The root of the system was my admiration for the simple Hit Die as a general measure for fighting ability. I learned D&D in the third edition era, so it wasn't until I started exploring older editions and retro-clones that I realized how much value there could be in a single number. I'd love to be able to work with something similar for magic. "Magic Dice" of sorts. I guess. So here's what I'm working with:
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A character with X Magic Dice can cast spells up to level X and begins each day with a pool of X dice to use in casting. When attempting to cast a spell, roll all of your magic dice; if the result is equal to or greater than the spell's difficulty (5x the spell's level), you succeed in casting the spell. Whenever a character fails at casting a spell, add one die to their pool; when they succeed, remove one die from their pool (minimum of one).
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Aside from my horrible use of pronouns in that paragraph, my biggest concern is probably that such a system could be exploited to cast low-level spells too often...although I guess that possibility is there with high-Intelligence Conjurers in The Black Hack, and it doesn't seem to break anything.
The spell list could be as broad or narrow as desired for the game, and it would be easy to add in "exploding" sixes...and rolls of "one" not counting for anything...to ensure that every instance of spellcasting has the chance to succeed or fail...
At any rate, I could imagine a really simple character advancement/construction system in which Hit Dice and Magic Dice are basically equivalent, so with each level, you just choose which one to add to your character.
UPDATE: Joel Priddy over at An Abominable Fancy has done an excellent breakdown of success rates with this system using a couple of different target number progressions. Be sure to head over there...not only does Joel use real-life mathematics to analyze this (rather than my typical "yeah, maybe that'll work..."), but his blog is always a great read...!
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| Margo the Magician. Because I wanted a picture in this post, and this one kind of fit the theme. |
It's not the same, but it reminds me of the WFRP2 system. Wizards have a spellcasting die per level -- there are four levels -- and they roll these and add up the totals to cast a spell; if the total beats the casting number the spell is cast.
ReplyDeleteDoubles cause side effects and triples cause even worse side effects, to the extent of rifts in space and time and d(a)emons appearing to eat everyone.
You'd have to tone down the effects of matching dice if you were to use it in D&D or any game with many character levels; perhaps have a staggered system so mishaps only occur with 4/8/12 matching dice, or something like that. Or maybe have one of the casting dice always be a "wild" die -- like in Star Wars d6 -- and if that comes up as a 1, then something bad happens, perhaps modified by the total number of casting dice used, so if you're rolling ten dice you get a worse effect on the 1 than you do if you're rolling two.
Ah, cool! I'll have to get my hands on those rules, as that sounds a lot like the sort of system I'll need to understand if I'm going to make this work. Joel Priddy suggested calamity-type effects over on G+, so that may be exactly where this ends up going. The wild die is also a very interesting thought...could be a small item to add in order to simplify effects.
DeleteThanks for the thoughts on it!
I love the way the Magic Dice pool goes up and down based on successful casting. That's an elegant way to track magic potential.
ReplyDeleteThanks James! I'm hoping the surface elegance pays off in actual play...I still have to play it in something more than random scenarios at the kitchen table. (I'm actually thinking it may work to model the abilities of a Green Lantern ring...)
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