Quote:
Originally Posted by ajardoor
Keep all this info written on a separate sheet, and be wary if your GM requires you to prove your character remembers this IC. (You DID take the Photographic Memory advantage, didn't you?)
|
I'd probably allow a Perk to let a character keep track of all the Charms he has on his person (although this wouldn't let him know when one was stolen). Alternatively, I'd argue that a simple Lesser Sense Magic ritual (with appropriate Duration), cast on the character, would be enough to give him a real-time map of all the Charms on his person. So long as he already knew what each did, that would also be included (so with the spell up he won't mix up his Repair Wounds and Your Head Asplode Charms).
Quote:
Originally Posted by ajardoor
Attack spell charms are best used for assassination, not heated combat because they need to be Readied (or Fast-Drawed).
|
While the issues with using them do mean you probably shouldn't rely on using them exclusively, do note that doing so is actually faster than using a bow, and archer is a viable role in the party, even without Heroic Archer (with Heroic Archer, they are roughly equivalent in speed). Due to harshly limited ammunition, however, you'll probably want these to generally be one-hit kills/KO's. Another good use for regular charms, if you are often up against other mages, are powerful Dispel charms (Lesser Destroy Magic, possibly a small Area of Effect, and all the energy you can manage pumped into Meta-Magic).
Quote:
Originally Posted by ajardoor
Revolvers are probably what you want to shoot ammo charms with, since you can "dial a round" by rotating the cylinder
|
This can be
extremely difficult to keep track of in the heat of battle, and I wouldn't even let the Perk from above help him here (he'd know which charms are in the revolver, but not necessarily which is currently loaded). The above ritual would probably work, however. I've seen a few instances of fictional firearms that this would work well with, even without the ritual. In
Antihero for Hire, the titular character uses a handgun called the Silver Arrow or similar, which uses normal bullets in a semi-automatic configuration, but with the flip of a switch can change to use a single bullet that is loaded elsewhere - he uses special ammunition (energy bullets, tangler rounds, etc) here. Perhaps a better one is in Sanderson's new
Mistborn series, where the main character has a revolver called Vindication. It has 8 chambers, but is actually designed so that it will skip two of them in normal use. Press a lever and spin the chambers, however, and you'll be able to access the other two. Again, the main character uses special rounds here, designed specifically to fight the various flavors of mages in that setting (typically each only has one ability, so there are bullets to mitigate/counter each).
The point is, without some magic assistance (or a clear revolver with clearly-marked rounds), you'll need to limit access to the magic bullets and probably only have one or two loaded at a time or you are
very likely to get them mixed up.
...
Another option are what I refer to as Wands, which I think are in Pyramid #3/66. Like tattoos, these are single Charms that can have multiple copies of the same ritual enchanted into them for use. A Wand of Fireball (and possibly a complementary Wand of Iceball for those fire-resistant foes) can be of great use for offense, and a Wand of Healing for keeping your frontline fighters up and going.