First, I’d like to say “Hello” to the forums. Second, if my post is in the wrong location, I apologize for that.
Is there a way to keep from having your own party constantly use your own mechanic against you? In this I mean Grief. I foolishly didn’t take a Lament, I’m the fighter of the group in a mainly non-combat intrigue game. With my character constantly being lied to and the multiple attempts to have me put in the position to kill. Is there a way other than becoming entirely detached from the group, refusing to help in any way unless it benefits me directly or just saying to hell with it and making a human cold blooded killer with a hardened heart all to keeping from being screwed by “HaHa lets Shaft the Elf by jacking his grief up!” I’m curious if I missed something in the book or misunderstood some facet of the Grief mechanic.
At first when I noticed the rampant ass-hattery I browsed the web and came across the whole Darkelf bit. I thought it could work for my character if this kept up. I was sent to help the human lands with trouble as an emissary of the elfs. This is my first major contact with humans and I’m not to return until the trouble has been resolved. I thought if the people you’re supposed to help while receiving no reward kept trying to screw you and were constantly racist you might grow a bit spiteful after a while. I brought this up to the GM and Group who think this is a horrible idea and is to munchkiny.
So I ask, is there some rule other than “don’t be a tool for being a tool’s sake” or mechanic that I missed that can help prevent this? I started with a Grief B5 and am nearing Grief B7 in only a couple of games.
I think the Spite mechanics would be perfect for the situation. However, it sounds like there is a bit of issue with the group. Burning Wheel works best when the players can trust each other to support the goals they have for their characters. The question here is, “Why are they screwing with your elf?”
Are you sure they’re trying to screw with you, as opposed to trying to give you Grief to struggle with? Grief’s a big thing for elves, it would be a shame if it rarely came up.
Take the grief and work on learning a Lament or two. I can’t remember if you can start learning them via Beginners Luck, if you can that’s the route to do it. If not, Circle up an Elf who knows a good Lament or two and get them to teach you the first test.
I think the first order of business is, are you playing with a bunch of jerks who have banded to together to ruin your game? Or are you reacting poorly to your fellow players’ good faith attempts to include your combat elf in an intrigue game by providing, I don’t know, intrigue?
If you think it’s the former, why would they do that to you?
Using Grief checks against an Elf is really a metagame thing. Making Elves grieve more isn’t a good solution to them, really.
And in-game it certainly doesn’t work. They’re not going to be able to get your Grief high enough to drive you to suicide or departure because they cannot utterly quench your hope. The most they can do is prevent you from spending your Deeds on Grief. But then pick up a Grief-rooted song or two. I recommend Burning Bright for wrecking face.