A bless is a set of enhancements and bonuses that apply to a nation's sacred commanders and units. The effects of a bless can include bonuses to units' attributes, special abilities, physical and elemental damage resistances, and enhancements to weapons. Most bless effects are activated in combat by blessing a unit, but some are always active both on the strategic map and in combat without need for blessing (termed "innate" in this article).

Sacred units can become blessed by a priest, by certain items, or when in a battle with a pretender or disciple in friendly dominion.

A nation's bless always applies to its pretender when it is within its own dominion.

Blessing a sacred unit also gives it +1 morale regardless of other bless effects.

When creating a pretender, a number of options are available for bless effects. The choice of effects is tied to a pretender's magic paths and is an important part of pretender design.

Any level in magic over the first provides one bless point. These bless points can be used to purchase any bless which the pretender's paths fulfil the prerequisites for. Some nations, such as LA Mictlan start with bonus bless points. Some effects require certain scale choices in addition to magic paths. Some options can be taken multiple times, which causes their effects to stack.

Additionally, any bless effects which require at least 5 levels in any one path of magic are incarnate only, activating only when the pretender god is present on the map. These effects will be inactive both before the pretender awakens and while the pretender is dead. This means that taking a pretender dormant or imprisoned will delay when these incarnate blesses come into effect.