How would a fight between god's work.

[So_Indecisive]

I'm not talking about the superpowered individuals who thinks themselves god's. No I'm talking about literal manifestations of concrete concepts.

So I was thinking about a fight between a god of time and a god of devouring.

The god of time freezes his opponent in a cage of time where a moment becomes eternity.

Immediately his opponent devours the attack as he is the concept of devour.

If he can devour the god of time. The god of time can just jump out of the past to continue fighting. If a god can completely embody all the aspects of his concept I feel like none of them can kill each other. Except for.concepts that are inherently subservient to another. For example the concept of Fire and then heat.


So the main question is how do they determine who wins in a fight? Does it just devolve into a meaningless slugfest?

 

[CarburetorThompson]

Depends on the rules of your world.

Personally I think more interesting option is having gods bestow blessings onto mortal champions who will fight against each other in a sort of proxy war.

Other methods I like is never directly stating how a fight between gods went, but only speaking of it through apocryphal fables and stories. Maybe the fight between gods is described through the story of a battle between a lion and a fisherman. Something like that.

 

[LiteraryWho]

The actual answer to this question is, "However you want it to work."

That said, one common method of having gods fight each other is through each other's followers (if your gods are built like that). They could have champions, or grant powers to mortal, or whatever. You have to design sensible, interesting, and consistent rules to make it work though, so that way the readers can have some stake in the outcome (or some sense that what happened followed from what was, rather than it just being some words some guy slapped on a page).

 

[RepresentingWrath]

Manifestation of concepts are not gods. ?

 

[LilRora]

Depending how far gone kind of gods we're talking about, some of them may be so far beyond mortal comprehension that calling it a "fight" is not accurate.

One example I've seen is that each god has a domain within which it is completely invulnerable, and gods essentially battle with their domains, as when their being (could be body but not necessarily) is outside their domain it can be instantly obliterated by the opponent.

Another one I know is a specific setting where gods work on faith. Functionally this means that a god cannot be killed (there's issues with words at this point, I prefer to say that a god can be killed but it still is, or still exists - it can get confusing quickly) so long as it has any followers. Then, battles between gods become wars between followers, can be military wars but could also be cultural.

These are just two of many options though. Generally speaking, you need to either skip the fight entirely, or get creative, since for gods, some of which may not even be capable of death entirely, different concepts are necessary to talk about victory or defeat. This is going to depend what gods in your story are exactly.

For gods as manifestations of concepts (not sure if I would call them gods, but that word is so loose at that point we may as well), I could argue it is impossible to kill one in a way that matters without dramatically changing the world (though something similar to my 2nd example could work). Depending on your setting though, you may as well just make them capable of killing each other through brute force, and have them reform as another being after some time.

 

[Plantorsomething]

I'm not talking about the superpowered individuals who thinks themselves god's. No I'm talking about literal manifestations of concrete concepts.

So I was thinking about a fight between a god of time and a god of devouring.

The god of time freezes his opponent in a cage of time where a moment becomes eternity.

Immediately his opponent devours the attack as he is the concept of devour.

If he can devour the god of time. The god of time can just jump out of the past to continue fighting. If a god can completely embody all the aspects of his concept I feel like none of them can kill each other. Except for.concepts that are inherently subservient to another. For example the concept of Fire and then heat.


So the main question is how do they determine who wins in a fight? Does it just devolve into a meaningless slugfest?

I think at that point I’d make it a myth or fairy-tale like battle rather than fisticuffs. Like the myths of various pantheons of gods in our world. Make it sound whimsical and fantastical using strange items and god-tier items and weapons with their own stories backing them. Have one of them sneakily take the bones of a dead godkiller dragon to forge a cage. Use the scissors of norns to cut threads of fate. Seal them in a cursed mirror that shows the ugliness of their inner selves. Make it thematic and strange.

 

[Spacerunner357]

I'm not talking about the superpowered individuals who thinks themselves god's. No I'm talking about literal manifestations of concrete concepts.

So I was thinking about a fight between a god of time and a god of devouring.

The god of time freezes his opponent in a cage of time where a moment becomes eternity.

Immediately his opponent devours the attack as he is the concept of devour.

