Arcane Language and Casting

Isilvar wrote:Exact my thinking. I did not want to make it more complicated. I just wanted to give the Arcane Languages a little bit more justification and some logical advantage. I think the advantage is indeed very little, but now you get some little extra for your 100XP.

The only real times it would be an issue is Ritual Casting, when it allows you to cast more difficult rituals without fear of any consequence. +1 may not seem a lot, but they soon start to stack up to pretty high numbers.

(Again, I am not saying this is bad, I am simply saying this is something that you should be aware of.)

jadrax wrote:

Isilvar wrote:Exact my thinking. I did not want to make it more complicated. I just wanted to give the Arcane Languages a little bit more justification and some logical advantage. I think the advantage is indeed very little, but now you get some little extra for your 100XP.

The only real times it would be an issue is Ritual Casting, when it allows you to cast more difficult rituals without fear of any consequence. +1 may not seem a lot, but they soon start to stack up to pretty high numbers.

(Again, I am not saying this is bad, I am simply saying this is something that you should be aware of.)

Hm, I do not see the danger. The maximum you can get with this new house rule would be +2. And you must have the mastery in the correct arcane language. If you have +20% in magick, well, that will not help in a ritual where you must use arcane elf.

Isilvar wrote:Hm, I do not see the danger. The maximum you can get with this new house rule would be +2. And you must have the mastery in the correct arcane language. If you have +20% in magick, well, that will not help in a ritual where you must use arcane elf.

To be clear, I mean that if you can generate a Minimum score of 14, you can cast any Ritual with a CN of 14 or less with no fear of consequence at all. As a lot of Rituals have really unpleasant Consequences, you tend to only cast ones that you are either going to automatically or close to automatically cast.

With you rule, the person who could get 14 can now get 16 pretty easily for Magic Based rituals at least, opening up the amount of rituals he would be willing to cast.

jadrax wrote:

Isilvar wrote:Hm, I do not see the danger. The maximum you can get with this new house rule would be +2. And you must have the mastery in the correct arcane language. If you have +20% in magick, well, that will not help in a ritual where you must use arcane elf.

To be clear, I mean that if you can generate a Minimum score of 14, you can cast any Ritual with a CN of 14 or less with no fear of consequence at all. As a lot of Rituals have really unpleasant Consequences, you tend to only cast ones that you are either going to automatically or close to automatically cast.

With you rule, the person who could get 14 can now get 16 pretty easily for Magic Based rituals at least, opening up the amount of rituals he would be willing to cast.

Sorry, but: where do you get the 14? A maxed out human Wizard Lord would gain +6 to his casting roll with my rule (without it a +4. thanks to the Meditation talent) when casting a ritual spell. Where do you get the other 10 points?

This will be good.

Isilvar wrote:Sorry, but: where do you get the 14? A maxed out human Wizard Lord would gain +6 to his casting roll with my rule (without it a +4. thanks to the Meditation talent) when casting a ritual spell. Where do you get the other 10 points?

That is no where near maxed out ;o)

You can get 4 magic through Careers, an extra 1 from a familiar, an extra 1 from a Draught of Power. So Magic Six.

That is a minimum roll of 6, plus channelling bonus of 6 and meditation adds that 6 again, so 18 so far.

The Link Lesser magic spell gets you a bonus of +1 per success on a Channelling test and can be cast on 5 people, assume each person has Channelling 100 (We did say max out), that's an average of +25 (Probably higher if they can garner re-rolls.)

Technically a Warpstone Token adds a straight +3, although you would have to be pretty desperate to use one, So I think most casters will skip this option.

Casting at a stone circle gives a straight +5 on each die rolled, so if we use out full Mag of 6, that's a +30 bonus, (If you used a powerstone and rolled 8 dice its +40, but tbh, you would never need to.)

Essence of Chaos adds a straight +1.

There is also a pretty common magic item in one of the published adventures that gives +1.

