Someone make a damn CofD/Storytelling 2 game worth playing, kthx

Sammi

@Ganymede
It's closer to the Second Sight stuff. It's not what you're looking for, because each magical discipline is a series of codified effects. I just wanted to know if you were familiar with it.

Coin

@Ganymede

I think you could do what you want by getting rid of Gnosis (which you are) and simply making Arcana into separate Merits. There's no real need, IMO, to make them linked to any one stat. Instead, if you want to limit their increase systematically, make sure that to have the next level, you need to already have a predetermined amount of Rotes in the previous ones.

For example:

Forces 1 requires no rotes (as there are no Forces 0 rotes; but it does open the character's knowledge of the Arcanum).
Forces 2 requires two Forces 1 rotes.
Forces 3 requires three Forces 1 rotes and two Forces 2 rotes.
Forces 4 requires four Forces 1 rotes, three Forces 2 rotes, and two Forces 3 rotes.
Forces 5 requires five Forces 1 rotes, four Forces 2 rotes, three Forces 3 rotes, and two Forces 4 rotes.

This is actually a system I have had in the backburner for a while and will probably use some day, but you're welcome to it if you like it, obviously. It makes characters have to broaden their horizons in lower levels before advancing--which is more "realistic", but more importantly, it makes sure someone who uses magic actually has an internal grimoire (so to speak) instead of cherry picking rotes they like and relying on creative thaumaturgy for everything else (which would be bad in your system anyway, since a lack of Gnosis would make their dice pools lame).

Ganymede

@Coin

Interesting idea.

Over lunch, I devised an alternative to what I proposed before: a custom-design "Avatar" built around one Power attribute, one Finesse attribute, and one Resistance attribute. The Avatar is the PC's conception of his idealized self as Imago, and defines how his magic is formed and manifested. The PC's Arcana are limited to the PC's sum of Avatar attribute points, divided by 3 and rounded down.

Example: Ganymede's Avatar is the embodiment of Pedantry, where all aspects of reality may be shifted based on one's mental will, knowledge, and acumen. The Avatar therefore is based on Intelligence, Wits, and Resolve. Out of CGen, she picks Intelligence 4 (because she's stupidly smarter than you, stupid), Wits 2, and Resolve 2. She elects to take 4 XP from her CGen-awarded XP to take Intelligence 5, because daayyyyyyum, she be the smartest bitch queen, bitch. The total of her Avatar attributes is 9, so she can start with any Arcana at 3.

Next, Rotes are highly personal, and developed through repeated reiterations of the Imago. The thing is, how the Imago is formed is affected by a Mage's Avatar. When developing the Rote, the Mage has to describe how the Imago is formed, and then propose an applicable attribute and skill and Arcana modifier. The attribute chosen must be one of the Avatar attributes, and bear a reasonable relationship to the Imago and effect; the skill chosen must be reasonably-related to what the Mage must do to cast the spell (e.g., if you have to strike the target with your hand, then Brawl); and, as expected, the Arcana must be the highest level Arcana necessary for the Rote, or, if there are two or more of the same, one of those.

Example: Ganymede conceives of a Rote that would allow her to muddle and bewilder a target after delivering a sentence of impenetrable logic and complexity. She proposes the roll to be Intelligence + Empathy + Mind. EmmahSue, who reviews the Rote, disagrees with the use of Empathy, and instead proposes that Persuasion be used. Ganymede, not wanting to mentally beat up poor EmmahSue, who, after all, has to deal with Mr. Raptor, accepts. Hence, the creation of the Rote: "Ganymede's Baffling Balderdash."

To add a layer of understandable complexity -- and to restrict the circle-jerking of rote-swapping -- suppose that a Mage can only use Rotes that use his Avatar's attributes. That means that "Ganymede's Baffling Balderdash" can only be used by Mages whose Avatars have Intelligence as the Power attribute.

Buuuuut, suppose we make the game a little more interesting by awarding players that teach and Rotes beats, which slightly reduce costs. Then people would have an incentive to mix and mingle, get into tutelage agreements, and, you know, role-play.

Just some thoughts.

Coin

@Ganymede
I actually really like that, except that I would insit that you can't have more than two Attributes from the same vertical category. So you can't have Intelligence, Wits and Resolve; it might have to be Intelligence, Wits, and Composure; or Intelligence, Manipulation, and Resolve. Mostly to promote a better spread.

I'd also allow being able to cast rotes that aren't within your Attribute spread--but maybe it costs a WP point, or takes an extra turn of concentration, or some other surplus cost that makes it worth it, but not as easy. Kind of like how in Awakening if you cast a creative thaumaturgy spell with Arcana that aren't from your Path, you have to pay an extra 1 Mana.

Arkandel

Is there Paradox in this implementation? How about mana, do they exist?

I.e. what are the inherent risks and/or costs to spellcasting, if any?

Ganymede

@Coin said:

I actually really like that, except that I would insit that you can't have more than two Attributes from the same vertical category. So you can't have Intelligence, Wits and Resolve; it might have to be Intelligence, Wits, and Composure; or Intelligence, Manipulation, and Resolve. Mostly to promote a better spread.

I initially thought of forcing people to pick one from each of Mental, Social, and Physical categories, but then realized that may be too spread out. In my example, I could see Ganymede's Avatar having Intelligence, Manipulation, and Resolve, but it may be a little odd to have Intelligence, Dexterity, and Resolve.

So amended and accepted!

I'd also allow being able to cast rotes that aren't within your Attribute spread--but maybe it costs a WP point, or takes an extra turn of concentration, or some other surplus cost that makes it worth it, but not as easy. Kind of like how in Awakening if you cast a creative thaumaturgy spell with Arcana that aren't from your Path, you have to pay an extra 1 Mana.

