[Circle of Hands] Playtest: venture 2, the funeral

[Moreno R.]

Hi!

Our playtest of CoH by G+ hangout had the second venture this evening. I was not the GM this time (we decided to rotate on that role, to try the game from different pow)

The players were the same ones as last week: Me, Mauro and Alessandro (the GM). We agreed at the beginning to play with these rules but at the end they were not used very much (the only fight was short, 3 clash between 2 characters). The "retiring for repairs" of the spell "link" had a much bigger impact, because it changed my strategy.

The character were:

Player: Moreno (me)
Character: Ludwig, Baron Hartmann (from Rolke)

Brawn: 7
Quickness: 7
Wits: 6
Charm: 6

Brave: Retreat is not the first option
Brutal: at home with physical and emotional pain
Profession Martial (High) and a Wizard
Social class: Gentry
Sex: male

Demeanor Blunt – not vicious or insulting, merely lacking in graces
Feature Emblem – A family emblem (a drawn sword) sewn side by side to the circle emblem. The Hartmann family is (in)famous as a lineage of Black Wizards Barons in the southern part of Rolke.

Armor and weapons: As gentry with martial (high), Ludwig is already skilled (on foot or mounted) with the spear, sword, and bow; he is armored with the kite shield, mail including a gambeson, and spangenhelm; and like everyone he has a personal knife. He doesn't carry around all this stuff personally, but rather chooses whatever he likes from this list at any given point.

Key Event:
Ludwig is looking in horror as his father, the Baron, the Wizard, is using a Rbaja spell to summon a Yoggoth, powered by the ritual sacrifice of his last servants, to strike back at the new king's army that is attacking their fortress (laying waste to the entire territory at the same time). Ludwig has been ordered to bring the first sacrifice, a tied and crying very young maid, to the altar above the blood bowl. He brings his knife on his father's back, instead, then he breaks the summoning symbol, and run to the walls to order the guards to raise the white flag.


Player: Mauro
Character: Heddy Badger from Rolke (this character was created by Alessandro)

Brawn 6
Quickness 8
Wits 3
Charm 9

Sex: female
TRAITS: Brave, Romantic
PROFESSIONS: Outdoorsman (Freeman)

MAGIC: Healing (1w), Perfect Senses (1w) Confuse (1b)

DETAILS: Fierce, Facial Scar

ARMOR AND WEAPONS: Sling, Bow, Hand Axe. Mail, Cone helmet, Buckler, Parma

KEY EVENT  (it was in Italian, sorry, it would take too much time to translate it, you can find it in Italian here

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The information about the venture:

The venture is in Famberge. Rolf "the Red", a baron of a barony that borders both with Rolke and with Tamaryon is dead. The Widow declared that the neighboring gentry that would come to pay the last respect to the deceased will have safe passage, no matter if they were enemies (in practice... everybody was their enemies, Rolf was a robber baron that sacked all the neighboring baronies for years, taking advantage of having his fortress (a wooden fort) in a mountain so steep to make a direct assault too costly.
This is an opportunity for Rolke to take advantage of this death, in some way.
------------------

Now, I start with the sticky part: during the game we used really, really a lot of time casting the same spells again and again in the morning and in the night. In this adventure, being rather short, it was not so much of a nuisance for me (but keep in mind that I have a lot of patience for power-up if they are effective), but I can see it becoming boring very fast, seeing that they will probably be the same day after day, adventure after adventure, forever...This is a point of the game that need some tuning

Anyway, we started the game declaring to have cast, in the morning, from the day we entered Famberge, the following spells:

- Heddy:
2 perfect senses, on her and Ludwig  (2 white points each time)

- Ludwig: 
warding (type of alarm: psychic)  [question: does the warding expire after alerting of a danger, or does it continue to work, on multiple dangers, until the dawn/dusk?)]
Righteousness (on the sword) [question: how does the "free" Absorb Spell work on the sword, in practice?] 
Bless (p, r). (on Brawn)
The last spell changed: the first day (in the forest) I did cast summon beast 1 (a Hawk), when we arrived in the barony I did cast another Warding on Heddy
- Total: 7 white points. 

I wanted to cast 10 points (with another Righteousness on the mail), but we remembered (or at least the GM did) about you telling once that a Wizard could not cast these kinds of "every morning" spells for a number of points bigger than his Brawn.  I have no idea why, not having still seen the updated rules about this, but we decided to limit it to Brawn anyway

Cutting away the first part of the adventure, that was us meeting meeting people and exploring the village, the situation was this: with Rolf's death, the new baron in line of succession would be his first son, Bertold, 20 years old, a placid man not much able with swords, that was scared of the return of his mad, bloodthirsty brother, Lothar,  for the funeral the next day. He feared that his brother would challenge him to a duel, that he could not refuse, and kill him.

Ludwig weighted for a while the two options: ally with the weak baron, or with the violent brothers. Deciding that he trusted a lot more a more pacific baron, he inquired if he could fight the duel in the baron's stead the day of the funeral, but that was not the case: a blood duel had to be fought in person by the challenged, he could not send a champion.

But that was not the only way to fight in the place of the Baron: asking for a private talk with Bertold, Ludwig asked him if he wanted to live, even if using black magic. The Baron said yes, so Ludwig offered to take his place, his face, his voice, to combat in the duel in the baron's place (the black spell "Sembiance"). In exchange, he did ask a very strict alliance, with a stop to raids into Rolke and exclusive rights for Rolke to the iron minerals extracted by a nearby mine.

