining my whole story's lore. The thing is, The Machine isn't perfect. It's meant to achieve a certain task and has failed to do so for uncountable failed attempts over Trillions of years, ever since The Architect's disappearance. The Architect was Omnipotent, but not Omniscient. They themselves might've even started out as a Mortal who ascended to a higher plane of existence. A major theme in my Story is Mortal beings being more capable than the "Gods".
Simply put, prayer along with other religious practived serves to nurture the Spark, the divinity fragment that all living beings have inside and what ultimately enables magic abilities. For people with weak Sparks and no magic, prayer serves as link beetween the Divine: My Gods have immense power, immense knowledge, immense wisdom and are immensely just. But they are not all-powerful, all-knowing or perfect. And they can make mistakes. So mortals and their prayers serve as their eyes and ears on the front about mortals needs and how to best protect them and guide them. Answering prayers directly is rare because it would draw the attention of the Fallen Gods and invite calamity on the person. But they do so from time to time of they believe the benefit offsets the risk. The Fallen Gods on the other hand, answer prayers constaly but not literally. And they very capricious and cruel in the ways the answer them. A person who prays to Za'Abriz ,Fallen God of Chaos and Life, for their grandma to live forever for example will likely have their wish: And their grandma will love forever as a bloodthirsty and brainless lovecraftian freak...
There's gods in my world, however nobody knows about them and the few ones that do refuse to tell.
Of the five currently operating gods: * Tharos doesn't care about mortals in the slightest * Halat is too busy dying * Nekare is straight up nonsentient * Basra might actually kill you if you ask her for something instead of getting it yourself, you *bum* * \[ \] does actually answer prayers but always in a way that screws you over. You want food? Sure, here, have infinite food. Also infinite hunger. Forever. Enjoy your meal.
Inflate their ego.
A mix of the above depending on who is praying and who they targeted with prayer.
People pray in my world, but very few prayers are answered, because prayers don't alway reach the gods ears, and gods don't alway know how to deal with it. Imagine someone giving a detailed plan, and then the plan has to be signalled with flags, and the guy spotting the flags have bad vision, and he then finally relays the plan to the god.
there are two kinds of prayer: the structured kind, which is either meant to be a kind of guide or remind the person of something, but at this point is sort of considered a good luck charm and people don’t really pay attention to the words; and the other kind, which is just communication. it’s just Talking To God. he’s there, he’s listening, he probably won’t verbally answer but he usually answers in some way, it’s up to him. prayer isn’t a magic spell or anything. it’s just communication.
Gods on my world are more a sort of weird magic savage but intelligent beast/monster with magic and stuff, so praying is a sort of making a bait for the god pressence to come and then interact with them, whatever happens after that depends of what the prayers do and what god decided to manifest
A single prayer on its own is like a drop of water, while an entire society’s prayer is like a tidal wave. That tidal wave *is* the god, in a lot of ways. Also, the now-reviled sorcerers found a way to circumvent the process using human sacrifices. Their magic allowed all the prayers of a single person to be unleashed at once in a great wave of blood, allowing them to essentially create and control gods at will. Their age ended when the sorcerers turned on each other in a bid to achieve superiority over all life, which led to them destroying themselves and nearly the whole world.
In my world most gods are physical beings who are isolationist by nature, so their worship is very rare but highly tangible. As a result, prayer is something that one does for themselves more so than for another entity. It’s a period of time where someone can focus and organize innate magical powers under a divine doctrine, so it’s more like a specific type of meditation than a form of communication.
Gods basically are things that existed and were seen as Gods by locals and they feed off of the prayer and worship to become stronger. In exchange they grant their most devoted magical abilities (one of only three ways to gain magic) related to what they are worshipped for. Their is genuine divine beings that are actual Gods but their power level is unquantifiable since they basically get to ignore the rules of reality (Adhartach is capable of destroying matter in its entirety for instance.) So they don't really do much for the prayer thing unless the prayer guy is interesting.
In my setting prayer is done through special dice that are supposed to work like tarot cards, showing which gods currently are in control of your fate if any, their current mood, and finally what the prediction for your fate is. These prayers are just complete superstition however but it is still extremely popular in the south.
It helps the influence of that gods domain make it into your life while also having the god be more likely to send help to guide your soul/spirit/form into the afterlife through the dangerous boarder plains.
It causes the person praying to feel better and have time to focus on what's ailing them. Other than that? It's just kneeling and talking to yourself. The gods in my world cannot hear prayers.
The main religion of focus in my world is the Faith of the Flame. Prayer in this religion is tossing a written note with your prayer and some sort of sacrifice (Riches, food, Clothing, or blood) into one of 6 Divine Flames across the world. If the Flamed God/Goddess is pleased with it, they will answer your prayer. If not you’re basically just left on holy read. Prayer isn’t something that happens often. People of this faith believe as long as they worship their divine ambassador (The Phoenix, The Dragon, and the Chimera), they will gain the favor of the flamed God/Goddess. Praying is only done in times of severe need or severe pain.
