Thursday, June 27, 2013

Point and Click

Question: You've mentioned Detachable Murder Vaginas and Prehensile Phalli and other such things being fairly frequent in mythology, especially among fertility gods. Do you feel these features warrant a boon or knack of some kind, or are they already covered under a knack or boon?

Hey, genitalia doing weird things in mythology! It must be Tuesday!

No, those probably don't need a specific knack or boon invented for them; they're definitely not really something that falls within the Fertility purview's scope despite the many fertility gods who have them (symbolism doesn't always translate directly to powers), and "do weird stuff to my junk" would be a pretty narrow and specific power anyway. But there are already several ways to get this kind of stuff going in the game now, so no need for extra fiddling!

Things like enormously distended or prehensile phalli or shark-toothed vulvas are easily covered by the Epic Appearance knack Unusual Alteration, which allows Scions to do basically anything they want with their appearance as long as the Storyteller is down with it. Most people use it to give themselves wings, crazy-shaped ears or extra arms, but there's no rule that says you can't use it to give your nether regions fangs or fingers or whatever other crazy thing you decide fits your divine image. Such things won't have extra powers - vaginal teeth, for example, probably won't get more than a couple of bonus dice to attacks made with them (yikes) and would just use your normal physical stats - but they're definitely a quick, cool and easy way to solve your hankering for a penis that can literally sit up and talk to you. If you're lower than Legend 9, Health gods with Human Clay can also reshape you into a new form if they're so inclined, though it'd probably be more fun for you to have control over that than to get stuck with whatever they happen to think is funny.

One of the firm Unusual Alteration/Human Clay rules we favor, however, is that you can't actually separate parts of your body (that'd just be taking damage!), so while you could easily have a Murder Vagina, a detachable model like Kapo's is a little more difficult. The easiest way to go about this would be to just make it a Birthright - stop laughing, you're the one who brought on the discussion of how to mythologize insane body parts! - and have a piece of relic genitalia, much as some other Scions might be wearing a relic eye in their foreheads. Relics can do and have all kinds of wacky powers, and you could probably stat up a roving mobile penis without too much trouble (other than getting your Storyteller to take you seriously, that is, but remind him or her that this is far from the weirdest thing out there in the wide world of myths). If it's actually truly your body part and you can detach it, leaving you body-part-less, you might even want to stat it as a maiming instead of a relic, or if it's an independent critter with a mind of its own, as a Creature or Follower; it's all about what kind of ideas you want to use.

Finally, you could just have something that "is your genitalia" that really isn't but looks and acts like it, doing your bidding with gleeful abandon. Those with power over the Industry, Health or elemental purviews could probably create little "creatures" or reshape mortals so that they appear to be roving genitals bent on unspeakable acts of procreation, and those with the Illusion purview can simply pretend to have those kinds of features without anyone low in Perception being any the wiser.

Incidentally, Goze had a relic penis (enlarged and eternally fertile) for a short while, thanks to being zapped by a Magic goddess who was trying to get Geoff into bed and ended up with him instead. She was disappointed, but made do with what she had.

7 comments:

  1. I can only imagine some deranged Japanese scion making a fanged shuriken vagina. Talk about breach of etiquette (though I'm sure susanoo-o and raiden would love it).

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    1. There's already an Ainu myth regarding such a lady, I believe, so there's precedent on the isles.

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  2. Today I learned health gods could make a bunch of humans into walking genitals. Mixed with suggestion if health god using Human Clay on a PC, we have the chance that someone ends up playing genitalia.

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    1. Health gods can do a lot of things they probably shouldn't. Turning people into giant genitals is one of them.

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  3. Lol, I had a similar idea a while back, of a femme fatale Loa scion that uses a couple of things that make her weird. One of the things I was going to do was get omnidexterity so I can use any part of my body to do wacky stuff. I was also going to get the crushing grip knack line, so that after she seduces her target, she could kill him in the act of sex. Kinda weird, but makes some sense.

    Other things I was thinking about. Having a relic tongue piercing that summons a snake for her that comes out of her mouth. One of the things she would do is kiss someone and let the snake go into the person. This would be coupled with a power the snake has to take control of people from the inside. The person would live, but not remember anything that happened before the kiss and during the time they are controlled.

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    1. Sounds suspiciously like rape. Make sure all your players are okay with it before bringing it to the game.

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    2. Very good point by anon - always gotta know the boundaries of your play group. Rape and other kinds of sexual assault/misconduct are certainly legit topics in mythology and stories relating to it, but that doesn't mean every group of players/Storytellers is going to be comfortable bringing it to the table. Check first. :)

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