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Old 08-06-2019, 11:38 AM   #41
Steve Plambeck
 
Join Date: Jun 2019
Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

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Originally Posted by MikMod View Post
With this new approach to unlocking 'different kinds of memory' - do you think we should also have a Linguist talent, which unlocks a traunch of 'language' memory, so you can learn up to your IQ in languages?
Love it. And TippetsTX, I read the thread you linked to and loved that as well.

We are in danger of coming up with a Unified Field Theory of Learning Stuff, aren't we? LOL

Talent points and a talent point pool, Spell points and a spell point memory pool, and Language points and a language memory pool. No competition about learning stuff that is widely different in nature. And all running under one single IQ attribute.

I can dig it.
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Old 08-06-2019, 11:55 AM   #42
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

Yes... as the Klingon proverb says "there are many ways to cook a Targ."
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Old 08-07-2019, 01:35 AM   #43
Steve Plambeck
 
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

As I hinted near the start of this thread, the Wizardry Talent I wrote up for Interplay at William Gustafson's request was only the tip of an iceberg. The full house rules for magical talents my original group composed and used from 1981 forward were so radical, they would surely have been too much for Metagaming to swallow. Uh, they are still too much to swallow :) I would not use this system today in a new group. Anyone reading this would call it crazy, and that's quite alright because it was.

We had two tracks of wizardly arts, and two tiers to each track. We required any wizard to take at least one of these talents to cast spells, but in return they no longer had to pay double for other talents; and each mage got a memory pool equal to IQ for memorizing spells. Verbatim, it began with:
IQ 8 TALENT, WIZARDRY (5). Ability to gather and focus ambient mana to cast spells. Spell costs reflect physical exhaustion for the mana gathering, and are tallied as fatigue type hits against the user's ST. This talent only costs 3 IQ if you already have SORCERY.

IQ 11 TALENT, SORCERY (5), Ability to tap personal Mana Valence [your mana charge, which started as equal to IQ] for the mana to cast spells. Spell costs reflect psychic exhaustion for mana expenditure, and are tallied as hits against the user's MV. This talent only costs 3 IQ if you already have WIZARDRY.

IQ 12 TALENT, ADVANCED WIZARDRY (3). Prerequisite: WIZARDRY. Ability to focus ambient mana to cast spells with great alacrity and efficiency. [Which went on to explain the ST cost for each spell was halved!]

IQ 15 TALENT, ADVANCED SORCERY (3). Prerequisite: SORCERY. Ability to concentrate more mana than usual in MV -- 2 mana points for every 1 IQ point.
There's a bit more to my old group's old text, explaining mana recouped at the same rate as fatigue, and a wizard couldn't mix both power sources for the same spell at the same time. Wish I had it all on computer, but alas no.

I know what someone will say. We must have blown up our planet with too many spells - hahaha. In point of fact, we reserved those two Sorcery Talents for a tiny number of rarely seen NPCs that, by copious ingestion of youth potions, had survived in hiding for a couple hundred years since a religious order had nearly exterminated all the wizards in the World. Those two talents, all enchantment spells, and most of the new spells that appeared for the first time in Advanced Wizard were considered "lost knowledge" from a "golden age of magic". We always intended to eventually restore that lost knowledge though a great in-game quest, but we never got to that campaign. In fact I can only recall one PC taking that Advanced Wizardry talent. He was mine and he only had ST 8 to begin with, so no, we never blew up our World! :)

In any event, taking all four of those talents would have cost 16 talent points. Imagine the starting wizard with 32 points to pay spell costs, plus twice his ST added in. But then that superhero would have to have started with ST 8, DX 8, and would probably have been skewered by a crossbow bolt and killed before getting off one spell in combat - LOL.

But the basic IQ 8 Wizardry Talent worked out perfectly well. Wizards having their full IQ compliment of spells even after Talents came along didn't rock the boat -- that was the ship we'd sailed since 1978.
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Old 08-07-2019, 12:05 PM   #44
Skarg
 
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

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Originally Posted by Steve Plambeck View Post
In any event, taking all four of those talents would have cost 16 talent points. Imagine the starting wizard with 32 points to pay spell costs, plus twice his ST added in. But then that superhero would have to have started with ST 8, DX 8, and would probably have been skewered by a crossbow bolt and killed before getting off one spell in combat - LOL.
Looks like it only requires 14 points (but IQ 15 prereq for Advanced Sorcery) because sorcery and wizardry only cost 3 if you know the other one.

So a starting wizard could be ST 8 DX 9 IQ 15 and know all of those, and would have half-ST costs for spells, 8 ST-based mana, and another 30 IQ-based mana.

