Akhôrahil

The best I can offer you is explicit example text. Given the quality of examples in RQG, I understand if that's not enough (there are many obviously incorrect examples in RQG), but it's all we have. What? No! You need 11 pts-equivalent to penetrate the 5pt Shield (this could be a boosted Dispel, but I'm sure we agree about that), but only 10 pts to Dispel it. But in the example, it's about what it takes to Dispel Countermagic, so it's a given that the Countermagic is in place. The obvious interpretation is that the Countermagic doesn't protect itself. If we go by your interpretation, an 9pt Dispel would be enough to get rid of 10pt Countermagic (because it's one point less, and that removes both spells by Countermagic text). This strikes me as super weird.

At 5%, they will never Special. They will crit one time in a hundred. Odds don't get any better than this in RQ. Also, is the T-Rex really going to declare a knockback attack? And so what if it does? (It's also really unclear about whether you can parry Knockback attacks or not - if you can, this won't work.)

No, it would make them exactly equally powerful. You need X points of Dispel/Dismiss to get rid of X points of Shield or Countermagic. Not X+1. And I think Countermagic does protect, not stop from manifesting. What happens if you hit several people with different amounts of Countermagic with a Thunderbotl? I woiuld posit that they defend against it individually. The Thunderbolt is there. It just slides off some targets. Also, Countermagic rules text: "This defensive spell protects the target" (my emphasis).

My biggest concern isn't mooks... they're there to lose anyway. My big concern is trivially skill-tanking a T-Rex, a giant, a dragon or something. Bringing a dinosaur or a giant down to 5% is utterly trivial.

If we believe the example at all (which, I will grant you, is not a given), then 10pt is enough. It's hardly a stretch to believe that the countermagic doesn't protect itself.

Me too, for the same reason I would never call Sword Trance "defensive". The point was that if Sword Trance is defensive, then so are a bunch of other spells.

That opens up some nice abuse of Bless Champion though, if everything that has any kind of defensive aspect, like Strength (hey, my parry improves!), counts as "defensive".

Yes, sorry, that was poorly phrased. Should have said "it will remove any even one-point defensive Spirit Magic first" - I was just thinking of how most Spirit Magic you cast on yourself is defensive (like Protection).

I can't see any reason why it wouldn't work. Although it might not work quite as well as for Ars Magica, because of how that game assumes that most will bring grogs and companions, with just one or a couple of the mages. (Unless that's how you structure the RQ game as well, naturally.)

It's easy to see how "I'm a powerful Humakti!" could misfire, though. Of course, Eurmali are no strangers to misfires...

Nah, Countermagic is usually really bad, because it can get popped almost accidentally (that Countermagic 4 you had up? The Sunspear pops it without even noticing it on the way in). Shield is ridiculously powerful, though, although once MPs are a trivial currency, the Sword Trance is at risk because of Dispel + Boost (plus the economy means that your re-casting of Sword Trance costs as much as the Dispel did in the first place). There are basically two ways to protect your Sword Trance - through Shield countermagic, and through "bait" spells. If an opponent doesn't have Soul Sight or knows enough about Humakti to call out Sword Trance as the target, any one-point Spirit Magic on you will soak up dispels first through the targeting rules.

You don't need that final MP to dismiss the Shield. RQG: "The total points of the spell must be eliminated to destroy the spell. Thus [...] to dispel a 1-point Shield (a Rune spell) requires 2 points". That is, the countermagic from the Shield doesn't in fact act as countermagic for the Dispel attempt against the Shield itself. This would also indicate that if you have Shield 4 + Countermagic 4, you still only need 8 points of dispelling to take out the Shield. EDIT: Or is this against Shield 5 + CM 1 as mentioned earlier? Even then it's not clear that the Shield's countermagic serves as countermagic for Dispel attempts against itself.

One fun thing about that is how it bakes in some oddities from SCA combat. For instance, note the massive amount of leg hits in the system - I think that's an SCA combat artifact more than a reflection of real-world research.

Really wish RQ did weapon types better - Pendragon is vastly superior here.

Crushes are different this way.

The closest thing to rules we have is the example, which says "This time she boosts the spell with 4 magic points, making it effectively a 6-point spell." I actually don't think the intention is to allow defensive boosting, but the most direct reading of the rules would indicate that you can. Your spell just got bigger, and bigger spells are harder to dispel. It really does. The rules say "A caster may always use additional magic points to boost a spell, regardless of type. This is typically done to overcome a Countermagic or Shield spell, or other magical defenses." And that's it. It doesn't say anything about how it's done or what the effects are - that's just in the example.

Unfortunately, rules questions no longer seem to get answered, so it's impossible to tell.

Partly. There used to be this giant gap between Initiates and Acolytes, and that's just not there any longer. But getting an Allied Spirit (now with its own re-usable Rune Magic) from Priest or Rune-Lord, that really is a game-changer.

By the way, I have no problem believing in Humakti mass-slashings, but in a magical community, numbers will take you down eventually. If the average initiate has 2-3 Rune Points, that's a lot of Dispels coming your way!

While you are right in the standard case (Shield countermagic protects versus dispels on other spells), it's not clear that your Shield protects not only yourself but also your sword. The sword may (I would rule that it does) count as a separate, non-protected target. Also, note that you could Dispel spells protected by the Shield through boosting your Dispel.

I see the cost as mainly economic - you need to spend half your time and income (probably maintaining a shrine or something), which can be kinda a lot if the community isn't supporting you.

I meant that since a God-Talker has to maintain a POW of 18, and other characters commonly settle for less in order to have a better POW gain roll (say 13-15), what it means in practice would often be that the God-Talker has about the same POW gain roll, but a higher POW.

In older material, sometimes characters did talk like this. Paulis Longvale writes about things like "Xenohealing" and "Heal 4" (!!).

On the other hand, can you really tell whether a Humakti in an enclosed helm, murdering a bunch of people, is in trance or just being a Humakti?

" However, it may be successfully cast against a specific spell if the caster can magically discern or can otherwise guess the specific spell." (my emphasis) Calling out the exact spell might be enough. "The one that makes him fighty" is not that. Also, it takes no magic for Humakti to obsess about their swords.