Author Topic: Joined my first campaign. Pointers?  (Read 2548 times)

Offline Don

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Joined my first campaign. Pointers?
« on: February 25, 2014, 06:16:54 AM »
I was invited to join a DFRPG campaign, but I don't have any RPG experience.

The DM knows the story universe pretty well, but none of the other players do.  They're all seasoned RPG folks, though.  I've read each book at least three times, so I figure my knowledge of the Dresdenverse will compensate for my noobness.

So I'm an apprentice wizard with 4+ lore, and one of my jobs will be to advise the other players on magic and politics.  I figure I'll learn the game as I go.  For now I'm just interested in figuring out some fun spells, and I'd like your advice.  Also, if you have any examples of standards, I'd be interested in hearing them.

Anyway, I've decided to go earth/water mage, and there isn't a whole lot of text support for those two elements.

Leg crusher:  A disabling spell that opens a sinkhole below an opponent and quickly snaps back, crushing leg bones.

Feasible?  I'm worried that the DM might accidentally make me kill someone by opening the hole too big and crushing a torso or something like that.  Is this something I should be wary of?

Coinshot:  This is stolen from Mistborn.  Harry uses his sword cane as a focus for spells involving magnetism.  Are there special rules governing this?  Do magnetic spells always attract metal towards the caster, or can I be more versatile with it?  For example, can I take a handful of ball bearings and shoot them outward towards a hostile?

If not, magnetism still has the advantage of disarming opponents and maybe I can even hit people with metal objects when my opponent is between me and the object itself.

Dampening Feild:  Can I use water to dampen the magic of others?  Say, pull ground water out of the earth and interpose it between me and an oncoming evocation?  Can my earth magic help me pressurize the ground water to assist pulling it out of the soil?

All of these ideas are pretty high-octane.  Would they cause me an unreasonable amount of stress?

These are just my first ideas, I'm going to mull t over some more.

Thanks in advance :)
Don is the Prince of Anarchy  :P

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Offline Haru

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Re: Joined my first campaign. Pointers?
« Reply #1 on: February 25, 2014, 06:36:13 AM »
Leg crusher:  A disabling spell that opens a sinkhole below an opponent and quickly snaps back, crushing leg bones.

Feasible?  I'm worried that the DM might accidentally make me kill someone by opening the hole too big and crushing a torso or something like that.  Is this something I should be wary of?
Yes and no. Definitely feasible in the way you describe it, just depends on what exactly you want to do with it. Basically, you have 3 options with this type of spell: attack, maneuver and block.

First, breaking legs is a consequence, that would result from an attack. If the attack isn't strong enough though, that won't happen, the target will just take some stress (which will still wear them down over time, but it isn't leg breaking). A broken leg probably starts to make sense at moderate consequence levels, which will take some doing to get to in one shot.

I would probably call the spell Sinkhole and make it either a maneuver or a block. A maneuver, if you want to use the aspect on something else afterwards, a block if you want to keep the target from moving. You could also go for a "tag for effect" with the maneuver, to force a compel on the target (I'll explain more later, if you like).

Quote
Coinshot:  This is stolen from Mistborn.  Harry uses his sword cane as a focus for spells involving magnetism.  Are there special rules governing this?  Do magnetic spells always attract metal towards the caster, or can I be more versatile with it?  For example, can I take a handful of ball bearings and shoot them outward towards a hostile?

If not, magnetism still has the advantage of disarming opponents and maybe I can even hit people with metal objects when my opponent is between me and the object itself.
Magnetism can do a lot of crazy things. I once created a spell that had the wizard use magnetism to melt a metal pole with induction heat.

It all comes down to how your wizard understands what he does. Does he have a basic understanding of magnetism (it can push/pull metal) or does he know more? Shooting ball bearings is a great way to use it. This sounds like a very good standard attack spell.

Quote
Dampening Feild:  Can I use water to dampen the magic of others?  Say, pull ground water out of the earth and interpose it between me and an oncoming evocation?  Can my earth magic help me pressurize the ground water to assist pulling it out of the soil?
This would be a straight up block against magic. Having the earth magic help is certainly possible on the narrative side, but you can only use one set of specialization or focus item bonuses for a spell. And since you are using water to dampen the magic, I would judge this to be a water spell.

Quote
All of these ideas are pretty high-octane.  Would they cause me an unreasonable amount of stress?
They will cause you as much stress as you make them, though 1 stress minimum. Maneuver spells have to be power 3 for a fragile aspect (which goes away after being used) or 4 shifts of power to make it last. Attacks and blocks can be as high or low as you like. You take 1 shift of casting stress for each spell, plus 1 shift for each shift of power beyond your conviction.
So if you have a conviction of 3 and you want to cast a 5 shift block, you take 3 shifts of casting stress. If you have a focus item or specialization for power that is relevant to that spell, it is added to your conviction for calculating the stress. So a focus item for +1 water power on the above spell would reduce the casting stress to 2.


Hope that wasn't too much all at once. If I can clarify something, I'll be happy to do so.
« Last Edit: February 25, 2014, 08:37:05 AM by Haru »
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Offline Tedronai

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Re: Joined my first campaign. Pointers?
« Reply #2 on: February 25, 2014, 08:17:34 AM »
I would amend what Haru said by clarifying that maneuvers must be at least 3 shifts (for a fragile aspect, and 4 for a sticky aspect), and need to be stronger if the relevant defensive skill of the target is higher than that (shift value at least equal to defensive skill, minimum 3).
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Offline Don

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Re: Joined my first campaign. Pointers?
« Reply #3 on: February 25, 2014, 08:43:55 PM »
Hope that wasn't too much all at once. If I can clarify something, I'll be happy to do so.

We had one session already.  We built our city and our characters.  We had some time to run through the mechanics, but it wasn't much.

I definitely follow what you're saying.  I'll pick up on things as I go.  This definitely helps me.  Consequences we did touch upon briefly.

Anyway, I've wanted to play since I've heard about the beta run, and I'm looking forward to learning it.

Thanks again
Don is the Prince of Anarchy  :P

Please excuse my grammar, and speling.

Offline Don

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Re: Joined my first campaign. Pointers?
« Reply #4 on: March 04, 2014, 05:17:38 AM »
The first law of combat wizardry: Be prepared.

I was unprepared.

But I had fun.
Don is the Prince of Anarchy  :P

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Offline Haru

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Re: Joined my first campaign. Pointers?
« Reply #5 on: March 04, 2014, 06:31:52 AM »
You know what they say: Try, fail, fail better.

If you need some help preparing, you know where to find us. ;)
“Do you not know that a man is not dead while his name is still spoken?”
― Terry Pratchett, Going Postal