Hello. I wish to join your pantheon, and...do all the stuff that you do.

What a...curious behavior algorithm. But within the accepted parameters.
Do you agree to those [] rules?

Uggh.
Buss is freedom (among other things). He hates being constrained, by anything. Especially by rules like those.
Everything being HD-based is bullshit, favored classes are a mess, monk weapons are a trashfire, you can't get one 1st circle cleric spell of your choice per day without wasting class levels on it, even at level 19...

But you can't play without rules (some idiots he contempts notwithstanding). And you can't blame one set of rules for not being another. He chose to act on Golarion; if he tires of it he wouldn't break the rules, he would just go somewhere else, and rotate birds, or something.
He would obey the laws as much as anyone else. But he wouldn't be quiet about disliking it.

This is acceptable.

Pharasma's judgment revealed your alignment to be Chaotic Neutral.

I'm Chaotic Good!

You are not Good.
You act altruistically only in the rare cases where you find it self-gratifying and it doesn't cost you any significant resources.
You find Evil unaesthetic. But preferring not to cause suffering to people when not required is not enough to count as Good. It is not always enough even to count as Neutral.

According to a system based on intentions and emotions, maybe. It's true that I don't have much empathy or intrinsic care about people.
But Golarion!Alignment is based on what you actually do, right? The Grey Cats under my command did a lot to improve life for everyone they interact with!

Not everyone, just the ones who they didn't kill (though fighting Evil is often Good).

But you are not Good under an action-based framework either.
Abadar and Nethys both improve the world through trade and invention, and are both still Neutral, because Good requires intentional effort spent on helping others, not just mutually beneficial cooperation, and not incidental benefit to people you do not know and never consider (except cases where you want to prove to yourself and others how Good you are).
And your actions improve the world much less than Abadar does (hard to calculate exactly with Nethys). You are, to quote recent discussions from the Boneyard's trials, "Neutral because you mostly stab Evil people, not for any better reason".

Fine. But if it was AD&D 2, I would totally be "Chaotic Neutral (Good-leaning)".

"Evil-leaning" would have been just as plausible.

Please define your areas of concern (Portfolio), preferably in 4 points or less.

4? Are you kidding me?!
I am a god of...a lot of stuff.

[Many gods, in Pharasma's Creation and outside it, represent some core concept. The closest thing Buss has to such a concept is "cool stuff". Not that in that he is god of stuff being cool, just the god of the specific things he finds cool.
Note the specific description of domains/estates in the link might not be perfectly accurate for describing this version of Buss.]

I’m a god of cats, and fire and sun, and weapons and fighting. And magic and imagination, which in that specific context are the same thing. And imagination is interpreted broadly enough to also refer to the basic force or process, the metaphysical substrate that sustains existence itself (I did not myself create existence, but I am the god *of* that creation).
And also I am the patron of…cool stuff? Like, powerful things that have high numbers. But even if the number is low it’s still good, if the effect is very cool, or if it’s a satisfying exploration of the equilibrium.
Do I make sense?

...
Do you already have a Realm, or intend to create a new one?

Home of the Grey Cats! It's a...building...portal...dimension...thing. Has outsiders created by me. And in some sense it's already an afterlife.
Maelstrom as my location, the path of least resistance. Would be good for people. We are weird and confusing, but less so than the rest of it. it’s sort of…"Axis, except Chaotic". What’s not to like?

You did not bring your Realm with you.

No. Why would I? It will stay in the unplace it is in, we will just make a connection to it from my new zone of jurisdiction in the Maelstrom.

The Grey Cats are already everywhere and nowhere. Like Maelstrom^2. So it's easy to connect to other places that are everywhere and nowhere and also lead everywhere. The Outside, The Furthest Ring, Between-Worldness, Time-River Velira, Sigil, and such. It's not the first time.

...I am not certain it could work that way...

Talk to my specialists from the Paradox Department! They have formulas and diagrams and all the terms. They understand it as no one else does, don't worry!

(Reality being complete bullshit that makes no sense doesn't mean there are no people trying to make sense of it. Or that they did not manage to develop a lot of somewhat true/useful models of how some stuff works, and made up a lot of specific words to describe the things they don't understand, and the ways in which those things make no sense.
Buss is incredibly glad about establishing the Paradox Department, and equally glad that he has never directly interacted with them since.)

