Author Topic: Rotes and Fast Casting  (Read 4183 times)

Offline Dictum Mortuum

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Rotes and Fast Casting
« on: June 03, 2012, 05:47:22 AM »
This is a thread about magical effects you can create. Ask any relevant questions here. I will be keeping a library of the effects in the first post, so you can check out any relevant rules or how many times you've used it (useful if you want to turn something into a rote).

IMPORTANT: Check out this for a template on how you can build a spell.

Magic stuff:

  • When casting you're rolling arete (just your arete) at a difficulty that's determined by me (it's not arbirtary - I'm going to follow a chart in the book). Lowest difficulty is 4, higher is 10.
  • You can spend more time in an effect and continue casting it over several rounds if you want to get more successes. You can roll arete again, but for each roll you're receiving a +1 cumulative difficulty. If you fail or botch one of those rolls (except from the first) you must immediately stop.
  • As a starting character you can have several magical effects as "rotes". Rotes are "spells" that you have used so many times that you know them by heart. You can have (# of spheres) magical effects as rotes as a beginning character. When you're casting a rote you're not receiving the +1 penalty for fast casting and you gain the additional advantage of using the magical effect as a ritual (more on that later). To make a magical effect into a rote you need to spend 2xp and have fast-casted it enough times ('research').
  • To cast something you need to explain the effect both in game system terms (OOC) and in fluff terms (IC - based on your paradigm).

Rituals:

Sometimes you might want to have an effect with lots of additional successes. Then you'll have to use a ritual.

  • You can gather as much as (arete+willpower) successes for a rote that is turned into a ritual. If you don't have the effect as a rote you can gather half that amount. You need to state the number of successes you want to gather beforehand (that means that you can't finish a ritual earlier because you decided you're fine with less successes or you can't push for more).
  • Each arete roll translates in 15 minutes of real time you're spending on your ritual. Some rituals can last multiple hours, so remember that you're still a mortal man (or woman) and you need to eat :P
  • If you're casting a rote as a ritual you can use an ability to reduce the difficulty of the ritual (but not more than 3 points overall). This ability is generally associated with your Tradition (for instance Do for Akashics, Enochian for Hermetics and so on).
  • If you fail an arete roll you can continue your ritual, but at a +1 cumulative difficulty.
  • If you botch an arete roll, you can continue your ritual only by spending a willpower point and at a +1 cumulative difficulty. You're also losing one success gathered per "1" rolled. You can choose to stop and receive paradox though. If you fail a second time, the ritual fails and you're receiving paradox. Each roll adds one paradox point to the backlash normally gained!
  • If you're distructed by an outside force, you need to succeed on a willpower roll (diff 8) or botch the whole effect. Remember that the ritual is supposedly an action that you do in private, not in a busy street. Plus anyone that witnesses the ritual will identify you as something supernatural, which may be bad socially (or even physically, considering we're playing in 1830's).
« Last Edit: June 04, 2012, 02:16:40 PM by Dictum Mortuum »
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Offline brujon

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #1 on: June 04, 2012, 01:06:51 PM »
My Fate Mage, i envision will be using several effects based on the manipulation of odds in his favor. I'll try to create a list of effects i think he'll be using.

A) Raising all of an opponent's difficulties by 1 for the duration of the encounter.

B) Nullifying one success from a dice pool.

C) Reducing all of his or an ally's difficulties by 1 for the duration of an encounter.

D) Adding one success to a dice pool.

E) "Hexing" or Blessing one object or an area so that for Duration X anyone holding that object/standing on that area (excepting himself, if bad luck), will be affected with bad/good luck (1 Added/Removed difficulty for any test).

F) Curse a target with exceptionally bad luck, making it so that rolling a 1 subtracts 2 successes instead of one, and a 10 doesn't entitle to a bonus die roll.

G) Bless a target with exceptionally good luck, making it so that rolling a 1 doesn't automatically count as a botch, and a 9 entitles you to a bonus die roll, same as a 10.

H) Curse a target with bad luck, forcing him to re-roll one dice that was a success.

I) Bless a target with good luck, giving him the chance to re-roll one dice that was a failure.

J) Curse a target with bad luck, making any one task require one additional success.

K) Bless a target with good luck, making any one task require one less success.

L) Rely on pure luck to find a person or an object you're looking for. (Don't know how this could work, mechanically).

