Shoptalk: Enabling Abilities

In Scion RAW, there are 24 Abilities listed on the character sheet. Some of these are fine and dandy, they work perfectly. Some have odd and slightly confusing names or descriptions of what they do and do not cover. There are holes in what Scion's RAW Abilities cover. So, in this post, I'll go problem by problem, identifying the issues and offering solutions.

Problem 1: Black Holes
Four of the Abilities (Art, Control, Craft and Science) are broken up into what is essentially an infinite number of Abilities, which becomes extremely annoying for anyone that cares about them and suddenly has to sink dozens of extra XP into their abilities while their friends who aren't interested in Art, Control, Craft or Science only have to deal with the 20 regular Abilities. That's an issue for me. A scientist who wants to know biology and chemistry has to spend a lot more XP than an athlete who wants to be good at both weightlifting and gymnastics.

More than just being an XP penalty to specific types of characters, the difference between a Black Hole and a regular Ability isn't very clear. Why is Academics alright as a single Ability, but not Art? It's somehow easier to learn history, philosophy and literature together than it is to learn painting, drawing and printmaking? Pfft, says I. What about Medicine and Occult, which are easily as broad as Control and Science? Again, pfft.

Solution! Remove this concept from the game. Collapse the Black Holes. Art, Control, Craft and Science become single Abilities, just like Academics, Athletics, Medicine and Occult.

Shoptalk: Stairways to Heaven

The Overworlds are the homes of the Gods, where the Pantheons dwell and where the Titans were born. They're the largest, most dangerous battlefield for the Titan War and where the strongest warriors of both sides clash. Ascending to the Overworld marks the transition between mortality and immortality, the rise to Godhood itself.

Well, kinda. In the books, that part is rather fuzzy. It is specifically mentioned that anyone using an Axis Mundi to travel from the World to the Overworld has to be Legend 9 or higher. Can lower-Legend beings survive in Overworlds? Do Sanctums count as part of the Overworld, or can Demigods visit their parents by using Axes Mundi that connect directly to their Sanctums?

There's another issue, which is Underworlds and their connection to Overworlds. In Scion, the Underworlds seem very specifically to be 'hellish' and dark. None of the 'happy' afterlives seem to be present. It's true that some cultures (Sumerians...) didn't have much of a happy ending for the dead, but many did. The Aztecs had multiple afterlives, depending on how you died, and some were pretty nice. The Norse had Valhalla and Folkvangar for their glorious dead. They're listed as part of the Overworld.

The Overworld is where Gods live, no where the dead live. The dead live in the Underworld, no matter if they were the "good" or the "bad" dead. The problem Scion runs into is that the writers were trying to match things up with the modern (primarily Judeo-Christian) idea that the "good" dead get to live "up" in "Heaven" with their deities. Historically, that isn't a popular idea and doesn't apply to any of Scion's existing Pantheons. The only overlap comes from specific God-Realms like Tlalocan and Folkvangar, but in Scion terms those are much more like Underworlds than Overworlds. Those specific Gods (Tlaloc and Freya) just happen to live with the dead.

Now that we've established the weirdness that is RAW Scion's stance on Overworlds and Underworlds, lets get down to resolving it in a fashion that makes a bit more sense given the source material and history. So, lets start at the bottom and work our way up!

Shoptalk: Being Social

Social Attributes are a sticky wicket, but because they deal with a very sticky part of role-playing. There are arguments about what Social Attribute you roll under what circumstances, arguments about how Social Attributes affect other NPC's and PC's when used by either or both sides. There are lots of problems.

To some degree, it's understandable that there's confusion about what Social Attribute to roll when. There are many ways to reach the same end through social means. Physical Attributes are much simpler. Strength is raw muscle power, Stamina is bodily endurance and Dexterity is fine motor skills and speed. There is some overlap certainly, because running could also be considered a function of Strength and a function of Stamina, but in game terms it falls under Dexterity. That's an established gaming convention that most players don't have any problems with.

