Round two!

@Darkspleen for Phystene


@Aristo for Aelius

@BBeast@Cyclone

Very late reply, but I'll have Abanoc make a gateway to his Sphere in Galbar after he's done setting up the Observatory. That'll probably take a while given that I'll have to build a monument pretty early on to help him observe Galbar since Mutton already said he can at best see half of it from his Sphere. Rodent already said he'd help me build it too. I don't know what Abanoc can do to help form Galbar though.

@Lmpkio for Sartravius

As I said for Nepja's review, I'm a fan of Norse mythology so when I see a spin on Surtr and Muspelheim, I like.

You can thank God of War for introducing me to the REAL world of Norse Myth.

I'd have suggested you might also play off the emotional side of heat by making Muspellsheim's essence occasionally drive someone into a fit of rage or irrationality, but the Pit already does that.

Yeah I would love to dive into that mindset - but since the Pit does it already, like you said, it won't be. Although perhaps I could say that some of the Pit's angst does seep into Muspell once in a while, but it might be redundant.

No matter; perhaps old Travis will still make a holy order of berserkers!

Oooooooooh - I will definitely make Berserkers for him.

One thing that we GMs would like to see more of is more details about the natural connections to Niflheim and the rivalry there, but perhaps you two were wanting to explore that IC.

Once I get in good contact with Jepisepter, we will definitely flesh it out.

Heat is a good Portfolio, though admittedly somewhat broad. Your abilities make sense and it's ultimately fine as you have it, but if you haven't considered it yet, I'll posit to you the idea of starting with something more specific like Fire or Volcanos, and eventually taking Heat or something along those lines as a Cluster. Up to you; just remember that specific Portfolios are allowed to be more powerful than broad ones.

I'll keep it as is for now. However, one other portfolio I consider getting is forges (since his heat does make and create metals), for the mortals to make axes and tools. This can be good for the creation of Berserkers actually.

As far as persona, you can join the (trio?) of angry griefers; you've got Orvus, Narzhak, and maybe even Mel to smash things with!

Fucking sold. You know he's gonna join them.

I don't think you'll run out of stuff to do, but eventually I hope you'll find something for Sartravius to do beyond sulking or rampaging; too much of that from a main character can get stale after a while. But the fact that you mention him having worshipers and life in his Sphere indicates that you're thinking about having Sartravius take on some more creative pursuits as well, which I like.

Oh definitely I got other plans than simple destruction. Again, getting the forges portfolio will open up some cool possibilities. We'll see what else happens along the lines and go from there.

One last note: just be aware that at the beginning, you can only have one form. I think we've already told you this and IIRC you affirmed that the dragon and armor forms will come about later when Sartravius buys them with MP, but I just wanted to reiterate to make sure we're all on the same page.

That dragon form might be his avatar actually. I feel that dragon can act also as a guardian of the volcanic portal into Muspellheim.

Khool

Just a reminder, folks, we're still doing reviews in the background. If you have updated your CS or have any questions based on previous comments, please let us know here in the OOC to take a look again. There's a lot to juggle with this many players and words in the Discord are ephemeral.

In other news, we are likely to get the IC up later this week, after which we will not be taking any new god CSs. Only demigods (and possibly heroes if you want) will be considered for joining the game after that. If you already have a CS in review and IC starts without your character approval, don't fret, you haven't been rejected, we're just slowpokes.

Thanks!

Can you post WIP sheets? I'd make a goddess of mana but I only have her sphere and portfolio down so far.

Can you post WIP sheets? I'd make a goddess of mana but I only have her sphere and portfolio down so far.

Yes, you can (and should) post your WIP as we’re about to close the window to further applicants. Are you on the Discord?