[during this conversation there were 2 charm roll: the first one from Ludwig to get the new baron to trust him with his problems and the arrival of the brothers, the second one was made both by Ludwig and Badger to convince him that they could indeed save him and kill his brother. Ludwig failed, but Badger (in an helper role, with the "it's enough that even one of you make the roll" condition) did convince the baron.]

The Baron agreed, but the next day, before the funeral (and after the arrival of the brother), two new visitors arrived: a "priest" from Tamaryon, with a "gift" for the new baron, a very beautiful girl that had (he said) "magic curative powers"

The Two Knight and the priest talked a little. For the Wizard Ludwig it was clear the the priest had white spells active over him (question:the GM didn't say the names of the spells, it's not clear from the draft if a wizard would get that information, too, without seeing the spell during the casting)). A few minutes later talking with Heddy the "priest" in practice admitted what we had already deducted, that he was really a White Wizard, and that he has seen out spells, too. But up until that moment we had cast only white spells in the entire venture, and not seeing any black magic, the "priest" said that we were not enemy and we could reach an accord, instead.

During the conversation between the white wizard and Heddy, Ludwig was inside his tent, with his entourage keeping people away saying that he was resting. He was intent into casting even more spells: he did cast Righteousness over his armor too, and he did cast "Magic Blank" on himself, too (and "Bless" that he still had no time to cast in the morning, needing two hours)

-----------
Some questions about these spells:
1) How does Bless work if cast right before other spells? I mean, if I cast bless when I am at full B, and I get 3 point of B more, and then I cast another spell for 2 points, and then I rest a while... I get the 2 points back, or that happen only if I am under the normal B score of the character?
2) How does Magic Blank work? You cast it on a person, not a spell... so if I cast spell on that persona AFTER the magic blank, these new spells are hidden, too, or not?
3) A wizard know if you cast spells in a area. Even if you have cast Magic Blank before? If the wizard has "perfect senses", does he notice the spell even outside his line of sight, or using perfect senses to overcome Magic Blank require a line of sight?
4) Not about a spell, but about a tally item: "Bestow instant recovery as per three meals and a night's rest" means total recovery of all the B used in casting spells, too? Can you cast it on yourself?
---------------

In any case: at the end Ludwig exchanged places with the baron, casting "semblance" two times (once to himself to look like Bertold, and one to Badger to look like himself - his absence from the funeral would have been noticed. And he did cast Magic Blank on her too), and went to the funeral, in a "holy" hill nearby

Total spells working on Ludwig at the time:
2 Righteousness (sword and armor) (2x3 points)
1 Bless (1d6 bonus B, rolled a 5, Ludwig's B goes to 11) (2 points)
1 Warding (1 point)
1 Perfect Senses (1 point)
1 Magic Blank (1 point)
1 Semblance (1 point)
He has two tally items too:
- Bestow instant recovery as per three meals and a night's rest  (no other effect)
- C rolls may be made vs. groups  (this arrived with "Voice becomes two-toned when raised or emphatic")

During the funeral, it's Ludwig/Bertold to challenge Lothar to combat (they are both in ceremonial garb - armed and armored, as a sign of respect for the dead warrior), not the other way around. Lothar accept and insult the "weak arms" of his foe.

As a reply Ludwig throw a spear at him, saying "does this arm look weak to you?"

[question: at this moment, Ludwig is throwing a spear at Lothar. lothat has a spear too, but he is CLEARLY not throwing it, keeping it at his front running towards Ludwig. Now, this is a clash or not? We debated the issue ("it's not a clash, he is attacking at a distance someone who is not throwing anything back, it's a roll against 12", "the target can throw the spear, too, if he does not is simply a total defense in a clash") and ant the end we provisionally declared it a clash. Who was right?

1st CLASH, Ludwig's action, Ludwig has the advantage, Lothar goes to total defense, Ludwig to total attack (i already did know that Lothar was not attacking, one reason to consider this not a clash... but anyway it didn't matter, nobody did hit anything), the total for the spear attack is high, 24, but it doesn't beat lothar's 25, Lothar deflect the lance with the shield.  For the next action, Ludwig draw the sword and attack, Lothar had already declared an attack with the spear (not thrown)

2nd CLASH, Lothar's action, he suck Ludwig in a clash, attacking with the spear. He has the advantage of a longer reach.  Ludwig goes to full defense. ludwig's defense beat Lothar's roll, that miss.

3rd CLASH: Ludwig's turn. Ludwig is inside the reach of Lothar's spear and he attack with the sword, he has the advantage, going to FULL OFFENSE (and trusting all the magic he wear to protect him from harm), Lothar goes 6 defense / 10 offense trying to hit ludwig with the shield.  [questions: Lothar has to declare if he attack with the a bash or with a slash? How does the "falling down" work, he does have to pass the armor or only to hit the foe? ]
I roll 3d6 for a total of 11, plus 14 for the full attack, +1 because he is using a sword,  total 26. Lothar rolls a 9, plus 6 defense, 15, it's not enough, the damage is 11 (the 26-15) plus Brawn (11) + the magic bonus damage on the sword (I roll a 6) total 28BQ damage. Minus lothar's 13 point armor, 15BQ damage, lothar is down (0 in both B and Q), I decide that the blow killed him immediately
(we calculated Lothar's shield attack, too, but it didn't pass ludwig's armor)

ludwig/Bertold is acclamed by all the people around, and with an excuse he and Badger go back to the house where the real Bertold is hidden, but they find the white wizard outside. He let them enter and inside the real Bertold is on the bed (or what passes for a bed here) with the "gift" of the wizard, the girl. They clearly have had sex. The girl is surprised to see two Bertold. Ludwig ponders for a while the choice to kill the girl, the baron, or both, but at the end he decides to simply drop the disguise in front of the girl, and say to the Baron that this was only an example of the advantages of having Rilke as a an ally... and that he now expect the Baron to keep his word, too.

