As attributes are on a 1-6 scale in _Prince Valiant_ and cannot be raised
(barring a clumsy optional rule), I was faced with the need for a method
for handling divine magic in "Prince Argrath" which did not rely on the
sacrifice of a characteristic. With "Greg on Magic in Glorantha" and a
copy of fourth edition _Pendragon_ in hand, I proceeded to define a set
of guidelines for divine invocation...Greg's so-called "miraculous magic".
As a side benefit, Devotion should also work fairly well with "PenDragon Pass"; only a few tweaks would be necessary to make it ideally suited to PDP, mainly involving the replacement of the POW characteristic in favor of the trait-based Insight rules from which Devotion is derived. When commenting on the following, please keep in mind that these are working notes rather than a completed draft. Be constructive...
Thanks to Thomas Gotschall BTW, for inadvertently helping me put a name to the concept.
THE BASICS:
Devotion measures a character's magical "connectedness" with his or her deity. Devotion is accumulated for behaving in a manner appropriate to one's religious virtues, participating in holy day ceremonies, maintaing sacred places, achieving spiritual goals and, in some cases, heroquesting successfully.
In "Prince Argrath", Devotion determines how much divine power a character can call upon in any given period, while the Invoke (deity) skill determines how effective he or she called down that power. A character may call upon one point of divine power for every 1,000 points of Devotion he or she possesses (500 points if you prefer a game where the miraculous occurs on a regular basis).
(What those points of power exactly represent can be approached two ways:
first, they might indicate a number of points of RQ-style divine magic,
usable as Runepower as described in David Cheng's TOTRM article; second,
they might indicate the maximum sorcerous manipulation which a wizard
could perform.)
As initiates, most characters will begin with at least 300 Devotion. In the event a character participated in the seasonal ceremonies and made no effort at further pious behavior, he or she would still be awarded 100 Devotion each year. Devotion may also be awarded each time a player roleplays one of his or her character's Religious Traits (or Vows, for wizard-types) in a dramatic, interesting fashion.
EXAMPLE:
Elusu is a Trickster [Treacherous (100), Mischievious (25), Lecherous
(50), Gluttonous (25), Deceitful (50)]. While "joyriding" into Hell with
Argrath on his Lightbringer's Quest, his player succeeds in emulating
Eurmal to great effect.
Elusu lies outrageously when they meet Golod Most Ugly, gaining 50 Devotion for his lavish deceit. At Kaldar's Gate, he artfully seduces Sinjota to allow the others to skulk past, earning another 50 Devotion for his lustful behavior. Finally, while being feasted at the Obsidian Castle, Elusu violates hospitality by eating the Only Old One's favorite trollkin, gives Subere a hotfoot and betrays Argrath by telling the assembled guests how Argrath slew Cragspider.
Elusu earns an additional 150 Devotion for his gluttony, mischief and treachery, in the end staggering home with a whopping 450 Devotion: 200 for successful participation, and 250 for acting in accordance with his Religious Traits (and, incidentally, Elusu also gets his butt kicked by Natalina Vingasdotter, one of Argrath's many Fighting Companions).
Michael Schwartz mschwartz_at_mindspring.com Ann Arbor, MI USA
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