[DF] Easy arcane magic for Dungeon Fantasy

[mlangsdorf]

Originally Posted by Bruno

Aaaand this is now officially another branch of the "Skill based magic sucks!" "No it doesn't!" "Yes it does!" thread.

Which is ironic, because I was fairly well convinced by the "just use a very small spell list and ignore the prerequisites" argument. I still have some very fundamental concerns and dislikes of the standard Magic system, but I'm trying to run a quick pick-up game and so I'm using a lot of stuff that I don't like (standard DF armor weights, etc). I can go either way, really.

And of course, the newbie player I was most concerned with decided to play the Half-Ogre Knight, making the entire concern a little irrelevant.

[Gnome]

Originally Posted by Langy

You seem to keep missing that I have been assuming that you'd have other spells available (probably from a spells-as-skills system) in addition to the innate attacks; you'd wind up having exactly as much versatility, doing more damage at higher range, with less point investment.

Well, the OP wanted an easier, simpler system. Combining spells with powers is more complex, although I agree with you that it would probably be a lot of fun. In fact, I designed a DF template once based around this idea: the Sorcerer. I won't post it here, since I'm still vaguely hoping to get it published in Pyramid someday, but basically I wrote up a list of abilities, with appropriate enhancements and limitations, using Magery as the Talent for the power. The Sorcerer had about ten to fifteen spells as well as about 50 points in powers. It worked very well, but I had to sacrifice some IQ to get the points for powers, so the template no longer had that "scholarly" wizard feel, nor did it have the high skill levels in spells that the wizard has. It's a nice way to go though for those who want a "D&D" style blaster mage.

[Kuroshima]

Originally Posted by mlangsdorf

And of course, the newbie player I was most concerned with decided to play the Half-Ogre Knight, making the entire concern a little irrelevant.

One of my players, during the playtest for Mirror of the Fire Demon, showed me that the real powerhouse is the half ogre swashbuckler...

[mlangsdorf]

Well, initially I had 3 players, so they went with Saint, Scout, and Swashbuckler-Thief. A reasonably balanced small party, though light on magical support. They approached the Mage to see if he wanted to join, but he blew them off, and the Saint is intolerant so the Dark Artist was a no go.

The other two players in our group tend to have attendance issues. If they show up, they'll play a Wizard-Bard or Demonologist or Shaman and the previously mentioned Half Ogre Knight. While a Half Ogre Swashbuckler would be crazy bad, the Knight has skill 19 with his flail and ST22, so it's not like he's letting the team down. Sure, Weapon Master would drive him straight into the center of Crazy Town, but he's already on the outskirts.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Bruno

Aaaand this is now officially another branch of the "Skill based magic sucks!" "No it doesn't!" "Yes it does!" thread.

GURPS Magic is like AD&D, in this regard.