Making (more) Magic, et al.

[SA]

[ooc]Luminous cussed me out for abandoning Apocodritch Lords. So here is a another magic thing that I will also never finish. It owes more than a little to some musings he made in IRC and I'd quote them if I knew where to find them.[/ooc]

Sorcery uses d6 dicepools; 1-3 is a failure, 4-6 is a success. Sorcery has three core components:
Power/Control/Knowledge

Power (P)

• The number of d6's rolled in the spell, to a maximum of 10D. Each die has an effect, positive with success, negative with failure.
• They are the sum of (1D-3D for each): Ritual, Incantation, Sacrifice, Assistance, Instrument, Ingredient & Deed. These are called Elements.
• A spell's foundational component is its Root: always a Ritual, Incantation or Deed. The Root determines the spell's core function, such as Communion With The Dead or Celestial Summons.
• All Roots have an associated Discipline, such as Thanaturgy or Invocation.

Control (C)

• The number of failures that can be neutralised, to a maximum of 5. It is a fixed value representing one's ability to adapt to a spell's unforseen complications.
• E.g: A magus with C1 attempts Communion With The Dead at P5 yielding two successes. Only one failure can be neutralised, leaving two dice worth of havoc.
• Each Discipline has its own Control rating. E.g: A magus with C0 Thanaturgy and C2 Invocation. Use the lowest relevant Control rating if multiple Roots apply.
• Control is unrelated to Power. A magus with C0 Thanaturgy can still Commune With The Dead if they know the spell, but they cannot mitigate its fallout.

Knowledge

• A magus knows specific combinations of Elements, called Spells.
• For every Element added or altered in a Spell, reduce Control by 1 if it results in a new Spell. Simply subtracting Elements yields no penalty.
• If you do not know the Root you cannot cast the Spell. All but the most introductory texts omit 1D Roots, assuming prior knowledge.
• You can only learn a Spell by casting it.

Consequence
Each die is a thing that happens, or combines with other dice to become an even more significant thing.

Failure

• Each element has its particular failure events.
• If the magus cannot generate successes equal to the Root, the spell fails altogether and none of the successes matter. The failures still apply.
• Root failures are worse than others.

We might imagine a magus specialising in Communion With The Dead, developing its complexity over time until they have a single 10D spell. They would simultaneously have mastered every subset of those 10D Elements. They would only need to improve Control in Thanaturgy. They would be no better at summoning angels than when they started.

This system is designed for wizardly games. Nonmagical mechanics should be heavily abstracted.

[Lmns Crn]

Aw, heck,

if I'm reading this right, this is all about, aw jeez, tremendous risk-- I mean, any spell you can find in a dusty tome, go right ahead and try it (but you probably have inadequate Control so those failures are going to hurt and the more Power you pump into the ritual, the more can potentially go terribly wrong)

, man, that's compelling.

I take it the different element dice are tracked to what element they come from (rather than just lumping all the dice into one big dice pool) so that you can see the breakdown: out of A Ritual dice, there were B successes and [A - B] failures; out of C Sacrifice dice, there were D successes and [C - D] failures, etc....

... so that when you look at the dice you've just rolled, you know exactly which parts of the spell worked as intended and which parts gave you grief. "Oh shit, that was an Incantation failure... that's bad."

[SA]

if I'm reading this right, this is all about, aw jeez, tremendous risk-- I mean, any spell you can find in a dusty tome, go right ahead and try it (but you probably have inadequate Control so those failures are going to hurt and the more Power you pump into the ritual, the more can potentially go terribly wrong)

You got it. Root failures are the worst kind of failures, so you jack up the dice in order to "ensure" at least Root successes even though you will, in all probability, fail your Elements.

... so that when you look at the dice you've just rolled, you know exactly which parts of the spell worked as intended and which parts gave you grief. "Oh shit, that was an Incantation failure... that's bad."

Almost. I imagined failures as "something going wrong somewhere" and one little problem bleeding into the whole spell so that everything starts going south. The magus has limited aptitude, limited Control: they can only hold the reins on so much magical power, but they can choose where they commit their attention.

