Powerstones

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Polaris

E

Assuming that 1 pt gives you powerstone at a 15 skill, it would only take 4 extra points to get Charge Powertone at a 16.

Bad math. The Skill(Spell) cost progression goes 1-2-4-8 etc.

To bring in more math, the chance of Quirking the stone (which can make it almost useless to an adventurer if a bad Quirk is obtained) never drops below 1-in-54 and destroying the stone is never less than 1-in-216.

IMHO and IMX that only makes it "minimal" if you only do it _once_. Start doing it every day (and possibly more than once per day) and it becomes inevitable. 3s and 18s do come up at the gaming table and they do so with a thoroughly predictable frequency.

[munin]

Since Charge Powerstone is not an enchantment, you can apply Luck to your casting success roll. Quirks and destruction are still inevitable, but if you use Charge Powerstone three to four times per day (game time) with a use of Luck available, you'll quirk your powerstone only about once a century and destroy it only about once every 10,000 years.

EDIT: Since recharging a powerstone is usually a background task, Charge Powerstone might even qualify for a No Nuisance Roll perk (especially if you have Luck to justify it).

[Polaris]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Bad math. The Skill(Spell) cost progression goes 1-2-4-8 etc.

No it's not. If you know the powerstone spell (at 15 or it's useless), you'd know the charge powerstone skill at 14 for 1pt (since it's vH), 15 for 2pts, and 16 for 4 points, so my math was just fine thank you (if you have the powerstone spell you likely have all the prereqs anyway)! Better yet, if you have enchantment at a base of 15 (16 base spell skill), then it only costs 2 points for charge powerstone at a 16 and not four points.

Before you criticise my math again, check your own.

To bring in more math, the chance of Quirking the stone (which can make it almost useless to an adventurer if a bad Quirk is obtained) never drops below 1-in-54 and destroying the stone is never less than 1-in-216.

Many quirks are not useless, so the chance of a quirk that makes the stone worthless is considerably less than 1:54

IMHO and IMX that only makes it "minimal" if you only do it _once_. Start doing it every day (and possibly more than once per day) and it becomes inevitable. 3s and 18s do come up at the gaming table and they do so with a thoroughly predictable frequency.

Then you aren't doing it right. 1:216 is truely neglible especially when you figure you can use bless, luck, and other rerolls on the spell (since it's not an enchantment spell) as was already mentioned.

That makes the risk of recharge so low to be almost completely neglible over any reasonable expected adventuring period.

-Polaris

[hal]

Originally Posted by Polaris

hal,

Be that as it may, it exists now and is perfectly book legal

If we try to gauge GURPS Magic by what "should have be the rule" rather than what the rules are, then it's basically impossible to gauge a scenario fairly and equitably across games, and the OP's question was refering to a particular issue regarding powerstones.

-Polaris

I agree with you, it is in fact, book legal. That having been said, it should have been vetted better, or I would not have mentioned the fact that it is not an enchantment spell, and that it should never have been written as it was ;)

Sometimes GURPS flat out states what a given rule is. Sometimes, GURPS implies things without flat out specifying that it is a rule. And other times, it implies two things that are mutually divergent. It is after all, a GAME about MAGIC - which doesn't neccessarily imply any form of "Science" behind the magics nor the fact that there is any form of consistency involved in how magic works. As I've pointed out many a time <g>, one can always houserule those things that the GM disagrees with vehemently. That is one I disagree with vehemently ;)

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Polaris

, you'd know the charge powerstone skill at 14 for 1pt (since it's vH), 15 for 2pts, and 16 for 4 points, so my math was just fine thank you

Gee, touchy much? I missed the switch from Powerstone to Charge Powerstone and the requisite drop of Skill by 1 point.

You're still exaggerating the ability to avoid critical failure. Even if your Luck has the Game Time Enhancement it still only works one time per day passed in the game.

Also, Bless does not prevent Critical Failures.

So with Bless, Luck and Charge Powerstone-16 you can charge your stone once per day, re-rolling 18s and probably not destroying your stone and the Bless turning your 17s into 16s so you don't get a Quirk.

If you go to do it more than once a day you're running the risk of destroying your stone and it is very likely to happen well before you try it for the 216th time.

You obviously can't use the Luck to save your characters butt or anything else on the same day and when the Bless runs out after it does save your PC's butt you;ll need to give up the whole scheme until you can get Blessed again.

There's also the drawback that your stone won';t recharge on its' own until well after you stop pulling thsi trick.

Then there's the question of what you have gained for your expenditure of 19 cp. You've gained the ability to store an extra 3 pts of FP per day (assuming FP of 10). You could have spent 9 pts and just gotten 3 more pts of FP. Then you could have taken the remaining 10 pts and raised you HT by 1 and gotten another FP and all the other benefits of higher HT (including the possibility of increased Dodge).

There wouldn't be that 45 minutes when you were recovering that 9 pts of FP you spent on the Charge Powerstone either.

Yes, you can make this trick work to a limited extent. No, it's probably not a good use of your resources.