At the end, it's a draw between the White Wizard and the Knights. Everybody has gotten what they wanted, the knights have got a treaty, peace and mining rights, the Wizard has put one of his agents in the bed of the Baron. Nobody wants to risk a open battle now, so they both depart toward their respective nation.

other questions
- to drop the magical disguise, the caster has to dispel his own magig in some ways, or he can drop it at will?
- can "semblance" hid even the collateral effect from tallies, like the two-tone voice?

[Moreno R.]

Ah, I did forget to post the upgraded characters!

Ludwig did improve B, Q, and C:

Character: Ludwig, Baron Hartmann (from Rolke)

Brawn: 8
Quickness: 8
Wits: 6
Charm: 7

Brave: Retreat is not the first option
Brutal: at home with physical and emotional pain
Profession Martial (High) and a Wizard
Social class: Gentry
Sex: male

Demeanor Blunt – not vicious or insulting, merely lacking in graces
Feature Emblem – A family emblem (a drawn sword) sewn side by side to the circle emblem. The Hartmann family is (in)famous as a lineage of Black Wizards Barons in the southern part of Rolke.

Armor and weapons: As gentry with martial (high), Ludwig is already skilled (on foot or mounted) with the spear, sword, and bow; he is armored with the kite shield, mail including a gambeson, and spangenhelm; and like everyone he has a personal knife. He doesn't carry around all this stuff personally, but rather chooses whatever he likes from this list at any given point.

Key Event:
Ludwig is looking in horror as his father, the Baron, the Wizard, is using a Rbaja spell to summon a Yoggoth, powered by the ritual sacrifice of his last servants, to strike back at the new king's army that is attacking their fortress (laying waste to the entire territory at the same time). Ludwig has been ordered to bring the first sacrifice, a tied and crying very young maid, to the altar above the blood bowl. He brings his knife on his father's back, instead, then he breaks the summoning symbol, and run to the walls to order the guards to raise the white flag.

Color Points: 2 white

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Badger improved W and C

Character: Heddy Badger from Rolke (this character was created by Alessandro)

Brawn 6
Quickness 8
Wits 4
Charm 10

Sex: female
TRAITS: Brave, Romantic
PROFESSIONS: Outdoorsman (Freeman)

MAGIC: Healing (1w), Perfect Senses (1w) Confuse (1b)

DETAILS: Fierce, Facial Scar

ARMOR AND WEAPONS: Sling, Bow, Hand Axe. Mail, Cone helmet, Buckler, Parma

[Ron Edwards]

... during the game we used really, really a lot of time casting the same spells again and again in the morning and in the night. In this adventure, being rather short, it was not so much of a nuisance for me (but keep in mind that I have a lot of patience for power-up if they are effective), but I can see it becoming boring very fast, seeing that they will probably be the same day after day, adventure after adventure, forever...This is a point of the game that need some tuning

Possible solution: not to permit B to return until a spell's duration is over, and after the scene is over. So instant spells would return soon, but not during the scene in which they're cast; but prolonged spells are going to keep their B deficit in place.

Problem: ass book-keeping.

Alternate solution: assassinate all role-players inclined to use the mechanics in this fashion.

Problem: morals, ethics, logistics, possible legal retribution unless the jury is composed of game designers.

[question: does the warding expire after alerting of a danger, or does it continue to work, on multiple dangers, until the dawn/dusk?)]

It's intended to function in the latter fashion - it works until the duration is over, whether it warns of one danger, fifty, or none.

Righteousness (on the sword) [question: how does the "free" Absorb Spell work on the sword, in practice?] 

The idea was to consider any spell of 2 B or less cast toward the holder of the sword to be ineffective, and the sword-wielder gained 1 or 2 B depending on the spell. The caster can pump B to override the Absorb, and the sword-wielder can counter-pump to maintain it (this bidding war occurs before the absorption, so the spell is not working against its own B). The Absorb spell is badly written, though, and is under revision.

For the Wizard Ludwig it was clear the the priest had white spells active over him (question:the GM didn't say the names of the spells, it's not clear from the draft if a wizard would get that information, too, without seeing the spell during the casting)).

A wizard can sense the presence of prolonged spells and enchantments, and their color, but I think identifying such spells requires a W vs. 12 roll.

1) How does Bless work if cast right before other spells? I mean, if I cast bless when I am at full B, and I get 3 point of B more, and then I cast another spell for 2 points, and then I rest a while... I get the 2 points back, or that happen only if I am under the normal B score of the character?

The latter. If spent in this fashion, or pumped to strengthen a spell, or pumped to jump ahead in the order of action, the B from Bless does not come back.

2) How does Magic Blank work? You cast it on a person, not a spell... so if I cast spell on that persona AFTER the magic blank, these new spells are hidden, too, or not?

The Magic Blank is a persistent effect, so yes, if it's operating, new spells cast upon the person will be blanked too.

