Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

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Puzzled_Viking
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Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by Puzzled_Viking »

Hi folks! I've been tinkering on an Atlantean setting for Basic Fantasy for a bit (I'm the same guy that posted at Puzzled Vikings for BF Appreciation Day), and I thought I'd share the first custom class I'm knocking together for it. Attached below is a PDF and Open Office Document. I hope the .odt works, as I had to create and save it in Word.

Any suggestions on improving the Mage would be appreciated! (I... very rarely get to play, so this hasn't been playtested at all.)

A brief blurb about the class (if people want, I'll try to post a forum-friendly version of the advancement charter): Warrior-wizards (more like a Cleric in terms of fighting ability) that attach magical crystals to their bodies, turning themselves into living spellbooks of sorts.
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jackel
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by jackel »

Hey Puzzled Viking, I downloaded and print this off to take a look see. Welcome to the boards.
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Puzzled_Viking
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by Puzzled_Viking »

Thanks Jackel, look forward to hearing your thoughts!
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SmootRK
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by SmootRK »

These sound very interesting. I am not sure I completely follow the spell casting and crystal thing yet, waiting for more details of the spells and crystals... I expect this will come together more as these details out.

This seems all very campaign specific, so knowing more about your version of Atlantean society, history, and the people (are they a separate race?, special abilities, etc.) Can other non-atlanteans become such mages? Again, this seems very specific to a particular world, so I am not sure it meshes with my own sensibilities. But I am always interested in new ways to approach stuff like magic systems.

It sounds like the general idea could potentially be ported over to something like Dwarven Magic using Magical Rune Stones (or gems or whatever). Perhaps when you are done, you might create a set of generic rules that govern such other variants on the mechanics.
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Puzzled_Viking
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by Puzzled_Viking »

Yeah, I'm hoping to refine the idea and make it as clear and simple as possible. It doesn't help that I'm horrible at getting ideas across. Basically: Each crystal has X charges, and can handle Y spells. Mages have Z spots they can 'equip' crystals to. So a mage with three 'slots' could equip, say... a 2 charge crystal that handles level 4 spells. a 1 charge level 6, and a 4 charge level 1. His spell casting chart would look like this:

Code: Select all

Spell Level  Spells Per Day
     1               4
     4               2
     6               1
These could be changed out at the cost of Constitution damage and HP damage. It's a system that would require a bit of extra legwork on the GM, as he'd have to prepare for a character wanting to acquire more crystals to expand their spellcasting prowess. I'm still deciding how he acquires the actual spells. I'd like to take a page from Vance and say he has to go a-questing for lost lore, or maybe raid his neighbor's library...


As far as the setting goes, yeah, they're setting specific. But there's nothing stopping someone from taking the idea and porting it over, as you say, to a Dwarven rune-priest, or making a tattoo-mage, or any other spin on the system.
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by jackel »

I have given it the once over coupled with your explanation above. This sounds like a lot of book keeping. Wizard z has y crystals with x number of 4th level spells and r number of 3rd level spells...... If I am understanding this correct. Why don't you try simple. crystal hold x number of points. spell cost some points per level say 1 per level so a 4th level spell cost 4 points. This will require some bookkeeping, but might be less. anyways just a thought. I like the dwarf rune preist idea though.
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Dimirag
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by Dimirag »

Welcome to the forum, for the crystal magic you can use the spell per day table that magic users use and required a specific crystal type per spell level or per X spell levels that the Mage is able to cast, if you want to require multiple crystal of the same type make that a crystal has a max amount of spell per day...
Sorry for any misspelling or writing error, I am not a native English speaker
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Puzzled_Viking
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by Puzzled_Viking »

While this does sound like a bit of book keeping, in practice, it wouldn't actually be much more than tracking a normal magic user's prepared spells. I'd tinkered with a spell point system, but combining all the pools together ended up being a bit tedious. Still, I'll take a look at the Magic User spells per day list to see if I can get some ideas.


I"ll be posting a revised version probably this afternoon, including a sample character (I find that seeing a character sheet helps when figuring out a new class).

On that note, is it okay to glean spells from SmootRK's Libram Magica for this project? I remember seeing in a thread elsewhere that it was preferred for a supplement to be as self-contained as possible.
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SmootRK
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by SmootRK »

The Libram as is most stuff here, is Open Content, so it is generally fine to utilize them.

That said, you can just copy/paste the appropriate spells into your document so that it can stand independantly without too much back and forth referencing. Adding some credit, or at lease a line where you mention utilizing parts of other named sources is probably best in the 'being cordial' sense.
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Re: Atlantean Antics: The Atlantean Mage

Post by Solomoriah »

You should put the OGL in your document, if you haven't already, and add the relevant copyright line(s) from Libram Magica's OGL to yours to be properly compliant. Otherwise, yeah, take what you want.
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