10. Powers

Elemental Powers - Common rules.

Creating Matter.

Elemental spells all share some common features, they all involve creating or dismissing an amount of the specific material, although it may come in various forms. When matter is summoned it generally begins in the simplest of forms, eg for Air this is generally 'air'. It can however be changed to other forms of air, such as noxious gases, poisonous gases, corrosive gases and various concentrations of air (wind). The temperature might be manipulated to make cold air (but not hot air!), and the shape of the air might be changed (blocks, cones tunnels etc).

In all cases where new matter is created it must be able to appear with a minimum of interference. Creating air in air is easy enough as one of them simply displaces with ease. Likewise creating water in air or water is simple as the existing medium can be displaced. Fire can be created around a target as the fire itself can be easily displaced. Stone, and like media (ice), however is more difficult. Solid matter cannot be created in the same place as solid matter, so you cannot create matter inside a person, or inside other stone.

The GM will have to decide for themselves how far they will let this go. In essence however the old or the new matter must be able to displace with a minimum of effort, and a minimum of collateral effect. If the GM decides this is not allowed then the spell cannot be cast. Players can ask for a ruling before they begin casting to make sure.

The intent of this is to stop the creation of matter inside other matter, like a person, no exploding people by the creation spell, no poison injected into their blood etc.

Created matter that is used to attack must be delivered as such, either thrown or fired at them, or enveloping them in some fashion, but the intent must be to deliver harm.

The other option is to create matter simply to create it (passively), such as making a wall. In this case the matter must be created in contact with the caster and extended from them. It cannot be ranged as it has no target. All the matter created must appear as one contiguous form, without breaks. It can be a thin wall that snakes away from the caster, or a solid block positioned beside the caster, but it cannot overlap existing matter. You could surround a target and put a roof on it to seal them in, which technically is still a passive move, but in such a case you should allow a Dodge defence to avoid it.

Created matter is magical and will vanish once the event is over. Accordingly there are some inherent limitations on the use of created matter. You can only briefly create stone to fill a real gap in a wall to stop it falling, the magically created stone will vanish shortly (30 mins or less), once the current event is over. It may help you to delay things but it will not be a solution in itself (unless other magic is used to extend or make it permanent).

Matter is created slowly, not instantly, over the action in which it is cast. An action is a minimum of 5 secs and may be upto 10 secs. During that time the matter begins to appear and takes form, based around what the caster wants. The nature of this will be factored into defence options.

Targetting & Defending

To target an opponent you must allocate successes to the attack, which can be countered by defence successes. These are the same successes that generate the spell, the caster must chose the balance.

If a Touch or BodyTouch attack is used against a single opponent then a successful defence prevents contact and the spell fails. If a ranged attack is made then a successful defence means it misses.

If a ranged attack is used against a Group then each target must defend individually, and where they do so the attack has no effect against them.

Dominance

Created matter must come from contact with its real origins. Earth must come from earth, fire from fire etc. Thus to create you must have a source of the natural material. If you are floating in the middle of the ocean you cannot create earth or fire. Likewise in the middle of a desert you cannot create water (unless you find an oasis).

In an encounter the presence, and amounts, of the natural elements will affect the performance of each of the elemental magics. An encounter on a grassy plain is dominated by earth or air, so fire and water will be at a penalty. In any encounter the GM can elect to rate the strengths of the natural elements and apply penalties to those that are inferior.

Element is: Effect

Dominant +1-4d, depending on dominance.

Balanced NE

Subordinant/small amounts -2d

Inferior/trivial amounts -4d

Impotent/not present -6d

In most circumstances ONE element is dominant, but their may be occasions where a specific balance is occurring. Eg on a grassy plain earth and air may be balanced (but a strong wind may tip the balance), on a sandy beach water and earth may be balanced (but the tides may alter this).

Source.

Created matter must come from a source, a significant amount of the naturally occurring element in the immediate vicinity. If no earth exists within sight then earth cannot be created. Fire is generally not available naturally so fire can be difficult to get started at short notice.

Created matter must evolve from its natural source, earth from earth, and the source should be big enough to provide the amount of matter needed. A wheelbarrow of dirt is not sufficient to create a block of earth 10x10x10. For this reason adepts of Fire tend not to be great travellers as they often do not have access to a large source of fire (or heat). Water adepts do not go into deserts. Earth adepts do not like ships. Air adepts do not like small underground cave systems.

There are ways to get around some of these limitations, a bottle of burning oil thrown on a stack of kindling may yield enough fire to create attacks against individuals, but not groups.

