Benedict Adamson foresees Untold Insuperable Difficulties:
> But consider the problems that will occur if the devotee changes sub
> cults or aspects. ST pg 70 says this is rare, which might as well say
> that player heroes will tend to do it! See the example on ST pg 71.
> Imagine that Govoran (a devotee changing from Ormalaya to Orlanthcarl)
> had learned the Orlanthcarl Farming feat of Move Stones, and raised it
> to a rating of 19 (costing 1+(19-12)=8 HP) while devoted to Ormalaya.
> Govoran now becomes devoted to Orlanthcarl. What is Govoran's rating in
> the Farming affinity? pg 71 implies zero (or 6, if you rather) until the
> player spends 3 HP, to gain an ability rating of 12. But what happens to
> Govoran's ability rating with the Move Stones feat? It too must fall to
> zero, then bounce back to 12. So the result would be that becoming
> devoted to Orlanthcarl could make a hero LESS capable of doing
> Orlanthcarl magic. I can't see how that is Gloranthianly correct, so the
> rules are not modelling Glorantha well, if you can purchase standalone
> feats from other cults.
Well personally, I would give the player the option of either simply retaining a standalone rating in that feat _in addition to_ their rating in the affinity; or of 'recycling' the HPs spent on the feat into the affinity rating (at some ad hoc ratio). I don't see any massive problems with either of those options either in terms of playability or of Gloranthic Consciousness.
> Absolutely not! The affinity names, and thus 'obvious interpretations'
> are very general. But looking at the provided feats for a sub cult (or
> even, aspect) shows that the affinities are meant to be interpreted much
> more narrowly. Allowing all 'obvious interpretations' of a 'combat'
> affinity, for example, would allow gross abuse.
Some would cite this as proof positive that the 'Combat' affinity (or rather the myriad different Combat affinities) are amazingly badly named, and should for choice have been given more descriptively specific names. Please-oh-please someone add this to the "to do" list for HQ (or HQ II, or HQ III)...
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