Feedback from Songtress

 Sovem wrote:

What a cliffhanger to leave us on! So cruel!

Ranked Strength v Godzilla - responding to Sovem's question, I'll be referring to this post made back on 27th September and give my response in two parts. 1) Our ruling is that the 1st Rank PC is Dominant Rank. That means that Grant is literally the Strongest in the universe. If he goes to a Realm where Godzilla, or the Hulk, or Superman exists, Grant will be stronger. It is not possible to find a creature in the multiverse which is Stronger than Grant. There is literally nothing that he cannot bend or break. He is the Apex. Even if Grant goes to a realm where something should theoretically be stronger than he, Grant's Dominant Rank will mean that he will also 'scale up'. Hence in some realities, he will be literally able to punch a planet out of orbit. The only exception to this are the Typhonians (as per the reference post above). They are meant to be 'Beyond' comprehension. 2) For those games where 1st Rank does not mean Dominant Rank, or let's just pick on Ethan because he is not Dominant Rank, it would be possible for Godzilla or the Hulk or Thor or Superman to be Stronger than he is. The GM needs to decide how such super powered characters rank against the Ranked PCs.

Interesting. The way I've always played it is, if you're Ranked in something, you're better than any denizen of Shadow in any direct contest, period. Now, that doesn't mean that you can do everything they do; if you go to a world with Superman, you might not be able to lift an airplane (I mean, you might, depending on the world's rules, but it's not a given), but if you were Ranked in Strength, you could beat Superman in an arm-wrestle. Because Superman isn't as "real" as you are, he simply can't beat you. It's like trying to punch something in a dream. Similarly, let's say you're going up against some supernatural kung-fu master; doesn't matter if you don't know a lick of Kung-fu, if you're Ranked in Warfare, you can spot their attacks and weaknesses in their defense easily. 
Now, if you're not Ranked, and have sold down an Attribute, well, then you're in trouble...

First off- Let me say AWESOME Session 17!

Now onto my confused 'gripe'. 
I have always been of the opinion (and mind this is only my first pass at the book, and I never read the Amber RPG book, but I've always felt that Rank was amoung the PCs, not for the entire meta verse... which seems like overkill FOREVER for me. Though as we've said you can trick, trap and change your strategey to make it hard for someone steam roll you with their dominant stat.

I would theoretically play it that Rank amoung PCs different from Rank amoung Metaverse people beyond 'normal' Gossamer citizens. (since there will always be people, older, 'better' , more knowledgeable. But I guess that's why GM's saying something is important.