Benefit to Overshooting a Control Roll?

[Becq]

Seems to be a lot of confusion here.  Conviction is important to evocation because it determines how powerful a spell you can cast, and how much stress you take just to come up with the necessary power.  Remember that YOU choose the power level of your spell; it's not determined by die roll.  You take 1 stress for casting at all, then an extra stress for each point by which your spell's strength exceeds your Conviction.  So if you cast a standard flame bolt and decide to make it w:5, that's a 5 shift effect.  If your Conviction is 4, then that's 2 stress: 1 for casting, and 1 because it's 1 point more than your Conviction.

Having done that, the next step is where you control your spell, which serves two purposes: determining if the spell was properly controlled and determining how well you hit your target.  Both are determined by a single roll of your Discipline -- this is where Discipline becomes cruicial.  For the control portion of the roll, you are comparing your Discipline roll against the power of the spell (the same number you decided on above).  If your roll was at least that, all is well.  If it's less, then you are going to take backlash or fallout from your lack of control.  Once that's determined, compare the same Discipline roll against your target's defense roll to see if you hit.  If you miss, then the stress, backlash, and fallout were for nothing.  If you hit, then you figure out damage the same way you would if you swung a sword at your target.  That is, you get damage based on how much you exceeded the defense roll, PLUS the weapon strength of the spell, minus any armor the defender has.

So Conviction and Discipline are both very important to spellcasting.  If you have a low Conviction, you will be limited to weak spells, or you will tire quickly due to the stress for drawing the power for the spell.  If you have a low Discipline, then you will be limited to weak spells, or risk damage to yourself and your surroundings from backlash/fallout of poorly controlled spells, AND you will tend to fail to cast the spells properly, as well.

Harry has a high Conviction and moderate Discipline.  He can cast powerful spells fairly well ... but they tend to burn down buildings (fallout).

[ironpoet]

So, as in your first example, this is the ONLY thing that discipline does? Make an attack harder to dodge? Can you cite that in the book for me? I'm thinking in circles at this point and I am sure I am missing it.

Becq explained it better than I could.  If we're just talking about Evocation, Discipline is used to (a) successfully cast the spell without fallout or backlash, and (b) successfully hit with an attack or a maneuver.  I believe that Discipline also limits the strength of your Rote spells.

Outside of Evocation, Discipline is useful for other things like defending in Social situations and building up power to cast Thaumaturgy spells.

[Alatain]

You can also think of an issue like this. Say you have a high power and a medium discipline. We will go with Conviction 5, Discipline 3. You want to put 5 shifts into a spell to blast an enemy hard and take them out fast.

You take your first mental stress and roll discipline (-+_ _). That is a total of four shifts of control. Now with no defense roll, this will net a total of 9 damage (weapon 5 + 4 control). However, if your opponent were to have an athletics of 3 or 4 there is a decent chance of them dodging your blast completely. And that is without a bad roll on your part.

The other scenario would be someone with the opposite scores. 3 Conviction, 5 Discipline. They can take the same one mental stress and the same roll to control it (-+_ _) and get the same 9 damage, only now they have a much higher chance of hitting the opponent. The athletics 3 guy would need a roll of (+++_) to get out of being hit which is much harder to pull off.

There is another side to this idea as well. If you throw your first spell as a flat conviction power level, then you are able to throw your next one for conviction plus one with no additional strain than casting a second time at just conviction power level (the conviction +1 power spell fills in the 2nd box, whereas the flat conviction spell would fill in the 1st box a second time rolling up to the same result). The same is correct for your 3rd spell as well. Now if you have a medium level discipline (say 3) then you will be rolling to control 5 (from conviction) plus 2 or 3 (from reaching for power). You now need 7-8 shifts of control. Not possible from a discipline of 3. If you have a conviction of 3 and a discipline of 5 you get to do one spell at 3 power, one at 4 and one at 5. All easily (more or less) with your discipline of 5.

It is basically a safer, more economical way of casting magic. It does mean you have to pull more power for bigger, non-combat effects. But if you are not in combat, then you will be able to do that without as much risk.

-Note- I am writing this without a book, so please correct me if I am wrong.

[Becq]

One other thing to note here is that if you have levels of Refinement or a Focus, then your Conviction and Discipline will count as being higher for purposes of spellcasting.

For example, Harry (early in the series, character sheet on OW136) has Conviction 5 and Discipline 3.  He also has a specialization, +1 power for fire.  He further has a staff (+1 offensive control for spirit), a blasting rod (+1 offensive control for fire), and a shield bracelet (+1 defensive control for spirit).  So when he casts a fire attack, he counts as having Conviction 6 and Discipline 4.  Spirit spells (offensive or defensive) are cast as though he has Conviction 5 and Discipline 4.  Air spells are at his base attributes (5 and 3), and he can't cast earth or water spells.

