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Old 03-18-2019, 03:23 PM   #1
FeiLin
 
Join Date: Aug 2018
Default Realm magic power level?

I was comparing Realm magic to standard, and looked at fireball. It's up to Magery per second in cost, max 3 sec, and the damage is 1D per die. With, say, Magery 3, that would be 9D for 9 FP.

Trying the same with Realm magic (6 levels, so it seems logical that 3 is needed for full damage spells), that means it needs, say, Fire 3, which generates a cost of 6, a casting time of 5 s, for a total of 1D damage (say burn). Sure, I can multiply that with however many dice I want, but it still seems quite far behind the standard system.

I'm trying to achieve a system where magic is fairly powerful, but CP-wise expensive (or at least not cheap), and quite flexible. I really like the concept of Realm magic, but the exercise above makes me question if I've missed something or wonder if there are any ways to make it more powerful while still not unbalanced. Any advice?
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Old 03-18-2019, 06:26 PM   #2
Gef
 
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Hi FeiLin,

I'm not too familiar with Realm Magic except in its original incarnation from Mage. Having reviewed the brief section in Thaumatology, I'd say your analysis is correct. There is a built-in option (top of p. 183) that extra dice can just impose a penalty to skill instead of costing fatigue, but it's steep.

If you don't want a house rule, the alternative is to think about what else magic can do. In the standard system, for instance, wizards spend lots of energy on a fireball but have a different spell to recover energy quickly. What's the way a wizard under your custom version of realm magic would deal with high energy costs?

The ones that come to mind are using some sort of life magic to boost fatigue or transfer it from your horse, some sort of matter magic to turn gems into fatigue, some sort of spirit magic to pull fatigue from spirits, and/or some sort of meta-magic to store energy, or a combination.

Suppose I could build a huge hot bonfire, then trap all that fire in a garnet using Fire 2, with Meta-Magic (if you have such a realm) to keep it trapped for a good long while. Then later I could end the spell and get a bonfire back, or use another Fire 2 effect to release the energy as an explosive fireball. Damage depends on the original bonfire and doesn't affect energy cost. Question is, does that approach fit your style?

In the standard system, Extra Fatigue (or Energy Reserve) makes a huge difference, and I suspect it would in the Realm system too.

I recently posted a very long thread on my Magic Vegas setting, which will use another system from Thaumatology, effect-shaping path magic. There are lots of ways the manifestation of that system depends on campaign-specific assumptions, in my case, the availability of spirits. Realm magic will require at least as much work, I'm sure.
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Old 03-19-2019, 03:06 PM   #3
FeiLin
 
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Gef View Post
I'm not too familiar with Realm Magic except in its original incarnation from Mage. Having reviewed the brief section in Thaumatology, I'd say your analysis is correct. There is a built-in option (top of p. 183) that extra dice can just impose a penalty to skill instead of costing fatigue, but it's steep.

If you don't want a house rule, the alternative is to think about what else magic can do. In the standard system, for instance, wizards spend lots of energy on a fireball but have a different spell to recover energy quickly. What's the way a wizard under your custom version of realm magic would deal with high energy costs?

Suppose I could build a huge hot bonfire, then trap all that fire in a garnet using Fire 2, with Meta-Magic (if you have such a realm) to keep it trapped for a good long while. Then later I could end the spell and get a bonfire back, or use another Fire 2 effect to release the energy as an explosive fireball. Damage depends on the original bonfire and doesn't affect energy cost. Question is, does that approach fit your style?

I recently posted a very long thread on my Magic Vegas setting, which will use another system from Thaumatology, effect-shaping path magic. There are lots of ways the manifestation of that system depends on campaign-specific assumptions, in my case, the availability of spirits. Realm magic will require at least as much work, I'm sure.
Yeah, I've looked at energy cost, skill modifiers, as well as margin of success, and have yet to decide on a setup I'm happy with. Having some spells that drain energy quickly and another one to regain it is kinda counterintuitive to me, so I'm not a big fan of Recover Energy. As an old DnD player/DM, I'd rather have an array of items, primarily staffs or other charged weapons, powerstones and "mana potions" (pauts, I guess in GURPS). I want to keep the balance of having magic fairly expensive (not HP wand waving magic), yet quite flashy (so not too punishing/exhaustive for greater damage or high effects).

I like your suggestion of having a bonfire and trapping the energy. I had a similar thought, where an ancient society/cult of Necron-like mages trapped magical energy in green gauss canisters that are ice cold to the touch because the energy is sucked into whatever the liquid is. These canisters can either be tapped in various ways (haven't decided rules for that yet), and there's also spillover effects that has created green gems that can be mined and used (most likely in the form of worn jewelry or adorned staffs that can be recharged).

I am toying with the option of letting players combine Techniques with skill modifiers, by using modifiers to gain effects (more dice for their fireballs without higher energy cost) and reducing the penalty (up to their Realm skill).
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Old 03-19-2019, 06:59 PM   #4
Gef
 
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Good luck. Techniques sound reasonable, but remember that it's only cost-effective to have a couple unless they stack.
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Old 03-19-2019, 10:18 PM   #5
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

One issue I have with Realm Magic is how what a Level in a Realm can do depends on how many Levels you choose to define, but how much it costs and how long it takes only depends on your level. This means that if you only define three levels so that creating damaging effects becomes possible at level 2, you're talking about 4 energy and 3 seconds; but if you define six levels and say that direct attacks become possible at level 3, you're talking about 6 energy and 4 seconds for the exact same thing.

