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MalcolmSheppard posted:Question for you guys: Almost anything that you don't cast on a resisting opponent to immediate effect, honestly. Even things that you want to roll high for, you probably shouldn't want to roll high for - the fact that, for instance, you only get one bonus dot of a physical attribute per success on Ultimate Honing just means you're going to cast Ultimate Honing as a ritual to push yourself to the cap, or else stay home casting Ultimate Honing over and over again until you get a good roll. The more stuff works like Mage Armor/Acceleration, the better. I think the best rote system would be one in which nearly all spells had a mana cost and knowing a rote either dramatically reduced or eliminated a spell's mana cost, so you really, truly, and honestly by rotes for any spells you use often, but not for any spells you use rarely. (If it's possible to spend mana to directly increase a spell's power, then a rote doubly serves to make a spell more powerful in your hands than someone else's.)
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Oct 7, 2012 15:12
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Mana only going to 10 really does seem to demand that most of the stuff you do be rotes, at least to my understanding.
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Oct 7, 2012 15:50
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^^^Don't forget that your ruling arcana don't cost mana for improvised spells.MalcolmSheppard posted:Question for you guys: Most people I run with do a sort of bastard version of D&D's Taking 10 rule, where if your dice pool is at least 5 you can just call it a success and move on. Speeds up play a lot.
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Oct 7, 2012 15:56
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I've started letting people "buy" successes for spells like that at 4 dice per 1 success. That and we frankly skip making anyone roll for armor and magesight at all and just assume they put them up as soon as they wake up and take -2 to make it last all day.
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Oct 7, 2012 16:08
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I'm pretty new to WoD. Well, not 'new', I've known about it for a few years, I just never bothered learning because I live in the middle of a forest alone for the most part. Anyways, based on my limited knowledge, I'm wondering how viable would Batman be to pull off in Hunter. The two seem like they go together like peanut butter and jelly. You could do so much with the setting.
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Oct 7, 2012 19:01
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Dear White Wolf Guy, Whatever Your Name Was: If whoever was responsible for the goddamn layout of Changeling's 1E Corebook (or design, or whatever resulted in that stupid loving intro) still works for White Wolf, please punch them in the throat for me.
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Oct 7, 2012 19:06
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Upmarket Mango posted:I'm pretty new to WoD. Well, not 'new', I've known about it for a few years, I just never bothered learning because I live in the middle of a forest alone for the most part. Anyways, based on my limited knowledge, I'm wondering how viable would Batman be to pull off in Hunter. The two seem like they go together like peanut butter and jelly. You could do so much with the setting. I'm not too familiar with Hunter but I'm pretty sure there's a few conspiracies that have hi-tech gadgets that would fit in nicely. You might also want to look into Armory and Armory reloaded for other possible uses.
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Oct 7, 2012 19:27
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Attorney at Funk posted:Basically all the Unveiling spells come to mind - a killer roll on a Mage Sight doesn't give you any more information, since that's what Resonance Analysis and other rolls that indicate protracted, focused scrutiny do. Potency just makes those harder to dispel, and really how often is someone going to go out of their way to shut down your (free, infinitely repeatably castable) perception spells? If someone's using spells to mask their spell's effects, their aura, or similar things mage sight potency can give you interesting things, so they might be worth rolling for in the current system. Still, I can see the merit in a system where your sights have a base potency of [arcana rating] which can be boosted by taking penalties.
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Oct 7, 2012 19:40
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Flavivirus posted:If someone's using spells to mask their spell's effects, their aura, or similar things mage sight potency can give you interesting things, so they might be worth rolling for in the current system.
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Oct 7, 2012 20:29
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Upmarket Mango posted:I'm pretty new to WoD. Well, not 'new', I've known about it for a few years, I just never bothered learning because I live in the middle of a forest alone for the most part. Anyways, based on my limited knowledge, I'm wondering how viable would Batman be to pull off in Hunter. The two seem like they go together like peanut butter and jelly. You could do so much with the setting. 5 dots in all abilities and every merit would be a good place to start. E: I thought you meant bats himself, not the setting. Whoops. Statting up some of the villians would be kinda fun though. crime fighting hog fucked around with this message at 20:56 on Oct 7, 2012 |
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Oct 7, 2012 20:50
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Yawgmoth posted:Actually all that is discovered through the Scrutiny roll. Core book page 223, in the section for Transform Aura: This spell cannot be detected except by a “Supernal Vision” (p. 221) Mage Sight spell with a higher Potency. Even once this spell is detected, the true nature of the mage cannot be per- ceived until the Transform Aura spell expires or is dispelled.
