So I’m trying to wrap my head around how Arcane Magnitude interacts with Effect.
Say a Whisper wants to use Tempest to take out an opponent: The Position is decided as normal. She chooses the magnitude of the magic and takes the stress for that, rolls Attune and succeeds. How is the Effect decided? I’m guessing that the magnitude effects Potency but I’m unsure quite how. Is this one of the gut feeling judgements? For me that feels like Moderate magnitude is standard Potency with Minor and Weak being -1 and -2 respectively and Serious +1 etc but it might not be as hard and fast that that.
And how does Tier factor into this? It seems to me that an unarmoured Tier 2 Red Sash with his fancy blade is just as vulnerable to be pummelled by marble sized hailstones as his Tier 0 apprentice. Or is it better to think of Tier as a wider abstraction just as hit points are in D20 style games? A Tier 2 swordsman is better prepared to deal with giant hail than a Tier 0 fighter even though it’s not so obvious from the fiction, just as a Tier 2 Whisper is better able to direct the same hail to greater effect than a Tier 0 apprentice would find possible.
I’ve not really seen play examples of how a Whisper goes head to head with a non magical opponent and the rules don’t make it completely clear.
This is a great question! It will be more useful for me to see how other players answer given the current text, so I’ll hold off on explaining it for now.
Only having had one session so far, I’m not particularly qualified. However I have opinions and internet access, so QED 🙂 Tiers are directly linked to quality of equipment, which has game mechanic effects but not necessarily changes in the fiction of their effect (although they probably should) Equipment is an enabler of actions in very similar ways that moves/actions are, and are equally used to differentiate one character from another. I don’t see why Tier differences would not also matter in every other thing a character does, unless specifically group enabling things for flavour reasons and having arbitrary game mechanic changes. Ergo – Tier 2 Tempest has more hailstones than a Tier 0 Tempest, and a Tier 2 target is better at dodging them than a Tier 0. Or similar – depending on situation. It is like D&D levels, but you can go down more easily.
As to Whisper vs non-magic – there’s not really any non-magic characters in the game, just some that roll dice and take the lowest.
(Disclaimer: I have yet to run a game, this is just my interpretation of the text from reading it.)
Looking at the examples of magnitude, it seems to me that for damage, effect = magnitude. The “standard” effect is 2, as in, 2 ticks on a clock (page 10). This matches pretty well with the “Cohort Harm & Healing” levels (page 21), if one were to use them for an important enemy NPC. In the magnitude examples, these also match up pretty well to the “Cohort Harm & Healing” levels. For example, magnitude 2 is “a hefty punch or kick,” which I could see leaving someone Impaired (level 2 cohort harm). Level 4 is “direct electrocution,” which could easily kill someone. 4 stress seems a fair price to outright kill an ordinary person.
For Tier, my personal guideline is that it only applies to things the target is “good at” or “known for.” Your example of the Tier 2 swordsman and his apprentice is perfect, actually. One could make the argument that a swordsman is good at dodging, so his tier does apply against hailstones — but maybe not against lightning. Conversely, a Tier 3 big bruiser, a giant brute of a man, might apply his tier to both hailstones and lightning, just by virtue sheer toughness. Whereas a Tier 4 information broker might not get any benefit from tier when defending against weather attacks, because it’s just not part of his schtick. His tier might apply when trying to see through your conjured fog, though — but the big bruiser’s tier wouldn’t, because he’s not really built for lookout duty. This is roughly the equivalent of the rule for applying a cohort’s quality (page 42): “When a cohort performs actions for which its types apply, it uses its full quality rating. Otherwise, its quality is zero.”
I agree with Will Scott: that’s also how I’ve handled it.
My reading is you use the magnitude of the Tempest, including the range, duration and area, to judge how effective the action will be to achieving the player’s goal. A magnitude 2 tempest will have a different effect level if you’re just trying to knock over one person vs. trying to murder a whole street of people. Also equipment like armour could reduce effect, so that’s where Tier may come in, along with battle field tactics or occult defences.
If the enemy forces have a scale advantage, then the area of effect will need to be increased. If their scale advantage is really great, like they’re a whole army, then their scale may be the dominant factor and the action may end up having little or even no effect.
