New Magical Knack: Lucky Bastard, Soliciting feedback and ideas Options

[blakkie]

A wacky idea. Just 'cause.

Alterante names: Lady Luck, Slim Chance, MY HALO (Magically Yoked, Horseshoe Augmented Lower Orfice), or suggest something yourself

Cost: What do you think? I was thinking maybe 10 BP.

What it does:
At moments of impending and seemingly certain doom you are saved, if only a temporary reprive, by some odd and unexplained effect or perhaps an apparent coincidence that is . What has, in truth, happened is some magical spell or power has intervined. The nature of the magic effect can, and if possible does, vary from incident to incident. It tends not to be readily apparent what exactly happened but typically bystanders, and perhaps even the subject, are left scratching their head and uttering "WTF?" or "there is something you don't see every day" or "you lucky bastard!"

Thaumaturgy:
Lucky Bastards are quite the magical enigma. Because of the shifting and adhoc nature of the effects this is a notoriously difficult to study magical effect.

Further the Knack seems to actively thwarts attempts to quantify. It has never been successfully replicated in a controlled environment, even to the point where there has been deaths in subjects suspected of being under it's protection that were put into danger as part of the test. As well the subject themselves seem to abdicate protection if they count on the safety net. Fickle indeed!

The subject of the knack does not appear have a magical aura and the knack has never been observed in a Magician, Adept, or Mystic. Nor has it been seen in a Technomancer, though this might merely be due to a coincidental lack of known intersection in two very tiny groups. Groups which both currently have a large percentage of members that are unaware of their status.

Because of the above it has been often postulated that the effect is actually caused by a spirit, possibly free spirit, that is acting as a secret guardian for the subject. However muddying the waters is at least one reliable reported case of an event in a particularly polluted sector of Glow City where the background count would have made intervention by all by a domain spirit extremely difficult. There have also been reports though of possesors of the Knack losing it after 'ware implants, which does not rule out spirits but does suggest the subject themselves does have some linked magical property.

Adding to this theory there have been a few cases where it appears that a subject with thaumaturgical knowledge demonstrated some ability to Counterspelling and even Banishing. However they were not able to bring full conscious control over these, interferring with baneful and beneficial spells and bindings alike.

There has never been a reported case of direct astral observation of the magic. There have been a handful of cases where an otherwise unexplained astral signature has been observed following a suspected event. However very little information has been gleaned from these observations.

When:
It is similarly to permanent expenditure of Edge to avoid certain death, although it can also be triggered with other dire conditions such facing arrest for a serious crime with damning evidence. Normally at least some conciquences are faced, such as with the above example the arrest may still occur but on the way to incarceration an accident occurs that allows the Lucky Bastard to escape.

Game/Dice Mechanics:
The player chooses when they attempt to invoke this. They must succeed at an Edge(2) to trigger it. Edge cannot be used in any way for extra dice for this roll. If the TN 2 is not met the Knack fails to act and it does NOT count as a usage of the Knack.

The possesor of the Knack gains a number of 'phantom' Magic points. The number of points is 1d6 divided by 2, round up. It can be a secret number rolled and tracked by the GM. It can never be increased nor can the character Initiate and is subject to normal effects of Essense lose. If Magic drops to 0 the character loses use of the knack any any Magic based skills.

Whatever magic occurs it will do so in a way that it is NOT directly observed on the astral. Any assensing of the signature following the event is at +3 to the TN and the signiture dissipates at an accelarated rate so that within seconds, at most 1 minute, it has faded to non-detectable against the background.

The magical effect is of whatever level that is required to produce the effect needed, although effect choice should be made with minimizing the magical power needed as a goal. It can occur in spite of even the most extreme background count or mana warp, yes even in orbit, but if feasible the magic will occur outside and the effect travel to the location of need via physical means.

The character can learn Counterspelling and Banishing. However they can only use the automatic versions of these. Counterspelling as per the book except that the character need not be aware of spell and will remain ignorant of it's occurance barring some other evidence.

Banishing is handled similarly. It is rolled without Magic dice when in the presense of someone attempting Summoning or Binding. Successes rolled are subtracted from the Summoning/Binding Successes. No drain is incured. If the character knows either of these skills they are rolled every possible use, they have no ability to turn this off. Even if unconscious!

