Magic - No not that one, another one

[ZorValachan]

This is not the typical 'I want Beyond Arcanum, so I can play my arcanist!” thread. I have perhaps very different views on the 2 missing books for BTS-2. I do not know if anyone shares my thoughts and concerns, but if enough people do, maybe as the books inch up on the pipeline, these can be taken into account. I am not going to mention Tome Grotesque, because we do need monsters and I am all aboard for that.

Warning: Anything I talk about here as 'real world magic' or 'real magic' is not saying I have belief in magic, or that I think it is real, just how magic has been done through history. I do not want to get into any debate on it's 'realness', but people through time have done things they believed produced effects that we call 'magic'. On the other side, I do not want to debate or seem like I am insulting any people here who have sincere beliefs in magic in the real world.

So, I like that BTS-2 doesn't have the arcanist class. In BTS-1 it was the PFRPG wizard's spells with PPE (BTS-1 was the first time PPE was introduced as a concept of Potential Psychic Energy, as well as a numeral representation of magical energy used to fuel spells. So both IC setting and OOC rules). BTS-2 even more than BTS-1 is shown by KS's writing to be a world where the supernatural is in the background and society as a whole does not acknowledge it nor believe in it. The ISP modifiers make it hard to near impossible to do anything that can be used as 'evidence' for the supernatural, or when the effect is done, ISP is spent and it cannot be redone. So, a double-blind series of tests would show overall failure, as it could not be repeated to be above chance.

Q: So what am I saying?
A: I don't want fireballs.

Add fireballs (or whatever spell is big and flashy and unexplainable-tornados, earthquakes, etc. can at least be explained as natural disasters. Not so much as a fireball flying from your fingers) without a 'severe' limiting factor and you make the supernatural apparent and common. This to me would destroy the BTS-2 feel. BTS-2 is not Fantasy in modern times nor is it just a not as advanced Rifts. Even the Firestarter has limited uses of his powers day to day, and they are mostly things that can be explained away as stage magician tricks. An arcanist class that is nothing but BTS-2's version of the wizard or ley line walker will be a detriment to the game, IMO.

Additionally, the concept of people using magic power by power words/gestures alone is a relatively new thought. On Earth, magic was done not through one's own manipulation of magical energy, but through one's beseeching of a higher power through ritual and sacrifice. I think this should hold a place in any BTS-2 system. With a modern 'Ganldalf-wizard' system of magic belief being crude and new (when compared to PFRPG/Rifts)

You want to make a love charm? You get a piece of hair from your target, do a ritual during the full moon and ask a moon goddess. Most, if not all, need ingredients/components that can be rare (such as a nile crocodile egg). My education is focused on 'Western (Greek, Roman) and their neighbors (Egyptian, Persian, etc.), but have done enough reading elsewhere to see similar trends. Earth people do real magic through higher powers. People like Siberian Shamans and Native Americans use rituals to manipulate spirits for a result. Aztecs slaughtered people to appease deities. Greeks, Romans, Jews, and early Christians sacrificed animals to theirs to get favorable results.

What I would like to see in a BTS-2 magic system is this:

1)A PFRPG witch type class. A person gains power by a pact to serve a higher power (demon/deevil/AI/Deity, etc.).
2)A historical ritualist, who finds and uses ancient civilization magic when 'spells' are done as rituals asking for favors from higher powers; Zeus, All-Mother, Jesus, etc. (I have seen many actual Roman/Egyptian spells that have invoked Jesus, Joseph, and other 'Christian' figures in the incantation part of the spell. Basically if the name was important and 'exotic' from the place you were form, it seemed to be used.) I know PB would keep away from Judaism/Christian/Muslim references, but I just put it here to make a point.
3)A 'New-ager' who uses skewed and neo-ancient/psuedo-historical magic systems for the belief requirement.
4)I think something like a summoner from PFRPG would not be out of line with the setting. (see 6 below for the PPE cost)
5)A modern scholar arcanist. A person who has figured out how PPE exists and works (via Victor Lazlo) and is set out to 'scientifically' do modern magic. Barriers to Flash-Bang magic (see 6)
6)A PPE system that focuses on a big point of the potential Psychic Energy theory, but often ignored/seen as lesser in the other PB games. Sacrifice and Syphoning PPE from others to fuel spells. Sacrifices have been used historically almost everywhere. If a arcanist wants to cast a spell, he might not have enough base PPE and needs to do an animal sacrifice. An evil one maybe will use humans for higher PPE. Or a cabal/coven/priesthood might get together and do it together, pooling PPE. If the arcanist's base PPE is similar to ISP for psychics, he may only have 6-10 and not enough PPE to do a fireball, and if he does a sacrifice, or pools the PPE of others, he might want something else than a fireball for his time/effort/sacrifice.
6)Spells that are useful to keeping PCs 'safe'. Never forget that your PCs actions to kill/get rid of the supernatural can and will have consequences. Discorporation makes it so you can't point to a dead Gremlin and say 'see we were killing that'. You are surrounded by police because you fired shots in a warehouse in a city, and all the police/prosecutor see is a dead businessman (cult leader), bullet filled walls and broken window/door. Your computer has files on the businessman's whereabout, and tracking him. They don;t care about this cult nonsense, your butts are getting hauled to jail and your adventuring days are exploring your prison cell for murder 1. Mend spells to fix doors/windows you broke for illegal entry. An attract metal spell to gather spent rounds and casings, so you can gather them easily and not be tracked back to you and your gun. A flash clean spell to wipe fingerprints from walls/doors. Clear tracks to remove foot prints. Spell such as these would be great 'modern' spells.

So, these are just my thoughts, because I see a lot of people talking about conversions from Rifts, BTS-1, PFRPG, and Nightbane and I would much rather a system using PPE but based on historical and modern Earth magic and not just a cut and paste of other systems that would break the BTS-2 feel of subtle and background horrors.

[gaby]

Well I think both Subtle and Ritual can wokr.
It will take a time to learning magic in the low ley line level of BtS,they have to build up the p.p.e.
I also think Magic limiteds from NightBane:Through the Grass Darkly,like they can only use them at Night or through a focus.

[mrloucifer]

Based on my discussions with Kevin concerning the magic in BTS-2, I can say this much:

1. Witches, Arcanists and Summoners WILL be in the book.

2. I do expect that pacts and sacrifices/siphoning energy and such will be a large part of their power.

3. I expect something like the ritualistic to be in the book as well.

4. I dont know about any plans for modern spells like you mentioned, but I like the idea and I'll try to remember it in future talks with Kevin.

[mrloucifer]

One example of the kind of magic that Kevin and I had talked about was something like this: The magic user casts a spell like "danger sense" or a precognitive supernatural warning of some type, and instead of getting a funny feeling that he's being watched or followed, something in the area alerts him to it, like every dog in the neighborhood suddenly starts barking.

Sure, you've got annoyed neighbors, but the dogs do their job in not only alerting the caster, but they get an incidental layer of protection from the supernatural fiend as all the yapping and noise of their dog may keep it away from their house/property.

[mrloucifer]

Cassowaries... how random. nice one!

[ZorValachan]

mrloucifer, good things for me to hear. I like the dog thing also because it can seem so 'natural' that even someone who isn't too skeptical could easily see that as just dogs barking over a cat or something.

[ZorValachan]

I just had a thought about a 'modern' spell that would allow the caster to alter his friction ridges. He could change them a bit and if he had an appropriate Fingerprint comparison skill (CSI, Forensic Science:Fingerprints, etc.) could replicate another person's from an examplar.