Question: Are there any holes in the existing APPs that you feel need to be filled? Anything that ought to be covered and isn't? Like how Industry/Forge fills the need for crafting and creating magical items.
Hmm. A tough question.
In general, I usually feel that Scion is pretty great about covering almost all bases, especially now that Frost, Illusion and Stars have been added to the original setup. If you can name a god of it, chances are that there is a purview that covers that idea, and there are few places I could point to and say, "Oh, man, what a crying shame that's not included." The only two ideas I see mentioned often that have any weight for me are some kind of Love or Emotion purview, the better to help out figures like Aphrodite or Ishtar whose powers aren't clearly covered by anything but Epic Attributes, and a Creation purview for folks like Brahma and Nuwa who perform great cosmic feats of worldbuilding that don't necessarily fall into other purviews.
I'm not entirely sold on Creation; I think you could just as easily expand Industry to be about creating all kinds of things, not just machines, and call it a day (though I guess that would kind of just be a Creation purview, huh?), but I'm still a fence-sitter since I can't rule it out, either. I'm more on board with a Love purview, though I think it would be difficult to write one that did enough different things that didn't tromp on the social Epics. Other than that, I've long been toying with the idea of separating the current Sky purview into two different ones, Sky and Thunder, so that air-and-atmosphere gods like Quetzalcoatl and Vayu have a clearly different set of powers from thunder-gods like Thor and Zeus, but that's a big project that I'm still not sure I want to undertake right now (and that I'm still not entirely sure is necessary - I waffle back and forth on it).
Beyond those few, however - none of which I think are strictly "necessary" for Scion to function, though I think they could be good additions to it if done well - I can't think of any purview territory that remains unexplored. Anybody else got any ideas for sorely-neglected mythic powers that I'm just not thinking of?
Symbols - There are countless myths about words, images, and icons. Some words when spoken out loud can change reality, and some myths exist in various cultures about true names granting you control over another. Some cultures think pictograms could bind souls or attract evil spirits, and others believe that runes can be combined to form spells. Some people even think there was an ancient universal language that was once shattered or forgotten, and tattoos have been known to convey mystical benefits.
ReplyDeleteHmm, interesting. Do you feel like that might be too many things at once? I can get behind the idea of a purview having to do with words or language and the symbolism therein (although what a mess to keep it distinct from Charisma and/or Intelligence!), but tattoos and iconography almost feel like two further things that might be too much at once.
DeleteI'll have to think about that one, I hadn't considered it before.
It is definitely a giant grab bag of themes that all fit beneath a single umbrella, so putting together any kind of sensible purview about it would require picking and choosing the parts that seem thematic and throwing away the parts that don't.
DeleteThat definitely requires making the distinction that you mention, but there are so many myths surrounding this kind of thing that the idea seems to be fertile soil.
I think Symbols and letters are more of a WAY that people could use Purviews. I can totally see a Shen who writes out his Boons on rice paper and when he activates them, the paper disintegrates and the Boon comes to life.
DeleteA Norse Scion who casts runes to use Mystery and Prophecy would be cool, too.
Aside from Forge, I also use a heavily modified version of Sound which incorporates Music and Language in addition to more modern ideas like sonic booms and such. Oh, and Emotion by Brent. Love me some Emotion.
Oh, man, Music! I forgot about that, somehow. Some of the Sound boons from BI get weirdly fiddly and science-y for me, but Music's a place I think you could definitely pull off a purview. There are quite a few gods of it, like Apollo or Sarasvati, who could benefit from its inclusion.
DeleteAt least one of our Norse Scions does use runes when she uses Mystery; we also had a Tuatha Scion who used the Ogham alphabet to activate a lot of his powers.
I gave Sound to Apollo, Bragi, the Dagda, Dionysus, Hathor, Kvasir, Ogma, Sarasvati, Tlazolteotl.
DeleteOh! And Wealth! I wrote a Wealth Purview. Totally forgot! It was all about buying, selling, trading and providing. Things like making sure your allies and worshipers had enough food and money, being able to pull off a Loaves and Fishes trick, writing binding contracts and even granting material wishes.
Wealth was for Freyr, Ganesha, Hades, Hermes, Lakshmi, Teutates, Veles plus a buttload of minor Shen and Kami.
Music is one of the purviews I am on the fence about. There is definitely enough substance there to build an entire purview around but I always ask myself if music is integral to the function of the universe or society.
ReplyDeleteEither way, any Music purview will have overlaps because of sound through gases (Sky), or sound through liquid (Water-ish), or sound through solids (earth). It's worth experimenting with though!
