Rethinking Banishing, trying not to derail the Ritual Spellcasting thread Options

[pbangarth]

Discussion of Banishing came up in the Ritual Spellcasting thread, and wishing to give my two cents worth without continuing the derailing of that thread, I comment here.

I used to disparage Banishing for a number of the reasons listed in the RS thread, but I have come to have more respect for it lately.

Points to ponder:

1) High Force spirits tend to have few services owed, and so Banishing tends to need fewer net successes than direct damage spells to eliminate the target. Also, even high Force spirits will tend to have a smaller dice pool to resist than the magician has to Banish.

2) Banishing allows the re-Summoning of the Banished spirit by the Banisher, even if it is of a type she normally cannot summon.

3) Banishing gets rid of the spirit permanently, requiring re-Summoning of an equivalent spirit by the opponent, whereas disrupting it through damage allows it to return later without requiring re-Summoning.

4) Banishing gets rid of possessing spirits without damaging the vessel. (Good if the vessel is your buddy!)

5) Attack of Will is a melee combat form that works both on the material and on the astral planes. An Attack of Will uses Banishing + Willpower to attack a spirit in melee combat, using Charisma as base DV. Many mages have these Attributes pumped anyway. So they a) have a large dice pool and damage code ( a CHA 5 magician does the melee damage of a STR 10 sammie), b) can ignore ItNW even without a Weapon Focus, and c) don't suffer Drain to attack this way.

6) Expanding from a couple of points above, Banishing is both a ranged and melee combat skill, albeit focussed on spirits exclusively, that works in both astral and material planes and so is very economical for a BP/Karma -strapped magician.

I think Banishing gets a worse rap than it deserves.

[BlueMax]

Thanks for the new thread. I had considered making one myself.

I agree to point 1, completely. But how to handle the Stunbolt arguement?

The question is, inside the conjuring group you have three skills. (off the top of my head...)
Summoning
Binding
Banishing

At least in BP builds, skill groups are only beneficial if you are going to use 3(or more) of the skills. Most of the mages I run for, or play with, bind rarely. So, that skill is already of low value.

One of my players uses stunbolt on almost every spirit. He usually winds up with one box of physical drain and the spirit is toast.
Another player has a big fraggin combat axe weapon focus. When he gets to use it, spirits go poof.

For them, Banishing is of low value. Let's call it half value, because they can take spirits true. Two low value skills and the Skill Group is a bad idea to take.

And though people will take it as a single skill (level 2 or so), how does one convince them its worth putting notable points into?

BlueMax
who loves magic

[Muspellsheimr]

1) High Force spirits have a very good chance of avoiding Banishing attempts entirely. In nearly every situation, Stunbolt is more effective.

2) The only useful aspect of Banishing, this is still minor.

3) This will only ever work against the players, & is a very minor detail.

4) The only, highly circumstantial, situation I can say Banishing is better than Stunbolt.

5) Attack of Will is a piece of shit, & should not even be taken into consideration unless you are a mundane with no other method of attack, at all (in which case, Banishing doesn't help you anyways).

6) Spellcasting is a vastly more effective & versatile ranged & melee "combat" skill.

[Draco18s]

#1 is only true if it's an unbound spirit.

The banisher rolls Magic + Banishing. The target spirit rolls Force if unbound or Force + summoner’s Magic if bound.

If a character buys the skillgroup and soft caps their magic, they get 9 dice to the test.
A bound spirit, at say, force 5, as that's a force to be reckoned with, summoned by a mage with 4 magic, has also 9 dice. Statistically 22% chance to remove 1 service.

Of course, a force 5 spirit can be brought down with large weapons (any heavy machine gun used by a character with 9 or more dice--the odds of dealing damage with normal weapons is the same as dealing physical damage to a guy wearing a ballistics jacket with some upgrades (+2/+2 from adept powers, or another stacking armor--my character has 10/8 armor)).

What about a force 8 spirit? I fought one of those off not too many weeks ago.

9 dice vs. 8 if unbound. Statistically 25% chance to remove 1 or more services (3% to get 2).
9 dice vs. 12 (!!!) if bound (assuming 4 magic). Statistically 6% chance of removing 1 service.

In all cases Banishing has less than 50-50 odds of permanently banishing a spirit who has 1 service that the group could not otherwise deal with. Where is that 50-50 odds? Roughly an unbound force 7 spirit, or a bound force 3 (4 magic) or force 4 (3 magic).

Note: My statistics might be a little off, I was trying to reduce them to being easily calculable and it may have disrupted the accuracy.

