Why not call off the wager?

[Wizard_Lizard]

They’d be very surprised and Hel would get a great ice-breaker at evil god parties is my guess. Well if anybody other than Thrym ever invited her, of course.

moral of the story: don't make deals with trickster gods.

[Peelee]

help me, Jasdoif Kenobanana, you are my only hope

This is getting out of hand, now there are two of them!

A human can worship Thor if he wants, certainly, but he is much more popular among the dwarves. Hel is specifically the goddess of the dishonored dead, which requires a system of honor/dishonor that really only applies to the dwarves and those humans that choose to believe in such things. If Haley died of disease, she wouldn't go to Hel because she wouldn't believe that she had been dishonored.

moral of the story: don't make deals with trickster gods.

The dwarves didn't make the deal, though. In fact, Hel's glee at the deal hinged on that the dwarves wouldn't know. So as far as the dwarves are concerned, the moral of the story is live honorably so you can die honorably.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Yes they would. In fact they used to.

Unless we're taking Hel extremely literally, they occasionally praised Hel. Now, I suppose an ultra-literal interpretation is technically supported by the comic, but that argument is weakened by the fact that they'd be singing Hel's praises while they were asleep, as long as they hadn't died.

I'm fairly certain "necromancer" is just a descriptor of a for a person who focuses in the necromancy school (or whatever they're called) of casting, and not a separate race, and so I'm not sure why you're making the distinction.

...Because humans, elves, and gnomes aren't all necromancers? Most humans/elves/gnomes have no particular reason to consistently worship Hel, but necromancers would.

And as Hel is a part of, seemingly unchangeably (quiddity and all) of the Northern Pantheon, I doubt she could do what you've suggested.

Why not? TDO, Loki, Tiamat, and Rat used to work together back before TDO left their chat room. You don't need the same quiddity to be...allies or business associates or buddies or whatever.

[Fyraltari]

Unless we're taking Hel extremely literally, they occasionally praised Hel. Now, I suppose an ultra-literal interpretation is technically supported by the comic, but that argument is weakened by the fact that they'd be singing Hel's praises while they were asleep, as long as they hadn't died.

What's your point?

[Wizard_Lizard]

Unless we're taking Hel extremely literally, they occasionally praised Hel. Now, I suppose an ultra-literal interpretation is technically supported by the comic, but that argument is weakened by the fact that they'd be singing Hel's praises while they were asleep, as long as they hadn't died.

Why not just take a semi literal understanding, instead of going completely over the top.

[KorvinStarmast]

I'm going with this explanation too. God bets aren't some lame truth-or-dare; they're hardbaked into reality and only the apocalypse revokes them.

I like this explanation.

I think she just needs better marketing. And maybe a series of trashy novels.

Yeah. Fifty Shades of Hel ...

[heavyfuel]

No backsies.

The actual answer

[Rrmcklin]

Unless we're taking Hel extremely literally, they occasionally praised Hel. Now, I suppose an ultra-literal interpretation is technically supported by the comic, but that argument is weakened by the fact that they'd be singing Hel's praises while they were asleep, as long as they hadn't died.



...Because humans, elves, and gnomes aren't all necromancers? Most humans/elves/gnomes have no particular reason to consistently worship Hel, but necromancers would.


Why not? TDO, Loki, Tiamat, and Rat used to work together back before TDO left their chat room. You don't need the same quiddity to be...allies or business associates or buddies or whatever.

1) Pretty sure there is Word of Author that when he says no one has worshipped Hel that does in fact mean, literally no (living) person ever. Arguing about how that doesn't make any sense all you want, but it's what the story is going with.

2) Because you made it sound like "necromancer" was a separate race altogether. Aside from that, you have no real basis for claiming that ordinary people wouldn't worship a god of death to begin with.

3) You said she should find some people unaffiliated with a pantheon to worship her. Seeing as Hel is inextricably linked to the Northern Pantheon, I doubt that's possible. What does having allies in other pantheons have to do with anything?

[GreatWyrmGold]

What's your point?

That a literal reading is ridiculous, so we need to take a non-literal reading. To expand on that...

Why not just take a semi literal understanding, instead of going completely over the top.

How literal is "semi-literal"? Is it completely over the top to suggest that people spent their entire waking lives praising Hel for, I dunno, not getting hit by a meteor? Is it still "semi-literal" to suggest that people only praised Hel when they almost died and didn't, or at least thought they almost died or could have died? Your solution is too vague to be helpful.

