Worship role Magic Points Buff

[French Desperate WindChild]

I learnt a new expression "dick move", I hope I understand well 😛

But it was just a quick & dirty illustration about mp use.

You can imagine a scene where the clan needs someone's MP for something else.

- the little sister of the chief is wounded and fall uncouscious.

          they can imagine the gain from the chief they would have if one of the pc had some mp to heal her, so sad.... and unfortunately there is only one person with mp to heal her and that is not the PC (no mp)  but a negociator from another clan who is here to obtain a favor the pc don't want (but the clan has a debt now) How they will manage it ?

- because bob the storm bull is too drunk, a fire starts near the clan forge. the only people with good magic to extinguish the fire are the pc (no mp) so they have to act physically. They will be tired the next days...

As a good Orlanth follower, I like my pc to show that their decisions can imply a lot of things, sometimes bad and must be fixed (still the idea of sacrifice).

I don't do it each time of course (as I said, I consider that succeed a worship should be a formality, the point is the level of success) but it can be usefull to add colors too. And to ask pc if the right action in fact is to gain Rune point by loosing opportunities to help their clan (well I m ewf too 😛 ) 

In another hand I would not "understand" why a pc who spent so many MP when he was low in worship ceremony, gives now only the minimum because his worship is 90%. Gods are not tools (yes i m not god learner) Some dream could be sent by the annoyed god.(maybe some devotion loss).

[Joerg]

17 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

1) I m pretty sure that there are guards in any clan during ceremonies. Of course I m not saying every holy day will see an attack, but there is always a risk. I cannot imagine smart enemies don't try to get advantages

Serving as a guard for a different cult than your own comprises part of your cult service minimum time allotment.

 

17 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

In all case, I consider a sacrifice must be a sacrifice, not just two cents you give. That must be a significant loss.

It has to be some significant investment, though not a loss. There are various clan and tribal items which can serve as "renewable sacrifice" in worship rites - items that serve as a conduit to the deity which are ritually "destroyed" or in modern speech discharged for a season or an entire year when used to boost a service. This does create a scarcity situation of its own, as the clan has to decide which rituals to use these items on - your player characters' heroquesting or better your regular clan worship services?

 

I would not consider a "1% per additional Magic Point" bonus on the worship roll - it goes against the general rule of RQG (and other more recent rules sets by Chaosium) not to give out piddling bonuses in exchange for in-game accounting. If 10% per MP is too much, halve it, or maybe quarter it so that each 2 MP give you +5%. These sacrificed MP need to come from the person, and cannot be taken out of storages, at least in my games. MP gained from Absorption (or Tapping) would be applicable, though, so you could munchkin your way around this restriction.

[David Scott]

4 hours ago, Joerg said:

Serving as a guard for a different cult than your own comprises part of your cult service minimum time allotment.

Unless you are a cult that specifically guards members of other cults - Babeester Gor for example.

[David Scott]

On 11/25/2020 at 2:02 PM, Caras said:

So basicly Worship should always be automatic success and players don´t even throw it... Unless it is important part of the scenario?

No. Page 141

Quote

It is usually obvious when an ability roll should be made, but if in doubt, the gamemaster should consider the consequences of failure. Does the chance of failure heighten tension and make for an exciting possibility? Will a failure add fun to the game? If the answer to either is “Yes,” then the gamemaster should have the player make an ability roll.

If it happens in down time (5 out of 8 weeks), making them roll won't add fun to the game. 

[David Scott]

On 11/25/2020 at 8:26 AM, Caras said:

I like players sacrificing things and animals, not magic points.

and that's how to play it. My players quickly realised that the sacrifices count as cult tithes. If a Storm Bull warrior earns 60 L a year and gives 1/10 a year to their khan, that's 6L. They can sacrifice 1 L per seasonal holy ceremony day. So they take 10 chickens to each ceremony, i give him +10% as it's 10, not 1 chicken. Who doesn't like chicken?  The Orlanth Thane, takes a sheep to each one from his herd. 

[Lordabdul]

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

My players quickly realised that the sacrifices count as cult tithes.

