I’m digging deep into the Magic-User lately, as I’ve finally got some Mage players reaching mid levels. Last week we talked about Duration effects, and how after I found they were being exploited as shields. I’ve since begun ruling that when a duration effect expires, a soft move is also triggered.
I’m now thinking about structurally limiting the total number of Duration effects that a Mage can upkeep simultaneously.
My first idea is that when a Mage spends Spell Power on DURATION, those points assigned to Duration are temporarily removed from the Casting Power available to other spells. If the Mage wants to reclaim those points for other use, the duration spell must end. You can reclaim some, all, or none of the existing Duration spells you have in play as you begin to cast another spell.
A second idea is that the number of Duration effects that can be kept up simultaneously might be determined by the Intelligence and Level of the caster using the formula CASTING POWER divided by three.
In any case, I’m quite sure I’m going to restrict the number of DURATION Spells that a Mage can maintain.
I feel like my home-brew game is delightfully turning into “AFoftF”. LOL. Jason Lutes you have truly unleashed a monster of a game.
I love the sound of this, and am taking notes.
Sounds like a lot of bookkeeping. What about simply imposing a -1 to cast a spell with duration for every spell with duration currently being maintained?
Hi Matthew G. Bookkeeping problems are all but eliminated by my
“Spellcasting Sheet”, which I created so players can allocate Casting Power not he table using glass cabochons (we also use them for Mettle, Favor, and Cunning). This not only makes casting easier, but now provides easy way to track points that are allocated to ongoing spells!
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/szh9Qfjtt4oSiV0D7upYmUhuAbZXSfWIj1wYz8ZV5LvPQwVEXISJj1ITQyaWoJkM6KN_vLZJY5POY_xFGFuLezyVFCZvRU7E9uM=s0
Now THAT is a thing of beauty!
I’m interested in keeping things minimal, but this play aid makes the spellcasting mechanic so concrete and manageable that I’m not sure I can ignore it.
Matt G: I think I like your idea of imposing a -1 on concurrent long duration spells. It’s easier to track.
But that really is a nifty tracking sheet, above.
I’m actually curious to hear about dynamic spell generation and power point assignment at the table. My experience has been that building spells on the fly made combat grind to a halt and really frustrated the other players… maybe I should write my own post instead of hijacking :\
Hi Matthew G.. I’m happy to go off on a tangent. The problem you describe is exactly why I developed this sheet. In our games, it completely solved the problem. Also, my (smart) players make little diagrams for spell variants that remind them of different favorite power point configurations. (ex: “Strike: 2,0,2,1”, or “Shield: 1,3,0,0” )