I came across this site a couple months ago, and overall I like it: http://fabletop.com/ Simple, easy to use, great for quick pick-up games. Biggest problem is there is very little you can do to customize the system to suit your tastes. The system in place is good, not saying otherwise, but it makes playtesting my own system on the site rather difficult. Also, though there were a small number of people running games when I first joined, the site seems to be languishing right now, possibly due to a lack of GMs. If you already have a playerbase to bring to the site, not so much an issue, but it can be hard (as a player) to find a game when you're available to play.
So I also came across this site: http://roll20.net/ Not quite as simple and certainly not as quick and easy to set up a game, but the customization is much more universal. Dice are customizable, and I can actually use my own system on the site. Plus, the option of voice and video chat between players is a nice touch. I played around with it a lot tonight, and I'll probably end up using it to run games soon. It seems vastly more populated than Fabletop, though that's less of a concern for me there since I'll be playtesting my own system.
On a side note, I may need to tweak the bonuses for weapon skills. It looks as though I may have been a wee bit generous.
Monday, April 8, 2013
Monday, March 25, 2013
Staring back at myself
Sometimes I just have to stare something in the face long enough before I can see it.
Sorcery is Arcane. Ritualism is Divine. The four schools that were under each are combined into one skill.
Is this a perfect balance? Well, no. Transmutation as a spell group has always dominated the list by the sheer number of spells it has. As it is, I'll be going through the Arcana Unearthed spells and redistributing them as I feel appropriate. Because I can do that. And I'll probably add in a few here and there that I really liked the flavor of (probably a good deal from the Arcanis system). And I'll remove the typical summoning spells, replacing them with my preferred one-shot summons, and that by itself should help balance between the two groupings.
Spellcraft as a skill would allow access to more complex magics from the other magical discipline (skill in either discipline would give access to the simple spells from any school). Exotic spells from your own discipline could be learned at ranks 3, 6, and 9, and more could be learned (from either discipline) through the use of Combat Proficiencies.
Unrelated quick thought: Base exotic weapon proficiency on a new Weaponmaster skill - each rank gives access to the exotic weapons of a different basic group (polearms, heavy blades, etc.), chosen by the player upon placing points in the skill.
Sorcery is Arcane. Ritualism is Divine. The four schools that were under each are combined into one skill.
Is this a perfect balance? Well, no. Transmutation as a spell group has always dominated the list by the sheer number of spells it has. As it is, I'll be going through the Arcana Unearthed spells and redistributing them as I feel appropriate. Because I can do that. And I'll probably add in a few here and there that I really liked the flavor of (probably a good deal from the Arcanis system). And I'll remove the typical summoning spells, replacing them with my preferred one-shot summons, and that by itself should help balance between the two groupings.
Spellcraft as a skill would allow access to more complex magics from the other magical discipline (skill in either discipline would give access to the simple spells from any school). Exotic spells from your own discipline could be learned at ranks 3, 6, and 9, and more could be learned (from either discipline) through the use of Combat Proficiencies.
Unrelated quick thought: Base exotic weapon proficiency on a new Weaponmaster skill - each rank gives access to the exotic weapons of a different basic group (polearms, heavy blades, etc.), chosen by the player upon placing points in the skill.
Friday, February 22, 2013
Sorcery vs. Ritualism
In the interests of simplicity, then, I'm once again taking a look at the magic system. Dividing things up into schools of magic, while it makes sense in some ways, has also imposed some limits that were not intended. Not to mention that the sheer volume of spells I've accumulated from so many different sourcebooks in order to fill out the lists of some of the lesser endowed schools (such as Divination) makes sifting through them prohibitive. Of course, the idea of rendering all that work invalid has only been more and more distasteful the more I've added to it, but I think something needs to give.
Part of this stems from reading through another sourcebook, Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed. In this book, magic has been separated according to complexity. Every level has simple spells, which any caster might access, complex spells which might require greater training or access, and exotic spells, spells that might become the signature ability of a character because of their rarity or difficulty. And the book has its own magic spells, already separated into these categories.
Trying to just cram it into the full list would destroy the balance. Trying to split the full list into simple, complex, and exotic is an ambitious and prohibitive project. It would be easiest, if I want to use this method, to simply use only this one spell list, but it is tiny in comparison to what I have, and there are entire schools with less than ten spells total, and none in the first few levels. Transmutation, as per the usual, has the most spells, including a few I disagree should be placed there, but others have also commented on the favoritism Cook shows for Transmuters. Obviously, this wouldn't work for a system where schools of magic are learned individually.
And so I'm considering scrapping all of this subdivision, and offering simply two choices: Sorcery, and Ritualism.
