Magic and a possible fix

[kilgs]

Hola,

Been daydreaming about this game since I found it 4yrs ago. The only thing that bugs me is that the Magic system is not worth the investment. So I've been kicking around with some systems and I think I found one that works for it...

O.L.D. Fantasy RPG (WOIN System by EN Publishing)

It's a wide-open system that allows you to build spells on the fly. Just need to come up with a conversion for damage/effects, add some Feats to aid it and need to figure out how to calculate Magic Points.

If you're looking for the same thing, a magic system with a bit more flexibility and options, I recommend checking it out.

[Divergent Reality]

Good to hear we have a volunteer for a rewrite!

What, in your opinion, makes the magic not worth the investment?

[Amanojyaku]

And why do I have the feeling it's a knee jerk "risk = bad"?

Let me clarify straight away: I like how magic works in this game. You can't just arbitrarily declare something happens and tell everyone else to deal with it. There is a chance of failure, there is a chance for chaos and mayhem beyond what your caster may have intended.

And, to be blunt, cribbing from Warhammer feels a lot more fitting for roll-keep resolution than does spell points.

That said, building spells on the fly does feel like something that something could make use of here. If, y'know, Third's metamagic feats hadn't been eaten by exaltations.

[GuardianTempest]

WOIN? I didn't think someone else would know about it. I have all the PDFs!

[telok]

The risks of the current system are really very manageable. Just rolling 3 more dice than you keep (or 2 more and the chance to reroll one die) keeps your risks on any one roll quite low. For example 6k4 outputs a 20+ result 75% of the time with only about 1.58% requiring you to keep a 10.

My group played a year long campaign and our "that guy", who just couldn't bother with the Tested feat or fettered casting and kept overcasting because he thought it was the only way to succeed at 3rd+ level spells, only managed to kill himself twice.

[ScrapyardDragon]

Thats not how it works. You ALWAYS keep the highest die. it isn't optional. Ergo you keep the exploded die and cause phenomena. If you don't want phenomena, cast fettered.

[telok]

Ah, I see, p.8 "keep the highest" in the dice explanation. I read p.150 on unfettered casting "if the sorcerer keeps" as the 'if' clause allows for choice.

That would increase a 6d caster to 46.8% warps and an overall 3% chance of the lost or destroyed results per unfettered cast. Then the DFAs on p.353 have a fettered 40% chance to cast their 3rd level spell or unfettered 57% warp chance.

[ScrapyardDragon]

In fairness, the ability to successfully cast high level spells *safely* is SUPPOSED to be difficult. Of course, the easy fix is to remember that even a +1 to your casting characteristic is a substantial increase to your success rate, plus you have things like the class completion bonuses from magic user & arcane knight that give you a static bonus to your focus power rolls, and if you'd rather cast unfettered you have tools like implement focus to reroll an explosion if you aren't in the mood for phenomena. There is also spell might, which trades some rolled dice for a static bonus, which is both a statistical bonus since higher rolled dice have diminishing returns if you don't also bump up your kept dice, while also reducing the odds you roll a 10. Keep in mind that spell might doesn't say "successful" focus power, it only says final result, so it CAN turn a 14 into a 24, thus allowing you to successfully cast a TN15 or 20 spell.

Magic is a powerful thing, but you have to choose between being able to cast something SAFELY, or having good odds of casting it at all. Its all a balancing act and game of risk assessment, and if you're truly paranoid about perils, you can always make an atlantean for the ability to reroll phenomena, get a wraithbone heart at chargen to reduce the odds of accidently deleting yourself, go do a peasant dip to grab luck to reroll a phenomena once per day (this is a good move regardless since it lets you get all 4 of the casting characteristics available to you in free study, notable when magic user doesn't get charisma, which is something a pure-mage build will want a lot of for spamming evocation in combat), or some combination of the three.

Even then, most phenomena aren't THAT bad. Some can even end up helping you. Its still risky, since there's always that small chance of a warp vacation, and there ARE a good amount that WILL mess you up besides them, but making the walls ooze blood isn't going to immediately screw you over...usually.

[telok]

Yeah, I know the mitigation. Its just that all of us in out group that actually read the book (three or four, I know minimum 3 who just looked at class-feat-equipment) read p.150 as getting to choose which dice to keep. This was the first time I've run across the idea of not getting to choose which dice to keep.

[Lestat]

The design of DtD goes against being forced to keep certain dice. Not only do you not need to in L5R where the dice system comes from, but while warp perils comes from Warhammer, a setting where you're supposed to eat shit and die with no say, DtD sides for player power and rule of cool whenever possible. It also would mean you can't hold back your force on a Strength/damage roll, or have any degree of control. The original system for warp phenomena was exactly changed so the player could have more control of the situation: originally it was simply if you roll doubles on your dice which was punishing for players who had more and more dice. Maybe thematic for Warhammer where we laugh at psykers heads popping, but DtD also needs to represent ancient wizards, and sorcerers with its rules. The example in the front of the book is both the most explicit place anything about the rules of keeping is said, but at the same time it is also just an example, something spun to help new players without overloading them with syntax and explanations of why you would ever want to keep worse dice.

And while the book is full of wording and rules containing "if" you keep, it never tells you if its a choice. But it was always meant to be: the psychics rules were changed just to add such a choice for the players to make for themselves:
lawfulnice.blogspot.com/2011/04/dungeons-dragoning-12.html

Apr 8, 2011 17:58:00 GMT -6 @LawfulNice said:

Psychic Phenomena now occurs when keeping exploded dice on an Unfettered test instead of when rolling doubles, thus making it less punishing to high-stat casters but also making the choice of risking Phenomena an actual choice.