He Who Roams Always

Question: I have been digging through Inuit stuff and stumbled upon Kiviuq. Apparently, he has an epic. Where would he fit in Scion?

Oh, man, Kiviuq is the coolest! (Ahaha, jokes about cold, because Canadian/Greenland/Alaskan myths.)

Kiviuq is, in my opinion, very obviously the star Scion of the Inuit pantheon (although of whom is up for debate!). He's a legendary hero who wanders all over Inuit territory performing various great deeds, meeting various gods and magical creatures, and generally being badass. He's characterized as an eternally wandering hero, which has the neat effect of causing him to have a wide range of different stories among different Inuit groups and areas, all of which can be organized together into a giant chain of events that characterize his life.

Kiviuq's doing a lot of cool stuff that really exemplifies a lot of recurring themes in Inuit myth. He participates in seal hunts and other adventures on the sea, and often encounters magical creatures therein or is afflicted (or sometimes helped) by supernatural storms and phenomena caused by various gods and magical beings he befriends. He loses his family, repeatedly in the cases of some groups, and therefore wanders in the wilderness as a representative of mankind versus nature. Sometimes he wins, sometimes nature wins, sometimes he works together with nature to make sure other people don't win.

Later, Kiviuq gains ongoing mythological functions that suggest he may even have reached apotheosis; for example, several different traditions hold that Kiviuq is akin to the soul of mankind or even the world itself, and that as long as he is alive, so too can humanity survive. If he were ever to die - a process that various areas suggest he might be doing very slowly even now - the world will end with him.

Basically, he is cool bananas and everyone should check him out if you have any interest in playing anything Inue-related. The Epic of Qayaq is a great source to read about some of the Greenland versions of his myths, and Henry Isluanik's Kiviuq's Journey is a good one for faithfully-preserved oral retellings from Canadian Inuit groups.

NPC Showcase!

Question: There was a character in the Scion books known as Thomas Blair/Blair Thomas. He/She is an Azlanti Scion who is a transsexual. How would he/she fit in your game?

Actually, Blair has appeared in our games!

Geoff's band encountered Blair several times when they were Demigods, first just when they had reached Legend 5, and again a few times at Legend 7. She was a member of another band of NPC Scions, along with a few other faces you might recognize from those character profiles in Demigod - Amelia Battelle, Niles Horne and Tyrone Norris. They were led by Bradley Dupree, a Scion of Poseidon who had a burning rivalry with Geoff, Goze and Marcus (which, by the way, was totally their fault - Goze punked the poor guy the first time they met and then he and Marcus made a point of demolishing whatever he was doing whenever they met him in the future, eventually culminating in Dupree calling down his father on them and all three of them ending up with a curse that required them to give all their wealth to Dupree and his marine biology foundation whenever they got near him), and although Geoff's band was never quite sure what they were up to, they turned up various times in the world, clearly running their own divine errands for their parents.

Tyrone didn't make it long; he was petrified by a basilisk the first time the band met them, and thereafter became a decorative piece for Dupree's research lab. Marcus was made somewhat disconcerted and uncomfortable to discover that he had a younger sister in Amelia; he had the feeling he should do something for her, but he wasn't sure what and had pretty poor interpersonal skills, and ended up vaguely alienating and then avoiding her (she didn't have much time for his shenanigans anyway; she had way more important things to do than try to make nice with her crazy estranged older brother). Poor Blair's experience with the band was something akin to being struck by a massive truck out of nowhere; the guys just drooled over her (for a while, she was their casual standard of hotness - "The water nymph is very lovely." "Yeah, but she's no Blair."), which she could have handled, but Sangria came down on her like a ton of massively Dutiful bricks. She saw in Blair another warrior for the Aztecs, who sorely needed help, and had zero tolerance for Blair's failure to help her struggling people in Mexico and tendency to be wallowing in semi-luxury at Dupree's house instead of out doing things. Eventually, Blair started pretending to go on missions just to get away from her fellow Teotl Scion, and was pretty relieved when Geoff finally moved his group on.

And Niles... well, he got around. Sora's Japanese Scion group also encountered him, when he was running with a different band of Scions (this set all original NPCs), and narrowly prevented him from stealing the relics they recovered for the Kami right before the Netjer, Aesir and Theoi staged their assault on Japan. Geoff's group didn't think much of him, since he didn't interact with them, and were totally unaware that he later became a pivotally important person in their story. You see, Niles is a Scion of Isis, and Geoff really, really upset Isis, and she decided she wanted an eye for an eye. So she sent Niles on an undercover mission, disguised, to take away what mattered most to Geoff: his family. That mysterious "Aztec" Scion who disappeared with Geoff's son?... that was totally him. Geoff and his group never even knew who it was, other than that it was an imposter.

Blair was never a major character, but she was - and is, as far as anyone knows - present in the world of our games, and one of the few Aztec Scions who managed to hang on and try to help their struggling people get back together. Her story was not followed closely; the PCs never knew if she encountered either of her siblings (Orlanda Elliott, who they also knew, or Carlos Jolie-Pitt, who died tragically young) or what she spent most of her time doing, although at one point they did know that Jay Ortiz was training her for some kind of mission.

Incidentally, while we absolutely love the books setting a transgender person as a Scion of Xipe Totec, allowing her to literally magically enact physical changes to herself to become comfortable in her own body, the writeup of her is pretty intensely problematic in a lot of its wording (like point-blank saying that she is "actually a man" and other similar grossness). But it's still a super neat character concept for the child of a god who changes his skin to renew both himself and the world around him, and we couldn't help but include her in our stories.

Quick Fix

It's time for another big-bang post full of quick answers! For those who want to keep track of the ever-expanding vortex of the Questionado, it's currently at 194. We're down 7! Success!

Question: Do Scions automatically know the language of their pantheon?

No, they do not. They know whatever language they actually know, and won't magically learn their pantheon's native tongue just from being activated as a Scion. If you're thinking of that weird thing that the Percy Jackson books do, we're sorry to disappoint you - nobody ever has a language "hard-coded into their DNA". (But you can get Language Mastery and that's basically about as good!)

Question: Just noticed that on the Annuna you have a profile up for Nanshe (with 6 associated) but she is not listed as a playable god. Is there any particular reason for this or are you just holding off for a major Annuna update?

Sometimes gods get kicked off our rosters for not being high enough Legend, but we keep their pages around in case other people still want to look at them. You'll also find "secret" god-pages for Sif, Geb, Kebauet, Dian Cecht, and a few others.

Question: What gods would you suggest for an expanded British pantheon? At the moment I’m thinking of adding Tommy Atkins, Merlin, Herne the Hunter and Tom Hickathrift (A.K.A. Jack the Giant-Killer) to Britannia, John Bull and Robin Hood. I don’t want it to resemble Arthurian legend too much, as that’s a little too Christianised for my tastes, but I want it to stand out from the Tuatha and the Welsh gods as well.

Sorry, we can't help you with this one. We are passionate haters of the World at War pantheons, including the Allied/British pantheon, and would never make them a "pantheon" of gods of an equal standing with people like Ra or Zeus. At best, we'd consider them former Scions, undercover personas of various established gods, or in a few cases Legendary Mortals. (But we do consider Herne the Hunter to be an alternate persona of Cernunnos, if that helps you with anything.)

Question: First off, I definitely love what you did with the Inue. In terms of Native American pantheons, most of the fan stuff has been to take some of the gods from each pantheon and bring them together as one like the Manitou. What is your opinion on something such as that and do you feel each of the individual pantheons can stand on their own like the Inue?

We're not fans. We think the pantheons of all different areas of the world should have an equal shot at being Scion parents, and that there's no reason to assume that the tons of Native American pantheons wouldn't be just as distinct from one another as all the pantheons of the other continents.

Question: If a paleontologist Scion wanted to, could they make their personal Santum a chain of islands modeled after Las Cinco Muertes from the Jurassic Park franchise?

You can put whatever you want to in your Sanctum - it's your house and you can decorate it as you please! (But that only goes for in your house, so you won't be able to use it to create a free dinosaur army that can leave to lay waste to New York with you.)

Question: Do you think Gods' Honest is broken knack?

No - if we thought that, we wouldn't be letting our Scions use it all the time. I'm not sure why you think it's broken, since you didn't say, but feel free to tell us why in the comments.

Question: What do you do when a PSP boon requires a roll of a Virtue (like how Familial Sacrifice's pool is Conviction) and the Scion doesn't have that virtue? Do you just have them botch the roll, or do you have them use the next most appropriate virtue?

They can't make that roll; they have zero dice. They probably shouldn't have swapped it out, or should try to get it back if it was taken from them. However, they could still use a Virtue Channel or Legendary Deed to get some dice/autos if they still want to use the boon anyway.

Question: When purchasing dots of Epic Stamina, you get health levels. Are these -0, -1, -2 or -4?

