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Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base rules?

Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 4:39 am
by Tor
I think I remember somewhere encountering some rule about being able to store (in addition to base?) triple base PPE for something like PE in minutes duration before it disappates into the environment?

I can't remember if this was some kind house, FAQ or Rifter or Canon rule though.

I don't think anything like this was in the original main book, but am wondering if anyone recalls if it was included in any later books like FoM, Dark Conversions, PF2nd, Book of Magic or RUE?

I'm also wondering about how it works if you are immediately putting PPE into a spell instead of storing it for minutes, if this is the case.

For example, if I am remembering right about this 'triple base' rule, it still means that someone with 50 PPE is limited to storing 200 PPE (50 + 150) and some spells have higher cost than that.

There are ways you can get more PPE though, like other people giving you PPE during a ritual, or it being stored in Talismans. I am wondering, are these also limited by the rule? Or does the nature of rituals and other PPE supplementers bypass this triple base rule and allow limitless casting?

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 5:17 am
by Damian Magecraft
Tor wrote:I think I remember somewhere encountering some rule about being able to store (in addition to base?) triple base PPE for something like PE in minutes duration before it disappates into the environment?

I can't remember if this was some kind house, FAQ or Rifter or Canon rule though.

I don't think anything like this was in the original main book, but am wondering if anyone recalls if it was included in any later books like FoM, Dark Conversions, PF2nd, Book of Magic or RUE?

I'm also wondering about how it works if you are immediately putting PPE into a spell instead of storing it for minutes, if this is the case.

For example, if I am remembering right about this 'triple base' rule, it still means that someone with 50 PPE is limited to storing 200 PPE (50 + 150) and some spells have higher cost than that.

There are ways you can get more PPE though, like other people giving you PPE during a ritual, or it being stored in Talismans. I am wondering, are these also limited by the rule? Or does the nature of rituals and other PPE supplementers bypass this triple base rule and allow limitless casting?

Book Of Magic page 21
RUE and The PF Mysteries of Magic books also have some insights on this line of query.

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 6:01 am
by Glistam
This method doesn't limit you when it comes to rituals. But for regular spell casting that is your P.P.E. limit, regardless where the P.P.E. comes from.

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Mon Aug 19, 2013 6:54 pm
by Tor
Anyone know pages for RUE and MoM? I'll have to take a look, will check RUE now.

Glistam do you know what phrasing in the rules implies that rituals are excepted from this?

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Mon Aug 19, 2013 8:12 pm
by Glistam
Page 187, first paragraph, left column. The mage uses the energy for the spell from the participants, animal sacrifices, himself, and from the ley lines/nexus if necessary.

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2013 12:08 pm
by Tor
So I guess the idea is that since it's multiple people participating in the spell-casting (not exactly Group Casting from TTGD, but still sort of collective) that excess PPE above the maximum of the caster is stored in the pools of the participants, be they active or sacrifice?

I'm not clear on how this would allow the storage/channeling of ley line or nexus PPE though.

Example: if Leo the LLW (80PPE) is doing a ritual with the aid of PPE from his buddy Cecil the Cyber-Knight (20PPE) which costs 500 PPE, even if the PPE is available from a ley line nexus, since it exceeds the triple maximum extra (100+300 is only 400) how would the extra 100 PPE be used?

Looking through Book of Magic when it says triple I'm still not clear if that means triple total or triple additional. Is it "I can store 100 forever, 300 for a few minutes, for a total of 400" or "I can store 100 forever, 200 additional, for a total of 300" ? Wording is unclear.

Also noticing in RBoM... on pg 22's Table of Contents... why is the Millenium Druid listed as a magic OCC? Those guys are just basically wussy Wilderness Scouts who suck up to tree and get presents from them. Same with Nexus Knights from that book, those are just a mod you make to other OCCs (like Man at Arms) with people who happen to have ISP to power TW devices, not magical at all, they just get magic items.

Also interesting that the Phase Mystic from Phase World is listed as a magic OCC in spite of being predominantly psionic. Perhaps phase powers are a form of ISP-powered magic abilities.