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Oct 7, 2012 20:53
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Flavivirus posted:If someone's using spells to mask their spell's effects, their aura, or similar things mage sight potency can give you interesting things, so they might be worth rolling for in the current system. Still, I can see the merit in a system where your sights have a base potency of [arcana rating] which can be boosted by taking penalties. Yeah and by the same token dispelling mage sight is a thing, but you can just, like, roll right then, when it's relevant. Forcing everyone to roll their binary utility sight spells all the time because at some point SOMEONE might care about the Potency is silly
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Oct 7, 2012 21:00
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Yawgmoth posted:^^^Don't forget that your ruling arcana don't cost mana for improvised spells. It should be closer to 3, IIRC
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Oct 7, 2012 22:10
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Attorney at Funk posted:Basically all the Unveiling spells come to mind - a killer roll on a Mage Sight doesn't give you any more information, since that's what Resonance Analysis and other rolls that indicate protracted, focused scrutiny do. Potency just makes those harder to dispel, and really how often is someone going to go out of their way to shut down your (free, infinitely repeatably castable) perception spells? Wait, are there people who would ever make someone roll Mage Sight or whatever unless it was like during combat or something where it really matters that they do it right then? Like, you can just keep trying until you get it, what the gently caress. Let's not gently caress around.
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Oct 7, 2012 22:38
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Xiahou Dun posted:Wait, are there people who would ever make someone roll Mage Sight or whatever unless it was like during combat or something where it really matters that they do it right then? Like, you can just keep trying until you get it, what the gently caress. Let's not gently caress around. Yeah, like, I've never run or played a Mage game where I or the ST stood on ceremonies for rolling all that poo poo. But Malcolm was asking "which spells would it be better not to roll for, period" and, to me, Unveiling spells are almost always in that category
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Oct 7, 2012 22:49
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Loomer posted:Yup. I was going to try and integrate everyone's backstories in as a later encounter or plotline (Hop got the short end of the stick with the fishmen, for instance). Welcome to how I felt about our VtM game. There was a lot going on in that, and you guys barely scratched the surface. 
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Oct 7, 2012 23:27
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Loomer posted:Dear White Wolf Guy, Whatever Your Name Was: As much as I adored Changeling: the Dreaming, even 1e, there is nothing, nothing whatsoever good about any of the fiction, or how it was presented, or about anyone who liked it.
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Oct 8, 2012 00:11
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What methods of torture are deemed acceptable by human rights organizations to motivate my group to play Hunter?
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Oct 8, 2012 00:35
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Dave Brookshaw posted:It should be closer to 3, IIRC
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Oct 8, 2012 00:49
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Upmarket Mango posted:I'm wondering how viable would Batman be to pull off in Hunter. The two seem like they go together like peanut butter and jelly. You could do so much with the setting. My first nWoD game was a reskinned Changeling where the PCs were Arkham Asylum villains, which incorporated the insanity and supernatural powers pretty well. The "big" villains each ran one of the four courts, (Joker, Ivy, Scarecrow, and Mr. Freeze) and Batman something big and terrifying. It really depends on whether you want a more realistic (Nolan) or fantasy (Dini) Batman where the hard science is handwaved.
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Oct 8, 2012 00:59
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Re: Auto successes, I have repeatedly failed 6 die rolls (IE I stalled enough to roll it again) that would have drastically and irrevocably altered the entire trajectory of the campaign had I succeeded. So yeah, as Yawgmoth was pointing out, 3+ dice alone really does not make having a success a 'safe' bet.
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Oct 8, 2012 03:26
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Turning a couple dice into an autosuccess is appropriate for situations in which a spell doesn't really get better with more successes, which is pretty common, or for situations in which you can freely cast a spell over and over again in total safety until it produces the result you want, which is even more common, especially with ritual mechanics being what they are. You'd definitely not let people claim automatic success in high-stakes, limited-time action scenes.
