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From:	Razor Girl <sprawlg@*******.COM>
Subject:	Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Fri, 11 Sep 1998 19:44:39 PDT

Message no. 1 I have been reading through the magic section today. The whole procedure
on spellcasting has me confused a bit. So if people could look at the
following examples and questions, and tell me if I understand things
properly, I'd appreciate it.

Take an example of spellcasting in combat. For our examples we will use
a Mage with a sorcery of 6, spell pool of 6, Willpower of 6, magic of 6.
(She may be a munch, but this is an example.) She is in combat with four
cops at a retirement party. Her team has just kidnapped a Knight Errant
Police chief who wants to defect to Lone Star. The first thing she does
in combat, after determining initiative; is identify to who, what and
if she is going to offer spell defence. She can only cover 6 people,
herself included. Now, here is where things begin to waver. Does she
allocate the spell defence dice now, or when the situation comes up? Any
of the dice she allocates are not allowed to be used for any other
sorcery actions, is that right? She can allocate any amount of sorcery
dice up to her magic rating. And she can allocate any amount of spell
pool dice up to her contributed sorcery dice.

She covers herself, three runners, the mission's extraction target and
their getaway van. She can see all of the things she allocated defece
dice for clearly. She puts 2 of her six sorcery dice and 1 of her spell
pool dice into a spell defence "fund". (it isn't a pool so it doesn't
refresh and it can vary depending on the owners wishes) This means that
she has 4 sorcery dice to cast spells with and 5 spell pool dice to
adjust things with.

Now when it comes to her first action of the turn (she rolls an 11 for
initative), she decides to cast a Force 5 Medium Powerball at the
pursuing police officers. She potentially has 4 Sorcery dice and 5 pool
dice, with which to cast this spell. She has also noticed that one of
the cops is out side of the area of the spells effect, by one meter. So
she expands it by 1 meter by reserving a Sorcery die. Is this die
considered spent for the remainder of the turn? She then casts the spell
throwing in all the dice she can. That equals 3 sorcery dice and 3 pool
dice, correct? So with six dice she casts the spell against the police.
She rolls the dice and gets a 2,3,3,5,5 and a 11.

The police officers, four of them, now make a spell resistance test.
Their combat mage buddy is still inside and not involved for this combat
turn. There are two humans with a body of 3, one is a dwarf with a 5,
and an ork with a 6. (They are really out of shape, but bare with me for
purposes of example ;-).) She has five successes against the two humans,
3 against the dwarf and one against the ork. All the police roll body
tests against target number 5, the force of the powerball. For the sake
of example lets say they one of the humans gets one body success and the
other three cops get 2 successes each. The first human takes deadly
damage (M dam +5 sorcery successes -1 resistance success = net +4 or
stage up two damage levels), the other human takes serious damage (M dam
+5 sorcery success -2 resistance success = net +3 or stage up one damage
level), the dwarf takes medium damage (M dam +3 sorcery successes -2
resistance successes = net +1 or damage level stays at medium) and the
ork takes no damage (M dam +1 success -2 resistance success = net -1 or
no spell effect). Is that all correct?

The mage now has to resist drain for the spell. She cast a Force 5
Medium Powerball. This means she resists 3M stun drain (Force 5 divided
by 2 and +1 for power, medium damage because it was a medium damage
spell and stun because force 5 is less than her Magic stat of 6). She
rolls her willpower of 6 and has two remaining spell pool dice to roll
if she chooses to. (6 spell pool dice less 1 in spell defence, 3 in
augmenting the spell success test, and two for drain.) She uses one
spell dice, rolls seven dice versus target number 3 and rolls 4
successes, staging the drain to nothing. She is left with one spell pool
dice.

Now it comes to her second action. What is the situation now? Is it she
cannot cast any spells since she has tied up all her sorcery dice in the
last initative pass and has only one spell pool die? Or does her full
sorcery become available again? Can she reset the spell defense dice to
get at those two sorcery dice? Or because the spell defence has the
option to break at the beginning of her action she has 6 sorcery dice
and 2 pool left to do stuff? Can she readjust her spell defence?

