Alternate Sorcery System (inspired by Promised Sands)

[RPGPundit]

Ok, magic is based on the joining of sorcerous words, the more advanced version of power words, essentially. Combining these words will launch a spell.  If you do not wish to launch the spell, you must hold out one or more "Lynchpins", blank spaces in the "sentence" you are casting, that will hold the spell from being cast until its filled in.

For each spell, it takes one round to add each word; you can leave as many lynchpins open as you like, which allows the spell to stay more adaptable, but adding each lynchpin in the moment to launch it will take one round per word.

Likewise, it is possible to take the spell you have "hung" at any moment, and replace one word for another. It takes ten minutes to "take back" a word, and another round to "add" the new one.

In cases where any effect could have one or the opposite effect (ie. healing or harming), the word must be directed toward one or the other in forming the spell, so unless it is kept as a lynchpin, you must decide whether the effect will be one or the other beforehand.

Here is the list of words:

1. Structural words:
Create: this spell structure opens a shadow gate through shadow to an area where the desired element is located, "shipping" it in. If you use an elemental word with your spell and do not use "create", then for the spell to work a sufficient quantity of said element would have to already be in the area.

Direction(x): where "x" is the direction or area of effect you wish; you can place this word in order to alter the direction of an existing phenomenon, or to direct the effect of your spell. most spells that involve summoning or manipulating elements will require a "direction" structural word to work.

Duration: If this word is not used, the duration of the magical effect will be instantaneous.  If you use this word, however, you can specify a longer duration, anything from one round, up to "permanent". In any case, the duration of any spell can be cut short by someone using pattern, logrus, shifting shadow, or casting a "snuff magic" spell.

Surge: A more powerful version of the process surge power word, it will have a more significant and longer effect.  If the spell is meant to "surge" a specific element, that element will be another word in the spell. If it is meant to surge any pre-existing process, then the Surge:Any counts as two words.

Snuff: The same, but will kill any process. In this case the specific process must be included in the spell, usually left open as a lynchpin.

Alter: This word will indicate that the spell is to transform one kind of shadow object into another. Usually both objects must be specified as words; but if you specify only one word it can be used to allow you to "shape" that kind of effect (ie. "alter rock" to allow you to easily dig or bore a hole into rock). This kind of power can not affect any objects or creatures of "reality" (from Amber, or Chaos, or containing "real" power within them).

Shadow: This is the lynchpin to specify the shadow in which you are casting.  The word is often left as a lynchpin unless you're very sure of where you are going to be casting.  Sometimes magic from one shadow will work in another shadow if the shadows are similar enough, but until you try it is never a guarantee.

Target: this is if the spell is intended to work upon a particular being or type of being. The Target can be as general as "orcs" or more specific. If the target is a being of "reality", it is necessary to specify the particular target (which, at the DM's option, might require knowing the target's "True Name").
This structural word is necessary only for spells that are meant to psychically contact or affect the particular mind or body of a living being; it is not necessary for general elemental spells.  The "target" in question can also be yourself.

2. Effects:

Attribute: this, combined with surge or snuff, will temporarily magically increase the power of any of the four attributes. It will usually raise these attributes by one full rank with a surge (making them slightly better than the true holder of that rank) or decrease the attribute one full rank with a snuff. Either of these effects will dissapear instantly through the touch of pattern or logrus, or very quickly if one shifts shadow.

Mind: when combined with target, this creates a spell that allows you to make psychic contact with an individual target.

Consciousness: when combined with target, this creates a spell that can either cause someone to fall into unconsciousness or a deep coma-like sleep, or it can wake someone up; the former requires that the caster's psyche be superior unless the target doesn't resist.

Life: Affects the life force of living beings. Used on a particular target it can be directed to help regenerate injuries, effectively doubling their healing rate; or it can be used to cause a drain of life-force. On anyone with a human level of endurance, it will kill them instantly. Someone with a chaos rank of endurance will suffer long-term helplessness requiring a week of bedrest to recover, and someone with amber or higher endurance will only suffer the equivalent of an immediate blackout lasting only a few rounds (or as little as one, if one's endurance is very high).