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Thanks guys. Those are all interesting answers. It seems that it’s much as I thought:
Magnitude can be thought of as being equal to the number of ticks on a clock assuming everything else is in balance – A weak Magnitude does nothing (it’s a cantrip – useful for a distraction but not much else), minor gets 1 tick, and so on.
Tier is factored in where it makes sense. This could be due to experience or better equipment. This makes things interesting fictionally as a player might be able to come up with an effect that can avoid Tier – a lightning strike instead of a gust of wind that slams into someone where the better armour of a higher Tier opponent would become part of the equation.
Just to clarify some of the other points that have come up. By “magical vs non magical” I mean a Whisper using magic against someone with no skills in magic as opposed to a magical dual where an opponent has a good chance of using magical means to defend against a magical attack. Yes, anyone can roll Attune but that’s not going to be any use against an incoming ice storm.
On the question of a larger area of effect (or increased range) – I deliberately kept my question to the simple one on one example where it makes little difference if a single target is pummelled by hail in a small area or in the middle of a larger area. If the attack is part of a group combat then my feeling is that whether expanding the area has more effect on the overall combat is a judgment call just like any other form of attack. A cutter rolls a success on a skirmish role in group combat and this doesn’t mean that he slices into every thug in front of him and yet the group still takes a couple of ticks of damage and so my feeling is that if a Whisper blasts ice into the face of one of the thugs then that is considered group harm and it’s a judgement call as to the level of effect.
I don’t know. I think it’s misleading to think of magnitude level being equivalent to effect level or number of ticks. The relationship between Magnitude and effect entirely depends on fictional context and what the player’s goal is.
For example, if you’re trying to get through a room filled with guards but only lit by candle light, a puff of wind across all the candles at once (Magnitude 0) may be enough to give you great effect, or 3 ticks on say a 4-segment clock.
Or if you’re trying to end a manifestation of a Forgotten God, or destroy a regiment of the Imperial Army, or take down a fortress, and you throw a hurricane wind (Magnitude 6) at it, it’s very possible you’ll have little or no effect, so 1 or 0 ticks on whatever number segments those clocks might have.
I don’t think in practice things work as a simple equivalence equation and it’ll probably confuse people trying to learn how to play by saying “Magnitude level = Effect level” or similar. It misplaces the importance of considering magnitude as part of the fictional position.
Wouldn’t those be exceptions covered by Potency and possibly Scale?
Will Scott, I don’t think my examples are exceptions. They’re like any situation that comes up in a game, I went with my gut feeling that in the first a weak Tempest has great effect, in the second a devastating Tempest has no effect. You can use the factors if you want to fine tune things, working out where the player character has advantage and disadvantage, show how they might tackle things differently so their actions have the desired effect, but you don’t have to use them and in these cases I didn’t. I just looked at the fictional situation and went with my gut feeling.
I’m with Oliver on this one. You basically need to take each action on a case by case basis and determine how effective that might be. In your hail example, if the PC rolls a 6, then they have hit the target with hail. Ask yourself how problematic that would be for the target and assign effect that way.
Sometimes there is a good rule of thumb, but in this case I don’t think so.
Yes, I know that we can all see uses of Tempest where a weak Magnitude can have great Effect and of course all those need to be judged based on what makes sense. What I’m looking at is the very simple case where the magical effect itself is used as a direct weapon. It’s a common case – the Whisper is using magic directly to subdue an opponent. In this case a Moderate Magnitude is equal to a strong punch and this seems to me to be a Standard Effect.
I think this where where we need some play examples and maybe some light rules on how to judge Effect based on Magnitude.
Compel is another Whisper ability that could be used for attacking opponents and this seems to me even more tricky to judge Magnitude vs Effect. My main thought is that the Magnitude needed to Compel a spirit depends on the nature of the spirit rather than the target of the attack. If the Whisper can’t control the spirit then things go horribly wrong in very bad ways. Some idea of what Magnitude is needed to have a chance of controlling what types of spirits would be useful along with what sort of effect those spirits would have when directed against an opponent would be helpful.
Paul Byford, I can also construct examples where the magnitude of Tempest equals the effect level of the action. I just doesn’t think that’s an instructive way to understand how effect and magnitude relate.
