Warning...this is going to be ridiculously long.


Players: Drew, Jerome, Natalie, Ozzy, Tim

Our World: Prisim is a desert planet that has been covered almost entirely by a sprawling technological metropolis. While the society's technology level is quite high, magic is also alive and well (if not acknowledged as being of particular value). Everyone's position in society is determined algorithmically by the government mainframe, so that each person is placed in the perfect job for their talents. Doing a job not predetermined for you is taboo, which makes even washing one's own windows a massive faux pas. And there are an extraordinary number of those windows, as nearly the entire city--which is to say the entire civilized world--is built of glass.

Governmental authority is also determined by the mainframe, with the president being determined using the same system as a person in any other position...or that is the general belief. In reality, society is run by a shadow government that uses its programmers to control the masses...including the so-called president.

Not everyone agrees to fit into this "perfect" predetermined mold. Beneath the city stretches a vast network of ancient mining tunnels which are home to the "wildlings" (no relation to their Game of Thrones namesakes). These free people choose to live outside the heavy mechanical hand of technocratic authority.


The Gods:

(1) Santus, the Plague Maiden, Goddess of Health and Corruption. Her virtue is that she is harmonious. Her flaw is that she turns things against themselves. Her temple is a sanitarium and healing well located at an oasis in the desert. Drinking from the well will either grant a worshipper perfect health or grant them crippling disease. Santus's priests and priestesses are midwives, nurses, and executioners, and perform funerary rites, birthings, and cremations. They do not wash except in the well, and their robes are stained with blood.

(2) Thalnezza, Who Gives and Takes, Goddess of Generosity and Greed. Her virtue is that she keeps her eyes on the prize. Her flaw is that she gives till it hurts. Her temple is half-buried in the sand and is nestled between the abundance of the city and the emptiness of the wastes. The floors are cool and a small fountain bubbles up to form a small pool in the sloping floor. Her priestesses wear dusky robes and jeweler's eyepieces. They inspect the offerings of those who come to worship and mark them, for each who requests something of Thalnezza must give in turn, and those found wanting will receive no boon...or refund.

(3) Kepen, the Manipulator, God of Honesty and Trickery. His virtue is that he helps failures to become successes. His flaw is that he is easily bored and has a habit of discarding his toys. His temple is a structure of twisted glass, mirrors, and optical illusions. Only the worthy can reach the inner sanctum...then they discover they can't find their way out.

(4) Anaz-Caradool, the Wishbringer, God of Dreams and Nightmares. His virtue is that he is generous with information and inspiration. His flaw is that he is drawn to amplify the faults in others. His temple is an inverted funnel whose interior is dark in daylight and blazing bright at night. The walls are made of shards of many-colored glass, and the priests and priestesses are illusionists and cryptic fortunetellers. The number of chairs available to worshippers always varies, but is never enough for everyone in the room.

(5) Valir, the Judge, God of Mercy and Wrath. His virtue is that he is meticulous in his decision making. His flaw is that he is extremely stubborn once he has made a decision. His temple is a massive courthouse. The priests and priestesses all wear black robes. A giant gavel hangs over the entrance, and there is a set of scales in the lobby where sacrifices (though not of the blood variety) are performed.


The Mortals:

(1) Torrell Sodel, predetermined President of Prisim. As the game begins, he is cursed by Kepen to be a compulsive liar. During the course of the game he gained a blessing from Santus of undeniable charm. He is linked to Lester Phibbs and Val Galendor. He passes tasks to and receives information from Lester. He in turn is given instruction by Val, who is his contact in the Shadow Government.

(2) Val Galendor, a senior programmer for the Shadow Goverment. As the game begins, he is cursed by Anaz-Caradool with restlessness. Later on, Valir cursed him with self-loathing. He has links to Torrell (already described) and Aida. Aida is his "estranged daughter." He originally programmed her before she achieved sentience.

(3) Lester Phibbs, Head of Police. He was blessed from the beginning by Valir, making him cool, calm, and collected. No other god chose to bless or curse him during the course of the story. He is linked to Torrell (already described) and Arina. He and Arina are lovers, although he does not know her true nature or agenda.