Always -0. Dots of Epic Stamina also remove the wound penalty negatives from the health boxes you already have as you get more of them.

Question: When a Scion spends Legend, are Fatebonds only formed with those physically present? EX: if someone catches a film of them and uploads it onto YouTube.

Yes, you will only gain Fatebonds to people who are actually nearby when you spend the Legend. If someone recorded your deed and uploaded it to YouTube, no one who watched it would get Fatebound because you would not be spending any Legend when they saw it.

Question: I was looking through the graveyard, and Jesus Christ, what happened in Langley?

Vote for Strawberry Fields fiction, and find out. ;)

Question: So, weirdest question ever about Michael Chambers. How would any man or woman he sleeps with want to deal with a cold piece of metal on his penis? I can't imagine any woman wanting that inside them.

We... are not sure whether or not you're serious. But in case you are, you may want to do a careful and discreet Google of the term "Prince Albert piercing", and god go with you.

And we'll stick with those ten for today!

The Blood is the Life

Question: I have a slight problem with the Aztecs. A little thing called "playing alongside a blood-crazed mass murderer". It's hard to play the goody two-shoes hero when my bandmate thrives upon the blood of virgins and the tears of children. I know that you can make an Aztec that's a pretty good guy, I just haven't seen it been proven. Aztecs are all crazy.

Hummm. Well, there's a lot going on here.

First of all, back your train up: Aztecs are not all crazy. You just got through saying you know that there can be Aztecs who are good people, so you clearly know this. Like everyone else on the planet, the Aztecs are a race of human beings, and they have all the good, bad and ugly in them that every other race has. It's no more fair to call them all crazy than to call all Chinese people crazy, or all French people, or all of any other race or nationality or ethnic group. Chill out with the name-calling of an entire civilization.

I know we've talked about the Aztec religion and the importance of blood sacrifice in it before, but our blog is a deep quagmire of many things, so we don't blame you for not digging through it all. We could write an entire book on what blood sacrifice is about and why it's centrally important to Aztec religion (in fact, other people have - if you have a chance, check out David Carrasco's City of Sacrifice for a very thorough look at the subject), and furthermore why this is not a moral question as much as a religious one, but the basics are these: the Aztecs believed, as the central conviction of their religion, that the gods lent all their power to making sure the world was maintained and supported so that it did not collapse. They believed that it had collapsed before, and would again if the gods didn't keep it running the way they were supposed to. And they believed that the power that the gods used - indeed, the most potent power in the universe - was chalchihuatl, "sacred water", which was contained only in the blood of living things. Blood was conceived of as literally being life and power, and therefore the sacrifice of blood to the gods was directly sending them the power needed to run the universe. Human sacrifice - which certainly could and did sometimes take the form of the murder of human beings, but was more often a semi-frequent ritual of letting a little of one's own blood, a practice called autosacrifice - was intended to lend the power of the blood spilled to the gods, who would then use it to keep the universe running. In effect, the religion was designed as a massive community works project, in which everyone did their part and shed their blood to ensure that the entire world continued on.

Of course, that doesn't mean people didn't abuse the system. There are sadists, opportunists and heartless bastards in every culture, and there were definitely priests who took advantage of the sacrifice system to extort goods and services from people, nobles who abused it to get rid of people they didn't like and people from every walk of life who tried to weasel out of it by getting someone else to go under the knife instead of themselves. But this isn't specific to the Aztecs; every other pantheon's religion has examples of behavior just as bad. And considering that the vast majority of them also practiced human sacrifice at some point in their history, they don't all have a lot of moral high ground to stand on for this one.

But, at any rate, the point here is that Aztec religion is not about murdering people for fun, or drinking the tears of babies, or bathing in blood just because they like blood. It is about doing what needs to be done, even when it's painful, for the good of the entire community and the entire world. The Teotl don't kill people because they're sociopaths; they kill people because they know if they don't, everyone's going to die anyway. In fact, murder for murder's sake is just plain wasteful, as far as they're concerned, and was illegal among the Aztecs.

It sounds to me like you're having a problem with a specific Aztec - your bandmate the blood-crazed mass-murderer. We don't know anything about him or her, but let's assume that they really are a crazed murderer who skins children for giggles. You know what? It is totally 100% okay for your character to hate, fear or despise them. That shit isn't okay. Your character doesn't necessarily know why they're doing those things, nor do they know if they have any reason beyond "I haven't seen blood in the last ten minutes". Your character is presumably a fairly normal person with a fairly normal moral compass (or so I assume from you saying you're playing "a pretty good guy"), so murder should bother him, and ritualized or fetishized murder probably even more so.

It is totally possible that your bandmate is a crazy person who should be put down for the good of everyone who encounters them. Like we said, we don't know who they are or what their motivations are, or even what exactly they do, so it could be anywhere along the spectrum from "I have to perform sacrifices or my parents are going to die and lose the Titan war" to "I just like torturing people with needles", or anywhere in between. It is totally possible to create and play characters who are evil serial killers - we've certainly had one or two - so that may be what you're dealing with here. If so, you're responding pretty much the way anyone could be expected to. I don't know what reasons you have for putting up with this person in character, but even if you have to be around them, nobody can make you approve of what they do or stop trying to prevent them from hurting the innocent.

However, it's also possible that you're approaching this from a position of ignorance when it comes to what Aztec sacrifice is about, and that you might want to take a closer look at this character and their behavior. Has your character ever asked them about what they do, what it means to them, or why they do it? Do you have enough Occult or Academics for your character to know what Aztec sacrifice is about and to be able to tell if that's what's going on here? Has your character ever encountered any other Aztecs, possibly NPCs, and did they seem to behave the same way? Have you spoken to your divine parent or other people in your pantheon and asked them why they would put you with this crazy-ass murderer, to see if they know something you don't? If you feel like you're stuck with this person, have you taken any steps to try to learn more about their motivations, and to see if there's any way you can try to lessen their violent tendencies or convince them to try something different?

And hey, maybe you have and it came up fruitless, and that's cool. Maybe you're just running in a band with someone who really does keep peoples' faces in a box under their bed, and there's just nothing you can do about it. But your question sounds a lot like you're blaming Aztec society and religion in general for the behavior of one individual, so it might be worth your time to investigate whether or not they're actually acting on behalf of their pantheon or just happen to be a crazy person. No society can be made up entirely of serial killers; it couldn't function. You may just be with a person who happens to be a psychopath, rather than a typical Aztec Scion.

As for our games, we have a wide variety of Aztec Scions, each with their own way of handling (and often struggling with) the problems and morality of their religion's need for human sacrifice. Sangria, the oldest of them, is in fact a psychopathic murderer who has no compassion or concern for the lives she takes whatsoever, but she's also only interested in killing people for sacrificial purposes, never for fun or because she doesn't like them; and the others run as much of a moral and emotional range as any other pantheon's Scions might, including Kettila, who kills only children because she was an abused child herself and wants to save them from anyone being able to hurt them anymore, Carlos, who kills only animals because he isn't willing to hurt other human beings, or Jay, who performs only autosacrifice and actively crusades to save people from harm and try to convince his pantheon to change their views on human sacrifice and outlaw the practice.

The bottom line is that Aztec Scions are no more automatically crazy or evil than any other pantheon's children. Their parents simply come from a different culture and religion, one that can seem very alien to European-oriented minds, and it is often difficult for Scions of other pantheons (and even the Aztec Scions themselves, who are often perfectly normal modern people) to understand and reconcile their radically different views on how the universe works and what their place in its support system needs to be.

Players Tell All

Guest vlogging continues! There's no intro this time because it's really just the second half of last week's epic one-hour marathon, but the players are back to tell you more of their opinions. And they're just enjoyable.

Question: A lot of Scions are going to be illegitimate children of their divine parents. Could you mention the social ramification for bastard children in the different cultures we have Pantheons for?

Question: In any of your games, have Scions ever been revealed to the public? If so, how did the public react - to both their existence, and their parents existence?

Question: My group constantly fights. Nothing much gets done. We're all good friends in real life, but when we sit down for a game everything goes to hell. Mostly it is the fault of Virtues, but not always. Any advice?

Question: It seems like Scion is full of great victories and horrible failures. What would you say are your best MVP Scions and worst screw-up Scions in your games?

Question: Is Vidar proud of Folkwardr? I'm curious as to Vidar's fatherly feelings towards his new son.

Question: Bring in the players for this one! If YOU were a Scion, which pantheon would you like to be a Scion of? Which pantheon (speaking strictly from their Virtues) do you think you'd be a part of by that metric? For bonus points, what purviews and Epics would you give yourself or see yourself getting? I've seen too many arguments from recent questions, hopefully this one is just pure fun. Right? Please?

Our players are some pretty great folks. A round of applause to them for doing this and being such sports about it!

