An idea to allow more spell casting

[Blackmako]

I don't know what your talking about Potestas. My post was not what a GM has to do. Though as a GM I don't like to have a starting fight in a game night wipe out the hierarchy of consequences at the outset unless I am setting up a mood of desperation (desperation is a common emotional tool in Dresden books) My comment about pacing was about what a player should do. A typical Dresden book has numerous scenes over a couple of days. I was pointing out when you have two to three scenes for a day (typical to a Dresden book) and your conserving energy you can still throw out a lot of spells. A smart player maybe takes a mild consequence to throw out more spells. Dresden books show Harry getting exhausted over many scenes. In fact one thing that characterizes Dresden is exhaustion after throwing out spells. What the original poster was proposing is balance breaking in my opinion. Good discipline rolls with a 2 to 3 shift weapon over and over and over with a ranged component plus 3 shift veils over and over and over again with 3 shift blocks or 1 shift armor over and over again with no stress cost is not a minor boost. And it defeats the purpose of willpower running out.

Between scenes a smart player does things to justify recovery. What if the player did an equivalent of the Reiki Hands biomancy ritual except with the mind? What about the potion in the book that refreshes the mental stress track. There are tools all over for a wizard to beef up/prepare.

Wizards are not just about throwing evocation out. The point of evocation is that its a crude blast of will that wears you out. That is the point. A smart wizard can use exchanges to make assessments, maneuvers, and use of skills to better manage the battlefield. In fact its wise battlefield management with a well placed attack that is queen of the battlefield. In my experience with a sizable party five to six exchange combat is typical. Six exchange fights are not going to tap out/exhaust a wizard unless his mental pool is getting hit. Throw in assessments and maneuvers a wizard can easily cast 4 spells and do a few maneuvers and acquit themselves well. A wizard is more that pew pew pew. Belials example I don't see as cheating (I am sure Belial was being ironic/sarcastic with cheating comment). Its smart playing. For longer battles with 10 to 15 exchanges you run into issues with other templates. Usually at that point the melee/speed/toughness/str are getting beat to crap with physical consequences mounting up.

Then there is the rest of the party. The wizards shine in the party of the game I am in because the melee guys do stuff like grapples to help wizards fire off their 1 stress spells with no chance of miss. They operate as living shields for the wizards. Dresden books have plenty of examples of companions force multiplying the damage Harry does. 

I know on DFRPG resources there are excellent suggestions for powers and stunts that can give wizards more staying power: mental stoicism, mental resilience, and the endurance stunt that gives extra mild consequences for evocation.

[Taran]

I was rereading stormfront and it seemed to me when harry first overcame the frog demon he did so by tapping the power of the storm. The storm augmented his power to a far greater degree then the a simple +1 to the ladder that the rules state. He channelled the naturally occuring energy of the storm into at least a legendary effect as he put down the frog demon with one hit. If we are at all honest with ourselves the hit was probably far stronger then that. There is nothing in the rules that allows wizards to do this, at least not to the effect harry does in the book. The spell he used would seem to be a cross between evocation and thaumaturgy, he seemed to prepare it but the effects were much stronger then the time he had and what the rules would have allowed for. Does anyone have anything in mind to allow wizards to do such stunts that better mimics what harry did in the book?

Let aspects pay for mental stress.  Each aspect tagged is a+2 to power without it costing extra mental stress.  Granted, you still have to control the Mighty Storm, but that's the risk of channeling so much power.

Regarding extra spells:  Just let them refresh their stress tracks more often.  That helps the non-spell casters as well.
Enchanted items make up a lot of a wizards power by adding extra spells.

[Mr. Death]

I had an idea similar to this once.

An alternate idea I had was to allow duration attack spells, but that's something entirely different.

Alternate ways is to just put more into Enchanted items. It's what Harry does.

[Belial666]

There already are attack spells with a duration. Look up "Orbius" in Our World.


*retreats before Sancta can turn up*

[Mr. Death]

There already are attack spells with a duration. Look up "Orbius" in Our World.


*retreats before Sancta can turn up*

Yeah, but my idea worked a little differently. I'll see if I can dig up the thread.

Found it:

So how's this for a proposal:

A caster can create a multiple-exchange attack by devoting one shift of effect to each additional exchange. For each exchange that the attack is active, the caster must roll Discipline to maintain the hold on the spell, involving fallout or backlash as normal if he fails to make the difficulty equal to the spell's Weapon rating, regardless of whether he is attacking with the spell that exchange. If the caster is attacking using the spell energy, the Discipline roll will serve as the targeting roll as well.

