Avatar: The Godhead
Contents
In The Beginning
The Primordials
From Pantheon to Pantheon the story of creation varies greatly. Yet all share a common belief that at the beginning, Something stirred the universe into motion. What that something was remains a topic of hot debate between divine entities within each Pantheon. Wars have even started between the Pantheons over this subject and all now generally agree to disagree with the goal of avoiding pointless violence.
One thing all the Pantheons can agree on is the existence of primordial deities, like: Chaos, Darkness, Day, Earth, Light, Night, Sea, Sky, and the Underworld. Other potential primordial deities include: Fate (one or more), Life and Death, Time (or Eternity) and Love (or Misery). A few of the Pantheons include negative aspects of the previously mentioned primordial deities and can include personifications, animals or stranger things.
Creation: The First Age
At some point, after the the awakening of the Primordials, they procreated with one another and gave birth to the Elder Gods and the world as we know it. These amazing beings had few if any limitations and many represented unrestrained elemental forces. Some were intelligent after a fashion, but many were thoughtless entities who were ruled by their passions. During the first age, the Primordials and their children shaped creation to suit themselves, giving birth to the stars, separating landmasses from the sea, creating mountain ranges and giving birth to the origins of all life. Their battles and lovemaking created the world and universe as we know it now.
So You Want to be a God?
"Being a god is being able to recognize within one’s self these things that are important, and then to strike the single note that brings them into alignment with everything else that exists. Then, beyond morals or logic or esthetics, one is wind or fire, the sea, the mountains, rain, the sun or the stars, the flight of an arrow, the end of a day, the clasp of love. One rules through one’s ruling passions. Those who look upon gods then say, without even knowing their names, ‘He is Fire. She is Dance. He is Destruction. She is Love.’ [...] they do not call themselves gods. Everyone else does, though, everyone who beholds them." — Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light
Dominions
Introduction
The term dominion means the power or right of governing and controlling; sovereign authority. But with respect to deities, the term dominion comes to mean something similar, but different. Here dominion refers to sovereign authority over a given aspect of reality, such aspects cover a wide variety of material phenomena such as: animals, plants, rocks, geographic features such as mountains or rivers or other entities of the natural environment, including thunder, wind and shadows. The deity's divine authority allows him or her to command these diverse phenomena through their spiritual element and each deity's dominion over their chosen phenomena grants them nearly uncontested control of those phenomena.
Classifications
There are three classifications of dominions: common, pantheon, and sacerdotal. Common dominions are available to all deities regardless of their pantheon, sacred band or parentage, provided they are not anathema to the deity or violate that deity's taboo. Pantheon specific dominions are only available to deities who belong to a specific pantheon and cannot be taught to another deity outside the pantheon. Sacerdotal dominions are very specialized dominions that govern the more mysterious powers of the universe like: fate, magic, prophesy and sacrifice. Most deities with sacerdotal dominions are perceived as having a greater power over their progeny, sacred band or pantheon and as such, they are usually loath to teach these secret dominions to other deities regardless of their relationship.
Character Creation
At the point of character creation, players may take up to three Dominions, one gained from their Divine Progenitor, one gained from their Pantheon and one jointly learned in tandem with their Sacred Band. Those Dominions taken by the Sacred Band must be agreed upon by the group of players before hand.
Powers
Each dominion is further broken down into classifications of potency known as the lesser dominions and the greater dominions. Lesser dominions are available to demi-gods and lesser deities, while the greater dominions are only available to full-fledged gods. Within each delineation of the lesser or greater dominions, individual acts of dominion are called powers. For example, the first power within the Lesser Dominion of Beasts is Beast Speech which allows the deity in question to converse with most animals. Both lesser and greater dominions are broken down into five powers ascending from weakest to strongest, so the fifth and strongest power of a given lesser dominion would be slightly weaker than the first and weakest power of the greater dominion. Despite this arrangement, there is a considerable jump in potency between the lesser and greater dominions.
Common Dominions
Lesser Dominions of Pantheon
| Lesser Dominions of the Aesir -- The Norse Gods | Lesser Dominions of the Dodekatheon -- The Olympian Gods |
| Lesser Dominion of Blóð af jotunnum -- Secrets of the Aesir | Lesser Dominion of Epikrátisi -- Mysteries of the Dodekatheon |
Lesser Dominions Sacerdotal
| Lesser Dominion of Fate | Lesser Dominion of Prophesy |
| Lesser Dominion of Magic | Lesser Dominion of Sacrifice |