Lots of question, eh? Is sorcery like the pistol skill where you can
always use it at it's base level every time you test with it? Does it
refresh with every initative pass or does it diminish with use and not
recharge till the next combat turn begins?

It seems that the best way to play a magic user is to have a pile of
dice in front of you an physically move them around to track what is
your character's current magical options.

Thanks for reading this. Please insert comments, corrections or answers
at the point in the text you are referring to.

Ciao

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From:	Mongoose <evamarie@**********.NET>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sat, 12 Sep 1998 00:30:18 -0700

Message no. 2 :Take an example of spellcasting in combat. For our examples we will use
:a Mage with a sorcery of 6, spell pool of 6, Willpower of 6, magic of 6.
:(She may be a munch, but this is an example.) She is in combat with four
:cops at a retirement party. Her team has just kidnapped a Knight Errant
:Police chief who wants to defect to Lone Star. The first thing she does
:in combat, after determining initiative; is identify to who, what and
:if she is going to offer spell defence. She can only cover 6 people,
:herself included. Now, here is where things begin to waver. Does she
:allocate the spell defence dice now, or when the situation comes up?

Technically, she alocates on her action, but could have been
"sustaining" spell defense on those targets if prviously stated (and
possible given range and such).

:Any
:of the dice she allocates are not allowed to be used for any other
:sorcery actions, is that right? She can allocate any amount of sorcery
:dice up to her magic rating. And she can allocate any amount of spell
:pool dice up to her contributed sorcery dice.
:

Actually, you can plunk down as many spell pool dice as you want for
DEFENSE. For spell casting, its limited to sorcery dice used for casting,
but defense lets you go all out.

:She covers herself, three runners, the mission's extraction target and
:their getaway van. She can see all of the things she allocated defece
:dice for clearly. She puts 2 of her six sorcery dice and 1 of her spell
:pool dice into a spell defence "fund". (it isn't a pool so it doesn't
:refresh and it can vary depending on the owners wishes) This means that
:she has 4 sorcery dice to cast spells with and 5 spell pool dice to
:adjust things with.
:

You are golden so far.

:Now when it comes to her first action of the turn (she rolls an 11 for
:initative), she decides to cast a Force 5 Medium Powerball at the
:pursuing police officers. She potentially has 4 Sorcery dice and 5 pool
:dice, with which to cast this spell. She has also noticed that one of
:the cops is out side of the area of the spells effect, by one meter. So
:she expands it by 1 meter by reserving a Sorcery die. Is this die
:considered spent for the remainder of the turn?

Its a sorcery skill die she used for that casting. She can use he
whole sorcery skill again on her next action.

: She then casts the spell
:throwing in all the dice she can. That equals 3 sorcery dice and 3 pool
:dice, correct? So with six dice she casts the spell against the police.
:She rolls the dice and gets a 2,3,3,5,5 and a 11.

Sounds right to me.

:The police officers, four of them, now make a spell resistance test.
:Their combat mage buddy is still inside and not involved for this combat
:turn. There are two humans with a body of 3, one is a dwarf with a 5,
:and an ork with a 6. (They are really out of shape, but bare with me for
:purposes of example ;-).) She has five successes against the two humans,
:3 against the dwarf and one against the ork. All the police roll body
:tests against target number 5, the force of the powerball. For the sake
:of example lets say they one of the humans gets one body success and the
:other three cops get 2 successes each. The first human takes deadly
:damage (M dam +5 sorcery successes -1 resistance success = net +4 or
:stage up two damage levels), the other human takes serious damage (M dam
:+5 sorcery success -2 resistance success = net +3 or stage up one damage
:level), the dwarf takes medium damage (M dam +3 sorcery successes -2
:resistance successes = net +1 or damage level stays at medium) and the
:ork takes no damage (M dam +1 success -2 resistance success = net -1 or
:no spell effect). Is that all correct?

