Is my summoner Balanced?

[Aminar]

I'm trying a route I think is new on summoning.
Required Powers
Channeling(Control)
Ritual(Summoning and Binding)
Demense(Never-Never Pocket to hold creatures(limiting this for wizards.)

Summoned creature guidelines.

Summoned creatures cost Summon points.  1 Enchanted item slot = 1 summon point.
1 point = 1 refresh.
1 point = Your lore in skills.
The creatures conviction score must be 1/2 the creatures refresh rounded down.

Examples.
Binder goon.
4 skill points
2 Guns
1 Endurance
1 Athletics.
8 with starting powers.

My Shadow Imp Pokemon.
5 refresh
Inhuman Speed-2, Claws, Cloak of Shadows, Diminutive Size
12 skill points 4 Athletics, 3 Fists, 2 Conviction, 1 stealth, 1 burglary, 1 alertness
Total cost 8 slots.

I can see this escalating with some advancement.  Especially with a 5 lore.
However, I have to give the creature orders, which is a channeled spell.
Attack, Defend, Summon, Unsummon, Search.  All of those orders cause 1 mental stress(Hence option 1 being really easy to hide while still combat effective.)  I think this seems fairly balanced.

Thoughts.

[Sanctaphrax]

It doesn't raise any immediate alarm bells. But I need to take a closer look.

Also, I post this link whenever I get the chance.

[Aminar]

Yeah.  You sent me that before.  The issue being that it doesn't quite carry they feel I wanted(That being simplicity.)  Your rules work very well for summoning bigger things.  My guy would require a 14 strength ritual(with perfect command and full aspects)(which is easy peasy...)  But Give me a week or 3 to work with and I have an army of the little guys.  That's not where I'm going with this character.  He's supposed to feel a whole lot more like a Pokemon trainer.

(That said, we were going with those until I came up with this today.  It's easier for the DM and lets me play around.)

Next step is to scrap the little guy for a 20 skill point 7 refresh with modular powers 5.  That will be hell on wheels to have fun with.

[Sanctaphrax]

This is actually a very complex system, in my opinion. But we might be using different definitions of complexity.

Also, a 14-shift ritual is not easy.

Anyway! Now for my thoughts.

This is reminds me of the pet and ally rules that we were working on before the board crash. More than anything else, it represents controlling multiple characters.

I think there are too many prerequisites. Why would you need Demesne?

Also, I don't like the magical control rules. Why are they here? They seem pointless.

Also, the skill cap of the conjured creature should matter. It's important.

Also, I don't think there's any good reason to mandate the Conviction skill of the summoned creature.

And I don't really like having this be separate from the rules that you'd use for mundane minions and for summoning creatures with a ritual. It's inelegant.

So, yeah. The more I look the less I like.

[Aminar]

I'm trying to balance it with the magic items rules.  We all know Thaumaturgy can be easily imbalanced.  Especially in games with large time jumps(like the one I'll be in), so I'm working off another system, the slightly less broken enchanted items.  Now, a summoned creature doesn't have a limited number of uses, so I had to balance that.  Having control spells does that easily, and makes it so a summoner needs to use all the mage skills(Lore, Discipline, and Conviction.) making them feel more magey.

The conviction score is based around the idea that summoning and controlling somethings difficulty is completely based around its conviction score.  If I allow itty bitty conviction scores then the creatures are simple to summon and simple to control.  That strikes me as exploitable.  I don't want my character summoning trolls as minions.  This is supposed to represent somebody who's whole deal is summoning things, while staying balanced.  Trolls are unbalanced when they can be acquired easily.  This system limits that by placing a cost.

Demense is for flavor.  And has some fun tagalongs anyway.  There has to be a place to hold the things.  Demense represents that.

Long term I can actually see the character becoming less useful, as he can only control so much at a given time and summons can never reasonably top 8 or 9 refresh.  I'm working on that...  What it comes down to though is that this feels balanced in a way the other rules don't and making a creature is really easy(for anybody that can manage character creation).   Anything from the book, down to pixies is nigh impossible, but flavorwise this feels right.

