Free Will example

From: Richard Melvin <rmelvin_at_radm.demon.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 1997 22:52:39 +0100


Hengvik the Storm Voice has 18 POW and 21 points of castable/regainable rune magic. He also has an 8-point shield spell active on the Orlanthrole  in the Stealing the Sandals myth at his local temple[5].

Total 'extended POW' = 47.

Of this 47 points:

18 is his current self - the bit that calls itself Hengvik.

19 came from supporters at his temple. More was actually sacrificed,

   but got spent on the quest in non-productive ways.

10 came came from personal POW sacrifices previously made and

   since regained.

Hengvik will suffer two free will effects:

  1. The 18 POW from supporters at the temple will tend to bias his personality traits towards what his supporters expect (or demand) of him.
  2. the 10 POW from sacrifices made when he was younger will act as 'ballast', tending to keep his personality similar to what it was when he made the sacrifice.

In terms of Pendragon personality traits, this would probably be some small bonuses to selected traits, and a slightly smaller chance of his traits changing over time than normal.

Perhaps (19/18 * 2) = +2 to the top 3 personality traits expected by his supporters, and (10/18)/10 = -5% to the chance of a trait changing. Effects are divided by personal POW, so that strong willed people are less affected, Soul Waste saps your will, etc.

Now consider you are Argrath, aroubd 1640. You probably have hundreds of points of magic active on the hero-plane, doing such things as making it possible for the magicians of Sartar to learn to work together, enabling others to learn dragon magic once again, and lots more besides[2].

The same effects will be present, but much stronger.

Given who your supporters are, and why they supported you, this probably translates as a 'hate lunar empire' passion in the 30s. And with the amount of POW you will have sacrificed over your career, your chances of changing that trait are minimal.

And so you have no choice but to carry on fighting the Evil Empire, even after Sartar is free. No price is to high to pay to make the empire suffer: bring back Sheng Seleris, the most hated man in Gloranthan history, cause lozenge-wide climate change, or even risk the destruction of all Glorantha at the hands of Wakboth.

You have become the idea of the death of an empire.

There _is_ one way you could regain your free will. Cancel all your magic cast on the hero-plane, and renounce all your powers[3]. The paths you have cut will become overgrown again, your followers will soon forget you, and you will be free to be human again.

Unfortunately, lacking free will, you can no longer make the decision to do this.

Richard

[1] This greatly increases the chance of success at this quest.

    Without people like Hengvik this would be a real quest, not just     a routine 'pay-the-cost-and-take-the-rune-magic' job.     This spell will last as long as he is alive.

[2] While the actual spells cast go away when the caster dies, if

    they've done a proper job of setting up an organised cult,     others will already have recast them.     Death does tend to lead to a bit of a drop in your free will, as     you stop counting your personal POW in the 'credit' column.

[3] There's probably a specific ritual/quest for doing just this

End of Glorantha Digest V4 #552


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