Index

What is Godbound? 1

Powers of Godbound 2
How do I get Dominion, Influence, and Wealth. 3
How do I do changes? 3
What can you do with changes? 4
Miracles 5

Character generation 5
What are the places I can start in Arcem? 6
What facts are best? 6
What attributes are best? 7
What words are best? 7
What gifts work best? 8

What is Godbound?
Godbound is a tabletop roleplaying game where you play gods. It’s what we all really wanted
video games to be. Whenever you run to a wall and see that your character can’t hop over it
and wish you had more freedom, or were given a dumb fetch quest that had no plot
meaning, then you yearn for tabletop roleplay games. Just as video games are run by code,
and are limited to what their systems allow, in a roleplay you can do anything. You have a
bunch of players and a game master (GM) who control the world and all the NPCs within,
and both can improv and react dynamically to the other.

You can play it online, in person on a tabletop, and in it you have cooperative improvised
roleplay and dice rolling to show what you do. You create a character and explore heaven
and hell and stranger places yet, set up merchant groups that take over the world, build spy
networks that cross from plane to plane and many stranger things yet.

One major difference to players from other games like D&D is that your character is a lot
more powerful. You have influence and dominion, which let you, in less than a month,
change the world. Want to raise a crusade to invade hell? You can do it. Want to end slavery
in a society? You can do that. Your powers are also much more dramatic and powerful than
in most roleplays. You can destroy armies, kill gods, and save or destroy societies, and that’s
just at level one.

Remember what Godbound is not. It’s not just a dungeon delver. Your characters are
extremely powerful. Most dungeons they can resolve in a few minutes, and more dramatic
challenges are needed. It’s not do whatever you want. There are structured rules to say what
you can and can’t do. Unless you buy Sword as a word, you can’t just pick up a blade, say
it’s a laser sword and block everyone. This guide is here to help you be as effective a
godbound as you can, both by understanding the roleplay aspects, and by mastering the
mechanical elements.

Powers of Godbound
Dominion, influence, and wealth. Effort, HP, smites, divine fury.

These are your tools of change. With these tools, your godbound can alter the world in
massive and magnificent ways. They represent your godbound’s reality warping powers.
Some things you just do. If you are a godbound of artifice, you can just spend a few hours
and you have a house. Some things are larger reaching and grander, though. A godbound of
artifice clearly can’t build a city in any reasonable time with just their gifts, so how long does
it take?

Suppose you want to give a village running water and plumbing because of disease issues.
The locals will love it, but they have no idea how to maintain it, if simply bought or paid for in
influence. They may decide to rip the plumbing out and weaponize it as water cannons. They
may loot the plumbing to make their own things. If influence is withdraw, that feature will go
away.

Dominion is stronger. With that, you can train the locals, weave plumbing into the fabric of
reality, or make it magically repair itself. Now it will last until some major foe tries to destroy
it. This is the tale of dominion.

For influence, your gifts and miracles can do a lot, but it’s a lot of effort you roleplaying out all
those fiddly things you could do in your downtime. Influence represents a quick and easy
way to say you want stuff done. It works as a band aid to a problem while you personally are
there.

Effort. Your divine resource. When a godbound runs out of this they can’t do cool magical
things any more. You get 2 at level 1, and 1 extra each level up. You run out of this, you are
vulnerable and need a nap. You use this to power gifts, miracles, effort autosaves, and
artifacts.

HP. Most people understand this. You run out of this, you collapse.

Divine fury. You get one per level. When you run out of hitpoints you gain level rounds to
stay up, half your health back, your level in effort, and immunity to bondage. Useful for
emergencies.

Smites. Once per two rounds, you can use a smite. A smite does extra damage, and can be
used to crush foes.
How do I get Dominion, Influence, and Wealth.
You get dominion for each adventure, as decided by the GM. You can break celestial shards
for 4 dominion. You can also have a cult. The larger your cult is, and the meaner you are, the
more dominion you get per month. You get one for each size category your cult is.