If he can devour the god of time. The god of time can just jump out of the past to continue fighting. If a god can completely embody all the aspects of his concept I feel like none of them can kill each other. Except for.concepts that are inherently subservient to another. For example the concept of Fire and then heat.


So the main question is how do they determine who wins in a fight? Does it just devolve into a meaningless slugfest?

They set up Ruels like who does the most Damage and also it can be not just fighting;.
Also they can just make a Weaker Version of themselfs to fight soo it's more stratgy I don't like think about this have a great day alll!!

 

[NotaNuffian]

Do it xianxia style?

Give these concepts personalities, make them more human ergo more prone to error?

 

[Prince_Azmiran_Myrian]

The strongest god wins.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

The way the gods usually handle fights is ... through their worshippers. They may empower a few, manipulate some events to sic heroes on the other side, raise up monsters, etc. Going directly against each other tends to cause all sorts of problems that can reorder reality...

 

[vzymmer]

Conceptual battles are quite complicated if your story doesn't have a clear and established rules already in place, like physics in the real world where matter and energy can be influenced by atomic motion and chemical reactions.

Another way you can do it is by limiting the gods control and energy in the concepts.
So the more energy someone has the stronger they are and the better they can influence other concepts.
Another thing you should take note of, conceptual battles are not always straightforward like the one in your example.

Like fire and water concepts, they are opposites and yet they have almost similar dominions over a few usage of their concept.
They both have temperature, flows, and also the resulting reactions should be manipulable by both concepts.

 

[Alfir]

I always imagined a fight between gods would be like an argument between children when they play pretend.

 

[melchi]

I think it sorta doesn't work. A big mess happens but nothing gets settled.

Like for example, arguably the most powerful opponent in the greyhawk universe is Chronos. No one could beat him. So the other dieties got together and trapped him in an illusion where he is endlessly fighting them. However, he keeps getting stronger from all the fighting and slowly the illusion is breaking down. Eventually it'll fail and and even more powerful Chronos will emerge, angrier than ever.

 

[ElijahRyne]

I'm not talking about the superpowered individuals who thinks themselves god's. No I'm talking about literal manifestations of concrete concepts.

So I was thinking about a fight between a god of time and a god of devouring.

The god of time freezes his opponent in a cage of time where a moment becomes eternity.

Immediately his opponent devours the attack as he is the concept of devour.

If he can devour the god of time. The god of time can just jump out of the past to continue fighting. If a god can completely embody all the aspects of his concept I feel like none of them can kill each other. Except for.concepts that are inherently subservient to another. For example the concept of Fire and then heat.


So the main question is how do they determine who wins in a fight? Does it just devolve into a meaningless slugfest?

First p, heat trumps fire since the latter is a chemical reaction while the first is a type of energy. Second, assuming that they form a body/avatar it is probably the one who kills the others material form. The other god would probably still exist and have influence over the material world just no body. Third, if a god wanted to eliminate another then they would have to destroy or outlive the others concept. Devouring will at the very least will die once the last black hole dissipates but time is eternal so time wins the long game, assuming that other surviving gods knowing what devouring is and that black holes are part of their domain. Hell, time might just have to move them both to the heatdeath of the universe to greatly weaken if not kill the god’s avatar if they were to fight.

 

[_oinkchan]

I'm not talking about the superpowered individuals who thinks themselves god's. No I'm talking about literal manifestations of concrete concepts.

So I was thinking about a fight between a god of time and a god of devouring.

The god of time freezes his opponent in a cage of time where a moment becomes eternity.

Immediately his opponent devours the attack as he is the concept of devour.

If he can devour the god of time. The god of time can just jump out of the past to continue fighting. If a god can completely embody all the aspects of his concept I feel like none of them can kill each other. Except for.concepts that are inherently subservient to another. For example the concept of Fire and then heat.


So the main question is how do they determine who wins in a fight? Does it just devolve into a meaningless slugfest?

Meaningless slugfest and at a point the gods forget why they were fighting in the first place, get bored so stop fighting and then their followers continue.

 

[AwakenFreddy]

Okay, what can i understand is that you want a fight between a concept, theres probably more way it can turn out, here is ome that i can think of

1. No, it cant happen
In your example you want a fight between time and devour, what prevent time to reverse time again and again, and what prevent devour from devouring time as concept? It will be on deadlock

2. They are manifestation of concept but the concept is not them
iirc dc god from concept work like this. It will work like fight between avatar of concept.

