Samsara:Ultramundane abilities
Contents
APPENDIX A: ULTRAMUNDANE ABILITIES[edit]
I love magic. Let’s get that out of the way. I love mysterious mystics and brash sorcerers and sly magicians. I love spells and incantations and theurgy and summonings and conjurations and faery-tale charms. I’m also pretty happy with psychic powers and weird energies and alien abilities and wuxia stunts. The first thing that I look at in a game system is how it handles all of this stuff, which I collectively refer to as ultramundane abilities.
Despite the fact that SAMSARA is not designed with any setting, I just couldn’t let the opportunity to let ultramundane stuff slide by. Besides, one of the strengths of the system, I think, is the variability of implementation that could be performed for this kind of stuff. Jedi powers, Elric-style summonings, Zothique magicians with hundreds of spells on call. All that stuff. So this appendix describes some ultramundane abilities and how the system could be used to manage them. It turns out that the same systems can be used to model various styles of power, so some of the entries have multiple descriptions. However, I believe that the description really should be primary. The story is in how the abilities are understood and narrated, not in how they are gamed.
Making the Magic Happen[edit]
If an ultramundane ability can be used automatically, then it can be treated like any another ability. Some folks can just fly and that’s all there is to that. In this case, the ability mod would be used when an actor is attempting to do something difficult with that ability. The flying guy can always fly, but he might need to roll STA + SPD + Flight to dodge heat-seeking missiles being shot at him.
But frequently, these abilities are envisaged as having to be engaged somehow. Spells must be cast and might always be miscast. Telepathy exerts an awful strain on the psychic and might lead to psychic feedback. And you don’t even want to think of what might happen when try your necromantic summoning ritual and forgot which protective symbol to draw.
If ultramundane abilities do not automatically work, then engaging them means a contest between the wielder and the effect he is trying to create. This can be either a simple or full contest. Overall difficulty might be a factor in the decision: if the Archmage is trying to magically light a torch, this should probably be a simple contest; while trying to banish the manifestation of Death might be a full contest.
But, as mentioned earlier, narrative needs should probably dictate the choice. If a psychic is trying to telekinetically bring his scotch and soda to him that can be a simple contest whether he is a master of the craft or just beginning his telekinetic studies. It’s a simple contest because the stakes are nearly-nonexistent and watching the struggle play out over several turns is not particularly interesting. However, if he is trying to telekinetically grab a vial of poison that is teetering on the edge of the city’s water supply, then that can be a full contest. Even if he is the world’s greatest telekinetic. Even if he can do this in his sleep at home. In-game, the explanation could be that he’s under stress, but you don’t need an in-game justification: this is the climax of the story; the heroes either save the day or the town is ruined. And you’re going to let one measly roll determine this? Imagine if this were a movie: this scene would take several minutes to play out, as the vial rolls back and forth, closer and closer to the brink and the sweat starts pouring of the hero’s face. See it? That’s why it’s a full contest.
In either case, the effect to be produced, the spell to be cast, the ritual to be performed, is given a Contest rating. How this is determined depends upon the mechanics being used for these abilities (see the following sections). The GM could simply assign a rating based on difficulty. Or, if the system, builds effects mechanically, then that will determine the number. The contest then plays out like any other. If the character wins, the power is engaged, although he might have suffered some checks. If he loses, the power doesn’t engage. Maybe nothing happens (Simple Contest with Simple Failure result); maybe he took some severe checks and is in bad shape (Full Contest); maybe something terrible happens (Simple Contest with Spectacular Failure result or Full Contest based on the nature of the powers i.e. totally losing a Full Contest while trying to summon a demon might result in bad things happening rather than just failing to summon one).
A further complication comes from transitive effects; that is, trying to cast a spell on someone. Does the target get a chance to resist? If so, then you should add in their relevant modifiers as a bonus to the Contest rating of the effect. The GM will have to adjudicate what the relevant modifiers are, based on mundane actions in the same sphere. For example, Mandragore the Mage is trying to mind-control a guard. The Mind Control spell is determined to have a Contest rating of +11. The guard would resist any attempt at persuasion with WIL + RES, so that becomes his modifier and is added onto the Contest rating of the spell (of course, the guard may only be represented mechanically with Contest rating if he is an unimportant character, in which case you don’t have to determine the appropriate abilities; just add his Contest rating onto the spell’s Contest rating).