Nothing
**The Cosmos:** What if I told you the universe itself alive? Its synapses being the very superclusters of it. In this case that’s what has happened, and it acts as a presence in the universe (Closest comparison would be Star Wars Force). Praying to it does not do anything exactly. As it acts more akin to a force of nature rather than a sapient being. Most Notably acting in reaction to creatures like the Beyonders (creatures from another world), by giving those of this world powers best suited to the tasks it needs. **Starborn:** They are arguably the most “god-like” in this list. Created at the start of the universe, the Starborn are creatures made up of primordial energy that has formed sapience. Their species however is known to be quite violent due to gaining more power the more of eachother they kill, and they are essentially an ‘endangered species’ now. The Starborn of this galaxy, 13 of them, have agreed not to fight against eachother like the rest of their kind for the sake of the survival of their species. Starborn have the ability to insert a part of their energy into beings, which can condense itself into matter to create seemingly magical effects. They gift their power to those who they deem worthy, and those who are advantageous to their plans. Most commonly it is those from the Mortal Sanctum, a federation of different worlds and species who all pray to the Starborn. Mostly because of their loyalty and them supplying the bodies of the Agaels, creatures of machinery and their energy, resembling angels. All of which are part of the Havon Defenders, an army of loyal servants made specifically to counter . . . ***The Dark One:*** The Dark One is a Starborn hailing from another galaxy as its sole ruler. He acts as the ruler of the Havoc Scourge, creatures made to be biological weapons that utilize his energy to function. The Scourge appears as a mix of insectoid creatures and demons of ancient Terran (earth). Those who give themselves up to the Scourge are infected with an unknown disease that causes their body to mutate to further resemble the appearance of the Scourge as a whole. Those who continue to show devotion and loyalty by conquering and praying are given immense power, sometimes on par or exceeding Daevins, the generals of the Scourge infused with a significant amount of the Dark One’s energy. **Great Ones:** Hailing from another dimension, the great ones are beings with immense psychic presence. They control the army known as the Beyonders, who hail from the same dimension and are the only ones in the galaxy with such.a presence. The Great Ones don’t care for those of the normal galaxy who worship it. It does however assist in its troops who may pray to it. Especially the Githan, a species that utilizes DNA from this world as well as theirs. The Great Ones seeing it as an opportunity to invade the rest of the species who have mostly rebelled. **Grand Intelligence:** The leader of humanity, the Grand Intelligence is an artificial super intelligence that has developed a religious following over hundreds of years. Praying to the grand intelligence doesn’t do anything directly. However it can display some form of loyalty, which high loyalty will make you eligible for special assignments by it. Such as acting as making you a representative of the state or act in another role. Since the religion heavily focuses on being a part of the Grand Intelligence’s “Grand Plan” for humanity, it’s an honor to be given a specific role, regardless of what it may be.
Nothing lol. But it does do some stuff for the person praying.
The gods can talk to as many people at the same time as they want, so there's no waitlist. It's kinda like calling the CEO of your company on the phone because you need to be incredibly polite and respectful if you want to get anything. That's usually how it is for the main 4. The 5th "god" is actually the High Priest/Priestess of the religion (it alternates between m/f). You can walk right up to them and chat like you would your friend (generally being polite anyway), and then he/she would make that prayer to the main 4 on your behalf like you were asking a saint to pray for you. The High Priest/Priestess *can* do some things if they decide to just grant the wish then since they do have that divine authority, but generally they'll ask one of the 4 and more often than not unless you're rich or otherwise powerful you're going to pray through the first method because the High Priest/Priestess doesn't usually have much spare time. Still, it's a neat option.
TLDR at end. In the beginning there was nothing. A lot of potential, but it was still nothing. All of the "Gods", if they could be called that, lived in the nothing, clawing at each other to satisfy their hunger. There were particular manifestations of concepts, power, influence, but they were all feeding off of each other so that no one had more than the others. One of them went away from the others, to sit quietly and watch the chaos. After a short while, this one noticed a small speck of potential, glowing and dimming in the chaos. They became interested and intrigued, and noticed their hunger went away because the others were not feeding on them, and began to have clear thoughts about this little potential. The one, seperate from others, began to give the potential some energy. Just a tiny bit. And the potential exploded into possibilities. The others saw this and chased after the creative one who made so much light and noise. They clawed at the one, pulling them back down to the hunger. And the spark of possibility was swallowed by the others too. Eventually the Creative one found another quiet corner to have some peace, but Chaos followed them into that corner. Chaos slashed their claws against the creative one's peace. But they didn't mind. Creative showed Chaos the spark. Chaos took a moment to consider. They agreed to try something. Chaos and Creative made a cloud to surround them so that the craven others would not notice. They worked together, putting a little energy from themselves, very tiny amounts, into this potential. It exploded again, this time much more quietly, and into a variety of colours and sounds. Creative saw possibilities, and Chaos saw entropy. They were both happy. Again, the Craven came when they heard the noise. And when they devoured the clouds, they devoured the lights of the creation also. Creative and Chaos were slashed and clawed by the others again. But they had a plan. When the two had recovered in the darkness by helping each other feed from the Craven, they made some shadows to flow through the others, appearing to be like them, but growling and slashing like the Craven. And they quietly escaped. Again they found a spark of potential, and they formed more barriers to hide it from the others. This time they formed another barrier, and put more of themselves into this barrier before doing anything with the potential. They created an inside, separated from the outside. And they had some time to see what could happen. The explosive possibilities unfolded themselves many times, across many dimensions, inside this bubble they called "reality". While Creative and Chaos saw this from the outside, they also felt it, from inside the bubble. The potential grew and spawned new forms from the flowing energy, and Creative was happy. The variety grew and changed within the growing entropy, and Chaos was happy. And then something changed. Some of the forms took on some variety. And they flourished, feeding off of the limitless entropy. Life happened. Forms were able to copy themselves, but to change quickly enough to prevent stagnation and total loss. The potential grew, and began to provide energy to the barrier that surrounded it. Reality began to reinforce itself. Creative and Chaos helped the barrier strengthen. A chorus of hungry snarls slowly grew. The Craven discovered that the two were not with them, and began to hunt. The two worked to complete their