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Old 07-13-2016, 07:18 PM   #1
Rindis
 
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Default [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

New intro for this thread:

I've been working up some of the spells from That Other Game (AD&D 1e/2e actually, with some extra inspiration from the Basic line) in a Sorcery-type format. It's good for getting a lot more familiar with a lot of advantages at the least. Part of the point of these is to include a lot of the oddball effects and restrictions of the originals; the 'feel' of this particular brand of magic is that it is not straightforward and logical.

Naturally, I'm coming up with lots of questions I can't quite answer on my own, and this thread is mostly to get discussion and advice for builds....

My blog post giving the general tweaked Sorcery system is here:
Dungeons & Sorcery Part 1

Highlights:
* Spells make liberal use of "Requires Gestures" and "Requires Magic Words" (spell components are being largely ignored).
* Spellbooks are a Mitigator to keep known spells reliable.
* There are eight colleges, which are also specializations of the Thaumatology skill.

I would like to adjust the Sorcerous Empowerment modifiers a bit to come up with an even 10% result. That way everything always costs a whole number of points. Getting to a net +0% modifier would also be nice as the '10 points of capacity per level' is a lot easier to remember.

I've started a series of some 'Grimoire' blog posts to collect worked out spells:
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 1
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 2
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 3
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 4
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 5
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 6
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 7
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 8
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 9
Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 10

At some point, I need to start hammering out thoughts for Part 2, which would be a system for coming up with a 'once only' spell (enchanting a particular castle against Passwall and the like...), and researching new Sorcery spells, and will feature extensive use of Thaumatology and its specialties. (Part of the goal is for mages to be more specialized when using this part of the system.)
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Last edited by Rindis; 10-04-2018 at 11:31 AM. Reason: List latest blog post
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Old 07-13-2016, 07:27 PM   #2
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

Quote:
Originally Posted by Rindis View Post
Okay, I've been looking at working up some of the spells from That Other Game (AD&D 1e/2e actually) in a Sorcery-type format. It's good for getting a lot more familiar with a lot of advantages at the least.

Naturally, I'm coming up with lots of questions I can't quite answer on my own....

First, assuming I want spells to need gestures and/or incantations as well as the 1 FP cost baked into the -15% Sorcery modifier, what are those worth? My thought was around -5% each, but Sorcery's bit on Alternative Rituals implies a -5% for both together. Then what would gestures but not incantation be worth?
GURPS Power-Ups 4: Limitations explicitly puts both "Requires gestures" and "Requires magic words" at -10%


Quote:
"Requires gestures: Your hands – and to a lesser degree, the rest of your body – must be free to move about. If your arms are restrained in any way, or your lower body is fully pinned or clamped in place, you cannot use your ability. -10%.

Requires magic words: You must chant at normal conversation levels. You cannot be gagged, and stealth is impossible.
-10%."

It's a great book and I highly recommend you pick it and it's sister supplement GURPS Power-Ups 4: Enhancements if you plan to do any in-depth sorcery or powers work.
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Old 07-13-2016, 08:05 PM   #3
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

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Originally Posted by Minuteman37 View Post
GURPS Power-Ups 4: Limitations explicitly puts both "Requires gestures" and "Requires magic words" at -10%
Also Powers -- probably the one to get before PU4, though if you get into building abilities PU4 and PU8 are both worth having.
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Old 07-13-2016, 08:15 PM   #4
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

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Also Powers -- probably the one to get before PU4, though if you get into building abilities PU4 and PU8 are both worth having.
I've got Powers (you might note I referred to it a time or two). Haven't gotten to the Power Ups series yet.

I'm surprised that Sorcery seems to rate gestures and incantations so low in comparison, though I suppose that's because you get a choice of things to do under the Alternative Rituals rule.
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Old 07-14-2016, 03:01 PM   #5
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

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Originally Posted by Rindis View Post
I've got PowersI'm surprised that Sorcery seems to rate gestures and incantations so low in comparison, though I suppose that's because you get a choice of things to do under the Alternative Rituals rule.
That's basically it. Being able to choose which 2 of those 3 Limitations are in place makes their value drop dramatically.

Not sure how to handle most of them, but for Alarm; Obscure Sound, give it a Delay that triggers when a specific act is performed rather than a specific time (should be about 0% modifier, same as a Delay with a set time?), and possibly Ranged if you want to be able to have the spell cast from another area. Obscure automatically is detectable in the same sense that it blocks out, like a ball of Darkness for sight.
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Old 07-14-2016, 09:23 PM   #6
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

I would prefer not to go through all that effort with Obscure. What's it Obscuring anyway? (Yes, the alarm bell, which becomes audible when the Obscure drops, but where's the alarm bell coming from? Add an audio illusion onto this?)

