Willpower

Main Page

Quote: "In the absence of willpower the most complete collection of virtues and talents is wholly worthless." - Aleister Crowley

Discussion

Willpower measures a character's determination - not courage precisely, nor conscience, but everything that leads to persistence in the face of adversity and to effort that transcends her normal limits in a moment of supreme crisis. Like Road, it is rated from 1 to10, but unlike any other trait, Willpower has two ratings - one for permanent potential and one that varies up and down depending on circumstances.

The permanent rating indicates your character's overall will in much the way other traits function. It serves as a dice pool when you must roll Willpower, and it can be increased with experience. The temporary rating varies in the course of play, and you can spend its points for various immediate effects. Doing so makes your character more prone to outside influences, however. When someone challenges your character with Willpower as the difficulty rating, use the temporary rating.

Rating versus Description

• Spineless
•• Weak
••• Unassertive
•••• Diffident
••••• Certain
•••••• Confident
••••• •• Determined
••••• ••• Controlled
••••• •••• Iron-Willed
••••• ••••• Unshakable

Spending Willpower

Willpower serves several very useful purposes in the game of Vampire, so your character's temporary Willpower score is likely to move up and down faster than any other trait, with the possible exception of blood pool. Be sure that you understand these applications, as they can make the difference between success and failure at crucial moments.

Ensuring Success

Spend one temporary Willpower point to get an automatic success on a single roll. You can spend only one Willpower this way for a particular action and modify only one action in a single turn this way. Nothing cancels out the success, not even rolled botches. If your character puts forth that special exertion, at the least he'll get something to show for the effort. When the task involves extended effort, you can spend one Willpower each turn to reinforce the results of sequential rolls.

Note that you must declare your intent to spend Willpower on a roll before you actually make the roll. This isn't license to retroactively fix an unfortunate result. First the effort, then the randomization. The Storyteller may also sometimes disallow Willpower modification of particular rolls, for several reasons.

Resisting Instinct

Some actions are nearly automatic - stepping back from a dangerous precipice or barely controlled flame or sunlight filtering through a thin curtain, for instance. Your Storyteller may allow you to spend a Willpower point to have your character avoid the reflexive response. This is a discretionary matter, and the Storyteller need not always provide the option, though it is generally suitable. Sustained conquest of reflex may require additional Willpower expenditure a few turns later.

Maintaining Sanity

Spend one temporary Willpower point to restrain a derangement from manifesting for the rest of the current scene. Particularly strong stimuli may overwhelm this expenditure, requiring a Road roll or even applying automatically. Most of the time, however, Willpower can temporarily overcome other compulsions. Using Willpower thus repeatedly can weaken most derangements over time and even eventually cure them. Malkavian vampires cannot use Willpower for permanent triumph over the derangement that manifests in them at the Embrace, and other specific cases may also resist cure.

Overcoming Injury

Spend one temporary Willpower point to ignore wound penalties for one turn. Doing so allows your character to take heroic actions in spite of grave injury, in accordance with a long tradition of special vibrancy on the part of notable heroes (and villains). Incapacitated characters and those in torpor cannot use Willpower thus.

Regaining Willpower

Running out of Willpower is a very bad thing for characters. Even though they do not look at their character sheets, characters know the feeling of fatigue and the compulsion to act according to a few particularly deep-seated impulses. It is hard for a character with zero temporary Willpower to do much of anything. Storytellers should not be too harsh in letting characters regain Willpower - this venture is not an adversarial one, and the rules do assume that characters can draw on at least a few points of Willpower as circumstances require.

Acting In Accordance with Nature

Characters regain one or more points of temporary Willpower when acting in accordance with their Natures, as described previously. When your character reaches zero temporary Willpower, the Nature overwhelms pretty much all other desires until he can act in a way that qualifies him to regain at least one point of Willpower.

Completing a Story

Your character's Willpower pool returns to its maximum rating at the conclusion of a story-line. This is the point at which your character and his allies have brought resolution to the conflict facing them and gained the opportunity to rest and reflect after multiple sessions of effort. Limited success may restrict the Willpower your character regains this way, and abject failure may cancel it altogether.

Resting

At your Storyteller's discretion, characters can regain one Willpower at the start of each night as they rise from slumber. This gain reflects the renewed determination that comes with rest.

Triumphing

At your Storyteller's discretion, characters can regain one or more points of temporary Willpower upon achieving some outstanding goal or victory. Overcoming vampire-hunters who have penetrated the coterie's haven, for instance, is often good for some Willpower reinvigoration, as is a decisive victory in a battle of prestige or the popular acceptance of an artistic or other innovation.

Group Willpower and the Individual

In addition to these general matters, where the bonus usually applies to all the participants in the success, individual characters may earn Willpower for acting successfully in accordance with their respective natures. A character who succeeds in several challenges that require (or allow) her to act upon her Nature's imperative within one scene may qualify, as can a character who succeeds in at least one such challenge per scene for several scenes in a row. A number of notable successes of this sort equal to the character's permanent Willpower is a good benchmark for progress, though Storytellers can and should vary the details to fit the needs of the chronicle and the moment.