If everyone in a village, up to 1000 people, worships you, you get 1 dom per month, if
everyone in a city worships you, up to 100,000 people, you get 2, a region of up to a million
3, a nation of up to 100 million 4, and a realm, up to several billion, 5.

To quote Kevin Crawford on cult strictness, “Mainstream-denomination US Protestants are

about as minimal a commitment as you can make and still get Dominion. Very trad Catholics
or Mormons are enough for +1 Dominion. Strictly-observant Hasidic Judaism or Wahabi
Islam has enough baggage that it would be worth +2 Dominion. If your cult looks like a
fantasy version of ISIS, Munsterite Anabaptism, or Pol Pot-flavored communism then you're
looking at +3 Dominion, but it's probably going to explode if you're not there constantly to
keep it in check.” More dominion, more problems, but your cult won’t be very useful if it’s too
strict.

You get 2 influence at level 1, and +1 each level up. Some gifts can give you extra. This
influence gives you temporary solutions to problems, but evaporates with time.

1 wealth converts to +1 influence, 3 to +2, 6 to +3, and 10 to +4. You get wealth by raiding or
ownering people, cities, dungeons and or by being a wealth god or some sort of god who
can create wealth.

How do I do changes?
Tell the GM what you wanna do, something to do with your Words, and they will tell you the
cost. Want to raise an army? Want to make everyone a super soldier? Want to make the sun
smile at people and give them directions? Want to build an army of James Bond superspies?
There’s a cost for each of these.

A village sized change, at base, costs 1,city 2, region 4, nation 8, realm 16. It’s harder to
change bigger areas, though you get more cool stuff if you do.

This is multiplied by the difficulty. A plausible change is *1, an implausible change is *2, and
an impossible change is *4 plus one celestial shard, a special resource you get in
adventures. Plausible means stuff that’s politically normal, and within normal resources of
the area. Implausible stuff means stuff that politically difficult, and within normal resources of
the realm. Impossible means stuff that’s politically infeasible or not possible with any
resource you can easily acquire.
So, if you want to make everyone in your city master chief, that would cost 2*4= 8 dominion
plus a shard because there’s nowhere that sells cortana and power armor. If you want to
make them badass soldiers, that’s just 2*2= 4, because badass soldiers probably aren’t
accessible immediately around you, but they do exist somewhere. If you just wanna make
them good at stabbing, that’s 2 dominion.

If you want to end a city’s harsh trade laws that the locals hate, that’s just 2 dominion. If you
want to end the very profitable trade in slavery which they like a lot, that’s 4 dominion, as
implausible. If you want to end the Aztec’s system of ritual sacrifice for their nation as they
believe it keeps the sun up, that would cost 8*4=32 plus a shard as they believe ending the
sacrifices ends in their death.

Many changes you can make cheaper. If you become heroes to the people, they will be
more willing to accept change. Certain gifts or words or things you make could make future
changes more easy. If you kill the evil sun god, maybe the aztecs will be more ok with you
ending sacrifices. If you are bound to City, building an amazing city is just something you can
do with a wave of your hand.

Some areas also have resistance. This means people or magical items called mundus wards
are resisting your changes. These will increase the cost of changes. Ask your GM how much
they increase the cost, and you can either pay the extra cost, or destroy the people or
magical items that oppose you.

In addition, remember that certain changes may add problems to the place. If you rip out the
local traditions and replace them with your divine vision, some people are gonna be pissed.

What can you do with changes?

Many many things.

Remove someone you don’t like. A merchant diss you? You can ruin their business and drive
them out of the city.

Start a cult.

Raise some mobs to fight for you.

Make your loyal followers into super soldiers.

Make magical wealth of some sort, from a trade network to a fountain of gold to a magical
toy manufactory plant.

Create a spy network.

Create a useful institution, like irrigation.

Remove a bad problem or curse

Build a castle, or a city.

Create artifacts

Create Godwalkers

Create 8 dom super minions

Make Paradises

What are these Miracles?

