Changing Manastone [Magic]

[AlexanderHowl]

Right now, Manastone is a really cost inefficient spell because you need a very valuable gem for a manastone (while reusable, the cumulative chance of critical failure makes life uncomfortably expensive). I suggest that we increase the cost of a casting of Manastone to 20 energy per casting but increase the capaciity of Manastones to 4 energy per casting (a gemstone could hold 4 energy per carat if used as a manastone instead of 1 energy per carat if used as a powerstone). In addition, quadrupling energy cost would allow casting on non-valuable objects.

While Powerstones would still be preferred for most purposes, the new version of Manastone could have some interesting utility. For example, magicians could write scrolls with Manastone enchantments on them, so the scroll would contain the spell and the energy for the spell. In the case of such self-powered scrolls, you could even have non-mages being able to use them to cast the spells, as they would only need to say the words. In that case though, I would suggest changing the time required to make a self-powered scroll to one hour per energy point, as long as there is sufficient capacity for the energy required for the spell, just to keep up with potential demand.

[Prince Charon]

Personally, I prefer to go the other way, houseruling that Manastones do not need to be made of valuable materials.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Personally, I prefer to go the other way, houseruling that Manastones do not need to be made of valuable materials.

This. I think DF Scrolls do something like this already.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Right now, Manastone is a really cost inefficient spell because you need a very valuable gem for a manastone (while reusable, the cumulative chance of critical failure makes life uncomfortably expensive). I suggest that we increase the cost of a casting of Manastone to 20 energy per casting but increase the capaciity of Manastones to 4 energy per casting (a gemstone could hold 4 energy per carat if used as a manastone instead of 1 energy per carat if used as a powerstone). In addition, quadrupling energy cost would allow casting on non-valuable objects.

I'm pretty confident that manastone is intended to be a world building alternative to powerstones rather than a competitor. Personally I'm increasingly inclined abandon the powerstone idea in favour of recharging with alchemical potions.

[bocephus]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Personally, I prefer to go the other way, houseruling that Manastones do not need to be made of valuable materials.

This is exactly what I have done. I have a house rule that allows several types of pure metals to also be used for powerstones (Manastones would work as well but has the same limitations) . Each metal has its drawbacks, for maximizing size/weight/durability/capacity gems are still the superior adventuring material.

Metals have to be processed carefully for purity increasing their refined cost by and additional 50%. This has to have high skill metallurgy combined with an alchemical or magical means to get the final level of purity required. Similar to slow and steady enchanting there is a final roll for the metallurgist before enchanting can start.

The mass required to use iron makes it a stationary item completely unsuited to adventuring. Silver has a chance to lose its enchantment (basically silver has a 10% cumulative chance each month to lose its efficacy). Gold is the best bang for the mass, but too easily damaged which causes the stone to malfunction making it fairly useless for adventuring as well. Lead wont take enchantments, its a magically inert metal. Enchanting Platinum is volatile in amounts greater than 5ep (this is my battery material for powered convenience items).

I created my mechanics to deal with the type of world I wanted to create which has magic convenience items, they are all "luxuries" in cost, but available to anyone that wants to spend the resources. I needed a way for shops to create powerstones without the randomness of attaining a suitably large gem, but with a significant expense time and some added skills required to offset the higher availability and make mundane skills relevant to magic users.

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

I'm pretty confident that manastone is intended to be a world building alternative to powerstones rather than a competitor. Personally I'm increasingly inclined abandon the powerstone idea in favour of recharging with alchemical potions.

How do you deal with the availability of components? I like allowing Alchemy and Herbalism for getting magic effects without magic per se. Whats your regulating factor though when anyone can start creating magical effects? Is it NPC only or just a non adventuring skill because of equipment or other requirements?

[Taneli]

I was thinking about allowing Manastone to be cast at quadruple energy cost when cast on non-valuable items (like Powerstone) and also to be cast for more than one point of storage on one casting, so that if you have for example 100 energy available, you can store up to 20 points into a valuable item, or up to 5 points into a cheap item.

But the campaign never went into enchanting.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Manastone is a really cost inefficient spell because you need a very valuable gem

"Use all normal Powerstone rules (limits by value, etc.), except that a Manastone does not recharge its power" I think means that means this applies:

cost to cast Powerstone is quadrupled if the item being enchanted has a value of less than...

Originally Posted by Taneli

I was thinking about allowing Manastone to be cast at quadruple energy cost when cast on non-valuable items (like Powerstone)

I just assumed that was the case.