Old Gods with Modern Purviews

[wyrdhamster]

Stated as slight off-topic here, we entered in to discussion of how classical Pantheons Gods could take modern Purviews – for example, Internet. Open topic for lists I will compile once in a while from posts. Only rule – we propose maximum two gods per Pantheon per concept, so do not having every long lists of things.

Starting list compiled from my and Dataweaver propositions:

Internet

Aesir - Heimdall?
Theoi – Hermes, Iris - she's at least as qualified for the role as Hermes is.
Netjar – Isis
Devas - Sarasvati, Goddess of Arts and Letters.
Kami - Tsukiyomi - he's big on travel and gossip.

[No One of Consequence]

I have this image in my head of Hades and Hermes going into the banking business together during the Renaissance, and this being part of the backstory of Hades's offspring Mammon.

Also Ares and Hephæstus arguing over who gets atomic energy during the 40s and 50s, which Aphrodite ends up finding so tiresome that she goes off and helps start the free love hippie subculture as a response.

[Kyman201]

Did you try reading the corebook? Where many of the entries talk about roles that the Gods take in the modern day? Or miss the point I made in the thread you cited about how you're looking at the internet as a purview all wrong?

And to copy my contribution from that thread to here:

Each God would find their niche with the Internet as the medium and draw the lines in that.

Sarasvati, the Muses, Thoth/Djhuety, other Patrons of Arts and Written Word would claim the written stuff on the internet.

Loki and Tezcatlipoca would take great delight in trolling subcultures.

Online dating and matchmaking sites? There are canonically in Scion several Gods that bless them.

Other examples of Gods Adapting could include Hephaestus blessing modern factories, Xochipilli being all about dance clubs where ecstasy is handed out like Skittles, Artemis becoming a patron of modern parks and conservation efforts, and the Tuatha de Danann formally accepting Rap Battles as a Noble Art.

[Maitrecorbo]

I cant find it now but i wrote some musing on which gods like which type of video games.

Only one i remember right now is Odin likes counter strike and other very competitive video games but he always ends up cheating and having his accounts banned.

[Maitrecorbo]

Ooh found it.
Meh most of it is boring, like Athena liking RTS games.

But that might be funny.

It might surprise someone to learn that the Tuatha De Danann love to play Minecraft.
The only thing is that they are just about the worst sort of griefers out there.
It wouldnt be strange for a TDD to come back to their minecraft castle one morning only to find it had been burned and tnted to the ground with a signpost in front reading.
"LOL newb.
Stole all your cows.
Signed Lugh "

[No One of Consequence]

I like to believe that Set, Ares, and Loki all consider outlaw motorcycle gangs as falling under their influence, which is part of what inspired my idea for the Lords of Chaos cult/motorcycle club.

[Eldagusto]

Stated as slight off-topic here, we entered in to discussion of how classical Pantheons Gods could take modern Purviews – for example, Internet. Open topic for lists I will compile once in a while from posts. Only rule – we propose maximum two gods per Pantheon per concept, so do not having every long lists of things.

Starting list compiled from my and Dataweaver propositions:

Internet

Aesir - Heimdall?
Theoi – Hermes, Iris - she's at least as qualified for the role as Hermes is.
Netjar – Isis
Devas - Sarasvati, Goddess of Arts and Letters.
Kami - Tsukiyomi - he's big on travel and gossip.

No way man Internet is definitely Odin, he was also all seeing but he also included all knowing. The I internet is one of his ravens.

[Adrasalieth]

No way man Internet is definitely Odin, he was also all seeing but he also included all knowing. The I internet is one of his ravens.

That's the one he uses to contact worthwhile heroes that are not from martial backgrounds (a modern war needs its accountants and scientists, after all)

Huginn, Muninn, and Linkedinn.

[Errol216]

Pft. The internet is clearly Athena's purview. Ain't you kids heard of ARPANET.

[No One of Consequence]

Pft. The internet is clearly Athena's purview. Ain't you kids heard of ARPANET.

I remember Neal Stephenson, in his novel Cryptonomicon, presenting the idea that Athena is the goddess of technology. Which does fit with the idea that she invented a number of things that make agricultural societies possible, taught mortals mathematics, and was highly skilled at a number of crafts that required technological tools. I could easily see her taking an early interest in computers and programming languages¹. I could also see Ada Lovelace being one of her Scions.


¹Also flying machines, automobiles, cameras, the printing press, and a dozen other things. When Demigod comes out, I'm likely going to invent a group of Athenean offspring who are now the minor goddesses of various technologies.

[Kyman201]

I remember Neal Stephenson, in his novel Cryptonomicon, presenting the idea that Athena is the goddess of technology. Which does fit with the idea that she invented a number of things that make agricultural societies possible, taught mortals mathematics, and was highly skilled at a number of crafts that required technological tools. I could easily see her taking an early interest in computers and programming languages¹. I could also see Ada Lovelace being one of her Scions.


¹Also flying machines, automobiles, cameras, the printing press, and a dozen other things. When Demigod comes out, I'm likely going to invent a group of Athenean offspring who are now the minor goddesses of various technologies.

No offense to Stephenson, but if Athena is God of Technology what does that make Hephaestus? You know, the actual Greek God of building things and the like?

But yes, this kind of overlap is exactly why i said "Having a singular God of the Internet is looking at it the wrong way"

[Errol216]

Also, whoever actually takes the Internet as a purview has ascended to an equivalent of Zeus/Poseidon/Hades in terms of Sky/Sea/Earth. That'd be a fun conversation to have amongst the Theoi.

[No One of Consequence]

No offense to Stephenson, but if Athena is God of Technology what does that make Hephaestus? You know, the actual Greek God of building things and the like?

This is mostly from a monologue by a character who was, IIRC (and I may be getting my streams crossed with Gregoy Keyes's Age of Unreason), part of a secret society dedicated to Athena, and largely had to do with her being about fighting wars with brains rather than pure brawn. But part of it went into the idea of her being a symbol - or in the case of Scion, an insperation and motivator - for technological development and its applications to warfare, especially the concept of cryptography. He also talks about how while Athena and Ares are both war gods, they are very different incarnations of the subject. Ares is very much the idea of war from the perspective of someone intimately familiar with the world of front line combat and two people desperately trying to kill the other before he kills him first; Athena is a step removed from that, the idea of war more as a concept and ideal, and of trying to outthink your opponent. I think this may apply to her and Hephestus as well. He may be more of an engineer/artisan/maker, while she is more of the idea of invention itself. In my head canon, I think of them both being gods of modern technology (both in the modern day and the past), and not having much conflict over it.

[Dataweaver]

(Prometheus)

[Kyman201]

(Prometheus)

Prometheus used his powers of Foresight to predict the internet. He's not a Titan related to the Internet, except for one thing.

You know the primal need to post 'first' on anything with a comment section? He started that. And now it echoes.