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The Dresden Files => DFRPG => Topic started by: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 12:33:33 AM

Title: Casting more spells
Post by: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 12:33:33 AM
The DFRPG rules do a pretty great job of modeling the universe we see in the books.  There are a few exceptions though.  One of the biggest things I've noticed lacking in the rules is a way for characters to cast more spells over time. 

In the books, as Harry progresses and becomes a more powerful wizard, his spells grow more powerful, and he's also able to cast more of them before he starts getting worn out.  The rules do a good job of modeling the former, they don't do a good job at all with the latter.  In fact, there really are no ways to increase the number of spells you can cast.  You cap out at 4 points of mental stress with 3 points of conviction (which any spellcaster should be starting with), and there are no toughness powers for mental stress like there are for physical.  And as far as I've found, there are no ways to avoid the mental stress from casting a spell.

Has anyone else thought this was an issue in need of fixing and tried to come up with ways around it?  Basically, it seems like you'd need to either be able to cast some spells (likely pretty weak ones) without taking any stress at all, or somehow increase your boxes of mental stress.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Taran on October 15, 2013, 12:58:04 AM
I've heard different PoV and one that would allow for more spell casting is to break up scenes.  Everyone's stress track clears immediately after a scene, so if you were to look at some of Harry's fights as several mini-scenes, he'd have a little time to quickly catch his breath (clear his stress track), then continue fighting.

So maybe the PC's get ambushed, there's a quick skirmish and the enemy pulls back or retreats into another room or building.  The fight continues in the next room/building but then a new enemy blows the roof apart and flies in and starts fighting both sides.

This could be seen as one big fight or, 2 or 3 separate scenes.

scene 1: ambush
scene 2: new room
scene 3: New enemy arrives on-scene.

This, of course can be done at any level(Feet in the Water or Submerged).  It just depends how drawn-out the GM wants the fights to be.  It doesn't really model a more powerful wizard being able to fire off more spells, though.

Another way could be custom stunts/powers.  They eat up refresh and could give you one (or two) extra stress slot specifically for soaking up magic.  Or model it as a mental Toughness type of thing but the catch would be "everything but my own magic"
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 01:00:11 AM
Quote from: Taran on October 15, 2013, 12:58:04 AM
I've heard different PoV and one that would allow for more spell casting is to break up scenes.  Everyone's stress track clears immediately after a scene, so if you were to look at some of Harry's fights as several mini-scenes, he'd have a little time to quickly catch his breath (clear his stress track), then continue fighting.

So maybe the PC's get ambushed, there's a quick skirmish and the enemy pulls back or retreats into another room or building.  The fight continues in the next room/building but then a new enemy blows the roof apart and flies in and starts fighting both sides.

This could be seen as one big fight or, 2 or 3 separate scenes.

scene 1: ambush
scene 2: new room
scene 3: New enemy arrives on-scene.

This, of course can be done at any level.  It just depends how drawn-out the GM wants the fights to be.

That is a good point actually, we do tend to go with pretty much one scene per gaming session every time.  I'll have to bring that up.

Of course consequences heal after a certain number of scenes too.  I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: bobjob on October 15, 2013, 01:04:12 AM
I dunno, I don't necessarily see Harry casting more spells through out the books. If you count Cold Days, I could easily see his "wearing out" more along the lines of:

(click to show/hide)

I did create this power that could be used for rote casting. In my opinion it's fairly balanced and would give you not only a little more versatility with your rotes (giving you access to one more rote), but also give you a little more staying power. This could even be upgraded with a version of refinement that increases the stress track or Lore value. I'll have to write that up and add it to the power.


Rote Mastery [-2]
Your mastery of rote spells is so efficient that you do not tire as easily when casting them.
Skills Affected: Conviction, Lore
Effects: 
Mind Over Matter - You gain two additional Mental stress boxes that can only be used for rote stress. These two boxes may be used before using your normal Mental stress boxes.
Arcane Intellect - Your lore is considered one step higher when determining the number of rote spells you have access to.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Taran on October 15, 2013, 01:08:53 AM
@molten_dragon: I edited my above post while you were posting, so you might have missed another suggestion I made. Mostly saying what bobjob said.