Brothers in Battle

Question: You've discussed before that, in general, having disparate pantheons together in a campaign can be problematic. What generally are the guidelines you use for determining if pantheons play nice with each other, if only in terms of their Scions fitting well? If you could give specific examples (say, with the Teotl, not that I plan on running a game where they're prevalent wink wink) of what pantheons work with another one and why, that would also be awesome. Thanks!

There are two important guidelines that can help you plan for future band harmoniousness, and those are the Virtues of the Scions in question and the historical interaction between their pantheons/cultures.

Virtues are the easiest go-to place to compare; as a general rule, the more Virtues a pantheon has in common with another, the less likely their Scions (and gods) are to get upset with one another. Virtues in alignment means that those Scions will agree with one another a lot more about what needs to be done, understand where their bandmates are coming from a lot more of the time, and spend much less time and effort grappling with intra-band conflicts of morality and theology. For example, the Teotl and K'uh are likely to get along very well, since they have the shared morals of Conviction, Courage and Loyalty in common; they'll respect one anothers' bravery, be able to count on one anothers' loyalty, and even when they disagree they'll at least respect the integrity of the other person's refusal to compromise. Another good example would be the Bogovi and Netjer, who despite not having much in common in terms of culture or history can still be down with each others' religious dedication, determination to preserve the World's balance and adherence to the rule of law.

That doesn't mean that bands with different Virtues can't get along, but it does mean that it's much more difficult and will require a lot more compromise, conflict and personal growth on the parts of the characters, something that not every player wants, needs or enjoys doing in their games. We love our god-level PCs, but when their group started and it included one Scion (Sangria) with Conviction, Courage, Duty and Loyalty and two others (Goze and Sophia) with Expression, Intellect, Valor and Vengeance, can you guess how well they got along? The answer was not at all. They hated each other. Sangria didn't understand (or care about trying to understand) the Greeks' abstract ideas about the importance of art and culture, and they went stark bananas from not being able to handle her murdering innocent people for power and doing what she thought was her job no matter how evil or destructive they perceived it to be. Their Virtues were opposed about 75% of the time, with the result being that they had to learn to adapt or die (luckily, the former). They survived it and it added a lot to their characters and development arcs, but it also generated a lot of conflict and heartbreak along the way, probably more than the game strictly needed.

Opposed Virtues don't just not get each other - in many cases, they actively hate each other. If one Scion has Expression and a mighty need to create magical artwork all over the world and the other has Harmony and a stringent code that prohibits putting magical shit anywhere in human territory, those two Scions are going to end up throwing down (or worse, trying not to and then going into Virtue Extremity). If one Scion has Courage and leaps into action to destroy every enemy in his path no matter whether they're already injured and the other has Valor and can't stand to see the helpless be harmed, those two Scions are going to end up punching each other in the face on the battlefield instead of their enemies. The Scion with Vengeance fucking hates the Scion with Order, who refuses to let her visit sweet revenge on those who have wronged her, and the Scion with Order is just as upset in return with his bandmate who sees nothing wrong with committing every felony on the books as long as she gets to destroy someone she hates.

Now, there will always be opposed Virtues in your Scion band - always, always, always. You can't avoid them. Scions' own Virtues sometimes oppose one another (I hate this guy with a Vengeance, but he's a wuss and my Valor says I can't hit him! Argh!), and even if you get Scions of the closest possible Virtue sets together, they'll always have one or two Virtues that don't match and that get in the way once in a while (I'm a Netjer Scion and my Conviction makes me accept that sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do, but my Bogovi buddy I normally agree with keeps saying he can't shirk his Duty even if it's clearly the best course of action! Argh!). And some Scions will come in as a normally closely-aligned pantheon but take a different Virtue at character creation, which you may not know ahead of time as the Storyteller (unless you ban them from doing that, I guess). This is normal and will make for good play; if nobody's Virtues ever clashed, they wouldn't be able to develop as characters nearly as much, so don't panic or give up if your carefully-crafted group of all normally-compatible Anunna and Elohim suddenly explodes into a screaming match of Conviction vs. Vengeance. Characters will disagree, sometimes heatedly and with gusto, from time to time over the course of the game. As long as it's not so much that the group can't function (which is what this question is trying to help you set up to avoid from the get-go!), that's perfectly all right.

Virtues are only half the equation, however. They're great measures of how much ideological common ground a pantheon might have with another, but they don't necessarily have a strong bearing on how those ideas are interpreted in the real world or what might have happened between them in the past. That's where historical interaction between the pantheons comes into play.

The Kami and the Shen have very similar Virtues - with Duty, Harmony and Valor in common, the only place they differ is that the Kami prefer Endurance and the Shen prefer Intellect. (Yes, I know we talk about changing these a lot, just follow me for the explanation for now.) Does that make them automatically prone to being best friends? Not necessarily, because the history of interaction between Japan and China, both mythologically and in the World, has not always been a very cordial one. The Kami, as the deities of Shinto, might be nursing a grudge thanks to the invasion of the foreign gods of Chinese Buddhism onto their turf centuries ago, leading the fall of Shinto as the only state-approved religion and the introduction of all kinds of new practices and deities that didn't follow the old ways. The Shen may not have forgiven the Kami for their continual wars on the mainland over the past few centuries, both in mythology and among mortals, especially the very fresh tragedy of the massacres committed by Japanese attackers during the Sino-Japanese wars of the last two hundred years, which might or might not have involved divine interference. Scions, as modern people from either of those cultures, may bring their own baggage along with their parents' - a Scion of the Shen whose grandparents died during the Japanese war crimes of the 1930s might have no tolerance whatsoever for agents of the Japanese gods, regardless of how much they have in common philosophically, and a Scion of the Kami who sees herself as the representative of a religion dying out because of Chinese influence might hate her opposite number on principle thanks to his pantheon's campaign against hers. Gods on either side can also easily influence their childrens' perceptions; even if the Kami weren't necessarily involved in the Sino-Japanese wars, for example, it really only takes a single comment from one of the Shen that they were behind it/didn't bother to stop it/benefited from it, and their children will act accordingly.

This works in reverse as well. You might think that the Theoi and Netjer would absolutely hate one another, since they don't have even one measly Virtue in common between them, but while there have definitely been vicious conflicts between them in the past, there have also been long periods of historical cooperation and cultural trade. They're not in love or anything, but they often can and do get along much better than their Virtues would suggest, especially when they have a common goal. The Yazata and Bogovi only share Order and are otherwise wildly different in Virtue setup, which might suggest that they would have nowhere to begin getting along with one another, but their history suggests otherwise, with the two religions often influencing and borrowing from one another, to such an extent that there are even a few crossover deities between them.

It looks kind of like we're saying, "Who knows, apparently Virtues don't mean anything," but that's not what we're trying to do. Rather, we're saying that Virtues are almost always a great starting yardstick for whether or not Scions will get along within a band; but, other factors, such as history, religious affiliation and previous experience may affect that, so make sure you know the interactions of the pantheons you're thinking of combining instead of just their four Virtues and how those stack up to everyone else's. And - and this is probably the most important thing you can do as a Storyteller to make people suck it up and get along in a band even when they don't want to - make sure you always give the Scions who work together some common goals. Even if they're not getting along right now, even if they really think things the other people do are fundamentally wrong, even if they despise one anothers' guts, they'll still usually pull it together when they know they have to all work together to achieve something that's important to each of them. It might be because their parents told them to, it might be because the specific situation requires other people with skills they just don't have, or anything else, but common goals will always go a long way toward making sure people put in the effort to deal with one another instead of just stomping off home or taking a pike to their bandmates' faces.

Oh, by the way: Teotl Scions will probably get along best with Scions of the K'uh, with whom they share most of their Virtues and with whom they have a history of cultural interaction and exchange, several crossover deities, and an understanding of some religious concepts that other pantheons don't always get (blood sacrifice being the main one). There may be some bad blood between them from the K'uh side thanks to later Maya communities being conquered by the suddenly expansionist Aztecs near the end of Mesoamerican civilization and the general Aztec attitude that they are the best and everyone else in Mesoamerica had better recognize it, but nothing that would cause too much of a conflict between them. Runners-up (each with two Virtues in common) would be the Aesir (probably respectable as fellow warriors but also deeply irresponsible by Aztec standards), the Apu (with no cultural context but similar ideals of courageous battle and duty to the community giving them some common ground) or the Orisha (equally badass and passionate and with a close connection to their people, but maybe a little too hung up on things like their personal problems to be as effective as deities as they should be).

In closing, we'd just like to point out that while these things all help intra-band harmony, they don't guarantee it; and further that we don't know if you need to try that hard to make sure everything is as close to the same for everyone as possible. Often, we set up possible pantheons for a new game based on them all having only a single Virtue in common, or being in a particular cultural group in spite of their Virtue spreads, and those approaches can and have worked, too.

Edit: In case it might be helpful for some, here's a quick chart of who's got Virtues in common.

