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Old 04-19-2014, 10:20 PM   #1
Domiel Angelus
 
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Default Two long standing house rules.

I'm not certain if anyone else has used this house ruling or not. We've been running GURPS and several other systems for some time and magic has always seems under powered in some aspects. We, as a game group, found two things to alleviate this little problem.

1. All Buffing Spells (Armor and Shield excluded) have an area of effect equal to the caster's Magery in hexes.

2. All attack spells gain a +1 to damage per level of the caster's Magery.

Anyone else have house rules pertaining to Magic?

Also if anyone has house rules pertaining to Modular Abilities or Wild Talent, I'd like input on them as well.
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Old 04-19-2014, 10:28 PM   #2
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

I have never used but heard of the second.
The first I wouldnt do but instead I would go with the Mass effect spells from the Epic Magic issue of Pyramid.
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Old 04-19-2014, 10:42 PM   #3
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Domiel Angelus View Post
1. All Buffing Spells (Armor and Shield excluded) have an area of effect equal to the caster's Magery in hexes.
One more slight one I would add is the spells that buff ST should buff from +10% to +50% instead of +1 to +5 (with maybe a minimum limit of 1-5). Instead of an area based on Magery, make them Area Spells with a max area of Magery, maybe halving the base cost if the area is 2yds or more.
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Originally Posted by Domiel Angelus View Post
2. All attack spells gain a +1 to damage per level of the caster's Magery.
That's quite an impactful bonus (4d+20 fireballs for probably 3 or less mana? 1d+5 fireballs for free makes them better than archers...). I'm not sure if mundane damage could keep up with that, and magic from Magic had only one weakness, and that was the damage output. You might push magic's sphere of power too wide. But if it works for you...

I've seen Gunslinger and Weapon Master variants to buff damage spells, which feels about right to me.
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Old 04-19-2014, 11:45 PM   #4
Domiel Angelus
 
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

I also built a rather off the wall advantage to assist casters in getting a large bang for their buck. It's probably going to have an instant pang of OP for anyone that reads it.

Mystical Mastery - 20 points and 10 points there after; requires Magery 3 and 10 spells of the college mastered at 16+ or Power Investiture 3 and 6 spells from each tier at 16+.

A Caster with Mystical Mastery is granted three points of fatigue to power spells of a given college and a reduction in casting time of one quarter, minimum of one second. These bonuses are in addition to the bonus for high skill, so someone buying these out the gate have 4 points in a given spell.

There's also a variant for Imbuement that reduces the final modifiers for using an imbuement to 1/3rd. This version requires Imbue 3 and an Imbuement Talent, of any variety, of 2.

Quote:
Originally Posted by kirbwarrior View Post
One more slight one I would add is the spells that buff ST should buff from +10% to +50% instead of +1 to +5 (with maybe a minimum limit of 1-5). Instead of an area based on Magery, make them Area Spells with a max area of Magery, maybe halving the base cost if the area is 2yds or more.
This is a very good idea on the % stand point, I'm not so certain about the max area of Magery, we may have to give that a test run.

Last edited by Domiel Angelus; 04-19-2014 at 11:53 PM. Reason: added a quote and response.
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Old 04-23-2014, 09:21 PM   #5
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

When using the basic magic system, I often remove any caps on the amount of fatigue you are allowed to spend on a given spell, so like allot of damage dealing spells will only allow you to spend a max of 3fp for 3 dice damage, I often lift those kinds of restrictions figuring if the player wants to blow allot of fatigue and spit out allot of damage (or other effects), I'm not going to arbitrarily limit that, I figure that's what the FP expenditure is there for.
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Old 04-23-2014, 10:39 PM   #6
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

Quote:
Originally Posted by kirbwarrior View Post
One more slight one I would add is the spells that buff ST should buff from +10% to +50% instead of +1 to +5 (with maybe a minimum limit of 1-5).
I think I would keep the FP cost per +1 to ST, but a) make the maximum +50% instead of +5, and b) ignore any extra FP cost for affecting a larger than SM 0 target. +1 buff is +1 buff, but a hulking brute can support more ST buffing.

Perhaps better to give them a HT or Will buff, then let them use Extra Effort.
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Old 04-24-2014, 08:22 PM   #7
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

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Originally Posted by RyanW View Post
I think I would keep the FP cost per +1 to ST, but a) make the maximum +50% instead of +5, and b) ignore any extra FP cost for affecting a larger than SM 0 target. +1 buff is +1 buff, but a hulking brute can support more ST buffing.
I actually used that house rule that I got from another system. It made strong creatures stronger and weak creatures still weak. Since this is gurps, it only helps big creatures, not punishes small ones.
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Perhaps better to give them a HT or Will buff, then let them use Extra Effort.
As a power, afflicting large amounts of Will (Only for Extra Effort for ST -60%) sounds really neat...
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Old 04-27-2014, 07:03 PM   #8
Domiel Angelus
 
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

Quote:
Originally Posted by pfharlock View Post
When using the basic magic system, I often remove any caps on the amount of fatigue you are allowed to spend on a given spell, so like allot of damage dealing spells will only allow you to spend a max of 3fp for 3 dice damage, I often lift those kinds of restrictions figuring if the player wants to blow allot of fatigue and spit out allot of damage (or other effects), I'm not going to arbitrarily limit that, I figure that's what the FP expenditure is there for.
What we've done in cases like this is make it coincide with double a caster's Magery or the spell's limitation, whichever is higher. It keeps it in line without making it too powerful. Its a balancing act between melee, ranged and magic.
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Old 04-27-2014, 08:17 PM   #9
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Domiel Angelus View Post
I'm not certain if anyone else has used this house ruling or not. We've been running GURPS and several other systems for some time and magic has always seems under powered in some aspects.
How is magic underpowered?

Why do you think that is?

-Someone that struggled to keep Magic from being overpowered in 3e*.

*Except when running it along 3e Psionics, where we found it a toss up.
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Old 04-28-2014, 07:50 AM   #10
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Default Re: Two long standing house rules.

Quote:
Originally Posted by pfharlock View Post
When using the basic magic system, I often remove any caps on the amount of fatigue you are allowed to spend on a given spell, so like allot of damage dealing spells will only allow you to spend a max of 3fp for 3 dice damage, I often lift those kinds of restrictions figuring if the player wants to blow allot of fatigue and spit out allot of damage (or other effects), I'm not going to arbitrarily limit that, I figure that's what the FP expenditure is there for.
You're remembering from 3E. The 4E RAW is much more loose: you're allowed to power up a missile spell for 3 seconds, but each second, you're allowed to put up to your magery level into the spell. A magery-6 wizard with lots of fatigue could launch some truly devastating explosive fireballs.
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