I thought about allowing Mages to use their Rotes without WP cost. Sure, you'd have fuckers tossing fireballs back and forth like Triss Merigold, but who cares: PHANTASIE MEENZ MAGIK. Then again, I want a darker, low-magic sort of game, so maybe not.

But, perhaps the proposed model is too restrictive. I can see that perspective. So, let's amend and go with 1 WP to cast a Rote without an Avatar-attribute, but no WP for a Rote within the Avatar's attributes.

See? I'm an easy-going game dev.

Coin

@Ganymede
You could also do something in between.

e.g.

You may cast a number of spells that you know (i.e. have the rote for) in a single [time unit]º equal to your Willpower score.
Any spells beyond this require 1 WP point to cast.
Any spell that you know the rote for but that does not conform to your Avatar's Attributes always costs 1 WP.

And then if you want to be really mean, 3. and 2. can stack and if you're past an amount of spells equal to your Willpower score and want to cast a non-Avatar spell, it'll cost you two WP points.

º where "time unit" can be a scene, a day, a week, whatever, depending on how restrictive you feel.

Ganymede

@Coin

Not sure if I need to. Let's say a person has 15 dice for a fireball attack: that means they invested substantial XP into raising all Avatar attributes to 5, a skill to 5, and their Arcana to 5. If XP auto-gain is capped, then you have someone who is so narrowly-formed as to be completely useless in an infinite number of other respects, who would be unlikely to be able to do anything else with any reasonable level of skill.

Besides, that's still only 15 dice, which would likely do, on average, 4-5 damage. You'd probably be better off making an archer.

Coin

@Ganymede
I was just suggesting a way to split the difference. It's only useful if you really want people to have to watch out regarding how much they can cast. If you don't care because people should be allowed to cast all the magic they want (or at least, within the scope of their Avatar), then sure.

Ganymede

@Coin said:

I was just suggesting a way to split the difference. It's only useful if you really want people to have to watch out regarding how much they can cast. If you don't care because people should be allowed to cast all the magic they want (or at least, within the scope of their Avatar), then sure.

What would you prefer?

Coin

@Ganymede
It largely depends on the aim of the game.

Is the aim of the game giving people magical powers that are codified (as opposed as uncodified, which Mage has always tried to do) that they can flaunt? Or is the aim of the game creating people who are powerful within a certain scope if they can adjudicate their resources wisely (which mage has also done)?

If you're aiming for a more freeform game that you don't need a lot of bean counting for, etc., I suggest limiting it as little as possible and letting people toss fireballs all over the fucking place. If you want a grittier game where someone's magic might run out in the midle of a tense, dangerous scene? Use [something like] the rules I posited above.

I, personally, can enjoy either model, but I would go into it with different expectations.

Sammi

It's also possible to allow low-level effects to be free and have higher-level effects require energy from the mage in order to make stuff happen. If Willpower is too restrictive, then it's a possibility to allow the caster to take physical damage in order to cast if they don't use the Willpower to control the energies.

Misadventure

Or you can have a Risk associated with casting.

Ganymede

@Sammi said:

It's also possible to allow low-level effects to be free and have higher-level effects require energy from the mage in order to make stuff happen. If Willpower is too restrictive, then it's a possibility to allow the caster to take physical damage in order to cast if they don't use the Willpower to control the energies.

That's what I'm thinking, actually. That you can cast an attribute-aligned Rote without spending WP, but doing so means taking 1 bashing for each 1 rolled on the activation roll.

Coin

@Ganymede
Honestly, I know it doesn't seem like it because it feels very simple, but that's actually too complicated in my opinion for what you're trying to accomplish. It just... adds a step too many. IMO.

Sammi

@Coin
It may not be so complicated. It could easily be worked into the roll system that rotes get cast with a special command, which would take a switch to indicate that you're spending Willpower, and if you don't spend Willpower, the system gives you damage for each 1.

Coin

@Sammi
Being able to code it doesn't take away the inherent complexity, though.

Sammi

@Coin
The complexity would be players having to count up the dice and apply damage to themselves, and scene-runners monitoring that. If the code does it automatically, the player only has to think about one thing: spend Willpower, or risk losing some vital energy. Then the roll happens and everything is resolved at once.

It would be much simpler than how Paradox is handled.

Coin

@Sammi
I don't really care, because I'm not referring to that being the problem. I think the idea is overly complicated based on what @Ganymede has been trying to build. Whether you can do it with code or not is irrelevant, in my opinion.

Sammi

@Coin
You have a different definition of "complicated" and you're not explaining it well. In game system terms, complicated systems are ones that require players to go through a lot of steps in order to resolve the action. The MtAw Paradox system is complicated, because you first figure out your dice pool for the spell, then you roll Paradox, then you apply those successes as a penalty to your casting roll unless you choose to eat the Paradox as backlash, which produces a special kind of bashing damage. And then, whether or not the spell succeeds, any remaining successes manifest in various possible forms.

Now, if the only extra consideration for the player is, "I might take damage if I don't spend Willpower," because the code does the counting and applies the damage, that's not very complicated. Especially not with what Mage players are used to.

Whether you can do it with code or not is irrelevant, in my opinion.

Except that, empirically, it's not irrelevant. The ability for the system to be semi-automated in code has a large impact on the amount of work that players and STs have to do to make the system function. How much constitutes "overly complicated" is subjective, but the ability of code to reduce the complexity for the player is not.

So since your opinion is counter to something that can be verified empirically, you might as well be saying that dogs are reptiles and defending that with "in my opinion" as if it makes the statement any less wack.