Oh that's a good point actually. Thanks!

[tnli]

Off-camera, I just let 'em get a refill, unless the situation is really bad, like if they're in a place with no options for worshipping their gods.

During adventuring times we roll, and the MP sacrifice can be significant. 

Edited November 27, 2020 by tnli
More readable

[Akhôrahil]

Since I used the previous experience rules, some of the PCs have pretty gross Rune Point amounts without being Rune Levels (starting at 9 is a lot, and I would have cut it down had I realized the implications). The more Rune Points PCs have, especially without being Rune Levels, the more difficult it is to actually manage a full seasonal regain. Especially when some use Rune Points for downtime actions, like Bless Crops.

Emptying the tank is pretty different when you have 9 Rune Points compared to 3...

[Rodney Dangerduck]

6 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Emptying the tank is pretty different when you have 9 Rune Points compared to 3...

Good point.  Associated cults are your friends for this, or just in general when you need to recover quickly.  My Vingan has probably recovered more of her Rune Points at Ernalda ceremonies than at Orlanth ones.

[French Desperate WindChild]

17 hours ago, David Scott said:

and that's how to play it. My players quickly realised that the sacrifices count as cult tithes.

Are you sure that the sacrifice (for bonus) isn't an addition of the cult tithes ?

From my perspective the cult tithes are made to let the cult works (pay servants, suppliers of the temple, etc..) when sacrifices are made to give the god happy (and ok give free food for the priests 😛 so they are happy too) ?

[David Scott]

2 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

Are you sure that the sacrifice (for bonus) isn't an addition of the cult tithes ?

Of course I'm not sure. Fortunately it's not explicit in the rules, so allows a roleplaying opportunity rather than the mechanistic you pay 10% of your money at the end of the year, blah. blah, blah. It encourages players to develop their adventurers, gaining wealth by keeping animals and having families to manage those resources.

2 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

From my perspective the cult tithes are made to let the cult works (pay servants, suppliers of the temple, etc..) when sacrifices are made to give the god happy (and ok give free food for the priests 😛 so they are happy too) ?

We already have a temple budget on page 406.

Here's what the two Storm Bull Players in our group came up with (handy having an accountant in the group, who can quickly make stuff up) :

150 Hiording initiates, 1 Bull priest (and one nearly Bull priest). All warriors pay 6L per year = 148 x 6 = 886 L. Nearly Bull priest is a noble so pays 20 L  The Bull priest pays 90% of 200 L = 180 L, so  1086 L in total.

Wealth owned by the Minor temple, 20 cattle & horses. The Tribal Queen gives 20 cattle.

The temple maintains a herd of cattle, bison, high llamas and horses. For a total of 2 hides of income. It also replaces any mounts lost by members (cult support)

So income is about 1100 L / year / 6 holy days =180 L / 150 members 12 Clacks. So everyone gets beer and a chicken on holy days. What more do they need?

This does not include goodwill donations for killing chaos and gifts for loyalty bonuses (not so important for Storm Bulls). Or the Bull priest's extra income for teaching spirit magic or donations for rune magic. This covers "The Priest must provide food, weapons, and magic, and will try to provide followers with choice mounts, gold, and other favors." 

Only a fool would try to ransom a Storm Bull cultist, and few come to the temple seeking their specialist magics.

I actually think there's two main Storm Bull groups in the Colymar, one at Clearwine (but no Bull priest in the GM screen adventure book) and the players group in Swan, but a single minor temple. So we will fudge this around sometime. I broke the 150 down into about 9 per clan plus 30 in the Ernaldori, and Hiordings respectively. The clan ones are a quarter part of the full time clan warrriors, with the remaining - ready for muster. This will alter the economics above, but I will just increase their holdings so they get beer and chicken every holy day.

[tnli]

The priest wouldn't pay tithes from the income they receive from the temple lands to support their lifestyle. 

[David Scott]

11 minutes ago, tnli said:

The priest wouldn't pay tithes from the income they receive from the temple lands

That's correct, they don't pay tithes on the herd. It goes straight to the temple and goes to look after everyone.