This does cover skill cap.  The creature has to follow the pyramid the same way a PC does.  Thus if I spend 4 slots to get 16 skill points(with my 4 lore) I can get a 5, a 4, a 3, a 2, and a 1.  However, that creature can really only be used for one thing-A huge limitation.  I'd have to have 21 skill points to hit +6 and once again, the summon is still vastly limited.  I could always say the creatures skill cap is the highest level skill it's controller possesses to, stopping it at +5.  That wouldn't be outside the realm of reason.

[UmbraLux]

Also, a 14-shift ritual is not easy.

Unless you've house ruled Declarations, you can hit 14 shifts with Lore 2 and three exchanges of preparation.  (A Declaration and a Maneuver in each exchange.)  That's pretty  easy to me.

@Aminar - some questions for you:
 - It sounds like the summoner has to summon these ahead of time using item slots / summon points, is that correct?  If so, does it cost an action to bring to the summoner's presence?
 - Also, you mention using Channeling to control the demon.  Does this cost mental stress?  Is it resisted?  By what?  (I'm guessing this is why you specified Conviction, but it is a guess.)  How general / specific is the control?  i.e. Does the caster use all his actions controlling one demon or does he give one order then go to town on his own?
 - Are the demons / summoned beings limited in power by Lore as foci are?

[Sanctaphrax]

@UmbraLux: You cannot maneuver outside of combat. Also, a ritual with 12 complexity (Mind Fog) is specifically called out as powerful and complex in YS.

@Aminar: I seriously don't think that enchanted items are more balanced than Thaumaturgy.

You can store creatures anywhere, a Demesne is not required. By making it a prerequisite you limit the types of character that can use this massively for no real reason.

I don't see why you care what Conviction score summons have under your system. After all, your system does not use the summonee's Conviction for anything.

A skill cap should be implemented. A character with Epic Contacts is possible for 28 skill points, which is entirely realistic. And a character with Epic Contacts will also have 6 other skills, 2 of which will be above the skill cap of a Feet In The Water character. So he could easily be Fantastically wealthy and Superbly strong. He'd hardly only be good at one thing.

Each skill point gives +1 to appropriate rolls. So a skill point invested in a skill you will use often (your apex skill) is better than a skill point invested in a skill you use rarely (some random Average skill). As such, it's generally optimal to pump as many points as possible into your main area of focus.

[Aminar]

@UmbraLux: You cannot maneuver outside of combat. Also, a ritual with 12 complexity (Mind Fog) is specifically called out as powerful and complex in YS.

@Aminar: I seriously don't think that enchanted items are more balanced than Thaumaturgy.

You can store creatures anywhere, a Demesne is not required. By making it a prerequisite you limit the types of character that can use this massively for no real reason.

I don't see why you care what Conviction score summons have under your system. After all, your system does not use the summonee's Conviction for anything.

A skill cap should be implemented. A character with Epic Contacts is possible for 28 skill points, which is entirely realistic. And a character with Epic Contacts will also have 6 other skills, 2 of which will be above the skill cap of a Feet In The Water character. So he could easily be Fantastically wealthy and Superbly strong. He'd hardly only be good at one thing.

Each skill point gives +1 to appropriate rolls. So a skill point invested in a skill you will use often (your apex skill) is better than a skill point invested in a skill you use rarely (some random Average skill). As such, it's generally optimal to pump as many points as possible into your main area of focus.

Thaumaturgy.
At the end of the session ask every party member to take a mild consequence.  14 shifts of power.  Right there.  Real easy.(in the campaign this is for.)

If I spent 7 of my item points to get a winter fey that knows Mab kudos to me.  I doubt she'll help me out anyway.  I can do roughly the same with enchanted items.  From there, just because I have a fantastically strong and wealthy summon doesn't mean I can use those skills. 
Or a 20some point ritual, which as listed just a bit ago, is really really easy.
Granted what you just listed is Queen Mab's favorite Lephracaun and in order to originally obtain that I probably pissed somebody off.  What I love about the Dresden system is how much the balance is based off the world at large.(And that sounds like a fun thing to have in a game.)