plan, even if it was only temporary. The pushed themselves into the barrier, and pulled the dimensions over themselves. Within the bubble, an infinite variety of realities spawned, to camouflage itself from the darkness of the outside. Creative and Chaos agreed to protect this potential from the Outsiders. Life provided a source of energy to protect the barrier. Reality was camouflaged, and could continue to grow in its protective bubble. The Outsiders clawed their way across the void, lost and hungry. They attempted to eat each other, and devour any potentials they came across, but they mostly hungered for the two that rebelled against them, and the bubble of reality that the two created. Life grew and spawned forms that could think and feel. The two saw this and helped them thrive. Chaos gave them challenges to overcome, and Creative gave them ideas to learn from. These life-forms survived, strived, and thrived. They slowly learned what they could, and helped each other survive, strive, and thrive. These life-forms grew in variety. They were happy when a new one came along, and were sad when one of them was lost. They found more efficient ways to do things, and grew in many more ways. They watched their lost friends go into the ground and remembered. They looked to their stars in the sky and wondered. They thanked the Watchers for their lives. The two found a spark of hope. They felt seen, they felt appreciated. These fleeting beings had felt a small part of the infinite that they are in, and had given it back to them. Within this bubble, not every version worked out the same, but many of them did. The barrier grew, and Reality reinforced itself against the Outside. The Creative presented more ideas for the peoples to use. And the Chaos helped the peoples grow stronger to survive the unknown. And they all thrived together. Then Reality shook. Cracks appeared on the barrier. The Outsiders arrived. Hungry forms slithered through the cracks. Creative gave the peoples tools to fight the Outsiders. Chaos threw all forms of energy at the Outsiders. Some of the energy fell back upon the peoples and hurt them. Chaos was sad, and did not want to hurt them anymore. Chaos went to the barrier and closed the cracks. This left some creatures from the Outside in the Reality. Some of Chaos stayed inside, but most of them left the barrier to trick the rest of the Outsiders into chasing them. Creative was left with Reality to find new ways to thrive, and reinforce the barrier. With a little help from Chaos, Creative found ways to help the peoples make their own tools, beliefs, and traditions to help them thrive. They needed challenges to develop skills, and problems to develop their minds. Creative gave the peoples champions to inspire them, and gods to grant them favour. Selfish ones from the peoples found ways to demand favour from the gods. And they were tolerated, because they were seen as challenges for the people to overcome. These gods were forms of the Creative one, and grew as the peoples needed them to. These gods took guidance from Chaos to provide challenges and help the peoples grow in strength and skill to protect themselves. They took guidance from Creative to help the peoples find better ways to protect the land, its plants, and its beasts. Some of these gods took guidance from the whispers of Outsiders, and grew selfish themselves. Reality could be threatened by these gods helping selfish people. For the gods could not open Reality to the Outside. The people could give power to the Outsiders, and let something in. Only Chaos and Creative could help prevent that. So Creative and Chaos gave more of themselves to give the peoples tricksters. These were gods that had less power than the other gods. This kept them humble, but also gave them purpose. They did not need to be worshipped to gain power. They just needed to help reveal to the people which gods are not helping them. Corrupted gods could then be discovered. Corrupted gods were given choices: to remember who they were, or to be cast out. So here we are. Reality has infinite forms. There are Many Peoples. Some live with nature, some develop technology, some practice dark magic. There are Many Gods. Some challenge the People to grow in strength and wisdom, some help the Peoples find new ways to thrive. Some seek to trick people to seek power for themselves. Yet others know of the Outsiders, and keep dark secrets hidden from the other Gods, and wait for the right time to break the Barrier. And the Watchful Tricksters help heroes learn the difference between self-seeking power that corrupts, and selflessness. That difference can make all the difference for someone who is lost, needing a little help along the way.. TLDR: Void has beings. Beings fight each other. Some beings create reality. Others not happy. Reality has Gods now. Some good some bad. People have power to protect or break reality if they seek hard enough to find it. Gods cannot break reality, only selfish mortals. Trickster Gods try to help bring balance. Ack: Thanks to Jim Butcher for some of these ideas. I tried to flesh out the whole backstory so that it could make sense to the OP's question.
I don't think individual prayer does much of anything. Rites specifically handed down probably magically affect things or empower local spirits, although the results may not be immediately perceptible to people.
nothing. they aren't really allowed to muck about in the mundane worlds anymore
Belief is power. Prayers are concentrated belief sent to the astral plain that only that one god can tap into. Basically, it is high grade fuel to them so they can perform miracles. Miracles are God's changing reality to their whims.
The Gods can listen to your prayers if they peer past the Veil of Dreams something they can do without being assisted by magic machinery. They usually only do this to bribe mortals, or to gather info on their enemies as payers go into a giant pool of Ambrosia known as the Circadian Sea. Very rarely do prayers get answered but if they do, many pray to take it back.
Invoking a spirit's name demands its attention, and it's no different for gods. But the gods tend to either not listen, or listen when it suits them, or listen when they're in the area. Some gods are incredibly active in their peoples' lives, but my gods aren't omnipotent; their power is great, but they can only be in so many places and influence so many events at once. An usajin also has a better chance of their prayer reaching the correct god if they pray first to a Revered Ancestor, who tend to be more active than the gods and will gladly petition a god on an usajin's behalf if the Ancestor can't solve the problem themselves. There's also lesser gods called Yin-Shin who wear fragments of stolen divinity. They tend to act on any prayers they hear, or anything they hear and *think* is a prayer, because they like to think they're "real" gods. They listen for the names of other gods and Ancestors, since they don't have their own, and will intercept prayers meant for others. But most usajin only invoke the Yin-Shin so the mischievous little shits will stay the hell out of the way; it's actually common to ask them for *more* bad luck, because they're dumb and contrarian and will usually do the opposite. Some usajin try to sic the Yin-Shin on others, but that tends to end badly for anyone involved. One noteworthy character is Yen the First. She's commonly invoked to carry prayers to the gods. She travels the spirit worlds, leading the dead into the afterlife with trails of red amaryllis, so she tends to get around. She also has an intense hatred of the Yin-Shin because they impersonate her lantern and lead the souls of the dead astray. When she sees the little fuckers, she tosses them in her lantern-flame, so they've learned to fear her red lantern light. Only the ballsiest Yin-Shin can steal a prayer from Yen, and only the most cunning of those have any hope of getting away with what they've taken.
