<BW> Into the Wilds

[Tim]

It'll be getting difficult/challenging.

Heh. Well, that's all about trying to do stuff when you're wounded or otherwise in dire straits. You've sorta got to look for adversity and set yourself up to fail. We torture our imaginary friends in BW.

[Frappe]

v1.1
WORK IN PROGESS- more stuff to be filled in

Concept: Enthusiastic Young Mage Tapping Directly into the Wellspring of Magic
Character Name: Mònteròssa
Stock: Human
Lifepaths: Born Noble, Arcane Devotee, Religious Acolyte
Age: 19
Stats: (9/16)
Pe: 6
Wi: 3
Ag: 4
Sp: 5
Po: 3
Fo: 4

Attributes: Health: 4, St:6 Re:5 MW: B9, Hesitation: -, Resources:B0, Circles: B1
PTGS: Su:B2 L:- Mi:- Se:- Tr:- Mo:-
Skills: (13/5) Doctrine: B3, Calligraphy: B3, Read: B3, Write: B2, Research: B3, Sorcery: G5 / Enchanting: B3, Persuasion: B4, Magic-wise: B3, History-wise: B3
Gear: Ring of the Opal Court (blessed holy symbol (+1d advantage die to Faithful)), Turn Aside the Blade, White Fire, badly burned clothing
Traits: Mark of Privilege (Intricate dark blue tatoo on right wrist), Base Humility, Gifted, Tonsured, Faithful
Relationships: none
Affiliations: Nobility 1d
Reputations: none
Beliefs:
- My training has concluded, but before I can present myself to the Opal Court or call myself Mage, I must learn of the world and increase my power.
- My studies showed that the long-lost artifact, Daoud's Wondrous Lanthorn, was forged on the Anvil of Gyr. With this tie of creation, I might be able to find clues or trace the Lanthorn’s current location!
- If I'm going to be an explorer, I've got to get some decent gear, and soon!
- GEAS- The Opal Court is the ultimate Earthly authority of Magic. So why would the Angel of Magic decree that the Court is to be destroyed? If there is a darker side of the Court, I must learn of it.
- FAITH- Magic is more than a means to an end, but an Art and Element in and of itself.

Instincts: (besides the first, not sure about these)
- As is tradition, cast Turn Aside the Blade at dawn.
- Knowledge is power, Assess people when meeting them.
-
Background: Born in a noble family with a bloodline of arcane abilities, Mònteròssa was apprenticed at young age to the family friend and Wizard Ascari. Mònteròssa displayed the family’s aptitude for casting, but lacked the discipline of proper focus. Paradoxically, this only seemed to encourage his love of the Arts and he immersed himself in the study of lore and old tomes. As the boy grew, he began showing the rare ability to access arcane forces directly, allowing him abilities without the safer filter of established incantations (much as the Druidic traditions’ ties to the natural world allow them influence in their domains). Ascari began preparing the boy to enter the Opal Court, a small sect of Mages deeply faithful to the Arcane Arts. Late one night, as Mònteròssa’s training began to conclude, a mysterious fire consumed Ascari’s villa. Once the embers died down, there was no sign of the old Wizard. Mònteròssa now seeks to explore the world and gather items and spells of power.

[Tim]

Oh, HELL YES!

I LOVE the first two Beliefs, Frank. I have no idea what to do with the Faith Belief, though. I suppose you're saying that your character has Faith in magic, itself? That's cool, but how does that belief (small b) evidence itself in the real world? How does his Faith change the way he interacts with the world around him?

I suppose the Opal Court is a sect of Faithful magicians? I really like that!

I also love that his only possessions are badly burned clothing and a holy symbol!

The second instinct...are you saying he's always cheerful?

Lastly, Monterossa is the most bad-assed name for a wizard, ever!

Tim

P.S. thanks for pulling these characters together, everyone. It warms my cold dead heart.

[pseudoidiot]

Okay, so now that I realize I can use the working carefully rules with Spell/Skill songs, I can get up to +2D on something, I'm not so worried about the low exponent on Threne of the Chameleon.

I'm still thinking, though, I may drop the Song of Paths and Ways and put one of those points into the Threne, and find something to do with the other.

[Tim]

I've got one question...who the hell's going to Mend your broken equipment? Circles and Resource rolls?

[pseudoidiot]

I'd thought about picking up mending, but then I realized I probably couldn't afford the tools.

[sjarvis]

I'd thought about picking up mending, but then I realized I probably couldn't afford the tools.

HA!

True, though.

Wait -- do we get extra RPS? I thought I remembered that we get an extra 5 rps or something along those lines.

Steven

[Tim]

Yes, there's an extra 5 rps.

[sjarvis]

After seeing Frank's awesome piled up high on top of everyone else's awesome, I think this game is going to ROCK! I'm looking forward to this game like I haven't looked forward to a game in, um, maybe forever.

