REIGN:The Line

THE LINE
a game of REIGN by Greg Stolze, storied by Delacroix

Dramatis Personae

Character Creation

• characters are generated using Mapache's ORE Character Generator, with any racial template
• characters begin with 10 XP to spend

The Cast

TOPHOCLES as ARMITAGE SHANKS
RANDOMNAMECHOICE as CRIFF
CIVIL SAVAGE as PO XINGSHAO
GLYPTODONT as GRAM MARGRAVE

Houserules

Conduct

• don't be a dickbag. If someone has spent XP on Patrons, don't kill them. If someone has spent XP on Possessions, don't steal them. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.
• don't cheat.
• try to post at least once every other day

Rules

Fluid Combat

Fluid Combat from the 2nd Year of Our REIGN, p108 is in effect.

Destiny

Rationale REIGN tends to be a bit whiffy, especially at the levels we're starting at. One of the major criticisms of the system is that it doesn't have any expendable resources like action points that help players mitigate the effects of bad rolls; that's what I'm hoping to introduce.

Will and Passion Your reserves of Will are linked directly to your Passions. You don't have to start with three Passions, or any, but it's advantageous to do so: for every Passion you have, you gain the capacity to draw on Will (for a maximum of 3 possible Will points, if you have a Mission, Craving, and a Duty). These reserves are filled when you have:
1) accomplished a Mission
2) sacrificing something significant in the line of Duty
3) denied a Craving.

Note that your Will reserve for that Passion can only be filled by appropriate action. In example: Nui the chieftain's daughter has no real Duty, not having been raised to be particularly concerned with such things, but she does have a Craving ("the admiration of men") and a Mission ("reconcile my clan with our enemies by marrying their chief"), so she has a maximum possible reserve of 2 Will. She turns down the advances of one of her bodyguards, and earns a Will point, growing stronger in spirit for resisting temptation. Later, she surrenders herself as per treaty to the attentions of the enemy chieftain, becoming his wife in exchange for peace, and in accomplishing her mission takes comfort in the knowledge that her people are safe, earning another point of Will, maxing out her capacity. If she had instead turned down the advances of two suitors, but fled the arranged marriage, she would only have 1 Will point, as denying the second suitor, while admirable, merely reinforces her earlier resolution to resist temptation, instead of forges it.

The Will to Power Will can be invoked in moments of great importance to change your destiny. For the cost of 1 Will point, you may choose to do any of the following:
1) remove one die from all sets (both yours and your opponent's) in a contested roll
eg. Bif attacks Ned with a club; Ned attempts to parry. Bif rolls 2x10, while Ned rolls 2x3; ordinarily, Ned would get hit. Ned spends a Will point, and spoils both sets: his own parry fails, but that doesn't matter because Bif's attack also fails. On the other hand, if Bif had roll 3x2 while Ned roll 2x1, Ned would spoil his (already useless) parry set, but Bif's attack still connects with 2x2, albeit slower, unless someone else manages to interrupt Bif with a Width 3 attack, which ordinarily would have resolved at the same time as Bif's (Bif kills Ned, and then is himself struck) but which now interrupts him and spoils his set.
2) reroll the player's dice pool. He has to take the second result, even if it's worse
3) exempts a roll from any penalties. This could be used to make many more attacks than normal, but the number of possible attacks you can make is still limited by the maximum possible number of sets you could get. Someone with an 8 dice pool couldn't get more than 4 sets, so he can take a maximum of 4 actions in a multiple-action flurry. This can also be used to retain a specialty die when that die would otherwise have been removed due to penalties.