The following is the rough Myth Cycle I've come up with. The Myth Cycle covers the Comics Code that will be followed in the various Ages, and the Ages that can come next. In a campaign, players could follow the Myth Cycle I've laid out, create their own, or come up with the Myth Cycle on the fly as they advance through the Ages. This is meant to be both play resource and inspiration/guideline for what Myth Cycles are about - it was barely researched and is not intended to be definitive.

Also, the playtest draft is completed. Anyone interested in playtesting can send me an e-mail at bret.gillan@gmail.com or PM me (while we still can). It's a busy week for me at work so it may take me awhile to get back to you.

The Myth Cycle
===============
The Beginning
--------------
Everything must be subordinate to the will of the gods.
Nothing may be unmade.

Leads: The Time of Ancients, Untamed Wild

The Time of the Ancients
-------------------------
The ancient races cannot be destroyed.
The bond between the ancient races and the gods cannot be broken.

Leads: Judgment, Age of Wonders

Untamed Wild
-------------
Sentient beings cannot arise.
The wild cannot be conquered.

Leads: Dawn of Civilization, The Great Beasts

Judgment
---------
The ancients cannot escape their destruction.
The gods cannot be merciful.

Leads: Dark Age, Dawn of Civilization

Age of Wonders
---------------
Nothing mundane can occur.
The ancient races cannot suffer setbacks.

Leads: Judgment, Birth of the Enemy

Dawn of Civilization
---------------------
The rise of sentient beings cannot be thwarted.
Civilization cannot be destroyed.

Leads: Golden Age, Age of Heroes

The Great Beasts
-----------------
Beasts cannot lose their control of the world.
Sentient beings cannot be victorious.

Leads: Dawn of Civilization, Disaster

Dark Age
---------
No progress can be made.
Setbacks cannot be overcome.

Leads: The Great War, Age of Heroes

Birth of the Enemy
------------------
The enemy cannot be destroyed or pacified.
The enemy cannot win.

Leads: The Great War, Rise of an Empire

Golden Age
-----------
No one can suffer from poverty.
Progress cannot be halted.

Leads: Dark Age, Age of Heroes

Age of Heroes
--------------
Heroes cannot lose.
Heroes cannot die in vain.

Leads: Birth of the Enemy, The Great War

Disaster
---------
Disaster cannot be averted.
The majority of life cannot escape destruction.

Leads: Wasteland, End Times

The Great War
--------------
There can be no peace.
The war cannot be won.

Leads: Rise of an Empire, End Times

Rise of an Empire
------------------
Disunity cannot arise.
The empire cannot be defeated.

Leads: The Great War, End Times

Wasteland
----------
Nature cannot flourish.
Great cities cannot arise.

Leads: The Great War, End Times

End Times
----------
Nothing and no one can escape destruction.
There can be no hope.

Leads: None

How is a lead triggered? Instead of gloating?

Bret wrote:
Nothing mundane can occur.

How about: After 5 (or whatever number) of Story Tokens are earned via Gloating, the age can end via an Event, with whoever narrates the event deciding the lead?

yrs--
--Ben

Andrew wrote:
How is a lead triggered? Instead of gloating?

Bret wrote:
When all of its check-off traits have been used, the Conflict: "Event: A new age dawns," is triggered, and the player who wins that Conflict decides which of the two leads comes next.

Indeed I am, Tony. I just need to be more transparent when answering questions about my game.

When the triggered Conflict is laid on the table, or when someone rolls up one side or the other, it should be made clear to the group which side is which. "The black die is for End Times, the white die is for The Great War," or, "Okay, I'm rolling up in favor of Untamed Wilds."

Damn this sounds cool.

::ahem::

I wish I was in a position to playtest but I am still rallying the troops to play some vanilla Capes.  What do you imagine your ETA might look like?  If you would prefer not to say to avoid people hassling you about it that's cool.  I'll get in on it if my own Capes learning process permits.  Anyhow, I really like the flowcharty structure you have going there so far.  Good luck with Gods!

One thing I see is that there are some ways to move through the Leads that would make a game much shorter than other combinations.  The Beginning-->Untamed Wild-->The Great Beasts-->Disaster-->End Times being the shortest I noticed.  No value judgement on that, just an observation.  Other paths could be at least twice as long.  Seems to give room for apocalyptic deities to imminentize the eschaton for sure, which I think would be a feature.

