My current class project: The Sorcerer, another experiment in non-vancian magic.
Thoughts and questions welcome!
Originally shared by Adrian Thoen
The Sorcerer is getting closer. The starting moves are approaching functional, and they have advanced move upgrades. The class still needs a lot of flavor and advanced moves not related to the starting moves.
The final may have two versions with the different styles of backgrounds, but I’m as yet undecided.
Have you seen the Mage, one of Jacob Randolph’s playbooks? http://www.mediafire.com/view/?i5has0rh422pgaz
Yeah, a lot of the inspiration is draw from jacob’s Mage class, with a different slant on establishing what the class can, and can’t do with magic.
I’m thinking the class may have its own blank spell book where the player can write common applications of their magic for easy reference.
Initial thoughts:
1. I love the overall idea of making magic into something like Signature Weapon or Signature Style. It seems like a step further along the path that the Mage takes, and I mean that in a good way.
2. There’s some strange overlap/inconsistency between Sorcerous Origins and foci. E.g., the Tempest origin and the “giving into my emotions” focus seem synonymous, and does a Bender speaking words of power really make sense. I like the idea of having both, and choosing your own spellcasting stat, but some division of labor is in order. Maybe think of the focus as the house, and the origin as the foundation?
3. Touch of Power probably doesn’t really need to be stated, as its effects sound like the sort of thing your GM should be allowing anyway.
4. You’ve got way too many effects and consequences listed for Sorcery. If you’re going to include that wide a range of effects, just make it a freeform thing and improvise as you go.
5. I like the idea of the laws of sorcery, but I feel like the specifics should be determined by your game. Maybe have a list and pick X from each?
6. The “choose an additional focus” advances seem kind of weak. I think they’re trying to add flavor, but as-is they kind of dilute your character’s special brand of magic without really adding anything.
Thanks for the feedback James! The focus methods in origin are currently rather weak, and I’m trying to decide on ways to make them more flavorful, or get rid of them and go with inner darkness instead.
With Sorcery doing so much, my options are either to split it into a few moves, either completely separate, or advances that add new options, or to go totally fictional. I did have a version of the beneficial magic that gives bonuses under a spell called Charm which may work better.
The benefit of having an additional focus or two means that if you lose your ability to use that focus (Broken limb, stuck mute, lost your staff) you can still use your other focus. Perhaps I’ll make the secondary focus weaker than the first though.
My problem with Inner Darkness is that it really shoehorns your character into being, on some level, a bad guy (or at least a broken one). It’s good mechanically, and flavorful things are great, but I would personally, as a player, prefer the more open-to-interpretation route that the origins take if I were given the choice.
My advice is to make the Origins an internal thing and the Foci an external, expressive thing. So, e.g., the Bending origin might not necessarily be about martial arts forms so much as internal training and perfection of the body in general, while your Focus could very well express this as martial arts, or intricate gestures, or potions and unguents if you’re going a sort of Witcher-y route. And any of those could tie in just as well to the Tempest origin, if they’re fueled by emotional turmoil rather than martial discipline (which sounds more like CHA than WIS to me, but that’s not really based on anything).
Hmm, I like that interpretation for Origins, and could lead to being about what you use your magic to achieve.
I didn’t realize that I got ninja’d at 7:00! So I’ll respond to that post first.
The Mage handles spellcasting as two moves split along a damaging/non-damaging axis, along with counterspelling as a separate move. This works, but it’s not perfect, and one of the weaknesses of the class is that virtually all of the advances are taken up by improvements to one of these base abilities, and since you voice an interest in branching out with your own advances I would keep the moves more minimal. As a suggestion, maybe you can tie the fictional constraints and abilities of the move in with your influences and the laws of sorcery?
E.g., if you have influence over the element of fire, anything that fire could reasonably do falls within your sorcerer’s abilities. It makes sense that you could damage someone with your move in this case, but healing, not so much–although you might be able to prevent hypothermia, or maybe part of your world-building made fire into a rejuvenative force a la the phoenix. This makes a little more sense to me than having two or three different moves for sorcery, especially if not all of them would make sense for your area of influence in the first place.
EDIT: As for the multiple focuses thing: that makes sense, but it feels like playing defensively, which sort of goes against the feel of the game to me. If you are suddenly muted and can’t use your words of power, what’s more interesting: using your backup focus, or being forced to find a nonmagical solution to your problem? And if it was a permanent loss, I don’t know any GM who wouldn’t give you an opportunity to find a new focus without having to burn an advance on it.
As for the origins as what you use magic for: that’s sort of covered by Drives, isn’t it? Or do you have something else in mind?
The Drives are about what you want, or need, and the Origins are more about what you believe magic is for, at it’s core. The two could conflict in very interesting ways if players choose to do so.
I do want to express the idea that certain influences fictionally lend themselves to certain types of effects. Flesh and blood for instance would be a big part of healing or…darker magics.
I like the needs/beliefs dynamic. I can’t think of any good examples or analogies off the top of my head, but I can definitely see where that could lead to some very rad conflicts.
I like it! I left a few comments on the doc.
Hi Adrian
I really like this a LOT. One of the things I like is that this is basically a good guy, and can only become bad at cost. There are a few custom classes around that are fundamentally evil characters – so this is a breath of fresh air! And I love the idea of consequences: Spells that go awry and backfire!
As far as the effects go, have you thought of categorizing them? Like for instance:
Damage: Do damage to things or creatures.
Fix: Heal or fix things or creatures. Invigorate and bolster.
Physical force: Move, immobilize, levitate, throw, block things or creatures
Mind: Positive: Soothe, heal, invigorate, enlighten
Mind: Negative: Confuse, scare, enrage, madden
Vision: Scry, divine, discern.
The consequences could then link directly to the category.
One last thing that I think is great about the idea of consequences: One can use them to balance out very powerful spells. Give the player a chance of doing something epic, but at great risk. He wants to blow up the stone giant with one word? Fine, but if things go wrong he blows his friends up instead… With great power comes great risk to balance the move!
Well done Sir!
Seconding Wynand’s idea of categorising effects. Also, just got some feedback from the mage player in our group – here’s what she said:
“I like the balance of having use CON and WIS for some spells. It also gives you more of a fleshed out back story and reason for what you think you should be doing.
May reboot [my mage]… Much more balanced – probably more of a challenge but a fun one!”
cool, thanks for the feedback! I’m considering ways to align effects with talents in a general way that doesn’t cause information bloat.