Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gothmog" data-source="post: 3659490" data-attributes="member: 317">Well, considering the game is owned by Atlas Games, and has been around since about 1990, I don't know if I can verbatim post rules.  But here is the general idea:Lets say you have a Rego score of +7, and a Mentem score of +8, and you wanted to make someone obey your commands for a short period of time.  You're in a magically neutral area (some areas make it easier to cast magic, others inhibit it); and you're not previously fatigued, so your Stamina stat is +1.  Your casting score for this spell would be +7 + 8 +1 = 16. If your character knows this spell (called Confusion of the Numbed Will), then the difficulty to cast this spell is 20.  Your character rolls a stress die d10 and adds his casting score.  If he rolls 20 or more, it works.  If its 20 or less, the spell fails.  A stress d10 is one where if you roll a 10, the attempt is a potential botch.  The GM will have you roll a number of d10 as botch dice, and if any of them come up 10, then there is a botch.  If a 1 is rolled on the initial die, you roll the die again and double the result (treating 10 as a 10 now).  If another one is rolled, roll the die again and quadruple the result and so on.If you don't know this spell and want to improvise the magic, you halve your casting score, and roll the die, adding a +8 in this case.  If the roll is 20 or more, the improvised spell works.  Its a very simple system, and its very speedy in play.In addition, Ars Magica has extensive rules for foci (like wands), laboratory research, spell design, familiar creation, and Certamen- which is a kind of magical duel where two wizards use their force of will and skill with Forms and Techniques to batter down each others willpower and magical defenses until one submits or is knocked unconscious.  In addition, the Ars Magica game is set around a Covenant, which is a wizard's stronghold where several wizards, their apprentices, servants, and grogs (warriors) live and work together- almost identical to the HP magic academies.  Now that I think about it, JK Rowlings HP books are almost identical to Ars Magica- basically if you made the wizards in Ars Magica kids and made the Ars Magica world a little less grim (Ars Magica is based on medieval Europe), you'd end up with Harry Potter.Actually, you can download the 4th Edition of Ars Magica (they are up to 5th Edition now) for FREE on RPGNow.  Check it out- its one of the most innovative yet simple systems out there.<a href="http://enworld.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=774&" target="_blank">http://enworld.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=774&</a>or <a href="http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=AG0204" target="_blank">http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=AG0204</a></blockquote>

Verification