Jason

Thanks Jason. I'm extremely excited about the game myself. Ever since a conversation with Tony brought about the Myth Cycle idea I've felt like Gods has really developed into something more than "Capes, but different."

I'm not sure what you mean by "What do you imagine your ETA might look like?" Do you mean publishing it in, like, book form?

And yes, I realize that some paths to the End are quicker than others. That's not a bug, it's a feature. :) I want to allow for variations in game length from group-to-group. My main concern with the Myth Cycle, actually, is that it might steer the plot of the game in specific directions, so I think in my text I'm going to be emphasizing it as an example, and expand on the idea of groups making their own Myth Cycle beforehand or as they play. The purpose of Gods is to have groups create their own worlds and mythologies, so while I think the Myth Cycle-Comics Code idea is awesome I want to emphasize groups creating their own.

Thanks for your thoughts, Jason, and good luck getting a Capes game together!

Bret wrote:
My main concern with the Myth Cycle, actually, is that it might steer the plot of the game in specific directions, so I think in my text I'm going to be emphasizing it as an example, and expand on the idea of groups making their own Myth Cycle beforehand or as they play.

Bret wrote:
My main concern with the Myth Cycle, actually, is that it might steer the plot of the game in specific directions, so I think in my text I'm going to be emphasizing it as an example, and expand on the idea of groups making their own Myth Cycle beforehand or as they play.

Eric,

The game can also end from Wasteland, but your right - the endgame options for Ages are a little iffy for me and I haven't figured out how, or if, I want to do something about it. There's a couple of stickers with the current flow:

- The Untamed Wild path can be a little isolated from the other Ages if you go that route. I feel like it's the most deterministic one.
- The endgame options seem limited - if you don't want to hop right into the End Times you seem to end up in a Great War/Empire loop.

However, I want a rush to a quick endgame in five "moves" or a never-ending game to both be possible. I don't want to create a ridiculous network of Ages that get people stuck in loops or don't relate to other Ages in a way that makes sense, so simpler is better for me. Basically, I'm going to have to playtest it and see what I think, and while I want to let the other players in my playtest organically shape what happens I'm definitely going to be "aiming" for problem spots in the Myth Cycle.

Really, though, the more I think about it more I want this Myth Cycle to be a "sample" Myth Cycle, not the only one - that frees up my angst about it as well as pushing the hack towards what I want it to be - an opportunity for a player group to go crazy with creativity. I want to provide guidelines for structuring your own Myth Cycle as well as encouraging a "freeform" option where the winner of the New Age Conflict gets to set the Code for the next Age ensuring that it will be hotly contested.

Eric wrote:

Bret wrote:
My main concern with the Myth Cycle, actually, is that it might steer the plot of the game in specific directions, so I think in my text I'm going to be emphasizing it as an example, and expand on the idea of groups making their own Myth Cycle beforehand or as they play.

It seem like the end game in particular have very few paths.  Does the world have to end from empire or war?  I don't know if this is a bug or a feature, but my intution would be to try to find more than two penultimate steps. 

Giving "an empire emerges" a lead to "golden age" would be swiffy.  Then you can have a few ages of Man.

yrs--
--Ben

The Myth Cycle will probably undergo at least several revisions. I cranked it out in its entirety over the course of three or four episodes of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and walking the line between complexity and simplicity in a way that's satisfying to me isn't going to be done in an hour while Master Shake distracts me with his hilarity.

So I appreciate the ideas. We'll see what happens.

Bret,

All I meant by ETA was some version that would be available for not-just-playtest.  Like, I wouldn't ask about a book because my question is more protean than that - I don't even know what your intended eventual format is.

Thanks,
Jason

Hey Jason,

I have absolutely no ETA right now for anything. After Tony's earlier threat of printing and selling Gods against my will, I'm definitely considering Gods as a product somewhere down the road. That somewhere, though, is at least a year of playtesting away. Once upon a time I could have been playtesting it three nights a week, but now with a full-time job, friends with full-time jobs, and a general lack of enthusiasm about playtesting my game in my local group, the amount of time I'll need to make sure this package does what I want it to do will be given a generous estimate. But who knows, maybe they'll say, "Screw Burning Wheel, we want Gods and we want it now!" :) But then there would be writing up the final copy, editing, layout, art, etc. etc. and I've never done anything like that before so...

