[DF] Threshold magic points

[Anders]

Increased Threshold costs 5 points per 20% increase over the campaign base. Default base is 30 points; 20% of that is 6. This means 1.2 points per character point.

[Devil_Dante]

Originally Posted by Anders

Increased Threshold costs 5 points per 20% increase over the campaign base. Default base is 30 points; 20% of that is 6. This means 1.2 points per character point.

Ye, i forgot to write, in my campaign i fixed the numbers and should be like what i wrote, but was just an example. What i'm trying to achieve is something some dynamic pool he can use that can go up and down during the battle.

Because of this, i need to set the right price. If the standard cost is 1.2 tally per points, how should this new configuration cost? What modification should i apply?

[Dalin]

I mostly play DFRPG these days, so my GURPS skills are too rusty to help with the mechanics, but I wanted to say that I love this idea. I can easily imagine this fitting into a lot of settings. It also allows for some great self-sacrifice scenes where the crippled priest drives a knife into her leg to power one last desperate spell.


I'm looking forward to seeing how the costs shake out.

[Devil_Dante]

Originally Posted by Dalin

I mostly play DFRPG these days, so my GURPS skills are too rusty to help with the mechanics, but I wanted to say that I love this idea. I can easily imagine this fitting into a lot of settings. It also allows for some great self-sacrifice scenes where the crippled priest drives a knife into her leg to power one last desperate spell.


I'm looking forward to seeing how the costs shake out.

in my setting there are 7-8 different kind of magic.. I used every single variation described in Thaumatology XD

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

Ye, i forgot to write, in my campaign i fixed the numbers and should be like what i wrote, but was just an example. What i'm trying to achieve is something some dynamic pool he can use that can go up and down during the battle.

Because of this, i need to set the right price. If the standard cost is 1.2 tally per points, how should this new configuration cost? What modification should i apply?

34 points for 1 Tally per 3 HP damage. This is based on a level 3 Imbuement and the rules for converting them to advantages in Sorcery. 74 points for 1:2 conversion and 114 for 1:1 conversion.

[evileeyore]

Okay, there are two "best practices"* ways to do this: A simple inexpensive way and a complicated expensive way.


Simple Inexpensive Way:

Taste Of Blood 2.4 points per level
When wounded† or having dealt wounds† Priests of [INSERT GOD] temporarily receive a blessing of increased power. One point of energy per wound they received or dealt until those wounds are healed (or their enemy dies [I recommend until the end of a scene for slain foes, or longer if it's a particularly empowering moment]).


Under the hood:
Energy Reserve 2.4/level (ER [3]; Accessibility: Equal to wounds received or dealt - only while wounds exist, -10%; Power Modifier: Divine, -10%‡).


The Way It Works:
For every wound he takes or receives the Priest unlocks one level of his ER pool. This means he has an upper limit, a maximum cap on the ER pool. It also means if he chooses to be a walking wounded for an extended period of time, this pool will refresh on it's own! So staying wounded in the eyes of his God is a blessing, maybe he's showing off his strength or prowess, or something, but regardless, this pool will refresh on it's own (as per ER standard rates of 1/10 minutes).

The standard ER refresh rates also apply between uses... so if the Priest fights in a battle, uses up this pool, heals, and then get's into another fight before it can completely refresh, the pool is still diminished.

My Personal Thoughts:
It depends on how you want to run it... my personal preference is to drop standard ER refresh rates, the pool is simply full every time he unlocks it. However... if you have munchkins, or you like the image of the Priest's God trickling them a slow stream of extra energy from being walking wounded, and you don't mind the extra detail tracking this requires, then keep the refresh rates.



Complicated Expensive Way

Taste Of Blood 5 points per level
When wounded the Priest's God blesses them with increased potency, for every three(ish) points of wounds they receive, their Energy Pool increases. This pool is 'capped' by the amount of wounds the Priest has received or dealt that are still open and bleeding.


