Leewei
2010-05-13, 12:46 PM
Hi Playgrounders,
I've been tinkering for a while now with a play-by-post / play-by-email game system based mainly on LARPing. While people online generally don't dress up, a good avatar image and good roleplaying can go a long way.
The game world is a medieval fantasy world that is wracked by apocalypses. Every so often, an old bad-tempered deity rouses himself from sleeping and stomps the cities flat. PCs are fledgeling wizards trying to gather the knowledge of past civilizations to make a good life for themselves and perhaps stave off the next cycle of destruction.
My reason for posting today is to seek feedback and advice regarding the spells I'm putting into the next campaign. These fall into a several different types. These can be thought of as colleges from GURPS, nouns from Ars Magika or disciplines from WoD.
Obtaining new spells
Wizards must painstakingly discover how their magic works by reading magic tomes, meditating and working through various exercises until they gain the appropriate level of enlightenment. The game term describing this process is Research.
A wizard collects tomes for each type of magic. The number of unique tomes that a wizard possesses determines the power of the spell the wizard can learn for that type of magic. The progression follows:
Tomes: Maximum spell level
1: 1
4: 2
9: 3
16: 4
Furthermore, PCs may spend time and money to copy and trade tomes to each other. Since they're competing with each other to an extent, the power of any given PC will probably be somewhat held in check.
Each spell and tome will be named in honor of the first PC to possess it.
Having said this, here are the magic types and spells I have so far:
Scrying Magic
-X's Intuition: Aids exploration skill checks. Learning this spell grants the special Intuitive trait, which gives more verbose results from skill checks.
-X's Visitation: Allows unlimited communication via dreams for the rest of the game day, regardless of PC location.
-X's Discernment: Grants the special Discerning trait, which makes the PC far harder to dupe by magical means. Also reveals most active spells and magics to the PC.
-X's Omniscience: PC can interact with 1 region at range, regardless of distance, benefitting from the Omniscient temporary trait.
Influence Magic
-X's Enticement: Grants PC the Enticing temporary trait which aids Trade skill checks.
-X's Indenture: Target NPC is now a Sycophant, a special Minion that aids some skill checks.
-X's Influence: Grants favor from target district's Influences; diminishes favor for all other PCs.
-X's Primacy: Change any one trait of target City.
Healing Magic
-X's Convalescence: Grants a temporary Medicine trait which aids Chirurgery skill checks.
-X's Rejuvination: Heals all physical debilities in target PC. Changes NPC Debilitized trait to Restored and grants substantial influence with that NPC.
-X's Absolution: Heals all curses and afflictions on target PC.
-X's Serum: Grants the special Immortal trait. Also empowers one of the wizard's traits, making it impossible to damage or exhaust.
Essential Magic
-X's Distillation: Converts a modest amount of silver into an Arcane Essence.
-X's Extraction: Convert Arcane Essence + Materia into the appropriate form of advanced Essence.
-X's Crucible: Wizard may now create an Essence Crucible, allowing Distillation and Extraction spellcasting at will with no turn cost.
-X's Philosophy: Wizard gains the special Philosopher trait, allowing Philosophy action to create wealth using Arcanist rather than Merchant skill.
False Magic
-X's Silver: Creates a special Trade item that yields money at the cost of reduced reputation. Can also be traded between PCs.
-X's Impersonation: Wizard can impersonate another PC or NPC for the rest of the game day.
-X's Sanctuary: Wizard gains the special Subtle trait, becoming very difficult to detect and target for effects.
-X's Confidence: Interact with target NPC as if you are their most Influential PC until the end of the game day.
Road Magic
-X's Pathfinding: Aids Travel skill checks.
-X's Gait: Grants the special Itinerant trait which can be used for extra movement on any road, once per game day.
-X's Stepstone: Travel to any familiar City in one turn. Must have a known road there from your current location.
-X's Highway: Target boundary between locations is now considered a road. Must be adjacent to another road or City.
