We Aren't Sure We Understand the Question So This Gets Rambly

Question: What are your thoughts on the end of the world? If a Scion campaign focused on the aftermath of a massive disaster, would you have it tied into the Titan War/divine politics, or would you have the gods/Titans continue in their normal roles while adapting to the situation?

Well... that really depends on what you mean by the end of the world. If you mean something like a global disaster that strongly affects humanity, I doubt it would reach the point of a truly end-of-the-world scenario, because the gods have the power to take care of that sort of thing. Humans causing nuclear winter would suck, but gods with Health, Fertility, Guardian and so forth could prevent the planet from self-destructing, and those with an interest in their people or strong Virtues urging them to would probably do so (or, if all else fails or it's easier, just move the remnants of humanity to a new planet, which is also easily within the abilities of the gods). Of course, that would probably lead to strong losses or disasters on the front with the Titans, because the gods would be putting their energies elsewhere instead of into the defense and reconquering of their enemies, but humanity can be very inconvenient like that. Gods, as a generality, have a strong interest in protecting the World and the humans that live in it - they have Valor, they have Harmony, they have children growing up there, they have cults that feed them sacrifices and so on - and therefore they're unlikely to ignore something that would actually threaten all of that on that gigantic a scale.

If you mean something like a mythological end-of-the-world scenario, like the death of the Fifth World or the onset of Ragnarok, that's more likely to be strongly tied to the Titan War and divine politicking among the gods themselves. Those things almost invariably happen as a result of Titans coming after the gods - Surtr coming after the Aesir, for example - or as a result of gods' schemes and actions, and therefore are hard to divorce from the overall picture of the Titan war, though of course they might most strongly impact certain parts of it and be less of an issue for others. Keep in mind, too, that these are the myths of ancient cultures from specific parts of the world, not global monomyths; the End of the World isn't necessarily the end of the entire world, just the part of it that that myth came from. Ragnarok will surely fuck northern Europe at least nine ways, but it's not likely to have nearly as strong an impact on, say, South America.

Of course, you could also decide that any culture's end-of-the-world myth affects the entire globe, but that's a dangerous generalization; if you decide that Aesir problems can nuke the entire world instead of just Aesir territories, you're basically making Norse myth more important in Africa than African myth, which is pretty unfair to the sub-Saharan mythologies. Those things can certainly affect the whole world - and should, if they're really that big an occurrence! - but they shouldn't destroy the whole world, so end-of-world-scenarios in mythology generally don't translate to end-of-world scenarios for the entire Scion setting.

Which leaves us with the core of your question: can you have a giant disaster on a scale that the gods would consider to be effectively ending the world, without it being related to the Titan war or the political backstabberies of the divine? And I think the answer might actually be no. Gods and Titans wield such vast, incredible power that if they want to prevent disasters, they can, and if they want to cause disasters, they can do that, too. While the World keeps on ticking on its own, doing its thing, the gods and Titans oppose each other and one another at a gigantic, cosmic level. There really isn't anything that can meaningfully oppose a high-level god except a Titan, another god or Fate itself; and that means that those are the only things that can seriously ruin a god's day. Things don't randomly happen in myth; they happen because a god or a Titan caused them to happen, thus forcing other gods and Titans to respond. Humanity, while a powerful tool of Fate, is nevertheless mostly helpless against these powers; they can't challenge the gods except through the power of their belief, and they couldn't hope to do anything that these beings with Ultimate Attributes and unfathomable purview powers couldn't see coming a mile away and easily quash.

So it seems to us that the end of the world in Scion would have to be as a result of divine action or inaction; divine powers are at the pinnacle of the setting. If humanity managed to destroy the world all over themselves, it would be because the gods didn't stop them - most likely because they couldn't spare the manpower away from the war, had been outmaneuvered by other divine powers, considered it not their problem, or even wanted it destroyed for their own purposes.

But that could still happen, at which point you could totally run a Scion game set in the post-apocalyptic wasteland left behind. In such a case, gods would certainly adapt to the situation; the nurturers of mankind would probably want to rebuild, while the warrior deities would seek destructive revenge, the less humanity-focused gods might not give much of a damn and the rulers of the pantheons would doubtless immediately begin jockeying for political advantage to be gotten out of the situation. So many gods' normal roles in myth have to do with humanity - protecting them, feeding them, policing them, inspiring them - that they would have to adapt to the new needs of whatever people remained after this disaster to continue fulfilling them. As now, most gods would probably try to strike a balance - focusing on continuing the fight against the Titans but also trying to aid and protect humanity. A lot would depend on individual gods, their attitudes toward the World, and how much any of them stood to gain or had already lost.

Of course, the real end of the world scenario in Scion is the triumph of the Titans. If the Titans win, the World will very literally end, consumed, destroyed and ravaged by the rampages of these insatiable cosmic powers. A big, big bang. So the efforts of the gods to win the war are not only for their own benefit, but in a very real way defending everything in the world as well.

These are some guys who work hard at their jobs. They all deserve some divine props.