Specific Divine Spells

[d(sqrt(-1))]

(Based on PhillHibbs' Specific Sorcery Spells thread) 

Caveat: I posted these to the RQ Core Rules thread but with a game coming up on Tuesday I'd be interested to see what people think generally as they might become relevant:

 

Create Fissure (p324) : Are all dimensions multiplied by the number of points in the spell, or just the depth? If you create it underneath a target do you have to overcome their POW or does it just work? Why DEX x 3 rather than Dodge to not fall in?

Create Shadow (p235): Can it be cast on a target and move with the target (earlier versions were immobile AFAIK, but this version says it has a movement rate of 12 - so how does it move? Or is that a maximum if it is cast on a target?). If One point is enough to allow Dark Walk - does that mean I can cast both and become invisible and soundless for 15 minutes while moving around even in daylight (well there will be a bit of haze)?

Dark Walk (p235): This is really a range Self spell isn't it? The implication is that it works on the caster. I guess it means that anyone attacking gets -75% to hit etc as per total darkness? Anyone more than 160m away can see the target normally if it's not night?

Summon Elemental (p342): Can I summon an Elemental directly on someone within Range? Do I need a POW vs POW roll to do so? How much Create Shadow do I need to summon or maintain a darkness elemental in daytime: one pt, two, or more? I'm guessing two from the Create Shadow write up since that blocks daylight on Cave Trolls and Trollkin, or maybe one since that's enough for Dark Walk to work?

Edited October 20, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[Austin]

21 minutes ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

Create Fissure (p324) : Are all dimensions multiplied by the number of points in the spell, or just the depth? If you create it underneath a target do you have to overcome their POW or does it just work? Why DEX x 3 rather than Dodge to not fall in?

My understanding is that all dimensions are multiplied. Length, width, and depth AFAIK (memory, not re-reading). I think it just works, no POW roll needed. DEXx3 makes it somewhat more dangerous than flat Dodge when used on highly-skilled opponents, but I don't think using Dodge instead is too crazy. It's worth thinking about if someone in the middle of a huge rift can realistically avoid it, though--at the least, I reckon they'd be forced to move if they succeeded their check. Maybe they'd need to roll a special, too.

[Russ Massey]

45 minutes ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

 

Dark Walk (p235): This is really a range Self spell isn't it? The implication is that it works on the caster. I guess it means that anyone attacking gets -75% to hit etc as per total darkness? Anyone more than 160m away can see the target normally if it's not night?

 

I've always treated this as if the target has successfully made a hide in cover roll and a move silently roll. It allows an initial attack by surprise against an unsuspecting enemy, but gives no further advantage while engaged in combat. I feel it should be a stealth facilitator rather than a combat augmentor.

[d(sqrt(-1))]

38 minutes ago, Crel said:

My understanding is that all dimensions are multiplied. Length, width, and depth AFAIK (memory, not re-reading). I think it just works, no POW roll needed. DEXx3 makes it somewhat more dangerous than flat Dodge when used on highly-skilled opponents, but I don't think using Dodge instead is too crazy. It's worth thinking about if someone in the middle of a huge rift can realistically avoid it, though--at the least, I reckon they'd be forced to move if they succeeded their check. Maybe they'd need to roll a special, too.

 

I just found the text to be ambiguous on the dimensions thing (are stacked Rune Points meant to be linear or geometric?). Thinking about mounted PCs I guess I'd possibly give them a Ride roll to leap off a mount if it was about to fall in a big hole.

If it just works with no POW vs POW that would seem to be an easy way to get rid of opposition with a starting PC - Rune Lord attacking? Oh dear they probably just fell down a 15 meter crevasse...

Interestingly there's no mention of the fissure closing up again, so I guess the area near the Shaker temple in Old Tarsh must be riven with giant holes in the ground!

Edited October 20, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[d(sqrt(-1))]

10 minutes ago, Russ Massey said:

I've always treated this as if the target has successfully made a hide in cover roll and a move silently roll. It allows an initial attack by surprise against an unsuspecting enemy, but gives no further advantage while engaged in combat. I feel it should be a stealth facilitator rather than a combat augmentor.

That's interesting, as I'd assumed that it doesn't wear off once you attack (it doesn't say either way), so you'd be basically invisible and soundless for the full 15 minutes. I can't see how that wouldn't give you a big combat advantage really!

Edited October 20, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[Russ Massey]

2 hours ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

That's interesting, as I'd assumed that it doesn't wear off once you attack (it doesn't say either way), so you'd be basically invisible and soundless for the full 15 minutes. I can't see how that wouldn't give you a big combat advantage really!

