Is Soulfire overpowered?

[mostlyawake]

One of my players has a devout character with Soulfire. This is his only magic, at -5 refresh.  We're new to this and are still trying to suss out what all of the rules and powers mean, but his understanding of soulfire makes it sort of... overpowered.

Because soulfire essentially says "all the spells of thaumaturgy" and every other sponsored magic (minus hellfire) includes "with evocation's speed" clauses, he believes that in essence he can do any thaumaturgical effect that the Good Lord wants him to have at the speed of evocation, which essentially negates the entire speed penalty on thaumaturgy (when would his spells NOT fit the Lord's will, if he stays in character?) So at -5 refresh, he's gotten full thaumaturgy, faster than normal, channeling, plus all of the soulfire benefits vs toughness, at the cost of having to be in alignment with god's will, which he pretty much always will be. 

I'm kind of at a loss, how is this not better than buying regular thaumaturgy plus channeling for the same -5 refresh?  In exchange for having to -essentially - stay in character, he gets a big boost versus any toughness plus ignores the primary limitation of thaumaturgy (the speed)?   The only thing I can see is that Soulfire doesn't explicitly say "at evocation's speed" . So does that just not apply here?

[Wyrdrune]

i don't think that's the way it's intended to be, but i haven't had many thoughts about it, as no one in my round uses it at the moment.

soulfire is one of the more complicated sponsored magics. as i read it, it is more a smite evil-thing and the fires of creation (making conjurations faster/easier - holomancy and the like), but not "everything the Good Lord wants him to do"...

[JosephKell]

1.  4 complexity is pretty weak.  Thaumaturgy at speed of evocation is lame.  Remember, a character can only involve an aspect ONCE in an act, so if your player invokes an aspect to up the allowed complexity (which costs a fate point to begin with), that same aspect can't also be invoked for +2.  Furthermore Thaumaturgy at the speed of Evocation requires all the shifts of power to be gathered at one time.  So unless your player has comparable Conviction to the complexity of the ritual, this will inflict mental stress.  Then there is the Discipline control roll.
2.  Without true Thaumaturgy, anything you do has to relate to Soulfire.
3.  With just Soulfire you get no specializations refinements.

Even if he used his focus slots for thaumaturgy boosts they have to be specific.

FYI: Soulfire looks like the only sponsored magic that doesn't grant some form of "Thaumaturgy at the speed of Evocation."  But it does seem to basically give full Thaumaturgy (minus the free specialization).

I just carefully read it, then did a text search of my pdf.  Go to page 292 (the top paragraph is the end of Hellfire).  Do a search for "speed" and you will find it for Hellfire, then hit next and you see it for Places of Power (which is restricted to "entropomantic effects" at evocation's speed and methods).

Also note that the book even suggests that with Soulfire you might keep the player on a tighter credit limit for fate point debt.

Here is what Soulfire actually gives:
1.  "Standard Sponsored magic benefits (YS 288).  This is "virtual" channeling and ritual with 4 focus slots (reduce by 2 slots for each of Evocation and Thaumaturgy you may have).
2.  Downgrade Toughness and maybe satisfy a catch.
3.  In evocation (I think they meant "channeling") it acts most like fire.
4.  Seems to grant full scope of thaumaturgic applications.

Nothing about "[insert type of thaumaturgy or the whole thing] at evocation speed."  It doesn't even say "Like hellfire but not evil."

[luminos]

1.  4 complexity is pretty weak.  Thaumaturgy at speed of evocation is lame.  Remember, a character can only involve an aspect ONCE in an act, so if your player invokes an aspect to up the allowed complexity (which costs a fate point to begin with), that same aspect can't also be invoked for +2.  Furthermore Thaumaturgy at the speed of Evocation requires all the shifts of power to be gathered at one time.  So unless your player has comparable Conviction to the complexity of the ritual, this will inflict mental stress.  Then there is the Discipline control roll.

