Celtricia, World of Factions-Mechanics Information V2.0

[LordVreeg]

Celtricia, World of Factions
V 2.0 for CBG
Setting thread--do not post here. Post here
There is a seperate thread for the Celtrician/Guildschool Setting Info.
Celtricia, World of Factions PBwiki
Celtrician Primer
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Campaigns are like relationships, in that you tend to focus on finding the aspects that were lacking in your last relationship when you venture forth into romance once again. Not to the exclusion of everything else, but there is a tendency to focus on fixing whatever went wrong the last time.
Celtricia started in 1982 with a map. and a few big-picture ideas. A very large map. And the hazy first ideas were about the histories and origins of the world, the current conflicts and then building the game system out of the cosmology and needs of the system.
Working on it's 26th year as a full-time played campaign, with 37 players and 134 PC's, this world has some history and playtesting behind it.
One of my pet peeves about my earlier campaigns was that I was using some version of AD&D, and it felt that I was using a generalized set of rules that did not apply to the outcomes I wanted to get. So during the first few years of work, the setting and the rules were designed together. Please note that this thread is still very much the edited version from the Wiki.

Basic Game Premise
The GuildSchool rules were a direct attempt to make the rules of the game fit the play and outcome I was specifically looking for.  Other games I had played in were fine with other rule systems, however, we had certain goals in mind for the campaign.  And as we tried to make the odl rules stretch over the ideas we had for the setting, it became apparent that the rule mechanics did not create the feel we were looking for.
Also, it bears mention that this was the early 80's.  Many of the later versions of D&D did try to solve some of the same rule-issues.

Though many Homebrews have 'house rules' and major departures from the published rules, the major changes in guildschool took three major forms.

1) Character creation and development rules.
2) Combat mechanics.
3) Spell Mechanics.

I will go into each in it's own post.  It is worth mentioning that one major reason for the changes cannot be easily sundered from the others; and that particular issue has reared it's head in many of the worthy discussions on this site. That is the question of relative threat level, and the progression of same.  This came into all of the three catagories listed above.   So many rules we created in a specific areas were affected by this particular tenet.

(and to all of you who have shown interest in the past, I hope separating the crunch and the fluff will help)

[LordVreeg]

Reserved for Character creation and development

Celtricia, World of Factions
skill page


I don't want to throw around the term 'realistic'.  Games that purport realism are often sacrificing in other areas.  But when we envisioned Celtricia and started to build the game system around it, we were certainly looking for a game that allowed for more free-form development.  The older Class-strict D&D games lacked that, and even newer versions were still bounded by class-structures.  This class can gain this skill at this level...etc.  
The second hurdle was how experience was applied.  I know the older game versions explained that combat experience was used to substitute for thieves prctising lockpicking and mages studying books.  But we wanted to create a system that rewarded players for using their skills.  One that would not, as we have said many times, make a thief better at picking locks by killing things.  
Also, the fluff part of the game was moving towards a faction-heavy setting, where intrigue and allegiance to God, Guild, and Country were paramount.  So we wanted a system that would make these factional organisms more valuable to the players.
And as mentioned in the first post, we were looking for a character development system that did neccessitate finding more and more powerful threats every week.  We wanted an axe blow to be threatening to a character 12 and 20 sessions into a characters life.
On the other hand, we wanted to avoid demotivating players by reducing the regularity of advancement.  And though we were trying to reduce the strictures found in a class-based system, we wanted to take advantage of the feature of having certain groups better at certain things, which is the weakness of many skill-based systems.

Skill Based system
So we created a skill-based system, where experience was kept in the skill itself.  And the base amount gained per level in that skill, and the sub-skills it gives are constants.  But the speed that a person breaks the levels is adjusted by an 'experience modifier'.

When a character is created in Celtricia, they need to choose a primary guild or School (hence the name of the system, GuildSchool). The school will have certain skills that have favorable 'BXPMOD', or Base Experience Modifiers. A good example of this is a character that tries to learn the 'Alchemic Spell Point ability' from the Martial school of Song has a .09 BXPMOD. Learning that same skill from The Church of Jubilex of Chaos has a BXPMOD of .2. The Altrnative School of Magic, however, teaches that skill with a .39 BXPMOD. (and you don't ever bother learning a skill from a school that sucks at it...like learning astrophysics from a landscaping company). The effect of these modifiers is the speed that a character breaks level in something. The .39 BXPMOD gains actual, modified experience 4 times as fast as the idiot who asked the Martial School of Song to teach him.