The note on "nothing here" under "Q" on page 23 also irks me. Kev goes to all the trouble of listing stuff like "Mystic, Born" and "Mystic, Phase" yet could have done "Queller, Demon" to fill that hole. Queller is the root noun here, Demon is basically just the adjective noun.

I am also upset about nothing being listed for X. Surely somewhere there is a class that begins with X. Let's find it.

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2013 7:18 pm
by Glistam
The purpose of the ritual is to contain that excess energy above what the caster can hold - otherwise there'd be no point to it. The ritual creates a framework to "box" in the energy being provided and at the apex/conclusion of the ritual the energy is directed by a combination of the ritual framework that has been developed and the caster/participant's will into forming the spell effect. I believe Mysteries of Magic touches on this as well but I'm still navigating the book so I can't give you any page reference. I may also be discussing my interpretation and not so much the cannon of what was written.

The interpretation I've used, and seen used elsewhere for the excess P.P.E. that a character can hold, is 3× the character's base above his normal maximum. So a mage with 100 P.P.E. can, for a number of minutes equal to his P.E., hold 400 P.P.E.. Note that that timer starts from the moment they go to 101, not the moment they get to 400.

Re: Storing (or using to cast spell) PPE above one's base ru

Posted: Sat Aug 24, 2013 5:46 pm
by Tor
Glistam wrote:The purpose of the ritual is to contain that excess energy above what the caster can hold - otherwise there'd be no point to it.
You mean other than the higher strength of the magic (for lower level people, anyway), that some magic can only be cast as a ritual, that rituals can sometimes produce greater effects, cost less PPE, have longer ranges, or allow people to offer all their PPE to a mage willingly instead of only half of it (not sure on this last part).

Glistam wrote:The ritual creates a framework to "box" in the energy being provided and at the apex/conclusion of the ritual the energy is directed by a combination of the ritual framework that has been developed and the caster/participant's will into forming the spell effect.
This would be cool and I consider this possibility (thus the idea of the pooled PPE base) but I haven't encountered any book language describing that.

Rituals are mentioned as allowing the lending of PPE but not of increasing PPE storage maximums. I guess the question is "does a mage have to store PPE to use it to cast magic?" and if not, how do we rule when a make can 'grasp' the PPE long enough to use it for magic?

I am inclined to grasp at there being a 30-second window since that's how long extra PPE can be held onto when using the Chi-to-PPE spell. It fits nicely with the maximum casting time spells took in the old system (2 melees, though RUE made it less). It could be ruled rituals extend that, or simply that most of the PPE in a ritual climaxes at the end of it...

I guess my issue with ritual casting is, if you're taking hours to cast a spell, people could actually get extra PPE during that period (especially with the RUE updates on PPE/rounds instead of hours) so it makes the storage cap almost meaningless.

If rituals bypass storage limits, what is stopping the weak wizard with 50 PPE doing a ritual with his 30 PPE apprentice to cast a ritual version of Crimson Wall of Lictalon, in spite of its 6000 PPE cost being well over the triple (240) of their cumulative 80 PPE?

Glistam wrote:I believe Mysteries of Magic touches on this as well but I'm still navigating the book so I can't give you any page reference. I may also be discussing my interpretation and not so much the cannon of what was written. The interpretation I've used, and seen used elsewhere for the excess P.P.E. that a character can hold, is 3× the character's base above his normal maximum. So a mage with 100 P.P.E. can, for a number of minutes equal to his P.E., hold 400 P.P.E.. Note that that timer starts from the moment they go to 101, not the moment they get to 400.
Whether it's 1+3=4 or 1+2=3 aside, the timing issue is also an interesting one. It makes me think whether or not timing should be on a per PPE basis. If I'm a guy with a PE of 3, and I grab an extra 5 PPE and hold it for 2 minutes, and then I grab an extra 50 PPE, after another minute I can see why the initial 5 PPE should buzz off but I think there should still be 2 minutes left on that more newly acquired 50. Fuzzy issue I guess.