[pbangarth]

Well, let's just check the accuracy of Muspellheimr's and Draco18s' claims. Let's have a challenge between Summoning Sam and Banishing Bob, two reasonably competent magicians right out of character creation. For fairness' sake, they will have the same stats:

200 BP base Attributes:

BOD 3
AGI 3
REA 3
STR 3
CHA 5
INT 3
LOG 3
WIL 5

MAG 5

DRAIN: WIL + CHA

Sorcery Group 4
Conjuring Group 4

Spell: Stunbolt (Drain: (F/2) -1)

#####

Summoning Sam

... summons a F5 spirit: MAG (5) + Summoning (4) = 9 dice ==> 3 hits

F5 spirit resists = 5 dice ==> 2 hits (let's always give the spirit the benefit)

Drain: DV 4, resisted WIL(5) + CHA(5)= 3 hits, net 1 stun damage to Sam

Net Services: 1
Stun Track : 11 boxes

Now, Summoning Sam could try for a tougher spirit, but then the likelihood of getting no services increases, and the drain does too, into physical damage

Banishing Bob

...has three options: Stunbolt, Banish, Attack of Will

a) Stunbolt

MAG(5) + Spellcasting (4) = 9 dice ==> 3 hits

i) Force 5 spell (to limit Drain):

Spirit resists with WIL (5) ==> 2 hits, therefore DV = 5 + 1 net hit = 6 damage, spirit still around
Drain: DV1 - easily resisted

ii) Force 10 spell (max):

Spirit still gets 2 hits, DV = 10 + 1 = 11 damage, spirit is gone
Drain: DV 4 P - resist WIL (5) + CHA (5) ==> 3 hits ==> Drain 1 physical

b) Banish

MAG (5) + Banish (4) = 9 dice ==> 3 hits

F5 spirit = 5 dice ==> 2 hits ==> reduce services by 1 ==> 0 left, spirit is gone
Drain: DV 4 - resist WIL(5) + CHA(5) ==> 3 hits ==> Drain 1 stun

c) Attack of Will

Banish(4) + WIL(5) ==> 3 hits, DV = 5

Spirit REA (5) ==> 2 hits ==> 1 net hit ==> +1 DV
Spirit Damage Resistance BOD (5) ==> 2 hits ==> -2 DV

DV = 5 + 1 - 2 = 4 damage
No Drain

#####

So, Muspelheimr and Draco18s, the BEST that Stunbolt can do is match Banish and get rid of the spirit in one shot. In order to do so, Banishing Bob has to overcast to the limit, and take physical Drain damage. As far as the "piece of shit" Attack of Will goes, it is in the same league as a typical, safe casting of Stunbolt.

If Summoning Sam sends a tougher spirit, its services reduce, making it more susceptible to Banish, but its Force increases, making it more able to resist the Banishment, though the maximum Force 10 spirit still only gets as many dice as Banishing Bob does. On the other hand, the higher Force spirit gets a greater dice pool to resist the Stunbolt spell, making it almost certain to survive the first casting, even at maximum overcast. Similarly, it affects Attack of Will. Some positive and some negative for Banishment, no positive and some negative for Spellcasting and Attack of Will.

If Summoning Sam Binds the spirit, then it is tougher against Banishment ( larger dice pool), but equally strong against Spellcasting and Attack of Will. Against bound spirits, then, Spellcasting comes more to the fore.

It is too much work to try this for every level and type of spirit, but the basic argument that Spellcasting is always better than Banishing, and way better than Attack of Will just doesn't hold for this typical example.

Oh... and Banishing cannot be Counterspelled.

[Draco18s]

But what's the probability of rolling perfectly average in all cases?
On average banishing will reduce that 1 service to 0 services and make it go away, but when was the last time anyone at your table rolled average and had the opposing dice roll average? That spirit needed a mere one more success to not get disrupted. For a tactic to be on average be reliable (not on average successful, there's a difference here, on average you only need a die pool of 6 with a fun to kill people) you need to be getting 1 to 2 more average successes than you need to account for a poor roll on the player's part or a good roll on the opposing side.

Edit: I should also note that I never ran the numbers on an UNBOUND force 5 spirit. Or about 80% success.

[pbangarth]

@Draco18s:

1) I gave the benefit of the doubt in assessing hits to the spirit in all cases, thereby lessening the effect of variance in dice on the strength of my argument.

2) Your point applies to dice rolls for Spellcasting as well as for Banishing. As I am comparing the two approaches to spirits, the effect that applies to both is nullified in the comparison.

[Ryu]

The above example shows that banishing can be an interesting option.

There are a few limiting factors:
- bound spirits get to add the magic attribute of their conjurer to the resistance test. Bob expects zero hits now.
- if spirit force is scaled up, banishing looses all effect (expect no net hits), while stunbolt might still do damage.