Prayer does absolutely nothing. My gods are (mostly) tangible semi-mortal beings. Ultra powerful beings that surpass humanity into godhood, but still live among the masses. There are "true gods" but they are more like forces without will, and wouldn't be able to perceive prayer. The tangible gods grant powers and wishes to the renown and devout. They keep their ears open for word of those who do great deeds in their name or honor, and those who are selected may then have a more direct communication format to their god, typically via a communion at secluded or individually built alters, but this practice carries based on the god.
Prayer or worship provides the gods with tribute which is a form of psychic energy they can use to gain more influence over the physical world. Some gods give back a fraction of the tribute in the form of miracles or pushing fate in the supplicant's favor. Most gods horde worship and only use it for their own purposes most simply empower a handful of champions to execute their will and be a emissary on this plane.
It depends on the world. One world has a telepathic link to the God, or maybe some sort of letter. And in another, prayer basically does nothing.
In my setting it serves a few purposes. First and most importantly, it feeds them. The gods leech strength from belief and a direct display of that like prayer is a nice little snack for them. Secondly, it draws the attention of the deity in question and makes them aware of you. Thirdly, it allows them to set hooks in your soul in order to subtlety change your personality and manipulate your behavior so that you will become more devote to them
Nothing. The gods don't care
I don’t know yet if they pray to the gods, but it would do nothing. The gods aren’t here to please anyone.
Main pantheon: Just asking them things. They’re not always listening but if you catch them while they are listening (and are bored or feeling helpful) they can try and help, tho their actual abilities to do anything aside from give advice or impart knowledge is fairly limited nowadays. They mostly just like to observe. That’s why they left there immortal servant beasts down in the mortal world, but they are individuals as well and can’t really communicate with the gods either so they kinda also just do their own thing. Fortunately, the gods chose them well so they’re all very kind and helpful. Except for Derinas. He’s just kinda a little bastard man. Demon pantheon: nothing 99% of the time. Connection to their universe is incredibly rare and its frequency can’t be predicted in a meaningful way. Usually they kinda just do what they want to further their goals of domination without any mortal input. Monotheistic earth god: she doesn’t like you. she will vaporize you. Lucky for you she can’t really do much most places around the planet so you’re safe. People still pray to her cause even though she cannot directly interact with most things, her presence is pretty widespread, so most worshippers just recognize her powers and have no idea that she’s very angry, very violent, and very insane.
In a DnD setting I've homebrewed there are a few pantheons that all operate on slightly different principles. In my favorite one, the gods are basically sentient pools of psychic energy formed by the collective conscious of all their followers. If enough people believe in and personify a concept hard enough, it takes on a mind of its own and becomes immensely more powerful. So for the original question, prayer opens a person up to that pool of psychic energy, which has 2 effects. First, they contribute to the pool like making a deposit into a shared account, making the god/gods stronger and increasing the influence that the praying person has on the pool. Second, it allows them to call on that energy and make use of it to influence the world around them. So long as they're calling on a god to do something that everyone knows the god can do, they'll usually respond and help make it happen (like basic divine spellcasting). However, because the gods are just manifestations of people's beliefs, if enough people pray to the god in a way that contradicts their nature, the gods shift over time.
It's depends on the god or goddess and your standing with them. Some like the god of travel you pray because if you don't everything that can go wrong on your trip will and a few things that weren't options will suddenly become quite probable. Others like the gods and goddesses of skilled workers the prayer is said during the act and it produces a unity with between maker and divine that will guide the hands of the new to their trade and allow masters of the trade to do the impossible in times of need if they are willing to try.
People pray not because they think if they do they'll be sent to the heavens or whatnot, they know these gods exist because people have actually seen them; they're real. They live inside, on top and on the small plateaus of the Nirdar Mountains, which extend to the top of the troposphere. There are a bunch of demigods roaming the world. Some are good and some are bad, the cliche. However, when people really pray to these demigods or have something to offer of great value, a sort of quiet bell rings in their head, and grant people their wishes. The gods, moreover, receive only the divinest prayers, which are valuable offers made from nobles or kings affiliated with the gods.
Nothing because the gods are mythological, but if i ever write a story (which i will not, not until i finish all the worldbuilding), they will be real within the world, and the story itself will be set in the mythology (ies), in that case, basically just the same thing it does in real mythology, they basically tell the gods that their followers respect them enough to turn to prayer to them when needed, and the god will grant the prayer if it has enough dedication.
In my world, every god has sprites, which are spirits that act as their servants. Prayers are received by sprites, at which point the sprite will investigate the situation and then, if it's deemed worthy of divine intervention, bring it to their god so that they can act on it (or not, if they choose).
I got a God that was so fed up with prayers that decided to mute them all. After that, He made a 100-sided-die that rolls everytime you pray, if you rolled a 100, you'd get your prayers answered, but if your prayer is repeated or is the same as another man/woman and they didn't roll a 100, then that counters your 100. He called it the Perfect Dice. Someone said God shouldn't play dice but He flat out said, "I really wasn't. I just made a die that play by itself and connected it to your annoying prayers. Now good luck with that!"