Charisma, Manipulation and Appearance aren't as well defined and there is a strong gaming convention that "Charisma" is your go-to Social Stat. It tends to get rolled an awful lot, leaving the other two Attributes in the dust. What good is Appearance when instead of being hot, you can just be charming and get the same result? And what good is just being hot if you can't talk to people because of your crippling lack of oratory skills? Can't you use Charisma to lie to people just by steamrolling them with your force of personality? Well.. kinda. You can get a lot of flexibility out of the Social Attributes. With them it's less a question of "what can I use Charisma to do that I can't do with Manipulation?" and more a question of "HOW can I use Charisma to do this?"

Instead of breaking down by the ends, Social Attributes break down by the means. If you want to get past a guard by making him think you belong there, you can use any of the Social Attributes. Which one you use will depend on how you go about it, and each method has its own benefits and consequences. Being so sexy that the guard doesn't want to question you because it will make you less likely to sleep with him is one way, but so is lying to him and convincing him that you're there for a surprise inspection.

I'm not going to spend forever breaking down all the problems inherent in trying to define the entire spectrum of social interaction into three categories. What I will do instead is describe how I define the role of each Social Attribute.

Shoptalk: Animal Is Weird

The Animal Purview is one weird mess. It can be taken many different ways without even bothering to apply what could be called 'house rules'. Just different ways of reading the poorly-defined RAW version of Animal can give you radically different variations in how the Purview is handled in a game. It's so messy that I even have to break down the different ways it can be interpreted differently.

Association Interpretations!

1. Super Literal: If your parent is Associated with Hummingbirds, you gain an association only for Hummingbirds. You get no XP discount on any other manifestation of Animal. This method of reading also means that each type of Animal requires its own Relic to channel. You would need one Relic for Hummingbird and another for Eagle. Essentially, each type of Animal is a totally different Purview. The only thing that unites Animal (Hummingbird) and Animal (Eagle) is that they both have The Beast as their Avatar. Note: Protean Understanding causes some issues under this interpretation because it suddenly causes all the different Purviews to unite as one at Legend 11.
2. Semi-Literal: So long as your parent has any form of Animal as an Associated Power, you get an XP discount on any form of Animal. So even if Daddy has Animal (Hummingbird), you can still get a discount for learning Animal (Shrike). Under this interpretation it's a 50/50 call if you would need multiple Relics for Animal, or only one. 

How Divided Is Divided?

1. Really Damn Divided: If there is any reasonable difference between two types of animals, then they are considered two different types of Animal. This interpretation would say that Animal (Butterfly) is different from Animal (Moth) and that Animal (Cat) is different from Animal (Tiger). Obviously this is going to cause some issues when categories like Cat are much broader than others like Lynx, but the people who hold this view are almost always very specific about what types of Animals are allowed. Typically, broad categorizations such as Cat or Bird-of-Prey would not be acceptable. 
2. Divided Indeed: This is a little bit more lax, but still fairly strict. People who fall here tend to say that even if you pick something like Animal (Tiger), you're just doing that for fluffy fun. You actually have Animal (Cat) and can apply your Animal Boons to any creature that falls under a similar taxonomic category as your specific totem beast. 
3. What Divide?: Aten is mostly to thank for this category, since he is listed as having Animal (Flying Creatures). It opens the door for extremely broad categorizations of Animal such as Sea Creatures, Varmints and Bugs.

As I said, all that chaos is without any House Rules at all. That's just different takes on what's actually printed in the books, since the books don't provide clear, well-written guidelines for how to deal with Animal. If we added in all the ways people House Rule the Purview, we'd be here all night just going over the different possible solutions. We won't do that. Instead, I'm going to explain how I handle the Animal Purview and explain why I do it the way I do.

Shoptalk: All That Is Within My Purview

In the RAW (Rules As Written) system for Scion, a peculiar situation arises where Death Gods are required to be Charismatic if they want to be good at their jobs. Health Gods are useless unless they themselves are hardy like an ox. In short, the rolls for Boons are often tied to seemingly random or ill-suited Attributes. This isn't always something that can be fixed by changing the roll. Sometimes there is no Attribute that really fits. Take Rainbow Bridge for example. What's the Attribute most related to teleportation? Does it help to be smart? How? What about flexible or fast-footed? How does that help you warp space and travel without moving?