11 minutes ago, tnli said:

to support their lifestyle. 

The income supports their lifestyle as per page 406:

Quote

This results in a total of about 4,500 L a year, which supports the chief, Chief Priestess, five priests and thanes, five priestesses, the chief’s bodyguards, and the rest. The temple might own additional herds, gain wealth from raids, etc.

 

[French Desperate WindChild]

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

We already have a temple budget on page 406.

Yes absolutly, that what I understood : in addition of the lands revenues, there are the tithes (1280L in the example) to manage the temple (and the people associated), not the better ceremony because the "extra" sacrifice

From a gameplay perspective, why describe a cost for a bonus if the cost is already included in an obligation ?

 

that why I consider tith is not for the "worship bonus", it is for the "worship standard". but I may have misunderstood something.

[David Scott]

2 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

From a gameplay perspective, why describe a cost for a bonus if the cost is already included in an obligation ?

From a roleplaying perspective, why not use what's there to expand your gameplay.

2 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

that why I consider tith is not for the "worship bonus", it is for the "worship standard". but I may have misunderstood something.

You can play it anyway you like in your game. My players enjoy the idea that their roleplaying actions contribute to the overall setting.

[PhilHibbs]

I think +5% per MP feels more RuneQuesty to me. There are plenty of ways to get other bonuses, and I like the incentive to get involved in the adventurer's worship.

More generally, I am finding that the RP mechanism is making players risk-averse. They don't want to spend RP because they might need them later, and if they are out of RP then they don't want to do anything risky. I've seen this in Jeff's White Bull Campaign on YouTube as well, so it isn't just my group.

[Baron Wulfraed]

1 hour ago, PhilHibbs said:

More generally, I am finding that the RP mechanism is making players risk-averse. They don't want to spend RP because they might need them later, and if they are out of RP then they don't want to do anything risky. I've seen this in Jeff's White Bull Campaign on YouTube as well, so it isn't just my group.

Yeesh... expose them to RQ2! Where initiate rune spells were one-use and required sacrificing characteristic POW to regain.

 

[jajagappa]

2 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

More generally, I am finding that the RP mechanism is making players risk-averse. They don't want to spend RP because they might need them later, and if they are out of RP then they don't want to do anything risky.

It's not limited to RQG.  I hit that with players holding back on Hero Points in HQG as well.  And it was worse in RQ2 where you had to think about what spells you even wanted in advance.  

I'm also a player in an RQG Smoking Ruins game, and already burned a couple RP's to drive back some attacking spirits (and we haven't even reached the Smoking Ruins yet!).  I am conscious of not wanting to burn through too many (and I was at 5 to start) where I might need some in the ruins later.  

I think as a GM, you have to be aware of this RP economy and decide whether you want to push the PC's early, or help ensure they have a dramatic conclusion (or an opportunity to regain somewhere in between).

 

[Akhôrahil]

54 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

It's not limited to RQG.  I hit that with players holding back on Hero Points in HQG as well. 

That was also a question of bad game-design, where you wanted to save the Hero Points for ability increases rather than use them for effect when at all possible. No game should make you choose between looking awesome and doing sensible character advancement. I quickly ruled that when you spent a Hero Point for an ability bump, it also counted as an advancement spend.  

[Lordabdul]

3 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

More generally, I am finding that the RP mechanism is making players risk-averse. They don't want to spend RP because they might need them later, and if they are out of RP then they don't want to do anything risky. I've seen this in Jeff's White Bull Campaign on YouTube as well, so it isn't just my group.

While this ties into a group's specific psychology and into the potential need for meta-knowledge (like knowing vaguely how long is an adventure, whether there will be downtime or not, etc.), I agree that it is something to watch out for. It takes a bit of training and thinking on the GM's part to handle this particular issue, and for me, interesting thing is that it translates into in-world considerations. Basically, I was thinking about the usual KoDP line you get from your clan ring: "We only raid in Fire season! We need our people and magic for other things the rest of the year!". And then I figured I could apply it to an ongoing RQG campaign. For instance, the PCs' temple or chieftain would not send them on big missions too often in a season because, well, they would run out of divine magic. While Rune Point per se aren't a thing in Glorantha, there is such a thing as "being out of favour", and so the party's patrons would need to manage that, being indirectly aware of Rune Point economy. Similarly, if the PCs have responsibilities, like being thanes of Apple Lane, that also comes into the equation: "We can't do this until 3 weeks from now because we've taken on too much recently... or maybe we need to hire some help". This could get interesting, especially if waiting to do something can make it harder because, I don't know, the Tusk Riders have built a better settlement during that time.

