GURPS Magic Flavor

[Poonbahbah]

And for the high skill mage there is also the maintain spell which given a little time can let the caster provide a modest combat boost to the entire party. It takes away the spell on penalty and with enough skill can maintain the targeted spell for quite a while for free.

In this post I was able to provide about 7 people +1 move and dodge, +1 DB to the front, and -2 to be hit for a little over 9 minutes. They also had a 2 point hide on them for about the next 10 hours. The caster herself and one other had Darkvision and Missile Shield still being directly maintained. If she had known the spell she could of also given them all +1 DR and who knows what else without spending any actual FP thanks to her high skill. Though this character was at 250 rather than the 160 yours will be starting out at. It did take about 45 seconds, and as many rolls, to cast all the spells with many chances for a crit failure but the whole group was that much more likely to survive. She couldn't do much big stuff but little things add up after a while.

[dripton]

For 160 points (depending on how many disads you allow) they can start with something like ST 10, DX 10, IQ 15, HT 11, Per 12, FP 14, Magery 3, 30 1-point spells, and 25 points of other advantages or skills or spells. That yields someone who's lousy at physical stuff but very good at mental stuff and knows enough spells to be very useful. (Of course he's also very squishy -- I recommend spending the 15 points for Luck, or a few less for the defense-only version.)

30 points in spells isn't enough to do everything, but it's enough to get some great utility spells like Major Healing and Flight and some game-breakers like Great Haste and Invisibility and some self-defense like Iron Arm and Deflect Missiles and some quest-shortcutting information spells. But with only 14 FP, he won't be throwing a lot of huge flashy spells around, instead casting a bunch of little things and benefitting from the skill 15+ cost break.

A lot comes down to how easy you make it to learn new spells in play. If players know it's hard to learn new spells (they have to find a rare teacher who knows that spell then to a quest to convince him to help then spend lots of hours studying while paying him top dollar) then they'd want to cut other things to start with as many spells as possible. (1 less IQ point equals 20 more spells.) And multiple mages might want to coordinate their starting spells lists to reduce overlap, both for initial breadth and so that they can later teach each other their spells without needing to find NPC teachers. And, later, they'll end up improving the spells they already have if that's much easier than learning new ones. (For example, raising Invisibility to 25 makes it possible to leave it on all the time, which is a great way to not get attacked.)

OTOH, if you let them easily convert 5 earned character points to 5 new spells of their choosing with little fuss, then they can very rapidly grow more capable over time by expanding their spell lists after every session. Would you rather have specialists or generalists? Specialists with just a few good spells at a high level can get kind of boring (the guy with Dehydrate-25 can throw 3d-3 Dehydrates that are hard to resist for 0 FP every single turn, so that's probably what he's going to do as long as it works), but at least their players know what their main spells do so play moves along. The generalist with 80 spells can be a problem if he's always holding up play looking through the magic book.

Also, think about powerstones. If money is easy to come by then the mages will soon buy big powerstones for lots of extra magical FP without spending precious CP. If money is tight then they'll only be able to afford dinky little powerstones and putting CP into FP or ER looks a lot better, which means they can't put it into more spells.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by dripton

Specialists with just a few good spells at a high level can get kind of boring (the guy with Dehydrate-25 can throw 3d-3 Dehydrates that are hard to resist for 0 FP every single turn, so that's probably what he's going to do as long as it works), but at least their players know what their main spells do so play moves along. The generalist with 80 spells can be a problem if he's always holding up play looking through the magic book.

This is huge, and I'd like to call it out from the middle of dripton's reply.

—

After having run fantasy campaigns under every edition of GURPS over the past 27 years, I can honestly say that the generalist whose player flicks through a book or a stack of index cards every damned time he wants to cast a spell is the source of far more annoyance than the specialist who does a couple of things well, if a little too well. The first wizard holds up play, has so much scope that he invalidates and invades the niches of other characters, and can't be challenged by anything less ham-fisted than a no-mana area. The second is easily challenged by a situation or a foe that isn't susceptible to her best tricks, leaves vast swaths of competence free for other PCs, and is a blessing because she knows what she wants to do.

