Greetings all! Long time since I've last logged in to Dumpshock, but the Shadows have called to me again. I'll be GMing a bunch of new players with a couple of those use to the seedier side of RPGs

One such old hat wishes to have a custom spell that'll speed up the growth of plants (to reproduce the effects of Akira Miyawaki but quicker still).

He then asked if such a spell existed. I told him no, but also that he could create his own, custom spells given time and resources.

So that brings me to my question: What is the best way to design such a spell?

I found that it boiled down to one of two schools of thought/spells: Health or Manipulation.

HEALTH:
Were it a Health spell, the caster would have to touch one such plant and continue to do so until said spell was complete. The plant could grow, even a tree to full size in a short period of time, but soil quality would quickly deteriorate as the environ couldn't keep up with the new tree (all that mass has to come from somewhere after all).

So how much time would such a spell require? How would you have the Force affect the growth? What sort of water/soil would be needed?

MANIPULATION:
For a Manipulation spell, I'd look to the Shape Change spell for guidance. A metahuman can be changed into any critter so long as the body is within 2 of the target's form. One can use Health spells to boost/lower the body to get it within range.

What guidelines would you use for Body stats to change a seedling tree into a full grown one (say a mature oak)? What amount of time would it take to make this permanent or would it have to be sustained? Does the above soil/water problems still affect it or is this by-passed by the nature of Manipulation magics?

Feel free to leave me any opinion on the subject you have--don't mind criticism all I'm asking for is it to be constructive.

Sign--

Wacky

Working through the SR3 custom spell procedure in Magic in the Shadows (as 3rd is the only edition I own / play):

I would not go with health, as most of the spells are restorative or deal with repairing damage, rather than promoting new growth, and the spells that affect attributes are sustained.

So, I'd edge towards a manipulation spell. Base target number for a manipulation spell is normally 4, or 6 for a barrier spell or something involving fine manipulation. I'd go with 6, as it will involve giving the plant exactly the right conditions and resources to stimulate growth in the perfect conditions.

Looking at the chart of effects, create matter comes under major environmental change, which has a base drain level of M. However, I'd go with the massive environmental change as that includes control weather, which has a base drain level of S. The reasoning here would be that to promote growth, you're force speeding natural processes and providing a spurt of raw materials in a perfect environment - so creating matter, providing the exact perfect mix of heat, light, water, humidity, perhaps even lessening gravity to help stems grow outwards.

On top of that, I would go with the "Physical spell" and "Restricted Spell" power modifiers (these effectively cancel each other out)
For the drain level, I would apply "Permanent Spell" and "Touch Range", which again would cancel each other out.
So, overall the drain code is (F/2)S, for a sustained manipulation spell, with a target number of 6

I would probably go with as rules for effects something like: "whilst the spell is maintained the single plant touched during the spell casting will grow at a rate (Force X successes) times faster than normal"
So, a caster with a Force 5 spell, would be draining 2S. Assuming we have a "good" caster, with Sorcery 6, say 2 points of grade, and 6 spell pool to throw in, that's 14 dice against 6s, so 2-3 successes. With 3 successes on a F5 spell, you get a growth rate of 15 X normal.
Looking on the web there are various sites that will tell you the growth rate of trees and plants normally - so a "fast" growing tree will grow >25" per year or more, or > 2" (50mm) per month.
To make the maths easier lets say the "fast" tree would grow 60mm in a 30 day month normally, or 2mm per day. Growing at X15, that gets us up to 30mm per day whilst the spell is sustained.

But, that means the mage is spending a day sitting cross legged, holding and keeping physical contact with the plant during that time for extended periods, and is of course sustaining the spell with the knock on effects that brings. Ideal spell for either quickening or a sustaining focus.

If you want to lose the "Touch" requirement, the spell becomes (F/2) D for drain, but lets you pick a tree at LOS and grow it.
If you want to do an AoE version, then it becomes (F/2)+2 D, but works on an area magic X meters radius.

Which makes the forest growth of the Tir and some NAN nations impressive - means they have some fairly hefty ritual groups who can throw a LOT of dice at that spell.

Of course, if that's not the sort of effect you're after, dropping it to a target number of 4 for "general manipulation" would work too - in the example above, would give us 7 successes on average, for a growth rate of X35, giving growth of about 100mm per day, which is a lot more noticeable in terms of daily change.

Also depends on your power level in your campaign of course. If you're at a point where a mage can go: I have sorcery 6 (spellcasting 9), plus 9 spell pool, 4 from a power focus, 6 from an expendable spell fetish, 5 dice from grade and another 5 from the aid sorcery power of an appropriate spirit - that's 38 dice, and this is important to me so I will have a reroll on casting. If you have TN=4, 38 dice would be approx 30 successes after rerolling failures, giving a X 150 growth factor, or 300mm a day. Cast on a sustaining foci, that's a foot a day, or an oak tree growing 7 feet a week. Planting a sapling will double in size in a week - which is pretty good going!

Depends on what your players are like and what they're doing in game of course. Growing a tree because they're a druid or into the RP ethos, or defeating a toxic despoiler - all good. Thinking they can force grow rare species of Lillies or Orchids to sell at vast markups may quickly destabilise the economics in your game...