Concentrating innate magic (talents)???

[Caynreth]

Hi all,

I decided to use HQ for my games in a setting from a german low-fantasy game (Das Schwarze Auge= The Dark Eye).

Now I still have a problem with the concentration of innate magic. If a player decides during character creation to concentrate his magic on innate magic (talents) what does this mean in rule terms?

That's how far I got: He must abandon any other form of magic. It halves all learn and improvement costs. He can use talents as active abilities.

But which and how many talents does he get? 5 like everyone who chooses common magic? Or all the talents in his religion keyword?

Suggestions???

Cay

[Peter Nordstrand]

Hi Cay,

That's how far I got: He must abandon any other form of magic. It halves all learn and improvement costs. He can use talents as active abilities.

This is all correct, and I don't have much to add. However, concentration affects character creation very little.

But which and how many talents does he get? 5 like everyone who chooses common magic? Or all the talents in his religion keyword?

Suggestions???

He gets five common magic abilities at 17. He may make up his own talents, pick talents from the sample list in HeroQuest page 29, or from his religion keyword (if any). But the total number of common magic talents is five.

Exception: If his narrative or list mentions talents, these are added to the keyword, but at a rating of 13.

This is it, really.

Cheers,

[Caynreth]

He gets five common magic abilities at 17. He may make up his own talents, pick talents from the sample list in HeroQuest page 29, or from his religion keyword (if any). But the total number of common magic talents is five.

Well, isn't that a disadvantage compared to (for example) someone who chooses a wizardry school and gets all the grimoires at 17 plus talismans for three spells from each grimoire at 17?

Seems a bit unbalanced to me...

[Peter Nordstrand]

Well, you asked about the rules and you got a straight answer.

Is concentrating common magic disadvantageous compared to other forms of magic? Perhaps. However, "game balance" is a concept that is highly problematic in most games, and in HeroQuest most certainly so. The character with the highest rating (after augments) in the contest at hand is the one with the advantage. Will this be the character with the most abilities? Sometimes, yes. At other times, no. Here is some food for thought: Perhaps the character with the highest number of useful relationships is the one with the greatest advantage.

[Alai]

He gets five common magic abilities at 17. He may make up his own talents, pick talents from the sample list in HeroQuest page 29, or from his religion keyword (if any). But the total number of common magic talents is five.

Exception: If his narrative or list mentions talents, these are added to the keyword, but at a rating of 13.

Hrm.  Not sure if I'm following you here:  if they're added to the keyword, surely by definition they're at the keyword rating.  This sounds to me more like you're saying, they're added to his repertoire of CM talents, but not to his CM keyword as such.


I could see an argument either way as to which is 'the more correct'.  If one regards the keyword as 'grab-bag of CM abillities', then the limit of a specified number of talents at the keyword rating makes a certain amount of sense. OTOH, if you regard it as your keyword of a specific common religion, then having it be open-ended within that given 'source' of CM seems valid, also.

As to the broader question:  firstly I'd suggest that the HQ magic rules are pretty clearly 'tooled' to some of the details and cosmology of Glorantha, so when adapting to another setting, the watch-word should surely be, loot freely, but don't consider yourself hide-bound by its precendent at all.[/i]

[Caynreth]

I am a bit confused because p. 17 says: "Even abilities not listed in these rules under a keyword can be used at the keyword rating..."

I thought than that someone who decides to concentrate on any kind of magic/religion gets all the magic that fits the keyword.

[Alai]

I am a bit confused because p. 17 says: "Even abilities not listed in these rules under a keyword can be used at the keyword rating..."

I thought than that someone who decides to concentrate on any kind of magic/religion gets all the magic that fits the keyword.

But if your "common magic keyword" is just any five CM talents you happened to think of, there's no rational test for what what 'fits' or not.  (So in this case I'd suggest a presumptive definition of "that first five 'fit', after that, tough".

If your CM keyword corresponds to a CM magic _religion_, then all of the abilities you have from it should be at the keyword rating.  _But_, you don't automatically get them all:  you get 5, plus any you list/narratively describe (p.18, Common Magic Keyword).  Or any that you buy subsequenty with HPs, that "fit".

