================================================================ || || || DRAGONQUEST Newsletter March 1995 || || || || Volume 2 / Number 3 || ================================================================ The DQ Newsletter is for discussions of the DragonQuest role playing game. The key addresses you need to know are: Philip Proefrock (Editor, Article Submissions, Etc.) psproefr@miamiu.muohio.edu David Nadler (Distribution Coordinator) nadled@uh2297p01.daytonoh.ncr.com Drake Stanton (FTP Site Coordinator) drache@netcom.com All articles are copyrighted property of their respective authors. Reproducing or republishing an article, in whole or in part, in any other forum requires permission of the author or the moderator. The DragonQuest Newsletter also maintains an ftp archive site: [ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/dr/drache] which includes back issues of the newsletter and other articles of interest to DragonQuest players and GMs. ----------------------------------------------------------------- C O N T E N T S ================================================================= Editorial Administrivia Letters -- John F. Rauchert -- Jerry Stratton Enhancements to Ensorcelments & Enchantments -- Russell H. Whyte Further Discussion on Invested Items in DQ Spelljamming -- Jerry Stratton Water Magics Modifications -- Joe Gregg Column: DQ ARCHIVE ----------------------------------------------------------------- EDITORIAL: Phil Proefrock ================================================================= This month's issue is lacking an entry in the "Beastiary" column. We need more submissions for this column! In an attempt to expand the scope of the Beastiary, it has been suggested that we include character backgrounds and descriptions. Whether this should be a part of the Beastiary or a separate column of its own will remain to be seen. You should see this begin in the April or May issue. Fortunately, we are starting to get more things for the Newsletter. As was mentioned in the February issue, the April issue will be a special issue devoted to Shape-Changers. We already have a couple of articles, but if you have some additional information on the topic, now's the time to send it! ----------------------------------------------------------------- ADMINISTRIVIA: Dave Nadler ================================================================= As I mentioned last time, I'm testing out a new method of sending the netletter. When I receive the copy from Phil, I normally remove all the carriage returns and new line characters except between paragraphs. I thought this would make a more readable document on the receiver's end. Unbeknownst to me, Phil goes to great pains to make sure each line is less than 60 characters long thus ensuring the content will fit on most screens and/or print formats. So, here's the question. How readable is this and the previous issue of the DQ Netletter? I'm just forwarding on Phil's copy without removing any extra characters. Let me know if this issue (and the last one) come across OK or if there are weird line-breaks that mess up the document at your end. Thanks. ------------------------_L_E_T_T_E_R_S_-------------------------- ================================================================= Re: Canonical DQ Index In one of those Ares magazines (I don't remember which, maybe Nr 6 or 10) was a description of products under development, one was a world generation system by Steve Jackson. I had an opportunity to talk to Steve when he was the guest of honor at Calcon (Calgary's gaming convention) and he said that he had indeed developed a world generation system for DragonQuest but SPI went belly-up before it came out. I tried to find out what happened to the original notes but all he would say is that most of that work found its way into GURPS. I personally would pay big bucks for the original. -- John F. Rauchert (john.rauchert@sait.ab.ca) ----------------------------------------------------------------- {The following is an excerpt from a recent discussion with Jerry Stratton. Jerry is the maintainer of the Cerebus site, and some of the Archive materials will be made available there, too. --ED} >Is there someone currently maintaining this archive? Are you in >contact with other DQ players (other than those we know of who >are Newsletter subscribers)? Are you interested in getting >additional material for the Cerebus archive? I'm maintaining the archive. I'm not in contact with any other DQ players, and I don't play myself anymore. I have a soft spot in my heart for DQ, however, and continue to pull stuff down off the net when it arrives. Of course, that's few and far between. If you have additional material, I almost certainly would like to put it on Cerebus. If you have ftp access to the net, you can put stuff on Cerebus in the 'incoming' directory. You won't be able to see it once you put it there, but it's there, and I'll move it to the correct place later. If you only have e-mail access to the net, you can send text submissions to me, or directly to Cerebus at "submissions@cerebus.acusd.edu". And you can finger or e-mail help@cerebus.acusd.edu for more info. I look forward to seeing more DQ stuff! -- Jerry Stratton (jerry@teetot.acusd.edu) {Editors' Note: Jerry is not a member of the Newsletter staff; the Cerebus site just happens to have a DQ area, which he graciously maintains. If you send material to the Cerebus site, please also send it to one of the editorial staff so that we can let everyone know