Seems correct to me. Note that the ork only needed ONE succses; zero
succeses= no effect.

:The mage now has to resist drain for the spell. She cast a Force 5
:Medium Powerball. This means she resists 3M stun drain (Force 5 divided
:by 2 and +1 for power, medium damage because it was a medium damage
:spell and stun because force 5 is less than her Magic stat of 6). She
:rolls her willpower of 6 and has two remaining spell pool dice to roll
:if she chooses to. (6 spell pool dice less 1 in spell defence, 3 in
:augmenting the spell success test, and two for drain.) She uses one
:spell dice, rolls seven dice versus target number 3 and rolls 4
:successes, staging the drain to nothing. She is left with one spell pool
:dice.
:
:Now it comes to her second action. What is the situation now? Is it she
:cannot cast any spells since she has tied up all her sorcery dice in the
:last initative pass and has only one spell pool die? Or does her full
:sorcery become available again? Can she reset the spell defense dice to
:get at those two sorcery dice? Or because the spell defence has the
:option to break at the beginning of her action she has 6 sorcery dice
:and 2 pool left to do stuff? Can she readjust her spell defence?
:

She would take her entire sorcery (and 1 pool die) and do whatever she
wants. She could allocate spell defense AFTER casting any spells; it's a
free action.

:Lots of question, eh? Is sorcery like the pistol skill where you can
:always use it at it's base level every time you test with it? Does it
:refresh with every initative pass or does it diminish with use and not
:recharge till the next combat turn begins?

You get your full sorcery each action, but must split its dice among
uses in that action.

:It seems that the best way to play a magic user is to have a pile of
:dice in front of you an physically move them around to track what is
:your character's current magical options.

I did that for combat pool in SR2 already. In SR3, its even more
vital; a long time could pass in RL before your pool refreshes, making it
hard to track in your head.

:Thanks for reading this. Please insert comments, corrections or answers
:at the point in the text you are referring to.

Thank you for being so lucid and structured in your syntax. It was
easy to reply at the proper time, despite that advice to do so was at the
end.

Mongoose

From:	Spike <u5a77@*****.CS.KEELE.AC.UK>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sat, 12 Sep 1998 12:10:08 +0100

Message no. 3 And verily, did Razor Girl hastily scribble thusly...
|Take an example of spellcasting in combat. For our examples we will use
|a Mage with a sorcery of 6, spell pool of 6, Willpower of 6, magic of 6.
|(She may be a munch, but this is an example.) She is in combat with four
|cops at a retirement party. Her team has just kidnapped a Knight Errant
|Police chief who wants to defect to Lone Star. The first thing she does
|in combat, after determining initiative; is identify to who, what and
|if she is going to offer spell defence. She can only cover 6 people,
|herself included. Now, here is where things begin to waver. Does she
|allocate the spell defence dice now, or when the situation comes up? Any
|of the dice she allocates are not allowed to be used for any other
|sorcery actions, is that right?

Yes. You alocate your defence dice before hand so you can't suddenly say,
"Ahhh, blow it, I was going to defend myself, but as there aren't any mages
about... KABOOM!"

She can allocate any amount of sorcery
|dice up to her magic rating. And she can allocate any amount of spell
|pool dice up to her contributed sorcery dice.

Ahhhhh, 3rd Ed....
I'll stop now....
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
|u5a77@*****.cs.keele.ac.uk| Windows95 (noun): 32 bit extensions and a |
| | graphical shell for a 16 bit patch to an 8 bit |
| Andrew Halliwell | operating system originally coded for a 4 bit |
| Finalist in:- |microprocessor, written by a 2 bit company, that|
| Computer Science | can't stand 1 bit of competition. |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
|GCv3.1 GCS/EL>$ d---(dpu) s+/- a- C++ U N++ o+ K- w-- M+/++ PS+++ PE- Y t+ |
|5++ X+/++ R+ tv+ b+ D G e>PhD h/h+ !r! !y-|I can't say F**K either now! :( |

