Creating Magical Effects

STEPS

When you decide to work magic (or whatever your mage calls it), you need to go through a simple process to determine the results. Follow these steps:

Determine the Effect

Figure out what you want to do, whether it’s hurling a ball of flame, causing people around you to fail to notice your presence or making dice fall as you dictate.

Decide Upon Your Method

Each mage’s paradigm - his means of looking at magic - influences the casting of an Effect. If you’re a Hermetic mage, you probably use Enochian chants, the names of powerful angels and spirits, geometric sigils or glyphs. If you’re a Virtual Adept, you might reprogram a computer to project energy or re-code the surrounding universe itself. Figure out how your mage justifies the Effect in order to determine what focus and what Ability you use with the spell. Mages don’t just crank out spells. They work, chant, pray and invoke to make the magic happen.

EDITORS NOTES!

Its also important when Deciding Upon Your Method that you use an appropriate Focus:

When you shape an Effect, your mage generally needs to use a focus. Doing so takes the form of chanting, brandishing an object of power, mixing a substance and applying it, manipulating energy through song and dance or whatever else the mage believes is necessary to work magic. In game terms, you’ll use various trappings and Abilities to work your spells.

Using no focus, called Surpassing A Focus, is generally ill-advised. It requires the expenditure of a Willpower trait, and you are down three traits on your Arete Challenge.

Check Your Knowledge

Do you know how to accomplish what you want to do? Look at your character’s Spheres and determine what knowledge will help complete the feat. If you have the appropriate rote, you’re fine. If not, you may not be able to work the Effect. If you use the optional rule for fast-casting, you can try to cast the rote even if you don’t know it. If you use the optional rule for dynamic magic, you can try to build an Effect that does what you want, even if there is no rote for it. However, if you don’t have the necessary Sphere requirements, you can’t perform the magic. The base assumption is that you cannot perform a given spell unless your Spheres and rotes explicitly list the ability to do so.

Calculate Difficulty

The base difficulty for a magical Effect is the Effect’s Sphere level in Traits if it’s coincidental, plus one if it’s vulgar, plus another one if it happens in view of Sleepers who wouldn’t believe that it’s possible. Add modifiers based on the circumstances,as shown in the following chart.

Perform the Effect

You cast the Effect by making a Static Challenge. Generally, no Narrator is required as long as your Effect conforms to the rules presented here. You simply make the challenge against anyone handy. (Just be sure to tell the other person what you’re doing so that she doesn’t get the wrong idea.) If you win the challenge, your Effect succeeds. Work out the result as described for your rote or Sphere and continue. If you lose, your Effect fails. If you tie, you must check your Arete Traits against the Effect’s static difficulty, which you computed before. You win if you have more Traits or equal Traits. Note that if you lose the test, you can retest with an appropriate Ability for your focus (see the list of foci and Abilities on p. 178, which you picked when you decided upon your method. Also, you can over bid with your Arete if you have twice as many Arete Traits as the Effect’s Trait difficulty. However, your opponent can overbid if the reverse is true.

Wound modifiers do not affect your Static Arete Challenge. Therefore, you do not come into the challenge Traits down or lose on ties automatically simply for being wounded. However, you cannot perform an Effect if you are unconscious and have not somehow maintained your thinking process magically.

Suffer Paradox

Once you’ve finished the Effect, you will take Paradox. Typically, Paradox causes a small amount of damage, but the Paradox Judge may decide upon another Effect as well. See Paradox.

MODIFIERS

CASTING DIFFICULTY TRAIT MODIFIRES

Cause, Status, or Trait	Modifier
Already Maintainang An Effect	+1 per two Effects Maintained
Spending Quintessence	-1 per Quintessence Trait Spent (Max -3, limited by Spending)
Domino Effect	+1 per Effect (Max +3)
Opposed Resonance Trait	+1
Assisting Resonance Trait	-1
Using specialty focus	-1
Using non-required focus	-1
Spending Extra Time	-1
In or near a Node	-1
Surpassing a necessary focus	+3

OPTIONAL CASTING MODIFIERS

Cause, Status, or Trait	Modifier
Conjuctional Effect	+1 per additional Sphere beyond the highest (Conjuctional Rule)
Fast-casting	+1 (Fast-casting rule)
Distracted	+1
In conflict with Avatar	+1
Possess item with the subject's Resonance	-1

PERMUTATIONS

Magic isn’t as simple as all that, of course. Besides the basic Arete Challenge and the modifiers, you can influence your outcome in a couple of ways and incur a couple of potential difficulties.