And it's not really offset by the CP-per-Level: the difference we see above is because we're comparing a 2-of-3 against a 3-of-6. Change that latter part to 4-of-6, and you have an Effect that costs twice as much and takes two seconds longer to cast to produce the same result at the same point cost.

As well, we're assuming that direct damage is level 3-of-6. What if it isn't? Moving it up or down a level alters its cost and casting time without any change in how much damage it does.

To address this, I introduce the concept of the relative level: relative level = 6×(level/maximum level). Casting time and casting cost are based off of the relative level, addressing the first issue; and your relative level also enhances the result on the same scale that margin of success uses. For damage, it takes two points of margin of success to add one die of damage (if using that approach); so every two points of relative level also adds a die of damage to the total.

I apply this before applying energy cost, difficulty penalty, or margin of success, and independent of those factors: for energy cost, this means that the basic energy cost gives you two dice of damage at a relative level of 2, and three dice of damage at a relative level of 4; doubling the energy cost doubles the number of dice you get; tripling it triples the number of dice; and so on. So instead of 6 or 8 energy for 1 die of damage, we're talking about 6 energy for 2d(+2?)* or 8 energy for 3d. Those are more reasonable numbers, IMHO.

* The business of the “+2?” comes from me interpolating halfway between 2d (level 2) and 3d (level 4). That is, the “+2” is a stand-in for “½d”. So doubling 2d+2 doesn't give you 4d+4, it gives you 5d; tripling it doesn't give you 6d+6, but rather 7d+2.
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Last edited by dataweaver; 03-19-2019 at 10:22 PM.
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Old 03-19-2019, 11:11 PM   #6
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Dataweaver, I'm glad you weighed in on this. I wanted to answer a legit question that wasn't getting much attention, but I don't have practical experience with realm magic as it seems you do. -GEF
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Old 03-19-2019, 11:42 PM   #7
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Thanks for that. I don't visit the forums regularly, and it's easy to miss a thread like this; and your response is what brought it to my attention.

To be fair, what I'm suggesting are rules hacks; in terms of working within the rules as presented in Thaumatology, this isn't going to be any help at all. That said, I'm trying to give reasons for the hacks, and not just change things willy nilly.

As an addendum to my last post: I implicitly go with the notion that every effect has a primary parameter: that one parameter, and no other, benefits from margin of success and Realm level. It might also benefit from energy cost or, less likely, skill penalty* (in which case you need to work out how the two contributing factors interact), so that the caster has some means of choosing to enhance the parameter further.

If you think the above is too powerful for a given effect, you can tone down the benefit granted be the Realm Level by saying that only levels above the one where the Effect first becomes possible count. That said, that approach would put us right back to square one where damage is concerned; so I'm inclined to stick with what I originally proposed for damage, even if I use “excess levels” for everything else.

* I say “less likely” because imposing a skill penalty has a negative impact on the margin of success, and thus is a less reliable way to enhance the result. In fact, because margin of success is so generous with its boost, combining the two only really stands a chance of giving you a net boost when the skill penalty has a real impact on your overall chance of success. As such, I do not recommend trying to combine the two: energy cost and margin of success, sure; but not skill penalty and margin of success.
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Last edited by dataweaver; 03-20-2019 at 12:29 AM.
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Old 03-20-2019, 12:00 AM   #8
Gef
 
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Quote:
Originally Posted by dataweaver View Post
To be fair, what I'm suggesting are rules hacks
I wouldn't say that in a deprecating way. GURPS has multiple magic systems, but they're not created equal. The standard system is plug-and-play but endlessly tweakable; the path system is assembly-required because it depends on campaign-specific details on spirits; and the realm system is a conceptual framework for a true do-it-yourselfer. You are by definition a rules-hacker if you use it.
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Old 03-20-2019, 05:22 AM   #9
Anaraxes
 
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

Quote:
Originally Posted by FeiLin View Post
Having some spells that drain energy quickly and another one to regain it is kinda counterintuitive to me
Recover Energy isn't really a spell, at least in my mind. It's a skill most mages learn along with their esoteric art, to better tap into the surrounding mana and draw it into themselves. It's listed among all the other spells in the book, certainly, but spells are skills, and it'd work the same way if you just broke it out into an intro section about skills for mages. Whether or not a "skill that lets you manipulate mana" is a "spell" is one of this bits of semantics that the magical philosophers probably spend a lot of time arguing about in their academies. (And boy do some of those arguments get vicious. The stakes are so small, after all...)

It could of course be a spell if you liked, as still be at least as sensible as any other magic. Clearly spells tap into far more energy than the couple of FP the mage himself is providing. If you can pull energy from somewhere and make 9d Explosive Fireballs or change the weather for miles around, or pull energy to instantly regrow tissue, then there's no reason you can't pull some of that energy and put it back into your own body. That would only be done if you can pull more energy than it costs to control it -- which is why there's no net cost for Recover Energy, only the net benefit -- but that's routinely done in most spells.

"Counterintuitive" is of course a question separate from whether or not you want that ability in a game.
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Old 03-20-2019, 09:00 AM   #10
ericthered
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Default Re: Realm magic power level?

I'm fond of Realm magic, but as I look over what I've done, I realize that I've never used the proper casting costs. I've used it as an alternate price for standard magic, I've used casting costs that must come from outside of the mage, and I've floated games in which the FP cost is ignored.

When I look at this, I notice a few things:

Realm magic doesn't make momentary spells cheaper. So comparing a fireball to a fireball may comparing one system's strength to another system's weakness.

Ritual Path magic costs are very much a refinement of realm magic costs. RPM has a clause differentiating between internal and external damage, and tripling external damage.

And the costs for realm magic do seem just a touch high to me.
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