Taking yourself out

[zenten]

So if you're playing a Mage, and you inflict enough mental (or physical if it's backlash) stress on yourself to be Taken Out, who narrates what happens?

[Dravokian]

if your doing so as a concession then you would but if not then I would think it falls to the gm's desecration. As a GM I wouldn't let you do so just to get a powerful spell off and then drop... id make you take all available consequences first unless it was a concession. But I would do it along the lines of the more consequences you took the lesser the narrative for the take out would be... for instance if you did it on first action so you could hit someone with a 20 stress attack and then fall I might have it kill you or seriously limit your abilities. If you had taken a minor, mod, sever, and then fell i would probably treat it as your body finally wore out from the pain and you fell asleep.

[sinker]

You do, so make it dramatic and great! I imagine that the table would make suggestions and expect a reasonable "Taken out" result (no "I simply wake up refreshed several hours later"). The GM would be able to outline some of your opposition's goals and such. Honestly I'd expect it to be a negotiation between you and the table/GM, but if you do a good job then I would expect them to accept it.

[ways and means]

Well raw when you take someone out you get to pick the taken out result with limits of what ever is reasonable acceptable by the table, if you take yourself out I so no reasons why the same rule would not apply, probably with a stronger emphasis on what is reasonable.  That or you could see it as the person that forced the the wizard to use that much stress was the one that actually to the wizard out.

[The Mighty Buzzard]

if your doing so as a concession then you would but if not then I would think it falls to the gm's desecration. As a GM I wouldn't let you do so just to get a powerful spell off and then drop... id make you take all available consequences first unless it was a concession. But I would do it along the lines of the more consequences you took the lesser the narrative for the take out would be... for instance if you did it on first action so you could hit someone with a 20 stress attack and then fall I might have it kill you or seriously limit your abilities. If you had taken a minor, mod, sever, and then fell i would probably treat it as your body finally wore out from the pain and you fell asleep.

I think you meant discretion but desecration is certainly funnier.

[computerking]

for instance if you did it on first action so you could hit someone with a 20 stress attack and then fall I might have it kill you or seriously limit your abilities.

I don't think a character could do that, though. When they choose how many shifts of power they want to summon up, I think they take the stress at that point, and would be Taken Out before they could even focus the power into a spell. Without taking Consequences, they could only summon up enough power to take them out that way, which would be their Physical Stress Track +1. If they take Consequences they can get up to that (Consequences) + (Stress Track) stress mark. Any more than that and, once again, they are Taken Out before they can cast.
And that's before the backlash. But Backlash is almost irrelevant at that point.

Am I getting this right, folks? 1: Choose Shifts of power, 2: Take Stress, 3: Roll Discipline, 4: Take backlash/Make Fallout?

[sinker]

I don't know, that's pretty murky territory. If you model it that way then you have all sorts of issues with casting. I say stress could be applied before casting, but regardless the spell ought to still work. Taking yourself out to cast a spell is entirely pointless otherwise, and it's just too dramatic and interesting an option to completely exclude.

Keep in mind though that a 20 shift evocation would be a b**** to control, even if you could call up that much power. We're already talking senior council mojo at that point.

[wyvern]

If just calling up energy is enough to take you out... I'd say that's death curse territory.

If you "merely" get taken out by backlash, on the other hand, that's negotiation time.  It's not quite a Taken Out result, since you could have chosen fallout instead of backlash, but it's not quite a typical concession situation, either.  I'd definitely say that's a "negotiate with your table & GM" type thing, rather than either a "Take-Out so GM controls result" or "Concession so player controls result".

[computerking]

I don't know, that's pretty murky territory. If you model it that way then you have all sorts of issues with casting. I say stress could be applied before casting, but regardless the spell ought to still work. Taking yourself out to cast a spell is entirely pointless otherwise, and it's just too dramatic and interesting an option to completely exclude.

I admit that I'm kinda extrapolating from info I got in the Faster Counterspelling thread (http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,28988.0.html), Where it was explained to me that you take "Drawing power" stress separately before casting and taking Backlash Stress. I inferred that this means that there's a split second where the amount of power you draw can take you out, before shaping it into a spell.

[zenten]

If just calling up energy is enough to take you out... I'd say that's death curse territory.

Actually, it's the *only* way death curses make any sense.  Otherwise you could just channel like 200 shifts of mental stress and blow up the city or whatever.

[Becq]

Per the casting sequence on YS250, you take the stress before you make your control roll.  I would tend to think that succeeding on a control roll would be difficult while unconscious.  Death Curses are a specific exception and play by different rules entirely -- note that you can't simply cast for 1,000,000 shifts because you're going down anyway.

[UmbraLux]

So if you're playing a Mage, and you inflict enough mental (or physical if it's backlash) stress on yourself to be Taken Out, who narrates what happens?

Since whomever takes out a victim sets the victim's fate and the character always "owns his own death scene", the player of the mage would narrate what happens.  See YS203.

Am I getting this right, folks? 1: Choose Shifts of power, 2: Take Stress, 3: Roll Discipline, 4: Take backlash/Make Fallout?

I use 1) set shifts of power and take any stress or consequences devoted to increasing power, 2) roll Discipline and take backlash stress / consequences if needed or desired.

[The Mighty Buzzard]

Since whomever takes out a victim sets the victim's fate and the character always "owns his own death scene", the player of the mage would narrate what happens.  See YS203.

Yeah, right there with you.  So long as it's clear that taking yourself out strictly off the summoned shifts of power means it will be a death curse and a death scene.

[sinker]

I'm surprised that none of you are interested in maintaining something that could be so very good for a story. I guess I can understand if that's RAW, but still, I know that in my games taking your self out via casting (without it being a death curse) will always be an option, because it's wonderfully dramatic.

[computerking]

I'm surprised that none of you are interested in maintaining something that could be so very good for a story.

I wouldn't say none of us... I'm not against taking yourself out with the backlash, but I prefer the idea of a young apprentice trying to impress his mentor pushing a spell attempt to a point where he passes out before being able to shape the power into a spell.
 
(Next Scene, water is flung onto the unconscious body of the apprentice. He sputters and sits up)
Apprentice: What happened?
Wizard: You got cocky. You tried to make a wedding cake when you were only being taught how to make cookies. Don't overstep your bounds, child.