Cthulutech Magic in GURPS

[onetrikpony]

I'd like to play the Cthulutech setting in the GURPS system. I've heard that you can do anything in GURPS you just have to find out how much it costs.

I'm kind of skeptical that it's possible to play magic that 'FEELS' like Cthulutech using the GURPS system. And I'm wondering if pleople here can point me to a ritual magic system that has some commonalities with the Cthulutech setting.

For those who are unfamiliar with Cthulutech; here's some idea of what Cthulutech magic looks like and what I'm looking for.

In affect, the magic of C-Tech is always premeditated. It is Ritual spell casting. Rituals take a long time (possibly days) to prepare and cast so they don't provide any offensive capability that is immediately useful. (No fireballs or magic missiles.) However the magic is always wierd and often evil both narratively and mechanically, and powerful in relation to the setting. Sorcerers practice at great risk for high rewards.

More specifically these are some elements that the system should include;

--C-Tech uses Ritual Magic, ie; not thaumatology.
--Spell rituals are extremely difficult to find or research
--Once you have access to a ritual in an ancient tome or from a teacher you have to learn to cast the ritual. This requires a minimum rate in Occult knowledge, Intelligence, and Tenacity (which is will and health rolled into one)
--Learning a ritual causes you to make an insanity test. Failing an insanity test gives you some type of mental disadvantage and you can eventually go irretrievably insane. (effectively character retirement)
-- an average or middling power sorcerer will probably only know half a dozen rituals.

--Casting a ritual is difficult and time consuming.
--Before it can be cast a ritual must be prepared. Preparation can take anywhere from several hours to several days. It also requires dedicated space (usually 10 foot square room), and expensive material components and apparatus ($hundreds to $tens of thousands)
--Casting also requires a great deal of time, often several hours.
--The test to cast a ritual is difficult, on average equivalent to skill -3, to -5 more powerful rituals require two or more tests to cast successfully.
--Casting also costs personal power (called Ruach) like the fatigue cost of GURPS magic. Typically a sorceress will have enough power to cast one or two spells of moderate power.
--It's relatively easy to borrow or steal the (Ruach) from other living things via the communal activity or sacrifice.

--The spells themselves are powerful in relation to the magic in CompleteSet.
--The duration of spells is usually much longer,
--there's usually no limit or difficulty due to range
--protection spells last for days to months,
-- there is no time limit to the tasks of a summoned creature,
--many C-Tech rituals have the effects of seveal GURPS spells in one.

As an example: the simplest "Scrying" spell allows the target to see invisible, detect magic, read the auras of living things, and lasts for 24 hours. However it takes about 8 hours to cast, costs a third of your fatigue points (ruach) requires that you make 2 skill(-1) tests, and materials cost about $70.

I don't want to reinvent the wheel. Does anything like this already exist in published materials?

[Diomedes]

You might want to look at Path/Book magic, in GURPS: Thaumatology; that does most of what you want out of the box, and can probably be tweaked to get the rest.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by Diomedes

You might want to look at Path/Book magic, in GURPS: Thaumatology; that does most of what you want out of the box, and can probably be tweaked to get the rest.

I'll second this and raise you Corruption from GURPS Horror.
Horror is a great book for any horror setting anyhow so your not just buying it for the magic tweek.
Book/Path is a great fit.
G with Books to get that weird arbitrary feel and difficult to research.

[onetrikpony]

Huh. Thaumatology.
I bought magic thinking thaumatology would have been the opposite way to go.

Thanks

I've Heard Cthulhupunk doesn't really have any magic rules. Can anyone confirm that?

[Mr_Sandman]

There are some rules for spells to contact, summon and control mythos creatures in Cthulhupunk, but the system is more or less the same as GURPS Basic Set magic. Path/Book magic is much closer to what you are looking for.

Thaumatology is a great toolkit for creating and tweaking magic systems. If you are interested in making your own magic systems for your games, it's definitely worth having.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Refplace

I'll second this and raise you Corruption from GURPS Horror.

Or you know, just Confusion checks.