Lines in the Sand

Question: In the constant war for succession between Horus and Set, which Egyptian gods do you think are on Set's side in the conflict?

It's difficult to say, really! There are a lot of factors in play, plus political situations that might change at the drop of a hat, and on top of all that Isis and Horus are both in there with their Ultimate Manipulation chicanery. But we have a few suggestions.

The most obvious ones are Set's wife and sons; they're likely to be on his side simply through family loyalty, if nothing else. They have a vested interest in his triumph, which puts all of them in a better position, and of course they may be kind of pissed off at cousin Horus for taking the throne if they believe Set's claim is better. On the other hand, they're also all at least slightly on the fence; Sobek tends to help Horus out when asked and isn't particularly hostile to anyone (but then again, do you really expect the crocodile to be much of a politician?), Nephthys was in some variant traditions (which, depending on the interpretation you like, might be true facts or later retcons by priests attempting to make Osiris look better and Set and his family look worse) infatuated with Osiris, not to mention very close to her sister Isis, both of which might be factors that sway her more than Set might like. Certainly Nephthys aided Isis in her burial and mourning for Osiris after Set killed him, which might just be sisterly solidarity but might also indicate that she isn't taking a firm side in all this. Anubis is suspect for the same reasons, thanks to the fact that those same diverging myths disagree on whether he's actually Set's son or Osiris', and he doesn't involve himself in the doings of folks above ground very much anyway.

However, Set is the grand defender of the pantheon and indeed the whole world from the depredations of Apep, so those who are likewise involved in that endeavor with him might view him as a comrade in arms as well as knowing firsthand how much he cares about his people. Ra, who is personally guarded and rescued by Set every single night, is almost certainly firmly in his came, and it doesn't hurt that Isis screwed him over with her tricksy magic spells a while ago and probably ensured that he'll never like her again. Various warlike gods who ride the boat and fight with Set, which depending on the version might include Maahes, Monthu, Khonsu, Serket and others, may also be more inclined to support him as a powerful and capable leader, especially if they were there that day he didn't go on the boat in order to go attend Anubis' birth and the Horus-led defense team got their asses handed to them.

And where Ra goes, the Eye of Ra is likely to go, so those goddesses who are or have been the Eye - Hathor, Sekhmet, Bastet, Tefnut and so on - may also rally behind Set as a result of Ra's influence. How much influence Ra still has after Isis' meddling is up to individual Storytellers to decide, though.

Oddly enough, those paragraphs look backwards: unrelated people Set hangs out with at work are the most likely to be gung-ho about getting him into power, while his own immediate family is kind of unsure and possibly working for the other side. It's a great example of a different set of Virtues at work: when you have Order, Piety, Harmony and Conviction, you're likely to believe in someone you respect with a whole and unflagging heart, but that's more important than pesky things like filial loyalty that other pantheons might hold in higher esteem.

And, of course, there are at least as many gods arrayed on Horus' side in this very, very old argument. Gods probably can and do change sides all the time, based on who they think is winning, new information they learn about one or the other being a douchebag or the manipulative meddling of the social powerhouses among them. It's a Game-of-Thrones-esque labyrinth of byzantine intrigue, where everything might change at a moment's notice and the only surety is that you don't want to end up on the losing side at the wrong moment.

Social Climbing

Question: You had Eshu vs Loki the other day, how about Isis vs Tezcat? How would you handle conflicts between those kind of social powerhouses who always get what they want? How could PCs handle them when they reach godhood? I know Geoff's already told Isis where to get off, but surely she hasn't just left it at that?

Social powers have so many options and layers that this question is basically unanswerable (which is also why it's sat in the queue for so long - sorry, asker!). If you think about all the different things social characters can do to perpetrate shenanigans, encourage behavior and influence one another even as Heroes and Demigods, you already have an idea of how insane the scale must become when they get to the level of actual deities.

As we've talked about before, it's mostly fruitless to talk about "which god would win", because that's not only something that is nearly impossible to forecast thanks to all the variables and kinds of powers in play, it's also unlikely to come up because there are entire pantheons and relatives associated with them that know better than to let things get to that level. Actual outright conflict between gods is probably pretty rare, because it makes life miserable for everyone, not just the main members of the feud. As we said before, when Eshu and Loki get into a tiff, the world loses.

But social conflicts don't necessarily have to erupt into armed beatings - in fact, most of the time they probably don't, except in the rare cases of socially manipulative people who are not smart enough to realize what a bad idea that is. Instead, they look a lot more like terrible, terrible cold wars, where both sides play a game of vicious wizard's chess with all the people they know and can get their hands on as pieces. Social characters with Charisma will play Who's Your Daddy with everyone they know, always winning friends and allies away from others with sheer force of their awesomeness; whomever's actually in the room is probably winning, because Charisma requires that kind of up close and personal attention most of the time, but your friends can prevail on their friends and soon it's a chain of a bunch of people doing crazy things out of love for you just to stick it to the other guy. Characters with Manipulation, on the other hand, can weave their influence even more subtly, spreading evil rumors about you, convincing others that you want things you don't want, turning your friends and even relatives against you and laying curses and traps just waiting to trip you up.

One of the things about being Isis or Tezcatlipoca is that, yeah, you always get what you want - inside your own little pool, that is. Unless you're going up against someone with a truly heinous resistance score, your home pantheon-mates are probably mostly susceptible to your charms - you're the resident manipulator or major presence, after all. But when you branch out into the larger world of Scion and come up against other puppetmasters and leaders, it becomes an increasingly complex and insane web of possibilities, and there's no way to predict what would happen. Every new person, situation, alliance or enmity introduces new variables that could completely change what happens, and a feud between the same two gods could go off infinite different ways, like a multitude of parallel universes.

So the answer is really whatever your Storyteller can come up with. If Isis and Tezcatlipoca want to get into it, they're going to be in an insane, subtle, ongoing prank and influence war that might stretch anywhere from corrupting one anothers' cults to misdirecting one anothers' Scions to interfering in one anothers' family lives and everything else they think they can get away with. PCs trying to deal with it are going to find themselves embroiled, possibly even before they know it, and more often than not targeted. Hopefully they can play the game right back (or if not, survive its consequences).

As for Isis in our games... well, she and Geoff are not getting along. There's been kidnapping, violence, influencing other gods to attack one another, pantheon schisms and probably a whole lot more behind the scenes that the PCs aren't even aware she's up to. Recently, Jioni tried to pray at a temple to Isis to regain some Legend and everyone got attacked by members of the Centzonmimixcoa that Isis shanghai'd into striking against them, which led to a lot of heartbreak and screaming Aztec fury. That problem's probably not going to get fixed any time soon, but feuds between gods that last forever are one of the staples of mythology, so it only stands to reason that Scions pick some up as they go.