Divine Intervention

[Lev Lafayette]

Nota bene: Crossposted from the RuneQuest-rules mailing list. Comments invited here as well, of course

Issue

There has been a fair bit of Divine Intervention going on in my campaign of late, mainly out of justified desperation as the difficulty level arcs up. But due the rather random nature of DI, the PCs have suffered a great deal with three PCs losing over 18 points of POW each. You can imagine what it is like with three of the PCs now wandering around with almost no chance of casting a Heal I, let alone resisting a Disruption.

It lead me to do some investigations on the various editions of the game and some thoughts on which is perhaps better that the rather extreme randomness that currently exists.

Summary of Various Divine Intervention Procedures

RuneQuest I & II & III

In RuneQuest I a Rune Priest could call for Divine Intervention with a 10% chance per point of permanent POW previous expended and allocated to the spell at the time of casting. Rune Lords call for Divine Intervention by rolling a table instead, losing between 0 and 10 points of POW. It can be used to raise one adventurer from the dead, or teleport a dozen out of trouble. Divine Intervention can only be used to help the caster, not directly harm anyone else as that would put the Gods in direct conflict of what is a proxy war using humans etc. In RuneQuest II the mechanics are largely the same. The main difference, at least from what I can see, is an Initiate could also attempt Divine Intervention once a week by rolling under their POW on d100, losing that many POW points if successful. It is also clarified that Intervention cannot be used to substitute training and experience and that it can be used to enchant iron or Rune metals. Bound by time, it cannot be used to fortell the future or change the past.

In RuneQuest III it is specified that Intervention is restricted to the God's normal abilities (and bound by Time), an Initiate or Priest may roll D100 and attempt roll below their POW. If they succeed the Intervention occurs and they lose a number of POW points equal to their dice roll. It cannot be used against worshippers of the same God. Characteristics can be raised by 1 point, within species and other limits. Gods are unable to help non-worshippers, cannot create new spells etc, as per previous editions.

RuneQuest: AiG

In RuneQuest Adventures in Glorantha, an initiate, acolyte, priest or lord could call for Divine Intervention. The situation has to be desperate. If a roll equal of less than the character's POW is successful, then the Intervention occurs with the character losing a number of points of POW equal to the roll. A Rune lord rolls 1d10 instead. There are no multiple calls; either the God responds the first time or not at all. Divine effects will concur with the powers of the God. As a rule of thumb, an initiate or acolyte gains access to a number of points of divine magic equal to twice the POW expended in the call for divine intervention, or twice the number of points of divine magic he or she knows, whichever is greater. A priest or Rune Lord gains access to a number of points of divine magic equal to thrice the POW expended or thrice the number of points of divine magic he or she knows, whichever is greater. Worshippers can choose to stack such spells to affect any initiates (or higher ranking worshippers) of the god within range with a single casting. For example, a Humakti could use 5 points of divine intervention granted divine magic to cast a Truesword not only upon her sword, but also on the swords of the four other Humakti initiates in her party, all as a single spell. Further if the worshipper is unconscious or dead when he or she calls for divine intervention, he or she can continue to cast spells granted by divine intervention until the points run out. They cannot cast any other spells while unconscious or dead. A dead worshipper may attempt to resurrect themselves (through the use of the Resurrection spell) after they have healed the wounds that caused their death (through the use of Heal, Heal Wound or Heal Body spells). Due to the Great Compromise, gods will not directly attack mortals. Divine intervention cannot be used against worshippers of the same god, for a god will not act against himself or herself. Gods are unlikely to help non-worshippers. Divine intervention cannot transport an individual into an enemy stronghold or temple where the enemy's power is greatest, but it could be used to escape from such a site.

Mongoose RQ

In Mongoose RuneQuest Divine Intervention may be called by Acolytes, Runepriests and Runelords once per month. Roll D100 and attempt to roll below POW; if successful the miracle occurs, but that amount of POW is lost. Some same powers of a Divine Intervention includes with the casting of any cult spell of any magnitude., allowing a cult spell to affect all worshippers within line of sight., bringing a character back from the dead. Divine Intervention cannot be used to directly harm or slay mortal creatures. It can allow any cult spell to be cast with no limit on magic points or magnitude, it can affect any worshipper within the caster's line of sight, and allow for various 'divine effects' (e.g., temporary double STR, change weather etc).