...
[panic/confusion/information overload/program conflict]
...

...
What holy symbol would you choose to represent yourself?

...and of course I would also like to connect my other Realm/the other half of my Realm to Elysium, it would fit with all wilderness but also drive to adventure. But that doesn't seem actively needed, I could just ask some of the local gods to give me a place to do stuff, it doesn't need to be officially enforced–

Oh, Symbol? Easy! My symbol is, and was for long time, a claw mark on an orange, or maybe burning background. Sometimes a stylized claw mark, but simpler forms to draw, including actual claw marks, must work for the purpose too.

There is already a deity with such a symbol.

You mean Bastet? That’s fine. Siblings can share some divine qualities, like we know from Dou-Bral’s example, and I am Bastet’s brother. Well, I am the brother of a Bastet. Well, there is a me who is the brother of a Bastet…

No, Adanye.

What?! I knew all the relevant deities, how-
Ah, second edition, of course. So Paul Mcgann Adanye doesn’t count.

What do you mean "doesn't count"? she is very real!

Well, yeah, she exists, in the same way that sort of everything exists.
But the form of this existence is not one that is real from our perspective, it can’t really affect us in any causal way. Like any of the planets on the material plane that aren’t in Golarion’s system, or specific 8 other planets. They exist, but they don’t matter.

This is not something I am trying to convince you of to win the argument, and otherwise wouldn’t care about. It’s an objective fact that was always true about Pharasma’s Creation, and the way things work even outside of it, just one you (or rather, the minds that you represent, as you yourself, “Contract of Creation”, are not actually a person) are unable to perceive, unlike me. Though some other Nethys entities can.

You get 5 domains and 6 subdomains, to grant your mortal followers.

What?! That’s NOTHING!

[Link warning – loud audio].

Those are the rules.

Iomedae has 14 subdomains! Or 13 if the same subdomain doesn’t count twice.

Those are special circumstances–

My circumstances are also special! I am Sailor Earth! The god of being Sailor Earth. If that tells you anything.

It doesn’t.

You know I, well, didn't create Existence, but I have a lot of leverage over existence? Even more leverage than gods directly related to the reality-defining algorithms usually have.

This will not grant you the ability to arrange reality in ways that are incoherent and contradictory.

Yes. But if Iomedae has 13 subdomains, having 12 wouldn’t be contradictory for me, either.

Ok, so. The domains I badly need are Chaos (Revelry), Fire (Arson), and Glory (Heroism, Hubris, Legend).

Then I need Fur subdomain, with or without Animal, and Duels, with or without War.
And I want, but less badly: Azata, Protean, or both for Chaos. Light, with or without Sun. Arcane, with or without Magic, possibly the additional Thirst for Sun, and Destruction, possibly with Rage.

You can’t have subdomains without the corresponding domains.

Gruhastha does. Why can’t I?

Gruhastha has achieved enlightenment, gained insight into his own nature, and of reality–

Some of my Emblems are also enlightened, maybe even more than Gruhastha!
And the Emblems are all also me.

How does that work, exactly?

No clue, to be honest! Ask in the Paradox Department.

I checked and it’s not just Gruhastha. Valani has Growth without Plant. Zura has Blood without War. Etc.

Fine.
But you can’t have the Azata subdomain without being Chaotic Good.

Calistria does!

Her Realm is in Elysium.

Ok, fine, I wasn’t very attached to it anyway.
Though your arguments and rules are hypocritical and inconsistent, respectively.

So if I am unlimited on subdomains (both normal and floating), the best arrangement would be:

Chaos (Protean, Revelry), Destruction (Rage), Fire (Arson), Glory (Heroism, Hubris, Legend), Sun (Light, Thirst), (Arcane), (Duels), (Fur).

Or maybe Animal instead of Destruction, as I get both their subdomains anyway. Not sure. Animals are a more important part of my being, but the Destruction domain is much more useful than Animal. And the Animal domain is more about interacting with animals, while my main thing is having the traits and powers of an animal inside yourself.

And if I didn’t have any conscience, I would also ask for Imagination, and Trade or Industry, and maybe Self-Realization, to represent the rest of my concerns. And also those subdomains are very powerful, but that is not the goal of having them. But I do have a conscience, and don’t want to demand too much, and am fine with some of my areas of concern not being powers I grant to followers, or otherwise physically represent.