From:	David Foster <fixer@*******.TLH.FL.US>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sat, 12 Sep 1998 10:24:28 -0400

Message no. 4 On Fri, 11 Sep 1998, Razor Girl wrote:

->I have been reading through the magic section today. The whole procedure
->on spellcasting has me confused a bit. So if people could look at the
->following examples and questions, and tell me if I understand things
->properly, I'd appreciate it.
->
->Take an example of spellcasting in combat. For our examples we will use
->a Mage with a sorcery of 6, spell pool of 6, Willpower of 6, magic of 6.
->(She may be a munch, but this is an example.) She is in combat with four
->cops at a retirement party. Her team has just kidnapped a Knight Errant
->Police chief who wants to defect to Lone Star. The first thing she does
->in combat, after determining initiative; is identify to who, what and
->if she is going to offer spell defence. She can only cover 6 people,
->herself included. Now, here is where things begin to waver. Does she
->allocate the spell defence dice now, or when the situation comes up? Any

She can allocate spell defense dice any time during which she has
a Free Action. Free Actions must always be declared at the beginning of a
Combat Phase, so only if your opponents have a lower init. than you do
would you be able to hear their declarations and then declare your own
actions.

->of the dice she allocates are not allowed to be used for any other
->sorcery actions, is that right? She can allocate any amount of sorcery
->dice up to her magic rating. And she can allocate any amount of spell
->pool dice up to her contributed sorcery dice.

Yep.

->She covers herself, three runners, the mission's extraction target and
->their getaway van. She can see all of the things she allocated defece
->dice for clearly. She puts 2 of her six sorcery dice and 1 of her spell
->pool dice into a spell defence "fund". (it isn't a pool so it doesn't
->refresh and it can vary depending on the owners wishes) This means that
->she has 4 sorcery dice to cast spells with and 5 spell pool dice to
->adjust things with.
->
->Now when it comes to her first action of the turn (she rolls an 11 for
->initative), she decides to cast a Force 5 Medium Powerball at the
->pursuing police officers. She potentially has 4 Sorcery dice and 5 pool
->dice, with which to cast this spell. She has also noticed that one of
->the cops is out side of the area of the spells effect, by one meter. So
->she expands it by 1 meter by reserving a Sorcery die. Is this die
->considered spent for the remainder of the turn? She then casts the spell
->throwing in all the dice she can. That equals 3 sorcery dice and 3 pool
->dice, correct? So with six dice she casts the spell against the police.
->She rolls the dice and gets a 2,3,3,5,5 and a 11.

I'm not doubting you, but where does it say you can withhold
Sorcery dice and increase the area of effect? I cannot find it in my BBB3
no matter how hard I looked. I remember it in SR2 but can't find it in
the BBB3.

->The police officers, four of them, now make a spell resistance test.
->Their combat mage buddy is still inside and not involved for this combat
->turn. There are two humans with a body of 3, one is a dwarf with a 5,
->and an ork with a 6. (They are really out of shape, but bare with me for
->purposes of example ;-).) She has five successes against the two humans,
->3 against the dwarf and one against the ork. All the police roll body
->tests against target number 5, the force of the powerball. For the sake
->of example lets say they one of the humans gets one body success and the
->other three cops get 2 successes each. The first human takes deadly
->damage (M dam +5 sorcery successes -1 resistance success = net +4 or
->stage up two damage levels), the other human takes serious damage (M dam
->+5 sorcery success -2 resistance success = net +3 or stage up one damage
->level), the dwarf takes medium damage (M dam +3 sorcery successes -2
->resistance successes = net +1 or damage level stays at medium) and the
->ork takes no damage (M dam +1 success -2 resistance success = net -1 or
->no spell effect). Is that all correct?

Looks correct.