The actual EXPMOD of a skill comes from the BXPMOD of the school and the ATRIBMOD. All skills have an attribute modifier as well, so that smart characters are good at things that need smart, and strong charcters are good at combat, etc.
[spoiler=Hitpoint skill example]HP is a skill that has the least to do with the school a character comes from, and the most to do with the ATTRIBMOD.
It is, however, the only skill EVERY character gets. Still, it is a good illustration of how this works. The BXPMOD froma fighting school might be .15 (a bad school is .05, there is little guild distinction in this skill).
The notation on ATTRBMOD for HP reads ST10-.01/HE10-.03, which means that for every point of Strength a character has over or under 10, the gain or lose .01 on their EXPMOD, and for every point of Health over or under 10, the EXPMOD goes up or down by .03.
So, A character from this school with a 10 ST and a 10 HE has no ATTRIBMOD, and ends with the .15 from their BXPMOD as their total EXPMOD for that skill. If the character had a 15 Strength and a 15 Health, this means they have ((15-10*.01=.05)+(15-10*.03=.15))=.2 as the ATTRIBMOD, added to the .15 BXPMOD= an EXPMOD of .35 for Hit points. This character will gain levels in HP over twice as fast as a character with the lower Attributes.

On a more humorous note, the fastest way to get experience in Hp is to get hit, though you can also add combat experience to HP.[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Level breaks for every skill]
100=1
200=2
300=3
500=4
800=5
1300=6
2000=7
3000=8
4400=9
6300=10
[/spoiler]
So the effect of the EXPMOD mechanism in Guildschool is to show how good a character is at a skill, by determining how fast they break levels in it. It also allows us, in-game, to place experience in a skill ONLY WHEN IT IS USED. So in my 12 year old Mistonian crew, the fighters may have 28-38 HP, whereas the non fighters normally have 12-16 hp. You can put experinece in HP, you see, from comabt exp given after the fight, or when you get hit.
This has been kind of cool, as it does not allow for characters to gain EXP in things they do not use.

So anyone who looks at the level break chart and thinks that it seems easy to break levels, guess how many skills a beginning character generally starts with as full skills? Normally 7-12. The Mistonians average about 38k experience (and this group has averaged a session a month for 12 years), but they also average 20-24 skills each. Characters grow and change based on what they learn and what they use.

Subskills
Skills in Celtricia are also based on the familiar tree system, in that 'Basic Trap Skill' has sub skills of 'Find Trap, remove Trap, and 'Set Trap'. 'Avoid Trap is a sub skill of 'remove trap', etc.

Now, since you understand that skills have sub skills, how do sub skills affect the game? It is first important to understand how 'base skills' work. The basic Trap skill has a 1.0 dropdown for Remove trap, Set trap, and find trap, which means that 100% of the skill amount is dropped down as an ability in those skills. SO why would anyone bother to learn the find trap skill?
Because BAsic skills have lousy amounts gained per level. 'Basic Trap, for example has a base of 5% with 1-4 gained per level. This means that a thief-type who does not learn the sub skills may be fifth level in Basic Trap, but it will only give an average of 17.5% skill in the trap abilities, which is pretty lousy. (that 17.5 it gives to the subskills is called the 'dropdown').

Find Traps, the sub skill, has a base of 10% with a 2-7 gain per level. So the amount gained per level is higher, though the scope is narrower. The same thief-type from before, with a second level skill in 'Find Trap' added to his fifth level 'basic trap' skill dropdown, will have a 36.5% Find Traps skill.

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[LordVreeg]

Reserved for Combat mechanics
Damage, Protection, Hit points, and the Lethality of a Campaign
Or,
Another Inside Look at the Mechanics of Celtricia
Or
The Warhorse Fallacy, Revisited.

The Warhorse fallacy is, quickly put, a  critique on the HP system that allows players to take the amount of damage they can in many systems.  The Warhorse is chosen because at a relatively low level, most fighters can absorb more damage than a 2000lb destrier.  (yes, they could get that heavy, though that is about the max).
I understand full well the arguments that HP also equate to luck, learned skills, destiny, etc.  And to a small degree, I totally agree.  It is fun to be able to take more damage as a character gets more powerful, and it is better for the game, to some extent, to have the characters not as threatened by every bow shot.
But I seriously have trouble to the extent that it is done in most systems, and would contend that it is, like many rules , a crutch for bad GMing.
[note]This is not to say everyone who uses such systems is a bad GM, merely to suggest that said rules mitigate the problems that come from poor GMing at the expense of assisting the better GMs to create a more dramatic world [/note]
I mean, I consider it an overdone mechanism of the game that a rogue who never gets hit and almost never gets attacked has 30 HP at a medium power level, and a fighter at that level, unarmored will have 45 or more HP.  Not to even get into higher level characters.