Team them up with a couple of assistants at say ST 10 DX 13 IQ 9 with the Aid spell, and they could Aid the wizard/sorceror's DX.

Or someone could start with ST 8 DX 12 IQ 12 and start with Advanced Wizardry and one talent, 12 spells at half-ST-cost, 8 ST-mana and 24 IQ-mana.


I don't think it's all that crazy if that's what you want, and if the GM gatekeeps access to the talents by the characters' background or in-play activities needing to be special training, and that's the world/game situation you want.

It does make a very large difference in the power balance, especially the advanced talents, compared to original RAW ITL/AM/AW. The available mana especially. But it's not all that much different from a high-powered game where powerful wizards have access to strong ST batteries and/or apprentices.

The talent difference is pretty large, but talents aren't all that powerful for wizards compared to their spells.

Your frame of reference is a lot different since your game worlds already had wizards with a bunch of talents in addition to a full IQ of spells. In our games, most wizards would tend to have very limited talents because of the conflict of resources. Adding more talents wouldn't upset all that much, though I would expect some/many of them using them to be better wizards/combatants - e.g. taking Missile Weapons to shoot lightning and fireballs better.

The advanced talents, if available in our campaigns, would have been obvious choices for all wizards who got past starting level, especially Advanced Sorcery. From the perspective of wizards who aren't used to spending much if any IQ on talents, they'd simply want as many of these as they could get, and consider the extra talents they could learn gravy.

So I tend to think something other than just IQ ought to be determining who has talents of this type. In new ITL, there'd tend to be the 500XP per talent point cost, which could serve, but I think also has its own issues.

Last edited by Skarg; 08-07-2019 at 12:09 PM.
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Old 08-07-2019, 03:05 PM   #45
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

So how would this system work in the context of the new Legacy XP rules?

Would you charge 2500 XP to gain the talent post-character creation?

Can a character with the Wizardry talent still purchase new spells for 500 XP each beyond their IQ score?
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Old 08-07-2019, 03:13 PM   #46
Steve Plambeck
 
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

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Looks like it only requires 14 points (but IQ 15 prereq for Advanced Sorcery) because sorcery and wizardry only cost 3 if you know the other one.
I forgot the discounts! Hahaha. It's been a long time.

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Originally Posted by Skarg View Post
So a starting wizard could be ST 8 DX 9 IQ 15 and know all of those, and would have half-ST costs for spells, 8 ST-based mana, and another 30 IQ-based mana.

Team them up with a couple of assistants at say ST 10 DX 13 IQ 9 with the Aid spell, and they could Aid the wizard/sorceror's DX.
Oh yeah, combining those talents would make for one awfully powerful wizard in proportion to that wizard's Attributes.

Advanced Sorcery made it possible to have that high IQ wizard who liked to work alone, reclusive in his tower concentrating on research and magic item creation. With mana equal to double that IQ of at least 15, the need to socialize with apprentices, or even have apprentices, would be minimized. This is not the wizard you ever want to **** off and see stepping out of that tower however :)

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Originally Posted by Skarg View Post
Your frame of reference is a lot different since your game worlds already had wizards with a bunch of talents in addition to a full IQ of spells.

In our games, most wizards would tend to have very limited talents because of the conflict of resources.

The advanced talents, if available in our campaigns, would have been obvious choices for all wizards who got past starting level, especially Advanced Sorcery.
Since we were not doubling the cost of talents for wizards in our world, but weren't doing so just to unbalance everything, that was the trick to keep them away from taking too many of the fighter/hero talents: incentives to stay concentrated on wizardry. You could be a wizard with lots of weapon skills and mundane talents if you wanted to be, but then you'd be passing up these chances to be a better and better wizard.

My thing now is figuring out how best to do all this over for a new world in the Legacy Edition era. I wouldn't want to keep the two methods of spell casting, Wizardry and Sorcery, in the same world. It seems in any duel between one of each with otherwise equal attributes, the Sorcerer would beat the Wizard every time. Putting a high ST Wizard up against a high IQ Sorcerer would seem to even out, until remembering the Sorcerer will have more spells and higher IQ spells to work with in the confrontation.

Which would mean finding new magical talents to act as those incentives to keep wizards on the straight an narrow, assuming they want to be the best at wizardry they can be. The new XP rules are going to make this harder, because practically unlimited talents will be available to advancing characters. I'd rather see them forced to make some hard choices.

Well I've got a couple ideas I'll drop in here when I have it all tweaked a bit more. Lovers of the RAW may hate me though :)
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Old 08-20-2019, 03:35 AM   #47
Steve Plambeck
 
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

So this is the new model I'm considering for Wizardry Talents. It starts at the base with an Apprentice talent just like the one Chris Rice created and mentioned in an earlier post here. There are five total talents each spaced thee IQ levels apart, and each costing 2 talent points (I've listed the Apprentice talent as costing 4 just to simplify the table below ; it actually costs only 2 but has two 1 point prerequisites for a cumulative cost of 4). Each of these talents is a prerequisite for the next.

