Question: Are there any Legend 12 gods that are exclusively English? I know Britannia doesn't count and isn't Legend 12, but I'm interested in what associations she has.
Alas and indeed, Britannia doesn't count. She's a neat lady, but while she's the goddess of Britain, she is not actually British herself, being a thoroughly Roman deity. You're also right that she's not Legend 12, since the Romans mostly personified her to represent the territory and to have something to show their own gods and emperors as superior to, and there are no surviving myths about her other than some images of her being conquered by Mars or Caesar. She probably would have vanished from everyone's consciousness almost completely if Elizabeth I, that sexily badass paragon of queenliness, hadn't spearheaded her resurrection in the sixteen century as a symbol of the power of England, and since then she's been on a lot of coinage, stamps and other official symbols of the country's government even unto the modern day. She's now basically the Uncle Sam of England, though of course more antiquitious and Britishly fancy, and her origins as an actual divinity have been lost far into the mists of time.
All that is interesting, but it doesn't give us much to go on in terms of associated powers for her. We would assume she's Legend 9 and has been for a long, long time, and that her most likely association is War, since she was usually shown as fighting the (losing, but give her props for trying) war against the Romans when she first appeared and later represented British military and naval might and colonization. She's a good example of a goddess who came up sort of out of the blue and might have been a Scion herself, most likely of Athena, to whom she's markedly visually similar.
As for exclusively English gods... I'm afraid I have to disappoint you, because there aren't any, or at least not in the way we tend to think of England right now. The British Isles were populated by an ever-shifting murk of Celts and Norsemen, their influence waning or waxing in different areas depending on the current wars and rulers, and thus the evidence in England's ancient times all points to worship of the gods of those people. The Saxons brought the Norse gods with them, leaving traces of Odin, Thor and Volund before Christianity swallowed most of the island whole, and the Celts who predated and coexisted with them worshiped the Tuatha and the gods of Wales, leaving evidence of Lugh and Nuada and the Dagda and the rip-roaring tales of the Cath Maige Tuired and Mabinogion as well as infrequent shrines to other Celtic divinities such as Cernunnos. England wasn't considered its own cultural or ethnic group for a long, long time, and during that time it was pretty much a neverending party of northern European gods meeting at the crossroads between their territories.
And, of course, there were Romans in southern Britain, so the Dodekatheon had their say as well. If you're looking to play a historical game set in the wayback times, you could probably throw a rock in any direction and hit a religious observance dedicated to at least one of these three sets of gods. If you're wanting to play the most English Scion possible, my personal recommendation would be one of the Aesir, since the Anglo-Saxons became the basic stock of Englishmen until the Norman invasions, but the Celtic gods are equally reasonable choices.
Showing posts with label Britannia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Britannia. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Friday, December 23, 2011
Why do you hate America, JSR?
Question: Why do you guys keep the World at War pantheons non-playable? I thought you used to have a Scion of Britannia on the site somewhere, but I can't find him now.
The short answer: because most of them aren't gods.
There are a lot of things we love about the Scion: Companion book, but the World at War chapter is way not one of them. I actually think the idea of time period settings for Scion is very cool - after all, it's a game that could literally take place at any time and in any place, and any major world uprising probably has divine interference on some level - but the Yankee, Allied and dregs of Soviet pantheons are just not exciting to either of us.
The first reason is that these are figures who, for the most part, just aren't gods. It's a noble effort to explore different avenues in Scion, but there's no way to compare members of the Yankee "pantheon" to those of other world religions. There are a number of key differences; the most major is that the figures in the World at War pantheons are not and never were worshiped as gods, which is sort of counter to the entire idea of Scion. The other major issue is that there's no way these dudes are Legend 12 gods with mad powers. It's just not happening.
Look at John Henry. John Henry is a guy whose sole claim to fame is outworking a machine at his chosen profession, only to die of exhaustion as soon as he did. Is that awesome? Yes! Is it heroic? Yes! Is it exactly the thing we want Scions to be doing? Double yes! But what it isn't is godly. I think John Henry would make a great example of a lesser immortal, low-level Titanspawn or (most appropriately) a Hero-level Scion in previous times, but I don't think he ever made it past Legend 3 or so. He just doesn't have, well, legends. He doesn't have any power or oomph. He's a cool symbol and a cool story, but he's not even close to comparable to figures like Vishnu or Thor or Horus.
It's the same story for almost all the World at War "gods" introduced in Companion. John Bull? A satirical cartoon representation of a country, never taken seriously even by the people who invented him. The Citizen? An abstract concept that was never considered an entity on its own, and that's furthermore more built on other societies' perceptions of Russia than on Russia's own. Betsy Ross? Dude, her claim to fame is that she was good at sewing.
There's nothing wrong with these guys as Scions. In fact, they make great Scions; they're people doing cool, heroic things, just beginning to build legends that could one day grow up and become gods. But as they are, there's no contest. They're beings of folklore (that is, traditions or folk beliefs of a culture), not mythology (that is, religions that were once worshiped by a culture). They certainly can have a place in Scion, but that place is not among the ranks of such figures as Amaterasu and Zeus.
There are actually a few exceptions to our uniform disapproval of the World at War pantheons. Britannia is a legitimate goddess; she might have originally been a mere personification of a territory the Romans were busy conquering, but she became a minor deity in her own right during their occupation of Britain (they're Romans, after all. If it sits still long enough for them to notice it, it's probably going to get deified). Art exists of her peering regally over the British Isles or (less regally) being crushed beneath the conquering heel of Mars. Baba Yaga is another possible exception; she may be a folkloric figure now, but many scholars believe that she was originally a goddess of magic and women and was only demoted to the status of witch by the relentless campaign of the Christian Church to replace indigenous Slavic beliefs with their own. Finally, Rodina Mat is an unlikely contender for legit goddesshood: her roots lie in the dearly-beloved Moist Mother Earth, a Slavic goddess worshiped under many names in many areas for her fertile bounty.