Originally, I simply tried being flexible with the rolls required by various Boons. If a player could come up with a good argument to use a different Attribute, I'd allow them to change the roll. This worked fine in most cases, but it still raised the issue of the Boons where there is no clear-cut Attribute that lends itself really well. Many Boons, in fact, can be seen as simply raw manifestations of the Purview's power. Why should one Earth God be better at making earthquakes than another, when both of them are equally powerful (Legend) and equally invested in the Earth Purview (number and rank of Boons)? That just didn't sit well with me.

What the Atlanta players are testing out now is a system called Epic Purviews. What happens is that each Purview you know has a Rank which is equal to the number of different ranks you know Boons for. If you know a rank 1, rank 3 and rank 8 Boon in Health, then your Health Rank is 3. You also have a Purview Rating which is equal to the number of Boons you know, regardless of their rank. Your Purview Rating replaces Attributes for Boon Activation rolls and is sometimes used in calculations. Your Purview Rank provides automatic successes as if it were an Epic Attribute, keeping Purviews from falling behind at higher Legend.

Example: Sak Balam has a total of 12 Animal Boons, with at least one in every Rank from 1 to 8. This means that his Animal Rank is 8 and his Animal Rating is 12. When he activates a Boon like Animal Aspect he rolls Rating + Animal Ken, for a total of 22 dice, 10 from his Animal Ken and 12 from his Animal Rating. His Rank of 8 grants him 29 automatic successes on that roll, just as if it was an Epic Attribute.

Shoptalk: The Virtues of Virtues

Scion comes pre-set with twelve Virtues and four Dark Virtues. The Gods and their allies follow the twelve Virtues, while the Titans and their minions are all aligned with the Dark Virtues. There's a bit of a problem here. That pretty much ignores all the cultural background of the Titans and their minions, replacing it with a generic set of 'evil' traits that in many cases do not fit with the nature of the Titans and Titanspawn.

What, for example, is Prometheus doing with Malice instead of Intellect? It flies directly in the face of his entire story for him to be all about random acts of cruelty instead of having a focus on bringing Fire to mankind. There are lots of Titan-style figures who have nothing to do with the Dark Virtues at all, but for some reason they're all shoehorned as having 100% evilness all the time. That's patently ridiculous!

Then on the other side of the issue, we have Gods who almost certainly do have Dark Virtues. Nergal hasn't got even a little Malice? Odin hasn't got Ambition? Pan with his insatiable sex drive hasn't got even a bit of Rapacity?

Shoptalk: Avatar and Appearance

Another post about Godhood. Man, does it ever end? Yes, it does. But not for a while, because my players are on the threshold of Godhood and it's got me super-excited.

To the main topic! One of my players asked me if a Relic he owns, a cloak made of pure darkness, could actually become his character's shadow that billows around behind him on its own and conceals his face in darkness. Sure, I said, why not?! Because that's awesome and it works perfectly for the dark, brooding God that he's working on. This got me thinking about two things. Well, one thing, and the other came from the note about how I work Avatars included in the last post.

Shoptalk: Apotheosis II

In my last post about Apotheosis, I covered what happens to a new-born God's Favored Abilities and Associated Powers. That's all well and good, but other things happen when you achieve Godhood. Awesome, inspiring things that broaden the scope of your powers and bootstrap you up to divinity.

Well, at least that's what should happen. So, we'll first cover what the RAW has happen, then cover what I think should be the real deal. Sound good? Great! Let's go.

Actually, you know what? I changed my mind. We're not going to cover what the RAW has happen, you can do that yourself. Reference p.36 of Scion: God, if you wish. The Apotheosis process as outlined there is complex and, frankly, shitty. So I'm not gunna waste time copying it and distilling it down to its lame essence.

Shoptalk: Apotheosis

As far as RAW Scion is concerned, when a Demigod reaches Godhood... a whole lot of nothing changes. They don't reach independence. They don't leave behind their status as the child of another God and step into their own shoes. They keep whatever Associated Powers and Favored Abilities they had as a Hero and a Demigod.

Well, nuts to that. When a Scion reaches Godhood, they are no longer a child. They are a God and they need to stand on their own two feet. The solution? Upon reaching Godhood, a Scion is instantly and forever stripped of all their Favored Abilities and Associated Powers. Only their Pantheon-Specific Purview remains.