Faster Spellcasting, Developing Simple Action Spellcasting (SR4) Options

[Wombat]

I was thinking about Metamagic and came upon the idea of a Simple Action spell with the following points:

• The Metamagic would be either part of the cost of Initiating or 15 Karma.
• The Metamagic would allow the caster to cut some of the excess out of a spell's formula.
• The caster must know the original spell.
• Each shortened spell would have to be re-learned with a cost of 1 Karma.
• 2's count towards glitches on the Spellcasting Test.
• Additional Karma may be spent when re-learning the spell, to reduce the number of 2's that count towards glitches.

What do you guys think?

[BishopMcQ]

While I wouldn't use it in my campaign, a few other ideas would be:

Instead of 2's counting, treat spells cast with this metamagic as having a Spellcasting version of Gremlins. Rating equivalent to Force-Initiation Grade. Low Force spells are less likely to glitch this way, but casting a Force 6-12 spell is going to be very unfortunate unless the caster is a high Grade Initiate. (Example: Grade 3 Initiate casts a Force 5 Manabolt. The threshold of 1s needed to cause a Glitch is reduced by 2. [F5 - G3 = 2])

Have it be an Advanced Metamagic technique from Absorption. Power stored can be used to make a spell faster to cast instead of reducing the Drain Value. If the spell is cast at a higher Force than available stored power, increase the DV by 1 per point of uncompensated Force.

Instead of having a higher glitch rate, the DV uses Force instead of (Force/2)

[Muspellsheimr]

• The Metamagic would be either part of the cost of Initiating or 15 Karma.

Obviously

• The Metamagic would allow the caster to cut some of the excess out of a spell's formula.

Huh?

• The caster must know the original spell.

Obvoiusly

• Each shortened spell would have to be re-learned with a cost of 1 Karma.

To complicated

• 2's count towards glitches on the Spellcasting Test.

Doable

• Additional Karma may be spent when re-learning the spell, to reduce the number of 2's that count towards glitches.

To complicated

I have considered making such a metamagic myself, but it would be far to powerful in most situations, & multicasting is already allowed by the rules.

With the "Rushing the Job" penalty to glitching, it might be doable, but is still at very high risk of being game breaking powerful. If I was to do it, I would instead use a Drain increase to any spells cast in a Standard action.



Edit: My suggestion: "You may choose to cast spells as a Standard Action instead of a Complex Action. Doing so increases the spells Drain by +2."

I might even decide to use this in my game, but am still concerned it would be a must-have, & to powerful. I would not increase the Drain modifier though, as that would quickly make it unusable.

[Muspellsheimr]

Instead of having a higher glitch rate, the DV uses Force instead of (Force/2)

No. I hate it when anyone brings this up for any reason. An increase to a spell's Drain due to a static change in the spell should never be based on the spell's Force. Such a change is understandable, if still stupid, if an effect scales based on Force, but a Standard Action casting time does not scale in this manner.

[BishopMcQ]

The Metamagic would allow the caster to cut some of the excess out of a spell's formula.

Huh?

I think this was meant to be an IC explanation of how the metamagic worked. Given that as an explanation, increasing the Drain or making the spell more likely to Glitch would make sense. Basically removing the buffers that keep you from killing yourself accidentally with Magic and now you are more likely to do so.

New Alternative: Addiction--the character can become addicted to the rush of power from spellcasting this way, and needs to constantly push himself harder and further as the addiction grows.

Edit:

Instead of having a higher glitch rate, the DV uses Force instead of (Force/2)

No. I hate it when anyone brings this up for any reason. An increase to a spell's Drain due to a static change in the spell should never be based on the spell's Force. Such a change is understandable, if still stupid, if an effect scales based on Force, such as additional penalties to the target or something, but a Standard Action casting time does not scale in this manner.

That's fine with me, I was just rattling off ideas as they came to me. As I said before, I wouldn't use the Metamagic in my game.

[Maelstrome]

i did something like this, aswell as allowing defensive casting but you could only use spell pool and bonus dice from focuses. im not sure how that would be handled in fourth seeing as i dont play it.

it worked rather well and it didnt cause any problems.

[pbangarth]

So, here we're basically looking at finding a way for a mage to cast up to 8 spells in a combat turn as opposed to only up to 4.

Is this really something folks want to have happen?

[BishopMcQ]

Is this really something folks want to have happen?

Not at my table, but I'm willing to discuss it for someone else's table. If it bothers you, it'd be simple enough to limit the metamagic by still allowing only 1 spell to be cast per IP. This would allow casting and something else to be done.

(And even under the normal rules, it's possible for a mage to cast 8 spells per combat turn by splitting their pools.)

[pbangarth]

(And even under the normal rules, it's possible for a mage to cast 8 spells per combat turn by splitting their pools.)

Yes, or even more, but at least there are diminishing returns in that scenario.