One of the most potent, yet often neglected tools in a godbound’s toolbox.

You can do a lot of cool things. They cost a bit more effort (your divine resource) than gifts,
but are very useful. They cost 1 effort for the day, or 2 if the original gift costs an effort for the
day.

You can warp the world with your will in immediate and badass ways.

What can miracles do?

You can emulate any gift of your word.

You can smite a foe, for 1d8 damage per level, or 1d8/2 levels for an area attack.

You can transform an enemy.

You can summon a minion.

You can solve a problem relevant to your word.

You can block a magical power.

You can, with an action as well, destroy a magical power appropriate to your words.

You can summon appropriate items.

They can do a lot.

Character generation
So, hopefully you have some idea of what you want to do as a character. Make sure they
have grand dreams. You want to be wealthy? A Wealth Godbound can buy a city at level
one. Want to be the strongest sorcerer in the world? You can learn all the levels of sorcery at
level one. Make sure your goals are sufficiently dramatic for gods, and appropriate for
whatever setting.

What are the places I can start in Arcem?

The default setting is Arcem, which is a mixture of fantasy versions of various cultures.

Vissio is Renaissance Italy with cybernetics, Ancalia is Ethiopia with zombies, Patria
is the roman empire, Dulimbai is Imperial China, Lom is North Korea run by french
philosophers, the Bright Republic is modern society and modern tech, The Oasis
states are Ancient Egypt, Ulskang is Vikings, Nezdovha is Tsarist Russia with robots,
The Howlers is a general mix of various barbarian tribes, The Raktine Confederacy is
a Hungarian/ Romania style area filled with monsters and mad wizards, Kasirutan is
a Pacific island style sea nation as in Moana, a Thousand Gods is a forest land filled
with fighting giant mechas, and the Toba Planes is a Mongolian Horse warrior
country. You can also start in the Far Reaches, which is a stand in for any other
setting.

What facts are best?

Your facts are cool things about you that connect you to the world. They let you succeed at
things relating to them,and have powerful stuff and skills.

For example, if you are a scientist from the Bright Republic, you probably know all sorts of
Bright Republic science. If you are the leader of the Bright Order, you have an order of
knights helping you.

Cool things you can do with them-

Take low magic. Cinnabar magic is very strong for combat, theotechnical arts for making
minions and magic items, Seers of the Bright eye for spying.

Take an artifact. At GM discretion you can take one 8 point artifact.

Learn a strife. This makes you a more badass fighter.

Control an organization. At GM discretion, this can help you have lots of dudes who like you.

Be super skilled at something.

What attributes are best?

Attributes are less important than in D&D, because when you are bound to a word you auto
succeed in non combat tasks relating to that word. As a Godbound of Command, you can
order around most small groups easily. A Godbound of might can pick up anything below a
few tons.

Dex is often called kingly as a stat. It boosts your AC, your attack damage and to hit, and is
useful for escaping traps and outrunning foes. However, a might god gets 19 strength, which
can offer some unique benefits over dex, and Godbound have many ways to get around
dodging and hitting foes, such as weapon gifts which let you use any stat to attack.

Con is likewise often called kingly as a stat. It boosts your health and lets you better survive.
Charisma is useful for games where you have a lot of social play. Wisdom is good for seeing
things, though many gods have other powerful senses. Int is good for doing smart things,
and strength for picking things up and hurting foes.

If your word grants you an attribute boost you can use it to cover a low stat, like raising a 10
to a 16, or raise a 16 to an 18, and you can buy enhanced attributes with gifts, though this is
rarely recommended.

What equipment do I need?

You are a god, you have all equipment that is appropriate to your words and facts.
Godbound is not a game about minor monetary concerns. Miracles and Wealth can provide
more equipment, as can dominion influence and wealth.

What words are best?

Any godbound will be very powerful. You can create armies, smite foes, and do justice. But
of course, some word combinations will work better for certain concepts.