Pantheon	Three Virtues in Common	Two Virtues in Common	One Virtue in Common	No Virtues in Common
Aesir	Nemetondevos	Alihah, K'uh, Orisha, Teotl, Tuatha	Anunna, Apu, Atua, Deva, Elohim, Kami, Theoi, Yazata	Bogovi, Netjer, Shen
Alihah	None	Aesir, Atua, Elohim, Orisha, Theoi, Tuatha	Anunna, Apu, Bogovi, Deva, Kami, Nemetondevos, Netjer, Yazata	K'uh, Shen, Teotl
Anunna	Elohim, Netjer	Apu, Bogovi, K'uh, Orisha, Teotl, Tuatha, Yazata	Aesir, Alihah, Apu, Nemetondevos	Deva, Kami, Shen, Theoi
Apu	None	Bogovi, Deva, Kami, K'uh, Netjer, Shen, Teotl	Aesir, Alihah, Anunna, Atua, Nemetondevos, Orisha, Yazata	Elohim, Theoi, Tuatha
Atua	Elohim	Anunna, Bogovi, Orisha, Teotl, Tuatha	Aesir, Alihah, Apu, Kami, K'uh, Nemetondevos, Shen, Theoi	Deva, Yazata
Bogovi	Netjer	Apu, Atua, Deva, Elohim	Alihah, Anunna, Kami, K'uh, Shen, Teotl, Tuatha, Yazata	Aesir, Nemetondevos, Orisha, Theoi
Deva	None	Bogovi, Kami, Netjer, Shen	Aesir, Alihah, Anunna, Apu, Elohim, K'uh, Theoi, Tuatha, Yazata	Atua, Nemetondevos, Orisha, Teotl
Elohim	Anunna, Atua	Alihah, Netjer, Orisha, Tuatha	Aesir, Bogovi, Deva, K'uh, Nemetondevos, Teotl, Theoi	Apu, Kami, Shen, Yazata
Kami	Shen	Apu, Deva, Nemetondevos, Theoi	Aesir, Alihah, Atua, Bogovi, Teotl, Tuatha, Yazata	Anunna, Elohim, K'uh, Netjer, Orisha
K'uh	Teotl	Aesir, Anunna, Apu, Bogovi, Nemetondevos, Netjer, Orisha	Atua, Deva, Elohim, Shen, Tuatha, Yazata	Alihah, Kami, Theoi
Nemetondevos	Aesir	Kami, K'uh, Teotl	Alihah, Anunna, Apu, Atua, Orisha, Shen, Theoi, Tuatha, Yazata	Bogovi, Deva, Netjer
Netjer	Anunna, Bogovi	Apu, Deva, Elohim, Yazata	Alihah, Atua, Kami, K'uh, Orisha, Shen, Teotl, Tuatha	Aesir, Nemetondevos, Theoi
Orisha	None	Aesir, Alihah, Anunna, Atua, Elohim, K'uh, Teotl, Theoi, Tuatha, Yazata	Apu, Nemetondevos, Netjer	Bogovi, Deva, Kami, Shen
Shen	Kami	Apu, Bogovi, Deva, Theoi	Atua, K'uh, Nemetondevos, Netjer, Teotl, Tuatha, Yazata	Aesir, Alihah, Anunna, Orisha
Teotl	K'uh	Aesir, Anunna, Apu, Atua, Nemetondevos, Orisha	Bogovi, Elohim, Kami, Netjer, Shen, Tuatha, Yazata	Alihah, Deva, Theoi
Theoi	None	Alihah, Kami, Orisha, Shen, Tuatha, Yazata	Aesir, Atua, Deva, Elohim, Nemetondevos	Anunna, Apu, Bogovi, K'uh, Netjer, Teotl
Tuatha	None	Aesir, Alihah, Anunna, Atua, Orisha, Theoi	Bogovi, Deva, Elohim, Kami, K'uh, Nemetondevos, Netjer, Shen, Teotl, Yazata	Apu
Yazata	None	Anunna, Netjer, Orisha, Theoi	Aesir, Alihah, Apu, Bogovi, Deva, Elohim, Kami, K'uh, Nemetondevos, Shen, Teotl, Tuatha	Atua

Constructing Antiquity

Question: As a Gaelic Polytheist(i.e., I worship the Tuatha), I am curious: how might Scions relate to religions that worship their parents? This can obviously go for all Scions of any pantheon.

We've got an old post on this very subject back here - go ye and read!

That post is mostly about how the pantheons and their gods might respond to reconstructionist or revivalist worship, but I think the question of how Scions might respond is also a neat side issue. Scions (in the default setting, at least) are modern people and are likely to have modern ideas, morals and interpretations, so how they might relate to reconstructed worship of their ancient parents could have as much variation as you can find in any pagan community.

Some of them might love it. People still want to worship my divine patron and her buddies? Awesome! They want to learn more about them and debate theology? Cool! They want to perform festivals, make sacrifices or find ways to bring the religion into the modern day so more and more people can get involved in it? Outstanding! Scions who were reconstructionists already before discovering their heritage are probably especially excited about this, since it was already something they strongly believed in that has now been given actual form and power by their own existence as a Scion. Others, who might not have had a strong religion but are excited by having suddenly gained one, may also be gung-ho about throwing themselves into this new way of venerating very old gods, and those who never had much religious leaning at all might now have a group they can feel good about supporting, especially since modern pagan religions tend to be marginalized in much of modern culture. People with Piety will probably be jumping for joy - wanting their pantheon to be worshiped is like mission one for them!

(We're only talking about the reconstructionist religions here, I should note - polytheistic Buddhism, Hinduism, Shinto and Shenism, among others, are still massively practiced in their home territories. They do count as having new and modern worship practices, especially those that have radically evolved over the course of their existence, but something that has been ongoing and unbroken like Hinduism isn't really in the same boat with something like Canaanite Reconstructionism that died a long time ago and is being put back together via research and guesswork by people with modern agendas and not always a lot of great source material.)

On the other hand, some Scions may not react well to reconstructionist religions. Some, especially those who are superhumanly smart and therefore know more about these ancient religions than mortals can, may be offended or irritated by how inaccurate they are, or worse, how much they're actually borrowing from totally different theologies or traditions and putting them under the same umbrella with their own gods. Some may appreciate the effort but be unable to handle what they think of as "incorrect" performance of rituals or address of ancient deities (and Piety's a double-edged sword here, because while it totally wants people to worship its pantheon, it also feels the need to correct them any time they're wrong about said pantheon). You want to substitute canola oil for olive oil in this ritual? No, you can't do that! You want to worship the Teotl but you refuse to open a vein once in a while? Blasphemy, man up and learn to bleed! You want to worship both gods of the Netjer and gods of the Tuatha at the same time because you feel that both religions speak to you? Get out forever, you are an abomination.

And some Scions may not give a damn, and that's probably the likeliest scenario. If they're not directly involved with any neopagan cults associated with their parents, and mortals (as usual) can't affect the gods with their worship anyway, who cares what they're doing? Scions who like to think of themselves as above humanity probably definitely don't care, and even those who see themselves more as divine Everymen might easily ignore reconstructed religions as unimportant in the grand scheme of things. They've got adventures to go on and things to do, so they're probably not bothering to look up the local Kemetic chapter everywhere they go, or spend much time trolling the neopagan discussion boards to have conversations about stuff that they can go out and live instead. Scions who have little religious bent, before or after being Visited, may just go on not caring about religions of any stripe.

They do have a little more importance for Scions, though, because whereas gods are for the most part staying in their Overworlds and not getting involved in their cults for the past several centuries, Scions are on earth in the here and now and therefore that big bad bogeyman, Fatebonds, may come after them with a vengeance. Fatebonds come from mortal belief when supplemented by a Scion spending Legend nearby, so a Scion who discovers that a cult has grown up around himself as part of a pantheon may be very invested indeed in what they think of him and what they do in his name. It's all fun and games until you visit your personal church one day and find that someone declared that you're the modern god of ultimate racism or something, and you just didn't notice. Very awkward. And also potentially dangerous, since that might affect your Fatebonds.

As usual, mortal cults are both massively important and totally irrelevant to Scions. They can't do anything themselves and are made up of mortals who are mostly negligible when it comes to doing anything to a Scion or god... but the power of their beliefs and Fatebonds make them incredibly influential and either beneficial or dangerous to a Scion's health. Oh, the power these mortals wield, eh?

Branching Out

Question: Hello, I was just curious, and the "Doing It Your Way" post had partially what I think is an answer. Based on what you said about Demigod and buying new boons, the Scion core rulebook states that Demigods can only use purviews associated with their divine parent without a relic. But in your rules, would you allow a demigod to purchase, let's say for instance, Sky 1 if he/she just wants to spend Legend to never take damage from a fall?

