About the difference in how the gods are depicted in BG3: Firstly, you're right and they SHOULD have put more into the good aligned gods. Secondly, there's A Thing in the Forgotten Realms lore about how interfering with mortals directly is Bad. They have... history of it going wrong, in horrible ways. So good aligned gods tend to be a LOT more hands off in general. Still pick their Favorites and mess with their lives immensely. But that's more of a 'have a backup god ready' thing these days.
Yes, that's very true! I know in FR especially, Ao tries to keep things reasonably balanced, and you can narratively lean on that as the reason for a lot of the good gods' distance. However, I do think there's still an imbalance in how the good gods are represented in games like these. Yes, there's supposed to be a veil between gods and mortals, absolutely.
But Shar literally manifests in a gigantic unique model and a huge centerpiece cutscene to talk about how evil she is and how much she's annoyed specifically by Shadowheart, and Ao doesn't step in to stop herāwith the implication being that this level of appearance is okay with him. But Selune doesn't even get a whispered voice line? The god Shadowheart was stolen from as a child, the source of her power for the entirety of Act 3āwe don't get anything from her, not even once, in the entire game?
In fact, it's even worse than that; throughout Act 3, we don't get a single hint that Shadowheart now worships Selune through any active choice of her own. A codex entry says "it's better not to discuss where Shadowheart's power now comes from." She never once says, "I've decided to worship Selune again, and here's why." All we get is a turn away from Shar (for good reason!) without any turn towards something else in her place. Her faith is broken and she never replaces it, but she still somehow keeps all her faith-based powers.
In fact, Shadowheart still talks more about Shar after her crisis of faith than she does about her supposed new god! Even in the Stormshore Tabernacle, where you can see all the statues of the gods, Shadowheart's ambient voice line is along the lines of, "In another world, I might be here worshipping Selune instead." What? What?? You're a cleric in Forgotten Realms! You've turned from your god and you still have holy magic! Obviously that means it's coming from somewhere divine; why don't we ever see Shadowheart grapple with what that means? Why don't we ever see her take even a baby step towards a new faith that can bring her comfort and peace to replace what Shar tore from her? Why don't we see her searching out what being a worshipper of Selune meansāthe tenets of their faithāto see if that's something she can get behind?
Why doesn't Selune speak directly to Shadowheart? Even if you want to say "well, she's just giving her space after a really bad breakup with an abusive ex," fineābut even in the epilogue, we don't see a darn lick of Selune's presence in Shadowheart's life. Even in my favorite cottagecore endstate for her, she doesn't talk about Selune at all. A powerful, present, visceral evil god vanishes out of the narrative, a vague impersonal background benevolence takes its place, and I as a player am supposed to buy that they're two evenly weighted sides of the same coin?
Even Mystra gets to show up to talk to Gale, though she has a stock model with a neat iridescent effect. In some ways, it's like a straight line on a graph. The more evil the god, the cooler & more visible & more impactful they get to be; and the more good, the fainter and broader and less vivid they become. Evil looms; good wafts.
But this is a bigger problem than BG3 and Forgotten Realms. This is a consistent issue in any Western games (especially RPGs) that depict pantheons where the gods manifestly exist & have relationships with their followers. This is also spinning off a bit from that post I reblogged the other day, because I saw a lot of people in the tags saying, "oh yes, I'm writing a devout character, I need to make sure they engage more in religious rituals in their day to day."
And like, yes, that's trueāthat can help remind the reader that your character is religiousābut it's not just about the act of doing the ritual, right? You need to understand that when a truly devout character engages in ritual, it's not just because "I'm a follower of the Maker or Andraste or the Dawnfather or the Everlight, and in order to be a Good Follower, I have to follow the rules & Pray While Facing the Sunrise Every Single Morning." That's performative pablum; that's saying the pledge every morning in high school.
A truly religious character performs these acts because they genuinely believe they matter. They deeply, honestly, truly, way on down in the heart of them, believe that even if every other priest on the planet dropped dead tomorrow, it would still be important to them and their god that they prayed.
You have to understand the difference here. The devout character prays because they genuinely believe that their god can hear them, and that their god will be moved by their prayers. They are speaking directly to someone they know is real and they know has the power to help them, and they're asking for manifest help.
The devout character participates in rituals to honor their god because they believe their god is worth honoring. They have chosen a commitment to the tenets of that god, whether it was formal or in the wild adrenaline of battle, and the daily rituals they engage ināburning incense, attending Chantry masses, serving in a soup kitchen, saying a devotion at the end of battleāhave to reflect that commitment every single time. It cannot be performative, simply a thing to be done because that's what Good Followers Do. It must be out of real, heartfelt emotion every single time, or it doesn't count. (Which can be interesting on its own! Having a devout character realize they've only been lighting candles out of habit, rather than a true intention to honor, can be a fascinating flashpoint!)
This is where I see most modern Western depictions of religious characters fall apart. They go through the motions, they say the right things that Religious People say, but the player never gets the sense that this character actually internalizes any of the tenets of their god's faith. (Unless they follow Bhaal in BG3, in which case I absolutely believe every one of those guys would die for their convictions. But again, that goes back to the "good=bland" problem from above.) Sometimes the super-minor NPCs get it rightāI'm thinking of the acolytes at the Open Hand Temple in BG3's Act 3 who run the soup kitchen and talk about Ilmater reaching out to the poorābut the main characters who follow good gods rarely seem to believe in way that I as a player watching...well, believe.
There are exceptions, of course. Cassandra & Leliana from DAI are faithful and act on that faith. Gale certainly has a realāif complicatedārelationship with Mystra, even if I have major issues with her depiction in BG3. But these are isolated examples against a greater background of vague, impressionistic sketches of divinity, and the divine gets vaguer the more unquestioningly good they become.
I've also started to write about the importance of preserving the power dynamic between gods and followers several times, but this is already more than long enough, so I'll simply say: stop trying to bring the gods down to the level of the mortal follower. They don't need to be equal friends for the relationship to be worth having. The bond between a mentor & menteeāsomeone who truly wants to help & has the power to help, and someone who needs and wants that help & guidanceācan be so beautiful and meaningful, and I'm tired of seeing it portrayed as something undesirable simply because the god by its nature is more powerful than the mortal who loves it.
I'm stopping here because I'll keep going for another 3k words if I don't, but thank you for giving me the opportunity to sit down and hash out these long-simmering thoughts! <3
