Roles that people have trouble with

[Aaron Goulet]

Remembering back, I think some of my hardest roles were magickers that hated the fact that they were magickers, because without the aid of some cheesy "if I don't cast I'll go out of control" plot device (which I avoid like the plague), my characters never had a motivation to use magick; they just did their best to ignore it.  Seeing as they sucked at just about everything else, it kind of limited my play options and led to speedy deaths.

I've mostly avoided roles like that these days, but I'm curious...  How do YOU handle situations like these?

[Qzzrbl]

Remembering back, I think some of my hardest roles were magickers that hated the fact that they were magickers, because without the aid of some cheesy "if I don't cast I'll go out of control" plot device (which I avoid like the plague), my characters never had a motivation to use magick; they just did their best to ignore it.  Seeing as they sucked at just about everything else, it kind of limited my play options and led to speedy deaths.

I've mostly avoided roles like that these days, but I'm curious...  How do YOU handle situations like these?

Just use magick as often as possible, realistically.

Just like with any other skill, for any other character.

A ranger out in the wilds gets hungry.... What do? Forage food.

A vivaduan gets thirsty.... What do? Make water.

There's a situation for just about every spell. :3

[spawnloser]

The problem is in the form of reluctant magickers, Qzzrbl.  What if the vivaduan had ready access to water that wasn't magicked up?  Why make more when the character doesn't want anything to do with their own magicks?  They'd take any option besides using magick.

This is a role I haven't bothered with because I dislike hamstringing my characters in such an obvious/drastic fashion.  I can see how people would find it difficult.  I would find such difficult as well.

[Reiloth]

The problem is in the form of reluctant magickers, Qzzrbl.  What if the vivaduan had ready access to water that wasn't magicked up?  Why make more when the character doesn't want anything to do with their own magicks?  They'd take any option besides using magick.

This is a role I haven't bothered with because I dislike hamstringing my characters in such an obvious/drastic fashion.  I can see how people would find it difficult.  I would find such difficult as well.

The higher up the food chain in karma Magickers go, the harder it becomes to truly justify using your magick in a practical sense. I tend to find thinking and developing a background before jumping IG (Something I really try to avoid with mundane characters) helps alleviate the stress of figuring out how your 'gicker even casts, and why.

[Synthesis]

Bah, rolling a magicker and then declining to use magick is blatant karma fishing.

[Reiloth]

Bah, rolling a magicker and then declining to use magick is blatant karma fishing.

Hah, agreed. Why the hell would you play a Nilazi and not nom nom  nom nom mmmm nomz

[Aaron Goulet]

Bah, rolling a magicker and then declining to use magick is blatant karma fishing.

Blatant trolling?  I would've loved to use magick, and I THOUGHT I'd find an IC reason to do so in most cases, but once in game, I realized that, with the amount of shame and guilt my PCs felt about it, any excuse felt cheap and forced.

Besides, I have no reason to fish for karma.  

Edited to add:  It's worth noting that I had one PC that successfully transitioned from magicker hater to magicker, but the circumstances that allowed it to occur naturally don't tend to happen unless the stars align in JUST the right way.  Maybe I'll tell the tale once a year has passed.

[Qzzrbl]

The problem is in the form of reluctant magickers, Qzzrbl. 

Oh....

Yeah, I dunno about that then. x-X

[jriley]

Remembering back, I think some of my hardest roles were magickers that hated the fact that they were magickers, because without the aid of some cheesy "if I don't cast I'll go out of control" plot device (which I avoid like the plague), my characters never had a motivation to use magick; they just did their best to ignore it.  Seeing as they sucked at just about everything else, it kind of limited my play options and led to speedy deaths.

I've mostly avoided roles like that these days, but I'm curious...  How do YOU handle situations like these?

This sort of situation is less difficult to work through than you'd expect.

Here's your situation:  you enjoy playing reluctant magickers, but tend to go a little too far with it and then neglect to actually do magic. 

