Warhammer Magic 1st draft
=========================

Foreword
--------
The world as will and imagination -Schopenhauer

Magick is the art of imposing one's will upon the world. To be able
to do that, you need to learn how to control your will and focus it
upon your goals.

You need to be able to believe to the exclusion of your senses, that
the reality you shape is true.

This requires intense training and will warp your view of the world
and your personality. No Mage is ever truly sane, as the masses use
this word. He may have been able to keep a tenuous contact with the
reality, that "normal" people perceive, but many lose that contact for
good.

Magick is also very much culturally defined. A Dolgan shaman will have
very different notions of what magick is, and how to do it, than a
academically trained "tame" wizard of the empire.

The other important thing to keep in mind is, that magick, like art,
cannot be truly taught. Oh, you need to learn the basic techniques of
course, and to this end you need a master who will give his knowledge to
you, but the final practice of magick is highly idiosyncratic, and no two
mages will ever have the exact same spell. [Think of it that way: No two
painters will ever produce the same picture even if they paint the same
model.]

The Mechanics
-------------

To learn the art of magick you need a master and apprentice yourself to
him. By that, you enter one of the following careers:

* studiosus artem arcanem - the student at a magickal academy
* wizard's apprentice - the apprentice of a free wizard
* chosen son - the apprentice of a "primitive" shaman/witch

In all of these careers you learn the folowing fundamental skills:

* meditation - how to control your thoughts, emotions and perceptions of
the world. you need maditation for the recovery of _magic points_ [after
you meditate for at least 5 hours, you regain 1d4 MP per hour over 4
hours], you also need it to force your thoughts into controlled lanes.
A practitioner of meditation can believe anything to such an extent, that
even a mind-reader is fooled.

* body control - a practitioner of body control may change the reactions
of his body up to the point of inducing his own death by will. He may
also endure cold or heat, pain or sickness.
[a successful WP-Check is needed to bring about any effect of body
control. All body control effects take a toll, after an effect wears off,
the mage is weak as a kitten for the same time that he kept the effect
up. he is effectively at S1 and T1, he will be very tired, and probably fall
asleep for the duration of the effect. resist sleeping by WP-Check]

* initiation - (same as cast spells) After a mage-in-training has
mastered the other skills, he will receive his initiation. This
experience will put him into rapport with the invisible world, and
finally enable him to work magick. Initiations usually involve
near-death-experiences (in fact in some cultures, the mage truly dies and
is reborn as mage) and contact with the invisible world and more often
than not a patron spirit.
[I would suggest strongly, that this initiation is played out, as it will
give the mage a view into the different being he has become]

You also learn one path of magick. Each path is a way of getting a
certain result. That does _not_ mean that every practitioner of a path
will use the same methods. Methods are highly idiosyncratic and every
mage will eventually use his very own, usually though within the bounds
of his culture. You won't find a shaman reading incantations from thick
books, nor will an magister artem arcanem mess with tea leaves...

You will hear more on paths later in the respective chapter.
(Example paths would be: divination, transformation, mastery of an element,
dreaming, weathermastery or healing)

Upon completing the career, the new mage gains 1d4 Magic Points and 1d4
insanity points (nobody said it would be easy...)

Working Magick (or: Now we're getting someplace)
------------------------------------------------

The act of magic is "easy" and straightforward. The mage visualizes his
desired effect, and wills the reality to conform to his aims. In game terms
this happens as follows:

1. The player decides on one of the "spells" he has learned.

2. He rolls a WP-check.

3. No matter, wether the spell was successful or not, he then rolls 1 to
4d4, depending on the GMs demands. If he doesn't have enough Magic
Points to spend, he loses the remaining points as wounds.

(Example: Marcus Wieselflink tries to give himself the running speed, to
warn his friends 5 kilometers away of an impending beastman attack. He
rolls for WP, succeeds. The GM thinks of this as a simple spell and lets
him roll 1d4 of MP-loss. Unfortunately Marcus rolls a four and he has
only 3 MP left. He loses one wound as a consequence and will have a
splitting headache when he arrives.)