Sorcery, based on Mind stats, akin to Dragaeran sorcery, where the caster simply pulls energy (either to him or from within, I'll leave that to the player's flavor preference) and tosses it to achieve the desired effect. This would apply also to any magic system where memorization is more important than intuition, though it could be argued that the use of magical formulae is ritualistic.
Ritualism, based on Soul stats, which might be Eastern witchcraft, or religion-based, or even bardic magic - any ritual-based magic.
I'm not sure if this will be the final iteration or not. There are some discrepancies, I'm sure. Discworld wizards, for example, might well be ritualists with such a system, especially when you consider some of the high-powered magic such as the Rite of AshkEnte. But, considering how the Disc works, and what that Rite in particular does, that may not be inappropriate, especially if you go back to Pratchett's Sourcery. More concerning might be that magic used by divine beings might be categorized as Sorcery, since they're simply lobbing energy. Another explanation might be that they're imposing their will upon the cosmos, which would place their magic as being based on Willpower stats.
But all of this is simply a matter of semantics, a matter of the magic's origin, and not a matter of what you can do with it. Arcana Unearthed uses the same spell list for all caster types, leaving it to the player (and a handful of various feats and methods of altering magical effects selected by the player) to determine the flavor. This method would mean that the source of magic has no bearing on its limits - a Sorcerer might heal someone just as well or better than a Ritualist. It does away entirely with the debate of cleric vs. mage, arcane vs. divine, and says instead, "This is what is possible. How you get there is the fun part."
In some ways, though, it seems they should complement each other. Let's use the Force as an example: most of the active abilities used in combat such as a Force Push or even the Jedi Mind Trick would be based in Sorcery, in the Mind. The ability to use the Force as a means to predict the future, or to commune with deceased Masters, or to sense a great "disturbance" would be based in Ritualism, in the Soul. So how do I account for this?
Maybe I should just forego Mind and Soul entirely, and create a Magic stat, then separate spells by casting time - anything longer than a standard action is based in Ritualism.
Part of this stems from reading through another sourcebook, Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed. In this book, magic has been separated according to complexity. Every level has simple spells, which any caster might access, complex spells which might require greater training or access, and exotic spells, spells that might become the signature ability of a character because of their rarity or difficulty. And the book has its own magic spells, already separated into these categories.
Trying to just cram it into the full list would destroy the balance. Trying to split the full list into simple, complex, and exotic is an ambitious and prohibitive project. It would be easiest, if I want to use this method, to simply use only this one spell list, but it is tiny in comparison to what I have, and there are entire schools with less than ten spells total, and none in the first few levels. Transmutation, as per the usual, has the most spells, including a few I disagree should be placed there, but others have also commented on the favoritism Cook shows for Transmuters. Obviously, this wouldn't work for a system where schools of magic are learned individually.
And so I'm considering scrapping all of this subdivision, and offering simply two choices: Sorcery, and Ritualism.
Sorcery, based on Mind stats, akin to Dragaeran sorcery, where the caster simply pulls energy (either to him or from within, I'll leave that to the player's flavor preference) and tosses it to achieve the desired effect. This would apply also to any magic system where memorization is more important than intuition, though it could be argued that the use of magical formulae is ritualistic.
Ritualism, based on Soul stats, which might be Eastern witchcraft, or religion-based, or even bardic magic - any ritual-based magic.
I'm not sure if this will be the final iteration or not. There are some discrepancies, I'm sure. Discworld wizards, for example, might well be ritualists with such a system, especially when you consider some of the high-powered magic such as the Rite of AshkEnte. But, considering how the Disc works, and what that Rite in particular does, that may not be inappropriate, especially if you go back to Pratchett's Sourcery. More concerning might be that magic used by divine beings might be categorized as Sorcery, since they're simply lobbing energy. Another explanation might be that they're imposing their will upon the cosmos, which would place their magic as being based on Willpower stats.
But all of this is simply a matter of semantics, a matter of the magic's origin, and not a matter of what you can do with it. Arcana Unearthed uses the same spell list for all caster types, leaving it to the player (and a handful of various feats and methods of altering magical effects selected by the player) to determine the flavor. This method would mean that the source of magic has no bearing on its limits - a Sorcerer might heal someone just as well or better than a Ritualist. It does away entirely with the debate of cleric vs. mage, arcane vs. divine, and says instead, "This is what is possible. How you get there is the fun part."
In some ways, though, it seems they should complement each other. Let's use the Force as an example: most of the active abilities used in combat such as a Force Push or even the Jedi Mind Trick would be based in Sorcery, in the Mind. The ability to use the Force as a means to predict the future, or to commune with deceased Masters, or to sense a great "disturbance" would be based in Ritualism, in the Soul. So how do I account for this?
Maybe I should just forego Mind and Soul entirely, and create a Magic stat, then separate spells by casting time - anything longer than a standard action is based in Ritualism.
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