Rune Spell Lightning number of uses

[Hellfire6a]

One Rune point gets me a single lightning stroke for 1d6 damage? Or do I have 15 minutes of 1d6 damage? I realize the effects are instant, but does the ability to shoot lightning last for 15 minutes?

[Scotty]

1 hour ago, Hellfire6a said:

One Rune point gets me a single lightning stroke for 1d6 damage? Or do I have 15 minutes of 1d6 damage? I realize the effects are instant, but does the ability to shoot lightning last for 15 minutes?

see:

 

[Nick Brooke]

Consider it from a game balance perspective. One Rune point is usually worth two points of spirit magic; sometimes a little better (because Rune magic is the good stuff).

For two points of spirit magic, you could cast two Disruption spells and cause a total of 2D3 damage, ignoring armour. (Both spells need a POWx5 casting roll and a POW vs. POW roll to take effect; they'll take two castings, and will hit two different hit locations)

For one point of Rune magic, you can cast one Lightning spell and cause 1D6 damage, ignoring armour. (Your zap comes on SR1, and needs a Rune roll to cast and one POW vs. POW roll to hit a single hit location)

The best thing: Lightning is stackable, unlike Disruption. You can cast a two-point Lightning in one round, on SR1, with a high casting chance, to do 2D6 damage through armour to one hit location. And that will usually take any unShielded opponent down.

(Oh, that's not good enough? Stack three points into a Thunderbolt. No POW vs. POW roll, 3D6 damage direct to general hit points, and the target's magical armour is ineffective too)

[Hellfire6a]

But if I take "Strength" I get what for 2 full minutes. My PC gets +10% to hit and +2d6 added to normal damage. 10% added to agility rolls for 2 minutes. Etc. And his POW recharges. With Lightning I have to wait for my next Holy Day to recharge my RP for a single shot at (for a starting Adventurer) 3d6. That honestly doesn't seem like a great use of a God's resources. 

[Baron Wulfraed]

40 minutes ago, Hellfire6a said:

But if I take "Strength" I get what for 2 full minutes. My PC gets +10% to hit and +2d6 added to normal damage. 10% added to agility rolls for 2 minutes. Etc. And his POW recharges. With Lightning I have to wait for my next Holy Day to recharge my RP for a single shot at (for a starting Adventurer) 3d6. That honestly doesn't seem like a great use of a God's resources. 

Based on the characters I've generated -- most "starting characters" will have three rune points available (okay, just noticed you did use all three -- to get the 3D6 rating).

Rune/Divine magic has pretty much always been painful to obtain and use... At least RQ:RiG has finally made them reusable by mere mortals (rather than only the rune priests of RQ2, where mere mortals had to sacrifice POW to obtain/reload a one-use rune spell*).

My take: if you are going to ask the god to lend you some ability, you better have a very good reason to ask. "Interrupting" the god just to fling a spell at every encounter is what "doesn't seem like a great use of a God's resources", to me.

 

* In my RQ2 days, I recall only one player even attempting to make use of rune/divine magic, and that was only one character (our group often had three or more characters at various skill levels, allowing the GM to vary from simple starter conflicts to more complex situations based upon the mood of the group.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

1 hour ago, Hellfire6a said:

But if I take "Strength" I get what for 2 full minutes. My PC gets +10% to hit and +2d6 added to normal damage. 10% added to agility rolls for 2 minutes. Etc. And his POW recharges. With Lightning I have to wait for my next Holy Day to recharge my RP for a single shot at (for a starting Adventurer) 3d6. That honestly doesn't seem like a great use of a God's resources. 

To utilize that bonus to attack and damage, you need to be in melee with your opponent, which places you in danger of getting hit by their sword or claws.

Lightning is indeed "worse" than Strength - I agree with your analysis.  It's big advantage is that it is much safer.

[HreshtIronBorne]

Also, Lightning or Thunderbolt can lay waste to Spirits or other exceptionally difficult to engage targets. I would agree it is one of the least efficient choices to use Orlanth RP on but, it can DEFINITELY save the day. 

[Rodney Dangerduck]

One use of Lightning which we've never used, but I think would be important.

Your companion (not allied) Shadowcat is up ahead scouting and sees an ambush.  Should it

1. Speak in Stormspeech, a language many of the party might not understand well, and try to say "bad guys at 2 o'clock, 35 meters away behind the birch trees"
2. Cast a 1 point Lightning Bolt at the ambush.  Even if it does little damage, it will certainly alert the party, with the exact location!

Edited April 19, 2021 by Rodney Dangerduck

[Hellfire6a]

8 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Also, Lightning or Thunderbolt can lay waste to Spirits or other exceptionally difficult to engage targets. I would agree it is one of the least efficient choices to use Orlanth RP on but, it can DEFINITELY save the day. 

I didn't know you could use them against spirits. I am reading the rules right now. I am trying to understand the philosophy behind the apparent weakness of Lightning vs other spells. 

[Hellfire6a]

12 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

To utilize that bonus to attack and damage, you need to be in melee with your opponent, which places you in danger of getting hit by their sword or claws.

Lightning is indeed "worse" than Strength - I agree with your analysis.  It's big advantage is that it is much safer.

I would agree with your assessment...except blowing everything on one shot in combat is a good way to end up dead. Adventurers in RQ:G don't seem to be incompetent, anything but in my opinion. Also one of the rules of gunfights...tracers work both ways. You shoot a bolt of lightning you just made yourself the biggest target on the battlefield. 

