Did we lose love during the Gap?

[Swashbuckles]

Obviously not, pardon the clickbait-y title.

But I was looking at the Starfinder deities, and unless I'm mistaken there's a huge lack of a god(dess) of love/romance in the setting. Two of the lesser deities have sexuality (Arshea) and lust (Calistria) in their portfolios, but that's not the same as love (though they overlap, of course). We've also got a god of friendship (Hylax), but that's just a piece of the pie too.

The entry for Zon-Kuthon sheds a bit of light (ironically) on Shelyn (Pathfinder's goddess of love, beauty, and art):

Quote:

Of Zon-Kuthon’s sibling, Shelyn, much remains unknown. Though not silent, her responses to worshipers are infrequent and fractured, leading some to believe she’s traveling beyond the known multiverse in search of a cure for her brother’s ancient, yet still mysterious condition.

While very cool, it does show that even while she's around, Shelyn's at the very least preoccupied. I'm wondering if anyone's filling in for her in the meantime?

[BPorter]

While I think Starfinder is terrific, I think that the Gap is a hokey, ham-fisted solution to a problem that really didn't exist. It creates more setting issues than it solves, IMO. Maybe those deities rolled their eyes, said "too much drama" (which would be saying something), and departed for less convoluted pastures...

[johnlocke90]

More likely, the list of deities is incomplete and details on them are fairly limited because the team wanted to focus on the scifi elements.
The information we got feels like a brief overview for people who didn't play Pathfinder. If someone wants to know more, they can always look there.

As for love, Cayden Cailean had the subdomain in Pathfinder. No reason to think he doesn't still have it in Starfinder. He just hasn't come up yet.

[Pantshandshake]

I'm not sure the loss (temporary, permanent, or sporadic) of a deity corresponds to the loss of said deity's aspects among the varied races.

Also, in space, no one can hear you love...

[Master Han Del of the Web]

I hope we get an utterly alien deity of love.

[BigNorseWolf]

Unless specifically mentioned otherwise, all of the pathfinder gods are THERE they're just not mentioned. Some have vanished (Torag), but for the rest they're just not as important as a focus for the setting. you can still worship them and whatnot. Calden Cayden still has followers and a church/beerhall on absolom.

(Headcannon: as a non polar chemical alchohol is seen as a uniting force, working for/on those with left and right handed chirality schemes)

Master Han Del of the Web wrote:

I hope we get an utterly alien deity of love.

The beast with a million backs?

[Xenocrat]

The core deities are those whose areas of interest span numerous worlds and the concerns of spacefarers of many races. I think romantic and family related love are more race and place specific - human courtship customs and fertility concerns likely have little overlap with ysoki, let alone maraquoi or barathu.

[johnlocke90]

Hylax is fairly close to an alien bug diety.

[Metaphysician]

Xenocrat wrote:

The core deities are those whose areas of interest span numerous worlds and the concerns of spacefarers of many races. I think romantic and family related love are more race and place specific - human courtship customs and fertility concerns likely have little overlap with ysoki, let alone maraquoi or barathu.

This may be true, but its not really relevant to Shelyn, who is more a goddess of beauty and art and compassion. The details of how people pick their mates, or even *if* they pick mates, are largely irrelevant to her except for how it inspires them to find and share beauty.

That said. . . if you want an alien god of love? Oras is your man/woman/entity of any other gender. No matter what tab or slot you have, Oras will see it work. ;)

[BigNorseWolf]

Starfinder fact: the maraquois god of love is also the patron deity of three dimensional chess

[Swashbuckles]

Good answers everyone! Fair point about the Pathfinder deities still kicking around in most cases (in all likelihood). I still find it an odd omission in a "core" pantheon, but that's purely subjective of course.

[BigNorseWolf]

This thread brought to you by tinder. The goblin dating app. Tinder. Ignite your love.. and everything else.

[NorthernDruid]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

This thread brought to you by tinder. The goblin dating app. Tinder. Ignite your love.. and everything else.

this deserves to be repeated to the pop-culture thread in the homebrew forum.