[Polaris]

Fred,

All this is false many times over. Luck can be used once per real-time hour (or half hour or ten minutes for higher level luck). I don't know where you are getting your "once per day" from, but it's not the rules.

Also I suggest you reread the bless spell. It DOES negate critical failures at the expense of negating the bless spell itself.

-Polaris

Edit: It's actually a very good use of resources. I personally almost never use luck, but I definately use bless. Even without luck, 1:216 is actually extremely low odds. Enough that I can reliably recharge a 10pt stone about 3-4 times per day and almost never have a problem with breaking the stone in any reasonable adventuring time-line.

If I really want to get picky, wish items/spells can also be used to help in the extremely rare (as another poster pointed out) event that the stone is shattered.

In addition to all this, you can use this technique in conjunction with crass (cheap) manastones to make it even better.

[hal]

Originally Posted by Polaris

Fred,

All this is false many times over. Luck can be used once per real-time hour (or half hour or ten minutes for higher level luck). I don't know where you are getting your "once per day" from, but it's not the rules.

Also I suggest you reread the bless spell. It DOES negate critical failures at the expense of negating the bless spell itself.

-Polaris

A lot depends upon the strict reading of the spell BLESS from GURPS MAGIC.

The effect of a blessing is as follows:
All the subject’s die rolls are modified favorably by one point (or more, for a
more powerful blessing). The modification will not affect critical successes
and failures. This lasts indefinitely . . . until the subject fails some die roll (or
a foe makes a good die roll) and the subject is in some serious danger.

Note that this "fails some die roll" conditional has a very precise situation - "And the subject is in some serious danger" before the "somehow averts the failure and expires" aspect that you're alluding to.

So, I agree with the statement about Luck being available once per hour at the gaming table is not the same as once per day for the character - but I also disagree that your statement of Blessings affecting critical rolls applies. Only when the roll presents a danger to the character itself will it then apply (or so strict reading of the spell implies to me).

[Polaris]

Hal,

I'll agree that if you aren't in danger at all (safe at home), then indeed bless would not negate a critical failure. However, if you were in an environment where there was always a level of possibly immediate danger (like most dungeon crawls), I'd say a strict reading of bless indicates that it does. The spell doesn't say the recipient has to be in immediate danger, only in danger.

Naturally this is subject to GM interpretation, but almost all that I've had experience with rule that in an "adventuring" situation (i.e. not safe at home or in an inn or inside lots or protection), bless certainly does negate criticals against you....at the cost of the bless itself.

-Polaris

[hal]

Originally Posted by Polaris

Hal,

I'll agree that if you aren't in danger at all (safe at home), then indeed bless would not negate a critical failure. However, if you were in an environment where there was always a level of possibly immediate danger (like most dungeon crawls), I'd say a strict reading of bless indicates that it does. The spell doesn't say the recipient has to be in immediate danger, only in danger.

Naturally this is subject to GM interpretation, but almost all that I've had experience with rule that in an "adventuring" situation (i.e. not safe at home or in an inn or inside lots or protection), bless certainly does negate criticals against you....at the cost of the bless itself.

-Polaris

Which then implies, that the use of the Charge Powerstone spell, is not going to come under the heading of "and the subject is in danger", and consequently, will not affect the roll to avoid quirking or destroying your powerstone.

That said, the Luck advantage probably will permit bad rolls to be potentially negated. It should be noted, that someone with the spell Charge Powerstone, can automatically quirk the stone if they fail in casting the spell properly, and for a mage with the spell at skill 10, that's 50% of the time. This is a pretty nasty spell in the hands of a mage whose only desire is to change unquirked powerstones into quirked powerstones. A mage with 3 ongoing spells plus a skill of 10 with the spell, will quirk the stone on a roll of an 8+, and destroy it on a roll of a 17+ Kinda nasty if you ask me. :(

[hal]

Originally Posted by Polaris

Hal,

I'll agree that if you aren't in danger at all (safe at home), then indeed bless would not negate a critical failure. However, if you were in an environment where there was always a level of possibly immediate danger (like most dungeon crawls), I'd say a strict reading of bless indicates that it does. The spell doesn't say the recipient has to be in immediate danger, only in danger.

-Polaris

In re-reading what you wrote, are you saying that if you cast the spell while in a dungeon, but in no immediate danger at that precise moment from the spell's crit failure, that you expect the bless to kick in? If so, then I'd have to wonder what the danger of the spell itself presents to your character at that precise moment for the bless to kick in. As GM, I'd say "um, no danger to you at this precise moment, so no bless kicking in."

If you want to debate the merits that you need that powerstone in the next half hour (because that is how long it will take for you to recover your lost fatigue spent on a 1 point Charge Powerstone spell casting) - I'd have to say "um, no". Danger is the immediate moment at which the failed roll needs to be modified in some fashion. The example given states that it won't avert that arrow aimed at your heart, but it might divert it so it hits your arm instead (for a 1 point blessing) etc. The conditional "In danger" implies to me - that it is the IMMEDIATE danger, otherwise, it doesn't affect the die rolls and then expire.