Mechanics for a Babeester Gor Adult initiation

[Super Thunder Bros.]

I'm kicking off an upcoming campaign with some coming of age intitiaions taken from Six Seasons in Sartar. I have someone leaning into Barbeester Gor for her cult, and although there's nothing wrong with the Ernaldan rite, but I came across the following:

Amazing write up by @Wrestlepig I must say, I simply have to use it. The character seeks revenge against a Tusk Rider who killed her mother and bound her spirit as a slave, there's my opposed figure!

As I'm very much a beginner at running the game wanted to ask if anyone had any mechanical input to pad this out. What Rune, passion or skill checks make the most sense? I could certainly make use of some of Rites of Passage from Six Seasons

NB. Anyone have any suggestions for Helering adulthood rites? Run them through both Male and Female? Something new?

[g33k]

1 hour ago, Super Thunder Bros. said:

...

NB. Anyone have any suggestions for Helering adulthood rites? Run them through both Male and Female? Something new?

Disclaimer:  I'm a cismale, "of a certain age."
If you've got players at your table who aren't cisgender, I would consult with them & follow their lead.
Also:  get, read, and offer to your players the wonderful "Six Paths" ...
https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/395741/The-Six-Paths


My own impulse would be to interweave elements of both M & F rites and add some non-gendered elements, with recurrent/interconnecting branch-points where the PC can follow M / F / Neither paths.

Talk to the player ahead of time.

If they want to play a helering (non-cisnormative, genderfluid) Helering (follower of Heler), then help them pick disparate choices that are "all of the above."  If they want the PC to be cisgender (i.e. same as birth-gender) then they should (mostly but not necessarily entirely) follow that AFAB/AMAB path; or M-path for AFAB vingans, F-path for AMAB nandini, etc.

See also this thread:
https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/17389-initiation-rites-for-rqg

 

Edited April 3 by g33k
prior thread

[radmonger]

1 hour ago, Super Thunder Bros. said:

As I'm very much a beginner at running the game wanted to ask if anyone had any mechanical input to pad this out. What Rune, passion or skill checks make the most sense? I could certainly make use of some of Rites of Passage from Six Seasons

My take is that the normal progression would be to undergo the Ernaldan adulthood ordeal, either on-screen or just as something that happened before play begins. After all, the female adulthood ordeal starts as young as 13, and is not batched up into age groups like the male one.  So if PCs are 16/17, some will have undergone it years ago,

Either way, in it, they meet the figure representing Zorak Zoran. Maybe they are a courtier, perhaps representing Shargash rather than Zorak Zoran. Or they are an ambassador from the Kingdom of Night. Maybe they even take Orlanth's role, but call themselves Ragnaglar. Either way, the PC is prevented by the rules of Yelm's court from fighting them then and there. They may or may not go further through the standard Ernaldan path after that meeting.

Either way, after due confirmation and consideration, the PC decides that fighting that enemy  is more important to them than love or motherhood. Copperaxe knows the ritual described, and eventually agrees to go through with it. This might be after the first few episodes of the campaign. So it is what I call a cult confirmation, the completion oi the initiation process, not the start of it.

I would guess there other ways to end up in Babeestor Gor. One is being an orphan raised by a dedicated major temple, so having limited other options. Another is being the subject of someone making a political statement, like Harsaltar's Household of Death. Neither seems likely to come up in SSiS, but the ritual would still apply.

 

2 hours ago, Super Thunder Bros. said:

What Rune, passion or skill checks make the most sense? I could certainly make use of some of Rites of Passage from Six Seasons

If this is the first actual adventure, be careful of adding too many tests. As the linked post says: I haven't put a standard Fail condition considering that this is probably the first session for the character, they don't have much power and the narrative possibilities are really not pleasant.

The thing with dice rolls is you need to have a plan for what happens when they go wrong. Normally their is a group of PCs, and so that plan can be as simple as 'well, someone else will probably succeed'. For a solo PC, passing three successive 75% checks is nearly 60% likely to fail.

One such plan could be that failures give Fear or Hatred passions for some specific group, such as trolls. Wheras the true BG ideal is that vengeance and justice are for individuals who did wrong, not their kin.

[Malin]

I did write a handout for my Babeester Gor PC which was based on the Six Paths Ernalda initiation, and how things were adjusted compared to the normal one in there. There are no stats, but it might give you some ideas on how this first initiation into the tribe (not becoming an actual initiate of the cult) might happen.

 

BabeesterGorInitiation.docx