Spell Research ?
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alex_greene
Guest
Nothng in Legend yet.
Legend seems to presume that all the spells already seem to exist in some form or fashion, and that we get to learn of new Common Magic or Sorcery basically when a new book comes along.
Nothing in-game to allow for what I call metamagic; the hallmark of a true Master, one who has transcended his peers' Art and started creating his own spells.
We're not talking about Divine Magic or Common Magic here. Just Sorcery.
Let's say that a magus creates a new sorcery spell, Chameleon, one which has never been seen before that turns the caster's skin colour to match the background, making it harder to spot the caster. Outside the game, the player can decide the rules: requires 10% of Sorcery (Grimoire) per 3 SIZ of the caster or target, target colour change is automatic, bonus to Stealth equal to 10% per 10% of Sorcery (Grimoire) skill.
Ah. And there you see the problem forming.
The new spell exists in no Grimoire. So what is its base chance?
In game, the sorcerer would have to open up a new spell (2 Improvement points, one week, use the base chance for Sorcery (Grimoire) and then write it down in some form - effectively opening a new Grimoire, which would require, say, one month per new Sorcery spell written down.
Once the first spell goes into the Grimoire, any new spells the sorcerer comes up with go into that Grimoire. Separate Improvement Rolls need to be made by the sorcerer to increase his Sorcery (Grimoire) percentage on top of the two Improvement Rolls he needs to make to create the new sorcery spells in the first place.
Transferring spells he already knows from another Grimoire to the new one has no real advantages, unless the sorcerer's already managed somehow to raise the Sorcery (Grimoire) percentage above that of his old Grimoire, in which case he only needs to spend the 1 month writing down the spells into his new Grimoire, make another Improvement Roll and he can open the spells in his head at the new Sorcery (Grimoire) base chance.
Although, to be utterly honest, I really would prefer there to be just one single Sorcery skill. The sorcerer casts all his spells at this percentage, and uses the following lists for things such as increasing that skill, opening up and creating a new Grimoire, committing a new spell to memory, creating one from scratch and writing it into a Grimoire:-
Acquire Sorcery skill - a week in training and two Improvement Rolls, as per Legend Core Rulebook under "Training"
Increase Sorcery skill - a week in training or an Improvement roll, as per Legend Core Rulebook under "Training"
Open up a new Grimoire to learn - one week, one Improvement Roll
Open up existing spells from a Grimoire - one week, two Improvement Rolls
Create a new spell - one month, two Improvement Rolls
Write a spell from one's head into a Grimoire - one month
Legend seems to presume that all the spells already seem to exist in some form or fashion, and that we get to learn of new Common Magic or Sorcery basically when a new book comes along.
Nothing in-game to allow for what I call metamagic; the hallmark of a true Master, one who has transcended his peers' Art and started creating his own spells.
We're not talking about Divine Magic or Common Magic here. Just Sorcery.
Let's say that a magus creates a new sorcery spell, Chameleon, one which has never been seen before that turns the caster's skin colour to match the background, making it harder to spot the caster. Outside the game, the player can decide the rules: requires 10% of Sorcery (Grimoire) per 3 SIZ of the caster or target, target colour change is automatic, bonus to Stealth equal to 10% per 10% of Sorcery (Grimoire) skill.
Ah. And there you see the problem forming.
The new spell exists in no Grimoire. So what is its base chance?
In game, the sorcerer would have to open up a new spell (2 Improvement points, one week, use the base chance for Sorcery (Grimoire) and then write it down in some form - effectively opening a new Grimoire, which would require, say, one month per new Sorcery spell written down.
Once the first spell goes into the Grimoire, any new spells the sorcerer comes up with go into that Grimoire. Separate Improvement Rolls need to be made by the sorcerer to increase his Sorcery (Grimoire) percentage on top of the two Improvement Rolls he needs to make to create the new sorcery spells in the first place.
Transferring spells he already knows from another Grimoire to the new one has no real advantages, unless the sorcerer's already managed somehow to raise the Sorcery (Grimoire) percentage above that of his old Grimoire, in which case he only needs to spend the 1 month writing down the spells into his new Grimoire, make another Improvement Roll and he can open the spells in his head at the new Sorcery (Grimoire) base chance.
Although, to be utterly honest, I really would prefer there to be just one single Sorcery skill. The sorcerer casts all his spells at this percentage, and uses the following lists for things such as increasing that skill, opening up and creating a new Grimoire, committing a new spell to memory, creating one from scratch and writing it into a Grimoire:-
Acquire Sorcery skill - a week in training and two Improvement Rolls, as per Legend Core Rulebook under "Training"
Increase Sorcery skill - a week in training or an Improvement roll, as per Legend Core Rulebook under "Training"
Open up a new Grimoire to learn - one week, one Improvement Roll
Open up existing spells from a Grimoire - one week, two Improvement Rolls
Create a new spell - one month, two Improvement Rolls
Write a spell from one's head into a Grimoire - one month
alex_greene
Guest
Both this, and the other thread opened about the durations of enchantments, represent my cutting-edge thinking on the subject. I leave them out here as Open Content, but seriously I'll need to put these thoughts down, along with the Common Magic I created elsewhere and the thing about recovering lost permanent Magic points, into a single document.