Under the hood Metatrait:
Damage Resistance 5§/level (DR [5]; Absorption: ER, +80%; Extended Duration: Special, ±0; Does Not Stop Damage, -80%; Power Modifier: Divine, -10%‡).

Used to buy:
Energy Reserve 2.5§/level (ER [3]; Accessibility: Equal to wounds received or dealt - only while wounds exist, -5%; Does Not Regenerate, -5%; Power Modifier: Divine, -10%‡).


The Way It Works:
This one is a little more complicated... for every 3 (or 5) damage the Priest takes they can power 1 (or 2) level(s) of an ER Pool. The only upper limit to this is the amount of damage they take and the amount of wounds they have received or dealt that are still 'bleeding'. With this model they have to take damage to build the pool, however it remains 'unlocked' so long as they or their enemies are wounded. The "Extended Duration: Special" applies to the character points generated by the DR(Absorption), instead of bleeding away at a rate of 1/second, they remain so long as the Priest or a foe is in a wounded state. This is also why I added "Does Not Regenerate, -5%" to the ER Pool, there is no point to being walking wounded (for munchkinism purposes). However, if your Player is the sort to not resort to munchkinism, and you particularly like the idea, remove the "Does Not Regenerate, -5%". Wouldn't break nothin (as long as you and your Players like it).


COMPARISON

The advantage to the Simple Way is, well it's simple. However the Player may balk that it doesn't 'feel' like their getting more power for taking or dealing wounds as they have to buy the cap on the ER in advance, and it is inherently capped. The advantage to the Complicated Way is it retains the flavor in the crunch, the PC literally becomes more powerful the more they are damaged. The higher they buy the ability, the faster they become more powerful and less wounds they 'waste' in building that power.


* I'm ignoring Imbuements (Vampirism) as I'm neither willing to do the research right now and adding more power traits is perhaps over complicating a simple situation... also IIRC the Imbuement does nothing to address the "wehn wounded" portion of the request, which means the PC has to buy two traits to cover one bit of "flavor".

† I list it as wounds as while that is a higher amount (due to wounding multiplier most times), damage is blockable and this way the Priest (or those he strikes) have to be wounded for them to gain this.

‡ Or whatever your Power Modifier is in your campaign.

§ I smoothed the costs for pentaphiliac purposes. Actual costs are 4.9 and 2.4 respectively. One... this ability has an awful lot of handwavium in it (which doesn't bother me, but other GMs may break out the pitchforks and fiery brands) and two, it speeds play and chargen to have nice even costs.

¶ For instance, you could set it as "For as long as combat lasts", or "as long as wounded". The only problem that is really foreseeable is that as this is a "build up" power, the Priest could have 1 level and build up a huge ER with it, so caution in changing the duration that the ER pool lasts and whether it can regen or not is advised.

[awesomenessofme1]

Is Does Not Stop Damage a RAW modifier for DR with Absorption?

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

Because of this, i need to set the right price. If the standard cost is 1.2 tally per points, how should this new configuration cost? What modification should i apply?

If that's the direction you want to go...

See my suggestion above but swap out Tally [1.2/level] for ER. So...

Simple Inexpensive Way: 1 point per level.
Complicate Expensive Way: Same cost, except for every point of Damage the Priest takes they can buy 1 level of Buffer Tally.



Handwavium Simple Way, But Keeps The Flavor:

Taste of Blood 30 points for 1st level, 10/level thereafter
When wounded or having dealt wounds Priests of [INSERT GOD] temporarily receive a blessing of increased power. One point of energy (per level) per wound they received or deal until those wounds are healed (or their enemy dies [I recommend until the end of a scene for slain foes, or longer if it's a particularly empowering moment]).


Under the Hood:
Back of napkin used Leech variant and DR (Absorption) to buy 1 level of Buffer Tally (that's 1 point per wound given or received). Going this route is very similar to the Complicate Expensive Way from before, so the Priest can build a large impressive pool as long as he keeps hurting his enemies. A limit I'd bake into this ability is that this power only comes from actual combat, from hurting or being hurt by actual foes, so the Priest can't just let an ally punch his shoulder for five minutes while he builds up POWER OVERWHELMING.

