Whats the final verdict on magic

[jberger990]

When the RPG first came out, a lot of people were saying that magic was OP. Now that the game has been out for a while, what is the final verdict? OP or not?

[Haru]

I think you'll get a lot of different answers on that. And it probably depends on how you build a character as well. I personally think it's fine.

[dragoonbuster]

Magic is very powerful, but limited in its own ways, and just requires a different approach that other types of characters. There are plenty of other ways to build very powerful characters; each serves a different role than the other. Good GMing solves many of the problems magic can cause, and restrained role-playing solves the rest.

[Mr. Death]

Magic is powerful, but it's supposed to be. And yes, there's ways to mitigate its strength and ways to make other types of characters just as valuable.

But yes, this is a setting and system where magic isn't supposed to be, "Oh, he's a wizard, that's just another way of doing theh same damage," but rather, "Uh oh, he's a wizard, if we don't handle this right he can nuke us." Think of Karrin's narration in Aftermath -- seeing Dresden in action is terrifying, and she's on his side.

[Sanctaphrax]

It's strong. If the GM is too permissive it can be too strong.

[HumAnnoyd]

Very powerful.  But interestingly enough the only two characters to ever suffer Extreme consequences in our 5+ year game were both full blown wizards.  They aren't exactly glass canons but unless they prepare for it they can be dropped before they get their defenses up.

[Quantus]

It's strong. If the GM is too permissive it can be too strong.

This is the Crux of it, IMO.  The system requires more active work on the GM's part to keep it all balanced, rather than letting the Number-Crunch hold it all in line.  It can be a hard thing to pull off, one Im not great at myself.   

[Taran]

Our group found the power creep was related to foci.  Our group has interpreted the foci limit(based on lore) to be the total cap for a power instead of for each foci. 

So, if you have evocation and your lore is 4, the total of all your evocation foci cannot exceed 4.  That keeps wizards from having 2 foci of +4 control, +4 power foci.  Which is way more of a bonus than any other power in the game for the same refresh. 

If you take thaumaturgy, you get another 4 points to spread around for thaum related foci.

[InFerrumVeritas]

The two things that are a bit too strong are Evocation (foci and specializations stacking, control bonuses adding to attack rolls) and enchanted items. 

Ultimately, they're not too overpowered, but they're stronger than almost anything else in the system.  They don't break the game, or make playing other types of characters un-fun though.

Skill shuffling is also a bit broken, on the non-magic side.

[Taran]

Skill shuffling is also a bit broken, on the non-magic side.

I agree.  You can create One Man Party type builds .  It's worse if the GM let's a character into magic-using and non-magic using forms.  Like heavy combat builds that change into thaumaturgy builds during down-time and then can flip their skills into social builds when it's needed.

[Sanctaphrax]

Skill shuffling is indeed very strong. But I dunno if I'd call it broken.

It's worse if the GM let's a character into magic-using and non-magic using forms.  Like heavy combat builds that change into thaumaturgy builds during down-time and then can flip their skills into social builds when it's needed.

That's not just skill shuffling, though.

If you want to swap magic for other powers you've gotta use something like Variable Abilities. Which is really more of a guideline for making Powers than a Power in itself, so it can easily be broken if you're not careful. You've gotta treat making a new list like making a new Power.

Out of curiosity, does this have to do with Hick Jr's SDC character?

PS:

I probably should've mentioned earlier: don't let people make mental attacks with evocation. They'll start wrecking everything they attack. That's part of what I meant when I said magic could be too strong if the GM was too permissive.

I don't really think of this as a houserule, since my reading of Your Story doesn't imply that Evocation is good for mind-whammies. But with the release of the Paranet Papers I've gotta concede that I am actually changing the rules. So I guess I should've said that magic is overpowered, but that it's easily fixable.

[narphoenix]

I probably should've mentioned earlier: don't let people make mental attacks with evocation. They'll start wrecking everything they attack. That's part of what I meant when I said magic could be too strong if the GM was too permissive.

I don't really think of this as a houserule, since my reading of Your Story doesn't imply that Evocation is good for mind-whammies. But with the release of the Paranet Papers I've gotta concede that I am actually changing the rules. So I guess I should've said that magic is overpowered, but that it's easily fixable.

Does just being liberal about distributing Stoicism fix that as well?

[Sanctaphrax]

No. Spellcasters would still benefit from the ability to aim at whichever track's weaker. And even if you're liberal with Stoicism, many opponents will have Discipline well below their Speed + Athletics.

Even if it was an effective solution I wouldn't recommend it, though. Handing out Stoicism like candy would warp the game world, trivialize non-Evocation mental attacks, and make being tough more expensive for everyone. All to accommodate an ability that, as far as I can tell, adds nothing to the game.

If you really really want to keep mental evocation attacks, I recommend raising the price of Evocation. 6 Refresh might be fair, if Stoicism is around. That makes Wizards unplayable at Submerged, though, so it's not really an ideal solution.

[narphoenix]

You could have mental evocations as an upgrade if Stoicism's around? This even has an IC explanation: either you're extremely skilled and can delve in, or you're fucking stupid and reaching for power you shouldn't have.

[Sanctaphrax]

I guess you could do that. I'd rather have them be thaumaturgy-only with specialists using evothaum, though.