Well, in my opinion, the val'Holryn seem like they are patriarchal, but with the egalitarian nature of Milandir, if a woman of the ducal line were to set her sights on the Dukedom, I imagine that they could become Duchess of Tralia by simply being a better option than the other male heirs. Of course, I don't have a genealogy of the val'Holryn family, so I can't say whether it has happened before.

On the side of religious proclivities, we have seen val'Holryn priests and clerics before. Tralia itself was a center of religious power and authority for a very long time. Saint Theomund the Missionary was a val'Holryn cleric of Illiir. What I imagine goes on is the val'Holryn take a patron god based on their bloodline powers. Born with the powers of the Assante? Worship Illiir. Born with the power of the Mehan? Worship Sarish. Of course, I can't say what happens to the val'Holryn who mimic Virdan, Emman, and Mordane, as Neroth and Nier are marginalized by the MoC, but I believe, personally, that the val'Holryn worship them somewhat more. Easier to accept a god when they blessed your bloodline. Of course, I dislike Sabinus and his teachings, so there's that.

Oh wow, time really flies when your having fun. Maybe we could make a Living Campaign Calender that lists all the major events of the campaign in real time.

On the note of Konrad, I am very excited to join him in his pilgrimage. Now I need to get my invitations together, prep an apartment in the First City, full gear to prevent untimely assassinations, etc. . . just general knight stuff.

Maybe we will see the faces of other val'Holryn, like Baralong, Odile . . . Perhaps Cetegris will show his face.

Well. . . yes and no. You see, there weren't 11 Valinor + Anshar that made the Val Families, there were multiple of them. Aside from House Virdan and House Emman, who were blessed by the same Valinor, all the Val Families can trace their lineage to a different one. The val'Sosi, while not an original family, show this. When the Serenity of Beltine blessed the Heroes, they didn't become val'Ishi: they became a new family, because the Valinor who blessed them was different.

So if the val'Holryn are the descendants of The Other, they wouldn't have the full suite of powers. Since The Other was able to steal the power of a few gods and even kill the Gentlest of The Pantheon, but this was merely a portion of their power. His few surviving Valinor, severely weakened, would have to wait until the Blood War for a moment of weakness. By stealing the Bloodline Powers of those that participated, they would be able to survive. Going by this theory, the val'Holryn can only mimic the families that participated in the Blood War because they were the only ones they could get. The other original families were out of reach, and thus they can't possess their powers. Now, two things about this: one, the val'Cessari, for reasons I can't go into, are left out, and two, nothing says that the other families can't be added to the gene pool later. Of course, starting a Blood War 2: Electric Bogaloo is a bad idea on many, many levels, even for me. So, that's my thoughts on it.

Also, as a side note: while working on my character (a val'Holryn, obviously) I was looking at the Reluctant No More Bloodline Talent, and it made me wonder: did the val'Holryn get affected by The Storm?

There is no mention of the val'Holryn in either The Storm or The Aftermath.

When at "The Wedding", I didn't know about all that extra backstory as to why there was an illegitimate child and the politics was in progress.

"Interesting."
'Hiro' Barbara Duran-Dellanov, Legion of Heaven's Blade (retired), assistant to the val'Dellanov family at "The Wedding".

On the contrary. In the old yahoo group I certainly asked about this since my 3E character (sir Jaeger val Holryn) was both of the val’Tensen powers and a paladin of Hurrian to boot. Henry answered that Jaeger and other val Holryns did not have the same response as the val Tensen and were otherwise fine.

So. . . They weren't affected by The Storm, but yet they gained the Reluctant No More Talent? Strange. Something we'll have to look into later.

Ah well, as far as the mechanics of Bloodlines go, that change/update happened between editions as I remember...

Since the val'Holryn manifest whatever the family's bloodlines powers are, in the new edition they now get the "updated" val'Tensen powers. Should they instead use the old set of powers? An interesting idea. Even if a story purist would say yes, as a practically I don't think you want to "waste" the space in your core rule book explaining a corner case of val'Holryn unaffected by the Storm and listing alternative val'Tensen powers.

Maybe I'm wrong to dismiss it. Maybe there is more here to think about.

I think clear answers on this could be very interesting. Perhaps the most fundamental question is what generates a Bloodline / set of Bloodline abilities? There are val associated with gods that have no Valinor that have bloodlines and bloodline abilities. Even for the gods that do have Valinor there's no indication of which or how many Valinor (if any) were involved in a Bloodline's founding. We know the essence of a single Valinor is at least sufficient to found a minor bloodline (Serenity of Beltine and the val'Sosi). The death of a Valinor can have some effect (val'Sosi and possibly val'Tensen).

When the Serenity of Beltine died the val'Sosi were born, but no val'Ishi suffered ill effect. That implies at least that the Serenity wasn't involved in the founding of the val'Sheem bloodline or that the loss at least didn't take away from her descendants. The val'Tensen moved from having the Bloodline power of the Reluctance to the Bloodline power of the Wrath. Having the power disappear would imply that the Reluctance of Hurrian was involved in the founding of the val'Tensens and that the Serenity of Beltine was not involved in the founding of the val'Ishi. The Wrath arguably then was part of the founding of the val'Tensen bloodline as well, if suppressed by the Reluctance preventing those bloodline abilities from manifesting.

If the val'Holryn copy the abilities of a given bloodline when the val'Holryn's born or at least their first power manifests then I would expect none of those would be impacted by The Storm. Do we know how young that manifests? That would make them an offline not live system. It would be interesting to know if the val'Holryn first started exclusively manifesting the Wrath's bloodline powers after The Storm, or how that worked. If there's a change after The Storm at all, what's the master copy that's getting updated that the val'Holryn draw on if those who had the Reluctance ability before and after The Storm weren't impacted?

According to the Player's Guide to Arcanis, the bloodline powers represent the divine influence granted by each patron deity to their bloodline. If the val'Holryn's abilities aren't directly granted, what does it mean for them to be able to manifest any of the others family powers at all? Why do the other families not view the abilities as stolen? Were the val'Holryn an experiment to help boost the numbers of each of the families or preserve their legacy against possible annihilation?

I think it's all tied up in what makes the val'Holryn as unique as they are. Whatever that is.

With a sweep of his hat,

Paul