The caster may not cast any new spells while the first is active. If the caster attempts a separate action while the spell is active, either the Discipline roll or the main action roll must be made at a penalty of -1, similarly to the supplemental action rules. The caster may convert the spell energy into a Block or Maneuver, but any change to the spell's parameters--including converting it into a zone attack or a spray attack--forfeits the spell's remaining longevity.

Example: It is just not Harry's day (but when is it ever?), and some Red Court vampires have come to say hi. Harry decides that he can't make an effective spray attack with his Discipline skill given how many vampires are after him, and he doesn't want to risk frying himself with a zone attack, so he decides to try a multiple-exchange attack. He summons up a Weapon:4 fireball, and gives it three exchanges of longevity, and rolls very well, getting a solid 7 to control, putting a big flaming hole through the first vampire. After dodging a couple strikes, he throws it at a second vampire, rolling a 4 to successfully control the energy, and singes it. Harry decides it might be a good idea to get out of dodge, and decides to devote his next turn to doing so--he decides it's more important to get out of the zone, which has a border that will stop at least some of the vampires, so he decides to make his Athletics roll at normal, and roll his Discipline from the penalty. As a result, he makes it over the border, but only rolls a 2 on Discipline, and takes two shifts of backlash to maintain his hold on the spell. The barrier stops the vampires, though, so on his next turn, Harry decides to let'em have it: He converts the spell into a Weapon:2 zone attack, and manages an Epic roll, cooking nearly all the vampires he'd left behind.

[Cadd]

An interesting concept, and easily narrated as several unique spells while it's mechanically a single one.

[Sanctaphrax]

There already are attack spells with a duration. Look up "Orbius" in Our World.


*retreats before Sancta can turn up*

imma fite u

[HumAnnoyd]

What if Refinement was used to mitigate the cost of low level spells?  You could have it cost Refresh and would even have to adhere to the pyramid the same way Power and Control do.  Perhaps one slot of Refinement would allow a Power 1 Offensive Fire spell to be cast without stress for example.  You could call it Spell Endurance. 

[narphoenix]

imma fite u

GAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

[HumAnnoyd]

What if Refinement was used to mitigate the cost of low level spells?  You could have it cost Refresh and would even have to adhere to the pyramid the same way Power and Control do.  Perhaps one slot of Refinement would allow a Power 1 Offensive Fire spell to be cast without stress for example.  You could call it Spell Endurance.

Also you could limit it to Rote Spells only if that was too powerful. It would make Rotes more important which is nice.

[bobjob]

I wrote up some custom Rote powers that I haven't gotten a chance to playtest yet. I posted them on the board a month ago to make sure they were balanced.

http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,41157.msg2021770.html#msg2021770

[vultur]

3) Sticky aspects like "Aura of Power", "Magical Reserves", "Mana Storage" and the like. Instead of using the aspect to boost any rolls (though you still can), you use the Evocation ability to redirect an existing spell's energy. All those magical aspects are thematically neutral existing spells so you can redirect that energy to fuel your evocation - without expending mental stress.

I don't think that should work. You can redirect evocations, but redirecting thaumaturgy to get stress-free evocations doesn't sound right.

[Locnil]

I don't think that should work. You can redirect evocations, but redirecting thaumaturgy to get stress-free evocations doesn't sound right.

If I understood it correctly, he meant using thaumaturgy to give aspects, then tagging them to redirect evocation. So still redirecting evocations, just without expending fate points.

[Cadd]

Redirecting Spell energy doesn't cost a fate point though...

The way I figure you can increase you number of effective spells per scene is either grabbing Breath Weapon/Ranged Natural Weaponry and narrate it as magical attacks; or enchanted items and again narrate it as something you do then and there rather than a stored effect. You'd probably want to refer to these items in character as "foci" and store your "signature" spells in them saving your actual evocations for your improvised stuff...

[Belial666]

You can redirect evocations, but redirecting thaumaturgy to get stress-free evocations doesn't sound right.

Maybe - but they don't have to be thaumaturgy either. Sticky aspects through evocation already last for the scene for 4 shifts. Just put a few more shifts into duration so they last multiple scenes and you got an evocation effect that could be later redirected, allowing you to essentially store up spells from multiple scenes for later use.


Of course, the best way is if you got Thaumaturgy at Evocation's speed/methods. You could make redirectable spells that last for several days.