But even if you keep these three as deities, they probably aren't Legend 12. Britannia's legend is what - that she got her ass kicked by Mars? Join a vast and mostly not Legend 12 club. Baba Yaga may have once been important, but obviously not important enough to stand the test of time, and most people will just stare at you in confusion if you try to draw a connection between Rodina Mat/Mother Russia/Moist Mother Earth/any of the Slavic gods at the end of that road.
And that's okay. Not everybody has to be Legend 12. But there you have it: we don't use the World at War gods because, well, they aren't gods, and the few that are aren't up to snuff as divine parent material. You could (and should, if you want to) absolutely use them as lesser immortals, low-Legend gods or Scions in your games, but as people on an equal footing with Ra and Huang Di? Nope. Just a big nope.
(By the way, we did in fact at one time have a Scion of Britannia, an unfortunate young man by the name of Kent of Kentington. He was an early experiment; as one of the first characters in our Hong Kong game, we allowed it because we thought it would be interesting, as a large part of the setting involved dealing with the divine repercussions of Hong Kong reverting from British rule back to the Chinese. In the end, however, Kent was not a successful experiment and he disappeared from the site to make room for the legions of PCs with more developed and interesting stories.)
The short answer: because most of them aren't gods.
There are a lot of things we love about the Scion: Companion book, but the World at War chapter is way not one of them. I actually think the idea of time period settings for Scion is very cool - after all, it's a game that could literally take place at any time and in any place, and any major world uprising probably has divine interference on some level - but the Yankee, Allied and dregs of Soviet pantheons are just not exciting to either of us.
The first reason is that these are figures who, for the most part, just aren't gods. It's a noble effort to explore different avenues in Scion, but there's no way to compare members of the Yankee "pantheon" to those of other world religions. There are a number of key differences; the most major is that the figures in the World at War pantheons are not and never were worshiped as gods, which is sort of counter to the entire idea of Scion. The other major issue is that there's no way these dudes are Legend 12 gods with mad powers. It's just not happening.
Look at John Henry. John Henry is a guy whose sole claim to fame is outworking a machine at his chosen profession, only to die of exhaustion as soon as he did. Is that awesome? Yes! Is it heroic? Yes! Is it exactly the thing we want Scions to be doing? Double yes! But what it isn't is godly. I think John Henry would make a great example of a lesser immortal, low-level Titanspawn or (most appropriately) a Hero-level Scion in previous times, but I don't think he ever made it past Legend 3 or so. He just doesn't have, well, legends. He doesn't have any power or oomph. He's a cool symbol and a cool story, but he's not even close to comparable to figures like Vishnu or Thor or Horus.
It's the same story for almost all the World at War "gods" introduced in Companion. John Bull? A satirical cartoon representation of a country, never taken seriously even by the people who invented him. The Citizen? An abstract concept that was never considered an entity on its own, and that's furthermore more built on other societies' perceptions of Russia than on Russia's own. Betsy Ross? Dude, her claim to fame is that she was good at sewing.
There's nothing wrong with these guys as Scions. In fact, they make great Scions; they're people doing cool, heroic things, just beginning to build legends that could one day grow up and become gods. But as they are, there's no contest. They're beings of folklore (that is, traditions or folk beliefs of a culture), not mythology (that is, religions that were once worshiped by a culture). They certainly can have a place in Scion, but that place is not among the ranks of such figures as Amaterasu and Zeus.
There are actually a few exceptions to our uniform disapproval of the World at War pantheons. Britannia is a legitimate goddess; she might have originally been a mere personification of a territory the Romans were busy conquering, but she became a minor deity in her own right during their occupation of Britain (they're Romans, after all. If it sits still long enough for them to notice it, it's probably going to get deified). Art exists of her peering regally over the British Isles or (less regally) being crushed beneath the conquering heel of Mars. Baba Yaga is another possible exception; she may be a folkloric figure now, but many scholars believe that she was originally a goddess of magic and women and was only demoted to the status of witch by the relentless campaign of the Christian Church to replace indigenous Slavic beliefs with their own. Finally, Rodina Mat is an unlikely contender for legit goddesshood: her roots lie in the dearly-beloved Moist Mother Earth, a Slavic goddess worshiped under many names in many areas for her fertile bounty.
But even if you keep these three as deities, they probably aren't Legend 12. Britannia's legend is what - that she got her ass kicked by Mars? Join a vast and mostly not Legend 12 club. Baba Yaga may have once been important, but obviously not important enough to stand the test of time, and most people will just stare at you in confusion if you try to draw a connection between Rodina Mat/Mother Russia/Moist Mother Earth/any of the Slavic gods at the end of that road.
And that's okay. Not everybody has to be Legend 12. But there you have it: we don't use the World at War gods because, well, they aren't gods, and the few that are aren't up to snuff as divine parent material. You could (and should, if you want to) absolutely use them as lesser immortals, low-Legend gods or Scions in your games, but as people on an equal footing with Ra and Huang Di? Nope. Just a big nope.
(By the way, we did in fact at one time have a Scion of Britannia, an unfortunate young man by the name of Kent of Kentington. He was an early experiment; as one of the first characters in our Hong Kong game, we allowed it because we thought it would be interesting, as a large part of the setting involved dealing with the divine repercussions of Hong Kong reverting from British rule back to the Chinese. In the end, however, Kent was not a successful experiment and he disappeared from the site to make room for the legions of PCs with more developed and interesting stories.)
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