> how would you use: Secrets of the hearth
The character is a Yinkini huntress. It's a very male role and she's got an air rune rather than a earth rune. She's regarded as one of the men by most of the clan. This ability is her way of staying connected to the gender role she left behind. It's been used twice: - once to convince the clan's mother (Earth goddeses God Talker) to support the character and once to augment her healing torque.
I can see loads of other ways it might have come in handy. A couple of examples:
"Move over, I saw my mum light fires loads of times, you're all thumbs"
"Cwrina's not in the stead and she usually raises the wyter from the fire. I know the secrets of the hearth, wonder if it'll come when I call?"
> how would you use: extrovert and happy
This hasn't been used in the game. However it's been mentioned a lot outside conflicts usually in the context that's she's always grinning and talking to people and how unusual it is for someone to be so outgoing when she spends all her time with Alynx and lives in the woods.
I can see it being used in real conflicts though:
"The shade surrounds you, you feel the soul numbing despair leeching into you."
"No I don't, I'm way too happy to be easily depressed by some simple troll summoned darkness crap."
[Interesting technique if you can get the hang of it: if a player can insert the name of an ability into a coherent sentence telling you how they intend to use an ability, it probably means the ability is a good fit for the problem at hand. Can take some practise though - worth suggesting to your players though.]
> how would you use: orphaned?
Again, not been used in the game, but here's an example of how it could be used.
"I'm ignoring the bastard Lunar, he doesn't exist to me."
"How you doing that then?"
"I hate their guts as most of the clan does and it's there fault I was orphaned"
[That's 'Hate Lunars' augmented by 'Orphaned']
[And, after talking to the character's player she's told me she's used 'Orphaned' to augment 'Hate Lunars' several times in the game. Ooops, brain like a sieve.]
> Wouldn't swimming and fishing be apart of a keyword?
> Why would you list it if it is?
They might be part of a keyword, but even if they are calling them out says they're important to your character concept.
In addition there's a couple of mechanical reasons you might want to do this. You can breakout the ability from the keyword (from Yann's current character sheet):
Hunter 9W climbs and jumps like an Alynx +1 father's eversharp hunting knife +1 fishing +1 swimming +1 knows Tula like the back of her hand +1 names of plants and animals +1
(apologies if the tabs don't line up properly)
Which means that whenever she tries to stick a bear with her dad's knife she's rolling against 10W, not 9W. They're also good for converting things that might be regarded as stretches (e.g. is swimming really a part of being a hunter?) so instead of attracting a -6 you can use the keyword at full value.
> why would you waste an ability on a relationship with someone you hate?
How's it a waste? Taking this ability means three things:
> why would you waste an ability on Bitingly sarcastic when frightened?
Again, it's not a waste. It's similar to the previous example. When your back's up against the wall the ascerbic wit comes out and it shows the GM that your character is a bit like Spiderman - part of his fortitude comes from winding his opponents up by mocking them. It also tells the GM 'bring on the scary stuff, I've got a plan to shine when I'm scared.'
> How can Petronius stole my home be an ability?
To repeat an earlier post - an ability is anything you can use to resolve a conflict, to determine which fork of a branch in the action the story goes down. Or more brutally an ability is anything that allows a player to pick up a d20 and do shit in the game.
So 'Petronius stole my home' can be used in just about any conflict with Petronius - either as a primary ability or as an augment:
Again, hope that lot helps. Just remember that abilities have a couple of functions:
Getting really pompous abilities are a structured means of communicating between the players and the GM, bit like a shorthand.
Any other questions please shout!
Cheers,
Ash
Powered by hypermail