An Alternative

I don't like the randomness; your RuneQuest may vary. Rather, I would prefer that the character sacrifices an amount of POW in advance for the Divine Intervention. This may be done by an Initiate or Priest. If a character loses either status, the POW dedicated remains dedicated. This dedicated POW does not count towards applications for Priesthood or anything like that.

e.g., Red Mouse is an initiate of Zola Fel and sacrifices 5 points of POW to Divine Intervention. These five points cannot count towards the ten necessary to become a Rune Priest. His own bearing and confidence in himself is sublimated towards that of the mighty river whose valleys and brooks his travels around. To him The River is life itself. Over the course of the seasons however he rescues a young shaman, Penliss, from a rather dangerous situation. She recognises his great spirit and teaches him the ways of the spirit world. He becomes a shaman himself, but does not lose the ability to call upon Zola Fel for assistance. The Gods remember their debts.

When the Divine Intervention is called, the God will intervene automatically. The degree of intervention is dependent on the amount of POW allocated at the time of intervention. The God, rather than the character, will decide in what way they will intervene - after all, no character can tell a God, or their God, what to do. The God will usually be intervene the form of casting Rune spells but other effects can be simulated at an equivalent cost as appropriate to the standard restrictions of the game world (e.g., in Glorantha no mind-reading, altering of time etc) and their domain of activity. Typically an initiate, or even former initiate, will receive twice the POW dedicated and a Rune Priest or Rune Lord three times the amount. As usual, the general rule of thumb of a Spirit Magic spell being the equivalent of half a Divine Magic applies. Stacking limits etc, do not apply to Gods.

e.g., Facing the Watchdog of Corflu and a not insubstantial number of Lunars led by the Coders, Red Mouse watches his friend Honest John fall to the ground due to a well-thrown spear; he immediately calls for Zola Fel's assistance and allocates 3 of his 5 Divine Intervention points; his former initiate status of the cult means that the God will dedicate 6 points of Rune magic power to his aid. Zola Fel hears the call but can do nothing to prevents Honest John's spirit from leaving the mundane plane, as he does not have access to this magic. However, seeing the degree of danger he does Summon a an extremely large large Undine (4 point) which is placed under Red Mouse's control, grants Red Mouse and his ally Praxiletes the Spirit Magic spell River Eyes to aid any escape they require (1 point) and provides a Fireshield (1 points).

The alternative system significantly reduces the amount of power and control that PCs have in terms of access to Divine Intervention, however I feel it is closer to the intention (the Gods are limited to the abilities that they can grant to their worshippers, just not in scale). At the same time however it significantly increases the certainty of access to DI. Finally, it has the additional bonus of treating the Divine forces as actually Intervening by letting the GM roleplay their actions.

 

[RosenMcStern]

Re-posted from the RPG.net discussion.

Divine Intervention in RuneQuest is an example of a meta-gaming mechanics introduced in an era (1978) when meta-gaming had not been categorised and rationalised. As such, I think this mechanics is rudimentary, and it detracts from fun instead of adding to it.

Let us face it, the way it works in the RAWhas a very high chance of disrupting a campaign. The character is confronted with extreme danger, and uses Divine Intervention to escape capture or defeat when the plot requires the party is captured or defeated, or when it was just a matter of making an Idea roll to find the button that stopped the flow of lava into the chamber. And since the character is literally spoiling his or her beloved character, if you attempt to limit the effect of the Divine Intervention to save plot integrity, he or she will be really, really pissed off. You cannot say "Ok, you lost 15 POW, but you did not teleport far enough and the guards still reach you." And in an Orlanthi game, you cannot ban teleportation - Orlanth definitely grants it. At this point, with the plot disrupted, the next group of scenarios are all about reworking the character to its pervious power level. It is like Level drain in D&D: it just takes away the fun without adding anything. I once had a KL shaman reduced to POW 3 for this reason, and believe me, it was not nice.

Lev's solution is definitely better. But there is a very good alternative to this that has been introduced in Mongoose's edition of RuneQuest: using Hero Points to create a plot bending. Let us see what the advantages are.

- You are encouraged to negotiate how the plot bending/divine intervntion works with the Game Master. If there is an "escape button" that you did not find, spending a Hero Point will just find that button instead of have you teleport away.

- The available amount of plot bendings depends on how well you roleplay, not on how much POW you have

- You do not spoil your character because of Divine Intervention. If Chalana Arroy chooses to intervene, why should she take a portion of your soul away? Maybe Krarsht would do that, but Chalana Arroy?

- The mechanics is not random. If your character is a Hero of the Cult, the god should respond to his pleas when it is dramatically appropriate, not when you roll low on D100. Allowing Rune Lords to roll 1d10 is a poor fix for this problem, as not all Very Heroic characters are Rune Lords.

- Effects are more subtle, and possibly more fun, than the flash-bang results that players often invoke for classical divine intervention

Unfortunately, there is a very high resistance among old RuneQuest fans to using this sort of mechanics. Even in the games that I myself publish, this rule is still included, although I always recommend using plot variations instead of Divine Intervention. This is a pity, because Hero Points provide a better alternative and introduce many of the advantages of the narrativist style of gaming without losing the crunchy details of the simulationist approach of RuneQuest (and please do not start a narrativist/simulationist flame here, let us stay on topic).