Quote from: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 01:00:11 AM
That is a good point actually, we do tend to go with pretty much one scene per gaming session every time.  I'll have to bring that up.

Of course consequences heal after a certain number of scenes too.  I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing.

Consequences ONLY heal if you do something to start the healing process.  I guess if you have wizards constitution, you only need time - so that doesn't really apply.  In a situation like this I'd use the guide-lines in the book.  It gives you a meta-game length to heal consequences (after the next scene, after the next session, after the next scenario etc...) but it also gives you an in-game time increment.  So a moderate needs a "week or two" before it heals. 

In a situation where you're doing mini-scenes to make combat more drawn out, you might want to use in-game timing.  The GM would just rule, you can't start the healing process until this conflict is resolved.  So even though the scene ends, the conflict is still on-going.

On the other hand, it might be neat to have characters get a second-wind and have their minor consequence of "fatigued" or "sore ankle" go away as their adrenaline kicks in, if you want a really Epic Fight.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Tsunami on October 15, 2013, 09:09:51 AM
Quote from: Taran on October 15, 2013, 01:08:53 AM
On the other hand, it might be neat to have characters get a second-wind and have their minor consequence of "fatigued" or "sore ankle" go away as their adrenaline kicks in, if you want a really Epic Fight.
That's what recovery powers are for.
Remember, you can use those to shrug off a number(depending of the power level) of Minor consequences, as a supplemental action.
Also, those powers do allow you to recover from some consequences "instantly" i.e. at a scene change. (For example like Lara's broken Arm, during the Fight with the Skinwalker in the Raith Manor in Turn Coat)
Wizard's constitution however, does not. It gives you justification to start healing, it does not make you heal any faster.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Magicpockets on October 15, 2013, 09:32:16 AM
There's always the highly abusable tactic of using Recovery powers to negate consequences from fallout/backlash.

Only use this trick if you're in a party with some really high powered characters, though.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 11:25:03 AM
Quote from: Magicpockets on October 15, 2013, 09:32:16 AM
There's always the highly abusable tactic of using Recovery powers to negate consequences from fallout/backlash.

Only use this trick if you're in a party with some really high powered characters, though.

I don't see how that really helps though.  Don't you still take the mental stress from casting the spell even if you botch the control roll and take fallout/backlash?
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Magicpockets on October 15, 2013, 11:57:16 AM
Backlash can be physical stress, meaning you take a physical consequence which you recover via Recovery powers.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Taran on October 15, 2013, 12:07:46 PM
Quote from: Magicpockets on October 15, 2013, 11:57:16 AM
Backlash can be physical stress, meaning you take a physical consequence which you recover via Recovery powers.

The typical wizard doesn't have recovery. 
(click to show/hide)

Quote from: Tsunami on October 15, 2013, 09:09:51 AM
That's what recovery powers are for.
Remember, you can use those to shrug off a number(depending of the power level) of Minor consequences, as a supplemental action.
Also, those powers do allow you to recover from some consequences "instantly" i.e. at a scene change. (For example like Lara's broken Arm, during the Fight with the Skinwalker in the Raith Manor in Turn Coat)
Wizard's constitution however, does not. It gives you justification to start healing, it does not make you heal any faster.

Yes, I agree with what you are saying, but if you have wizards constitution, you can recover from a minor consequence after "the next scene" because you don't really need an excuse to start healing.  But if you run 3 scenes that are all the same combat, you probably don't want to allow that...but by RAW, you could...even without a recovery power. 