You're right, reflective wards that don't go away when bypassed and last a full day are lame.  Veils that cover entire building instead of just individuals are also lame.  So is any of the other absolutely amazing things thaumaturgy can do with the same number of shifts it takes evocation to do even basic stuff.  The player who thinks he gets everything at speed and methods of evocation is dead wrong, and he should know it if he reads the rules for soulfire.  It is still damn poweful, even without speed and methods of evocation, because for the price of thaumaturgy and channeling, you get thaumaturgy, channeling, and instant toughness ignoring abilities.

[smoore]

when would his spells NOT fit the Lord's will, if he stays in character?

Its only overpowered if he is allowed to run rampant with it.

How does he know its the Lord's will? Is the Lord sending down messengers or giving him signs? The Knights don't just run out and kill things, even evil things. Only certain missions constitute the Lord's will, and using his powers outside those parameters can lead to disaster. Is he giving the opposition a chance to repent first like Michael does quite often?

What happens when the Lord says that evil Black Court Vampire the character wants to fry has to live for some greater purpose? Perhaps the Lord needs the Vampire to enthrall and slaughter a few hundred children as a lesson in how evil the world can be in order to reform just one Denarian. The Lord works in mysterious ways, play it up.

Heck, have some Denarian pretend to be an angel and start giving him false signs and messages from the Lord. That little old lady? She is secretly a demon and needs to be purged. If the player wants to use his soulfire all the time build a scenario where he is going after people who look bad but are really good, situations like where Molly tries to help get people off drugs. Make Molly the "evil" he needs to go after, and once he does let him see the larger evil it causes when he does stop her his way.

[DFJunkie]

Not really, when you think about it. 

Soulfire costs 5 refresh so would buying Channeling (Fire Effects) and Thaumaturgy.  Now, Soulfire also provides the standard sponsored magic benefit (loaned fate points) as well as reducing your enemy's effective toughness. 

Your job as GM is to ensure that the situations in which your PC has access to Soulfire are sufficently restricted that it's enhanced power is balanced by its limited utility.  Now, if your PC is appropriately respectful of the fact that he has been given access to the fires of creation and only uses Soulfire when it's either utterly necessary or very appropriate, you're golden, game balanced.  If, on the other hand, he uses it more like a wizard would (ie. also when it's convenient and/or for less than noble reasons) you'll need to discuss the situation with him, and further consider compelling his character (I'm assuming his high concept and probably other aspects would directly relate to his use of Soulfire).

[mostlyawake]

If the character is a holy warrior for god, and the mission centers around tracking down evil doers, then most of his thaumaturgy effects (divinations, ect) will be, well, in line with god.  Plus, guide my hand and other prayers will keep him on the straight and narrow.

However, I like the bit about offering any mortal a chance for redemption.

[Belial666]

Keep these things in mind;

1) As far as we can tell, angelic forces are not allowed to interfere much because, to quote a certain archangel, Free Will must take precedence if it is to matter. This means that if use of Soulfire violates free will, feel free to compel his high concept not to use it. People willingly giving themselves to vampires? Sorry, can't interfere. Evil sorcerers walking the city but you don't see them doing anything to harm people? Nope, can't choose to attack them just because they are evil. Denarians having a meeting with another evil power but not actually harming anyone then? Sorry, you can't attack them first.
Remember how Michael could not attack the Denarians first? Remember how he had to listen and take their crap until they started hostilities? Celestial forces can only interfere to defend people from dark forces, not to attack dark forces just because they are evil.

2) Thaumaturgy with the speed of evocation, even if you allow it, still requires spending mental stress like Evocation does. And consider this; Soulfire costs 5 pts and has some special bonuses but is restricted in use. Evocation+Thaumaturgy has more elements, is not restricted and gives +1 evocation and +1 thaumaturgy specialization with a total cost of 6. Yes, they are equal in a cost/effect ratio.

