PERSONALITY RULES FOR ELRIC!

It seems strange that a game that "should be more about hate, love, vengeance, greed, and lust than tentacles and unnamable things" has no rules concerning personality. I hope that these Personality Traits rules do the job. I have not playtested them, so any advice or suggestion is warmly welcomed and thanked in advance.

First, let me say what Personality Traits are. They represent a character's subconscious and instinct. They come into play when the character responds to a situation according to his inner self, as opposed to his rational self - the player. His POW represents the control he exerts over his instincts; this is why the player has to oppose the character's POW against the Personality Trait value if he wants his character to stay in his control.

There is not a definitive list of Personality Traits because such list would be infinite although Honest, Wise, Sensible, Valorous, Lustful, Passionate are all valid examples. Note how they overlap: it is up to the player to decide which Traits influence his character's personality and how. Each Trait is also rated with a value between 1 and 10, with 6 being the threshold above which the character behaves maniacally in accordance with the Trait. Traits can increase and decrease. When a Trait reaches 0 it disappears. There is no such a thing as negative Trait scores - just take a positive score in an opposite trait.

HOW TRAITS ARE ACQUIRED

Personality Traits can be acquired during the adventurer generation, after and consistently with step 5. The player chooses as many (or as few) Traits he wants and assigns them a value. Only a third of the chosen Traits can have a score of 7 or greater - this rule ensures that no character is a caricature. The Gamemaster may wish to enforce cultural restrictions or modifiers.

A Trait can also be acquired during play. If a character shows a consistent behavior which could be represented by a Trait the Gamemaster may assign, with the player's agreement, to that Trait a score usually between 1 and 3. The exact value is decided together with the player.

HOW TRAITS ARE CHANGED

Personality Traits are changed by experience, as with skills, and by a deliberate effort to change on the part of the character. They also interact with changes in the Allegiance scores.

When a character behaves strongly according to a Trait, maybe because he lost the Resistance Roll, the player can check the Trait as he does with skills. To increase the Trait by one point, roll lower than 10 with a d00. This roll can be performed as the same time of Allegiance checks or Experience rolls. A character can also spend some time "practicing" the Trait, accomplishing small actions in
accordance with it, and generally behaving that way without there being any significant event which tests the Trait. He cannot train during this period, nor can he go adventuring and so on... After a time equal to his Trait score in weeks, the player can try to increase the Trait as above. Finally, when the character increases one of his Allegiance scores, all the Traits that the GM judges to be linked to that Allegiance are checked.

A Trait score is immediately decreased by one point when the character overcomes his instinct with his POW on the Resistance Table. Likewise behaving generally contrary to its nature can decrease a Trait. This is done as to increase its value by training (see above) but after the required time has elapsed, if the player rolls less than 10 with the d00, the Trait score is reduced by one point. Finally, when the character increases one of his Allegiance scores, the Traits that the GM judges to be opposite to that Allegiance are checked as above to see if they diminish.

HOW TRAITS ARE USED IN PLAY

Traits are used to determine a character's reactions in some instances and provide the inspiration that augments the chance to accomplish actions attempted under the influence of the Trait.

When a character is taken by surprise, or when a situation tests the character's control over his instincts, the player must overcome with the character's POW the Trait value +10 on the Resistance Table. If the Trait value is 7 or more, this roll must be made every time the character attempts an action contrary to the Trait - he is in fact ruled by such a powerful personality.

When two Traits are opposed simply roll on the Resistance Table opposing the values. The winner is the side of the personality which attracts the character, and against which he has to defend.

The Traits may also provide inspiration provided that the character is willing to abandon himself to his inner personality. When he is under the influence of a Trait, and for the duration of the scene which has triggered the Trait, the player may add the Trait score x5 to one skill of his choice that is pertinent to the situation.

EXAMPLE

During character generation, Sickboy's player (cf. last issue) assigns his character the following Trait scores: Shrewd 5, Prudent 4, Merciful (Abandoned Children) 7 - Sickboy was one of them after all.

Then, during an adventure, the characters are fleeing from a party of Darijorian knights through the streets of Gromoorva. Turning a corner, Sickboy finds a sleeping child upon a pile of trash. The GM instructs Sickboy's player to oppose his Prudent to his Merciful. If the former wins, Sickboy keeps on running, but if the winner is the latter he stops to check for the child's conditions. Since he is still
alive, Sickboy's instincts tell him to take the child with him. But he hears the sound of horses drawing near, so his player would like to have him flee with his companions.

The player opposes Sickboy's POW against 17 (the Trait value +10) on the Resistance Table. If he wins, Sickboy subtracts one from his Trait value and keep on running. Otherwise he checks the Trait, take the child and turns around to face the knights who are now upon him, adding 35 percentiles to his Dodge skill against their attacks until he has taken the child to safety.

Note that this tension between what the player expects and what the character actually does should be a great source of role-playing ideas - remorse, for example. ¤