For being sociable, Command, Deception, Passion, Faerie Queen, Music, Desire, Fate,
Freedom, Intoxication, Cities, Wealth and Madness are good. Depends on what theme you
want. Discuss with your GM how important sociability will be to the game, and consider what
sort of thing you want to do- raise armies, raise cities, seduce nobles and duel their
husbands, many things.
For fighting foes, you need to distinguish between two things- do you want to kill armies, or
want to kill powerful single foes.

To kill single foes well, you need alacrity, Sword, Bow, Luck, Vengeance, Protection, Health,
Lich King, might, endurance or Dragon. These words are all good at either surviving a lot of
hits (Alacrity, Endurance, Sword, Health, Protection) or hitting foes hard for a lot of damage
(Alacrity, Sword, Bow, Dragon, Luck, Might, Lich King) and so are good for combat.

Some powers are great at killing mobs. Sword, Dance, Dragon, War, Command, Death, all
have very strong anti mob powers. These let you kill vast armies very quickly. War and
Dragon are generally considered to be the most powerful mob killers, with extremely strong
smites that can destroy thousands of troops in seconds.

There are a number of other more advanced strategies you can also use. Good movement
(Sky, Bird, Journeying, Might) can be used to bombard a foe from afar, and dispel powers
(Thievery, Sun, Entropy, etc) can be used to strip enemy defences

You can also go for nature control. Earth, Artifice, Fire, Winter, Sea, Underworld, Night,
Beasts, these give you a great deal of control of the natural world, and let you quickly
change the world to your liking.

You can become a master of minions with an appropriate word, like Sun, Beast, War,
Command, Death, Insects, Birds. These let you summon expendable minions who can
distract, trip traps, and generally help you out.

As a special note, sorcery is very expensive as a word, so if you wanna be a spell caster,
expect to pay through the nose.

There are many options. Just consider what would be cool, and pick words that work well for
your chosen concept.

What gifts work best?

For each gift you choose, you want it to be something that you’re likely to use every day, or
several times a day. Remember, you can miracle a gift. So, take a gift like this one.

“Ender of Plagues Action

Commit Effort for the scene. Cure all diseases and poisonings within sight. If the Effort is
expended for the day, the range of the cure
extends to a half-mile around the hero, penetrates walls and other
barriers, and you become immediately aware of any disease-inducing
curses or sources of pestilence within that area. “
Cool gift, mass healings. Do you need it every day? Maybe yes, if you live in a plague
stricken land like Ancalia. Probably not, if you live far away from any sick people.

You may want this next gift every day. Some gifts are constant, no effort, or scene effort.
That means if you take them you can use them a massive number of times a day.

“Lifegiver Constant
Allies in your presence automatically stabilize at zero hit dice or hit
points provided their bodies aren’t torn to pieces. As an action, Commit Effort for the day to
revive an ordinary mortal creature from death
if they’ve been dead less than a day and some part of their corpse
remains intact. Godbound and other mighty entities cannot be revived. “

Because then you can revive friends, and keep other friends alive for longer. It’s up to you,
but go for gifts you’re gonna use a lot, gifts you want to be more permanent like resource
production. If you want a mountain of gold you will want to buy a mountain of gold gift so you
can get rich.

How do I do things?
How do I kill things?

You will face terrible wizards, evil angels, deadly martial artists, monsters with far too many
tentacles. How do you kill them all?

With combat.

Here are some good things to do, if you are not sure what to do.

1. Dispel a useful gift an enemy is using.

2. Use a divine smite, for 1d8 damage per level against single targets, or 1d8 damage
per two levels against multiple targets.
3. Set up a zone of danger, for 1 damage per level per round.
4. Curse an enemy with weakness.
5. Use a miracle to solve some issue.
6. Buff an ally so they can fight better or survive better.
7. Mess with the environment around an enemy.
8. Stab someone in the face.

