Quick question- how does everyone feel about the Steely Nerves talent? One of my players who is a Politico is quite happy with his character, but really feels like Steely Nerves is not very useful for 25 xp, compared to something like True Aim in another player's tree. Are we overlooking something great about it, or is there some kind of design choice we are missing? Any thoughts would be great.

It allows them to ignore the critical effect of several critical injury results. I would agree all of these are situational and this one in particular is not as attractive as Heroic Fortitude.

Critical them, and then see how they feel about it

edit: Also, it's probably a mistake to compare individually what other specs get at what levels. Some offer the first Toughness at rank 1, some at rank 3. The spec is a package with a flavour, not a list of exactly comparable abilities.

It's one of those powers which sucks because it never comes up, but is amazing when it does come up. IMHO, it's not any worse than the 20 point Grit right below it. Sure, it may seem costly, but it has its uses and if you want that Dedication from the Inspiring side then you'll have to take it.

One thing to remember is that it applies to any critical injury effect that targets those Characteristics, and not just the ones that say "reduce Characteristic X". So if you've got a critical injury effect that says you add a setback die to all rolls, or upgrade the difficulty of all skill checks, then you can activate Heroic Fortitude or Steely Nerves to ignore those effects so long as you're making checks pertaining to the Characteristics specified by the talent.

One thing to remember is that it applies to any critical injury effect that targets those Characteristics, and not just the ones that say "reduce Characteristic X". So if you've got a critical injury effect that says you add a setback die to all rolls, or upgrade the difficulty of all skill checks, then you can activate Heroic Fortitude or Steely Nerves to ignore those effects so long as you're making checks pertaining to the Characteristics specified by the talent.

Taken to an extreme, it still allows you to keep acting after a critical hit should kill you so long as you spend the Destiny point and the action(s) use the characteristics linked to your talent. Of course, you'll still die at the end of the encounter, but you'll go out like a boss!

One thing to remember is that it applies to any critical injury effect that targets those Characteristics, and not just the ones that say "reduce Characteristic X". So if you've got a critical injury effect that says you add a setback die to all rolls, or upgrade the difficulty of all skill checks, then you can activate Heroic Fortitude or Steely Nerves to ignore those effects so long as you're making checks pertaining to the Characteristics specified by the talent.

Taken to an extreme, it still allows you to keep acting after a critical hit should kill you so long as you spend the Destiny point and the action(s) use the characteristics linked to your talent. Of course, you'll still die at the end of the encounter, but you'll go out like a boss!

That one's highly suspect. After all, the critical injuries that say the target drops dead (either immediately or after a very small window). As the old adage goes, if it sounds to good to be true... and being able to ignore character death with the talent specifically saying it ignores character death certainly ranks up there with "too good to be true," particularly as Heroic Fortitude can be acquired fairly inexpensively (15 XP) for some specializations.

The bit about Heroic Fortitude, Steely Nerves, and the like came from Sam Stewart during his last appearance on the Orde 66 podcast, in response to GM Chris pooh-poohing those types of talents in their discussion of Dangerous Covenants' new specializations.

One thing to remember is that it applies to any critical injury effect that targets those Characteristics, and not just the ones that say "reduce Characteristic X". So if you've got a critical injury effect that says you add a setback die to all rolls, or upgrade the difficulty of all skill checks, then you can activate Heroic Fortitude or Steely Nerves to ignore those effects so long as you're making checks pertaining to the Characteristics specified by the talent.

Taken to an extreme, it still allows you to keep acting after a critical hit should kill you so long as you spend the Destiny point and the action(s) use the characteristics linked to your talent. Of course, you'll still die at the end of the encounter, but you'll go out like a boss!

That one's highly suspect. After all, the critical injuries that say the target drops dead (either immediately or after a very small window). As the old adage goes, if it sounds to good to be true... and being able to ignore character death with the talent specifically saying it ignores character death certainly ranks up there with "too good to be true," particularly as Heroic Fortitude can be acquired fairly inexpensively (15 XP) for some specializations.

The bit about Heroic Fortitude, Steely Nerves, and the like came from Sam Stewart during his last appearance on the Orde 66 podcast, in response to GM Chris pooh-poohing those types of talents in their discussion of Dangerous Covenants' new specializations.

If a character is going to die at the end of the encounter, is letting him/her have a few actions before leaving the game really so bad? Besides, its not like those talents let them keep going if they exceed WT/ST, so they can still be downed before the encounter ends.

One thing to remember is that it applies to any critical injury effect that targets those Characteristics, and not just the ones that say "reduce Characteristic X". So if you've got a critical injury effect that says you add a setback die to all rolls, or upgrade the difficulty of all skill checks, then you can activate Heroic Fortitude or Steely Nerves to ignore those effects so long as you're making checks pertaining to the Characteristics specified by the talent.

Taken to an extreme, it still allows you to keep acting after a critical hit should kill you so long as you spend the Destiny point and the action(s) use the characteristics linked to your talent. Of course, you'll still die at the end of the encounter, but you'll go out like a boss!

That one's highly suspect. After all, the critical injuries that say the target drops dead (either immediately or after a very small window). As the old adage goes, if it sounds to good to be true... and being able to ignore character death with the talent specifically saying it ignores character death certainly ranks up there with "too good to be true," particularly as Heroic Fortitude can be acquired fairly inexpensively (15 XP) for some specializations.

The bit about Heroic Fortitude, Steely Nerves, and the like came from Sam Stewart during his last appearance on the Orde 66 podcast, in response to GM Chris pooh-poohing those types of talents in their discussion of Dangerous Covenants' new specializations.

Awesome, I hadn't caught up to that podcast yet.