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Oct 8, 2012 04:17
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Xiahou Dun posted:Wait, are there people who would ever make someone roll Mage Sight or whatever unless it was like during combat or something where it really matters that they do it right then? Like, you can just keep trying until you get it, what the gently caress. Let's not gently caress around. I kind of feel like there is an honor code about not doing this, though. Same as auspex: you roll auspex for free, but it's not really cool to say "can I tell if hes lying? how about now? now?"
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Oct 8, 2012 08:02
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Yeah to a point it's a case-by-case basis where as a storyteller I'd have no qualms with telling a player "no, you roll for this." In general though it annoys me that there are spells for which 10 successes is virtually indistinct from 1 success and I've responded to this in many cases by adding in granularity for results where none (written) exists. In particular, mage armor and magesight are things every storyteller I know just handwaved and assumed everyone always had up, because the potency of those spells literally never came up.
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Oct 8, 2012 08:28
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Liesmith posted:I kind of feel like there is an honor code about not doing this, though. Same as auspex: you roll auspex for free, but it's not really cool to say "can I tell if hes lying? how about now? now?" Why shouldn't the storyteller just let you know if this guy being peeped out by Auspex is lying?
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Oct 8, 2012 16:29
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Pope Guilty posted:Mana only going to 10 really does seem to demand that most of the stuff you do be rotes, at least to my understanding. Related question: Do any of you ever run out of Mana? Because I have never seen that happen in any significant way. I've had players worry about running a bit low and scouring between scenes, but never any falling to zero. Your answers to the previous question are very much in line with my own.
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Oct 8, 2012 19:52
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I engineered a way of manafucking my players specifically so they'd have to ration that poo poo and make serious decisions about what they wanted to use their resources on. vOv
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Oct 8, 2012 19:59
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MalcolmSheppard posted:Related question: Do any of you ever run out of Mana? Because I have never seen that happen in any significant way. I've had players worry about running a bit low and scouring between scenes, but never any falling to zero. When I ran Mage a few years ago, I had all vulgar spells A) cost an extra point of mana B) have an innately higher dicepool than covert spells. And I wrote up spells like, "For every even-numbered success rolled, you can spend an extra point of mana to add one to this stream of flame's damage", and similar. Even so, I never saw people run out of mana. I have a much more mana-intensive spell casting system undergoing finishing touches right now, but I haven't had the chance to playtest it! I might end up spamming this thread with what I've put together or posting another one or something.
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Oct 8, 2012 20:00
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Dispelling your opponent's mage armour is usually pretty easy if you've invested in dispelling, since most mages don't bother to pump up its potency. This ends up being spectacularly advantageous in combat and will panic a surprising number of mages if you can pull it off. The only time having mage sight up in combat becomes a thing is during counterspells and the like. A good rule of thumb would be to make the potency of non-scaling spells equal to the number of dots in the primary arcanum of the spell used to cast it. This can end up with some spells being slightly harder to dispel than normal, but it's not a big deal. You have Prime 4? Your Prime mage armour and mage sight have a potency of 4. You're out of combat? You can activate them without rolling.
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Oct 8, 2012 20:13
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Etherwind posted:A good rule of thumb would be to make the potency of non-scaling spells equal to the number of dots in the primary arcanum of the spell used to cast it. This can end up with some spells being slightly harder to dispel than normal, but it's not a big deal. This is pretty much what I roll with, it has the elegance of being simple as gently caress, but also favors the players/NPCs who've put points into being good at Arcana X. note: I, and my group, generally enjoy running higher powered games (lol magic superheroes, etc.) and so I tend to also use this when rating shielding spells. I changed it so that players can choose to add (Arcana) dots to either Defense or Armor on a success. Speaking of, I know that RAW certain arcana shields are for defense, and others are armor, but the nature of the game leads me to favor allowing both from every arcana depending on how a player describes their shield, so I allow one or the other regardless.
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Oct 8, 2012 20:33
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Augure posted:Why shouldn't the storyteller just let you know if this guy being peeped out by Auspex is lying? because it's not fair if I invest a shitload of points into manipulation and subterfuge and am incapable of lying to a neonate mekhet with two points in auspex and an empathy penalty. Nor is it fair if I build a social titan daeva and that same mekhet wizard can stomp all over my sire's clever social games and make me irrelevant as what amounts to a bonus ability. It's also more difficult for the GM if his characters can suddenly never lie properly, and it makes the feeling of catching someone out feel a lot cheaper. thats just off the top of my head, I'm sure there are a lot of other good reasons on top of that.