I don't really think there's much overlap there at all. There's some with Sky, true, because Thunder is a sound and the Divine Threnody Boon is a thing.
DeleteSound traveling through water and being conducted by solids seems too scientific and esoteric to worry about. I doubt anyone is going to write a Boon about being able to hear through walls and say "You know where is a totally appropriate place to put this? Earth."
Also I'm not just dealing with Music, but also spoken language which is why I went with the idea of the Sound Purview. It covers music, song, speaking, creating and silencing noise, all sorta stuff. Is spoken language fundamental to the function of society? Hell yeah.
I'm not sure if it's integral to societal function - gets into weird psychological territory whether or not music is "essential" for humans to function. But it is universal to all cultures, and universally involved in the sacred and mythic, so that's good enough for me to consider it.
DeleteYeah, Sky (with things like Thunderclap and Divine Threnody) is the closest thing I can think of being a problem. It'd take a lot of tinkering (like any new APP - not a lot of ground left uncovered).
Oh, Echo Sounding, look at that. There was one in Earth. /facepalm
DeleteI think you'd have to make a clear distinction between music (a Music purview) and just sounds (which might happen as a byproduct of a few different things).
Schizophrenic commenting continues. Do you think speeches and and spoken language aren't covered fully enough by Charisma, Source? It seems like almost all those knacks have to do with holding forth in speech and communicating.
DeleteNaw, those Knacks cover being good at inspiring people or getting information across. In Sound, I included Boons that allow you to manipulate language as a concept.
DeleteGift of Tongues lets grant an ally (or yourself) the ability to understand any language for a scene.
Curse of the Rhymer can force someone to speak in only rhymes, or only in Ancient Etruscan (which no one speaks), making it a fairly nasty curse. But it can also be useful if you are suddenly having a challenge where you have to speak only in haikus to pass the Guardian Kami of a temple.
Whap someone upside the head with a severe and sudden case of aphasia via the Curse of Babel.
Charisma and Manipulation cover your own ability to bend words to your will and control people with what you say. Sound as a Purview allows you to control language itself. I think that's enough of a distinction that you wouldn't get a Manipulation Knack that can cause someone with no knowledge of Greek to start speaking it.
I'm not certain wealth is important enough to have an entire purview devoted to it, but as per the Wealth Purview discussion on the forums there were quite a handful of gods associated with Wealth and Prosperity in one form or another. Far more than just the ones Source listed.
DeleteAs for Music/Sound/Symbols, I think you could honestly have a worthwhile purview buried there involving some musical content and some language content. Kind of a mix of what we have noted earlier. I think Sound is not a very epic sounding name, but I have not yet thought of anything better!
We've actually got the curse of Babel rocking it up over in Chaos at the moment - seemed like a distinctly chaotic concept, though it could certainly also fit in something having to do with words and their use.
DeleteI'm with you, Iry - I've never thought Wealth was quite strong enough for a whole purview, simply because there are so very, very many ways to represent it in Scion - getting hold of and portioning out resources is peanuts for most gods, and the good fortune/prosperity stuff sounds like Magic (i.e., changing Fate to benefit others in small ways) to me. (Then again, that's the way we've been doing it for a while, so I am biased.)
Hmm, I'm remembering a previous iteration of Chaos, I think - we decided to just fold the Babel idea into Persistent Echo, I think, so it's not a separate boon anymore. Stupid carrying around ten different old versions of everything in my head.
DeleteSometimes I struggle (REALLY struggle) with Wealth. I still haven't finished the God-level Boons because it does get really tricky up at the high reaches. Hero-level Wealth isn't too hard to write and Demigod-level Wealth is TONS of fun, with all sorts of ideas.
DeleteAt God, though, it starts feeling iffy. So, yeah, I very much understand being on the fence about Wealth as a Purview. However, there are tons of Gods of wealth and praying to the Gods to bless you with more stuff is common through all of history. There's a lot there, but, yeah, Scion's system doesn't really model it that well and it gets fuzzy.
Sure, it might be a snap for an Epically Charismatic or Manipulative or Intelligent God to play the stock market and make billions or trillions, but that isn't really controlling Wealth any more than having Epic Physicals is a replacement for War or Guardian.
The interesting thing for me is that Wealth is a pretty easy purview to imagine and create at every level. Meanwhile creating a hybrid purview out of Music/Sound/Symbols is quite difficult because most of the effects you would want to create can already be reasonably replicated by other boons/knacks.