Time: as a directed spell this effect can alter the flow of time in an area, cast as a target spell on an object it can make an object age very quickly, becoming structurally weak, or age very slowly becoming resistant to wear and tear (effectively turning that object into an effect equivalent to the conjuration effect of "Invulnerable to Conventional Weapons"). As a target spell on a creature it can be used to enhance the velocity of a creature, essentially doubling its normal speed (but also its rate of aging), or to slow the creature in time to a crawl, or even turning them, effectively, into a statue.  Cast on an unwilling creature, this spell requires psyche advantage.
Combined with Target and Direction, "time" could be used to teleport a target to any other place in the same shadow (the direction would have to specify the desired teleport location)

Magic: this is the effect of raw magic itself; combined with snuff it can be used to cancel ongoing magical effects from previous spells cast on an area, object, or person; combined with surge and target it can be used to create a magical barrier around a person, which would provide extra magical protection against other magical effects (like "snuff" counterspells, or any Targeted spell on their person). Combined with alter and direction, it could create a magical barrier that would make it impossible for anyone of less than Amber rank Psyche to cross.

(elements): all of these elements are objects that can be used (in combination with create, direction, or alter; as well as snuff and surge) to create all kinds of effects in your environment. Used with create, the spell effectively "summons" this element into an area (if "create" is not used, then the element must already be present in an area); direction can be used to make the element in question into a kind of attack (with the caster choosing the particular aesthetic of the attack, ie. a "cloud of dust" or a "Lightning bolt"), with alter it can be used to transform one element into another, or to shape that element in the environment (it could also be combined with Alter and Target/duration to make an individual temporarily immune to attacks of that element type). Surge or snuff would enhance or kill any ongoing process related to the element (this works with certain volatile elements, but not others).  The following is not a complete list of possible elements, others may be thought up by the sorcerer, with GM approval:

Dust
Dirt
Rock
Metal
glass
plastic
rubber
water
rain
steam
smoke
sound
wind
plants
gravity
inertia
electro-magnetism
light
lightning
heat
fire
magma
cold

(note: the GM should encourage clever uses of spells; ie. constructing a spell with target(self)/light/snuff could be used to reduce the refraction of light in an individual making him very difficult to see, though this would also make it harder for him to see.  Using target(other)/light/surge/direction could allow a caster to create a spell where light is used to temporarily blind an individual (or do so more permanently combined with Duration(permanent)); whereas light/create(or surge)/direction/duration would essentially create a "light" spell illuminating an area.  Likewise, "electromagnetism" could be targeted on many technological objects with the effect of damaging circuitry)

Well.. what do you all think?

RPGPundit

[TonyLB]

I'm wondering what a "round" is, in Amber terms.  It's been a while since I was deep into the rules (and my rule-book is in a box right now, along with a lot of my other books) but I don't remember things playing out in rounds, per se.  Where would that stand, relative to (say) the time it takes an Amberite third-ranked in Warfare to draw and fire a handgun?

[RPGPundit]

Well, I meant by that an "action"; as in a period of time of a few seconds.  While Amber doesn't really use a formalized timekeeping system (in the sense of "one round equals 6 seconds", or "1 turn equals 30 seconds", or whatever), in actual play it tends to be that the GM goes from player to player asking them what their "actions" are in turn.  So each "word" takes one "action" to use.  Thus, if a spell has two open lynchpins, a wizard trying to "complete" the spell would take two "actions", enough time for someone else to do two things.

RPGPundit

[TonyLB]

Interesting ... I've never seen Amber played in that way.  Mostly I see combats and other such conflicts played by people telling what general stance (full defensive, opportunistic and all-out attack, for instance, are offered as stances one could take in combat) their character is going to take, and then running time forward long enough to get some interesting information (whether that's five seconds or five minutes) then taking a new stance.

