Give me your SAs!

[Darren Hill]

As a new GM, I don't feel I have a handle on SAs yet - what sort of scope or flavour they should have, that kind of thing. One thing I thought could help me, and others new to the game, would be for those who have played the game to post the SAs that players and NPCs have used in their games, with maybe a little bit of explanation to understand the context if needed.
Any takers?

[Overdrive]

One of my players has a character who is a former assassin/spy from Gelure. He has SA's like Drive: Against ideologies of Gelure, Faith: 3-to-1, Destiny: To kill one of his own blood and Conscience. He is also Tormented for his past. Of course his former employers want him dead. A very interesting concept!

Another character is a 3-to-1 Templar who was trained in Xanarium. He is loyal to the Pope-equivalent, has Faith and well fitting Drive: to burn all witches. He is power-greedy (flaw) with a suitable Destiny. He has no conscience whatsoever, like the inquisition.

Needless to say the campaign is set near Gelure; at time when they begin invading their neighbors..

[Mike Holmes]

There's a lot of debate on how much leeway to allow in what an SA entails, and what's appropriate.

What I'd say is most important is to look at what sort of game you want to run. Do you want bright and shiney heroes. Then require SAs that make the characters that. Do you want a gritty morally gray game? Then allow more lattitude.

Basically, I'm of the opinion that you can wedge just about anything into the right SA if you want to do so. And since these are chosen by the players, they're powerful indicators of what they want to see from play. So try not to limit too much. Basically negotiate with players to get characters that everyone can enjoy.

Does that help at all?

Mike

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Here are some older threads you'll find useful:

SA's - what's your best?
Spiritual Attributes by the hundreds!
Questions about Spiritual Attributes

Best,
Ron

[kenjib]

Haven't started the game yet, but we've done chargen and someone took:

passion:  Love the Vasco family swordmistress (who is also a daughter of the Vasco patriarch)
drive:  Protect Cabrano family
destiny:  Destroy the Cabrano family
faith:  Seth-Ri (a "heathen" god)
luck

He also has both the lechery and vow (celibacy) minor flaws.  :)

He is the swordmaster (arms trainer, retainer, and assassin) for the Cabrano family, which is having a feud with the Vasco family.  He isn't a family member, but has worked for them for a long time and comes from a different kingdom.

Basket case!!!

[arxhon]

In my game I have:

Æthelwærd, a Captain of the Guard for the Barony of Cen. His Sa's are Passion: Hate King Hrothwulf, Conscience, Drive: Destroy invaders of the Duchy of Guþric, Faith: Three in One and, of course, Luck.

The other character, Baron Cædmon ap Cen, has Passion: Hate King Hrothwulf, Destiny: Become a King, Faith: Three Gods become one, something related to revenge on an "allied" noble and Luck.

[Agnar]

What's to prevent a player from doing something like:

Destiny: To be the greatest swordsman in the land
Drive: Winning sword fights
Passion: Swordsmanship

And putting all his dice into a huge combat pool that he gets all the time and not just when he fights Morgan Duffy?

[Bob McNamee]

What's to prevent a player from doing something like:

Destiny: To be the greatest swordsman in the land
Drive: Winning sword fights
Passion: Swordsmanship

And putting all his dice into a huge combat pool that he gets all the time and not just when he fights Morgan Duffy?

The GM and all the other Players.

Also I don't think all the SAs would be available for every fight.
The Destiny in particular wouldn't. I'd only allow its use when fighting a known respected and BETTER swordsman... and then I'd probably limit it to fairly public fights if other use of SAs was annoying.

Drive is fine.
If this got annoying I'd say it could only be used when character starts losing.

Passion?
I suppose that could be a passion. I'd allow its use if the Player roleplayed it well enough. That is, if the character got into the fight because of their passion for swordsmanship. Not just fighting because they turned a conrer and got jumped by thugs.

I'd only implement these if play of the character got annoying though. A character with these SAs is great as long as fights are the point of the play, if the other Players are pursuing scenes relating to intrigue and treachery in the last days before the fall of a shaky government then the 'Fight heavy' character may find the most interesting things are being done by Players with SA like Destiny: To cause the downfall of the Priesthood, and Drive: To support the Nobility in all things.

Just my two cents,

[Ashren Va'Hale]

my three current characters are GARETH THELOUD, who I hav playedfor a year now and has basically achieved his initial destiny of changing his homeland forever- he basically declared savaxen independence after bankrolling a unification of the clans with another PC's vast fortune that was bequethed him. He had a drive to become a legend in his home land, a passion which was a loyalty to his family/clan and a faith in the savaxen pantheon with a belief that woden oneeye mustreallylike him. His new destiny is to start a war.