Here's the solution:  What you need is a MacGuffin.  Maybe say your character hates magic...but has somehow become convinced that by researching magic, they will someday find a way to cure their sick aunt of the plague.  You can have your character practice magic for an hour or two, and then you're more than welcome to play them as they stumble into a bar somewhere and drink themselves into a stupor, wallowing in their sense of self-loathing.

Since this appears to be what you want?

[jriley]

The best type of evil: Ends justify the means.

Full license to be a monster... you know, for their own good.

I think that you're onto something.  And I think it's in the right direction.

But I think that there's a little more to it than that.  I mulled the idea over for a bit, and then realized that I'd need some basis for analysis.  To start with, I made my own private* list of the world's worst villains.  These are the people that I believe have done the most harm to the world, of their hand, premeditated and on purpose.

Here they are in descending order:

1) Joseph Stalin
2) Adolph H.
3) Pol Pot

To be a villain, you really need to be fairly organized.  Psychopaths may be violent, but then again George Washington was violent, yet he serves as a hero to many people.  I'd say a villain needs to avoid being petty.  Dennis Rader may have offed about a dozen people, but even one hundred Dennis Raders wouldn't scratch the surface of what Pot 'achieved.'  And even Rader was pretty organized compared to an amateur like Billy the Kid**.

So organized is a good start.  Next I'd say somewhat of a megalomaniac.  This seems pretty central to me.  Someone who had a good perspective on their own place in the cosmos would, I suspect, be much more likely to engage in zen meditation than put in the tons and tons of effort into kicking off a massive and violent political purge.  To this I'll add a moderate dissociation from reality, which on the surface wouldn't appear to help at all but may be a necessary ingredient.

The third really central component that seems to link all three of these dudes is a willingness to go balls to the wall.  Both Adolph and Pot failed numerous, numerous times at many of life's endeavors, but they didn't really seem to let this slow them down.  Each time they'd get a good kick to their nuts, they'd fall down, cough, roll around for a bit, but then get right back up and charge into yet another hair-brained scheme.  No doubt a lot of potential villains end up dead or in prison before they have any real chance to unleash a megaton of human misery onto their fellow men.

Oh yeah, and they were cunning and all really paranoid.




*I realize that people are bound to disagree with this list, either in particular details or on principle.  Even if you do, though, I think that my point will remain in tact.
**I'd rather live on the same block as a villain than the same block as a thug, but I'd much rather live in the same city as ten thugs than live on the same planet with even one villain.

[FightClub]

[Scarecrow]

Crazy Man ^

[Spoon]

[Aaron Goulet]

The best type of evil: Ends justify the means.

Full license to be a monster... you know, for their own good.

I think that you're onto something.  And I think it's in the right direction.

But I think that there's a little more to it than that.  I mulled the idea over for a bit, and then realized that I'd need some basis for analysis.  To start with, I made my own private* list of the world's worst villains.  These are the people that I believe have done the most harm to the world, of their hand, premeditated and on purpose.

Here they are in descending order:

1) Joseph Stalin
2) Adolph H.
3) Pol Pot

To be a villain, you really need to be fairly organized.  Psychopaths may be violent, but then again George Washington was violent, yet he serves as a hero to many people.  I'd say a villain needs to avoid being petty.  Dennis Rader may have offed about a dozen people, but even one hundred Dennis Raders wouldn't scratch the surface of what Pot 'achieved.'  And even Rader was pretty organized compared to an amateur like Billy the Kid**.

So organized is a good start.  Next I'd say somewhat of a megalomaniac.  This seems pretty central to me.  Someone who had a good perspective on their own place in the cosmos would, I suspect, be much more likely to engage in zen meditation than put in the tons and tons of effort into kicking off a massive and violent political purge.  To this I'll add a moderate dissociation from reality, which on the surface wouldn't appear to help at all but may be a necessary ingredient.

