See, I was imagining it as a game in which you play monks. Not Shaolin ass-kicking monks, medieval Western monks. You live in quiet contemplation. You may brew delicious beer. You fear the predations of Vikings. You labor long hours to produce beautiful illuminated manuscripts, and a single ink spill could set you back years in your faithful effort.
Burning Canticle for Leibowitz?
Yes, I know what you meant to do but it easily crosses the line into strawman territory (ridiculing the opponent’s opinion) as putting on your pants isn’t exactly dramatic, and beliefs are all about drama at the core. But that’s irrelevant now.
As for the Bishop Frank example, I don’t care if it’s achieved by one single test or not. A single test can be hugely important in BW and the more important the gains are, the more you probably also risk to lose. The point is if it’s dramatic and drives the story forward in my view. The reason I used that name was because I wanted to make a direct example and I did so with what the other poster had already used. I’ve given other examples of what a personal goal could be and it’s of course always based on what works in the story. When it comes to badly worded beliefs I don’t think it should ever go to the point where a player even can be penalized for it because if the belief isn’t written clearly then the GM should ask him to clarify it, and help him do it. Everyone at the table should know what every belief means when you play. Here we also come back to the risk of a goal being too small. If that happens it should not be the case of you not handing out artha for it, it should be solved by you stating that the goal isn’t enough when he writes the belief. If you let someone play with a belief then you’ve agreed that it’s fine and the rules for earning artha apply.
I don’t think I have said that a belief should include a goal, and if I have it’s a mistake since I’ve never had that opinion. What I have said is that I think a belief should include how it makes the character act, which is not the same thing as setting a goal.
You are correct in the Ethical and Philosophical Stances case, but note that when they discuss them with an example they show that a belief that doesn’t contain an action is hard to challenge. They write a specific example that adds how the character will act (“I should sacrifice myself for the greater good”) and say that it’s better because it says more about the character and clearly shows how the player wants to be challenged.
Again with the guiding light beliefs they write them with clarity in how the character will act. It’s “I must…” and “I will…” in the examples.
Monk the TV show was indeed the character I had in mind…but this has a certain appeal to it.
Ok, I give, to a degree. 
I am, at times, overly pedantic about things, and when I think I figure out how something works, I can neglect other ways to work it. I am only human after all.
I never disputed that Beliefs should strongly implicate action. Overly broad beliefs, where almost anything can be conceived as manifesting that belief, are bad ones, I agree. I suppose my larger point was that Beliefs which are declarative in nature seem better to me in terms of being challengable and awardable than beliefs that are imperative in nature. Declarations can strongly imply imperatives, but the link isn’t as strong the other way. There is a subtle difference between “I should…” and “I must…” The former implies all sorts of fact-claims the character believes, the latter doesn’t.
And there’s a reason I’m trying to generalize the concepts here. I want a formal set of rules that lets me distinguish Beliefs from Intents, that illuminate the various possibilities for challenge, and that make the awarding of Artha non-controversial in terms of deciding whether to award Fate or Persona. Specific examples are useful to the extent they illuminate the general, but if there’s multiple, equally valid, but mutually exclusive ways to generalize from the specific examples, there isn’t such a set of formal rules, and there will be edge cases where it’s not clear how to decide between Fate and Persona.
Fundamentally, for me, Beliefs are the character’s “issues.” It’s the problems they have with the world that they need to change. An “itch” that needs to be “scratched.” That already implies action on the part of the characters, but it needn’t necessarily demand any particular direction for that action. An “itch” can be scratched in any number of ways, it can even be tolerated or ignored all of which can be viewed as manifesting the itch, but the itch itself is a fact. It has certain characteristics, such as location and intensity and whether it also burns or stings, and those characteristics are also facts. They also have implications for how to deal with that itch. Rubbing won’t work on an itch that burns, but will on an itch that stings, and vice versa for slapping. Succeeding in scratching the itch, or being forced to ignore it or tolerate it, all have clear definitions and criterion and seem to me to be worth Persona. Trying to scratch the itch, or trying to ignore it, also seems fairly clear to me when it occurs, and seems to be to be worth Fate if the try is entertaining or expands the narrative. I hope my perspective on this issue is a bit clearer now.