Also, I was trying to establish that Hel was speaking hyperbolically. How much hyperbole should we assume the self-victimizing semi-megalomaniacal teenaged-acting goddess was using? "Very little" doesn't sound like the right answer.

1) Pretty sure there is Word of Author that when he says no one has worshipped Hel that does in fact mean, literally no (living) person ever. Arguing about how that doesn't make any sense all you want, but it's what the story is going with.

2) Because you made it sound like "necromancer" was a separate race altogether. Aside from that, you have no real basis for claiming that ordinary people wouldn't worship a god of death to begin with.

3) You said she should find some people unaffiliated with a pantheon to worship her. Seeing as Hel is inextricably linked to the Northern Pantheon, I doubt that's possible. What does having allies in other pantheons have to do with anything?

1. ...I don't know you viewed my argument about how Hel wasn't frequently worshiped as an argument for Hel being worshiped, but okay.
2. I was under the impression that you could categorize groups of people in different ways without specifying the type of category every time. Especially when the definitions should be well-known to everyone in the discussion.
3. Mortals are not affiliated with specific pantheons. Mortals worship gods, who belong to pantheons, and eventually fall into the possession of a god in a pantheon, but they are not of the pantheon. Thor explicitly says they have three colors of quiddity (which is why they were more resistant to the Snarl than a god of equal level would have been). You might as well say that an elf worshiping Rabbit or a dwarf worshiping Bahamut is impossible, since the elves and dwarves worship the elven/Western and Northern gods, respectively. And don't get me started on humans...

[Fyraltari]

That a literal reading is ridiculous, so we need to take a non-literal reading. To expand on that...


How literal is "semi-literal"? Is it completely over the top to suggest that people spent their entire waking lives praising Hel for, I dunno, not getting hit by a meteor? Is it still "semi-literal" to suggest that people only praised Hel when they almost died and didn't, or at least thought they almost died or could have died? Your solution is too vague to be helpful.

You do realize that saying someone does something "all the time" is just a way to say they do that frequently, right? Nobody ever pushed for a literal interpretation of that.

It's quite, simple: they prayed to her when they got sick or injured and feared death, they prayed to her when their relatives were sick or injured, they prayed to her when they got pregnant so that their wouldn't be a death by childbirth or a stillborn child. They probably prayed to her for their ennemies to get sick and die as well.

Basically they prayed to her in the exact same situation that humans in the real world have prayed to death gods during all of History. And that means praying to her often enough that she didn't actually have to actively do something to ensure she'd get the required amount of Worship, Souls, Belif and Dedication she needed to stay heatlhy(-ish she is a goddess of disease).

EDIT: You seem insistent that the only description we've had of the worship of Hel in the older worlds is a lie, but there is nothing to contradict that. So why think that?

[GreatWyrmGold]

{{Scrubbed}}

[Kish]

And I already demonstrated it was an exaggeration, which you seem to agree with. You just disagree on how much of an exaggeration it is. Do you have any reason to think she was exaggerating less than I think?

I'm not clear on what you're suggesting. If it leads to anything like "she was unable to function as an evil god on the same plane as Fenrir, Rat, and so on," then yes, I think it's impossible to reasonably get that out of what Thor said about the changes in Hel, even if you assume Hel is making up out of whole cloth a past when she had anything but Dedications.

Evil gods, death gods, and evil death gods have plenty of worshipers and clerics in D&D settings. Hel doesn't because she's barred from having them, not because she's unprecedentedly repulsive.

[GreatWyrmGold]

I'm not clear on what you're suggesting. If it leads to anything like "she was unable to function as an evil god on the same plane as Fenrir, Rat, and so on," then yes, I think it's impossible to reasonably get that out of what Thor said about the changes in Hel, even if you assume Hel is making up out of whole cloth a past when she had anything but Dedications.

Evil gods, death gods, and evil death gods have plenty of worshipers and clerics in D&D settings. Hel doesn't because she's barred from having them, not because she's unprecedentedly repulsive.

Let's go over what I've actually said so far in this argument.

1. Hel, being a death goddess, is unlikely to be popular in races with established pantheons. ("Nobody wants to tick you off, but nobody wants to praise you eternally either.")
2. Hel, being a goddess with no church and an unpopular job, would be wise to proselytise among races without established pantheons.
3. Since TDO, Loki, Tiamat, and Rat used to work together, gods from different pantheons can clearly work together.
4. It would be to Hel's advantage to work with other gods who would appeal to such underserved races, like TDO (who already has an established base of worshipers, including some who sorta-kinda follow his faith but might be more open to Hel's creed).

