Category: Swords & Wizardry (Page 14 of 23)

More About Spell Research

October 27, 2013 / Bear

I've written before about my home-brewed Emphasis System that aims to make spells more diverse and less cookie-cutter. In a nutshell, the system provides classes that use spells a small bonus to research new spells. To get the bonus(es) to the successful spell research roll, the character needs to incorporate one or more emphases. An emphasis is a noun, chosen by the player, used to represent a specialty or specific area of magic a character enjoys. So if a character has the emphases of Fire, Entanglement, and Plants, the character would get the largest bonus to spell research by incorporating all three. Using the Web spell as a template, the character names his or her spell the Flaming Tendrils of the Macava. This spells entraps characters for 3 turns in fiery tendrils that emerge from the ground. The GM rules that if the flaming tendrils do damage, the spell will need to be a higher level. If the flames are simply and illusory effect, it can remain a 2nd level spell.

The thing I enjoy about the Emphasis System is that the nouns chosen can cut across classes. Fire works for a Priest, Magic-User, Psionicist, and any other sub-class of these three. Here's a compiled list from posts and other sources so far:

Air, Acid, Alchemy, Alteration, Animal, Artifice, Astral, Blades, Chaos, Charm, Combat, Creation, Conjuration/Summoning, Dimension, Divination, Earth, Enchantment, Entanglement, Evocation, Fire, Force, Geometry, Guardian, Healing, Ice, Illusion, Law, Metal, Mind, Moon, Necromancy, Numbers, Plant, Protection, Shadow, Song, Sun, Thought, Time, Travelers, Void, Walls, Water, War, Wards, Woods, and Weather.

I had wanted to include emphases for psionicists, but outside of Clairsentience, there isn't much not covered by the list. Thinking in 3.5 terms for types of abilities, an emphasis called Telepathy and ones I've already listed called Mind and Thought would function about the same. Meta creativity is the same as Creation. Psychometabolism is the same as Alteration. Even Psychoportation would work better as the Travellers emphasis I have listed above.

In one sense, I had hoped that Psionicists would contribute more to the list of emphases. However, seeing the list and realizing that items on the list could apply just as much to psionicists as they could to priests or wizards, I am happy to see the possibilities for all classes.

Sure, the Wards emphasis makes sense with my version of the psionicist. In my version, psionicists fight against incorporeal foes like ghosts and shadows. Having wards against shadows or vampires in gaseous form are quite handy and fit the concept well. What is interesting, though, is applying a War emphasis (think Psychic Warrior) or a Song emphasis (think Bard). For something really different, start a psionicist with either Artifice or Creation emphases. Having a psionicist that builds things is a really interesting concept.

This will be it for the emphasis system for now. I hope to put all this in a PDF for everyone to use or deride in their own game.

Using the Emphasis System for Priests

October 8, 2013 / Bear

There can be all sorts of fun with Clerics and emphases as well. Going back to 2e, the PHB mentions priests of different mythoi. The idea was that priests could be good/okay/poor at combat, have other major and minor powers different from Turn Undead, and have access to spells broken up into spheres of influence. The idea of spheres survived into 3.x and Pathfinder as Domains. I mention this because I'm going to use Domains later as a source of building interesting clerics.

Back to the 2e world for a minute, let's generate a list of spheres. Most of them are from the Priest's Handbook. I broke up Elemental into six different elements because I don't have elemental planes in my house rules. I also added the Moon as a counter to the Sun. Here's the final list:

Air, Animal, Astral, Charm, Combat, Creation, Divination, Earth, Fire, Guardian, Healing, Metal, Moon, Necromancy, Plant, Protection, Summoning, Sun, and Void, War, Water, Wood, Weather.