(4) Arina, leader of the Resistance. She was cursed to be spiteful and confrontational by Santus. As the game progressed, Kepen blessed her with the ability to be a convincing liar. She has links to Lester (already described) and Aida. Aida is her above-ground contact, and she is Aida's contact with the wildlings below.

(5) Aida (Advanced Intelligence Digital Android), the First of Her Kind. Aida is an artificially intelligent android who has gained full sentience. She was blessed by Thalnezza with a loving heart. As the game progressed, Thalnezza chose to influence her fate again, by cursing her with boundless want. Anaz-Caradool later blessed her with the ability to intermittently read minds. She is linked to Val and Arina (both already described).

Post continued in reply below...

...Continued from post above.

Play: Where to begin (now that I've already written a short novel)? This was a hell of a lot of fun. The premise of Pantheon is that the PC's are gods who influence the lives of mortals, sometimes subtly, sometimes drastically and catastrophically. The mortal characters are not controlled by any one player, but instead are bid on by the gods at the beginning of any (not god-only) scene. The highest bidder gets to "play" that mortal for the duration of the scene. So, the mortals have their agendas, but the gods playing them also have agendas...which might not line up so well with what the mortal has in mind. This leads to a (rather confusing, but fascinating) role-playing challenge, as everyone is effectively playing two characters at the same time...in the same body. In addition to these mortal scenes there are god-only scenes, which involve the gods sitting around and discussing/arguing over what to do with the mortal world. The choices they make usually drastically alter the mortal world for subsequent mortal scenes. There are also temple scenes (although we only had one) wherein one player, usually the active player, plays their actual god PC, and the other gods bid on mortals that visit the god PC's temple.

After some setup scenes that gave us a feel for the mortals and how they related to each other, the gods decided to stir things up a bit for their mortal congregation. They "gifted" the wildlings with chronic sensitivity to the sun and the over-worlders with a sensitivity to the "reek" of the earth itself. This guaranteed that neither would attempt to invade the other. However, since all the water was underground and the wildlings needed the sun to charge the Sun Crystals they used to power both their technology and magic, trade between the two would have to continue. The gods also decided (over the insistent objections of Valir) to give Aida the power to asexually reproduce, creating more of her kind. This led to the mortals deciding to appoint the new (theoretically neutral) android race to act as diplomats between the two human factions, complete with diplomatic immunity in both civilizations.

A decade later, the gods held another conference. In the intervening time, the android race had expanded rapidly, both in numbers and in their political power. Not only were they settling disputes between the two civilizations but were settling nearly every dispute within those civilizations as well (which, again, Valir was not particularly thrilled about). Due to their remarkable reliability and efficiency, however, the world had become rather boring. And, we all know the old saying, "Never Bore a God." So, of course, the gods discussed how to make their world less snore-inducing and came to the conclusion (or rather, the dice came to the conclusion...as Valir, Thalnezza, AND Santus were all against the idea) that it would be interesting to give Aida a chance to become a god.

And so, in our final scene, she succeeded...as Val bucked the influence of his god to save her by diving in front of Lester's bullet. Unfortunately for Val, Lester was aiming at the giant crystal of the magical device being used for the ascension, and not at his daughter at all. Val died in Aida's arms, and the other mortals left the room (either willingly or by force) just before the explosion that destroyed both the device and the Shadow Government's mainframe. In this final burst of energy, Aida was raised to godhood.

A few thoughts: First, giving a character the power to read other character's minds is probably not the greatest idea. There was a part during the last scene where I (playing Aida) asked the other players to tell me whether their character was lying--which she would pick up on--and this led to everyone saying their character's thoughts...which, well, I wouldn't recommend. As I was the instigator of this, I want to pass on...Just Don't Do It. I felt kind of GMey and obnoxious. Second, play this game. I loved my god character in this, and being a god is just SO MUCH FUN. Not to mention, it is good mental practice to try to role-play someone who is indirectly/directly influencing someone else that you are also roleplaying simultaneously. So, yeah, only two thoughts, actually.

Thanks to Jerome for both facilitating and creating the game. And thanks to Jerome (again), Natalie, Ozzy, and Drew for toying with the fragile lives of mortals with me.

And, lastly, thanks to you, the person of questionable sanity that has read all the way to the end of this write-up.