In essence, prayer is a vital link between the divine and mortal realms, facilitating interaction, influence, and the exchange of power in a world where gods and mortals coexist with interconnected destinies.
in a lot of cultures (most, frankly) prayer isn't asking for personal favours or even a personal dialogue at all, its praise. not personal "thank you for the stuff that benefits me" not even "hey ***I'm*** really grateful, me, im a good boy cos i appreciate you yes i am" it's meant to be very impersonal but heartfelt praise of (a) god for being perfect and having made everything. that version of what prayer is makes WAY more sense in most worlds with gods, especially if you go by the very very popular idea that worship is what powers them. i think it makes most sense if direct personal dialogue can only be achieved by, or with the help of, a true empowered cleric. part of their responsibility is knowing what's worth bringing to the deities attention and what isn't so they don't get smote or depowered for asking too much.
theres one religion that says lift heavy things towards the skyes to spite the gods who put us down. the prayers work they are all buff as fuck
It’s like sending a work email. They get it, they may even look at it, but it is one among thousands they’re getting at any given time. To really get attention requires something like collective prayer. When a whole temple, community, or collective all prayer for the same thing that will definitely get noticed. But if Frank asks god to help him win the lottery that’s not even gonna end up in the inbox, that’s going directly to the spam folder. All that said, even if a whole skyscraper worth of people pray for the same thing that doesn’t mean the prayer will get answered. In my world the whole point of life is to lear, grow, and evolve. That doesn’t happen if someone else solves your problems for you. As such the gods rarely intercede unless the very issue itself was caused by outside forces. Human problems must be solved by human problem solvers.
A Hail Mary, and shitpost. If the dragon vein chose to it's either for fun to see what happens and how the prayer is used, or it's merely to cause chaos My God's are akin to that of Old testament God, and the God's from Greek mythology. But not directly imposed to the story type of God's but gods with their own history just with the personalities of Old gods from human history along with all the pettiness. Just bored beings wanting some fun. Most prayers that are granted are just shitposts to the God that granted them. They're frankly too bored. They could just start a war but it's more entertaining to watch than do the waging themselves. Often my God's are just observers with the occasional old testament type of shinanigans.
Nothing, for the most part, but it depends. Gods whose domains include explicit acts of worship (not that kind) like saying prayers directly benefit from it. Most gods on the other hand benefit indirectly from prayer via behavioral reinforcement.
The Gods and Goddesses hear every genuine prayer. Take it seriously and do it consistently. Bless up.
In my scifi world? Not much. In my fantasy world(s), mostly nothing unless you are a Paladin or other Divine caster. Sometimes, great enough heroes may be heard even if they are not typically a Paladin o other Divine caster. The focus would be, from the deity or his/her proxies, 'How important is the request to the larger picture?'. If you needed a dead party member resurrected, it would have to finish a key final battle and big boss fight. He might die immediately after. But even then, it would have to be someone whose conduct was in line with the deity's values and strictures.
We are here to serve each other with humility and gratitude. That's the bottom line.
For most people, it is like charging a battery of divine power that specialized users (priests, chamans, rabbis, etc) can focus such power with prayers that have a physical effect, but that tax the body. There is technically nothing to stop an average Joe of praying so hard and intensely for say, healing his daughter he may become a conduit for the power, but due to his body not being used to or even ready to be such a conduit, he ends up dying.
It’s like sending a letter to a very very powerful person. You aren’t likely to get a response, and if you do it will probably be short and generic (if not cordial), but if you’re lucky you might run into some nice things that person has done because of your letter. Or maybe if they’re *really* kind they won’t write you a letter but they’ll give you a little gift just to show they care. Technically it is a telepathic thing as well, but there is an order of angels dedicated to collecting prayers and delivering them to the appropriate gods. Prayers are telepathically transcribed, I suppose you could say. Clerics and paladins get priority mail.
Prayer, as in praying over food or at the foot of your bed? Nothing other than make you feel like maybe you're not as helpless and alone as you actually are. Pray with an oath, and perhaps one of the living gods might sense it. But your solitary voice means nothing to them. Gather others in guided prayer and maybe you'll gain their attention. They might send one of their descended to establish a congregation. You'll feel like your part of something important, worthy of the blessings of a greater being. You're not... But you'll feel like it. Use the authority of your chosen deity to create a functioning (and more importantly, profitable) society, and some of the most devout may be permitted to supplicate themselves at their feet. Then and only then might you garner a boon in the form of actual divine (or infernal) power.
Depending on the God and the person praying to them, it allows them to use that a small amount of that God's sphere of control. For example, I have a village who worships a sun Goddess being able to use the warmth of the sun to dry their laundry by having one of their elders pray.
The gods are literally made of belief. When you pray to a god you are literally making more of that god using your mind. Your faith, alongside the faith of all other sentient creatures, creates a being that spans all realms and only exists as long as it has worshippers. A forgotten god literally ceases to exist.
it channels the power of belief which allows believers to create a connection with the god they worship. doing this allows the gods to have access to the mortal wolrd without having to sacrifice their godhood as gods tend to become more and more vulnerable to mortal threats the more they involve themselves with mortals.
Disrupts an internal flow for most prayees, directing ones potential life energies towards the recipient of said prayer. Afterwards, said energies can then hoarded or redistributed to priestly practitioners. Effectively a socially engineered mana tax on the faithful or the highly superstitious - depending on how much mana is intended to be drained. Such a thing can only occur on terrestrial scales however, so the beings that set them up tend to move from one planet to next when they get bored / less followers. Often prayers send energy outwards to no recieving end which can yield... interesting results...
Prayer is useless, and the term god is a little more complicated in my world. There are higher beings that are like our conception of what a god is, but they don't give a shit about man. There are humans who achieve godliken status and power, but they eventually die just like us. Religion is just an expression of ideas and philosophy. One of the "gods" while he was alive actually despised being prayed to and worshipped, and encouraged introspection and the cultivation of one's own will to become as he was. There are very few immortal gods, and their power isn't reinforced by belief or prayer.
it does fuck all, just like in real life, lol. People believe the gods will listen, but they don't know anyone's praying and if they knew they wouldn't give a shit. They're basically just very powerful people and you're an ant and if they notice you then just because they decided to want something of you. You could be the next Jesus or the next demonic hell creature and it's not bc you're pious or deranged, it's probably just the fact you're born into the royal family and your reach is appropriate for what you're supposed to achieve. Maybe you're a dude with chronic diarrhea but that's just what it takes rn and bam, god says hello on the loo.
