So, I was thinking of the variety of house rules I enjoy, and also picturing scenes from various cliched fantasy novels where the hero grads the ROD OF POWER from the evil bad guy and uses it on him to win the bigt battle.

But you can't do that in SR. You have to bond the focus and that takes time and karma. So, I thought, how could I arrange a scene like the above, without destroying the karma bonding system, which I also happen to like.

Here's what I came up with:

Using Foci without Bonding:

A magical type character (one with a magic rating above zero) can use a focus without bonding it. Everytime he does so (uses the extra dice from a focus, whatever the type), he must make a resistance roll, using his magic attribute to resist, against the rating of the focus. The first three times he does this with a particular focus, the drain is deadly. The second 3 times (4-6), the drain is serious, the third three times (7-9), the drain is medium, everything after that the drain is light.

Not sure if this drain should be stun or physical. I kind of like the idea of a character possibly dying if he attempts to use a focus too powerful for him, but it seems like it might be too harsh for this to be physical.

The catch is that if he does not achieve any successes on this resistance test, the character must check for magic loss. This small but real chance of magic loss keps a character from continuing to use a focus without bonding without some risk, even if the drain is light.

Thoughts, suggestions?

Derek

i'd go the other way. L the first few times, then M, then S, then D.

Any reason for that? Possibly to discourage continued use? I was thinking the magic loss check would do that....

The reason I went with D, S, M, L is because after continued use, you would become somewhat attuned to it. Heck, I could even see slightly reducing the bonding costs if you used it often enough. Of course, if you used it often enough, you risked a number of magic loss checks. Probably not worth it. Food for thought, anyways.

Derek

yeah, mainly to discourage continued use. if you survive using the focus enough times that you're down to taking L drain every time you use it, then it's highly unlikely that you're ever going to get 0 successes on the resistance test.

How about if you use an unbonded focus you risk destroying it AND you can never bond that focus yourself or use it again.

Interesting. I like the basic idea. I dont think I like this implementation, though. Karma rerolls can virtually guarantee that magic loss will never be suffered. I also dont like the changing damage level.

Perhaps:

To gain temporary control over an focus that he has not bonded, the character must engage in a spiritual battle with the current owner's imprint on the focus. This takes a complex action. The character rolls a number of dice equal to his magic rating, while the focus rolls a number of dice equal to its owner's magic rating. Both tests use the force of the focus as the TN. For every net success achieved by the winning side, the loser's effective magic rating for the purpose of additional tests is reduced by 1. Ties result in no change. The character then has the opportunity to continue by making another opposed test. This process is repeated until either the character or the focus reaches a magic rating of 0, the character chooses to terminate the battle, or the character fails to generate any successes on a given test. Regardless of the number of tests made, this process only takes a single complex action.

If the focus's magic rating is reduced to 0, the character has suppressed the owner's imprint enough to use the focus once. If the character's magic rating is reduced to 0, he takes Deadly Stun damage and must check for magic loss. If the character fails to generate any successes on a test, he must resist stun damage (using willpower) based on the force of the focus he is assempting to control, and that attempt fails. The character may try again, but doing so requires another complex action. Wound modifiers apply to this test.

If no one is bound to a focus (ie, if the previous owner dies), it can not be activated at all - any such attempts simply fail.

damage power = force
damage level =

Light if force is less than or equal to 1/4 magic rating
Moderate if force is less than or equal to 1/2 magic rating
Serious if force is greater than 1/2 magic rating
Deadly if force is greater than magic rating

Magical theorists assert that the similarities between this process and that used to banish spirits are more than superficial - they believe that the character is, in effect, using his raw magic ability to temporarily disrupt the astral imprint on the focus just long enough to activate it.


(edited some things)

(edited some more things - removed the word unbonded, as it was misleading)

OurTeam:

I wasnt talking about the Magic loss test itself, I was referring to the idea that the character could pretty easily avoid ever having to make a magic loss test by rerolling failures on the resistance test. With one or two karma rerolls he or she would be virtually guaranteed to get at least one success - as long as we aren't talking about a force 10 focus or something.

I otherwise agree with you on all points, except Body Loss (I dont see any particular reason to exclude it).

Also, can you do this to a focus bonded by someone else? If you can't then the whole "steal the wand and use it against the owner" schtick is pretty moot here.

Another possibility is to make every use of the unbound focus cost 1 good karma, and cause drain like first force times deadly, then force times serious, then force times moderate and finally force times light. This karma should count towards binding the focus.
If a character during these unbound uses ends up paying the full amount of karma, the focus is bonded as per usual rules.
This should probably not work on foci bound to other mages, but only to unbound foci.

Sounds reasonable.

Umm... requiring an astral quest to use a bonded focus or disallowing the use of a bonded focus altogether completely defeats the purpose of the house rule, as originally envisioned.

I think, if anything, that you should only be able to exert temporary control over bound foci. If the owner is killed, the focus goes dormant until it is bound by someone else. That serves the original goal of turning someones magical toys against them, while also eliminating the temptation to try to keep using the focus without bonding it.

Astral Quests can be pretty much instantaneous, as evidenced by the one used in Invoking.

This whole thing could be a form of Metamagic. Call it Karmic Infusion(yuck!).

In regards to the Invoking thing, I am pretty sure it is a holdover from SR2. Sorry about that. I was sure there were other such examples of Astral Quests taking place pretty with pretty much no time passing on the physical, but I must just be remembering the one you listed and the old rules. Even so, precedent is precedent.

If you where going to do this (and I wouldn’t recommend it) the drain should be physical or light depending on the force of the focus and magic attribute (same as summoning and sorcery drain).

The magic loss would discourage repeated use but I still would keep the drain at a flat level. L for sustainers, M for specific spell, S for spell category or spirit, D for power. Correct those levels as you see fit. I don’t have my books here, it is supposed to be based loosely on the karma cost for bonding.

Also you should still need to take the action to active the focus.

And you might find mages on the line of focus addiction deciding the have a better chance of keeping their magic if they use a focus as unbounded instead of activating it.

I do like Jason Farlander’s system much more

Edward

The damage definitely shouldn't decrease. If you're arguing that you're getting used to the focus, then you're bonding the focus. Decreasing damage might work as a mechanic for bonding a particularly expensive focus over time, though.

I have trouble with that "unbound foci" thing here:

The majority of foci is bound to a magician, since foci have to be bonded upon creation. In order to have an actually unbound focus, the person who bonded it at last, has to die, sicne there's no canon way for unbinding a focus other than binding it to a new magician ...

After a magician spend 1 Karma Point to start a bonding process, the old bonding is broken but the new bonding is not yet completed. The focus is no longer bound at that point.

As far as I know it's all or nothing as far as bonding is concerned.

I allow partial Bonding in my games, but only allow the bondee access to an equivalent percentage of the Focus' power until it is fully paid for.