Question: Do you think that Heku practitioners could extend their influence over soul anatomy to messing with other pantheons' ideas of the soul? Say, for example, manipulating a Teotl Scion's nahualli?
You're getting here into some very dangerous waters, where the deep, deep seas of Comparative Mythology and Game Mechanics meet and become choppy.
The answer to this is no, for a few different reasons. The major problem with this, from a game-balance perspective, is that that would automatically make Heku very, very overpowered. Many different pantheons and cultures have different ideas of what the soul is and ways that that could be expressed in Scion, from things that happen in their PSPs to custom Birthrights to interactions with their pantheons or lesser immortals, and since they're not all the same, it would require a pretty hoss set of powers with carefully-delineated effects to find good ways to interact with all of them. Heku is way not equipped to do all of that, and furthermore it would severely penalize people in other pantheons just for getting in touch with those things - if they have to voluntarily put a lot of time/effort/Birthright points into even getting that thing, and then the Heku guy can just fuck with it, why would they both doing that instead of getting some other relic that nobody would get to unfairly screw around with? What about cultures where the soul and its disposition is being handled primarily by APPs - is the guy with Heku just royally cheating people with the Death purview, too? Where are you drawing the line on what a "soul" is and what powers can and can't affect it?
So game balance is obviously an issue here. But, more importantly (at least in my opinion!), Heku is specifically designed to work with the Egyptian idea of the soul. Egyptian deities and religion believe in that idea of the soul, and interact with the soul that way; as we say every time we talk about comparative religion, it's their mythological truth. But it's not the mythological truth of other pantheons that have entirely different conceptions of soul, which vary widely and are often totally incompatible, and it doesn't make sense for the Egyptian "truth" to intrude on, for example, the Aztec "truth" and invalidate it. From the Aztec perspective, the twin-soul nahualli is the truth of how souls are put together, and it's the Netjer who have some weird exotic theory, so why do the Netjer get to impose their truth on other pantheons, when the same is not true in reverse? It's true that the Netjer have powers over the manifold soul of Egyptian mythology, but that doesn't necessarily translate to having power over everyone's soul ever across the universe, just as an Orisha Scion's control over her own destiny doesn't necessarily mean that she gets to invalidate every other culture's notions of Fate that don't match up to hers.
This is a place where, because All Myths Are True in Scion, you need to decide how it can be true that the Egyptians believe that everyone has an eight-part multi-soul but the Aztecs believe that everyone has a dual-animal soul but the Inuit believe that everyone has a triple soul of which one is the quality of breath that keeps them alive, and so on and so forth. All of them are true, but they cannot intrude on and make one another untrue without breaking the game. One answer might be that because the Egyptians have the power of Heku, they can interact with their own souls (and to a limited extent the souls of others) in the context of the eight-part Egyptian soul, but that that's a characteristic of their PSP, not a universal truth of how souls work. Another might be to say that everyone within the Egyptian religion's range has the multi-soul - after all, they all want to be mummified so their various soul parts head off to the afterlife correctly, right? - but that this only applies to Egyptian people and not to anyone else. Yet another option might be to say that all people everywhere have all the different cultural conceptions of souls, at once, and it doesn't matter because it only comes into question when someone has a set of powers that specifically affect one of those setups. Or maybe you have yet another idea for reconciling all these things that works better for you. I don't know, because I don't run your game.
But I do know that every culture's religious ideas of souls must be equally valid for Scion's universe to function without one pantheon being "better" or "more important" than the others, so while you can have powers like Heku interact with other people in some senses, you can never have them override another culture's conception of how things work. Heku and nahualli are both concepts that work with the soul, but they're not the same and it would be very difficult to find a way to make sure that not only those two interact in a balanced way, but that every kind of soul expression in the entire game does, too.
At any rate, Heku does not affect either other peoples' Birthrights or their PSPs, so no matter what way you run nahualli, the powers of Heku shouldn't be applying to them. Both are cultural expressions of a pantheon's religious idea of the soul, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're the same or compatible, or that trying to make them so would be good for the game.
Showing posts with label nahualli. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nahualli. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
Friday, March 7, 2014
The Shadow Self
Question: This one might have been written in the comments instead, but I think it deserves an entire post (whenever it gets through The Questionado): What are nahualli?
You know, we talk about nahualli a whole bunch on this blog, because they're a concept that is very important for Aztec religion and spirituality and therefore very important to a lot of Teotl Scions and gods. But we've never outright laid out exactly what a nahualli is, which it now occurs to me has probably been confusing for folks who hadn't heard the term before. So let's fix that!
The word nahualli comes from the root nahua; it has a meaning something close to "wisdom" or "secret knowledge", with a secondary connotation of hiding or disguise, all of which concepts tie in with the idea of the nahualli. Often translated as "shadow self" or "second soul", a nahualli is a specific Aztec religious concept: basically, the idea is that all people are born with only half their soul in their human selves. The nahualli is the second half of a person's soul, which takes the form of an animal (either a real, physical animal somewhere in the world, or a spirit animal that only exists in the realms beyond normal human sight). What kind of animal depends upon the person; everyone might have a different one, often related to who they are as a person, what day of the sacred calendars they were born on, what patron god they might serve or what their name, specially given in order to attempt to describe their future life, means. For most people, that's the extent of the idea - the average person never meets or interacts with their nahualli, and lives an average life.
Those who are especially spiritually gifted, however - usually priests or magicians - might occasionally be able to find and encounter their nahualli. Usually it is assumed that they can do so because of their great magical powers; there's not a lot written about them from the time of the Aztecs' heyday, unfortunately, since European invaders were way not cool with the idea and didn't really understand it very well anyway, but some Spanish writers recorded that nahualli might reveal themselves to their other selves in dreams, and become joined to them in the course of sacred hunts where the human pursued his animal self. Others (usually casting the nahualli as a "devil") simply claimed that Aztec "sorcerers" could call them up in rituals. Naturally, having both parts of the soul together made those who could connect with their nahualli enormously powerful, magically and spiritually.
