What Makes beings in Dark Souls gods

Throughout the series we hear and see many gods, such as Velka, Gwyn, And Gwyndolin.

But
what separates these gods from other powerful beings within the Dark
Souls universe. Nito himself is not a god, yet is just as powerful as
many being a four lord and even further in that the occultists attempted
to use his power to destroy the gods.

So what makes these gods
gods? Were they once mere men that attained transcendence through the
flame? Or have they always been gods?

I tend to see them as a separate species from humans, much like the gods from greek mythology. If we theorize the 4 Lord Souls were given to 4 different species. 1 for the Gods (Gwyn), 1 for the dead (Nito), 1 for the Witches (director confirmed them as different species from humans), and 1 for the humans (Pygmy).

^Never though of it that way. Actually makes a lot of sense.

Personally, while I think the gods ARE of a different race, I don't think that's what makes them immortal or whatever. I think they are members of that other race whose souls (they) are powerful enough that they have reached some kind of threshold where things like age can no longer debilitate them.

In other words, they become so strong they shrug away the aging process.

Shkar wrote:Personally, while I think the gods ARE of a different race, I don't think that's what makes them immortal or whatever. I think they are members of that other race whose souls (they) are powerful enough that they have reached some kind of threshold where things like age can no longer debilitate them.

In other words, they become so strong they shrug away the aging process.

But if the power was derived from their own souls then they would not have needed the first flame. More likely it is what others have said that simply their 'species' doesn't age. It is also possible that gods are less a species and more a force that embodies itself within these beings, like Nito.

What I mean is Nito doesn't derive his power from being the first of the undead, but being an embodiment of death itself, simply the power of death began at the death of the first person.

Buggy Virus wrote:

Shkar wrote:Personally, while I think the gods ARE of a different race, I don't think that's what makes them immortal or whatever. I think they are members of that other race whose souls (they) are powerful enough that they have reached some kind of threshold where things like age can no longer debilitate them.

In other words, they become so strong they shrug away the aging process.

But if the power was derived from their own souls then they would not have needed the first flame. More likely it is what others have said that simply their 'species' doesn't age. It is also possible that gods are less a species and more a force that embodies itself within these beings, like Nito.

What I mean is Nito doesn't derive his power from being the first of the undead, but being an embodiment of death itself, simply the power of death began at the death of the first person.

My theory on that was just that the first flame provided a sort of...power-up, I guess you could call it. Gwyn found his Lord Soul there, no doubt, but nobody denies that Gwyndolin is also a god, and he DOESN'T have a Lord Soul.

Well my point is that their immortality, although not derived from the Souls of Lords, is not derived from the power of a soul, but rather something inherent in their being as gods no matter how powerful they are.

I would go one further to say it is possible for them to die, being that you do kill them and (in my theory) Vamos is the dead blacksmith Deity.

Buggy Virus wrote:Well my point is that their immortality, although not derived from the Souls of Lords, is not derived from the power of a soul, but rather something inherent in their being as gods no matter how powerful they are.

I would go one further to say it is possible for them to die, being that you do kill them and (in my theory) Vamos is the dead blacksmith Deity.

It COULD come from the soul. The bosses we kill don't come back after we rip out their soul, and item descriptions confirm that the soul is the source of life. To say that the Lords literally "discovered, found, obtained" their souls from the flame implies they had no soul to begin with, and as such no life. It is more likely that they had a soul, but some event involved in finding the flame lead to a power surge of sorts.

As for their invincibility, I'm guessing it is almost like Seath's crystal. When he has it, you can "technically" do damage to him, it just heals in less then a second. Perhaps divinity is like that, but on a much slower scale. It can fend off slow "deaths" like illness and aging, stopping them in their tracks, but you can still kill them by slicing them in half.


All in all, to determine what truly makes them a god, we need to first determine what universal definition of "god" we are going to use.

I would think in order to be a god there needs to be those that worship them and i might even say they themselves need to think they are gods, I'm not saying that's it, there is definitely more, but that's part of it.

Leeroy_Jenkins wrote:I would think in order to be a god there needs to be those that worship them and i might even say they themselves need to think they are gods, I'm not saying that's it, there is definitely more, but that's part of it.

That's a very general view of a god, but I think within the context of dark souls it is more of a designation a single person can receive. Even if no one knows who exactly the god of war is he is still the god of war.

The god of war fell from god status perhaps he fell because he did not see himself as any better than normal people.

He fell because he exstinguished the first flame and lost the annals. The sunlight medal says one, cant remember what says the other.

DoughGuy wrote:He fell because he exstinguished the first flame and lost the annals. The sunlight medal says one, cant remember what says the other.

It never comes right out and says he extinguished the flame. I think that is something Acidic conjectured.

Probably but Acidic does not say anything without good proof to back it up. Time to go lore diving.

I always assumed that the gods were immortal in the sense of not being able to die naturally, as people are with the curse of undeath. That being why most of the gods seem to want keep the flame lit, keeping the curse going, thus keeping themselves from dying outside of battle.

Tolvo wrote:I always assumed that the gods were immortal in the sense of not being able to die naturally, as people are with the curse of undeath. That being why most of the gods seem to want keep the flame lit, keeping the curse going, thus keeping themselves from dying outside of battle.

This is pretty well proven by the fact that we can kill Gwyndolin. Gwyn has been around since almost literally the start of time, and he doesn't appear too have changed much (Yes, I know he is technically undead now, sue me). So they are pretty obviously unaffected by age (deathly, at least). Yet, we know for a FACT that we can kill them.

There isn't anything that directly disproves my theory that I'm aware of but I guess it's just a theory. I do like it though the god of war descending from godliness to help undead through jolly cooperation.

Leeroy_Jenkins wrote:There isn't anything that directly disproves my theory that I'm aware of but I guess it's just a theory. I do like it though the god of war descending from godliness to help undead through jolly cooperation.

Sunlight Medal - "The symbol represents Lord Gwyn's firstborn, who lost his deity status and was expunged from the annals."

Sunlight Blade - "When the eldest son was stripped of his deific status, he left this on his father's coffin, perhaps as a final farewell."

^Just about to go find that. Good work +1.

Sorry if I don't quite understand how this makes me wrong. do we know whose perspective item descriptions are written from. maybe the person/deity that recorded the events in dks history thought him foolish on a personal level.

Leeroy_Jenkins wrote:Sorry if I don't quite understand how this makes me wrong. do we know whose perspective item descriptions are written from. maybe the person/deity that recorded the events in dks history thought him foolish on a personal level.

That's not the part that's important:

"lost his deity status"
"was stripped of his deity status"

That doesn't imply that it just faded away or he gave it up; it implies that someone literally forced his godhood away from him.

Which kind of brings bullying to a whole new level...

Shkar stop posting things Im about to just before me lol. Another +1

DoughGuy wrote:Shkar stop posting things Im about to just before me lol. Another +1

I'm finally getting to where I can swing like a heavyweight in the lore discussions!

Don't take this away from me

lol looks like Im out of +1s. Sorry.

I know from experience you can lose something on purpose but the second one does kind of put a kink in my theory. but that raises the questions of who could strip it from him and why. I try to stay away from the he extinguished the first flame theory because it just doesn't sit right with me like how he could have done it if he put his sword on Gwyn's grave when he lost his deity status, isn't linking the flame what turned Gwyn undead(or killed him giving rise in the need of a grave if not for only sentimental reasons as they don't have his body) and why would the extinguisher of the flame have his name lost in history it seems like a big accomplishment/defeat (depending on which side your on)?