about it. -- ED} ----------------------------------------------------------------- ENHANCEMENTS TO THE COLLEGE OF ENSORCELMENTS & ENCHANTMENTS -- Russell H. Whyte (russell.whyte@sheridanc.on.ca) ================================================================= Enhancements to College of E&E I blatantly prefer this college, but find it a little lacking compared to other colleges in some areas. These are some suggestions to beef it up. I do not have a separate college for shaping/creating magic items. I placed that area under this college. Some of the following reflects this way of thinking. Feel free to modify/use/discard as appropriate to your campaign. Talents (T-2) Detect Magic This talent allows the adept to discern whether a given item is enchanted. It does not give any details about the enchantment. At the GM's discretion, it may also show the general domain of that magic (white/grey/black, elemental, etc.). The exact college/spells will not be known. This is a simple yes/no. If successful, the adept knows if it's magic. If unsuccessful, the adept doesn't sense any magic. The degree of enchantment is not shown. A coin with a permanent light spell will register the same response as Thor's hammer. The success chance is Perception + 4 per Rank. The experience multiple is 200. General Knowledge Spells (G-10) Silence Range: 15 feet + 15 per Rank Duration: 10 minutes * D5 * Rank Exp. Mult.: 300 Base Chance: 20% Resist: May be actively and passively resisted Effect: (15 + 15*Rank) foot diameter sphere around target. All sounds are nulled. This also includes spellcasting. If target fails resistance roll, spells cannot be cast until this wears off. This effect does not affect adepts of Sorceries of the Mind or Psionics. General Knowledge Rituals (Q-5) Analyze Magical Item This ritual, which takes one hour to invoke, will determine any enchantments or abilities which an item possesses. These can include Modifiers to hit/damage/initiative/spell casting/etc.; Special abilities (extra flame damage, bonus against orcs, allows user infravision, etc.). Note that this does not explain how to use these, it simply shows what abilities it has. If successful, the adept knows the realms of magic used in creating the item. If you blow the roll, you either don't understand the item, or you get the abilities wrong, at the game-master's discretion. I prefer getting it wrong. It usually is good for keeping players in line. Imagine analyzing a new mace, thinking it's specially enchanted against undead, only to discover it summons undead instead! Base chance is (40 + MA + Rank). Experience Multiplier is 150 (Q-6) Lesser magical item creation I include in this category the ability to create lesser-powered magical items. This includes the special alchemy items from the Black Magic College, charged items such as wands, rods, magical potions, scrolls, and any other temporary or counted-use item. Experience multiples do not apply, as I usually require special items/materials used in the creation of items. For example, an amulet of protection from undead would require blood or bones (or whatever) from an undead creature. The adept can only create this item on a new moon, it takes 3 days to build, and requires 500 silver pennies in spell-casting materials (incense, coloured chalks, special inks). A fully equipped lab with proper tools must be available. This stuff can be rather automatic to create, just make creating it complicated to keep under control (i.e. the undead remains must be freshly gathered to be useful). In other words, you want to create an amulet protecting the wearer from a creature, you gotta go kill one of those creatures that day to get the raw materials! Who said this was supposed to be easy? :-) This can be overbalancing, depending on player ingenuity. GM discretion and a bit of planning is required to keep this under control. This ritual will NOT create magical swords, armor, rings, or any other permanent magic items. That takes special knowledge rituals and a lot of endurance! Special Knowledge Spells (S-13) Fear Same as the S-13 Fear spell in College of Celestial Magics Special Knowledge Rituals (R-1) Warding Same as the Warding Ritual (see rule 32.4) with the following exception: This version allows the caster to place more than one spell in a Warding. The exact number is Rank/4, rounding down. -- Russell H. Whyte (russell.whyte@sheridanc.on.ca) ----------------------------------------------------------------- FURTHER DISCUSSION ON INVESTED ITEMS IN DQ ================================================================= David Novak: As far as the rules interpretation of environmental bonuses being added to the cast chance of an invested spell, I think the rules are quite explicit. >From [32.3], paragraph 4, "Whenever a spell is released from an object in which it was invested, the spell is treated as if it was being cast by the character who originally stored it in the object. It always emanates from the spot occupied by the object, but is treated in ***ALL*** (emphasis added) other ways as if cast by that character as he was *when he originally invested the object* {with the spell power ..." At least the 2nd edition copy I have states fairly clearly that the release of the spell from an investment should be treated as if cast by character who made the invested item AT THE TIME WHEN HE ORIGINALLY CAST IT. Thus, environmental bonuses are allowed by the rules. The problem with the rules are that this is rather unbalancing. Most of the DQ groups that I