Example SA's

[Edge]

I've noticed a few topics about SA's lately and i thought we could start one with example SA's in it to help new and old players alike in getting new ideas.
Maybe post SA's that you use or have used that you found worked really well or maybe ones that your players have used that were a little different.

[Edge]

My character in the game i'm playing in has the following SA's.

he is the rightful heir of a royal house (set in the midnight campaign setting) his family have been on the run for generations.  He is fighting against the occupying Orcs.

Passion: Loyalty to one of the other players who is a childhood friend
Drive: To free the people of Dorn (his racial people)
Destiny: To avenge the death of his father and retake the throne
Conscience:
Luck:

[Malechi]

hey..

I'm the GM in this particular game.  Its the first time I've really enjoyed a two-player game and its all because of the SAs.  The two characters have an interlinked background (childhood friend - protector) and the SAs reflect this.  I think maybe bigkev will post his sometime soon so I'll leave that up to him, but I also just wanted to say how nicely they flesh out the different positions that the characters come from.  Edge's character has Loyaly/friendship of bigkev's character, he's a deposed prince.  bigkev's character is the last in a long line of hereditary men-at-arms fated to protect the royal line at all costs.  His SAs come from the position of one who serves to protect.  While they're both in the vein of "loyal to ..." they describe a relationship that isn't as simple as that.  I find this really cool and as we saw in Saturday's quick game it can make for a really heroic session should one or both characters be threatened at any stage.  Having PCs with linked loyalties is one of the best uses of SAs I can think of...

cheers

Jason K.

[Malechi]

Oh I should also mention *the* biggest roll I've seen thus far in a game using SAs... bigkev, coming to the rescue of Edge's character, helping freeing the slaves, acting on his conscience and with a bit of luck had four of his five SAs firing and rolled a total of 24 dice (if i remember correctly) against an Oruk Warleader (I used some modified Gorem stats for the Oruk)...It only last two rounds..bigkev thrusting to the throat and scoring a massive kill in a red-red situation.  truly heroic...

Jason K.

[Edge]

Yes that was a very good fight :)
and don't forget the last scene of the session has bigkev's character trying to climb over a wall while just in front of an advancing Orc horde.
He fails his climb roll and falls into the orc masses.  My character trys to pull him up with him holding onto a rope.  I try a strength roll and it is really only with the loyalty SA that i manage to pull him up and we escape

[big kev]

gday all, big kev here of 24dice attack fame. My SA's

1)drive: freedom, myself and others. (we're a suppressed people)
2)drive: find fathers killer. kill fathers killer. (edge pa killed same time)
3)passion: protect edge
4)con
5)luck



makes for a pretty good game so far.

[Edge]

Hey well i'm guessing people don't want to share their SA's but hey i'm going to keep it alive anyway :)

I'm running a game as well as playing in Malechi's and in that game the 3 players are loyal to a Duke of Gelure.  We are playing at the beginning of the Gelure invasion.  2 players are men at arms and the other is the Duke's steward.

The 3 of them all grew up in the same town and are of very similar ages.

This particular Duke on the eve of the invasion decides not to follow the kings orders and defects to fight on the side of Cyrinthmeir.  This turns into a sort of Robin Hood sort of game with the men loyal to the Duke hiding out in the forest, while harrassing the troops loyal to the king.

Player 1
Passion: Loyalty to the Duke
Passion: Love (non boning as he puts it) of Player 2
Drive: To discover the identity of and hunt down the killer of his father (i know this is very cliche' but it fits really well into the story)
Con:
Luck:


Player 2
Passion: To defend the innocent
Passion: protect The Duke ( in game play this differs greatly from Player 1's loyalty to the Duke
Drive: To punish evil doers
Con:
Luck:

These SA's bind the group together and give a common goal for the players as well as offering a seperate more personal goal.
The sessions don't seem like they are there just to fulfill SA's as the SA's were chosen with this type of game in mind.

[Valamir]

coming to the rescue of Edge's character, helping freeing the slaves, acting on his conscience and with a bit of luck had four of his five SAs firing and rolled a total of 24 dice

Not sure if you were just being brief in your description.  But one thing that did catch my eye was the inclusion of Luck in the above.

Luck doesn't work like the other SAs.  You never just add your luck dice to the combat pool that way you do with drives and passions.

Luck permits you to reroll dice (1 per session per point), or convert a failed die to a success guarenteed by burning it permanently.

Just an FYI in case you were treating it like a regular SA.  Couldn't tell from the post, but I thought I'd bring it up just in case.

[big kev]

thats ok vlad, i was using 2 luck dice to boost my roll for the big kill. . it was epic.

[big kev]

...and apologies for 'vlad'. Cheers Val.

[Mayhem1979]

Not sure if you were just being brief in your description.  But one thing that did catch my eye was the inclusion of Luck in the above.

Luck doesn't work like the other SAs.  You never just add your luck dice to the combat pool that way you do with drives and passions.

Luck permits you to reroll dice (1 per session per point), or convert a failed die to a success guarenteed by burning it permanently.

Just an FYI in case you were treating it like a regular SA.  Couldn't tell from the post, but I thought I'd bring it up just in case.

This is incorrect sir.

Luck DOES work like every other SA in that it can be used to add die to a  roll.  It does not allow you to re-roll die (though in all honesty, it'd work about the same either way unless you rolled perfect or close initially).

The difference between Luck and the other SA's is that you can only roll your luck points once per session... that and you can permanently burn luck points for instant successes.

Or at least that's how Jake presented it when I went to a game demo he ran.  :)

[Ingenious]

No, you are BOTH wrong!
All kidding aside...

Page 10:
'.... These dice may be added to any of your rolls--all at once or bit by bit--during the course of one game session. When used up they're gone until next session, although generous Seneschals may allow refills during longer sessions. A point may be spent permanently to afford an instant success in any matter normally out of your hands--like a hay cart at the bottom of the castle tower you just fell out of(no matter what the TN!)'

*Ahem*... I am correct. You both are wrong, in certain regards..
:-D
Granted, we run 11 hour sessions sometimes.. and our seneschal isnt generous enough to grant us with a refresh.. though as players we use our luck point sparingly, due to not having a refresh.. and hence a limited supply. Thus it is a paradox that must be solved eventually.. either by us players growing some balls and using the SA.. or by the seneschal finally saying 'ok'.

Though this does bring up the question.. in using luck dice during combat.. are they just applied to a single exhange, or a single round...?Methinks a single exchange from the wording of the text on page 10..

*shrug*
I'm still correct. :-P
-Ingenious

[Mayhem1979]

Where was I wrong?  I didn't mention every detail, but what I said was correct.

[Ben Lehman]

One of my favorite characters ever was a fisherman (fishing skill of 3!  Go me!) who had gotten sucked into serfhood to pay for his head-in-the-clouds father's gambling debts.

Faith: Things my Da Tole Me
Drive: Restore the Family Honor
Passion: The Sea
Passion: Ayleen (my boat)
Conscience

[nsruf]

Care to tell us how they affected play? Especially those two look unusual but very interesting:

Faith: Things my Da Tole Me
...
Passion: The Sea