Hit points are a skill in Celtricia, and you only get experience in them in Combat, and a lot more when you get struck. As all skills, it is not hard to break levels early, but it gets much harder later on.  HP as a skill has a base of 3 and gains 2-5 per level (better guilds and schools (and factions) have better experience mods and gain levels faster...a healthy Knight might have an EXPMOD of .35, a wizenned alchemist a .1).  The very highest a PC has in HP is level 10, with 36 HP.  Out of the 13 active PCs, no one else has even 30 (though some of the fighrter types are getting close).  The beginning players that my Igbarians just rolled up have between level 1 and level 3 HP, based on their initial EXP breakouts, and have HP from 5 to 15.

Ogre warriors (between 1st and 3rd rank) will have between 17-42 hp, Hill giants at the same ability will have 45-68 hp.   Ograk have 15 base HP and gain 2-9 per skill level, Hill Giants have 35 base and gain 3-13 per level.

the two parts to the reasoning here are:
1)We use other mechanisms to keep everyone from getting killed whenever they go into combat.  That would be no fun either,
2)Frankly, on the other hand, our game is a lot more lethal than most.  On purpose.  Dumb moves get you killed.  And I want it that way.

Spells and missle weapons, and their proper use, definitely do help.  But the way weapons (and everything) does damage, and the way protection is done, makes for an interesting game.

To maintain a potential of great lethality, yet not overly so, was a challenge.    First of all, I did what many games had done, and I broke armor into avoidance and protection, and decided that anything that dealt with a character dealing with a blow that was going to hit something (armor, shield, a defensive weapon) dealt with protection, and slipping by all that was avoidance.  But it still didn't quite give me the variability I needed.  Daggers just could not ever touch anyone even in chainmail.  The breakthrough came one day when I really got down to brass tacks and looked at the probablity curves I was trying to create.  I wanted armor to have a range of protections, but more of a bell curve, while I wanted weapons to have a potential of lethality, but not every time, and the smaller the weapon, the lower the chance of a really lethal strike.

So what came out of it was to give both protection and damage a range, with a dividing die.  Which allows you to really mess with the probablity curves.  
I wanted almost all armor to have some protection, but to have a pretty good range.  And I wanted the frequency distribution to group somewhat towards a bell-curve, but still with a bulge towards the low end and a big single tail.  So the dividing die in armor is actaully the average of 2d6, which gives me my slightly taller bell in my curve.  An example of a character with very light armor would be some guy in Hardened leather and padded silk, who would have a base protection of 14-23, divided by those 2d6.  A guy in chain mail and padded silk would have a base protection of 22-31, with a divider, and a guy in Lammellar and padded silk would have 42-51 base protection, still with a divider.
[note]Note that this example does not include the avoidance, initiative or any skills, for the sake of simplicity.[/note]
So our dude in the leather can protect up to 23 hits, he averages 6 protection, and his minimum is 3.  Our guy in chain mail can protect up to 31, his average is 8 protection, and his minimum is 4 hits.  Our tank can protect up to 51 hits, which is a ton.  He averages 14 protection, but can protect as little as 7 on a couple of bad rolls.  This gives even the medium armors the hopes of rolling a pair of ones or a one and a two, and protecting on a big damage hit.  But it means that even the tank can get nailed if he rolls badly.  And heavily armored tanks never get missed.