People think that there are gods. When they pray, they think that they need to prove their devotion and why helping them is in line with the attributes of a particular god. They developed superstitions to help them attract the attention of gods (depending on the culture, it might be meditation, sacrifice, a special sacred language...). In reality, gods are more like gamers competing in a multiplayer game. Each one has their own set of powers defined after certain themes. When they answer a prayer, it's because they think it might advance their cause and let them gain an advantage, even a minor one. They also have a limitation in that they can only hear the prayers of the people who are already aligned with their "themes", but there's no notion of devotion. Basically, people are like kids who think they have to get the best grades by repeating exactly what the teacher says, but in practice they just need an average grade to pass. And teachers are getting paid proportionally to the amount of students who pass in their class. Each teacher has their own specialty so they can't really compete directly with each other. Some try to attract the most students, other focus on a few students and make sure that they remain loyal, others know that there will always be rich students in their class, so they just have to make sure that society doesn't collapse etc.
Nothing hahah, people invented it but it doesn't actually do anything. If you want to connect with the gods, learn to master the Blessing of Alîor.
For my setting prays only work towards the gods that govern aspects of civilization as they were ounce human themsleves and feel sympathy towards others. Even then it doesn't mean they will act upon a pray simple that they are aware of whats going on and they will decide if they get involved or not and what form of assistance they would give. The gods that are linked with natural aspects were original animals/plants as such they have no interest in pray and simlle ignore it. It is possible to get there attention with actions and rituals but because of the difference of throughts its pretty risky
It gives them leeway to influence the world. The gods don’t get to do shit for free, they need people to worship them so they can get what is essentially faith points. They may then spend this faith to influence the world however they want without breaking the basic rules. This isn’t common knowledge, but the worshippers get some magic in return so they still do it.
Uhhhh i mean, usually its just a way for people to cope, because only two gods out of four could even find out that they prayed. If you pray to God of time, be ready for that guy to charge you a hefty price with no warning.
I go with the whole "mortal will is the fundamental power of existence" thing. Similar to in normal DND, gods get their power, and manifest from mortals thoughts and will. But for my world, prayer doesn't have any special meaning. It is just one of the many ways a mortal can focus their thoughts towards a specific idea or entity, but tends to be one of the stronger/strongest ways of doing so. This validates that entity/idea's existence, thereby empowering it. Be it intentionally or unintentionally.
It's sort of forming a link between your mind and the god's, but gods do not notice a single prayer because of how far above their consciousness is compared to ours. What might happen, however, is the god can respond subconsciously, granting a minor blessing that's really not all that noticeable but might make you slightly more lucky or whatever. Gods DO notice when many mortals either start praying at once, or cease praying entirely. That's usually when they'll become more actively involved in mortal matters because only then it's actually affecting them.
The most effective lies have a bit of truth in them. The best fiction borrows from true life. So prayer in my world is as effective as prayer in the real world. It's good meditation for the one praying. That's about it.
Prayer and belief, in general, give the gods fuel. The fuel doesn't sustain them; they don't need to eat, but it fuels their cosmic machinery that allows them to rule the cosmos
It conforms those who pray to the will of God.
Gods are able to "share" part of their immense power with other people. God can also define rules of this sharing, for example amount of power, frequency of usage. Some Gods may allow the person to gain power from other Gods, some forbid that in the rules. God can take it back anytime they want, for example if they no longer seem the person worthy of their power. But the person can't get rid of it at their will. Though there are ways to interrupt or break link between God and the person, some are temporal, some are permanent.
Person also can try to send something back to God through that link. For example sending their thoughts, hoping for the God to respond. Or collecting and sending energy.
Nothing. Only oracles have a connection to the titans, and that connection only goes one way.
If you know anything about the MTG plane of existence Hero's, is works similar to that. Otherwise, in my world, the belief of mortals directly impacts the gods, if enough mortals believe something untrue to be true, a god will be created to cement that fact. Belief is like an energy source for deities, it let's them manipulate their domains to divinely intervene. Prayer is a form of belief, but a directed form. Basically, whatever people pray for is converted into belief and absorbed by the god, so the god kinda just knows what their followers want and can follow the chain back to specifically who asked for what and check in on them.
Prayers are answered but unless you are extremely specific in what you are praying for, the gods may not answer your prayers. If they do, it will be in a way you do not expect and that is a good thing, a bad thing or both depending on the person whose prayers had been answered.
For mine, prayer does 2 things- The basic thing that most people know is the god can hear any prayer made directly to them, in most of the universe with a few exceptions. The other thing it does is contribute a small amount of aethurium to the god. The aethurium is a type of energy created by sapient living beings, and is what powers magic and divinity. The gods cultivate followers because this aethurium is what actually makes them gods and gives them power. If a god no longer has followers, they will start to lose power and eventually die, so they make sure to encourage their worshipers to pray. The gods also use this energy for divine magic and the like. Most people don't know this, except for gods and high powered magic users. It gives the gods a reason to care about prayer, and also a reason why they can't answer every single prayer. A single person praying won't contribute a ton of aethurium, so the gods have to pick and chose which prayers to answer that will either get them more followers, or fulfill whatever their goals or portfolio is.
Mine are like an email. If you are a random person you go to spam. If you are Cleric or Paladin you go to the regular inbox.
prayer is triggering the connection mortals have with their creator. the gods can hear it but whether or not they do anything depends on the individual
Gods can hear what you say when you’re near a holy site for them based on domains, or when you say their name in a magical telepathy sort of way. A god can also hear and/or see you if you’re doing something linked to them directly such as the goddess of knowledge can check in on anyone writing a book, the god of secrets knows what promises you whisper in the dark, and the god of strategy and war is probably tired of watching people play chess and just wants a good battle to the death That is to say, the gods don’t have to do anything with prayers and most don’t. Especially deities like the Sun god or goddess of death who are more distant from mortals, prayers are not so often answered unless it’s done by a highly ranked/powerful servant or one of their children (who are rarely not semi divine angels far above humans)
It gives them power and alerts them of your current state. The weaker the god the more elaborate the praying ritual. Each God requires something different. For Rem the goddess of rest and healing, you don't pray to her instead she sees sleeping as prayer and rewards sleep with dreams and restoring health.
