WOD: Glorantha – Three New Backgrounds

A little game play, the joys of a Balazaring campaign and writing up new npc’s in the system have lead me to create three new backgrounds for the game.

Dogs

The character owns or has responsibility for a pack of dogs, they see him as pack alpha and will obey simple commands on a difficulty of 4 on a charisma or manipulation plus leadership or survival role. The pack of dogs will require some maintenance and care. This will be in terms of either time or resources. This is a common background to Balazar but can be found elsewhere in Glorantha.

  • o    1 dog
  • oo    3 dogs
  • ooo    6 dogs
  • oooo    10 dogs
  • ooooo    15 dogs

Dogs will require some maintenance and care. War dogs will count as two dogs in terms of numbers from the pack.

Mount

The character owns a mount and has a good relationship with it. It sees the character as its owner, it chooses to associate with them and will return to them if given a choice. Good quality mounts will be one dot higher, poor quality mounts can be one dot lower.

Mounts can only bought which are culturally and racially appropriate. Storytellers may wish to allow mounts which cross cultural and racial norms but should incur a greater cost for them

  • o    Mule/Donkey
  • oo    Riding Horse/Sable/Pony/Zebra/Impala/Ostrich
  • ooo    Cavalry House/Bison/ High Lhama/Demi Bird
  • oooo    War Horse/Rhino
  • ooooo    Wyvern/Griffin/ Giant Hawk/Unicorn

Many other mounts are possible scale accordingly. Flying beasts are only available at storytellers discretion.

Ransom

The character has a ransom that either was been stored up front or can be gathered by family, clan, company or cult. If wishing to surrender the background will be rolled with the social trait they can justify against a difficulty dependent on the situation.

For a standard professional combat the difficulties will be 6, this will increase due to the ferocity of the foe, and racial or cultural tensions and  any personal grievances. It may be lowered by any money motivations the foe may have, there honour and cultural factors.

One success is enough for the ransom to be accepted, however any successes less than the full required, ‘burn’ the ransom points permanently.  This reflects resources lost and good will and influence lost with the ransoming community.

Ransoms are not always paid in cash, but will have a value similar to the amounts below. The amounts below do not effect game play but give an indication of approximate values.

  • o 30 L
  • oo 150 L
  • ooo 500 L
  • oooo 2000 L
  • ooooo 5000 L

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