It's me again, with another silly idea.

Domoths mean nothing to the people holding them, other than the passive essence gain at Crown level (and a ton of responsibility on their backs). I've always felt they should benefit the holders themselves more. Hence, this idea:

Demigods

When holding a Domoth, you gain access to that Domoth's Powers (e.g. Nature: Affinity, Gift, Harvest). You may buy a Power for 10% the normal essence cost (as with ephemeral -> supernumerary conversion), at NO weight. Upon losing control of the Domoth, the power is removed from your POWERS STATUS, as if never bought, and would need to be re-bought if you regained control of the Domoth.

At Sceptre-control level, you may buy one power; at Orb, two, and at Crown, all three. If you've bought all three powers and Crown drops to Orb, one of the three is removed at random. However, if you have bought only 2 powers and Crown drops to Orb, nothing happens because Orb is enough to support 2 powers. Same for Orb dropping to Sceptre, mutatis mutandis.

This harkens back to the old ephemeral powers, which were intended to be "temporary power boosts".

Demigods w/Seals

E.g.
If a Seal-of-Justice-holder has bought (ephem or supernum) Aegis, and gains control over the Domotheos of Justice, he may utilize this system to buy the remaining two powers ephemerally at Orb-level. His properly purchased Aegis does not count against this system (thus not requiring Crown to have all powers bought) - however, he can't buy Aegis through this system if it's already in his POWERS STATUS, whether ephemeral or supernumerary. Meaning, normal power-buying and this system are essentially separate and can't mix. If, in this case, Orb drops to Sceptre, one of the two newly-bought powers will be removed, not Aegis.

Everything else works the same as for vanilla Demigods.

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I'm afraid I don't know how the system of Vernal Demigods works currently, whether they're allowed to buy one Ascendant power and if that stacks with a Seal they might have. I'm sure adapting the idea to them wouldn't be too much of a stretch.
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Ascendants

I have no idea how this would work for Ascendants, and especially Realm Ascendants. What makes this system balanced for Demigods in my mind is their weight limit and inability to buy Ascendant powers normally. However, allowing Ascendants to buy Domoth Powers at no weight could quickly turn into an overpowered mess, regardless of how temporary those powers might be. Or could it? Are the powers even strong enough to ever make someone overpowered? Maybe allow Ascendants to just buy one power this way, regardless of Sceptre/Orb/Crown? Suggestions?



Some of my rationale for this idea:

A ) 10% essence/NO weight

I feel like a 10% essence cost is appropriate for such a short-lived use of the Power, as it disappears upon loss of control over the Domoth, or loss of Crown/Orb. As well, NO weight for the same reason. It wouldn't be economically sound to have to super->ephem a bunch of Powers only to make room for this, very short-lived one, especially for Demigods who have a low weight limit, unsuited for Domoth Powers. As I said, this is imagined as a "temporary power boost" of sorts. Domoths can change holders extremely quickly, which is why I feel like having no weight attached to these powers is balanced.

B ) balance

No three same-Domoth Powers would be "too much" together, especially for such a limited period of time. Also, have in mind that people would most likely only buy one power, even at Crown level, because: a ) not all are that useful, and b ) even if they are, buying all three and then at Crown-drop one at random being removed is demotivating. If I really want Destruction and buy all three, and Crown-drop removes my Destruction, I'll be sad that I wasted so much essence and wasn't even able to make it all back with Destruction super-bashing. If I get Crown back, I need to re-buy the lost power, which can get very costly if I want to keep up all three powers.

Thoughts? Would this really be as balanced as it looks in my head? I know it probably wouldn't for Ascendants.

C ) use

I feel like this would be a good essence sink. The 10% essence cost is just right to be seen as a good, temporary essence investment, as opposed to a waste which would turn people off from even using this system. It would also (maybe) inspire people to fight for Domoths where previously they were apathetic towards them.

A potential issue that I can foresee is that this system seems geared towards vanilla Demigods, but vanilla Demigods are by far the least likely people to hold Domoths when there are Ascendants and Seal-holders around who can do it much better. Would it be fine for this to be the case? That a Demigod-holder who can benefit from this system is a very rare thing, and the system mostly caters to Seal-holders and Ascendants somehow? If not, what could be done to make this system more vanilla-friendly? Is the system intrinsically flawed/irreparable in that respect?



Uhh. I wanted to post this in simple ideas, but then I kept writing and it grew into this. If you feel this is a good idea, please give suggestions on how to improve it. Same if you feel this is a bad idea. I'm sorry for wasting your time (and forum-space :P) if it turns out the idea is unacceptable, but hey, dreamers be dreaming.

EDIT: I also don't know how this would work with people like Xenthos who've bought all available powers. <_<

Brahms:
Domoths mean nothing to the people holding them, other than the passive essence gain at Crown level (and a ton of responsibility on their backs). I've always felt they should benefit the holders themselves more.

Why?

I'd rather just get 25k essence per crown tick again.

That's all.

If you're gonna change anything about domoths, I'd rather alter the absolve/challenge mechanics a bit more.

Also, my pipedream about an opt-in non org-related conflict mechanism goes here.

Shamarah:

Why?

To add a more personal point to holding them, to make them more exciting to hold and more appealing. As it stands, holding a domoth is more or less a sacrifice on the holder's part. Maybe my impression is wrong, though. *shrug*


@Sojiro: I know that people would like some things to be changed about domoths, and some other things added with regard to conflict. This idea is in regard to the reward of holding a domoth. :P Probably a pipedream as well.

No. Not needed, sorry.

The passive power gains and "e-peen" is more than sufficient for holding a Throne at this time. Nice idea, mind.

I think there's a whole kettle of fish that is opened by giving them all powers for "10% cost" and no weight - the powers were designed for Ascendants only, and their costs were deliberately restrictive. Opening them up further like that is just too much in my opinion.

I agree, so please give back my 25k essence per crown, we can't even hold that many domoths as an org anymore!

I can't even remember why domoth essence gain was neutered, and I wouldn't have any objection to restoring it. As it is, a demigod doesn't even makes up the essence they have to invest from sceptre to crown unless they hold crown multiple times.

I've always seen holding a domoth as something you do for your org or allies and not so much for personal benefit.

If you find yourself doing it a lot and not feeling it worth it then campaign for VA or let somone else do it.

With the diminishing returns on essence change put in it would probably be wise to take a look at if the essence gain from holding a crown.

Wow. I never thought for one moment that I would ever agree with you on something, but for sure. The above post is -totally- what Domoths are about. They are an org thing. If people are claiming them for any semblance of "personal benefit" they really ought to not be claiming them at all.

For the record, as a demigod, you can raise it to Crown stage and -most of the time- keep it until it drops to orb. This is generally sufficient to offset the essence loss.

I'm against this, it's 9 players (or less) out of the entire game, usually people who are already pretty firmly in the 'speshul snowflake' area for one reason or another.