Now weapons I wanted something slightly different.  I wanted a range of damage, but I wanted to curve to be a little less belled.  I also came up with a neat mitigastion that allows me to not have the amount of damage being the only factor, but the bigger a weapon is, the smaller it's dividing dice.  [note] Smaller weapons also are much faster.  Sometime, a guy with a short sabre will get in 2-3 attacks for every attack of a guy with a bec-di-corbin, or something.  This is great when you are fighting a lightly armored opponent with a low protection.  However, it has been proved a zillion times that attacking 10 times and not getting through someones protection is not as good as one hit that does.  It's all a ratio, both have their place. [/note]
so a Bank dagger might have 11-18 damage, with a d10 divider, a gladius might have 15-26 damage with a d8 divider, a broadsword might have 17-28 damage with a d6 divider, and double bladed broadaxe might do 22-37 dmage with a d4 divider. Behind the curtain a little bit, this means that with the dagger, you can do up 18 hits (before modifiers), and our guy in Lammellar averages 14 and can protect as little as 7.  So if the guy with the dagger rolls a 1 or a 2 divider die, he has a hope of doing some damage to the tank.  But it also means that there is only a 10% chance of doing decent damage, the gladius has a 12.5%, the  broadsword 16.6%, and the axe 25%.  Only huge, slow weapons have d5 or d4 dividers, they are rare.  Giants generally have all d4 dividers, dragons have d3.  Don't get hit by a dragon.  A medium dragon bite is (55-70/d3)
The way the game has fallen out, and this is a gross generalization, is that a 1 or a 2 divider has a decent chance of doing some damage, anything else means you have to hope your opponent rolls a crappy protection.  So the odds of getting 'decent' hit become 20% with a really small, d10 divider weapon, 25% with the d8 medium weapon, 33% with the good sized weapon, and 50% with those super slow, punishing weapons.

[LordVreeg]

Reserved for Spell mechanics.
Celtricia, World of Factions

LINK TO SPELL PAGE
Spell Mechanics

Overview
                   As mentioned before, the GuildSchool system came into being not just as an exercise in creating a diferent rule set, or even just trying to create a system that catered to the maturing sensibilities of the players.  GuildSchool's major dynamic was to create a system that would fit the world we were creating.
This meant creating a system where casters learned to channell power from myriad power sources, sources that powered particular spell effects.  Casting a fire spell in Guildschool means using the caster's inner strength (spirit Spell Points) to initiate the spell, initiate the conduit to the Well of Fire on the Third Station, and use that power source to fuel the fire part of the spell.  So it will cost Spirit and Fire spell points.
                In other words, Spell casting in the bip system is done by the expenditure of spell points. Ability in a spell skill is the game vehicle for a caster's knowledge and connection to that power source, except for Spirit spell points.
 
Spell Point types/Spell Power Sources

Animist SP  --Powered by the Animal Oversoul
Artificer SP   -Powered by reaching out to the echoes of the Creator's Song in the Void
House of Air SP-Powered by the the Endless Sky on the Second Station (Since the House of Air was destroyed).
House of Chaos SP-Powered by the Well of Chaos on the Eighth House, which forces the void apart.
House of Death SP-Powered by the Polar Well of Death on the House of Death, Zevashopal.
House of Earth SP-Powered by the Endless Solidity of the House of Earth.
House of Fire SP-Powered by the Well of Fire on the Third Station (as the House of Fire is no more).
House of Life SP-Powered by the Polar Well of Life, on the House of Life.
House of Order SP-Powered by the Well of Order, which binds the Void together.
House of Water SP-Powered by the Endless Sea on the House of Water.
Mentalist SP-Powered by the Humanoid Oversoul
Necromantic SP-Powered by the conduit from the House of Death to all the Soul's End Journeys
Restorative SP-Powered by the Well of Life
Shade Sp -Powered by the void itself.  (unknown for millenia, not used)
Spirit SP--The personal power of the caster's trained mind.

                One major reason we did this is that we wanted the different specializations to be more than just a list of spells that could be cast.  A Church of Chaos (Orcus) will normally have decent ability in Spirit, Very Good Chaos, decent Restoratove, and decent death magic, and poor at most other types of spell ability.  The Steel Libram Sages of Igbar might have decent Spirit, Very Good Mentalist skill, Above average Artificer.  We want to have real Pyromancers, and real Artificers, and mentalists...Not just different spell lists.
                   
                Spirit spell points are the part of a spell the caster supplies himself; the internal power a caster learns to harness to trigger a spell. Every spell takes spirit spell points, and a caster can use Spirit to fuel any other type of spell point skill he may be deficient in, normally at 1:4 ratio. This is the game mechanic that allows a caster to use energy from his own personal stores to fuel a spell that uses an ability he may be deficient in.
 