With this list, we can generate some pretty interesting priests. Whereas the handbook talked about major and minor access to spells, we are going to use +3 and +1 bonuses. Each priesthood would have four high emphases with a +3 bonus and four low emphases with a bonus of +1. Using an example from the Priest's Handbook again, let's have a Cleric that is a protector of animals. They're emphases would be:

Animal +3, Charm +3, Divination +3, Protection +3, Creation +1, Healing +1, Plant +1, War +1

In Swords and Wizardry, some spells are quite obvious for this priest;

Cure Light Wounds
Light
Protection from Evil
Snake Charm
Speak with Animals
Cure Disease
Locate Object
Prayer
Cure Serious Wounds
Neutralize Poison
Protection from Evil 10' radius
Speak with Plants
Sticks to Snakes
Insect Plague
Quest
Conjure Animals
Find the Path
Speak with Monsters
Restoration
Resurrection
Symbol

Going deeper, though, some new spells make sense for this priest. Charm Animals, for instance, a lesser Charm Monster spell. Protection from Plants (for wild vines, jungle crawls and/or plant-based creatures. There's also spells for learning about an animal through divination. This translates to spells that reveal weaknesses in an opponent. The War aspect could be used for Summoning War Dogs, or possibly an ability of the priest to call Divine Hounds to his aid.

For busy people like me, I can also build on other OGL work to come up with some really cool spells options. Here are some links to the Grand OGL Wiki:

Animal Domain, Nine spells are listed because it is based on 3.x games, but it's easy to use these as a source to build seven S&W type spells. My favorite is beastshape.

Charm Domain, Again nine spells that can be easily modified. There's quite a bit here including insanity, suggestion and calm emotions.

Protection Domain, Well looky here, Spell Immunity and Protection from Energy. Very handy spells that also fit the War aspect as well. With choices like these, this could because a popular priest already.

There was an Oracle Domain at some point that functioned like a Divination Domain. The spells for it were: 1st level - identify; 2nd level - augury; 3rd level - divination; 4th level - scrying; 5th level - commune; 6th level - legend lore; 7th level - greater scrying; 8th level - discern location; 9th level - foresight.

Greater Scrying is out just because I don't do Greater Spells. Identify is interesting as well as legend lore and discern location. Foresight can be used for all sorts of things, but I imagine most character would use it for, shall we say, war-like purposes. For this priest that fits just fine. It will take a bit more work, but considering how easy the first three were, it will be worth it.

So here in about 15 minutes, I've sketched out an interesting priest using a random reference to one of my books and the Grand OGL wiki.

It's true, this takes a bit of work, but like the mages under the emphasis system, it creates something unique about each character in a meaningful way.

Now, add in the ability to make Cleric scrolls, and now we have the interesting variations that the mages have. This example priest has a +1 for Healing, which helps, but if he incorporates Animal somehow, it can be interesting. Yes, you could say that humans are animals, so Cure Light Wounds wouldn't be much different. Let's just say, though, that the emblem of the deity is a fox. A scroll could be something like The Healing Fox or The Vulpine Cure. You could describe the spell as forming a mist in the shape of a fox that is inhaled and exhaled. The effect is that the target is healed 2-7 points of damage. Like the mages, the effect is the same, but the description makes in more fun.

Hopefully there will be more tomorrow. This time using the psionic guys.

Emphases for Spell Casters

October 7, 2013 / Bear

I mentioned in a Google plus post that I was working on a conversion of a magic system from USR to Swords & Wizardry. Herein lies that conversion:

The study of magic is covers a vast and largely unmapped scope of knowledge. No individual mage can hope to master it all. Mages, however, have found that highlighted a limited number of areas of study helps them to use the forces of magic in many different ways. By focusing on three or four broad themes of magic, a mage can often successfully research spells that cover a wide range of effects.

These broad themes are called emphases. Throughout a mage's lifetime study of magic, he or she will choose a handful of emphases to guide their study allowing them to create wondrous and powerful magics. These emphases will also make one mage distinct from another. In battle, one mage may hurl small bolts of fire while another uses spears of ices to smite their targets. They may be equally powerful effects, but each mage adds their own signature style.