Here’s the beliefs of my last BW character, Birgaz, a Dwarf Templar in our Dark Sun game.
Belief: I must depose Kalak for my father’s legacy, but first we need allies among the other sorcerer kings.
Belief: I must find a way to convince Hadad to raise an army against his liege.
Belief: I will win my brother back to the cause, first I must turn him away from this foolish ziggurat.
Ok, and here’s what I think of them.
The first one’s not bad. You need allies to depose Kalak. That’s kind of a fact. The only weak part for me here is why does your father’s legacy require deposing Kalak? Is he a usurper? Is he a legitimate, legal ruler, but ruling badly? Is he perverting things your father did for his own ends?
The second one is weaker, but still not too bad. Why Hadad? Is he the strongest sorcerer king? Is he the one with the best access to Kalak? Why an army, and not something like an assassination attempt? At least we know that Hadad is liege to Kalak. But the ultimate motive is obscure to me here. What’s the purpose of causing a break between Hadad and Kalak, and having Hadad send his armies against Kalak? I mean, the ultimate purpose is clear, you want to overthrow Kalak. But is this particular goal aimed directly at that, or is it more tangential? Is the goal to soften Kalak up, but you don’t expect Hadad’s armies to win? Is it to merely demoralize Kalak and his armies from the loss of a prominent supporter? Or do you expect Hadad’s armies to win, and thus allow you to depose Kalak?
I don’t really care much for the last one. Why do you care about bringing your brother back? Is it just because he’s family, or does he have some special talent or something that would help you out? What’s the matter with the ziggurat? Why is it foolish? Why does your brother care about the ziggurat? (I assume that’ll be among his beliefs).
In general, while these beliefs sort of hint at what your character’s “issues” are, they don’t make them very explicit. You’re telling me what kinds of scratching you’ll be doing, but I’m having to guess at where your “itches” are. I imagine that much of this is because we’re talking about Beliefs in abstraction from the setting. Maybe that setting answers all my questions above, and by telling me how you’re scratching, I can easily “figure out” what your itches are. But I still think it’s better to be explicit about what the character’s issues are, and if you’re gonna tell me how you’re gonna scratch that itch too, that’s fine. But I don’t like the idea of a player telling me what they’re gonna do to scratch an itch they have, but make me guess about what that itch is.
I think those beliefs are perfectly fine. Beliefs aren’t supposed to tell you the entire backstory about the character and campaign, that’s something you learn from other places. They only need to point to things that the GM and the players know what they are to make everyone understand the motivations. If you write beliefs so someone that doesn’t know anything about the characters and campaign understand everything they are probably much too long-winded and redundant. In short they should be fairly short and don’t need to work in a vacuum.
Just look at the examples of beliefs for the character creation in the book. They aren’t any clearer than that on their own, but Luke explains them through describing other details about the campaign and characters, which the players will know.
“I will ingratiate myself to Dvalin, and make myself useful to him at any cost.”
“I will aid these adventurers and make short work of this wizard and his bandit minions.”
“I must find a path to this lost, fabled city so that I might recover the legendary Silver Hunting Horn.”
The beliefs worked just fine for the world we created. The GM had no trouble challenging them and awarding Artha. I had no trouble pursuing them.
I’d have trouble with those as Beliefs presented without context too, but Beliefs don’t need to be the full story. In a new game it’s worth talking, players and GM, about exactly what you mean—not rewriting, but clarifying. Who’s Kalak? What legacy? Why Hadad? But once these are clear, you’re good to go. This is what I’ve been trying to get at: the wording of Beliefs isn’t important; the intent behind them and its place in the world and the story is. Those Beliefs could belong to a cynical political operator or an idealist who wants to reform the world depending on who those people are and why he has those goals, so make it clear!