How often:
This happens at most once per "Adventure". Where adventure is an metagame grouping of 2 or more related gaming sessions. Alternatively the GM and player may agree upon other guidelines for refresh. In any event the refresh rate should be no faster than the rate of full refresh of Edge.

[blakkie]

I had also considered striking the "How Often" section entirely and replacing the first paragraph of "Game/Dice Mechanics" with:

The GM chooses when/if to trigger this knack. Be nice, be fair, be frugal, but most of all be dramatic and remember to ROCK!

[tisoz]

Wow! For someone who hates pre-SR4 editions, you manage to really embrace the introduction of new game concepts and rules bloat for a single knack. Phantom Magic, 1D6/2, +3TN, etcetera. Keep it in the SR4 spirit and leave it up to GM discretion, after all, who has a dice pool large enough to likely trigger an Edge(Threshold 2) test?

Or redefine HoG Edge use so that the point is not burned but refreshes intermittently.

[blakkie]

[Tarantula]

Honestly, its seems exactly like HOG to me. With a test to use it successfully.

[Buster]

[Ol' Scratch]

Yeah, but burning Edge isn't a positive quality only costing you about 10 BP that refreshes for free every "adventure." So, clearly, it's not a feeble attempt to get free HoGs or anything so much as a truly balanced, well-thought out, and not-overpowered suggestion for a new trait. I mean, the word count alone should be testimony to that.

[blakkie]

[Zhan Shi]

I agree with Buster. You'd probably be better off just using Edge, using your own house rules to achieve the effect you're looking for.


I sense Fisty of Doom closing in.....Run away! Run away!

[blakkie]

[tisoz]

[blakkie]

[blakkie]

Redo time, maybe even including the name? This is much closer to a mage but without being a mage. No, there isn't anything in past SR canon like this...I think. But maybe because they haven't been noticed. ;)

Cost: 15BP

- Can learn magic skills except those in the Summoning Group.
- No Magic Attribute.
- Use Edge in place of Magic.
- Any roll that would normally use Magic as part of the pool costs the 1 use of Edge. The roll is open-ended and cannot be further augmented by Edge.
- Essense loss penalizes Edge.
- Can use foci, including Power foci. The extra dice from the Power foci are only added when Edge is being used in place of Magic, not for regular uses of Edge.
- Edge still capped as per normal.
- Assensing detects as per Technomancers. Detection reveals something curious but likely require an obscure Knowledge test to understand what is up.
- Can initiate. No group. No reduced cost. Maximum Grade limited by Edge. Grade does not increase upper limit of Edge.
- Permanent burn of Edge typically manifests as a magical effect.
- Drain as per normal.
- Still required to buy spells/skills with BP/karma to use them. Character may not be aware of their abilities though. Might just think they are 'lucky'.


Upsides:
- Don't have to buy up Magic Attribute. This is a huge advantage, it is why the BP is so high even for just an aspected mage.
- Low profile aura without Initiation.
Downsides:
- Aspected to Spellcasting (my gut says Summoning would be too powerful, what do you think?)
- Will go through Edge quickly if the casting gets used a lot. How much an issue this probably depends on how fast Edge refreshes in your game. But in any event you still can't dump in more Edge dice when casting, so you are going to come up short compared to "real" sorcerers, and you won't have that Edge there for other uses if you start casting.
- Capped casting Atttribute instead of open-ended progression of Magic Attribute.
- Limited maximum number of Grades.
- Any Essense loss is felt twice as hard as it is impacts beyond just casting ability. This is important as it precludes the SR equivalent to a Tank Mage.

[Lagomorph]

This redux is quite a bit more interesting. It seems that what you've got here is pretty much a "wild mage" casting style, based on dumb random luck.

I'm not sure what you meant by "Drain as per normal." does that mean they'd pick a non edge attribute to drain off of?

Considering how high you can buy up edge attribute, I'd say this could actually be a 20-30 point cost since you don't have to buy up Magic. That would help prevent a "Human-Edge 8-Lucky+Lucky Magic" combo.

I don't see summoning being to powerful, it would be just as lucky that a random water spirit happens by and puts out the fire. Maybe limit spirits to 1 service.

[blakkie]

[Fortune]

[blakkie]

[Fortune]

That's cool. Just checking, 'cause I've seen some confusion on it in the past. :)

[blakkie]

It was a poor wording choice on my part. I've reworded it to something clearer.