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POW costs for Equipment with Sorcery


Greville

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I have a character wishing to make a magic item with one or more sorcery spells embedded.

On p246 of the BRP Book (big gold book) it states that:

"The creator of an artifact must sacrifice a point of permanent POW per sorcery spell invested in the artifact..."

Do you use the rules as written? I think it should read "per sorcery spell level". The player of the character hopes otherwise, and says that he should be able to invest a full strength spell, like four levels of Sorcerer's Armour, for one POW. :)

I'm in two minds, one POW is a significant loss and balances well against an extra 4 points of armour. Two POW to make it permanent doesn't worry me either. But I think there's potential to abuse the stat boosting spells.

What are your thoughts?

Cheers,

Greville

The sacred sentence of science: "I might be wrong: let's find out." - David Brin

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If your game doesn't contemplate POW gain then I'd say 1 permanent POW is a significant loss already. On the other hand, if your game does contemplate POW gain, then you should enforce 1 POW point sacrificed per sorcery spell level. Hope this helps.

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I think it should be similar to RQ3 rules where Enchanting was 1 POW per Spell Level enchanted in into the item, otherwise it is just as easy for a Sorcerer to create a permanent 1pt Magic Item as it would be to create a permanent 6 pt Magic Item, so I haven't moved on from RQ3 in that respect. I actually thought the BRP version was a typo.

" Sure it's fun, but it is also well known that a D20 roll and an AC is no match against a hefty swing of a D100% and a D20 Hit Location Table!"

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I think 1 POW per spell is a good value. In the Elric! rules, where Sorcery is taken from, it was a POW point to bind a full demon with all of their abilities.

Couple things to think about. In the sorcerous magic items section it mentions that items sometimes have their own POW reserve and sometimes tap the MP of the user to power their spells. If you think the 1 POW cost is too underpowered, consider making it cost 1 POW to set up the magic item's POW reserve.

Is your PC a sorcerer? If yes, they need a POW of 16 in order to cast spells. If so, they need a POW of 18 to either embed two spells in an item or, using the option that I made just made up above, one spell and a power reserve in order to still be able to cast their own spells.

If they're not a sorcerer, and you're just letting them use the item creation rules as character background, then they are likely to spend their POW below 16 making the item. They'll end up with a character that's like a sorcerer that relies on an external do-dad for their spells. That's limiting in it's own way. They're not going to be able to add spells to their repertoire. Even with POW gain enabled, it's difficult to boost that score back up to 16 and above. You have to win a POW : POW with an opponent who has a higher POW than you and then you get one check at the end of an adventure to see if your POW actually increased.

70/420

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