Goldilocks of the Gods

One of the things that tends to catch peoples attention about Rhym is the fact that there are only nine primary human gods.  And each is directly associated with one of the nine alignments.  This notion occurred to me when I was first considering developing my own 5e setting.  I was pondering two things that bother me about D&D pantheons.  Alignment, which has always seemed a somewhat artificial construct, and the fact that any deity must be shoe horned into that system.  The other issue is that religions tend to try to answer all the big questions, not just one.  And most D&D deities have very specific areas of concern and responsibility.

The first thought was to just skip the whole alignment thing, as it is much less entwined in character design and concept than in previous editions.  And perhaps have a monotheistic religion.  But that didn't feel right.  D&D without alignments wouldn't do.  And then it clicked.  One god per alignment.  Following your alignment is a way of showing your character's devotion to a specific deity.  But instead of each god's followers having their own organization, I decided that they are all part of one big church.  Between them the nine gods address all the big questions.  And a priest will usually belong to an order that reveres one god above all others, but they still worship all nine.

The implications of this setup lead to many interesting facets in the campaign setting.  For example the machinations among the various church orders.  Close ties between certain regimes and the various orders.  I drew on things like the the Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas, Camber of Culdi series by Katherine Kurtz, the 1632 series by Eric Flint, David Weber and many others, and of course our own real world history.  The result were copious notes in my original draft on how the various parts of the church both created sources of conflict and kept those conflicts from growing into full fledged war when possible.

Just think of the gaming potential,  Your players could be dashing heroes with allegiance to the king, But the High Priest's minions are always out to thwart you and your liege.  Or perhaps mercenaries are needed to settle a small conflict that has erupted between two political factions supported by different parts of the church.  Or, the reverse, perhaps your characters have been hired to protect church envoys out to stop a war.  I can go on and on.  And this is only one little piece of Rhym.

So to paraphrase Goldilocks, one god was not enough.  Many gods for with this or that specialization was too many.  But nine was just right!