Fixing Realm Magic [Thaumotology]

[Devil_Dante]

I don't know guys. But seems to me it's an unnecessary work to do. Nothing prevents a character to buy one realm at max level and high skill and being medio man in everything else. And still destroy your campaign. Quirks or not, having 10 spells on the fly with 150-200 energy points each is campaign breaking. Energy accumulation can go out of control pretty fast. Multiplying this for the level of the realm is not a good idea to me.

I may insist a bit too much, but I think the best bet is to Standardized parameter's cost. Everything that scales exponentially is not a good way to balance: low level, you can't do nothing. From a certain level, you are God. Something that scales linearly, won't never go out of control. And you know the level of power you can reach.

[dataweaver]

And we already have that with the way most of the existing Realm parameters scale: Range scales at a -1 penalty per yard (for Regular spells); Area scales linearly with radius; Damage scales linearly with number of dice; Duration has a maintenance cost per minute; and so on. Some of those costs are excessive (I'm looking at Damage and Area in particular); but that's a problem with the implementation, not the underlying concepts.

Again: adjust the pricing of things; but there's no reason to completely rewrite the underlying mechanics to operate according to an entirely different paradigm. To be clear: my objection isn't to using Energy Accumulation per se; it's to using Energy Accumulation as a “fix” for Realm Magic, as if the thing that's broken about Realm Magic is that it doesn't use Energy Accumulation.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

10 is not the average roll on 3d6, it is 10.5, so the numbers for average performance is a bit different.

For values above 17, using 10.5 probably is more accurate. It levels the multiplier on the print to an even 1.59. You get increasing returns on raising RPM skill, to the tune of quadratic energy.

It is important to remember that every gathering failure causes a quirk as well, so large spells will likely have odd effects. Even if a character uses Luck, that is a use of Luck that is burnt, and that will not prevent other subsequent critical failures. Magic is dangerous when you deal with horribly large spells.

Yes, quirks happen. Most of them don't wreck spells. Odd effects are permissible. It doesn't change the raw power of what a skill 21 RPM mage can do.

After a character burns their luck they wind up their spell and play more cautiously with magic. This is something every RPM mage I've played with has done.

[dataweaver]

If your goal is essentially “RPM, but with Realms”, Christopher Rice already has you covered: his “Alternative Ritual Path Magic” Pyramid article includes a “Path Realms” section that shows one way to apply Realm levels to RPM. It's not “fixing Realm Magic”; but it is a way of doing something like Realm Magic based off of the RPM system.

[Prince Charon]

Personally, if I were going to fix the cost of effects of Realm Magic, I'd probably replace FP with skill penalties like Effect Shaping Path/Book Magic, or use the Threshold-Limited Magic system from Thaumatology pp76-82 (and in both cases, the costs would be much lower than what's given in the book).

[AlexanderHowl]

Effect-Shaping in Path/Book Magic gives skill penalties for parameters equal to increased energy costs. Using threshold instead of FP is a valid way of doing Realm Magic at the current costs though, and it does provide quite substantial consequences for abusing the system. Some players may be annoyed with having to wait weeks between spells though.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Effect-Shaping in Path/Book Magic gives skill penalties for parameters equal to increased energy costs.

... I'm not sure what the point of this sentence is in this context? The only thing that I can think of is that you're taking my statement of the costs being lower as a misunderstanding of the RAW on my part, rather than a declaration of intent (because I'm of the opinion that lowering the 'energy' costs of Realm Magic effects is an important factor in fixing the costs), which is what it was.

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Using threshold instead of FP is a valid way of doing Realm Magic at the current costs though, and it does provide quite substantial consequences for abusing the system. Some players may be annoyed with having to wait weeks between spells though.

The time required for recovery depends on how the system and the character are set up, though. Needing to wait weeks between spells is one possible setting out of the many, many possible options for Threshold-Limited Magic.