The maker is a fairytale created by the chantry. The gods imprisoned themselves to keep their avatars from the taint.
Indeed? Then who created this city? Black or Golden it doesn't matter the city has a power greater than the old gods, this is the truth, someone had created the city and the power granted by the corruption is the greatest weapon of that world.
Probably when the maker decided to abandon the city the city become black and corrupted.
This maker is so great that he destroy the 7 old gods with their own stupidity because they wanted worship, the maker grant to them the best worshipers the darkspawn, the fallen mages. Now they can't even protect themselves in their sleep.
Somewhere in the codex of origins, the one about the archdemons in the creatures section tells that only the people who lived during the first blight, have considered Dumat as a god, only because they didn't know how to kill him, when the wardens discovered his little secret they destroyed him.
So in the end from what we know those old gods of yours are very weak in their sleep even in their pure form (remember the Architect has found the true form of Urthemiel unharmed) crazy as archedemons and they use a sort of soul's transfer to survive..
To me they are not gods just dragons who play with soul's transfer.