Astral security and Street Magic Options

[Samaels Ghost]

Wards don't hinder spells cast within them, only spells cast through them.

Unless that's a houserule...

[laughingowl]

[laughingowl]

[Demonseed Elite]

hoo boy, okay.

Wards do not hinder spells cast within the ward enclosure, only spells cast through the walls of the ward. They are not "solid" (in as much as anything astral is solid), but they are a complex web of mana holding together the ward walls and the physical anchor's astral shadow. Disturbances to this astral structure can cause the ward to collapse, which is why the physical anchor can not move very far in relation to the ward enclosure. Similarly, a ward can not be nested inside another ward, nor can a ward be built surrounding another ward because the astral structure will not hold where there is already another ward structure present.

[2bit]

I was about to say that too, as fancy as the diagram is, nothing between any of the layers of wards is actually warded.

[RunnerPaul]

[Demonseed Elite]

I'm not really sure I have an answer for that, because I'm not entirely sure about canon rules as far as astrally projecting mages' astral form size. The only reference I can think of is that astral forms are based on a projected self-image and therefore are probably roughly the same size as the person's physical body.

Assuming that's the case and mages can't change their astral form size (I don't think they can, but like I said, I'm not sure it's ever come up in the rules), it probably would protect against projecting mages. Though possibly the projecting mage could take a metaplanar shortcut around it too, like a spirit. Only the mage would have to undertake a metaplanar quest to do that, unlike spirits, which can just hop back and forth at will.

[RunnerPaul]

[PlainWhiteSocks]

I heard of a house rule that stated if one ward is 1/4 or less than the physical size of another it could be nested. The ward walls still couldn't intersect, but it allows for one room of a building to be more heavily warded than the entire building.

[laughingowl]

demonseed Elite:

Thanks for the response and it certainly seems to stop them dead.

I had taken your response to prionic6 (with the diagramed 'stacked' wards) to indicate (if 12 done as a 3d cube) to imply that the concept was sound.

You last response makes it much clearer on the intended rules, though personally any 'spirit' (whether a projecting entity or a true 'spirit') I would allow do get through the cracks (whether since they have a 'small size' or merely while in mundane terms you have to go through intervening space, that isn't necessarily true astraly. Just becasue there is a one to one mapping of 'astral' ot 'real' doesnt mean that if real you have to pass B to get to C, that astrally you have to pass B to get to C.



Though for me my house rules will be the following. To me the preserve the intent (to keep layered wards from being to hard of hassle/overpowered) yet follow closer 'currrent' beliefs and practices on wards and give slightly more flexibility without increasing the power too much (only 'scouting' and dual natured get hampered (and if this causes to much problem I would rule that ANY ward being defated in an enclosed space distrubs the matrixes enough that any weaker ward is disrupted enough to allow what ever broke through passage)

Wards can be layered although their effects (in most cases) are not cumalitive.

(To me this more accurately relfects most tradditions, since 'layered wards' are most common. Almost all traditions involve purifying and warding the entire area that the ritual is being attempted on, but often will have steonger wards at the source. (The 'room' will likely be warded to help keep out background noise/distrubance/general precautions but then the actual particapants of the ritual will enclose themslves in a stronger ward).

Ritual Magic/spirits manifesting at target X, or even a projecting person looking for 'X' merely has to overcome the strongest ward protecting the target. (since astrally A-B-C it is not necessarily required to pass B to get to C).

Now layered wards would hamper dual-natured beings and/or projecting mages/psirits that are seeking just to 'explore' or have only 'mundane' descriptions to the target.

The target is 280m thatway or I scout out the building to see if anybody is inside it.

Either of the above could require the mage to defeat each ward (and in the case of the searching if not done carefully perhaps some wards multiple times); however, if they were looking for 'something' it would be possible (if they could defeat the correct ward) to go straigth for the target provide a link of some kind (known aura, material link, etc).

Peace and thanks for the response

[Demonseed Elite]

Yeah, keep in mind that on this forum, I'm not speaking gospel or anything. When these ideas are posted, I'm mostly musing out loud to them here.

Also, I do think the ward rules are something you can tinker with in your own game. I would have liked to put one of those sidebars of variant ward rules in, but I just didn't have the word count. I came in at exactly the word count with what is there, and I'm not sure what I could have cut out of that chapter. :)

[Shrike30]

The only issue I've got with it being impossible to layer wards is the whole "hardened room" thing. As written, getting a hardened room in a complex would require 7 wards (six sides around it, being individual wards, with the center of the "box" filled with the seventh, stronger ward). It's not that I want to stack the effects or force my players to go through dozens of wards on their way to the target... I just want to be able to throw a "token" ward up over an entire location, with the actual secure spots having much heavier wards on them inside of the token ward. Tossing up seven wards to accomplish that through some act of geometric twinkage just feels silly.

I'd probably houserule to allow "pockets" to be created inside of a ward's shape.

[laughingowl]

Demonseed:

Totally understand the offical/not-offical.

I am free to modify my game anyway I like, even taking advice from random people off the web. If said random people have a strong insight into a developers thought process :-)


Do you see any balance problems with treating them like say visiblity modifiers.

Wards can be layered; however only the strongest applies at any give time.

If targeting something directly you most overcome/defeat whatever the strongest ward is that would cover the target. All other wards are considered defeated if the strongest is beaten.

The only 'advantage' to multiple wards comes in hampering dual natured beings and or just 'scouting' an area.

peace and thanks

[kzt]

It was sort of interesting that you can't move them, as that is a major change from the past. It does take care of my warded full-body armor idea (snicker) but the idea of carrying around magic items that are being searched for in small warded boxes has to have been fairly common with other groups. As would had been warding things like command centers on ships, citymasters, etc.

[prionic6]

I would suggest a metamagic that enables you to make layered wards with at least (6-initiate grade, minimum 1) meters "open space" between the walls. That way you could make better secured single rooms inside a warded building.