Regarding the soul controversy:

Anyway these are the potential problems I have with the system (not all are objective):

-If god souls are just large souls, and all souls decay, are all gods mortal, though long lived?
-Same, but regarding heros.
-What makes demi gods special then? Why couldn't you just pour a lot of soul into a gecko and make it a demi gecko? Is the process of making heros and demi gods the same, but to different extents?
-When gods/demigods/heros die, why would they go to the sky of pyres? Their souls are still intact, they could exist for eons more, and they have the knowledge to tell Kathy to feck off. They can exist as ghosts forever.
-At what rate do souls decay? How long can a normal ghost think clearly? An extraordinary one?
-What if a god intentionally creates a spectre, a soul bound to no body but energy. Would that soul be attracted to the pyre?
-On that note, what do bodies have to do with anchoring souls anyway? What sorts of bodies count? What can a soul be held in? Can you make a rock with a soul, and if the rock is never broken the soul stays in the rock forever?
-Golems, I mean they don't age. Would their souls decay in their bodies? Would Kathy have sway over them?
-Finite souls, and the peak soul crises, kinda seem silly and off base to me. That's a personal nitpick, so take with salt.

I feel like the finite soul thing simply contrives conflict in what I believe is an uninteresting way. The demon god and undeath god no longer become enemies or allies based on ideological grounds, but we will need to fight them because they are hogging a finite resource.

There isn't really any interesting outcome to a soul-shortage. It seems like it really just come down to having the artitect give us more souls, or bully demon boy or undeath god to shake some souls loose.

Edit : Further thoughts, My problem is that it seems like every other god has no reason to care about souls except at a seemingly random point when it suddenly an issue we need to worry about, and it will effectively force all humanity-sided characters to side with Kath since there isn't really any alternatives.

I feel like the finite soul thing simply contrives conflict in what I believe is an uninteresting way. The demon god and undeath god no longer become enemies or allies based on ideological grounds, but we will need to fight them because they are hogging a finite resource.

I have my issues with the soul problem, but fighting over resources is logical, if not expected, in Divinus, and more interesting than simple good guys, bad guys fight. I don't see how it is different from the other fights that might rise because of portfolios, followers, influence over kingdoms, etcetera.

@Double Capybara Because this will become a simple "good guys" vs "bad guys" conflict. It is "Do you want the universe to operate normally" or "Do you want to mess with it for selfish reasons"

It feels like it will be a captain planet conflict, "Do you want to dump toxic waste in the ocean, or do you not want to do that."

@Double Capybara Because this will become a simple "good guys" vs "bad guys" conflict. It is "Do you want the universe to operate normally" or "Do you want to mess with it for selfish reasons"

It feels like it will be a captain planet conflict, "Do you want to dump toxic waste in the ocean, or do you not want to do that."

Hmm, I am putting trust that Cyclone wouldn't leave it in such a one-sided situation, but upon reading your posts and a few things said, I guess I will ask what is his plan overall. In all honesty, considering my plans for Urhu and her personality, she will be out against Kath big time. I assumed this was an option, though in discord there was this entry,

"It oculd lead to a Thanos situation where more souls are needed, so some gods see the solution as being to eradicate a significant fraction of life so as to free up souls
...or it could lead to trying to ask the Architect for more souls
OR it could lead to trying to free the souls trapped in the undead Sphere
see how many possibilities there are?"

Which really covers only pro-Kathy options.

I feel like this might be a bit much, one of the things that got Sartravius accepted was going with "source of all flames" instead of "source of all heat", which I take establishes some limits of just how influential a sphere can be, and if truly everyone needs to dance along with Kath or risk the death of everything, eh, that is a bit more serious than the latter case.

I missed most of the discussion, so I'm coming in with a very limited perspective, but I gathered that souls are a finite resource. There's a 'pool' they're drawn from and recycled into when things are born and die.

However, what I'm not understanding is why this exists when we, as gods, can hocus-pocus things into existence. I understand we're not omnipotent, but we have the means to create. So why are souls so distinct?

It was brought up in another discord I think, but what constitutes a soul? Can you make artificial souls? Clearly demons function (albeit poorly) without souls, so basic function isn't predicated on having a soul.

What if a god dumped might into making home grown souls? What if multiple gods established a system, we'll call it 'spirit', that does the same thing as souls?