M) Reading the threads of fate. Analyzing one person to see how they will be faring on the near future, or the chances one task has of succeeding. Example: Jonah will be going to obtain information from a group of Neophyte Brujah Vampires that are known to not hold up their end of the bargain. He reads the threads of fate to see how are the chances of the meeting going sour, or of everything going as expected.

N) "Lucky Dodge". When affected by something that would inflict 2 or more points of damage, through pure luck the severity of the injured is diminished by 1 or more points, either through a lucky dodge, or through the source of damage not working quite as well as expected. Example: Jonah is hit by a bullet, except the bullet ricochets on a bone, just narrowly missing one major artery, which prevents further damage. Example 2: Jonah is thrown off a 20-floor building, but through exceptionally good luck, one sand truck was passing by, cushioning Jonah's fall.

O) "Lucky Shot": When dealing one or more points of damage, through exceptionally good luck, the severity of the wound inflicted is increased by one or more points of damage. Example: Jonah shoots a target, but misses the torso, hitting them in the leg instead, but the bullet bounces around the body, coming to rest inside an major artery, blocking off the blood flow, causing an embolism which causes the fast necrosis of muscle tissue around the shot leg.

P) Rigging the game. By using correspondece to affect a target not directly in line of sight, Jonah can influence events such as televised Soccer Matches, Horse Races, etc. to work in his favor, even though not directly present there. A marvelous source of income.

Q) Prestidigitation. Through his use of correspondence, Jonah can more easily cheat his way through games of chance, using correspondence to aid in feats of minor legerdemain, such as hiding cards under a sleeve, or using it out of gaming situations to produce in his hand one other object in his person, just like it was under his sleeve the whole time.

R) Pattern Damage: Through his use of Prime energies, Jonah can infuse one object or bullet with anti-pattern energy, making it deal aggravated damage instead of normal damage


For now, these are the effects i have in mind... Are all of them possible with my spheres? Which of them are strictly vulgar?
"All the pride and pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull consciousness of a fool, are poor indeed compared with the imagination of Cervantes writing his Don Quixote in a miserable prison" - Schopenhauer, Aphorisms: The Wisdom of Life

Offline Dictum Mortuum

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #2 on: June 04, 2012, 02:13:08 PM »
Notes:

You can't affect a Life pattern directly. You need Entropy 4 for that. So you have to curse an item someone holds (so losing it will break the curse).

Unfortunately you can't add or remove successes. It's impossible to dodge Fate and erase Chance completely. You can lower and increase the difficulty, or even force rerolls, but static bonus successes/removal of successes is not possible.

For the "hex" (E) example: It typically is: you can use each success on your arete roll as a bonus to lower/increase difficulty (+- 3 max) and/or increase duration and/or additional targets. Each success raises or lowers difficulty by 1 point, each target requires a success and duration goes like this:

0 successes invested: only lasts for a second (one turn).
1 successes invested: lasts for a scene.
2 successes invested: lasts for a day.
3 -> full story
4 -> six months
5 -> storyteller's option

So for example, making a "hex stone" that gives a +2 penalty to rolls to the one weilding it and another person within close range for a day, you'd require: 1 success for the effect + 2 successes for the +2 penalty and +2 successes for the duration, for a total of 7 successes.

L) Could work by decreasing the difficulty on your perception + investigation roll to find someone.

M) Probably needs a little bit of Time magic, too. You could use something like that on the spot, though, and get a tiny glimpse.

N) Remember that you need Time 2 for bullets. What you're describing is reducing your dodge difficulty (like the previous example).

O) Again, this is just reducing the difficulty of the dexterity + firearms roll. Or if you prefer you might get additional dice of damage.

P) It's just using Correspondence with Entropy. Remember that you'll need additional successes based on how far from you what you want to affect is.

Q) To physically teleport the card or make one you need Correspondence 3 Matter 2. To make one you need Matter 2.

R) This is ok, but you'll have to spend quintessence to enchant the bullets/items.
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Offline brujon

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #3 on: June 04, 2012, 02:58:30 PM »
B) and D) are out the door, then.

M) I was thinking something like a glimpse, yes, not like actually seeing the future, but only knowing if it's more likely to fail or succeed (What will fail or what will succeed is another question entirely, and probably needs time magic), but as for just getting a "feel" if it's going to go smoothly or not doesn't require Time, or did i miss anything?

