[Thaumatology] Specialist Magic-Users

[Alden Loveshade]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

I would guess that the other PCs are better at combat, while she does a lot of stuff that either isn't combat at all, or falls under the umbrella of 'combat support,' like detecting ambushes or confusing difficult enemies.

The "PC experiment" is still relatively new, and I don't want to post too much here on my ideas (my GM may be watching). But confusing difficult enemies and the related I think could be quite useful. I won't know how useful until I get in more combat

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Plane

Hey Charon how much FP would your Enchantress have to get the ball rolling on making powerstones? You'd need 12 energy to start off making a One-College Powerstone (Enchantment Only) which you could then use to mitigate the cost of the broader 20-energy all-college powerstones.

The thing is, she wouldn't be starting from scratch, nor working alone (which is why I gave her a business partner). The two of them started out as apprentices to Master Enchanter Basil of Hyrnan, where they dreamed of much more exciting work while drudging around and getting their skills up. One of the privileges Basil gives his apprentices is letting them borrow powerstones that they've worked on to make their own powerstones from material they bought themselves... and sometimes he allows them to buy quirky powerstones that he would never sell to a regular customer (reputation, you see), especially if they're reasonably to blame for the quirks. Thus, they were able to make their first powerstones under his supervision, and to enhance them over time.

By the time they went out to start their own shop, they had plenty of decent powerstones, and just needed a space to spread them out for charging in, secure enough where they wouldn't get stolen. They did go on one adventure together, and then decided that adventures are nasty things that make one late for dinner, and they'd much rather be alive and make steady money selling powerstones and staffs to crazy adventurers.

If she and her partner had to start from nothing, they'd probably each give ten energy to a single regular powerstone (I haven't decided if either of them even knows One-College Powerstone, nor Manastone), because they each have more than ten FP, though less than twenty. Then they'd do it again after they recovered, and so on.

Originally Posted by Alden Loveshade

The "PC experiment" is still relatively new, and I don't want to post too much here on my ideas (my GM may be watching). But confusing difficult enemies and the related I think could be quite useful. I won't know how useful until I get in more combat

OK, that's fair. When you can talk about it, please lets us know what happens.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

I haven't decided if either of them even knows One-College Powerstone

It isn't specified as being a separate spell, but I could see maybe treating it as some kind of specialty use. Like if you learned 1 specific college it might be 1 level easier to learn Powerstone, but then all other colleges (or generic) would be cast at -2.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Plane

It isn't specified as being a separate spell, but I could see maybe treating it as some kind of specialty use. Like if you learned 1 specific college it might be 1 level easier to learn Powerstone, but then all other colleges (or generic) would be cast at -2.

Looking at the entry in GURPS Magic (p70), I can't see anything to suggest that it isn't a separate spell, other than not listing a prerequisite, which seems to be an error as it has a separate entry in the Spell Table at the end of the book (p231), and that one does mention the prerequisite (Enchant).

[ericthered]

The last time I built a character for a Monster Hunter's game I added some specialist sauce to a Witch with rules from Pyramid 66.

ST 10 [0]
DX 12 [40]
IQ 15 [100]
HT 12 [20]

HP 10 [0]
Will 15 [0]
Per    13 [-10]
FP 12 [0]

English (native) [0]

Magery 6 [65]
Full Adept [40]
Natural caster 3 [45]
Higher purpose (curse breaking) 3 [15]
Contact group (my crazy family, somewhat reliable, skill 15, occult skills, shows up on 12) [20]
Signature Gear (Grimoires+truck) [3]
Luck [15]
combat reflexes [15]
perk: substituted Attribute (IQ for Esoteric Medicine) [1]
perk: Romani (accented) [1]

Code of Honor (Never abuse magic) [-5]
Skinny [-5]
Reputation (traitor) [-5]
Obsession (stop magic abusers,CR 12) [-15]
Motion Sickness    [-10]
Stubborn [-5]
Charitable (CR 15) [-7]
quirk (Wander Lust)    [-1]
quirk (sub-optimal vision -- distance for range penalties *1.5 without glasses)[-1]
quirk (wildly rants when frustrated -- quirk level bad temper)[-1]
quirk (uses little metal figurines for almost all of her traditional trappings in spells)[-1]

MAGIC
Thaumology            IQ    VH    18    [8]    3
Path (magic)        IQ    VH    18    [8]    3
Path (chance)        IQ    VH    17    [4]    3
Path (mind)            IQ    VH    17    [4]    3
Path(cross roads)    IQ    VH    17    [4]    3
Path (spirit)        IQ    VH    17    [4]    3
Path (body)            IQ    VH    16    [2]    3
Path (matter)        IQ    VH    16    [2]    3
Path (undead)        IQ    VH    16    [2]    3
Path (energy)        IQ    VH    16    [2]    3