For clarity, the posts above are in response to a debate that sparked on the Discord. I pinned the message where it started so that anybody who cares can jump up to it and read through, but I also told everyone to post the gist of their arguments so that others can more easily see and that it'll be easier to keep track of what's decided.

There were a few things that came up, most related to Katharsos and the current model of souls and recycling souls as it was implied in my CS. Obviously I'm quite invested in the argument because Katharsos would become absolutely pointless were some of the proposed changes to be made, and for that reason I'm going to at least wait for @BBeast and @Muttonhawk to weigh in.

1. The souls in the universe were let in when the Architect opened up the hole to Beyond, allowing entry to the souls of both the gods and everything else. There is a finite number of souls in the universe; more cannot be created. This is why Katharsos has the Sky of Pyres and why he insists upon recycling them.

2. [This idea has since been REDACTED by Cyclone, who was swayed on the Discord, mainly through the argument that this means demigods make no sense.] Gods have souls too, just like mortals. This is supported because they were brought in alongside everything else, how some gods also have seemingly mundane backstories like having been a weatherman or a fish in their previous existence, by how Katharsos believes he must one day burn the souls of the other gods (and my OOC opinion that such an event would make a cool thing IC).

3. Souls decay and get worn down over time, which is why Katharsos believes that he must recycle them, and which can pose potentially big problems to immortal races/beings whose souls would invariably decay.

---

I feel like the finite soul thing simply contrives conflict in what I believe is an uninteresting way. The demon god and undeath god no longer become enemies or allies based on ideological grounds, but we will need to fight them because they are hogging a finite resource.

There isn't really any interesting outcome to a soul-shortage. It seems like it really just come down to having the artitect give us more souls, or bully demon boy or undeath god to shake some souls loose.

Edit : Further thoughts, My problem is that it seems like every other god has no reason to care about souls except at a seemingly random point when it suddenly an issue we need to worry about, and it will effectively force all humanity-sided characters to side with Kath since there isn't really any alternatives.

I have little to say other than that I fundamentally disagree with almost every premise asserted. Most of these arguments are subjective. Concerning the last point I will say that Katharsos is extremely logical and the very pinnacle of utilitarian in his thought, and it'd be rather unrealistic to expect everyone to take his side even if it ends up looking like the "correct" one from an OOC perspective. I could go on about this more, but it's not the main point.

I think the first big thing to answer is whether souls should be conserved or if they can be created, as in 1. Personally I think it'd drastically change Katharsos' character (and render his Sphere largely moot) if it turns out that souls can simply be created and that there's no necessity behind his actions. Furthermore, I don't think this is anything more than a thematic complaint, because the way Katharsos' system works is that the recycled "soul ash" just drifts back down to Galbar and sits around until it can clump back together into a soul and be a part of some nascent lifeform. Any god could just scoop up souls and use them; they're not monopolized. Though a crisis emerging from a lack of souls could be pushed back and handwaved indefinitely and until convenient (or explained away through other means; for instance, as mortal populations rise, wildlife and animal populations will fall, keeping the number of required souls somewhat constant), I maintain that it'd be an interesting plot arc that could go several ways and potentially even have an entire Age centered around it.

Issue number 2 can be brought back up again if needed, but at this point I think it's safe to say that we're mostly all on board with gods having "divine essence" that is distinct from other souls. This may have come to be because they were gods in a previous existence, or it may be because the Architect thought he didn't have enough helpers and he arbitrarily "promoted" some ordinary souls into divine essences. The net effect is that demigods make more sense in that they have some divine essence to distinguish them from other beings, and that what happens upon a god's death is somewhat uncertain, but that could be tackled IC; perhaps Katharsos is wrong in his belief that he can just recycle gods' divine essence like he can mortal souls.

