[Magic-as-Powers] Power Stunts as Spells

[Prince Charon]

Power Stunts (GURPS Powers pp170-174) can be quite useful, and it occurred to me recently that in a Magic-as-Powers system, the power stunts could be the spells. This sort of magician might have very few 'power' advantages, but would use lots of power stunts; the more commonly used ones (or the important ones that have a high penalty) could be bought up as techniques. This was partly inspired by naloth's Spellforging thread, though it's probably closer to the Psi Techniques from GURPS Psionic Powers (p8, text box on p9). It might be useful for characters to keep a list of commonly-used stunts/spells, even ones not bought as techniques; maybe use the Grimoire Form from GURPS Magic (there's a PDF of the form on that page, under Excerpts). A lot of this would be rather cheaty if only one character were using it, but that's true of all magic systems.

The Rules As Written don't mention adding temporary limitations with a power stunt, or not that I noticed, but I believe it should be possible in this sort of system. Normally the combined modifiers from all the enhancements and limitations in the stunt should be positive, so it's still an enhancement, but if I were GMing I'd allow it as a negative number as long as it made thematic sense, and the player accepted that it was still going to have an energy cost and a skill penalty.

Depending on the setting (or the style, or the individual caster), there might be a single core advantage, or the core plus some alternates, or a small set of separate advantages. An Innate Attack with No Wounding is a plausible core ability, with many of the spells being based on Side Effect or similar enhancements. Affliction is arguably a better option, since afflicting advantages and disadvantages is built into it - the main difficulty would be that the primary effect of the Affliction would normally still be there, though adding a limitation that removes it to your power stunts may be acceptable to some GMs, as would having one advantage for helpful spells and another for harmful ones (e.g. 'Affliction (Advantage: Fit)' for positive spells and 'Fatigue Attack (Malediction)' for negative ones).

For 'elemental' styles, Control and Create make sense as core abilities, whether bought for a single element or a set of them. For a more mystical or 'spooky' style, something like the Second Sight advantage (GURPS Horror p18) could be interesting, though it might need some work, perhaps switching out one of the component advantages for Medium or Channeling.

Illusions is a potentially interesting core advantage for some styles, perhaps with some inspiration taken from Glamours (GURPS Fantasy pp20-21, 168). One possible enhancement would be a variant of Stigmata (Powers p95) that is not dependent on the Mental enhancement (see also this thread, though it hasn't gotten responses as of right now).

Power stunts normally never allow permanent effects, but if the GM and players want long-term magic items in this system, fudging that rule with additional requirements should be acceptable. What those requirements are should depend at least a little on the fluff of the setting, but I suggest requiring special materials, special locations and times to perform the ceremony, and possibly using the Combining Powers rules from pp170-172. Alternatively, stunting up some variant of Snatcher or Gadgeteer (limited to magic items) could also work - and some limited variant of Snatcher could also possibly work as a core power, for that matter.


Thoughts?

[Anders]

Have you looked at GURPS Sorcery? It uses Alternative Abilities for most spells and then power stunts for really powerful ones. If nothing else you could cannibalize it for ideas.

[Edges]

I once got started on a magic system that used Control: Magic as a base ability and had spells be stunts and techniques off of it. I even called it "Sorcery." But when PK came out with his book, I dropped it. But the general idea has a lot of potential.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Anders

Have you looked at GURPS Sorcery? It uses Alternative Abilities for most spells and then power stunts for really powerful ones. If nothing else you could cannibalize it for ideas.

I'm familiar with it to a degree, but I don't currently have Thaumatology: Sorcery.

[DangerousThing]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

I'm familiar with it to a degree, but I don't currently have Thaumatology: Sorcery.

It's worth buying as a pdf. It's my favorite magic system so far.

[Plane]

An interesting thing to consider about stunts is the FP cost in doing them:

1 for Extra Effort (or more w/ Godlike Extra)
2 for Temporary Enhancements
3 for Using Abilities at Default

http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/sample.html?id=5782

Another common option is a reduction to the FP cost to use the power's abilities under the right conditions.

This lowers all FP expenditures for any reason: regular use, extra effort, stunts, and anything else the GM comes up with.

This is conditional Reduced Fatigue Cost, which is a basic +20% per level, so FP reduction is +16%/level if Very Common, +12%/level if Common, +8%/level if Occasional, or +4%/level if Rare.

Note that this is very powerful, because it allows the user to use extra effort for free in some situations.

There seems to be some form of this built into Mana-Sensitive -10% or Magic -10% when we read P178's "FP Cost and Source"

since FP spent on magic spells recharge in one second in areas with very high mana (see Mana, p. B235), so do FP spent on magical powers

Unlike "Reduced Fatigue Cost" it is not a fixed amount though, since it seems like "any amount whatsoever" which is quite powerful.

Since however it recharges a second later there are realistic limits on what you can do, since you're still going to take HP damage if you exhaust your FP, even if you get it back right after.

More of a concern is going beyond how Very High Mana works though, since the "Wild Mana" rules in Thaumatology are just zero-cost (like with critical success rolls) rather than next-second refund.

In either case I could see people designing abilities made on the cheap with high "Costs Fatigue" limitations knowing that they could offset that in Very High Mana or Wild Mana.

[Refplace]

Actually GURPS Psionic Powers is an example of this kind of thinking.
You buy a core ability and then power stunts as Techniques instead of alternative abilities such as in Sorcery.
As for Control (Mana) as the core for a Sorcery type system, I briefly wrote that up as part of my Supernatural Energy article in Pyramid #4/1 Fantasy Magic, thankfully available at the moment through the current kickstarter as an add-on or higher tier option for those who did not get it last year.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Actually GURPS Psionic Powers is an example of this kind of thinking.
You buy a core ability and then power stunts as Techniques instead of alternative abilities such as in Sorcery.

Mentioned in the OP, but yes. Expanding on that a bit, it occurs to me that creating a bunch of Psi Techniques to use as spells could work in a Low-Tech Psionics worldline like in the Yrth as a Psionic setting thread. It would just be a matter of picking a few appropriate core psi abilities, and adding a range of new Psi Techniques (probably mostly player-created, though maybe some of you might post a few to this thread).

[ericthered]

I normally run my magic-as-powers settings this way. Stunts are essential to making the concept work.



Versions of the ability with limitations usually either end up as a net enhancement (with the limitation being especially applicable to the accompanying enhancement), or they end up being an ability used from default, especially if the limitations are transformational. Some generic limitations, like decreasing the duration or range, have been used to "Pay" for enhancements on occasion.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Actually GURPS Psionic Powers is an example of this kind of thinking.
You buy a core ability and then power stunts as Techniques

The only diff is in Powers the techniques were originally for a distinct roll you made using a Concentrate to apply enhancements to an ability you could use next-turn, but in Psi Powers they waive the second of Concentrate-prep in exchange for lumping together your Temporary Enhancements success roll with your ability's Success Roll (ie would only work since psi powers all have Requires IQ roll built in)