From georgeh@MIT.EDU Tue Feb 21 20:19:14 1995 Posted-Date: Tue, 21 Feb 1995 20:19:09 EST Received-Date: Tue, 21 Feb 95 20:19:14 -0500 Received: from CACCIATORE.MIT.EDU by MIT.EDU with SMTP id AA11805; Tue, 21 Feb 95 20:19:12 EST Received: by cacciatore.MIT.EDU (5.57/4.7) id AA04921; Tue, 21 Feb 95 20:19:11 -0500 Message-Id: <9502220119.AA04921@cacciatore.MIT.EDU> To: vespers@graphics.cis.upenn.edu Subject: VESPERS: Stormwatch saga house rules Date: Tue, 21 Feb 1995 20:19:09 EST From: George Heintzelman Status: OR The following is something I sent to the Ars Magica list a while back. Only a couple things have been changed/added since then, and I've edited it to update. One that's not included because most of the people on the AM list know about itis Vis Extraction from aura: A magus may extract from the local magic aura, in one season's worth of work, a number of pawns of vis equal to: (Creo + Vim + Magic Theory + Int + Aura*3) / 5, rounded down. A maximum of pyramid(Aura) (ie Aura 1 ==> 1, 2 ==> 3, 3==> 6, 4==> 10) may be extracted by magi in one season. Long-term effects of extensive use of extraction are unknown, and up to the SG. The rest of our house rules follow. It's a fairly long list, and some of them you may wonder 'why' about if you're not really familiar with the system and long-term play with them, and some of them haven't been extensively playtested, so caveat emptor. I've added a few notes here and there, too. > Date: Tue, 20 Sep 1994 12:03:18 EDT > To: ars-magica@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU > > From: George Heintzelman > Subject: Re: House Rules > > in the Stormwatch saga. > > ***** > > True Reason is neither. NB: Contrary to what I said in the questionnaire, this is actually pretty important to me... I'm not terribly happy with the 'belief defines reality' paradigm. > ***** > > Body Levels work strangely: instead of the standard body levels, you have > boxes. Hurt has one, Lt. wounds has 2, medium wounds has 3, and so on. If > you're hurt 1-5 over soak, you take one box; 6-10 you take 3; 11-15 take 6, > and so on. You get wound penalties when you fill up a level equal to the > levels ordinary wound penalty. Exactly how to deal with Large and Small Frame > characters hasn't been worked out, it's been handled more or less on the fly > so far. Most NPC beasts work on the standard BL system, though the SG is free > to do what he or she likes, of course. > Characters keep track of boxes of damage until the end of the story, wh > en it > is adjusted for healing purposes to the last filled level. Spells such as > Chirurgeon's healing touch which restore body levels restore a number of boxes > equal to the last filled level. > > Effects: the Death by Nicks and Scratches is more difficult; the SG has more > flexibility in doing damage from other sources 'by the box' as it were. I'm > strongly considering upping damage across the board to restore a little more > fatality into combat, as well, though it's still very possible to die quickly. I like this one, though it probably could use some more tinkering, and it's not as big a deal in a PBeM. > ***** > > Confidence use on an initial stress die roll of 0 _always_ uses that > confidence point for the story, and is decided before botch dice are rolled. This one is critical in a FTF campaign, or you will hardly ever see a botch rolled. I'm not sure though how confidence is going to work out PBeM, since a 'reroll' could easily destroy the flow of the story. An alternative in FTF (for those who LOVE botches) is on a 0, roll botches FIRST. Only allow rerolls if there is no botch. This, however, largely diminishes the value of Confidence, which Stormwatch finds incredibly valuable. > ***** > > Magical texts have a minimum art score as well as a maximum, representing what > you need to know in order to understand the book in the first place. A Magus > writing a text may start whereever he likes when writing, making high-level > texts easier to write quickly (advanced papers on asubject) but harder for > novices to grasp. > > ***** > > Writing arts and spells is done at a rate linear in the Maga's Scribe Latin > score. She writes the amount in the standard rules at Scribe Latin of 4. Incentive to increase a skill that every magus uses nearly every day of their lives. > > ***** > > Book use in the lab: If a book has a score of at least