How many magic potions are too many magic potions?

[Baroque]

Hi folks.

I have a player who wants to use potions, powders, gels..as their primary method of delivering magic. Basically anything you can whip up as a herbalist/sorcerer. Easy enough to transfer spell effects to a glass vial flung at someone but the issue I'm grappling with is how much they should be allowed to carry? My thought at the moment is they'd expend ingredients, magic points for spell effect strength and then perform a potions roll to brew the potion. The more powerful the spell effect desired the more magic point expensive and time consuming the brewing process.

Is it then fair to allow someone to carry seven days worth of magic point expenditure as potions into battle with them? I'm thinking "Maybe run the MP spend for the player backwards incrementing from 0 upwards to character maximum with every potion used so the more magic potions used the more they can brew and carry later."

I want to reward the player for the time the character spends in preparation but on the other hand I don't want them dragging a drinks cabinet of potions across the countryside.

Any thoughts?

[Thot]

My suggestion would be to use limited durability of prepared potions, so that the player can have this interesting way of doing magic, but cannot stock up on it too much.

[tooley1chris]

I'd allow it. HOWEVER I would also make a chance to bust a potion or two due to jarring, jumping, getting hit, grappled, or strenuous activity. 

Wonder what happens when a broken potion of agony is mixed with a potion of Itch on the bare skin as the spilled potions run down his back...

[Simlasa]

14 minutes ago, tooley1chris said:

I'd allow it. HOWEVER I would also make a chance to bust a potion or two due to jarring, jumping, getting hit, grappled, or strenuous activity.

Similar to what I've seen with characters trying to carry naptha-filled jug grenades. Any attacks on you have a chance of breaking a container or two. You could cushion them in bundles of straw/cloth, but that makes them bulkier and maybe harder to get at in a hurry.

Edited November 19, 2016 by Simlasa

[Questbird]

Ray Turney's Fire and Sword is a very interesting set of rules which can be downloaded from this forum. Among the various clever rules Ray came up with -- he was very interested in cutting bookkeeping during play -- were some herbalism rules for characters like yours (my campaign has one too). Basically such characters are considered to always be gathering this or that (easier away from cities). Fire and Sword has tables to determine which potions can be made.

It doesn't have rules for how much these things weigh, but I guess it comes down to encumbrance rules. Most characters have some equipment which takes care to handle or transport, whether it is keeping flint and tinder dry or keeping your blade sharpened and oiled. So I'd only penalise the character if they were trying to transport way too much. Powders, dried herbs, leaves, pastes, solids; these don't weigh too much, especially if very potent, and could account for many of the preparations.

Here's the herbalism/potions rules:

Procedure
Once per day the herbalist can make a luck roll (Difficult near cities) to find useful herbs for potions. If successful he can roll on the Herbalism table below. A critical result gets three rolls.

Preparation time
Fresh herbs must be prepared for use in potions. The preparation time is:
1d8-1 x (roll D6: 1 = minutes, 2-4 = days, 5-6 = weeks)

