Fantasy magic styles and alchemy

[Devil_Dante]

Hi!
I'm here to ask you some question, looking for advices.
I'm going to start a fantasy adventures soon, as DM. I'm setting the world and was studying magic, because will have an important task.
I'm dividing magic among the users:

1)any magician, sorcerer or "arcane-ish" mage will use the standard GURPS magic
2)any cleric, or "divine" caster, will use the clerical version with the Threshold variant rule (thaumatology p 76)
3)any "druid-ish" spellcaster will use the symbolic magic

4)then, i want, in my world, the alchemy, but not the baroc alchemy; just a more "fantasy oriented" alchemy. To make some example, like the alchemy from the witcher, where you have potions or decoctions that can emulate some spells or simply improving physical abilities (like a spell would do). To do this, i have picked the rules from pyramid 3-82, dungeon brewmasters, p4. In this way, brewing is faster and cheaper, and can be a reliable sorce of power.
On top of this, i 'd like to let my (eventual) PCs create their own potions using the rules from this thread: http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=136646
Not the most important stuff, but i just want to give you the idea behind my choices.

now, i'm asking 3 things:
1)is symbolic magic too difficult to handle? i have no experience with no standard magic version. I'm scared to slow down the game, or simply see my PCs going crazy, or use all their fatigue to cast a simple spell and be totally useless for the rest of the fight/day
2)About threshold, are the cataclisms too punitive? I'm looking for tweaking the effect a bit probably, but still, how is it feel?
3)about alchemy, i'd wish to recreate the chance to harvest any material from the nature, in this way they can prepare their stuff without spending precious money, because alchemy in general is way less strong than spells (as it should be imo). Any suggestion about this part? I don't want to see a brewing factory, but i don't even want to see a PC being useless cause he can't use his "alchemy" because of high prices or very long brewing time.

Thanks for answers!!

[AlexanderHowl]

Symbolic magic is not hard to handle as long as you keep in mind the limitations of the lexicon and the limitations of the system. Are you going with an FP-based system, a Threshold-limited system, or something more exotic for energy for the symbolic system?

As for the alchemy, I would suggest looking at the alchemy in Thaumatology: Ritual Path Magic. In short, it allows practitioners to store up to (Core Skill plus Magery) spells in reserve in elixir form, gives a Magical Reserve of (Magery × 3), though Magery does not add to magical skills. It takes an hour per elixir, so I think that a limitation of Alchemy Only (-40%) would probably be suitable and, since Magery does not add to skill, I would allow up to Magery 10.

In that system, an alchemist with Magery 5 (Alchemy Only, -40%) [35] and Alchemy-15 would have Magical Reserve 15 and could have up to 20 elixirs in reserve. They could only learn spells to cast them into an elixir, which they could pay for with their Magical Reserve. Of course, it might not work for your world.

[Devil_Dante]

Thabks for asnwer!!

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Symbolic magic is not hard to handle as long as you keep in mind the limitations of the lexicon and the limitations of the system. Are you going with an FP-based system, a Threshold-limited system, or something more exotic for energy for the symbolic system?

For symbol magic, i'd rather choose the standard FP system, but with the chance to gather energy from the surrounding area, like the ritual path magic does. Because is used by "druids", it could work, both mechanically and lore wise. The version on GURPS Magic has less rules compared to the Thaumatology. I think it could be a good start.

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

As for the alchemy, I would suggest looking at the alchemy in Thaumatology: Ritual Path Magic. In short, it allows practitioners to store up to (Core Skill plus Magery) spells in reserve in elixir form, gives a Magical Reserve of (Magery × 3), though Magery does not add to magical skills. It takes an hour per elixir, so I think that a limitation of Alchemy Only (-40%) would probably be suitable and, since Magery does not add to skill, I would allow up to Magery 10.

In that system, an alchemist with Magery 5 (Alchemy Only, -40%) [35] and Alchemy-15 would have Magical Reserve 15 and could have up to 20 elixirs in reserve. They could only learn spells to cast them into an elixir, which they could pay for with their Magical Reserve. Of course, it might not work for your world.

well, is not bad at all.. have to consider if i prefer this or the other, but in the end, both are suitable

[Devil_Dante]

so,after some considerations, i want to change something:
1)druidic magic will probably become path/book ritual.. it fits so well into the concept
2)one of my Pc wants to play a northern cleric, that means something like "viking" (not really, but something like)
I suggest him rune magic, instead to clerical magic, but still using the threshold limitations.
On top of this he asked me to introduce a fency stuf (hope won't hurt no one's sensibility): he wishes to gather souls and free them, through his magic, and let them reach the afterlife as worthy souls.
I think a good mechanic is to rule every soul as "powerstone" that grants additional tally.
could it work? I was thinking about 5-10 additional tally per soul