Incarnation of the Black Goat: Magic

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These are the magic rules for Fate Condensed and Fate of Cthulhu

Spell casting

Performing a spell or ritual uses the Lore skill. Characters with high Lore will have an easier time casting spells. That is a double-edged sword, though.

The Difficulty of a spell determines the target Lore roll. Lore rolls can be enhanced above the caster's basic skill, but this usually requires very special aids or intense preparation. Create Advantage rolls to yield boosts for casting a spell are usually as specific and arcane as the spells themselves.


Backlash

Performing magic triggers backlash. When a character does something that triggers backlash, note the effort of the Lore roll (plain or enhanced). After resolving the action, the caster must defend with Will against a mental attack whose rating equals that effort; for instance, if their effort was Great (+4), the backlash will also be Great (+4), whether their action succeeded or failed. This includes any boosts to their original Lore skill. The mental attack can be absorbed with stress and consequences, as normal. If they’re taken out by backlash, they must corrupt (rewrite) an aspect.


Rituals

Rituals tend to be used for big magic. They take hours, days, sometimes weeks to perform.

Though rituals have impressive effects, they are safer than spells by far. During a ritual, one participant must be the leader, who rolls the dice, but each other participant with Lore of Average (+1) or better adds a +1 bonus to the leader’s roll. Use of multiple participants reduces the likelihood of catastrophic failure as each person checks the work, so to speak, and the backlash is spread among them, lessening it considerably.

If a living human sacrifice is used in the ritual, the risk drops even further as the backlash is shunted into the sacrifice. Murdering the sacrifice isn’t just some gore fetish on the part of cultists, it has a practical application. If the sacrifice becomes completely corrupted, there’s a very good chanceit will end up killing all the participants.

If a sacrifice is used, there is no backlash against those casting the spell. If there is no sacrifice, each participant in the ritual rolls to defend against backlash, but the difficulty is decreased by one step per participant. With enough people, the risk of backlash is effectively zero.


Spells

Spells — with their short casting time and ability to be roughly approximated through rote memorization — tend to be used for more personal magic. Instead of spreading the risk among multiple participants, everything is placed onto a single practitioner. Failures are more likely and can have far more disastrous effects.

The lowest-level spells can be performed without much risk. However, their power is usually so limited (blowing out a single candle flame, etc), that mundane force or knowledge is usually far more effective at accomplishing the same results.


Summonings

Much magic is done by summoning magical entities whose powers are greater than the summoner's, and who will not face a risk of backlash. Those entities, however, are dangerous in themselves, and often the summoner is simply exchanging one form of risk for another.

Most summonings can be performed either as spells or rituals, and have their own usual costs and risks, regardless of whether they succeed or fail.


Working a summoning

A summoning is cast with a set Difficulty, usually related directly to the Will of the summoned entity. Some Greater Demons and godlings can have astronomical Wills.

Once the summoning is successful, the summoner can simply attempt to bind it with a Will vs Will conflict which ends when the target is Taken Out (and which risks inflicting mental Stress and Consequences on the summoner), or bargain with it via social conflicts. Deceit, Provoke and Rapport are typically used to attack; Empathy and Rapport to defend. Even Resources or some other fringe skill can at least Create an Advantage if the entity is, for example, especially avaricious, but this usually requires extensive advance knowledge.

Failed summonings and broken pacts

The most reliable way to secure a summoned entity's service is to make an exorbitant but postponed offer, such as the summoner's life or soul. Such entities normally have powerful Deceit skills, and will try to twist the bargain. In any case, the pact is binding, and the entity will collect.

If a pact is somehow broken or a summoning fails, the following consequences can occur:

Disappearing: the creature returns to its plane of origin.

Immobility: the creature just sits there in the Pentacle during the entire duration of its Contract. It cannot be dismissed; it just sits there.

Flight: the creature escapes from the Pentacle and flies loose, fully visible, usually until the next dawn.

Befuddlement: the creature executes the Contract in the wrong way.

Attack: the creature turns its powers on the Summoner. This begins Physical Combat. If the summoner defeats the creature, the Summoned returns to its home plane.

Capture: the creature turns its powers on the Summoner and begins Physical Combat as above. Should the Summoned Creature Take Out the Summoner, the Summoned Creature will attempt to carry the summoner off to its home plane.

Possession: the creature turns its powers on the Summoner and begins Mental Combat. Should the Summoned Creature Take Out the Summoner, the Summoned Creature will kick them out of their body and walk off with it. The Summoned Being in the body may stay on the physical plane wreaking havoc until defeated.