Yes. We kicked that rule out of play long, long ago. Demigods can use any purview without a relic, whether associated with their parent or not; they can only purchase up to a level lower than those who have a relic, and can only use their Epic Attributes up to a level lower than their maximum. That means that a demigod who wants to buy Sky boons at Legend 6 can only buy up to level four Sky, and can only use the successes of four dots of Epic Attributes in its activation rolls, but he can do it.

We don't think the original rule is necessarily the worst thing ever; it was obviously trying to illustrate that children of the gods more easily wield purviews their parents are associated with, the same way that the XP discount does, but in practice we found it a little too restricting. It's fine for Heroes to start with limited purview options, when they're barely more than humans and just feeling out their beginning set of powers, but at the Demigod level we want them to be able to branch out and make new divine identities for themselves apart from their parents. Restricting them to relics only for non-associated purviews all the way through Demigodhood is a little too much of a stricture, in our opinion, so we leave the unassociated penalties in place but allow access to any purview the Scion might want to invest in.

Supermassive

Question: If I wanted to have a Scion to become a god of black holes, how would I go about doing that?

Geez, you shoot big!

Well, to start with, here's an important question: what does your god of black holes do? Does he just create black holes, and if so, why does humanity care, since those are far away from them and don't really affect their lives much? Is there some representative concept attached to the black holes that does affect people, and if so, what is it and how does it relate to the pantheon your Scion's part of? Why do people worship this god, how do they worship him, and what role does he fill in the grand scheme of the divine world?

You don't have to know all of this the second you think about becoming a god, of course, because you'll grow and change over time, but the more of it you know, the more you'll be able to figure out what kind of powers and actions you might want to attach to her. Gods don't exist in a vacuum, and your Scion will need to do something with her divinity other than just sitting out in space not being interesting to anyone.

I would suggest maybe starting with the Darkness purview; since not even light can escape a black hole, using Darkness to blot out everything would fit your theme nicely, not to mention going along well with the name of the phenomenon. You could also possibly invest in Stars; true, mythology has no idea that black holes are the remnants of collapsed stars, or even that black holes exist at all, but as a modern Scion you do know that and can blaze new trails. Past that point, it'll depend on your take on black holes. If you think of them as entropic universe-breakdown causers, Chaos might fit your bill, or if you believe that matter sucked into a black hole is transported to some mysterious location, maybe Psychopomp would be a better choice. On more metaphorical levels, you might want to consider Epic Strength to represent the awesome crushing force of a black hole, or Epic Charisma to represent its ability to relentlessly draw everything around it in.

Stats aren't the only important thing here, however: you have to fit your Scion into a pantheon, which means she needs to have a place and purpose among them. Has mankind begun to foray into space in your games, making gods of astral phenomena more necessary, and if not, what does your pantheon need a god of black holes for? Do you work with any other gods or beings, and how do you do that? Why do people pray to you? What do they want from you? What do you do with your free time in the Overworld when you're not fighting Titans? Do the other gods think you're necessary or respect what you do?

You can generally make any cool concept work for a new young god, even heavy science ones - after all, you're playing a Scion in the modern day and you have tons of science at your myth-making disposal that our ancient ancestors didn't. But you'll still need to figure out what that concept does aside from being neat.

So go for it!

And They Will Call Me...

Question: The players in my group are approaching Legend 9, and we were wondering, how did your Legend 9+ players decide on what their 'god names' would be (ex: Sowiljr, Eztli, etc.)?

Question: Hey guys. I had a question. How do you find or create names for your characters who reach godhood? I see these evocative names and would like to know so when my characters reach God one day, they too can have culturally relevant new names. :)

Hey, there! I'm not sure if this is the same person twice, but if it is, please accept our apologies for only now slogging through the question backlog to get to you.

We've actually talked about this one before, so check out ye olde post about our god-level characters and how they came by their names. The short answer is that there's no official process, but hopefully there will be some helpful pointers in there that you might be able to use.

Scion Symphony

Question: In a previous vlog you had mentioned that many of the characters have a "theme song" without the knack itself. Could you share some tunes for your characters who are not rocking Theme Music?

I hope you guys are ready for this! We got all the players involved, went to our own giant playlists of character theme songs, and even after slimming it down (WAY down) we still have an awesome musical journey going on here. I'm not kidding when I say that John and I have songlists that are literally five or more hours long for each of our games, including songs for each character, for their relationships and for their great deeds. We love epic musical soundtracks!

Don't mind the videos for these. We're talking about the music, not the silly band dances.

Better Next Time:

There's a pretty neverending stream of music for these guys; you can sit through our iTunes list for them for about six hours without even being able to see the end of the tunnel. In addition to Geoff's official theme music - "How You Like Me Now" by The Heavy and "Lover of the Light" by Mumford & Sons, depending on his moon - we also like Natasha Marsh's "He Moves, Eyes Follow" and Rise Against's "Savior". The last one in particular is a great song for describing his relationships with his family members (mostly women) over the course of his life.

Sangria has a cocktail of songs about physical badassery and determination, but our top favorites would be "No Gringo" by Vienna Teng, "Indestructible" by Disturbed and "Titanium" by Sia/David Guetta.

Sophia's image song has always been Daft Punk's "Harder Better Faster Stronger", which really captures her attitude (and lack of normal human-like function). At the point where she became (according to John) infatuated with a particular Scion who shall remain nameless, we also started playing Adele's "Set Fire to the Rain" a lot.

Goze's playlist is as multiple-personality as he is, but Jim's Big Ego does both of his major songs, the frenetic "Stress" and the introspective "The Ballad of Barry Allen". When he impersonated Geoff, we also used to always play Maroon 5's "Moves Like Jagger" to illustrate his hilarious impersonation of his more charismatic friend.

Marcus James' unofficial theme song was always "I'm On a Boat" by The Lonely Island, which covered his bombastic crazy-ass personality traits, but in his sadder moments we also associate him with "I Need a Dollar" by Aloe Blacc. His player has also been known to remark that any song by Jay-Z is relevant to Marcus' life.

Eastern Promises:

There are a ton of characters in this game, so we'll try to be brief and split them up by group.

Mohini is all about some high-energy dance music (if techno dance beats had existed in her time period, she'd have been all over them); she has a lot of similar songs on her list, but some of the most often-played are "Come and Get It" by Selena Gomez and "Turn Me On" by Nicki Minaj/David Guetta. Shadan, the ever-irrepressible, rocks out to "Crown on the Ground" by Sleigh Bells, while Kebo's easy-going nature lends itself to "Movin' Right Along" by The Muppets and Cassara of course has to be "Food Glorious Food" from the musical Oliver! Padma's player wasn't sure what song to use for her, but said that she and Shadan should totally be the subjects of "Something There" from Beauty and the Beast. Akhi's song is Peter Gabriel's "Here Comes the Flood", which handily contrasts with Faruza, who obviously has to go with Alicia Keys' "Girl on Fire". Samuel, scourge of the skies on his ornithopter, is heralded by Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries", while Darrius' secretive nature lends itself to the moody "Hideaway" by Passion Pit. Mshai's player suggests "Your Hand in Mine" by Explosions in the Sky for his brief run, and Alvin, the suave son of a bitch, gets "In the Air Tonight" covered by Nonpoint. Adorable Yadi is Natasha Bedingfield's "Pocketful of Sunshine", and old, crochety, adventurous Paniwi rolls along to "Muddy Water" from the musical Big River. Lionel's grossness is aptly represented by Radiohead's "Creep" and "Brand New Day" from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and Mrs. Young's creepy personality makes everyone uncomfortable with "Danse Macabre" by Saint-Saens, rounding out our unpleasant team members. James' player suggests several upper-crust classical pieces for him, including "Dawn" by Dario Marianelli, and "Rule Britannia" by Thomas Arne; Leona of course gets Katy Perry's "Roar".

Terry's player totally did not okay it, but we play "Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)" by Big & Rich for him anyway.

Gangs of New York:

The first Gangs group, full of socialites with poor decision-making skills, was of course headlined by Michael, whose official theme song is Queen's "Don't Stop Me Now" and whose unofficial followup is Franz Ferdinand's "Michael". Sexy mysterious Valentina gets "Die Another Day" by Madonna, poor displaced party boy Nic gets "All I Ever Wanted" by Airborne Toxic Event, and psychotically vengeful James gets "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley.

The second group, which was more of a moving demolition derby than a set of semi-human beings, has an accordingly sadder and more dystopian list of music. Poor Winona's song is "Grey Street" by Dave Matthews Band, with "Down" by Jason Walker/Molly Reed as a secondary choice. Alan's song is Great Big Sea's "Wave Over Wave" or "Nautical Disaster" by Tragically Hip, while Jake (and everyone else in the group, eventually) gets Radioactive by Imagine Dragons and Simon's player informs us that, now bereft of his only true love in death, his character will be represented by Puff Daddy's "I'll Be Missing You".

