Dresden Magic System v3.3

Two Attributes:

Evocation

Thaumaturgy

Magic/Mojo pool, determined by 4D6 roll at the time of character creation, the total from the roll equals how many dice you have in the pool.

Rote spells are skills under the Attributes

Evocation:

Using Magic to shove energy at someone or something or using it to protect against damage or environment. Quick and imprecise, when you need to do magic in a hurry, the exact opposite of Thaumaturgy.

Evocation can:

1. Attack
2. Defend
3. Change/Maneuver/Alter situations/environments
4. Counterspell

To launch Evocation spells, the wizard must

1. Allocate dice to Target and Damage/Effect rolls
2. Calculate difficulty and power cost
3. Roll Target dice vs the difficulty and use that roll to hit the target
4. Pay for Power cost and Roll Damage/Effect dice vs. Target’s damage resistance
5. Deal with Backlash or Fallout, if any, resolve outcomes

When preparing to launch a spell at a target, the player declares how much of the Evocation Skill or Evocation Attribute dice are divided to Target Dice and Damage/Effect Dice.

Target Dice are the dice rolled to hit a target. The spellcaster rolls versus the appropriate defense skill roll. Appropriate defenses could be as simple as Dodge, Dex check, or even Perception or Willpower, depending upon the nature of the spell launched. The GM will work with the player during spell casting to determine the appropriate Target Dice vs. Defense Dice to be rolled.

Damage/Effect Dice are the dice rolled for damage or effect to the target. They are resisted by the appropriate skill or attribute, depending on the Damage or Effect chosen for the spell. Physical attacks can be resisted by Strength, Stamina, or Perception, for example, while Mental or other indirect effects can be resisted by Willpower, Knowledge, or Perception. The GM will work with the player during spell casting to determine appropriate Damage / Effect resistance dice to roll.

Next, the spellcaster has to determine the Spell’s difficulty and how much Power it will cost to launch. The primary cost of a spell, is it’s Damage / Effect Dice. A spell can add dice for the Damage or Effect to be performed in addition to the dice allocated by the player at the start of the Spell’s launch. The charts below detail the difficulty level and power cost based on how many dice of effect are being called for in the spell. Any Damage/Effect Dice allocated from the Evocation Attribute or Evocation Rote Spell skill roll, are subtracted from the total. Each Die allocated is worth 3 off the Difficulty and the Power Cost. (3 per 1D of Dmg/Effect)

Attack Forms

Attack Forms

Attack Form	Difficulty	Power Cost
Damage	+3 per 1D of Dmg/Effect	3 per 1D of Dmg/Effect
Fine Beam	15 (+3D to Dmg/Effect)	15
Med Beam	10 (+2D to Dmg/Effect)	10
Large Beam	5 (+1D to Dmg/Effect)	5
Blast	+0	5
Cone	+5 (-1D to Dmg/Effect ea row out from source)	5
Area Effect	+3 per 1” sq area	+3 per 1” sq area
Explosive	5 (-1D from dmg each 1” from center)	5
Split Attack	5; +3 per split	5; +3 per split
Persistent Damage/Effect	5; +VAR, see D6 Adventure book, Benchmarks Chart	5; +VAR, see D6 Adventure book, Benchmarks Chart

Damage: How many dice you want to damage your target with.
Fine Beam: A finger sized beam that can be tricky to target and is very concentrated
Medium Beam: A three finger sized beam that is a little less tricky
Large Beam: A hand sized beam
Blast: Simple yet effective blast of elemental energy
Cone: A blast that spreads outward from the wizard into a cone shape, the farther from the source, the weaker the effects get
Area Effect: Affecting a designated area, usually a radius or square footage
Explosive: Designating a particular square and damage radiates out from there, causing less damage further out from the source
Split Attack: Once you determine how many dice of damage, you can split those dice up to different targets. Use one Target roll vs. each target’s individual defensive roll.
Persistent Damage/Effect: Damage or Effects go for a longer time period than instant. Cost will vary, and GMs should use the D6 Adventure book’s benchmarks chart for calculating Difficulty and Power costs.

