I'm not saying it would do away with the pyramid, I'm just saying you'd get more Refinements to throw around in exchange for loss of versatility.

This mostly came about because being forced to play a "focused practitioner" as only being good at pyromancy when in fact they had like +3 power and control to geomancy was starting to annoy me.


I crunched some numbers on this, and you never really seem to gain more than a shift or two towards your "focus" versus just having a full pyramid. Take a look at the specialization pyramid of Crash Burntown, pyromancer, who's spent 8 Refinements.

+1 Earth Control, +2 Spirit Power, +3 Spirit Control, +4 Fire Control, +5 Fire Power

He's got half a Refinement left, which he presumably puts into a focus item or an enchanted item. Whatever. Now, Mr. Burntown takes the Power, and subsequently gains 10 Refinements for the price of 8 in exchange for being terrible at everything that isn't fire magic. His pyramid looks like this.

+1---, +2---, +3---, +4---, +5 Fire Control, +6 Fire Power

He has two Refinements left over, which he presumably puts into focus or enchanted items. Crash is now a much stronger pyromancer, at the price of only being good at pyromancy.


Also, I just realized there's at least one character in the series who becomes much easier to model if this power exists- Mortimer Lindquist. He has Ritual:Ectomancy in pretty much all his writeups, which is straight up worse than just Thaumaturgy, but he's repeatedly described as stomping all over Harry when it comes to his area of expertise.

You create a sphere around the target's head that air is not allowed to enter, suffocating them and bursting blood vessels.

someone is an Avatar fan.

- Earth Scene aspect maneuver: "Darkness"

You use electromagnetomancy to absorb all the visible-light-wavelength radiation in the area.

Nuclear Magic ward.

Hellfire Worldwalking Ritual.

You rip open a Hellmouth underneath your sleepy college town.

Color magic conjuration.

Photomancy skill replacement for Crafting (I can play that game too)

Green Lantern-esque hard light constructs.

are you prepared to go to war bobjob

Hydromantic Burglary replacement.

Briefly turning yourself into a ghost and "vanishing" a few hundred feet away.


Next up, a Biomantic Ward.

Actually, Mythic Recovery is pretty much a perfect model for that. Tessa has it too, and she does the "pulling yourself together" thing as well. Mechanics-wise, the uberghouls were Taken Out, but not by a Catch-satisfying attack, so their recovery was valid. That specific chapter/s and how many times the "scene" changed during it has been the topic of much debate on this board, but it's pretty clear it happens at least once. So the scene ends, Mythic Recovery comes into effect, the uberghouls clear all their consequences and stress tracks, and arise anew.

If you want to use biomancy to shapeshift, it's probably a better idea to just take True Shapeshifting and Modular Abilities and flavor it as biomancy.