Learning a skill to deal with medium-force summoned spirits does not seem very interesting. How many free spirits does your campaign have? If free spirits are a comparativly common occurence, the Binding aspect alone becomes interesting.
Then we almost have to add counterspelling to the mix - it does not factor into banishing. Shielding-initiates can bring more dice for counterspelling than a high-force spirit. Banishing will hurt, but spellcasting might not work at all.

On the other side of the fence, we have variance of results. Four hits on the spell resistance test? No problem, cast again. Four hits resisting banishing? Take 8 boxes of damage. Repeated attempts are possible for stunbolt, but rarely desireable in case of banishing.


One might consider to make banishing an extended test, binding both conjurer and spirit in a contest of wills, with the banisher suffering drain only once (will still feel like a damage lottery in most cases).

[The Jopp]

The stunbolt problem can be somewhat alleviated that all spirits (at least if their summoner had it) have a Sorcery skill at Force. A F4 spirit should have a Counterspelling of 4, thus rolling 8D6 in resistance against all spells.

A F6 spirit would have 12D6...rivaling spell pool on the average high ranking mage.

[suppenhuhn]

Quick question:
The Magic attribute a bound spirit may add to resist banishment, is it derived from the magic the summoner had when binding or his current magic attribute?

[Ryu]

Quick question:
The Magic attribute a bound spirit may add to resist banishment, is it derived from the magic the summoner had when binding or his current magic attribute?

It doesn´t say, and will usually not make a difference. I would take the current one instead of bothering with the book-keeping.

[pbangarth]

Quick question:
The Magic attribute a bound spirit may add to resist banishment, is it derived from the magic the summoner had when binding or his current magic attribute?

SR4, p. 180: "summoner's Magic", but no more info. It would make sense to use the Magic at the time of summoning, as no other changes in the summoner's abilities modify the spirit.

[pbangarth]

The stunbolt problem can be somewhat alleviated that all spirits (at least if their summoner had it) have a Sorcery skill at Force.

This is true for ally spirits, but I don't think it is so for regular spirits.

[Muspellsheimr]

The stunbolt problem can be somewhat alleviated that all spirits (at least if their summoner had it) have a Sorcery skill at Force. A F4 spirit should have a Counterspelling of 4, thus rolling 8D6 in resistance against all spells.

A F6 spirit would have 12D6...rivaling spell pool on the average high ranking mage.

The only summoned spirits with Spellcasting is Man. The only ones with Counterspelling are those with the Magical Guard power (Guardian only I think).

[Mr. Unpronouncea...]

The stunbolt problem can be somewhat alleviated that all spirits (at least if their summoner had it) have a Sorcery skill at Force. A F4 spirit should have a Counterspelling of 4, thus rolling 8D6 in resistance against all spells.

A F6 spirit would have 12D6...rivaling spell pool on the average high ranking mage.

Except that, by design, spirits don't get counterspelling.

One or two of the new spirit types in Street Magic get "Magical Guard" though, which functions as you suggest. Of course, base-book magicians can't get those...

I absolutely hate when developers add everything-you-can-do-but-better-and-you-can-never-do-this crap into splatbooks.

[Shinobi Killfist]

Except that, by design, spirits don't get counterspelling.

One or two of the new spirit types in Street Magic get "Magical Guard" though, which functions as you suggest. Of course, base-book magicians can't get those...

I absolutely hate when developers add everything-you-can-do-but-better-and-you-can-never-do-this crap into splatbooks.

Yeah. If they thought the new spirits were appropriate for the game, then they should have errataed the old spirits to add in some of the powers that fit. And maybe I'm just looking to closely but the stats on the new spirits seem better. A max penalty stat of Force-1 sign me up.

[Cain]

What about the BP differential? By not buying Banishing, you save enough BP to raise other things; if you combine it with an Incompetence in Banishing, you could potentially raise your Magic by a full point.

[suppenhuhn]

Well you can always get your maximum allowance of negative qualities by incompetences that don't affect you.
The GM that allows this should be hit with the BBB on the head though.

[Ryu]

I´d say the forfeit on "must collect them all" makes Incompetency: Banishing a valid choice.

[pbangarth]

What about the BP differential? By not buying Banishing, you save enough BP to raise other things; if you combine it with an Incompetence in Banishing, you could potentially raise your Magic by a full point.

This is a good point. I tend to fall into the school that values raising Attributes as high as possible at character generation. However, I don't know how one could make a comprehensive comparison of situations to determine which is more valuable, a decent Banish skill -or- one more Magic point. A lot would depend on the nature of the campaign.

[kzt]

The only summoned spirits with Spellcasting is Man. The only ones with Counterspelling are those with the Magical Guard power (Guardian only I think).

You could argue that they do, as they are sapient awakened critters, who are "capable of all magical tasks". (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)