My take was it would much too powerful a spell if used that way, though I do assume that the effects kick back in for the full 15 minutes if combat ends. The effect is derived from the Sandals of Darkness as worn by Kyger Litor and stolen by Orlanth. It's one of the four Orlanthi magic item rune spells along with Scarf of Mist, Shield of Arran and um... Lightning, I think. Orlanth in the myths only seems to have used the Sandals for sneaking around and stealing things, and giving all sight-based foes -75% against you in combat for 15 minutes would make it a way too powerful Orlanthi combat spell IMO.

[d(sqrt(-1))]

 

Sure, hence my question!

It's not the same as the Invisibility spell, which makes you reappear when you attack until the end of the round, because it's giving you Being Unseen and Soundless while in darkness - and the rules definitely say that people who can't see in darkness are at -75% to attacks and parries. Not normally a problem if you've got Trolls in a dark cave etc (well except for the usual problems with Trolls in a dark cave!), but the Create Shadow spell explicitly says that 1 point is enough for Dark Walk to function. So I'm at a bit of a loss to see what it is for exactly. If you can sneak around without being detected why wouldn't that help in combat too?

[Russ Massey]

41 minutes ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

 

Sure, hence my question!

It's not the same as the Invisibility spell, which makes you reappear when you attack until the end of the round, because it's giving you Being Unseen and Soundless while in darkness - and the rules definitely say that people who can't see in darkness are at -75% to attacks and parries. Not normally a problem if you've got Trolls in a dark cave etc (well except for the usual problems with Trolls in a dark cave!), but the Create Shadow spell explicitly says that 1 point is enough for Dark Walk to function. So I'm at a bit of a loss to see what it is for exactly. If you can sneak around without being detected why wouldn't that help in combat too?

You're trying to define the spell logically within the framework of the rules. I'm just saying what works for practical GMing.

A 1 pt rune spell that gives you the equivalent of 15 points of shimmer for 15 minutes as well as total invisibility is not balanced with other rune spells, so I don't use it that way.

That's not to say that your interpretation in incorrect or that mine is right, but since every Orlanth Adventurous initiate has access to the spell you would have to wonder how any night time ambush against the lunars could ever have failed to wipe them out completely if we define it your way. From the way that the thread on the official rules interpreations is going I do not expect there to be any sort of official response except to say that it is up each GM to decide how to play the spell within the context of his own campaign.

Edited October 20, 2018 by Russ Massey

[soltakss]

On 10/20/2018 at 10:26 AM, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

Create Fissure (p324) : Are all dimensions multiplied by the number of points in the spell, or just the depth? If you create it underneath a target do you have to overcome their POW or does it just work? Why DEX x 3 rather than Dodge to not fall in?

Dodge is to doge an attack, a DEXx3 is a general balance roll. I would allow anything like Jump, Acrobatics or similar skills to work just as well.

 

On 10/20/2018 at 10:26 AM, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

Create Shadow (p235): Can it be cast on a target and move with the target (earlier versions were immobile AFAIK, but this version says it has a movement rate of 12 - so how does it move? Or is that a maximum if it is cast on a target?). If One point is enough to allow Dark Walk - does that mean I can cast both and become invisible and soundless for 15 minutes while moving around even in daylight (well there will be a bit of haze)?

I think it has to be commanded by the caster and moves according to the caster's wishes. After all, this is not just a piece of darkness, it is a living shadow.

 

On 10/20/2018 at 10:26 AM, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

Dark Walk (p235): This is really a range Self spell isn't it? The implication is that it works on the caster. I guess it means that anyone attacking gets -75% to hit etc as per total darkness? Anyone more than 160m away can see the target normally if it's not night?

Why Range Self? I could cast it on someone else 30 yards away.

I think the way that these things work is that the Range is the furthest distance the spell can be cast, but then the spell just works. So, if I cast it on some 160m away, they could move another 100m and still be under the effect of the spell. 

On 10/20/2018 at 10:26 AM, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

Summon Elemental (p342): Can I summon an Elemental directly on someone within Range? Do I need a POW vs POW roll to do so? How much Create Shadow do I need to summon or maintain a darkness elemental in daytime: one pt, two, or more? I'm guessing two from the Create Shadow write up since that blocks daylight on Cave Trolls and Trollkin, or maybe one since that's enough for Dark Walk to work?

You need the element available to summon the elemental. In RQ2, you just needed some of the elemental and could summon it anywhere. In RQ3, the element became the body of the elemental, so you summoned it into the element.

As a GM, I would always ask for a POW vs POW roll if you cast a magical effect on someone, including summoning elementals. However, summoning a Shade a metre away from someone and then moving it to attack is just fine and doesn't need a POW vs POW roll.

I would think that 2 points of Create Shadow is enough to summon a Shade.

Edited October 21, 2018 by soltakss

[d(sqrt(-1))]

5 hours ago, Russ Massey said:

You're trying to define the spell logically within the framework of the rules. I'm just saying what works for practical GMing.