Our current group (the... good group?) in that game is slightly less depressed about their lives. Anton's song is "Stickshifts and Safety Belts" by Cake, Isaac's is "The Future Soon" by Jonathon Coulton, Skylar's is "Hannah's Theme" by The Chemical Brothers, and Zoe's is "By the Sword" by Emilie Autumn.

Land of the Red Sun:

Alison and Colin have an entire album dedicated to them, but a few highlights for the fractious son of Dionysus include "Frontier Psychiatrist" by The Avalanches, "Magic" by B.o.B. and "Unwell" by Matchbox 20. Alison's official theme music is "Pumped Up Kicks" by Foster the People, but she's also partial to "I Am a Scientist" by The Dandy Warhols, "Control" by Poe and "Sunny Came Home" by Shawn Colvin.

Of the Japanese crew, only Saki ("Bumblebee" from DDR) and Hachiro ("This Is Halloween" covered by Marilyn Manson) have the Theme Music knack. The rest of the group wasn't played for long and didn't have a strong musical set yet, but the Japanese group was so consistently ice-cool that we enjoy playing Far East Movement's "Like a G6" for them as a unit.

Skeins of Fate:

Aurora has hours of music all by herself, but in addition to her official theme music (Kelly Sweet's cover of "Dream On"), I'm also fond of Sara Lov's cover of "My Body is a Cage" for her, while John loves Michael Card's "The Prophet". We actually made the saddest double CD of music about her and Wolf several months ago, but listening to it made us turn to drink.

Woody, the old soldier that he is, has always had "Carry On Wayward Son" by Kansas as his main song, but songs about war almost always suit him; some of our other favorites are Billy Joel's "Goodnight Saigon" and Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Fortunate Son".

Vivian's official theme song is the 30 Rock Theme, which suits her awesomely, but she is a lady of many and mercurial moods. We also love Nightwish's "Slow Love Slow" for her, and of course "Lady Marmalade" from Moulin Rouge.

People often forget that Will actually has Theme Music - Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water" - because he doesn't use it very often. Bonus: John Doe's unofficial theme song was "Going Down" by Sick Puppies... and he did.

Kettila's adorable theme song is "I Won't Grow Up" from Peter Pan, and her creepy childhood schtick dominates her playlist. We also recommend "In My Arms" by Plumb, "Fields of Innocence" by Evanescence and "I Want My Innocence Back" by Emilie Autumn.

Strawberry Fields:

Cheerful Dierdre is the frontrunner here, with either "The Elfin Knight" by Kate Rusby or "Turn Loose the Mermaids" by Nightwish. Seamus is gloomier with "Save Yourself" by Stabbing Westward or "Disarm" by Smashing Pumpkins. The other Irish kids were sort of cannon fodder in Seamus' ruthless quest, so they didn't end up with many songs of their own.

I'm serious, this could go on for a very long time, but that's not very surprising. Lots of players and games have theme songs for their characters, so our list is only impressive because of the sheer number of characters making it massive.

What Runs in Your Blood

Question: Okay, so is it possible to have true Titanic Scions? I remember reading in the Grecian deluge myth that Prometheus had a demigod son.

No, it is not. Scions are specifically the children of gods; they are free of the taint of the Titans and made of equal parts divinity and humanity. Titans can corrupt humans to be their servants or have sex with humans to create Titanspawn offspring, but they can't make Scions. That ability lies with gods alone.

The person you are thinking of is Deucalion, so let's talk about him a little bit! There are actually a couple of Greek deluge myths, but Deucalion and his wife Pyrhha are the stars of the most famous one, in which Zeus floods the earth to destroy the people of the Bronze Age and only Prometheus' timely warning to his son allows the two of them to create an appropriate vessel and escape death. Deucalion and Pyrhha then repopulate the earth and foud a line of Grecian kings.

Greek heroes aren't always clearly labeled, and Deucalion is no exception. Apollodorus refers to him as "god-like", while Hyginus implies him to be part of the "human race"; Nonnus muddies the water by saying that "all mortal men perished" but Deucalion remained to repopulate with his wife. All different writers agree that Prometheus was Deucalion's father, while his mother is sometimes given as Pronoia (an Oceanid daughter of Oceanus and Tethys) but often goes mentioned. Deucalion does a lot of things that are Scion-esque, including receiving aid and favor from the gods to try to save himself from the flood, and he's considered to be dead but the manner of that death is never discussed, implying that he might have died of old age, a distinctly mortal condition. Pyrhha is clearly half-human, half-Titan, as a daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora, although depending on your take on the myth of Pandora's creation you might or might not consider her human.

All this certainly sounds like a Scion, but while we're totally down with running Deucalion as a Scion if you want to, we're not down with running him as the Scion of a Titan. That simply doesn't exist in Scion's framework - and shouldn't, in our opinion, because the creation of Scions is an important and unique feature of humanity that doesn't make sense for Titans, who are by definition no longer capable of interacting with humanity in that kind of close and positive way. This is a lot like that time we talked about Demeter trying to burn the mortality out of a kid with fire; Greek mythology (and every other mythology) occasionally does things that just don't fit into the game's world anywhere easily, because religions and gods are weird and you'll never be able to create a system that covers every ridiculous thing they've ever done, so if you want to reconcile it as a Storyteller, you have to be creative.

The first and most interesting option we'd explore is that Prometheus maybe wasn't a Titan at this point in time. While Pandora's existence tells us that this is after all his shenanigans with the stealing of sacrifices and dissemination of fire and earning Zeus' eternal hatred, Deucalion himself might still have been born before the battle lines between the two were drawn. Zeus himself helps Deucalion, which suggests that there are no hard feelings there. Prometheus is of course definitely of a Titanic generation, but he's also the same generation as Zeus (they're first cousins), so it's theoretically possible that he wasn't a Titan from the beginning and only defected later. Certainly he doesn't appear to have fought in the Titanomachy, and he's generally a more benevolent and unthreatening figure where humanity is concerned. If you go with that option, Deucalion really is just a normal Scion of Prometheus - possibly the only one that ever existed.

Another possibility is that Prometheus is Deucalion's father figuratively instead of literally, and that he's someone else's Scion (perhaps Zeus'?) that Prometheus acts as Guide or mentor for. We're not as big fans of this approach since Greek myth is very clear about repeating that Deucalion is Prometheus' son, but for those who want him to be Titanic from the very beginning but also want Deucalion to be a true Scion, this may be a useful compromise.

Or, you can also decide that Deucalion wasn't really a Scion at all, and proceed accordingly. He's very closely associated with humanity and rebuilding it after the flood, so maybe he was a Legendary mortal, created by Prometheus through the use of Artistry or other creative powers (which would explain why a mother is mentioned so seldom). Maybe he was a normal human that Prometheus decided to adopt, possibly because he married Pyrhha and therefore Prometheus felt some responsibility for her since he made her mother Pandora. Maybe he was actually a lesser immortal or Titanspawn of some kind or even a god, living in the World before the time that the gods left it for good; if his mother is an Oceanid, he could be one of the tritones, or any other kind of supernatural figure associated with water, which certainly couldn't hurt him in his quest to survive the great flood. The mortals that Deucalion engenders to repopulate the world aren't actually children of his but rather created from rock and earth, so he wouldn't need to be human in order to "create" human children in this way.

Honestly, this is one of those places where game rules don't match up and it's a pain in the ass. Use your best judgment, and best of luck to you.

Call Once in a While!

Question: What happened to mortal parents of your God PCs?

Various fates. It's hard to be a human who has been touched by the divine; your life never goes smoothly or normally, and when it ends (which is often) it's usually in an unusual way.

Sowiljr's mortal mother, Marlene Matheson, was a Las Vegas showgirl and single mother who raised him on her own before dying of cancer when he was in his twenties. Her story, and Geoff's rise to Scionhood, are told in the story Close to the Sun.

Folkwardr's mortal parents, Benjamin and Margaret Anderson, are long dead of natural causes; they lived in the latter half of the eighteenth century, and while Woody had Eternal Youth and whiled away the centuries until today, they had no such option.

Jioni's mortal mother, Eugenia Landry, was a devout Catholic stay-at-home mother who was put into the care of a nunnery shortly after Hurricane Katrina hit, right before Vivian was called away to go become a Scion. No one ever checked in on her again, so it's generally assumed that since she was in frail health anyway, she probably died during Fimbulwinter. If she didn't, she'd be somewhere in Africa right now with the rest of the population of New Orleans that Zwazo Fou Fou and Shango hijacked and relocated. The story of her interactions with Vivian is in her backstory, Godless.

Eztli's mortal mother (her name was Necahual but she went by Maria if anyone wonders, although Sangria never knew her and doesn't know her name herself) died in childbirth with Sangria, who came into the world bloody from the beginning. Since the Aztecs considered women who died in childbirth to have died in glorious combat, it is generally assumed she went to the House on the Left, although no one ever checked.

