Creating a Spell
The crackling of the flames could be heard in the background as Marius stared into the embers of the fireplace. The warmth of the fire making the small space much more comfortable than the biting cold winds outside of the outpost that the frontiersmen had erected and defended for this gathering.
“Now concentrate Marius. Feel the warmth of the fire on your skin. Feel the energy of combustion, destruction, warmth, and ignition slowly seeping into your body. Embrace it, as you have done so many times before and this time let it build, let it surge from your chest into your hands.”
The words came from his mentor, Kaspen, renowned in the wildlands outside of the Township of Boulderton as a focused elementalist of great strength- a pyremancer. Marius had heard the tales of his power and sought out the hermit, braving the ravenous gnolls and meddlesome goblins to find the man and his stubbornness was rewarded almost a year ago today when he accepted him as a pupil.
“Now, feel your latent energies mingling with the flame and call it forth. Command it to move as you desire and tell it how to act. Demand it’s obedience, or it will do as it wills and destroy you.”
With a nervous look to the side Marius locked his eyes with the yellow armbanded man to his left who gave him a nod.
“Find the words lad! Find the words that the flame will obey and call it to serve you! Now!” With a moment’s thought and as if he was testing not only the flame, but himself, Marius spoke aloud the words of power.
“I command you primal power! Enflame my blade!”
Marius shuddered, feeling his energy flow through him and into the longsword he grasped tightly as flame, raw and powerful erupted from the hilt and ignited his blade.
The scene paused momentarily as the rules marshal stepped in to speak with Paul- Marius’ Player, and Rich- Kaspen’s player.
“Alright, you are allowing Paul’s character to learn your spell ‘Enflame Blade’, yes?” The marshal asked looking over Paul’s character sheet.
“Yeah, we worked everything out between game and he’s been working up to it the last few events. We worked it into our roleplay and everything.” Rich responded.
“Very cool! Good to see it! That’s awesome guys. Okay Paul, you can go ahead and add Enflame Blade to your sheet, it costs 3 energy. Do you know how the spell works?”
“Yeah, me and Rich have been talking about it.” Paul replied.
“Excellent. Well congrats man! You are now the only other player who can cast this spell, so enjoy it!” The marshal responded, stepping from the scene and allowing it to play out.
Staring at the same flames now pouring from around his blade as rose from the fireplace, Marius wore a look of pride and determination.
“Well done lad. You are finally ready for my final trial. Pass this final test and you may take the mantle of ‘Pyremancer’ for yourself. By the next turning of the seasons I charge you with the creation of a new and unique magic that calls upon the essence of flame. If you cannot do so by the coming gather, I will no longer consider you a student and you will no longer be welcome in my home.” Kaspen warned.
With their interaction past, Kaspen walked off towards his home deep in the wood, leaving Marius- and Paul- to wonder how to go about his new task.
And this is where today’s Deep Dive is going to help. One of the most flavorful and interesting mechanics of Crestfallen Larp is the free form Magic system and it’s ability for a character to not only learn existing magics- whether it is common known magics widely known, or more obscure spells known only to a few like the above example- but to create their own unique magic spells and bringing them into the world of Katalossa either for their personal use, or for the good of all the inspired races.
The rulebook states the following in regard to creating new spells:
“Additionally, a character may create a new spell. To do so, the player must contact the plot staff between events to discuss what their new spell will do, determine its Energy Cost, and decide if the spell will be prototype or added directly to the rules system. A character may only have one prototype spell at a time. This spell is being tested and may only be used that character. Prototype spells cannot be copied, turned into items, or be taught to other characters. Every year, Prototype spells will be reviewed and voted on by the player base to decide if they will be included to the permanent spell list, discarded, or revised for additional testing. Once a spell is approved for use, the creator is given an Approved Project Design card. This allows the character to add the spell to their spells known, teach the spell to other characters for addition into their spells known, and/or grant access to the guilds to distribute the spell to other characters.”
This section of the rules shows us that at the onset of creating a spell there are two positive outcomes, or one negative:
• A spell is built in a manner that both player and staff feel it is balanced and suits the game world well and it is immediately added into the rules system and the player may have their free agency in what they wish to do with their new spell.
• A spell requires a bit of fine tuning, or review of how it functions in the system and as such requires playtesting as a prototype spell.
• A spell does not embody the intended spirit of the game or is unsuited to gameplay either through flaw or intended design and staff has reserved the right to deny it’s creation without sufficient reworking.
While the latter situation is a possibility it is always the intent of the Crestfallen Larp staff to work with a player to make their creations work in the system and working with them to realize their desired effect. Only in extreme cases where a spell would not suit the system thematically or mechanically will a spell be denied outright.
With that in mind we will look into the two outcomes that result in a new spell coming into play.
Immediate Approval
This outcome is the generally desired outcome for both staff and players, and as such any deliberation on new spells between staff and a player usually is done to workshop the spell to this point.
To outline how this process has been handled previously I will allow everyone a look into the creation of one of my character’s custom spells “Blessing of Fate”.
Being a sort of frontier charlatan and fortune-teller, I wanted to create a spell that I could administer to one or more targets through an acted scene telling their fortunes with a tarot reading. The spell would take effect after the acted scene and grant those involved a buff to their temporary body points. I had envisioned it as a small glimpse into their daily activity that allowed them to better prepare for combat.