DeleteGranting someone the ability to understand a language is nice, but you could possibly do the same thing with Instant Seminar (academics), get tricksy with Implant False Memory, or actually teach them the language with Total Recall. Forcing someone to speak only in Rhymes could be accomplished with creative uses of Benefit of the Doubt or God's Honest. You can even force someone to do it with Overt Order or Instant Hypnosis. You could also force someone to believe they have aphasia using the same tricks. Making loud sounds or silencing sounds shows up in Divine Threnody, and Extended Influence really blows open the door to doing all of these things in unique ways and through strange mediums.
Saying that wealth is an easy purview to imagine and create at every level is insane. Its a one trick pony with nothing at god level that even comes close to making sense.
DeleteAnd anything that wealth does is completely trumped by earth creation
And here comes Mr. Negativity blowing his 'My Way or the Highway Horn' :D
DeleteWe've also got Shroud of Silence over in Moon at the moment as well. Sounds (or lack thereof) all over the landscape, as it were.
DeleteCreating big piles of gold is no different from using your Chaos to win every lottery in every state at the same time or using Prophecy to make all the money in the stock market, or any other get-rich-quick scheme that Scions can come up with.
DeleteHaving money isn't the same as being able to control the idea of Wealth. It's just being rich. We get back to how War isn't rendered useless by the existence of Epic Attributes, even though both are good at combat.
There are plenty of fun ideas for a Wealth Purview that have little to do with getting rich. Not all of them are great ideas, but there are so many you are bound to fill up the necessary slots.
DeleteFor example, a power that balances the economy after some other scion breaks it in half using Create Earth. A power that tells you the exact value of a trade good to the culture you are currently in. A power that tells you exactly what someone values most, or a power that tells you what you need to bribe someone with in order to make them agree. A power that blesses someone with great success at their job, where wealth is pride in a job well done. A power that tells you what you need to do to empower or cripple a local economy. A power that ensures a person and their children and their children's children are successful for centuries to come. A power that transmutes mundane objects into objects of value to a person. A power that ensures that resources are quite abundant without your constant attention. A power that ensures someone finds the object or person of their desire, or a power that prevents such a thing from happening. A power that completely reshapes an economy to your desires.
That's just 12 ideas, and I can literally think of dozens more. There is a lot of overlap with Magic and social knacks which is part of the problem, but there are so many ideas you are bound to be able to build a full purview that would please most people. That still does not mean it's actually necessary to have a Wealth purview though. :P
Intelligence, intelligence, perception, magic, intelligence, magic, magic, fertility/earth, prophecy, eh?, most purviews plus intelligence and charisma.
DeleteAnd all of those seem very demigod-y. God level wealth things seem near impossible. No level of changing economies(humans change economies) is moving the sun.
Just because you have a lot of ideas, doesnt mean that makes a "good" purview. Ideas dont make good balanced work.
Source, Im just saying that its not "easy" because Iry can spit out a bunch of ideas that he thinks "are good."
Delete"The interesting thing for me is that Wealth is a pretty easy purview to imagine and create at every level. Meanwhile creating a hybrid purview out of Music/Sound/Symbols is quite difficult because most of the effects you would want to create can already be reasonably replicated by other boons/knacks."
This is the part I was responding to. Wealth has the exact same problem as Sound/Music/Symbols but for some reason he finds one easy and one hard. Even though his suggestions for wealth fall into the EXACT same trap as sound.
Some of the things I mentioned are definitely demigod-y, and some of them are definitely hero-y, but one or two of them are godly. Also, just because you can identify some crossover with existing knacks and boons does not mean you cannot do the exact same thing with some of the knacks and boons on your own website. It's something has has to be judged on a case by case basis to determine if there is any merit.
DeleteAlso, while you are doing your best to impersonate the NONONO cat (link provided for comedic reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKI-tD0L18A) I would like to point out that I very clearly indicated that the ideas I listed are not great ideas. I could also point out the multiple times where I stated that I did not think a Wealth purview was even necessary (including the original forum post). However, there exists a process when you begin a creative endeavor where you generate a large number of ideas then sift through them for what may work and what may not work. You then take those ideas that may work and refine them further. Once you have gotten down to a few really solid concepts you can begin to balance test those concepts.
Also, just because I find imagining and creating ideas for Wealth easier than Sound/Music/Symbols in no way makes such personal preferences qualify as 'insane'. You are free to contribute to this friendly session of brainstorming if you want, otherwise showing up to denounce everything as unworthy is not really welcome.
