Ritual Path Magic feedback for my campaign

[Ghosts.N.Stuff]

Hi everyone, long time lurker here.

I'm currently trying to come up with magic system I'd like in the setting I'm building up and looking for kind people to help me or give me any feedback. RPM is frankly awesome and from what I read so far (which isn't much), comes very close to what I'd want, but I'd also want to keep the "blaster" mage feel of standard magic to certain degree. Firstly, let me apologize (especially to PK and Ghostdancer) if what I do will be considered murder/complete misunderstanding of RPM rules or even GURPS ^^.

So far, I got this:

Ritual Adept includes Time lvl2 and place (connection removal is not available) and is limited to 1 Path only, max 1 Ritual Adept (effectively 1 path) per character. Now, I have also decided to alter the energy gathering.

To remain combat useful I will need one second gatherings, but with different modifiers to make it easier. This is first place I'm not sure how exactly/much I would break it:
No penalty seems over the top, so I was thinking - instead of having -4 for every second you take away, you would be at +0 (1st gathering), -1(2nd),...,-4(5th) or just pass and make the mods steeper (as in default) if it would feel too much.

I have split the effect, so you can use Ritual Adept (and gathering rules above) for casting lesser effects only.

So, if you would want to cast a spell that goes over your Mana Reserve, but is still Lesser, you could take up to 5 seconds to try and gather energy for it, but if it would be greater, you would follow non-adept casting (though it would be much faster to prepare the ritual if you are Adept in the Path).

Another thing to consider - For bit more simplicity, mainly for reduction of number of rolls I was thinking to allow player say "I'm casting X and taking 3 seconds to gather energy" and then let them roll once after 3 turns and just multiplying the margin by 3. Would this be a good idea? It feels it might generate overall less energy or more "all or nothing" deal.

Concerning Greater effects. The only way to cast them as fast as lesser ones, would be to accept Tally - (simulating that it is some sort of taping inside a reserve magic permanating the world or something in that matter) and would be used only in desperation. That is the Threshold magic tally from THAUM.p.77. It would be as in the book default 30/-8 per day, with magery raising only the cap.

So in an example, you would have 15 Mana Reserve, would want to nearly instantly cast greater spell for 75 energy, you would be at 75-15= 60 - 30(Tally limit) gets you 30 pts over tally, which is +6 in following calamity roll (which would be done even if the spell fails)

Of course this could mean that some dumbass blows up the world or make large parts of it completely barren... I could see limiting it to some Unusual background or other advantage.

So..I am trying to hammer a cube into a too small circular hole wishing too much? Or is it a reasonable solution?

I also have some additional questions concerning spell creation I came up with during trying to do examples for myself, if you wouldn't mind me asking more :).

[starslayer]

The charm pool does allow effective blaster mages. Almost all rpm mages in the games I have played in devote ~25% of there charms to direct damage spells. If you want to further encourage that...

I would not alter the time periods that carrying take place in our anything else, I would focus on how charms work and enable additional optional rules.

1. Allow stacked charms (where one item can contain multiple copies of the same charm) only for direct damage spells (for extra flavour say they can only be wands and staffs or guns, or silver gauntlets)

2. Increase the threshold for a lesser effect for direct damage (do not remove it) to about 2x what the highest mundane damage source is. [I personally don't think this option is required]

3. Allow, and encourage, the increased charm pool perk. (More charms means that casters will be more willing to dedicate direct damage charms)

4. Allow and encourage rpm alchemy as a seperate charm pool [potions are a more traditional way to buff and heal, so it generally resonates with players to use help ally potions and hurt enemy charms]

5. Be sure to point out, encourage, and allow spell synergies based on triggering conditions. [Lesser sense body (detect when you are inside flesh)+ 7d explosive damage on a rock /w charm greater control matter (7d(10) small piercing damage, +5 to the throw roll) == 21d of armour ignoring internal explosion damage on targets for two charm slots

[starslayer]

Looking over your request and trading your suggestions in detail, I am having trouble lining up your stated goal (encouraging blaster mages) with your rules, which seem to be designed to significantly castrate rpm capability and make casting take a lot longer, and be more specific in targets.

[Kalzazz]

I play using mostly vanilla RPM, but which allows good use of blaster mages

1. Love the rules for 'does not have to be thrown' attack spells
2. Allow 'Fast Draw' charm skill
3. Allow attribute substitution perk to run Innate Attack off of IQ (one of the things which most annoys me is making a random DX skill vital for mages)
4. Allow heavy use of quick and dirty charms . . . . this among other things let's people guesstimate the chance of their spells blowing up in their faces
5. The idea of rolling 30 times for 30 charms all at once and dealing with the issues of them blowing up in 'downtime' annoys me, so house rule is that charms exist in a potential state until activated. At time of activating then you roll, and if it botches it does it then
6. RPMists want luck
7. Innate Attack Spell exists, it is for doing Innate Attacks with . . . . spells. That alleviates the annoyance of needing a slew if attack types to just fling spells, and avoids the irritation of figuring out what category odd spells fit into, or mages where every single attack spell they make is shoehorned into a single attack type

[Emerald Cat]

While it is possible to cast spells on the fly, RPM is largely a preparation based casting system. Preparing offensive spells in advance allows mages to be effective in combat. So there aren't many changes you need to make to the system to achieve this effect.

If you want mages to be able to whip out spells in a second or two, Sorcery may be a better fit. Basically, Sorcery is a magic as powers system where each spell is an advantage with modifiers to flavor them as spells. Sorcery is a lot simpler than RPM, so I would recommend using that system if you have a lot of first time players.

Originally Posted by Ghosts.N.Stuff

Another thing to consider - For bit more simplicity, mainly for reduction of number of rolls I was thinking to allow player say "I'm casting X and taking 3 seconds to gather energy" and then let them roll once after 3 turns and just multiplying the margin by 3. Would this be a good idea? It feels it might generate overall less energy or more "all or nothing" deal.

Try the "Quick-and-Dirty Rituals and Charms" rules on p. 26 of RPM.

[Ghosts.N.Stuff]

Thanks for the replies!

starslayer: Admittedly I didn't get around charms that much, because from first glance since they seemed to kinda acomplish with what I meant for alchemy (brew fire bombs, healing potions etc.), but I gotta consult my players as well eventually. It is good idea to keep it simpler like you suggested.

Your points are helpful, especially about the trigger effects. Though I don't think my players would enjoy magic being so strong :).

I understand. It was meant to encourage lesser spells cast on the fly (spasm, 1d/2d fireball..) while at the same time keep greater effects (like +5d spells) gated behind rituals, so they would take more time and couldn't be combat casted as simply - you would need to set up your ritual circle, collect energy etc. OR if you need to cast it right now, you could use Tally and face calamity rolls. I think I tried to exclude charms, mainly because I wasn't sure how to do around with storing greater effects. Because then, everyone would just make those.

I went for flavour like this: you want to cast few small fireballs or lesser mind control spells, fine - you could do so more or less on the fly and accumulate energy in combat time. You want to call down lightning storm for that sweet 9d damage? you need to set up your place for the ritual and take the time. edit.: So while you could casts weak spells more casually, the more powerful spells would be very limited, since it seems with charms and conditional rituals, the power of the spells would be enourmous, way over what I intend for the campaign power level.


Emerald Cat: Thanks, I will go over it. I wasn't sure about Sorcery. I thought it is just expanded magic as powers, without any improvisation. Though from checking the preview, it doesn't seem to be the case.
Thanks for the suggestion, I'll check it out if it wouldn't be better fit.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Looks good. Starslayer pretty much said what I would've.