I think that restricting all magic use in the manner of GURPS Thaumatology: Magical Styles is the way to go, frankly. Require wizards to decide what they do well, bleed off a few points for mundane skills that actually make them wise, and drop in a social context. Free-form magical learning is more appealing to munchkins and to contrarians who object to structure "just because," but it doesn't do the campaign many favors – least of all if your campaign has six, eight, or more PCs (I once had 13), and they're all supposed to get a turn and enjoy a unique niche.

Originally Posted by dripton

Also, think about powerstones. If money is easy to come by then the mages will soon buy big powerstones for lots of extra magical FP without spending precious CP. If money is tight then they'll only be able to afford dinky little powerstones and putting CP into FP or ER looks a lot better, which means they can't put it into more spells.

Just ditching Powerstones is a sensible option, too. Making energy points cost character points in the form of FP or ER prevents oddities like Wealth being a better investment than IQ or Magery for a wizard . . . and like found Powerstones ratcheting up power level in a points-free way that gear for nonmages can rarely match in most fantasy settings. If you're using magical styles, there's the possibility of some secrets of each style being tied up with tapping special energy sources which aren't quite as portable or risk-free. This adds a lot of flavor and allows big spells, but lets the GM control the when and the where of it more, which in turn is a good way to limit game-breaking effects.

[doulos05]

OK, so magic styles with ER are the way to go. I'll start building my styles list now and post one or two here just for sanity checking while I get used to building styles.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Kromm

I think that restricting all magic use in the manner of GURPS Thaumatology: Magical Styles is the way to go, .

The problem with this is that there is no big book (or even pdf) of Gurps Magical Styles. The book with those words in its' name has only one style to serve as an example.

There are only a few more scattered through Pyramid issues.

So before you tell your prospective PC that they have to choose a Style from a list you have to have a list for them to chose from. It needs to be a Style that the player likes the look of too so a short list may not have enough entries. More work for the GM.

Having the PC create his own Style limits the process to expert PCs and discourages newbies.

[Kromm]

I'm not claiming it's easy, that's for sure! However, I would assert that creating a bunch of styles is easier than putting up with the woes caused by 100-spell wizards turning the campaign into a fantasy version of the netrunner problem. "Let's all wait while Magus the Mighty figures out which of his 101 spells will solve the problem faster and better than any of us could solve it without magic" gets more annoying than "Let's all wait a month to start the campaign because the GM is busy making magical styles" in a campaign that's going to run for a few years or more.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Kromm

I'm not claiming it's easy, that's for sure! However, I would assert that creating a bunch of styles is easier than putting up with the woes caused by 100-spell wizards turning the campaign into a fantasy version of the netrunner problem. "Let's all wait while Magus the Mighty figures out which of his 101 spells will solve the problem faster and better than any of us could solve it without magic" gets more annoying than "Let's all wait a month to start the campaign because the GM is busy making magical styles" in a campaign that's going to run for a few years or more.

Sorry, my experience is different from yours. The need to do work before a campaign can start has short-circuited more games than spell choice has delayed game play.

The ditherers tend to slow play with other decisions when they don't play spellcasters anyway. That's system independent too.

[ericthered]

and depending on how much you in the player trust each other you can decide on a Feel and wing it as you go.

That requires less work but a better relationship though. And only works for some kinds of players.

[doulos05]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Sorry, my experience is different from yours. The need to do work before a campaign can start has short-circuited more games than spell choice has delayed game play.

The ditherers tend to slow play with other decisions when they don't play spellcasters anyway. That's system independent too.

But magical styles are transportable from campaign to campaign. That said, I'd love to see a book of magical styles with advice for tailoring them to your campaign.

[Angle]

SHould we make a thread for brainstorming magical styles? For that matter, while we're at it, we may as well brainstorm martial styles, and maybe a few other things while we're at it. What you say, forums?