Powers & Perils PBEM Home Brew Rules and Personal Views This file will contain home brew rule variants, rule mechanics or just personal views I feel need to be given out. As more come to mind I will add to this file. * Divine Attention: In the universe of P&P the gods are still alive and active. Far more than in most games. They give the power of magic to spell casters. They drive almost how society works in some places. As a result a god or their minions in the upper world are always on the lookout for potential allies or threats. Generally there are a few common sense ways a god will be drawn to you. Magic and Skill high EL, usually in the range of EL10 or more is quite rare for normal mortals. So they may take note. Of course for Skills the EL equivalent of magic EL10 might vary. But for combat it could be like a Sword EL20. That would draw some attention. Also high experience those super fighters or magic users will draw attention. High Experience over short time will also draw attention. For example if you jump from MEL1 to MEL9 in one year by staying in a library reading books and casting spells then you will likely draw attention of a god. In this case it will be bad as the god will see it as a threat. More than one god may get such a attention. Depending on the god it could be bad or good. Some may see you as a possible champion and need to recruit you. Others may see you as a threat to their cause and try to out right kill you. Gods will do these things through demi-god Avatars that work through them. Some Avatars may have direct contact with gods or be quite powerful beings in their own right. Some two decades ago we came up with a full chart and formulae for such attention. So as each player grows in strength their Attention Factor will increase. This is normal so do not fear it but also don't be surprised when a Avatar comes to kill you for getting to MEL20 or a fighter not taking a scratch from killing an army of orcs by himself. There have been at least one player and 4-5 other PCs killed when said player drew attention of one god a decade or two ago. It is rare but it does happen. Just best to be warned ahead of time. One might assume two of the PL personalities might have drawn sure attention from gods are the High Elder of the Dark Lands and Nilgeranthrob the Lich guy. * Divine Failures/Success: With Balance in the universe comes divine justice. I've seen too many folks get overconfident in their defense. "I have 118% success with this spell I can NOT fail." Well never say that with the gods listening. So some two decades ago I invented this system not just for this game but a couple others that have gods in them. Even if you have 200% success with a skill or spell there is ALWAYS going to be a slight chance of failure. It is all in the dice or in this case the divine will. Maybe today the god is upset with you or had a bad woke up grumpy. This is balance to those who always figure they can always win. Now with this said there could b the opposite. Your about to go up against a Giant with nothing but a rock in your hand and he is 20 feet tall with a tree as a club. Chance of survival with all skills is about 3%. A divine critical success may occur and you could kill said god like Goliath with that rock. So it does work both ways. * In-Between time: IBT was invented for the PBEM. While the adventure has to be more guided and forced (otherwise a PBEM can get side tracked big time by months/years) IBT allows free form gaming. You decide what to do during this time and practice with skills or spells or do various jobs. Most IBT happens between adventures. It can vary from days, weeks to months. Some IBT may happen during an adventure if there is a long journey like on a ship or over land to get to said adventure area. I personally don't care what happens during this time. But my personal opinion is that I as player preferred spell practice during game. Standing around casting 20 spells in a row isn't something to me a hero might do. With that said I will not prevent you from casting 200 spells a day like some do. But look at the Divine Attention comments above. I personally prefer folks who casually grow rather than overnight. I've seen fighters go out just to find a dragon and kill it and jump 5 CELs in one week. That's a big jump in short time is fine if you want the risk. But with that risk comes attention. * Insubstantial: Unless stated otherwise the spell works as normal. But in years past we have varied the effect of this spell. In years past we allowed free movement. But in the current situation you MUST cast levitate to move around. Also this is for safety as once you move you could find yourself merged into solid things. So just cast levitate if you ever cast this spell. * Invisibility: The spell works as normal. But the effect of what is done once a target is hit can be debated. In years past the vast majority have agree to the following. Once you hit a target either through contact or damage you are seen by that one target. This makes the nifty