Say the spell is P5,R2,C1. Getting one success, the magus doesn't cover the Root so the spell fails, but they can neutralise the Root failure. Or say they get two successes, the spell succeeds, now they decide which element failure they least want to suffer and eliminate it. Or say they get three successes, the spell succeeds, with an extra element success to spend and one failure controlled, leaving only one wayward failure. Even if they scored 0 successes, 1D of Root failure is still better than two.

Control is Damage Control. Which damage do you take?

Now, since dice failures will be popping up like all the time, it behooves us to make them cool and compelling. They are plot elements as much as spell elements.

EDIT: this mechanic adapts a storytelling system I had bouncing around before apathy hit... in which players stacked scenes full of conflict dice based on Scenario and the Control-equivalent was a relevant PC Skill and the Root-equivalent was their Goal. So say you wanted to get the information about some asshole's whereabouts, you build a scene with these sociopathic thugs with guns beating on some schmuck in some devastated slum you've never been before and you're unarmed. You roll SD (scenario dice) and neutralise failures with your Fists. All dice advance the plot, but successes mean you beat the answer out of them. You need at least GD (Goal Dice) in successes for the play to work at all.

Wushu did something similar, but more freeform and with practically zero stakes.

EDIT 2:When I think about it, the original storytelling idea might be compatible with its magical reformulation. A sorcerer conceives uncontrollable spells, a warrior challenges insurmountable foes.

[SA]

[ooc]To go with the Sorcery system (this might replace SAGE)[/ooc]

Solidarity uses d6 dicepools; 1-3 is a failure, 4-6 is a success.

Novice dicepools are 2D. These 2D are your Core Dice (CD). Dice beyond the CD are Skill Dice (SD).

   2D   Novice
   3D   Amateur
   4D   Learned
   5D   Adept
   6D   Master
   7D   Perfect
   8D   Strange

So an adept Fighter has 5D in the FIGHT skill (2CD+3SD).

Say this guy is battling an ornery snakeman. Snakemen are heartless predators with an attack value of 2. Our hero rolls his dice, gets 4 successes. He can spend successes, 1 for 1, to negate the snakeman's damage or to deal harm of his own. He might negate 2 and deal 2; enough to seriously maim the snakeman without sustaining injury himself. He might take 1 or even both points in order to deal 3 or 4 damage (which kills it outright).

Players must describe the kind of action they are undertaking (Strike, Disarm, Grapple, Shift) before rolling but any success can be converted to defense without penalty.

When two or more PCs cooperate in a task, they pool their Skill Dice together and add the Core Dice. No matter the number of participants, the Core Dice are always 2D.

So an adept fighter and a learned fighter cooperating to kill a swaggering blackguard (ATK 3; Claymore) would have 7D FIGHT (2CD+3SD+2SD).

Say they roll 2 successes: they can negate 2 Harm, suffer 1 Harm and deal no damage. They can negate 1, take 1, deal 1. They can take all 3 and deal both of theirs. It's up to them to determine who is injured, who is defended and who strikes true.

So far the only rules for distributing successes among multiple participants are that:

• you must agree to cooperate in the first place.
  
  
• You can't claim more total successes than your dice contribution (your SD plus the Core Dice).
  
  
• If you didn't contribute SD, any participant that did contribute SD can authoritatively veto your declarations.

PCs don't have to pool dice. Say two explorers are climbing a cliff to escape several maneating spiderpeople. It's 2 successes each to get away clean. One guy is a 4D Athlete, the other is only 3D. They could pool for better absolute odds, but instead the better climber says "fuck it man, each to his own!" and books it.

Weapons and Armour and Stuff

Length - Close (knee, knife) Short (sword, dagger, club) Long (claymore, polearm) Near (shuriken) Far (bow, crossbow). Having a shorter weapon than your foe limits your combat options.
Damage - Hack (axe) Slash (sword) Stab (spear) Bash (fist) Crush (hammer).
Armour - Resists specific damage type (hack, slash, etc.) or more exotic things like iron or fire or mortals.

So a foe's plate mail might be DEF 1; ALL (resists all conventional types).

Enemies do not have a Dodge value unless they are exceptionally evasive, like jackalopes or ninjas.

Defenses can be negated in various ways. For instance, when you grapple a plated foe you can slip Close Stabbing weapons through the gaps, and if they're prone you can do the same with Short and Long Stabbing weapons.