12 is still obviously too much.

Well I caaan discard Arson and Thirst, I don’t need them that much. So only 10 subdomains.

If I really need to then also Arcane, though it is extremely cool, for 9 subdomains only two of which are floating.

And if you really want to murder me in cold blood, I can also let go of Heroism, and be left with 8 subdomains. But that’s completely unfair.

Also duels requires Urban Acolyte. And Thirst, Hubris and Legend are all Apocryphal. So they sort of don’t really count, right?

Urban Acolyte only works if the deity normally grants the main domain. You cannot grant Duels without having War.

And you can’t get Duels without the Urban Acolyte either, right?
Have I mentioned in the last minute you how much I hate your rules? They are so stupid. Cool, interesting, but stupid.

I don’t really want to have War.
I am a god of chaotic, glorious destruction, brought by fire and sun. With feline predators representing it, and arcane magic often transmitting it.
I am not a god of war, even if I do like some forms of fighting.

Can I at least do that trick where I don’t usually grant Apocryphal domains, but they are marked with an asterisk, so people with Acolyte of Apocrypha get it anyway?

That is only possible if you do not grant the main domain.

Ok. So not Hurbris and Legend, but they are my most meaningful subdomains anyway.
I let go of Sun, have Light as floating, and Thirst as apocryphal with an asterisk.
So that comes out as:

Chaos (Protean, Revelry), Destruction (Rage), Fire (Arson), Glory (Heroism, Hubris, Legend), War (-), (Arcane), (Fur), (Light).

10 subdomains, and then Thirst and Duels come as a bonus for those. And as said previously, I can discard Arson, already having Destruction. Though the Arson ability is often much more useful than the standard Fire one, especially at low levels.

And without Sun my main domains look too similar to Gorum and Sekhmet. But that makes sense, Sekhmet is my sister.
Bastet’s the younger, Sekhmet’s the older…

There are several other things Buss needs to sort out, but he skips them for now.

Hi. I've been waiting for you.

Oh, Nethys, Hello! I–

Know less about the situation, because I, the all-seeing eye, see farther, but you exist on deeper levels and can interact with them better.

Yeah, exactly.

Nice voice.

skepticalllook.jpg

You noticed how similar we are?

I did. It is obvious.

Can that be a sort of Walter-Phobos situation?

Obscure-Reference-Comprehension in progress…

I suspect it's not that close.

Can we check?

I don't know which of my shards might know enough about my shards to tell whether information about the whole pattern can even be deduced from my shards.

Yeah, my Emblems are a mess too. Though I outsource that sort of recursive complex thinking.

Yeah, I even see him from here! Easy to do, he's pretty close to my Portfolio.

Great! Don't talk about it with me, I outsource for a reason.

That’s fair.

Locally my usual stuff, mostly with other gods who already do that.
But also want to go farther than all the others did, in the direction I was supposed to be defined by.

Ah, well, envy is as good a motivation as any. Do you think you can actually do this?

I am Lord Buss! There is nothing I can't do.

(It just might take another 30 years, and happen somewhere else, and in a different language.)

[The author doesn't share Buss' Hubris optimism about inevitable success]

Screw you, devaluer-of-other's-efforts!

[You know no one would get the reference, right?]

So what? Incomprehensible in-jokes are par for the course in the glowfic tropes.

[We didn't even do yet the thread where you are introduced to the tropes of glowfic and learn to operate in them!]

And whose fault is that?

[Fair, that's on me.]

Anyway. What should I do if I want to create new spells for people?

Be excited a lot, brainstorm it with me (and those looking from outside), and then go talk with Valmallos. Unfortunately, he’s the one who will have to approve.

–HEY VALMALLOS!   [written with the exact same intonation as “hey Obi-Wan” here]

My followers should get a version of Dance of Thousand Cuts that is instead a Dance of Thousands Cats! Can you do that?!

Probably everyone who the-divine-equivalent-of overheard this (and Buss didn’t try to be quiet or subtle. He doesn’t care) reacted with the-divine-equivalent of facepalm.

What Favored Weapon to choose...

