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Needs? No.
No setting needs a god (gender neutral) of love, lust, or beauty. Especially beauty.
Could use? Maybe. For balance, possibly.
My best recommendation? If you have to have a god of those things make them gender/sex fluid. Shapeshifter if beauty. Those things do not have just one definition. In the past they were assigned because of ideas about which gender couldn't control themselves or some such. Don't do that. Don't assign a sex or gender.
You've just described Arshea, the gender-fluid deity of freedom, physical beauty, and sexuality.
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In pathfinder(and real life) most gods of lust or love or Beauty are female. Do you think the pathfinder setting needs or should have a male god of lust, love or Beauty? or other things usually associated with female gods.
Areshea- Sexuality, freedom and beauty. Is gender fluid.
Hembad- Male deity of matchmaking
Lymniris- Male deity of prostitution
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Also worth noting that Lymnieris is effectively the male deity of consensual sexuality. (Not that Arshea isn't also all about consent, but rather that consent is most likely the most important aspect for devout followers of Lymnieris.) And not the "they said 'yes'!" sort of consent, but rather the sort of consent that comes from enthusiastically participating for mutual enjoyment. That's an incredibly important distinction, after all.
Creative Director
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In pathfinder(and real life) most gods of lust or love or Beauty are female. Do you think the pathfinder setting needs or should have a male god of lust, love or Beauty? or other things usually associated with female gods.Areshea- Sexuality, freedom and beauty. Is gender fluid.
Hembad- Male deity of matchmaking
Lymniris- Male deity of prostitution
Don't forget Socothbenoth!
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In pathfinder(and real life) most gods of lust or love or Beauty are female.
But not all. The ancient Greek deity Dionysus was male and a god of lust, as was the Roman equivalent Bachus.
However, sexuality and sexual identity were concieved of and constructed very differently to now. If this interests anyone, and it may well interest those making the more detailed posts on this thread, it is explored in detail in Michel Foucault's superb "History of Sexuality".
Has anyone seen Foucault referred to in a Pathfinder thread? I think this may be a first.
Wouldn't Cayden Cailean fill the role of Dionysus/Bacchus in Golarion's pantheon? (He's even rather lusty and constantly trying to woo the more comely goddesses.)
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There's a male god of NECROphilia... because yeah...
And a male orc god of lust and the things they do to captives after capturing them
And Sobek, CN male god of fertility Orsiris is for Fertility too
all very male
And as James Jacobs said Socothbenoth, demon lord of everything perverted and taboo (does this make him the patron of the Internets?)...
or do he and Bast fight over that position?
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In pathfinder(and real life) most gods of lust or love or Beauty are female. Do you think the pathfinder setting needs or should have a male god of lust, love or Beauty? or other things usually associated with female gods.
Lymnieris, an empyreal lord who is focuses on ensuring that emphatic and wholly understood consent is exercised with regards to sex. Deals mainly with the avowed chaste, prostitutes, adolescents and unwillingly married couples, all groups for which consent can be a difficult to pin issue. Perhaps that is a bit more legalistic than what you had in mind, but personally I quite like the fact that this deity exists in the campaign setting.
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I don't want to know what a Lamashtan orgy actually looks like.Too bad, you're finding out now: It involves a hezrou, two buckets of Qadiran spice, a glabrezu with a tambourine and a succubus with indigestion.
No, no, no! This needs more hyenas!
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I created this thread in order to get different Views on and Discussion on sexuality in the Campaign Setting.
Such as do you think the subject of sexuality should be explored?such as with a pathfinder Campaign Setting book? Does sex ever come up in your games? What do you want to see in the future related to sexuality? and so on
This is not a thread asking for or about sex rules or stuff like that. It only about flavor(fluff).and your views on sexuality in the pathfinder Campaign Setting.
On the fluff and how it comes across in our playing of Golarion, it is definitely there, but often not central. There are plenty of options for... sigh... inter-species erotica, specifically in certain regions. Rampaging specific types of monsters are obvious, but when castles, nomad clans, cities, darklands, monster packs and fey live in close proximity, it can get pretty weird quickly if the dm or the players have any interests that way.
