Magic

Oh, oh, oh it's magic~

Magic can only be performed by those with the Arcane Background (Magic) edge, aka unicorns (and a few of the other races). Those without it can still take the Spellcraft skill, but it only represents their arcane knowledge and can't actually perform spells (except perhaps in certain situations the GM allows, like Arcane Background (Weird Magic) or rituals (see below)).

Magic in My Little Pony: Savage Adventures uses the No Power Points Setting Rule, to reduce on bookkeeping. Optionally you may decide to use the standard Power Points setting rule instead.

Arcane Background (Magic)

In My Little Pony: Savage Adventures, Arcane Background (Magic) works as follows:

Arcane Skill

As is standard in Savage Worlds, the skill used to activate Powers via Arcane Background (Magic) is Spellcasting, which is linked to the Smarts Attribute. ~~Twilight ur an egghead~~

Activating a spell works as usual with the No Power Points rule:

Success (after spell modifiers): Power activates
Raise (after spell modifiers): Power activates; gets any extra bonuses as stated in description
Failure: all currently maintained powers are canceled and the caster is Shaken

Starting Powers

You get 3 free starting powers. In addition, all unicorns automatically 3 "freebie" powers; see Inherent Spells below.

Each new additional Power (and associated Trapping) is one Advance, as per usual Savage Worlds rules.

Backlash

If your spellcraft die rolls a natural 1 (regardless of the Wild die), you suffer a backlash effect:

the spell automatically fails
you automatically suffer 2d6 damage; although if this would cause a Wound you instead take a level of Fatigue that can be recovered via 8 hours of rest (aka overnight).

Maintenance

Spells cannot be (easily) maintained indefinitely. Maintaining a spell beyond its duration imposes a -1 Fatigue penalty (cumulative with each extended duration). (Why else would Cadance and Shining Armor get tired keeping up their respective shield spells?). This "spell" Fatigue doesn't lead to Incapacitation by itself, but over time it will make it very, very, very difficult to do anything else, and if you're hit by any other source of damage or Fatigue, that can push you over to Incapacitation.

Example: Cadance is maintaining her "make love not war" (Boost Trait: Spirit) spell over the Crystal Empire to stop King Sombra from taking over. To be extremely generous, her "Make Love Not War" spell has a 1 hour duration, so every hour she keeps that spell up she gets an additional -1 Fatigue penalty. As Shining Armor states in The Crystal Empire pt1, Cadance doesn't sleep and barely eats: after 3 days of this she has a whopping -72 Fatigue penalty to do anything else. And that's why her husband had to chuck her off the balcony. :D ...i mean D:

Casting another spell while maintaining another also imposes a spellcasting penalty as usual with the No Power Points rule; for each current maintained spell it's -1 to the Spellcast roll.

Once you stop maintaining the spell, the spell Fatigue penalty goes away at a rate the GM feels is appropriate (~1 Fatigue/hr).

Interruption

Interruption in MLP:SA works as usual with the No Power Points setting rule.

Undamped

Your horn must be uncovered (and for the most part, unbroken) in order to cast magic (at least one inch freedom).

So basically if you saran wrap a unicorn's horn, no spells. No, dropping a bag over a unicorn's head doesn't count. See Hearth's Warming Eve; it's implied that if "Clover's" horn had been fully encased in stone they all would've frozen.

If a unicorn's horn is broken or otherwise damaged, they have a -6 additional penalty to spellcast.

Trappings

All powers start with the generic unicorn "oooh glowy" trapping, but at first taking a Power a player can also choose a single optional trapping that the character can use on and off.

For instance, Rarity can take the Entangle spell. Generically the spell just magically ties an opponent down, but Rarity can also use her Trapping to make it so it's the clothes of her target unraveling and restraining her target.

Trappings are the life and soul of magic in Savage Worlds; use Trappings to make your spell unique to your character! Every pony is unique, and your spells should be too. It's not called Bolt, it's called Twilight Party Cannon! :D For some inspiration, check out the Savage Spellbook and the Example Trappings for MLP:SA.

Note that Trappings can also give your spell additional effects, like Light, Sound, or Electricity, for the cost of additional spell penalties or smaller effect radius. See the core Savage Worlds rulebook.

Inherent Spells

Every unicorn knows some inherent basic magic, which are basically three things: lifting things with their magic, create light, and knowing when something is magical in the first place. Inherent Spells represent these basic concepts, and saves unicorn characters from "wasting" spellslots. ;D

Inherent Spells have these characteristics:

They have no spellcasting penalty, but you still need to take an action to cast it in the first place
- It's a simple TN=4 to cast
- (If you're using the regular Power Points rules, they cost 0PP)
- Caveat: If you've got the Young hindrance, you do have a -2 penalty
- This is because you are effectively "untrained" in the Power.
- Remember, with the No Power Points setting rule, you can spend a round to prepare a spell and reduce the spellcasting penalty by 2.
You only have the generic unicorn "oooh glowy" trapping.
Ie, Inherent Spells are not personalized for each pony, except by the particular magic color that's unique to a unicorn. Inherent Spells are powers that every unicorn can do. If you want to personalize it, you'll need to take it as a full Power.