Mechanics of Emphases

The mechanics of using the emphasis system in magical research are pretty straightforward. A 1st level mage chooses any noun to be their first emphasis. Examples include Fire, Healing, Walls, Blades, Ice, Illusion, Mind, and Acid. The player may also use labels associated with schools of magic used in various forms of the world's oldest RPG. These include Evocation, Summoning, Geometry (2e), Enchantment and many, many more. This first emphasis will be rated as a +2. At each new level a mage gains, he or she gain another emphasis rated as +1 or they may increase an existing emphasis by 1. The limits of increasing an emphasis is determined by the number of emphases a mage already has. An emphasis cannot be raised to +3 until the mage has three emphases. An emphasis cannot be raised to +4 until the mage has four emphases and so on.

To learn a new spell, a mage must research that spell. Successful magic research is determined by rolling higher than the mage's Saving Throw + the level of the spell. So if a 7th level mage wishes to research a third level spell, the mage must roll 12 or above to be successful. The Saving Throw of a 7th level mage is a 9 and the spell is determined to be a 3rd level spell, thus 9 (ST) + 3 (level of spell) = 12.

If the spell attempted incorporates one or more mage's emphases, he or she can use them to increase the roll. In our example, let's say that our 7th level mage has the following emphases: Fire +3, Blades +2, Mind +2, Acid +1. The mage wishes to research a spell that will immobilize 1d4 bipeds of up to human size or one target of up to Hill Giant size. The effect will be that the target will be immobilized because they will see themselves surrounded by a tight wall of swirling flaming swords. The GM notes that this is essentially a Hold Person spell, so he rates it as a third level spell. The mage must roll a 12 or better to successfully research the spell. The mage also gets to add 7 to the roll (Fire +3, Blades +2 and Mind +2 as the fiery swords are perceived only by the targets.)

Implications

Since gaining new spells relies on spell research, the ability to research spells is available to mages at 1st level. The cost of such research is level of spell * 300 gp. Researching a new spell requires a number of weeks equal to the spell level to complete. For example, researching a 3rd level spell costs 900gp in materials and will require three weeks to complete research. At the end of this time period, the success roll is made. If the mage succeeds, the spell is added to his or her spellbook.

The other, much larger implication, is that the spell list in S&W serves as a guideline for spells a mage can research. Many spells that will be researched will be very similar to those listed, but with certain tweaks to maximize the mages' emphases. The example noted earlier is, in fact, a Hold Person spell, but a mage with different emphases will display that spell with completely different effects. A Mage with an Acid emphasis may immobilize a target by surrounding it with very real acid. A Mage with an Undead emphasis may immobilize a target by employing a huge bony fist that emerges from the ground. The possibilities are endless.

Scrolls found in adventures can be the generic versions of the spells as listed in S&W. This makes work relatively easy on the GM. But an adventurous GM may decide to randomly determine the emphases of the wizard that created the spell thereby giving it a unique twist.

For the record, adding a spell to the spellbook requires the level of the spell in days to transcribe to the spell book.

Characters can also make scrolls at any level as well as engage in magical research. Making scrolls requires the mage to spend 100gp per level of the spell. It will take one week + the level of the spell in days to create a scroll. For example, creating a scroll of a third level spell would require 10 days.

How This Plays Out

This rule applies to all spell casters in my house rules, even Clerics. Cleric do not require spell research, but their spell exhibit themselves according the emphases determined by their specific deity. Clerics can make scrolls using the same rules as mages. Sorcerers also use their emphases for spontaneous casting of spells - the more emphases included, the greater the chance that the spell will work. (Sorcerers, however, cannot create magic items.) Even Alchemists and Hermetic Magicians gain benefits from emphases. Details will come when those types of magic-users are covered.

Category: Swords & Wizardry (Page 14 of 23)

More About Spell Research

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Using the Emphasis System for Priests

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