Vala's mortal mother, Hilda Dahl, died in a car accident the night of her Visitation. No one has any proof, but it seems like there might have been some kind of foul play involved. Read the story of Hilda and Aurora, Colors of Fate, and decide for yourself.

Kettila's mortal parents (her real ones, not any of the random ones she adopted), Oskar and Emma Blomgren, were never checked up on and probably also died during Fimbulwinter and Ragnarok. If they survived, they'd be among the meager few post-apocalypse people that live under Sowiljr's protection, although he would have no way of recognizing them.

Zwazo Fou Fou's mortal mother, Katherine James, died of natural causes somewhere during his Hero-to-Demigod career. He and his twin brother Mathias visited her grave once in a while, but not much once they got busy enough to make trips home impractical for them.

Aiona's mortal parents, Richard and Brenda Archimedes, were actually adoptive and she was aware of this from the start, consequently giving the poor couple little of her attention. Her real mother, Olivia, was seen several times in Hephaestus' company while he was posing as a mortal scientist, but her current whereabouts and what might have happened to her are unknown.

Sverrir's mortal mother, Amelia Nordstrom, was killed by a criminal during a holdup when he was a teenager, something that deeply affected his life and outlook thereafter. His stepfather, Michael Whitman, knew he wasn't Will's real father but was actually coopted to become his Guide by Njord, and helped his stepson as much as possible until he arrived at godhood, at which point he was lost to the furor of Fimbulwinter and Ragnarok.

Terminus' mortal mother, Claire Gozer, continued living in Wisconsin after his abrupt departure until he returned at Legend 9 to save her from Fimbulwinter, relocating her to his cult at Delphi. After Goze's death, Sowiljr took her in out of honor for his dead comrade, transplanting her to his Sanctum for a short period of time before resettling her in his cult lands in Iceland. She's one of the few parents of god-level Scions who is confirmed to still be alive and active, although she's pretty broken up over the loss of her son. Some of the story of their interaction is in his backstory, Wayward Son.

Elissa Margaritas, mother of both Alison and Colin, was left something of an emotional wreck after being left by both Apollo and Dionysus, but she was last seen still living quietly alone in her home in North Carolina. Alison saw her briefly just before her apotheosis and she seemed normal; no one has checked on her since, so it's unsure whether she survived Fimbulwinter to the end.

Saki's parents, Ichiro and Natsumi Kimura, are extremely not alive anymore. You can see why in her backstory, Little Fish.

And that's everybody that's a god right now! Many of the younger Scions of the Eastern Promises and Gangs of New York games are very much still part of their parents' lives; Zoe went to get nagged incessantly by her mother about getting married this weekend, while James sends telegrams home to the family when possible, Leona is deeply put out with her father for kicking her out of the house to go have adventures, and Skylar's poor mother is beside herself with worry trying to figure out what to do about her son being a mentally unstable superhero that the government won't let her see.

Any of you guys got any interesting stories about what mortal Scion parents are up to these days?

Wake Me Up Inside

Question: Could a god have an awakened Scion perform Visitation on an unawakened one? For example, Odin sending a daughter of Freyr who's been active for a few years to perform aVisitation for one of his children?

Sure could. All a Visitation needs is for the parent to send somebody - themselves, their fellow gods, their servants, their monsters, their other magic kids, whatever - to go drop off a new kid's relics and give them as much of an idea of what they are and what they're supposed to do as that god wants them to have. That could be another Scion just as easily as it could be another god in the pantheon or a lesser immortal like an alf or tengu.

So yeah, go for it! If you're making a new character and want a big brother or sister to come do the honors, there's no reason you can't. And if you're a Storyteller, you can send your PCs off to perform Visitations as part of the game's plot, possibly sparking new relationships along the way.

How to Get Pregnant Without Really Trying

Question: Is it possible to have a Scion of the Morrigan birthed by a lesbian mortal mother after the goddess impregnated her in female form after a torrid night of lesbian passion?

You know, I have gotten variations on this question way more than I ever would have predicted. I guess people are very concerned about the possible outcomes of divine lesbian encounters.

Sure, dude, you can totally do that; Scion's full of people doing crazy shit, and I see no reason this can't be one of those moments. Compared to some of the reproductive shenanigans going on in various mythologies, this is downright tame.

I'm not going to go into the details of all the ways two ladies can have sex (you guys have the internet, I'm sure you can figure it out), but the only thing to really worry about is the fact that somehow one of these women has to get knocked up, which means something has to fertilize an egg. In humans, that requires particular equipment, but gods don't have to play by those rules. Appearance knacks - Undeniable Resemblance and Unusual Alteration - that allow specialized shapeshifting can easily provide ways for this to happen, whether it's creating fertilizing fluid of some kind that is released through small openings in the fingers or even modifying the pores of the skin to allow simple contact to pass something unnoticed from one to the other. Purview Avatars, of course, can also probably pull this off easily as well; the Savior especially can probably just impregnate via finger guns if you want it to, but others can likely pull off similar events as well. Exactly how this works mechanically depends completely on the actions and interests of the ladies involved and the Storyteller's rulings, but it's far from something that is difficult for your average goddess to do.

To digress for a moment, you'll see very, very few cases in ancient mythology where someone is born without a male being involved anywhere. This is because most ancient societies' understanding of the process of procreation mandated that both male and female parts be involved, which is why even most of the most famous parthenogenic stories involve some kind of opposite counterpart or proxy - Cavillaca becoming pregnant by eating Coniraya's sperm in a fruit, for example, Erichthonius being born when Hephaestus's seed fell on the ground and therefore impregnated Gaia, or Xquic being impregnated by Hun Hunahpu spitting into her hand - even if sex isn't directly involved. There are a few, with Hera's solo birth of Hephaestus probably the best example of a story with no dudes involved anywhere, but not a lot, and I can't think of a single one in which two ladies were able to combine to make a child (unless you want to get funky with the confusing myth of Heimdall's parentage, maybe?).

But that's okay, because those ancient stories aren't the boss of us! Today's Scions are being born in a world where lesbian relationships are commonplace, in vitro fertilization is an everyday occurrence and scientists have figured out how to make viable sperm with no male genetic material involved at all, so there's no reason whatsoever they have to adhere to those crusty old classical ideas of how babies are made. Especially if it's just something in your Scion's backstory, feel free to be creative, and if the Storyteller wants details, work them out. In the end, it's perfectly plausible roleplaying favor that doesn't affect your mechanical abilities or behavior as a Scion, so I see no reason to restrict it.

Making Babies

Question: Besides normal human-god procreation and adoption, what other ways can a god create a Scion?

Scions are rare and special creatures; gods can't just pop them up all the time by doing random stuff, or their lives would be much easier and they wouldn't have to spend so much time messing around in the dangerous and Fatebond-plagued World. Scions are the fusion of the mortal with the divine, enabling them to reach for the awesome greatness of divinity while retaining the spark and soul of humanity, and that's not something that's easy to come by.

Gods can make progeny all kinds of ways, of course. They can create living creatures with various purviews, including Industry and Health, but those aren't Scions. They can have children with all kinds of Legendary creatures and inhabitants of magical worlds, but those aren't Scions. They can even make copies and illusions of themselves, but those aren't Scions, either, just mirror images or pale imitations.

There are technically a few ways a god might be able to manage it. We've talked before about the fact that gods might be able to create Scions by spreading their seed to animals instead of humans; the resulting children would probably be very bestial and have a lot of challenges that normal Scions don't, but it's technically possible, depending on your Storyteller's inclinations. It's also technically possible for a god with Human Hybrid to crossbreed a Scion with a normal human, resulting in a mortal who could be tapped as a Scion by the original Scion's parent. That only works for one generation, and since you're spending a bucket of Legend around a mortal to do it it doesn't seem like there's much point, but it's possible as long as you're of the creator-god set. Finally, as with most things, a purview Avatar used appropriately could probably create a Scion, particularly The Savior or The Wyrd; Avatars are able to do bananas things that normally can't be done, so they get around the usual restrictions.

Short of those, however, Scions are created by the fusion of ichor and blood from a mortal having a child with a god, and that's where the vast majority of them should be coming from. The other methods are possible but in most cases not useful unless there are extreme extenuating circumstances or obstacles to getting it done the normal way, and most gods won't go to the extra effort and expense unless they have a seriously important reason to do so.

Govern Thyself

Question: What does the mortal world think of your various characters? Also, are all of your characters in the same universe/continuity? Finally, what do mortal governments tend to think in general of Scions during that time when the governments know about them but the general public doesn't know yet (assume they ever get to that point)? Thanks for all your hard work!

Hey, you're welcome. Hard work can be fun, sometimes!