3) A wizard know if you cast spells in a area. Even if you have cast Magic Blank before?

Magic Blank stops the wizard's senses regarding the affected person.

If the wizard has "perfect senses", does he notice the spell even outside his line of sight, or using perfect senses to overcome Magic Blank require a line of sight?

As written, Perfect Senses would require a line of sight, but I hate the way it's written and am going to separate this spell from the wizard's senses entirely, so that Perfect Senses has nothing to do with wizard senses.

4) Not about a spell, but about a tally item: "Bestow instant recovery as per three meals and a night's rest" means total recovery of all the B used in casting spells, too? Can you cast it on yourself?

It does mean total recovery of the B used in casting spells. You cannot cast it on yourself.

question: at this moment, Ludwig is throwing a spear at Lothar. lothat has a spear too, but he is CLEARLY not throwing it, keeping it at his front running towards Ludwig. Now, this is a clash or not? We debated the issue ("it's not a clash, he is attacking at a distance someone who is not throwing anything back, it's a roll against 12", "the target can throw the spear, too, if he does not is simply a total defense in a clash") and ant the end we provisionally declared it a clash. Who was right?

I'm inclined to say that it's not a clash, but that the Q vs. 12 roll would have been limited to a single die - the target is in his home territory, doing things he's familiar with, hostile, and definitely not about to be taken by surprise.

... trying to hit ludwig with the shield.  [questions: Lothar has to declare if he attack with the a bash or with a slash? How does the "falling down" work, he does have to pass the armor or only to hit the foe?]

The attack needs to be narrated enough so we can all understand what the character is doing, so yes, a bash or a slash should be stated. To knock the foe down, he has to inflict real damage - getting past the armor.

- to drop the magical disguise, the caster has to dispel his own magig in some ways, or he can drop it at will?

I think the target (not the caster, if they're different) can suppress the Semblance, but not cancel it - it will return and persist in this way until its duration is over. I even think that suppressing it like this should cost a point of B.

- can "semblance" hid even the collateral effect from tallies, like the two-tone voice?

Yes. It's a complete disguise.

Regarding the character upgrades, I've revised the rules to be more restrictive: you choose one and only one attribute you're trying to raise, and if it fails, you get no other chances.

[Moreno R.]

... during the game we used really, really a lot of time casting the same spells again and again in the morning and in the night. In this adventure, being rather short, it was not so much of a nuisance for me (but keep in mind that I have a lot of patience for power-up if they are effective), but I can see it becoming boring very fast, seeing that they will probably be the same day after day, adventure after adventure, forever...This is a point of the game that need some tuning

Possible solution: not to permit B to return until a spell's duration is over, and after the scene is over. So instant spells would return soon, but not during the scene in which they're cast; but prolonged spells are going to keep their B deficit in place.

Problem: ass book-keeping.

Other problem: this would make magic really weak, and would not solve the "same spell every night and every morning" problem, it would even make it worse discouraging wizards from trying new combinations.

Alternate solution: assassinate all role-players inclined to use the mechanics in this fashion.

It's a short-term solution, the game will be found by other players that will exploit the same weakness in the rules.. the long-term solution would be assassinating the game designer. No more weak rules to exploit then!

I have a even better solution, maybe. Let's review what we want (or, at least, I think you want)

Magic should be powerful, wizards should be abler to go around powered by long-duration spells, and be able to cast devastating magic quickly in a fight.

By the other hand, casting always the same long list of spell every morning and every evening is boring and repetitive.

So, I ask... why make the wizards cast that list every single time? What's the reason? Avoid infinite-duration spells? Avoid having Wizard around with 50 operating spells? If you want that, having the wizard cast all these spells is the wrong solution, you still have in practice infinite-duration spell, and they take up even more time and they generate color-point inflation...

Why not use a direct limit on the number of "maintained" spells?

Allow the Wizard a number of "ongoing" spells, that he has no need to cast again and again and again. They are always active, powered automatically by the Wizard's own life force. Maybe a number of points equal to his brawn, or his wits, I don't know... but they don't consume Brawn, these are the ones that "can be powered without tiring the Wizard".

If the Wizard want to cast one more spell, he can:
1) Cast it with the same really long ritual that is used to cast the infinite-duration spells... and he has to drop other spells to allow the new one. He can never have more that X point active at the same time.
2) Cast it short time, using short-term energy and fatiguing himself. These are the instant spells, the Creation Spells, and very short-duration (a single scene) versions of the permanent Spells, and they cost brawn to cast.

One possibility is dividing spells like this
- instant spells, always cost brawn to cast
- creation spells, alweays cost brawn to casrt
- Permanent spells, will have a short-duration version that cost brawn

But another possibility is simply having a list of rituals for "permanent" (really) spells, and move there all the spells that people would like to cast again and again every morning, but make them really permanent, and they don't even give color points!  (no color points inflation!), and have a different list of spells (that include some different version of the rituals with shorter duration) divided into "instant", "whole conflict/scene/30 minutes/something", and "day/night",

[Ron Edwards]

I continued to think about this during the night and some of it parallels Moreno's thoughts.

Possibility 1: the spent B comes back as described in the text, but one may not have more than one's basic B score committed to prolonged spells at any time.

Requires slight bookkeeping, but not too bad, certainly not as bad as things like timing the duration of each separate spell: "OK, the Bless runs out in 52 minutes, but the Envenom will stay for another four hours, and oh yeah, the Cat runs out in five minutes."