There is also ways of adding extra Dice, such as the afore mentioned Powerstone, but those options are clearly not as good as a straight bonus or a bonus to Mag. And some casters gen different maths, Priests lose out on 2 Magic, but can use the Consecrate spell to add there Magic Stat again and gain Bonuses from assistants with the "Incantation" talent.

------

Basically Ritual casting is all about stacking as many of these bonuses as you can so you get the highest Fixed result from rolling the smallest number of Dice. (Well actually, of course all Spellcasting is, but on rituals your often dead if you do not.)

You cannot use the Channelling Skill when using a Ritual, see WFRP page 168 Casting Time.

The same could be said for the use of Draught of Power, since its use only gives a benefit over a short period of time.

Not sure of the the Link Lesser Magic spell you mention, without looking it up in the books. Which one is it in?

So with Meditation, which basically replaces Channelling, and a Familiar the total is 10. The rest seems fine though, just as long as its not a short term benefit.

Tor wrote:You cannot use the Channelling Skill when using a Ritual, see WFRP page 168 Casting Time.

Wow, well spotted - what a stupid place to put rules pertaining to the casting roll.

The draught o power is an interesting point, personally I would say that your Magic Stat at the point of making the Roll is the relevant point, although I can see the opposed case.

Link is in Tomb of Salvation, and actually throws up a good question as to have it work you would have to be able to cast it at the same Time as casting a ritual. (which you again could easily and fairly rule simply cannot be done,) although it would reader the spell somewhat pointless as written.

jadrax wrote:
The draught of power is an interesting point, personally I would say that your Magic Stat at the point of making the Roll is the relevant point, although I can see the opposed case.

The reason that I take it that the Casting Roll is made at the end or pinnacle of the Ritual is that the example of the ritual The Beastly Transmogrification of the Omnipotent Tchar given within WFRP page 169, state the consequence of failure is that you and your assistants suffer the effects of the spell. Thus suggesting that the ritual has been completed, but was mis-directed at the critical final point.

Tor wrote:The reason that I take it that the Casting Roll is made at the end or pinnacle of the Ritual is that the example of the ritual The Beastly Transmogrification of the Omnipotent Tchar given within WFRP page 169, state the consequence of failure is that you and your assistants suffer the effects of the spell. Thus suggesting that the ritual has been completed, but was mis-directed at the critical final point.

Yes, but that still means you would only need to drink the potion just before you made the casting roll, as far as I am aware nothing stops you drinking a potion (Or indeed doing may things,) while you are also involved in casting. Although again, I wouldn't really look askance at anyone ruling that you could not.

jadrax wrote:

Tor wrote:The reason that I take it that the Casting Roll is made at the end or pinnacle of the Ritual is that the example of the ritual The Beastly Transmogrification of the Omnipotent Tchar given within WFRP page 169, state the consequence of failure is that you and your assistants suffer the effects of the spell. Thus suggesting that the ritual has been completed, but was mis-directed at the critical final point.

Yes, but that still means you would only need to drink the potion just before you made the casting roll, as far as I am aware nothing stops you drinking a potion (Or indeed doing may things,) while you are also involved in casting. Although again, I wouldn't really look askance at anyone ruling that you could not.

I would not allow the Draught of Power working for a ritual. It is a very shorttime boost, and the casting is very long. In my opinion this little short boost is not enough to build up more power then usual. It might be correct that you make a singe casting role, but the whole ritual is part of the casting, and lasts usually very long. I also thing that there is a very long casting sequence (many words of power, so to speak) and when speaking the arcane words you can not drink a potion in the same time.

(Klaatu * barada * gluck, gluck * nikto)

Draughts of Power are good for normal casting only.

I take the opposite view tbh, I would not let anyone perform 8 hours of speech without having a several drinks during it. Indeed the longest Ritual Casting Times I can find off hand is 3 days! (Consecrate) - you would be close to dying from thirst casting it. ;o)

That said, again - yes I can well see why people would not allow it. Ultimatly I think it comes down to how much you want rituals to actually be used in your game.

