So
Dan over at Throne of Salt made an expansion to my Pantheon Generator. Firstly, I'd love to say thank you for your kind words
about my generator, it's actually my most popular post on my entire
blog. It seemed incredibly popular and I'm glad people are thinking
about it. Now let's talk about the expansion that Dan made.
Firstly,
I'd like to start by saying that this is not supposed to necessarily
be a value judgment of which one of us “did it better”, nor am I
trying to claim stole my idea or anything. This is just seem
feedback. It seems his post was pretty popular too, so clearly this
concept interests people.
The Changes
Let's
start with Dan's new “Where did they come from?” table is good. I
like the subtle changes to my first table- his table feels more
appropriate from “ground up” worldbuilding- what the people of
the world actually believe happened, as opposed to my table which is
more objective. I think making information more pertinent to the
players is a better use of time then creating objective facts about a
setting anyway, so I do think his table is better in that regard.
Now
the change to the prime God / head of the pantheon is an interesting
one. The concept of having the Prime God being a trio of beings
instead of just one, or a opposite pair, or something even more
complex (like absent entirely, which I think is a good one) is kind
of cool. But here's where we get to the unpleasant part. The thing is I don't like the Moiety thing. I'm somewhat confused why it's
even being included at all, but I think I have both a reason and a
counter to it. Let me explain.
I
think what Dan was going for here was the concept of creating a sort
of scheme for the God(s) in the pantheon. Something like a Pantheon
being ruled over by squabbling sisters of the Sun and Moon is an
interesting concept- this exact setup is how two important Gods from
Path of Exile are portrayed- Solaris and Lunaris. Here's the problem
though- imagine if you wanted to expand out the pantheon more. Would
you then create multiple Gods that fit with this theme of Day versus
Night? Well, you wouldn't. I mean you kind of could, but it wouldn't
feel the same. You see, the struggle of Day and Night between Solaris
and Lunaris is its own thing. It's setting specific, and it works
because they're locked in eternal conflict.
When
I went to create the Pantheon Generator, I did so because I wanted it
to be a way for people to create their own Pantheons similar to
Greek, Norse, and Egyptian mythology. Other mythologies, such as
Hindu, Japanese, or Chinese I'd also like to emulate somehow, but I'm
less familiar with those. The issue here is these pantheons don't
really have this idea of Moeity. I mean you have good and evil and
yin and yang, but they aren't necessarily evenly split down the
middle. What's the point of arbitrarily putting Gods into categories
of “passive” and “active”?
Now
here's my rebuttal to this- Humans are very good at finding patterns
even where they don't exist. It's the basis of superstition and, by
any metric, religion and religious practice itself. Goblin Punch had
a good post about this just recently too. Here's my reasoning- I
would never need to use Moiety for my generator because I would
naturally find
connections without
needing to. The strange love or friendship between the God of Storms
and the God of Wines is something you can extrapolate- Oh, those two
Gods are paired up? Well, that's a good in-setting myth to explain
why the ocean tumbles and makes waves during a storm- the ocean God
must be getting drunk off the gifts of the wine God! It's an easy,
cheap, basic explanation and easy myth to remember.
Next
complaint (feels like this is just me complaining about Dan's
generator at this point) I dislike the change to the appearance
table. The reason why the God appearances are aged and specific are
to encapsulate the ideas of mythology. I used the term “Mature”
here to mean adult, probably bearded if a man, to fit stuff like Zeus
and Odin as being the old and prime members of their pantheons, hence
why Prime Gods are the aged ones. But I didn't feel right calling
them “old”. In my mind, the inclusion of apparent age and sex to
a God says a lot about their character and helps build the mythology.
By breaking it down into a basic gender table I think you lose that.
And while you could just determine the ages after you make the God, I
think it's interesting to roll a God of the Underworld who is young
and a God of War who is old. It instantly creates a dynamic that you
wouldn't get if you just ran off a list- male, female, female,
androgynous, etc. However, I did like the concept of having them
portrayed as multiple genders, though I don't know how many examples
of that there actually were in old mythologies, it does add to the
mystique a bit. I kind of implied that with the androgynous
appearance roll- the idea of things like Mercury/Hermes having both
male and females traits or forms. (I mean Gods change their sex all
the time so I guess you can argue it doesn't really matter, but a
primary depiction is still more fitting with classic mythology
anyway).
Now
let's address the elephant in the room- this bit.
“You
can only have viable godly offspring between gods of different
moieties (I mean, it's possible to get double hot and double cold,
but that's where you get legendary monsters) - the god's typical
physical representation has nothing to do with it.”
Here's
the thing, if you're trying to emulate classic mythology like I am
doing, a God's gender is supremely
important to their pairing. Godly pantheons are incestuous families,
at least in the sources from where I am pulling. While there are
examples of exceptions of this, like Loki turning into a female
horse, and he still
had a wife who gave birth to several important Gods. I don't really
want to turn this into some kind of discussion about sex and gender
or whatever, but if you're creating a mythology that has godly
parents and pairings, then the vast majority are going to be heterosexual. Doing
otherwise just feels weird at best, and blatant pandering at worst.
I
do like the changes to the relationship table, which gives it a bit
more depth. Finally, picking domains off of tarot cards is
interesting, though personally I think Gods are a bit more suited to embody
physical phenomena then some of the abstract traits included there (for a more mythological pantheon anyway); but overall I think this is a very nice addition.
Conclusion
All
in all, I feel a bit confused by what Dan's table is trying to
accomplish, though I think you could easily use it to create a cool
pantheon. Finally, the concept of the “Godhead” being something
that isn't an original couple is a good idea that I didn't include in
my own generator. I think I'd like to create a more complex, “fantasy
religion generator” at some point that included things like
Monotheism, Ancestor worship, and Lovecraftian outer-gods as
potential symbols of worship along with a more traditional pantheon,
maybe with each part as fully fleshed out as the Pantheon Generators
we have made. Maybe one of YOU can work on this project- let me know!
Thanks for reading, Dan. Bye.