[Belial666]

Say you got an evoker built like this;

[-7] wizard template
[-2] refinement 2x

You got 5 conviction, 5 discipline, +1 spirit power, +2 spirit control, +1 spirit power focus, +4 offensive spirit control focus.
Your effective power for spirit is 7. Your defensive spirit control is +7 and your offensive spirit control is +11  total.
So for a wizard your power is above average but not exceptional. Your Control however is amazing. The following things are true;


1) You can guide your blasts with pinpoint accuracy; no chance whatsoever of doing collateral damage (fallout) if you don't want to.
2) Your well-guided spells do not miss. Only the absolutely fastest opponents will dodge and only if they are lucky.
3) Because you focus your energy into doing exactly what you want it to, you can use it more efficiently; against the average baddie with +4 defense, you are going to get +7 extra shifts. That means you are going to do a whopping 14 shifts of damage with single-target attacks or be able to attack up to three zones at once and still do 8 shifts of damage.
4) Even using a mere 1 shift of power, you can do 8 or more shifts of damage on a hit.



So effectively, you can use your power extremely effectively. By focusing the energy it would take to telekinetically lift a beer bottle into a razor-thin plane, you could cut off a man's head or mimick a sniper's shot to the heart. With enough energy to blast a zone, instead of producing a blast of crushing force to hit everyone - which many might survive - you produce a scything blade that is nigh impossible to avoid and cuts them in half. Literally; you deal as much damage as someone with TWICE your power.

[MyNinjaH8sU]

[snip]

Thank you, very much. This is exactly the sort of thing I was looking for. I believe I understand completely, and I am glad my instincts made me ask about this today, because I knew I was missing something.

[Becq]

Just for the record, Superb Conviction and Superb Discipline *are* the marks of an exceptional caster.  Dresden was often described as being fairly exceptional, especially as one so young, and he was a mere 5/3 with no Refinement (to start with).

I'd assume that an 'average' Wizard (ie, one of the Wizards who, if he attends Council meetings at all, sits in a seat in the back and tries not to get called on; certainly not a Warden) would have abilities closer to 2-3 (Fair to Good) early in their career, with a level or two of Refinement added on top of that.

Note that player characters are not "average" people, even among Wizards.

[Falar]

Keep in mind that this is a bit of a one-sided look at Evocation. Blocks, Maneuvers, and Counterspelling don't use this "targetting rolled into the control roll" format, so if you're looking to do anything fancier than just hitting the enemy with a blunt stick of magic, you're gonna need some more Conviction.

[MyNinjaH8sU]

That is entirely correct. Which, honestly, is sort of what I was looking for.

The character I'm slowly developing is a relative newbie to the White Council, and what's more, is considered extremely weak, having only scraped by the Council's aptitude tests. He resents this, and has vowed to make himself great based on hard work, and prove himself the equal of heavy spell-slingers in the council.

[HobbitGuy1420]

If you want to play up the "getting more done with less power" side of things, you could take a Stunt to allow the character's lower Conviction to restrict his spellcasting less.  For example:

Control is its own power:  You're no mystical powerhouse, but you've got such a skilled hand with the stuff you don't *have* to be.  Your Discipline compliments your Conviction in spellcasting.  This includes when considering how many shifts of power you can summon via Evocation without incurring increased mental Stress.

[MyNinjaH8sU]

On the one hand, that seems pretty cool, and I'll have to see if anyone minds me doing that. Although, I was lead to believe that Stunts in general shouldn't be able to influence magic. Is that not the case?

[HobbitGuy1420]

::shrug:: call it a power, if you must.  I just called it a Stunt because it isn't really magical itself, it's just a sign of special training and experience.  Stunt or power doesn't make to much of a difference, once you've already got powers.

[Kaldra]

alright then the general rule for powers is two shifts per point of refresh on average how many more shifts do you think this power would grant someone to their spell slinging.

[HobbitGuy1420]

That's actually the same rule as for stunts, but on a more limited basis, or +1 for a broader application.  I think this evens out because (if I'm remembering the rules for one skill modifying another) a modifying skill only grants +1 to the skill modified.

if I'm wrong about that, someone let me know.  don't have the books here.

[Becq]

I think the power you describe is too strong; assuming your Discipline is over your Conviction (which is the only reason you'd get it) it grants a near-blanket +1 to the spell.  (It would be like having a stunt that gives +1 to Weapons for attacks with weapons.)  A power more inline with existing mechanics would be one that gives (for [-1] refresh) a +1 to Conviction for purposes of evocations using two specified elements (or +2 for one element).  You could alternatively allow the power to give a +1 to Discipline for purposes of evocations using two specified elements (or +2 for one element), for those with high Conviction but lower Discipline.  Or even allow a character to mix one bonus from each.

I propose that this power be named "Refinement [-1]".