I've been tinkering for a while now with a play-by-post / play-by-email game system based mainly on LARPing. While people online generally don't dress up, a good avatar image and good roleplaying can go a long way.
The game world is a medieval fantasy world that is wracked by apocalypses. Every so often, an old bad-tempered deity rouses himself from sleeping and stomps the cities flat. PCs are fledgeling wizards trying to gather the knowledge of past civilizations to make a good life for themselves and perhaps stave off the next cycle of destruction.
My reason for posting today is to seek feedback and advice regarding the spells I'm putting into the next campaign. These fall into a several different types. These can be thought of as colleges from GURPS, nouns from Ars Magika or disciplines from WoD.
Obtaining new spells
Wizards must painstakingly discover how their magic works by reading magic tomes, meditating and working through various exercises until they gain the appropriate level of enlightenment. The game term describing this process is Research.
A wizard collects tomes for each type of magic. The number of unique tomes that a wizard possesses determines the power of the spell the wizard can learn for that type of magic. The progression follows:
Tomes: Maximum spell level
1: 1
4: 2
9: 3
16: 4
Furthermore, PCs may spend time and money to copy and trade tomes to each other. Since they're competing with each other to an extent, the power of any given PC will probably be somewhat held in check.
Each spell and tome will be named in honor of the first PC to possess it.
Having said this, here are the magic types and spells I have so far:
Scrying Magic
-X's Intuition: Aids exploration skill checks. Learning this spell grants the special Intuitive trait, which gives more verbose results from skill checks.
-X's Visitation: Allows unlimited communication via dreams for the rest of the game day, regardless of PC location.
-X's Discernment: Grants the special Discerning trait, which makes the PC far harder to dupe by magical means. Also reveals most active spells and magics to the PC.
-X's Omniscience: PC can interact with 1 region at range, regardless of distance, benefitting from the Omniscient temporary trait.
Influence Magic
-X's Enticement: Grants PC the Enticing temporary trait which aids Trade skill checks.
-X's Indenture: Target NPC is now a Sycophant, a special Minion that aids some skill checks.
-X's Influence: Grants favor from target district's Influences; diminishes favor for all other PCs.
-X's Primacy: Change any one trait of target City.
Healing Magic
-X's Convalescence: Grants a temporary Medicine trait which aids Chirurgery skill checks.
-X's Rejuvination: Heals all physical debilities in target PC. Changes NPC Debilitized trait to Restored and grants substantial influence with that NPC.
-X's Absolution: Heals all curses and afflictions on target PC.
-X's Serum: Grants the special Immortal trait. Also empowers one of the wizard's traits, making it impossible to damage or exhaust.
Essential Magic
-X's Distillation: Converts a modest amount of silver into an Arcane Essence.
-X's Extraction: Convert Arcane Essence + Materia into the appropriate form of advanced Essence.
-X's Crucible: Wizard may now create an Essence Crucible, allowing Distillation and Extraction spellcasting at will with no turn cost.
-X's Philosophy: Wizard gains the special Philosopher trait, allowing Philosophy action to create wealth using Arcanist rather than Merchant skill.
False Magic
-X's Silver: Creates a special Trade item that yields money at the cost of reduced reputation. Can also be traded between PCs.
-X's Impersonation: Wizard can impersonate another PC or NPC for the rest of the game day.
-X's Sanctuary: Wizard gains the special Subtle trait, becoming very difficult to detect and target for effects.
-X's Confidence: Interact with target NPC as if you are their most Influential PC until the end of the game day.
Road Magic
-X's Pathfinding: Aids Travel skill checks.
-X's Gait: Grants the special Itinerant trait which can be used for extra movement on any road, once per game day.
-X's Stepstone: Travel to any familiar City in one turn. Must have a known road there from your current location.
-X's Highway: Target boundary between locations is now considered a road. Must be adjacent to another road or City.