MuVi 30 - Sight | Conc | Ind | - Scrying The Scryers
Targets an intellego effect of up to 30. If the caster can manage a casting total greater than the intellego affect, you too gain the same insight of that intellego effect provides.
(Sight +3 | Conc +1 | Ind +0 | Base 30 (2x(General +1)))
Moderate away.
W
Well, how does one see an Intellego effect?
Here are a few case examples I see:
Mage Tom Peeping is using Prying Eyes (InIm5) too peek into a room. Godiva of Guernicus Peers into the effect using Scrying The Scryers and sees that Tom is actually scrying Tania, the Baron's wife, tapping anothers mage familiar (albeit in human form). Tom will be acused of scrying on magical ressources of another mage at the next tribunal.
You could also use the effect to hear the taughts of a being subject to Thought Within Bable effect or a posing the silent question and any other intellego effect.
W
To work sight based magic, you need to be able to see the target. You can't see an Intellgo spell, without something else that detects the presense of Intellego magic, namely Intellego Vim. So, the target is wrong.
Also, this spell, even adjusting for the target will have issues of penetrating the magic, as per non-cooperative magi.
How does the rest of the MuVi effect work? I would think that if you see an hear a magus casting an effect, you can atleast attempt to determine the TeFo. You can also use SoAM to detect the intellego effects. I'm pretty sure that targetting a spell is a legit target.
I'm still unsure as to if the effect should be Intellego or Muto. Intellego could maybe allow to tap in the other intellego effect while it is still active and "listen in". Muto would superficially change the original effect while it is being cast to allow a "leak" from which you can tap into the effect. The muto effect might require an Intellego requesite...
W
Actually, I take it all back. Rereading the MuVi guidelines, such a spell is impossible, because it is impossible to target an effect already cast.
This sounds like it should be designed as an InVi spell.
Agreed so let us say it is cast while the other is. Does it work? Does it require an Intellego rq.?
Would it better work as a flat InVi?
In our campaign, I got this maga that keeps scrying on folks doing InMe spells. Knowing what she is looking for, on the spot, would be an advantage.
W
It's a tricky effect to design, since, as it has been stated, you must somehow both detect that the scrying spell is being cast, and cast your MuVi spell simultaneously. It's also a pretty dangerous spell to cast: if the potential scryer is indeed scrying on a Hermetic third party, by "tapping" his information flow, you are guilty of scrying on that third party yourself! If all you want to learn is what the scryer is trying to learn, rather than what information he got, it's probably better to go for a plain InVi spell.
Look at the InVi guidelines for detecting magic of a given level (note that the lower the level of the magic you are trying to detect is, the higher your InVi effect must be -- detecting subtle stuff is harder). Immediately below, you read that at the base level of the guideline, you learn the effect strength (i.e. magnitude). Adding 1 magnitude to your InVi spell, you learn if the target magic is Hermetic (or if it belongs to some other supernatural tradition you are familiar with). Adding 2 magnitudes, your learn Technique and Form. Adding 3 or more magnitudes you learn more details, depending on the design of the spell.
I'd say that for 3 magnitudes, you should be able to learn the T/D/R of the spell, including who the Target actually is, OR the spell guideline used. For 4 magnitudes, I'd say you should be able to learn the basic description of the spell, though possibly missing things like cosmetic details, side-effects resulting from experimentation, or any modification carried by a MuVi spell that causes a "superficial" change to the spell. This should be enough for your purposes. This extra information essentially makes it a "boosted" (+2 magnitudes) version of Sight of the Active Magics, i.e. a level 50 spell, You may want to turn it into a "Sounds of the spell details" with T:Hearing rather than T:Vision, which shaves off a magnitude.
Your original proposal has its closest equivalent in Passing the Reins of , a MuVi spell from Hermetic Projects which passes the "reins" of a spell to someone other than the caster. This is considered a "significant" change to the target spell for the purpose of the MuVi guidelines. Arguably, if you could somehow notice that a scrying spell is being cast (rather than has been cast) and can beat its initiative and penetration, you could use a similar change to "steal" the spell from the caster, so that now you do the scrying. To allow you to "clone" the information flow instead of stealing it, I'd probably add a magnitude. Note that Passing the Reins of is Form specific. I'd allow a version of the spell that works on all spells with the Intellego Technique (which is a bit broader than a Form specific spell) by adding yet another magnitude. The result would then be (assuming you are within Sight Range of the caster):
Scrying the Scrier: MuVi Gen, R:Sight, D:Mom, T:Ind
You can "tap" the information flow of a (non-Ritual) Intellego spell as it's being cast. The spell must be at least 20 levels lower than Scrying the Scrier. Thus, a Level 50 version of Scrying the Scrier can tap any spell of level 30 or lower.
(Base Level of the Target spell -5, +3 Sight, +1 "clones" the information flow leaving the original spell in place, +1 works on any Intellego spell)
Interesting but as all non superficial change bucket in MuVi, the level structure makes it impractical to use outside cooperative casting scopes. I was hoping to see that no change in target, level, base effect would bring it into the superficial change category. But I think you are right. The effect I'm looking for probably is an InVi Spell.
Scrying the Scrier: InVi 30, R:Sight, D:Conc, T:Ind
You can "tap" the information flow of a (non-Ritual) Intellego spell as long as it is active and you can perceive it as usual. Targetting a momentary effect is hard to time properly requiring you to best the iniative of the other caster. If successfull, you will obtain the same information as the other caster and gain the right to be prossecuted for scrying another magus at the next tribunal.
(Base Level 5, +3 Sight, +1 conc, +1 Obtain information retrived by the other effect)
W