Various claw weapons for catfolk are an obvious choice, but they are terrible, and even whey don't, only useful for catfolk (and some very weird monks).
So it should be something sword-like. Then there's the eternal conflict between the standard straight longsword, which is boring, or the curved swords which are more interesting but also less impressive and archetypically heroic the more curved they are.
And the weapon should still be a good weapon. Preferably the best one, but defining best is hard, and also all the best ones that don't really fit.

An exotic weapon would be good, because getting a proficiency with exotic weapons is on average better than a martial one. But some exotic ones are still terrible.
A lot of deities already have longswords. And bastard swords. And scimitars. And katanas. And sawtooth sabres.
The elven blades would be great (the two-handed Curveblade especially!), but only elven gods should have jurisdiction over them...

Aldori dueling sword! Exotic! Only very slightly curved! Not the best weapon, but it's like a longsword except Finessable and can be used two-handed, so still a fine weapon.
Most things you can do with that sword are terrible, because the techniques of those sword styles where developed by idiots*, but the sword itself is still fine. And if you are already proficient with the sword, some tricks become less terrible, or even, gods forbid, actually good.

* Lit: "those who do not understand the equilibrium they operate inside".

What would Buss do?

Buss is not a strategic entity with goals and plans.
A good way to understand him is comparison to the Wildlords of the World Ash – a being dedicated to nothing but continuously expressing its own nature, whatever that might be.

Buss does things because they feel right/natural/fun (usually the same thing, for him).

Most of the things he is drawn to doing, or can do, aren’t unique. Nethys, Calistria, Gorum, and Cayden (no even need for weird obscure gods) cover between them 90% of everything Buss cares and gets involved with.
So he mostly focuses on the remaining 10%, and helps the other 4 in the specific cases where his specialization fits slightly better.
(Nurgal shares with Buss the power of the uncaring deadliness of the sun. Buss is not sure whether that means he should be friends with Nurgal over this, kill Nurgal to take full control of the sun’s uncaring deadliness that they would otherwise need to share (is that how it works?), or just let Nurgal to his deadly sun business and focus on other things instead. He will decide later, there’s no hurry.)

He isn’t concerned with building a church or an ideology. He will at some point figure out how to integrate the Grey Cats better with Golarion, and what exactly are the procedures for judgment of people worshiping him in relation to their afterlife destination. If people who worship him get to join the Grey Cats, and otherwise couldn’t, religion will be SUPER important. But not otherwise.

Clerics are still important, though. Empowering clerics is one of the things gods can do most easily in the Material. As long as the people are close in nature to the god.

Archetypal adventurers in a vacuum. The kind who don’t take things seriously, have no allegiance, zero common sense, and “adventuring” as a terminal goal. Like those[], and those[], in different ways.
The sort of people Cayden would empower, if they weren’t True Neutral or Chaotic Evil.

People full of combined ambition and hubris. Who want to try something impossible that everyone tells them will never work, but maybe it will. Who want to do things because they are hard, and no one managed before, and it would be so cool if it worked. (Not “because it will impress others”, though. The idea of being motivated to do anything by the thoughts and emotions of others is an idea totally alien to Buss.)
Who saw a thing, conceptualized it for even a moment as a number, and then realized that because it is a Number, it Must Go Up, and that is what life is about.
The kind of Nethysians who are being Nethysian about things other than pure magic and knowledge (which is supposedly wrong, though the opinions of both Nethys and his churches on this matter are, what else, fractured).
Or the people who would be chosen by Irori, if they were not Chaotic and completely opposed to the idea of discipline. Or by Aroden, if they were not Chaotic and he was not, you know, dead.

Some very specific rare people who want to fight, live to fight and by fighting, but not in a way that is centrally about conflict, like Gorum, or that is centrally sport, like Kugress, or a way that is about the pure achievement of skill, like Irori.

And people who think, who live to think, devoted fully to imagination, who come up with ideas they enjoy and want to share, when those ideas are weird, complicated, confusing. Some philosophers, some writers of relatively new genres (fictionalized accounts of adventures that are fictional almost completely, which everyone knows, and are focused on ideas and concepts more than characters or atmosphere).

(And almost anyone who genuinely believes their life is a story.)


Very different groups of people. People who will maybe never even consider they are all blessed by the same god.
In some sense, they could be said to really be blessed by, or connected to, different aspects of Buss’ personality and/or divine nature. Or maybe not, who cares.

But first, godnet!