A 1 pt rune spell that gives you the equivalent of 15 points of shimmer for 15 minutes as well as total invisibility is not balanced with other rune spells, so I don't use it that way.

That's not to say that your interpretation in incorrect or that mine is right, but since every Orlanth Adventurous initiate has access to the spell you would have to wonder how any night time ambush against the lunars could ever have failed to wipe them out completely if we define it your way. From the way that the thread on the official rules interpreations is going I do not expect there to be any sort of official response except to say that it is up each GM to decide how to play the spell within the context of his own campaign.

Sure, what I'd really like is an idea of the intention - I can make up my own interpretations, but it would be nice to know if they are reasonably accurate or not. 

The difficulty I have is that spell A says "creates darkness" and spell B says "works in darkness" but the resolution seems to be "you can't do the things in darkness that other rules say you can". So if the Argan Argar player wants to create shadows and sneak about undetectably they can, but for some reason that doesn't work in combat is a huge suspension of disbelief problem

Edited October 20, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[d(sqrt(-1))]

Quote

Re Create Shadow: I think it has to be commanded by the caster and moves according to the caster's wishes. After all, this nis not just a piece of darkness, it is a living shadow.

So does the caster have to concentrate to move it? Can they do something else at the same time?

Quote

Re Dark Walk: Why Range Self? I could cast it on someone else 30 yards away.

The wording is odd, it says "allows the user to be totally invisible and soundless in darkness and shadow to anyone within range. Blend-in is total". Cults of Prax says the same with the exception that is also says the spell is stackable to 2 points for double duration. The way it reads to me is that is cast on the caster ("the user" but it could possibly be "the target") but makes you invisible and soundless to anyone within 160 metres.

 

2 Points of Create Shadow for a Shade seems reasonable to me.

Edited October 20, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))
editing seems to have gone berserk

[soltakss]

14 hours ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

So does the caster have to concentrate to move it? Can they do something else at the same time?

I would say they probably have to concentrate to move it, but could do something else as well, perhaps with an INTx5 Roll.

If the Shadow is like a Shade and has intelligence, the caster could simple give it an order to move to a certain place.

14 hours ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

The wording is odd, it says "allows the user to be totally invisible and soundless in darkness and shadow to anyone within range. Blend-in is total". Cults of Prax says the same with the exception that is also says the spell is stackable to 2 points for double duration. The way it reads to me is that is cast on the caster ("the user" but it could possibly be "the target") but makes you invisible and soundless to anyone within 160 metres.

I think we used the "That's silly" rule for that in RQ2 and treated it like Invisibility. 

[d(sqrt(-1))]

46 minutes ago, soltakss said:

I would say they probably have to concentrate to move it, but could do something else as well, perhaps with an INTx5 Roll.

If the Shadow is like a Shade and has intelligence, the caster could simple give it an order to move to a certain place.

Sounds a reasonable interpretation TBH. I'm not sure if the intention is that it's like a shade, or "just" darkness though.

46 minutes ago, soltakss said:

I think we used the "That's silly" rule for that in RQ2 and treated it like Invisibility. 

Invisibility while in darkness/shadow? That's also a decent interpretation that makes more sense. Since Invisibility is a 3 point Rune Spell, here you are getting a limited form of Invisibility for (possibly) 2 points - 1 point for Create Shadow and 1 point for Dark Walk, and that also takes you 2 rounds to set up as opposed to 1. It also fits with the interpretation that it's mostly useful for sneaking about but still makes it useful for combat. Sold! I'll give it a go.

Thanks for the suggestions.

Edited October 21, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[soltakss]

Be careful with the Create Shadow and Dark Walk combination, it suffers from the same problems as Mist Cloud. You see a blob of darkness that moves around. Sure, you can't be seen inside the Shadow, but people can see the shadow moving around. I have used Create Shadow to link two areas of shadow, allowing me to move between them with Dark Walk.

Dark Walk is a funny spell, in some ways. "So, I can't be seen when it's dark? But it's dark, so I wouldn't be able to be seen, would I?"

Edited October 21, 2018 by soltakss

[d(sqrt(-1))]

32 minutes ago, soltakss said:

Be careful with the Create Shadow and Dark Walk combination, it suffers from the same problems as Mist Cloud. You see a blob of darkness that moves around. Sure, you can't be seen inside the Shadow, but people can see the shadow moving around. I have used Create Shadow to link two areas of shadow, allowing me to move between them with Dark Walk.

Dark Walk is a funny spell, in some ways. "So, I can't be seen when it's dark? But it's dark, so I wouldn't be able to be seen, would I?"

