Pantheon (Game)

Dani and Renya playing Pantheon

A card game based around the deities, spirits, and religious figures of Pelted (and later human) religions. Renya is an expert at this game, through petitioning Kajentarel and the Battleangels; so too is Kerov.

History

Invented by a Harat-Shar of the polytheistic sect of their religion, the first deck used the full set of battleangels and their inverses. The game was intentionally never trademarked, so when it inevitably made it into broader Alliance society, which it swiftly did, the deck expanded to include divinities of the Pelted religions. This happened long enough ago that most people think of that multispecies deck as the first real deck... even the Harat-Shar.

But it was a Harat-Shar again who dared to create the later expansion set that included human religions, shortly enough after the Rapprochement to be controversial not just to the Pelted, who were ambivalent about their makers, but to devout humans who weren't a fan of being used in a card game (and treated the same as religions with deities they considered contrived). The deck was "ten years in the research and creation" since there are far more human religions, and the Harat-Shar who undertook it was gleeful about doing the interviews and meticulous about getting the details right.

As a freely usable game, no one person owns the rights to Pantheon (which the inventor approved of). Versions of the game created by various individuals and game companies, however, are trademarked, and can be as fancy or as basic as the market will bear. Expensive sets might have cards with info-films instead of booklets. "Core gods" are expected in every set, but different sets might have different additions/sizes.

Rules

The game is played by drawing a random condition card; if a player has a card they can play to match it, they do so. If one player can play a card and another can't, the first player gets the point. If neither or both players can, the round is a draw. If the round is a draw due to both players having relevant cards, the draw can be broken by playing a second relevant card from the hand, though this is risky as it more rapidly depletes the player's hand.

If the game is at a draw when the round ends, a second condition card will be drawn at random, and whichever player's already-played card matches best wins the round.

Rounds can be played "blind," where the condition card in play isn't known until after the deity cards have been chosen.

Traditionally, the conditions the deities answer aren't written down in full; practically, most people agree on which deities are proper responses to which conditions, however players can make arguments for unusual choices.

Divine beings from the Pelted deck

• we need to identify all of these. Two are said to defy identification but the others should be noted.

• Iley, god of the Tam-illee, depicted smirking
• Naem-fili, avatar of the Malarai, depicted with tears in her eyes
• "winged catlike women in pale robes" (Please identify)
• "fierce nude griffins all golden with loincloths of lake and gemstones" (Battleangels)
• "sinuous hexapedal half-ghost creatures in blue and rime-white." (Please identify)
• Christ, a man in brown robes with a halo, crouched before a pack of wolves (could be St. Francis from one legend or a Hinichi version of Christianity)

Divine beings from the human deck

• Since this game is matching deities with conditions, the conditions need to be noted as well. Most here need to add that.

(with the condition cards they meet in Rayna's and Kerov's first game)

• Kali, a blue four-armed snaggle-toothed female
• St Francis of Assisi, a tonsured man in brown robes surrounded by animals (historical human)
• Athena, a grey-eyed woman in a white gown tied in gold cords bracketed with olive trees (presides over battle)
• (Orpheus? but no tights. Also doubtfully historical) "A man in tights with a harp and an open mouth" (can't place this one) (historical human)
• Kitsune, a pale woman in colorful flowing robes with no less than four fox tails
• Quetzalcoatl, a feathered snake (Please note what this matched)
• Coyote, a dancing man with what looked like the head of a Hinichi wolfine (sense of humor)
• Chac, a brown-skinned man surrounded in corn and rainclouds (tied to the seasons)
• Demeter, a plump woman with a basket of grain (tied to the seasons)
• Morrigan, a woman in a black gown with crows (presides over battle)
• (Ares? Or (less likely) Oden??) (presides over battle) "a fierce-looking man in a helmet, bearing a round shield"
• Thor, a heavily-muscled blond male with a hammer
• Venus, a sloe-eyed woman with a cocked hip and a knowing smile (preached love)
• Hestia, a friendly, round looking woman with elaborate curls (hearth-guardian)
• Christ, a human man, in brown robes and crowned in a halo (preached love, popular among other races)

Sample condition cards

• Sense of humor
• Esteemed for trickery
• Historically recorded as an actual human being
• Tied to the seasons
• Presides over battle
• Hearth-guardian
• Preached love
• Popular among other races