I didn't say that Hel probably won't get much support from the Northern Gods, due to her little attempted coup, and hence getting allies outside that group would be wise; I suppose I might as well put it out there now.

What I did not say:
1. Hel was never worshiped.
2. Hel can't function as a god without some sugar daddy to support her.
3. Hel doesn't have clerics because, nyeugh, I dunno, potatoes.
4. Everyone in TDO's old chat group is stronger than Hel.

Argue against my actual points.

[Rrmcklin]

Let's go over what I've actually said so far in this argument.

1. Hel, being a death goddess, is unlikely to be popular in races with established pantheons. ("Nobody wants to tick you off, but nobody wants to praise you eternally either.")
2. Hel, being a goddess with no church and an unpopular job, would be wise to proselytise among races without established pantheons.
3. Since TDO, Loki, Tiamat, and Rat used to work together, gods from different pantheons can clearly work together.
4. It would be to Hel's advantage to work with other gods who would appeal to such underserved races, like TDO (who already has an established base of worshipers, including some who sorta-kinda follow his faith but might be more open to Hel's creed).

I didn't say that Hel probably won't get much support from the Northern Gods, due to her little attempted coup, and hence getting allies outside that group would be wise; I suppose I might as well put it out there now.

What I did not say:
1. Hel was never worshiped.
2. Hel can't function as a god without some sugar daddy to support her.
3. Hel doesn't have clerics because, nyeugh, I dunno, potatoes.
4. Everyone in TDO's old chat group is stronger than Hel.

Argue against my actual points.

When you're starting from a premise you have no actual basis for, arguing against the rest of what you said seems pretty pointless (and people still did so anyway).

[Kish]

Let's go over what I've actually said so far in this argument.

1. Hel, being a death goddess, is unlikely to be popular in races with established pantheons.
[...]
Argue against my actual points.

I did. Your apparent dislike for my argument aside. Though I would add that calling your unsupported assertion and three more assertions that build on that one points strikes me as overly generous.

Again:

Evil gods, death gods, and evil death gods have plenty of worshipers and clerics in D&D settings. Hel doesn't because she's barred from having them, not because she's unprecedentedly repulsive.

[Fyraltari]

{{scrubbed}}

That's wrong. Most people before the event of regular medicine were very aware of how omnipresent death is. Not only does pretty much everyone knows dead people, but there are entire professions that deal exclusively in death (ie morticians who are needed in every city not just ports unlike sailors) and soldiers. Not to mention that Hades did have an establish clergy, and that death-themed festivals are a pretty universal phenomenon. Death may not be as common as rain, but it is much more important.

Hel would presumably have been the same way. Everyone used to pray to her occasionally, but hardly anyone prayed to her regularly (let alone "praised her eternally").

Not a lie, an exaggeration. It makes sense to assume she was worshiped significantly, but not so much that she wouldn't benefit from having regular worshipers. Certainly not so much that people would "praise you eternally," which is the phrase you initially took umbrage at.

She had a clergy, you know. These guys did pray to her eternally. Well as eternal as life (+undeath) + afterlife gets, anyway.
And beyond that, I see no reason why she wouldn't have her own laypeople devotees, like Thor has in the Thundershields and the rest of Firmament (although I am sure that Sigdi and Tenrin, being soldiers, used to pray to Tyr a lot as well)

And I already demonstrated it was an exaggeration, which you seem to agree with. You just disagree on how much of an exaggeration it is. Do you have any reason to think she was exaggerating less than I think?

Death gods are much more important to religions than you seem to think.

[deuterio12]

Death gods are much more important to religions than you seem to think.

Not only to religion but also to society as a whole.

Like several of the most impressive buildings that survived to our day from ancient times are death-related. The pyramids in both Egypt and Central America plus fancy tombs all over the place.

As they say death is the only certainity in our life, sooner or later she comes to collect everybody, rich and poor, strong and weak, loved and unloved. And whetever it's 1000-year old ginseng elixirs or the pilosopher's stone or their newer repainted versions like transhumanism, some people always looking for a way to escape it.