have played in do not allow the environmental bonuses when using an investment. MA bonuses and a backfire chance of 40% are allowed since the MA bonus is intrinsic to the caster and the caster would be investing the spell as if in adventure sequence, not tactical sequence. However, these are all house rules from campaigns with medium to high levels of magic. AFWIW, those with whom I have gamed, would never say that I have ever tried to bend the rules in favor :-) -- David Novak (trumpet@peak.org) - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - -- - - - - - - -- - - - - - - -- - - Philip Proefrock: I think Cameron King had some good points in his letter about Invested items in DragonQuest, and the differences between his approach and mine have as much to do with the campaign flavor as with the actual interpretation of the rules. His point of view makes as much sense as my own, but my campaigns have dealt with magic as a special but very available medium; a different kind of technology. David Novak's position is equally valid in my opinion. But I think that the interpretation the rules more closely imply is that if the Investing adept increases his Rank with a spell, an object which was Invested by that adept does NOT suddenly change and become better, too. Invested items are self-limiting because of the number of charges they have. Players tend to hoard their magic because it may be needed for something more critical later on. Flying spells seem to be the most abused type of investments, at least in my experience. (There's nothing worse than having the party decide to fly from point A to point B and bypass all the fun encounters you had envisioned for them along the way...) I have periodically introduced 'real' (i.e. limitless charge and permanently enchanted) magical items from time to time, which have become the really valuable magical items in my campaigns. I guess the answer ultimately depends on the tone of the campaign. I haven't had anyone get out of control about enchanting each and every bit of stuff they are carrying, yet. I suppose that the possibility of a backfire (and I am known for my 'creative' backfire results) helps to limit that, too. -- Philip Proefrock (psproefr@miamiu.muohio.edu) ----------------------------------------------------------------- SPELLJAMMING -- from the Cerebus DQ Archive ================================================================= Copyright ) 1992 Jerry Stratton. Distribute freely, at no cost to the user or profit for yourself. SPELLS 44.0 CELESTIAL MAGIC 44.6 SPECIAL KNOWLEDGE SPELLS Spelljamming (S-14) Range: Self Duration: Concentration/maximum of 1 hour + 1 hour per Rank Exp Multiple: 600 Base Chance: 5% Resist: May not be resisted Effects: The caster links to a vessel of some kind, and turns this vessel into a spelljamming vessel. Any vessel will work. To move the vessel requires 1 Fatigue Point per tonnage/rank per hour. Speed in wildspace is the jammer's Magic Aptitude, millions of miles per hour. Speed can be doubled or trebled with a good roll. Within a larger object's Gravity Plane, the vessel may move Magic Aptitude miles per hour relative to this object. Speed perpendicular to a Gravity Plane is in hundreds of miles per hour. WILDSPACE: Any area that is not included in a Gravity Plane. Any creature flying under it's own power will move at its normal movement rate (in miles per hour) times 100,000 miles per hour. A creature that normally moves at 10 miles per hour will move at 1 million miles per hour. GRAVITY PLANE: Objects have a Gravity Plane that follows their contour. This plane extends in the direction perpendicular to the plane of the object, twice the depth of the object. The correct plane to use is the largest dimension of the object. Spheres (such as the Earth) have a plane extending equally outward. Earth's plane extends twice its diameter, for 7,776,057 feet above the Earth's surface. This is approximately 1,500 miles. Thus, for a spelljammer with a 15 Magic Aptitude to leave Earth's Gravity Plane will take 1 hour: 1,500 miles divided by 1,500 miles per hour. At Magic Aptitude 21, with a doubled speed, it will take 1,500 divided by 4,200, or 21 minutes. It will take the same amount of time to land on the Earth, coming in from wildspace. -- from the Cerebus DQ Archive (ftp://cerebus.acusd.edu/pub/Role-Playing/Fantasy/DragonQuest) ----------------------------------------------------------------- WATER MAGICS MODIFICATIONS -- Joe Gregg (gregg@espresso.rt.cs.boeing.com) ================================================================= The College of WATER MAGICS Background on these changes ---------------- It seemed to us that the original College of Water Magics required a lot of Magical Aptitude for not much adventure usefulness. We needed their magic so the GM's always had to provide them as NPC's or wharf shop proprietors. When TSR published the Shaping Magics rules, their ability to sell investments cheaply at the waterfront disappeared (if you chose to implement the new restrictions - only Shapers could make investable items). We reasoned that the tremendous need for their services would have driven research to find a way to get their magic to the multitude of fishers & seafarers in a mostly-water world. If investments aren't readily available, what other medium could a Water Mage expect to use cheaply? It took about 0.005 seconds to answer that: potions! Here is a liquid investment medium that naturally applies to this branch of magic. Aside from that, other branches