Question: We know that a god/goddess does not have to give their Scion a personal 'Visitation' and can use beings such as crows (like in Eric Donner's fiction), but can they ask another god/goddess to do the visitation in their place? Without giving up paternity rights?
Sure, easy as pie! It's not the presence of a god that decides whose Scion a child is; that's the god's blood, and a different god performing a Visitation won't be able to change that. All a Visitation really is is the intrusion of the divine into a mortal's life, awakening their dormant godly blood. Many gods do it themselves, because it's a good way to introduce themselves to their offspring and make sure they start doing what they want them to, but they can also send practically any magical messenger they want. Lesser immortals, enchanted animals, other gods of their pantheon, or even gods of other pantheons are all possibilities for awakening a Scion to her new life as a divine soldier.
Don't worry about your paternity rights; they can't be stolen from you by anything short of The Wyrd, no other loopholes possible. The only normal way for a god to transfer parental rights to a Scion is via the Scion Adoption Rite, which requires the willing knowledge and consent of both participants; only high-level Magic gods can do it, and they can never do it without the original parent's agreement, so it's nearly impossible to "steal" Scions from their parents. (Of course, they can use shenaningans like Epic Manipulation to convince a god to consent to allowing an adoption to go through, but they can't just push it through on their own.)
We actually had an example of just this sort of thing in our own games; Hermes, being the messenger of the Dodekatheon, did his duty and performed Sophia's Visitation when Athena was too busy. This meant that she didn't meet her mother for a while longer, but left the goddess free to keep directing the war efforts against the foes of the pantheon, so it was a good tradeoff. Besides, Hermes has Co-Location, so he's great at hitting up a bunch of new Scions and still being home in time to carry love notes to Zeus' latest flames.
I think, in some cases, it makes more sense for the messenger god of each pantheon to the visitation. Why would Zeus bother to show up for each of his scions visitations when he could easily send Hermes or Iris to do it for him? It kind of falls into their duties as messenger gods anyway.
ReplyDeleteIt does make sense for Hermes or Iris to visit Dodekatheon Scions for their visitations, and I think if a player wants Hermes or Iris to perform their visitation as a way to get to know those charming psychopomps, that's totally within their rights.
DeleteThe difference, though, between logic and the game, though, is that the players aren't just Scions - they're the PCs. They're the Scions that Zeus is going to take the time out of his day to come visit if the player wants their character to meet their father. They're the Scions who get the special exception of the personal visitation. If the player wants to meet the messenger (or the ST has a special reason why they want the messenger to appear instead of the actual God) then by all means. But it shouldn't be a given that the messenger will always be the one to visit if you pick a big fancy God as your sire/dam.
On a side note I cannot for the LIFE OF ME figure out 'messenger' gods in any other Pantheon. Maybe Agni? It says that Hermod is the 'Messenger of the Gods' for the Aesir, but I know 0% of anything about Hermod so I'm not sure. Anunna have nobody with psychopomp period, Quetzalcoatl is the only one with psychopomp in the Aztlanti and he's definitely no 'messenger of the gods'...just seems to be like having messengers is a Dodekatheon thing. Or at least having important, Legend 12 messengers.
Probably not Agni...Agni takes the prayers and sacrifices of humanity to the Gods, but he's never the one bringing messages from the Gods to humanity.
DeletePlus, imagine the Bogovi's reaction to a God who makes it his job to act as the link between Gods and men :D Heart attacks all around!
Obviously not all pantheons have one, for the Mesopotamians (especially Ishtar) Ninshubar acts as messenger, some scholars think she inspired Hermes' role as messenger. But for the most part, other pantheons have minor gods who act as messengers/servants for a specific god rather that one who acts for all the gods. A scion of Frigg might be visited by one of her attendants like Fulla if she's too busy. Or maybe Ares is busy on the battlefield so he sends one of his sons or sisters that aid him in battle (which Phobos or Eris stopping by to welcome you to the family would be pretty freaky, but you get the idea). Obviously its not something a player should be forced to do, but it is more realistic if that's what your aiming for. If a god has a messenger or servant, why not use them? I know making out that your pc if the one of the most important is how most people play, but for me its the underdog that makes for a better story overall.
DeleteHey Anne, I'm glad this question is buried now because no players are gonna come snooping.
ReplyDeleteIs it possible, purely for NPC Rival Scion purposes, for a Titan to come and Visit an unawakened mortal on behalf of their God parent and grant them relics and use them for their dark purposes?
For example, I have a Rival Scion of Thoth. Thoth went missing in the Sundering of Duat, and now he is the prisoner of his old flame Ma'at in the Justice Titanrealm, and she is not pleased with him making anti-Titan babies with mortals (especially given she is one.) So I'm having it so she came to his unvisited Scion, visited him claiming she was Thoth's wife, his stepmother, and gave him her birthrights, and blamed the whole Thoth going missing thing on Anubis (the only God to escape Duat during the Sundering, and a PC's god parent) so that he will do Ma'at's will in the name of his Birdly Father, and challenge the PCs to avenge him. (And his Conviction and dedication to Justice will be enough to make him drown out any cries of "no it wasn't Anubis it was the Titans" for a while.)
Do you think that works or is that way out of JSR canon? (Which is important to me.)
(another martyr from my phone. Farewell post, until ye rise again.)
ReplyDeleteBut lo! It is risen!
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