The first year he'll start out by mentoring his apprentice for a season.
The second season he learns Words with the Flickering Flame from lab notes. His plan is to use this in conjunction with his spells to turn other objects into fires (Transformation of Fire , Transformation of Fiery Steel , and Consummate Transformation of Fire).
I imagine that this would give him a target to speak with that has the worst mental characteristics of words with the flickering flame and stone tell of the mind that sits/converse with plant and tree. Yet it is still something and Ranulf's deficiency with intellego really harms him in using most reasonable alternatives (at least magical ones, non-magical ones are hindered by the gift).
I was going to have Ranulf develop two additional spells to help him with this plan but they worked out to non-fatiguing sponts:
Season 3: Ranulf invents both Enigma's Gift (so he can master it for defense) and Restore the Faded Threads at level 25 (from true lineages, because while he doesn't have any significant intellego vim to use on spell traces but as a hopolite he's eager to keep traces fresh for his Quaesitor associates that do have intellego vim) using lab texts.
Season 4 he spends doing a last season of tutoring for his apprentice
I'll now assign 11 years of XP (330 points) and go on to three more years of lab work.
Ancient Greek 2
Aramaic 2
These two were because he went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and spent some time in the Thebian tribunal while doing it.
Artes Liberales to 4
Philosophae to 3
Spell mastery Enigma's Gift (defense)
Spell mastery Wind of Mundane Silence (defense)
Spell mastery Opening the Intangible Tunnel (defense)
Muto to 20
Vim to 25
Spell mastery pillum of fire to 6 (finesse)
Magic Theory to 9
Perdo to 15
Finesse to 6
Spell mastery Consummate Transformation of Fire (fast casting) This can now be a good defensive spell
6 xp in ignem which becomes 9 xp as a result of his affinity.
The next two seasons are used to create something more questionable from a rules perspective
This spell uses the guideline for a total change in spell (p 139) with the note that a change of more than two magnitudes requires a creo requisite. I added two magnitudes to support the third target level increase but an argument could be made that this requires tripling the original spell level or some other level boost. Does this seem to be reasonable to you?
Well, as far as I can tell, the difference between autohit and aimed spells is thus:
Autohit spells guide the spells all the way toward the intended target, which some troupes may describe as allowing curve trajectories and flight correction to account for a moving target, anime-like
Aimed spells use non-magical mediums, and "throw" them toward the intended target. Thus, if she moves or else (thus the defense roll), the spell can miss.
Consider, for exemple, Invisible Sling of Vilano and its "autohit" variant: One spell guides the stone all the way, the other just gives an initial impetus.
=> To me, with autohit spells, if you target the "wrong" target (or if you target an illusion, thinking it to be real), this is what you hit... SAVE if your range is AC, in which case, the spell is guided not by your physical perceptions but by the AC link itself.
I agree. Another way of looking at it is that if you don't realize where the target is, you are not perceiving it, and thus you can't affect it with magic without an arcane connection. Assuming that the spell automatically knows "the truth" even when the caster doesn't can lead to all sorts of abuse and confusion. I'd really try to stay as far away from that can of worms as possible.
I'll also chime in late on the other aspects of this interesting discussion.
I agree with those who say that the pilum shooting out of the magus' hand is cosmetic. The caster is effectively creating the fire at a distance. If the caster wants to affect that fire, he needs a Voice range spell. This is different from affecting the spell as it's cast, which could be done with a R:Touch MuVi spell. Yes, this discrepancy between the "look" of the spell and the actual effect can cause reality disconnects; but between fluff and mechanical base I'd always go with the mechanical base to rule stuff. For Pilum of Fire (and it's Pilum, not Pillum!) in my games I say it's an "ethereal" javelin of fire that can bypass walls etc. and goes off in a burst of "real" fire only when it hits the target.
I find using Muto to increase damage by +5 per magnitude fishy. I really don't like it. It's not in the guidelines; if I really were to design a new guideline in this sense at the very least I'd require the same base level as creating the fire from scratch (keep in mind that affecting a hotter fire requires 1 extra magnitude for every +5 of damage caused by the original fire -- so bringing a +45 fire to +50 would require the same magnitude as bringing a +5 fire to +50, which one could argue should then be the same magnitude as bringing "no fire" to +50).
Also, can a fire get arbitrarily damaging? One could read the guidelines as saying that the "hottest" a fire can get is +30. I'm not arguing this position, I'm just pointing out that it may be worth considering. I haven't bothered perusing the books in search of hotter fires, though I do recall there's a Ranulf spell/effect somewhere in MoH that does +35 damage. Still, I'd say that it's not obvious at all that you can get all the way up to +50.
As for fires that "stick" to the target, there's precedent for those in Blade of the Virulent Flame and Coat of Flame... and the latter specifically states that its Diameter duration causes the target to take damage 20 times.