Different strokes, I suppose.

[RPGPundit]

Every time I've seen combat run, it was the exchange of action for action, strike for strike; except in cases where one opponent vastly outclassed the others (ie. Amberite vs. shadow humans).

RPGPundit

[finarvyn]

Interesting. I've never played "Promised Sands", but I do like the general concept of what you are describing here. Have you playtested this, or is it just theoretical?

[RPGPundit]

Totally theoretical at the moment, but I'm strongly considering using this sorcery system for the next time I run Amber.

RPGPundit

[Nihilistic Mind]

Let us know how it turns out...

[RPGPundit]

Bump, just because its been a while, and I'm going to be running Amber sometime soon.

RPGPundit

[Nihilistic Mind]

I'm glad you did, I had forgotten about this thread and I am likely to use these rules for my next Amber Campaign chapter (which we may start tonight). I hadn't put an emphasis on sorcery until now, and it's about time to do so.

I'm assuming that the power source for the spells is the sorcerer himself. Would using the Logrus as a power source and to store spells make them more powerful etc.?
What other powers could be used to power up spells?

Is there a limit on how many spells a Shadow sorcerer can make in a day? What about a Chaosian? An Amberite? Endurance could take care of that I'm sure, but have you thought of some kind of ratio?

When it comes to sorcery, I like to run it with three seperate levels: charms, spells and rituals.

Charms are quick and very simple (power words, basically, but the sorcerer is not limited to power words that are learned).

Spells are more complex, take more time, maybe some incantation, sigils, small sacrifice. Usually I like for spells to use a defined power source other than the character, but it can be done without with charges limited by the character's endurance. Spells can be stored.

Rituals are long, complex and very powerful. They cannot be stored and need to occur where its effects are needed. A power source is very important if lasting effects are required.

When it comes to a power source, local Shadow things can be used if the Shadow has the right properties, but won't be as powerful as something like the Logrus or a connection to the Fount of Power.
It's the way Spikards are described power source wise: a ring that pulls from many Shadow power sources to process semi-instantaneous spells.

What I like about what you've written in your first post is that it could be used for spells and rituals.

[jibbajibba]

I like this system a lot oddly becuase it ties Power words in as well but also because it keeps the essence of the system that exists ie you can create your own spells and all spells are a unique working of each character (avoids tedious repetative spell lists).

I would go a step further and say power words are just singl word spells and you need to learn power words (the cantrips of the system) before you move onto spells.

Have you thought about using a basic and advanced sorcery option and perhaps allowing extra features at the advanced level ?

Lastly the round thing might be tricky in theory but I think woudl be okay in practise. I would also seem to me that you can speak whilst fighting have you considered that.

Sator arepo tenet opera rotas ....

[Uncle Twitchy]

This is interesting -- can you give a clear example of its usage?

[RPGPundit]

Just to let people know, I've stickied this thread for completely selfish reasons. My next Amber campaign will begin in a question of weeks now, and I'm strongly leaning toward using this magic system.

RPGPundit

[Uncle Twitchy]

Still waiting for that clear example...

[RPGPundit]

Well, let's say you wanted to cast a "lightning bolt".

You'd need the following lynchpins:
Create
Direction (bolt extending out from your fingertips)
Shadow (the Shadow you were casting it in)
Element: Lightning

To "hang" the spell for quicker casting later, you'd need to leave at least once of those three lynchpins open, probably "Shadow". Thus, when the moment of casting came you'd fill in the word taking up your action that "round" and the spell would be cast.

You could choose to leave two lynchpins open, for example "Shadow" and "Element"; this means that instead of a Lightning bolt the spell would become a generic attack spell, where you could fire a bolt of fire, or ice, or lightning, or magma, or whatever you wanted. However, with two lynchpins open, it would take you two rounds of action to activate the spell.

RPGPundit