So technically, in scene 1 you take a minor, scene 2 you still have the minor by scene 3 you've recovered.  Given my example above, it probably doesn't make much sense.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Elkhorn on October 15, 2013, 01:36:30 PM
The RAW already provides a mechanism for this (hopefully Wolfhound is around to beef this up with details on how we've done it specifically), but IIRC it comes down to spending a Fate Point to Declare a "scene break." (For example, Invoke the BBEG's "Megalomania" Aspect, and he spends a bit monolouging while the party catches their breath).  This doesn't do anything for consequences for most characters, but it does clear stress tracks and allow the battle to continue.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Tsunami on October 15, 2013, 01:42:00 PM
Quote from: Taran on October 15, 2013, 12:07:46 PM
The typical wizard doesn't have recovery. 
(click to show/hide)

Yes, I agree with what you are saying, but if you have wizards constitution, you can recover from a minor consequence after "the next scene" because you don't really need an excuse to start healing.  But if you run 3 scenes that are all the same combat, you probably don't want to allow that...but by RAW, you could...even without a recovery power. 

So technically, in scene 1 you take a minor, scene 2 you still have the minor by scene 3 you've recovered.  Given my example above, it probably doesn't make much sense.
I think we're just agreeing with each other here.
Wizards constitution takes away the "measures need be taken to start healing" aspect of justification to heal. It does not take away the "down-time is needed" part.
During Combat there is no down-time to start healing... hence no recovery without a Recovery Power.
As we all know, the RAW in the DFRPG often rely heavily on people not trying to squeeze them for every little advantage. This is one of those cases.
Wizards constitution is not meant to provide a hands on advantage, it's more a narrative device... which is why it costs 0 refresh.

But we're starting to drift away from the Spell Endurance issue here.

I think the harsh limitations on how many spells a magic user can manage per scene are highly important in terms of game balance.
Magic is already extremely potent in the DFRPG, and if one took away those limitations it would go totally of the rails.

One way to increase the number of spell per scene i would consider, would be the sponsored magic route. Take on debt to cover the base stress of a spell. that would, theoretically, give you an unlimited number of spells per scene, but at a cost... a potentially really high cost. One Compel per free spell thrown... it's something to use in desperate situations... as it should be.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Mr. Death on October 15, 2013, 05:07:07 PM
I haven't personally run into this as a problem--I've rarely had any instances where a combat lasted long enough for the wizards to run out of stress completely, and when they have, they tend to invoke things or take consequences--remember, at 5, a wizard has an extra mental mild consequence, so they've got a total of 6 spells.

Generally, I allow them to invoke something (either a scene aspect, one of their consequences or aspects) to eat up to 2 stress, so they can cast a spell equal to their second stress box in power using the aspect as the 'source'. This is also a good way to look at, say, sponsored magics--taking debt for the same reason.

I also wrote up a little while ago a way to extend magical attacks similar to how you can extend blocks.

But all of that aside? The RAW key to a wizard's longevity is enchanted items. I have one wizard NPC who could easily go eight or nine rounds throwing off Weapon:5 and 6 single attacks, and a Weapon:4 zone attack, with an armored coat; said character, when prepared, will pretty much never have to worry about running out of stress to cast spells with.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Taran on October 15, 2013, 05:36:00 PM
Quote from: Mr. Death on October 15, 2013, 05:07:07 PM
I haven't personally run into this as a problem--I've rarely had any instances where a combat lasted long enough for the wizards to run out of stress completely, and when they have, they tend to invoke things or take consequences--remember, at 5, a wizard has an extra mental mild consequence, so they've got a total of 6 spells.

Generally, I allow them to invoke something (either a scene aspect, one of their consequences or aspects) to eat up to 2 stress, so they can cast a spell equal to their second stress box in power using the aspect as the 'source'. This is also a good way to look at, say, sponsored magics--taking debt for the same reason.

I also wrote up a little while ago a way to extend magical attacks similar to how you can extend blocks.

But all of that aside? The RAW key to a wizard's longevity is enchanted items. I have one wizard NPC who could easily go eight or nine rounds throwing off Weapon:5 and 6 single attacks, and a Weapon:4 zone attack, with an armored coat; said character, when prepared, will pretty much never have to worry about running out of stress to cast spells with.

These are all good points.  I use invokes for power as well.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Sanctaphrax on October 15, 2013, 07:02:11 PM
Superb Conviction gives an extra mild consequence that you could use to cast an extra spell. Epic Conviction gives you another one. If you were to houserule that Superb/Epic stress-track skills give a stress box instead of a consequence, I don't think anything would break.