Well I was wondering about the use of it for Trolls seeing as they can see in darkness anyway, but it's great for Argan Argar during the day...I was thinking about counters to it and yes one disadvantage is that there is this hazy/shadowy/darkness blob of 9mx6mx6m moving around, bound to make people suspicious and drop missile/area attacks etc in there, or just dispel it and you are left there standing like a numpty.

Given that the spell says "9mx6mx6m or any other shape with the same volume" (324 cubic metres) I'd be strongly tempted to make it 2m (high) x 13m x 12m or 2m high x 7m radius (approx.), especially if you can move it around reasonably easily. Unless you are a Troll, 2m should be high enough to cover you so you stand a reasonable chance of not being hit too much. Won't help much vs Darksense or Detect Life etc I guess.

Mist Cloud I hadn't read - 2m diameter for each Rune Point covers a lot smaller area, and it looks like it doesn't move so it's a bit like the equivalent of D&D Fog Cloud or Obscuring Mist.

Interesting idea about moving between shadows with Dark Walk - I don't get that from reading the spell but it could make mythic sense.

 

Edited October 21, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[soltakss]

I think that Dark Walk used to work against darksense as well - Otherwise Orlanth would not have been able to hide from trolls.

[Russ Massey]

15 minutes ago, soltakss said:

I think that Dark Walk used to work against darksense as well - Otherwise Orlanth would not have been able to hide from trolls.

Good point. It's defined as totally invisible and soundless, so it should work against troll darksense as well. Although I notice in the new Bestiary that troll darksense is only implied to be sound based (in the Sea Troll section), whereas it used to be explicit in Trollpak and previous works on trollkind.

[d(sqrt(-1))]

42 minutes ago, Russ Massey said:

Good point. It's defined as totally invisible and soundless, so it should work against troll darksense as well. Although I notice in the new Bestiary that troll darksense is only implied to be sound based (in the Sea Troll section), whereas it used to be explicit in Trollpak and previous works on trollkind.

I thought that Darksense was always defined as basically sonar? If the protected PC is soundless that doesn't stop Trolls pinging them. The Silence spell (p264) says that it only stops noise created by the users movement. Ok, it's a Spirit spell so the same may not apply to Rune magic...

Edited October 21, 2018 by d(sqrt(-1))

[Russ Massey]

20 minutes ago, d(sqrt(-1)) said:

I thought that Darksense was always defined as basically sonar? If the protected PC is soundless that doesn't stop Trolls pinging them. The Silence spell (p264) says that it only stops noise created by the users movement. Ok, it's a Spirit spell so the same may not apply to Rune magic...

It depends whether 'soundless' can be taken to mean that no sound at all is emitted by the subject, in which case they would effectively have a 'stealth' coating rendering them invisible to troll sonar. I can't remember if this cropped up in gaming before, but I now have a player with a human Argan Argar initiate with Darkwalk, so it is going to be quite important whether the spell works (for whatever your particular interprestarion of that is 😉) against trolls as well as humans.

Since Argan Argar is supposed to be the interface between troll and human cultures I do feel that the spell should work against both species.

[d(sqrt(-1))]

5 hours ago, Russ Massey said:

It depends whether 'soundless' can be taken to mean that no sound at all is emitted by the subject, in which case they would effectively have a 'stealth' coating rendering them invisible to troll sonar. I can't remember if this cropped up in gaming before, but I now have a player with a human Argan Argar initiate with Darkwalk, so it is going to be quite important whether the spell works (for whatever your particular interprestarion of that is 😉) against trolls as well as humans.

Since Argan Argar is supposed to be the interface between troll and human cultures I do feel that the spell should work against both species.

Yes I too have a player with an Argan Argar PC with Dark Walk and Create Shadow, hence my questions. In fact I initially talked them out of having Summon Shade and Control Cult Spirit on the basis that it would use all their rune points and they might not have such a good chance of controlling the elemental when it turned up.

It could be that Dark Walk gives a "stealth" ability that stops Darksense pinging subjects of the spell. 

 

[Thyrwyn]

Multispell - does this spell allow the caster to cast two (or more) spirit magic spells each round, beginning with the very round that Multispell is cast?

the general rule is a clear “no”, but the text of the spell could be read as intended to circumvent that general rule. I’m tempted to run it as a “yes”, since otherwise the spell shows no benefit until round 3 (Multispell, 1st &2nd Spirit spells, 3rd & 4th Spirit spells; vs 1st Spirit spell, 2nd Spirit spell, 3rd Spirit Spell). 

Thoughts?

[womble]

Yeah, the RAW is pretty clear, and the delay until net benefit is potentially greater because you may be able to cast more than one Spirit Magic spell per round anyway, if you have enough SR. It goes on for 15 minutes though, and a larger stack of it will bring net benefit sooner, as well as making Disruption a total beast if you cast say a stack of 4 (for 3 RP) and then focus Disruptions on single targets each round. Boom, boom, boom until you run out of MP.