Our characters are not all in the same continuity, but rather in three distinct universes. I'm not going to link to all of them because that's a lot of linking action, but here's the breakdown of who's where:

Continuity One: Better Next Time, Skeins of Fate, Strawberry Fields, Land of the Red Sun and Hong Kong. This is the big motherlode universe, involving the most of our characters and by far the dominator of our fiction section; it's set in the modern day and has been played in consistently for the past 4+ years of our games running, involving a modern world in which the resurgance of the Titans causes the ancient and magical to suddenly spill back over into everyday life. Its PC characters include Geoff Matheson, Sangria Tecuhtli, Mitchell Gozer, Sophia Archimedes, Marcus James, Chuck Clark, Aurora Dahl, Woody Anderson, Vivian Landry, Kettila Blomgren, John Doe, Theo Arnoux, Will Nordstrom, Dierdre O'Riordan, Seamus McMann, Alaina Bertrand, Killian Corvinus, Luke Honre, Ian Jupiter, Sam Striker, Najarat Sekhar, Amunet Ipi, Iggy Rex, Auggie MacDonough, Jude Shriver, Tyler Hamilton Orton, Art Eclipse, Lapis, Darcy Jolie-Pitt, Hime-Kame Jolie-Pitt, Carlos Jolie-Pitt, Cora Champagne, Maximus Giovani VII, Sora Sato, Saki, Hachiro Taro Koga, Hiro Subaru, Aisu Sutoraiku, Ahuiliztli Matheson, Chuck Clark Jr., Charlie Gozer, Alison Margaritas, Colin Margaritas, John Shimoda and Raymond Dent. There's also a much-too-large host of NPC and side characters fleshing out the stories, with the most famous being Jay Ortiz, Kane Taoka and Wolfgang Amery.

Continuity Two: Eastern Promises. This is our second longest-running universe, and is set in the middle of the nineteenth century, incorporating elements of steampunk and political intrigue into the tale of Scions trying to save the world without anyone noticing. Its PC characters include Mohini Misra, Shadan Ferma, Penelope Young, Padma Billingsworth, Kebo, Cassara Mitchell, Terry Gaither, Faruza Alinejad, Samuel Vanderbilt, Shanti Paavatika, Nisha, Kitty Sanders, Sanjiv Nayak, Mshai, Ahkileswar, Layla Wahab, Lionel Cuthbert, Darrius, Leona Middleton, Paniwi Bayteru, James Howard, Haji, Zahed Al-Azif and Yadi. They don't have quite the giant backlog of famous NPCs yet (although there are a few - hi, Paul Bunyan) and don't have a ton of fiction stories yet, but they're heading toward being a force to be reckoned with.

Continuity Three: Gangs of New York. Our most recent game is another modern-day, normal Scion setting, but set in a different universe from Continuity One to allow a new crop of Scions a chance to blow up landmarks. Its PC characters include James Keenan, Valentina Radic, Nic Mason, Mabel Grey, Michael Chambers, Alan Parillo, Winona Nelson, Simon Rockwell, Jake Devon, Rick Nolan and Adira Bazzi. They don't yet have any fiction (although believe me, I have notes on them), and are still babies in Scion terms, with the most powerful scarcely Legend 4.

So, yeah. For the most part, you'll see us talking about the folks in Continuity One the most, because there are the most of them and they've done the most things over time (some have made the journey all the way from Legend 3 to Legend 11 now, in fact!), but the other games are also awesome and we love their different possibilities.

As for what the mortal world thinks, I won't do a full rundown because it would take forever, but it's about what you'd expect. The government, once it realizes that there are superpowered people running around, tends to react with paranoia and immediate steps taken to understand and contain any threat Scions might be to the world, which works better in some areas than others. Entire armies have scrambled to try to take down Sangria or hunt Michael out of the streets of New York, with very limited success; on the other hand, the Strawberry Fields game's plot revolves strongly around the government's new Dangerous Supernaturals Division and its attempts to understand and combat magical phenomena by capturing and experimenting on Scions and Titanspawn alike. Some Scions, like James Howard, are actually members of the government themselves, allowing them to influence national and even global policy, and even where the Scions aren't pulling the government's strings, very often some supernatural agency is. In the nineteenth-century Eastern Promises game, different countries are still trying to figure out how to handle the possible dangers of Scions; some, like Russia, are embracing the supernatural and are employing magical beings of their own to serve the country, while others, like England, have instituted strenuous registration and behavior restrictions on Scions and punish any infractions as threats to the Commonwealth.

These are all possible reactions any government might have; it's always scary for mortals to find out that there are things way more powerful than themselves running around, and since a government's job is to protect its people and enforce law and order, they're almost all going to have to have a knee-jerk reaction to try to contain, control or even eradicate such frightening threats. But since Scions themselves are fully capable of involving themselves in the mortal government as well, either front and center or from behind the scenes, how the world at large views and treats them is as much up to them as anyone else.

Generations of Godliness

Question: Don't expect this one to get answered for a while, but have you ever had a character in one of your games whose grandparent was the god instead of their parent?

Aha, but it was quick to answer, so it gets to come out early anyway! Boom!

We've only had one Scion who had their grandparent as a patron instead of their direct patron, and it was Ahuiliztli Matheson, daughter of Geoff Matheson and Sangria Tecuhtli. Her parents were not high enough Legend to make her a Scion at the time, but her grandfather Huitzilopochtli invested her with power and sent her out to continue furthering the Aztec cause. She was played for a short period of time during the side game Children of the Revolution, along with other PC children Charlie Gozer, Chuklark Jr. and Magnus Magnusson. Those PCs were never on the website because their game was shortlived, although they remain NPCs now.

Maximus Giovanni VII comes from a family line that claims he is the seventh generation removed from Hades, the pater familius of their line. While the family firmly believes this, it's obvious that it's not actually true and that his divine blood must run in a closer generation. Since most of the Giovanni men are nearly identical looking and Hades is a master of stealth, it's anyone's guess whether he's Max's father or grandfather. Certainly no one has ever asked him.

It's always an option to play a character is the grandchild of a god, but it hasn't been very popular with our players to date. I'm not sure if that's because it's just more interesting to be more closely connected to the god in question, or it just doesn't often occur to players during character creation.

(It's also possible that there're some kind of generational shenanigans going on in Dierdre's background. But nobody knows if that's actually true.)

Endless Questions

Late-night vlogging! With both of us now, like a band reunion tour but with more crochety mythology!

Question: When I reread the Aztlanti pantheon, I noticed that Tlazolteotl has a loooong enemies list. How did that happen?

Question: I think by now we know your hatred of World at War Scion and the gods of the US and the Allied pantheons, but I still like the idea of being a Scion of Robin Hood or someone similar. Who would you say would be most thematically similar to him (not mechanically)?

Question: Been reading Neil Gaiman's Sandman and loving it. If you HAD to, hwo would you model the Endless in Scion?

Question: Love your version of Jotunblut, but two questions about it. Does the size increase also affect your shape in boons like Animal Form and Beast Shape (do you turn into unusually big animals)? What about Appearance knacks like Undeniable Resemblance - if you change your size with it, is the shit permanent or not (giantsblood is strong stuff, after all)?

Question: Is there any way to be able to reply on Dodge late in the game? I was looking to be more of a dodge-tank, but after reading a couple of blogs and doing some math, dodging is not a good path for a combat god. Do you have any suggestions for me that would help me build a character who fights like Jackie Chan - all over the place and rarely getting hit hard? If it comes to boons, would the more ethereal elements (air and fire) be a good place to start? Are there any untouchable combat gods?

Question: My character has ripped out his eyes. Does Epic Appearance still work against me? If it still works by smell or sound, what if I destroy my nose and ears?

Question: So Lionel Cuthbert, the plantation-owning raging demigod of death, sun and ice... is he also a racist who would own slaves if he could?

The freeze-frame on this video makes us both look like someone just asked us something that makes us tired and annoyed.

Is This Thing On?

Solo vlog flight! Today, clearing out a bunch of older questions that have just been waiting for their turn in the sun! Talkin' 'bout associated powers, Appearance knacks, character concepts and the checkered history of African civilization.

Question: What do you think about people using Unusual Alteration to turn themselves into trees or animals? How would that function differently from Animal Form or other shapeshifting boons?

Question: Brahma seems so powerful, yet he has so few associated purviews and Epics. What's up with that? How do you reconcile what the gods can do and how important they are with how they are mechanically represented in Scion?

Question: What would you think of a character - a Japanese Scion or other - trying to model themselves off an anime character?

Question: What does The Sentinel going rampant look like? If a god with the Avatar of the Guardian purview gets killed, I somehow can't imagine the consequences.

Question: Code of Heaven says the Orisha are against slavery, and yet Shango has slaves. Can you explain?

Question: Do the social sciences belong in the Science ability?

Question: May I use the name Ian Jupiter (not the character, just the name) for my story? He's going to be the name of a reincarnated Zeus.

Back into the Industry/boons/Atua/Seamus mines with me!