Issue 3 is a big one that's still on the table. I was going to have Katharsos explore this IC, but now it's pretty clear that was a poor idea. I'll explain now what I've been thinking: souls are like ropes, and that over time they start to fray, so given immortality a mortal soul might grow weaker and this could manifest as a creeping madness or overall weakness. Some beings have larger souls than others, explaining how some beings are longer lived with little ill effect and how heroes can be created (just enlarge their soul as part of the process). The "soul fraying" would mainly come up if a mortal, say a human, used some means other than acquiring divinity or herodom to extend their lifespan far beyond what is natural, or with undead. As undead grow older and older, they start to become less predictable and more dangerously erratic, which doesn't seem incompatible with Foe and Mourner's Hollow) and is why Katharsos would be fundamentally opposed to permanent states of undeath.

I missed most of the discussion, so I'm coming in with a very limited perspective, but I gathered that souls are a finite resource. There's a 'pool' they're drawn from and recycled into when things are born and die.

However, what I'm not understanding is why this exists when we, as gods, can hocus-pocus things into existence. I understand we're not omnipotent, but we have the means to create. So why are souls so distinct?

You have a point in that the distinction is somewhat arbitrary, but in laying down the metaphysics for this universe the owners of the relevant Spheres get a big say in what is canon. In my case for Katharsos, souls being finite is a core idea. The obvious reason that I'm so opposed to that idea being overturned is that it largely renders Katharsos (as he's currently portrayed) unusable for the RP; he'd be transformed into something evil, which is the exact opposite of what I wanted him to be.

Ultimately the creation of souls can just be handwaved off as a power beyond the capacity of our gods, much like teleportation and time travel.

"It oculd lead to a Thanos situation where more souls are needed, so some gods see the solution as being to eradicate a significant fraction of life so as to free up souls
...or it could lead to trying to ask the Architect for more souls
OR it could lead to trying to free the souls trapped in the undead Sphere
see how many possibilities there are?"

Which really covers only pro-Kathy options.

I feel like this might be a bit much, one of the things that got Sartravius accepted was going with "source of all flames" instead of "source of all heat", which I take establishes some limits of just how influential a sphere can be, and if truly everyone needs to dance along with Kath or risk the death of everything, eh, that is a bit more serious than the latter case.

What would you expect or want for an "anti Katharsos" option? Killing him and putting someone more lenient in charge of the Sky of Pyres, someone who might simply "temper" souls rather than fully burn and recycle them? Not unreasonable. I quite expect for many gods to hate, defy, and misunderstand Katharsos; his conception was of a god that's incredibly benevolent (probably the most benevolent), wise, and even noble, but only if you're willing to accept his extremely detached and utilitarian view of the world. One can argue that he's borderline Satanic, so I'd say there's definitely a shade of gray and that he's not completely white.

I'm amenable to other solutions for such a potential arc, too. And see my previous comment about it being believable (and honestly preferable) that not every god have the foresight and emotional capacity to see things from Katharsos' perspective and take the pragmatic solution.

It was brought up in another discord I think, but what constitutes a soul? Can you make artificial souls? Clearly demons function (albeit poorly) without souls, so basic function isn't predicate on having a soul.

What if a god dumped might into making home grown souls? What if multiple gods established a system, we'll call it 'spirit', that does the same thing as souls?

My thinking was that soulless beings like demons and golems can be created, but that a mortal being designed to have a soul (like a human) simply cannot be born without some soul. Note some; going back to my earlier comments about some osuls being "larger," in times of scarcity the supply of soul ash could just be spread thinner, and it'd weaken the living beings born with smaller souls.

Creating an alternative to "souls" is a solution to the finite soul thing that I'd accept both OOC and IC; in fact, it has precedence because in Mk. II my god actually created beings with something called Flickers that acted as pseudo-souls. It should probably be a really difficult and big undertaking though; in Mk. II, Fate (that universe's equivalent to the Architect) took some grave exception to my god bending the universe's rules.

I think your going to have to go and write up exactly what:
Function souls perform in making something alive which would normally be done by meat irl
How those functions degrade due to soul decay
How demons and the like are affected by not having souls, tying this too the above to points
Separate the soul system explanation from Katharsos's solution to the problems the above cause