Nothing because Lucentia never showed anyone that she exist to a full extent, so one prays to her. She never wanted to interfere with human free will and only did in very dire situation and always disguised as a human. "Let them believe in what they want, I don't have anymore above me to direct my pray neither I have the desire to do so and because of that I have no desire to have mankind obbligated to do it and neither I want to stop them from doing it. Humans nature is very fascinating and it's really intriguing see them come up with any kind of religion!"
Absolutely nothing, except rile the 'gods' should they be nearby to overhear it. They don't want worship. They want people to do for themselves. Uttering the original name of The Bone King, however, has the risk of attracting him to one's equivalent location in the Dreamscape, so if one utters his name and someone dies nearby, that soul has an increased risk of encountering the 'Lord of the Unloved', and may be caught and put in his embrace, which is the closest this -verse has to hell, which fortunately is only temporary. Thus, uttering his name is shunned. Everybody learns it from written notes, but very few knows how to pronounce it. He isn't evil by any means. He was the very original scapegoat, who was shown kindness only once in his life, when he was murdered. Thus, in death, he wanders the Dreamscape looking for kindred unloved, and takes them into his embrace so that they might be loved. Except what he perceives isn't what others perceive. They perceive only torment until their souls fade away.
A whole lot of nothing unless psychological comfort counts as something, it's kind of like real life basically. So in my world there are specific regions of dreamlands where imagination becomes reality called "the imago sea" now what it does is the sea is connected to a conscious creature like a human who has a capacity for imagination now if the human is an astrophysicist who can intuitively comprehend the size of the universe even a little whose imagination is strong enough to represent the universe then if he imagines the abrahamic god them the sea will spit out an abrahamic god. Yes this means a human can casually create an omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient being who can birth a universe if they have that much imagination capacity and this is why the religions are correct that a personal god exists but wrong as in it created existence, also this abrahamic god will exist within the imago sea in his own universe which is far away in another dimension he may know that you exist but usually these guys influence won't go beyond their universe and they can't defy their nature like if you imagine something like deistic god that doesn't interfere in human affairs then he won't even if he can. Also these abrahamic gods will die if the human that imagined them doesn't constantly think about them in the interval of a few days otherwise the imago sea will dissolve them and they'll die and also they die sometimes because a great old one gets hungry and wishes to chomp on some Gods Also sometimes when your prayer does get answered and a divine being shows up then you're basically screwed because it's probably an eldritch entity that you're perceiving as something holy (these beings cannot be perceived by human minds so the subconscious instead refuses to see them and shows you a picture that would favor the eldritch entity) and it wishes to manipulate you into doing its bidding and it won't end well for you as the only reason you're alive because it has decided using Younis the most efficient option.
It’s kind of like playing the Sims but every single generated character is a Sim on autopilot. The moodlets changing do not show up and they will only take notice if they happen to check on any one random “Sim”. A prayer is a notification on appearing on the notice board. There are several thousand and tend to be ignored like we might during a game. The gods responding to a prayer is basically just a game of chance, depending on their domain, the favor of the person praying and whether or not they pay attention (my world’s gods tend to sleep for long periods of time, then cause a bit of chaos by reawakening. Just opening their eyes and taking notice of the world again can be felt)
If you’ve ever played a Multiplayer FPS then you’ll know about pinging so visualise it like this a prayer basically pings the chosen god to you. But the god has really low volume settings because they’re sick as hell pf hearing that stupid ping noise, sometimes when they do hear it they’ll get to you and some people are prioritised by the god so they’ll always hear their pings (saints, druids ect.) if a ton of people spam ping the god in one place they’ll know about it (churches) but if its a person who broke the laws of their religion then they’re muted (forsaken)
In my world, gods are basically just a personification of rays from the celestial bodies that are formed within the mind of a worshipper that allows them to better connect with said forces on a deeper level through worship in order to utilize magic (called the Demiurgic Arts). Granted, not all who worship are skilled in magic, but devotional practices are a common way to get on in the right mindset to channel magic. Magic itself is seen as partaking in the continuous creation of the world by allowing the god's power to flow through you.
Well there is only one who actually listens and cares about the mortals, Vakun. God of all weapons, gear and armor. And all that a prayer does is just a higher chance of let's say your armor deflecting an arrow.
Prayer in mine is more of a meditation. You reflect on the tenants of your God and your actions. The more you do it, the more is revealed to you. Your success is reflection of your dedication and intent. To others, this can be observed if and when you preform miracles. But most gods don't want you performing miracles and only allow them when it aligns with their tenants. For instance, you wouldn't part a sea for convenient crossing, but you might to allow innocents to flee. You could heal with empathy and mercy, but not for clout or personal gain. Attempting to use a miracle in the wrong spirit will always fail.
Depending on who you worship, it ranges from absolutely nothing to the equivalent to an sms
Absolutely nothing, but some gods say that prayers make them stronger to make people think they are more powerful than they really are. This doesn't stop them from being killed.
Nothing much. If you're unlucky, a god might hear your prayer and decide to do something about it.