My answer is: I have no idea. ;)

::chuckles::  Thanks!  That's a perfectly good answer as far as I'm concerned.  I do now recall that earlier thread since you mention/link it.

Jason

One option you could consider is to allow some secondary options for branching, which are only available if someone invests Debt and splits off a third side in these conflicts. That way the tapestry has some richer possibilities, but you can still lay out the main paths through your tree.  Some examples that occur to me: The Great War could also plausibly lead to Wasteland or Disaster; Rise of an Empire could also lead to Golden Age, Birth of the Enemy, or Dark Age; Wasteland could even lead all the way back to the Untamed Wild, the Great Beasts, or possibly Age of Heroes.

I most particularly would be interested in allowing branching off the tight loop in The Great War and Rise of an Empire, since the other option is End Times; the choices seem a little constrained there.

Threlicus wrote:
One option you could consider is to allow some secondary options for branching, which are only available if someone invests Debt and splits off a third side in these conflicts.

Threlicus, that's a great idea. I think I might even allow it so that you can stake Debt and split off a third side, allowing you to choose any Age if you do so. I think that resolves some of the qualms I had about the current path structure.

Bret wrote:
Threlicus, that's a great idea. I think I might even allow it so that you can stake Debt and split off a third side, allowing you to choose any Age if you do so. I think that resolves some of the qualms I had about the current path structure.

The freedom is (as Threlicus points out) really cool.

There's something a bit undermined, however ... In the existing setup (with only the prestructured branches allowed), Disaster, The Great War, Rise of an Empire and Wasteland are the serious ages.  They're the ones that could conceivably transition into the End Times.  You're one step away from disaster, and so the efforts you make during that Age are earning you resources that can mean the difference between the game ending and continuing.

Once anyone can jump to the End Times at any time, you're always potentially on the edge of the Apocalypse.  It makes the positioning within the sequence of eras into somewhat less of a big deal.

I think there's a lot of different ways you could go with the Myth Cycle - the free-for-all route, the rigid path structure route, the various areas in between. I'll probably stick with the more rigid Myth Cycle for convention play and initial playtesting, but the other possibilities will definitely be elaborated on in the text. I'm not sure if that seems screwy to present the Myth Cycle and then half a dozen different ways you can actually employ it.

Some questions/comments regarding the text:

Under the section "The Creation Myth", it seems to imply that there is one "character" called Creation in the middle of the table, that people add traits to.  Later on, you talk about Creations, being a kind of pared-down NPC for players to use.  May I suggest that this overlap of terminology is confusing?  Perhaps rename Creation to "The Cosmos", "The World" or similar, or let the players come up with a name appropriate to the type of myths they are making up?

The comics code for End Times in the list of myth cycles is different from that described in the section "On through the Ages".

My assumption is that the Creation Myth section comes to an end when all the empty boxes on Creation are filled?  I think this section needs some expanding, because I'm not exactly certain what purpose scenes serve here; is there some reason why players won't just keep laying conflicts to create the traits until they are all filled in one drawn out scene?  is there an advantage or disadvantage to doing it one way or the other I am missing?  Also, I think it should probably be Creation Myth Cycle, not Creation Myth.  There could be a number of myths associated with creation, as each part gets put in its place. 

Hans wrote: Under the section "The Creation Myth", it seems to imply that there is one "character" called Creation in the middle of the table, that people add traits to.  Later on, you talk about Creations, being a kind of pared-down NPC for players to use.  May I suggest that this overlap of terminology is confusing?  Perhaps rename Creation to "The Cosmos", "The World" or similar, or let the players come up with a name appropriate to the type of myths they are making up?

The comics code for End Times in the list of myth cycles is different from that described in the section "On through the Ages".

My assumption is that the Creation Myth section comes to an end when all the empty boxes on Creation are filled?

I think this section needs some expanding, because I'm not exactly certain what purpose scenes serve here; is there some reason why players won't just keep laying conflicts to create the traits until they are all filled in one drawn out scene?  is there an advantage or disadvantage to doing it one way or the other I am missing?

Also, I think it should probably be Creation Myth Cycle, not Creation Myth.  There could be a number of myths associated with creation, as each part gets put in its place.

Bret wrote:

I think this section needs some expanding, because I'm not exactly certain what purpose scenes serve here; is there some reason why players won't just keep laying conflicts to create the traits until they are all filled in one drawn out scene?  is there an advantage or disadvantage to doing it one way or the other I am missing?