3) All actions have consequences, consequences mortals cannot know about. Saving someone abused by vampires may lead to said someone be full of hatred due to his abuse, which would lead him to using Black Magic to take revenge against all vampires. The forces of Heaven will instead leave him to succeed in freeing himself, so his sense of accomplishment and his own defeat of his captors allows him to see that he can do good and so he uses his power towards good ends in the future.
So your Soulfire-wielding guy trying to help him? Don't allow it. It is not the Lord's will.

[Deadmanwalking]

Belial666:

Uh...that's not how Soulfire works in the books. At all. Once bestowed, it's just yours, and can be used in any way you desire (probably as part of that Free Will thing you mention), including to 'violate free will' or even to 'go against the divine plan'. It's nature is just for it o be used for creation rather than destruction. Sponsor Debt is (or should be) handled more as a debt to the nature of the magic itself, or the consequences of putting your soul into things (ie: Harry's hand problem), than as God demanding things of you.

Heck, it can be argued that Soulfire just makes you more you than you already were and it's Debt Compels should be just like your regular Compels on your Aspects.

[Ophidimancer]

One of my players has a devout character with Soulfire. This is his only magic, at -5 refresh.  We're new to this and are still trying to suss out what all of the rules and powers mean, but his understanding of soulfire makes it sort of... overpowered.

Because soulfire essentially says "all the spells of thaumaturgy" and every other sponsored magic (minus hellfire) includes "with evocation's speed" clauses, he believes that in essence he can do any thaumaturgical effect that the Good Lord wants him to have at the speed of evocation, which essentially negates the entire speed penalty on thaumaturgy (when would his spells NOT fit the Lord's will, if he stays in character?) So at -5 refresh, he's gotten full thaumaturgy, faster than normal, channeling, plus all of the soulfire benefits vs toughness, at the cost of having to be in alignment with god's will, which he pretty much always will be. 

I'm kind of at a loss, how is this not better than buying regular thaumaturgy plus channeling for the same -5 refresh?  In exchange for having to -essentially - stay in character, he gets a big boost versus any toughness plus ignores the primary limitation of thaumaturgy (the speed)?   The only thing I can see is that Soulfire doesn't explicitly say "at evocation's speed" . So does that just not apply here?

Being able to cast Thaumaturgy at Evocation's speed is nice, but it's not terribly overpowering, because you still need to summon sufficient energy to accomplish what you want to do and you still need to control it like a regular Evocation spell.  Sponsored Magic just gives you a little more breadth of magic instead of only being able to Attack, Block, Maneuver, or Counterspell.

As to Sponsor Debt, it wouldn't count as Debt if it didn't cause some sort of conflict for your character.  Even the most stalwart of characters has to have things they care about.  Sponsor Debt should put those things in jeopardy for the Cause.  Find out what the character cares for and make him make the tough choices.

If he is a goody two shoes all around with no family or lover or any other interesting ties to the world  then have him make Superman's choice, where he has too many people to save and not enough of himself to go around.  Compel the character to burn himself out, taking Consequences all the way, in order to be able to accomplish everything the Almighty wants him to do.

On the other hand, you could also try and make him have to make cloudy ethical decisions.  Make a very sympathetic bad guy, like the budding black sorcerer that Molly was.  I bet he wouldn't want to kill a little girl, but he also has to find a way to stop her from ... oops, too late, she's already committed evil, now what Mr. Righteous Crusader?

[JosephKell]

You're right, reflective wards that don't go away when bypassed and last a full day are lame.  Veils that cover entire building instead of just individuals are also lame.  So is any of the other absolutely amazing things thaumaturgy can do with the same number of shifts it takes evocation to do even basic stuff.  The player who thinks he gets everything at speed and methods of evocation is dead wrong, and he should know it if he reads the rules for soulfire.  It is still damn poweful, even without speed and methods of evocation, because for the price of thaumaturgy and channeling, you get thaumaturgy, channeling, and instant toughness ignoring abilities.

Lame as in "no where near as effect as thaumaturgy as thaumaturgy."   

To veil an entire building requires shifts for block strength, and 2 shifts per zone effected.