OCCULT
Mental Strength                    will E    19    [2]    3
Occultism                        IQ    A    17    [1]    3
Hidden Lore (sacred places)        IQ    A    15    [1]   3
Expert Skill (psionics)            IQ    H    14    [2]
Research                        IQ    A    15    [2]
Current Affairs (arcane,US)        IQ    E    15    [1]
Area Knowledge (gates,western)    IQ    E    15    [1]
Saviore Faire (occult community)IQ    E    15    [1]

COMBAT
Sword Sword                DX    E    14    [4]    
Pistol                DX    E    14    [4]    
Brawling            DX    A    13    [4]    
Throwing            DX    A    12    [2]                        
Fast Draw (pistol)    DX    E    13    [1]    1

SOCIAL
Psychology (human)    IQ    H    14    [2]
Detect Lies            IQ    H    14    [2]
Diplomacy            IQ    H    14    [2]
Indimidate            will   A    14    [1]
Fast Talk            IQ    A    15    [2]
Streetwise            IQ    A    15    [2]

Mechanic (auto)        IQ    A    14    [1]
Artist(figurines)        IQ    H    13    [1]
Stealth                   DX    A    12    [2]
Housekeeping           IQ    A    14    [1]

attributes: 160
advantages: 218
perks: 2
disadvantages: -62
quirks: -4
skills: 83

total = 397

The higher purpose (curse breaking) gives +3 when targeting the magic of others or undoing the effects of a spell. She also had a pair of grimoires that gave +4 to removing a ritual to a person or from a place.

As an RPM witch, she's not terribly specialized in the grand scheme of things, but the higher purpose and signature gear give her +7 for an effective skill of 25 when removing the magic of others.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Looking at the entry in GURPS Magic (p70), I can't see anything to suggest that it isn't a separate spell, other than not listing a prerequisite, which seems to be an error as it has a separate entry in the Spell Table at the end of the book (p231), and that one does mention the prerequisite (Enchant).

Yipes, great observation, I love easter eggs in those spell tables :)

Now the next question would be: would learning that once allow you to create OCPs of any college, or would we need to learn separate versions for each college?

The cost of casting OCP is -40% from the usual cost, exactly the value of 1-college magery (B67). This sets a convenient precedent for, if we wanted to invent other variations on the Powerstone spell NOT in GURPS Magic, simply adapting the limitations on Magery to come up with the energy cost for them.

T25 "Limited Colleges" for example would suggest:

2 colleges = 14 energy
3 colleges = 16 energy
4 colleges = 18 energy

It could be a worthwhile skill to buy if these were 3 extra skills which allowed you to make any combination of colleges. If you had to learn a separate skill for each combination (ie one skill for fire+water, a 2nd skill for fire+weather, etc) then it could get prohibitively costly though...

Do you think having "one spell only" powerstones costing 4 energy to make would be going too far? If that were possible, I could see someone building a Powerstone-only Powerstone to get their foot in the door of making the costly unrestricted ones.

4*4=16 so that would still be tricky to make if you didn't have a valuable thing to enchant. The previously proposed "one college" manastone (or better yet, a "one spell" manastone costing either 1 or 4 energy) would still be helpful in building up to that.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Plane

Yipes, great observation, I love easter eggs in those spell tables :)

Now the next question would be: would learning that once allow you to create OCPs of any college, or would we need to learn separate versions for each college?

I'd say that it depends on the GM, but that makes sense to me.

Originally Posted by Plane

The cost of casting OCP is -40% from the usual cost, exactly the value of 1-college magery (B67). This sets a convenient precedent for, if we wanted to invent other variations on the Powerstone spell NOT in GURPS Magic, simply adapting the limitations on Magery to come up with the energy cost for them.

T25 "Limited Colleges" for example would suggest:

2 colleges = 14 energy
3 colleges = 16 energy
4 colleges = 18 energy

It could be a worthwhile skill to buy if these were 3 extra skills which allowed you to make any combination of colleges. If you had to learn a separate skill for each combination (ie one skill for fire+water, a 2nd skill for fire+weather, etc) then it could get prohibitively costly though...

That looks good, IMHO.

Originally Posted by Plane

Do you think having "one spell only" powerstones costing 4 energy to make would be going too far? If that were possible, I could see someone building a Powerstone-only Powerstone to get their foot in the door of making the costly unrestricted ones.

4*4=16 so that would still be tricky to make if you didn't have a valuable thing to enchant. The previously proposed "one college" manastone (or better yet, a "one spell" manastone costing either 1 or 4 energy) would still be helpful in building up to that.

That also looks workable. Of course, I'm by no means an expert on the standard system, but your ideas fit what I do know about it, and it does not seem overpowered. Depending on the game, I'd either allow Powerstone-Only Powerstones, or not allow one-spell only powerstones at all, but if you hadn't brought it up, the idea of a cheap, Powerstone-only powerstone would probably not have occurred to me.

[Plane]

Of course, a one-spell powerstone (rather than an enchantment-only one) could only be used for EITHER the generic powerstone spell OR the separate "one college powerstone" spell, so it wouldn't be supremely versatile. You'd need a 2-spell powerstone for that versatility.