You could do it in one drawn-out Scene or you could do it in multiple Scenes. It's just that it's entirely possible that all Conflicts could be cleared from the table before Creation (or rather what was formerly known as Creation) was filled, making more Scenes necessary. It's not a strategy thing.

Boy, fella. You're full of questions!

Hans wrote:
The creation of Creation (or whatever its called) is very important, since that thing will be sitting on the table until the End Times, however long that will be.  Perhaps there COULD be some strategy involved?  Perhaps the god that wins the conflict gets some kind of preferential treatment on that element.  Perhaps veto power when someone else tries to use it as a check off.  Just an idea.

Also, can the elements of Creation be changed in the same way the elements on creations are, through meddling?

Was it your intent, in expressly stating that, unlike Capes, the sides to a conflict represent specific outcomes, to preclude schisming to new sides in the "Goal: Create X" conflicts during the Creation Myth?

You may want to formalize the veto rules in the first paragraph under Omnipotence.  In the popcorn thread, I used the terms assertion and proposition; an assertion is a narration that no one can challenge by the rules, and can only challenge through popcorn (i.e. social feedback), a proposition is a narration that can be changed through the rules of the game.  I think that it needs to be clearly defined when a person can make assertions, and when they have to make propositions.  Capes has this; everything you say is an assertion.  You are stepping away from this, and should probably provide some rules to support the change.

Do creations (not Creation) require a conflict to create them, or are they just drawn up like extra characters in Capes?  You give an example of someone having an Inspiration from "the God-Emperor of Korehl's 'Goal: Father an heir'" goal.  If the God-Emperor of Korehl was a creation, is it just pay a story token, write it up, or is it "Goal: Create God-Emperor". 

I am assuming that creation does not mean literal out of thin air creation and includes the results of meddling, so that, for example, Jason could be considered a "creation" of Apollo, because he was tutored by Chiron, Apollo's lackey.  Was this your intention?

My assumption is that Creation's traits only refresh at the beginning of a new Myth Cycle (although I can't find this in the rules at the moment).  I suggest that at the end of every scene, one Creation box is checked off if none were checked off during that scene, starting with the lowest number to the right?  In this way, you are always heading to the end of the current Myth Cycle, even if people aren't using Creation.  This provides at least some "push" to get through the current myth cycle; it has, at most, 5+4+3+1 (final) scene in it (13 scenes, a lot).  This rule may be unecessary in actual play, as those check offs are pretty tempting, but my concern is that near the end of an Myth Cycle the remaining Creation traits may just not seem very appropriate to what is going on, and difficult to narrate into the action.

Hans, maybe we should take this to e-mail, unless this conversation is particularly fascinating to anyone out there.

i totally need you to do this game. A prime occupation of many would-be roleplayers is world building, and i have some people i could sell this to for its weight in gold pressed latinum.

I'm thinking the any age leads to any thing else is good, but i liked the structure of the tree thing to ease the newbies in.
I'd go for something like: http://www.geocities.com/maxkill666/Gods.pdf if the players are going by the "default scenario". That way you could pretend its like a tech tree in age of empires or something. :D

Assuming the entire thing could be played through in a session or two, the default scenario as a whole is then the 'extended creation myth' for the campaign proper because by then you should have enough material to guide things to custom ages better. The end results are not really the end, just the beginning.

eg: Divine Paradise: Polaris style catastrophe. Schism on how to run things. Human nature exerts itself.
Transcend: The transcendant beings are competing with each other using their own creations. The Transcendant beings become jealous of the Gods, or the lesser beings jealous of the transcendant ones.
etc.

That's a hot looking Myth Cycle, oreso. If you play with it, let me know how it goes.

I just did a playtest of the Creation Myth last week. Very heavy on the Debt, and I'm not sure if I like that or not. It means you come out of the Creation Myth with a lot of Inspirations and Story Tokens, but it can be frustrating if you want to avoid being Overdrawn. But we did come up with a cool idea - making the Cosmos of variable sizes allows you to increase or decrease the pace of the game. For a con scenario the Cosmos will probably just have five slots - more slots means a longer campaign.

Damn! Here I'm designing a god-game and Eero tells me that there is alreay one coming up as a Capes-variant.

Your project looks good though.