Deities

Deities or gods are higher beings that exist in the world of Pact. They gain power from worship<ref name=":0">Some think dragons are what happens when something feeds into itself.  Every dragon is different, and some are more elemental, or mostly elemental, or spirit, or deific.  Something like a lesser god that worships itself, or an elemental that takes in more than it puts out. - excerpt from Sine Die 14.3</ref> and are generally immensely powerful.

Nature

It is said that the least of gods is similar to the greatest of spirits.<ref name=":1">The spirits collected and gathered, drawing in the emotion, feeding on it, altering themselves.

They congealed.

A greater spirit, the least of gods, the line was thin between the two.

They wore the form of a bird.

- excerpt from Interlude 11 </ref> In terms of cosmic significance, they are second only to Angels and Demons.<ref name=":2">You can bind a god, which is technically on a lower tier than an Angel/Demon. You can bind a Primeval,

again, on a lesser tier.  But gods and primevals, even if bound, are 

little more than really big, really dangerous batteries to draw on, and they're a danger every time they're tapped. Usually you're just binding

them to get them to be good and to restrain their impact on the world.

Making one a familiar (or hosting them, or forming any direct connection to them) is like having sex with a bear. You're not in a position of power and you're liable to get mauled. They don't understand your behavior and you really, really need to understand every

last detail of theirs.  When it comes to primevals there's just no 

reality where it's doable. They're a big fucking bear/wolf/bird/bramble, and they're always mad.

Angels and demons are worse on that front. They're so inevitable and permanent as forces that you might as well be trying to stop the world from turning or rotating around the sun.

In cases where gods or angels are in a place where they understand humans and they develop a rapport, there can

be interactions like hosting or familiar bonds, but this is a pretty 

one-sided relationship, forever one misunderstanding or godly whim from you being turned into a pillar of salt or having a metaphorical, nine hundred pound bear fuck buddy crawling out of the tattered skin of your one hundred and fifty pound self.

So just to outline:

Really frigging hard. Same goes for other 'high tier' Others like Primevals, Gods, and Demons. - Wildbow on Reddit </ref>

Despite their power, without connections they can fall into Limbo and become part of it<ref name=":3">In the midst of that cavern, a face stood out from the wall.  It wasn’t stone, but it looked like something close.  Bone, perhaps, or calcified flesh.

I had to wrestle with the idea that it was simultaneously further away than it looked and very, very big.  Especially for a face.

It could very well have been as large as a mountain.  The area between it and me was empty of anything, vast, a chasm as wide as the gap between countries, maybe.

It rested at an angle, leaning against a distant solid surface I couldn’t make out, surrounded by cracks that cities could have been built in.  It was cracked as well, with gaps running along its pale features, almost to the point that it looked like

it might shatter any moment.  The eyes were open, and a light radiated 

from the eyes, as intense as the sun.

The noise it was making, the size of it, I couldn’t comprehend it, not cognitively, but in my would-be heart?  I felt something swell.

Light shone from the open mouth, too, and the drone emanated from the mouth, deep enough to touch me in the core of my body.

The size of it, the sheer base… I wasn’t even sure how to phrase it.  The simpleness

of it?  No, that was wrong.  The appearance, the light, the utter 

monotone of the sound it generated, it was more like it was at the heart of simplicity, at the heart of something from which more complicated things could emerge.

A lesser god?

Forgotten, fallen through the cracks, swallowed up by this place that had existed before the Drains were Drains?

- excerpt from Null 9.5 </ref> or even fall out of reality entirely and become Lost.<ref>The reaches are realms which may have been a part of reality, a part of the abyss, or a fragment of collective unconsciousness, which has come untethered from just about everything.  Without history, human attention or human logic to help pin them down, these places and their denizens unspool.  A lesser god with no connection to reality will fall to the Abyss.  When she is entirely unrecoverable, she may find herself drifting across the Paths, where sustenance is so little and so far between that she is forced to hibernate for centuries at a time, insofar as time has any meaning in those places.  Beings such as this once-god often wake only when practitioners approach. - FINDERS, document by Wildbow.</ref> (Although a maenad implied to Blake that the gods in Limbo may simply be too lazy to leave.)<ref name=":4">“They’re endangered,” the maenad told me.  “Can’t breed, no gods old or rough-edged enough still around to make more.  Except maybe where you’re from, but any that crop up there still aren’t going to be adventurous enough to move.  Everyone knows it isn’t right to touch a giant.  Or they should know.” - excerpt from Sine Die 14.3</ref>

Even injured-seeming and in the Abyss, a god's body was immensely vast - Blake speculated it's head was as big as a moon, surrounded by cracks that could contain cities.<ref name=":5">“If we send it elsewhere,” Johannes spoke, “My familiar can strike at the demon.  There are old, forgotten gods in the Abyss.  He can put this demon right in front of those gods, and they can kill it.”

