Blinding Us with Science

Question: Where do you draw the line between science and myth as far as purview powers are concerned? E.g., one of my players wants to expand his lightning-based Sky boons to electromagnetism. I understand why you took the time powers out of Stars (they made no sense), and I understand your reasoning for why Time as a purview doesn't work, because it's too modern-science based. But what about boons like Fusion and Solar Prominence, in Sun? They seem to me to be equally non-mythic. Ditto Starfire's cosmic radiation.

Groannn, Fusion... we meet again, my nemesis.

As I'm sure you've gotten an impression of by now, we don't particularly like science-based boons, because they're very un-mythic, which runs counter to the flavor of the game, and in many cases they don't make any sense, either (what've Thor or Marduk been doing with those electromagnetism boons all these centuries - just sitting around wondering what they were for until the nineteenth century?). Science and Scion are not incompatible, of course; Scion's a game about modern children of the gods, and modern children means they'll bring their modern ideas with them, and that's good. They can invent, innovate, combine and challenge the old order with the new in any way they can conceive of; they're the new generation of gods, and if a Scion wants scientific concepts to be a big part of their role as a god of this new age, then he should pursue that.

But purviews are almost never the way to do so. Purviews represent the massive, cosmic forces of the universe; the sky, thunder, lightning and all, is one of these cosmic forces, but the tiny scientific applications of minute amounts of its power (i.e., human electricial pursuits) is just the way that humanity manages to understand and use a tiny fraction of it. Electromagnetism is not one of the underlying mythic forces of the world but rather a modern scientific way of looking at a very small part of one of them. Purviews have been in existence since the dawn of time; they are the underlying forces of the Titans and the great powers that fuel the gods, which means that the powers they grant are equally ancient and universal. Indra, Zeus and Susanoo don't have powers the have to do with electromagnetism; they have powers that have to do with thunder and lightning, because thunder and lightning are part of the collective mythic consciousness of humanity, and specialty sciences of the past two measly centuries are not. If a boon is doing or representing a concept, principle or way of looking at the world that didn't exist in the ancient times that the stories of Titans and gods come from, odds are it's not really appropriate for a boon.

Does this mean your Scion can't be a god of electromagnetism? Of course it doesn't. If that's what he wants to be god of, that's what he should be god of; it just means that he'll have to be a little more creative about how to go about it than just trying to stat up some ill-fitting, obviously modern boons. He's already halfway there, with the power of lightning at his command as a Sky god - remind him that it can be used as a tool as well as a weapon, and try to be sensitive to times when he stunts his lightning powers in such a way that he could legitimately be getting scientific applications out of them (using Storm Augmentation to scramble a computer's brains, for example). Find other powers that might enhance the ideas of magnetism, gravity and electricity he's leaning toward; for example, picking up Axis of the Heavens from to use along with his Sky powers will help him subtly simulate magnetic effects, or getting Unusual Alteration will allow him to give his own body electrical impulses and receptors (like an eel, but more divine). Industry is practically made for gods who want to be scientifically inclined - or, if he isn't interested in making a bunch of awesome electrical toys and relics, encourage him to find someone else who is and find a way to threaten, steal, cajole or quest to gain them. Have him use science in his stunts, his speech, his behavior; being a god of something is about embodying and representing it, so even when he isn't using powers, his badass connection to the forces of electricity can still be expressed.

Really, this is the case for everyone who wants to be god of something off the beaten path, not just those who are science-inclined. Life's easy for the schmoes who just want to be God of Fire or Goddess of Water, but for those who want to be God of Fickle Fortune or Goddess of Inevitable Decay or Goddess of Comforting Humanity, there's always an element of finding the right combination of powers, relics and personal exploits to get that idea across. A god who's strongly about electromagnetism is certainly more esoteric and thus harder to plan for than a god who is merely associated with thunder, but it'll be all the more awesome a payoff for that guy when he becomes a unique young god with his own unique modus operandi. Encourage him to be creative; really, just writing custom boons is about the most boring way I can think of to go about becoming a god of something new or complex.

As for other scientific boons, we've been slowly paring them off the game for years now, leaving only a few small brown spots on our otherwise deliciously mythic apple. Starfire doesn't pose a problem for us, as our rewrite of it has nothing to do with radiation and everything to do with searing, overpowering starlight, but Fusion is possibly my most-hated boon still in the game at the moment. The only reason we haven't removed it is that we genuinely haven't been able to come up with anything better to replace it yet; Sun is very difficult to write for at the high levels, as sun gods tend to spend all their time either moving the sun or being the sun, both of which the purview has already been doing for ages. We're actually not fans of Solar Crown, either, because it's intensely boring for its supposed power level, but if we took both of them out there'd be no level ten Sun boon, so we're keeping the two bad options and working diligently on finding something to replace them before Sowiljr gets to Legend 11 and starts complaining about buying his tenth level of "oh, look, guys, I'm really bright".

Personally, I could see moving Fusion over to Industry, where the gods do have a definite feeling of destroying/devouring/repurposing things into something new. But that's for another day and another great industrious writing project!