The ranges/duration/abilities are reduced from its base Power

In return, you get these "spells" effectively for free as Inherent Spells:

Simple Telekinesis
- Range: Smarts; Duration: 3 (1PP/round)
- Lift only 1lb per Spirit die; 5lb with a Raise; cannot use to fight with a weapon
  - This is the basic unicorn skill of magically lifting simple objects, like Twilight's hairbrush or Rarity's sewing needle. It is based on the core Telekinesis Power from the Core Rules, but modified to be lighter and simpler.
Simple Light
- Range: Self; Duration: 30 minutes (1PP/10 minutes)
- Soft magical light emanates from your horn, fully illuminating within a Medium Burst Template (4" diameter) around you, and dimly illuminating out to the distance of a Large Burst Template (6" diameter) around you.
  - This is the basic unicorn flashlight skill (mah horn is glowing), as seen by the guards in It's About Time. It's based on the core Light/Obscure Power from the Core Rules, but modified to only create light. This light is magical and in a setting with vampires and other such creatures, it is not equivalent to natural sunlight; you'll need to take the full power for that!
Detect Magic

Also remember you can take the Power straight up and attain its full ability, which means that you get to personalize the Power with Trappings (which means it can have additional effects) and tailor it to your character's spell repertoire.

Spellbooks

Unicorns can also cast spells they've learned from spellbooks, without having to actually take the Power as an advance.

In order to do this, they must be 1 rank higher than the Power, and when they acquire the spellbook they have to make a successful Investigation check, which takes 1 day for Novice, 1 week for Seasoned spells, 2 weeks for Veteran, and 1 month for Heroic spells. If failed, you'll have to make another Investigation check and spend additional time.

Afterwards, to cast from the spellbook, you must make an additional Investigation check right before casting, to make sure you remember everything. This means you need to carry the spellbook around with you. Each time you cast, you must first reference the book (and make an Investigation check, which takes an action), then make your Spellcast skill check.

Arcane Background (Weird Science)

Depending on what kind of pony-universe your group wants to play in, you may want to include some Arcane Background (Weird Science) elements as well.

This would cover things like Flim Flam's apple cider machine (something magical powering something mechanical), Pinkie Pie's flying gyrocopter (by all counts that thing is held together by candy canes and bubble gum and defies physics), or the cloud-producing machine of Cloudsdale. Your character may have invented some super cool awesome gizmo, and instead of just leaving it lying around in your inventory, you're going to use it!

Creation and use of any Weird Science gizmo should be up to the GM, as well as how you want to mechanically categorize it. Your GM may require the actual Weird Science skill to create/activate the device, or use a related skill instead. Depending on the extent your GM wants to include Weird Science to the game, Edges such as Gadgeteer and Mr. Fix It may also be included or tweaked.

Under the standard No Power Points setting rule, Weird Science has a backlash malfunction occur on a natural 1 on the skill die, where the device blows up for 2d6 damage to the attempted user, and will require a Repair roll of 1d3+1 hours to fix.

Arcane Background (Alchemy)

Since we've seen Zecora brew potions before in the show, it would be remiss to not mention the option of including alchemical components to MLP:SA.

Due to the nature of needing to brew potions before using them, Alchemy requires the use of the regular Power Points rules (rather than No Power Points) and is best mechanically categorized as Arcane Background (Alchemy) as described in the Savage Worlds Fantasy Companion (available via Pinnacle, Amazon, driveThruRPG, or your local game store), summarized as follows:

Arcane Skill: Alchemy, linked to Smarts
- Activating a Power: get thee to a Alchemy Lab. Spend Power Points, roll Alchemy (no spellcasting modifiers, unless you're maintaining a Power) with standard TN=4; if you fail nothing happens (other than your PP being spent). Each potion takes 1hr per rank to brew.
Starting Power Points: 10
- PowerPoints are not recovered until the potion is spent/consumed/used, at which point they recover at 1PP/hr

Starting Powers: 3 (no Inherent Spells)
- Backlash: if you roll a natural 1 on the skill die, you roll on the Alchemical Backlash table (chemistry be dangerous yo)
Maintenance can't be done; you're making a potion beforehand, after all. However, the Duration can be extended beforehand if the alchemist spends the additional Power Points right when they're making the potion.
- Disruption (Interruption) as per standard Savage Worlds rules
- Range is limited to how far you can throw or launch your potions.

Magic Rituals

While unicorns can cast spells via their horn, there's also the typical fantasy tradition of elaborate complicated rituals with fancy arcane drawings that can have even greater effects.

For simplicity, the GM can run this as a Dramatic Task. For more options, you can refer to the Savage Worlds Horror Companion (available via Pinnacle, Amazon, DriveThruRPG, or your local game store) or the setting East Texas University (available via Pinnacle, Amazon, DriveThruRPG). In there, you'll find options describing how rituals can:

reduce the spellcasting penalty
extend the spell's range
extend the spell's duration
increase the spell's damage or effect

With rituals, you can have additional casters/participants, extended casting time, or required materials. But be warned: with the potential power also comes with dangerous risks - see the Savage Worlds Horror Companion! (Don't worry, you don't have to have failure mean a portal to the netherworld is opened...unless you want to. :P)