How to input myths?

[Merion]

I have created my own pantheon, and entering gods and priesthoods is pretty straightforward. But I also have some myth, about gods battling each other or gods being created by others.

Of course I can use the story section when creating a god, but when several gods are involved, copying the text and pasting it in each god topic seems kinda inelegant. I could use a generic "other" topic, but was curious what other people use for things like this.

[kbs666]

I use the Incident topic for this sort of thing. It seems to be the ideal topic for handling events that happened at some time in the past whether or not the date is known.

If you want to record a lot of such myths that occur at some indefinite point in the past you could create a custom topic based on the Incident topic.

[MNBlockHead]

Depends on what you mean by "myth." Are you treating the myth as part of the actual history of the world, or is it flavor text on one groups beliefs about the world, which may differ from and conflict with other groups.

This is what I do.

First, I list all the gods or similar entities that fit into pantheons into "cast lists". In the cast container topic I give a description of the pantheon for some more complicated pantheon structures, but usually, it is just a sentence or two, mentioning the religion and primary ethnic groups and regions, so that those auto-link.

For each deity, I'll give the details for the deity and make relationship links to other deities and another relationship links that are appropriate.

For the tenants of the religion itself I'll create a "Concept" topic that will contain the beliefs of the religion and some brief notes on any organizations, ethnic groups, and regions, so that they link up. I will often have sub-topics under the concept. For example, say the top containing concept is "Tengrism (Religion)", under that I have "Monotheistic Tengrism" and "Shamanistic Tengrism". Each will describe the differing dogma of two factions/denominations that grew from Tengrism. Then I may have further levels for important concepts that play a part in adventure paths that I will want to link up to other topics. For example, under "Shamanistic Tengrism" I have a topic called "Ongon", which is what Shamans are believed to become after death. This way I can link the religious concept to a monster article for "Ongon".

Therefore, in my realm, most of the mythology is found in the concepts, character list, and diety topics.

I'll also create religious organization topics under "Group: Religious" but these topic generally focus on the mundane details of location, hierarchy, operations, etc. with links back to concepts and pantheon character lists. Snippets of myth may also be found in location topics and I may have a snippet on the major beliefs and myths in Group:Ethnic and various place topics, but these are mostly a sentence or two to link them to the concept and pantheon character class topics.

As for events. I my world, there are many competing religions with widely different conceptions of the divine and their own mythic histories. I do not bother to create mythic event topics. I just describe any mythic history in the concept topics. I use events only for actual historic events and in-play events.

If I was running a game where religious events are history--like the Forgotten Realms, for example--I would then enter the events as these are not really "myth" in the Forgotten Realm but actually recorded historical events.

[Barwickian]

I do similar to MNBlockHead for Glorantha - I setting I'm prepping for later use - but rather than incidents I use concept topics for the myths, since Glorantha has no details timeline sequence for myths.

I'm putting in all of the Heortling mythology stories into Realm Works - my plan is to run what I call the Giant Orlanthi Campaign, running over around 15 years. Myths are important to Glorantha, and none of the players is very familiar with the setting, so I intend to read an Orlanthi myth at the start of each session. Once I've read it, I'll release it to the players for later reference.

[Vargr]

@Barwickian:

Hey, that is a great idea!
I better start coming up with some myths and similar so I can try what you do.

[Merion]

First off: thanks for all the input!

Originally Posted by kbs666

I use the Incident topic for this sort of thing. It seems to be the ideal topic for handling events that happened at some time in the past whether or not the date is known.

If you want to record a lot of such myths that occur at some indefinite point in the past you could create a custom topic based on the Incident topic.

Of course! Why didn't I think of that!
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Originally Posted by MNBlockHead

Depends on what you mean by "myth." Are you treating the myth as part of the actual history of the world, or is it flavor text on one groups beliefs about the world, which may differ from and conflict with other groups.

This is what I do.

First, I list all the gods or similar entities that fit into pantheons into "cast lists". In the cast container topic I give a description of the pantheon for some more complicated pantheon structures, but usually, it is just a sentence or two, mentioning the religion and primary ethnic groups and regions, so that those auto-link.

For each deity, I'll give the details for the deity and make relationship links to other deities and another relationship links that are appropriate.

For the tenants of the religion itself I'll create a "Concept" topic that will contain the beliefs of the religion and some brief notes on any organizations, ethnic groups, and regions, so that they link up. I will often have sub-topics under the concept. For example, say the top containing concept is "Tengrism (Religion)", under that I have "Monotheistic Tengrism" and "Shamanistic Tengrism". Each will describe the differing dogma of two factions/denominations that grew from Tengrism. Then I may have further levels for important concepts that play a part in adventure paths that I will want to link up to other topics. For example, under "Shamanistic Tengrism" I have a topic called "Ongon", which is what Shamans are believed to become after death. This way I can link the religious concept to a monster article for "Ongon".

Therefore, in my realm, most of the mythology is found in the concepts, character list, and diety topics.

I'll also create religious organization topics under "Group: Religious" but these topic generally focus on the mundane details of location, hierarchy, operations, etc. with links back to concepts and pantheon character lists. Snippets of myth may also be found in location topics and I may have a snippet on the major beliefs and myths in Group:Ethnic and various place topics, but these are mostly a sentence or two to link them to the concept and pantheon character class topics.

As for events. I my world, there are many competing religions with widely different conceptions of the divine and their own mythic histories. I do not bother to create mythic event topics. I just describe any mythic history in the concept topics. I use events only for actual historic events and in-play events.

If I was running a game where religious events are history--like the Forgotten Realms, for example--I would then enter the events as these are not really "myth" in the Forgotten Realm but actually recorded historical events.

That is great stuff! My Gods tend to be more like the Forgotten Realms ones, actual divine beings that meddle with mortal affairs, but the historical recordings are not always very concise especially for events long ago. So something did happen, but the lore is more a vivid story told in temples (and slightly different in different temples) than precisely recorded history.

[DaFranker]

Originally Posted by Merion

That is great stuff! My Gods tend to be more like the Forgotten Realms ones, actual divine beings that meddle with mortal affairs, but the historical recordings are not always very concise especially for events long ago. So something did happen, but the lore is more a vivid story told in temples (and slightly different in different temples) than precisely recorded history.

For that, then, another great trick baked in RW that you could use is the "Truth Level" property (from the snippet options menu on the right of every snippet) combined with some GM Notes on the snippets - that way, you can have side-by-side snippets detailing the canon history in your game world and snippets describing the current-day myths or stories regarding that piece of history.

If you're not already using the "Snippet Style" properties for other things, you could also use that to further nuance the different snippets, though you'd have to work out your own "system" in that regard.

[MNBlockHead]

Yes, forgot about the truth level. I use this in many myth topics to mark certain snippets as factual and other as not.

[Merion]

Right, truth levels exist! Good idea, will try this out.

Been using RW nearly since release (but rather casual), feels like I'm still scraping at the surface.