Pantheon: Vedic Pantheon

Pantheon: Vedic Pantheon

Just like in the previous post - here's a Vedic pantheon for India-inspired nations and peoples. Mostly just taken from Planescape and GURPSified.

Brihaspati
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Lawful Good
Symbol: quill and scroll
Home plane: Celestia
Portfolio: wisdom, worship
Domain (-40%): knowledge spells
Worshipers: teachers, monks, scholars

Brihaspati is the deity of wisdom and worldly learning in the Vedic pantheon, the one who constantly exhorts the other deities to their divine duties. At the same time, he’s also the one who reminds mortals that the gods require belief in order to survive, that the faithful must keep their pantheon alive. By urging the people to concentrate on the rituals of worship, Brihaspati not only plays an important part in keeping the Vedic gods strong, but also helps mortals ascent to a higher consciousness.

Indra
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Symbol: white elephant
Home plane: Limbo
Portfolio: weather, battle
Domain (-40%): weather spells
Worshipers: warriors

Indra, along with Agni and Vayu, are known as the Three Gods of Chaos. Indra holds power over war, battle, and weather.

Agni
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Symbol: flames
Home plane: Limbo
Portfolio: fire, messages
Domain (-30%): fire spells, communication and empathy spells
Worshipers: messengers, monks

Agni, along with Indra and Vayu, are known as the Three Gods of Chaos. Agni holds power over communication and fire.

Vayu
Lesser deity
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
Symbol: sapling bending in the wind
Home plane: Limbo
Portfolio: wind, life, destruction
Domain (-30%): air spells, healing spells
Worshipers: healers

Vayu, along with Indra and Agni, are known as the Three Gods of Chaos. Vayu holds power over wind, life, and destruction.

Kali
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Symbol: skull
Home plane: Abyss
Portfolio: life, death
Domain (-30%): healing spells, necromantic spells
Worshipers: healers, necromancers, monks

The goddess Kali is a creator and a destroyer, a builder and a demolisher. She gives birth to children and then eats them, takes a husband and then destroys him. She is a loving and hating mother, a brutal and gentle goddess who reveals the beauty of life and death even as she takes them apart – literally.

Mitra
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Lawful Good
Symbol: plant inside sun
Home plane: Celestia
Portfolio: friendship, contracts, warmth, light, growth
Domain (-20%): light spells, communication and empathy spells, plant spells
Worshipers: farmers, judges, commoners

If Brihaspati pushes all mortals to strive for the mutual good, Mitra is the one who gives them the motivation to do it. He is the twin of Varuna (the deity of the cosmic order), and the uses Varuna’s purity to cut to the heart of matters and create understanding. It’s no wonder, then, that he has become another of the pantheon’s gods of the sun – specifically, a helpful god who shines his warm, nourishing light on friendship and contracts.

Ratri
Lesser deity
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
Symbol: woman’s silhouette
Home plane: Hades
Portfolio: night, darkness
Domain (-40%): light and darkness spells
Worshipers: thieves

Ratri is not a typical goddess of the night – she is fickle and chaotic. Just because she believes in darkness does not mean that she cannot appreciate the light, and just because some thieves worship her does not mean that they all do. Ratri cares nothing for a mortal’s profession, really – it is what he does in the darkness that concerns her.

Rudra
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Symbol: black bow
Home plane: Mechanus
Portfolio: storms, disease
Domain (-20%): animal spells, weather spells, poison spells
Worshipers: foresters, monks

Rudra is a deity that tolerates no imperfection among the other gods; the avenger of grievous wrongs; the righter of the balance; and the one who masters the animal instinct and grants the strength to change.

Siva
Greater deity
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Symbol: cobra head
Home plane: Negative Energy Plane
Portfolio: destruction
Domain (-30%): fire spells, breaking spells, other spells of annihilation
Worshipers: monks

Siva, the Vedic deity of ultimate destruction, is actually rather liked by the rest of the pantheon. His duty is to tear down the multiverse in order to bring it in line with the Vedic unifying spirit, to make everything whole again by eradicating the multiplicity that has arisen. Sive does not consider himself evil – he is merely destruction incarnate.

Surya
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Lawful Good
Symbol: half sun
Home plane: Celestia
Portfolio: morning, evening
Domain (-30%): light and darkness spells, healing spells
Worshipers: monks, healers

As the complete embodiment of the sun, Surya is said to hold all the other solar gods within his being. It is not known if that means he literally contains those deities, if each god is another manifestation of Surya, or if the sun is made of several different deities. Whatever the truth, Surya oversees the rising and setting sun, making sure the day begins and ends correctly. Surya heals diseases, brings the light and heat of the sun to his faithful.

Vishnu
Greater deity
Alignment: Lawful Good
Symbol: sun, shell, lotus, mace
Home plane: Celestia
Portfolio: mercy, light
Domain (-20%): light and darkness spells, healing spells, protection and warning spells
Worshipers: monks, healers, commoners

The most widely worshiped deity in the pantheon, Vishnu is thought to be the one who prevents evil from triumphing over good. Odd thing is, Vishnu feels no particular enmity toward those of his pantheon who embrace evil, reserving his fury for humans and fiends who cross the planes and leave desctruction in their wake.

Yama
Intermediate deity
Alignment: Lawful Neutral
Symbol: red mace
Home plane: Mechanus
Portfolio: judgement of the dead
Domain (-30%): knowledge spells, spirit spells
Worshipers: monks, commoners

Said to be the first mortal who ever died, Yama is charged with judging the spirits of the dead as they prepare to move to the next life in their cycle of existence. Yama can view each being’s entire life span in a single glance, and he assigns the dead to their next incarnations accordingly. Most are sent for a short time in a deity’s realm and then reincarnated back on the Material Plane.