This way, one might power-up in the morning as Moreno is describing, but if a situation comes along in which some other prolonged spell is very much the right one to use, the character has to drop one of the active spells from use.

Only problems: (i) all this power-up talk runs into trouble with color point accumulation, which Moreno has addressed above (and I'm thinking about); and (ii) it still lends itself to the rather boring "put my spells on with my shoes" approach to life that Moreno has mentioned. I don't see the latter as a play-crisis, but it does bear some thinking about.

Possibility 2: A character cannot cast the same prolonged spell more than once at a time. So if you have Perfect Senses, then you cast it on yourself or someone else, but you can't cast it on anyone else while that one is going.

This way, one must strategize a bit more about the morning power-up, and it reduces the color-point buildup too. It also means practically no book-keeping beyond what's already basic knowledge at the table.

The question is whether this limitation is enough to meet the aesthetic and practical needs of play. It might!

I'm also thinking of cutting back many of the prolonged spells to instant status - especially Bless/Curse.

[Vernon R]

I know signs of either Rbaja or Amboriyon magic show up during casting but do those signs linger at all?

What I'm thinking is these characters loaded up with a half dozen spells and mostly white ones to boost abilities are going to be glowing with energy and socially that's not a good thing in this superstitious world.   Most likely they will be feared and distrusted, heck even if there is no signs of magic somebody this capable is going to appear unworldly and possibly godly (or demonic).   From the playtest we did it didnt seem like you could just achieve your goals by powering over them, if there is a social cost to overloading on magic then that could be big.

Of course this comes down to personal preference on how much magic you want active in play.  Mine is for magic to have a cost and yeah looking at that list of spells active everyday on your characters it wont be hard for them to get a tally a day, and likely end up in the clouds before long.  The other thing to consider is it's all fine and good for your characters to be loading up on magic to take on every situation but what happens when they run into an NPC mage and the GM decides to load him up similarly?  Have you created a magical cold war Moreno? Ha :)   All mages wandering around constantly stacked to the gills with active spells just ready to nuke anyone who gets in their way.

[Moreno R.]

@Vernon: this could limit spellcasting during the scenes, but for morning boosting, there is the simple spell "sembiance" that would take care of it... so the end results would be to have more spells cast in the morning, hidden for hours, and less during the action.

My (personal) perception during the playtest:

1) Having a lot of spells in action is cool. The combat system goes a long way into turning these "+d6" not into a countability, but into a increase in the sheer badassery of the PCs in the fiction.
2) Having NPC wizards use them in the same way: that would be cool, too: they should be considered dangerous enemies, they are encountered (by rules) less than half of the times and whey do the BECOME the adventure (the adventure end when they are deal with, the other component is of lesser importance), people fear them, they turn baronies into wastelands, and can cast spells that kill entire villages at once. Why should they wear normal, not boosted armor?

What is not cool at all?
- bean-counting. Having to check numbers, bonus, effect, and try to remember a lot of different numbers. Having to roll a lot of different dice and adding the together 3-4 times simply to know the damage you did.
- Boring, repetitive spellcasting. Spellcasting should something epic that is "shown" in the fiction only when the situation is dramatic.
- Color points inflation. Getting a tally should be epic, not "this is the third tally today, put it with the  rest".

Now, the problem with the system of "game balance" based on "the time you need to cast spells spells" (or memorize them like in OD&D) is that attack only the good, cool awesome parts of spellcasting, and increase the boring parts: bookkeeping, routine casting in "safe" situations, etc.

Its because of this that I proposed the other way around, with spells that DON'T HAVE to be cast every day. Now, the exact system  could be one of many, I suggested some, there are surely others, but the point is: what was boring was the serial casting in safe situation, NOT having a +d6 damage on the sword! That was epic!   
So, it's true that if you remove the convenience and utility of that +d6, making sure that nobody in the the game will want to use that spell ever, you have removed even the casting of it every morning... but you have thrown away a lot of children with the bathwater.
Worse: the bathwater will simply stay there for other children: if people can't cast every morning a +6 damage spell, they will cast a different spell. To remove that you should remove any utility of any spells for a long duration: so, make a magic system that nobody would want to use, or having only very short-duration spells.

Thinking about the "B doesn't return for the spell duration" cited by Ron, the problem is that it's still something that reduce spellcasting, not bookkeeping. If a spell is not worth the cost in B, it will simply not be cast. If it's worth it, it still will be cast every morning.

Thinking about Ludwig the Wizard Knight, he would have cast Bless every morning, and used the boosted B to cast Righteousness on the sword in any case (it's not simply a damage booster, it gives protection from magic attacks too!) and Perfect Senses, because they are worth it.  The result? Practically the same number of boring cast-in-a-safe-moment spell, but LESS use of B during the battle to cast spells, act before others, etc: practically the same of the boring, much less of the cool.

There's simply no way to make Bless not advantageous: you spend two B, and you get 1d6 B (or any other stat you like) back... and it's a ritual! So, no matter what, every knight who know that spell will pass two hours casting a ritual spell every morning and every night.
Does the way it need two hours of fictional time make it less used? No, it's still too useful. It simply increase the bookkeeping of fictional time. To reduce bookkeeping, casting spell should be EASIER, not HARDER.

So, you want to remove the boring casting of spells every morning, WITHOUT removing the exciting casting of spells later on? You don't remove the spell, you don't remove the usefulness: you remove the boring part, the "have to be cast every morning" part.

