# A Guide to Magic

##### A detailed description of Primal, Arcane, and Divine magic used by the Lesser races

### How to cast Magic Casting magic is the same as using any other skill, except the caster has greater control of the difficulty. In addition, **The Caster must have at least one rank in the skill in order to cast a spell** The different types of spells are: **Attack**, **Augment**, **Barrier**, **Conjure**, **Curse**, **Dispel**, **Heal**, and **Utility**. Casting Magic is usually an action, and costs 2 strain after successes and advantages are spent. In order to cast a spell you must use **Verbal**, **Motion**, and **Focus Components**. ### Magic Upgrades Each type of magic can be upgraded to add new effects. Upgrades have three components, **Difficulty cost**, **Effect**, and **Exp cost**. **Difficulty cost** determines how much the difficulty increases when you choose to add it to a spell. **The greatest Difficulty a spell may have is 5.** That means no more upgrades may be taken after the difficulty reaches 5. **Effect** is fairly self-explanatory, it adds new effects to the spells cast. **Exp Cost** is how much experience it costs to actually use the upgrade. Upgrades marked with * may be selected multiple times. ### Universal Magic upgrades

| Difficulty Cost| Effect | Exp Cost | |:----:|:---------------|:----:| | +1 | Silent: May cast Spell without the need for verbal components | 5 | +1 | Still: May cast Spell without the need for motion components | 5 | +1 | Illusion: Spell is not real, but appears to be real. Can only be used on Attack, Augment, and Conjure| 10 | +2 | Quick: May cast spell as a manuever | 15 | +3 | Permanancy: Augment, Conjure, and some Utility spells (determined by GM) become permanent. They may still be destroyed or dispelled. | 25

> ##### Illusion > **Attack** and **Illusion** creates a spell that affects the targets mental state, and is **Soaked by Willpower plus Discipline**. > **Augment** and **Illusion** lets one take the appearance of another being, with associated beneifits. >**Conjure** and **Illusion** lets you create creatures and weapons that deal damage as described in **Attack**, or create false images of objects. ``` ``` ### Linked Skills and Characteristic

| Skill | Linked Skill | Linked Characteristic | |:----:|:-------------|:-------:| | Arcana | Knowledge | Intellect | | Divine | Discipline | Willpower | | Primal | Survival | Cunning |

### Spell Maneuvers Spell manuevers function the same as regular maneuvers, except only those with at least one rank in a magic skill may use them.

### Magical Talents All these talents require 1 rank in a magical skill.

| Talent | Rank(Ranked) | Effect | |:-----|:-------|:-----:| | Blood Magic | 1(no) | Suffer 2 wounds instead of 2 Strain when casting magic. | Spell Focus | 2(yes) | Select a +1 difficulty upgrade that you have access to. Once per encounter, as a focus manuever, you may ignore the increase. Each rank lets you select one more upgrade. | Familiar | 2(no) | Gain an animal minion no larger than a housecat can aid or provide focus for free. | Spell Focus (Improved) | 3(No) | May use Spell Focus at any time as a focus manuever. | Blood Magic (Improved) | 3(Yes) | May suffer 2 wounds per rank to reduce the spells difficulty by one per rank. | Spell Adeptness | 4(yes) | As Spell Focus, but may select a +2 difficulty upgrade instead. | Familiar (Improved) | 5(no) | Familiar may cast spells equal to 1/2 your skill, linked skill, and characteristic 1/turn. | Blood magic (Superior) | 5(no) | May suffer a critical injury to reduce a spells difficulty to **Easy** 1/session. | Spell Focus (Superior) | 5(no) | May suffer 1 strain to use spell focus as an incidental once per session.

\page # Attack

##### Attack Magic upgrades | Difficulty Cost| Effect | Exp Cost | |:----:|:---------------|:----:| | +1 | Close Combat: Spell may target opponent at engaged. | 0 | +1 | Distance*: Increase range of the Spell by 1 range band. | 0 | +1 | Elemental: Spell gains one of Burn, Stun, or Ensare equal to linked skill. | 5 | +1 | Impact: Spell gains Knockdown and Disorient, with ranks equal to linked skill. | 5 | +1 | Explosive: Spell gains Blast equal to linked skill. | 10 | +1 | Deadly: Spell gains a critical rating of 2 and Vicious equal to linked skill.| 10 | +1 | Manipulative(Arcane Only): If Spell hits, Caster may spend 1 advantage to move target 1 range band. | 10 | +1 | Paralyzing (Primal Only): Spell gains Stun Damage and prevents opponent from taking Manuevers next round if successful. | 10 | +1 | Smite (Divine Only): Successes deal 1 additional damage against Patron's foes | 10 | +2 | Chained: The Spell gains Auto-Fire, the difficulty of which has already been included in the cost. | 10 | +2 | Destructive: The Spell gains Sunder. The Spell also gains Pierce equal to the linked skill |10| | +2 | Empowered: The Spell has a damage score equal to double the linked characteristic. Blast affects up to short range if available.| 15 | +2 |Lingering: If the Spell deals damage, the target must make a Hard Resilience check or suffer wounds and strain equal to linked skill |15 > ##### "Flavors" of Magic > Each Effect has been purposefully left vague as to what it narratively does. This is to keep some level of creativity to the Players and Story Teller > > For example, the Elemental upgrade can grant the Burn quality. This can be described as either acidic or fire causing the damage. Chained can either link between targets, as it's namesake implies, or it can be a rapid-fire of the base spell. ``` ```

## Spell Rules

##### Arcane, Divine, Primal **Concentration**: No **Duration**: Instant **Base Difficulty**:1

This Spell follows the standard rules for weapons. The base damage of the Spell is equal to the **Linked Characteristic**, the base range is **Short**, and has a no crit rating meaning a **Triumph** must be used to crit. Additional abilities are added from upgrades. > ##### Sample Spells > Taken From D&D, Pathfinder, and several other RPGs from the tabletop and from video games. >##### Arcana, Primal, and Divine | Total Difficulty | Spell Name | Effect| |:----:|:-------------|:----| | 2 | Magic Missile | Range +1. | 3 | Shocking Grasp | Engaged, Stun. | 4 | Vertigo | Knockdown, Sunder, Disorient, Pierce. | 5 | Fireball | Range +1, Blast, Burn. | 5 | Phantasmal Killer | Illusion, Range +1, Crit 2, Vicious >##### Unique | Total Difficulty | Spell Name | Effect| |:----:|:-------------|:----| | 3 | Astral Blast (Arcana) | Manipulative, Blast | 5 | Wyrm Shout (Arcana) | Manipulative, Knockdown, Sunder, Pierce, Disorient | 3 | Holy Flame (Divine) | Smite, Burn | 5 | Holy Wrath (Divine) | Smite, Empowered, Blast | 4 | Asp Bite (Primal) | Stun Damage, Prevents Manuevers, Engaged. | 5 | Venomous Miasma (Primal) | Stun Damage, Prevents Manuevers, Lingering. \page # Augment ##### Augment Magic Upgrades

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