Do Splugorth possess Prototypical Deific powers?

[SolCannibal]

I'm guessing that as a brand of Alien or Supernatural Intelligence they do, but don't remember any specific mention of Great One-Eyed One making use of them or directly confronting gods or demon lords, ergo decided to hear other people's thoughts on the subject.

[ShadowLogan]

It isn't just the Splugorth AIs in this regard, I checked a few other AIs in the books like The Lord of the Deep (WB7), Nxyla (WB12), the Vampire Intelligence (WB1o) also lack any mention of PD-powers in their stat blocks (there might be other AIs, I just can't think of them at the moment).

Now D&G (pg73) states "Deific Powers: Most Alien Intelligences have the full range of all prototypical deific powers at regular cost"

Going over the list of powers in D&G and known alliances (in WB6), it would appear the VIs at least DO NOT have the full range of PD powers since one of the VIs allied with another SN being for the purposes of weather control (a PD power). Weather the VIs would have access to other abilities isn't clear.

I don't recall any mention of the Splugorth (or Nxyla or TLotD) specifically being known to use PD-powers, but then again the Splugorth also have a life span where other AIs are immortal. So for the Splugorth I'd say no, they just aren't that "mature" of an AI to have access to PD-powers.

[Warshield73]

I have said that lesser SI's (Splugorth, Vampire, Zllyphan from WB3 basically any SI that is a species rather than individual) no. For the greater ones yes since that seems to fit the description in D&G.

[Aermas]

I would say the species doesn't but an individual might if they really tried for it. God's are molded by belief & the evil one eyed tentacle monsters whether alien, vampire, or supernatural don't like others controlling them. The God & Dragon book in PF says even demon & deevil lords can get some God powers, so I don't see the problem with any sufficiently powerful thing, worshipped by tons & tons of cultures & peoples can get access to God powers

[Library Ogre]

I say yes, in general, though they may have to pay more for them than standard cost (qv some deities in D&G, who pay double or triple regular cost).

Splynncrth, incidentally, I would say has the full range of powers, at standard cost, given the amount of worship he receives. But deific powers generally don't show up in Rifts, especially since they were conceived after a lot of Rifts stuff was written.

[Plane]

I'm guessing that as a brand of Alien or Supernatural Intelligence they do, but don't remember any specific mention of Great One-Eyed One making use of them or directly confronting gods or demon lords, ergo decided to hear other people's thoughts on the subject.

PDPs weren't originally part of the power set of various PF gods' and demon/devil lords' stats in the Palladium RPG or Rifts Africa or 1st Conversion Book but then they retroactively had them the entire time as of Dragons and Gods, so I don't see any problem with giving them to most alien intelligences in general, which certainly helps to establish them as the horrors they ought to be, and not just giant pools of MDC and PPE as they used to seem.

I always figured we were intended to retroactively apply them to gods from previous books like CB2 (pantehons) or England or South America, though the GM might judge to personalize them a bit as they sometimes are.

Going over the list of powers in D&G and known alliances (in WB6), it would appear the VIs at least DO NOT have the full range of PD powers since one of the VIs allied with another SN being for the purposes of weather control (a PD power).

ah you mean page 37 where Haktla is "unable to do so on his own" (wait AIs have gender?)

I don't know if that's meant to mean that he has zero weather-affecting abilities, just that they're not adequate to the task of consistently being able to prevent rainfall in a large region for the long term.

CW: Local only lasts an hour and costs 400 PPE to affect a paltry 40-mile diameter (20 mile radius).. if we look at Enumu's natural abilities on page 39 there's no PPE cost associated with his ability so he can do it as often as he likes, and his hits a 1000 mile radius (2000 mile diameter) which is 50x the AE

AIs have always had weather-influencing magic. If we check their spell list on page 11 of the original Vampire Kingdoms they knew:
"all summoning and circle magic" (includes Summon Rain and Summon Storm presumably - cast them in areas adjacent to your vampires to deplete water vapor above your own region, perhaps?)
"calm storm" ("As a spell, the mage can slow a downpour to a light rain" .. "Using ritual magic the mystic can turn a torrential rain into a drizzle"
"create scroll"
"1D6 spells from levels 7/5/3/1"

They could be constantly creating scrolls to give out to their secondary vampires to do stuff like make rain go away, not to mention turn mages into vampires and have them cast those spells.