(P.S.: and some booster, like the one for armor, could be turned into a straight number, not a roll, to reduce the handling time)

[Vernon R]

I agree with a lot of what you are saying Moreno but I do see a couple problems.


The biggest thing is regarding the magic making knights pretty badass, I think they're already there.  If you have a knight with good combat abilities he can be pretty devastating in battle without any magical aid.  The playtest we ran of two knights versus a manticore and 3 peasants was a bloodbath.  One shot took down the Manticore and that same knight likely could have pumped B a few times and taken out all the opposition. With any magical aid it would have been a cake walk.  I think if the expectations in the game are the knights will be amped up with tons of magic at all times all the creatures will either have to be boosted if you want them to be any challenge or the expectation will be knights burn through them like butter. 

I think Ron's suggestion of dropping the number of prolonged spells is probably the best solution.  Make them short duration, just last instantly or until the next scene (conveniently the same time you'll have that B back) or make them permanent at the cost of a permanent reduction in B.  I guess the B cost isnt really permanent if you regain it after an adventure.

I'm going to run a couple playtests with more magic involved to test my assumption about the viability of knights with boosted spells taking on the toughest beasts.

[Vernon R]

So I followed this up with a combat playtest.  One circle Knight wizard vs one of the toughest creatures in the game a Silver Dragon. I used Gethyn's tool to create the character this is what I got.

B7 Q9 W5 C4

I quickly went through the spell lists to have him constantly boosted.  I didnt extensively hunt for the best spells so there may have been some better picks.
I gave him Shimmer, which is an awesome spell much better than the armor spell based on cost.  Rolled one dice +5 defence.
Armor, +3 armor.
Bless, this is really the most problematic one.  I rolled a 5.  Adding 5 quickness to a character makes him god-like. I would suggest halving the effect from 1-6 to 1-3, a 6 point swing to an attribute is huge.
Grow, +2b. 

So now the Wizards stats are

B9 Q14 W5 C4

He is fully armored so Mail, Parma, Spangenhelm, Sword, Spear.

His armor is 13 plus 3 for the Armor spell gives him 16 and he's getting a bonus 5 points to defence for the shimmer spell which is effectively the same as adding to armor so 21 points he has to over come.  Right away I see that's a problem for the B9 Q9 A9 dragon.  If he doesnt have advantage and is only rolling 2 dice the Dragon cant affect the wizard in straight combat unless he goes heavier on offence then on defence and the knight outshines him there.

When I ran the fight the first thing I had the knight do was throw his spear.  I decide not to have it breathe fire back since I wasnt sure how that would work, does it turn into a clash?  I think so but the effect is the dazzle spell right?  In any case I ignored it for this test and let the knight throw the spear more as a test of the mechanics.
Q vs 12 starting at 14, rolled a 7 so 21.  That's 9 points difference add the 9 brawn, take away the 9 armor and the dragon is taking 9 damage.  That drops the Dragon to the end of the Q so the Knight walks over and chops his head off.

I could have had the dragon pre-cast shimmer but that's the only spell that could really boosted it's abilities that it had access to it might have made the battle last a little longer but really this dragon has little to no chance against the Wizard Knight.

I could also have had the Dragon pump B to take initiative but saw it as futile, the knight would just counter by pumping B to retake initiative.  Now if the knight was still down the B from casting all those spells ahead of time it might have made a difference.  He wouldnt want to use up any more B and couldnt keep pace with the dragon.

[Moreno R.]

Hi!

I will list some problems with this example, I don't think that it reflect something that can happen in real play. But before doing that I want to say that I agree that many beasts, monsters, etc are not so tough as it would seems from the description (see for example the battle with the wyrm in my first playtest). But not so much as it would seems from this example.

So I followed this up with a combat playtest.  One circle Knight wizard vs one of the toughest creatures in the game a Silver Dragon.

In a true venture, the Silver Dragon would not be toughest opponent. There is, always, a human character with better traits than the PCs (same number of total points, but better distributed). In a lot of adventures he will be a wizard, too.  Looking at the list of components for ventures, it's more probable that the Silver Dragon is with a white wizard (from the start of the venture as a different component, or because the wizard just summoned it in the first place)

I quickly went through the spell lists to have him constantly boosted.  I didnt extensively hunt for the best spells so there may have been some better picks.

I went to the same list to choose the spells for the Wizard Knight I played Thursday. I will write the reasons why I didn't choose some of the ones you list

I gave him Shimmer, which is an awesome spell much better than the armor spell based on cost.  Rolled one dice +5 defence.

Shimmer would turn the knight into a walking disco ball. Even if the effects would not be so noticeable as I am thinking now (but to give a +5 defense it has to be A LOT of shimmer...) to cast it in the morning would be catastrophic for all the social interactions, and would alert any opponent. It's a good spell to cast right before a battle if you don't care if you are seen sparkling, but terrible as a semi-permanent power-up.
So, in a real game situation, this spell would have lowered B by 1 as cost for the casting right before the battle.

Armor, +3 armor.
Bless, this is really the most problematic one.  I rolled a 5.  Adding 5 quickness to a character makes him god-like. I would suggest halving the effect from 1-6 to 1-3, a 6 point swing to an attribute is huge.

Armor DOES NOT sum to real armor. It's a spell to give some sort of protection to people who is wearing "garments". It's for this reason that I don't think it's too powerful at all (and it cause a shimmer, too, so it has the same problems of the Shimmer spell. By the way I don't think you can shimmer twice at the same time for double effect, so probably they don't add together

Grow, +2b. 