One might determine that if the caster fails in his attempt only because of the target’s modifier, that the spell was successfully cast, but the victim shook it off or dodged or what have you. If he fails by more than that, he failed in casting in the first place. This distinction may or may not be a useful one to make, depending upon the nature of magic in your campaign and whether or not failed castings have any backlash upon the wizard.
Relevant Attributes[edit]
This is the foundation of ultramundane abilities. In many settings, manipulation of magic or psychic powers is based off of the wielder’s mental attributes. In the Classical mode, trying to create a magical/psychic effect might be a roll of INT+ PER/WIL. But you could use whatever fit the game.
Perhaps psychic powers draw on vital energies and the roll is based on STA + WIL; this roots use of the abilities in the awful strain of their use. If the wielder receives severe checks from using his power, those checks might be physical instead of mental. Too much mental effort and the guy slumps to the ground, gasping for breath.
If occult powers are based off of summoning and contacting supernatural beings, then one or two social attributes might be in order: INT + PRE to contact and WIL + MAN to reach a bargain. Maybe you need to know the True Names and proper fumigations (INT) but also need to be charming (MAN) or commanding (PRE). If the summoner receives severe checks, these could be social checks which would hamper his ability to be convincing. Possibly word gets around in the spirit world that this guy is a jerk. Possibly, he drools from extradimensional backlash and can’t charm anyone anymore.
Example Applications[edit]
The Master of Magic (Effect-based Abilties[edit]
This system is used to model a metaphysic where wizards spend years studying and mastering long list of spells. They have hundreds at their fingertips which they could use at any moment. Think Zothique or Gondwane. Rather than have each spell be an ability, you build effects and then describe them however you want to.
Effects-based powers focus on the actor’s intent. The means of carrying them out (that is, the in-game explanation of what is happening) is left to the player to describe. This system of abilities is thus very consonant with SAMSARA as a whole.
To use effects-based abilities, you need a list of possible effects, such this:
- Attack
- Protect
- Summon
- Transform
- Move
- Perceive
Each of these is available as an ability. Attack +2 and Move +4. Then you need a way to build each effect. Thus:
Base Attack Spell: Has a range of 5 feet, affects 1 target, and is instantaneous. Checks delivered to the target are based off of the caster’s roll with an effect rating of 1. The base Contest Rating is +5. Modifiers: *Effect rating +1 for each +2 to Contest rating *Range of 5 additional feet for each +1 to Contest rating *Affects 1 extra target for each +3 to Contest rating *Affects all targets in 3 foot square area for +5 to Contest rating (i.e. the opponent’s Speed modifiers don’t apply) *Lasts 1 extra turn for each +3 to Contest rating
Using this, you could create a spell called “Conjure Throwing Knife”. It has a range of 10 feet (+1) and everything else is base. This is a quick and easy spell—the Contest Rating is +6, with the opponent’s STA + QWK modifying the Contest rating. It’s not at all a flashy spell; in fact, it might not even seem to be magic since you could have been hiding the knife in your sleeve. Someone with very minor magic abilities could cast this without too much trouble. Some who is a master could cast this in his sleep and he could pull scores of these things out of thin air, which would be a bit unnerving to his opponents.
You could also create a spell called “Flowering Razor Blossom”. This shoots ofo a small spark which explodes into a whirling cloud of razor blades, like deadly fireworks. It has an effect rating of 3 (+4 to the Contest rating), a range of 30 feet (+5), affects everyone in an area of nine square feet (+10), and lasts for 3 turns (+6). This is a roiling mass of pain and a very hard spell to cast. The Contest rating is +30, which would require some serious ability.
An idea to consider is whether the magician can change his method of casting to suit his needs. What if he takes extra time? That might reduce the Contest rating. What if he has various magical doo-dads, like a wand of oak tipped with a ruby or powdered demon hide? Maybe they help too. Or is the casting fixed: this is how it is done and that’s all there is to it.
Effects-based abilities can be used to model all variety of abilities: from a magician with access to myriads of spells; to a wielder of some kind of universal, mystic force; to someone able to shape reality to his will. It will allow the character a great deal of flexibility, since he can do pretty much anything in an effect that he knows.
Fire Sorcerers of the East (Thematic Abilities)[edit]
This system allows one to create thematic wizards, perhaps the products of a particular school of magic. Any effect which could be accomplished by that theme is allowable and this calls for some thinking. Your Fire Sorcerer might have just one ability: Fire Sorcery +3. Any magic using fire sorcery uses that ability.