Imaginary fire is a funny thing for a creo ignem spell to create. I changed it because it was cheesy but I don't see the justification for why this cosmetic bit isn't cosmetic actual fire rather than cosmetic "ethereal" fire.
the guidelines that I used are actually harder than what you describe. The spell has a base level which grants no additional damage and it has to be adjusted for the target spell's heat, ergo it comes out as a higher level than an equivalent creo ignem spell.
I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. The problem is this. Mechanically, Pilum of fire creates the fire at a distance. So, if there's a gauzy veil between the magus and the target (thin enough for the magus to see the target through it), the magus burns the target without damaging the veil and without leaving proof that he shot the javelin from behind the veil. But if we imagine a javelin of fire shooting from the caster's hand towards the target, there's no way the veil could survive intact. Thus, a disconnect between the mechanics and the "cosmetic" changes - changes that unfortunately suggest a mechanical resolution different, in aspects that matter, from the correct mechanics. One way of making the situation adhere to the mechanics in many similar situations while saving as much of the cosmetics as possible is to say that what shoots from the caster's hands appears to be a javelin of fire, but this javelin has no substance (and thus does not interact with physical reality) until it hits the target.
There is a very substantial benefit in following the mechanics rather than the fluff -- in decoupling style from substance,
if you wish. It allows me, as a storyguide, to accept any cosmetic changes proposed by the players without worries of their actual repercussions on the game in terms of game balance, consistency etc. I can accept anything that looks cool, because I know there isn't a hidden price for that coolness. Thus, my games will generally feature cooler visuals while remaining rock solid.
I think that this benefit can be achieved by noting the cosmetic portions of spells as cosmetic. In other words an agreement not to be exploitative about what is specifically intended to be trivial. If the players want to take advantage of the cosmetic things they should redesign the spell.
This, to me, is an easier thing to swallow than having incidental pseudo flames as defined reality within the story.
Well, don't forget that, in Ars, cosmetic effects are quite real, as evidenced by "Frosty Breath".
I see no problem in having the fire burn the veil, just like I see no problem in having it be stopped by an invisible wall (your targeting was right, but the wall interfered, just like if an ennemy magus had fast-casted it to stop your pilum).
This, IMO, is one of the things that Tremere would have taken pains to prepare: the ability to muto walls so that they can see through, AND custom spells that "really" create a fire at a distance, so that they can target and shoot their ennemies, but not the reverse.
As I see it, cosmetic effects are there to be cool and flavorful, not to be munchkinized or a headache. So they're fine if
They add nothing special to the spell (who cares if your CrIg spell only conjures purple flames?), which is very akin to a sigil's effect, as I see it.
OR
They mostly limit its effectiveness, like for Frosty Breath or PoF.There may be cases where a clever player can make use of it, but these should be rare.
If the cosmetic bit has a real effect that allows the spell to do more, it needs a requisite and/or added magnitudes.
Meh, those spells are likely to be R: Sight anyway.
The sound of your voice may carry about 50 yards, but not if there's a 10 foot stone wall in the way!
ah, apologies. I did catch your point, I simply ignored it.
I think I was trying (and clearly failing!) to communicate that you might as well integrate this change of cosmetics while re-inventing the spell wth R: Sight anyway.
Looking at my notes from last summer I had Ranulf creating a spell that as I look at it now I feel is horribly flawed. I'm goigng to post it anyway and see if we can come to a consensus as to what it would take to actually pull off the effect.
This spell idea would work if you assumed some sort of a analogy where hermetic magic was only broadcast in a certain frequency range and it would then be possible to then attack all of the other ranges, or if hermetic magic were like a bacteria modified to be resistant to a certain antibiotic, and that antibiotic could then be used to kill all of the other magics. But I see no reason why I should believe that magic should to be this way, and even if it were, it might be better to use two magnitudes for the specificity.
As a counter argument unraveling the fabric of (form) doesn't have any difficulties not dispelling inappropriate magic. We can develop a version of unraveling the fabric of (any magics that the spell inventor is familiar with). It doesn't seem too large of a jump to let a magus develop a version of wind of mundane silence spell that doesn't dispel a sort of magics that he is intimately familiar with.
I might be tempted to develop the spell with an itellego requisite so that it could know what is a hermetic spell or not (although such a spell is beyond Ranulf with his deficient intellego flaw).
But does that come too close to a spell that is thinking for itself. Does selectively doing away with foreign magic require two spells, an intellego vim and a perdo vim?
The next season I had him develop a hopefully non-controversial spell that's been on his to do list for decades but always got pushed back in favor of things that I thought would provoke discussion
Certainly a less powerful spell could have been made but Ranulf had a season and a substantial lab total. I imagine that after using Stockade of Infernos a perdo vim spell more powerful than he can spont would frequently be helpful for him.
Not sure what to think about this one. +1 specificity is not enough, +2 is better.
I must admit I find that to be rather a jump.
I can follow that temptation - I feel it too.
However I'm waery of simply adding requisites every time I feel like they would be needed.
I think this should be doable simply via extra magnitudes (please note the plural).
Not much to comment on here, looks pretty clean.
Maybe T: Room instead? But then it's of limited use outdoors, admittedly.
