[PK]

Originally Posted by Landwalker

Does this mean that, assuming a Malediction-type spell that doesn't allow an active defense, all spells are resisted straight-up against HT or Will?

No, it's a Quick Contest vs. the spell, like most magic. Sorry for not making that explicit enough; with RPM, space constraints required me to be as frugal with words as possible.

Bards, that icon of sword-and-sorcery games across many systems, use their magic through songs. How would one reflect this in the RPM system? Would Magery (Song, -40%) even exist, considering that Magery pretty much only exists to determine the effective skill cap and the mana reserve?

Magery can have limitations -- it just means that when you aren't following the rules for your limitation, your path skills are limited and you lose access to that chunk of your mana reserve. (Technically, it should affect your conditional spells as well, but as a GM I'd let that be a gray area, only to be enforced if I felt you were abusing the system, only because tracking multiple conditional-spell limits isn't fun.)

So let's say you have Magery 3; Magery 3 (Song, -40%); Path of Energy-18; Path of Matter-15; and Thaumatology-18. When you're singing, you have a mana reserve of 18 and your Path skills can be as high as 18. When you're not singing, you have a mana reserve of 9 and your Path skills can be as high as 15. So your Path of Matter isn't affected by whether you're singing, but your Path of Energy drops significantly when you don't. You don't get any point break on the Path skills for this; it's strictly a function of Magery.

The upcoming RPM book doesn't go into the specific example above, but it definitely goes into the details of limited Magery and Ritual Adept, as both are commonly combined with custom limitations when you use the rules for en . . . wait, I don't think I've leaked that yet. Never mind.

What about Ritual Adept (Song, -40%)? Would that mean that the spellcaster can enjoy the benefits of Ritual Adept as long as he's singing, but is treated as a non-adept when he isn't?

Exactly. Limited Ritual Adept is generally a lot simpler in play than limited Magery is; in practice, it basically boils down to, "Without my focusing trick, I cast spells much more slowly."

One of the NPC adversaries in the d20 module I'm basing this campaign off of has the spell Ghost Sound. And I have no idea how to render this in the RPM system, or what its effects might be.

For constructing the actual spell, all I can come up with is Lesser Create Energy (+6) to fabricate the sound, Range up to 10 yards (+4), Duration up to 10 minutes (+1), for a total cost of [11 Energy].

Sure, that looks right, assuming the sound is something indistinct and generic, like "a lion roaring" or "a crowd babbling." If you want useful speech or anything controlled enough to convey information, it's a Greater effect.

But what happens then? How much sound does that actually create? How loud is it? How can I add and subtract energy to determine the sound's volume? If someone hears it, do they get any rolls to identify it as real or fake?

RPM isn't nearly as legalistic as d20 things are. There are no rules for determining the volume of the spell . . . because the volume is whatever you want it to be. Casting a whisper is as difficult (and the same energy cost) as casting a shout. You only have to pay more if you want some sort of game effect, like a shout loud enough to stun people.