What you should always remember is that nothing about the "official" DnD lore is a hard rule consistent over every possible setting. Things like "gods need followers" or "chromatic dragons are evil" are assumptions that the game makes about your world by default and that are true in the Forgotten Realms or other official settings. In general, you should follow these conventions if you don't have a particular reason not to, since it makes everything a bit more consistent and things like the Monster Manual easier to use (and saves a lot of work). But if one of your core ideas about your world contradicts one of these assumptions, you should definitely go through with it. If a rule or a piece of lore is in your way, you shouldnt be afraid to change it in order to make YOUR game more fun. So if you like the idea of gods existing regardless of mortals to revere them, do it. It only means you may have to change a few more aspects of the default DnD to suit your idea.

What you should always remember as a DM is that nothing about the "official" D&D lore is a hard rule consistent over every possible setting. Things like "gods need followers" or "chromatic dragons are evil" are assumptions that the game makes about your world by default and that are true in the Forgotten Realms or other official settings. In general, you should follow these conventions if you don't have a particular reason not to, since it makes everything a bit more consistent and it makes sources like the Monster Manual easier to use - and it saves you the DM a lot of work. 

But if one of your core ideas about your world contradicts one of these assumptions, you should definitely go through with it. If a rule or a piece of lore is in your way, you shouldnt be afraid to change it in order to make your game more fun. So if you like the idea of gods existing regardless of mortals to revere them, do it. It only means you may have to change a few more aspects of the default D&D to suit your idea.

What you should always remember is that nothing about the "official" DnD lore is a hard rule consistent over every possible setting. Things like "gods need followers" or "metallic dragons are evil" are assumptions that the game makes about your world by default and that are true in the Forgotten Realms or other official settings. In general, you should follow these conventions if you don't have a particular reason not to, since it makes everything a bit more consistent and things like the Monster Manual easier to use (and saves a lot of work). But if one of your core ideas about your world contradicts one of these assumptions, you should definitely go through with it. If a rule or a piece of lore is in your way, you shouldnt be afraid to change it in order to make YOUR game more fun. So if you like the idea of gods existing regardless of mortals to revere them, do it. It only means you may have to change a few more aspects of the default DnD to suit your idea.

What you should always remember is that nothing about the "official" DnD lore is a hard rule consistent over every possible setting. Things like "gods need followers" or "chromatic dragons are evil" are assumptions that the game makes about your world by default and that are true in the Forgotten Realms or other official settings. In general, you should follow these conventions if you don't have a particular reason not to, since it makes everything a bit more consistent and things like the Monster Manual easier to use (and saves a lot of work). But if one of your core ideas about your world contradicts one of these assumptions, you should definitely go through with it. If a rule or a piece of lore is in your way, you shouldnt be afraid to change it in order to make YOUR game more fun. So if you like the idea of gods existing regardless of mortals to revere them, do it. It only means you may have to change a few more aspects of the default DnD to suit your idea.