The Castes, their abilities, and Supernals

[wonderandawe]

Supernal abilities aren't as overwhelming as they're sometimes made out to be. A huge charm investment in one arena means you're good there, but having melee Supernal, for instance, doesn't mean you have 10 extra charms to spend on melee or that your essence is 5 for all purposes or that you get helpful synergy from dodge/resistance/athletics/stealth/ride right away. It doesn't give you the mote pool to sustain use of higher essence charms either.

A deep investment in combat, including a supernal ability, lots of charms with some synergy or complementary effects, artifacts, and good tactics, certainly pays off though. If one character is dramatically better than others, more than a Supernal ability is making that happen.

My Twilight is Lore focused, but she is the best archer our circle has run across thus far.

[Zelbinnean]

I just wish Eclipses got something exclusive to them other than Sail. I don't like that Ability, it's not the most iconically Eclipse, and so far nothing about their anima powers has convinced me to play one over another caste, so it would be nice if Supernaling a social skill pushed me in that direction.

The anima powers should push you there. Exclusivity is not the sole measure of value. Hell, I don't consider it any metric of value in this system, because E1 Charms are awesome.

Supernal Presence or Linguistics are amazing. Socialize is okay IMO, the persona tree doesn't do anything for me.

[Kyman201]

So why only allow Dawn's to access Supernal combat Abilities?

Because Dawns fight. It's what they do. No matter what their weapons, Dawns fight. Sometimes the weapons are swords, sometimes bows, sometimes their weapon of choice is "Armies", but the Dawns aren't JUST generals. Here, let's just list the Concepts from the core book, and I'll highlight the ones that you seem to think Dawns should be.

Bodyguard, genius tactician, city guardsman, wandering swordsman, barbarian warlord(?), repentant brigand, martial monk, former slave gladiator, veteran soldier, daring young farm girl, swordsmith, arena brawler.

Emphasis mine, obviously.

So, yeah, that's a lot of concepts you're just waving off. I DO get not wanting your characters to be just dumb murder hobos that solve every problem with violence, but letting Dawns choose Supernal Combat isn't the problem in that case.

(As for why not picking Supernal War... The War charms cap out with a couple of E3 charms. Supernal probably won't get you as much mileage in War as it will in Melee or Brawl)

[Root]

My Twilight is Lore focused, but she is the best archer our circle has run across thus far.

And may turn out to be the best archer in Creation. Who knows?

[TheCountAlucard]

Achilles' heel was named as such because it was literally the only vulnerable point on his body. Story went his mom (I think) dipped him into the river styx by holding him by the heel.

In some stories. Notably not in the Iliad, where a spear to the heart would most likely have killed him dead.

I seriously don't know how you manage to come to the conclusion that he's vulnerable at all.

Pretty much the entirety of the Iliad. If he was invulnerable, why on Earth would he have lamented being unable to avenge Patroclus without his armor?

[Eric Minton]

I still find, frankly, supernal combat abilities aren't the real issue with balancing combat. The real issue is that, of 5 players, one will have 15 combat charms, one will have 10, two will have 5, and one will have no combat charms at all. And this can (but doesn't necessarily) get worse with experience, as the Dawn buys more and more combat charms while the social character buys more and more social charms.

This was an issue in my 1e game, where the Dawn started to outstrip the other PCs in combat investment to the point that none of her Circlemates could fight on the same level. And then the Dawn's player started one session by announcing that he was going to dedicate all his XP for the next several sessions toward Medicine Charms so that the rest of the Circle could catch up.

[Amoeba]

(As for why not picking Supernal War... The War charms cap out with a couple of E3 charms. Supernal probably won't get you as much mileage in War as it will in Melee or Brawl)

Yeah, I have a similar problem with my Eclipse player. He's supposed to be the group's manager and negotiator, rich guy with connections to the Guild, and all that. And he finds no reason for taking Bureaucracy as Supernal, since he can get everything he wants as a starting character at Ess 1, and figures that Ess 2 after 10 games will be soon enough for most of the rest. (No plans for the "attack other organizations" branch which is the only place where Ess 2 comes up soon.) It's not really wrong, but a bit irritating... and he might well be taking a third of his starting charms in Bureaucracy, it is core to his character.
It seems a bit off that Supernal is pushed as the "character's defining ability", but for mechanical reasons a player might choose their Supernal as something else so that they can get an interesting 2nd depth charm they want in another ability.

I don't know how badly things would be broken if Supernal gave some other advantage, but I'm starting to think about it...

[Zelbinnean]

The best solution is for all Charm trees to hit the E5 level in the rules. Give something enticing for everyone. Your player is thinking smart, frankly.

[DrLoveMonkey]

The best solution is for all Charm trees to hit the E5 level in the rules. Give something enticing for everyone. Your player is thinking smart, frankly.

Not only does bureaucracy hit essence five, Order Conferring Action is awesome.

Also essence 3 isn't quite as soon as it feels. It's about 22 sessions before anyone can take their first non-supernal essence 3 charm, that's not insignificant I think.

[armyofwhispers]

In some stories. Notably not in the Iliad, where a spear to the heart would most likely have killed him dead.

Pretty much the entirety of the Iliad. If he was invulnerable, why on Earth would he have lamented being unable to avenge Patroclus without his armor?

Your point was that it was called Achilles heel because he was super vulnerable. Except that's the exact opposite of how he's depicted everywhere except the Illiad. Literally his only vulnerable point was his hell. Achilles' heel is now a synonym for a person's weakness or even only weakness because of this fact.

Seriously, Achilles had a perfect soak up all the time and his flaw of invulnerability was his heel. That's what the flaw of invulnerability is supposed to duplicate for crying out loud.

[TheCountAlucard]

Your point was that it was called Achilles heel because he was super vulnerable.

Hardly. Pretty is not super (though if it starts to be, I suppose a heads-up would be nice).

Except that's the exact opposite of how he's depicted everywhere except the Illiad.

Which is sorta like saying Superman cereal boxes take higher priority to you than the comics or movies when talking about the powers Supes has or doesn't have. The Iliad is the single most-read legend of Achilles in the world.

Literally his only vulnerable point was his hell.

The word is "heel."

[Solar]

Are you really going to be like that about a typo? Seriously? Is that what we have come to?

[Zelbinnean]

Are you really going to be like that about a typo? Seriously? Is that what we have come to?

It's Alucard, so yes, yes it is.

And this level of pedantry and grammar correction with implicit condescension/academic superiority is what this forum deserves, not what it actually wants.

[Solar]

It's Alucard, so yes, yes it is. This level of pedantry is what we deserve, not what we want.

Well I dunno about that

[Zelbinnean]

Well I dunno about that

After the way so many Kickstarter threads fell out, yes, we completely deserve it. :P