From the description the spell doesn't increase the armor size, and neither the weapons size. If the target doesn't have custom-made bigger weapons and has not trained in their use, I see the grow as more of a problem than an advantage. And it has the same problems I listed with Shimmer about social interactions (and with riding a horse, too). 

After perusing a lot the list of spells, I think that the best "morning power-ups" for a wizard knight, when you don't have specific informations about some menace that could make some other more specialized spell preferable, are the ones I used:  Righteousness on the sword (and the armor, if the rules allow it) and Bless (but this one is limited to a single stat). These helps a lot but surely don't turn a wizard in an unstoppable opponent.

He is fully armored so Mail, Parma, Spangenhelm, Sword, Spear.

So he discarded the garment he did cast Shimmer on, and had to cast a counter-magic spell to return to a size that allow him to wear armor? How much B he has left?

His armor is 13 plus 3 for the Armor spell gives him 16 and he's getting a bonus 5 points to defence for the shimmer spell which is effectively the same as adding to armor so 21 points he has to over come.  Right away I see that's a problem for the B9 Q9 A9 dragon.  If he doesnt have advantage and is only rolling 2 dice the Dragon cant affect the wizard in straight combat unless he goes heavier on offence then on defence and the knight outshines him there.

First, as I did show, the numbers are wrong.
Second, even if they were right...  why the Silver Dragon would nicely put itself at strike range for the spear, and wait patiently for the knight to attack? When he FLY, can sense tallies, it's highly intelligent and has MAGIC? (and can see the knight from km away, with all that shimmer...)
And, even if the Silver Dragon has not been just summoned by a wizard present at the battle...  do you think it will not have a Warding spell active?

If I was in the Silver Dragon's... shoes (or, more probably, if I was his GM) I would simply cast shimmer staying out of range, and the very first attack, always, would be the White Flame Breath: what moron Silver Dragon would choose to bite a fully armored wizard knight without doing that before?

So we have a clash (or even a vs12 roll for the Silver Dragon if the situation allow it to avoid being targeted by the spear). And very probably, with advantage for the Silver Dragon (it fly, and if he was not just been summoned by a wizard, he is in his territory)

I don't know if in this example you would still use grown without armor and shimmer or not, so I will not go into these numbers, apart for noticing that...

When I ran the fight the first thing I had the knight do was throw his spear.  I decide not to have it breathe fire back since I wasnt sure how that would work, does it turn into a clash?  I think so but the effect is the dazzle spell right?  In any case I ignored it for this test and let the knight throw the spear more as a test of the mechanics.
Q vs 12 starting at 14, rolled a 7 so 21.  That's 9 points difference add the 9 brawn, take away the 9 armor and the dragon is taking 9 damage.  That drops the Dragon to the end of the Q so the Knight walks over and chops his head off.

Damage is HALVED, with one half (rounded down) going to B and the rest to Q.  9 points would simply drop the dragon 4B and 5Q

[Vernon R]

Sure damage is split between Q and B but the fact he was damaged moves him to the bottom of the que to act.  Heck even if he's not he's taken a bunch of Q and B damage so the Knight is at a huge advantage, spend B to move up and attack again with a Q 14 vs 4.  At that point the Dragon stands no chance mechanically. Even with the advantage die he wont be able to overcome that 10 point advantage. 

It was a thrown spear so likely the best the dragon could have done is a clash between the fire breath and the spear throw.  There is no range difference stated in the game so I'm assuming the spear is held and thrown as the dragon gets close enough to breath.  Just going by the numbers I'd suspect the knight would come out on top and the dragon would be in more trouble having to also spend 2 B for his Dazzle breath.

As for the spells, nothing states armor cant be cast on mail or cast it on a cloak or tunic and all armor stacks so it should still count.  Same holds for Grow, I assume it includes equipment or else it's of very limited usefulness (and that's one thing I hate from my Gurps days 90% of spells were useless).  The B gain is completely offset if you cant wear mail.  The bless spell really is the big problem though, with Q counting twice in combat, attack and defence value if you can boost it by 6 points that's tough for anything to overcome.  Shimmer, yeah likely problematic socially as is grow.  The specific spells used dont matter so much, this was more a test to see how powerful an amped up wizard is vs the current creatures in the game.  Change them around, pick your own spells yours are probably better I think righteousness would protect against the flame breath. 

Again this is all done in the spirit of playtesting and trying to see what the rules give us right now.  As it is the mechanics in the playtest seem to not reflect the descriptions of the monsters.  They arent very dangerous, more so with a full contingent of spells already in play for a wizard.   Even that is fine if the characters truly are supposed to be beyond badass, ripping monsters to shreds left and right but I'm not sure that is what Ron was intending. 

Are monsters supposed to be dangerous?  Remember this was a one on one battle, if there were 2-4 knights involved the dragon would go down in a hail of thrown spears.  It would be hard to use the Monster option in scenario creation and have the monster be a significant factor.  The NPC's may be stronger than the monster and the monster is really only there to drag the characters into the situation.   

[Moreno R.]

Remember one thing: Silver Dragons are summoned by White Wizards with a simple 3 points creation spell (it's not even a ritual, and as a creation spell once cast it cannot be dispelled). if a Silver Dragon could always (or even often) beat a prepared Wizard Knight in a one-on-one battle, there would be no need for any other spell: White Wizards would simply summon Silver Dragons and win every battle.