keen invisible assassin have one and only one chance to kill his target then after that the defender can defend. This balances it. Also in years past we varied the effect of invisible people on terrain. But for the current time you do affect terrain. So walking in a dusty field will set foot prints, dust devils going. Laying on a bed invisible will show a depression. This will remain in effect. * Mana Battery: Since a person can abuse this and have too many such things I have a rule set for this to limit it. A person can only make and use MEL/2 (Round up) batteries at one time. So an apprentice at best can only do 2. If you are given one made by a person and not made yourself then this is a -2 per battery to that number. So a MEL6 wizard makes 2 batteries and is allowed 3. If he is given one he can't use it. Since his limit would be 6/3=2-2=0 if given one. This is to affect that mana batteries are attuned to each person and their essence. So if given ones its not as efficient. The given battery will still work at 100% but your limit on new batteries will be adjusted. So it is best to make your own. * Magic Sensing: In my universe magic has color, substance and magic effects. I like to add flair to spells. For example healing magic might have green or blue hues to its effect. As a result Magic has auras. So magic is detected and sensed with that aura. Anything of magic has some form of aura. Some might just be a color while others might be a light energy field of static. Magic is detected by line of sight and can be blocked by clothing. BUT if the magic is strong enough it acts like normal light and can spread out even around a wall or object. So the more powerful the magic the bigger the aura. For the sidh this is normal. For those who learn the spells to detect magic the aura isn't as defined as for the non-humans. It will be a bit weaker and less distinct. Everything from grass, rocks to people have some form of mana energy from the gods. Most (98%) of things may only have trace amounts so subtle it takes intense concentration to detect. For the sidh as a normal rule this is ignored as background noise. But for magic users the amount of mana one can store (Casting ability) is a direct effect of that person's aura. The bigger the CA the bigger the aura he/she has. This is how Relative strengths can be determined. * Oblivion: I never liked the D&D bag of many things. Was way too out balanced. So Poteth the god of Oblivion will have some fun with this spell. If you send a person into oblivion chances are he will not affect said person at all. But if you send a item without a person he might find that to be a donation or a offering to him. He WILL take it if he likes it. So with that said you risk what is put into oblivion. * PBEM Strength: As the PBEM continues on I upgrade rules and the difficulty factor. In years past I was lenient on things like food or water or minor things as item damage. But as the game went on I added such things each time. This is to balance the effect of player strength. So each game will get harder and harder in some aspect. Each game will also be more strict in the rule areas outlined separately. * Role Playing: Experience: Role playing compared to Roll playing will always be better in my view. I know player experience varies with RPGs. Its fine when first starting out to depend on dice to talk for you or get you out of being mobbed. But as you grow I respect role playing over dice. So if you role play the situation I may not even roll the dice. I will just go by that. So role playing will also be given preference over roll playing. * Stupid does as Stupid does: As GM I do NOT kill outright. As a player I always hated that. It sucked! Its rather stupid to have a character invest months of work in a character then get stabbed walking into a house. But with that said I will warn as best I can of various situations and risks. After that it is up to you to kill yourself. If I outline there is a pit of alligators to cross to get to the shiny Magic Key of Everything then well you know the risk. If you die so be it in that situation. So don't blame me for those things. Just use common sense. * Teleport: For over 20 years I have always done it that if you teleport mass doesn't move in your wake. So this means you CAN easily teleport into solid walls and such. So this is a constant risk. There has been no secret how to avoid this among Insubstantial, height of teleport and a few other spells a person can use to improve chances. * Treasure claims: Any treasure found during play is first come first serve. Of course there are some who see the updates first before others. So if more than 1 person claims one item then you can fight over it or just trade for it. I have no problem with that. So far we've not had a single death due to treasure claims. * Universe Balance: I'm big on Balance. One thing you should never forget about me. In every system I do I don't like straight super bogus beings or worlds or adventures. It should all be balanced. There should be