His familiar.  I noticed Faysal Anwar wasn’t in the room.

“I know about the gods in the Abyss,” I said.  “I met one.”

Johannes smiled.

“It was losing,” I said.  “Slowly, but surely.”

The smile faltered.

“Gods range in power,” he said.  Picking up right where he’d left off.

“I can’t say for sure,” I said, “But the one I saw was maybe the same size as the moon.  Or his head was.  I don’t think you can pull that off, resting in the Abyss, unless you have plenty of power.”

- excerpt from Sine Die 14.9 </ref>

Abilities

Gods are among the few beings powerful enough to empower someone to kill a dragon.<ref>“Dragons are so like they are in video games,” Evan said.

“No,” Tiff said.  “Um, in video games, a guy with a sword can kill a dragon.  Only way that happens here is if a god intervenes, or you’re drawing on some similar degree of power.”

“We’ve got an in with gods, right?

“Not unless someone wants to hike back to the house,” Peter said. - excerpt from Sine Die 14.3 </ref><ref name=":6">“There’s no polar opposite.  Most are amalgams of elemental and spirit and animal and nightmares, on top of whatever else.  You have to beat them at their own game.  You get the dragons that are all poison, to the point that one drop of venom can clear out a lake.  Then you have

to just out-poison them.  You get the dragons in some areas of
the East that are more spirit and elemental, like dragons of the 

mountains and… it’s like you have to destroy a mountain by hitting it with a bigger mountain.”

“How do you-” I started.  “Nevermind.  You’re saying the only way to kill ol’ firebreath there is hotter fire?”

“No,” she said.  Her voice dropped to be even quieter, as we approached the end of the street.  “There’s another way.  Most are violent, killing machines.  So… if you’re brave enough, you can try the conventional means.  Facing them in battle.  Eventually someone succeeds.  Usually with the backing of some major power.  Usually a god.  Which makes them rare.”

- excerpt from Sine Die 14.3 </ref>

A god can be powerful enough to shatter all the Demesnes in a building for their follower with a single blow.<ref>Mala Fide 10.6</ref> They could easily crush a being such as Blake at a word from their follower.<ref>“Any last words?” he asked.

“Why would I need last words?” I asked.  “I’m not planning on dying anytime in the immediate future.”

“It’s a courtesy.  I only need to say a word to my deity to lay you out flat.” - excerpt from Execution 13.7 </ref>

Even a lesser god of light was able to restrain and injure Ur.<ref>“Ur,” I murmured.

It was working its way into this place that lay through the cracks.  Into the Drains.  The only thing that had stopped it, cutting it off from the heart at the source of it, was the accidental uncovering of this ancient forgotten god.

[...]

I screamed guttural, as close to the same tone as the god that shone its light into this dark chamber, fighting Ur for as long as he lasted.

I worshiped that lost god for just a moment.

The light grew more intense, and Ur burned away.  Even the pieces in my arm.

- excerpt from Null 9.5 </ref> Johannes believed that there were gods in Limbo that could kill Barbatorem, although Blake disagreed.<ref name=":5" />

Usage

With a positive enough relationship, a god can be used for Host Magic or as a Familiar, but due to their immense power this is a very one-sided relationship with the Practitioner at the mercy of the god.<ref name=":2" />

Gods can be bound, but this is usually done simply to compel them to stop causing problems. A bound god can be drawn on as an immense battery of power, although this is dangerous every time it's drawn on.<ref name=":2" />

Types

There are various gods, belonging to different pantheons. Dionysus of the Greek Pantheon is one example of a major god, his creations and cultists active in Toronto.

Each god will have a portfolio, for example Dionysus has power over madness.<ref>The High Priest worshiped a deity that included madness in his realm of control. - excerpt from Judgement 16.5</ref>

Only the oldest or roughest gods were able to create Giants.<ref name=":4" />

Lesser Gods

Some have been noted to be lesser gods, like the god of light that remains as part of The Drains.<ref name=":3" />

Corvidae could be compared to the least of gods,<ref name=":1" /> as could the empowered Wraith of Molly Walker.<ref>Jacob’s Bell is going to become a new attraction in the Abyss, complete with a spiteful lesser

god and a perpetually tolling bell.  - excerpt from Sine Die 14.1</ref>

A lesser god which worships itself is one of the feedback loops that could develop into a dragon.<ref name=":0" />

Notable Gods

• Dionysus
• Lesser god of light in The Drains

History

Once, particularly old or rough-edged gods created the Giants. Those gods eventually died or fell into Limbo, leaving the giants - which cannot breed - a dying race.<ref name=":4" />

The champions of gods, along with others backed by similarly-great powers, have slain most of the dragons.<ref name=":6" />

References

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