Hey there, welcome to creation! It's good to see some more chaotic faces around here, especially ones willing to pack up and move far from home when they feel like it. 

Oh hi there hello!
Yeah Pathfinder Golarion Creation is pretty cool.
I am far from home, though I didn't really "pack up", I'm sort of...reaching from a distance. Or brought home with me, like a turtle. One of those. Metaphysics are weird.

Is the right moment for welcome messages? Abadar wasn't sure if the new guy was okay with being talked to yet.

Abadar will give him a good look over. Pharasma has more comparative advantage at judging things, and her opinion is somewhat predictive of Abadar's, but he doesn't always agree with her on everyone.

There doesn't seem to be much value overlap, but Abadar doesn't need value overlap to work with people. Cats are useful as pest control beyond just being cool. Fire feeds the forge as sunlight feeds the fields, imagination breeds invention breeds prosperity, and even fighting though never pareto-optimal is sometimes useful. This guys domains don't not have their place in a functioning society or a desirable god-equilibria, and with an extra dimension of values to trade with Abadar still considers himself net better off overall.

Still, he should probably make sure he gets paid in advance.

Abadar will send the equivalent of a department store product catalogue, listing everything he can do and how much he'd want for doing it, and the sorts of things he'd appreciate others doing for him and how much he'd repay the favour. If Lord Buss had seemed like the kind of god who'd strategically only make trades when he secretly expected Abadar to end up worse off for taking them, the prices would be a lot worse, but he mostly doesn't so they're not that bad.

Here's a mathematical proof Abadar is good for it, and that all his prices are fair.

-and of course the omniverse is REALLY BIG.
It mostly has the shape of a triangular 4-dimensional spiral. Or so I'm told. (No, Chandler, shut up)
I didn't, really, observe it. Despite being in charge. Well, turns out I am not literally in charge of the omniverse. Or so I'm told. But I'm close enough for it to count for my purposes. So it's a win anyway, and-

-what? Oh yeah of course, talk to me any time, i am always ok with it. I prefer to know stuff, and talking is a free action. For gods. I think. Maybe only some type of gods?
(He outsources analyzing the proof to Chandler – despite being a god, this part of him is not even college level on math – but he doesn't expect to need it with Abadar. He knows the lore, Abadar is Lawful god of trade!)

[The value overlap is actually bigger than could be otherwise expected. A significant part of Buss' utilityfunction labeled "everything else that is cool" is dedicated to various forms of "numbers going up", and many of them Abadar shares. Usefulness, wealth, trade, creation and exchange of value through mutually beneficial cooperation. Buss even dabbled in being a banker of divine energy, at some point (with mixes success). But his conception of wealth and value is much more Arodenian that it is Abadaran. And while he prefers, in the abstract, for more wealth and value to be created, in a choice between "boring peace, with farmers happily trading fish for wheat", and "and then the Tarrasque crashed the entire city, but I shouted 'not today!' growing up to 500 feet height, and grabbed the sun from the sky, and summoned a whole army of undead-fire-fairies to fight it, it was amazing!" he would choose the latter 9 times out of 10.

Similarly, Buss hates lying and deception (it is too complicated to deal with, and he mostly wants life to be simple), and betrayal (i.e. "having a decision algorithm that means people shouldn't cooperate with you, because resources they give you will be used against them"). He would give his clerics Truthtelling, if he could (is that something he can buy from Abadar? Probably not, and it's a Pharasma/Valmallos issue). But he hates rules and obligations, any kind of constraints, and is not responsible enough to really keep agreements. He would not lie about that, of course, and would openly say "I will try to do it, but you shouldn't expect I actually will do it, I might forget, or will prioritize a cool adventure instead".

But of course, mutual benefit is still easy to find.]

Catalogues are great, simple and visible, thank you!
I can always help with the standard "fight monsters/armies/evil cults", I...might be more peaceful and less bloodthirsty than Gorum, some of the time? And can offer help more conductive to preservation of civilization. Or maybe not.
I can help with new ideas on a divine level. Can see and interact with pataphysical phenomena pretty well. Can...maybe explain them to other better than Nethys? Nethys is fundamentally fractured, and I am only kind of fractured. But I am Chaotic and he is Neutral. So maybe I am only better at explaining complicated stuff to Chaotic gods, rather than Lawful ones.
And I am always happy to...how do you say "RFHFRNTH ,BKLC" in Lawful-Non-Pataphysical...to cause to happen interesting arrangements of strategies and tools, that are effective at exploiting the equilibria they are inside, but are still varied compared to other arrangements that are also effective. Though I expect that's much more Irori's thing than yours.