a way to win and a way to lose. For every spell or skill there should be a counter. With that said as characters get bigger and bigger balance is there as well. While a MEL1 and CEL3 group could barely handle a few orcs a MEL9, CEL8 group could handle 40-50. So enemy will increase in number and power. So in essence those who strive for power through experience will hinder the party by making things tougher for all. Just be warned that Balance is always in effect. * Languages/Supernatural Languages: With magic we have a powerful spell in Tongues. Poof your speaking the language. One in theory could learn all the languages of the Middle World and be a diplomat in a day or two. Seems a bit of an abuse to me. So to balance it there is the supernatural languages. As with most things in magic folks tend to want the quick fix rather than the study method to learn slowly. Instant downloaded magic, knowledge and languages. I have no problem with folks learning languages of basic human cultures. With a large party there is enough folks languages isn't a factor in most games. As to SLs they are languages that enhance the magic per the normal rules we all know. I have 2 sides to this. As a player I feel a quick fix learning SLs is bad. In regard that it should be taught not downloaded. If your willing to waste the time of some god rather than praise him in study with a teacher or book then would you waste their time with other things? As a GM I feel SLs are sacred tongues. If you speak the language a god may only know then your almost putting yourself on their level. For this purpose your ego and intellect must be good enough to withstand possible influence by the gods. The problem with P&P is most players ignore the full religion aspect of the game. Gods do exist. Magic is given BY CHOICE by the gods. To ignore the gods and their religion is to ignore them. To use magic while ignoring them is bad. Would you use a free wagon given by a king only to ignore all summons to meet with him? When one uses the SL to cast magic they should be using it to gain the influence of their god (thus the +1 EL). To use it willy-nilly to paint your house is bad. To use it to banish a enemy of the god say a demon would be of high value to the god. So one would offend the second would promote and praise him. I believe most should appoint one god or goddess in the game if they are using magic. They should regularly pay tribute and honor to them. The problem is multi-class. If your say a shaman and wizard and druid all in one which god to you love the most? They can't tell. So how should the gods react to you? But a priest of Enki would have total attention by Enki. Eventually these abuses, ignoring aspects will lead to divine attention (see topic above). It can be bad or good if its done with praise and well being for the god. To simply trade a SL like some dagger in a market could be very bad, speaking as Scott the player. To treat the SL as such demeans the tongue and thus the god who likely invented it. As a GM I have to remain neutral in that not all gods act the same. A chaos or balance god might not care if you abuse the SLs. But a law god might. So it all depends on the situation and god. I do note all in the end after a course of an adventure and update divine status for attention. Theres a whole home brew system for those charts. So as a GM I don't care what you do with SLs just as long as you know there could be risk or could be none. As player Scott I say be cautious! With that said some SLs could be exchanged like a normal human language like the faerry or Elf ones. Especially if said folks are allied with those races. In the end it is a personal decision as to if you exchange a SL to some stranger or ally. One must consider their purpose and intent. Would they use it just for knowledge or to praise the god through use of the spell in magic to aid the god? Would they simply use the language as some item to sell? In the end it is up to you. * Enhancement v2 Rules: The rules for the number of items one can enhance has changed. Here is the snippet: NOTE — Enhancement is not possible without knowledge of the specific enhancement rites for the material. This knowledge is learned educationally. The Referee may allow the characters to start with knowledge of the enhancement rites of 1D6 materials. Shamans learn 2D6 rites in addition to knowledge of materials they gain as detailed in Book One. Effective immediately. You will be limited to these rites. For those long term characters it will depend on what you have done. How I will handle this is if you have already enhanced items on your character sheet I'll total those items and those will be deducted from your rite number. So if you have D6 or roll a 3 and you have enhanced garlic and poppy then you can still have 1 more free. If you do not have such items I will when you do enhance an item note that as one of your rites and mark it on the sheet. If you have reached your limited in old character generation then your done. I won't remove anything as