Defense Forms

Defense Form	Difficulty	Power Cost
Defense dice	+3 per 1D	3 per 1D
Dome	5; +3 per 1” radius	5; +3 per 1” radius
Wall	5; +3 per 3” length, +3 per 1” height	5; +3 per 3” length, +3 per 1” height
Area Effect	+3 per 1” sq area	+3 per 1” sq area
Simple Shield	+0	5
Ablative	+5 (Each attack stopped, but protection lowers 1D each time hit)	5
Personal Shield or Armor	5	5
Protect Multiple Individual Targets	5; +3 per split	5; +3 per split

 

Defense Dice: Amount of dice to put into protection
Simple Shield: 1 to 3 ft shield, circular or any other simple form
Dome: half of a globe, covering a designated area, usually around the caster
Wall: Hedge wall or taller, can keep enemies at bay...
Area Effect: Protect a certain amount of square footage
Ablative: The amount of Defense Dice decreases with each successful hit
Personal Shield or Armor: Caster can wrap their body in Defensive Energy, yet retain mobility, like a portable force shield.
Protect Multiple Targets: Once you determine how many dice of defense, you can split those dice up to different targets. Use Target skill vs. each target’s defensive roll. (if they try to avoid the spell)

Note: When using Evocation to bring up a shield or other defensive magic, Evocation Attribute or Evocation Rote Spell skill will work as a reaction skill vs. Attacks. Shields and other defensive magic can be maintained; it will require one of the following: Willpower skill, appropriate Evocation skill, Evocation Attribute, or Concentration skill check to keep it up. Chart below can help with determining difficulty for the check.

Maintaing Evocation Spell Difficulty Chart

Number of foci:	Modifier:
1	+5
2	+10
3	+15
4	+20
5	+25

Launching the Spell

Once you have tallied up the Difficulty mods and Power requirement, you must now roll the Targeting dice vs. the difficulty number, success, all is good. If you fail, use the next chart for Backlash or Fallout. A willpower check will allow you to attempt to draw the power in and damage yourself rather than the environment, or allow you to shunt all the energy to the environment. The targeting roll is also used for the difficulty of your target’s defense / dodge roll.

Backlash and Fallout

There are basically two kinds of trouble: Backlash and Fallout. Backlash affects the wizard; fallout affects the environment or other nearby targets. Like everything else, backlash and fallout are measured in damage—in this case, the difference between your failed roll and the gathered power. The worse the failure, the more the spell’s energy goes haywire, and the worse the effects get.

You get to choose how much backlash you absorb, with the rest going to the GM as fallout. Particularly self-sacrificing wizards may choose to take some or all the excess as backlash—especially if there are allies nearby who might bear the brunt of the fallout of the failed spell.

Uncontrolled power taken as Backlash remains a part of the spell and does not reduce the damage or effect of the spell; Fallout is different: every point of fallout reduces the effect of the spell.

Backlash means that the spell energies run through the wizard, causing injury or other problems. This manifests as points of damage, which could require the taking of consequences in the usual way.

Fallout means that the spell energies flow into the environment, causing unintended consequences. This can manifest in a number of different ways. The GM may place aspects on the environment or on targets that the wizard didn’t intend to hit (like his friends and innocent bystanders), or she may assign damage and consequences directly. The GM is encouraged to think of the worst applications of Murphy’s Law possible and enact them. Remember, the wizard was arrogant enough to try to control the forces of the universe—and failed. When fallout happens, it’s the universe putting that wizard in his place, and it’s the GM’s job to take the universe’s side. Greek tragedies have been written about this sort of thing.

As we hinted above, it should be noted that backlash is a kind of safety mechanism for the wizard—if he chooses to absorb it all himself, his spell should still go off as intended because he was willing to pay the extra cost. Fallout is another story entirely, because the wizard has just released the energy into the world and let it run wild. When determining the effect of the spell that caused the fallout, the GM should determine how the dice of damage behave.

The Cost of Power

Power for a spell is paid by the number of dice allocated for Damage/Effect after subtracting the Damage/Effect die allocated from the Evocation attribute or Evocation Rote spell skill at the start of the casting process. Each Die allocated is 3 power points. (1D = 3 power points) If points are left over after subtracting the dice, then that is how many points taken from the wizard’s Mojo pool. If the number goes below zero, the wizard begins to take the points as damage, vs. Strength or Stamina roll, possibly a Willpower roll, depending on the spell being launched and circumstances. GM’s call as to what skill or attribute to roll versus the damage.

Once the power cost is determined and meted out, roll the total Damage/Effect dice versus the Target’s resistance skill or attribute. (Assuming their dodge or defense roll failed.) Damage is figured out as normal, and effects will be based on how successful the roll was.

If you use more Mojo than what you have, every point past zero is a point of damage. Roll Strength or Stamina to resist damage or its effects. If you are still conscious, awesome, but you won’t be able to draw power, unless you want to take on more damage or find another source of power.

Other Sources of Power

It is possible to mitigate the cost of power by drawing the energy from another source.

Drawing Power from artifacts: Some artifacts act as batteries, most of these items are uncommon and as such, easily recognizable.

Drawing Power from other living beings: All living creatures have a certain amount of Mojo, and there are certain conditions under which it can be taken.

