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Spirit Spell - Magic Point Enchantment


Godlearner

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13 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

So is this finally an official clarification that NPCs don't get at least two POW gain rolls per year from their cults (HHD + Sacred Time) the way PCs do? This has always been one of the most unclear things about the game to me.

See NPC initiates, Creating NPCs here.

As a rough guide, I personally might give them a point of POW every 5-10 years, likewise a new rune spell, unless they were major NPCs like the Clan chief or associates. As it says in the link:

Quote

This is also the kind of general setting material the GM should be crafting based on their own needs, this not the stuff of rules clarification.

 

Edited by Scotty
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48 minutes ago, Scotty said:

As a rough guide, I personally might give them a point of POW every 5-10 years, likewise a new rune spell, unless they were major NPCs like the Clan chief or associates.

I think this has a reasonable outcome. Let's say they gain one per five years, and use half for Rune Magic (the other half goes to wyter, enchantments, the occasional one-use Rune Magic, or merely an increased POW score) - this will tend to result in the default 3 Rune Points for generic typical adults that we see all across published scenarios.

What I kinda dislike is that this means that PCs go by separate rules from NPCs, something that I think is less than ideal in a simulationist game. But since things will be downright weird if NPCs gain one POW per year, it's probably the preferable solution.

Edited by Akhôrahil
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14 hours ago, Richard S. said:

Sacrifices to their Wyter, most likely.

12 hours ago, Akhôrahil said:

You think the Wyter is spending maybe 1000 Rune Points per year? That seems... dramatically high.

Nobody said that except you. There's a TON of things people can spend POW on. The wyter needs a bunch, there's Rune Points, one-use spells, the RBoM has a bunch of new spells that take participants' POW and other attributes to power, there's other enchants that multiple participants can contribute POW to, etc. Your implication (yes, I'm doing the same as you) that there are thousands of POW being spent on making MP enchantments every year is ridiculous.

Even if the spell is widespread and popular, it will reach a point where there are enough MP matrixes around, and people will stop creating them. Not all graphs are straight lines.

Edited by PhilHibbs
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7 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Nobody said that except you

Did I misunderstand Richard S.? He wrote "I'd imagine that over the course of a year it'd use enough magic that most adults would need to give it 1-2 points". Doesn't that mean upwards of 1000 points of POW, where the only reason to pass them to the Wyter is if it has dipped below its baseline POW, which will typically only happen from its spellcasting? 

Edited by Akhôrahil
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10 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Did I misunderstand Richard S.? He wrote "I'd imagine that over the course of a year it'd use enough magic that most adults would need to give it 1-2 points". Doesn't that mean upwards of 1000 points of POW, where the only reason to pass them to the Wyter is if it has dipped below its baseline POW, which will typically only happen from its spellcasting? 

Fair point, but there are a lot of wyters. Most people are going to have more than 3 wyters to spread their points among, with the closest (and smallest) ones getting preference.

And as I said, I disagree with the idea that most POW does not go to wyters, but again I apologise.

Edited by PhilHibbs
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Wyters can spend POW really easily though. Think of it this way. If everyone does give 1 point per year to one of the many wyters that they have a relationship with, then every point of POW you give to a wyter corresponds, on average, to one spell cast on you per year. You go into battle to defend your clan? Wyter casts Shield 5 on a bunch of people, maybe one of them is you. There's your point for the year gone. Or if you weren't one of the lucky ones in that battle, maybe your wife got pregnant. Wyter cast Bless Pregnancy. Or maybe you got haunted, so the wyter cast Spirit Block on the priest who banished the ghost. Put that way, it doesn't sound unreasonable. One spell per person per year.

I fell back into the trap of implying that 1000 worshippers was 1000 POW so I deleted that sentence. Easy done. If your largest wyter has 1000 people, and that's one of say 4 wyters that you relate to, then that wyter gets 250 per year on average if you assume each person has 1 spare POW to give per year. And as Scotty opined, that's highballing it.

Edited by PhilHibbs
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5 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Wyters can spend POW really easily though. Think of it this way. If everyone does give 1 point per year, then every point of POW you give to a wyter corresponds, on average, to one spell cast on you per year. You go into battle to defend your clan? Wyter casts Shield 5 on a bunch of people, maybe one of them is you. There's your point for the year gone. Or if you weren't one of the lucky ones in that battle, maybe your wife got pregnant. Wyter cast Bless Pregnancy. Or maybe you got haunted, so the wyter cast Spirit Block on the priest who banished the ghost. Does it add up to 1000 a year for a wyter with 1000 menbers? I don't know, but put that way, it doesn't sound unreasonable. One spell per person per year.

Oh, it can spend super easily! But due to the cost, it probably only should in emergencies or when it has some unique power. Let the Ernalda priestesses handle various fertility blessings, they have reusable Rune Magic and ridiculously fast Rune Point regain, so each priestess should be able to cast hundreds of points of Rune Magic yearly. Your clan will be stronger for not wasting POW unnecessarily.

There are admittedly some really cool Wyter tricks, like mass Resurrections for a limited cost or the emergency giant multi-target Shield casting you mention.

Edited by Akhôrahil
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1 hour ago, Akhôrahil said:

What I kinda dislike is that this means that PCs go by separate rules from NPCs, something that I think is less than ideal in a simulationist game. But since things will be downright weird if NPCs gain one POW per year, it's probably the preferable solution.

Some people call RuneQuest sumulationist, and in some ways it is. I don't think that's the editorial intention though. And I don't know one way or another whether 1 POW per year is the right conclusion from the rules.

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