Heroes of Many Worlds

Question: I see you have a steampunk setting on the polls. What other settings have you considered for Scion?

Our steampunk nineteenth century setting is actually being play-tested by the Eastern Promises band of Scions right now, and so far seems to be going pretty well. The PCs have embraced Tesla technology and zeppelin crashes with aplomb, and they only blow up and almost kill themselves about forty percent of the time!

Scion's one of those games that basically has limitless possibilities for settings; the core idea, that the gods have become active again to fight against their opponents, the Titans, is easily transplantable into a myriad of different situations. There are tons of historical settings that would be perfect for a Scion game, up to and including recent ones like the World Wars or Industrial Revolution; all you have to do is have the Titans busting loose then instead of now, and presto, setting change achieved with no hassle. And, of course, the Titans don't have to be the main focus of a setting if you don't want them to, so you could also play in historical times, either leading up to (or perhaps causing?) the escape of the Titans or involved in other affairs strictly between the gods.

Culture-specific settings are also perfect for Scion, especially if you want to tell a story about specific groups interacting or the cultural dynamics of a specific society. The Scion: Ragnarok book's deeply Norse-centric adventure is a great example of this; you could technically play it with any Scions you want, but it's obviously designed for the Vikings among us and plays to all their specific mythology, traditions and peculiarities. You can do the same with any other culture, since they all have significant and awesome events and ideas in their mythologies to play with; the choices are limitless.

And, of course, there are also settings completely other than earth. Scion has an abundance of these in Terrae Incognita, Overworlds, Underworlds, Sanctums and even the ability to reach other planets, and there's no rule that says a Scion game has to start in the World. An entire Hero chronicle in which the PCs eventually discover that they've been in a Terra Incognita, all Truman Show-style, their entire lives would be quite a mind-bender, wouldn't it?

A quick list of some of our favorite possible settings for Scion might look something like this:

Mythological Settings
• The Age of Heroes - Your Scions are active in ancient Greece during the first Titanomachy, when the gods were still battling the Titans in the heavens and the mortal world knew the likes of Heracles and Perseus
• Brother My Brother - Your Scions are active near the dawn of the Indo-European civilizations, living through the schism between the Devas and Yazata, seeking to bring the pantheons back together or encourage them to split for reasons of their own
• The Double Crown - Your Scions are active during the ancient wars between the Upper and Lower kingdoms of Egypt, mirrored in the heavens by the war between Horus and Set over control of the Pesedjet themselves
• Dreamtime - Your Scions are active during the ancient hero-tales and tribal stories of the Australian people, helping create a world that is still formless and full of possibility
• Hands of God - Your Scions are Avatars of the Hindu gods, separate in consciousness and power but fighting their battles on earth during the age of rakshasa and asuras, ignorant of their true identities
• Kings of the Cattle Raid - Your Scions take active part in the ancient feuds, battles and in-fighting between the Irish kings, queens and magicians of old, changing the course of history forever
• The Promised Land - Your Scions are part of the first Mexica to leave Aztlan, led by Huitzilopochtli, to try to carve out a place in the world for your people and gods
• Romance of the Three Kingdoms - Your Scions are active during the time of some of the greatest battles in China's mythic history, aiding the likes of Huang Di or Guan Yu as they decide the fate of the Middle Kingdom
• Vanguard of Heaven - Your Scions are at the forefront of the Amatsukami decision to descend from heaven to conquer and claim Japan below, coming up against demons, mortal men and the Kunitsukumi themselves

Historical Settings
• Ellis Island - Your Scions come to the newborn United States during the rush of immigration at the turn of the century, ready to try to shape the country into whatever form their pantheon wishes
• Newfound Land - Your Scions are children of the Aesir (or, in reverse, the Inuit gods), discovering the frozen northern regions of North America for the first time and learning about the native gods and dangers they have to offer
• Precious Blood - Your Scions are active in Mesoamerica during the height of the warring powers there, influencing which kingdoms rise, which fall, and which pantheons control the vast wealth and blood sacrifice of the Valley of Mexico
• Seeds of the Calabash - Your Scions are active in Africa during the encroachment of European forces, becoming part of its history as they help or hinder the struggling native tribes and the slave diaspora
• There Is No God But God - Your Scions are active in the Middle East during the rise of Judaism or Islam, part of the pantheons of that ancient place responding to this new world of monotheism
• Wild Wild West - Your Scions are alive during the Gold Rush, part of a new vanguard of children of the gods desperate to explore and claim the New World
• Wilder Wilder West - Your Scions are children of the Native American gods, created to try to preserve, protect or find a way to fight back against the encroachment of European forces, both mortal and magical

And seriously, that's just a small sample of all the things you could do. Scion's easiest to run in the modern day (because you don't have to do any extra research or setting work) with the Titans as antagonists (because they're only a Wikipedia click away and classic antagonists to boot), but it has practically unlimited possibilities. Any time that legendary events occurred, there could have been Scions; any time the gods might have had a reason to invest their effort and time into them, they might have created children to do their work; and any time that major historical events occurred, it's possible that there was a touch of the divine about them. We don't think every historical event ever should have been the work of Scions, because mortals are pretty awesome in their own right and can certainly cause global change on their own, but any one you wanted to choose as a setting for Scion could be entirely awesome and valid. It's amazing that way.

As for our games, we're continuing with Scion Basic for our new Hero-level game and the god game (although the mess the gods've made of the world really no longer resembles anything except itself... maybe we should call that setting What's Left After Geoff and Aurora), and we're enjoying the nineteenth-century steampunk setting for the soon-to-be Demigod-level game. We aren't planning on starting anything too radical in setting soon - after all, we're already thigh-deep in three games, that's a lot to do! - but we have in the past thrown around the idea of a post-Ragnarok setting in which players can play children of the previous god PCs. Scions of Folkwardr, go out into the world and frown at it until it sorts itself out!