Yup. The GM new that Kalak was the despotic sorcerer king of Tyr because it was a Dark Sun game and we all had beliefs about Kalak. He knew that I had to kill him or my father’s dwarven oath would remain unfulfilled and he would rise from the grave as a banshee. He knew that Kalak was building a massive ziggurat that he said was going to protect the town from the Dragon that no one has seen for 50 years, and that the ziggurat was bleeding the city of its resources while the other rulers were mounting an attack. And there’s the terrible price in slaves and confiscations of land that the buildings exacted from the city. He knew Hadad was morgan’s character, a landed noble in Tyr, who as a popular hero coulld mount a credible revolution. He knew that my brother should have taken up my father’s oath as first born, but he was buying Kalak’s bullshit about the dragon…so much we all knew. None of it required to be spelled out in the beliefs.
As a new GM I am trying to support my players in forming Beliefs but I feel my Inquisitor player could use more help. Below are his beliefs
The will of the Gods.
Everyone must follow the will of the gods. The new era must be fought against (with all cults, heretics, demons and witches that comes along with it). They must be tracked down and destroyed. The humans must worship the gods so that their power isn´t diminished.
“I will do everything I can to track down the threats against the gods and the power of men, destroy it without pity.”
Visions from the gods.
“The gods have shown that I shall find and lead a group of people. Together we will ifind artifacts that can be used to fight the evil of the new age of Owichan.”
Sword of Truth.
The broken sword I found is one of the artifacts. Galmon, the god of war appeared to me and reforged the sword.
“I will find out what the sword can do, what it powers are and learn how to use it.”
The number 3 seems to be missing an actual action to it any suggestions?
For number 2 se above.
What about 1? It seems like a good one even though the description of an action to be performed the next session is not there.
What about rewards then? Is this player in a bad place there?
As background information the game is set in a medival world where the presence of fantasy elements are being introduced more and more for each session. That is the age of owichan.
Ok, I apprechiate any assistance you guys can provide.
Without knowing more about the situation, my two pieces of advice would be to tie at least one of his beliefs further into the immediate situation of the upcoming session and to add a contradictory or conflicting element to one of the beliefs. Right now he seems very one dimensional in his devotion to the gods. You need something to hook good dilemmas onto.
So, some humble suggestions. I’m not at your table, so I may be way off, but I hope my comments spark your own ideas.
These beliefs are very vague. “I will do everything I can to…” Them’s mincing words. “I will destroy!” is much more active. “The threats against the gods and power of men?” Now you have to invent various threats for him to track down. How about he does that? Something more like “The goblin king Malak threatens the gods. I will destroy him and his people!” Same with the second belief. What group of people? What artifact? Found where? Against what evil? Third belief is okay, but how will the character learn about the sword? One simple sentence tacked on like “I will ask the hermit on top of Mount Hermine” or “I must seek knowledge from the library at Toth” would do a world of good here.
The player seems to be waiting for you to provide all this rich detail from your boundless imagination, but you’ve already got a lot of heavy lifting to do challenging his beliefs. Ask him to give you the goods, so you can focus on your job.
Thanks!!! I will do some work on this and flesh it out with the player. Again guys thank you so much
The vision one especially is begging for details. He’s had a vision? Fantastic! Now what’s his first step to assembling people to lead? Or finding the artifacts? He’s given you what he wants to see his character do but it would be great if he also told you specific steps.
Or not; it can take a while to get used to the GM-like power Beliefs give players. You can fill in the blanks for him if he’s uncomfortable, but encourage him to be bold and make up elements of the setting himself!
Cool. Did you spend the first session creating the Situation and the Characters together? I find that is the best way to plug beliefs into the game. If things are going to revolve around some specific person, locale, event, etc., you can just ask everyone to take one Belief about that thing.