new power idea--reverse evothaum

[nadia.skylark]

I've been trying to figure out how to handle thaumaturgical spells based on evocation elements. For example, if I wanted to burn out an infection, that's fire magic, but it's also clearly thaumaturgy.

Instead of creating a new thematic specialization "fire" for thaumaturgy and buying refinement for it, I was thinking of creating a power that is sort of like evothaum, only instead of allowing you to cast thaumaturgy with the speed and methods of evocation it allows you to cast evocation with the speed and methods of thaumaturgy.

Does that sound balanced? If so, how much refresh should it cost? Should it apply to just one element, or should it apply to all your evocation elements?

[Taran]

I don't have my book so I can't give you a page number but I'm fairly certain that thaumaturgy can do anything evocation can do.  Although, I've never really thought about what category it would be for the purposes of refinement specializations.

I think you can just specialize in fire if you like.   A fire Mage has ritual fire, after all. 

In any case evothaum tends to be thematic anyways. 

[nadia.skylark]

I think you can just specialize in fire if you like.   A fire Mage has ritual fire, after all.

Yes, but if I'm a wizard with significant refinement invested in fire evocation but no refinement in fire-themed thaumaturgy, then it seems like I could do things with evocation that I couldn't do with thaumaturgy, which makes no sense to me (evocation's advantage being that it can do things quickly, rather than that it can do things that are impossible for thaumaturgy). If I can throw around fireballs and fire-themed shields with evocation, that seems like something that narratively should give me an advantage when doing fire-themed thaumaturgy, as opposed to, for example, biomancy-themed thaumaturgy.

That's why I'm trying to work out a power that lets me use my evocation bonuses to help with thematically-appropriate thaumaturgy.

[Mr. Death]

Yes, but if I'm a wizard with significant refinement invested in fire evocation but no refinement in fire-themed thaumaturgy, then it seems like I could do things with evocation that I couldn't do with thaumaturgy, which makes no sense to me (evocation's advantage being that it can do things quickly, rather than that it can do things that are impossible for thaumaturgy). If I can throw around fireballs and fire-themed shields with evocation, that seems like something that narratively should give me an advantage when doing fire-themed thaumaturgy, as opposed to, for example, biomancy-themed thaumaturgy.

That's why I'm trying to work out a power that lets me use my evocation bonuses to help with thematically-appropriate thaumaturgy.

The skills aren't really cross applicable, though. Think of it like guns and gunsmithing.

Evocation specializations mean you shoot the gun really well -- you can fire fast, hit your target, reload quickly, etc.

But they're not going to help you in building or repairing the gun. That's a different skillset.

Evocation can't do things like "burning out an infection." That's just not something the power is capable of, any more than you can build a gun by shooting bullets.

[Sanctaphrax]

I think it'll almost always be easier and cleaner to spend the Refresh that would've gone into this hypothetical Power on normal Thaumaturgy refinements that match your Evocation specialty.

[nadia.skylark]

The skills aren't really cross applicable, though. Think of it like guns and gunsmithing.

Evocation specializations mean you shoot the gun really well -- you can fire fast, hit your target, reload quickly, etc.

But they're not going to help you in building or repairing the gun. That's a different skill set.

The thing is, knowing how to shoot a gun really well actually would help you in building and repairing one compared to someone who's never picked up a gun before. You may not know everything about guns, but you know more than someone who's never used one.

Evocation can't do things like "burning out an infection." That's just not something the power is capable of, any more than you can build a gun by shooting bullets.

Of course not. That's why I want to use thaumaturgy. The example I'm thinking of is a scenario that happened in another book series that used elemental powers. One of the characters was poisoned with a hypodermic needle, and in order to get rid of the poison a water mage pushed all the poison in her blood to the place where the needle entered and a fire mage burned it away. I'm trying to find a way to to do that in the Dresden Files. While what happened is clearly a thaumaturgy spell, it seems like being able to use Luccio's hair-thin fire beam should translate to some sort of boost in using this kind of precision magic, even though the fire beam is evocation.

I think it'll almost always be easier and cleaner to spend the Refresh that would've gone into this hypothetical Power on normal Thaumaturgy refinements that match your Evocation specialty.

Probably, but it still bugs me.

[Mr. Death]

Probably not a good idea to use examples from a different, unrelated book series -- the rules for every magic system are going to be different. Hell, I wouldn't even use a semi-related series, since the magic in, say, Codex Alera is largely incompatible with Dresden's rules.

