Free INT - Sorcery

[Shiningbrow]

16 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Most of the time what I seen in play are Rune Lord - Acolytes. Requirements for that are much less POW. This way you can build up.

Technically, the POW requirement should be the same for God-Talkers & Priests. So that combination ought to be the same anyway (with some cults being having exceptions).

[Shiningbrow]

14 hours ago, davecake said:

Many may, rather than pushing the POW down, pushing it up to 18 POW and become Rune Lord-Priests for that sweet +20% (not the highest possible, but decent),

Why would you go for the -Priest combination? You get the same (mystical) benefits as a God-Talker (including the +20% POW gain), without the burden of time or money. While you may not get the room and board and support, as a Rune Lord, you're more than covered anyway. And, I imagine, even Associate (and possibly just Friendly) cults would help look after a Rune Lord on occasion - certainly treat them very well! (if the local lords don't.... which should be even rarer!!)

 

14 hours ago, davecake said:

It is so much easier to get an extra few Rune Points than it is to master 5 skills. They aren't expendable - they are a precious resource that you try to keep alive!

Depends on how high you want your POW to be. Although it's easier to gain the POW to sacrifice for more RPs, you only go up 1 or 2 points per successful roll (or 0 without the luck :p). With Exp Checks, that's 1D6%.

If your POW is low (sub 15), then it's easier to get more POW than Exp (assuming - good enough stats to get a nice Category Modifier - minimum of 5%, up to 20 or 25%...). Minimum is going to be 11%** - 100% - 89% (just under Mastery level), plus X in Category Modifier...  Which could be a nice 25-30% (or higher*) in total chance to increase a skill. A +20% modifier means 31% chance to increase by 1D6. 30% in POW gain roll is a POW of 15.

(with 17 in all the right stats, Manipulation gets a 30% Category Modifier... and that's weapon skills! Thus, a minimum of 41% chance to increase from 89% to Mastery at 90%)

All of which comes down to - how high to you want your POW to be? If you want it at about 18, then it's going to be easier to get the skill mastery than the numerous RPs you're after.

 

(mathematically, each point of POW increase is equal to a 5% boost in skill - approximately... except, POW doesn't have a Category Modifier to help out)

 

(**unless you've got a faulty stat that gives a negative modifier - as for Stealth)

[Richard S.]

I feel like this thread is now very off topic...

[Darius West]

I wonder if future sorcery rules will have a ritual application where sorcerers working together can share a portion of their Free Int with the ritual leader.  Notionally you are able to share half your Free Int perhaps, but the sub participants are each able to sub-perform the same ritual as well, so you have apprentices feeding free Int to the adepts who in turn feed Int to the Sorcerers, who in turn feed int to the ritual leader, leading to some large power large duration spells.

[Shiningbrow]

2 minutes ago, Darius West said:

I wonder if future sorcery rules will have a ritual application where sorcerers working together can share a portion of their Free Int with the ritual leader.  Notionally you are able to share half your Free Int perhaps, but the sub participants are each able to sub-perform the same ritual as well, so you have apprentices feeding free Int to the adepts who in turn feed Int to the Sorcerers, who in turn feed int to the ritual leader, leading to some large power large duration spells.

I think it should be obvious that there needs to be some sort of mechanic for this. Sorcerers, especially in cabals, and thus in large cults in empires, obviously work together for big spells... otherwise, there'd just be a whole stack of individuals working together to... combine knowledge???

[French Desperate WindChild]

2 minutes ago, Darius West said:

I wonder if future sorcery rules will have a ritual application where sorcerers working together can share a portion of their Free Int with the ritual leader.  Notionally you are able to share half your Free Int perhaps, but the sub participants are each able to sub-perform the same ritual as well, so you have apprentices feeding free Int to the adepts who in turn feed Int to the Sorcerers, who in turn feed int to the ritual leader, leading to some large power large duration spells.

I hope so, and seems to me very most gloranthan

[Shiningbrow]

53 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

I feel like this thread is now very off topic...

I wonder if sorcerous cults will have a minimum POW requirement to advance into the Rune levels. If so, it's going to suck having to keep both a nice Free INT as well as the POW (which would obviously not be used for Inscriptions... to free up the INT).

[metcalph]

30 minutes ago, Darius West said:

I wonder if future sorcery rules will have a ritual application where sorcerers working together can share a portion of their Free Int with the ritual leader.  

The way Jeff describes it it would be one sorceror doing nothing but cast Enhance INT on the other sorcerors who then cast biiger spells etc.

[Godlearner]

6 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Possibly, but not a real "precedent", as the resisting at Max POW is specifically stated as the god making up the difference to defend their RL - so definitely not the same reason, and definitely not really related.

Sure, and expanded mind capacity can also be explained as training in Logic which sorcery requires and attuning oneself to the rune, especially Magic Rune.