How about this..

Harsher version (least friendly).

+1 Mastery give you the ability to make a difficult willpower roll and try to abort a casting AFTER the roll, before results (and T Curse) is determined. In effect your skill is such you can try to to focus a 'shut down' phrase to abort the working if it is getting out of control.

+2 mastery allows this automatically.

Alternate version:

+1/2 version of mastery give you the ability to re-roll 1/2 die. The re-rolled dice are treated as hedge/chaose dice and do NOT add to the casting of the spell, but can hopefully remove a T Curse / Insanity check (if all ones).

While this option doesn't totally remove the risk.. (since presumably you are re-rolling because of doubles (or more likely triples), there is a chance the re-roll would still trigger a curse, but it gives you a chance to avoid.

Either version gives a solid reason to take mastery in an appropriate arcane language, yet also avoids the automatic succeed problem.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

As a sideline is there a canon quote of Teclis saying humans can not handle more then one wind... or that Humans can not SAFELY handle more then one wind.

My reading is that the latter is certainly true, as it was not that long ago at all that 'non-teclis' wizards lived (if in hiding) in the empire, and certainly humans outside of the Empire don't (yet) likely know Teclis style magic.

My take on it has always been:

1) Teclis needed the humans to be able to fight Chaos and help, but also didnt want to make a whole new problem.

2) A strict codified system segmenting the magic, and taught very rigidily allows humans to reach some potential (enough to be very helpful in the war), but minimizes the risks. (minimizes since there certainly are even 'offical' mages that go bad.

3) It is in the interest of the Elves (Teclis) and the Empire, to play it safe rather then sorry (at least publicly). If everyone believes that 'more then one doesn't work' that will reduce the number of people that try more then one..... so generally you will have the two types that due try.. the 'power hungry' which likely are the ones already being watched, and can be neutralized if they do try, or the 'mastered' one and see similarities / begin to think they understand what their brethren in other colleges do and start to explore (which likely have the experience to go slowly and possibly actually do it). However, it is certainly true that magic works elsewhere, and that not that long ago people in the empire (if in secret) did magic that was relatively safe (well atleast was not a dark lore in and of itself), nothing catastrophic has fundementaly changed magic, so an elamentilist SHOULD still work, if you could find a teacher (or self-teach, which would have had to happen at some point)

To cross game for a second, I sort of see it like Pskers from 40k... strangely none are trusted / said to have given positions of power, etc.... however, why is it the vast majority of the 'whos who' in the book as 'it is unknown to most, but soandso is also a powerful psyker).

Sure Teclis (since the elves dont want millions of humans mucking with high magic, or even multiple paths) want humans as confined as possible (yet needed extra help during the chaos war). Likewise given past problems, the empire certainly wants control on magic (both from fears/superstitions and raw politcal control). The general population will be told X is possible and that is it. However, even the fluff in the rules books supports it. RoS (I believe) when talking about the Light College states that the original head, could see all 8 winds but unlike his contemporaries was uncertain if he could control all of them, so studied them but never used them. Making it clear he 'could' have (if not safely) and that others HAD..

jadrax wrote:

Tor wrote:You cannot use the Channelling Skill when using a Ritual, see WFRP page 168 Casting Time.

Wow, well spotted - what a stupid place to put rules pertaining to the casting roll.

I read that and my first reaction was 'wtf! rituals use magic, and magic has to be channelled, therefore a magic user must use their channelling skills when performing a riutal.'

In short the statement was completely counter-intuitive based on the way I thought magic works.

However, on reading the actual rule I note that it doesn't actually say that channeling skill isn't used in casting a ritual. What it actually says is that a player cannot enhance their casting roll based upon their channelling skill, because the ritual already requires their total focus and control.

Still not entirely logical as one would have expected those with greater channelling skill to be able to cope with the task better than those with lesser talent, but at least it adhere's to the basic principles of magic casting.

laughingowl wrote:As a sideline is there a canon quote of Teclis saying humans can not handle more then one wind... or that Humans can not SAFELY handle more then one wind.