So let's say it is a small warehouse (so 4 zones) and you want a Good block.  That is 11 shifts of power.  Not counting duration (you may argue it defaults to until sunrise, but maybe you just need a scene, so whatever).

If you have a Lore of 4, you need to get 7 complexity.  There is no time for declarations, so it probably means 4 invokes (and those same aspects can't be used for the discipline roll).  If you are feet wet (which the OP's case is), your conviction is 4 or less, or discipline is 4 or less (the other will be less).  So doing such a veil fast is not feasible (you have to take consequences for the initial mental stress AND backlash).

So maybe you have Lore 4, and Discipline or Conviction 4 (and the other at 3, or both others at 3).

And sponsored magic specifically says that a player can only borrow ONE fate point from their sponsor per spell.  So the example above requires 3 personal fate points in additional to the borrowed one.  The book doesn't say to still meet complexity with your Lore or to skip that, but even if you do get to ignore it, it is still hard for a character to whip out 11 shifts of power.

So yeah, I think thaumaturgy at evocation speed is lame and way over-hyped.

Maybe it allows your to do a Tracking Spell (YS 298) fast, and that is neat and useful, but most big things that thaumaturgy is normally used for are beyond conventional characters (of course a ridiculous -19 refresh wizard can do whatever, whenever).

[luminos]

Maybe you could reread the section on thaumaturgic veils, as well as the rest of thaumaturgy.  For this specific case, a thaumaturgic veil fits over an entire threshold by default, only shrinking down to individual size when no threshold is available.  Thaumaturgic complexity is not calculated using the same rules as evocation, thus making the "+2 for a zone" part irrelevant in this case.  That is nowhere near the limit of thaumaturgies superiority to evocation, even for small complexity spells. 

[JosephKell]

Warehouses have no threshold.

Mind Fog explains that 6 of its complexity is from effecting 3 zones.

Edit:  And while the Wards section doesn't say to consider number zones, it also doesn't say to ignore it.

But Veils specifically say "In addition, bigger veils mean a higher complexity."  And "Count up the number of zones a larger veil covers, and add that to the complexity of the veil."

This is a departure from the 1 zone = +2 shifts.  It could be an old passage.

[luminos]

Amazing, so on warehouses, one small aspect of thaumaturgy out of the whole conceptual framework is no more powerful than evocation.

[JosephKell]

Amazing, so on warehouses, one small aspect of thaumaturgy out of the whole conceptual framework is no more powerful than evocation.

Actually you partly right.

Technically to Veil a 4 zone warehouse with a Good block on detection (or noticing it isn't empty or to notice the noise coming from it) would be 7 complexity.  Which is much more doable at evocation speed.

There is a passage that says Wards "are almost always tied" to a threshold.  And that when such is the case they have no size concern.  But without a threshold they can only be small (which means to make it bigger is harder).  In fact, the "small" is described in the scale of "block that door."

So throwing up a ward around a tent isn't as generous as you suggest.  It isn't a "I want to bounce back vampires, so let's bust out an 8 shift (5 conviction + 3, so a 4 mental stress action) ward" because all that does is block the door (they can still tear through the sides of the tent.  It needs to factor for the whole thing, so it is either +1 per zone or +2 (which everything else seems to be).

Technically allowing any sort of zone coverage for a no threshold ward is a house rule.  This could be why the White Council does veils for gatherings in the opening instead of taking extra effort to do full on wards as well.

I e-mailed Evil Hat and Fred replied.

I was reading the Veils and Wards sections and noticed that Veils are +1 complexity/shift per zone while Evocation blocks (and in fact every other demonstrated instance of zone expansions) are +2 shifts per zone.

Is this because the veil section was written earlier and thus didn't get an update when it was decided zone coverage was really good (and thus deserved to be +2 instead of +1)?

Honestly? I'm not sure there. I could see allowing Veils to be special-case as they don't protect against damage, they simply protect against discovery.

Fred

Edit: Citations.
Veils zone cost can be found on YS 276, 5th paragraph under Veils.
Wards on size "no veil size concern" is on YS 277, first complete paragraph of the left column.