Drawing Power without one's knowledge: The magi can siphon Mojo from a person by making a to-hit roll and then the victim must make a perception vs. wizard willpower roll. If the wizard is successful, then they may draw half the target's Mojo pool.

Drawing Power with a person's knowledge and consent: Wizards can draw 70% of a person's pool. There is no limit of how many people can donate at one time.

Drawing Power from a unwilling subject. Anyone being attacked in this fashion may resist with willpower vs. willpower roll.

Drawing Power from another wizard is darn near impossible

Taking Power from killing a living creature or person, is the most terrible method of taking Mojo from a living creature. At the moment of death the killing wizard can take double the person/creature's Mojo.

Creature	Mojo potential
Apes	4D6
Bear	2D6
Birds (small)	1-4
Birds of Prey	2D6
Canine: Small	2D6
Canine: Large	3D6
Canine: Wolf	4D6
Cat: Domestic	2D6
Cat: Wild (Predatory)	3D6
Cat: Large Wild (Lion/Tiger)	4D6
Cattle	4D6
Fish	1-4
Horse	4D6
Lizard: Small	1D6
Lizard: Large	2D6
Monkey	2D6
Mustelid (weasel or badger)	2D6
Rodent: Mouse	1-4
Rodent: Rat/other large rodents	2D6

Power from Ley Lines

Ley lines are matrices of natural Psycho Kinetic Energy that run in straight lines across the globe. Life creates this energy, and it is constantly renewed by the circle of life and death of living beings. Where several lines intersect and cross, the energy is even greater. These intersections are called nexus points. Magi can siphon energy from these lines and nexuses, especially during certain periods and positions of the moon and stars. The additional energy is often only accessible directly at a ley line nexus and must be used while it is available. The Power cannot be saved and used later. This makes timing a critical factor.

Ley lines have the following effects:

1. Being near a ley line, 3.2 km increases the range and duration of spells, wards, and circles by 20% or 2D6.
2. Within half a mile of a nexus or on a ley line increases the range, duration, and damage of magic spells, wards, and circles by 50%. The mage can also draw 10 Power or ‘Mojo’ from the ambient energy once per combat round. Also, the magi can recover 10 Mojo per 30min without having to meditate or sleep.
3. Being at a nexus or within 200 ft (61m) of one doubles the normal range , duration, and damage of magic spells, wards, and circles. Wizards also enjoy a bonus of +5 to saves against spells. The wizard can also draw an additional 20 Mojo once per combat round. Plus the wizard can recover 20 Mojo per half hour.
4. Periods of increased energy: a. Midday and Midnight: A wizard can draw an extra 20 Mojo per combat round along ley lines and 40 Mojo at a nexus. This energy is available for one minute; from 12:00 to 12:01. b. Vernal and Autumnal Equinox: Energy is high during daylight hours of the vernal equinox and the nighttime hours of the autumnal equinox. Wizard can draw 40 Mojo per combat round at a nexus. This amount doubles to 80 points at dawn, noon, sunset, and midnight. However, on a failed roll, or a complication or an over draw of energy, there is a 15% chance that a portal will open, and demons will come out. c. Summer and Winter Solstice: June 21st and December 21st the Mojo energy is the same as during the equinox. At the dawn of a solstice, the nexus erupts with energy for a five minute period. During this time the wizard can tap into 300 Mojo. However there is a chance, (50%) upon a complication, or failed roll that a portal will open and something will come out or a terrible storm. At sunset, another, smaller, five minute energy flare erupts. The wizard can draw upon a 150 Mojo. This time there is a 25% chance of a portal opening with a failed roll or a complication. d. Lunar Eclipse: Once per combat round 30 Mojo can be tapped during the 90 minute period of the eclipse. But for one minute during the zenith of the eclipse the wizard can tap into 400 Mojo. e. Partial Solar Eclipse: During the 2-8 min eclipse, 60 Mojo can be tapped once per combat round and 800 Mojo at the zenith for one combat round.

Ley Line Storms

Ley line storms occur seemingly at random and some scientists think it might have to do with recycling ley line energy and to keep the flow evenly distributed. During a ley line storm rain seldom occurs, but the skies turn a dark green-grey color, black clouds roll in, and the wind gusts bringing a chill to the air. Bluish bolts of electrical energy shoot down from the sky and everything in the area of the storm crackles with a halo of energy.

These maelstroms of mystic energy have dangerous side effects on magic items and creatures of magic. Most flee at the first sign of a storm.

Things that can occur during a ley line storm:

1. Extra energy normally available at ley lines and nexuses are not available during a storm.
2. Magic effects are heavily distorted during a storm. Use the Chart below if any spells are cast, or magic imbued items are used, or if anyone tries to siphon energy from the storm.