offered some adventuring abilities that we felt were missing from a College that had such a high MA requirement. A PC Water Wizard could not compensate for weak magic offense & defense with lots of skills or weapons because so many of their starting characteristic points had to be in MA. We changed the spells & rituals to give more useful abilities to them without making other Colleges into comparative wimps. Overview of the College --------------------- Like other Elemental Colleges, Water Mages cannot practice their art where their element cannot be or has trouble being. Their modifiers depend on the prevalence of water in the area of the caster. Talents include weather prediction and Detect Water, which with other skills can be used to identify something about the water & what else is in it. For this, the sense of smell is more important than the sense of sight. General Knowledge Spells: * G1, Water Breathing. Puts gills on the target's neck, magically conforming to the needs of the target. * G2, Water Swimming. Magical fins & tail appear, becoming more full at higher ranks & complete above rank 15. Still need to breathe. * G3, Water Purification. Make drinkable water from any liquid that is not part of a living being. * G4, Talk to Sea Mammals. Speak with them & they are well disposed. * G5, Talk to Sea Creatures. Speak with them. No other promises. * G6, Fishing. Catch one fish with a created pole, line, & lure. An inverse version is known to sea adepts, so beware of treasure you see near the beach. * G7, Sea Blessing. Modify all die rolls by one in your favor while on or in a medium or larger body of water. * G8, Mage Wind. Same as the current spell: get & control a wind. * G9, Rust Metal. Corrodes non-noble metals with specific damage to armor & weapons, and general effects on pounds of other metal. General Knowledge Rituals: * Q1, Bind Water. Same as the current ritual: control some water. * Q2, Ship Binding. Construct or repair a ship. This takes a while to do the first time, & less time to renew it even if underway. Any rigging must be provided by other means. * Q3, Waters of Vision. Like the current spell, but it reflects more than one vision or location-scrying with rank, & more than one user may command the visions. Special Knowledge Spells: * S1, Water Play. The caster joins other beings in the water in some minutes of play, becoming exhausted. Recovery of all fatigue and freedom from nightmares & other feelings result quickly. * S2, Water Warming. Adjust the temperature of a volume of water with potentially interesting effects. * S3, Water Jet. Essentially a "Bolt of Water." * S4, Summon Sea Mammal. Bring one mammal to you & get it to perform a service. * S5, Summon Sea Creature. Bring any one sea creature to you & get it to perform a service. Afterwards it makes normal animal reactions. * S6, Summon Fantastic Creature. Summon an aquatic being whose existence is due to magic/extraplanar origin. It won't attack the party if it isn't attacked. * S7, Repel Water Creature. Any aquatic creature flees out of range. * S8, Waterspout Spell. Form many small waterspouts according to rank that spin & hold a creature each, or one large spout that does some damage. * S9, Maelstrom Spell. A whirlpool sucks beings & vessels to the bottom where they are battered severely. * S10, Summon Sea Sprites. Get a number according to rank that will gladly perform simple, helpful actions. Special Knowledge Rituals: * R1, Bind Weather. Modify weather in the area according to rank. * R2, Summon & Bind Water Elemental. The usual. Don't backfire. * R3, Become Fish. Be the fish of your dreams for a time and size that increase with rank. Retain your knowledge & other mental skills. You could train in fish form in other physical skills... * R4, Make Potion. A potion of various types can be made according to rank with this ritual. At higher ranks, other Colleges' adepts can assist to put THEIR knowledge into potions. There is no Investment Ritual for this College. The full details of range, BC, duration, etc. will be sent when we get another block of time to type them up. Yes, we have them on PC format. No, we don't have a way to connect that via our Unix computers. Feel free to comment on this! We have playtested it & it can be fun. We are open to suggestions. -- Joe Gregg (gregg@espresso.rt.cs.boeing.com) ---------------------_D_Q_ _A_R_C_H_I_V_E_----------------------- ================================================================= [Archive ftp site is at: ftp.netcom.com in the pub/dr/drache directory. [ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/dr/drache] Archivist and ftp Guru: Drake Stanton (drache@netcom.com)] College of Monastic Studies (Monk) -- John Forrester ARCHIVE NAME: monk.Z from the introduction: "This college is concerned with the enhancement and adjustment of the physical traits and capabilities of the adept. Adepts of this college disdain the use of all 'artificial' aids and will only use them until they can do without them. They will only wear clothing to blend in with the societies they frequent and prefer not to wear footwear if they can avoid it. They cannot abide armor and will only wear leather at most. They will use melee weapons only until their unarmed combat skills (including magical bonuses) exceed those of the weapon they choose to use." ############################################################ ### End of DragonQuest Newsletter v2/n3 -- March 1995 ### ############################################################