First, and this might seem a little off-topic, but Bully is a horrendously overrated talent from an efficiency perspective. Loosely translated, it reads "when you inflict negative status effects on your enemies, you win." You really don't need to spend a talent in order for this to be true; if your enemies are consistently Knocked Down, Slowed, or Crippled, you're going to win anyway. Bully seems much better than it is because it makes big, satisfying numbers pop up on the screen. Lightning Rod, for example, is much more efficient than Bully, because it's much more likely to decide the outcome of a battle. (The other three talents you listed, however, are powerful indeed.)
Second, it's totally okay that you're a fan of Bully. There is a specific psychographic of RPG player who enjoys those big, satisfying numbers popping up on the screen, and if that's what's fun for that player, then it's okay if they're a little bit less purely efficient. (Notice that I qualified all the comparisons above with references to efficiency, because more efficient doesn't directly correlate to better.) Some people like collecting data more than they like powergaming; those people would really like Walking Almanac. Some people might have a fantasy of being stuck in a jail cell and escaping on their own, and they might really like Jailbreaker. Some players couldn't resist at least on playthrough with Pet Pal to make sure they got to see what all the animals had to say, just because they're curious. If you're designing a game, you shouldn't judge every single talent according only to the standards of your personal psychographic (reminds me of
Spike/Timmy in MtG), because you need to be able to cater to multiple different psychographics simultaneously.
But I do really care about what you, Fellgnome, think about Head Start, because from what I can tell you're the intended demographic for that kind of talent. With the others, there might be other people who might like them, but if you don't like Head Start, I can't imagine who would. Similar situation, but not quite as extreme, with Savour the Moment.
