this post was submitted on 12 Apr 2025
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I think that kind of approach is pretty me-e-e-e-e-e-eh
Depends on how it's handled from there, but there are quite a few fantasy lores wherein deities gain their power from the worship, fear, of even just awareness of mortals; so depending on this specific game's lore it could make sense. But of course, that's just the "why", there might be cause for elaboration on the " how" and the "who". Good stories could certainly be drawn from there, I'd imagine an entire order created for the purpose of enforcing the taboo around these deities, everyone with knowledge of them being forced to take vows of silence or be killed, massive burnings of scrolls, shattering of tablets, spying and inquisitions to find those who break the taboo... And certainly, there'd be some stuff in there that can somehow be tied to the main story. Maybe a group faced by the party could be the heirs, the ghosts, of the magical creations of that order. Or perhaps those of the repressed.
Even in IRL religion, names have a lot of power. In the Bible, God mentions his own name many times-
Exodus 3
Here God is explaining the meaning of His name to Moses and tells Moses His name- YHWH (rendered in most translations as "The LORD" due to ancient taboos around the Name) and Jewish and Christian lore state that pronouncing this name can grant great power. Jewish folklore states that Moses parted the Red Sea by saying an extended version of God's name, and even today most Christians don't even know that God has a name other than "God" because of taboos around saying it.
Another example of this is Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaten who tried to get the Egyptians to worship only one good. The priests and pharaohs after him went to great lengths to erase his name