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04-17-2012, 12:30 AM | #1 |
Join Date: Nov 2006
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[DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
I was thinking about something to do with Bards. They can play music that can cause mind control. I was wondering if Magic Resistance should work on their songs. When a Wizard casts a spell he uses magic to directly affect the mind of another person therefore if a person has Magic Resistance then it would make sense that he would be less affected by the magic than a person without it. When a Bard sings a song he probably needs magic in order for his voice or song to be able to be as pure and beautiful to be able cause mind control but maybe once the song is in the air it is no longer magical? Maybe the song is mundane but so beautiful or terrifying that it can affect the minds of others? Maybe Magic Resistance only helps against magic cast directly at a target while magic cast indirectly like through a Bard's song could bypass Magic Resistance?
This might make Bards more useful if so. |
04-17-2012, 12:37 AM | #2 |
Join Date: Dec 2007
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
I'm not a DF player but the answer to your question revolves around this: Does mana level have any effect on bardic music? If it doesn't, then magic resistance wouldn't do anything either, just as it won't stop psi or a variety of other power sources.
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04-17-2012, 12:43 AM | #3 |
Join Date: Nov 2006
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
The Bard needs mana to make music.
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04-17-2012, 12:45 AM | #4 |
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: Oregon
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
As it says under the skill description for Enthrallment: "Depending on the setting, these skills might be magical, psionic, or a cinematic form of hypnotism." So really, it's up to the GM. In DF, in which Bards can work "arcane" spells through song, it makes sense to treat Enthrallment as just another set of "spells", disabled by No Mana and resisted by Magic Resistance. Considering how easy they are to acquire compared to Magical mind control (requiring Charisma 1 rather than the more expensive Magery) it might be unbalancing if they were also immune to the common countermeasures against magic.
In that case it makes sense for Magic Resistance to work against it. |
04-17-2012, 05:33 AM | #5 |
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Minneapolis, MN, USA
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
From Dungeon Fantasy 1, page 21:
Bard-Song abilities are also subject to the constraints on wizardly magic: they need mana to work, Dispel Magic can end their ongoing effects, and modifiers such as the -5 for low mana and penalties for Magic Resistance apply to rolls to use them. |
04-17-2012, 10:51 AM | #6 | |
Join Date: Nov 2006
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
Quote:
So the same logic could apply to a Bard. The Bard needs mana in order to create a song that is so beautiful that it affects the minds of others but once created it is the *song itself* that controls the minds of others not the mana or spell. |
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04-17-2012, 10:55 AM | #7 | |
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: SF Bay Area, CA
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
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04-17-2012, 11:00 AM | #8 |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
In DF, songs don't control minds – magic does. Music is merely the vehicle for the magic . . . In game terms, bardic magic is simply spellcasting using Magery with a variation on the standard Musical or Song limitation. The high-powered songs in DF 11 are also magical and explicitly allow Magic Resistance, because they're advantage versions of the same general idea. And since these capabilities are built with major limitations, making them cheaper, they shouldn't be advantageous in the sense of ignoring Magic Resistance.
You pretty much need the above interpretation to avoid weirdness such as different or absent aesthetic sense being a defense against bardic magic. I'm not saying that a more nuanced reading has no place in fantasy – far from it! I'm merely saying that this has no place in fast-playing dungeon fantasy which has little respect for the intricacies of culture, language, and society needed to make the "It's the song's beauty, not the magic!" analysis work.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
04-17-2012, 11:05 AM | #9 | ||
Wielder of Smart Pants
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ventura CA
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
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It is clear to me that the intent of the DF rules is that all countermeasures to magic apply to all Bardic Abilities, Enthrallment Skills, and Musical Influence. At any rate Enthrallment skills are already pretty good for the cost so MR isn't going to nerf them overmuch. From previous experience in threads of this nature I think the OP wants to understand what the rules explicitly and implicitly mean and/or the designers intent. Appeals to GM freedom don't seem to be especially helpful. Last edited by sir_pudding; 04-17-2012 at 11:27 AM. |
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04-17-2012, 11:10 AM | #10 | |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: [DF] Should people who hear Bard music be able to use their Magic Resistance?
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Let's avoid getting personal, please.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
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