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Oct 8, 2012 20:39
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Error 404 posted:Speaking of, I know that RAW certain arcana shields are for defense, and others are armor, but the nature of the game leads me to favor allowing both from every arcana depending on how a player describes their shield, so I allow one or the other regardless. They're actually all for Armor, although some describe themselves as making you dodgy rather than tough. Technically, if you want to increase your Defense your only recourse is using Mind to buff your Wits and Life to buff your Dexterity. What I did was list which Mage Armor spells are "fortified" and which are "elusive"; the former could block environmental damage and grappling damage, while the latter made you more difficult to even get a hold of or make a mark on as well as to actually harm. Nowadays I want Mage Armor to be way more low-key than it is in the Mage core, or even nonexistent. It's cooler to have to expend on-the-spot effort to deflect an incoming bullet than to just walk around, all day, with massive damage resistance.
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Oct 8, 2012 20:43
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MalcolmSheppard posted:Related question: Do any of you ever run out of Mana?
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Oct 8, 2012 21:06
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MalcolmSheppard posted:Related question: Do any of you ever run out of Mana? Because I have never seen that happen in any significant way. I've had players worry about running a bit low and scouring between scenes, but never any falling to zero. None of my players ever ran out of mana. I blame this on the fact that mana has no real uses outside of mitigating paradox and my players were all super paranoid about paradox.
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Oct 8, 2012 21:11
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I ran out of mana exactly once, while using Celestial Fire to try to shred a Life adept who was healing himself as fast as I was burning him. I've never seen anyone else run out of mana in any game I've run or played.
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Oct 8, 2012 21:11
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Oh, riight, you did. I should note note that AaF's character was using Prime in my game, so A) it did more severe damage than normal, but cost 1 base mana to use instead of 0, and B) it was a vulgar spell, so it had a +1 mana surcharge, meaning that each Celestial Fire blast was gobbling up 2 mana in its casting.
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Oct 8, 2012 21:32
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Liesmith posted:because it's not fair if I invest a shitload of points into manipulation and subterfuge and am incapable of lying to a neonate mekhet with two points in auspex and an empathy penalty. Nor is it fair if I build a social titan daeva and that same mekhet wizard can stomp all over my sire's clever social games and make me irrelevant as what amounts to a bonus ability. It's also more difficult for the GM if his characters can suddenly never lie properly, and it makes the feeling of catching someone out feel a lot cheaper. thats just off the top of my head, I'm sure there are a lot of other good reasons on top of that. They all seem like good reasons for removing the "can see if someone's lying" power altogether or putting it higher in the discipline tree rather than tricking players into thinking they can see when someone's lying but actually it only applies when the person isn't trying really hard to lie to them.
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Oct 8, 2012 21:57
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Ferrinus posted:They're actually all for Armor, although some describe themselves as making you dodgy rather than tough. Technically, if you want to increase your Defense your only recourse is using Mind to buff your Wits and Life to buff your Dexterity. I completely agree with you here, and so that's where I put the successes. Basically I houserule that leaving Mage armor up all day gives you exactly 1 free shot. Somebody snipes, or sucker punches you and you're covered for that one attack. BUT, anything after that first shot means you have to reroll your shield (or decide not to) and then it's an "active" spell where your successes count for how many rounds you have it active. So Basically the "spend mana= lasts all day" is just for walking around out of combat. Basically it's an airbag rather than a suit of platmail. As always YMMV, but my group likes it this way.
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Oct 8, 2012 23:00
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Error 404 posted:Basically it's an airbag rather than a suit of platmail. I really like that idea. I've been putting together a situation where all-day shields exist but are fairly subtle in effect unless you're actively pumping mana into them, but straight-up using as-written Mage Armor that "falls off" after it's been put to the test is very slick.
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Oct 8, 2012 23:03
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I also like this quite a bit because it helps players feel a bit better about being ambushed. Stealth against player characters is almost as difficult to pull off as social mechanics against player characters. "What do you mean there was nothing I could do?"
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Oct 8, 2012 23:07
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