Roll Percentile	Effect
1-20	Magic powers are increased-double range and damage. The caster cannot regulate damage or range.
21-40	Magic powers are decreased-reduce range and damage by half. The caster cannot regulate damage or range.
41-60	Magic powers are completely negated-the Mojo is absorbed by the storm, and so nothing magical works.
61-80	Magic powers are completely wrong-the GM can switch spells at will (anything goes) It is wise not to use magic at this time.
81-00	Magic discharge-everytime a spell or magic item is discharged, there is the sound of thunder and the magic user is knocked off their feet from a sudden explosion in their face! Initiative is lost along with one action from that combat round.

3. Bolts of ley line energy are attracted to anything magic in the area including magi, creatures of magic, magic items, artifacts, or weapons. The bolts appear as blue-white energy doing 2D6 energy damage.
4. Creatures who are disguised by metamorphosis or magic suddenly appear to grow or shrink and their features become distorted. Getting hit by a ley line bolt may transform them into their true shape. (1-44% chance)
5. Psionic characters and similar creatures suffer from headaches (use stun damage), are -2 to initiative, and their psionic sensing powers are scrambled; reduce range by half.
6. Magic Illusions disappear
7. Existing dimensional portals close.

Roll the following for every 30min of the storm when along a ley line or once every 5min at a nexus. No saving throws for this.

Roll percentile dice	Event
1-15	Airlift, everybody, including vehicles, crackle with energy and rise 10ft (3m) above the ground and are blown down the ley line for 2D6 minutes before dropping to the ground.
16-30	Rolling thunder-a rolling black cloud comes racing along the entire width of the ley line. Speed of 60mph, everyone hit by the thundercloud is drenched in water, temporarily deafened by the thunder, and knocked off their feet, losing all attacks for the combat round.
31-55	Euphoria-everyone feels good, happy, and cheerful. Many will start to laugh, sing, act silly, as if intoxicated. Those who are injured are healed one level of damage. Characters will feel no fear or hostility toward anything, including known enemies. They will not attack unless attacked first, at which point all attack dice are halved. Number of attacks limited to one. Euphoria typically lasts 2D6 minutes.
56-64	Alien..slimy things accompany a light rain. Squishy, icky, foul smelling, alien things. They don’t do any damage except make the characters stink for 2D6 days
65-72	Dimensional Flux!-one minute on earth, the next, in limbo. After 1D6 minutes they are returned to the same spot on earth. But 2D6 hours passed.
73-80	Massive Ley Line Energy bolt-Characters hit by the bolt take 2D6 energy damage, lose initiative, all attacks, 4D6 Mojo, and are teleported 4D6x10 meters down the ley line.
81-00	A dimensional rift opens! –GM Choice

Counterspell

If a wizard is in the presence of a magical effect, he can attempt to nullify it with the power of his will alone. Even though counterspells are an evocation effect, they can be used to disrupt thaumaturgy. While such an attempt may only be temporary, it can buy the wizard precious time.

Counterspelling is basically an attack against the energy of the spell itself—you summon up energy of your own to disrupt or redirect the energy holding the spell together. Mechanically, this is pretty straightforward. You need to equal or surpass the power of the effect you want to disrupt, and you roll it just like you would roll an attack spell. The tricky part is sussing out precisely how much power the spell is using, so that you know at least how much power you need to bring. You can try to guess—but if you don’t bring enough, the counterspell won’t work; if you bring too much, you run the risk of not being able to control it all. Figuring this out requires an assessment action (which is a free action, so you can do it just before you intend to counterspell) using Lore vs. the offending spell’s Damage total, to figure out how much power to counter with. Then allocate Evocation Attribute Dice or Evocation Rote Skill dice or Willpower roll and roll versus the Damage total. If the roll is greater than the damage roll, then no damage taken, otherwise, the points that make it through, are Damage as is normal.

Focus Items

Finally, there are focus items, the most common tools of the evocator’s trade. Most wizards rely on focus items to reduce the risks inherent to evocation. These vary widely in terms of what they can be, and they depend highly on the wizard’s particular paradigm of magic. For example, Harry Dresden has a lot of the traditional, medieval English wizard thing going on, so he has a rune-carved staff and wand (blasting rod) as his primary focus items. A wizard with a Far Eastern bent might have prepared scrolls with mystical calligraphy on them. A wizard of a religious bent might brandish a symbol of his faith.

The main purpose of a focus item is to make it easier to control the release of energy in an evocation. In a way, it’s a method to add extra control to the construct in the wizard’s mind. If he can envision the energy traveling down his arm into a rod and the rod is an actual object, it’s easier than if the construct is entirely mental. Launching a spell without a focus item will give you a -2D penalty to your Target roll. See “Artifact Crafting” for more information about the types of bonuses focus item provide as well as how to build them. Typically (and traditionally), a focus item is used only for one element. However, it is possible for a focus item to be more powerful, adding a bigger bonus or being useful for various types of evocation.

