Welcome to our Worldbuilding Wednesday! On the first Wednesday of the month, we will discuss the creative process behind different facets of the Twinverse, from as lofty a concept as the entire cosmology, to specific characters and their role in the setting. Worldbuilding Wednesday is meant as a behind-the-scenes column to give insight into how the setting itself changes and evolves, beyond just the events of the books.
The final part of our tutorial focuses not just on individual deities, but on their interactions as a pantheon, and on their effect on the world. It's a good idea, whenever creating a new deity, to always consider hooks associated with it. Typically, I assume at least one other deity is their ally, and at least one is their enemy. The precise nature of these relationships (is the enemy a parent who opposes them? is the ally their spouse?) depend on the deity, but this starts creating tension within the pantheon, which is good from a storytelling perspective as it can create factions of worshippers who help or hinder each other (not to mention splinter sects who don't agree with the enmity, or with the alliance).
Unless you need the deity fleshed out now, you don't need to immediately name these allies or enemies: you can wait as you create the pantheon, and natural connections will start developing. Partly, they will be shaped by the nature of your pantheon: if the gods in the pantheon are all siblings, then those relationships must be colored through this filter. If they are a loose congregation of local deities which barely qualify as a pantheon, you may create relationships maps that form sub-groups within the pantheon, with little or no connections between at least some of the sub-groups, perhaps to suggest that this is not a cohesive pantheon, but an aggregation of various smaller cults.
In the latter case, it would work better if each subgroup and its associated deities had its own "flavor" (for example, you could have a sub-pantheon derived from a previous warlike civilization where the surviving deities are mostly focused on aspects related to war; another sub-pantheon could be derived from local nature cults; and so on). The gods might have different naming schemes depending on their origin, as well. In this scenario, there could be parts of the population that only recognize one sub-pantheon as "real", and ignore or belittle the others; this could create rich opportunities for political tension, though depending on the story to be told, it might require the author to figure out which, if any, are real deities.
Another important connection that needs to be defined is the impact each deity had on the world. Did they have demigod or heroic children? Did they sire monsters? Did they take a mortal as a spouse? Did they create ancient artifacts, or were they responsible for some ancient catastrophe? Are they incarnate in a specific location of the world, or did they ever appear in physical form? Why? How did their existence and their plans affect the world and its people? Each of these topics, in turn, provides further food for thought.
Consider these associations between deities in light of each deity's portfolio as well, to give them more weight and more significance. Everything should be symbolic - or at least hint at symbolism - when it comes to gods.
Depending on your definition of godhood in your world, you may find it unrealistic to believe the entire world follows the same pantheon and religion; if that's the case, use the multiplicity of pantheons to your advantage, building each pantheon around a different concept idea and trying to find out how you can flesh it out in an original way.
And then, evaluate the connection between those pantheons, because if any of the deities are real creatures, they most likely have interacted with each other - especially if they are ageless.
All these threads, once connected, create a vibrant and living pantheon that can be added to, played with, used or exploited to add color to the world, or even become part of the story, directly or indirectly.
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