There are already spells that follow targets around. Let's take Coat of Flame for an example as it's probably closest. It just requires a Rego requisite to keep the flame following the person. So a simple following-type spell should be OK by adding a Rego requisite. Just because this is already a Rego spell doesn't mean you don't add the extra magnitude, though. Just add the same +1 for "intricacy" here instead of for "requisite." It's fairly simple following on and doesn't usually require Finesse.
Think of this more like glue than autopilot. You glue something to a person, and the thing moves along with the person. Glue doesn't need any sort of artificial intelligence or anything to figure that out. The motions are far less complex than those discussed in other threads.
Your analogy is weird, and quite besides any reasonable point. In particular, overextending control of a spell in time is an issue of Concentration, not of Finesse, and is treated on ArM5 p.122. It has nothing to do with Finesse at all.
Needing high Finesse stress rolls for delicacy (like "follow the grog's head with the sword's tip at 1 inch distance") certainly cannot be avoided by writing the command on a piece of parchment before, or such: the spell requires Finesse for delicacy by its description, and trying to modify some parameters would not change this.
Can you design a ReTe spell, that simply carries a sword behind your shield grog, without any tricky, fussy or menacing requirements, but also without demanding Finesse or supervision? I should think so.
MoH p.50 Circular Wall of Shields helps finding the limits here. No Finesse is needed to have the shields slowly rotate around a circle and cover what's inside from missiles. But the caster's Finesse determines the resulting Defense from Melee attacks.
The target is that particular sword and that particular person. Otherwise the sword is simply levitating, possibly attaching to any random head as they pass by, occasionally being dislodged and floating in air until another head wanders by ... which is an interesting thought.
Yes, you call the grog by name, but the sword is deeply stupid and ignorant. It knows not Kurt from Katherine.
I accept that the sword can be attached to a particular person without concentration, provided the extra magnitude. Concentration rolls would be required to shift the distance from tip to head.
After a while I'd think the grog would discover that the sword will maintain a (roughly) one inch distance no matter what skips or drops, so dancing seems likely to not only restart, but increase as the playful grog experiments.
At the end of the spell, of course, it falls directly down on the grog's head, much like the one soon to drop on the magus. Nasty time-bomb spell.
Perhaps my point seems weird to you because you are quite literally misreading it?
I never wrote "overextending control in time", as in "making something last longer".
I wrote "overexerting control". As in, I'm supposed to lift a glass exactly 54 cm from the ground, and I lift it 55 cm from the ground.
Again, there seem to be some communication difficulties between us. One thing is delicacy. Another is precision. If I have a solid, flat bench with a surface exactly 54cm from the ground, I can position a heavy box with great precision at 54cm from the ground, without any delicacy whatsoever, by just dumping it onto the bench.
groan. Why didn't you say so earlier?
Hmmm. I must say I can't fully understand what this spell exactly does, nor whether it implies you can have a sword or shield follow a grog, without demanding Finesse or supervision. For example, the spell does not specify if the designated person around which the shields "orbit" can move with the shields following him, or it's more like the magus designates the initial position of a person to be the immovable centre of the shields' orbit. In the latter case, the shields are not responding to the environment, they are simply moving around in space.
It's also not entirely clear if the shields actively try to block blows, or simply move around in a predefined pattern. In the latter case, no reaction to the outside environment is again taking place, and the Perception + Finesse roll simply suggests that the greater the caster's Finesse, the more intricate (and hard to penetrate) the whirling pattern he can set up (though we read that the shields rotate "slowly"...). However, I think that the shields actively react to attacks -- because if there are at least two of them per person, even if buckler sized, they perfectly block all missile attacks (whereas it would seem that if they moved around slowly and obliviously to incoming missiles, and one just shot random arrows at the protected person, at least a few should manage to hit).
Last but not least, the spell does not say what happens if the "protected" person also attempts to defend himself by dodging melee attacks. Can he do it? If he can, does only the better Defense Total (that of the shields or that of the defender count?
In any case, note that the grogs in question appear to have no control whatsoever on the movement of the shields (save the ability to remove them), so this example does not prove that in a case like Gauntlet of Ogre Power the caster would use Finesse + Perception to hit. It's a very different scenario, where the Rego Terram movement is controlled by the will of the caster.
Not the most illuminating example, I'm afraid, but thanks for bringing it up.
Hmm. The example brought up by One Short (MoH, p.50, Circular Wall of shields) seems to suggest that no extra magnitude is needed ... if you read the spell as moving along with the protected person. Which is not at all clear from the description, at least to me.
Good catch.
Just a side note: the text specifically says "The Rego requisite ensures that the fire does not spread". So, it's a bit like the Rego requisite that protects the caster from those large scale devastation spells, but in this case it protects everyone but the intended target. I do not think this should be read as needed "to keep the flame following the person" -- I think that comes for free.
I should really reserve the question for the other threads but ... it seems then that a spell that makes something follow perfectly the tiniest movements of the target without supervision or Finesse rolls (and I'd say, without any extra magnitudes) is indeed possible.
Precision is one kind of delicacy, though not the only one.
Ex post any mechanical movement can be precisely described. But unless you know and consider at spellcasting the complete environment, and so know of the measurements of the 54 cm high table beforehand, having the spell hold the box at exactly 54 cm above ground requires delicacy.
As I said, the spell is an example to analyze just when Finesse is required to ReTe objects, and when not.
I am not particularly interested in the magnitudes, by which a spell's level needs to be increased to have an item follow a grog around.
Uh? I checked the link, but I can find no differences between the two corresponding portions of text. Nor does my post show sign of any edits.
I wrote overexerting, you wrote overextending (and added "in time"). I'm sorry but communication between us is getting worse
Yes! Chocolate is another Frankly, this whole thing is getting surreal. Let's move on, shall we?
The fact that I did not even realize that you were responding to that paragraph of mine (which I then removed as irrelevant) shows that we have really failed to understand each other's points. I still fail to see in my entire post a single instance of the word "overextending", which you then refer to. So, as I said, let's move on.
Here is an approach, that looks to me like it works:
The Sword Follows its Assigned Wearer ReTe 60 (R: Touch, T: Ind, D: Sun) Ritual
Transports the item you touch to within a pace of a person or animal, of which you hold an Arcane Connection. If it is not a Terram item, you need to include casting requisites. The transported item will hover near the person or animal, and for the Duration of the spell follow it around at the distance of about a pace. It cannot perform precise or complex maneuvers. At the expiration of the spell, the transported item falls down. The spell does not need any Finesse. It is a ritual only because of its level.
(Base 25 [MoH p.92], R:+1, D: +2, metal: +2, complexity: +2)
It uses an AC to define the person (or animal, because 'we can') which the item follows around, and extends the ReTe guideline for object transport with some hovering and following at its destination.
Touch to sword, plus AC to a target that the sword first gets teleported to (that's the guideline One Shot was referencing).
I can't fathom why One Shot decided he wanted to involve teleportation to AC range, but I guess that's the "because we can" part
It's not obvious that the spell works, but I'd say that if it does work, there are much lower level spells that just get a sword following a grog you start reasonably close to.
Hmm. Let's look at Coat of Flame, from the corebook. Does it need an AC or an InCo effect to follow the victim around for its Diameter duration? Nope! (Thanks to ... uhm, callen, I think, for pointing this example out).
InCo or an AC is not required to target victims of auto-hit spells, so I find it strange that it would be needed here. It certainly does not make sense in terms of many other Core spells.
i.e. Crystal Dart knows that it is meant to hurt that one person among the three standing by a door.