Hexing

While a spellcaster normally hexes technology as an accident of being a wizard (page 228), he can also do it on purpose, focusing his energies to disrupt electronics and other devices. This is significantly less taxing than performing other forms of evocation—you don’t even need access to the Evocation power (page 180) to do it, so long as you are some sort of practitioner, because it doesn’t require command of any particular element or force. In addition, the normal Mojo Point cost for summoning power up to perform a spell is waived, giving you a “free shot” at most forms of technology.

Deliberate Hexing Table

Difficulty	Technology Potentially Affected
1	Highly sensitive, complex computerized technology—the sort that a good swift bump might break. Very new, cutting-edge technologies and prototypes.
2	Complex (or simple-but-sensitive) computerized tech. Specialized, new, and probably expensive technologies.
3	Simple electronic equipment. Desktop, laptop, other “household” computers. Most current, modern cars.
4	Conceptually complicated, more modern guns (automatic weapons, etc.). Most cars, including older cars from the last few decades. The exciting technologies 1967 had to offer.
5	Even cars without electronics under the hood start to have problems—if it was on the road starting in 1950, there may be some trouble, with a few notable exceptions. Some smaller firearms may be affected, though conceptually simple ones still work pretty well, at least for a time. Older automatic weapons may malfunction.
6	You can’t wear a watch for long without killing it. Even the Model T looks a little scared when you get near it. Electricity is right out.
7	If it’s from the Twentieth Century, it’s probably broken. The late Nineteenth Century’s tech is also prone to troubles. Simple guns may stop working at inopportune moments. Even steam-powered stuff may experience sudden failure.
8+	Nearly anything with moving parts from the Industrial Revolution (late-Eighteenth to early-Nineteenth Century) forward, and even some things further back than that. It’s open season on technology. Take that! Silly lever!

Prolonging Spells

Sometimes, it behooves a wizard to maintain a spell effect for an indefinite length of time especially when the effect is a block or maneuver. Normally, you’d assign more power as indicated on the chart below to make the spell persist longer than an exchange. However, this makes the lifespan of very powerful effects depressingly short.

Alternately, you can actively funnel more energy into an evocation to maintain it, but this takes up one action for the round. This is functionally equivalent to rolling another spell. Summon the power per additional round you want the spell to last, and make another Evocation roll to control it. This takes up your action and deals Mojo Points as per the usual rules for a normal evocation; the advantage is that you don’t have to sacrifice the efficacy of the original spell—it keeps the rating of the original roll. If successful, the spell effect stays active for that length of time.

Time Increment	Evocation Difficulty	Evocation Mojo Point Cost
Instant	0	0
a few moments	5	3
half a minute	10	6
a minute	20	12
a few minutes	60	36
15 minutes	100	180
half an hour	200
an hour	400
a few hours
an afternoon
a day
a few days
a week
a few weeks
a month
a few months
a season
half a year
a year
a few years
a decade
a generation
a mortal lifetime
several mortal
lifetimes
and so on

 

Redirecting Spell Energy

Sometimes, you might commit energy to an evocation, only to discover that circumstances warrant a different effect than the one you originally chose. This happens most often with blocks—you put up a shield of some sort that you’re maintaining, only to find out that what you really need to do is attack or maneuver. It’s true that you could simply cast another spell, but there are times when a wizard needs to economize his resources—like when a demon is about to eat his face.

In those circumstances, you have an option—you can reuse the spell energy from an effect you currently have active, spending the Mojo Points on another evocation without having to roll another spell. This is subject to some limitations:

1. The spell must have been maintained from a previous round into the current one.
2. The spell must not have been used already for its original function in the current round.
3. You must be able to describe how the energy could plausibly be redirected.

Presuming these things are the case, you can use the current power value of the spell to act as a different kind of spell. If the new kind of spell requires a roll for targeting (like with an attack or maneuver), you may roll the appropriate Evocation skill or Evocation. This immediately cancels out the previous effect, as the spell energy can no longer be used for that purpose.

Thaumaturgy

Thaumaturgy is the safest, most reliable method of doing magic—pretty much the polar opposite of evocation. The primary differences between the two are matters of preparation, time, and mindset.

In evocation, you summon up your power, envision the result you desire, and attempt to control the energy on the fly. Because the construct is made up only from the caster’s will and the elements are held solely as concepts in the caster’s mind, evocation can achieve only simple effects, with a very good chance of something going wrong.

