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Buddha72
Ok, need a little help here. I have heard three different verisions of spell defense.

1) You must add equal amounts of Sorcery and Spell Pool.

2) You must add at least 1 die of Sorcery and then as many Spell Pool as you desire.

3) You can add any amount of either Sorcery or Spell Pool.

Which is it? Tried the FAQ but no help there. Thanks is advance.
FrostyNSO
Option 3
James McMurray
In case you were wanting more than one answer: what he said
Brazila
I thought that you could not add more pool to it than Sorc. dice, I will have to check my books....
Fortune
I believe that Spell Defence is one of the exceptions to that rule about Pool allocation.
Necro Tech
None of the above. Can use as much sorcery as you wish and may not exceed chosen amount with pool. Spell Defense is a sorcery test and the spell pool must follow the rules.
Edward
Anybody got a reference for any of that, I understood it to be option 3

Edward
Namergon
We had this kind of discussion on a French forum. One of us decided to ask Fanpro. Answer from Fanpro :

- you can't allocate more spell pool dice to spell defense than Sorcery dice
- so in order to have a spell defense, you have to allocate at least 1 die of Sorcery to it.
- next major update of the FAQ should include this clarification.
Fortune
I'm glad I house-rule Spell Defence totally out of the realm of the Sorcery skill.
Dexy
QUOTE (Fortune)
I'm glad I house-rule Spell Defence totally out of the realm of the Sorcery skill.

Why? What's so complicated about Spell Defense?
Grinder
Yeah. Why are you stripping the mage of one powerful tool?
Deacon
Sounds like he might have something different in mind. I do that too -- spell defense dice come out of Spell Pool, not Sorcery, in my games. You declare how many dice are coming out of your pool to protect and defend. However, I also allow mages to protect a number of targets equal to their Magic rating. So a Magician with Magic 6 and Spell Pool of 6 can use 3 dice for defense, keeping 3 dice in the pool -- but that 3 dice applies to EACH target he's protecting. Makes the mage a bit more useful to his buddies.
Demosthenes
And gives the mage a reason to NOT keep his spell pool dice for staging drain down to nothing...

wink.gif
Fortune
I am not 'stripping the mage of a powerful tool', nor do I find the rules complicated (except that the way they are written makes the Sorcery skill unique in application).

I make Spell Defence solely a function of the Spell Pool (similar to Deacon), which brings the Sorcery skill back in line with the way all other skills work in the game. This also prevents the mage walking around with 12 (or more) dice in Spell Defence any time he is not actually casting a spell. It also still chews up Pool dice that might otherwise be used elsewhere.

I like my system. It's easy, consistent, and most of all pleasing to any and all players who have used it in my games (so far). smile.gif
James McMurray
When you allocate spell defense, how is it used? Do all dice immediately defend against the first incoming spell, or can the mage choose how many to use?
Fortune
Up to the mage himself. If he wants to use all the dice to defend against the first spell, then it sucks to be him if another comes in right afterwards. If he wants to risk letting the first spell through, then he takes his chances. If he wants to use only a portion of his alloted dice against the first spell, that's fine too.
Bigity
What about using dice for drain, that's allowed too?
James McMurray
QUOTE (Bigity)
What about using dice for drain, that's allowed too?

You basically have a pool of dice available, equal to Sorcery + Spell Pool. You can decide how to allocate those dice between casting the spell, soaking the drain, and adding spell defense to yourself and others.

I also think its odd that sorcery acts differently than any other skill, but it hasn't ever been a big enough deal to matter.
Bigity
So basically, you are using the pre-faq way of things? Except for the extra coverage?
James McMurray
What does the faq change?
Bigity
QUOTE (Namergon)
We had this kind of discussion on a French forum. One of us decided to ask Fanpro. Answer from Fanpro :

- you can't allocate more spell pool dice to spell defense than Sorcery dice
- so in order to have a spell defense, you have to allocate at least 1 die of Sorcery to it.
- next major update of the FAQ should include this clarification.

I guess it's not in the FAQ yet, but is going to be soon.


James McMurray
How does this really change anything other than cap spell defense at 2 x Sorcery? Unless there is also a cap on how much spell pool you can use for casting and draining.
Bigity
I don't like the part where you have to allocate evenly from sorcery and spell pool myself.

I thought the limit of spell defense dice at any given time was Sorcery anyway.
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