Question: I've seen Anansi mentioned often in connection with the Loa; is he actually considered a member of their pantheon? If so, why? I mean, I can see him under related African pantheons, but specifically Loa Voduon? Also if he is a Loa, why isn't he on the Loa page?
Anansi is currently allied with and a nominal member of the Loa in our games, which is probably why you're hearing them mentioned together. The PCs made that happen with a blend of fancy political shenanigans, good old-fashioned African travel tales and blind screaming spider-fueled panic, but it's not something that the game came with out of the box. The Loa were attempting to move most of their worshipers and religion back to their African roots, and put Vala's band on getting the support of some of the other African gods to help smooth the transition.
Anansi himself is not one of the Loa; he's from the Ashanti religion, while the Loa have their roots in the Yoruba religion, two distinctly different sets of African myths. He's only about as related to the Loa as the Tuatha are to the Bogovi; they share real estate on the same continent and some common themes, but in general they're separate people with separate ideas that shouldn't be lumped together.
We hope to one day figure out what to do with Anansi, who is clearly god-parent material but who also comes from a pantheon of like four people; until that day, however, he serves as a free agent and adjunct when things in Africa are going down. Just as in North America, Africa really just needs like twenty statted pantheons of its own, but most of them are so obscure for players that they're not priorities.
But old Talespinner certainly does keep on spinning.
The loa in raw were a horrible idea and will be transitioned eventually to a more African pantheon
ReplyDeleteThat confuses me so hard. I don't want it to be wrong to play a Scion of Baron Samedi!
DeleteBaron Samedi is SOOO not a legend 12 god. Hes luckky to be legend 10.
DeleteYour relentless pursuit of mythological purity shatters my rum-and-tobacco-soaked dreams :(
DeleteIt's okay! You can still be a rum-covered dilettante. You'll just have fewer associated powers. :)
DeleteWhy not just give Anansi a writeup and not give him a PSP? In the game I am in only two of the players treat PSPs seriously anyway and that's Arete and canon Taiyi.
ReplyDeleteBecause it would be wildly unfair to anyone who wanted to be a Scion of his to not have access to a PSP. Sure, some players might not care, but it's definitely not universal - lots of ours are heavily invested in them, and anyway, it's super unfair to not let them make that decision themselves because it isn't even an option.
DeleteWe'll figure out something awesome to do with him, but I don't think it'll ever include not giving him a PSP. It'd be a shame to not give him cool culture-specific powers, both for him and for any Scions he might have. If we do him, it'll be all the way.
Those other players are insane! Pops are so important
ReplyDeletePsp
DeleteYeah PSPs are immensely defining. Can't imagine anyone NOT taking them seriously...except raw Jotunblut from the book. Couldn't take it seriously at all until the JSR write-up, after which it became one of the best/most awesome of all the PSPs.
DeleteSo many giants.
DeleteThat reminds me, which came first, Brent's Jotunblut or y'all's? Or was it a collaborative effort that diverged in process?
DeleteI believe we both spawned about the same time from a jotonblut that we found on the scion wiki page
DeleteOr ours came out a little before, but brent had already been working on his and didnt like ours as much as his own so finished. Something like that.
DeleteSome of your stuff is better than Brents. Some of Brents stuff is better than yours. Have you guys ever considered getting together and becoming a Scion super power? I know you two used to play together.
DeleteThe only reason we don't still play with Brent is that he had the audacity to move several hours away. We still enjoy him whenever we can get him in town, though!
DeleteWe actually collaborate with Brent fairly extensively on Scion stuff; my inbox has more than a few 100-message-long threads full of discussion on boons, powers, the underpinnings of the Scion world, and basically all related subjects. But despite our burgeoning and awe-struck wonder for his awesomeness, we don't always agree on everything, so sometimes we share ideas that we both love and use, and sometimes only one of us likes it and keeps it on deck, or hates it and gets rid of it.
If you're asking if we've considered actually melding with Brent into a super Scion gestalt mind, then no, I imagine his wife would be pretty annoyed with us.
Brent is a very good friend of ours and we used to work with him on many things. However he is also newly wedded and new jobbed and is a very busy man.
DeleteAnd in general I dont work well with others in long term scenarios. Eventually I reach a my way or the highway boiling point.