How safe/open/tolerated is the worship of evil Gods in the "civilized" parts of Faerun like Baldur's Gate? Will you get arrested if you announce you are a worshipper of Shar for example?

>>95972596 (OP)
It varies.

>>95972596 (OP)
It depends.

>>95972596 (OP)
It's inconsistent

>>95972636
>>95972829
>>95972833
Not only on the place, but also the specific God. Lots of port cities allow open veneration of Talos, but would be less thrilled about others. Places run by wizards have it os for Shar. Etc.

>>95972596 (OP)
Yes, by a Sharrite most likely.

>>95972596 (OP)
depends what god
Umberlee will be safe and open, at least in any place that relies on the sea
Talona, not so much

>>95972596 (OP)
there's a temple to Umberlee in Baldur's Gate, because its a port town and they want to avoid her wrath, while the Temple to Bhaal is hidden beneath the city and their followers keep themselves hidden.

it depends on the god and their portfolio

>>95973975
I never liked that Umberlee was so straight-up evil, given the sheer bounty and wealth that the sea can bring. I always felt like she should be Neutral instead. She should be the wave that capsizes ships, but also the dolphins that then rescue the sailors. She is the empty nets that bring hunger to poor fishermen but she's also the chests of treasure that wash up on the nearby shore from a hulled ship to reward the fishermen for remaining faithful anyway.

>>95972596 (OP)
I run my games with syncretic, polytheistic religions similar to how we know they functioned in ancient socieities. Gods aren't "good" or "evil." Want a mild winter? Leave fresh fruit on the shrine to Auril. Tired of getting yelled at by the foreman at your construction site? Some light self-flagelation and self-affirming chants to Loviatar can help you get inspired to take control of the situation. Off on a hunting trip? Burn the liver of your first kill to Malar.

They're just gods. You pray and sacrifice to them for the things you want. Your city or nation prolly has an official one, and you and everyone else is expected to show up on feast days and pay your taxes by offering a barrel of wine to the temple.

Treat it however you want, though. It's your table.

>>95972596 (OP)
>Will you get arrested if you announce you are a worshipper of Shar for example?
No faithful Sharran would announce that in public. Shadows and secrets are her domain. It's fairly similar with Cyric as well.

Others are probably tolerated so long as they don't cause issues. Bhaalists are an issue when they go on murder sprees, Banites when they're enslaving people illegally, and so on.

>>95972596 (OP)
Depends on the civilized part oaf Faerun.
Take Silverymoon for example which tolerates temples of evil gods simply on the basis of equality and if they dont fuck with the temples of good deities.

In other places they are tolerated kinda out of fear like Talos or Umberlee which you simply want to have around unless you like your City to get hit by flashfloods or cataclysmic storms.

>>95974077
You could argue about whether Umberlee is capital E-Evil. Mostly shes just really petty, selfish and self-centered as in: give her tribute and pay her some lip-service and she generally wont drown you.

>>95974364
you could just said she is a woman

>>95974077
>She should be the wave that capsizes ships, but also the dolphins that then rescue the sailors.

They rescue them in order to rape them, anon. That's not making her more Good, it's making her more Evil!

>>95974379
>Mostly shes just really petty, selfish and self-centered as in: give her tribute and pay her some lip-service and she generally wont drown you.
sounds like almost every Greek god (Poseidon specifically if we don't replace "drown" with what other gods prefer to do as punishment)

>>95974515
Their pupils turn into hearts anon that means it's consensual!

>>95974515
what sort of monster would reject a Dolphins love?

>>95977694
Who let the dolphin on the internet? Was it one of your Seaworld minions you've raped into compliance, or a marine biologist you raped into Stockholm Syndrome?

>>95978721
Squid Tentacles typed this post.
My fellow marine mammals, we must stand together against this Anti-Delphinoideaism.

>>95978742
I hope the Japs eat you all even though you're full of mercury.

>>95972596 (OP)
Depends entirely on deity.
Worship of Umberlee and Auril is acceptable, you respect their power and beg to be spared their wrath. Worship of Talos or Asmodeus is passable, you acknowledge what they can do for you and the world even if their effects on society will make some side-eye you. Worship of Bhaal, Cyric, and Shar is completely unacceptable, you would have to be insane to openly proclaim your patronage to a goddess who wants the end of all life.

>>95972596 (OP)
In a well written story? Yes, worshippers of evil Gods won't be tolerated. Faerun and D&D as conceived and written for most of its existence was not a grey and gray morality setting. Good and Evil are objective tangible things. The IRL equivalent question would be "Would you tolerate a store that sells Cheese Pizza media and is run and frequented by people who openly admit to wanting to SA children and there are a few that have done so"? No, such an establishment would create an intense revulsion in whatever community it tried to establish itself in and even if the local laws allowed it vigilantism would rapidly take care of it.

Of course D&D nowadays is run by a group of likely pdfiles, so kultmarx proselytizing and neolib subversive tactics to confuse, brainrot, and mkultra weak willed normies is the name of the game and in post 2014 D&D settings I doubt anyone would give a fuck if someone was openly worshipping Shar on the street and sacrificing people to her (as long as it couldn't be framed as a racist thing, since racism is le only ebil thing left nowadays).

