Wizard's Boost & Warping

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

Quick question. When boosting an effect of level 25 to 30, will the effect now warp its target?

Or it is a way to gain another magnitude of power without warping?

W

2

Muto Vim changing the Target spell's magnitude may make it cross the warping threshold.

3

I've always thought Muto Vim is power munchkin paradise.

I don't know if there is an official ruling, however, I think it depends on the group. If they love power gaming, good exploit spotted. If they don't like power gaming, "Raising a magnitude, that's a warping".

4

We know for certain that MuVi on the first spell makes it effectively a higher-level spell for another MuVi. We also know for certain that levels for MuVi with items include and exclude the same things as Warping with items (e.g. they both ignore uses per day). Considering the consistency there, I would expect bumping a spell to level 30 via MuVi would cause Warping. If not, why would they work differently in this case and not in others?

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5

I'm also of the opinion it causes warping but lets explore potential angles of why it would not.

  1. MuVi adds magic of another kind so the same way that two spells of level 25 do not warp a target, the Mutated spell would also not
  2. The MuVi effect boost 9.999% of a full magnitude but some small amount is lost in the transition allowing the 1st effect to not warp the target
  3. "The effects of the extra 5 levels of power are for the storyguide to determine". Caster intent is to avoid warping so the final effect does not warp if a finesse roll is successful

W

6

In reply to those:

  1. So why does the second MuVi need to handle level 30 and not need Group? This is inconsistent.
  2. This suggestion doesn't even obey the rules for Warping, so it's clearly invalid. Level-26 is 6th magnitude, let alone level 29.something.
  3. If the intent is to avoid Warping, why not just not cast the MuVi? Clearly there is some other intent to the MuVi spell.
1 Like
7

Nothing says that a level 25 spell can never cause warping.
We know that a hermetic spell of 6th magnitude or higher does count as a "powerful mystical effect", and can cause warping. But other than that it is subjective what counts as a "powerful effect"
So a boosted level 25 spell may well be powerful enough to cause warping, even if it somehow doesn't reach 6th magnitude.

2 Likes
8

Yep. And I see no argument, that powering up a magic effect via MuVi makes it less warping than designing the end result properly in the lab.

9

1-5 = 1st magnitude
6-10 = 2nd
11-15 = 3rd
16-20 = 4th
21-25 = 5th
26-30 = 6th

OMG! Reality warping/shattering!

W

10

I think you misunderstand:

The magnitude of a spell is equal to one fifth of its level, rounded up

25.000001 / 5, rounded up is 6th magnitude.

Hermetic spell of sixth magnitude or higher counts.

OMG! Reality warping/shattering!

.

Also, in your OP you said 30, which you then changed later when providing this argument anyway.

1 Like
11

If you just used Wizard's Boost to affect the Penetration of the spell, would it cause Warping? After all, the spell is still level 25...

12

Why not? As I noted earlier, it is possible for a level 25 spell to cause warping. And if it has been boosted so as to be more powerful than a regular level 25 spell, I'd say it moves from "possible" to "likely".

13

That could potentially be fine. It's still level 25. An item with a level-25 effect with 0 penetration behaves the same for Warping as an item with a level-25 effect with 100 penetration. If you cast a spell, the penetration doesn't matter for Warping. Should adding more penetration this way?

But ErikT's point that the book doesn't say a level-25 spell cannot warp as a powerful effect still stands, so it's possible it could cause Warping.

1 Like