[Caynreth]

Well, that makes sense.

Finaly I can finish converting magic and religion to HQ.

Thanks for your help!

Cay

[Alai]

Glad I was of some help, Caynreth.  After writing that, though, it did occur to me there was an aspect of your question I'd rather missed. If you're following the 'standard' HQ pattern of keywords where each character gets a CM keyword _and_ a 'specialised religion' keyword, it naturally arises what happens if your 'specialised religion' _is_ a common religion.  And this will necessarily arise if you're concenrated in talents, since only common religions have them (as a general rule, at least).

In Glorantha this doesn't seem to be anticipated to happen much, and certainly no common religion we're seen to date seems to be constructed in the expectation of being anyone's "main religion".  In another setting, you might certainly want to revisit that assumption as you write them up.  In such cases, you might want to consider writing them up in terms of "all of the following talents (etc)", or "[n] from this list", or a bit of both, say.

Cheers,
Alex.

[Caynreth]

If you're following the 'standard' HQ pattern of keywords where each character gets a CM keyword _and_ a 'specialised religion' keyword, it naturally arises what happens if your 'specialised religion' _is_ a common religion.  And this will necessarily arise if you're concenrated in talents, since only common religions have them (as a general rule, at least).

Actually that was the idea behind my question. In the setting I want to play are elves, who believe that everything special you do or are able to do arises from your personal life-energy. That made me think of talents or innate magic as described in the Basic Magic Chapter. As the elves don't ever believe in any other source for their special abilities and won't ever join any other belief system they should concentrate their magic on talents.

As you pointed out this is a general problem when you decide to concentrate on innate magic and therefor give up any other kind of magic. It seems to me that the creators of HQ didn't take this situation into account although they gave the rules for concentrating.

I think I will just increase the number of talents the players can include in their magic keyword if they concentrate on innate magic.

[Mike Holmes]

There were some clarifications of some of this in a stink I raised on the HQ-Rules list. Mark or Rory (or both, can't remember) cleared it up pretty well after a lot of thickheaded prodding by myself. It might do to check there.

It may be that this will confirm the above (might be where Alex is getting some of this), but, IIRC, there were some subtleties that might be being missed here.

This all said, on the Hero Improvement Costs - Magical Abilities, it indicates some interesting things. First, interestingly, all magic is indicated as starting out at 13. Affinities (and linked feats, of course), Grimoires (and linked spells), relationships with spirits. One reading of this is that magic is an exception to the keyword rule - only the mundane abilities under a keyword "default" to the keyword level. There's a sort of logic to this. If this is the case, then it makes sense that Common Magic, too, would follow this rule.

But this is odd, because then the common magic keyword only makes any sense if it pertains to a common magic religion (with attendant mundane abilities). Otherwise it's just a placeholder. Further, what would happen if I were to raise the keyword? Would the five abilities go up, but not the others?

There's another reading to all of this. When a player starts out, he has all of the affinities for his god by default, or all of the Grimoires for his order, basically all of the magic for his chosen magic, all at 17. So the starting at 13 might be meant to refer to magic that's the sort that makes sense for the character to take, but lies outside the keyword technically. For instance, a character with Initiate of Destor could know another subcult affinity. If so, then does this affinity fall under the keyword or not?

If not, then it's no surprise that it starts at 13. Just like any other non-keyword ability. Meaning that what's intended is that those based on the keyword, should, in fact, start at 17. That all said, the rules for practitioners and binding spirits seem to preclude this. But this may be the exception itself.

Also, the charts list the cost for sidekicks as giving them at 13. But if they pertain to the Keyword, that's when they start at 17 as the section on them relates. So, again, the 13's may only be for non-keyword associations, and the keyword rule may superscede these costs when it applies.

One thing is sure, secrets are definitely keyword related (or seem so to me as you can't get one without the keyword), but always start at 13. So that's another strike against the theory.

But, possibly telling, here, the listing for common magic says only that the cost of a new common magic ability is 2 (1 if concentrated). It does not say at what level. This might, again, imply that it's at keyword level. Else why not list the 13 as all of the other listings do?

Note that I'm using the game aids version of the chart, which I'm assuming is the same as the one in the book.

