Blocking spells and multiple attacks [RPM]

[Nereidalbel]

Unless you're paying for a duration on your blocking spell, I agreethat you need to roll for every attack.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

Unless you're paying for a duration on your blocking spell, I agreethat you need to roll for every attack.

It doesn't outright say it - but I'd think that Duration is incompatible with Blocking spells. That's the trade off for being able to use a spell instantly and in enough time to defend with it. That's what I've always treated it as anyways. PK might overrule me here - but I don't think so.

[starslayer]

I guess I'm not being clear as to the gist of the spell because it seems to be interpreted wrong....

I'm speaking to a spell that itself blocks things that are coming at the PC.

Like something that uses greater create gate, greater control gate, lesser detect energy, and a duration with the conditions of 'anything that exceeds <some energy threhold> put the gate in the way, otherwise keep it over my head'. This is not a triggered spell, but a standing, active, spell- the character is walking around with the spell active an in effect for a large portion of the time. There may or may not be a visible effect from the 'shield' that is being repositioned to capture things.

From previous discussion and example spells (such as RPM dancing shield)- I am quite confidant that this is a valid build and will defend the 'wearer' of the spell with 1/2 skill +3 as per any other blocking/parrying methodology at least once per round; the big one coming to me is 'what happens if its more then once per round'.

[Nereidalbel]

In that case, you get one block per turn. If you find a way to pump in more energy and get a pair of dancing shields, you get two blocks, triplets give you three, etc.

[ericthered]

There's an arguement to be made for allowing successive blocks at huge penalties: -4 per cumulative block sounds right.

[Kazander]

The Blocking Spell Mastery perk from Thaumatology:Magical Styles (p.23) allows multiple blocking spells at successive -5 penalties. This perk requires specialization per Blocking spell, so if you want it for Iron arm and Ward, you have to buy it once for each Blocking spell.

That sets the precedent for what the penalty is, and what the RAW are: 1 Blocking spell per turn, unless you have this perk for that spell.

In my own campaign, I house-ruled before this expansion came out that all Blocking spells could be cast successively at cumulative -5 penalties. It doesn't seem imbalanced, because you still always have to pay full cost of Blocking spells. You can't keep this up forever because you will run out of 'juice'. I still allow the perk, if someone wants to reduced the penalty to -3 per, similar to what WM/TBaM do for melee weapons.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by starslayer

I'm speaking to a spell that itself blocks things that are coming at the PC.

The iteration penalty is going to be up to the GM, and will depend on if the effect seems most similar to Block (-5 per iteration), Parry (-4 per iteration), or Dodge (-1 per iteration, or no penalty). You may wish to treat Ritual Adept like Trained By a Master for these purposes (so -3, -2, and -1, respectively).

Personally, I'd probably have all such abilities - regardless of fluff and character Advantages - use -3 per iteration. Ideally, there would be some energy cost to change this to -2 or -1 per iteration. Offhand, I'd go with 5 energy to go to -2, 20 energy to go to -1 (and theoretically 100 energy to negate the iteration penalty outright).