N) For bullets, what i was thinking of was more in the lines of mitigating the damage that occurs after the bullet hits me, like when you read in a newspaper that a guy miraculously survived a bullet through the head because instead of bouncing around and liquefying his brain, the bullet went straight through, or stopped before doing more damage inside the guys head? Something like that. I'm not affecting the path of the bullet, when it's going super fast, but the probability that i survive or miraculously prevent further damage through a lucky break. A gunshot wound doesn't do it's damage all at once, but in stages, and the most damage is made by the ricocheting of the bullet inside the body, or what path it takes after it's entered the body (When it already has slowed down a bit)... Or something like that still requires some slowing down of time to apply the effect?

Q) It's not really teleporting but more like aiding feats of legerdemain. I'd still have to have the things in my possession, but, for instance, i'd do it better than with just sleight of hand. Like if i want to quickdraw a pistol, but i don't really need to go all the way to the waist, and the gun sorts of pull into my hand a bit, making everything go just that little bit faster and smoother. I'd still have to use sleight of hand and dexterity, but Correspondence would make it easier. Is this doable?


"So for example, making a "hex stone" that gives a +2 penalty to rolls to the one weilding it and another person within close range for a day, you'd require: 1 success for the effect + 2 successes for the +2 penalty and +2 successes for the duration, for a total of 7 successes. "

You meant 6 successes right? 1 for effect, 2 for penalty, 2 for duration, 1 for additional target. Or the original target requires an additional success, apart from the one already spent for the effect?

Question: Can i apply the hex to a projectile, so the person hit by it is hexed until they take the time to remove it/duration ends? This i think is the only way of using it in-combat before Entropy 4.

So i could make hexed bullets, infused with 1 quintessence (for aggravated damage), 1 success invested for duration (1 scene), 1 success invested for the penalty, +1 for the effect.

What do i need to do to make it so the effect's "clock" only starts ticking when i actively use the bullet? I think the making of these bullets, based on the amount of success required for them, would more likely be made as part of a ritual, as opposed to being used "on the fly", but would not always be worth going the extra mile to pump successes up to a duration of permanent of semi-permanent, so necessarily the effect would need to stay "dormant" until i decided to actively use them.

Another thing. How does the amount of successes needed increase with area affected, in the case i want to hex an area? Say, me and the Cabal are engaged in a fight against agents from the Order of Reason, and there are too many for me to ping them all with hexed shots, so i decide that the best course of action is to just curse the whole area in which we are fighting. Do i have to go nova and spend all of my stored quint just to get the amount of successes needed or are the successes required a bit more reasonable?
"All the pride and pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull consciousness of a fool, are poor indeed compared with the imagination of Cervantes writing his Don Quixote in a miserable prison" - Schopenhauer, Aphorisms: The Wisdom of Life

Offline Dictum Mortuum

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #4 on: June 05, 2012, 02:01:59 PM »
M) Yes, you'll get a feel or get a premonition and I will probably base it on your paradigm. The premonition will not be 100% right though.

N) The combat system is like this:

1) roll dexterity + firearms, difficulty 6, unless special conditions apply.
2) If subject has chosen to spend an action to dodge, he rolls dexterity + dodge and cuts successes from your successes.
3) If you have rolled at least one success you roll damage dice with +1 dice for each additional success in the "to hit" roll beyond the first.
4) If the target is hit, he soaks, if he is able to do so.

That's the system. If you want to influence the damage roll, you'll have to roll them normally, as if you had additional successes on your "hit" roll.

Q) I'm away from books, but unless I don't remember something clearly, you can't do that with Correspondence. Of course, you can just use the talent "legerdemain", no reason to get a magical effect for this.

Hex Stone) Actually it requires 6 successes, true. 1 for the effect, 2 for the difficulty, 2 for the duration and 1 for the additional target. Whatever you do, you will have to spend 1 success to shape the effect, or influence someone.

Projectile) Yes you can, but be warned that you'll have 1-3 successes, unless you spend multiple rounds refining the effect (with a progressively higher difficulty). And yes, you can make hexed + infused bullets.

"Clock" Effects) Anything that has a time trigger, obviously requires the Time sphere.

Area effects) It's just additional targets, each additional target requires an additional success.

Warning: I'm getting a feeling that you're too invested in in-combat effects. You might get dissapointed :P
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Offline brujon

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #5 on: June 05, 2012, 08:11:35 PM »
M) Yes, you'll get a feel or get a premonition and I will probably base it on your paradigm. The premonition will not be 100% right though.