[HreshtIronBorne]

1 hour ago, Hellfire6a said:

14 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

To utilize that bonus to attack and damage, you need to be in melee with your opponent, which places you in danger of getting hit by their sword or claws.

Lightning is indeed "worse" than Strength - I agree with your analysis.  It's big advantage is that it is much safer.

Expand  

I would agree with your assessment...except blowing everything on one shot in combat is a good way to end up dead. Adventurers in RQ:G don't seem to be incompetent, anything but in my opinion. Also one of the rules of gunfights...tracers work both ways. You shoot a bolt of lightning you just made yourself the biggest target on the battlefield. 

This is where the actual universe of Gporantha steps in rather than the RQ rules, setting itself apart from some other systems. An NPC, for most intents and purposes, cannot know how much RP are left in your tank. And if played appropriately shouldn't be always going Balls to the Wall on the party all the time either with their RP and resources, unless cornered and driven to extreme measure. Most of the possible "hostile" encounters in RQ versus something like D&D can play out much differently. If you find a dozen trollkin and a couple Dark Trolls and Liquify the Dark Troll with a lightning bolt there is a pretty damn good chance they DON'T CARE how many resources you have left or spent to bkow him up. They are fleeing terrified into their tunnlmels unless the last Dark Troll can manage to wrangke them. Then there are the possibilities of ransoms and yoelding and all sorts of other ways for encounters to end. Sometimes shit needs to die RIGHT NOW but, over there. So Lightning Bolt can solve that.  I personally prefer Teleport 😏. 

 

 

[Joerg]

20 hours ago, Hellfire6a said:

But if I take "Strength" I get what for 2 full minutes. My PC gets +10% to hit and +2d6 added to normal damage. 10% added to agility rolls for 2 minutes. Etc. And his POW recharges. With Lightning I have to wait for my next Holy Day to recharge my RP for a single shot at (for a starting Adventurer) 3d6. That honestly doesn't seem like a great use of a God's resources. 

Strength means you have to enter the melee range of your enemy, whereas Lightning can be cast from outside of most missile ranges. Good value against a Truesword Sword Trance Humakti or similar combat monsters in my book...

[Shiningbrow]

20 hours ago, Hellfire6a said:

and +2d6 added to normal damage.

???

How did Strength add +2D6???

I can understand it adding another 1D6 if you've already got high STR/SIZ.

[jajagappa]

3 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

How did Strength add +2D6???

I can understand it adding another 1D6 if you've already got high STR/SIZ.

It shouldn't be adding +2D6. 

The spell reads: This spell adds 8 points of STR to the target for the spell’s duration. This increases melee combat damage by one step on the Damage Bonus table on page 56 (e.g., from +1D4 to +1D6)

The best bump up comes if your STR+SIZ was in the 33-40 range (i.e. average of 17-18).  In that case, you'll push the total into the 41-56 range and effectively add +1D6 (taking you to a total damage of +2D6). 

[Lordabdul]

Do you people roll a d20 for hit location with Lightning? Or do you just name the hit location and the Gods zap it? The rules don't really specify it but I get the feeling that it's meant to be the former, which means that it's a pretty good way to disable an enemy's limb (or head!) that was already damaged by a previous blow -- a finisher move, if you will.

[PhilHibbs]

4 hours ago, lordabdul said:

Do you people roll a d20 for hit location with Lightning? Or do you just name the hit location and the Gods zap it?

Ooh that's a good question. That would be a nice bonus, to elevate it slightly.

[David Scott]

6 hours ago, lordabdul said:

The rules don't really specify it

Page 197, Aimed Blows:

Quote

These rules are strictly for use with hand-to-hand combat and missile combat, not with spells.

reiterated in Rune Fixes 2:

Quote

Anyone who wishes to strike a particular location in melee or ranged combat—not with spells— must state that exact location before rolling. 

 

[tnli]

As a GM I would rule it to be random, unless the Players are happy with the idea of getting their characters heads blasted off...

[PhilHibbs]

2 hours ago, tnli said:

As a GM I would rule it to be random, unless the Players are happy with the idea of getting their characters heads blasted off...

Why does everything have to be a stick to hit players with? If you want to kill a PC with a spell, use Thunderbolt.

[Godlearner]

3 hours ago, tnli said:

As a GM I would rule it to be random, unless the Players are happy with the idea of getting their characters heads blasted off...

I use a simple rule, if there is a to hit roll, then you can aim to a specific location. If there isn't one, then nope.

[Lordabdul]

6 hours ago, David Scott said:

Page 197, Aimed Blows:

I don't know what you mean here. You point to things that, indeed, do not apply to spells.... so that doesn't tell me anything about Lightning's hit location?

My point was that Lightning's description says "...causes 1D6 points of damage to a single hit location". It doesn't say if that hit location is random or called.

[David Scott]

Offensive spells are always random.

[Lordabdul]

42 minutes ago, David Scott said:

Offensive spells are always random.

Thanks! Ok so then Lightning is on par with other ranged attack spells as far as I can see.

It does make sense to me that melee attack spells produce higher damage for each Rune Point, since you have to put yourself more in danger.

[AndreJarosch]

2 hours ago, David Scott said:

Offensive spells are always random.

We we ALL know what that means: "Left Leg" 😉

[Kloster]

4 minutes ago, AndreJarosch said:

We we ALL know what that means: "Left Leg" 😉

Yes, the wooden one.