Even the fact that the PC are usually so bad-ass than "solving the adventure" (I use quotes because there is no adventure to "solve", really) is a practically a given. it's written right there in the three-pages description of the game.

The fact that the most dangerous opponents are men, is one of the point of the game, I think (see how a mob is much more dangerous that any other opponent, for example)

So, the knight win at the end? Cool, the game works the way it should. The Silver Dragon should be beaten, if the knight doesn't make a lot of blunders.  What I was contesting was the way your example, disregarding social issues, good tactics of the Dragon, and (I still think) the description of some spells, did turn a fight into a one-shot farce. You don't kill a Silver Dragon with one shot, and you need all the magic you can get to beat it.

[Jonas Ferry]

- Color points inflation. Getting a tally should be epic, not "this is the third tally today, put it with the  rest".

Yes, one way of limiting the number of ongoing spells is to make getting a tally more epic.

What if getting a tally also creates an Amboryion or Rbaja zone, similar to the spells Wrath and Distort? For an NPC wizard that's about the coolest thing ever. For a Circle knight getting in his morning spells in the middle of a village, not so much. You can beef up with white spells until you have 8 white circles, but that means you can only use black spells for a while unless you want to induce Wrath when you get the tally. With morning and evening Bless for 2 points you could use it for two days before you get a tally.

Another way is to add an element of personal risk to getting a tally, for example a 1d6 roll that has to beat the PCs number of tallies of the current color, otherwise the character is lost to Amboryion/Rbaja. That means that the sixth tally is suicide, and would make you think twice before getting tallies. Or you can use W vs 12, as is in the rules now when you use tally specials in a magic zone. Again, some NPC wizard may wish nothing else than to ascend/descend into their chosen element, but probably not PCs.

Or you combine the two options. Or the PC has to choose if they want to externalize and create a magic zone or internalize and risk being lost to Amboryion/Rbaja when they get a tally.

You can of course offset all this by casting a two-point black spell at the same time, but do you really want to cast Trailtwister or Cloud of Hate every day? It seems like most of Moreno's daily spells are white.

The exact details aren't important. My point is that by making the tallies also negative or risky you limit the number of spells people want to use, and save the uses for more interesting situations, like fights and other showdowns.

[Vernon R]

That's interesting about wizards summoning dragons because now that I think about it the pc wizard could do just the same thing.  In our playtest my fellow player considered summoning a 3 point demon to rouse the leaders of the town and get the information we were after. 

The way I was thinking about about a lot of the level 3 spells is they wouldnt be cast willy nilly, more often used in the case of a trip wire.  I have a venture I created that I'll post later that uses them in that fashion.  Hopefully the discussion here shows things to consider when fleshing out the sections in the completed book.  As it stands now there is a lot of leeway for playstyle variations which might be a good thing.  We played with two not very magical knights in my playtest, I can see now how different it would be in a group with multiple wizards.

[Nyhteg]

My feeling is not that magic isn't epic enough, it's that it's not...consequential.
As it stands, magic is basically free power.
There's no cost and no real risk. Granted, spending Brawn during a fight might be 'risky' but it's an indirect risk.
The act of spell casting itself is carries no jeopardy.
Do I cast Bless and Armour every morning when I put on my socks? Pff! Why on earth wouldn't I?

So, yeah, I very much like the idea, for instance, that getting a Tally gives you a special effect and a superpower...but also that it might just kill you.

Obviously, this is not my game and not my rules to write, but off the top of my head for the purposes of creative provocation:

- Wrath and Distort should both be easy to cast...one point spells, instant effect rather than rituals...and they should both have a chance of killing the caster - dissolving them, just like that, into the Amboriyon or Rbaja zone.

- Gaining a Tally gives the caster the option to cast Wrath or Distort for free right then and there.
--- But also, gaining a Tally has a chance to involuntarily cast those spells regardless.
--- Plus, gaining the points which earn a Tally by actually casting Wrath or Distort automatically kills the caster.

- Tallies should function like colour points do but more so.
--- Instead of nine slots, you have three, say.  So at any time you can have 0, 1, 2 or 3 Tallies of a single colour or a 1:1 or 1:2 ratio of both.
--- Black and White Tallies replace each other exactly as colour points do. Replacing tallies with the other colour is just another part of the shocking heresy inherent in Grey Magic.
--- Tally effects come and go as the colours of the Tallies change.
--- If a wizard has 3 Tallies of a single colour, every spell of that colour has a chance of triggering Wrath or Distort as appropriate.
--- If a wizard gains enough colour points for a fourth Tally of a single colour, he's gone. Self destruct. Wrath or Distort is cast and he is dissolved into Amboriyon or Rbaja.

- This all creates an inevitable death spiral for NPC wizards, so I would also say that all characters clear two points of either colour a day - Amboriyon at dawn, Rbaja at dusk or something. A Tallies are  for life, though.

See, now we have a situation where a wizard is presented with a bunch of scary, gutsy choices.

No wizard is obliged at any time to vanish in a puff of black or white smoke...but they can definitely choose to run that risk that in extremis.
Magic becomes as scary and dangerous as combat is.
Sure, you can happily power up and become a glowing tank of unstoppable magical death if you want to...knock yerself out. But make a habit of it and down the road, one day that stuff is going to kill you...

Just my present thoughts to spark more discussion.

G