I'm pretty much with John. None of the ideas you gave are God-level and most of them are the kind of generic, boring ones that I rejected. Anything "economy" based strikes me as something that you'd come up with in a brainstorming session, but then when it goes to play, it'd never be used. How often does a player need to magically re-arrange finances? It's easy to come up with ideas for Wealth, but not necessarily ideas that would see consistent use in a game situation and have enough balance to make them viable.
DeleteThe Wealth Purview I've managed to hammer out so far isn't based on economics, it's based on determining what people need and want, then providing it for them. It gets abstract at high levels, and I'm still not sure I have anything I'd be happy with as a rank 10 Boon.
Iry's examples of ways to duplicate Sound Boons actually don't strike me as valid. I wouldn't let you use Overt Order to curse someone to speak in Rhymes because that falls outside the "one action" limit of the Knack. Instant Hypnosis.. eh, it might work but only for a short time. It's a very limited way to accomplish the goal. And it couldn't force someone to speak a language they don't know. Likewise, you couldn't use Instant Seminar to suddenly gain the ability to understand Ancient Etruscan, or teach someone to speak Japanese if you don't know how to do that yourself.
Knacks are cool and all, but they're not nearly as 'magical' as Boons are. Boons do things that simply fall outside the purview of Epic Attributes.
I'm not sure what you mean by none of the ideas I made are God-level, Source. One of the suggestions I made would allow you to change the very concept of wealth in Asgard into an exchange of hugs if you were willing to suffer the consequences for such an action. The closest equivalent to that would be Ultimate Charisma or Ultimate Manipulate. Some of the suggestions I listed are also determining what people need and want, then providing it for them (these are not the god level suggestions though). For example, the power that tells you exactly what someone values most, or a power that tells you what you need to bribe someone with in order to make them agree (bribes are not limited to money and can include anything the person considers valuable), or the power that transmutes mundane objects into objects of value to a person (such as treasured flowers, or sentimental reminders), or the power that ensures someone finds the object or person of their desire.
DeleteNow once again I am not suggesting that these are good ideas, but you did just state that they were 'boring ones that you rejected' followed by the statement 'it's based on determining what people need and want, then providing it for them. It gets abstract at high levels'. This seems contradictory. :P
Im fully aware that you can have crossover, but thats the very same reason you said sound was hard. You cant use the same argument to say sound is hard, and then use it to say wealth is easy.
DeleteAlso I can call you insane, because you're using the same argument to say one thing is easy and one thing is hard. AND Denouncing everything as unworthy is sort of why this site exists. Have you read the FAQ? Maybe I should link you the FAQ.
http://gothambynight.com/scion/faq.htm
John, we're not even discussing mechanics at this point so there is nothing but subjective opinion being thrown around. I specially wrote, "The interesting thing for me..." which means it applies to me. Not you. Not Source.
DeleteWealth is easy for me. I can "imagine and create' a massive amount of ideas for wealth at the drop of the hat. I cannot do the same for Music/Sound/Symbols not because it cannot be done but because it is not easy for me to do so. Having an opinion does not qualify one as being insane under most circumstances.
And yes, we all know you love to troll people to try and get a rise out of them. This is pretty obvious and you've admitted as much by writing "I'm certain that like most of my posts they'll spark much arguing and throwing of fire. Which is the part of this blog I find entertaining." I will be the first to admit that I am quite easy to bait because I bite most of the time, but you should seriously consider being more constructive unless this is just your way of blowing off steam.
Erased a giant post because anne would like me to attempt to be more civil to you this one time.
DeleteThis isnt the WW website. You have no rights here, your opinions do not matter.
I get a great deal of enjoyment from talking to many people on here. I think some people have some great ideas, and I love to hear stories about their games.
You are not one of those people.
Feel free to continue using this website, responding to the blog, using our rules, our systems, the thousands of hours of work we put into this, for free(except rare donations from AMAZING wonderful people).
But if you tell me how I should, think, feel, act, respond to comments on my own website again, you will find yourself unable to log into said website.
Thank you for the fact you took the time to be more civil. I would like to reiterate that I honestly believe that the work you do here is to the benefit of the Scion community. I look forward to actually donating some day.
DeleteBut I think we're going to have to chalk this one up to irreconcilable differences. The sad thing about all this is I put just as much thought and pride into my games as you, and all I really needed from you was some validation and approval.
While I appreciate the offer to continue responding to the blog, I must politely decline or this will probably happen all over again some day down the road. Good luck John, and you keep on being awesome Anne.
Shroud of Silence always interested me because it offers no mechanical benefit to Stealth while Divine Threnody does. Is this an oversight or just a situation you like to leave in the hands of the storyteller?