By contrast, thaumaturgy sets up the construct physically and allows the elements to act as a lens through which the wizard then focuses his power. Because the spellcaster doesn’t have to concentrate to keep the construct in mind (it’s right there in front of him), he creates a much stronger and more stable effect—meaning he can focus on achieving effects of much greater complexity and subtlety. He can also direct power into the spell gradually, making it far less likely that something will go awry.

Thaumaturgy also allows the wizard the luxury of drawing power from sources other than himself—such as bound spirits, forces of nature, or the assistance of others. Over time, the effects of thaumaturgy are more powerful than those of evocation. While a blast of fire may injure, a ritual curse can leave you and your offspring crippled for generations.

Most of the spells in traditional tomes, or the ones passed down through schools of sorcery, are basically thaumaturgy. They can be described in physical terms—if you follow the recipe of the spell correctly, feeding in the power that it requires, the spell/ritual will work.

Particularly effective thaumaturgical rituals require elaborate physical preparations (such as rare items, multiple casters, unusual times of year, or outside influence such as storms) and may also require a minimal influx of power; this makes them usable by people who, otherwise, would never be regarded as wizards. This can be useful, or it can be very dangerous. (Sadly, it’s usually both.)

How to Do It

1. Determine the spell’s difficulty and Mojo cost a. Find Symbolic links to create a vessel for the spell. Greater the link, the more it can subtract from the Difficulty. b. Use the charts below to calculate the Difficulty and Mojo c. Mitigate the Mojo cost by finding sources of power or taking longer to draw the power you need. d. Use feats to obtain help with the symbolic links, mitigating difficulty, and finding power sources. e. Skip scenes with the other players to continue working on building the spell. For every scene you can participate in during a session and choose to skip in favor of preparing the spell, you can add 3 points toward mitigating the difficulty. f. Perform a Ritual-by performing a ritual, based on how elaborate, relevant, and detailed it is can deduct from the Difficulty.

2. Roll your Thaumaturgy Attribute or Skill and pay the power cost

3. Resolve the Spell’s Effects or Damage

Determining Difficulty

Okay, below is the quick n dirty chart for Thaumaturgy Difficulty. If the wizard and GM are in a hurry, use this chart to quickly setup the roll(s). This number represents the investment of both preparation and gathered power. You can move straight into the casting stage if the spell’s difficulty is equal to or less than your Lore (including any bonuses from focus items). This indicates that your wizard’s personal collection of knowledge and accouterments suffices for the spell. If the difficulty exceeds this limit—or under other circumstances dictated by logic—additional effort is required to set up the spell and you go into the preparation stage, detailed below. (Remember, every 3pts = 1D, so a Lore of 5D = 15 pts, a Difficulty Level of more than 15 (Moderate) requires preparation.)

Quick and Dirty Thaumaturgy Difficulty Chart

Example	Difficulty Level
Solve Improbable or Impossible Problems	10-20
Increasing a skill	10
Simple Action	5
Create Lasting Changes in People and Things	20-30
Increasing an attribute	15
Provide Inaccessible Knowledge	10-30
Allow Interaction with the Supernatural	10
Shape Magical Energies into Physical Forms	20-60

If doing simple damage, physical or other wise, use Evocation charts as a basis and then use the charts below to create the spell’s final difficulty.

Once Difficulty is determined, check it to the level of your Lore, then make up the difference with Rituals, Symbolic links, and Casting Time. Whatever is left, roll your appropriate Thaumaturgy skill or the Thaumaturgy Attribute

Thaumaturgy Effect Duration Chart

Time Increments	Point cost	Dice cost
instant	3	1D
a few moments	5	1D+2
half a minute	6	2D
a minute	7	2D+1
a few minutes	8	2D+2
15 minutes	9	3D
half an hour	10	3D+1
an hour	11	3D+2
a few hours	12	4D
an afternoon	13	4D+1
a day	14	4D+2
a few days	15	5D
a week	16	5D+1
a few weeks	17	5D+2
a month	18	6D
a few months	19	6D+1
a season	20	6D+2
half a year	25	8D+1
a year	30	10D
a few years	40	13D
a decade	50	16D
a generation	60	20D
a mortal lifetime	70	23D+1
several mortal	80	26D+2
lifetimes	90	30D
and so on	100	33D+1

Preparation (Creating a Spell Construct)

If you don’t have a Lore rating high enough to cover the difficulty of the spell (page 264), then you need to spend time in preparation before you can cast it. Preparation time is normally divided into three broad categories: researching the ritual, obtaining stronger symbolic links, or acquiring additional power sources. Taken as a whole, the collection of ritual elements, symbolic links, and power sources is called a spell construct. The construct is a physical container for the energies of the spell, and the container helps your wizard focus his power like a lens and direct it with more stability and safety. The more elaborate the construct, the more power it can hold. This allows for more complicated effects.

