Do size changing Muto spells stack?

Do size changing Muto spells stack?

If I cast a spell to change size, can I cast it again to repeat to the effect?

Of course, for spells to increase size, I need a high enough size modifier to affect the new, larger size.
But for shrinking spells?

Looking up Muto on ArM5 p.78, Muto magic is defined as granting or removing properties something cannot naturally have.
Being strict with that, a new size is a new property granted - and the spell should grant that new property completely, not by adding onto another size as a property granted before.

This argument is of course partially motivated by the wish to avoid stacking of magic adding or reducing size. But it serves its purpose, doesn't it?

Reading up ArM5 p.131 Preternatural Growth and Shrinking confirms this: "Adds +1 to the target's normal size or decreases it by up to 2 points." As the spell doesn't change the normal size of the target, casting it twice doesn't stack. Same for Arm of the Infant on the same page.

It seems like an iconic case of similar spell not stacking. Only the highest bonus (biggest size) applies.

I don’t know what would be the the case if several size changing spells with opposite purpose are cast in the same being. Only the last casted one applies? Or the highest magnitude?

Spells don't have any magic resistance. The last magic applied prevails.

And yes, if my previous spell still exists and I can apply it again by concentrating, I thereby can again overcome the magic that replaced its effect.

I would prefer if repeated spells didn’t stack, because that makes some things too easy.

From my POV, it doesn't stack. Last effective spell is effective.

In case of conflicting spells, see counterspelling rule or let the SG decide (it's a common debate in our IRL saga [when two magi use ReMe spells on the same person, but wanting to do conflicted things] - some SG would say highest level wins, other use casting total, other use penetration to decide which wins...)

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Even if you did allow them to stack, spells increasing size would eventually need a higher magnitude to affect a creature at the new, current size. The level 15 Preternatural Growth And Shrinking simply won't work on a person larger than size +1, no matter how you rule on repeated applications of the same spell or effect.

Stacking of the same things shouldn't work. Otherwise we get things like casting MuCo for +1 Soak repeatedly for +100 or so Soak for an adventure.

The one guideline which seems to be an exception is CrCo or CrMe to add one to a stat up to a set limit. They appear to be designed to be done as permeant spells sine the level will require the use of vis anyways, and just cast one after the other to raise the stat in question.

That's not really an exception, though. If the effect is no longer magical, there is no magic to stack on top of. It's just as much stacking as casting Gift of the Bear's Fortitude a single time on someone with the Tough Virtue.

Except that as written with the guideline you could cast a temporary version of the spell (say with a magic item) and it would still seem to stack. Of course warping would be prohibitive, but you could have an item with day duration that could be used repeatedly to raise a single stat multiple times on one character, up to the stated limit.

Why? There is nothing in the guideline's description to at all imply that any more than any other bonus provided by other spells would seem to stack. Just because there is a cap before it is no longer Creo and becomes something different?

The fact that increasing magnitudes increase the limit of how high the stat can be raised instead of how far it raises implies that they are stackable.

No, it doesn't. It just says that that +1 may need some extra oomph if it's to work on something with a naturally higher score.

With your reasoning, you could say similar about other guidelines. Let's say you have a ward that can hold back a Might-5 being. Increasing magnitudes increase the limit of how high a Might score can be held back. According to your reasoning, "that increasing magnitudes increase the limit of how high" implies stackable, that means I could throw down ten of these Might-5 wards to hold back a Might-50 being.

I don't really think you can compare Stat boosting Rituals with size-changing Muto spells. The Stat booster guidelines specify a maximum you can boost to, and then you need a higher guidelines. Exceptions are for stats below 0, which do stack. If they didn't, the guideline to raise a -3 by 1 point would be lower, and that might have been too easy. As it is now, it is as hard to increase a -3 as a -1.

But the size-changing spell refer to "normal size", which can reasonably be interpreted as un-stackable, although the guideline does not specify this, not does the generel MuCo text in the insert box.

I know changing size upwards quickly runs into the problem of not having sufficient size modifiers on the Indvidual Target. But changing down doesn't have this problem, and I'd like to avoid a loophole of repeated use of (relatively) easy spells. I mean, you can still stack Pilum of Fire, Demons Eternal Oblivion, Wound the Weeps etc.

These sentences reveal the internal conflict. There is no implication that they stack. The designers could have just decided that there is a minimum difficulty and that the difficulty doesn't rise until beyond a certain threshold. Your second sentence gives a reason the first sentence does not follow logically from what is written in the guidelines.

The fact is that guidelines do specify the need for greater magnitude to hold a being with greater might, they do specify, repeatedly how effects can be specifically increased with higher levels of magnitude. Except in this one case.
Admittedly it is implication, not specification, and your storyteller is free to disagree, but the implication does exist.

Did you not notice that I copied your wording for this guideline exactly to apply it to wards and it fit perfectly? This is because both follow the same logical structure for increasing spell level or magnitude.

"Except in this case"?!?!?! The guidelines for increasing Characteristics quite explicitly do specify "how effects can be specifically increased with higher levels or magnitude." How? The limit to what your spell can raise things is increased. Are you seriously saying that an increase in the level or magnitude for a spell that increases Characteristics is not specified? If so, please go reread the guidelines and keep rereading them until you read the specification about the upper limit.

This is just like warding. If you have a higher-level ward, I doesn't do anything more for the lower-Might things; it does nothing more at all. But it also works for the higher-Might beings, now providing them with the same result as the lower-level effect applied to lower-Might beings already.

To lay it out more clearly by writing both (wards against beings with Might and characteristic boosts) more mathematically:

ReFo N: Do something (prevent action across) if score (Might) ≤ function of N.
CrFo N: Do something (+1 to a Characteristic) if score (innate Characteristic) ≤ function of N.

As you can clearly see, in both cases the "do something" part does not increase with level or magnitude. Instead, the maximum value for "score" increases with level or magnitude. These behave in exactly the same way, just with different functions of N. Therefore, if it's an implication for one, it's an implication for the other. If you disagree about casting 10 wards against Might 5 to ward away Might 50, you are contradicting yourself, showing you your reading is incorrect.

As I've shown, the implication is only there if you apply your logic incorrectly to force a non-existent implication. Using proper logic, there is no such implication at all. You are welcome to disagree and play it however you want, but the implication does not actually exist at all.

a ward as you use it in this argument, is binary. either it stops the creature or it does not. This is not the same as raising a stat by +1, which could also be raised to +2. Unless you have some other suggestion as to what extra would happen to a creature beyond not being able to cross the ward... in the case of wards the unidirectional aspect of incrementalism is inherent in the function itself, and using that as an argument for the non-stackability of attribute bonuses is so fallacious as to be ludicrous. It's like saying that the fire doesn't get hotter because water can't get wetter.

Which is why I have done no such thing. If you think I've said that, then you really need to work on your reading. If you don't think I said that, why did you bother making that statement?

All I've done in this regard is to show that what you have said is not there is actually explicitly there. Just because it doesn't affect the part you have arbitrarily decided it should affect doesn't mean it isn't there.

First, it's not necessary. as my argument was just that there is a change with the increase in level or magnitude in consistent ways. Second, sure, how about pushing beings away instead of not just letting them enter? How about pushing them so much they get banished to their relevant realm? How about they cannot sense through it, either? I can imagine non-binary repulsion/blocking from a surface.