That said, I'm not seeing gaining a creature like that as so easy.  Anything with that high of contacts would require a pretty high refresh cost to justify and have some related aspects to boot.(As in character creation all of this requires the DM"s knowledge and agreement on what is balanced within their game.

Again The Demense is flavor and balance.  It doesn't limit who can use it by any means.(It stretches the ingame definition of Demense, but that's on purpose.  It's meant to be a subtype of wizard, a focused practitioner, that has been trained in this specific art.  Binder is the ingame example.  This mimics almost exactly how he works, but he doesn't seem to need channeling, but I feel like this is more...  Interesting to play.  I don't see where the limitation in type of character is.
The conviction score is the required result on a control spell in this system, If my creature has conviction 3 I need a discipline roll of 3 or higher to give it a command.  It's also the benchmark in game summoning is based around, and a built in redundancy so that the creatures have to have skills to have refresh.
I should have explained that better in the initial post.

[UmbraLux]

@UmbraLux: You cannot maneuver outside of combat. Also, a ritual with 12 complexity (Mind Fog) is specifically called out as powerful and complex in YS.

Sometimes I think you play a very different game than I do.     In any case I haven't seen anything explicitly limiting maneuvers to combat, can you point that out?  Also the example under Challenges on YS324 shows use of a maneuver used to help start a car.

But even if you limit it purely to declarations, casting a 14 shift spell is just slower* not more difficult. 

*May not even be slower.  Not real sure there's a limit on the number of free actions / declarations you can make in an exchange.

[polkaneverdies]

Am I remembering incorrectly that the base thaum complexity you can cast without research is lore + complexity focus bonus? It has been a while since I read the section, but iirc that would seem to be a somewhat limiting factor.

Obviously you could do your research ahead of time, but you wouldn't be immediately adaptable to every situation that cropped up unless you put in some major research time in a lore library with a high enough rank to actually have the info you are looking for.

[Aminar]

That's where declarations, consequences, and the like come in.  Hitting 30-40 is hard.  Anything less is slow.

[polkaneverdies]

If that is in response to my question then I don't understand your answer.  Perhaps i misunderstood your phrasing but you seem to imply my vague memory was correct. If the answer to my question is yes then you would still be capped at lore+complexity focus.

If the max complexity without research is your level + complexity focus  bonus, then how does a declaration help you?

Obviously they help when you are actually casting the spell, but how do they impact whether or not you know the ritual in the first place?

[UmbraLux]

Thaumaturgy power is a combination of Lore, consequences, skipping scenes, and aspects.  By default, aspects either already exist and require a fate point or are set up with declarations.  Since declarations are statements of fact or knowledge they don't typically require time. 

I prefer to allow maneuvers and assessments as well.  It's still aspect creation / discovery and makes it easier for the whole group to participate in the scene.  (Also, I haven't seen anything in the rules which would prevent doing so.)

[Richard_Chilton]

If the max complexity without research is your level + complexity focus  bonus, then how does a declaration help you?

It's not "max complexity without research" so much as "max complexity without prep work".

You can declare something that adds to the prep work.  It can be Lore: I know the colour Green is the right symbolic one for this spell.  It can be something like Resources: I bought the right herbs for the ritual.  Anything like that can help.

The best example of prep work in the books is in Proven Guilty.  Near the beginning of the book, Harry takes several scenes to set up a spell - he mediates, showers, lights candles, etc, then the phone rings before he can cast it and everything is lost.  Later he tries the same spell, but he doesn't have time for the prep work so he spends FATE points on aspects and takes a consequence.

I hope this helps!

Richard

[polkaneverdies]

Yes, thank you. That does clear up my misunderstanding. The last two responses now make a lot more sense.