Pink Dot Problem

I cannot envision a magus banging their nose into an illusory wall that everyone else can walk through. I think illusions must just be negated inside the Parma, just like a magical fire that you walk through is. So MuIm Pink-Dot couldn't work.

I disagree with the notion that a sword turned pink is deflected by the Parma, but can understand the reasoning that makes it viable.

Given that, I think it's very feasible to get a piece of a magus, you just have to surprise him. One can't cast responsively to a shot arrow. A wad of crossbow bolts is going to ruin his afternoon unless he's always under the appropriate ReTe/ReHe protections, and then he's going to rack up warping points...three a year (ReHe, ReTe, and Longevity) are going to add up. Within five years he'll have a Warping Score of 2, seventeen years a 4, and that assumes no botches or alternate sources. After a while, it's going to add up...almost a hermetic equivalent of smoking. ; )

I do think, though, that it's very hard to harm a magus. While in twilight, but in the mundane realm, you're invulnerable. Short term protective magics cause no warping. Most fae or magical creature powers lack the penetration to harm a magus with a parma of three or greater. I think this edition makes it fairly tough to actually hurt a magus, and that's tough on a storyguide. Often, it feels like you need to crank the threat level to something just shy of excessive in order to really put a decent fear level into a magus... though I guess that's as it should be, but the problem that arises when you do that is that your average grog is so much hamburger when that sort of threat level raises its head. But then that also might be as it should be...

thoughts?

-Ben.

True enough, but there're ways to minimize the warping. First of all, any wise mage who expects any sort of serious brush with combat would do well to redesign the single-form ReIg, ReHe, and ReTe protective spells vs. fire, wooden and rock/metal weapons so as to make a combined warding spell with requisites. Optionally, one might also add Animal and Corporem requisites so to ward the blows, claws and teeth of mundane animals and humans, too. It would still mean doubling the Warping bill when the spell is up, but not so bad as 3-5 different wards. It would be a kind of second Parma.

Moreover, only mages that are on the road all the year or are downright paranoid would keep this spell on all the time. Many mages would activate it only when away from the covenant, on quest or travel. Let's say one or two seasons a year ? Also, this is a spell that many mages would prefer not to cast it except in the expectation of danger, since keeping it all the time hampers so many daily activities: you cannot handle wooden or metal tools (enchanted staff ? metal casting tools ?), touch or be touched by other people (no sex, no kissing, no handshake) or by animals (no ride, if the Gift would allow it): I'm uncertain whether such a spell would affect one's familiar and talisman, too. As a matter of fact, this is one spell many mages would want to master for the Fast Casting and Harnessed Casting mastered abilities, in order to quickly activate and drop it.

Therefore, for a typical magus, it would actually be rather simple to shield oneself from mundane violence with a minimum of warning, so warping-mindful games would typically only be vulnerable to surpise attacks, while the most paranoid ones would be protected almost all the time, but at the price of a significant (but not drastic) curtailing of one's lifespan.

But in any case, serious threats to a decent Hermetic mage should normally come from other mages and supernatural beings, not mundane rabble, who should quake in fear of a wizard's or witch's anger, not the other way around. A well-placed Incantation of Lightning trumps any number of peasants with torch and pitchforks and the Divine, not the mob, the force that ultimately keeps the Order from abusing the mundanes too much. And any serious Hermetic mage should be expected to end his span on Earth in Final Twilight or overwhelming violence. Straw death, decrepitude in one's bed, is the hallmark of the wimps and wussies. So speaketh Wotan, and well spoken it was :wink:

Shielding the Wizard's Life

Re Te (An, Co, He, Ig)

R: Per, D: Sun, T: Ind

The caster is protected from non-enchanted wood, stone, metal, and the blows and natural weapons of mundane animals and humans, as well as any non-magical heat and fire which inflicts +20 damage or less. None of these can actually contact his body. Other animal and plant materials, however, can.

I don't think so. I think the pink point defense works, the sword is now magical and blocked by parma. As mentioned, however, this requires you to cast the pinking spell at the weapons.

In practical terms, I think the PDP has not really entered my games. Furthermore, I think magi shouldn't be worried by mere mundane opponents in general and I don't think the pinking spells are so out of whack with warding spells as to make them game-breaking in that regard (you have to see the target, cannot cast the spell in advance, and so on). It's not pretty, but it isn't really a problem.

I think a worse problem is magical weapons and enhancements, including powers of critters. It is ironic that the divine wolf Lupersus can't hurt the magus (or, supposedly, defend anyone form him) while under the effect of his own power. It is ironic that magi have to fear mundane swords, but not Excaliber.

MR doesn't protect against the mundane attacks of beings with might, only the supernatural... Perhaps the same can be said to apply to magic items?

It protects against supernaturally enhanced physical attacks by beings with Might, just as it protects against magically enhanced weapons.

Certainly, house rules can remedy that. But alternative Parma ideas are a different kettle of fish... :slight_smile:

As I said: not the object is magical, only its image is magical and images arent blocked by a parma.
But this might be my point of view whch might differ from SG to SG, but for game balace i would prefer my POV. :wink:

Ask yourself this Lucius: What is the target of the spell? That is what has become magical. Remember, that if the sword had some sort of MR, it would resist such a spell...

(Hmm - so if you're hunting an illusionist, use relics...)

The target is the image, not the objekt: if i cast a perdo imaginem on a sword i only destroy the image of the sword not a property of the sword (otherwise you could turn the image of an object with a MuTe/Co/He ect): in AM terms a objekt (terram, ignem, corpus ect) and an image (Imaginem) are two different things and an image is NOT a property of an objekt, it is something different.
And to the MR: i think image and object are overlapping, so the image is protected because of the objects MR, much like an object is protected by an magus parma.