Centaurs, ogres, Dwarves and fey it has come up a bit. Yeah, can't trust those centaurs and the fey, well they aren't held back by many restrictions or norms in our telling. So the Kelesh ninja hooked up with a Fey noble who was one for shapeshifting. The good news, is this actually allowed learning more about what was going on, who the players were, and to move the party (led by the lucky ninja) closer to the fey faction in a mutual defence pact (got to help out your girlfriend when she is need after all).
We have had players that are interested in roleplaying in this direction, some that find it very weird (I'm just here to kill things), and some that use their character's body to get ahead. Yes, the intel on the Dwarven city is excellent, but did you have to... with that many... please go clean yourself up.
Everyone made a mental note that bard had a thing for Dwarves after that.
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In pathfinder(and real life) most gods of lust or love or Beauty are female. Do you think the pathfinder setting needs or should have a male god of lust, love or Beauty? or other things usually associated with female gods.Lymnieris, an empyreal lord who is focuses on ensuring that emphatic and wholly understood consent is exercised with regards to sex. Deals mainly with the avowed chaste, prostitutes, adolescents and unwillingly married couples, all groups for which consent can be a difficult to pin issue. Perhaps that is a bit more legalistic than what you had in mind, but personally I quite like the fact that this deity exists in the campaign setting.
Agreed, and the minor deities are the most interesting and innovative deities in the setting. Thanks to their makers.
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...Highschool had a lot of campaigns like that. Players learn early on that connections are only fodder for the DM to use against you to lure you into a deathtrap!It's nearly impossible to have a campaign without sexuality in it, unless no one's married, no one's in love, no one's flirty, no one mentions that anyone's attractive, and no one has kids or parents.
OMG! The longer I lurk about the Paizo threads the more arguments I see that are actually in favor of an Eberron campaign! A couple more years and I'll be starting my own campaign. o_O
Warforged completely bypass this whole problem/issue regarding sexuality.
Of course, you can always bring sex in but, by nature, it is happily absent among the Warforged.
See, I think that you can argue that warforged and also undead minions do possess sexuality, but one that is different from our own. I have argued in the past that the Forsaken from the Warcraft universe (a race of zombies returned sentience) can feel love, but they observe a different kind of love.
Warforged and Forsaken are created as tools; previously, they did not have the autonomy to choose their purpose. In the Warcraft universe, the Forsaken wither away if they see themselves as useless and those Forsaken become mindless zombies once more, shambling around purposelessly. Their sentience "dies", analogous to how species go extinct when their biological traits become obsolete.
Forsaken and Warforged have sets of instructions from the onset, but those instructions are no longer applicable to their new lives. So, they must make choices, in the interest of the survival of their own sanity, analogous to the survival of species. They have to set new priorities. A Forsaken or Warforged is likely to assess his or her relations with other minds by his or her priorities determined
I put a lot of thought into stuff. I dunno why. <_<
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Agreed, and the minor deities are the most interesting and innovative deities in the setting. Thanks to their makers.In pathfinder(and real life) most gods of lust or love or Beauty are female. Do you think the pathfinder setting needs or should have a male god of lust, love or Beauty? or other things usually associated with female gods.Lymnieris, an empyreal lord who is focuses on ensuring that emphatic and wholly understood consent is exercised with regards to sex. Deals mainly with the avowed chaste, prostitutes, adolescents and unwillingly married couples, all groups for which consent can be a difficult to pin issue. Perhaps that is a bit more legalistic than what you had in mind, but personally I quite like the fact that this deity exists in the campaign setting.
I very much agree that some of the empyreal lords are way more exciting than the core deities. I also think that xavier c's prompt isn't... inappropriate, considering the attention those same core deities tend to get. after all, of the 8 female deities, 5 of them are naked or wearing revealing outfits, and tying some of the earlier comments in this thread back into it, are (romantically) pursued by each other and/or other deities/creatures in the world.
None of the 13 or so core male deities appear naked, no matter if they're originally an ancient stone giant deity like Erastil or a Dr. Manhattan like Nethys. I think maybe Iori is shirtless? Aside from Cayden being a lech and Torag being married, are there lore-snippets of any of the male gods having interest in anything?
