Powerstones

[Polaris]

Originally Posted by Langy

I don't see anything in Magic that says how much a Manastone of certain size costs. If it's truly linearlly, and a capacity 1 Manastone cost 70 bucks (the same as a Powerstone), then a Manastone that cost the same as a Tyche elixer would hold 18 fatigue points. Since Manastone is a fifth of the power point cost of Powerstone, though, it seems likely that it would cost 1/5 the price - so that Manastone would actually hold 92 fatigue points.

Still doesn't seem like a great deal to get that Tyche elixer.

You use the cost of enchanting items and up to 60 power, quick and dirty enchantment costs $1 per powerpoint (see GURPS Magic page 20). The base cost for Manastone is 5power points per casting, but for mundane (cheap) items this is multiplied by 4 for 20 power points per casting (see GURPS Magic page 69-70). Because there isn't any item cost for destroying the manastone in creation (unlike a powerstone), the cost is very nearly linear.

-Polaris

[hal]

Originally Posted by Polaris

I beg your pardon but I showed mathematically that this was false. The the risk even without the use of bless or luck is very low even for just quirking the stone. Please review my numbers again. It's hardly "playing with fire".

While it's true you can't bless yourself, it's also true that bless is dirt cheap (only $10 for Bless one) to get cast on you. Also it's worth noting you CAN bless an item that you have and then wear your own item. Bless can be cast as an enchantment even if it's not one.



Again, I've proved it's relatively safe WITHOUT the luck advantage and very safe with it. As for knowing the spell at 15+, if you have the powerstone (and manastone) spell at all, that's almost a given because of the very low prerequisite count for Charge Powerstone.

-Polaris

Beg all you want dude LOL.

A Mage with IQ 12 and magery 3, costs a total of 40 points plus 35 points, or 75 points total. Toss in Luck, and it cost the player a total of 105 character points.

Absent the Tyche potion at $1300 per shot, lasting 2d6 hours - and absent the luck, a mage with only 1 character point in the spell, will have the charge powerstone at a skill of 12.

As a GM, I've seen instances where a player couldn't roll under a 12 or less to save their life, this despite having the luck advantage and using MY houserules - where you get THREE "rerolls" before the luck advantage needs to recharge. So it does happen.

Without a functional BLESS using YOUR method, the risks for rolling a crit failure are bad enough, but rolling a 12+ without LUCK or without BLESS is just playing fire. The odds are, that once out of very 4 atempts to use that spell will result in quirking your stone.

I don't mind you making assertions and I really don't have a problem "debating" the rules one way or another. I've been wrong more times than I care to count - but, I've also been right more times than I care to count as well ;)

If all you count upon is the standard rules as written for "Luck", the odds of blowing at least one set of re-rolls with a skill of 12, is equal to 1-odds of rolling a 12 or less on 3d6 raised to the 3rd power. That works out to 1.7% of the time.

Without Luck however, the odds of quirking your stone work out to be roughly 1 in four.

If you want to spend 30 points getting the Luck advantage when instead, you could have had 30 points in spells, that's your choice. Few mage characters will be built in that fashion - which makes it atypical...

[Polaris]

When would the use of Tyche be a good idea?

When the decrease in the odds of breakage costs an expected costs that exceeds the cost of the elixer itself.

That's going to happen about a stone size of 20 or so approx.

-Polaris

[Polaris]

Hal,

No one would build a wizard that way (that specializes in magic anyway).

You want a "Base Magic Skill" of 15+ regardless in order to get the fatigue reduction which means any REASONABLE dedicated wizard is not going to have IQ12 and Magery III. Such a low powered wizard has no business enchanting anything!

A more realistic wizard (even on 150+75) will have a basic magic skill of 15, usually of the variety of IQ 14 and Magery III for a total positive cost of 115. That's out of a total budget for your typical starting hero (let along DF characters!) of 225 which allows plenty for spells and if necessary luck as well.

I also proved that you don't NEED luck.

Sorry there is it. Your example is a very poor and atypical one.

-Polaris

[hal]

Originally Posted by Polaris

Hal,

No one would build a wizard that way (that specializes in magic anyway).

You want a "Base Magic Skill" of 15+ regardless in order to get the fatigue reduction which means any REASONABLE dedicated wizard is not going to have IQ12 and Magery III. Such a low powered wizard has no business enchanting anything!

A more realistic wizard (even on 150+75) will have a basic magic skill of 15, usually of the variety of IQ 14 and Magery III for a total positive cost of 115. That's out of a total budget for your typical starting hero (let along DF characters!) of 225 which allows plenty for spells and if necessary luck as well.

I also proved that you don't NEED luck.

Sorry there is it. Your example is a very poor and atypical one.

-Polaris

Tell ya what - build what you think is a typical mage based on 150 character points. Then we'll see how this goes...

[Langy]

When the decrease in the odds of breakage costs an expected costs that exceeds the cost of the elixer itself.

Using a Tyche elixer to charge a powerstone is also not recommended if you could, instead, purchase a Manastone of the same capacity or higher. If it's really a straight linear progression, then you would need a Powerstone greater than size 65, which is what you can get with a $1300 manastone.

[Polaris]

Originally Posted by Langy

Using a Tyche elixer to charge a powerstone is also not recommended if you could, instead, purchase a Manastone of the same capacity or higher. If it's really a straight linear progression, then you would need a Powerstone greater than size 65, which is what you can get with a $1300 manastone.

I agree. This goes way back the original topic. Cheap manastones (made of mundane material) probably do unbalance the game and likely would replace powerstones for adventuring wizards. However, I find it's useful to have both and if you have both, recharging the powerstone when you have to is incredibly useful. [And manastones don't interfere with powerstone recharging].

It's useful to have both because you can't recharge a manastone and that can be important.

-Polaris

[Langy]

Yeah, but suggesting using a Tyche elixer to recharge a powerstone as being an economical idea when you have manastones available doesn't seem particularly... right. There's no reason to spend money recharging a powerstone if you can just buy an equivalent manastone for less.

[Polaris]

Originally Posted by hal

Tell ya what - build what you think is a typical mage based on 150 character points. Then we'll see how this goes...

Hal,

Your typical 100pt (for 1st - 3rd edition GURPS) and your typical 150 pts 4E GURPS wizard have been based on IQ14+Magery III almost forever....since the mid 1980s at the very least.

In fact when making a generic 150pt wizard (or 100pts in prior editions), the very first thing you do is pencil in 14 IQ and Magery III [unless the GM allows higher levels of Magery in which case you can skimp a bit on the IQ].

That's because you want a fatigue cost reduction of 1 for almost all your spells while only spending the "minimum" (1pt) for each spell. There is even a term for this: Base Spell Skill IIRC.

Thus your typical adventuring 150pt wizard spends 115 pts on IQ 14 and Magery III and then plows most of his remaining 110 pts into spells. This is the most effecient way to build a wizard in general and this has been known almost forever.

-Polaris

[Polaris]

Originally Posted by Langy

Yeah, but suggesting using a Tyche elixer to recharge a powerstone as being an economical idea when you have manastones available doesn't seem particularly... right. There's no reason to spend money recharging a powerstone if you can just buy an equivalent manastone for less.

That depends on if Manastones are available. You can quickly recharge a powerstone in the field (or in a dungeon) using charge powerstone. If the stone is big enough, it makes economic (or even if you NEED to suceed) sense to use a Tyche potion to assist you.

You can't recharge a Manastone anyway. You'd have to remake one from scap in the field which takes a lot more fatigue and takes a lot longer.

Thus there is a niche for both for the adventuring wizard.

-Polaris