half your Art score, > you may use it to add +1 to your lab total by using it in lab that season. If > it's higher than your score, you get +2, twice as high +3. Multiple books may > be used, but the second and subsequent books are at -5 (cumulative) on their > effective level, so it is rarely useful to use more than one book (not to > mention dangerous, since books used in the lab are subject to potential > damage...) You must still meet the minimum Art score (see above) to use the > book in the lab. > A book describing a spell that you're trying to invest in an object or > make a > potion of can be used similarly, though we haven't figured out the details; > perhaps as similar spell bonus halved, assuming you don't already know the > spell. > > ***** A magus studying from a book with multiple arts chooses what to study in the normal way. However, if the book has more than one Art or knowledge which is higher than the magus's current level, make a stress roll for each art, add the difference between the tome and the magus's knowledge, and subtract a cumulative 1 per roll beyond the first (ie, third & subsequent Arts, -1, -2, -3, etc.). A total of 9+ means the magus gains a point in the art or an xp in the knowledge, as a 'side benefit' of the studying. A botch means that one less of the original Art/knowledge studied is gained, and no further rolls may be made -- the magus was distracted by extraneous information. Possible tweaks: Increase the difficulty level and add Int and/or Scribe to the required roll. This one isn't very playtested. Virtue +1 Broad Learner: You find it easy to 'pick up' related bits of knowledge from casually reading them, even when not directly studying. Get +1 on all rolls to learn additional arts/knowledges from a multiply-arted book. Flaw -1 Inflexible Learner: When you learn something, you have to focus on it so to the exclusion of anything else that you can only learn what you meant to learn. You never roll to pick up additional arts/knowledges from a multiply arted book. ***** If a book contains spells in addition to Arts, a magus studying an Art may 'pick up' a spell using that Art if his lab total to learn that spell is twice the level of the spell, while still studying the Art normally. ***** I think that books & teachers & suchlike should work the same as arts study do. That is, if the teacher's skill is three times yours, she can teach 3 xp worth in a season; if it's twice, 2 xp, etc. Same for books. It takes a lot of time to get every scrap of knowledge out of a book or a teacher --- why do you think getting a PhD takes (about) 20 seasons? Talents should not be teachable except in rare circumstances. (Skills and knowledges are.) Teachers should be required to have a Teaching skill, and the level taught should be limited by the skill in teaching + 1. A season spent teaching might (if say, Int + simple > Teaching or Teaching *2) yield an xp in teaching to the teacher. You may teach Pyramid(teaching) + 1 people in a season, that is: Teaching 0: 1 person. Teaching 1: 2 persons. (1 + 1) Teaching 2: 4 persons. (3 + 1) Teaching 3: 7 persons. (6 + 1) Teaching 4: 11... Etc. Also, group teaching is limited by the requirement that no pupil may gain experience AND end the season with a better score than the worst pupil in the group. Also, seasons spent explicitly teaching or learning should be counted against yearly exp as studying magic does. Also, one additional skill: Research: allows you to collate the information in various sources and arrive at a score higher than either one individually. You may use as many sources as you have skill in research, plus one; an experience point in research may be gained by otherwise fruitlessly spending a season, if you have no skill. Sources add experience-wise. That is, two level 4 sources combine for 10 + 10 = 20 exp, or a level 5 source (almost level 6, if you can get another text). The SG may determine that for particular sets of sources the full benefit is not gained (ie., two copies of the same book, two books written by the same author.) This could potentially be modified to allow a similar task with Arts, but Stormwatch's view is that Art books are somewhat mystical anyway, and so a mundane method like this is doomed to failure. Furthermore, it would have LARGE ramifications about the potential levels reachable by magi. ***** George