Originally Posted by awesomenessofme1

Is Does Not Stop Damage a RAW modifier for DR with Absorption?

No. But it's shown up a few times over the years on the boards here and no one has every shouted it down.

[Devil_Dante]

Well my man, your work is outstanding. First thing first, thanks for your time.

Now, the idea is to give him some extra pool to use only during fights, and nope: asking for some punches on the back won't work XD
Lucky for me, none of my players has a "munckhin" approach, so it won't be a problem.
So, these additional points he would have on top of his starting daily pool, should be used only during the fight, and for love of simplicity, any unused point would be erased after the fight ends. That's help book-keeping those numbers.

As far i've understood, in the simple way, if he uses all extra points (capped with the level bought), he has to heal in order to refill the pool again, or, as you said, they regenerate at the standard ratio.

The second way is more like i thought about it: there is a maximum cap (the level he decides to buy), and the pool can go up and down dinamically during the fight(i.e.: he hits for x damage and during the next turn he has x more tally to cast a spell, then he is wounded for y damage and has y extra tally to use).

The second build is way more cool. The only downside is the cost: quite expansive. For a 6 points pool (like that i think he wishes to have), we're talking of 30 points of DR and 15 points of ER= 45 points. Yes, he could use more the 30 points per fight in this way.

Now, in my setting, i set the starting tally at 20, with 20 of regeneration. According to the thaumatology rules about "increasing threshold: 5 points to increase the pool by 20%", this means 5 points give 4 tally. For regeneration, according to standard rule: 5 points per 5 tally per day.

With 45 points he can buy 20 extra tally per day and 20 regeneration per day.

That is, now, my only concern, from a Point-wise prospective.

But that's quite an answer <3

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Devil_Dante

Well my man, your work is outstanding. First thing first, thanks for your time.

No worries. I did it during breakfast and then lunch instead of doing other things I should be doing (but didn't want to do). This post was typed one hand while juggling a cat and dinner (I have a cat that demands attention while I'm eating at my desk... and his demand is to be cradled like a baby... which takes up an entire arm. Dinner was a burrito that I could cut with my fork, so I'd take a bite, type, pet the cat, take a bite, type... sigh).

As far i've understood, in the simple way, if he uses all extra points (capped with the level bought), he has to heal in order to refill the pool again, or, as you said, they regenerate at the standard ratio.

The Simple Inexpensive Way (aka just pure ER) gives him a pool that he always has, but can only be used once he's taken or dealt wounds. By RAW, this pool refreshes at a rate of 1 point per 10 minutes.

So, for example, if he buys 6 levels, he has a 6 point pool that can't be used until hurt is dished out. Then only as much of the pool is usable as the amount of hurt. So if he smashes someone with an axe and does 6 damage before DR, but is reduced to 2, and then modified to 3 (for being cutting damage), he unlocks 3 points of his pool. Likewise, if he gets stabbed for 4 wounds, he unlocks 4 points. Once the pool is used completely (likely to happen in fights) it takes an hour (1/10m) to completely refill.

You can change this refresh rate to "instant" or "once fully healed" if you wish... unless he is in back to back fights with less than an hour between, it's unlikely to ever really come up. However setting it to "only if fully healed" means he does have to heal and begs the question of "but what if he was never injured?" If you want to reduce bookkeeping, setting it to "fully refreshed for every combat" is perfectly fine, unless he buys and uses like 20 levels. then a little thought might be in order...

The second way is more like i thought about it: there is a maximum cap (the level he decides to buy)...

To clarify, with the Complicate Expensive Way, the "maximum cap" is on how much injury he can use to buy up ER every time he gets wounded.