My idea was that normally, you'd cast Detect (Creatures) on yourself and see if anything was there; here, I'm defining as a special effect that instead of you personally sensing 'there's something here', the alarm goes off (i.e., the noise is a stand-in for the normal 'I sense something').

Technically, the fact that it automatically tells all your friends that you detected something is an advantage (Afflict: Detect (Creatures) w/Area Effect), but it also tells the creature that they were detected, and it's possible that it's the only one in hearing distance (you went on your merry way).

Delay is supposed to be an attack only modifier... but the +50% Triggered Delay may be the answer here. I've got enough special ideas hanging off of this, what's one more? Though... doing that would imply that the spell could last forever until triggered, and I would like to stick with a 4 hour maximum. Or it's limited to the normal 1 minute, and it still has to pay the +150% for 4 hours, and I'm hoping to avoid that with some form of Extended Duration (Once Only) (4 hours).
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Old 07-15-2016, 01:42 AM   #7
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

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Originally Posted by Rindis View Post

Delay is supposed to be an attack only modifier... but the +50% Triggered Delay may be the answer here. I've got enough special ideas hanging off of this, what's one more? Though... doing that would imply that the spell could last forever until triggered, and I would like to stick with a 4 hour maximum. Or it's limited to the normal 1 minute, and it still has to pay the +150% for 4 hours, and I'm hoping to avoid that with some form of Extended Duration (Once Only) (4 hours).
I have gone with Illusion with hefty limitations on utility and Triggered.
Add a duration limiation if you like.
A less restrictive Illusion still should be pretty cheap and let you make different types of warnings.
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Old 07-15-2016, 05:13 AM   #8
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

Thinking outside the box here... how about doing it as an Ally spell? It is a Conjuration spell, isn't it?

You Summon a 25% Ally that can only do this. Give it 25%, buy down IQ and ST to 1, give it the Astral Entity advantage and a Detect advantage. Tell it to roam the area and use its Perception (suitably enhanced) to Detect intruders. Add the Minion Enhancement. Something like this:

ST 0 [-100]; IQ 3 [-140]; DX 12 [40]; HT 6 [-40]
HP 5 [10]; Perception 14 [55]; Will 10 [35]; FP 6 [0]; Basic Speed 3.00 [0]; Basic Move 3 [0]; Size Modifier -4 [0]
Advantages: Astral Entity [171]; Detect (Creatures; Vague, -50%) [10]; Telecommunication (Cosmic: No Die Roll Required, +100%; Limited: Only "detection" yell, -80%; Broadcast, +50%) [51]
Disadvantages: Cannot Learn [-30]; Mute [-25]; No Manipulators [-50]
Skills: Stealth-12 [2]
Point Cost: -51 points

Ally (25% or less; all the time x4; Disappears once used once, -80%; Extended Duration x3000, +140%; Limitation: Only for guard duty, -50%; Minion, +50%) [7]

Once it detects anything, it lets off a telepathic scream with a range of 200 yards (that's all its IQ allows) and disappears. It can be spotted by anything that can see Invisible, but it's small and stealthy, so even they have a hard time doing so.
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Old 07-15-2016, 08:41 AM   #9
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

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Originally Posted by Anders View Post

Ally (25% or less; all the time x4; Disappears once used once, -80%; Extended Duration x3000, +140%; Limitation: Only for guard duty, -50%; Minion, +50%) [7]
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Originally Posted by RogerBacon View Post
The cheapest category is "5% or less" not 25%. I believe that was updated in Supers page 68. The costs for 5%/10%/15%/20% are 0.2/0.4/0.6/0.8.

Using those numbers you could possibly create a new category of "0 points or less" for a cost multipler of 0.1.
He could actually make a much cheaper ally, and put in some group modifier, so he could throw many "alarm-o-boys".
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Old 07-15-2016, 10:06 AM   #10
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Default Re: [Sorcery] Those Other Spells...

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He could actually make a much cheaper ally, and put in some group modifier, so he could throw many "alarm-o-boys".
Yeah, I thought about that but I didn't want to use more supplements than absolutely necessary. If you do go with the reduced cost, I would still make it a single Ally costing 2 points and improvise the spell. It's such a minor effect that it would make a great improvised spell.

You could also improve the Detect ability with Cosmic: No Die Roll Required which would allow you to detect anyone where the combined penalties for Range and whatever else you can think up is -11. Assuming Range is the only penalty, this gives the spell an effective range of 150 yards even if the Ally stays put in one place.
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