 
 
[ic=Rules for Spell Point Conversion]
 
                If all things were perfect, we would always have enough Spell Points to cast the spells we learn. But often, due to past spells cast, or spells not perfectly suited to our characters, we need a little help to cover all the bases in a spell.
                Our characters have been trained in some areas and not others; quite frankly this is purposeful. There is much to know in the world of magic, and the work of many lifetimes to master any part of it. So often, a caster must throw more of their personal power to make up for the area they are lacking in.
                However, if a character is very familiar with a power source, the conversion factor will be less, due to the innate affinity with that source, and the understanding of it.
 
Conversion Chart
unfamiliar No knowledge of Power Source 1:4 ratio
familiar Character has that Spell Category,  1:3 ratio
specialized Level in Specialized Spell Category is >= ½ of Spirit Spell Level, or >= Level 8, minimum lvl 3 1:2 ratio
devoted Level in Devoted Spell Category is >= ¾ of Spirit Spell Level or >= Level 12, minimum lvl 6 1:1.5 ratio


 
                Characters achieving 'specialized' or 'devoted' status will be grandfathered in that status when they achieve the next level in spirit. However, they must achieve another level in the specialized or devoted category before they achieve another spirit level or they will lose the status (unless they are over the permanent status level).
 
Rules for Spell Level
 
                Spell level is normally determined by the characters highest achieved level; normally spirit. However, there are mitigating factors. If the spell that is being cast's primary focus is a category the character has, they may add ¼ of that spell type's level onto their Spirit level. So if Joe Templar is L5 Spirit, L3 Order, L2 Water, and L1 Artificer, and was casting a Water based spell, he would be considered level 5.5 (5 for Spirit and .5 for Water).
                This effect is increased if the spell cast comes from a in which the character is specialized or devoted, to ½ that skill level being added on. So if our friend Joe Templar was casting an Order base spell, his functional level would be 6.5.
[/ic]
 
[ic=Rules For Spell Point Reclamation]
Spell points also take a while to return to the caster. The caster's Spell point reclamation skill determines this. That skill is a 50% auto dropdown from the spell points, so until the caster grows in power, the spell point reclamation skill is normally ½ the casters actual skill in that type of spell points. This translates into the caster reclaiming at .05* their reclamation skill per hour while active, and .15* their reclamation skill per hour while sleeping.
                Also, a caster can reclaim up to 3 different types of spell points back in a given hour while awake, but up to 5 different types per hour while sleeping.
                So this means a character with 20 spirit points has probably a 10 Spirit reclamation skill. He will reclaim .5 points an hour awake, and 1.5 an hour while sleeping.[/ic]
 
[ic=Spell Success]
 
Spells are not assumed to always work perfectly.   The concentration needed to draw energies from the disperate source, the twisted logics that must be used, are all difficult.  So every spell must be rolled for, to see if it succeeds.  The players have a spell success dropdown skill at .5 of their best spell skill which is addded to the spell success of the skill, and added to a dm roll.  The players need to roll under this.[/ic]
 
 

Magic In Celtricia--Behind the Curtain
One of the primary issues I see come up in threads is the magic level question. How prevelant is magic in the mileau? Is it a 'high-magic' world, or a 'low magic' world.

But there is more to it than that. Many games have similar ratios of high, mid, and lower level magic. Another question is what is the frequnecy distribution of ability?

When I created the spell point system for Celtricia, I set it up to be as flexible as possible, so that casters can blow all their points in one spell, or cast lots of little spells, or use rituals to cast tougher spells. I also do not differentiate between divine spells and others, as they actually all come from the same sources of power.


But I also set things up so that I could have a magic rich world, but where even middle level magic is rare, and high level magic is a thing of legend. Igbar, as an example is a small walled city of thirty thousand souls. Bards, mages, sages, priests, alchemsits and other people who can manipulate the void-bound sources of spell power abound. However, There are no priests capable of casting a Full Ressurection. Raise Dead is possible at 5 of the churches.

Higher level spells obviosuly cost more spell point. But they also have unfovorable spell successes, and pull from more spell sources. All spells need spirit points, which is the trigger, the part of the spell that comes fropm the caster. Beginner spells and cantrip pull from Spirit and one or 2 other spell point sources. Tougher spells will pull from 3, 4, or even 5 sources, so a caster must be 'fluent' in many disciplines to cast any medium or higher power spells.
[spoiler=aformentioned spell types]
Amnimist SP

Artificer SP

House of Air SP

House of Chaos SP

House of Death SP

House of Earth SP

House of Fire SP

House of Life SP

House of Order SP

House of Water SP

Mentalist SP

Necromantic SP

Restorative SP

Shade Sp

Spirit SP
[/spoiler]

So, as I have stated before, we keep a level of experience in every skill for a character, and being better at a skill means have a more favorable experience modifier. So only real casters even have the capacity to cast more difficult spells. As a very, very rough rule of thumb, we can assume a caster gains 4 spell points per level in a spell skill.

