Total War

Question: Say the Titans aren't an issue, and one of the pantheons decides "screw it, we're taking over." Which pantheon do you think is most likely to start a war to dominate the rest?

I don't know if there's a "most likely" in this scenario, but let's look at the possibilities!

First of all, I want to know: taking over what, and why? Are you talking about one pantheon trying to conquer the Overworlds of all the others? Trying to take over all the real estate on earth so only they are worshiped? Trying to assert their power to make all the other pantheons fiefdoms under them? Different kinds of power grabs come from different kinds of gods - for that matter, are all the members of this pantheon going to get power in some way or is it all going to funnel to their current king/queen, and if so, how does that change things? Also, why are they taking over? Conquering one other pantheon would make sense - maybe they hate them, or they have something they want to seize, or they're strategically located next to something important, whatever - but all of them at once is a lot harder to have a motive for. Is this hypothetical pantheon made up completely of crazy megalomaniacs who want ultimate power in the universe, or are they trying to take over to impose some kind of order or goodness in areas they think are broken, or do they think everyone else is about to gang up on them and they want to go on the offensive first, or do they have some kind of racial supremacy thing (more than the usual) going on? What is this war even about?

All of that stuff affects the answer to this question; any pantheon might decide to up and declare war if they thought they had to in order to get something they needed or kill a group of hated enemies. If the idea is that they just want to be In Charge of Everything, with no further explanation, that seems pretty unlikely but would lend itself best to the pantheons that come from conqueror nations whose social climate was based on warfare and annexation. In the Americas, the Teotl, K'uh and Apu all come from extremely war-oriented and expansionist cultures, while in Africa the Orisha spend half their existing myths conquering one anothers' kingdoms, in Polynesia the Atua oversaw crazy canoe-cavalry warfare between islands for centuries and up north the Tuatha, Aesir, Yazata and Theoi are famous for European and Asian warfare. And that's not even counting ridiculous people like the Elohim, who just really love war.

Actually, there are very few pantheons that have no warfare in the background of either their gods or the culture they were worshiped by, so there are few of them that probably just wouldn't go for it at all. The Bogovi are probably one; the Slavs were no slouches in the arena of war, but the Bogovi policy of not interfering with the World (or anything else outside their scope most of the time) would make it unlikely that they'd suddenly go on a conquering rampage. Gods of cultures like the Inuit, who did have conflicts occasionally but were usually way more concerned about surviving the coming week, are even less likely to have any reason to go out and start something.

But even they are still totally possible. The Inuit gods might decide they'd like some real estate that isn't a frozen hellscape; the Bogovi might decide that if they were in charge of the universe, they could stop everyone else from all this interference in the World they keep insisting on. No pantheon is off the table for a power bid, not really; gods are, after all, creatures of power and influence. They were designed to be in charge of things.

If you're thinking about making this a major plot in your games, we'd probably say to keep in mind that you can find a way to make the idea work for any pantheon, but that the actual success of such an endeavor is very, very unlikely. Even the largest pantheons are massively outnumbered when they decide to oppose all the other gods in existence, and gods vs. gods is a matter of equal powers clashing, without the Titans' ability to call on greater disasters and powers thanks to their link to the primordial. It could maybe still be done, but it would have to be planned incredibly carefully, get really lucky, and have some massive distractions or reasons other pantheons wouldn't just cut it short before the ball rolled too far. Remember, this pantheon is deciding to suddenly attack and conquer literally hundreds of other Legend 12 beings with purview Avatars and Ultimate Attributes. One god with an Avatar can fuck up any battlefield plan; imagine how many would be involved here.

What would probably happen is that one of those warlike pantheons would start hostilities, conquer a few other pantheons, and then the remaining ones would decide, "Okay, they're out of control," and become allies to shut them down. Even a massive pantheon will run out of steam eventually, especially if fighting a multi-front or serial war.

Also, don't attack Russia in the winter, kids. I know it always seems like a great idea, but while mortals can't get past the weather and the angry natives, the gods will probably have no better luck getting past the brick wall of eternally stubborn Bogovi opposition.