[LordVreeg]

I relay like this, BTW.
I enjoy spell systems with more to them, as it creates a ore interesting character and a better hold on how it would feel in the game world.


I think cooperation has to be a bit harder, though.  Or more of a skill in it's own.  Or higher chance of screw up.

[LordVreeg]

BTW, not to make things more difficult, but something I like using is optional rules.  PCs in GS can cast spells pretty easily with the basics, but knowing what areas they are familiar, specialized, and devoted to is a huge helper, as is understanding ritual casting and the use of higher level reagents and enhancers.

[SA]

I think cooperation has to be a bit harder, though.  Or more of a skill in it's own.  Or higher chance of screw up.

Teamwork is integral.

Some of the creatures that parties encounter can straight up murder a noncombatant in one turn. Take an ATK 4 doomwraith, laying into a milquetoast magus. The warrior (Fight 6) swoops in, declares his assistance, and simply hands successes over to the magus (who, with Fight 2, can negate two harm with a 1-in-4 chance); maybe 3 successes, so now the magus can negate all but one Harm, or maybe tank 2 Harm and leave 1 Strike for the warrior. On the other hand, say it's two Fight 5 warriors: they can pool for 8D as long as they're doing the same thing (both striking, both grappling, etc.) or roll 5D each for 10D total and do whatever the hell they want.

Now this all assumes the magus is fighting at all, like he's casting a deleterious touch spell or something. If instead he needed time to charge up an area buff or something he might take an Athletics action to create distance. This would use a different skill, as would trying to talk the doomwraith down, etc.

PCs in GS can cast spells pretty easily with the basics, but knowing what areas they are familiar, specialized, and devoted to is a huge helper, as is understanding ritual casting and the use of higher level reagents and enhancers.

I'm all for options that make magic more interesting, just so long as they don't make it safer.

[sparkletwist]

Teamwork is integral.

One problem with dicepool systems that let groups of combatants combine their dicepools in roughly linear fashion is that swarms of untrained combatants can overwhelm an expert. There is a certain amount of realism in this, and it is even somewhat desirable of you're going for teamwork being a good thing-- but it also can make badass heroes and monsters seem a lot badass. In your system, due to the way that the two core dice don't combine, it seems like the problem is not quite as bad, but it still seems to be the case that swarms of minimally trained combatants can overwhelm an expert. For example, a hero with "Strange" combat ability facing 6 "Apprentice" level mooks is facing an equal challenge, which may or may not be the feeling you want. Relatedly, let's say some sort of fearsome beast with "Strange" combat ability attacks a village; it seems like the town only has to gather up 6 minimally skilled guys and they've evened up the odds, making that beast seem a lot less fearsome-- it seems like it'd be hard to be a BBEG in this game.

[SA]

Thanks for the feedback, sparkle. This game is very low-powered.

On the other hand, it's important to consider that a) only PCs roll dice (or have skills at all) and b) enemy challenge values will (probably) not combine linearly.

   Some untrained schmuck or conscript or militiaman, or an unruly hob, has ATK 1.
   Serpentmen, loping long-armed bogeys, professional soldiers and the like have ATK 2.
   A swaggering blackguard, a troll, an infernal infantryman, has ATK 3.
   Doomwraiths, star maggots, manticores and so on have ATK 4.
   (it keeps on going...)

That's not what they roll, because enemies/obstacles never roll. A doomwraith is ATK 4 every day all day. It deals 4 damage this round, next round, every round until you're all dead.

There's no rule yet for fighting multiple foes at once, but whatever it is, they won't be combining dice like the PCs.

[sparkletwist]

If I'm understanding it right, a given ATK value is just the average for double that number of dice. ATK 1 guys would be mooks rolling 2 dice, all the way up to ATK 4 guys who would be badass enemies rolling 8 dice. That doesn't actually change the math in the long term, it just saves some die rolling. The key point, I guess, is that enemy challenge values don't actually combine linearly.

[SA]

That doesn't actually change the math in the long term, it just saves some die rolling.

And prevents crazy shit like ATK 4 enemies rolling the 8 hits their virtual dice would allow for. I don't want situations where the PCs roll no successes, while the NPCs roll all successes and slaughter everyone at once.