Cantrips may cost 2-5 spirit points, and 1-3 points from another source.

 



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[spoiler=Air Cantrip, Chilling]

Spell Name Chilling

Major Sphere Air

Spell Source

Initiative 3

Range touch

Duration 20 sec

Save none

Save effect none

Spell Success 27

Area of effect 1' cube

Counter

Spirit cost 3

Earth cost 0

Water cost 0

Fire cost 0

Air cost 1

Life cost 0

Death cost 0

Law cost 0

Chaos cost 0

Restorative cost 0

Necromantic cost 0

Mentalist cost 0

Artificer cost 0

Animist cost 0

Total cost 4

Description

This cantrip decreases the tempurature of an object by 10 degrees or reduces the

tempurature to 35 degrees farenheit, whichever is lower. After the duration, the

object returns to tempurature at normal speed.
[/spoiler]
 

 

So a caster who is first level in Spirit and first level in Air can cast this, maybe even twice.

 

Now, let's go to a common spell everyone know in every system. This is an air variation of Magic Missle.

 



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[spoiler=Air Spell, Minor Kinetic Blast]

Spell Name Minor Kinetic Blast

Major Sphere Air

Spell Source

Initiative 2

Range 60

Duration inst

Save reflex-15%

Save effect neg

Spell Success 0

Area of effect

Counter

Spirit cost 10

Earth cost 0

Water cost 0

Fire cost 0

Air cost 5

Life cost 0

Death cost 0

Law cost 0

Chaos cost 0

Restorative cost 0

Necromantic cost 0

Mentalist cost 1

Artificer cost 0

Animist cost 0

Total cost 16

Description

This is one of the basic offensive spells learned by those versed in Air. It creates balls

of invisible air that smack unerringly to their target. A caster can create 1 ball per 3

levels of experience (i.e., 1 ball at levels 1-3, 2 balls at levels 4-6, etc). Each of the balls

does 5-10/d4 damage (d6+4). Armor protects 1/2.

Please note that these are totally invisible
[/spoiler]


A perfect example, as it pulls 10 Spirit points, 5 Air and 1 Mentalist. A beginning caster, just created, would probably be second or third level Spirit, and first level in 2 other disciplines, so this spell, and maybe a cantrip, would be within casting before needing to recoup points.

Now we move to the lowest of the Raise Dead variations, one used by the Churches of Madrak, Ceminiar, and Amrist.


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[spoiler=Earh Spell, Raise the Earthen Dead]

Spell Name Raise the Earthen Dead

Major Sphere Restorative

Spell Source

Initiative 24

Range touch

Duration perm

Save health+caster's level

Save effect live

Spell Success -18

Area of effect touch

Counter

Spirit cost 42

Earth cost 16

Water cost 0

Fire cost 0

Air cost 0

Life cost 8

Death cost 0

Law cost 0

Chaos cost 0

Restorative cost 20

Necromantic cost 0

Mentalist cost 0

Artificer cost 0

Animist cost 0

Total cost 86

Description

This powerful spell takes a creature that has sunk beyond life and infuses them with

the many spirits of life, bringing them back from beyond the pale.

The person cannot have been dead more than 1 day per 2 levels of the caster, and all

body parts must be accounted for.

The newly raised will be very weak, and will have only one hp. They will take 8

days+2 days per hp to recover their strength. And the character must make a health

CC+ the caster's level, or remain dead, and be unraisable without a ressurection spell.

The caster must use holy water, and at least 3 holy candles tpo cast this spell, and

must know the target's full, real name.
[/spoiler]

The spell successs here s lower, and with 42 Spirit points needed, 16 Earth, 8 Life, 20 Restorative, we are talking 9-12th level in Spirit, 3rd to 5th in Earth, second in Life, and 4th to 6th in Restorative.

So what you have in Celtricia is a land where magic is not unusual at all, where Head Chef's and master Stonemasons use lesser magics on their important jobs, and where minor casters of all stripes are seen regularly. However, greater spell use is extrememly rare and wonderful.

 

[LordVreeg]

Rserved for example character

This is an early Version Of George, A hobyt Mysteriarch from Igbar's Mysteriarchs of Lathe.

