Area effect spells, Target Room vs. Individual

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

Looking at Winds of Mundane Silence, it har Target: Room. So, this spell does not work outside? Why is such an area spell not defined otherwise, with a diameter of effectual area?

I seem to remember some other spells, that affect an area, but they're defined as Target: Individual, perhaps with some boost to level for the size of it.

Shouldn't this spell also do this?
I know some spells are naturally Room targets; Heating the Frigid Hall, Chamber of Spring Breezes.

2

the things included in the target to be affected by this spell, are the actual spells, not people or the area... so we can either have

  • "Single Mundane Silence" Voice, Mom, Ind, which will remove a single specified spell within Voice range (with the bonus the it dispels up to (SMS level + 10)/2 instead of WMS level/2)
  • "Group of Mundane Silence" Voice, Mom, Group which will dispel up to 10 spells in a clearly defined group (ie some connection between them, eg "the spells affecting 'those men'") with success if the targeted spells have level <= RMS level/2.
    Note that you don't get to cast the spell on 50 men and hope to dispel the lowest 10 spells, and that if the men have multiple spells on them you have to choose how your Group is defined before you cast the spell, and you still only get 10 spells (unless you increase the size of the Group).
  • "Room of Mundane Silence" Voice, Mom, Room only affects some spells in a clearly defined room (walls, floor, ceiling), but the number is not limited - Room Target affects everything within the room - only the volume of the Room (unless, again, you increase the Size factor of the spell).

There are no spells in ArM5 which "affect an unbounded area". (If you lack a room, you can try either a Circle target (draw a ring on the ground) or Boundary (no walls but needs a defined limiting boundary and a Ritual spell))
There are spells which create an Individual amount of "stuff" such as Fire, or Fog, which, having a volume when created, will spread over an area of ground and so affect things within itself. Note that here that e.g. the burning by fire is a secondary effect - the primary spell effect is "create fire".

Vice versa when creating stuff, you can create an Individual thing (which may in turn find itself limited by surroundings) or a Group of things, but you can't create a Room, Struct, Boundary, Circle,... "of stuff" 9though you can create your Ind or Group within a rommor structure and it may happen to be enough to fill same.).

Note also that (particularly with Perdo) you may wish to eg make a hole, and this uses the Part Target (not Ind - which has to be "all of a single thing")

If you have read ArM4 it is likely you are remembering that - the spell categories were less clearly defined and some spells slopped over between categories; Arm5 instead tries to anticipate this and define more categories, and define them more clearly.

3

I see the differences between the 4th ed Targets, and the way the 5th ed works is more rational I think.

But "Winds of Mundane Silence" Target Room might need to be redefined, otherwise it'd only work outside.

The problems arise because spells are less intangible than fire or fog, so Target: Individual/Group isn't always doable. If "WoMS" is limited to affecting such targets, you'd really have to InVi a lot, so you know excately what you're casting on. Most often my players will use it, to rid an area of spells, not knowing precisely what and how many effects actually are in play.

I think the easiest fix, would be to add to these guidelines, or the spell description, this clause: "If the target area is not a well-defined room, the caster must encircle the area, as if casting Target:Circle. The maximum diameter of the circle should yield less area than if casting Target Room."

At the moment, I cant remember the size definition of Target Room, but this figure should be mentioned in the above clause.