Various Aztec figures have famous nahualli, or employ nahualli in their stories. Tezcatlipoca's nahualli is the famous Tepeyollotl (meaning "heart of the mountain"), a massive jaguar that causes earthquakes and flees from the sun, and also possibly Chalchiuhtotolin ("jade turkey"), the turkey that symbolizes masculinity and diseases; both of them show different aspects of Tezcatlipoca himself, appropriate since they are, after all, him. Huitzilopochtli's nahualli are the hummingbird, symbol of virility, ferocity and resurrection, and the golden eagle, which led the Mexica people to their new home in Tenochtitlan to build their glorious empire. In fact, for most of the Aztec gods, their most closely associated totem animal - or animals, since as you can see in the previous examples gods sometimes have more than one - is likely to be their nahualli, as they are all deities and therefore by definition spiritually powerful enough to have contact with their shadow selves. Human priests and magicians also contact their nahualli in Aztec myth; in one story, a large contingent of Mexica magicians decide to undertake a journey to Aztlan to pay tribute to the earth goddess Coatlicue, and because they are passing from the world of humanity into the magical land where the goddess lives, they must transform into their nahualli in order to do so.
This idea of the nahualli is the root of the term nagual, a later version of the word now employed in modern Mexican spiritualism, witchcraft and folklore. The word nahualli is associated with not just the spirit animal but the person who was able to call it up - in modern times, that becomes its primary meaning with the animal a distant second, probably partly through a process of cultural evolution and partly because incoming Europeans were confused about the whole idea - and in the modern day, the word nagual usually refers to a sorcerer, one who is able to transform into an animal and perform spells and curses for others, both beneficial and malicious.
So, for the Teotl and their children in Scion, nahualli are obviously hella important! We represent them in games as a custom Birthright, one that Scions gain once they have become sufficiently powerful to find and harness their alternate self, and all of our Teotl Scions have gotten theirs at some point in their careers, although some sooner than others and some more successfully than others. Eztli, our Scion of Huitzilopochtli, is twin to Cuacitlali, an enormous vampire bat that mirrors her associations with blood and death, while Yoloxochitl is twin to an unnamed axolotl that mirrors her associations with immaturity, childhood and otherworldly beauty. No one has ever actually seen Maquicelotl's nahualli, but we all presume it's probably a jaguar, like his father's.
Details on exactly how we run a nahualli Birthright are in this old post here. And not only are we happy to talk about them, but I know a few Aztec enthusiasts who hang out in the comments who probably are, too! This was a pretty simplified overview of nahualli, so if you're interested in them, we encourage you to dig around for more.
You know, we talk about nahualli a whole bunch on this blog, because they're a concept that is very important for Aztec religion and spirituality and therefore very important to a lot of Teotl Scions and gods. But we've never outright laid out exactly what a nahualli is, which it now occurs to me has probably been confusing for folks who hadn't heard the term before. So let's fix that!
The word nahualli comes from the root nahua; it has a meaning something close to "wisdom" or "secret knowledge", with a secondary connotation of hiding or disguise, all of which concepts tie in with the idea of the nahualli. Often translated as "shadow self" or "second soul", a nahualli is a specific Aztec religious concept: basically, the idea is that all people are born with only half their soul in their human selves. The nahualli is the second half of a person's soul, which takes the form of an animal (either a real, physical animal somewhere in the world, or a spirit animal that only exists in the realms beyond normal human sight). What kind of animal depends upon the person; everyone might have a different one, often related to who they are as a person, what day of the sacred calendars they were born on, what patron god they might serve or what their name, specially given in order to attempt to describe their future life, means. For most people, that's the extent of the idea - the average person never meets or interacts with their nahualli, and lives an average life.
Those who are especially spiritually gifted, however - usually priests or magicians - might occasionally be able to find and encounter their nahualli. Usually it is assumed that they can do so because of their great magical powers; there's not a lot written about them from the time of the Aztecs' heyday, unfortunately, since European invaders were way not cool with the idea and didn't really understand it very well anyway, but some Spanish writers recorded that nahualli might reveal themselves to their other selves in dreams, and become joined to them in the course of sacred hunts where the human pursued his animal self. Others (usually casting the nahualli as a "devil") simply claimed that Aztec "sorcerers" could call them up in rituals. Naturally, having both parts of the soul together made those who could connect with their nahualli enormously powerful, magically and spiritually.
Various Aztec figures have famous nahualli, or employ nahualli in their stories. Tezcatlipoca's nahualli is the famous Tepeyollotl (meaning "heart of the mountain"), a massive jaguar that causes earthquakes and flees from the sun, and also possibly Chalchiuhtotolin ("jade turkey"), the turkey that symbolizes masculinity and diseases; both of them show different aspects of Tezcatlipoca himself, appropriate since they are, after all, him. Huitzilopochtli's nahualli are the hummingbird, symbol of virility, ferocity and resurrection, and the golden eagle, which led the Mexica people to their new home in Tenochtitlan to build their glorious empire. In fact, for most of the Aztec gods, their most closely associated totem animal - or animals, since as you can see in the previous examples gods sometimes have more than one - is likely to be their nahualli, as they are all deities and therefore by definition spiritually powerful enough to have contact with their shadow selves. Human priests and magicians also contact their nahualli in Aztec myth; in one story, a large contingent of Mexica magicians decide to undertake a journey to Aztlan to pay tribute to the earth goddess Coatlicue, and because they are passing from the world of humanity into the magical land where the goddess lives, they must transform into their nahualli in order to do so.