If your Lore covers the difficulty and allows you to skip the preparation work, these three things are still happening in the spell—it’s just assumed that they’re done fast enough and well enough that there’s no need to spend additional preparation time on it. In other words, small spells can be whipped up quickly—like Harry Dresden does with a few of his quick tracking spells, using some chalk, a bit of hair, and a few murmured words of power. Regardless, the symbolic links are key here—if you don’t have them, with or without the preparation phase, you just can’t cast the spell.

Ritual

A ritual includes the casting space as well as any special components the wizard uses as part of the procedure of casting the spell. Chanting, dance, inscription, certain ritual movements, sexual rites, and physical implements such as an athame (ceremonial knife) are all examples of ritual components. The casting space is an area set aside to contain magical energies—most wizards of the White Council begin with an unbroken circle in which the wizard can stand and arrange the other components, with the circle serving as the boundary that keeps the spell energy hemmed in until released. This can be as elaborate as a personal sanctum with a metal circle bolted into the ground or as hasty as a circle drawn in chalk on the sidewalk, but a functional casting space and some basic ritual procedure are absolute minimum requirements for any working of thaumaturgy.

Rituals are largely a matter of research and consultation. The wizard learns the steps and tools he needs from a book, scroll, or some other source of knowledge such as a mentor or contact. Magical knowledge is often very closely guarded. Many wizards do not wish to share the secrets they have learned, so they keep their sanctums warded against intrusion. Likewise, many spirits and supernatural beings (especially demons) traffic heavily in magical lore—a powerful currency when bargaining with magical practitioners. Some rituals also simply require tools and components that are difficult to fashion or acquire, like a spike of pure diamond or the blood of a White Court vampire.

Ritual	Difficulty Modifier
Blood Letting	-10-20
Sacrificial Rite-Animal	-20-40
Sacrificial Rite-Human, willing	-100-300
Sacrificial Rite-Human, unwilling	-200-500
Sacrificial Rite-Mass	-300 per person
Chants/Chanters/Singers/Singing	-10 per person
Dancing/Dancers	-10 per person
Believers/Disciples	-15 per person
Laying of Hands, ritual touching/gripping	-10 per person
Formation of Bodies	-5 per person
Prayers or Praying	-15 per person
Ritual Combat	-10 per 2 people
Ritual Drama-simple	-10 per person
Ritual Drama-medium difficulty	-15 per person
Ritual Drama-complex	-20 per person
Altar/Trappings-simple	-10-20
Altar/Trappings-complex	-20-50
Sexual Rite-Couple	-10-100
Sexual Rite-3-4 people	-20-300
Sexual Rite-Group	-50-400
Sexual Rite-Orgy	-100-500
Sexual Rite-Mass Orgy	-500-1000

Symbolic Links

The other minimum requirement is one or more symbolic links—objects that are included in the ritual process that metaphorically represent where the spell energies are being sent. The voodoo doll is probably the most popular example from folklore, but a specific target can be represented in many different ways: a personal possession that has emotional resonance, a sculpture or model of the target, a sample of the target’s writing, actual hair or blood from the target, the target’s True Name, etc. Places can be represented through models, depictions of the place (like a photograph), or things taken from the site itself. Using more of these links in the construct and using links that are “close” to their source increase the connection and make it more likely that the spell energies will go where they’re supposed to when they’re released.

Symbol	Value
Piece of person (hair, flesh, blood, appendage, etc.)	10-30
Personal artifact, possessions	5-15
Representative symbol (doll, clay figure)	10
True Name	20
model of place, picture, things taken from it	15
Sample of writing	5-15

Gathering symbolic links to an individual can be a tricky prospect, as the best ones literally involve taking a piece of the target itself, whether physically or emotionally. For maximum effectiveness, you may need to break into a prospective target’s house for a prized possession, or stalk the target to find a stray strand of hair. Some wizards even resort to violence or have a independent party commit violence for them. Linking to a supernatural creature is even trickier. They are much harder to “sneak up on” in every sense—you will likely be required to risk resources, work through proxies, and make bargains with other entities.

Even getting a link to a place can be difficult at times. The best links are to-scale representations, requiring certain detail. Some areas might be guarded, warded, or restricted in access somehow, requiring you to be very clever to bypass those restrictions.