->The mage now has to resist drain for the spell. She cast a Force 5
->Medium Powerball. This means she resists 3M stun drain (Force 5 divided
->by 2 and +1 for power, medium damage because it was a medium damage
->spell and stun because force 5 is less than her Magic stat of 6). She
->rolls her willpower of 6 and has two remaining spell pool dice to roll
->if she chooses to. (6 spell pool dice less 1 in spell defence, 3 in
->augmenting the spell success test, and two for drain.) She uses one
->spell dice, rolls seven dice versus target number 3 and rolls 4
->successes, staging the drain to nothing. She is left with one spell pool
->dice.

Math is good, math is your friend, and your math is well
behaved... looking good so far.

->Now it comes to her second action. What is the situation now? Is it she
->cannot cast any spells since she has tied up all her sorcery dice in the
->last initative pass and has only one spell pool die? Or does her full
->sorcery become available again? Can she reset the spell defense dice to
->get at those two sorcery dice? Or because the spell defence has the
->option to break at the beginning of her action she has 6 sorcery dice
->and 2 pool left to do stuff? Can she readjust her spell defence?

Sorcery SKILL dice refresh every action, so your next action
you've got all 6 dice (and reduce your spell defense unless you
re-allocate the dice). It would be like having a Sami holding back Pistol
dice from one action and losing them the next action.

->Lots of question, eh? Is sorcery like the pistol skill where you can
->always use it at it's base level every time you test with it? Does it
->refresh with every initative pass or does it diminish with use and not
->recharge till the next combat turn begins?

Yes, Yes, no.

->It seems that the best way to play a magic user is to have a pile of
->dice in front of you an physically move them around to track what is
->your character's current magical options.
->
->Thanks for reading this. Please insert comments, corrections or answers
->at the point in the text you are referring to.

Did so.

Fixer --------------} The easy I do before breakfast,
the difficult I do all day long,
the impossible only during the week,
and miracles performed on an as-needed basis....

Now tell me, what was your problem?

From:	Razor Girl <sprawlg@*******.COM>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sat, 12 Sep 1998 08:02:02 PDT

Message no. 5 >:Any of the dice she allocates are not allowed to be used for any
>:other sorcery actions, is that right? She can allocate any amount >:of
sorcery dice up to her magic rating. And she can allocate any >:amount
of spell pool dice up to her contributed sorcery dice.
>:
>
> Actually, you can plunk down as many spell pool dice as you want
>for DEFENSE. For spell casting, its limited to sorcery dice used >for
casting, but defense lets you go all out.

The rules in SR3 seem in coflict then. On page 183 "To use Spell
Defence, allocate Sorcery dice, plus any Spell Pool dice desired, to
defence." The on page 180 "Dice from the Spell Pool can be added to
Sorcery Tests for spellcasting, spell defence and dispelling. No more
Spell Pool dice can be used than the number of Sorcery dice allocated to
the test."

So which is it?

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From:	Razor Girl <sprawlg@*******.COM>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sat, 12 Sep 1998 08:05:59 PDT

Message no. 6 >->She has also noticed that one of the cops is out side of the area
>->of the spells effect, by one meter. So she expands it by 1 meter >->
by reserving a Sorcery die. Is this die considered spent for the
>->remainder of the turn? She then casts the spell throwing in all
>->the dice she can. That equals 3 sorcery dice and 3 pool dice,
>->correct? So with six dice she casts the spell against the police.
>->She rolls the dice and gets a 2,3,3,5,5 and a 11.
>
>I'm not doubting you, but where does it say you can withhold Sorcery
>dice and increase the area of effect? I cannot find it in my BBB3 >no
matter how hard I looked. I remember it in SR2 but can't find it >in
the BBB3.

>Fixer

See page 181 under the Preperation section. And thank you for your
answers.