This idea of the nahualli is the root of the term nagual, a later version of the word now employed in modern Mexican spiritualism, witchcraft and folklore. The word nahualli is associated with not just the spirit animal but the person who was able to call it up - in modern times, that becomes its primary meaning with the animal a distant second, probably partly through a process of cultural evolution and partly because incoming Europeans were confused about the whole idea - and in the modern day, the word nagual usually refers to a sorcerer, one who is able to transform into an animal and perform spells and curses for others, both beneficial and malicious.
So, for the Teotl and their children in Scion, nahualli are obviously hella important! We represent them in games as a custom Birthright, one that Scions gain once they have become sufficiently powerful to find and harness their alternate self, and all of our Teotl Scions have gotten theirs at some point in their careers, although some sooner than others and some more successfully than others. Eztli, our Scion of Huitzilopochtli, is twin to Cuacitlali, an enormous vampire bat that mirrors her associations with blood and death, while Yoloxochitl is twin to an unnamed axolotl that mirrors her associations with immaturity, childhood and otherworldly beauty. No one has ever actually seen Maquicelotl's nahualli, but we all presume it's probably a jaguar, like his father's.
Details on exactly how we run a nahualli Birthright are in this old post here. And not only are we happy to talk about them, but I know a few Aztec enthusiasts who hang out in the comments who probably are, too! This was a pretty simplified overview of nahualli, so if you're interested in them, we encourage you to dig around for more.
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
From the Heart of the Vortex!
Today, we're clearing out a bunch of quick and easy answers! Blog attack, go!
Question: Would you use Larceny or Art/Science: Computer/Hacking for hacking?
Art (Computer), or, if you happen to have the Polymath boon, it would fall under Art (Modern). It's too specialized a skill to be done with plain old Larceny.
Question: Do improvements to relics always have to come from a crafter god, or can certain relics gain power through mythical events like their Scion owners gaining legend? For example, if a Scion defeated a powerful monster and gained a Legend dot, would her magic axe gain new abilities?
Relic improvements always need to come from Artistry within the game itself; you won't spontaneously gain new relic points from things you do, because that would be overpowered and difficult for a Storyteller to adjudicate (not to mention making people with Artistry have a purview that was way less useful). However, you gain new Birthright points when you become a Demigod and when you become a God, so you could have relics spontaneously gain dots at those jumps if you wanted to.
Question: Why doesn't Ra have Animal (Scarab)?
Because it's really Khepri, the scarab god, who has that association. Ra was syncretized with Khepri sometimes, where the beetle god was seen as Ra's aspect as the rising sun, but if we gave Ra associations for everyone he was ever syncretized with, he'd be Voltron.
Question: According to your posts, Hecate is still a titan (or at least very, very titanic). Does this mean she can't sire scions, or is she goddess enough to do so? Do her hypothetical kids have any side effects (showing up when scenting the titanic, gaining dark virtues etc) or are they just normal scions who might have to put up with some prejudice due to their heritage?
Hecate is a goddess for purposes of our games, and creates Scions normally as part of the Theoi. She is of Titanic lineage and occasionally called such in Greek mythology, but she's the same generation as Zeus' children and had a strong cult worship that made her close enough to humanity to be considered a god.
Question: What do Pakiy, Emamu and Stvaranje mean?
Etymological roots for all the Titanrealms can be found in this old post.
Question: Aura of Dread doesn't specify that it's only for Scions with Negative Epic Appearance, yet it is clearly the starting point for the Negative Knacks. Since it doesn't say "Negative only" does that mean an attractive Scion can still take that Knack? If I wanted my good-looking warrior Scion to still project a terrifying image on the battlefield, would that work?
No. Aura of Dread, like all the other knacks in the terrorizing tree, us usable by negative Epic Appearance only. It should say that, so we'll fix it, but it should also be pretty obvious, y'all.
Question: Are the Avatars going to get worked over with the boon revamp? Or is that a separate project?
It's a separate project, but one that we hope to work on soon, and we're talking about basic ideas for it while we work on the APP project.
Question: I was looking for how Sanctums worked, and found that your post from April 1, 2012 that said you were working on definite rules. Is that something thats progressing without a bar? has the project been demolished? up for vote? finished but not released?
It isn't being worked on at this particular moment, but we could certainly add it to the voting block if it's something you guys would like to happen sooner rather than later!
Question: Creatures are always lower legend than the scion. Does this also apply to Nahualli? I mean, they're YOU?
No. Nahualli are not Creature Birthrights and are not bound by that rule. They are a unique kind of Birthright all their own.
Question: Hello! If a Scion has a child as a Hero or Demigod, I know that the ichor would still flow from the grandparent and the grandparent will be able to activate the child, but what happens if the Demigod becomes a god - could they THEN activate their own child?
Yep, sure can.
Question: I was looking at your Perceptive Capacity table. Does it mean that the furthest any mortal can see is 12 yards (5 on the table)? That seems a little harsh to me, am I misunderstanding the rules?
You are, but that's okay, we explain it in this old post back here.
Question: Do the Aztecs have a legendary smith like Vølund or Hephaestus?
They do not; most of their armor and weapons were made of non-metal materials like obsidian and stiffened paper or cloth. They had artisans that performed goldsmithing (mostly for jewelry and ritual objects) and occasionally traded with their neighbors for bronze, but it wasn't an important enough style of crafting to merit its own deity.
Question: Do Fatebonds get the XP discount if the player has the appropriate Me PSP associated with a purview?
Yes, both the player and their Fatebonds get to buy (or unbuy) that purview at the lower rate thanks to Me.
Question: Do Empath auto-successes apply to Manipulation + Empathy rolls for lying?