[Aaron L]

I don't think Hel would go for it as I think she is very unstable from not receiving the proper kind of devotion required for divine "good nutrition" (similar to the situation Odin is in.)

Hel doesn't get any kind of actual "worship," being proper praise and devotion. Hel has no cult, which comes from the same root as cultivation; the care and maintenance of a god through performing ceremonies and rituals in praise and supplication... all she gets is actually just appeasement. And lone dwarves desperately screaming "Please don't let me die!" (essentially "Stay away from me, Hel!") is much different than groups of dwarves happily performing ceremonies chanting "Praise be unto thee, Great Thor the Mighty!"

We've been shown through the example of Odin that simple recognition of a god's existence and power isn't nearly enough to keep them healthy. Odin is still acknowledged and respected as the All-Father of the pantheon, but even that hasn't been enough to keep him from going senile from lack of the proper kind of worship; All Hel has gotten for the entire existence of the current world has been outright rejection, desperate appeasement, and the souls of the sick and cowardly... I think she is probably very mentally disturbed by now, perhaps even enough to not even really care much if the Snarl just destroyed all the gods in the event that her plan didn't work out.

[Wizard_Lizard]

Egypt had at least two death gods
Anubis and Osiris
They got worshipped.

[snowblizz]

We've been shown through the example of Odin that simple recognition of a god's existence and power isn't nearly enough to keep them healthy. Odin is still acknowledged and respected as the All-Father of the pantheon, but even that hasn't been enough to keep him from going senile from lack of the proper kind of worship;

That's from the entire existence of the *last* world. Basically, this world is slowly rehabilitating him.

I agree on the idea that Hel isn't going to come ot of this arrangement very stable though. If she was to begin with.

[Wizard_Lizard]

That's from the entire existence of the *last* world. Basically, this world is slowly rehabilitating him.

I agree on the idea that Hel isn't going to come ot of this arrangement very stable though. If she was to begin with.

Just what we need, the loony deth goddess is getting even more cookoo

[Fyraltari]

This raises an interesting question. How much of the gods’ character is dependent on the mortals’ belief, and how much is how they originally were?

If everybody think Hel is terribly evil then she gets worse, and her actions will lead the next generation to think of her as worse than the generation before did. Repeat until the god’s character reaches an equilibrium it can never escape. The question wouldn’t be ask if the inter-world period was long enough for a personality to reset but we know from Odin it isn’t.

[Wizard_Lizard]

This raises an interesting question. How much of the gods’ character is dependent on the mortals’ belief, and how much is how they originally were?

If everybody think Hel is terribly evil then she gets worse, and her actions will lead the next generation to think of her as worse than the generation before did. Repeat until the god’s character reaches an equilibrium it can never escape. The question wouldn’t be ask if the inter-world period was long enough for a personality to reset but we know from Odin it isn’t.

Like in discworld!
Where the gods appearance is based off of what people belive they look like!
And a gods power is based on how msny belivers he/she has!

[Peelee]

This raises an interesting question. How much of the gods’ character is dependent on the mortals’ belief, and how much is how they originally were?

I think of the gods like a Stretch Armstrong doll.* You can stretch it and contort it forcibly somewhat, but it's still going to be recognizable for what it is, and it will eventually return back to its original state.

*Well, I do now that you asked that question, at least.

[Wizard_Lizard]

I think of the gods like a Stretch Armstrong doll.* You can stretch it and contort it forcibly somewhat, but it's still going to be recognizable for what it is, and it will eventually return back to its original state.

*Well, I do now that you asked that question, at least.

Unless you stretch them sofar that they break.

[Peelee]

Unless you stretch them sofar that they break.

I don't know if you're talking about the toy or this analogy.

[Wizard_Lizard]

I don't know if you're talking about the toy or this analogy.

both......

[Rrmcklin]

Besides, I don't know if Hel being terribly evil (or any more so than say Loki or Fenrir. or any other evil god) is part of her mental degradation.

We've been told she got a lot of worship in the old world(s), but that doesn't mean the people didn't actually know she was evil then.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Heck, she may not have been evil in all previous incarnations. If World #887734 uses reincarnation, she'd be no more evil than the person in Human Resources who transfers you to a new job in a different city.

[factotum]

We've been told that what your followers do affect the gods themselves, so Odin has gone a bit doolally because he's god of magic and all his worshippers hate magic. Since all Hel's worshippers are the desperate or the undead, that could definitely have had an effect on her personality.