My reading is that the latter is certainly true, as it was not that long ago at all that 'non-teclis' wizards lived (if in hiding) in the empire, and certainly humans outside of the Empire don't (yet) likely know Teclis style magic.

My reading is similar to yours, though the official stance has varied over time.

The v2 Magic System in its determination to promote Colour Magic as a universal channelling theory, has undermined the original motivations and influence of the High Elves considerably. Although, even in RoSv2 there is an extract quoted from the Summa Magica which states that 'the reason Human Magisters cannot safely ultilise magic in the same way and to the same degree as the powerful mages of Ulthuan is becuase Humans perceive the Winds as seperate colours, Human visualisation may be a limitation of our minds.'

Now, I would quickly point out that in my opinion this statement is merely fluff, not canon, as it is written in the context of human academic's 'in-game' musings on why Teclis didn't teach human magisters to cast multi-hued magic. But nevertheless it carries forward the concept that the human mind cannot channell multi-hued magic in a controlled manner like the Elves do.

What it leaves open to speculation is whether this is universally true, or whether this is merely a judgement made by Teclis at the time and accepted by his pupils. My own preference is to stick with the principle that this was a judgement made by Teclis at the time, perhaps even a compromise struck with Finrier who did not want the humans taught anything of the theory behind their teachings. This leaves open the faint possibility that the Elementalists might actually be right and that in fact humans can use more powerful magic's than the Elves would have them beleive.

Didz wrote:

jadrax wrote:

Tor wrote:You cannot use the Channelling Skill when using a Ritual, see WFRP page 168 Casting Time.

Wow, well spotted - what a stupid place to put rules pertaining to the casting roll.

I read that and my first reaction was 'wtf! rituals use magic, and magic has to be channelled, therefore a magic user must use their channelling skills when performing a riutal.'

In short the statement was completely counter-intuitive based on the way I thought magic works.

However, on reading the actual rule I note that it doesn't actually say that channeling skill isn't used in casting a ritual. What it actually says is that a player cannot enhance their casting roll based upon their channelling skill, because the ritual already requires their total focus and control.

Well yes, the spellcaster is always 'channelling' magic through themselves, but the Channelling Skill represents a certain level of skill in the channelling of that magic.

Tor wrote:Well yes, the spellcaster is always 'channelling' magic through themselves, but the Channelling Skill represents a certain level of skill in the channelling of that magic.

In my game it also represents the process and beleif upon which the channelling of magical energy is based. Hence the Channelling of Jade Colour Magic is different to the Channelling of Amber Colour Magic and different again to Channelling Witchcraft, or Channeling High Magic.

What that means is that rituals not only required channelling skills, but they also need the appropriate channeling skills to perform the ritual.

laughingowl wrote:How about this..

Harsher version (least friendly).

+1 Mastery give you the ability to make a difficult willpower roll and try to abort a casting AFTER the roll, before results (and T Curse) is determined. In effect your skill is such you can try to to focus a 'shut down' phrase to abort the working if it is getting out of control.

+2 mastery allows this automatically.

Alternate version:

+1/2 version of mastery give you the ability to re-roll 1/2 die. The re-rolled dice are treated as hedge/chaose dice and do NOT add to the casting of the spell, but can hopefully remove a T Curse / Insanity check (if all ones).

While this option doesn't totally remove the risk.. (since presumably you are re-rolling because of doubles (or more likely triples), there is a chance the re-roll would still trigger a curse, but it gives you a chance to avoid.

Either version gives a solid reason to take mastery in an appropriate arcane language, yet also avoids the automatic succeed problem.

No. Too complicated. I want it simple.

And I do not see the advantage in the second version.
If you reroll 1 or 2 dice as chaos dice then the chance for Tzeentch's Curse is even higher, and the casting roll will surely fail because you use less dice for the actual casting roll.

If I have the chance I will try my version, and I will see if it is too powerful.