Yes, they apply to anything that you roll Empathy for.
And that'll be it for now! Don't worry, we won't be doing a lot of these (we prefer the big in-depth posts!), but since the questionado has grown to a current maelstrom of 203, we figured we'd get a few of the quick ones out of the way.
Back into the fray!
Question: Would you use Larceny or Art/Science: Computer/Hacking for hacking?
Art (Computer), or, if you happen to have the Polymath boon, it would fall under Art (Modern). It's too specialized a skill to be done with plain old Larceny.
Question: Do improvements to relics always have to come from a crafter god, or can certain relics gain power through mythical events like their Scion owners gaining legend? For example, if a Scion defeated a powerful monster and gained a Legend dot, would her magic axe gain new abilities?
Relic improvements always need to come from Artistry within the game itself; you won't spontaneously gain new relic points from things you do, because that would be overpowered and difficult for a Storyteller to adjudicate (not to mention making people with Artistry have a purview that was way less useful). However, you gain new Birthright points when you become a Demigod and when you become a God, so you could have relics spontaneously gain dots at those jumps if you wanted to.
Question: Why doesn't Ra have Animal (Scarab)?
Because it's really Khepri, the scarab god, who has that association. Ra was syncretized with Khepri sometimes, where the beetle god was seen as Ra's aspect as the rising sun, but if we gave Ra associations for everyone he was ever syncretized with, he'd be Voltron.
Question: According to your posts, Hecate is still a titan (or at least very, very titanic). Does this mean she can't sire scions, or is she goddess enough to do so? Do her hypothetical kids have any side effects (showing up when scenting the titanic, gaining dark virtues etc) or are they just normal scions who might have to put up with some prejudice due to their heritage?
Hecate is a goddess for purposes of our games, and creates Scions normally as part of the Theoi. She is of Titanic lineage and occasionally called such in Greek mythology, but she's the same generation as Zeus' children and had a strong cult worship that made her close enough to humanity to be considered a god.
Question: What do Pakiy, Emamu and Stvaranje mean?
Etymological roots for all the Titanrealms can be found in this old post.
Question: Aura of Dread doesn't specify that it's only for Scions with Negative Epic Appearance, yet it is clearly the starting point for the Negative Knacks. Since it doesn't say "Negative only" does that mean an attractive Scion can still take that Knack? If I wanted my good-looking warrior Scion to still project a terrifying image on the battlefield, would that work?
No. Aura of Dread, like all the other knacks in the terrorizing tree, us usable by negative Epic Appearance only. It should say that, so we'll fix it, but it should also be pretty obvious, y'all.
Question: Are the Avatars going to get worked over with the boon revamp? Or is that a separate project?
It's a separate project, but one that we hope to work on soon, and we're talking about basic ideas for it while we work on the APP project.
Question: I was looking for how Sanctums worked, and found that your post from April 1, 2012 that said you were working on definite rules. Is that something thats progressing without a bar? has the project been demolished? up for vote? finished but not released?
It isn't being worked on at this particular moment, but we could certainly add it to the voting block if it's something you guys would like to happen sooner rather than later!
Question: Creatures are always lower legend than the scion. Does this also apply to Nahualli? I mean, they're YOU?
No. Nahualli are not Creature Birthrights and are not bound by that rule. They are a unique kind of Birthright all their own.
Question: Hello! If a Scion has a child as a Hero or Demigod, I know that the ichor would still flow from the grandparent and the grandparent will be able to activate the child, but what happens if the Demigod becomes a god - could they THEN activate their own child?
Yep, sure can.
Question: I was looking at your Perceptive Capacity table. Does it mean that the furthest any mortal can see is 12 yards (5 on the table)? That seems a little harsh to me, am I misunderstanding the rules?
You are, but that's okay, we explain it in this old post back here.
Question: Do the Aztecs have a legendary smith like Vølund or Hephaestus?
They do not; most of their armor and weapons were made of non-metal materials like obsidian and stiffened paper or cloth. They had artisans that performed goldsmithing (mostly for jewelry and ritual objects) and occasionally traded with their neighbors for bronze, but it wasn't an important enough style of crafting to merit its own deity.
Question: Do Fatebonds get the XP discount if the player has the appropriate Me PSP associated with a purview?
Yes, both the player and their Fatebonds get to buy (or unbuy) that purview at the lower rate thanks to Me.
Question: Do Empath auto-successes apply to Manipulation + Empathy rolls for lying?
Yes, they apply to anything that you roll Empathy for.
And that'll be it for now! Don't worry, we won't be doing a lot of these (we prefer the big in-depth posts!), but since the questionado has grown to a current maelstrom of 203, we figured we'd get a few of the quick ones out of the way.
Back into the fray!
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Most Masculine of Birds
Question: You've listed Tepeyollotl as the nahualli of Tezcatlipoca, and while that makes sense I have one question. I read about a god named Chalchihuihtotolin who was also listed as Tezcatlipoca's nahualli. Is this a case of bad info or multiple nahualli?
Hard to say, actually!
"Chalchiuhtotolin" is really just a very fancy way of saying "jade poultry", which is referring to that most venerable creature: the turkey. Don't laugh. Aztec turkeys are serious business.
See? He is not to be trifled with.
Turkeys do in fact appear associated with Tezcatlipoca more than a few times in Aztec art and iconography; sometimes they even have the smoking mirror replacing one of their feet, a clear sign that we're actually looking at Tezcatlipoca in the form of a turkey. Turkeys were heavily associated with nobility thanks to their impressive size and coloring, and since Tezcatlipoca is the god of nobility himself, it makes natural sense for turkeys to be attached to him, and he also sometimes shows up wearing their feathers. Turkeys were also symbols of youth and masculine virility (which makes sense if you have ever seen a male turkey freak out over mating season), another of Tezcatlipoca's traditional domains. And finally, turkeys are delicious, which made them a perfect symbol for sacrificial victims, leading them to be linked to the cult of the ixiptla, a mortal who "became" Tezcatlipoca before being sacrificed to him.
