Social implications of RPM

[Nosforontu]

Thinking a bit more about it, and assuming a somewhat commonish open RPM world. I think that a lot of people would potentially go through life with various location based buffs/debuffs that relate to the sites purpose. For example a theater stage might grant a +5 bonus to Disguise, Perform, Singing, Dance and say stage fighting/acrobatics, in addition to granting the penetrating voice perk. A forge might grant a +5 bonus to various craft skills, a few levels of Temp Tolerance (heat) and say 6 points of DR versus fire for those who work their.

Depending on regulations I could also see site owners also trying to make their employes loyal to the shop, city etc. this might range from Sense of Duty (boss/shop), Honesty [Company Policy], Fanatic [Boss], or even
Slave Mentality for actual slaves or those of insufficient Social Status.

[blacksmith]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

The first things to look at when considering the impact of spells like eternal youth, is how available are mages, and how hard it is for them to achieve such spells.

Mages need to throw 50+ points into magical abilities before they even start looking impressive. Is that achieved through training alone (10,000 hours! ivory tower time . . .), or does it come largely from inborn ability (just how common are they?).

Then there's the issue how much demand there is, and how much offer (above). If talented/educated mages are rare, they will be the Gates' and Jobs' of the world.

Access to high level books and workshops can really lower the bar. As well as effect specific bonuses. Really popular/important effects could easily be cast regularly with a +8 or so.

[Nosforontu]

Originally Posted by blacksmith

Access to high level books and workshops can really lower the bar. As well as effect specific bonuses. Really popular/important effects could easily be cast regularly with a +8 or so.

And that number is being relatively conservitive, when you figure someone like Bill Gates is probably being treated by a guy with a +10 Book, the specific ritual learned as a perk for +2, of an appropriate magical tradition for +3, using high quality workspace (+2) on a really nice sacred site (+10), and the guy casting the spell is looking at an effective skill 37 even if he was barely trained before hand with a base 10 skill.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by blacksmith

Access to high level books and workshops can really lower the bar. As well as effect specific bonuses. Really popular/important effects could easily be cast regularly with a +8 or so.

Again, depends on availability, pricing etc.

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by Nosforontu

And that number is being relatively conservitive, when you figure someone like Bill Gates is probably being treated by a guy with a +10 Book, the specific ritual learned as a perk for +2, of an appropriate magical tradition for +3, using high quality workspace (+2) on a really nice sacred site (+10), and the guy casting the spell is looking at an effective skill 37 even if he was barely trained before hand with a base 10 skill.

Would those huge bonuses to skill even matter in that case? Having a lot of people who willingly sacrifice FP would be much safer than rolling for gathering energy. Bill Gates could easily afford to pay for that.

[Nosforontu]

Originally Posted by Andreas

Would those huge bonuses to skill even matter in that case? Having a lot of people who willingly sacrifice FP would be much safer than rolling for gathering energy. Bill Gates could easily afford to pay for that.

Probably depending on what extras the spell gives him, the duration of the spell and just how strong the spell is set at to protect from casual dispelling. Keep in mind their is rarely a problem of someone having to much energy for a RPM spell, at worse it just means that your spell is harder to dispel. With voluntary FP sacrifice taken into account and assumed into the spell Bill is probably looking at a spell that makes him Unaging + other cool things the client wants. Hollywood Actors/Actressess might get Unaging + 5 to various acting/performance skills and Appearance Very Beautiful/Handome for example as a "common package"

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by Nosforontu

Probably depending on what extras the spell gives him, the duration of the spell and just how strong the spell is set at to protect from casual dispelling. Keep in mind their is rarely a problem of someone having to much energy for a RPM spell, at worse it just means that your spell is harder to dispel. With voluntary FP sacrifice taken into account and assumed into the spell Bill is probably looking at a spell that makes him Unaging + other cool things the client wants. Hollywood Actors/Actressess might get Unaging + 5 to various acting/performance skills and Appearance Very Beautiful/Handome for example as a "common package"

I might be misremembering but is not difficulty to dispell goverend by energy amount rather than skill?

Sure you could get slightly more energy by gathering energy a few times before you start sacrificing FP but I don't really see why the increased risk of critical failure (even low energy critical failures) would be worth such a small increase in energy. You could just get more sacrifices instead.

[Nosforontu]

Originally Posted by Andreas

I might be misremembering but is not difficulty to dispell goverend by energy amount rather than skill?

Your correct but higher skill level roughly works out to more energy to use in the spell someone and since Dispel Magic is a straight energy cost versus energy cost effect the higher skilled caster typically can imbue the spell with more total energy over the opponent.

Originally Posted by Andreas

Sure you could get slightly more energy by gathering energy a few times before you start sacrificing FP but I don't really see why the increased risk of critical failure (even low energy critical failures) would be worth such a small increase in energy. You could just get more sacrifices instead.

I could see that but a single energy accumulation roll from the above caster is worth on average 27 energy which is going to roughly be 8 people being paid to particpate. The first 3 rolls that the skill 37 witch is using on Mr Gates is worth 20 people who can contribute 12 FPs each. I suspect that after a certain amount of time that simply getting enough people lined up properly and choregraphed for the spell might become counterproductive for the relatively low amount of energy they are providing.

Ultimately of course is going to depend on just what the target energy number is and which method is going to be employed. I suspect the end result will not frequently matter much to Mr. Gates though since any spell actually used on him is likely to be a charm that would be further vetted via Detect Magic to make sure that it is Qurik free with no unacceptable downsides to it.

[scc]

Originally Posted by blacksmith

Why? Yes it was originally designed for a secret magic setting but I am intending on using it in open magic fantasy settings.

RPM isn't fantasy magic, it doesn't do fantasy things

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by scc

RPM isn't fantasy magic, it doesn't do fantasy things

There's probably more than one type of fantasy magic. There's more than one type of fantasy too.