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Old 07-25-2021, 10:46 AM   #41
Emerikol
 
Join Date: May 2021
Location: Eastern Kentucky
Default Re: Cost to cast spells as a service

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Originally Posted by kenclary View Post
That works fine for basic worldbuilding. However, you need the players to buy into it, as well.

I think the usual problem (and this may just be a thought experiment for gamers who like to theory-craft, most of the time) is the handwaving technically creates loopholes in the worldbuilding --- and player mages (or whatever) with resources and agency can exploit those loopholes --- so you end up with a choice between "let the players exploit your less-than-rigorous worldbuilding" or "try to find solid logic to close the loopholes."

But in practice, it doesn't come up at all if the players can just play along with whatever you write for them.
It’s why I provide a reasonable reason. There are many options. I try to avoid loophole worlds. It would bug me even if the PC’s cooperated.
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Old 07-25-2021, 11:42 AM   #42
Celjabba
 
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Luxembourg
Default Re: Cost to cast spells as a service

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Originally Posted by Micah Davis View Post
Of course, if a player invests in Multimillionaire 2 and enough magic/economic sense to transform the economy, I'd just let him. Kind of a weird thing to want to do in a standard fantasy campaign, but let them have fun. A self-made merchant-mage millionaire? Why not? Why shouldn't you totally transform your society as a player character?
In a sandbox campaign, or even in a more scripted context if all the player agree... I am all for it.

In fact, it sort of happened in at least two of my campaign (one with a gadgeteer/inventor player and some time travel, the other with players gaining access to world-hopping tech and the multi-millionaire merchant leveraging that heavily ... )

I was more targetting the players (and their GM ! and people on the forums ;) ) discussing the world and saying that logically, someone (not them especially) should have changed the society before, and therefore the world cannot exist as described.
Which is both True, and False.
True if we follow "real" logic, physics law and the sociology of human behaviour,
False because all three of the above are no longer valid as soon as magic/... is in play.
Once you break one physics law, you cannot invoke the others to determine "reasonable" consequences, imho. Or rather, you can, but you lose the right to refuse some handwaving.

Or in other words :

Rick Robinson's Second Law of Space Combat:
For every kilogram of handwavium you remove from a setting, you add about 10 cubic meters of impossible to maintain plumbing.

Last edited by Celjabba; 07-28-2021 at 02:08 AM.
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Old 07-26-2021, 07:37 AM   #43
SolemnGolem
 
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Join Date: Apr 2010
Location: The Hall of Fallen Columns
Default Re: Cost to cast spells as a service

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Originally Posted by Kromm View Post
This is covered at considerable length on GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Setting: Caverntown, pp. 43-45.
Thanks for this. A PC of mine wanted a staff enchanted with a single (rechargeable) charge of Wither Limb, as a sort of self defense weapon. Going off of the GURPS Magic rules resulted in a cost level that he was barely able to afford, and the Caverntown options are better.
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Old 07-26-2021, 08:22 AM   #44
Varyon
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Default Re: Cost to cast spells as a service

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Originally Posted by Celjabba View Post
"You as player are correct, but your character would never spot this logic loophole or exploit it, because of an in-universe global "taboo" field preventing him for thinking about it, enforced by supernatural powers beyond the scope of mortal being."
It is heavy handed, it is inelegant, but it solve the problem, and it is plausible.
You can also have superstition get in the way. For my Oubliette setting, the reason small, independent bands of adventurers are the ones conquering dungeons instead of military forces (and the reason dungeons are conquered - via destroying the Dungeon Core on the lowest floor - rather than farmed for their continual supply of resources like Shards and magic items) is because there are very strong superstitions against doing the latter. Scholars have questioned the rumors that ancient civilizations tried more efficient methods (like the use of large military forces, farming, etc) and subsequently collapsed in a dramatic fashion (typically involving being overrun by monsters spewing out of a massive concentration of newly-formed dungeons), but nobody in recent times has been brave - and capable* - enough to test such. Naturally, other superstitions have arisen in association with this, which is why adventurers have a great deal of mobility, even being able to travel between countries without much difficulty, but also are unable to hold any sort of official position (or be nobles - a noble who becomes an adventurer is officially stripped of his/her title upon doing so, although it's more like holding it in abeyance) and cannot generally take on non-adventuring work until they officially retire (although some are willing to hire them as short-term mercenaries).

*While there have been more recent attempts at breaking this taboo, such polities are inevitably crushed (be it in direct warfare or via assassination) by their neighbors who fear the consequences would spill over the borders. You'd basically need a powerhouse capable of taking all comers while having a large chunk of their military unavailable on account of delving, and such doesn't exist amongst the city-states of the setting.
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Old 07-27-2021, 11:14 PM   #45
scc
 
Join Date: Mar 2013
Default Re: Cost to cast spells as a service

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Originally Posted by Kromm View Post
I'm saying that I think the precedents are wrong. In the case of the Low-Tech series, the supplements are fine but applying them to wizards is wrong; those supplements are looking at realistic workers in settings that mostly don't have FP-burning magic. In the case of Magic, it's due to a 35-year-old rule that dates to some author before my time trying to bang a square peg (FP-burning magic) into a round hole (a generic monthly job system created for realistic jobs) being propagated into a new edition that didn't ever cross my desk for editing or review.
Magic has so many problems in regards to enchanting it's not funny, ECONOMICS AND ENCHANTMENT is so flawed it should be thrown in the bin and once you start trying to apply economics you'd probably be better off magically (hah) transporting your enchanters into the modern world and going from there to work out prices.

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Originally Posted by Kromm View Post
My Dawn of Magic campaign had a heavy dose of that.

Magic was known to have existed – but so long ago that it was seen as folklore, legend, even myth. Most of what people "knew" about it was at best bleached of all color and contrast by the suns of time, and at worst poppycock. Mostly, magic was reduced to superstition, tales of bogeymen, and "asking for proof betrays a lack of faith" religion.

Then magic started to come back. Most of its practitioners were ostracized, sometimes at the witch-burning level, thanks to superstition, tales of bogeymen, and the urgings of priesthoods who had everything to lose. Practitioners who were exceptionally magically talented and/or already socially influential weren't shy to exploit their gifts in various ways in order to avoid such fates. Most of these felt that security resided in grabbing power; some went very far, creating zombie armies to conquer, setting themselves up as living gods to demand worship, or just perverting social systems from within to claim imperium.

Into this stepped the PCs. The entire campaign goal was to play out the transition from "magic doesn't exist," through "magic is sinister and can't be trusted," to "an age of magical enlightenment." This involved very little use of their magical powers and a great deal of assassination of troublesome magic-wielders, conventional warfare, and exerting social influence on rulers. It was quite the epic campaign.

Of course, I also tossed in forgotten wisdom in ancient scrolls that identified the waxing and waning of magic with an eternal cycle of golden ages and apocalypses. The PCs knew that their peace wouldn't last forever, that at some point, the magic-wielders would challenge the gods, the gods would yank magic away, and the world would plunge back into mundanity and superstition until the next Dawn of Magic.
Are we likely to see a source book for this?
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