It's really up to individual Storyteller decision whether or not Chalchiuhtotolin is actually a nahualli, or just a shape Tezcatlipoca takes sometimes, or even a minor god of his own who works closely with him (a former Scion, perhaps?). Old Tezcat is famous for turning into all kinds of things, not just random animals but also inanimate objects and various humans, and so it's sometimes a little sketchy to try to guess whether the turkey is genuinely a nahualli or just one of his many shenanigans. Certainly, the turkey isn't nearly as commonly or strongly associated with him as the jaguar, so some scholars have placed it at a lower level of importance than a full-on nahualli would have. At the same time, though, the turkey (especially with mirror-foot) definitely appears to be an aspect of Tezcatlipoca in some way, and there's certainly a precedent in Aztec mythology for gods with more than one nahualli in both Huitzilopochtli (the hummingbird and the eagle) and Itzpapalotl (the butterfly/bat and the deer).
So it's your call, really. Tepeyollotl is pretty solid as the Smoking Mirror's better half, but that doesn't mean you can't use Chalchiuhtotolin as another nahualli belonging to him if you want to. And even if you decide against going with a true nahualli, for a god as full of shapeshifting and illusiory misbehavior as Tezcatlipoca, turning into a turkey on a whim whenever it suits your plot is as easy as snapping his fingers or inducing Quetzalcoatl to commit suicide.
Hard to say, actually!
"Chalchiuhtotolin" is really just a very fancy way of saying "jade poultry", which is referring to that most venerable creature: the turkey. Don't laugh. Aztec turkeys are serious business.
See? He is not to be trifled with.
Turkeys do in fact appear associated with Tezcatlipoca more than a few times in Aztec art and iconography; sometimes they even have the smoking mirror replacing one of their feet, a clear sign that we're actually looking at Tezcatlipoca in the form of a turkey. Turkeys were heavily associated with nobility thanks to their impressive size and coloring, and since Tezcatlipoca is the god of nobility himself, it makes natural sense for turkeys to be attached to him, and he also sometimes shows up wearing their feathers. Turkeys were also symbols of youth and masculine virility (which makes sense if you have ever seen a male turkey freak out over mating season), another of Tezcatlipoca's traditional domains. And finally, turkeys are delicious, which made them a perfect symbol for sacrificial victims, leading them to be linked to the cult of the ixiptla, a mortal who "became" Tezcatlipoca before being sacrificed to him.
It's really up to individual Storyteller decision whether or not Chalchiuhtotolin is actually a nahualli, or just a shape Tezcatlipoca takes sometimes, or even a minor god of his own who works closely with him (a former Scion, perhaps?). Old Tezcat is famous for turning into all kinds of things, not just random animals but also inanimate objects and various humans, and so it's sometimes a little sketchy to try to guess whether the turkey is genuinely a nahualli or just one of his many shenanigans. Certainly, the turkey isn't nearly as commonly or strongly associated with him as the jaguar, so some scholars have placed it at a lower level of importance than a full-on nahualli would have. At the same time, though, the turkey (especially with mirror-foot) definitely appears to be an aspect of Tezcatlipoca in some way, and there's certainly a precedent in Aztec mythology for gods with more than one nahualli in both Huitzilopochtli (the hummingbird and the eagle) and Itzpapalotl (the butterfly/bat and the deer).
So it's your call, really. Tepeyollotl is pretty solid as the Smoking Mirror's better half, but that doesn't mean you can't use Chalchiuhtotolin as another nahualli belonging to him if you want to. And even if you decide against going with a true nahualli, for a god as full of shapeshifting and illusiory misbehavior as Tezcatlipoca, turning into a turkey on a whim whenever it suits your plot is as easy as snapping his fingers or inducing Quetzalcoatl to commit suicide.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Uayward Son
Question: In your system, does the Maya idea of uay work similarly to how you worked the nagual?
Question: Love the nahualli of the Aztec, what about the wayob of the Maya?
Yes, as a matter of fact! While we don't have any active K'uh running around right now, we would be inclined to use a similar model for uayob as we do for nahualli, setting them up as customized special Birthrights tailored to the Scion who is attached to them. The concepts are similar enough that most of the nahualli Birthright effects make sense for a Maya Scion as well, so those who want to use the same template can go right on trucking.
There are some differences between the Aztec idea of the nahualli and the Maya idea of the uay, however, which may require that Storytellers and players investigate alternatives and get creative. Where nahualli are always animals with no exceptions, uayob are usually animals but can appear in other forms as well, such as the famous skeleton uayob of the Underworld deities. There's also an interesting concept among the Maya that doesn't appear for the Aztecs of animals having uay of their own, so where a Scion might have an animal as a uay, an animal might have a human twin, or another animal, that behaves similarly for it. You might be able to do some particularly neat things with a Scion who has a Birthright Creature and is its uay, providing it unusual bonuses or abilities (but remember to keep this all reasonably Birthright cost-appropriate!). Finally, the Aztec concept of a nahualli hits the idea of the other half of the soul very hard, but the Maya concept of the uay, while incorporating the same idea, tends more toward illustrating a figure's magical powers, so you may want to experiment with uayob being less about the Scion's personal attributes and self and more about things he can do.
Uayob aren't up to the totally crazy level of inclusion as, say, the Deva vahanas which can basically be any darn thing in the world; for most PCs, they'll probably be animals and the nahualli template will work perfectly well for them. But if you have a player who's really interested in the subject and willing to do some research to come up with a cool new idea, by all means, tinker away until it fits.