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From:	Mongoose <evamarie@**********.NET>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sat, 12 Sep 1998 21:00:47 -0700

Message no. 7 :> Actually, you can plunk down as many spell pool dice as you want
:>for DEFENSE. For spell casting, its limited to sorcery dice used >for
:casting, but defense lets you go all out.
:
:The rules in SR3 seem in coflict then. On page 183 "To use Spell
:Defence, allocate Sorcery dice, plus any Spell Pool dice desired, to
:defence." The on page 180 "Dice from the Spell Pool can be added to
:Sorcery Tests for spellcasting, spell defence and dispelling. No more
:Spell Pool dice can be used than the number of Sorcery dice allocated to
:the test."
:
:So which is it?

HMM. (puzzles for 45 secs). Maybe spell defense isn't a test as such;
it's more a resistance roll? If it IS a test, injury modifiers apply,
which gets ugly. (of course, they apply to dodging, so...) I'd say it's
not a "test" as such, and so the limit does not apply.
BTW, you seem good at finding refs; isn't it possible for a mage to
use spell defense on themselves at any time, without allocating defense?
Or was that removed to boost the cost of using exclusive magic?

Mongoose

From:	David Foster <fixer@*******.TLH.FL.US>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sun, 13 Sep 1998 12:59:18 -0400

Message no. 8 On Sat, 12 Sep 1998, Mongoose wrote:

->:> Actually, you can plunk down as many spell pool dice as you want
->:>for DEFENSE. For spell casting, its limited to sorcery dice used >for
->:casting, but defense lets you go all out.
->:
->:The rules in SR3 seem in coflict then. On page 183 "To use Spell
->:Defence, allocate Sorcery dice, plus any Spell Pool dice desired, to
->:defence." The on page 180 "Dice from the Spell Pool can be added to
->:Sorcery Tests for spellcasting, spell defence and dispelling. No more
->:Spell Pool dice can be used than the number of Sorcery dice allocated to
->:the test."
->
-> HMM. (puzzles for 45 secs). Maybe spell defense isn't a test as such;
->it's more a resistance roll? If it IS a test, injury modifiers apply,
->which gets ugly. (of course, they apply to dodging, so...) I'd say it's
->not a "test" as such, and so the limit does not apply.
-> BTW, you seem good at finding refs; isn't it possible for a mage to
->use spell defense on themselves at any time, without allocating defense?
->Or was that removed to boost the cost of using exclusive magic?

I just (because I was bored, I'll admit it) put together a Physad
decker with the Sorcery Skill & Astral perception. Physads are still
classified as magicians and, according to the rules on page 183, it only
says magicians are able to use spell defense.
Also, on a side note, Spell Pools (Int, Wil, Mag add & divide by
3) are available to magicians, and Physads are magicians, so why wouldn't
they have one for Spell Defense?
On page 55 it says, "Adept characters use their magic in radically
different way than other magician characters." and this tends to look like
Adepts are an 'other' magician type... and therefore be able to use Magic
Pool and Spell Defense.

Fixer --------------} The easy I do before breakfast,
the difficult I do all day long,
the impossible only during the week,
and miracles performed on an as-needed basis....

Now tell me, what was your problem?

From:	Razor Girl <sprawlg@*******.COM>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sun, 13 Sep 1998 10:51:03 PDT

Message no. 9 >I just (because I was bored, I'll admit it) put together a Physad
>decker with the Sorcery Skill & Astral perception. Physads are still
>classified as magicians and, according to the rules on page 183, it
>only says magicians are able to use spell defense.

Actually, adepts are in a class by themselves. Page 55 on the character
creation table there are three existing types of Magically active
character available (at this time in SR3); Full Magician, Aspected
Magician and Adept. Later on the page it outlines the powers and skills
used by these types. In the Full Magician section it says, "Full
magicians can cast spells (sorcery), conjure spirits (conjuring), use
magical foci, astrally perceive and project into astral space." In the
Aspected Magician's section it says, "To a limited degree, they can cast
spells (sorcery), conjure spirits (conjuring) and use magic foci. The
adept's section flat out says, "...; they do not cast spells or conjure
spirits, nor do they have access to astral space (unless an adept buys
Astral Perception as a power)."