The third really central component that seems to link all three of these dudes is a willingness to go balls to the wall.  Both Adolph and Pot failed numerous, numerous times at many of life's endeavors, but they didn't really seem to let this slow them down.  Each time they'd get a good kick to their nuts, they'd fall down, cough, roll around for a bit, but then get right back up and charge into yet another hair-brained scheme.  No doubt a lot of potential villains end up dead or in prison before they have any real chance to unleash a megaton of human misery onto their fellow men.

Oh yeah, and they were cunning and all really paranoid.




*I realize that people are bound to disagree with this list, either in particular details or on principle.  Even if you do, though, I think that my point will remain in tact.
**I'd rather live on the same block as a villain than the same block as a thug, but I'd much rather live in the same city as ten thugs than live on the same planet with even one villain.

I think that you're totally onto something.  I never though to analyze Stalin and Hitler, but I've noticed that my most successful "villains" weren't evil; just self-absorbed, silver-tongued, and didn't mind ruining someone's day/week/month/life for what they considered "the greater good".  Of course, they never reached a level of infamy that got them noticed, so their success is arguable.

[Bilanthri]

Way to pull a favorite out of left field, Spoon!

[Marauder Moe]

Reluctant magickers: make it a matter of survival for your character.  It's a rough world and apparently most of it believes you eat babies for lunch.

If you're a gemmer, you see constant angry mobs that seem to be barely held back by the militia, and have a feeling that the soldiers don't really care, they just have orders.  If things boil over into a riot, do you really think your pleas that you don't actually practice magick will save you?  Probably not.  However, being able to bust out a storm of fire might.

If you're a gemmer who grebs for a living, you've got the aforementioned angry mob problem plus that of desert beasties, raiders, and possibly worse to worry about.

If you're a gemmer with a job, well, it's unlikely you were hired for your looks or personality.  You were probably hired to do magickal shit, and if you like getting paid, you ought to be improving.

If you're not gemmed, secrecy is obviously your best defense, but what if that fails?  Again, your cries for mercy will not be heard.  Your only option at that time will be to fight or run in the most effective way you can.


So, you don't have to like magick, but what other choice do you really have but to learn how to use it?

[Thorg]

Reluctant magickers: make it a matter of survival for your character.  It's a rough world and apparently most of it believes you eat babies for lunch.

If you're a gemmer, you see constant angry mobs that seem to be barely held back by the militia, and have a feeling that the soldiers don't really care, they just have orders.  If things boil over into a riot, do you really think your pleas that you don't actually practice magick will save you?  Probably not.  However, being able to bust out a storm of fire might.

If you're a gemmer who grebs for a living, you've got the aforementioned angry mob problem plus that of desert beasties, raiders, and possibly worse to worry about.

If you're a gemmer with a job, well, it's unlikely you were hired for your looks or personality.  You were probably hired to do magickal shit, and if you like getting paid, you ought to be improving.

If you're not gemmed, secrecy is obviously your best defense, but what if that fails?  Again, your cries for mercy will not be heard.  Your only option at that time will be to fight or run in the most effective way you can.


So, you don't have to like magick, but what other choice do you really have but to learn how to use it?

To not use it?

A Whiran may have no greater aspiration than to get drunk as often as possible, and only keeps up attendance at his temple because it gives him a community to rely on when times are hard. There are slackers, moochers, and freeloaders in every society, even one made up of elementalists, and they rarely stick around when times get hard.

Being thrown out of your home with the clothes on your back to live with a horde of strangers who terrify you every time they open their mouths, who have some incomprehensible drive the deepen this sickness that has set them apart from the rest of society would probably make me drink. A lot.

If you think personally you'd employ your magick to defend yourselves from people you thought were in the right, or use it to leave the city (why would you ever leave the city, are you insane?), that's one interpretation of being a 'gicker. Are you really complaining because not everyone reaches the same conclusion, that not everyone roleplays the same identical train of thought?

[Qzzrbl]

Protip: If you don't think you want to be playing a reluctant magicker that hates themselves and never casts magick ever....

You ready for this?

Don't play one.