Question: Love the nahualli of the Aztec, what about the wayob of the Maya?
Yes, as a matter of fact! While we don't have any active K'uh running around right now, we would be inclined to use a similar model for uayob as we do for nahualli, setting them up as customized special Birthrights tailored to the Scion who is attached to them. The concepts are similar enough that most of the nahualli Birthright effects make sense for a Maya Scion as well, so those who want to use the same template can go right on trucking.
There are some differences between the Aztec idea of the nahualli and the Maya idea of the uay, however, which may require that Storytellers and players investigate alternatives and get creative. Where nahualli are always animals with no exceptions, uayob are usually animals but can appear in other forms as well, such as the famous skeleton uayob of the Underworld deities. There's also an interesting concept among the Maya that doesn't appear for the Aztecs of animals having uay of their own, so where a Scion might have an animal as a uay, an animal might have a human twin, or another animal, that behaves similarly for it. You might be able to do some particularly neat things with a Scion who has a Birthright Creature and is its uay, providing it unusual bonuses or abilities (but remember to keep this all reasonably Birthright cost-appropriate!). Finally, the Aztec concept of a nahualli hits the idea of the other half of the soul very hard, but the Maya concept of the uay, while incorporating the same idea, tends more toward illustrating a figure's magical powers, so you may want to experiment with uayob being less about the Scion's personal attributes and self and more about things he can do.
Uayob aren't up to the totally crazy level of inclusion as, say, the Deva vahanas which can basically be any darn thing in the world; for most PCs, they'll probably be animals and the nahualli template will work perfectly well for them. But if you have a player who's really interested in the subject and willing to do some research to come up with a cool new idea, by all means, tinker away until it fits.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Bat on a Hot Tin Roof
Question: If you don't mind me asking about your games, I have a inquiry about Eztli. I've watched her Twitter with the humorous bat outbursts. My question is, when she does transform into her bat-self, does she speak and act like that to the band? Is she locked in a complete primal mindset? What is she like when the bat comes upon her?
Cuacitlali really is the bomb for in-game tweets. Sangria's just hanging out there not caring about much, like she does, but the bat has opinions and it will share them with you at the top of its voice.
Because of the way nahualli work, it's not really accurate to say that Eztli ever transforms into Cuacitlali. Cuacitlali and Eztli are equal halves of the same soul; they are the same person and both of them are always present. They can and do manifest differently depending on what's happening at the time, so often you'll see one of them, the other, or both at once, chilling in double manifestation. Eztli tends to appear as only (mostly) humanoid when they're in political or social situations where a bat would be inappropriate, usually because Sowiljr tells her to dial it down; Cuacitlali, being a bat, is also very cranky about bright lights and tends to not appear when things are too well-lit. In moments of heavy emotional stress or danger, Cuacitlali often appears by herself, with Eztli completely absent; it's in this form that she threatens enemies, bothers Sowiljr for attention or tries to eat people, because as the more emotional side she often overrides Eztli's natural indifference. Cuacitlali also tends to bust onto the scene whenever stars are present. She is, after all, the eater of stars, as she will tell you whenever prompted.
And, of course, they can also both hang out together in the same scene, which also happens fairly frequently. It's not uncommon for Eztli to march around with her band while Cuacitlali sits brooding on Sowiljr's shoulder, or for Eztli to tend her children while Cuacitlali keeps watch or plays with the littler bats. A nahualli is just a different facet of an Aztec Scion or god, not a different person or creature that must be summoned or transformed into; generally, Eztli and Cuacitlali are mostly interchangeable and can turn up in any combination, because they're the same person in the end.
That said, though, they do have separate "personalities" - or, more accurately, they manifest different facets of their shared personality. Eztli's all pragmatism, duty and law, and she's the part who drives getting things done, safeguarding her people and following the rules of the Aztlanti. Cuacitlali runs all the passionate and reactionary parts of the whole, and is the one who actually gets angry with interlopers, demands sustenance and complains about discomfort, or possessively hisses at anyone else who gets too close to Sowiljr. The bat can't really "come upon" Eztli, because Eztli is the bat all the time (in fact, thanks to Bestial Nature, they're not all that dissimilar-looking anymore) - the only time you could say it really came upon her was when she discovered it at her apotheosis. But the bat can take different "actions" than Eztli classic would have, thanks to expressing different parts of her personality that she wasn't aware of before she was aware of Cuacitlali itself.
But yes, Cuacitlali is pretty much all yelling all the time when dealing with others. She, like Eztli's more "human" half, operates primarily on instinct; the only difference is that she's emotional about it where Eztli usually isn't, so she tends to be more volatile and temperamental about it. She routinely tries to eat Folkwardr (or tries to convince Sowiljr to let her eat Folkwardr, anyway), snaps at and assaults other gods and magical creatures, whines about being hungry (her favorite thing to do is beg Sowiljr to let her bite him, because he's so deliciously magically tasty) and shrieks whenever irritated or angered, which is often. Nobody can actually understand her unless they have Animal Communication (Bat), so her screaming is usually confined to Sowiljr, Terminus (when he was alive) and other bats. Everybody else just hears this.
Both Eztli and Cuacitlali are pretty primal to begin with; it's not like Eztli was ever overly "human" to begin with. If anything, Cuacitlali's the more human half of the equation - emotional and responsive, as opposed to Eztli's brute-force instinct and disinterest. If Eztli had more qualities of humanity, so would Cuacitlali, but they are what they are, and neither is really ever going to understand or resemble mankind all that much. She's one of those animal gods that is closer to the beast than to mortal man.
Cuacitlali really is the bomb for in-game tweets. Sangria's just hanging out there not caring about much, like she does, but the bat has opinions and it will share them with you at the top of its voice.