I would take the above to indicate, that though they are kin to
magicians (like chimpanzees to humans) they cannot access the abilities
of spell defense or have a magic pool. Adepts can posses the skill of
sorcery (Page 87 regarding both Sorcery and Conjuring; "Only character
with a Magic Attribute of 1 or greater can have this skill(s).") but
they can only use it for astral combat (page 174 "Even characters who
cannot cast spells (like adepts) can use the Astral Combat
specialization of Sorcery for astral combat.") or other non spell
weaving methods. Regarding Physical Magicians, they would be like the
missing link between Adepts and their magic skill using brothers.

>Also, on a side note, Spell Pools (Int, Wil, Mag add & divide by
>3) are available to magicians, and Physads are magicians, so why
>wouldn't they have one for Spell Defense?
>On page 55 it says, "Adept characters use their magic in radically
>different way than other magician characters." and this tends to >look
like Adepts are an 'other' magician type... and therefore be >able to
use Magic Pool and Spell Defense.
>
>Fixer

The problem here is the fact that they "...use magic in a radically
different way than other magician characters." Not in a fashion almost
the same as but with a whole bunch of variant ways too. Adepts use
somatic magic, magic of the self and body. They can get a form of spell
defense in the adept power of magic resistance. Anything more would be
potentially ruinous to game balance.

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From:	Razor Girl <sprawlg@*******.COM>
Subject:	Re: Sorcery and Spellcasting (long)
Date:	Sun, 13 Sep 1998 11:27:55 PDT

Message no. 10 >...isn't it possible for a mage to use spell defense on themselves >at
any time, without allocating defense? Or was that removed to >boost the
cost of using exclusive magic?
>
>Mongoose

The relevant page seems to be page 183 "The USE of allocated spell
defense dice is automatic and does not require an action on the part of
the defending magician." Further down it also says, "Allocating Sell
Defense dice is a Free action." This would indicate that as long as the
player has an opportunity to use a free action, they can rearrange their
existing spell pool dice. Thus, they can choose to move any amount of
unused sorcery (refreshes at next initiative pass turn) and spell pool
dice (refreshes in the magician's next combat action in the next combat
turn) into or out of spell defense.

The problem is they must have the opportunity to take a free action to
ALLOCATE spell defense dice. Thus, they couldn't allocate any more or
less dice in the middle of another Magician's spell effect. If the
defending magician knew a spell was coming before the casting magician's
action, he could adjust the defense dice. And after he got pounded, the
casting magician's action ends, he could decide to shore up his spell
defense. But not during a spell, he would only have the dice previously
allocated to the spell defense pool.

Also, nowhere in the book can I see rules stating that you have to
allocate spell defense dice to specific people. The gist of the rules
seems to be that you designate the people you want to use Spell Defense
on (any number of people/objects up to your sorcery rating). Then you
set aside the amount of spell dice (sorcery or spell pool) available to
the spell defense pool. Nowhere does it say that you have to spell out
which defended person or object gets how many dice BEFORE a spell is
cast. It is only after an spell has been successfully cast does the
Magician have to worry about how many dice defends what.

Simple, huh? Some of my pre-law tort classes are easier.

>BTW, you seem good at finding refs...
Thanks, it comes from being a rules lawyer and wanting to be a real one.
It is a gaming disability I have to fight against every day. Especially
now that I have a copy of the rules to quote from.

And yes, I used to be real bitch about when my GM's would change or
break rules on a whim. But from getting kicked out of one group and told
off by another I learned my lesson. The game rules are NOT the most
important part of the game, the fun is. But it is still a compulsion
that I have to fight.

In the spirit of the last paragraph let me say one last thing, Spell
Defense works however you, your GM and co-players decides it works. The
rules are only guidelines, there are no Fasa Cops (or there are but
someone said they are still busy with EARTHDAWN) and as long as the game
is fun for everyone you are playing Shadowrun the right way.

(GOD, saying that hurt. ;-) )

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