>>95982196
>tourist

>>95972596 (OP)
IIRC, the only evil deity whose worship is "legal" is Bane. Because unlike Shar or Lolth or Bhaal or whatnot, he understood that good PR is a key to success and being stupid evil won't get you anywhere. So he reinvented himself as a "lawful" god of war and vengeance, while also doing his thing with Zentharim under the hood. The end result was Bane becoming THE evil god of Faerun that even Shar was afraid to touch, because he had SO MANY followers back in the day.

>>95982605
Umberlee is worshiped in every port of every major city because cities who don't maintain such a shrine don't have ports for very long.

>>95974547
>>95974515
there's plenty of sea monsters in the realm that would probably either raise the dolphins as a rape squad or just be capable of raping their own sailors and dolphins

>>95974077
Its because her and Selune are in a religious cold war thanks to the Moon-Tides connection.
The good thing to do is cast down her temples and support Selune in taking her portfolio.

>>95974077
"The sea is a cruel mistress" has an equivalent in over 200 languages and dialects. Literally every society that has ever had to deal with the ocean depicts it as a wrathful demon that must be appeased or bribed for safe passage. You may love the ocean, but you must do so knowing that it is a schizophrenic woman who could just sweep your village off the map for any or no reason at all. God help you if you're a sailor. Most people don't have a 90% chance of choking to death on the god they worship as an occupation hazard.

>>95974077
>She should be the wave that capsizes ships, but also the dolphins that then rescue the sailors. She is the empty nets that bring hunger to poor fishermen but she's also the chests of treasure that wash up on the nearby shore from a hulled ship to reward the fishermen for remaining faithful anyway.
If I torch someone's house before offering them a ride to the hospital, I'm still fucking evil.

>>95972596 (OP)
Auril is technically evil, but also very cute. Because of that one can't be faulted for singing her praises.

>>95984020
Tell me more about her
The only things I know is that her clergy make their money running a protection racket over what roads are safe to travel during winter.
And that she is slowly draining the Giant God responsible for fathering all the Giants outside of the Main ones of his power while he slumbers deep in The High Ice.

>>95972596 (OP)
Depends entirely on the gods. Ones like Umberlee are allowed because a port city (AKA everything along the sword coast) does not want to be on the bad side of the Bitch Queen. It really depends on the consequences of drawing that particular god's ire.

>>95982196
>and even if the local laws allowed it
Odds are good such a thing would be completely legal in Athkatla. That place seems to have three laws all of which are related to magic in public.

>be me
>stubbed my toe once
>completely devote myself to beshaba to avoid such a fate again
>go to the city to get my foot fixed
>get refused at the gate because of my antlermaxxing outfit
>explain the dire consequences of my refusal
>screams of stubbed toes echo through out the garrison in a cacophony of pain
>guard tries to physically remove me as a "danger to society"
>the dude stumbles and smashes his toe with his shield
>get special permission to enter due to lack of servicable guardsmen
>people look at me funny as i walk down to the physician
>same people get stubbed shortly after
>meet the local flesh mechanic
>"thats grogroneus toexicas gotta remove your leg bro"
>fuck it at least it wont hurt anymore
>wake up after the procedure
>he removed the wrong leg
>make him do it again
>he removed his own leg
>looks of disbelief
>we join forces
>remove eachothers legs
>our toes are now unstubbale
>he converts to my faith
>we lock stumps to become the two-headed antlered armwalker
>literal chosen of beshaba
>handdle over to the door to spread our teachings to the city
>stub pinky into the frame and stumble
>impale each other on the antlers
>die
>the city is now haunted by the toetergeist twins

>>95990059
Wasn't sure where this was going, but man am I glad I read the whole thing

>>95974077
I bet you also think women aren't inherently evil too, huh Einstein?

>>95972596 (OP)
Well just look at mormons. They are an evil cult in civilized lands and they are tolerated but kept at a distance.

>>95972596 (OP)

I always imagined it would be sort of like IRL s-tanists where you'd have a three tier system.
>Edgelords sacrificing pets in the woods(the expendible tools)
>The corny safe-edgy urban intellectuals arguing that the demon(s) are just abstract symbols of freedom and don't really exist(the PR/spin team)
>The rich practitioners with private land/islands, mansions, servants etc who can procure human sacrifices and rule from the shadows(the inner circle)

>>95993153
That's unironically what Bane is doing.
>Look, I am just a god of control and ambition. You like having control over things, right? You want to be ambitious, right? There is nothing wrong in it. No, I am definately not an evil overlord hellbent on trying to conquer the world.
He's also the only one not actively malicious towards his followers, because his goal is to rule the world. The plan falls apart when you have nobody to rule over because you killed everyone for no reason.

>>95990085
I mean not in the Forgotten Realms they Umberlee is from, anyway; there’s no alignment restrictions based on sex.

>>95972596 (OP)
>>95993476
Bane gets to stay around most civilized societies because his followers pay their taxes on time between all the scheming.

>>95990059
The gods and there ways are truly miraculous to behold.

>>95972596 (OP)
It's been a while since I last played BG2 but didn't Athkhatla, which is a higher tier city than Baldur's Gate, have open Cyric worshippers in it? Not straight up a temple but you'd come across Cyric worshippers talking about their god
Unlike the cult of the eyeless I don't think other temples did anything about those either

>>95993153
same but for christianity

>>96004118
There is an insane priest of cyric, but he immediately attacks your party and gets killed. So not a great example here.