[Godlearner]

3 hours ago, metcalph said:

The way Jeff describes it it would be one sorceror doing nothing but cast Enhance INT on the other sorcerors who then cast biiger spells etc.

All you need is one who specializes in this one spell. Strength 25 (adding about 9 Free Int) for three hours or so to other sorcerers would not be unusual in that case.

[davecake]

7 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Depends on how high you want your POW to be.

While obviously yes, it is almost certain that it is easier to get your POW/RPs up than master 5 skills. 

It is easy to get a POW gain roll every season - but not the same for skill rolls. Skills go up an average of 3.5 points per roll, equivalent to 0.65 the rate of POW increase. You can have some control over your POW gains, reducing it for easier gains, no such option for skills. You don't have a lot of choices over what these skills are - and if one is far below 90%, it can be a real pain to get it up/

7 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Why would you go for the -Priest combination?

Are you trying to just increase your POW increase, or maximise your spread of Rune magic?

Because literally you get to be a priest/lord combination by just getting your POW to 18 , and it has the same POW increase chance. Becoming a Rune Lord/God Talker is a thing that only makes sense if you are talking about two different cults, which then makes it more difficult and costlier than being a Rune Lord-Priest of the same cult. 

7 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

You get the same (mystical) benefits as a God-Talker (including the +20% POW gain), without the burden of time or money.

A Priest-Lord of a single cult has no increase in time or money - a Lord/God-Talker of two different cults has increased cost, 95% of their cash rather than 90%. 

[Richard S.]

9 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

I wonder if sorcerous cults will have a minimum POW requirement to advance into the Rune levels. If so, it's going to suck having to keep both a nice Free INT as well as the POW (which would obviously not be used for Inscriptions... to free up the INT).

Sorcerers don't have anything like Rune levels. The only difference between an apprentice and a master is how much they know, not what special abilities a higher power has granted them. Obviously, this plays hell with spells that affect Rune levels differently, since there's no clear line as to when a sorcerer's power is on par with a Rune master's.

[Godlearner]

Number of mastered runes/techniques seems like it should be a measure. 

[metcalph]

1 hour ago, Richard S. said:

Sorcerers don't have anything like Rune levels. 

Yet.  Whether there will be rules for a rune-level sorcerer (there have been in past RQ and HW/HW incarnations) remains to be seen.

[Shiningbrow]

11 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Sure, and expanded mind capacity can also be explained as training in Logic which sorcery requires and attuning oneself to the rune, especially Magic Rune.

hmmm ... Personally, I'm not convinced by that.

Noe, if their deity chose to give Species Max Free INT, I'd buy it. Or something super special about the Magic Rune (perhaps as a spell..), maybe.

[Godlearner]

4 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

hmmm ... Personally, I'm not convinced by that.

Noe, if their deity chose to give Species Max Free INT, I'd buy it. Or something super special about the Magic Rune (perhaps as a spell..), maybe.

Call it the benefit of following the way of the Invisible God and aligning yourself with the Universe.

[Shiningbrow]

11 hours ago, davecake said:

Are you trying to just increase your POW increase, or maximise your spread of Rune magic?

Both 😄

11 hours ago, davecake said:

Because literally you get to be a priest/lord combination by just getting your POW to 18 , and it has the same POW increase chance. Becoming a Rune Lord/God Talker is a thing that only makes sense if you are talking about two different cults, which then makes it more difficult and costlier than being a Rune Lord-Priest of the same cult.

Ok, you're right. My brain didn't work for a bit... I didn't add in the 18 POW req for GT. (for some reason, I thought it was lower).

However, it's somewhat easier to attain God Talker first, and then graduate up to Rune Lord. POW 18, 5 RPs, 50% in 4 skills (plus Worship), 1 Rune at 90%, and 1 other Passion at 90%... Versus 90% in 5 skills (much harder than 50%), 90% in Rune (same), 90% Passion (same), CHA 18 (I'd suggest harder... going up 1 or 2 points is easy... going higher may not be - not as easy as POW).

And once you've achieved RL, then you're automatically upgraded to Priest anyway... (and, so, it sort of makes the whole Rune Lord/Priest section somewhat superfluous, other than to say it's automatic).

[Shiningbrow]

8 hours ago, Richard S. said:

Sorcerers don't have anything like Rune levels. The only difference between an apprentice and a master is how much they know, not what special abilities a higher power has granted them. Obviously, this plays hell with spells that affect Rune levels differently, since there's no clear line as to when a sorcerer's power is on par with a Rune master's.

I doubt that will remain true. Not once the West book comes out, and sorcerous cults are defined.

[Mugen]

22 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

I wonder if sorcerous cults will have a minimum POW requirement to advance into the Rune levels. If so, it's going to suck having to keep both a nice Free INT as well as the POW (which would obviously not be used for Inscriptions... to free up the INT).

I don't know if this was changed in RQG, but in RQ3 MPs were more important than POW for Sorcery.

Which explains why Vampires could be Sorcerers despite having 0 POW.