File: 1188657491_392_FT31806_georgefront.pdf
File: 1188657491_392_FT31806_georgecombat.pdf
File: 1188657491_392_FT31806_georgeother_sk.pdf
File: 1188657491_392_FT31806_georgespell.pdf

[LordVreeg]

Replaced

[LordVreeg]

Celtricia, World of Factions
Mechanics Thread
V2.0
In game example post.  
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This is a descriptive line from one of the old story posts from the new Legion.  Squire Tusnus set off a trap, and it was a good illustration of the system at work.  
[ooc=behind the curtain]Reflex CC-10%, missed by Tusnus. Assegai (d8+12/d8) damage, +1 for the force of the spring. Tusnus wears padded silk under average chain mail( + his basic defence skill) AV43/PR31. damage for the assegai (15/1)+1=16 (ugg, close to maximum), protection (31-3.4)/3.5=8 protection. Tusnus has 16 HP, and takes 16-8 prot for 8 damage, leaving 8hp. He gains 24 exp in basic defence and 80 exp in HP.[/ooc]

What is the Guildschool Translation of this gobbldeegook?


 [ic=Reflex CC-15%]

Guildschool has 4 major CC rolls. Will, Fortitude, Reflex, and Social. Reflex is based on IN+(CD*3)+ dodge/surprise skill.[/ic]


 [ic=Assegai (d8+12/d8)+1 for the force of the spring.]

GuildSchool damage is almost always done with an amount and a dividing die, to control the probability curve. The Assegai is a small weapon, so it has an 8 sided die divider. So the weapon does 12-20 before adjustments, but the dividing die means that there is a 12.5% chance of doing 12-20. Daggers normally have d10 or d8 dividers, larger weapons have lower dividing dice. A broadsword does (d10+16/d6), having a 16.7% of doing 17-26 base damage, a demilune does (d12+17/d5) base damage, having a 20% chance of doing 18-29 base.
The +1 bonus is for the forsce of the spring. Minor construction adjustments and minor spells add damage before the dividing dice, great strength and better magic adds damage after the divider.
A critical hit reduces the divider of any weapon to a d4 and sometimes has a subtractor to that divider.

Now, how does a low HP world like mine deal with this much damage being thrown around? Other than rolling up new characters, that is?[/ic]


 [ic=Tusnus wears padded silk under average chain mail( + his basic defence skill) AV43/PR31.]

Protection, that's how, or Damage reduction, in some folk's new-fangled vocabulary. The above notation means that Tusnus has a 43 avoidance (he's pretty easy to hit), but has 31 max protection. This explanation deals with protection. All protections have a d10 roll and a (2d6/2) divider. The 2d6 average divide is created to give more of a bellcurve, so that protection has more of a traditional bell-curve, vs the larger-tailed probablity curve of the weapons. Tusnus's protection will be between 5.7 and 10.4 points 77.5% of the time, though it can be as low as 3.6, and as much as 31.

We've used this system for over 2 decades of playtesting now, and despite many tweaks, it accomplishes what I wanted. Charaters who go into combat wear a lot of armor, since they are going to get his a lot. Weapons do a lot of damage and HP are low in GuildSchool. Protection is all fighters have.[/ic]


 [ic=Tusnus has 16 HP, and takes 16-8 prot for 8 damage, leaving 8hp. He gains 24 exp in basic defence and 80 exp in HP.]

Guildschool is also skillbased, not classbased. We keep experience seperately in each skill. Character's that leasrned the skill from a good school and have advantageous Attributes have a better EXPmodifier, so they go up levels faster. No one gets better hitpoints from picking a lock, but no one becomes a better lockpick by killing a skeleton.
In the example above, Squire Tusnus got nailed. He protected 8 points, and gained 24 exp in basic defence skill (he's not advanced enough to have to worry about what subskills to put it in, if he wanted to), and his 8 HP taken in a real battle netted him 80 EXP in hit points. He also gasin a share of exp for creature he has a part in killing which must be spent based on his contribution to the combat.[/ic]

[LordVreeg]

Celtricia, World of Factions
V 2.0 for CBG


Well, despite me being in my own busy season at work, work on the Celtricia pbwiki continues.
I have been ably aided recenly by a few of my players (2 of them original players of this setting from the early-to-mid 1980s)  So the front page has been cleaned up a lot, and many more pages have been added, including many more in-depth notations of the Igbarian area of play.
I'm mentioning this in thr crunch psection because that much of the rectent work has been in crunch.
World of Factions