[Lordabdul]

2 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

No game should make you choose between looking awesome and doing sensible character advancement.

Yes, I agree, for me in that case it was more of a byproduct of having a point pool do 2 things (something which I think has been fixed for the upcoming QuestWorlds rules). There was a similar problem with my group when playing the Cypher system (Numenera), where stats are used to spend effort and as hit points. Ugh.

[Akhôrahil]

4 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

Yes, I agree, for me in that case it was more of a byproduct of having a point pool do 2 things (something which I think has been fixed for the upcoming QuestWorlds rules). There was a similar problem with my group when playing the Cypher system (Numenera), where stats are used to spend effort and as hit points. Ugh.

Stats as separate Hit Point tracks works great in Year Zero Engine, though. I believe it borrowed it from PDQ System.

[Mossmac]

The GM can introduce minor holy days that occur weekly giving players a chance to replenish RPs.  Only some deities are listed as having these but I see no reason why the major deities like orlanth on Windsday and Yelmalio on Fireday wouldn’t have a weekly minor holyday. For less well known they may have a weekly minor holyday  in a particular season that their High Holy Day occurs in making it the primary time of year that they adventure in.

Players should also familiarise themselves with associated cult Holydays and where and when they would be available to regain some RPs. This can be a great hook in developing the environment they are in and meeting new NPCs characters.

 

[Lordabdul]

3 hours ago, Mossmac said:

The GM can introduce minor holy days that occur weekly giving players a chance to replenish RPs.  Only some deities are listed as having these but I see no reason why the major deities like orlanth on Windsday and Yelmalio on Fireday wouldn’t have a weekly minor holyday.

IIRC Orlanth has one but wasn't mentioned in the rulebook. I think it will be in the Cults book.

3 hours ago, Mossmac said:

Players should also familiarise themselves with associated cult Holydays and where and when they would be available to regain some RPs. This can be a great hook in developing the environment they are in and meeting new NPCs characters.

Yeah associated cults are really great for that, and when the players venture into far away lands where these cults are less common, that gives a good sense of being "away from home" (although they may be able to recover *some* RPs from the *equivalent* cults there?). I think the only cult that suffers from all of this is the Humakt cult because it has no associated cults.... I wonder if it would be cool, instead of giving Humakt minor holy days, to give it some alternative way of recovering the equivalent of a minor holy day's worth of points, like, say, by doing a solitary Worship roll after a honourable combat, or something.

[Mossmac]

19 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

I think the only cult that suffers from all of this is the Humakt cult because it has no associated cults.... I wonder if it would be cool, instead of giving Humakt minor holy days, to give it some alternative way of recovering the equivalent of a minor holy day's worth of points, like, say, by doing a solitary Worship roll after a honourable combat, or something.

I know this will divide players but I often think of Humakti as cut apart from the community - almost an Outcast or 'Other' as his myth describes. This is perhaps balanced by the Powerful Sever Spirit spell and Truesword, Sword Trance etc they can cast. I see his followers as Stoic and grim. The cult is dominant in where you find larger bodies of troops as well such as city regiments where unity of large numbers can compensate for individuals who are runniing low on RP's. Humakti are not supposed to be optimised in small groups of adventure parties or going solo.

This means that having no minor holy days and no associated cults kind of fits for me.

I think the obvious alternative rule would be for the Humakti actually fighting in a battle (Not a skirmish but a battle (GM's Discretion). At the end of the battle the surviving Humakti may complete some worship rites that have similar outcomes to a minor holyday modified by the individual's success in the battle.

Edited December 2, 2020 by Mossmac