On today's blog, project updates, future possibilities, a call to action for you guys, and a whole bunch of questions!
Question: How do you handle "secrets" in myth? Things that supposedly certain gods do not know (and would have extreme reactions if they found out) yet are an established part of the myths about them?
Question: How do you explain the story of King Midas? I mean, the guy's an ordinary mortal who gets the power to turn anything he touches into gold. What Scion powers can give such a power to a mortal?
Question: Can you kill a death god? Should you be able to kill a death god? Does killing a death god really accomplish anything?
Question: What do you think would happen if a Scion, who has not yet received a Visitation, were to simply stumble across a Birthright relic that doesn't belong to an active Scion? Could that result in a kind of "triggered activation" of the Scion's divine blood? Or would nothing happen since it isn't a true Visitation?
Question: How do you determine the damage from some of the more extreme attacks that Scion's power allows? If my Strength monster picks up the Empire State Building and hurls it at a Titan Avatar, or some other powerful foe, how do I determine how badly such an impact hurt the target? If I used Create Earth to conjure up a mess of diamonds, then threw the diamonds into a tornado conjured by Tornado Tamer and hurled the whole thing at a bad guy? How would I determine THAT damage?
Question: How far is too far for you guys at GothamByNight when it comes to PC morality? When do you take one of your Players to the side and ask them if their PC could still be considered "a good guy/aligned with the Gods" and not some Chaotic Evil Titan in waiting that is deserving of a Dark Virtue or two? For example, do you think that a God-level PC Band's active attempts to wipeout humanity or kill off their parents for their own ambitions justify them gaining Dark Virtues?
Question: Do you guys have anyway of setting apart gods and goddesses of hunting mechanically? I'm working on some homebrew and I feel like these hunt gods need some association to really drive the point home, but I don't know what. I almost find myself wanting to make a Hunt Purview, but that's a heck of a lot of work. But what else to use? Is War fitting? An attribute that most fits their hunting style? I'm really at a loss here.
Question: You said in an earlier vlog that the difference between Followers/Creatures and Guides were that Creatures and Followers were below you and Guides were beings above you. Now what if I have a character who's got contact to the Valkyries as a Guide from Hero - would it be possible at Demigod that they turned into more like an equal ally type of thing? That instead of them just giving you good advice, they help you out physically when you really need it.
Question: Nut is a Titan, Shu is a Titan, and Geb is probably going to be a Titan as well - but the most ancient of them, Ra, is not?
Question: So! If everyone on Earth, for whatever reason, suddenly got a point of Legend, and the Gods were then able to get up to their old tricks without having to worry about Fatebinding, would they? If they could without having to worry about Fatebinding, would the Gods return to Earth? Related question, is there anything you can think of from any mythology that would be capable of giving everyone on Earth a legend point? Some Uber Relic or ritual that, if done, would give everyone that kind of power?
To our sixth questioner, we now realize that while we talked about PC morality in answer to your question, we didn't really address Dark Virtues. Our rule of thumb is that Dark Virtues are something PCs gain by contact with Titans or otherwise through magical events, so for the most part we would not give them any Dark Virtues automatically just because they're being jerks. It is entirely possible for Scions (and gods, too!) to be sometimes or even often malicious without actually having Malice, just as it's possible to be interested in knowledge and learning without having Intellect or to bravely run into battle without having Courage. However, Scions who are consistently evil or often do things that are in line with the goals of the Titans are likely to attract their attention, in which case it is entirely possible they might end up corrupted by a Titan Virtue later on.
If you want to email us boons, do it here! Go nuts!
Why is Mr. Data staring at me while I watch this. I'm getting kind of scared here.
ReplyDeleteHe's studying you in an attempt to learn this human emotion called "nervousness."
DeleteFor the last question, would the gods get up to their old tricks? Like if all humans had the point of legend (for whatever reason, it doesn't matter why), would the gods go down to earth and do more stuff in the mortal world. Is that kind of myth-making behind them or would they get back up to it?
ReplyDeleteThat's really a question for individual Storytellers and what they plan in their games - you'd probably get very different answers if you asked a bunch of different people what would happen in their games. We would expect that some gods, particularly those who really like screwing around with mortals, might very well start doing that more; but at the same time, they're fighting a war with the Titans right now, so they really don't have a lot of time for vacationing in the World at the moment anyway. They certainly don't want to bring the Titan conflict into the normal world, since doing so would probably blow the whole place up.
DeleteIt would depend strongly on what's already happening in the plot, which gods you mean and how much they traditionally want to (or don't want to) get involved with humans, and what reasons they might have for doing so.
Well for a example of a secret that didn't get out would be Dagda and Boann. They had a affair and a kid but her husband never found out about it.
ReplyDeleteAha, thank you! I think that's the one I was trying to think of! That is indeed a good example of an "open secret" in a myth - Boann's husband is unaware that the kid was even born, since the Dagda used his sun shenanigans to prevent anyone from noticing. But we all know about it, obviously.
