New Spell: The False Victim

My one hour commute has become three (no car , or easy access to one) , because my players moved.
A 14 hour commute would probably get me from Sydney to Los Angeles.

Noble's parma, so I may be wrong, but I believe you are. My understanding of these is as such:
CrCo draw on the Human form (Corpus), not on your particular form (I don't think there are platonic forms for individuals) and try to restore your body to that general form. That is, 2 arms, 2 legs, a head with 2 ears, 2 eyes... And no gaping wound inside of you.

Old wounds, such a a leg injury suffered during childhood, have become a part of you, of what you are, and now belong to your essential nature. It can't be healed by magic, even though you were born with 2 sounds legs.

=> You can temporarilly heal a Missing Eye (as per the flaw), but not permanently, since it has become part of the Target's essential nature, despite the basic Human Form having 2 eyes.
I seem to remember that's why physical flaws are supposed to be part of your essential nature and thus can't be healed, even when you weren't born with them. Not because the spells revert you to a form with a missing limb. These are imperfect, and thus not platonic ideals.

Again, noble's parma, but I seem to recall Aging to be Perdo, because it specifically makes you a worse exemple of a form.

I like this, and would probably have done somehting similar.

A side note: This, varying a spell, is supposed to be exactly what Finesse is good for. And, too often, I think people just build up the "varying" in the spell without even a requisite or added magnitudes. I think it's sad, because it diminishes finesse other as like a targeting stat.

Until you are 15 (IIRC) aging is Creo, since you ar eimproving to the perfect human form: a fully formed youth. From that point onwards, the passage of time makes you a worse example of a human being, but before you are maturing to perfection. Or the most perfect example of yourself, at least.

Cheers,
Xavi

Of course :smiley:

Ah, if you need to have the body at hand when casting, this replaces the need for a specific spell/a finesse roll/intellego you'd need otherwise.

My other comments were tangential to the spell anyway. Just nitpicking :wink:

So , what RAW spells or guidelines indicate that this is "how things work"?
That merely touching a particular individual thing when casting a Creo spell allows you to simply copy it.
No Intellego (Form) and/or Finesse roll required.
Lets not forget , that any created body is infused with the magus's sigil.

HoH: Societates , page 60:

For Levels of Success for Illusions on page 62 (HoH:S):

So by your spell , touching the body allows you to create an exact copy without a Finesse roll.
However , if you wanted to create an Image (Illusion) of the same body , while touching it ,
a Finesse roll is required.
You are saying , that creating something in the Form of Corpus , with a model ,
is different to creating something with the Form of Imaginem using a model.

Alternately, you might feel that the idea of using the Finesse for IM is also a mistake. Aside from making Finesse a dump skill that magi are required to put points into just to do normal magic tricks, the approach adds the complication of an extra die roll and unneeded randomness. Hermetic magic should work more reliably than that.

Well , i'm not trying to argue that people can house rule whatever way they choose on this.
Just trying to see if there is a RAW position that says you need or don't need a Finesse roll
or the use of Intellego magics.

My impression is , that in previous editions , Creo made perfect examples of the thing created.
Not just functional or average examples , but the limit of mundane perfection.
Magi could therefore dominate all trade and commerce by making the best possible versions of whatever they chose.
Human skills and crafts would be irrelevant.

That Creo was essentially "dumbed-down" in 5th edition for game balance reasons.

RAW is nebulous, to say the least, on the issue, which isn't surprising considering how many different authors wrote over the years just on 5th edition. Counterexamples to the concept of requiring Finesse rolls abound. For example, the hoary old spell "Conjuring the Mystic Tower" creates "an elaborately carved tower". Only by extrapolating from books that were published much later can one get the idea that this creates a hideously ugly tower that is likely to fall over at any moment.

Dumbing down Creo doesn't actually do much for game balance, because gross Creo is still ridiculously easy. You can make a lump of gold bigger than that tower with no great difficulty. If you want to scale down Creo you need to adjust the 1 magnitude = x10 volume rule.

I'm actually ok with the idea of requiring IN requisites to do copies but I'm not sure how supported that is in the rules. It's Finesse that gets on my nerves.

HoH:S p 60: "Creo magic always makes a functional version of that object,"
HoH:S p 62: "The simile of apples allows a magus to make apples that look natural, and vary from the ideal within the natural range."
Also: "This is also the level of Finesse required to create a copy of a particular person’s appearance, so that it fools friends of the original person."
To fool friends, you need Int + Finesse roll = 9, 6 if you use the original as a model but then you use Perception.

HoH:S p 60: "When creating artificial objects,"
C&G p67: "CRAFT LEVEL FOR SHODDY ITEMS: 3"
For artificial objects, you need Int + Finesse roll = 6 for a day's work. That should be an automatic success.

Well yeah. Creo Corpus makes a body, which emits species based on what characteristics that body has. If the copy of the body is close, the species would be similarly close. Creo Imaginum creates species directly. When interacting with species being produced by a body, that would only be that image at that particular moment, not the image that would be similar to that which would be put forth if the body was in a different position. Sort of like the difference between live action films and old pre computer animated films. In the one, once the prop is built, it just works that way. In the other, if you wanted to show the prop in different ways, you had to keep drawing it in different positions and rotations and so forth.

The big limit on Creo is the need for vis for permanent creation. For those things which are impermanent in nature, being able to make a copy of something but requiring that you have an example of that item to cast the spell is rarely more useful than a spell making a generic example of that form. If you want a horse to ride and don’t have one, The Wizards Mount is a useful spell. A spell that makes an exact duplicate of another horse is not nearly as useful. If you are trying to cross a river, The Bridge of Wood is a useful spell. If you had to touch a bridge to make a bridge, that is not a useful spell.

So, in terms of game balance, I don’t see it as much of an issue. It will almost never be as useful for a spell to make a copy of something but require the original be used in the casting of the spell as it is to have a spell which makes a generic example of that item. There are some limited examples of things which would be advantageous to have such a spell. For instance, if I can duplicate a bronze statue with CrTe spells, then I don't need to make lost wax models of that statue to make copies of it, I can use the original to make copies, use them to make the clay model, wait for the bronze inside the model to disappear and then fill the model with bronze again. But that is a pretty specific trade you are getting an advantage in.

But as you said, that is a different question that whether the RAW support this variation.

Oh?
I didn't remember that, and stand corrected.

Requiring a finesse roll for a spell without a copy seems perfectly normal to me, but I find requiring one for a spell that requires a copy at hand to work (which is an additionnal limitation) seems overly harsh :frowning:

So, this spell would create a perfect copy with a Pe+Finesse roll of 6+?
Not overly difficult, although I'd lift it completely in the case of a spell that requires the copy (contrary to the exemple, when you can do without)