>From: Paul Andrew King <paul_at_...>
>
> >I understand there are good cultural reasons for narrator characters
> >to join churches and orders, but that doesn't mean it makes sense for
> >player characters. Am I missing something? Is there some workaround
> >that makes it more practical for player characters to belong to an
> >order? Or in practice do most simply choose wizardry schools, animism,
> >or theism?
>
>I think the biggest reason for a player-character to be part of an
>Order is that that is the premise of the game. I don't think it
>likely that an Orderly would be part of an RQ-style adventuring party.
Looked at another way, why would someone merely be a lay worshipper when they could be an orderly or an adept? Why have no specialized magic at all? Yet in my most recent game, this is precisely what three of five new players did with their characters.
One of the reasons that this is attractive, IMO, is because one of the big themes of HQ is about making the choice of what to believe. If you take an adept, you've pretty much made that choice. You can still back out of it, but it's a much greater loss you face when you do so. Which is interesting in and of itself, but a different question than that of a less "decided" character. Orderlies are interesting because, like practitioners, or initiates, they have a tad more "breadth" in what they can take.
The difference between adepts and orderlies here isn't as pronounced as it is between Initiates and Devotees (some have actually argued that there's no reason to devote - that being an initiate is more potent overall). But I think it's still there.
Note that the book indicates that "most characters" will have magic, and be towards the "high end" of the spectra. That is, it assumes that many players will make the same analysis that you have here, and be interested more in the themes produced by generally more potent characters. But HQ uniquely makes less powerful characters as interesting to play (again, IMO), and, as such, many players see a lot of value in playing through the character not being committed, to possibly becoming more committed.
Again, I've seen it a lot, so...
Mike
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