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Making an Effective Sorcerer


Tywyll

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So one thing RQ has always had is emergent mechanics. By that I mean it's hard to see what looks ng time characters might look like from just reading the rules. RQ3 sorcery was an excellent example of this issue...for me at least,figuring out all the moving parts for a Sorcerer was very difficult.

Now Free Int is back, but I don't think Int spirits are a thing anymore. So how do you make an effective or 'high level' sorcerer these days? How do they free their Int? Where do they get all the more they need? Etc etc.

 

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42 minutes ago, Tywyll said:

So one thing RQ has always had is emergent mechanics. By that I mean it's hard to see what looks ng time characters might look like from just reading the rules. RQ3 sorcery was an excellent example of this issue...for me at least,figuring out all the moving parts for a Sorcerer was very difficult.

Now Free Int is back, but I don't think Int spirits are a thing anymore. So how do you make an effective or 'high level' sorcerer these days? How do they free their Int? Where do they get all the more they need? Etc etc.

I think inscriptions are how you are supposed to do that. One POW to get one free INT back, plus the inscription gives you a free point of manipulation. Plus you can start with INT 20 now.

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9 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

I think inscriptions are how you are supposed to do that. One POW to get one free INT back, plus the inscription gives you a free point of manipulation. Plus you can start with INT 20 now.

And there's also an INT-boosting spell associated with Fire Rune.

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On 11/20/2018 at 10:30 AM, Tywyll said:

Now Free Int is back, but I don't think Int spirits are a thing anymore. So how do you make an effective or 'high level' sorcerer these days? How do they free their Int? Where do they get all the more they need? Etc etc.

Probably the most important thing to remember is the Memorising Spells rules on page 390, which suggest that a Sorcerer can meditate to forget (takes 1 hour) and remember (takes 3 hours) spells they have known.  This means you can clear your mind of clutter and focus on a single spell with most of your INT free, but then when it is cast, you have to re-remember what you forgot etc.  This makes the use of the Meditation skill very important to sorcerers who use this approach.

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The secret to being an effective wizard is to be a min-maxing bastard. To quote myself from the facebook group:

Quote

Step 1) Have a wizard with high INT, and a mastery of at least Fire and Summon.

Step 2) Have a source of extra MP, like a crystal, enough so that you can cast full INT spells

Step 3) Bootstrap your way up to a higher INT using Enhance INT. I think it's possible for a 20 INT character to get +4 INT for a year at a time with enough fiddling.

Step 4) Cast buffs at your full INT in MP with long duration. Boon of Kargan Tor is particularly nasty, since you can do things like give weapons +4d6 damage for 12 hours, or +2d6 damage for years.

Step 5) Repeat step 4 as often as MP allows.

I elided a lot of fiddly details (eg, avoiding learning spirit magic), but that's one of the better paths to wizardly power.

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Next trick: Hordes of elementals.

I'm assuming that we're using a min-maxed sorcerer with 24 INT and have enough spare MP lying around for our needs.

  1. Master Truth, Spirit, Summon, Command, and your target elemental rune.
  2. Locate a suitable target elemental. This is the trickiest bit, actually, since the core book doesn't have any spirit sight sorcery spells. You might even have to (gasp) cooperate with a barbarian.
  3. Get within range, and cast Identify Otherworld Entity from a safe distance. Learn your target's true name and power. Alternately, you can try summoning it and overcoming its POW, then resummoning it for a longer duration when once you've learned its true name.
  4. Cast Summon Elemental. With 23 points of free INT, we can summon a small elemental for four years (+5 strength, +18 duration), a medium elemental for two weeks (+11 strength, +12 duration), or a large elemental for six hours (+15 strength, +6 duration). This is obviously a spell that benefits from increasing your free INT.

So, yeah, a suitably motivated wizard could have dozens of small elementals following him around at any given time. The same technique works even better for other spirits, as well, since RAW you don't need to overcome POW if you know the spirit's true name. Our example wizard could have *any* spirit he knows the name of obeying him for 128 years! 😮

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2 hours ago, Scott A said:

Next trick: Hordes of elementals.

 

A medium sized Shade is particularly effective. It's probably going to win its POW v POW fearshock attack (3d6+6 vs 3d6) and thereby stands a chance of instantly killing even rune levels, and at least taking them out of the combat. The sorcerer in the party I GM has a POW 20 Shade and it has made challenging encounters much easier. Throw in 2 or 3 of them and it's a game changer.

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2 minutes ago, Tywyll said:

Since Spirit Magic now uses Charisma, does that mean Sorcerers can use it without loss of power?

So you cannot use a spirit's Int for spell storage, correct?

For purposes of Free INT only (per the rules, anyway) Spirit Magic takes 1 point of INT per point of spell. 

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