BattleMaster Community
Toms Other Games => SpellMaster III => SM General Discussion => Topic started by: Zane on September 20, 2011, 04:18:06 AM
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I'm trying to wrap my head around where things might fall in the intent/base map. What would be an example of a "Control/Death" or "Create/Mind" spell?
Control/Death - could this be used for a spell to animate the dead (Yay! Zombies!)? Or perhaps prevent someone who would have died from dying? Not healing, but simply preventing them from crossing from "mortally wounded" to "no longer living".
Create/Mind - it seems like this could be used to give life to inanimate objects - part of creating golems, for example (I assume there would be additional magic needed to allow them to move). Or perhaps "uplifting" unintelligent flora or fauna to intelligence - giving one's pet cat the intelligence needed for sentience and speech?
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Control/Death would be manipulating how people die, or any form of controlling undead.
Control/Mind would be, well, mind-control. I think your examples would be closer to Create/Mind or Change/Mind, respectively.
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I'm more curious about Move/Death.
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Move a case of death to someone else?
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Not all of the combinations really make sense, that's not a problem for me. I can't think of a Move/Mind myself (hm, astral travel maybe?) and yes, Move/Death probably won't do a thing - "moving a case of death" is definitely a Harm spell. :-)
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Not all of the combinations really make sense, that's not a problem for me. I can't think of a Move/Mind myself (hm, astral travel maybe?) and yes, Move/Death probably won't do a thing - "moving a case of death" is definitely a Harm spell. :-)
Only if they don't want it, I guess? I think you could make a case for someone willing to sacrifice themselves to save the life of someone else being a Move/Death spell.
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Only if they don't want it, I guess? I think you could make a case for someone willing to sacrifice themselves to save the life of someone else being a Move/Death spell.
No, it's still Harm. There is nothing in Harm that requires an unwilling target, just like there's nothing in Heal that requires a willing one. :-)
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Move/Death could just be some trickery, maybe moving a dead body to somewhere else? It wouldn't be anything powerful but rather something to have fun with. I guess if you did it enough it would be a Death user's way of making a wall, but I can't see anything overly useful from it.
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I can't think of a Move/Mind myself (hm, astral travel maybe?)
How about a body swap?
That seems like it could easily work within the system.
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Or imprisoning a mind or soul in some other object.
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create mind = illusions?
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create mind = illusions?
Depends. For making someone think he sees or hears something, yes.
I'm not sure if maybe we should have a new base for illusions, if we want to have powerful illusions that can also be touched, are independent of the viewer (a create/mind effect would only affect its targets), etc. Thoughts?
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Maybe we should have some kind of deceive? An illusion is a part of deceiving, no? Some of my spells are powerful illusions. Powerful enough to make a person believe he lost his arm when he gets hit by one. His body reacts to the spell and kills cells making the arm fall off.
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Maybe we should have some kind of deceive? An illusion is a part of deceiving, no? Some of my spells are powerful illusions. Powerful enough to make a person believe he lost his arm when he gets hit by one. His body reacts to the spell and kills cells making the arm fall off.
Hm, you mean instead of a Base "Illusion", we could have an Intent "Deceive"?
I'm not sure. Making it a base would mean we can have create, control, etc. on illusions, as well as harm (destroy) to dispel them.
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Maybe we should have some kind of deceive? An illusion is a part of deceiving, no? Some of my spells are powerful illusions. Powerful enough to make a person believe he lost his arm when he gets hit by one. His body reacts to the spell and kills cells making the arm fall off.
Dunno... that kind of sounds like Perceive Death or Harm Mind. In theory it could also apply to Control Mind.
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Maybe we should have some kind of deceive? An illusion is a part of deceiving, no? Some of my spells are powerful illusions. Powerful enough to make a person believe he lost his arm when he gets hit by one. His body reacts to the spell and kills cells making the arm fall off.
Since the function of cells, and things like immune responses that would attack the bodies own cells are not a function of our conscious mind, that effect sounds like it might be control/body spell.
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Hmm... I would think that a create mind would be more in tune with seeking knowledge. You do not actually create the mind...but you create a connection to a mind? or to a being from another dimension or what have you.