 

[duncan_disorderly]

Re-posted from the RPG.net discussion.

Let us face it, the way it works in the RAWhas a very high chance of disrupting a campaign. The character is confronted with extreme danger, and uses Divine Intervention to escape capture or defeat when the plot requires the party is captured or defeated, or when it was just a matter of making an Idea roll to find the button that stopped the flow of lava into the chamber.

That's an interesting way of looking at it, but I started at the opposite end.
Divine Intervention in RQ is a risky and potentially career-ending option, so is only ever invoked "in extremis" - A character faced with certain death may attempt DI, but a character who is facing capture which may give a chance to escape later is more likely to take their chances with captivity. Allowing easier or more certain and less costly DI makes it more, rather than less likely that players will disrupt the plot. (Leaving aside any consideration of whether having a plot this rigid is a good thing or not - especially as I don't think that is a simple "Yes"/"No" question).

To my mind RQ DI is a "last chance" when things have gone wrong, not something players (or GMs) should be relying on to get them out of a tight corner - (I don't think "The party are doomed unless they make an Idea Roll to find the 'off switch' or a DI roll to teleport out" is good adventure design. ) It's a case of "If you don't use the DI then you are going to be rolling up a new character anyway" - This gives you a chance to survive, although possibly with a POW so reduced that it's just a case of getting an honourable retirement rather than a hastily dug grave...

The problem I see with Lev's solution is that unless you want to become a priest, and so need to take points of divine magic, you are better off devoting POW to "divine intervention" than learning other spells - you get a 2 for 1 return, and the flexibility of picking the spells at the point you decide to cast them...

 

[RosenMcStern]

Just to clarify: think of the scene in Star Wars where the heroes are in the garbage compacting chamber. In a game with meta-plot devices, either they manage to contact 3PO with a good roll of "Use Imperial Communication system", or if they fail the roll, they must use up a Hero Point and suddenly 3PO remembers to check his GPS screen to locate Master Luke.

In a RuneQuest game which presents the same situation, the characters might be tempted to teleport out with Divine Intervention. This is a less fun solution, because they will clearly teleport out of the intended plot to the nearest Orlanth temple landing chamber (see MOB's article "A Hard Landing " in TotRM #10 for a description of such a device), thus missing a the rest of the adventure, and someone will lose a lot of POW or Pact skill percentiles.

There are, of course, several other solutions that are less damaging for the character who is attempting Divine Intervention. The Pact mechanics in Cults does less damage to the character who attempts Divine Intervention and is easier to achieve. You will find a slightly modified mechanics for this in Merrie England and Crusaders of the Amber Coast, co-developed by Soltakss, Pete Nash and me. But despite the fact that we still use Divine Intervention in our games, my advice is to go with Hero Points and not Divine Intervention when you want your god to save you from a "blind alley" situation.

 

[soltakss]

I've never had a problem with how DI works in RQ, although I liked the Divine Intervention spell in RQ2 and will be using it in my current campaign now that we have a Priest.

Sure, it's over the top and potentially POW-trashing, but that's OK. We always cut the POW-challenged a bit of slack and provided fairly low-POW opponents to get a POW gain roll from.

RQM doesn't have the same problems as DI works slightly differently.

In our game, we use Hero Points that allow the players to reroll dice rolls, including opponents' rolls, so it is quite possible to reroll an opponent's critical or their own fumbles. This means that serious injuries are relatively rare, especially when compared to older campaigns I have been involved in. This doesn't really affect the flow of the game and players are as relieved by being able to reroll a critical or fumble as by rolling a critical themselves or seeing an opponent fumble, so it doesn['t affect the enjoyment of the game at all.

Having said that, fatalities do happen and Divine Intervention is an option. One PC has successfully called for DI twice, both times having been skewered by a powerful opponent having already spent all his Hero Points. Since we use Divine presence as a measure of a character's link to his deity, I ruled a long time ago that a character could add his Presence and cult runes to his POW when trying for Divine Intervention, thus increasing the chance of success and decreasing the risk of POW-trashing. This meant that he succeeded both times and lost some POW, some Presence and some Runes, balancing the damage quite nicely.

This way, the sense of danger is kept fairly high and the sense of actual loss is retained but the actual danger and loss is reduced. Everyone wins except the poor old NPCs.

I would certainly use Hero Points generally, including the excellent idea of Plot Points from Mythic Russia, but would also keep Divine Intervention for when things go really badly and a direct appeal to a higher power is necessary.