If you're talking about Coil, then he got his powers from Cauldron. It's mentioned in an interlude that he owes Cauldron a week of service. It's mentioned in another interlude (Battery's?) that a week of service is one of the conditions that Cauldron can place in a client's contract.

 

What I took away from the interlude was not that Accord was going to be taking over Coil's position, but that it was Skitter who now held that chair because she was now the de facto leader of Brockton Bay, something that Coil was shooting for.

I also don't think he was aware that Cauldron was placing their bets on him. Accord and Cauldron are working together towards some goal and it, for some reason, involves Brockton Bay and someone controlling it. It feels like it's a way for the main character to be placed in such a pivotal position as to save the world. (Pretty good way of going about it, too, I might add.)

Why? Not sure, but of all the powers that Cauldron has access to, I'd guess one of them was a psychic and placed the fate of the world with whoever was leading BB.

Just my two sense.

 

Has anyone got a basic definition for each of the different classifications i.e. Makers, Shakers etc?

 

Off TVTropes

Mover - Capes whose powers let them move great distances at a time. Includes flyers, teleporters and speedsters.

Shaker - Capes that seem to be able to bend reality in some way, shape, or form. Includes capes capable of bending or compressing space or creating forcefields.

Brute - Capes who are extremely durable, either through Super Toughness or an incredibly effective Healing Factor.

Breaker - Capes that "break" the laws of nature for themselves, sometimes used when dealing with an Elemental Shapeshifter (how one can breath if they're made of fire) or the Required Secondary Powers for a Super Speed type cape (like altering how friction applies to them).

Master - Capes whose powers allow them to control others or create minions.

Tinker - Capes capable of highly specialized technological/biological creations years ahead of their time: from building Frickin' Laser Beams or a Hover Board, to growing Mix-and-Match Critters.

Blaster - Capes with a ranged attack, emitting Frickin' Laser Beams, Hard Light, or Elemental Powers

Thinker - Capes whose powers deal with the mind, allowing for Awesomeness by Analysis, Sherlock Scan, or Precognition abilities.

Striker - Possible subgroup of Breakers. Capes with the ability to apply an effect at point-blank range, whether it be an Elemental Punch or Healing Hands.

Changer - Capes who can change or shift forms. Effects range from utilizing a Shapeshifter Weapon to Swiss Army Hero abilities.

Trump - Capes whose powers are an Adaptive Ability, Power Copying, or can even change their power loadouts on the fly.

Stranger - Capes whose powers can be used for stealth purposes, be it an Invisibility Cloak or inflicting Laser-Guided Amnesia.

Gonna go look for references in the actual serial.

Edit: Can't find any. However, Uber is a Thinker, believe it or not. So is Victor. Humour at it's best?

 

I believe that is it, keep in mind that the classifications are not exclusive. For pretty much any super you have a main one that the power is mainly about and several suporting ones.

 

I'd like a little bit better explanation of the power scaling system. We're thrown some numbers, like that Skitter is a Master-5 and a Thinker-1 (I wonder if this number will be upgraded in the light of what Piggot said about prescience and what Skitter displayed in the fight with Echidna - i.e. ability to take in, analyze, and disseminate an almost impossible amount of info at once). Tattletale is labeled a Thinker-7 at the end of Extermination and seems to think that that is impressive (though again, having read the rest of what there is to read, nobody in the Protectorate can figure out what she actually does, and it does seem like she's on the high end of what thinkers can do, so maybe higher rating now?).

However, we also know that Labrynth is a Shaker-12, which seems like it breaks the scale. Maybe it's supposed to. I'd like to see what someone like Legend is rated as. Do the numbers increase in a linear fashion or is a 5 significantly more powerful than a 4? As far as the plot itself is concerned, the answers really don't matter, but if there are going to be numbers thrown around it would help to have a better grasp of what they mean.

 

Wildbow has commented on that a couple times, and apparently it's difficult to give an exact representation of what each rank does, as they were initially used for threat assessment by the PRT, and only later became common terminology.

For instance, you can't just say "a Brute 3 can lift X pounds and endure Y amount of damage," because creativity has to be factored in as well. Say that Brute learns how to harden his skin and convert offensive potential and mobility into a heightened form of defense, that feat which would likely justify an increased rating. Skidmark, one of the weakest and most pitiable characters in the series, is explicitly stated (in the comments) to be able to create deflector shields capable of repelling bullets, if only he'd pull his head out of his ass and realize that he can overlap his Shaker effects to give a greater result. A weaker power used in a more creative fashion merits a higher rating; Skitter's probably rated higher than five by now.

 

You also have to factor in biases on the part of the PRT.
Everyone that controls humans, even with big handicaps, gets a high Master rating (Canary, Regent). Skitter who can *merely* control insects gets just a 5.

 

The numbers seem to be about what has been observed done and what comes from that, no extrapolating on what logically follows. If it wasn't like that then Skitter would be classified as a very high threat, the number of diseases insects(and the rest she controls as diseases themselves) is simply ridiculous if she truly wanted to she could trigger a pandemic disease pretty easily.

Especially since it has been noted that the orders she gives are valid even after she isn't in range of those she gave orders to.

 

Controlling humans raised the possibility of controlling a cape. That's the big fear that nets those Thinker's a higher level.

 

Are you sure about that? I thought it was explicitly stated that it didn't work. She can give orders that work while she is unconscious, but not orders that work while she is out of range.

 

Hum... I will have to think of it so I can find the passage that says either way, I clearly have the idea that it is like that but been wrong plenty before.

Either way she is still more than enough dangerous, given a few weeks of effort she can transmit several different diseases to dozens of millions and that is the low end estimative.

 

Were we told what became of Vista and Shatterbird? Or what about that Chariot guy? I don't remember him being mentioned after it came out that he was a plant and everyone knew it during Coil's "death."

 

In the interlude that wasn't we learn what happened with Shatterbird and I believe that part is still canon. Won't spoil it if you haven't read but you should, most of it is still canon.

 

There was an interlude that Wildbow decided to scrap which revealed their fate. Those portions are still canon.

 

Well I answered my own question about Vista. She puts up a post during the interlude that I guess replaced the one that got scrapped.

How is a scrapped interlude still canon? Author just didn't want to bother with a rewrite? If it's not published then...

And I'm not trying to be combative here.

 

Wildbow thought that Witness wasn't good for the story as a whole, so he took her out along with the interlude that introduced her. Vista still kills Shatterbird and escapes, though, just as she does in the interlude.

Edit: Here's the confirmation.

 

Huh, I was unaware of that failed interlude. I'm not surprised though, as it was fairly awful.

 

Orm Embar posted the link to it but so anyone that can't be bothered to click on it knows. He basically stated that Vista lived and Shatterbird died and that he would work that in the narrative at some point.