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Old 05-10-2012, 05:17 AM   #1
B9anders
 
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Default Ironing out Threshold Magic for my setting

So, I've decided that I like the idea of Threshold magic for my homebrew setting. There are a lot of significant historical details that come as a consequence of this:

The Ancient Great Magical Kingdom whose demise ended the previous age enjoyed a much higher Threshold and Recovery rate, besides having high mana zones and such built around their cities to make magic freely available, powerful and easy to use. The Magewar ended up with such huge magical excess though, that the fabric of reality was almost torn apart. After many centuries of magic being totally unreliable, the fabric has repaired itself somewhat and the result is the current level of Threshold and RR.

There have been cultural consequences of this disaster. Magic is seen as something dangerous that requires great responsibility and knowledge to wield safely. In civilised regions, magic is tightly controlled by the wizardly guilds (once much more unified, but now more or less isolated local enclaves though pretty much guided by the same principles) whose foremost task is to ensure that such reckless and irresponsible use of magic can never happen again. All guilded wizards are subjected to a kind of magical inhibitor that prevents them from exceeding their threshold too much. Magical items are all built with similar blocks.

Guilded wizards are somewhat trusted due to this regulation, but renegades are considered extremely dangerous and persecuted by guilds and common folk alike (join us, get inhibited or we sever your Magery is the usual offer. Though execution is not uncommon).

Powered magical items are also considered dangerous for the same reasons and the guilds have declared all such items to be the property of the guilds since common people can not be trusted with the responsibility of handling items that could disrupt reality itself. In reality, it can be hard to enforce (though if they find examples of normal people disrupting the weave with such items, they will seize them) and people can obtain permission from the guilds to use magic items that have been declared safe. Trouble is, magical items from the previous age were not designed with the blocks modern ones have. On the contrary, they were designed for use in an era were they could safely draw on much more energy than they can today! The potential for disaster in such ancient magic is thus quite strong.

There is a host of meta magic spells designed around this that all guilds make use of. The ability to discover and track calamities of sufficient impact. And also secret and outlawed spells that allow wizards to cloak and conceal such excess. There are even spells that allow them to undo the inhibitors placed on all guilded wizards, though the penalty for doing so is death.

The main dilemma for wizards here then, is the limited access to energy. There are ways around that, not all of them sanctioned by the guilds. Necromancers draw from the very lifeforce of others to power their magic, conjurers strike deals with extra-dimensional beings (both practices are likely to get you executed by the guilds if discovered). Guild houses are generally built on ley line wells (this is also the reason why wizards choose to live in towers in the wilderness) for more energy access.

So, all that is left is how to represent all this in GURPS. Much of it is self-evident, but I am thinking about a meta-trait package for "Guilded Wizard" and "Renegade" and wondering what it should include.

Guilded wizards would have some social benefits tempered with the disadvantage "Threshold Excess Limit" (cost?!?) and some sort of code of honor. Renegades wouldn't have that, but they have some social disadvantages instead. Either Secret or Enemy and Social Stigma.
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Old 05-10-2012, 05:23 AM   #2
B9anders
 
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Default Re: Ironing out Threshold Magic for my setting

Also, how do you make Imbuements work in a Threshold Magic setting?
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Old 05-10-2012, 05:32 AM   #3
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Default Re: Ironing out Threshold Magic for my setting

The Threshold Limit Excess could be implemented as a penalty to spellcasting based on the margin by which the wizard is already over the threshold.

The ability to use extra energy beyond the threshold is balanced by the potential calamitys which might result - I'd say these balance as zero points.


A standard (GURPS) wizard has a bank of energy equal to his FP (and/or ER), which recovers at the usual FP recovery rate (ER might recover differently, and there are spells to increase FP recovery)

A threshold wizard has access to a bank of energy equal to the Threshold, and this bank recovers at a defined Recovery Rate.

Depending upon the actual numbers, these are pretty much considered 'balanced'.

- A threshold wizard can also dip into an exceess pool, but with potentially dangerous consequences. (As I said above, I suspect this is a balanced zero point feature).


All you're doing is limiting the size of the excess, and therefore limiting the size of the possible calamities - I'd say this still balances as zero points.
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Old 05-10-2012, 10:13 AM   #4
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Default Re: Ironing out Threshold Magic for my setting

Imbuements could draw off the same Threshold and I would call that balanced vs. FP same as magic is.
They also could be other then magic (especially since you already have other sources you list like Extra dimensional and Life Force) and a Chi based Imbuement character would use FP.
In fact I can see Chi techniques being developed in your world after the Calamity as people try to find new energy and ways to do things.
These Chi based warriors could have their own power structure and be considered safer and more reliable so highly desired, even if they do not have the versatility of more traditional magic.
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Old 05-10-2012, 10:30 AM   #5
Peter Knutsen
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Default Re: Ironing out Threshold Magic for my setting

The impression I got from Unlimited Mana is that a magic user has something like 30 or 40 spell points to work with, but he recovers only a fraction of those per day. Say 10 spell points. This means he's reluctant to spend on small things, and will tend to save up his spell points for situatons he deems critical.

A GURPS Magic caster has something like 9-12 spell points to work with, but he can recover them very quickly, in an hour or two, and so has several times those 9-12 sp per day. Also he'll be working mostly small effects, many subject to sp discounts for high skill (15 and IIRC 20 and then 25) so that in some (many?) cases the cost drops to zero, while in most other cases the cost is lowered significantly.

On the other hand, an Unlimited Mana user is much freer to cast really expensive spells, when he deems it necessary, and so even if the sp cost reduction for high skill is in effect (I don't remember if it is supposed to be), it doesn't matter much, e.g. skill 20 reduces the cost from 25 to 23 sp, which is no big deal.
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