But what does fire sorcery do? Well, that depends upon the game. A free-form game might allow just about anything. Shooting bolts of flame is obvious. But maybe the fire sorcerer can step into any large flame and teleport to any other large flame. Maybe he can perceive anybody near to a flame and thus spy on them. Maybe he can use flames to hypnotize people. Can he summon fire elementals? Are there even such things as fire elementals?
Thematic abilities are the opposite of effects-based; the cause is everything. The effects of Thematic Abilities run in the Romantic mode might be left fairly indeterminate at the start. But in the Classical Mode, the GM might provide a list of what fire sorcery does: bolt of flame, walls of flame, resist heat and cold; but no summonings, no teleporting, no mind control and so on.
If there is a pre-determined sense of what Thematic Abilities can do, the GM might include experimentation as a mechanic. This would mean that the player knows what can be done with his ability, but not what can’t be tried. If the character wants to try and do something unusual, he can try with some penalty. If he succeeds, he has now learned a new application.
Experimentation can be tweaked in many ways. For instance, to emphasize the struggle of the new and the overcoming of that, the GM might apply a decreasing modifier to the Contest roll. A base -4 modifier would apply the first time an experiment is made. If successful, the next attempt at the same experiment will be -3 and so on, until the character can be said to have internalized the experiment when he reaches 0 modifier. If the character fails the roll, the penalty stays the same; a spectacular failure might even result in an increased penalty the next time.
To increase the struggle even more, the GM might require the actor to engage in a contest with his own powers, as he struggles to better understand them. The Fire Sorcerer who has never tried flame-walking might have to win a contest using his INT + WIL vs. his own Fire Sorcery stat. This would make it harder for powerful wizards to learn new tricks. In this case, the GM might allow the player to select as many applications of his power as he has positive modifiers at the beginning of the game (Fire Sorcery +3 means that the character knows three applications). Thereafter, anything new is going to be a struggle.
For the opposite effect, experiments might be given a Contest rating against which the character contests using his Thematic modifier plus relevant attributes. This would allow more skilled actors to better experiment. The Contest rating could be based off of the in-game difficulty of the action (walking of fire might be less unnatural than teleporting through fires) or of the effect’s relation to already-known applications (the Fire Sorcerer who already knows how to walk on fire, might find teleporting through flames less of a conceptual stretch than hypnotizing people through flames).
Labyrinths and Lycanthropes (Each Spell as an Ability)[edit]
This metaphysic also calls for mastering individual spells, but this time the characters are not expected to know hundreds of them. Rather, they might know just a few spells and painstakingly piece together a few dozen more over time. This would serve well for settings without “professional” wizards, but with folks who get what they can and Johnny One-Spells. Of course, professionals might have learned ten or twenty spells. This might fit into a setting inspired by the original Dying Earth.
Each spell is an ability: Bolt of Acid +3 or The Efficacious Incantation of Perspicuous Sagacity +1. Even with this fairly inflexible system, the GM will have to decide if the spell is capable of being changed by the caster or not. Does the Bolt of Acid always produce exactly the same effect? Or could the caster attempt to increase the range in exchange for a penalty? This decision need not be known to the players. Maybe “everybody” knows what the Bolt is like, up until the time that the player finds himself in a tough spot and tries to jury-rig a new version that affects multiple targets. Experimentation might be used in this system as well as the preceding one.
This system would function in either mode, although would fit the Classical mode best given its rigid structure.
The Ten Million Gods (Universal Magic)[edit]
This system is the opposite of the “professional wizard” described above. In this setting, magic is potentially available to anyone in the form of dealings with the innumerable spirits who live in the world. This is an animistic setting, with gods of the harvest and the rivers and each tree in the forest. Everyone has learned a thing or two about dealing with some spirits; otherwise life would be impossible. The farmer knows to leave offerings for the Goddess of Fertility (to increase his yield) and to the Mouse Prince (to keep vermin out of the crops). The blacksmith always starts his work with an invocation to the Triple Forge Lords: the Fire, the Water, and the Iron. Successful interaction with the Ten Million allows humans to successfully endeavor in a harsh world; incurring the wrath of the spirits means trouble.
In this metaphysic, there are no specialized abilities for magic. Magic and art (in the widest sense of the word) occupy a continuum of human action, with magic being the most efficacious form of art. Any time an actor attempts to take action against reality (i.e. engages in a Contest), his status with the relevant gods comes into play. His default modifiers represent someone neutral in the eyes of the spirits. If he wishes to improve his chances at any endeavor, he must first engage in a prayer-contest with the proper beings.