If you're looking for custom Powers, there's a set of them on the wiki:

http://dfrpg-resources.wikispaces.com/Inhuman+Mental+Resilience (http://dfrpg-resources.wikispaces.com/Inhuman+Mental+Resilience)
http://dfrpg-resources.wikispaces.com/Supernatural+Mental+Resilience (http://dfrpg-resources.wikispaces.com/Supernatural+Mental+Resilience)
http://dfrpg-resources.wikispaces.com/Mythic+Mental+Resilience (http://dfrpg-resources.wikispaces.com/Mythic+Mental+Resilience)
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 09:55:20 PM
Thanks for the good ideas.  Our group is still debating how we want to handle it.

One other idea we came up with was that if your control roll beats the number of shifts you are calling up by a certain amount (say 5 points), then you take no stress for that spell.  So basically you could cast weak spells with little risk (but not no risk) of taking any stress for doing so.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Magicpockets on October 15, 2013, 10:01:12 PM
I wouldn't reward Control too much. It's already very much superior to power.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Hick Jr on October 15, 2013, 11:04:50 PM
That actually sounds good. I'd allow that as a stunt, but only requiring a +2 or 3 overflow, on the die roll.


Otherwise i'd just make a Warden with this and put a buttload of Control focus slots on their sword, possibly never having to pay stress. Magicpockets is right. Control is almost strictly superior to Power, when it comes to Evocation. Look at Harry and Luccio- they're in the same ballpark, power-wise, but Luccio's a hell of a lot more deadly because she controls all that power much better than Harry.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Sanctaphrax on October 16, 2013, 04:49:55 AM
Control isn't necessarily better than power. It's better for attacks, but for other spell types power is often more useful.

Excess control on a shield spell does nothing, after all, and backlash can often make up for a control deficit.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Haru on October 18, 2013, 11:15:37 AM
Quote from: molten_dragon on October 15, 2013, 12:33:33 AM
In fact, there really are no ways to increase the number of spells you can cast.
I think the best way to increase the number of spells you can cast are enchanted items. At face value, 1 point of refresh can give you a 7 uses item (1 use from the initial slot, 3*2 uses from the 3 remaining slots from the refinement). If you spend a point of specialization on casting frequency, each enchanted item slot gives you an additional use of an item, which will quickly give you a lot of spells to work with. If you put the spells you use most often into items, you will last quite long. Keep your stress open for spells you need to adjust on the fly, and you should be good for anything that's going to happen.

On the other hand, Harry casts not that many spells in any given scene, I believe. Not without a sponsor, anyway.

For sponsored magic, there are a few things you can do, without actually attaching yourself to a sponsor and its whims:

Temporary location of power:
A location of power for sponsored magic only costs 3 points of refresh, but as a wizard with full evocation and thaumaturgy, it only costs you 1 point of refresh. If your GM is up for it, you could tap into a location of power (for example a ley line or a storm) for one scene by spending a fate point per the temporary upgrade rules. That way, you could get quite a bit of mileage out of that one fate point. Of course, any sponsor debt taken here should have an effect later, but for the moment, the wizard should be able to dish out quite a bit.

Self sponsored Magic:
Some of the powers on the custom power list that I actually like. Self sponsored magic is a form of extremely powerful specializations. The Merlin would have self sponsored magic (wards), for example, which allows him to raise wards at evocation speed and with some debt taken to himself to increase the power.
Of course you should discuss with your GM/group how debt to yourself plays out, since that is a bit weird. In the case of the Merlin, I imagine, the magic would sort of backlash into his behavior, forcing him to use the turtle tactic on most problems, wall yourself in and sit it out, since that's sort of the mindset of wards. Even if attacking the problem would clearly be the better way to go.
Title: Re: Casting more spells
Post by: Magicpockets on October 18, 2013, 12:47:56 PM
Yeah, Enchanted items are definitely the way to go for higher frequency or higher power. The only thing they lack is an accuracy bonus, although their advantages clearly outweight that.

Do note that even if an Enchanted item runs out, you can still power it at the cost of 1 Mental stress per use.