These characters are just chock full of potential in a world that (especially in Tim's able hands) is full of potential. I can imagine miles and miles and miles ahead for all of these characters --- they are living, breathing people who are going to live and grow and change based upon their upcoming adventures.

In playing a lot of Burning Wheel games over the past couple of years, I've seen a LOT of really cool characters. One of the cool things about BW is that you can start a game with a capable, experienced character that doesn't feel faked up like creating a 5th level character in D&D does (to me, anyway).

But this is the first time I've seen it from the perspective of a bunch of three LP characters, and it looks like we're about to open up a completely different view on this awesome RPG. I'm sure there will be some learning curve issues (especially for Tim as he figures out how not to kill us off immediately!), but I'm really looking forward to watching how all these characters (least of all my own) grow and change through experience.

And that may be one of the things that keeps me in awe of BW, or maybe I've just been lucky to play with some great players lately (or both!): that it allows people to create characters that I enjoy watching in action as much as I enjoy running my own. And that's true even though each of these characters fairly easily fits into a fantasy RPG archetype: the wizard's apprentice, the young street rogue/thief, the young knight, the young (by Elven standards!) Elf out to experience the rest of the world for himself (in D&D terms, sort of an Elven cleric).

All of that (and much more, of course) is why I stand, slack-jawed, in awe of Luke (and Thor and Dro) and what they've wrought in The Burning Wheel, this tool that empowers US to make the AWESOME happen.

Steven

[Tim]

Yeah, I'm REALLY looking forward to seeing how these characters develop. This will be the first open-ended campaign I've done with BW revised, and if you look at the Si Juk threads on the BW forums, open-ended play is really exactly what the game's designed for. I hope we can end up with a campaign that cool when we look back on it!

I AM really worried about killing you guys off! I don't want to pull my punches, though. I HATE fudging die rolls and the like! My main advice for you guys is to play smart, USE the rules to your advantage, and try to keep a Persona point on hand to invoke the complication rules.

Tim

[pseudoidiot]

I'm thinking of switching my Power 3 and Forte 4. I'll have a little better IMS for Fight, and it wouldn't affect my mortal wound calculation.

I think I may also drop the Song of Paths and Ways, and maybe drop another skill point into Threne, and either open up Rhetoric (so I'm not totally defenseless should I need to DoW), or open up Mending. Since I wouldn't have tools, I'd have to find a situation to maybe borrow someone's and pay for the time, or just eventually buy my own.

I like both options, and since my Perception is 6, both would be open at an exponent of 3, and if I still want the other, it's only 4 beginner's luck tests to open it up.

Thoughts?

Oh, and great post about the awesomeness of BW, Steven.

[Tim]

Sounds pretty reasonable to me, Jeremiah.

[pseudoidiot]

What about Mending vs. Rhetoric? One nice thing about mending, is that as long as your armor isn't demolished, the Obs really aren't that high. So, if I were trying some beginner's luck with mending, the obstacle for the first die of damaged armor is only 1, so I'm looking at an Ob 2 on 6 dice, which should be a piece of cake.

On the other hand, using beginner's luck in a DoW against someone that has a duelling skill would be a big disadvantage.

So, I think I'm leaning towards mending, and then hoping to find a smith that'll let me work in their forge until i actually have tools on my own, especially if i can work extra to pay for the use of their tools and earn myself extra tests

Then I can heal the suffering of people AND inanimate objects! hehe

[sjarvis]

Well, crap. I didn't realize it had to be successful to bring about Wonderment. Maybe FoRK in Singing to get the number of dice up and get the Routine tests?

Well, it's not the routine tests that are as hard to come by. It'll be getting difficult/challenging. As it is, with 3 dice vs an Ob 3, that's a base difficult, and with forking I could get a routine, but I can't get a challenging test out of that, which doesn't matter at exponent 3, of course, but at exponent 5, routine tests no longer count, and i need challening and difficult tests.

Just as Tim advised us above (somewhere) to use the environment to get advantage dice, you can also petition him to give you DISadvantage dice (i.e., take dice away from you!). Thor touches on this concept obliquely in his BW Old Skool thread when he talks about using games like this to develop some rules mastery and work the advancement rules hard.

Luke mentions it in his recent post about Why he loves BW:

Advancement
• The way advancement drives conflict is so much fun. In both of our games, we get mad at our GMs if they don't test us and give us disadvantages! How else are we going to advance?

A lot of BW wisdom in that quote.

Steven

[Tim]

Mending or not is totally up to you. If you don't have tools you're going to have to Circle up a trained craftsman who's willing to loan you tools (which won't be all that easy) or buy some after you've gotten some phat lewts.

On a side note, I don't think mending is the same thing as blacksmithing, at all. I think it covers repairing relatively minor damage (a few chainmail links, patching a new piece of steel with rivetsl over a pierced breastplate, sewing up your rent leather armor). In fact, I think there's a whole OTHER set of obstacles for blacksmiths repairing metal armor.