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There's only 10 core male deities, and 8 core female deities. Of the gendered deities, 3 are portrayed nude, all of them female (Desna, Lamashtu, and Urgathoa). 4 are shirtless or wearing revealing clothing, 50/50 split (Calistria, Irori, Shelyn, Zon-Kuthon), and the rest are more or less fully attired. The other 2 core deities are Gozreh, who has both male and female aspects and is portrayed nude regardless of gender, and Rovagug, who is a genderless ascended qlippoth lord who would rather destroy clothing than wear it.
So... yes, there's a bit of a disparity there, but it's arguably far better than most and a step in the right direction. Would I like more eye candy among the male deities? Sure. But I don't buy Pathfinder as a replacement for porn.
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Well, I like Urgathoa's curvy body... =)
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Can't get much more "naked" than that, though!
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I would include Aroden as a core deity since he does have a lot of depictions, lore, and inclusion in material. Rovagug is typically referred to as male, with "sire" and references to impregnating other creatures. Gozreh has one side as an old and angry bearded man of destruction while the other is a nubile young woman of gentleness. I would not consider him to really be that freed of gender norms.
I'm not saying that Paizo hasn't done a better job than most; they have done a better job than anyone, and the fact that this thread is even able to talk about these things reflects that.
I also think that xavier c's prompt isn't unwarranted, because of the reasons I mentioned above. Shelyn and Calistria are both nubile young women with very sexualized outfits and they're both associated with love. Lamashtu is a naked shapely pregnant woman. Urgothoa - whose depiction I love because to me it's reminiscent of a radial bra-burning feminist fighting against the establishment - is still a skeleton with a pair of breasts. If she were male and we inverted it, what would people think of a dude with a skeleton that just has a shapely, muscular rump attached to its pelvis?
I don't think that there's anything wrong with any of them or that even having these depictions is wrong; I do think it's a little goofy that there is this disparity when it shouldn't even really matter. When the equation is "well this shirtless guy getting ready for a martial arts battle is equivalent to this woman standing there in a corset with a whip", it feels a little one-sided - more so when pointing it out is met with the response of "well it's not porn!"
Sure, I mean, yeah, it's not - and for those people who enjoy hot babes in their lore, it is. In a thread that's talking about sexuality in Golarion, I think it's totally fair to point out that the most prominent deities have... well, a particular pattern that could, in theory, have some impact on the world.
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I know all those gods exist. but besides(that i know of) Eros/Cupid and Xochipilli you don't usually see male gods with Beauty or Love in there Divine Portfolio.
Apollo and Hermes for the Greek pantheon are male beauty icons (athletic handsome young men). Adonis is literally the male god of beauty and desire for the greeks. There are a bunch of others among the greeks as well.
There are a ton of male fertility gods in many pantheons. Tamuz from Babylon, Frey from Norse mythology (and Balder for beauty/handsomeness/likeability).
There's only 10 core male deities, and 8 core female deities. Of the gendered deities, 3 are portrayed nude, all of them female (Desna, Lamashtu, and Urgathoa). 4 are shirtless or wearing revealing clothing, 50/50 split (Calistria, Irori, Shelyn, Zon-Kuthon), and the rest are more or less fully attired. The other 2 core deities are Gozreh, who has both male and female aspects and is portrayed nude regardless of gender, and Rovagug, who is a genderless ascended qlippoth lord who would rather destroy clothing than wear it.
So... yes, there's a bit of a disparity there, but it's arguably far better than most and a step in the right direction. Would I like more eye candy among the male deities? Sure. But I don't buy Pathfinder as a replacement for porn.
This is a detailed and well thought out post.
And maybe too much so, at least in a sense. I mean it is fantasy, so of course you find lots of scantily clad females and lingerie armour.
I suspect that people who are overweight, or not attractive for some other reason, have more right to feel excluded by the way Pathfinder individuals are portrayed than women.
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I know all those gods exist. but besides(that i know of) Eros/Cupid and Xochipilli you don't usually see male gods with Beauty or Love in there Divine Portfolio.Apollo and Hermes for the Greek pantheon are male beauty icons (athletic handsome young men). Adonis is literally the male god of beauty and desire for the greeks. There are a bunch of others among the greeks as well.