Thoughts?
Thoughts?
Simulacrum
Mongoose
alex_greene said:
Unless you are advocating dropping the manipulation skill you don't need to change the RAW - you simply specify an extensive spell list as being the grimoire pertinent to an entire tradition. It can be added to, the sorcerer still needs to learn specific spells on the list, and physical copies of the grimoire are almost all abridged, redacted or otherwise incomplete, so collecting the full spell list may be a lifetime of work. You can add spells to the grimoire thru invention, and being devised within a specific philosophical tradition your normal grimoire spell applies. There you go, a single grimoire skill for everything.
A sorcerer from another culture or parallel universe turns up - his sorcery may effectively produce all the same spell effects but his way of doing it is so alien it's a different (grimoire) skill.
All you need in these cases is a few lines about how it operates in your setting, rather than an overhaul or reinterpretation of the RAW. The rules are very flexible in that way.
I only half agree with Alex on this.
It is fairly clear (to me anyways :? ) that a Sorcery (Grimoire) skill represents a particular philosophy, a way of seeing the underlying currents of the world and understanding how to manipulate these with sorcery.
The scenario Alex describes presupposes that any new spell created by a master sorceror would by necessity have to involve the creation of a new Grimoire.
I propose that it is far more likely a sorceror will create or develop a new spell or effect within a sorcerous philosophy he is already familiar with, expanding his current Grimoire and relying on his current skill, rather than inventing a new philosophy from scratch.
I could see this being used to both add existing Core Book spells to a Grimoire that does not have them as well as truly creating a new spell effect.
There admittedly would have to be significant GM involvement regarding the appropriatness of the spell being researched/added. I could see a GM ruling that a master diabolist, expert of the Sorcery (Book of a Thousand and One Blasphemous Names) skill, could not realistically create the spell "Peace, Love and Harmony" and add his to his Grimoire.
Therefore the mark of a true Master Sorceror, as Alex says, would not be to create a new spell effect, but rather to create (unveil really) a new philosophical understanding of the world that would allow for an alternative Sorcery (Grimoire) skill, perhaps broadening the spectrum of spell effects available to him.
Please note that what I mean by Grimoire in the paragraphs above refers to the philosophical underpinnings of the sorcery, rather than the physical book or tablets or whatever. Whether the sorcerer has "blank pages" to scribe his spell on or has to buy a new book has no real bearing on my point. A single "Grimoire" can be an entire library as far as I am concerned.
Alternatively, go with Simalacrum and put everything under one single Sorcery skill
Have fun,
Dan
It is fairly clear (to me anyways :? ) that a Sorcery (Grimoire) skill represents a particular philosophy, a way of seeing the underlying currents of the world and understanding how to manipulate these with sorcery.
The scenario Alex describes presupposes that any new spell created by a master sorceror would by necessity have to involve the creation of a new Grimoire.
I propose that it is far more likely a sorceror will create or develop a new spell or effect within a sorcerous philosophy he is already familiar with, expanding his current Grimoire and relying on his current skill, rather than inventing a new philosophy from scratch.
I could see this being used to both add existing Core Book spells to a Grimoire that does not have them as well as truly creating a new spell effect.
There admittedly would have to be significant GM involvement regarding the appropriatness of the spell being researched/added. I could see a GM ruling that a master diabolist, expert of the Sorcery (Book of a Thousand and One Blasphemous Names) skill, could not realistically create the spell "Peace, Love and Harmony" and add his to his Grimoire.
Therefore the mark of a true Master Sorceror, as Alex says, would not be to create a new spell effect, but rather to create (unveil really) a new philosophical understanding of the world that would allow for an alternative Sorcery (Grimoire) skill, perhaps broadening the spectrum of spell effects available to him.
Please note that what I mean by Grimoire in the paragraphs above refers to the philosophical underpinnings of the sorcery, rather than the physical book or tablets or whatever. Whether the sorcerer has "blank pages" to scribe his spell on or has to buy a new book has no real bearing on my point. A single "Grimoire" can be an entire library as far as I am concerned.