Because of the way nahualli work, it's not really accurate to say that Eztli ever transforms into Cuacitlali. Cuacitlali and Eztli are equal halves of the same soul; they are the same person and both of them are always present. They can and do manifest differently depending on what's happening at the time, so often you'll see one of them, the other, or both at once, chilling in double manifestation. Eztli tends to appear as only (mostly) humanoid when they're in political or social situations where a bat would be inappropriate, usually because Sowiljr tells her to dial it down; Cuacitlali, being a bat, is also very cranky about bright lights and tends to not appear when things are too well-lit. In moments of heavy emotional stress or danger, Cuacitlali often appears by herself, with Eztli completely absent; it's in this form that she threatens enemies, bothers Sowiljr for attention or tries to eat people, because as the more emotional side she often overrides Eztli's natural indifference. Cuacitlali also tends to bust onto the scene whenever stars are present. She is, after all, the eater of stars, as she will tell you whenever prompted.
And, of course, they can also both hang out together in the same scene, which also happens fairly frequently. It's not uncommon for Eztli to march around with her band while Cuacitlali sits brooding on Sowiljr's shoulder, or for Eztli to tend her children while Cuacitlali keeps watch or plays with the littler bats. A nahualli is just a different facet of an Aztec Scion or god, not a different person or creature that must be summoned or transformed into; generally, Eztli and Cuacitlali are mostly interchangeable and can turn up in any combination, because they're the same person in the end.
That said, though, they do have separate "personalities" - or, more accurately, they manifest different facets of their shared personality. Eztli's all pragmatism, duty and law, and she's the part who drives getting things done, safeguarding her people and following the rules of the Aztlanti. Cuacitlali runs all the passionate and reactionary parts of the whole, and is the one who actually gets angry with interlopers, demands sustenance and complains about discomfort, or possessively hisses at anyone else who gets too close to Sowiljr. The bat can't really "come upon" Eztli, because Eztli is the bat all the time (in fact, thanks to Bestial Nature, they're not all that dissimilar-looking anymore) - the only time you could say it really came upon her was when she discovered it at her apotheosis. But the bat can take different "actions" than Eztli classic would have, thanks to expressing different parts of her personality that she wasn't aware of before she was aware of Cuacitlali itself.
But yes, Cuacitlali is pretty much all yelling all the time when dealing with others. She, like Eztli's more "human" half, operates primarily on instinct; the only difference is that she's emotional about it where Eztli usually isn't, so she tends to be more volatile and temperamental about it. She routinely tries to eat Folkwardr (or tries to convince Sowiljr to let her eat Folkwardr, anyway), snaps at and assaults other gods and magical creatures, whines about being hungry (her favorite thing to do is beg Sowiljr to let her bite him, because he's so deliciously magically tasty) and shrieks whenever irritated or angered, which is often. Nobody can actually understand her unless they have Animal Communication (Bat), so her screaming is usually confined to Sowiljr, Terminus (when he was alive) and other bats. Everybody else just hears this.
Both Eztli and Cuacitlali are pretty primal to begin with; it's not like Eztli was ever overly "human" to begin with. If anything, Cuacitlali's the more human half of the equation - emotional and responsive, as opposed to Eztli's brute-force instinct and disinterest. If Eztli had more qualities of humanity, so would Cuacitlali, but they are what they are, and neither is really ever going to understand or resemble mankind all that much. She's one of those animal gods that is closer to the beast than to mortal man.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Stealing Souls
Question: I’ve read that in some cases an accomplished Nagual could steal the Nagualli of others. How would you handle that in your system?
Trying to navigate the murky waters of the traditional Aztec concept of a nahualli versus the modern Mesoamerican idea of nagualli is a tricky proposition. The two concepts are clearly closely related, but they don't always work in practice in quite the same manner; your question's a good example, because while modern folklore does indeed suggest that nagualli (human magicians) might steal the spirit-twins of others for themselves, we don't actually know of any examples of that in older Aztec myth. The traditional Aztec nahualli is literally half of a person's soul, the animal totem that everyone has but only the most magically gifted or important of people can interact with or harness. Huitzilopochtli is the hummingbird, Tezcatlipoca is the jaguar, and Quetzalcoatl is the plumed serpent; trying to steal that from them would be literally stealing a part of themselves, a much more enormous endeavor than merely stealing a normal tool or bonus.
Since nahualli are Birthrights in our system, it's easiest to just go with the folkloric flow on this one: in order to try to steal a nahualli, you have to be an incredible magician, so in order to steal a nahualli Birthright, you have to be Magic god enough to have the Steal Birthright spell. Furthermore, we'd require that anyone attempting to sever a nahualli from its other half would need to have all ten levels of Itztli, thus illustrating total mastery over the secret powers of the Aztecs. Once severed from the Scion, a god could attempt to rebind the nahualli to himself with Birthright Bond, but in the time that it was ownerless it would have its own free will and could do whatever it wanted, so he'd have to be careful that it didn't tear his head off for ripping it away from the rest of its soul. We'd probably also give it a resistance roll to try to fight off anyone trying to rebind it to a soul that it wasn't meant to share.
Someone attempting to steal a nahualli without being Aztec herself would have an even more difficult road ahead of her; we'd probably require nothing less than the Wyrd to successfully sever it from its owner, and even if she succeeded in in turn binding it to herself, it would probably be as a normal Creature Birthright, not a true nahualli. And, Aztec or not, it goes without saying that the political and social fallout from stealing a nahualli would be massive and possibly unsurvivable; such an act is an incredibly damaging attack on the person who loses their totem animal and a dangerous precedent for anyone to set, and the Aztlanti are likely to terminate with extreme prejudice.