As for Move death... well... how FAR you move death should depend on how powerful you are. If you are about to die and you move death, do you move it an hour, a day, or a month? Then again if you are gaining power as you extend death... I suppose you could continue to extend death farther until the advances in your power no longer outmatch the expense of the spell. Perhaps we should ask the Lich King what his secret is?
all in all I think I have been using my power as a spell master my entire life.... Every time I "change" "mind"
;D
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Create/Mind seems to me to be something that you could use for creating semi-sentient objects. Like creating a magical version of an expert system, or something.
If it were possible to chain spells together, then all kinds of things would be possible. Perhaps an extension of the ritual mechanics could be used to do it. Perhaps two simultaneous, or one feeding into another.
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I think there may be some differences in the inherent definition of the "base". For many, the base seems to be a target in many instances. For example, Create/Mind being the creation of a mind (sentient being, etc). Or Move/Death being the shifting of when you die or somesuch. But even then, that definition is not held in all instances. Protect/Water does not protect water from being harmed, it protects the caster. In the same way, Harm/Fire does not damage fire, it damages a desired target with fire.
While it may cause a slight shifting of mindset in some instances, may I submit that "base" stop being a garbled mixup of target-or-something-else and become akin to the "source" or "form" of the magic. You Harm something WITH Fire. Or you Harm WITH Death. Or your Mind. You Protect in the very same way. Your Protection comes in the form of Water or a Mental barrier. Control and Create become less about Control/Create things that are comprised of the particular "base element/type" and instead are Control/Create USING the particular "base" as a source. Want to convince the horse he should run in your direction but don't have sufficient Mind to Control it that way? Control/Fire could utilize Fire as a rapid-moving, snaking fire-wall to force the horse to go in only the direction you allow it. Create/Water could allow for the creation of a water elemental or perhaps a naiad.
As was mentioned in another thread, Perceive/Fire doesn't need to be knowing how many forest fires are burning in an area- that would be perceiving it as a target. Instead, use it as a source to scry for whatever it is that you want. Perhaps it would still need to have a fire as a source on the other end, but it's still very doable.
Can anyone come up with a combination, looking at "base" as a source instead of a target, that still doesn't seem to work? In my brain, I think all the combinations are entirely viable that way.
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While I understand what you are saying with that... why would we want to limit the spells by taking away from the creativity of writers?
I remember years ago... D&D and trying to tell my wife at the time that she could not drown someone by creating water in his mouth... the rules say you must have a container... But as the rules here are being developed...why would we want to limit the fun of new ideas?
If someone wants to TRY and cast the examples you stated... I see no valid reason to stop them. Protect water could indeed protect the water of a sacred basin so that no one may poison it.
If an elemental best of fire is after you... you must harm the fire, using water or what ever your fun idea may be.... but you must harm it right?
Open minded thinking is where the fun comes in... guided by the limits set in the game... but designed to be a fun story. Lets not restrict it too much with rules designed only to restrict.
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While it may cause a slight shifting of mindset in some instances, may I submit that "base" stop being a garbled mixup of target-or-something-else and become akin to the "source" or "form" of the magic.
Uh, it already is? The definition of Base is:
The Base of a spell is where it draws its power from, how it manifests. Again, a single word describes the base, words like fire, water, stone, death, mind, etc.
They describe how the spell works to achieve the intent.
I thought that was pretty clear.
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Open minded thinking is where the fun comes in... guided by the limits set in the game... but designed to be a fun story. Lets not restrict it too much with rules designed only to restrict.
I'm not trying to limit anything. By the rulings coming out from Tom and the GMs, the pairings are fairly restrictive and I was looking at a way to expand them. I know what the rules say, but I don't know that the playerbase/GMs are on the same page for what constitutes how the pairings work.
Or perhaps the struggle lies more in using a fully flexible and open system to then have a hard-and-fast defined spell created from said system. I may have missed/forgotten this from early early discussions, but what's the reasoning for having boxy, pre-defined spells instead of letting the caster pair Intent/Base on the fly to do whatever they'd like to do? I guess maybe I'm looking more seriously at Spontaneous casting. If the system is built the right way, Spontaneous would be loads more fun/flexible/useful and could very easily do away with the need for spell lists altogether (and the need to sort through/approve them).
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It is fully intentional to have both spontaneous magic and spells.
Spells are your ready-made scripts. They do one thing, they do it well and reliably. Spontaneous casting is there if you don't have a spell ready that does what you need to do, but it's always a bit risky and never as reliable.
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"but it's always a bit risky and never as reliable."
Also known as FUN and AWESOME!