Alternatively, go with Simalacrum and put everything under one single Sorcery skill
Have fun,
Dan
If it is the grimoire of an order or another organization of sorcerers,RangerDan said:
it could even represent rather different philosophical approaches to
a common aim. What all the spells of such a grimoire would have in
common would be the intention to support the order's or organizati-
on's goals, while the philosophies of the members who developed
these spells could be quite different.
alex_greene
Guest
Really good suggestion, but for one small thing - that idea came from me.RangerDan said:Alternatively, go with Simalacrum and put everything under one single Sorcery skill
Sorcery could come in different Paths or philosophies - Thelemic, Discordian, Chaos, Left Hand Path, Taoist - but a grimoire is a solid book.
I'd have gone for a Sorcery (Path) skill, allowing for the sorcerer to have entire shelves of books - multiple grimoires - dedicated to the Path.
Incidentally, this answers an almost unrelated question in another thread "Magic Of A Dead Man" - if a sorcerer's enchantments and spells all die when the mage dies, it would be impossible for just any old sorcerer to pick up the magic item and reawaken its now-dormant enchantments unless he had studied the exact same Sorcery (Path) skill as the creator of the item.
Mechanically, the skill is identical - die rolls, scale of the effects still depend on the character's skill - but suddenly, by focusing on calling it a Path rather than a Grimoire, a mage becomes the embodiment of a philosophy rather than a man who's memorised some fancy tricks out of a book like Hong Kong Phooey.
Simulacrum
Mongoose
Simulacrum said:
It's not what I do at all - I'm simply pointing out that what Alex is suggesting can be done wihout a rewrite. A Grimoire is not necessarily a single tome, and several books may be required to obtain all the knowledge encompassed by one Grimoire skill. I believe that's how the Abiding Book is concieved, but I haven't really delved that far into the Gloranthan stuff.
Choosing which way to go is a bit like choosing how Combat Styles work in your setting - except the crunching of a big range of spells into one skill has a more dramatic effect than crunching a load of weapon skills together under one style - because the scale of effect, rather than just the level of proficiency, is governed by that skill. Plus if certain spells are readily found together that land you with a min-maxing issue, it can break the setting logic.
alex_greene said:Really good suggestion, but for one small thing - that idea came from me.RangerDan said:Alternatively, go with Simalacrum and put everything under one single Sorcery skill
Fie to quick posts from work!Simulacrum said:
- Redaction: Alternatively, go with alex_greene and put everything under one single Sorcery skill in the way suggested by Simulacrum.
Sorted!
I agree on this distinction. I've been doing this already with my GMing in subtle ways without going so far as to change the wording of the skill (perhaps I should...).alex_greene said:
I agree, and as I had said above I feel that there should be limitations to which spells fall under which Grimoire/Philosophical Path.Simulacrum said:
I'd lean towards the 'partial/expandable Grimoire' approach. Many ancient manuscripts exist in multiple, differently partial forms. Some are essentially the same, but have quite large differences in whole sections. Sometimes - like the Dead Sea Scrolls - apocrypha are found which are claimed to be extra 'chapters' of an ancient text.
Treat the Grimoire as a 'living' document (literally, in some sinister cases). Master sorcerers will add their masterwork spell to their version Grimoire, which will be included in some of the copies of the grimoire that are 'descended' from it. Eventually, these will become different books, but for centuries, what you will have are different versions of the same book.
As in Monster Coliseum / Monsters of Legend...
Treat the Grimoire as a 'living' document (literally, in some sinister cases). Master sorcerers will add their masterwork spell to their version Grimoire, which will be included in some of the copies of the grimoire that are 'descended' from it. Eventually, these will become different books, but for centuries, what you will have are different versions of the same book.
As in Monster Coliseum / Monsters of Legend...
duncan_disorderly
Mongoose
Indeed - Like much of MRQ/Legend, there are a number of ways of approaching this, and you really need to think about this up front when planning your game/setting.
One approach is to say that a Grimoire is just like a D&D Wizards Spell Book. It is the collection of spells that he knows. Whenever the player learns a new spell, whether it is one from the core rules, one that appears in a subsequent supplement, one invented by the GM, or one invented by the player, it is added to that players "personal" Grimoire.
Another approach is to say that Grimoire's are fixed at the start of the game. Every spell is assigned to one or more grimoires (except those not permitted in this setting/game...). If a player wants to learn a spell that isn't in a grimoire he has access to, then his first step is to acquire a copy. If new spells are introduced after the start of play then they are added to "new" grimoires (which, "in game" might be ancient tomes that have only just come to light.
Alternatively Grimoires might be the seen as the "philosophy" of a sorcerous school or style. Spells are still assigned to one or more grimoires, but new spells that fit thematically (so you can't add "Fireball" to the Grimoire of an order of sorcerous healers) can be added as and when required.
...and many more...
How you define a grimoire will affect how a player can create a new one.