O:

[Marauder Moe]

If you think personally you'd employ your magick to defend yourselves from people you thought were in the right, or use it to leave the city (why would you ever leave the city, are you insane?), that's one interpretation of being a 'gicker. Are you really complaining because not everyone reaches the same conclusion, that not everyone roleplays the same identical train of thought?

Pay attention to discussion context, please.

People were saying they had trouble finding reasons for self-loathing magickers to use their magick.  I was offering a potential character motivation to solve that dilemma.

[Aaron Goulet]

Thanks, Marauder Moe.  That's what I was getting at.

And thanks to everyone who put forth relevant suggestions; you've given me a few ideas to work with!

[Thorg]

If you think personally you'd employ your magick to defend yourselves from people you thought were in the right, or use it to leave the city (why would you ever leave the city, are you insane?), that's one interpretation of being a 'gicker. Are you really complaining because not everyone reaches the same conclusion, that not everyone roleplays the same identical train of thought?

Pay attention to discussion context, please.

People were saying they had trouble finding reasons for self-loathing magickers to use their magick.  I was offering a potential character motivation to solve that dilemma.

Apologies, I just saw the response without a quote and assumed you were stating that people had difficulty with these roles! I know I've enjoyed playing 'gickers "from scratch" in the past and, despite what people might call 'karma fishing' by purposely hamstringing myself (and if you can prove to the staff you can handle a self-inflicted difficult role, don't you deserve a little karma?) it was fun to find a tutor and build my own 'cosmology' about how their taint worked!

To contribute: Minion roles. It's not easy (or a lot of the time, desirable) to be the jack-booted thug, the obedient thrall, etc. but by developing a devotion to your "boss" at the expense of scheming and plotting you can really help them achieve some cool things. Even if it's just having a red-shirt to throw at the gaj.

[MeTekillot]

I don't find minion roles to be that hard. I'm sort of playing one at the moment, really.

[Spoon]

Way to pull a favorite out of left field, Spoon!

Yeah, I totally have difficulty in playing Sean Connery too.

[Barzalene]

I love being a minion.

[Thunkkin]

1) Joseph Stalin
2) Adolph H.
3) Pol Pot

Villains like these can only be villains because millions and millions and millions of people agreed with them.  These "villains" were individual people, yes, but the reason you know their names is because they were merely the apex of millions of people who agreed with their leaders and followed the moral code of "the end justifies the means" and "me first."

The true villains were the ones who enabled your list above.  Every person who let their life-long neighbors and acquaintances die, every person who simply turned their backs, every person who channeled their impotent rage as they shouted in throngs about their "nation" or "class" - each was no more less or less a villain than your big three.  Each one, when push came to shove, ultimately thought "me first."   

When one Polish town heard that the Nazis were coming as the Russians pulled back, the locals took all their Jewish neighbors and friends and killed them and had them ready on display for the Nazis.  This was before the implementation of the final solution.  But the locals knew that the Nazis hated the Jews and this was a way to prove that they weren't aligned with the Russians and to save their own necks.  "Me first."  After a decade or so of Soviet-satellite Communism in Prague, everyone knew what a sham the entire project was.  But they also knew that those who spoke up either vanished or were put into show trials followed by executions.  It was known that by turning in one person, you could hopefully prove your own loyalty and save your own neck for just a little longer.  "Me first."  This isn't to cast blame, per se, on these people, because I'm fully convinced of the fact that most people I know, if faced with a similar situation, would also think, "Me first."  Even though I like to imagine otherwise, I know I'd probably do the same.  Ask me to pick between my family or YOUR family and I know what I'll pick every time.

You don't get a villain by having one person act according to "me first" and "the end justifies the means."  You get a villain by having EVERYONE act that way.  And in Zalanthas, just about everyone does.  Oh, and look ... the Highlord and the Sun King.  Yes, they are powerful because of a power within them that none of your real life examples had.  Yet ... without the entire population of Zalanthas saying, "Me first," their kingdoms would be empty, pointless wastelands.  Luckily, there's no shortage of Zalanthans willing and eager to support that "moral" code.