it is grandfathered in. This is going forward only. Adventure #7 Change: I like the idea that each enhancement will be increased as a separate spell entry. Therefore going forward I will do each enhancement separately. If this has not been done already then I will make changes as needed at the time. * Civil players: We are all adults here and so should act as civil folks. use the Golden Rule. If at any time as a player you feel offended take it direct to the player and ask him to stop or check if he meant it. We all misread things. If it continues get me involved. If one feels offended or harassed too much action may have to be taken. * Point Allocations: Just a reminder that Characteristic Points (CPs) are awarded AFTER the adventure is over. The reason is updating stats is one thing for one character sheet but doing it for 10+ sheets and then updating formulae, skills and other info would take too much time and drive me insane. Insane GM is not a fun gam for the players. So I do it after. For CEP/MEP and Expertise I award those AFTER a combat or complicated scene. Thosse will be updated right away. But during a combat if you know that extra 2 points would mean the difference of a critical hit and a miss then bring it to my attention. I can do the quick math and take it into account. But otherwise I use data from pre-combat scene to that point. Then I update it. Again this is for my sanity. :) * Healing Mist: Since there is no inherent Duration for this spell it makes it a very powerful spell. To balance it I have come up with a rule change. For all those affected by this spell the duration of the spell will end once the target with the least amount needed to heal is fully healed. Example: Player A has 10 to heal, B 15 and C 22. If the Mist heals 2 points per phase then once A is healed the 10 points the spell ends. B will be down 5 and C 12. This makes the weakest link to this spell critical to its use. * Multi-Arrow Archery spell - Normally just one hit with a arrow does the normal CDFx2 expertise to the skill. But this spell copies more arrows so could have 10 or more hits on one target from one arrow. I thought about doing one CDF only. So if CDF is 2 if just one of the 10 hit then earned 4 expertise. But it does take skill to 'target' the copies so they can add extra damage. So assuming all 10 hit it would normally be 10x4\40 expertise which is a bit much. So I will total the number of hits and divide by 2 (RU). So a Multi Arrow spell hits 5 times from one arrow it would be 5x4=20 Expertise. A bit more fair I think. * Hand to Hand 'pulling back' - If you wish to lightly damage but not subdue (or even subdue) you can let me know if you wish to use the skill at a lower EL. So if you have Hand to Hand EL5 and you want to just do a EL1 hit then let me know. Otherwise it will be assumed full EL. * Mana Powers - Mana Sending - No range for the sphere listed. I think a basic EL+1" per phase is good enough. * Energy recovery rules - Some spells allow one to restore energy like Energy or Shadow - Energy to name a few. But there is no rule on how many times these can be done. For the next adventure I will need to come up with some rule to regard that. Like maybe can only restore energy 100% in one day. So if energy is 50 and you go from 1 to 50 that's the limit. I'm not sure on this yet. [WORK IN PROGRESS - stay tuned] * Knowledge Spells - To clarify that this spell is cast and cost at the Alone method of teaching. So Instruction bonus does not apply for what is learned from this spell. Also skill/spells learned from this spell will be learned gradually. If Spell X takes 20 points to learn and you have earned 12 points to it then you are only 60% there. This might be a basic rite but not enough to complete casting. * Item Creation - In creating items using Permanment Magics the EL of said spell will determine how many property slots can be done. Once it is determined even EL increases can change the determined slots. A EL0 spell will yield one slot. The initial spell cast will determine the EL. Thus if doing a Enchantment then that EL will figure slots but if you add a Ensorcellment to said item then will not change the slots. Keep in mind the number of properties will be set in stone not to change later. * Healing Costs of Energy: Based on the severity of damage and style of wound a Healer will need to supply Energy life force to the victim when healing. This will not be a set number of points but based on case by case. It should not be any more than a d10 at most. * Magic has a cost: All magic has some cost to pay. It might not be ever seen or felt. But it depends on the magic and power of said magic. There is no set rules to document on this but it will be subjective. * Reputation: Each person due to their actions over a short or long term will earn a Reputation number. Said number will cause good or bad things to happen. Reputation will come from fellow peers/friends, general population around said person, the government, enemies and the gods themselves. Updated: 6/2/15