divine magic 4e

External Since: Mar 01, 2006 Posts: 7

I think the relevant advantage is Power Investiture. Unfortunately the
Basic Set is not very clear on the spells available to clerics. Does
anybody have some experience with this advantage or some rule of thumb
for the creation of spell lists?
I am completely clueless here. How many spells should be available to
clerics and what level of Power Investiture should be necessary to learn
them? the objective is to keep arcane magic and divine magic balanced
and distinguishable from each other.

thanks,
Tobias

External Since: Feb 13, 2006 Posts: 34

David Johnston wrote:
> On Thu, 02 Mar 2006 02:46:47 +0100, victimOfGravity
> <opfer-der-schwerkraft.DeleteThis@gmx.de> wrote:
>
> >I think the relevant advantage is Power Investiture. Unfortunately the
> >Basic Set is not very clear on the spells available to clerics. Does
> >anybody have some experience with this advantage or some rule of thumb
> >for the creation of spell lists?
> >I am completely clueless here. How many spells should be available to
> >clerics and what level of Power Investiture should be necessary to learn
> >them? the objective is to keep arcane magic and divine magic balanced
> >and distinguishable from each other.
>
> The rule of thumb for creating divine spell lists is first and
> foremost to keep them thematically appropriate. Don't worry _too_
> much about balancing arcane and divine. While divine magicians have
> the advantage of not needing to follow prerequisite chains, that can
> be as much a disadvantage as an advantage. Those homely little
> utility spells that arcane magicians need to know and the servant of a
> powerful god may not bother to pick up even if he has access to them
> can be damn useful on a day to day basis, often more useful than the
> big guns just because of their low fatigue cost. Apart from that, the
> invested magician has the disadvantage that he has to avoid pissing
> off the boss and doesn't get any points for it.
>
>
> The important thing is to make sure that the god doesn't offer spells
> that conflict with their identity or infringe upon the domain of
> another jealous god from the same geographic area. For example if you
> were going to use Thor, then he wouldn't offer spells that create
> illusions, or control fire , or read minds, or create undead. Not
> only would they not fit into the storm/warrior motif, but they do fit
> into the motifs of gods like Loki, Odin, and Hel and gods can be both
> jealous of other gods intruding upon their sphere of authority and
> unwilling or unable to use the powers which represent their arch foes.
>
>
> So assuming you were doing a fantasy Thor, then the spells he might
> typically offer might be (from the 2nd edition magic book)
>
> Shape Air,
> Air Jet,
> Predict Weather,
> Walk on Air
> Clouds
> Rain
> Windstorm
> Whirlwind,
> Lightning
> Might
> Vigor
> Persuasion
> Snow Hail,
> Lend Strength
> Lend Health
> Recover Strength
> Share Strength (but only to other people with Thor Investment)
> Minor Healing
> Create Warrior
> Bless
> Curse
> Fear
> Panic
> Terror
> Bravery
> Berserker
> Haste
> Quick March
> Great Haste
> Slow Fall
> Hawk Flight
> Winged Knife
> Shield
> Armour,
> Sense Danger
> Missile Shield
> Iron Arm
> Weather Dome
> Thunder Clap
>
> Perhaps the Air elemental spells, and you might add a couple of new
> spells, like one that makes a hammer appear out of thin air and bash a
> foe if you felt so inclined. And you'd be set.

Or perhaps a variant of the Lightning spell as well. Since the obvious
weapon for a priest of Thor is a Hammer, properly blessed, of course,
this one might make sense. By the way, I have not yet read the 4e
Magic book, so I do not know if something like this is already in
there. However, I have seen Icy Weapon in the Basic Set, so the idea
is already there.

Empower Weapon (Elemental spell)
For the Arcane side, prerequisites would include Magery 1 or 2, and
knowledge of the spell being placed on the weapon at 15+. (See below)
Time to Cast: Time to Cast Prerequisite Spell + 2 turns. (The extra two
turns cannot be reduced)

This spell takes an Elemental Spell and places it into a weapon for one
melee attack. The spell is released when the attack hits or is
blocked, but not on a parry. The extra two turns is to lock the spell
into place in the weapon. A critical failure can indicate that the
spell goes off at this stage. Each element and spell requires a
separate Empower Weapon spell. Possible ones include Ice, Fire,
Lightning, Light (Flash), as well as others.

For a priest of Thor, the obvious one is Empower Weapon (Lightning),
with the limitation that it only affects Hammers and similar weapons.

Mark Sebree