N) The combat system is like this:

1) roll dexterity + firearms, difficulty 6, unless special conditions apply.
2) If subject has chosen to spend an action to dodge, he rolls dexterity + dodge and cuts successes from your successes.
3) If you have rolled at least one success you roll damage dice with +1 dice for each additional success in the "to hit" roll beyond the first.
4) If the target is hit, he soaks, if he is able to do so.

That's the system. If you want to influence the damage roll, you'll have to roll them normally, as if you had additional successes on your "hit" roll.

Q) I'm away from books, but unless I don't remember something clearly, you can't do that with Correspondence. Of course, you can just use the talent "legerdemain", no reason to get a magical effect for this.

Hex Stone) Actually it requires 6 successes, true. 1 for the effect, 2 for the difficulty, 2 for the duration and 1 for the additional target. Whatever you do, you will have to spend 1 success to shape the effect, or influence someone.

Projectile) Yes you can, but be warned that you'll have 1-3 successes, unless you spend multiple rounds refining the effect (with a progressively higher difficulty). And yes, you can make hexed + infused bullets.

"Clock" Effects) Anything that has a time trigger, obviously requires the Time sphere.

Area effects) It's just additional targets, each additional target requires an additional success.

Warning: I'm getting a feeling that you're too invested in in-combat effects. You might get dissapointed :P

This might be a side effect of playing too much D&D... As for the "clock" thing, it's more like when the duration starts counting or stops counting. I make the bullets, does hex on them start wearing off immediately or is there a way of postponing that? Like, the time only starts counting when i effectively use them. Does this necessarily require time, or i can maybe make the enchantment require some sort of "trigger" to start functioning properly, like, only when it leaves the barrel of the gun?
"All the pride and pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull consciousness of a fool, are poor indeed compared with the imagination of Cervantes writing his Don Quixote in a miserable prison" - Schopenhauer, Aphorisms: The Wisdom of Life

Offline Dictum Mortuum

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #6 on: June 06, 2012, 08:56:42 AM »
This might be a side effect of playing too much D&D... As for the "clock" thing, it's more like when the duration starts counting or stops counting. I make the bullets, does hex on them start wearing off immediately or is there a way of postponing that? Like, the time only starts counting when i effectively use them. Does this necessarily require time, or i can maybe make the enchantment require some sort of "trigger" to start functioning properly, like, only when it leaves the barrel of the gun?

Unfortunately, triggers generally require at least time 2.
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Offline brujon

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #7 on: June 06, 2012, 02:47:37 PM »
Can i leave the enchantment unfinished, providing the last part required for it to activate only when i'm firing the gun, for instance? (This also applies to stones, etc...)
"All the pride and pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull consciousness of a fool, are poor indeed compared with the imagination of Cervantes writing his Don Quixote in a miserable prison" - Schopenhauer, Aphorisms: The Wisdom of Life

Offline Popedanei

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #8 on: June 07, 2012, 07:35:24 PM »
@ dictum
is it assumed that we know the effect from the book without spending rote slots on it?

Offline Dictum Mortuum

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #9 on: June 09, 2012, 08:41:16 AM »
Can i leave the enchantment unfinished, providing the last part required for it to activate only when i'm firing the gun, for instance? (This also applies to stones, etc...)

No unfortunately. You need to finish your effects. Otherwise someone could carry a powerful enchantment and release it at the most opportune moment without any disadvantages.

@ dictum
is it assumed that we know the effect from the book without spending rote slots on it?

No!
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Offline brujon

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Re: Rotes and Fast Casting
« Reply #10 on: June 09, 2012, 11:39:43 AM »
Can i leave the enchantment unfinished, providing the last part required for it to activate only when i'm firing the gun, for instance? (This also applies to stones, etc...)

No unfortunately. You need to finish your effects. Otherwise someone could carry a powerful enchantment and release it at the most opportune moment without any disadvantages.

@ dictum
is it assumed that we know the effect from the book without spending rote slots on it?

No!

Hm... I'll guess i'll need to work at it on my downtime, then, so i can muster enough successes to get the duration up to a workable level. (IE: More than a scene or a day. Months/Years)
"All the pride and pleasure of the world, mirrored in the dull consciousness of a fool, are poor indeed compared with the imagination of Cervantes writing his Don Quixote in a miserable prison" - Schopenhauer, Aphorisms: The Wisdom of Life