I ALSO PLAY Karl, anothr gelurean assasin (DARN CAPS PROBLEM AGAIN!) who went rogue after being ordered to kill a woman and child, ths guy was a gifted beast who racks up massive body counts very fast: drive: redeem self- build new life
PASSION: Hate gelure
Destiny: over throw an empire
conscience: NO WOMEN no children

I apologize forthe randomcaps, my pc + this board casues probs

and lastly my wonderful conman Ashren
drive: improve his social status
destiny: be king for a day, only one day
passion: hate nobles/nobility
passion: hate the duke of his province.

gareth is by far my favorite. the beast has a cp of 19 with  great sword and an mp of 13 wth a throwingknife, a st of 7, tough of 6, agility 7, wit 7, ma 4, per 6, ht 4, wp 5, end 5 and a social 3. and more money than he kows what to do with.... few people let me play himin tir campaign anymore which is sad, I cant see why really. but I digress, sorry forthat tangentbut I Couldnt resist, just as te sas make the character, the character makes the Sa's

[Morfedel]

And correct me if I'm wrong, but i believe the main rulebook says that SA's cannot overlap too much by nature. If they happen to be triggered at the same time, thats fine, but they cant overlap the same triggers.

What's to prevent a player from doing something like:

Destiny: To be the greatest swordsman in the land
Drive: Winning sword fights
Passion: Swordsmanship

And putting all his dice into a huge combat pool that he gets all the time and not just when he fights Morgan Duffy?

The GM and all the other Players.

Also I don't think all the SAs would be available for every fight.
The Destiny in particular wouldn't. I'd only allow its use when fighting a known respected and BETTER swordsman... and then I'd probably limit it to fairly public fights if other use of SAs was annoying.

Drive is fine.
If this got annoying I'd say it could only be used when character starts losing.

Passion?
I suppose that could be a passion. I'd allow its use if the Player roleplayed it well enough. That is, if the character got into the fight because of their passion for swordsmanship. Not just fighting because they turned a conrer and got jumped by thugs.

I'd only implement these if play of the character got annoying though. A character with these SAs is great as long as fights are the point of the play, if the other Players are pursuing scenes relating to intrigue and treachery in the last days before the fall of a shaky government then the 'Fight heavy' character may find the most interesting things are being done by Players with SA like Destiny: To cause the downfall of the Priesthood, and Drive: To support the Nobility in all things.

Just my two cents,

[Ashton]

What's to prevent a player from doing something like:

Destiny: To be the greatest swordsman in the land
Drive: Winning sword fights
Passion: Swordsmanship

And putting all his dice into a huge combat pool that he gets all the time and not just when he fights Morgan Duffy?

Put him in situations that don't involve swordfighting or where he cannot bring a sword.

As an aside: passions tend to be more raw emotional things and related to people. Passion: Swordmanship would be better placed under the Drive SA.

[Jake Norwood]

Or let him have it...if it's what he wants, and it doesn't mess up anyone else's fun, then how is it wrong?

Jake

[Darren Hill]

Hello,

Here are some older threads you'll find useful:

SA's - what's your best?
Spiritual Attributes by the hundreds!
Questions about Spiritual Attributes

Best,
Ron

Thanks - those are useful (especially the middle one).
Thanks also to everyone who has posted examples. I hope you keep hem coming.

One SA I have trouble with particularly is Destiny.
Say someone chooses "Destiny: to become King".
Assuming the GM allows this, does this place an assumption into the campaign that the character will actually become king if he survives?
How would that destiny affect play?

[Morfedel]

The way I interpret it, since the future is never certain (particularly in any game that adheres to some form of random determinations, such as combat), his destiny to become king would be "if the future unfolds in THIS manner...."

In other words, he will either become king... or die in the process, something like that, heh. Perhaps in the final battle with the current, evil king, he could cut off the current lord's head and win - or have his own cleaved in two, and never see the throne.

The destiny puts him on the path where he COULD become king.

(Side note: since showing this game system to my players, like half of them want some form of destiny similar to that; man that is irritating! :)  )

[Lance D. Allen]

A comment to both Morfedel and Demi, regarding Destiny, as well as the other SAs:

The idea of any game is to have fun, as we all know, One of the brilliant things about SAs is that they are a direct message, in writing, from player to Seneschal.

Destiny: To Become King.

This is the player giving you a message, in writing that they would get the most fun, the most "Ooh, I remember this one awesome game I was in where..." moments would be from their character becoming king.

SAs, in addition to adding bonus dice to important situations, and allowing characters to advance by doing things that are important to them, are communication. The Seneschal only has to look at his player's character sheets to determine what the game should be about.

One of my players has that exact destiny for his character. I don't intend to make it an easy path, but I intend to, unless he manages to get himself killed off, give him the opportunity to become king. As the other character cares about becoming wealthy, they have ample reason to work together.

This is why there is an emphasis on group character creation in this forum. Sit down with your players, all together, and let them hash out the story by creating their characters so that they relate, somehow. This is also why there will almost never be any such thing as a pre-gen "adventure" for TRoS.. So much hinges on the characters.

So, in short.. If every single one of your players wants a badass destiny, let 'em have it. If every single one of them wants to have the destiny to become king, let them have it. I'll bet that you've never heard of a campaign where every PC ended up as a king, now have you? It'd certainly be interesting...