For example: He buys 3 levels for 15 points. Every time he takes a hit he can buy 1 level of ER. Because every time he gets hit for 3 or more wounds, he gets 3 temporary "character points" that he can use to buy ER, that go away once he or his enemies are no longer wounded. So with 3 levels, and a long enough fight... he can build a tremendous pool (if he has some way to survive being hurt and keeps a foe around to keep wounded...). If he has some method of healing that doesn't use his Threshold and he can keep a wounded foe about, there is no 'real' upper limit (at this point the upper limit is his and his foe's HP limits, and the limit of your patience).

and the pool can go up and down dinamically during the fight(i.e.: he hits for x damage and during the next turn he has x more tally to cast a spell, then he is wounded for y damage and has y extra tally to use).

Yes, this is the advantage of method 3, the Handwavium Simple Way. And yes... it's extraordinarily expensive. But... here's a dirty secret, if you want to, you can reduce the cost.

I was literally going to post a 10 point per level version but looked up Leech just incase and then went with a Leech build.

So if you reduce it to 10 per level, he can buy 3 levels for 30 points, and then every time he takes or deals 3 injury he gains a "Tally Buffer" of 3, which just keeps going up with wounds taken and dealt.


Part of the reason I was sticking with the Leech cost. At 30, it's a heavy buy in, isn't as awesome, but has no 'real' upper limit. The character is very unlikely to every really hit his actual limits (personal and foe's HP totals) and it's actually kinda cheap (I cut the cost of ER by 2/3rd).

Now... side question, are you adverse to setting the upper bound to "Equal to Magery or less at any given moment?" This way you can put a cap on it, use the lower cost (10 to 15 points per level is pretty about 'right' IMO), but at any given moment in a fight he won't have a Tally Buffer higher than his Magery (or Power Investiture if that's what you're using). That keeps accidental munchkinery at bay, and neatly ties his limits back into his Magery (or PI). You can also require him to loudly dedicate his attacks to his God, which is always a bonus (so if he goes to stab someone on the qt, he can't vocally dedicate them to the Blood God and increase his personal power). Both of these would be enough in my opinion to reduce it's cost a bit (but no less than 10/lvl).

The second build is way more cool. The only downside is the cost: quite expansive. For a 6 points pool (like that i think he wishes to have), we're talking of 30 points of DR and 15 points of ER= 45 points. Yes, he could use more the 30 points per fight in this way.

That's not how it works. I hope the above examples have been a better explanation than my previous posts?

Only the Simple Inexpensive Way gives him a set pool with a set cap.

Now, in my setting, i set the starting tally at 20, with 20 of regeneration. According to the thaumatology rules about "increasing threshold: 5 points to increase the pool by 20%", this means 5 points give 4 tally. For regeneration, according to standard rule: 5 points per 5 tally per day.

With 45 points he can buy 20 extra tally per day and 20 regeneration per day.

Your math isn't lining here for me... but assuming it's 1.2 points per Threshold Increase...

That's the other way you can go, let him buy Increased Threshold with "Accessibility: Equal to wounds received or dealt, -10%", which is 11 points for a +10 Threshold, fully usable only if he takes or deals a total combined 10 injury (but partially usable up to the amount of injury dealt).

And then also add Rapid Magical Recovery 2lvls for 10 points.

This means for the day, he has an additional 10 Tally if hurt is dealt out.

Doing it the Complicate Expensive Way or the Handwavium Simple Way and buying Increased Threshold... the problem is Increased Threshold doesn't reduce the Tally when it goes away.

The Complicate Expensive Way and the Handwavium Simple Way really only works if you allow him to buy Tally Buffer... which isn't an option in Thaumaturgy. Tally Buffer is Tally which isn't tracked with his Threshold and goes away on it's own (which is why I was using ER... it's essentially the same thing)... otherwise it's more like 'Temporary HP' which does not reduce the injury a character has taken, just reduces it's impact, until the Temporary HP go away, but the injury remains. Increased Threshold would do the same thing, temporarily increase his increase his Tally Limit during the fight