Standard magic: area spells and walls

[Devil_Dante]

Hi everyone! Got a couple of questions.
I feel area spells are very expensive to use: a lot of them have 2-5 FP. Trying to cover a 6 radius circle becomes very tough. But maybe is a way to balance the game. What I really don't understand is why the wall spells are so bad: lighting wall costs 6, this means 12 at least, for a very tiny wall. Is there any why to handle them? Because doing the same spell with the sorcery is far more cheaper (wall enhancement and area spell modifier scale cheaper than area spell radius).

Am I misunderstanding? Or if I am not, is there any way to make those spells more reliable?

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

lighting wall costs 6

Only if you insist on it doing 3d-3 damage, which is rather a lot.

is there any way to make those spells more reliable?

Reliable? I assume you mean cheaper to cast. The amount of energy used doesn't change the skill level, and so wouldn't affect reliability.

We played one game with a houserule that scaled Area spells using the Speed/Range table progression, so large areas could be covered at logarithmic cost rather than linear. It was also a Threshold magic game where a sufficiently motivated mage could burn 30 or so points on one spell by himself, without ceremonial casting, if he thought it really necessary.

Magic seems to me to be meant for small-scale use, as on arena maps or in dungeons, hearkening all the way back to its heritage from Wizard. It's on a personal, single-figure combat-time scale. That Wall of Lightning would be used to seal a door or protect the wizard's hex to keep the swarms or trash mooks out of his hair, not protect a city wall with one casting, or even an entire room, so a hex or two is usually all you'd need. (For all the complaints about the Magic system being overpowered, I've heard a number of complaints that mages can't be made powerful enough, at least in the city-threatening sense you often see in fantasy books.) Enlarge is notoriously OP for allowing geometric growth in the size of objects while most effects are linear. But if you want to cover large areas, that's exactly the sort of change in mechanics that you want.

[Devil_Dante]

thanks for reply

for reliable i meant that you can rely more on that and their utility, but yes, price is what i was talking about.

I thought about using that (using the penalty as a multiplier).
My wizard's player yesterday was trying to cast a wall to divide a group of enemies: 3 of them were already in melee, while other 3 foes were coming. In the end, he could chose to cast a "big" harmless wall, or a small dangerous wall. He chose to cast another spell

[Taneli]

Even 10 points of Energy Reserve make mages a lot more frightening, consider giving them up to 30, suddenly they have almost thrice their FP that they can use before getting any danger of exhaustion.

Another way is to get their skills up to 20 or even 25, after that most spells they can maintain for free. How about Flight and Reverse Missiles free for all party members?

[Devil_Dante]

Originally Posted by Taneli

Even 10 points of Energy Reserve make mages a lot more frightening, consider giving them up to 30, suddenly they have almost thrice their FP that they can use before getting any danger of exhaustion.

Another way is to get their skills up to 20 or even 25, after that most spells they can maintain for free. How about Flight and Reverse Missiles free for all party members?

it's true, but we starting playing (me as GM and 3 players) 3 months ago with 180 points (150+30 of dis). Now they have barely 200 points.

With these points, my wizard player has 20 PF (both in PF and ER) plus a 10 FP powerstone. The main problem came when he wished to cast a wall, but to do it, he needed all his PF more or less, to cast something that was kinda usefull. So i was wandering, could a wall spell be so usefull, when the main task was to do a little bit of battlefield control?
I am a big fun of the D&D wizard battlefield control style, and to be honest, i really don't like how wall are treated. I wish to give them a bit of love. And in general, AoE spells are pretty expensive.

From next session, i will introduce the "speed range table" for AoE spells. Wish to see how it works.

The reason is always the same: the gish player can dish out an average of 15 damage per round (even more when buffed). Don't want to see the wizard felt useless, that's all

[Gnome]

If you're looking for battlefield control there are many good spells for this: Glue, Grease, Force Dome/Wall, Mystic Mist (has to be cast ahead of time), Darkness, Shape Earth, Windstorm ...
Note though that none of these spells does damage! Standard GURPS Magic makes mages very weak at dealing damage but very good at pretty much everything else. In DnD, I found that wizards eventually outclassed everyone at everything. In GURPS, at least a warrior can dish out more damage (this is a warrior's specialized niche after all), even if a well-built wizard could easily defeat her in a fight with save-or-die type spells, probably has more ways to affect a broader battle between buffs, battlefield control spells, and special case utility spells, and more or less outclasses the rest of the party anyway if the player knows what she is doing...

The one exception to "mages are bad at damage" is elemental damage. If you're fighting an ice elemental, the wizard's weak fire spells are suddenly an important factor.

If you're going to modify this state of affairs, I would suggest inventing some expensive special advantages a mage can buy to improve her damage-dealing prowess or improve other aspects of magic. I have a house advantage called "Spellslinger" which effectively increases RoF and damage for missile spells. I have another one called "Huge Caster" (I reserve this for giants and such) that allows the caster to cast on large SM subjects and over large areas for cheaper. Thaumatology has lots more options for modifying Magery or the magic system to make it better/worse/different.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Taneli

Even 10 points of Energy Reserve make mages a lot more frightening, consider giving them up to 30, suddenly they have almost thrice their FP that they can use before getting any danger of exhaustion.

Another way is to get their skills up to 20 or even 25, after that most spells they can maintain for free. How about Flight and Reverse Missiles free for all party members?

You mean after dumping 90+ points into something a Character might be potent?

Go figure... ;)