Herbalism table
Roll    Effect    Doses
1-3    Cure Specific Disease I potion {which disease is determined by plot, or roll randomly}    1D3
4    Cure Specific Disease II potion {which disease is determined by plot, or roll randomly}    1
5-7    Heal Potion {cures Flesh rot and also has the effect of a normal Heal spell}    1D3
8-9    Greater Heal Potion {as above, but has the effect of a Greater Heal spell}    1D3
10    Heal Body Potion {as above, but has the effect of Heal Body and Cure Flesh Rot II combined    1
11-12    Blade venom – +25% to incapacitate, +25% to lethality, if any damage gets through    1D3
13-14    Bitter plant poison, if you can a person to ingest a dose {usually by forcing it down them}, they will die unless a (Difficult Constitution) roll is made, but people usually won’t east this stuff. Characters who survive a dose are seriously wounded    1D3
15    Tasteless plant poison – victim dies if unless a Constitution roll is made – and is seriously wounded otherwise    1
16    Sleeping draught – tasteless – any character who takes this goes into a natural deep sleep, and will awaken at dawn the day after his or her player makes a constitution roll.    1
17-18    Shamanic skill enhancer – if a treated form of this plant is smoked the smoker is +15% on all shamanic skills rolls, and on Power rolls for purposes of spirit combat    1
19    Berserker plant – the character who eats this plant is affected by an effect which is treated for rules purposes as if it were the Battle Frenzy divine spell    1
20    Roll on Rare Herbalism Table    NA
Rare Herbalism table
Roll    Effect    Doses
1    Revivify Potion – burn seven doses around a body and it comes back to life    1D3
2-3    Beeswax from rare species of bees, each dose creates 1 candle which can be burnt a rate which releases 5 sorcery magic points per hour, for four hours.    1D3
4-5    Awareness potion – a character that drinks this becomes hyper alert for 12 hours. Character cannot sleep    1D3
6-7    Potion of Dispossession – any character who drinks this will have attacking spirits Banished as if a Banish III spell were cast at them    1
8    Panacea potion {treat as Panacea spell}    1
9-11    Trickster shape shifting potion – roll 1D6 to determine form; 1 is cat, 2 is raven, 3 is turtle, 4 is rabbit, 5 is sheep, 6 is worm. Shape shift lasts for one day.    1
12    Trickster sex change potion – a male character who consumes this becomes female, and vice versa    1
13-14    Shamanic skill enhancer – if a treated form of this plant is smoked the smoker is +25% on all shamanic skills rolls, and on Power rolls for purposes of spirit combat. Discorporation automatically succeeds    1
15-16    Any character who smokes this receives a blessing from his or her deity – all divine spells are regained and a divination {treat as the Divination I spell} is cast on his behalf    1
17    Potion of Magic Resistance – drinker is immune to hostile spells unless the caster rolls a critical    1
18-19    Luck charm – when a character is asked for a luck roll and has time to consume the potion, consuming the potion replaces the luck roll    1
20    Universal antidote. Character who consumes this will find all effects of poisons negated. If drunk, character becomes sober.    1D3

The herbalism tables are from Ray Turney’s Fire and Sword

[soltakss]

I'd definitely allow it.

In our old RQ2 game, we used to carry around medicine cabinets full of potions and salves.

 

[Simlasa]

7 hours ago, soltakss said:

In our old RQ2 game, we used to carry around medicine cabinets full of potions and salves.

I was just reading through 'Dragons at Dawn'... an OSR-ish game purportedly based on the game notes of Dave Arneson. What struck me is that, except for three spells all the magic in the basic game takes the form of potions, powders, gases, etc. Cooked up ahead of time in magical laboratories. Mostly one use per item... with various complications depending on who is using them... and you don't know if the spell worked till you use the item.

So there's some really early RPG precedent.

[fmitchell]

FWIW, Numenera has a limit to the number of one-use "cyphers" a character can carry.  Beyond that, they react unpredictably and start losing power / melting down / going off.  The number ranges from 2 to 5 (6?), but cyphers can literally do anything.  In another hypothetical game maybe there's a separate, higher limit for health potions, minor amulets of luck, and the like.

For that matter, you could look at D&D spells not as mystic potential but as little gizmos that "magic-users" carry around.

[Sean_RDP]

One other thought building on other comments, you might have each Potion give off low level radiation that can affect other potions. So someone can carry a lot for a little bit of time or a few, but for longer.  Another thought is that the magic points only last 24 to 48 hours and then the potion becomes inert. A permanent potion would require a point of POW. Those will last indefinitely.

[Simlasa]

 I like the idea of magical 'radiation' in general for whatever arcane equipment a person might carry. I'm tempted to call it 'personality' though... so that, if stored together, my invisibility potion might alter my healing potion... but also that my magic sword might not get along well with my magic shield, setting up some sort of rivalry that comes out at inopportune moments.

Serving as a check on loading your character down with too many magical widgets... or having to at least be careful in how you do it. Like, maybe fire spells are very competitive and boastful, and if stored together they have a tendency to 'show off' by exploding prematurely. Maybe invisibility potions are shy and get harder to find when they're around more brazen types.

Edited December 14, 2016 by Simlasa