Abilities Enhancing Magic

When you roleplay a focus properly, you can claim its benefits to your character. For instance, if you actually take the time to speak some mystical words, flourish your hands and grasp your mystic amulet, you may well represent your mage’s use of Linguistics: Emhian, and you’re certainly putting that knowledge to work.

If you spend a full turn on the roleplaying of your focus before you cast an Effect, that focus’ Ability helps with the result. The list of sample foci gives some ideas for appropriate Abilities for each focus. When you meet this requirement, you can use that Ability for one retest on the Arete Challenge as long as you have any levels left.

Using Quintessence

As noted on the difficulty chart, using Quintessence allows you to make difficult Effects much easier. Each Trait of Quintessence that you channel, up to a maximum of your Avatar rating, lowers the difficulty of the Effect by one Trait. At best, you can have a net difficulty of three Traits lower than the base difficulty, to a minimum difficulty of two Traits.

Spending Extra Time

Should you choose to spend extra time, you can help to guarantee success in casting Effects. Taking a full extra turn to cast gives you a + 1 Trait modifier on the resolution of the Arete Test. You can stack this modifier with the use of a focus Ability. Therefore, if you take three turns total (one turn for extra time, one turn for the focus, one for the base Effect), you can cast with a +1Trait bonus and an Ability retest.

Interruptions

If you're interrupted while casting an Effect - say, you're wounded while you're working your focus - you have two choices. You can either cast the Effect immediately and lose any bonuses from the extended casting, or you can take the penalty for being distracted and continue. Therefore, if you are trying to gain the 1 Ability bonus and casting an Effect, but you are wounded later in the same turn, you can decide to release the Effect without penalty but without gaining the retest. Similarly, you could continue to cast the Effect and gain a bonus for taking extra time, which would cancel the distraction penalty.

Countermagic

Sometimes you just can't let the enemy get the drop on you, and you have to find a way to fight or cancel his spell. That's where countermagic comes in. A mage works countermagic by using his own powers to cancel or wash out his enemy's Effect. Doing so counts as your action for the turn, so you can't do it if you've already acted. The three basic types of countermagic are sphere countermagic, anti-magic and unweaving.

Sphere Countermagic

This occurs when you have the Spheres necessary to know what the opponent is doing. You pit your Arete against the enemy's. In such a case, you make an Arete Test, at the same difficulty as the opponent (although you take your modifiers for distractions and Resonance into effect). If you win, the spell is canceled. If you have Apprentice-level (or better) Prime and your Arete is higher than the opponent's, the Effect can be reflected back upon him, so he might be hit by his own fire bolt or wounding spell.

Anti-Magic

This uses Quintessence to strengthen the Patterns of reality against an Effect. You spend Quintessence to raise the difficulty of the opponent’s Effect. You can spend Quintessence up to the limit of your Avatar Background, as usual.

Unweaving

This tries to tear apart a n existing spell. You make a challenge against the difficulty of the original spell (although your difficulty might still be modified by distractions or Resonance). You must have the Spheres necessary to have cast the Effect, and you must have at least the Apprentice-level Prime Sphere. If you win, the spell loses one grade of success. Unweaving can degrade the duration of a spell. If the spell has no grades of effect left (i.e., it’s down to a simple Effect),then an unweaving destroys it

Simultaneous Effects

You can cast only one Effect in a turn.Even with Time magic, you are limited to channeling only so much magical energy. If you want to do multiple things at once, you will probably have to build a conjunctional Effect,if your game uses that optional rule.

However, some Effects have a duration, especially if you use the grades of success mechanic from performing rituals or using Willpower (see the optional rules on p. 138). If you have an Effect running already, it takes some of your concentration and makes casting other Effects difficult.

