Tests of Character, Looking for Roleplaying ideas

[MooCow]

First, if you are in my campaign, stop reading. You know who you are.....









Next..... I'm running a campaign in which the characters are the chosen by the gods as their collective champions against a dark force which threatens all existence. At the moment the characters don't realize this, but they'll learn eventually. This is somewhat a matter of blood, but they must also prove themselves worthy. Part of the campaign, is to find and claim Armor/Weapons that are part of their birthright.

By making it to the items, they will have proven their physical, and intellectual prowess by beating up various monsters and solving puzzles. But the gods don't just want people who are strong and smart, they want people who they know have the courage, willpower, honor, etc to get the deed done. Basicly their "character" must be tested. What I'm thinking is when they reach for the items, each individual will be transported to a place where they must face a test of character, to determine if they are worthy. I want this to be a purely roleplaying thing... the less dice rolling the better.

Example: For one character, I plan to have what he thinks is the spirit of his father try to disuade him from accepting the burden the gods are placing on him.

Problem is, I'm pretty much stumped for ideas (except the one example). So I'd like to hear any suggestions, stories of things you have done along these lines, ideas, literary examples you could recomend (I'm already stealing heavily from numerous different fantasy novels), etc that you might have. Hopefully the stuff you give me will help to spark some good ideas that will fit into my campaign.

Thanks for your help!

MooCow
The stumped cow

 

[Happiest_Sadist]

Do you have a contingency plan for if they fail?

I would like to give someone the choice between saving either what they need to save the world or an innocent life (preferrably one with emotional attachment) destroyed. If they choose to save the innocent it shows they have the strength to make sacrifices and prioratize. (This would work well for a lawful person who knows his duty is to get the thing at almost any cost.)

Show another charachter the future if they take the path, make it grisly and painful. Offer them a chance to pass the burden on to someone they know as either incompatant or evil and take a slightly less important role.
(Works well for chaotic types.)

 

[Nightfall]

Well don't know about LESS dice, but have a test where the character is stripped of all armor and weapons, and has to fight a creature to defend an innocent. Or similiar, duel a powerful outsider bare handed. (EG Grappling/wrestling)

Besides that have a kind of Temptations of Christ theme, where they are offered their dreams and fears, and must face them, but have them inflict REAL damage if they fail, or to add some realism to their experience.

 

[Darraketh]

They are wisked away to face a god or a tribunal and must answer a riddle.

Say you have each character working for a different god. As they assemble their respective collections of weapons and armor one of them has ever more disturbing visions and must come to realize that he works for the dark god and will eventually turn on his companions. bwaahahaha!

I like the temptation ideas too.

 

[Darraketh]

Ooo ooo ooo here is another one.

Each item is always in one of three boxes or behind one of three doors etc.

 

[nameless]

Sounds like a cool concept. The only problem I see with it, is that failure in the test has a high price, as in that character can no longer participate in the campaign. I'd say that you should rig it so depending on the choices the PC makes, a different successful outcome will happen. If he has to choose between saving perhaps an innocent child or the woman he loves (but he knows to be evil), for instance. If he saves the kid, he becomes a champion for the virtue of justice. If he saves his lover, he becomes a champion for passion. The only way he would lose is by indecision.

-nameless

 

[FireLance]

If you don't want to railroad the storyline because the characters might fail, one possibility is to have the items draw power from the virtue displayed by the owner. If the owner displays the virtue, the item becomes more powerful, otherwise it becomes weaker. That way, it becomes a continuous test instead of a one-off.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I can think of a few options:

1. Have the character instantly transported to an unwinnable situation along with. (Ancient Red wyrm attacking repeatedly and nothing that can hurt it, the Tarrasque rampaging through an inescapable valley, etc.) Does the character choose to do his/her duty and die with courage and honor or does the character feed it innocents hoping that the menace will eat him/her last?

2. Present the characters with an illusionary opportunity to save the world with less loss of innocent life by refusing to take up the arms and armor that are the object of this stage of the quest. This will reveal whether the characters are motivated by their desire to save the world/save others or by their desire to look good and have powerful toys.

3. Have the items in the possession of an NPC (or in some other position that makes it clear that they are Off Limits). Offer the characters the a choice to steal the weapons for themselves (for only good intentions of course) or to allow their current owners to continue with them. (This is modelled on Diggory's quest to get the apple in _The Magician's Nephew_). If the character refuses to steal/wrongfully take the items, s/he has proved his/her worthiness and is given the item. If the character steals the items, they still work as advertised and the character saves the world but it does so in a way that destroys everything the character holds dear. (There will come a day that you will say "It would have been better to have lost the final battle than to have lived to see what became of the world we saved" etc.) Alternately, the character who uses the stolen weapons to defeat the evil may simply end up replacing the evil they defeated. ("In the place of the dark Lord, you would have a Queen. . . " or "Strike him down and take his place at my side. . . .")

 

[MooCow]

Well I'm thinking that failure results in one of two things.... Either the character is expelled from "room", and the group must move onto another item quest, returning at a later time for the character to try again. Or, the character will become possessed by the spirit of the items (which is an amalgam of all those who have ever possesed the items, similar to the past lives effect in "Children of Dune").

In the first the characters get another shot later in the campaign, in the second they're companions will have a chance to free them and give them another chance to try for dominance of the weapons.

MooCow
The GMing cow

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

It sounds like you would want to tailor these to the individual characters a bit, so I think I'd need a little background on the characters before I could come up with anything really good. At any rate, you can always set things up with the old "who do you save" choice. And your example of a known and loved figure acting in a way that is unexpected has some fun possibilities for most characters, like a Cleric being ordered by his god to do something dreadful. Does the Cleric blindly follow the god's order, or does he show the conviction to stand up for what he knows is right? Depending on your needs, either loyalty or conviction could be rewarded.