Amounts

To make things easy (I hope), when a Create spell is cast it will create an amount of matter based on the number of successes. This unit can be divided up into any form of cubic values, as long as the three values (the factors) total the score. Eg with a value of 8 you might create a 1x3x4 cubic amount of material, being 12 cubic meters. The factors add up to 8, 1+3+4. You could also use 0.5x7x0.5, a wall 7 metres long and half a meter tall and wide. Again the factors total 8, 7+0.5+0.5. You will note that this will result in an optimal size if the greatest amount of matter is required, this is accepted.

You can increase the amount of material created by allocated extra successes to that end. Each success allocated to increasing the amount of material will increase the amount produced. So if one success was allocated for extra matter the value would become 8.

At 10 successes added to extra matter (after the first to cast the spell) the value is sufficient to cover a zone.

Possibly the easiest way to represent this on a game table is with string. If the caster sets the width and height then the length of the string is what is left over. Eg if you have 32 points, allocate 1 to width and 2 to height, then the length of the string is 29 inches.

You can also increase the area affected by dispersing the matter created, water becomes mist, air becomes thinner, earth becomes dust and fire becomes heat. This can be used to increase the total factor by 50%, so 4 becomes 6, 8 becomes 12 etc. Dispersal of matter is meant to be generally harmless in most circumstances, although it may have utility in specific situations, its use is mainly a plot device for imaginative players. Eg a mist laid over a burning field might dowse the fire.

The same applies to dismissal or removal volumes.

Forms.

In general we have kept to cubic forms for ease of visualising it, there is no restriction on matter appearing in other forms, such as a ball or a cone, it just means someone has to be able to work out the volumes of these shapes and keep them within the agreed values. A hollow form can also be used to surround an opponent in various dimensions, although ample room should be allowed to achieve this as the target is not static during the 5-10 secs the matter is appearing.

You also dont HAVE to use all the matter you may be entitled to.

Targeting

The usefulness of linear measures in a combat system that avoids linear measures is a bit vague. It will be upto the GM and the players to make some guesses and estimates of what may be possible. The number of successes added can be related to the Size value of a creature, so a man (Size 0) could be encircled by a wall of matter with 1 added successes (2x3x3). A Group of Size 0 creatures can probably be blocked down one side by a wall of 0 successes, and ringed around by +2 successes (relate targeting a Group = 2 successes). A Group with a larger creature in it might need that creatures Size (min 2) +1 successes to enclose it.

Where an elemental spell is being used offensively, or as an interaction with others, you should be guided by the targeting rules. TFs can be related to successes for size comparisons. So to target a single size creature costs 1TF = 1 extra success of matter. To target a group costs 2TF = 2 extra successes. To link another target costs an extra success etc etc.

Options

Matter can be changed as part of its creation. It can be concentrated in some cases, it can be changed into alternate forms. In nearly all cases doing so will reduce the amount of matter (volume) that is created. For eg earth might be concentrated into rock, which means the amount of earth created will be less (it is compressed into the rock). Air can be created that is various forms of gases, fire can be made hotter etc. Some basic rules will apply however, just to keep the physics simple.

• Air cannot be concentrated enough such that it liquefies (liquids are the domain of Water). Air cannot get hot by itself as that is a property of Fire. It can get cold.
• Water cannot be concentrated at all, water is always water. It can be converted to ice however, or to other liquid forms such as poisons and acids. Again water cannot get hot, so steam is not a normal state of water by itself, it would require some input from Fire. It can get cold.
• Fire only ever gets hotter, although the heat can be spread around. There is no liquid fire.
• One element cannot take on properties of another (unless you combine them). So fire controls heat etc.

Unaltered matter will obey its natural laws, water will flow, air will disperse, earth will collapse, fire will burn away. Unless some other change is applied the matter will appear as requested and almost instantly act according to its nature. If you want something to remain in a usable shape you will need to change it, water to ice, earth to stone. Air generally cannot be contained unless Cohesion is used (qv), but if there is no wind it will disperse slowly.

Created Matter

Created matter is NOT normal matter, and at the end of the encounter it slowly begins to vanish (if it hasnt already). Created Fire does not need fuel, or oxygen to burn, it is magical fire and magic provides its fuel. Fire however tends to have a short life span, normally instant. Real matter can be altered by the presence of created matter, water can change the form of dirt into mud, then it would dry up, such a change is permanent. Fire that burns something will leave it burned, plus fire once started will become real fire if fuel and conditions exists.

Created matter is recognisable to a viewer if they have the Create spell for that type of element. So anyone with Create Air will be able to recognise created air on sight. Others will require a perception roll.