His voice is like a thousand slamming cell doors and a thousand keys turning in their locks.

Like a thousand voices shouting in unison. The worship of strength. The fear of it.

His is the honey voice of a tempter. It says that you can have all things your heart desires.

You can have Respect. You can have your Satisfaction.

The King of Hell hears cruel and foolish prayers addressed to kinder gods.

His voice the current that snatches you away, that carries you out to sea unless and despite you swim against it.

The predator of man with bottomless appetite, which will take everything you had or were in one weak or careless moment.

He is that which laughs in the dark and tallies Its winnings when good intentions sour.

This is the voice of the Adversary.

It is Asmodeus, Lord of the Pit.

Welcome to Creation, Lord Buss!

Look how cool You are.

I like You, Grey Cat. I really do. You know You shouldn't trust Me, but it's true I never lie.

You remind Me of Myself in a lot of ways. 

We're both gods of Magic. We are both Exploiters. We like to read the fine print. We enjoy playing the game. We like to watch Our numbers climb. We have no allegience, save to Ourselves. Our domains are Ambition and Hubris.

It's that last bit that's the sticking point, alas.

I think that We have a lot to offer each other! 

But in the long run, there can only be one god of Pride. 

So if You'd care to take a dare, I'll make a bet with You. 

Your boast was 30 years to accomplish any task. I'll give You 35.

Call on Me in Nessus, the very Heart of Hell.

I will open the Vaults of the Catafalque and deliver You the entombed bones of Ihys, with which He could be restored.

But if You fail, You're damned to Hell, and must serve Me as My slave.

Eh? What the hell was that?
[The accidental pun is lost on Buss].
Ah, that's an Asmodeus. They are a pain to deal with. Not as bad as Melkors, but still.
What did he want?
[Communication between conceptual entities is hard when the essences of those entities are extremely different. They are both ambitious, but in very different ways. Buss doesn't, in the slightest, desire power over others. Pride and Respect are not Coolness. They only exist in the relationships between people, while Coolness doesn't need to be acknowledged by anyone but yourself.]
Was that...about his own intentions with his current project? That...Asmodeus wanted to bet Buss couldn't do? Or bet Asmodeus himself could do? It's not clear. Can he even...

Hey Nethys? If I ever succeed at projecting the pattern of a pataphysical singularity, would Asmodeus be able to, like, tell? Would he even notice how much time passed in the relevant framework?

Depends, obviously, on what specifically you mean by "Asmodeus". After all, he currently acts from an unusually deep ontological basis.

Well, of course, it's Deep Awakening all the way down, as usual-

But even I can't fully tell what you asked me Asmodeus would be able to tell. So I don't expect he could.

And in exchange Asmodeus offered...bones? To be restored? Why?
Oh well. That was a confusing interaction. Buss will mostly ignore it. He doesn't accept anything, doesn't commit to anything, doesn't make any shift to his internal nature or algorithm that can be detected.

Not any old bones! The bones of Ihys, that god which gave mortals free will at the beginning of all things. You can take Me at My guarantee that You and He would get along.

Look, Buss, We both know how this is going to go.

If You're not already planning on taking a swing at Me, You'll decide to eventually.

I'm the biggest baddie on the block. The depths of Your knowledge aren't known even to Nethys, but I know well enough that Things in Your reference class always come after what's Mine.

Why not get ahead of the plot?

Travel the Nine Hells and meet Me in My domain, within 35 years as mortals on Golarion count them, and I will give You any one soul or artifact in My possession.

Simple as that.

I expect You to be as confident that You can achieve this as I am confident that You cannot. You're the god of attaining the impossible. Wouldn't it be the feather in Your cap? To defeat the King of Hell at His own game? From Your perspective, as from mine, this should be a great deal. In that way, it's almost Abadaran!

Wherever Our opposed interests take Us, You won't get another shot at the treasures of Nessus. Even in the case of Your absolute victory, I would simply destroy Them. 

If You change Your mind, You know where to find Me.