My revision of Ascendant (using parts of other Destinies)

Ascendant Destiny

Level 4: Concept
When you choose this Destiny, select one Concept that you seek to embody. This Concept should fall under one of these three broad categories:
Body - Aspects of the natural world, such as certain kinds of weather (Storm, Snow), types of plant or animal (Tree, Feline), types of terrain (Desert, Forest) or even a specific sentient race (Unicorn, Griffon). You cannot choose Sun or Moon as a concept.
Mind - Emotions, such as rage, compassion, or mirth, or philosophical ideals, such as Justice, Beauty, or Industry. You cannot select Love or Disharmony as a Concept.
Spirit - Certain "substances" that traditionally carry a spiritual or symbolic connotation, such as Air, Water, Earth, Fire, Metal, Wood, Light, Darkness, Blood, etc. You cannot choose Day or Night as a Concept.
While you are by no means limited to the examples listed in each category, the Concept you choose must easily fall under one of the three categories. You also get For the Cause.

For the Cause
You gain a +5 bonus on skill checks to further your Concept. When the +5 bonus is in effect, natural 20s count as Cutie Mark Criticals (CMCs) even if not a Cutie Mark skill, and 19s count as CMCs if it is already your Cutie Mark skill. Although any CMCs that occur due to this rule can only occur if they pertain to your Concept.

Level 7: Manifestation
See Things My Way - At-Will
Through natural talent, preternatural ability, or magic spell you command your Concept and it obeys. You may now manipulate your Concept as if using It's Witchcraft. This would allow you to become a cloud of darkness, start fires, help two ponies fall in love, etc. as long as it would pertain to your Concept. Both how drastic a change the character wants to make and how fast you want to make the change affect the difficulty of the Concept DC.

Level 10: Incarnate
You have transcended your mortal form and become the living embodiment of your Concept. Your appearance changes to match your Concept. Your natural, true form becomes three times larger than your original and has an appearance that is nothing short of legendary - whether Alicorn, Draconequus, Changeling Queen, Adult Dragon, or something completely new; this Form commands respect. You may shift between your True Form and your original at will, and can be anywhere from one-to-three times as large as your original size in any form.

Additionally, the merging of yourself with your Concept has made you as immortal as the Concept itself. You no longer age unless you wish it, though you can still be poisoned, diseased, cursed, etc. If you are ever killed you will reform - completely unharmed - a year and a day later. However, your Ascendance has made you too powerful to be resurrected by any other means than the above year and a day rule, so no outside force (like somepony using the Resurrect power) can bring you back before your time. You can only be "put out of commission" for longer periods of time by powerful magical imprisonment, and can only be destroyed outright if your Concept disappears forever.

Note: Once you have received this ability, other beings of your power level - and higher - take notice in you. While they might let you finish your current quest without interference, they will generally not tolerate continued action after that point. Once your quest is complete, you must either ascend to a higher plane of existence or develop a strict "non-interference" policy; either way, your adventuring days have come to an end.

Ooh, you liked my Destiny enough to revise it yourself? I'm flattered! This mostly looks good, but there's one issue that I have with it...

While this is certainly simpler than the original draft of this Destiny, which is something that I wholeheartedly approve, it seems to me that the revision of See Things My Way has made the destiny as a whole lose quite a bit of its... well, let's say "functional flavor". With this new ability, the whole Destiny becomes (more or less) Freaky Knowledge taken to its logical conclusion, i.e. specialization within a narrow range of skill checks, which is - no offense meant, but quite frankly - rather bland. If you want to give See Things My Way a different effect than the original, or even replace it with a new ability, then I suggest you come up with something equally (for lack of a better word) flashy.

What I really wanted to do was allow for much more mechanical manipulation of the Concept in Level 7, such as create fire or storms, make someone really happy or depressed, cause trees to come to life, etc. But the problem with that is that it would require paragraphs of game-speak to define all possible potential powers. Making another stat a potential CMC nat20 or nat19ing your primary CMC just seems equal in power to the currently published works.

EDIT - The thing that comes to mind after I spend a few minutes thinking about it is to make the effect even slightly grander than a CMC, which seems impossible by the aspect of it. But the thing about the manipulation is to be able to really get into the controlling of your Concept. You should be able to raise the sun or make two ponies fall in love with each other, for example.

Although I would guess that would fall under CMCs. But it is possible that we need to add another sentence or two regarding such magical manipulation.

Azureink wrote:What I really wanted to do was allow for much more mechanical manipulation of the Concept in Level 7, such as create fire or storms, make someone really happy or depressed, cause trees to come to life, etc. But the problem with that is that it would require paragraphs of game-speak to define all possible potential powers. Making another stat a potential CMC nat20 or nat19ing your primary CMC just seems equal in power to the currently published works.

EDIT - The thing that comes to mind after I spend a few minutes thinking about it is to make the effect even slightly grander than a CMC, which seems impossible by the aspect of it. But the thing about the manipulation is to be able to really get into the controlling of your Concept. You should be able to raise the sun or make two ponies fall in love with each other, for example.

Although I would guess that would fall under CMCs. But it is possible that we need to add another sentence or two regarding such magical manipulation.

Fair enough. I see your point, and to a certain extent, I agree. However, while versatility via increased control of your Concept looks good on paper, it's much more difficult to implement in practice. Making it fall under the "CMC" category ultimately leaves the control not with the player, but with the DM - and in the hands of a bad DM, such an ability could quickly become useless, or even worse, boring. Besides, gaining a power that grants you an automatic daily CMC frankly cheapens the awesomeness of CMCs anyway. Not to mention that the effect of an auto-CMC at Level 7 is arguably more powerful than, for instance, the Level 10 ability for the Explorer destiny...

But anyway, like you said, it would be great to be able to do all sorts of things with your Concept, but the need to define limits means that converting the concept into non-ambiguous mechanics, while still making it seem cool and useful, is nigh-impossible. Not quite impossible, but probably more trouble than it's worth.

That said, I'd like to be proved wrong. With enough elbow grease and creative input, we might just be able to make this work.
(Any other forum-goers who want to add their two cents are more than welcome to, by the way.)

However, some part of me still feels a need to go into some extended justification of my original concept for both the abilities and the destiny as a whole. I have spoilered it below; feel free to read or ignore it as you see fit.

Spoiler:

Now that I had some time to think about it (and read your spoiler)... perhaps a power similar to Its Witchcraft based off of your Concept might work. Using a skill you chose to act like Arcana.

Azureink wrote:Now that I had some time to think about it (and read your spoiler)... perhaps a power similar to Its Witchcraft based off of your Concept might work. Using a skill you chose to act like Arcana.

Yeah... Yeah, that might work. I'm a bit busy right now, but I'll see if I can write up something along those lines when I have the time.

Of course we would need to make sure it was understood that the Its Witchcraft ability would only work in the manipulation of the chosen Concept, and not just a blanket power like Its Witchcraft.

Perhaps the following:

Level 7:
See Things My Way - At-Will
Through natural talent, preternatural ability, or magic spell you command your Concept and it obeys. You may use your chosen Concept skill to manipulate your Concept as if using It's Witchcraft. This would allow you to become a cloud of darkness, start fires, help two ponies fall in love, etc. as long as it would pertain to your Concept, at the DM's discretion. Both how drastic a change the character wants to make and how fast you want to make the change affect the difficulty of the Concept DC.

Ok with some feedback I have finished updating my first post with the new version of Ascendant.