Relevant attributes would be PRE (impressing the god), MAN (cajoling the god), and INT (knowing what the god likes or does not like). The appropriate skill acts as a specialization as normal. And recall that “art” should be loosely used, so that “Swordplay” might have an associated spirit, as might “Seduction” and “Chess”. The Contest rating might be based on how the intended action fits into the Divine Scheme: natural actions would be aided by the gods, while unnatural actions would be resisted. Causing a magical iceberg in the desert to melt would be encouraged by the Sand Daemons, while creating the iceberg would be resisted by them.
It is suggested that this contest be made a Simple Contest, except in dramatically appropriate circumstances. If the GM elects to have a Full contest, then the subsequent action should be made Simple since successive Full Contests will be very involving. Winning the Contest garners a bonus when the actor makes his attempt. Simple success garners +1, while a Spectacular success garners +3. Alternately, one might say that any success in the prayer-contest means that the subsequent attempt automatically succeeds because the relevant gods support it (it would then be appropriate to have the prayer contest be a Full Contest).
Failure would be penalized similarly or deny the action outright. If Severe checks are incurred, it is suggested that they do not recover naturally, but can only be restored by making some sort of amends with the appropriate spirit. On the other hand, they might not apply to all actions within the Sphere, but only to that particular type of action. The farmer who enrages the Mouse Prince might have a severe check on future farming actions where they relate to predators, but not to all future physical actions.
The issue might be complicated if the actor’s knowledge of the gods is limited. Maybe not everybody knows all of the relevant sprits in the world (it would be quite a lot of spirits to memorize). So perhaps the characters only know certain gods: perhaps one god for each ability they possess, or one god for each +1 in INT. In this case, the characters might call upon gods to do things which they might not normally do. The Contest rating, in this setting, might be based on the personality of the god: the Maiden in Blue Silk loves all people and eagerly answers prayers to her, while the Lord of the Black Frost hates humanity and only answers prayers that contribute to its destruction.
It might also be based on how the intended action relates to the spirit’s nature: the above-mentioned Mouse Prince will happily assist in destroying crops and poses a Contest rating of +1 for the artist (+1 because even the Mouse Prince doesn’t want to be bothered all the time); he is less likely to help someone find a lost grimoire since mice don’t care about that sort of thing and poses a Contest rating of +6 for this. Failure in the prayer-contest in this setting, might result in the gods shutting the character out for some time, or until reparations are made for the rudeness, or even result in attacks by the god.
Yet another variation would organize the gods into a hierarchy of power. Greater beings can give more aid, but are also harder to successfully petition. The spirit of the pebble beside you, on the other hand, is very easy to contact, but isn’t a great deal of help. In this case, the Contest rating will equal the bonus being sought and a relevant spirit must be found. If you want a +2 to build your bridge, the local river spirit could help you with little fuss (Contest rating +2). If you want to make the greatest bridge in history and seek a +15 to your effort, you will have to get into the good graces of Harmonia, Duke of Sympathies and Connections, a mighty god who does not easily grant his favours.
Failure in this setting might result in a simple penalty as above; it might also result in the actors being cut off from that level of the hierarchy. The zealous bridge-builder who offends Harmonia might find the ranks of the Greater Conceptual Dukes closed off to his entreaties and will have to make do with minor, local spirits for a while.
The same implementation of the mechanic could be used if there is only one god who grants all petitions, but finds it easier to grant small favours than large miracles. This would call for less creativity on the part of GMs and players, who would not have to keep discovering new spirit-powers every time they try something new. Failure in this system might have the most severe consequences as angering the One God is probably a bad thing. Magic becomes another tactic in this system: getting a big favour calls for greater effort and risk.
Absolute Abilities[edit]
Some ultramundane abilities do not seem to require ever rolling. If the Fishman is an amphibian and can breathe underwater—well, that’s all there is to that. And the Living Hunk of Stone is an animate chunk of rock—no breathing, no eating, not susceptible to poisons. It is hard to see how one might use these as a modifier. If you want, you could just have them as absolute abilities with no number attached.
That said, you could also use these absolute abilities as modifiers, but not directly. They could be used in social situations particularly, as a measure of how inhuman someone is. For example, Fishman doesn’t need to roll in order to breathe underwater, but maybe he could use his Gills +2 to help in impressing upon a tribe of merfolk that he is not one of the hated “land-dwellers”. The Living Hunk of Stone doesn’t need to roll his Animate Construct +6 to resist the effects of nerve gas, but he could use it to scare the locals into worshipping him as a god.
2.Contests
6.Motives
7.Checks
