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The Backroad to Civilization

January 8th, 2023:

We just took it easy today. Rachel and I had our 4th Covid booster

yesterday, so that was enough excitement for me for one weekend. Aside

from taking out the garbage & recycling and doing the dishes, I haven't

done anything more strenuous than building a Kit Kat Holiday Cabin kit

with Astrid. She plunked the kit (a Christmas present) in my lap earlier

saying she wanted to build it, so what's a dad to do? I cleaned off the

kitchen table and we got to work.

No sooner was it assembled when it was devoured by its proud nine year-old

owner.

The rest of the afternoon was spent fooling around in GURPS. I dove

further into Ritual Path Magic with the intent of working through the

making of charms. Charms are basically small, fragile items that contain

a single-use spell, which is cast instantaneously by breaking the object.

Working through the charm creation rules shed a bit more light on the

Ritual Path Magic process and I realized that, while I haven't been doing

things *wrong* per se, my non-Ritual Adept NPC character has been very,

VERY lucky in casting spells that should be *just* beyond her skill

level...

I won't get into details as it's a *lot* of math and is frankly a bit

headache inducing for even *this* diehard GURPS fan. The long and short

of it is, by the time I was done, "Witchy Janet" managed to create a charm

that held a "Conjure Credentials" spell, making her roll against the

"Quick and Dirty Rituals and Charms" chart with exactly the number she

needed (once penalties were applied). Thus, the little plastic toy

policeman in her pocket now contains a "Conjure Credentials" spell, cast

by breaking the toy.

I'd largely ignored the idea of charms until now. They'd struck me as a

bit of a gimmick, but now that I've used Ritual Path Magic in a campaign

and dealt with the long, looooooooong casting times for more powerful

rituals, I have really seen their utility.

For example, to use a Lockpick spell under RPM, Janet has to spend five

minutes gathering ambient energy, rolling to see how much energy was

gathered and, if it's not enough to meet the ritual's energy requirement,

has to spend another five minutes gathering more ambient energy, and

again, and again, until she has enough.

The Lockpick spell is an easier ritual requiring five energy. Typically

she can cast it after the first five minute gathering. Sounds great until

you remember that in-game, rounds are measured in seconds. In the middle

of combat, with people shooting at you, are you going to wait five minutes

for some weird ugly nerd to wave their hands around and speak nonsense

just to unlock a door? No! Now, what if instead you wanted her to cast a

fireball spell which requires 18 energy? Depending how the dice treat

you, gathering the required energy could take anywhere from ten minutes to

an hour! Not something you want to wait on.

This is where charms are great - the spell is cast on the charm well in

advance (typically between gaming sessions) and when you need it, it's

ready for use in one round. For example, rather than spend five minutes

or more gesticulating at a locked door, Janet can reach into her pocket,

take one of the plastic keys off the Fisher Price infant toy keyring she's

carrying (each key on which contains a previously-prepared Lockpick

spell), snap the toy in half, and release the spell. Voila! Three rounds

versus five minutes (or more).

I plan to delve deeper into making charms in the near future. It's been a

fascinating experiment so far.

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