DeleteOkay, we talked this one around a little bit this morning. Since Aengus is the child being born in question here, and since he's famous for his trickery and Ultimate Manipulation (which he later uses as an adult to trick the Dagda into giving him his house), we would probably say that it's Aengus himself that is keeping that secret. It was probably a use of Ultimate Manipulation that prevents Nuada/Nechtan from discovering the circumstances of his birth; he was born a full-fledged god, after all, and might have either done it intentionally or sort of reflexively as an outgrowth of his birth myth being all about the need for Nuada to never learn about it. We would run it as something like any time someone attempts to tell Nuada about it or talk about it in his hearing, they immediately forget about it themselves, or of Nuada is about to read about it in a book, he automatically puts the book away and forgets that he was reading it.
DeleteWow! Three of my questions in one vlog! Thanks John and Anne!
ReplyDeleteFirst, I asked the Midas question, and I love your explanation here. Yeah, I guess the Avatars may have come into play on that one. Or maybe it was some kind of Magic curse, I suppose.
Second, I asked the "extreme damage" question. Yeah, I definitely see your logic in not giving the Empire State Building 3000 dice of damage and stuff.
Third, I asked about the "stumbling across a Birthright" thing. Once again, I completely agree with your assessment. Yeah, if this is a PC, then finding a relic is, by definition, part of the Scion's Legend and thus would be a Visitation.
I guess there's one follow-up question? What if it wasn't your divine parent who left the relic around? What if I'm a Scion of Thor and I find a relic left by, say, Set. That wouldn't count, would it?
Not unless your parent arranged with Set to have that happen. :) A random relic someone else dropped wouldn't be bound to you and wouldn't be part of your story, so it wouldn't count as a Visitation or mean anything that would contribute to your awakening as a hero.
DeleteYeah, that was my thinking as well.
DeleteJust wanted to make sure.
Thanks again!
Umm...that mailto link says ampstorytellers@right.com. Did you change it or is that a mistake? Cuz most of us regulars know your email id but some new Anon out to make a contribution is going to be confused.
ReplyDeleteHoly bananas. I'm sorry, everyone, I must have been way more medicated last night than I thought. That's ampstorytellers@gmail.com - if you get a bounceback or already sent an email, please send again!
DeleteI feel like there are several myths that toy around the idea that a Death God who has died cannot leave their underworld. They are still a god, and still able to control their underworld, but they are effectively trapped and unable to leave except in major circumstances (which are probably them asking favors from other gods or popping an avatar of their own).
ReplyDeleteThat is to say, Death Gods who have never died seem to be able to come and go from their underworld realm with far greater ease (though they may choose to stay for personal reasons).
With the exception of Yama who goes walkabout all the time, you're idea sounds solid.
DeleteHmm...I wonder, does Ereshkigal never leave the Underworld because she can't or because she won't?
Ereshkigal probably can leave, but just doesn't. She isn't dead, to my knowledge; the fragmentary myth of her taking over the Underworld involves the dragon Kur coming to the gods to demand someone take charge of the Underworld because it's chaos, and she either volunteers, or after the dragon kidnaps her decides to stay and do the job anyway. Enki tries to kit up to go rescue her, only for her to tell him not to bother, because she's seen what a mess it is down there and someone has to take it on.
DeleteThere's definitely a flavor of Osiris not being able to leave the realm of death - that's why he's so upset about the situation, and why his brief resurrection by Isis is such a big deal. Izanami, it's implied, could leave, but Izanagi sealed her in with the giant boulder to prevent her from chasing him out, so now she's locked in, which sounds like the result of an Avatar or major relic used on her rather than a direct consequence of her being dead. Hel does seem unable to leave, but since Odin tossed her down there and there's again no mention of her dying first, probably she just can't leave because he won't let her.
I would definitely say that maybe, since we treat Underworlds as specialized Sanctums belonging to the death god, some of them come with strings attached that don't allow or make it not a good idea for their owners to leave? And that there are also a lot of political considerations in play as well.
And then there's the question of, post split, who opposes the Sky Titan versus the Thunder Titan
ReplyDeleteThunder should stay with the Atua. As for Sky, I've always been a fan of sticking Sila in there and pitting the Inue against them (mostly because I'm trying to save the Frost Titan for an eventual Iroquis Pantheon), given how Sila always struck me as more a Sky figure than a Frost figure. Plus, it would not be too large of a stretch to say that the Inuit as a whole hate the frigid North Winds and all they bring with them, which could easily be interpreted as Sky instead of Frost. As with all things Titanic, YMMV.
DeleteIsn't the frost Titan dead? The Aesir killed him.
DeleteIn the Scion line, Ymir, the original main Avatar of Frost, was killed by Odin and his brothers, but that was just the death of an Avatar; the greater Titan of Frost itself should still exist. We wrote one up as an antagonist for the recent Inuit pantheon, but as Samudra says, it could be fighting various different groups of gods. :)
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