I think forcing tithing is a dangerous thing, however if we remember, D&D is a cooperative action of the players and the DM telling a story together. There are all kinds of characters, and players need to be free to express their character's needs, desires, etc.

Religion generally is a good way to express conflict and relationship between the PCs and something greater than themselves. For some characters religion is a sore spot - but other characters will want to express the piety of their character. The job of the DM is to foster an environment for them to do that in a creative and fun way.

First I want to deal with it as conflict. Some of your players have personal reasons to dislike religion. As a DM, you don't have to get involved in those reasons, but it can be fun to give your players an outlet for their frustrations. For this reason, it is (sometimes) a good idea to create a campaign world that features some of the classic sins of the clergy. This is not to necessarily force anything on your players, but it is effective to give some players a foil that they have personal reasons to hate. Who doesn't like the story of a man against the gods? I can think of a few ideas just off the top of my head here:

A corrupt monastery that gives special treatment to monks that have connections to money and power. All the other monks get crappy cells to sleep in on straw mats. The favored ones get high positions, prized morsels for supper, a giant room with a hot tub, an awesome view of the pool, and a secret door to sneak chicks in with. This of course creates conflict in a situation that is supposed to be based on personal asceticism and piety. In the real world this practice was called Simony. I have no idea why, but that's what it was called. A pious character has reason to hate these corrupt clergy because they give good clergy a bad name. A cynical character has reasons to hate these sorts of monks because they see the trouble that it causes for everyone else.

If you've read the Safehold series by David Weber, there's a situation where the established church exists for the sake of its own benefit and lets all the peasantry starve and freeze out in the cold. It can certainly be very cool to allow your characters an opportunity to play the part of a reformer.

I remember in Baldur's Gate II, there's a quest chain where your character breaks in to one of the temples in Athkatla and steals a precious holy symbol necklace thing... while this is a very simple gather quest, it's a good way to express some of your characters' opinions on religion.

Now let's deal with relationship:

Let's go back to BG for a minute. One of the obvious ways to express piety is by taking your character to a temple and making a donation. Depending on how much you donate in BG your reputation stat will change. You can also change reputation through actions as well. That reputation stat will effect the way that people treat you. Shop keepers make good deals to upstanding members of society (Think "I'm Commander Shepherd and this is my favorite store on the Citadel"). Guards will treat your characters with more or less suspicion. It effects the way that certain NPCs behave with the main character. If you have a low score Khalid, Jaheira and Minsc will stay with the party, but that causes headaches for Xzar and Montaron.

In one of the previous campaigns that I was a player in, there was a good representation from several different world views. The DM had put together an interesting pantheon, and so it became something of a contest to prove which character was the most pious. There was of course tithing as a possibility, but there are other ways to show piety. Several of the PCs served a god of mischief and chaos, so it was - again - something of a game to prove who could do the silliest things to prove their faithfulness to their deity.

Frequently,(in this campaign from the previous paragraph) there was a thing that characters would do called a "God Call." This would essentially request a miracle for a deity to provide. Take out a d100 and on a roll of 1, your request is granted. This chance would be effected if your character was in the good graces of the deity, and also if the request aligned with the deity's interests. This was monitored a little, so you couldn't cheat the system by just making a series of god calls all day. You might get one or two god calls a week tops, and the chance could dip below 1%.

In addition, to God calls, if a character remained in the good graces of the deity, as they gained levels they would be given "Granted Powers." In effect this was not a game breaking thing, but my fighter that followed a healing deity eventually got the ability to cast cure light wounds once per day. This was extremely handy - and again, not game breaking. These granted powers would be based on the character and portfolio of the deity, and frequently we would meet and fight villains that had received granted powers from their deities. This gave the game a certain flavor that I feel wouldn't have been there if it had been omitted.





As a DM, I want to create a world that feels believable and exciting. So, one of the considerations is how the church(es) effect(s) the world at large. The deities need to feel real, and their relationships and conflicts with the PCs need to be meaningful. Maybe the church owns bishoprics and can enforce tolls and tithes in that domain as if it were a baron or a count. Maybe the church funds an order of clerics or paladins. Maybe the church is a source of knowledge and funds a cadre of astronomers or wizards. Maybe the church is evil and subsidizes the kidnapping of travelers for sacrifice. Maybe the church sells indulgences and guilts people into paying extortionate fees. Any and all of these could be the means for you as the DM to hand your players an adventure.

The only other piece of advice that I have here is to be sensitive to the feelings of your players. Some games are going to have to find adventure some other way - and that's fine. The trick is to find out if this is a good method to introduce FUN into your game.