3. Fight with proxy
Kinda boring one if you use a god as manifestation of concept. Especially if you bring time. You probably want to make a limit so the champion of each god not abuse it to much, especially champion of time.

 

[CupcakeNinja]

Manifestation of concepts are not gods. ?

depends on how you define a god. Merely a being with immense power? And what power does this manifest in ? Is Superman a god, or the Flash? But manifestations of concepts are perhaps the closest one could call being godlike. Because you cannot kill a concept once it is born. It now exists. Perhaps it has always existed. Will always exist. Are humans gods? We create entire civilizations to toy with as we please via games. Does a very smart Ai make it sentient? What is sentient? How do we measure and define THAT?

A god seems a very grand idea, but also small. We are to ants what godss are to us. What exactly is the difference? i cannot conjure food from thin air, but i can feed a legion of ants

Im the fucking ant god, bitch.

But i digreess. i WANNA FUCK THE MANIFESTATION OF THE CONCEPT OF FAT BOOTY

Okay, what can i understand is that you want a fight between a concept, theres probably more way it can turn out, here is ome that i can think of

1. No, it cant happen
In your example you want a fight between time and devour, what prevent time to reverse time again and again, and what prevent devour from devouring time as concept? It will be on deadlock

2. They are manifestation of concept but the concept is not them
iirc dc god from concept work like this. It will work like fight between avatar of concept.

3. Fight with proxy
Kinda boring one if you use a god as manifestation of concept. Especially if you bring time. You probably want to make a limit so the champion of each god not abuse it to much, especially champion of time.

In DC the conceptual beings manifest in the physical plane by going to a being called Anthropormorpho and gaining a body. They are intrinsic to the concept itself. If you kill them, you kill the concept. Lady Death was once killed off by captain Mar-Vell( the og captain marvel)) when he was on his death bed somehow and iirc the...cancer-verse?? was created from that where no one was able to die.

Well, DC is very fucky and rules change alot.

 

[laccoff_mawning]

If you go with the idea that a god is the persona of a physical concept, I don't think you'd want it to work.

If the god died, what would happen to the physical concept? E.g. in your example, we have Time and Devouring (I'll capitalise them when referring to them as characters, not concepts.)

Well, if Devouring died, the concept of devouring should also die. Then how would humans eat food? Logic would dictate that they wouldn't be able to, so they'd die off pretty quick.

However, if we reverse the logic I suppose we could consider a god "killed" if we make the concept obselete. So the less things that devour, the less domain Devouring would have. Should the concept of devour become obselete, then Devouring would die.

 

[N0xiety]

If a god embodies a concept/rule in a universe, then defeating that god means destroying that very rule, which means throwing the entire universe into disarray, which also means you will have to go against all the other gods/rules of the universe if you want to destroy one of them, as they sure as hell won't allow their universe to basically unravel at the seams. Imagine purging a rule from our universe, not a good day to have eh? Thus, you can't really defeat such a god, unless you can destroy an entire universe while you are at it.

It would need to be something beyond concepts and rules, like an extra-universal entity, to devour or destroy such 'gods', just as they would do to entire universes. Basically, something incomprehensible from a mortal's point of view, or maybe even the point of view of such 'gods'.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

In DC the conceptual beings manifest in the physical plane by going to a being called Anthropormorpho and gaining a body. They are intrinsic to the concept itself. If you kill them, you kill the concept. Lady Death was once killed off by captain Mar-Vell( the og captain marvel)) when he was on his death bed somehow and iirc the...cancer-verse?? was created from that where no one was able to die.
)
Well, DC is very fucky and rules change alot.

Mar-Vell (MARVEL's first Captain Marvel, but the third character with that name to see print) and the Cancerverse are Marvel not DC.
Both companies have Death usually appear as a woman (a cute goth chick in Vertigo/DC, and a beautiful woman that the person she is manifesting to knows ... or the traditional Grim Reaper, but not the character Grim Reaper as he's neither a woman nor beautiful.... and the character of Lady Death belongs to an indie publisher - she's a blue-white skinned beautiful woman)