If it is a personal spell book, it just requires parchment, ink and time
If it is a "fixed" set of spells then creating a new "fixed" list may require some sort of "Heroquest", or sacrifice of POW/Magic Points. It certainly shouldn't be as easy as just writing them down, or someone would already have created it in the past (ie what's the point of having fixed lists if anything can be linked to anything else)
If a Grimoire represents a sorcerous philosophy then creating a new one will involve creating a whole new philosophy and rationalising your existing magic with this new understanding. If you are running the sort of game where characters are the "movers & shakers" of the setting, and spending very little of their time in traditional "adventuring" activities then you might want to consider some rules for doing this, otherwise,I'd say it's not really possible while continuing to play that character in regular play.
One approach is to say that a Grimoire is just like a D&D Wizards Spell Book. It is the collection of spells that he knows. Whenever the player learns a new spell, whether it is one from the core rules, one that appears in a subsequent supplement, one invented by the GM, or one invented by the player, it is added to that players "personal" Grimoire.
Another approach is to say that Grimoire's are fixed at the start of the game. Every spell is assigned to one or more grimoires (except those not permitted in this setting/game...). If a player wants to learn a spell that isn't in a grimoire he has access to, then his first step is to acquire a copy. If new spells are introduced after the start of play then they are added to "new" grimoires (which, "in game" might be ancient tomes that have only just come to light.
Alternatively Grimoires might be the seen as the "philosophy" of a sorcerous school or style. Spells are still assigned to one or more grimoires, but new spells that fit thematically (so you can't add "Fireball" to the Grimoire of an order of sorcerous healers) can be added as and when required.
...and many more...
How you define a grimoire will affect how a player can create a new one.
If it is a personal spell book, it just requires parchment, ink and time
If it is a "fixed" set of spells then creating a new "fixed" list may require some sort of "Heroquest", or sacrifice of POW/Magic Points. It certainly shouldn't be as easy as just writing them down, or someone would already have created it in the past (ie what's the point of having fixed lists if anything can be linked to anything else)
If a Grimoire represents a sorcerous philosophy then creating a new one will involve creating a whole new philosophy and rationalising your existing magic with this new understanding. If you are running the sort of game where characters are the "movers & shakers" of the setting, and spending very little of their time in traditional "adventuring" activities then you might want to consider some rules for doing this, otherwise,I'd say it's not really possible while continuing to play that character in regular play.
A grimoire is more than a set of spells. It is a religious or philosophical treatise, and from the tenets enshrined in the text can be derived certain methods of manipulating otherworldly forces.
This interpretation is derived from the Gloranthan setting of MRQ2, but could be applied to a number of settings. In Greyhawk (AD&D), for instance, if an 18th level mage learns Magic Missile for the first time, he can immediately cast it at 18th level proficiency. No problem. So he and all other mages have a single grimoire skill, Greyhawk Magic.
So, if you run with this interpretation, the sorceror is studying the text and calculating new applications of the incantations and essence plane node graphs (or whatever), and when he has worked it out, any other sorceror with sufficient familiarity with that order's teachings (their grimoire) can all say "Of course, it's so obvious now that you point it out" and can cast the spell at the full grimoire skill.
If you feel the need to have magic more freeform and disassociated from religous scripture, then you could increase the IR cost and time taken to learn a new spell to represent the new knowledge that needs to be acquired in order to cast a new spell with an existing Grimoire skill, I think that is fair given that pretty much any spell can be added to any grimoire - in the above approach, the spell has to be in keeping with the philosophy of the grimoire. You're unlikely to find the seeds of a Water Breathing spell in the Celestial Revelations Grimoire, for instance, and the Fiery Wrath of Saint Burnard is going to be fairly self-explanatory in its theme.
This interpretation is derived from the Gloranthan setting of MRQ2, but could be applied to a number of settings. In Greyhawk (AD&D), for instance, if an 18th level mage learns Magic Missile for the first time, he can immediately cast it at 18th level proficiency. No problem. So he and all other mages have a single grimoire skill, Greyhawk Magic.
So, if you run with this interpretation, the sorceror is studying the text and calculating new applications of the incantations and essence plane node graphs (or whatever), and when he has worked it out, any other sorceror with sufficient familiarity with that order's teachings (their grimoire) can all say "Of course, it's so obvious now that you point it out" and can cast the spell at the full grimoire skill.
If you feel the need to have magic more freeform and disassociated from religous scripture, then you could increase the IR cost and time taken to learn a new spell to represent the new knowledge that needs to be acquired in order to cast a new spell with an existing Grimoire skill, I think that is fair given that pretty much any spell can be added to any grimoire - in the above approach, the spell has to be in keeping with the philosophy of the grimoire. You're unlikely to find the seeds of a Water Breathing spell in the Celestial Revelations Grimoire, for instance, and the Fiery Wrath of Saint Burnard is going to be fairly self-explanatory in its theme.
