Magery-suppressing shackles?

[Evil Roy Slade]

Do I recall somewhere in DF (or even the DFRPG) shackles that one could slap on a mage to temporarily nullify their ability to cast spells? I've looked in every likely place but I can find nothing... am I thinking of something in another game system?

[Witchking]

Gurps Magic p 130

Suspend Magery Regular Spell
specifically mentions an Item form 'shackles' being popular.

Magic p 127

Drain Mana (VH) Area Spell
IME often used to make 'No Mana Zone' Rooms by Mage's Colleges. Useful for Opening potentially hazardous packages, experimentation, or cells for naughty members.

[RGTraynor]

Mage-Manacles, Magic Items II, p. 96

[StevenH]

Originally Posted by Witchking

Gurps Magic p 130

Suspend Magery Regular Spell
specifically mentions an Item form 'shackles' being popular.

Magic p 127

Drain Mana (VH) Area Spell
IME often used to make 'No Mana Zone' Rooms by Mage's Colleges. Useful for Opening potentially hazardous packages, experimentation, or cells for naughty members.

Those manacles require 2200 energy to enchant. Very expensive, and time consuming, assuming you can find an enchanter capable of making them. And they cost $72600, assuming normal enchanting costs. That's a very expensive (and valuable) pair of handcuffs.

I realize that the shackles are pretty much the only way to safely transport a mage prisoner...sedatives would be cheaper, as would a gag and mundane handcuffs for most mages...although maybe a set of five Chinese finger traps might be useful too. But a gag and "hand immobilizers" won't stop a mage with high enough skill. That would require those really spendy Magical Manacles of Marginalizing Mages.

What I would like to see is a variant that greatly reduces the cost to enchant these things. Something that makes them affordable enough for a city's guard units to be able to buy them.

And yes, I know I can just make it up out of whole cloth, and handwave all of the inconsistencies such an act would entail. But where's the fun in that? ;-)

[Witchking]

Originally Posted by StevenH

And yes, I know I can just make it up out of whole cloth, and handwave all of the inconsistencies such an act would entail. But where's the fun in that? ;-)

Well I expect even at the RAW price point those responsible for naughty mages CAN afford Suppress Magery Enchanted shackles.

If you have Mage's Guilds (useful for training, member benefits, centralized hub for item and spell sales, etc) they likely operate in the cities.

If they operate in cities then either 1. Being allowed to do so involves them providing said shackles as part of the deal to charter them. or 2. much like other historical situations the Mages (as a minority) are responsible for policing their own. So either they enchant such shackles for themselves or the Master of the Day on shift zaps the naughty mage with the spell and hauls them back to the Guild for trial.

Even if the City Guard had to buy a set from cash they are a permanent item. The cost amortized over 100 years or so is not really all that much.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by StevenH

Th But a gag and "hand immobilizers" won't stop a mage with high enough skill. That would require those really spendy Magical Manacles of Marginalizing Mages.

That you can stop someone who's spent 80 pts on IQ ,35 pts on a special advantage and then some more pts on esoteric skills with purely mundane countermeasures already seems pretty impressive.

A mage who can circumvent these things is even more expensive. Pretty much the cheapest build that could is someone with Shatter-20 for another 24 pts but that only gives the mage one response to countermeasures. Someone who maintained the ability to cast any of his merely Hard Spells under these condtions is probably IQ 19 (180 pts) and then Magery 3 for 35 more.. He still can't use his VH Spells either.

If you want a countermeasure for Mages of even godlike ability that city guards can afford to buy out of their billy club budgets you might be changing things so radically that you need to reprice Magery.

[ravenfish]

If you're planning to bind and gag the mage, keep in mind that Breath Fire is automatically cast without gestures, and so could presumably be cast while bound and gagged at only skill-15 to bypass speech components. Fireproof cloth might be a good investment.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

A mage who can circumvent these things is even more expensive. Pretty much the cheapest build that could is someone with Shatter-20 for another 24 pts but that only gives the mage one response to countermeasures.

if your magery is suppressed and you need Magery 1 to cast Shatter isn't this more "wreck the cuffs before they finish slapping them on me" since once they're all the way on it's too late to shatter them?

Unless maybe you reflexed it?

[ravenfish]

Originally Posted by Plane

if your magery is suppressed and you need Magery 1 to cast Shatter isn't this more "wreck the cuffs before they finish slapping them on me" since once they're all the way on it's too late to shatter them?

I believe the use of shatter is described as being employed versus the "immobilize and gag the mage with mundane bonds" approach which was put forward as an alternative to the "magic-disabling item" approach. The significance of skill 20 is that it allows the mage to cast without using words or gestures, so, if he can cast shatter at such a high skill, he can break the bindings and then be free to cast other spells that aren't known at so high a level (other spells known at skill twenty might also be used- a missile spell could probably break bindings holding the hands and fingers in place, a shapechanging or body-of-element spell could let the mage adopt a form that slips out of the bindings, or a mind-control spell could compel a guard to release them). Of course, as pointed out, skill twenty is very high, so the immobilize-and-gag approach should work on the vast majority of mages while being far cheaper than a relevant magic item.

[RGTraynor]

Originally Posted by StevenH

What I would like to see is a variant that greatly reduces the cost to enchant these things. Something that makes them affordable enough for a city's guard units to be able to buy them.

And yes, I know I can just make it up out of whole cloth, and handwave all of the inconsistencies such an act would entail. But where's the fun in that? ;-)

It's ALL made up out of whole cloth ... it's not as if Steve Jackson was transcribing historical records of how the Khazar khanate or King Shield Jaguar dealt with rogue wizards. A variant/houserule doesn't become less valid if you write it (to suit your own amour propre) than if it got written into a Pyramid article.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

If you want a countermeasure for Mages of even godlike ability that city guards can afford to buy out of their billy club budgets you might be changing things so radically that you need to reprice Magery.

My take as well. Never mind that a mage so mighty as to be able to cope with shackles, gags, hoods and soporifics is someone that's beyond the scope of schmuck city watchmen anyway.