Combat starts with you going first. Godbound are super awesome, so they always go first
unless they’re being ambushed or the enemy has alacrity and uses a go first gift. You fight in
things called rounds. They represent 6 second increments when you can do things. In a
round you have one action, and one move action, and limitless instant and on turn actions.
What are these things?
An action is something big you do. Maybe you punch a wizard in the groin. Maybe you set a
village on fire. Maybe you summon a giant statue of yourself to squish an enemy.

A move action is where you move closer or further away from something. You can move 30
feet a round, more with the right gifts.

An instant action is a special sort of gift that you can trigger at any time. Defensive gifts are
like this, for example, and you can trigger a defensive gift even after the enemy has rolled
their attacks and damage, protecting yourself. Turning off a gift is an instant action.

An on turn action is a type of action you can do as many as you want to, but only on your
turn. For example, raising Leap the Moon lets you jump really far.

If you do damage, there are two types of damage. For most types of damage, you roll the
damage, and then if you get 1, you do 0 damage, if you get up to 5, you do 1 damage, if you
get up to 9, you do 2 damage, and if you get 10 or over you do 4 damage. This is repeated
for each dice. Some damage is straight. The dice result is subtracted straight from the
enemy’s health. Area attacks vs groups of enemies are always straight, as are super badass
attacks.

After all the godbound have acted, the NPCs go.

Remember, if you are attacked, and take a lot of damage, you can use defensive dispels to
block spells and smites, but not attacks. That means you spend one effort, have a word that
can block the smite or spell, and it goes away. But you cannot dispel fists, attacks. If you
have a gift that can dispel attacks, you can use that.

Remember, if you are worried you are going to die you can always run away. Many words
can teleport or create a distraction.

What is balance?
Here are some notes on things that are common for balance reasons.

1. No cheap extra attacks or actions. Godbound with extra attacks and options tend to
be overpowered.
2. No niche protection. Many words overlap each other, and so it’s common to see gifts
that do similar things.
3. No feat chains. Each gift is useful on it’s own.
4. No static modifiers. Gifts change things. They don’t add +4, they change the world.
5. No effort modifiers. If a god can quickly recover effort, they can do too much.
6. Combat is rocket tag. Enemies should have 10+ total PC levels*2 in health. Smites
do 1d8 damage per level. At level one, a balanced enemy will have 18 health, which
will take at most around 6 rounds to resolve, with 5 damage from smiting every two
 rounds. At level 5, with an enemy having 50 HD, it will normally take on average 4
rounds to resolve, with 25 damage from smiting every two rounds.
7. Godbound can generally, at most, wreck a city with their casual efforts. Dominion is
required for larger efforts.
8. There are enemies stronger in personal combat than most single godbound.
9. Powerful gifts are generally supposed to mostly have more powerful and longer
lasting effects, rather than larger numbers.
10. Sun, Alacrity, the Hunting Strife, Scorned Lover Strife, 8 dom minions, Vengeance,
and Might all have the potential to be majorly unbalanced in combat. Purity of Brilliant
Law is widely seen as the strongest and most nerfed gift, for breaking the action and
effort economy.
11. Godbound is balanced against PCs fighting major supernatural foes. Lesser foes and
mobs are trash and distractions, especially vs a war god or a dragon.
12. Effort of the Word is one of the best starter gifts, as low level godbound have little
effort.
13. GMs can be tamed with gifts of pizza and beer and praise about the beauty of their
setting.
14. Cinnabar is widely noted as the strongest low magic, with powerful attacks and
summons.
15. 8 dom minions don’t need a shard, unless they have crazy abilities.
16. You level up fast early on normally (3 exp and dom) and slow down around level 4-5.
17. There are many, many army destroying combos.
18. The game isn’t well balanced for pvp, and if you like it, house rules often help make
pvp rocket tag.
19. An optimal combat godbound will generally be able to do at least 4 regular damage a
round. Save or dies are not that useful against most foes, as they can use effort to
save and generally have strong saves.
20. You can’t dispel attacks. You can dispel smites, but not sword blows, unless you
have a word that can protect against swords.