Keep in mind as of the revised VK their spells have expanded (page 34) to include "all ley line magic" too, which includes "Swallowing Rift" (can suck up rain) or Triangular Defense System (could block raindrops) it's just all very expensive compared to what Enumu can do, so Enumu is key for stabilizing a large region on the cheap to free up your PPE investments.

Weather the VIs would have access to other abilities isn't clear.

Hm, I feel like they ought to have SOME, if we read the revised Vampire Kingdoms the adjective "deific" does get used a few times in reference to these AIs: 10/26/32/39/216/219

If them getting full access to it seems unbalanced, you could also just have them operate like a lot of the demon lords where abilities are "double cost" with the additional logical house rule that zero-cost things gain "Token" status... meaning stuff that normally has zero bodily investment (like Control Weather) now has a Token (D+G pg 89) amount, meaning intelligences wouldn't want to do it casually since it would cut into their HP/SDC

This technically isn't RAW but double-costing deific powers for all other higher categories go up a level (Token becomes Severe, Severe becomes Consumed, Consumed becomes Annihilated) so having None>Token follows that pattern and would help inhibit weaker AIs while still giving them flexibility.

I don't recall any mention of the Splugorth (or Nxyla or TLotD) specifically being known to use PD-powers, but then again the Splugorth also have a life span where other AIs are immortal. So for the Splugorth I'd say no, they just aren't that "mature" of an AI to have access to PD-powers.

Most AI or god descriptiosn don't go into a full exploration of what they can do or have done so I wouldn't assume anything from that.

The lifespan thing is an interesting highlight though, I can't remember seeing that for any other AI or god.

deific powers generally don't show up in Rifts, especially since they were conceived after a lot of Rifts stuff was written.

The first we saw of them I believe was in WB16 where FoM's The Three got access. They was also written in for the Russian Gods in WB 18 (Mystic Russia) but got cut for space, the official states are on page 30 of Rifter 6.

The writing is a bit confusing though since it says stuff like "All prototypical powers plus Consume P.P.E.,Control Tectonic Plates, Control Weather (local), and Display Deific Omen" which is confusing because those four things ARE prototypical deific powers.

i think it's a mistake where Siembieda intended this to mean "The Basics" (pages 85-88 of Dragons and Gods) but not the entirety of the PD ones beginning on 90.

The RGs I think are basically on a lesser level than most D+G gods since they lack universal access to all the powers, which could explain why we haven't seen them make any large influence on the Rifts scene or get mentioned in other world books or megaversal conflicts.

If you did want to bring them up on those powers, then you could literally give them all the powers but make the ones explicitly mentioned function better - maybe they function at half cost, or all the other powers besides them cost double.

[Marcethus]

The way I run it is that all Gods, SI, and AI have the prototypical basic powers. Though I will modify which powers and their costs as my story needs dictate.

[Plane]

One of the confusing things here regarding consistency...

in 1996 on page Dragons and Gods pg 73 preceding Vulnerabilities it says "Most Alien Intelligences have the full range of all prototypical deific powers at regular cost."

in 2002 on page 9 of Conversion Book 3: Dark Conversions (as AI templates were removed from the Revised Conversion Book 1) there is no longer a Vulnerabilities section, instead it gets lumped into a "special god-like powers" section which includes % rolls to find both powers and weaknesses.

Despite a passing mention that some AIs are "deific beings of goodness" they are never assigned deific powers like in D+G, despite us already having deific powers being mentioned in Federation of Magic and also later in Dark Conversions where they're retroactively given to the Demon Lords who didn't have them mentioned when they were statted as AIs in the first unrevised Conversion Book.