For my money, the simplest way is just to assume that if it's in the keyword that it starts at 17 like mundane abilities do. This might contradict the rules, but it's by far the easiest way to sort it all out.

But I'd like to hear if somebody can clarify any of this.

Mike

[Alai]

Actually that was the idea behind my question.

I thought so -- it just took a bit of time. ;-)

In the setting I want to play are elves, who believe that everything special you do or are able to do arises from your personal life-energy. That made me think of talents or innate magic as described in the Basic Magic Chapter.

I'd suggest the first quiestion to ask yourself is, how close a mapping do you want or need between Glorantha's magic, on the one hand, and HQ's realization thereof, and this different world's, and your HQish take on it, on the other?  Do you plan on using all four (and a bit?) of HQ/Glorantha's magic systems?  Do they have a similar relationship to each other?  If not, it might be possible to simplify quite a bit without really 'losing' anything from the core system.

As you pointed out this is a general problem when you decide to concentrate on innate magic and therefor give up any other kind of magic. It seems to me that the creators of HQ didn't take this situation into account although they gave the rules for concentrating.

I think I will just increase the number of talents the players can include in their magic keyword if they concentrate on innate magic.

As I said, it's quite possible that it _doesn't_ really happen in Glorantha, at least not so much that any given culture is 'set up' to faciliitate anyone on such a path. So it may be a fairly logical omission But as you'll have to write up your own specialiist religions anyway, it's just another step to consider one structured around talents.

Cheers,
Alex.

[Caynreth]

If not, then it's no surprise that it starts at 13. Just like any other non-keyword ability. Meaning that what's intended is that those based on the keyword, should, in fact, start at 17. That all said, the rules for practitioners and binding spirits seem to preclude this. But this may be the exception itself.

That's how I understand this keyword thing. If any ability fits any of your keywords it starts with 17. All other abilities start with 13.

In the official HQ-Rules-FAQ there is a question about common magic and talents beeing a source for powergaming and too powerfull at all. I suppose they chose to make common magic so different to prevent some kind of abuse or the like.

[Caynreth]

I'd suggest the first quiestion to ask yourself is, how close a mapping do you want or need between Glorantha's magic, on the one hand, and HQ's realization thereof, and this different world's, and your HQish take on it, on the other?  Do you plan on using all four (and a bit?) of HQ/Glorantha's magic systems?  Do they have a similar relationship to each other?  If not, it might be possible to simplify quite a bit without really 'losing' anything from the core system.

I chose the HQ-rules because they are simpel and versatile at the same time. I prefer the HQ approach to magic with its four different magic systems than that presented in my game. But before I could adopt these rules to my setting I had to understand them first. Common magic troubled me most because it seems so different.

The setting in DSA is full of different groups using magic and different ways it works but there is only one rule system for it. I think HQ magic rules will diversify the approach to the magical world in my game. So I have to match the magical groups with the right magic rules.

So it may be a fairly logical omission But as you'll have to write up your own specialiist religions anyway, it's just another step to consider one structured around talents.

That's what I consider to do.

[Mike Holmes]

Well, there's no doubt that this is what the keyword rule says. But it seems that there may be exceptions. Again, for certain, if you get a new relationship with a spirit, it starts at 13 according to the specific rule on how to do that. And that's whether or not it's part of your practice or not. Secrets start at 13, not keyword level. Affinities and Grimoires are similarly listed as starting at 13 in multiple places. This makes sense in the case of those that are outside of the keyword, in those cases, but for abilities that aren't out of keyword, it seems an odd thing to state.

The question is whether or not these 13s are following the general rule, and would be superceded by the keyword rule, or if they are exceptions to the keyword rule. I'd be very happy to hear that it was the latter. That said, the secret would be an odd case. Basically it would be saying "start the secret at 13, or at keyword level, which is basically keyword level, since the secret always applies to the keyword."

Basically, if the rule is as simple as, "All new abilities start at 13, except for those that are part of a keyword, which start at the keyword level," then it was very confusing to put the 13s in all of the example. They should have said, "starting level" and let the above rule determine what that is.

Mark? You out there? Mark'll know what the answer is.

Mike