In Dresden, there is a very clear, delineated separation between what Evocation can do (move energy around in large, relatively blunt ways) and what Thaumaturgy can do (basically anything more subtle than that, if you have the power available).

It's just not a system where being able to burn things really effectively translates into being able to heal things really effectively.

So yeah, I'm with Sancta here -- the refresh would be better spent on plain Thaumaturgy with a fire-flavored specialization or perhaps some Sponsored Magic from a phoenix or something.

[Taran]

Yes, but if I'm a wizard with significant refinement invested in fire evocation but no refinement in fire-themed thaumaturgy, then it seems like I could do things with evocation that I couldn't do with thaumaturgy, which makes no sense to me (evocation's advantage being that it can do things quickly, rather than that it can do things that are impossible for thaumaturgy)

Evothaum has its own issues.  There's always been a bit of a debate over which specializations get used for it.

Let's say I have Thaum.  evocation and Summer Magic with evocation specializations in Summer.

When doing biomancy at the speed and methods of evocation, if you use evocation specializations, you end up better at biomancy than if you do it with thaumaturgy.  So, should you use Thaumaturgy specialties instead?  And if you do something like an attack, should you add weapon bonuses like evocation or just straight shifts like thaumaturgy?  Maybe I'm opening up a can of worms, but I'm just trying to point the issue with being better at one over another due to specializations.

If I can throw around fireballs and fire-themed shields with evocation, that seems like something that narratively should give me an advantage when doing fire-themed thaumaturgy, as opposed to, for example, biomancy-themed thaumaturgy.

It will.  Use fire-based spell maneuvers and declaration in your ritual prep.  It will help you control the magic and target the poison, it will help you make up the complexity of the ritual if you are using the purifying ability of fire.  Fire will make your ritual more potent, even if you don't have refinements in fire thaumaturgy.

You are going to have the same issues with a reverse power.

[nadia.skylark]

Probably not a good idea to use examples from a different, unrelated book series -- the rules for every magic system are going to be different. Hell, I wouldn't even use a semi-related series, since the magic in, say, Codex Alera is largely incompatible with Dresden's rules.

I agree you need to be careful when doing so, but it can work well some of the time. For example, in the Elemental Assassin series the main character can harden her skin to make it like stone, which strikes me as a really good earth spell.

In Dresden, there is a very clear, delineated separation between what Evocation can do (move energy around in large, relatively blunt ways) and what Thaumaturgy can do (basically anything more subtle than that, if you have the power available).

That's why I want to design a power that allows them to be less separated.

It's just not a system where being able to burn things really effectively translates into being able to heal things really effectively.

But it should when the healing involves burning things. I'm not trying to use fire magic to heal cuts, I'm trying to use it to burn out poison. It's a subtler, more controlled use of fire magic than just setting a person on fire, but it's clearly related.

It also falls under the category of purification, which YS mentions in the context of subtle fire evocations.

Let's say I have Thaum.  evocation and Summer Magic with evocation specializations in Summer.

When doing biomancy at the speed and methods of evocation, if you use evocation specializations, you end up better at biomancy than if you do it with thaumaturgy.  So, should you use Thaumaturgy specialties instead?  And if you do something like an attack, should you add weapon bonuses like evocation or just straight shifts like thaumaturgy?  Maybe I'm opening up a can of worms, but I'm just trying to point the issue with being better at one over another due to specializations.

I agree. This is why I'm not using sponsored magic for this (if I were, it would probably fall under Superior Pyromancy or phoenix-sponsored magic). I'm explicitly trying to design a power that says "You can do [z] with [y]'s specialization bonuses" and I'm trying to work out how much it would cost and if it would be overpowered.

It will.  Use fire-based spell maneuvers and declaration in your ritual prep.  It will help you control the magic and target the poison, it will help you make up the complexity of the ritual if you are using the purifying ability of fire.  Fire will make your ritual more potent, even if you don't have refinements in fire thaumaturgy.

This is a good idea.

[Sanctaphrax]

I agree. This is why I'm not using sponsored magic for this (if I were, it would probably fall under Superior Pyromancy or phoenix-sponsored magic). I'm explicitly trying to design a power that says "You can do [z] with [y]'s specialization bonuses" and I'm trying to work out how much it would cost and if it would be overpowered.

You could cost it anywhere from 1 to 3 Refresh without breaking anything. Really, though, I don't see the point. Refinement can already do what you want to do. And such a Power will always be either strictly better or strictly worse than Refinement for thaumaturgy specializations, which is a problem because you generally want to avoid strict quality differences.