And provided it doesn't have a bajillion services.

I've seen you mention this several times, I just hope you realize that unless you stack several metamagics any Background Count high enough to affect a free spirit is also going to slaughter your Magic rating which in turn directly impacts your Summoning and Binding dicepools.

The idea is that when in a background count you suffer penalties to your magic, and the spirit suffers penalties to its force. That means that since your dicepool when going up against a free spirit is your Willpower + Binding, your dicepool doesn't shrink (unless the background count exceeds your magic rating and then you can't use your binding skill).

So for every point of background count, the spirit suffers a -1 dicepool penalty and you suffer a -0 dicepol penalty. Therefore, binding a free spirit in a thick background is objectively a good thing. Of course, the spirit's Edge is uncoupled from its Force, so its penalty is only 1 die per point of background.

Similarly, binding a normal spirit is also beneficial in a background count. the spirit's force drops by X, which entails a dicepool penalty of 2x, and your magic drops by X, for a penalty of only X. So relatively speaking, binding in a background count puts you ahead by X, where X is the background count.

Heck, the drain you suffer is even less bad, as the Force and Magic drop together (so no conversion of stun to physical occurs), and the drain code is based on the spirit's hits. Do to the opposed nature of the binding tests and the character skill independent fashion of generating drain codes, conjuring in heavy background count is objectively a good idea. Spellcasting in heavy background count is a bad idea, but conjuring is all good.

You get less hits, the spirit gets more less hits, and your Logic and Willpower are unaffected so you get more services and suffer less drain fo conjuring the same spirits.

On a side note, Invoking is severely less impressive in a background count.

-Frank

Yes and no. First of all, summoning in a background count is just asking to be smacked around. The spirit isn't even in the background count until the opposed test is successful, so you're running at penalties and the spirit is not. The pnalties for that are even worse than you describe - drain isn't reduced at all, you could easily be bumped up to physical drain, you get less services, and your spirit at the end operates at penalties once it gets here. It hits you coming and going.

As for binding, then the reduction in maximum Force is a real and noticable effect, but the reduction in the Force you can conjure before you take physical drain is not. So for example, were you to decide to bind a Force 5 spirit, you'd suffer Stun damage if your Magic was 5, you'd suffer physical damage if your Magic was 3, and you'd be unable to even make the attempt if your Magic was 2. Now, if you walk into a level 2 background count, that same spirit is only Force 3, and your Magic is reduced by 2 as well. So you still suffer stun if your magic was 5 (3), but the guy with a Magic of 3 (1) can't even make the attempt anymore (and the guy with a Magic of 2 is effectively mundane).

Force and Magic are reduced by X for binding. That means that for purposes of whether you suffer phyical or stun there is no change (a comparison of X vs. X). But for the purposes of whether you can make a binding attempt at all, you're falling behind the curve (X vs. 2X). Of course, I think that pretty much means jack, because player characters with any sense don't even tr to bind spirits with Forces of about twice their Magic attribute. It's not that hey can't make the attempt, it's that it isn't going to work.

So to put it all together, when you bind in a background count:

• You suffer less drain. DV reduction of 4/3 of a point per point of background count.
• The maximum "real" Force of a spirit you can bind is reduced by the Background Count.
• You get more services. 1/3 of an extra service per point of background count.
• No change to whether drain is physical or stun.

-Frank

Already thought of that.