There are a ton of male fertility gods in many pantheons. Tamuz from Babylon, Frey from Norse mythology (and Balder for beauty/handsomeness/likeability).
I was about to write this post a while ago, but you beat me to it. I also missed Adonis and Tamuz, so props. In the Norse mythos, there is also Njord, whose feet were so beautiful he outshone both Frey and Balder in a foot beauty competition.
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I was about to write this post a while ago, but you beat me to it. I also missed Adonis and Tamuz, so props. In the Norse mythos, there is also Njord, whose feet were so beautiful he outshone both Frey and Balder in a foot beauty competition.I know all those gods exist. but besides(that i know of) Eros/Cupid and Xochipilli you don't usually see male gods with Beauty or Love in there Divine Portfolio.Apollo and Hermes for the Greek pantheon are male beauty icons (athletic handsome young men). Adonis is literally the male god of beauty and desire for the greeks. There are a bunch of others among the greeks as well.
There are a ton of male fertility gods in many pantheons. Tamuz from Babylon, Frey from Norse mythology (and Balder for beauty/handsomeness/likeability).
It's more impressive when you've seen what a rucksack march does to a person's feet. Pulling the warrior routine and keeping your sock-racks nice is a 'feat' in and of itself.
The official explanation is that Njord, god of the seas and fishing, had good feet because he spent his days standing in sea water.
I was about to write this post a while ago, but you beat me to it. I also missed Adonis and Tamuz, so props. In the Norse mythos, there is also Njord, whose feet were so beautiful he outshone both Frey and Balder in a foot beauty competition.I know all those gods exist. but besides(that i know of) Eros/Cupid and Xochipilli you don't usually see male gods with Beauty or Love in there Divine Portfolio.Apollo and Hermes for the Greek pantheon are male beauty icons (athletic handsome young men). Adonis is literally the male god of beauty and desire for the greeks. There are a bunch of others among the greeks as well.
There are a ton of male fertility gods in many pantheons. Tamuz from Babylon, Frey from Norse mythology (and Balder for beauty/handsomeness/likeability).
all I knew is that his feet were white. Didn't know they were gorgeous.
Also, this thread is going in a Scion direction....
God I love that game. Wish the rules made better sense.
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I think people are missing the question of why the deities needed to decide whose feet were prettiest.
Negotiated weregild to the Frost Giantess/mountain ice goddess Skadi for the death of her father. She got an Aesir camp husband but she could only pick by looking at their feet. She was hoping for Balder but Njord had better feet. They gave it a go but eventually separated over climatic preference differences.
Oh my god those goofy stories that add personality to the gods are always the best! I'd forgotten about the foot competition. I have to say, I'd love reading more about those kind of stories with the Golarion deities.
They have a few, like Abadar and the mortal queen, I know, but these are way more fun.
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Also, body water is rather saline, and pretty close to sea water levels, so pruning doesn't happen in salt water.
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I can personally attest to pruning happening in salt water.
Okay, now on to sexuality in the campaign setting.
Sexuality takes many forms, and all of these matter and can be important. There are canon NPCs who are gay, straight, bi, ace, and Wrath of the Righteous even gave us a major trans NPC. Representation is so very important to members of minorities, who get to feel a stronger connection to the campaign setting and know that 'there are people like me!' in Golarion. Then there's the issue of actually having sex, and I feel Paizo has done a great job handling this as well. Even in scenarios where sexuality explicit content would be expected, they tend to give an 'out'. Sure, the succubus might be expecting an orgy, but that doesn't mean you can't impress with some entirely non-sexual performance instead, and that's awesome that they keep in mind all possible audiences.
Now, there are a few areas where there is room for improvement... sexuality often comes up as a theme involving female NPCs, and female 'monsters' are far more likely to be portrayed nude than male ones, when considering those monsters where you can clearly discern the gender. However, I feel they've mostly done an excellent job in accounting for sexuality but keeping it optional.
I was going to leave a reply to this thread, but read your post, and realized I didn't have to- You said it, and you said it awesome. Thank you!