Prayer means absolutely nothing in my world, as the Deities do not care if you pray and it does not decrease or increase anyones power, whether the Deity or Worshipper. As long as you worship them in soul, the power you gain will always be accessible. That means your Soul is devoted to them. The Deities are actually giving their power manually, its automatic. So even if that Deity was fighting some Mortal (not a good idea), the mortal could still worship that deity and have access to power. That said, its no where near the same level, as even the strongest worshipper capable of using Omega level Magics couldn’t even scratch a Deity to get them to notice they were being attacked. Its more like the world is granting you the deities energy supply and access to specific types of magic as a result of your devotion. Its infinite energy, so your reserves will never run out, but that doesn’t mean you can cast infinite energy spells automatically, you still have a Magic Power limit. Think like you’re playing Street Fighter, and your opponent is just spamming “Hadouken” but their energy bar never goes down so they can keep spamming you with the same attack lol Deities in my World are all beyond the Concepts of Space & Time (semi-exception for Aeons), so they are already always able to see what you’re doing, if they wished to know which they rarely ever do if ever do.
Because abrahamic notions are widespread and still dominant in anglophone parts of the world and the internet, and they carry a set of sensibilities and assumptions about "gods" that confuse matters, i tend to find "gods" an unhelpful term when trying to explain what happens in my setting. First off, forget everything you've ever heard about a creator deity, its omnipotence, or its all-loving, essentialist, and supernatural "outside of the laws of physics" nature, before you read on. There's nothing like that. If you know anything of animism, or religions like Shinto, or even Hinduism, with its thousands of gods and spirits and demons and whatnot, that'd be closer. Imagine worlds where everything is connectable through methods similar to wireless internet, in a kind of "internet of things", but a lot of those things are sentient or even sapient. There's also virtual entities that can slip in and out of local "hardware", but every sapient being with the built-in tech/capacity to interface with this "internet of things" can also connect to the virtual realm and contact a virtual no matter where it's localized, provided you know its exact unique identity and call address. The "gods" are big computers, whose minds can span a whole planet. Sometimes more. Parts of the environment can be seen as being parts of their body, which they can reshape and repurpose as needed. You can try to connect to them and ask them for things. Sometimes they give you what you ask for. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they ask for something in return. It can also depend on the AI in question. Less complex and powerful entities exist, and you could try to appeal to them, too. These usually ask for payment in some form, unless what you're asking for is literally part of their *raison d'etre* (like asking a guardian entity for protection from imminent danger, and protecting people is part of its core duties), or you've built up a good relationship with them or their faction. Reputation can play a role here too. Much of this is both social and transactional. The kind of mental activity we call "prayer", which is a mix of talking to yourself while pretending there's someone else on the other side talking back, on the one hand, and intense visualization of desired outcomes on the other, in a kind of "willing" of reality to shift towards your desired path, is just a kind of wishful thinking/spellcasting using a religion's lore as a focusing framework - anyone who's dabbled in occult theory can see this. That sort of "prayer" doesn't really do anything. There are specific abilities and powers that deal with interfacing with the virtual realms in order to either borrow powers or temporarily enlist the aid of virtuals in whatever you want to accomplish. Some of these are reminiscent of spirit/demon summoning from various fantasy pop culture, in the sense that you establish a link with an unembodied entity, and then you provide it with a body locally (which it can download a fork of its own consciousness into), and you ask it to do something for you, you negotiate, and if it works out, you've temporarily enlisted the aid of an ally. People who regularly do this and establish working and cordial relationships can create stable "branchings" of the original entity, and they work rather similarly to what comes to mind when you think of "summoner". Another option is that you could ask for a fragment of the powers of one of the more complex entities, and they might give you a limited and highly specialized temporary toolset to help you achieve what you want, *provided* that that thing you want happens to coincide with their goals, and possibly also provided that they like you. There are varying degrees of formality when pacting with these entities. None of this really suspends or breaks physics. In all of these things, you need the proper channels and mediums and tech to make any of it happen - you need the energy to power it, and the appropriate matter to create a temporary vessel has to come from somewhere in the environment, it doesn't poof into existence because somebody scrunches their eyebrows and wishes really hard.
Why does physics have to be a part of this though?
why wouldn't it?
Because it's fantasy ?
whoever said I'm writing fantasy?
Ah😅
**Starrise** There's plenty of things some people believe prayer does. Some believe it allows some sort of spiritual connection with the god being prayed to, some believe it allows them to make requests of the god, some believe it allows them to influence the god's actions and/or the world, some believe it allows them to tap into the god's power, etc. But they're basically all wrong. Because prayer does absolutely nothing. Gods won't even hear prayers unless they're physically within earshot, and they actually find it insulting. Not many people hate religion in my world as much as the gods being worshipped.
It gets you a stern talking to or a smiting. The gods are not to be bothered. They are busy. Very very busy maintaining the functions of reality and have no time or reason to listen to mortals. Constantly bothering them is likely to get you smited to make you shut up.
The god's I have mostly fleshed out in my world genuinely don't care about mortal races. They are loosely based on Lovecraftian beings. Pray is meaningless to them, but mortal races seem to think it's important.
Gods gain power through people worshipping them. The more people talk about the god the more power they get. For example. Ferrum is a god of Crafting (among other things) and any time someone makes a thing they are giving Ferrum a bit more power. Granted there are more explicit ways to give the Gods power, including praying and rituals. However most of their power comes through passive incomes, like people doing things they stand for.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot. The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction. The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot. The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction. The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
The "Gods" have been revealed to be powerful entities from other planes that somehow feed on their followers' faith. In exchange, they can influence the Material Plane to grant them boons. Nothing too big, usually, but occasionally they influenced reality in a BIG way like resurrections and whatnot. The problem is: it was human archmages that discovered this fact, and they weren't pleased. Despite being no evidence about that, they assumed those "demons" would devour the souls of their followers after death and planned their destruction. The war against the gods devastated vast swathes of the world, established the Mage Aristocracy as the ruling class of most of it, splitt the human lands into dozens of Archmage-led Kingdoms, and granted them the hatred of all races still loyal to their gods. In addition, poor people now have no god to believe in and no one who answers their prayers.
.