So, casting Force of Will seems tricky. How has that worked in your campaign?
It takes forever to cast, and with most normal spellcasting idioms, it seems like the target would see/hear you doing it a mile away. It’s Presence origin, anyways, so you can’t get a mile away anyways. The spell itself doesn’t cause amnesia, so while your target may now have undying loyalty to Alfred the True King, he’s also going to remember being tied to the table while that creep chanted magic spells at him for half an hour.
Surely the typical use of Force of Will results in two beliefs, protect Alfred the True King at all costs, and kill that creep who made me believe that.
What am I missing? Do Force wizards sneak into people’s bedrooms and make Stealth rolls to cast it really quietly? Do their henchpeeps lie about the purpose of the magic, saying that the wizard is detecting evil curses or something? Do you typically handwave the amnesia thing, so the target forgets the spell being cast?
You kidnap your victim, torture them for days to lower their will and then break their minds. Then you order them not to speak of the horrific things you’ve done to them.
At one point, some of the players in my Burning Noir game were recruited into a secret cabal of sorcerers. Part of the initiation process is that you get Force Of Will’d into never revealing the cabal’s secrets to outsiders. The players consented to this. I narrated an NPC Sorcerer administering the spell on them. No dice were rolled; as GM, I am entitled to Say Yes to NPC actions, too, when doing so makes the story go more smoothly.
I have a wizard/enchanter who created a circlet that has the Force of Will spell as a rechargeable matrix (as well as an Arcane Kindness matrix with spell sustainer) the Circlet of Domination looks like a nobles tiara/head band, but allows either spell to be mentally activated in two actions as long as it is worn by a gifted one.
That means he can change a believe as fast as a man can draw his sword.
There are some drawbacks as the Sorcery roll is set at ten successes for Force of Will and six successes for Arcane Kindness, so anyone with a B5 or higher Will needs some “convincing” (enchanted a “throne polish” to tax the will of whoever sets upon the throne), although the Arcane Kindness does grant a +3D advantage.