When building a spell many things are brought into factor, however in this instance my factors were:
• Delivery type • Effect • Cost • Affected targets
As the spell was a largely out-of-combat spell the delivery type was of no issue to either myself or plot. I had no issue delivering the effect via spell ammo to each target.
The effect was equally simple, as there are existing basic enchantment potions for temporary body, we agreed the base effect of 5 temporary body was a good starting point.
As far as cost went the starting point for all existing spells is 1 energy, and a 1 energy for 5 temporary body seemed a fine enough cost, however I had wanted the spell to be able to target more than one individual per casting, which no other spell effect has done before. This moves into Affected Targets.
I had envisioned doing mass readings for groups and enhancing them all at once. My original idea was to have a base reading for 1 person be a quick 5 minute spread and the target gains 5 temporary body. With the ability to do a longer reading for more targets I didn’t think that 6 people would want to sit there for 30 minutes for just 5 temporary body, especially when an enchanter could create potions for the same effect they could drink instantly.
So through working with staff we decided that the acted scene could act as part of the cost for the spell, as at Crestfallen Larp your time is a heavily contested resource.
They had suggested that the reading time would be a set 30 minutes. And during that time I could grant temporary body to up to 6 targets (1 more target than 30 minutes of enchanting would give you potions for!) and the base cost would be 1 energy for 5 temporary body.
I still wasn’t sold on the 30 minutes for 5 body, so I opened the discussion: Could I spend more energy to grant more body?
We had decided a 1 for 5 would scale a bit too high, with a character who wasn’t optimized for spellcasting and had only played one event that would be 30 body for 6 people if I spent all my energy into it. Sure, that would mean a 3-hour rest for me to be able to do it again, but that was 180 temporary body every 3 hours.
We had decided that a diminishing return on energy spent would suit the spell fine. 1 energy for 5, another 2 for 10, another 3 for 15.
So once the spell was concepted it looked as such:
Blessing of Fate Casting Time: 30 minutes with acted scene Targets: 1-6 targets Cost: Varied, see below description Description: By allowing Oz to peer into their fates the target(s) can better prepare themselves for their upcoming ordeals. This spell grants the targets a base of 5 temporary body with the option to grant an additional 5 body for a cumulative energy cost to the caster. (3 energy for 10 body, 6 energy for 15, etc)
Hopefully by pulling back the curtain and showing the back and forth process from concept to finish this gives a better idea of how simple it is to create a spell with a member of staff aiding you. This example ended well, with a spell both parties feel was evenly balanced and did not work outside of the expected mechanics of the game, however there are times when a bit more effort needs to be put into a spell’s creation.
Spells requiring Playtest as a prototype
To better show where a concept moves from the above example into something that would require seeing it in action we have begun works on a new spell specifically to outline this process.
In concept we went with a spell idea that directly challenges one of the core mechanics of the game: energy points for spells, and point recovery mechanics. The spell being concepted is “Flesh to Energy” a spell that allows the caster to deal damage to themselves (or another target) and allow them to instantly regain spent energy.
With this concept I reached out to staff to discuss how this spell could be brought into the game in a manner that doesn’t directly run contrary to the intended game mechanics.
My thoughts were that the spell cost could mitigate the inherent problems of giving players unlimited access to infinite energy by having a large body cost that would make it dangerous to use constantly, or even a cost so high that only higher level players would have the body to cast it.
In discussion we very quickly addressed the immediate issue of the spell being targetable: the caster of the spell could go around an event and restore people’s energy to them willy nilly, and if they (or another character) had a healing specialization they could just instantly recover the damage. So we immediately identified that the spell would need to be self-targeting.
At this point I suggested maybe a smaller Body cost and inflicting bleed (a condition that lasts until removed by some means that does not allow the target to recover lost body), to which staff rationalized that a bleed effect that could not be removed for a duration would be enough of a cost that a body cost would not be needed. Staff also suggested that if we wanted it to recover more energy it could restore an additional 1 energy for the cost of 10 body at the time of casting.
As multiple instances of the same condition do not stack, the spell cannot be used on a target that is already bleeding, making the real cost of the spell the duration of time the bleed cannot be removed, followed by the need to remove the bleed somehow.
With this information we have the following thoughts for the current look of the spell:
Flesh to Energy Casting Time: Instantaneous Targets: Self Cost: See below description Description: Oz taps into darker energies to open a bleeding wound on himself, channeling the pain to power. At the time of casting Oz is inflicted with the Bleed condition that cannot be remedied for 10 minutes and he recovers 1 energy. After this time the bleed condition remains but can be removed by normal means. Oz is able to choose to deal an additional 10 damage to himself at the time of casting to restore an additional 1 energy.
At this point the spell requires some testing to see how it works in play rather than in theory, to see if the bleed condition is an effective cost, and to see if the energy recovery seems fair and worth the cost.
One of the ideas that came up in discussion was the ability to instantly cast this spell when afflicted with a bleed condition by outside means, and it may become a part of a future playtesting of the spell.
So that’s it! I know that the spell creation system can seem intimidating but in my opinion it is one of the best things about Crestfallen Larp, giving a player the ability to craft their magic using character in the specific manner they want to.
I intend to update this post as the above spell works it’s way through playtesting in the coming year, and I encourage you to reach out to staff if you have any ideas for spells for your character and see where the discussions take you!