Using Spirit and Rune magic together to augment statistics.

[Simon Wigley]

Dear all,

I had a query about using Charisma and Glamour together, which would also apply to Bear's Strength and Strength.

If you have, say, a CHA of 16, and cast Glamour, it goes up to 24.

If you cast Charisma in the next round, does CHA double to 48? Or does it only double the base stat, making 40? Or does Charisma just supplant Glamour, making 32?

It seems like something that could have been clarified in the Red Book of Magic, possibly in a futre edition with a short paragraph.

[Jason D]

9 minutes ago, Simon Wigley said:

Dear all,

I had a query about using Charisma and Glamour together, which would also apply to Bear's Strength and Strength.

If you have, say, a CHA of 16, and cast Glamour, it goes up to 24.

If you cast Charisma in the next round, does CHA double to 48? Or does it only double the base stat, making 40? Or does Charisma just supplant Glamour, making 32?

It seems like something that could have been clarified in the Red Book of Magic, possibly in a futre edition with a short paragraph.

The correct use is to improve the base attribute, not the magical addition to it. 

That said, the difference between the results is not huge, and if you'd like to make your Rune magic that much more powerful, by all means do so. 

As for putting clarifications into the RBoM,... we did what we could, but if we tried to cover every single example of a potential combo of spell effects, the book would be triple the size. 

[Simon Wigley]

Dear Jason D,

I quite understand the problem of textual bloat, and don't want to press. However, a single para might be useful as a rune fix such as "The effects of spells are always additive unless otherwise noted, and their durations are separate and concurrent. For example, Shield 2 gives 4 points of armour, and Protection 1 gives 1 point: cast on the same person they give a total of 5 points of armour, dropping to 4 when the Protection expires. Likewise, Charisma doubles the base characteristic, and Glamour adds 8 charisma, so a character with CHA16 with both Charisma and Glamour would double their base characteristic to 32 and then add 8." -- even as a rune fix, it's less work than having the likes of me nag you every five minutes 🙂

[Ludo Bagman]

10 hours ago, Simon Wigley said:

Bear's Strength and Strength.

This was clarified in Bear's Strength - The rune spell does not double the effects of STR-enhancing magic spells such as Strength. The same should apply to Charisma and Glamour.