If you're looking for a much lower-scale way to represent the idea of human or low-Legend Scion sorcerers messing around with the nahualli of others, you'll probably need a custom Birthright that allows them to do so (perhaps through creative use of the Fate Prison spell?) and they can probably only do so for the nahualli of people who haven't yet discovered or been able to interact with theirs, possibly only for short periods of time. Once someone has harnessed and become one with their nahualli, it's nearly impossible to ever separate the two again.
Trying to navigate the murky waters of the traditional Aztec concept of a nahualli versus the modern Mesoamerican idea of nagualli is a tricky proposition. The two concepts are clearly closely related, but they don't always work in practice in quite the same manner; your question's a good example, because while modern folklore does indeed suggest that nagualli (human magicians) might steal the spirit-twins of others for themselves, we don't actually know of any examples of that in older Aztec myth. The traditional Aztec nahualli is literally half of a person's soul, the animal totem that everyone has but only the most magically gifted or important of people can interact with or harness. Huitzilopochtli is the hummingbird, Tezcatlipoca is the jaguar, and Quetzalcoatl is the plumed serpent; trying to steal that from them would be literally stealing a part of themselves, a much more enormous endeavor than merely stealing a normal tool or bonus.
Since nahualli are Birthrights in our system, it's easiest to just go with the folkloric flow on this one: in order to try to steal a nahualli, you have to be an incredible magician, so in order to steal a nahualli Birthright, you have to be Magic god enough to have the Steal Birthright spell. Furthermore, we'd require that anyone attempting to sever a nahualli from its other half would need to have all ten levels of Itztli, thus illustrating total mastery over the secret powers of the Aztecs. Once severed from the Scion, a god could attempt to rebind the nahualli to himself with Birthright Bond, but in the time that it was ownerless it would have its own free will and could do whatever it wanted, so he'd have to be careful that it didn't tear his head off for ripping it away from the rest of its soul. We'd probably also give it a resistance roll to try to fight off anyone trying to rebind it to a soul that it wasn't meant to share.
Someone attempting to steal a nahualli without being Aztec herself would have an even more difficult road ahead of her; we'd probably require nothing less than the Wyrd to successfully sever it from its owner, and even if she succeeded in in turn binding it to herself, it would probably be as a normal Creature Birthright, not a true nahualli. And, Aztec or not, it goes without saying that the political and social fallout from stealing a nahualli would be massive and possibly unsurvivable; such an act is an incredibly damaging attack on the person who loses their totem animal and a dangerous precedent for anyone to set, and the Aztlanti are likely to terminate with extreme prejudice.
If you're looking for a much lower-scale way to represent the idea of human or low-Legend Scion sorcerers messing around with the nahualli of others, you'll probably need a custom Birthright that allows them to do so (perhaps through creative use of the Fate Prison spell?) and they can probably only do so for the nahualli of people who haven't yet discovered or been able to interact with theirs, possibly only for short periods of time. Once someone has harnessed and become one with their nahualli, it's nearly impossible to ever separate the two again.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Griffinguy: You probably won't like it
Hey... make me a Hero-level Nahualli!
For a Hero-level nahualli, you have to make a few adjustments. You want it to be powerful enough to seem important, but it can't overpower other Hero-level relics.
I think the best eventual solution is to tie the nahualli into the PSP. The temporary solution I came up with requires an excellent role player and may not be for everyone. It's borrowed in part from a god-level nahualli I made for Kettilla. I'll be making it here for a Death-focused Scion whose totem animal is a vulture, but it should be easy to see where you can adjust it for any character type (though I would not change out the ability bonus for a combat one).
****Nahualli
Add your Animal Ken dots as dice to all Survival rolls.
Add your Animal (Vulture) boons as autos to all Death rolls.
Faunaphagia costs double, but lasts for a week.
Disadvantage: At the start of each day (midnight on earth, others depending on realm), roll 1d10. This die cannot be rerolled. On a roll of 1, you become a vulture. You are the other half of your soul and act exactly like a vulture. You keep all your stats, but cannot use Animal boons. You don't speak or understand languages, nor can you read. Your goals should change as the other half of your soul has complete control. You probably just feel like getting meat. You remember the people you have been around and know that they aren't enemies, but you're a vulture; act like one. At the end of the day roll again and you will probably change back.
So that's my balanced Hero nahualli. I still think they could be handled better with a PSP, but there you have it for now if it's something you might want to use in your games.
For a Hero-level nahualli, you have to make a few adjustments. You want it to be powerful enough to seem important, but it can't overpower other Hero-level relics.
I think the best eventual solution is to tie the nahualli into the PSP. The temporary solution I came up with requires an excellent role player and may not be for everyone. It's borrowed in part from a god-level nahualli I made for Kettilla. I'll be making it here for a Death-focused Scion whose totem animal is a vulture, but it should be easy to see where you can adjust it for any character type (though I would not change out the ability bonus for a combat one).
****Nahualli
Add your Animal Ken dots as dice to all Survival rolls.
Add your Animal (Vulture) boons as autos to all Death rolls.
Faunaphagia costs double, but lasts for a week.
Disadvantage: At the start of each day (midnight on earth, others depending on realm), roll 1d10. This die cannot be rerolled. On a roll of 1, you become a vulture. You are the other half of your soul and act exactly like a vulture. You keep all your stats, but cannot use Animal boons. You don't speak or understand languages, nor can you read. Your goals should change as the other half of your soul has complete control. You probably just feel like getting meat. You remember the people you have been around and know that they aren't enemies, but you're a vulture; act like one. At the end of the day roll again and you will probably change back.
So that's my balanced Hero nahualli. I still think they could be handled better with a PSP, but there you have it for now if it's something you might want to use in your games.
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