If you don’t want to use effect level, that’s cool, you can say all actions default to 2 ticks and the system will still work. But that doesn’t mean, if you do want to use effect level, that you should or need to find a standard case for a Tempest so you can use its magnitude level as a baseline for determining how effective PC’s actions are at achieving the PC’s goal. Using Tempest is like any other action, you should look to the fiction first.
I guess I don’t agree searching for a standard case to measure all others against is the right approach to understanding how the system works.
Fiction first. Yes I agree. That’s the whole point of the system. Where I differ is that Tempest, and magic in general, is no longer just like any other action because of the rules on Magnitude and stress. It’s not like you can role Skirmish and by spending between 1 to 6 extra stress punch a guy harder and harder. When Attune was just “I use Attune and cause hail to pummel the guys” then it was all down to judgement as to the effect, but now that magic is more codified, I feel that at least some guidance is needed. I’m certainly not advocating any hard and fast rules, but some suggestions to GMs about the best way to handle scale would be useful.
I’m not even asking for a single “standard case” just guidance for some common cases and I feel that doing harm directly to an opponent using magic is a very common case.
Blades is a very free and open game where a player can try anything and the rules are just there to support the fiction, but few GMs and even fewer players are used to that. Those of us in this group understand the free nature of the game but we are the exception. I don’t want those new to the system to be unsure how to apply the rules and get frustrated. It’s been a learning curve for me and I’m all in on the Fiction First nature of Blades.
I dunno, I think the system works fine both ways — a good guideline will produce results very similar to your “gut instinct” anyway.
For example, a gentle breeze (magnitude 0) putting out the candles in a room does not sound like a 4-tick success to me; 2-ticks sounds more appropriate (which is what you get from minor effect = 0, +1 Potency, +1 Scale).
As another example, a hurricane wind against a fortress: for starters, Tempest only lets you spend up to 6 stress, so assuming you have to pay 3-stress for the area effect, that leaves you with a magnitude 3 effect (staggering wind). -1 Potency, and let’s say -1 for Tier, you wind up with a 1-tick success; so the fortress suffers some broken windows, maybe loses some livestock, etc.
For compel: The section on Arcane Magnitude says something about using it to measure the strength of ghosts, demons, etc. I’d call that the creature’s Quality. For example, a demon who routinely manifests Magnitude 5 effects would be a Quality 5 dude, which would factor into the final Effect of your attune action to compel. If you succeed, the devil hits your opponent with a 5-tick Effect (or whatever makes sense for their own Magnitude modified by Potency, Scale, etc.). If you fail, you just pissed off a Quality 5 devil, have fun with that! (And, obviously, this whole exchange is a ripe opportunity for a literal devil’s bargain…)
Paul Byford, cool I think we’re basically on the same page then.
I see the stress spent on Tempest as just another way to affect the fiction, perhaps more reliable than trying to describe your way or roll your way into a fictional position, but not fundamentally different.
If you’re trying to harm an opponent, whether you throw an actual grenade at them or unleash a storm with the force of a grenade, you work out the effect level of that action in more or less the same way. I see the range of stress that can be spent on Tempest grants a characters more flexibility in the forces they can unleash, not as granting them access to fundamentally different kinds of forces requiring different system mechanics.
Also, you’re probably just talking loosely, but Tempest doesn’t allow a character to use magic to directly harm opponents. You have to describe the storm it creates and it’s through the storm that Tempest can harm opponents.
Will Scott, interesting point about the limits of spending stress on Tempest. I had read it that that each increase in magnitude allows you to also increase one of the factors (range, duration, area). But I realise now that the sentence under Baseline and Modifiers on p61 could be read either way: For each +1 added to magnitude, the Whisper may increase one of the factors below by one step (these increases do not contribute to the force of the effect).
Also I think it’s pretty straightforward to create an example where a magnitude level 0 force could have a standard or greater effect, ticking off 2 or more segments on a clock. You can try to break that down that effect level into advantages among the factors, but my point is that relying on simple equivalence is not the best way to understand how effect and arcane magnitude relate or how the system works.
Yes, I was talking loosely. I mean that the effect created solely by magical means does the harm and the magic is not used to trigger some non magical effect like drawing acid from a jar to form a corrosive mist.