Performing any Effect that requires full concentration, like controlling weather with constant changes, precludes you from doing anything else. All of your attention is occupied on the spell. Even with Mind multi-tasking, you can’t divert your magical will to another feat.

Any other Effect typically requires a little magical will to sustain, but it’s not too taxing. For every two full Effects of this sort that you have running, you take a one-Trait penalty on all new casting challenges, because you’re slightly distracted. Therefore, you might keep up a Forces shield without difficulty, but if you also add on the Better Body rote, then you’ll suffer a one-Trait penalty to all additional Effects that you weave.

ADDITIONAL OPTIONAL RULES

Using Willpower

Eliminates chance to botch. If the test is successful, you gain a one-grade bonus to the effect.

Overbidding for Success

If you win your Arete Challenge, you may choose to overbid if you have the required Traits (i.e., your Arete total equals or exceeds twice the difficulty of the Effect). If you win the overbid as well, you add one grade of success to the Effect at no additional cost. If you fail the overbid, you fail the Effect. (EDITORS NOTE: I think a better descriptor would be 'You fail the original Arete challenge, etc. In any case, your desired Effect does not work!)

Acting in Concert

Multiple mages can work together to form an Effect that they'd have difficulty performing alone. Everyone involved must have at least Apprentice-level knowledge of the Spheres used (Rank 1), and they must find a way to make their paradigms and foci work in concert. A Ehtuanatos's knife probably can't enhance a Virtual Adept's computer program, for instance, but a Verbana's blood work could complement a Dreamspeaker's said paintings.

Each participant who has the Spheres necessary for the Effect can either choose to add one Trait to the main casting group's Aerete Trait total for purposes of the challengee, or he may add one grade of success to the spell if he also manages to make a successful test for the Effect.

Each participant who has at least rudimentary Sphere knowledge for the Effect, but not the level necessary to cast it, adds one Trait to the main caster's Arete Test.

Each group of five un-Awakened acolytes who helps (generally by holding candles, chanting, forming circles, etc.) adds one Trait to the main caster's Arete Test.

Add all the modifiers to the Arete Test before any caster involved makes the challenge. Therefore, if 10 acolytes help and two mages work together on an Effect for which they have the right Spheres, both mages get to test. The acolytes add two Traits to both challenges, and if the assisting mage wins his test, he adds a grade of success if the main caster also wins.

Rituals and Extended Magic

By extending the time it takes to cast a spell and taking extra care, a mage can cause his spell to work far more Effectively. Many rotes have an entry for "Grades of Success". If the mage wants to not just improve his chances to get a spell right, but to actually facilitate a more potent spell, he does so by performing a ritual.

When you use a ritual, you spend extra time to generate a stronger Effect. You don't get the bonus of taking extra time on the Arete Test unless you actually double your ritual time - therefore, if you spend an hour on a ritual, you must spend an extra hour to garner such a bonus. You can still claim a focus retest, though.

The more time you spend, the Effect becomes more powerful, but the casting becomes more risky. A "simple Effect" is one listed with the normal Spheres, and which takes only a turn to cast. Rituals, on the other hand, may take an extra minute, an extra hour, or an extra day (the limit of human endurance). When you cast the ritual, you make a succession of Arete Tests, and you must succeed in all of them (win, or tie with more Traits, including retests for focus Abilities).

Each time-part you spend requires one test, so you test after the first turn of casting, then after the first minute, after the first hour, and finally for the end of a full day. If you fail any test, the difficulty goes up by one Trait, and you must recast that time part. So if you fail on the first turn, the difficulty goes up one, and you must take another turn. If you fail after the first minute, the difficulty goes up one and you must take another minute before testing again. The difficulty can continue to increase until it reaches double your Arete Trait total. At that point, the ritual botches utterly, and you not only garner Paradox for a botched Effect, you gain an additional Paradox Trait for each time-part you spend on the ritual (+1 for an extra turn, +1 for an extra minute, etc.).

