Knocked Up

Question: So what's the deal with Sangria and Geoff? Their relationship is like a divine version of Knocked Up where Geoff marries her because he feels responsible for getting her pregnant. Does Sangria love or care for the poor guy at all? Or is she just an emotionless psychopath that's just using him for breeding stock?

Question: Geoff and Sangria - sometimes I think their relationship is kind of cute, but then other times it seems like it's just awful. Do they regret getting married? What's life like for Geoff being stuck with a crazy woman who would probably gut him if she could get away with it?

We've had a couple of questions about this lately, so I figured now, with all this interest about Geoff's love life, was a good time for a guest blog by the man himself. I sent these questions off to Geoff's player for his perspective, and because he is a champion he actually sat down and wrote something instead of telling me that he's a very important lawyer who doesn't have time for this kind of stuff. Check it out:

What a couple of questions. Welp, I guess I should start at the beginning…

Geoff originally decided to marry Sangria after Pan called down a bacchanalia. If you read Geoff’s origin story (which by the way is an amazing piece of fiction and gets me right in the feels every time) you know that his mother never married and never took another lover after Baldr. Geoff watched his mother grow old alone, but never saw resentment or anger at what had happened. She felt she was blessed to have such a wonderful child. When Geoff was old enough to realize what had happened, he made a vow that he would never abandon his children or the mother of his children. At first it was because he felt it was his duty, and that he would be dishonoring the memory of his mother if he were no better than his divine father. He had to do what was right.

While Sangria was an amazing physical specimen and at this point I think divinely beautiful (besides the bone arm), it still felt like a burden. It was a duty Geoff had taken on; he had to protect his family, and to honor the mother of his unborn child. After the birth of Aren, everything changed. Geoff had a family again. He had only briefly met his father, who as soon as he had appeared was gone again. But now he had a child, but it wasn’t only his child - it was Sangria’s as well. They shared something so powerful and amazing that as he immediately was filled with love for his child, he began to grow to love the woman who had carried and brought this child into the world. She was the vessel that had given him what he had always wanted: a family.

Another way to look at it is like an arranged marriage. When he and Sangria first tied the knot (literally), he only knew about her as the terrorist, the warrior, the cold-blooded killer and mother of monsters. But as the battles passed, as his family grew closer, he learned more about Sangria; about her unwavering and completely selfless loyalty to her family. How she would sacrifice everything she had or was to make sure that no harm befell her children or her husband. He learned that she had never known nor felt love. She had only ever known duty, and that after their marriage day her duty shifted to include him. He came to learn that she would never be the wife who gave him a hero’s welcome home, or weep at seeing him leave. But she would never leave him, never betray him, and always keep him and their children safe. She would honor Geoff. That came to be enough.

A long way down the road after they both had achieved apotheosis, Geoff began to learn more about his wife. She had acquired a nahualli, a bat named Cuacitlali (Eater of Stars). This creature, this animal, was basically her emotions or her id. All the emotion she had built over the years for Geoff and never understood or been able to express, Quacitlali could. It is one thing to be snuggled by a beautiful woman, and quite another to be snuggled by a human-sized vampire bat.

As it stands in the game currently, Sowiljr loves Eztli. He even affectionately calls her Xochiyotl (it means "gentle flower"). It amuses him, but also shows how in his mind Sangria is his everything. He is rebuilding his pantheon as the new All-Father, and he is going to be a better father to his family and to his people than those before him. His mother raised him better than that.

Hope that helped with the people who have trouble seeing how this relationship works.

TL;DR - It was rough at the beginning, got better once children started showing up, post-apotheosis realized how much she cared about him, and now are very happy together (although she is still dumb as a brick, so that has its own challenges).

Life together, on the other hand, is a loaded question. It is a constant struggle making sure that Eztli doesn’t dash off into the stars to try and destroy everything in her path. Ptah had a good idea when he figured out a way to distract and control Sekhmet all the time. As I said above, she is real dumb, but powerful. Together they are an unstoppable force, which as a player is how I like to think of them. She is the warrior, the unflinching soul who will wade into the middle of Hell itself, while Geoff is the king, the politician or general who has plans and plays the game of thrones (I couldn’t help myself). There is no regret from Geoff for having married Sangria. He would like for her to be able to smile and laugh and be happy (and trust me, he is working on it ;)). So I would have to say that life remains…exciting... yes, that is the word I will choose.

Thanks, everyone, for your interest in our game and in Geoff and Sangria! I never thought that this character would grow so much and gain an actual following! It always makes me smile when I hear that you guys are talking about him or thinking about him. =)

Hugs and Kisses,

Geoff
(Mat)

So there you guys have it, straight from the sun-god's mouth. As for Sangria's perspective, I'm not going to get as detailed as he did, but I will say that if she were going to go out and pick a guy just to use for breeding stock, it would probably not be a Norse dude.

What you guys should be worried about is Eztli versus Folkwardr. Every game that one of them doesn't try to murder the other is like a miraculous victory.