ReplyDeleteHmm, that's a good point. Our PCs have actually never even asked about using it for stealthing - they use it to block out horrible sounds (like sirens, for instance) or deaden communication between foes, that sort of thing. If Divine Threnody has a mechanical stealth benefit for making things quieter, Shroud of Silence probably should, too (for everyone, not just the Scion using it).
DeleteOne more thing to put in the changelog!
Things like Echo Sounding, Divine Threnody, Shroud of Silence and Persistent Echo are the result of *not* having a Sound Purview rather than evidence that a Sound Purview isn't needed. They're Sound-related Boons that people wanted to create, but didn't have a place to stick that made total sense because there is no Sound Purview. So they went with next-best places.
DeleteA lot like how Concept to Execution is a stand-in for the entire idea of a Forge/Industry Purview.
An argument could be made that Divine Threnody still deserves to be in Sky, because otherwise Thunder Gods have to learn Sound to be good at their jobs. I don't necessarily agree, but I can see the logic at work there.
I actually never liked Divine Threnody being the only thunder-making boon out there (which is why we added Thunderclap to help Sky gods fill out in that area). Though I guess you could also make the argument that all boons that create lightning also automatically create thunder, but being able to control it instead of causing it as a byproduct seems like a necessary thunder-god skill.
DeleteHuh. I always give them a stealth bonus if its up. But yeah that should be in the boon somewhere.
DeleteInstead of Wealth, I'd much rather see a Fortune purview. It expands the idea out to more than just economical windfalls or crashes. Focused around luck without touching magic too much. I dunno, it's something I ponder often.
ReplyDeleteI've thought about that, too, Aynie - I feel about it a lot like how I feel about separating Sky and Thunder, in that I think it might work and be really cool, but I'm still not sure if it's necessary enough to justify the mountain of work it'd be.
DeleteI waffle, especially since I do think there's something to be said for the idea of luck and fortune to stay in Magic - good or bad luck is, after all, an expression of your fate being good or bad that day.
What about boons that give a broad blessing in your category(Fertility boon that make bob an excellent farmer, Industry boon that makes him an excellent hacker etc)
DeleteI'm hesitant because Charisma knacks already do that - Instant Seminar can already grant more dots of any ability than any mortal could ever have on their own, no muss, no fuss, no extra boons necessary.
DeleteI think we may have a strong difference of opinion here, as I feel that its reasonable that there be mroe than one way to skin a cat.
Deletebut I meant it more like a limited form of blessing bonus dice to stuff that falls under your boons just... feels right.
One area that I feel is somewhat underrepresented in the mechanics of the game is that of a god or culture hero as a teacher. It definitely doesn't merit an entire Purview all to itself, but I don't think that stories such as introducing fire, farming, or architecture to humans are adequately covered by Teaching Prodigy, Instant Seminar, and some Social/Mental stunting.
ReplyDeleteYeah, thats a tough one to do. Fire,...maybe you just brought the fire? But definitely education of humans has some problems. Id wing it atm withi teaching prodigy and instant seminar, but I agree its a hole.
DeleteThat is a thing, but I do think it can fall under Knacks instead of being made into a Purview. I'd particularly like to see more of it under Intelligence instead of Charisma. Fits better there and gives the Mental Knacks more to do. They're kinda lacking in that generally.
DeleteHurray for this discussion, because it finally reminded me to convert the Sound Purview into a PDF. Once I finish, I shall stick it in the WW Forum Sticky Post where I stick all such things. Someday maybe I'll make a nifty website.
ReplyDeleteWealth is still on the drawing board, though.
Wait, wait, are you Telgar? Now MY mind is blown.
DeleteMan, you think YOUR mind is blown? Talk about MINE when I realized you were Malkbunny!
Delete(Yes, I'm me).
Heh, I wasn't trying to be sneaky, I just figured it'd be nice to talk as myself on the forums without anybody thinking, "Oh, she's from GBN, she probably opposes XYZ on principle" or anything. It's not a very well-kept secret, though.
DeleteMan, I've definitely been thinking, "I must know this guy, I'm almost sure I do, but who is he?" Now I am vindicated.
For a while we thought you were Baron
DeleteI am not! But he also lives in North Carolina, so there's that. If his name is John, too, that'd really blow my mind. How many dudes named John can live in North Carolina and play Scion?
DeleteIt's not, but it does start with a J, so we were slightly suspicious. Then we were like... no way, he'd totally have told us it was him. Stumped.
Delete