If the mage loses enough Wounds to go critical, he rolls on the
appropriate Critical Hit table (I'll write it, for the moment simply use
hit location head and improvize.) he may die, but he also may keep the
enemy off for the few decisive minutes. (Great for last stands... "I'll
keep them! Get the hammer back, and sing a song about me when you come
home...)

4. If the spell was successful, the desired effect happens, if not,
tough luck...

Learning spells
---------------

Any effect, a mage cares to use a second time is a spell. He may learn
it through a book, by tradition, or he may think it up himself. No matter
how he learns the spell, the decisive moment is the first application. If
he succeeds, he will have this spell in his repertoire, if not, he will
never be able to learn this exact spell. That is, he will have to go back
to the "drawing board", vary the spell in someway, and try again.

The GM may give a bonus or a penalty on this first WP-roll, depending
on the amount of preparation (or desperation) of the mage.

On the other hand may a mage also _improvise_ at WP -20. He then thinks
of something at the spur of the moment, and just lets fly... An improvised
spell does not enter the repertoire and is as a rule not really recreatable.
If the mage wants to re-use this spell, he will have to design it anew.

A new repertoire spell costs 50 EP, and the first casting will cost all
the mage's MPs or double the amount rolled, whichever is less. [That
just means, that you can't die from learning a spell. You _can_ die
from an improvised spell though.]

Magic Point costs of spells
---------------------------

[That's where I'm still a bit in the dark, and I _will_ need feedback on
this]

A spell needs energy, i.e. Magic Points. Depending on the power of the
spell, you roll between one and four d4 and spend the amount of MP
indicated. I have drawn up 4 very loose power levels. I do think that the
level of a spell is mostly "master's choice" and as GM you can by this
measure determine the power of magic in your campaign.

* 1d4: The simple, most used and normal spells. With this power you can
achieve results that lie within your "physical means" or don't affect the
story overmuch. In combat you would be able to get one point of
armor/toughness, or make 1d6 of damage. The attack does count as
"magickal", though, and you are able to wound things that couldn't be hit
otherwise.

* 2d4: This is already strong magick. you will be able to influenc more
than one or two persons, you will make a visible effect on a community, a
fight or make real contact with the otherworld.

* 3d4: Heavy stuff! Don't ask a mage of this power to come yesterday,
he might take you at your word... This power is out of reach for most usual
mages, and if you're capable of this, your name will be _known_.

* 4d4: To reach this power you have either wrestled death herself and
won, or you have given yourself to a higher (or lower) power. This is
Constant Drachenfels league.

Of course a lowly apprentice will not be able to cast spells of 2d4
power, not to speak of even higher spells. So there are

Limits to spellpower
--------------------

To be able to use a spell of a higher power, you need to have:

* to be thoroughly comfortable at your current power. That is: you must
have at least 10 spells of the lower power in your repertoire.

* an initiation into this higher power. This initiation need not
necessarily come from a teacher, you may initiate yourself. But it should
be a profound experience and it will change you. [you pay 100 EP and gain
another 1d4 Insanity points]

* the necessary amount of magickal energy in your veins. [that is you can
advance if you hve at least double the magic points, that a new spell of
this power would cost you. That is:

at least 32 MP to advance to spells of a power of 2d4
at least 48 MP to advance to spells of a power of 3d4
at least 64 MP to advance to spells of a power of 4d4

How to gain Magic Points
------------------------

While the character is pursuing a magickal career, he may buy 1d4 of MP
for 100 EP. That's it.
Note that thus the process of aquiring MP is abit
erratic, and a character may end up with 4 or witzh 16 MP for 400 EP
he spends.

Ther may be powers though that give him more MP... for a price. This is
the lure of chaos to mages.

Still to do:
------------

* Careers, careers, careers... There should be about 20 of them to give
at least a spectrum.

* Paths! There needs to be a good description of each path, together with
alot of examples.

* "Reality checks" otherwise known as playtesting. This is more or less
the system we played here in our campaign for the last 5 years, but we never
really codified it. we had a set of common understandings and winged it.