I’ve been thinking about this some more and I’ve come to the conclusion that part of the difficulty is that spending stress to increase Magnitude is a mechanical system with only a defined fictional outcome. It’s easy for a player to understand that they can push themself and pay 2 stress for an extra die – it’s a mechanical cost for a mechanical outcome, so it’s reasonable for a player to ask ”If I pay 2 stress to make the Magnitude Moderate, what does that buy me in terms of results?” Currently there is only a fictional answer to that question (your magic is as strong as a firm punch) but there is no mechanical guidance. I just want a GM to find it easier to answer that question in mechanical terms.
“If you’re trying to harm an opponent, whether you throw an actual grenade at them or unleash a storm with the force of a grenade, you work out the effect level of that action in more or less the same way. I see the range of stress that can be spent on Tempest grants a characters more flexibility in the forces they can unleash” — Oliver Granger
This wins the thread. Now I have to rethink my whole approach.
Paul Byford, yes, a mechanical cost for a fictional outcome. Nicely put. And yes, I can see how that’s could seem weird.
But to answer you question, players and GM should turn to the Effects section. The effect of a Tempest is judged like any other action. This is often a conversation between the player and GM about what their trying to achieve, what action their PC is taking and how much they can expect that action will go toward achieving their goal. There can be a bit of to and fro, as players adjust their expectations, change their actions, or for Tempest spend more or less stress.
What the stress cost is really getting you is access to new ways of controlling the fiction in a reliable way. No one else can create frozen ice blades, explosive winds, lightning from the thin air, rains that douse flames, etc. That gives the character heaps more flexibility in how they go about achieving their goals. And with no risk from failing a roll. It’s not safe because burning stress is dangerous, but you know that if you have the stress to spend you can create the effect you want when and where you want., every time. That certainty alone is powerful.
Oliver Granger I’m pretty sure you still have to roll in addition to paying the stress. At least John makes Stras roll for tempest in addition to paying the stress in the bloodletter game. In my games, the effect always manifests, but the roll determines if that effect does what you want or is out of control in some fashion. Basically, there is always risk.
Yes, you have to role but if a Whisper fails then, as long as their Position is not already desperate, they have the option to role again with worse Position. If they have pumped a whole load of stress into the Action then it would make sense to do that. As a Whisper gets at least 2 die on Attune the chance of complete failure over 2 rolls is 1 in 16 which is pretty low. Getting serious consequences are high though but that just adds to the drama. 🙂
Oliver Granger of course every Action is a discussion between player and GM and Arcane Magnitude is part of that but that doesn’t mean that guidance is not useful. To say that “it all comes from what makes sense in the fiction” is fine but it could leave both GM and players who are getting to grips with the system floundering. I asked the original question because I wanted some clarity and this thread has allowed me to gain a better understanding of the issue and how to resolve it but the interaction between Magnitude and Effect is complex and so a few notes of general guidance would help players have a better understanding of that interaction. There are no firm rules here and any GM can feel free to ignore them.
At least in my games, it’s the GM who decides the consequences, so rolling again in a worst position is not always an option.
I suppose it is up to the GM to make that call but if a Whisper who spent all that stress asks for a worse Position then I think it would be unfair to deny that. One of my issues with D20 style games is that a spellcaster casts their One Big Spell, rolls and fails, losing the spell. The chance in Blades to re-role is one part of the system that I really like. The GM can always load on complications for the first failure.
The issue with D20 style games is not that you failed with your one big spell, it’s that you cast your spell and nothing happens, because that’s boring. In Blades, when you fail with tempest it can be incredibly interesting and that’s what is important. There should be a chance that you take your big risk and fail, and when my whisper rolls her 4 dice and fails, I’m not inclined to let her roll again and and miss out on the fun of failure.
Just my 2 cents obviously, you can rule that however you’d like.
Hmmmmmm, yes you have a point. It can work all ways. I would probably load up the outcomes with complications and reduce effect if that made sense. I know what it feels like to have your character’s single big moment fail and giving a player an opportunity to salvage the situation even if the effect is reduced and complications are added can be more satisfying all round.
Oops, yes my mistake. Of course you have to roll to see if using Tempest has the effect you want. I got carried away thinking about being able to set the magnitude of the Tempest to whatever you want, that I missed the main game.
Paul Byford, I’m all for clarity. I was just trying to help you find the guidance you were asking for.
Thanks guys, it’s been a useful discussion. Now that we have had our say I would be interested in John Harper’s thoughts.