Of Constructs and Conjurers

[Talon Starblade]

Alright, first time posting in official clarification forum, so here goes…

1 – There are two versions of the Conjurer OCC (one in Federation of Magic pg 83 and Mount Nimro pg 30)… for the most part they are identical, but then you get to skills and magic spells where you discover the differences:
The two different living experiences are a no brainer (no higher tech thinking for Fantasy version without exposure), so just mentioning it…
The older FoM version (first printed in ‘97) has 8 more OCC skills than its fantasy iteration (also has one more WP in exchange for a spoken language). Then the additional spells FoM gets 1 “creation” spell ever 2 levels, while the Nimro gets 1 per level and a partial list of what qualifies as usable. Was this a deliberate change or is there an errata or FAQ I missed?

2 – The artwork that accompanies the FoM version shows the Conjurer with a blade and a bird that appear to be composed of translucent stable energy… Is this how the creations are or are they temporary renditions of the real things they copy, including materials and properties (like electrical conductivity). This raises the question on things like bullets, if energy are they propelled by force (like Force Constructs in Powers Unlimited 1) being both silent and almost invisible, or do they make flash a crack like the real McCoy?


On a side note, do the PU inanimate constructs actually function like the real things, e.g.: The powered person creates a frying pan, being made of force energy will it conduct the heat properly, oddly or only prove useful as demonstrated by the movie “Tangled”? *Pong!!*

[Nekira Sudacne]

1: The FoM Conjurer was Rifts-itized for skills. as for the lack of list of useable spells it was likely cut for space, given that we know that the FoM had a lot of wordcount crunched (to the point they made a revised version just to put in more cut material--although not for conjurers.

2. No. They are stated in text to make actual materials, not energy. they are real things with all innate properties of mater, not energy. Most likely it was just him casting Lightblade, which as a spell that creates something they could use and would likely do so sinse 1d4*10 is much better damage than a puny 2d6 sword they could make with conjurering. that's why they have access to creation spells as well.

[Talon Starblade]

Thanks Nekira, that helps...

I do have a follow-up I just realized I had:

When the Conjurers are on Rifts Earth and create ranged and wants to do Megadamage, he needs to spend an additional 30ppe... But is that on the weapon, the ammo, or BOTH?

[ShadowLogan]

Re: #1. While the classes might have the same name, I would just put the differences down for spell selection to them being "regional" variations just like the skills imply. Then again the extra skills might be used to justify the slower automatic spell count (off hand I forget if Conjurers can learn spells outside the auto progression).

Re: #2. While I agree with Nekira about how the items are to appear, it is also possible that the art work is depicting the item(s) in question as being partially conjured into form, in which case they might not appear "solid" until they are fully "conjured".

[drewkitty ~..~]

For some reason I had though one of those two was a psionic conjurer.....off hand do any of you remember a conjurer PCC? maybe from one of the rifters?

As far as the two under discussion, the differences mainly just reflect the worlds (literal and social) they are in.

[eliakon]

Maybe the difference is that they are for two different games?
Just like the Wizard and the Ley Line Walker are different. Or pretty much any class/whatever tends to be set up for the game it is in things tend to be rewritten to fit the game that they are being published in and not for the game that they came from. This is why we have so many versions of spells, psionic powers, or skills with the same name but slightly different effects, or why core rules are even a bit different in tiny ways between different games.

[Fermat]

Psionic Conjuror would be the Psi-Shaper from Nightbane 4: Shadows of the Light; Also the Astral Lord from Nightbane BTS has some conjuring elements

[ShadowLogan]

For some reason I had though one of those two was a psionic conjurer.....off hand do any of you remember a conjurer PCC? maybe from one of the rifters?

As far as the two under discussion, the differences mainly just reflect the worlds (literal and social) they are in.

Some one suggested Nightbane. Can neither confirm nor deny.

Aside from that though any Psychic with Astral Projection, Astral Golem, Ecto-plasm, Ecto-Plasmic Disguise can be said to be psionicly conjurering things into existence either on the Astral Plane or Physical Plane by using ecto-plasm. There is also the class in Mindwerks that creates an Ecto-plasmic body. Any one of which might be thought of as psionic conjuring. Some lines also have Teleport as a psychic ability, which could be used to "conjurer" (by deception).

[drewkitty ~..~]

Psionic Conjuror would be the Psi-Shaper from Nightbane 4: Shadows of the Light; Also the Astral Lord from Nightbane BTS has some conjuring elements

*nods* I see it.

[Axelmania]

Most likely it was just him casting Lightblade

It didn't look like a lightblade to me, this had a clear handle with bolts on it and stuff. I think it was translucent because he was in the middle of creating or uncreating it, same with the bird. Bird might also be a Magic Pigeon spell. Either could also be a magic tattoo, in spite of the text pitting Conjurers against them there is nothing preventing them from getting that.

[eliakon]

Most likely it was just him casting Lightblade

It didn't look like a lightblade to me, this had a clear handle with bolts on it and stuff. I think it was translucent because he was in the middle of creating or uncreating it, same with the bird. Bird might also be a Magic Pigeon spell. Either could also be a magic tattoo, in spite of the text pitting Conjurers against them there is nothing preventing them from getting that.

There is also the possibility that....it was just art. Not everyone agrees that Art is canon, let alone that one should take every artistic detail as information that supersedes/modifies the text.
It could also be some sort of 'create X' spell that we are not aware of (for example. The bird could be a lesser pattern drawing animal from South America....which explicitly DOES look like an energy bird).

[Axelmania]

Maybe the Conjurer in a picture has a Psymbiote in him and it is creating a Psi-Sword. Although I don't picture Psi-Swords having so many details like rivets.