The intervals and costs were selected so as to use up as close to possible 50% of a wizard's talent points at each of the IQ levels. This way it's still possible to charge wizards the same number of talent points per talent as other figures, while not doubling up the regular talents they can take. (In other the words, preserving the intent of the RAW in this regard). As per my 1982 Wizardry Talent, learning spells is not charged against talent points and a wizard may memorize as many spells as their amount of IQ -- a wizard transitioning from the Wizard microgame doesn't have to forget any spells to start taking talents.

Of course this curriculum is voluntary. If a wizard decides to stop progressing as a wizard he will end up taking more regular talents than he'd been entitled to under the "talents cost wizards double" rule. The trade off then being this wizard will forgo doing magic a different wizard could. If using the old rule where increasing IQ equally increased talent points, then yes, the off-track wizard can learn more talents than before. But if using the newer Legacy rule that increasing IQ does not give a figure more memory for talents, it comes down to the same thing ; under the newer rule, talents can be bought with XP and are therefore unlimited for wizards too. So pick your poison, but the wizard who skips the more advanced wizardry talents is going to end up with more regular talents now either way.

The plan though is to tempt wizards to keep improving as wizards. So the higher level wizardry talents have to offer the magic users something they can't get otherwise, but at the same time not increase their powers, especially in combat, allowing wizards to dominate the whole game. This is the trickiest part. I believe I have a solution, and a solution that actually preserves the effects of the RAW even though it changes the wording of those rules slightly. I'm not giving this away just yet though, being curious to see if anyone can see through my diabolical plans :) So the higher level incentive talents are not named in the table below, but I already know what they are going to be. I don't have a silver dragon to give away, but the first person to guess what these incentive talents are gets a drink on me should they pass through Chicago :)


_______WIZARD TALENTS (cost)______Cumulative Cost/Talent Points Left Free / % of IQ Left Free


IQ 08___APPRENTICE (4)__________________________4 / 4_____ / 50.0 %
................(let's wizard learn spells up to IQ 11)
IQ 09___________________________________________4 / 5_____ / 55.6 %

IQ 10___________________________________________4 / 6_____ / 60.0 %

IQ 11___WIZARDRY (2)___________________________ 6 / 5_____ / 45.5 %
..................(let's wizard learn spells up to IQ 20)
IQ 12___________________________________________6 / 6_____ / 50.0 %

IQ 13___________________________________________6 / 7_____ / 53.8 %

IQ 14___INCENTIVE TALENT #1 (2)__________________8 / 6_____ / 42.9 %

IQ 15___________________________________________8 / 7_____ / 46.7 %

IQ 16___________________________________________8 / 8_____ / 50.0 %

IQ 17___INCENTIVE TALENT #2 (2)_________________10 / 7_____ / 41.2 %

IQ 18__________________________________________10 / 8_____ / 44.4 %

IQ 19__________________________________________10 / 9_____ / 47.4 %

IQ 20___INCENTIVE TALENT #3 (2)_________________12 / 8_____ / 40.0 %

IQ 21__________________________________________12 / 9_____ / 42.9 %

IQ 22__________________________________________12 / 10____ / 45.5 %

IQ 23__________________________________________12 / 11____ / 47.8 %

IQ 24__________________________________________12 / 12____ / 50.0 %
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Old 11-24-2022, 09:12 AM   #48
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

Hey Steve, do you have an updated link to the original article?
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Old 11-24-2022, 07:03 PM   #49
Steve Plambeck
 
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

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Hey Steve, do you have an updated link to the original article?
Odd, the onedrive link (from the first post in this thread) still works here from my end. I'll happily get the original pdf to you though, and anyone else if they need it... now where'd I put that?!? Hehehe.
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Old 12-01-2022, 10:01 PM   #50
David Bofinger
 
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Default Re: A Wizardry Talent (unpublished 1982 Interplay article)

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I also did away with the artificial distinction between Heroes and Wizards by creating two new Talents. Apprentice was an IQ8 Talent that allowed a character to learn any spell from IQ8 up to IQ13. Wizard was an IQ14 Talent that allowed spells up to IQ20.
Some issues with this:
  • It creates an unmagic number at IQ 14. Did you consider allowing the lower-level talent to provide spells up to (8 + IQ)/2 or or something like that?
  • The cost of being a wizard is fixed, so compared with RAW it's cheap for characters with plenty of talent/spell points and expensive for those with fewer. Probably not an issue for RAW ITL characters.
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