Spells are now 2/3 transcribed.
spell index page

[LordVreeg]

Crunch updates for celtricia

Examples of combat expanded
examples of combat
Rsetorative and Order spells finished (working on Mentalist spells, powered by the collective subconsious of all celtrician sentients)
spell list

[LordVreeg]

Bump for more spells
Mentalist spells trasnscribed onto site.  Necromantic spells next.  Which might be my favorite...stupid little spells like "Vermin Puppet".
celtrician spellbook
(yes, to go along with our own spellrules, we have our own spellbook unique to the campaign, 11 different major spell sources  since I have been speaking to many designers on many threadsa about their spell systems, the link to the spell book is above, the link to the spell rules are here.  Artificers, Animists, Necromancers, Life mages, Death Mages, Pyromancers and Earthmagi (and more! and combinations!) all exist in Celtricia.
It was very important that a mage who knows some spells about charming and noise (mentalist spells) can't just learn a spell about a totally different discipline (say a fire spell) without knowing how to access the power source for Fire spells.
rules

[LordVreeg]

Basic Necromantic spells added to spell list.
spellpage
Only Restorative and Water spells to add, then the basic spellbook is posted, and I can get back to creating new spells again.
Frankly, I think I enjoy my necromancers better than any other spell sources.  Way fun to create.  And since they are powered by the Well of Death, many sentient undead actually can access some of these spells once in a while.

[LordVreeg]

And once again, a bump, as the Basic Spell List and descriptions for the Restorative Spells in Guildschool is finished.
Guildschool spellbook
Restorative spell ability is channelled fropm the Well of Life, on the House of Life.  It represents the caster's ability to restore and revitalize a creature.

And once I finish the House of Water spellbook, I can get onto creating new spells again!  Phew!

[LordVreeg]

And finally, the job of inserting the 467 basic spells and descriptions from the guildschool system is finally finished.
celtrician spellbook
Basic water spells aer done, so the basic spells for all 13 spell types are done on the site.
Air Spells
Animist Spells
Artificer Spells
Chaos Spells
Death Spells
Earth Spells
Fire Spells
Order Spells
Life Spells
Mentalist Spells
Necromantic Spells
Restorative Spells
Water Spells
 
This has taken months to complete.

Now I can get onto the task of redoing the weapons.

[LordVreeg]

Somehow forgot to update this on the thread. We have been playtesting this for almost a year, and it went onto the Wiki months ago.
spell rules

Spell Resistance
                      Spell points of every type are skills, as we have mentioned, and they have a few drop-own sub skills.  Spell resistance (and counterspelling) is one of these.   The skill is an automatic dropdown at 1/4 the ability of the spell point ability, excepting Spirit Spell Points.  In other words, if a person has 16 points of Fire Spell points, they have Fire Spell Resistance at 4% skill.  The idea behind this skill is that if a caster is conversant in a type of magic, he will know better how to resist it.
                      This has 2 major uses.  The first is simple, passive resistance.  Whenever a person casts a spell that is in a realm the caster has points in, any CC gains a bonus of the 1/4 of the spell points.  So if the caster above has a fire spell cast at them with a reflex CC needed, they have a 4% bonus on their CC.                      
                      The other use is to counterspell.  Instead of casting, a caster can gain initiative, and wait for an opposing caster to work magic.  They can try to agressivley counterspell if they have 'Spell resistance'  as mentioned above in the type of spell the caster is using.  If so, they can subtract their spell resistance to the caster's success% (as Magic resistance ability), and it only cost them one Spell point in that type of spell.  Note that the point it lost whether the spell comes off or not.  Also, please note that is with other casters, infering the actual casting of spells.  One cannot counterspell the spell-like effects of an outsider or any Sauroid casting, as they cast differently, and it would be alien to a caster.

[LordVreeg]

Armor types slightly changed, more shields added in and changed.
4 players in the Igbarian crew are serious SCA folk, and have done tons of research.  Nothing is like a PC telling you how happy they are that your game has lammellar armor, and then to pull out a eral suit of lammellar they have made.  

So the boys made it very clear how much protection a shield really gives, and how important shields were to combat, and we all did a lot of work on the history of the shield.  So I had to up all the shield protections a little bit, since it was made all too clear to me that a good shield's protection is more than a poor suit.

New Armor Page

And the Chicken skin armor is a joke from a long time ago...