You can cancel a ritual at any time. The spell fails, but you don't suffer any other penalties. You might cancel a ritual so that you can react to an attacker before the ritual is interrupted, or so that you can avoid a horrible botch as described previously.

If you're interrupted, the ritual typically botches. You can spend a Willpower Trait to keep going, but that time-part is considered a failure. Add one to the difficulty, and start that time part over again.

Each extension adds a grade of success to an Effect. The rotes all list ideas on the changes to the power grade. For instance, the Sense Forces rote normally lasts on yourself for a scene or on another subject for a turn. If cast as a one-minute ritual, it lasts on yourself for a session or on a subject for a scene.

Superhuman Ritual

Although most humans can concentrate only for so long, therefore limiting typical rituals to a day of work at most, a mage can use magic to boost her capabilities and then perform a superhuman ritual. It's very, very risky. Failure usually obliterates the caster, as the weight of Paradox is truly phenomenal. But it can shake the world.

To perform a superhuman ritual, the mage must have a magical means of prolonging his endurance (typically though an already ritually extended Life or Mind Effect to banish or ignore fatigue), or use up to two Willpower Traits for each additional day of casting.

Each day you add extends a ritual by one grade. This addition requires the additional test and bears the risk of increased Paradox on the botch. If a given day's work is failed or interrupted, the mage needs to make up one additional day, not the whole time spend already.

Generally, rotes don't list progressions for superhuman rituals. Its up to the Storyteller to determine the exact Effect. However, many rotes have a sample progression. Therefore, a superhuman ritua might be capable of casting a spell that lasts for a year, or one that inflicts a huge amount of damage (four or more health levels) in a single strike. Of course, such EFfects can be mightily unbalancing. Its upon the Storyteller to determine what's appropriate and to disallow abusive nonsense.

Fast Casting

Its possible to cast a rote that you don't know. Since its not something you've practiced, you're limited to coming up with the Effect on the fly, by improvising based on your knowledge of the Sphere in question. This trick is called fast-casting.

You pick a rote for which you have the necessary Spheres, but that your character hasn't learned. Add one Trait to the casting difficulty. Other than that, you cast the Effect normally.

Dynamic Magic

Skilled mages recognize that rotes are just a teaching tool. The real flexibility of the Spheres lies in the endless variety. With true dynamic magic, a mage can accomplish anything, so long as he knows the proper Spheres.

Each Sphere has a listing of general guides for each level. As long as an Effect doesn't exceed that level, the mage can create an Effect from scratch and customize it to do what he wants. For instance, the Initiate level of Forces allows a mage to channel enough power to inflict one health level of damage. The mage might instead decide to channel the electricity to jump-start a car. Since this amount of energy seems to be approximately equivalent, the Effect is possible. Similarly, Adept-Level Life magic allows major changes to life Patterns,such as shapeshifting. The mage could decide to give a target gills. Although there may not be a specific rote for such a change, its within the descriptive effect of the Sphere, so its possible.

Making a dynamic Effect is considered fast-casting, of course.

If anyone present does not agree with the interpretation of a dynamic Effect, you must consult a Narrator or Storyteller. For this reason, dynamic magic should be limited to only the most experienced troupes, and only if they have sufficient Narrating staff.

Conjunctional Effects

By combining Spheres, a mage can often perform a greater Effect that overlaps different areas and thus performs a substantial transmutation. Any Effect that relies on multiple Spheres is called a conjunctional Effect.

A list of conjunctional rotes appears at the end of the Spheres descriptions. This list covers many special Effects that mages might try, although its by no means exhaustive. A mage can learn and use conjunctional rotes like any other rotes. The difficulty is based on the highest Sphere level, plus one for each extra Sphere added on, and one more for cast-casting.

You can also make a conjunctional Effect with dynamic magic. In this case, you sling together some of the powers of Spheres to arrive at a new combination. You might, for instance, decide to combine Mind and Forces, so as to create a free-standing Effect that reads a subject's mind and projects light pictures of his thoughts. Your Storyteller arbitrates the equivalent Sphere levels, and you add one to the difficulty for each Sphere added past the highest Sphere.