On a Dev stream it was said that Funcom has a lore master who makes sure that everything added fits into the world of Conan. I’m curious why an incorrect representation of Derketo made it into the game. I know that there is confusion in the world of Conan about the religion but perpetuate it in the game?
What do you mean “incorrect”?
Even in the official lore, there are many local versions Derketo. It’s not a homogenous religion, each culture sees the goddess in a different fashion. Some see her as a goddess of pleasure, others as a goddess of death, yet some see the duality as a whole.
Furthermore, as Conan in the game explains, the gods of the Exiled Lands are not 100 % the Gods of the Hyborian Age, but rather versions of the gods created by the people themselves.
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Where are you getting your lore? I legit want to know.
“Xuthal of the Dusk” describes Derketo as the dusky goddess and talks about followers knowing the mysteries of Derketo being know threw pleasure.
“Red Nails” talk about Derketa being the queen of the dead and everything just being meat in the end as Conan is standing over a dead dragon.
Two different gods with slimier sounding names but still different.
In the Conan Pen-&-Paper RPG by Modiphius Derketa/Derketo is the same, just seen differently by different cultures.
Are they different? Or are they the same goddess, seen from the different angle, with cultural variations to the spelling?
From what I have read in the books it feels like they are different. All of the Conan gods are adapted from real myths and legends. Derketo feels very Aphrodite and Derketa feels much more Queen of the damned.
i want to point out, the “Gods” In Conan Exile Lands… may not be gods.
Conan himself point this out, as does …rrrrrr i think another points out the Avatars are just that… Avatars based on people there. (or there thoughts of it)
So Derkito, godess of death and beauty, lust etc is half/half… Fitting to what people in exile lands think she is when they call it to the world.
Its meant to be what people think it is, not true form.
I like the outfit with the nipple buttons, that’s all I know about her.
Howard doesn’t really go very deep into world-building. It’s quite possible that Derketo/Derketa is simply a misspelling, or it’s possible that he designed two entirely different gods and accidentally ended up using very similar-sounding names. With the technology of the 1930s it’s likely that he didn’t have copies of many of his manuscripts, so he didn’t necessarily have opportunities to go back to what he had written earlier to check. He has quite a few unrelated Amalrics in his Conan stories, for example.
And a lot of the Hyborian Age setting, including its cultures, geography and religions, existed only in Howard’s head or in fragmented notes. What little we know of the gods are mostly deductions made from the “real-world” parallels. Ishtar is pretty much Ishtar. Mitra is pretty much Mitra. The only mention of “Derketa” that I recall is that she’s the Queen of the Dead. Whether this is more an Osiris-like entity, a Persephone-like entity or a Mictecacíhuatl-like entity, we have no clue. “Derketo” as mentioned in the Slithering Shadow (aka. Xuthal of the Dusk) seems to go beyond Aphrodite and into Dionysus’s territory.
But if Howard had written comprehensive descriptions of the gods and religions of the Hyborian Age, little of that has survived. Your guess is as good as anyone’s.
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