Power Sources

Finally, many wizards attempt to boost their effectiveness with contributions of power outside themselves. This allows the wizard to cast very potent and complicated spells, with the external power sources doing most of the heavy lifting. This power can come from a variety of sources, listed on page 45. Acquiring power from entities is a matter of convincing them to contribute their power willingly, or forcing them to do so via magical binding, kidnapping, bargaining, or other coercion. Taking the power from an artifact or site requires either researching a means to access the power that is in accordance with its nature, or deliberately desecrating it—which could result in its destruction. Harnessing the power from a natural event (storms, earthquakes) requires precise timing to incorporate the event into the casting, as nature can be rather fickle. And then there’s dealing with plain old mortals—either they’re actively willing to assist in the casting, or they aren’t, and the wizard has to decide if he’s willing to kidnap, torture, and sacrifice lives in the pursuit of his goals.

Compared to the other two components of spell preparation, power sources are by far the riskiest. Depending on outside assistance for a spell is perhaps the most vulnerable position a wizard can be in, prone to betrayal and the fickle nature of supernatural debt (see “Sponsored Magic,” page 48). Anyone capable of contributing power to a wizard’s spell is going to want an equal measure of assistance in return, and the kind of energy they contribute will bias some behaviors of the spell once cast. Many a wizard has found himself forced to further the agenda of a Winter Court faerie or foul demon in these (sometimes literally) Faustian bargains.

Anyone not willing to assist can be forced, but that requires coercive magic, the threat of harm, and the making of enemies—and supernatural creatures are almost universally slow to forget a slight. You can always find willing assistance in the form of Outsiders, but those costs are too high to contemplate. Even researching the topic breaches the Seventh Law, inviting swift retribution from the White Council.

Example Power Sources

Power Source	Mojo Point Value
Self	MP Level
Willing Creatures / People	Variable, Can use table below, or roll MP
Unwilling Creatures / People	See Next Table
Objects that Store Power	Variable
The Environment	12-400 MP Depending on Conditions
Vernal and Autumnal Equinox	80 at dawn, noon, sunset, midnight
Midday and Midnight	20-40
Summer and Winter Solstice	at dawn 300, at sunset 150
Lunar Eclipse	30 during, at zenith-400
Solar Eclipse	1600 at zenith
Partial Solar Eclipse	800 at zenith
Outside Reality	Varies, could be 200-400 or more
Place of Power	20-200
Ley Line Nexus	10-300
Stone Circle	50
Significant Historical Location	30
Spiritual Location	50
Symbolic (for the spell) Location	40
Earthquake	10 per Richter scale
Storms	10 per Storm Class Level
Moon cycles	25 per quarter, 0 for new moon

Creature	MP potential
Apes	4D6
Bear	2D6
Birds (small)	1-4
Birds of Prey	2D6
Canine: Small	2D6
Canine: Large	3D6
Canine: Wolf	4D6
Cat: Domestic	2D6
Cat: Wild (Predatory)	3D6
Cat: Large Wild (Lion/Tiger)	4D6
Cattle	4D6
Fish	1-4
Horse	4D6
Lizard: Small	1D6
Lizard: Large	2D6
Monkey	2D6
Mustelid (weasel or badger)	2D6
Rodent: Mouse	1-4
Rodent: Rat/other large rodents	2D6

Summoning and Binding

Dealing with spirits and other supernatural entities (such as demons) from a “safe” distance is one of the hallmarks of ritual magic. The traditional sorcerer from folklore relies entirely on summoning and binding demons to accomplish his aims—and typically pays a terrible price in the process. It is wise for a budding wizard to heed these cautionary tales. Dealing with spirits and demons is no simple task.

There are three parts for summoning a spirit, each of which can (and often should) be done as its own spell—though a very ambitious wizard can always try to build a spell that incorporates two or more of these parts:

1. Create a container to hold the entity.

2. Summon the entity.

3. Control the entity (binding).

4. Containing

Containing the entity requires you to create a container, much like crafting a ward (page 276) with a very specific purpose and the intent to keep things in rather than out. As with a ward, the difficulty of the containment spell should depend on a combination of duration and the strength of the block. Use the rules for wards when creating a spell of this type. Focused practitioners specializing in summoning and binding can always cast containment spells for use with their work, even if they have no facility for creating wards in general.

2. Summoning

Summoning a supernatural entity is a matter of willing it to your presence and having a place to contain the entity when it arrives—typically a casting circle. This usually requires enough levels of difficulty to beat the entity in a contest of Willpower, so you’re wise to shoot for five or more dice above the being’s Willpower. Ten is about the minimum number to make safety probable, as that’s sized to beat a 10D in Willpower. Therefore, most summoning requires a bit of preparation beforehand. Usually, this time is spent sussing out the entity’s True Name. Once your wizard successfully casts the spell, the entity appears in the designated space.

There is no guarantee the summoned entity will behave how you want it to. You will have to bargain with the entity to achieve your desires. There’s nothing technically magical about this part of the interaction, and a wizard who expects to do this regularly should make sure he’s well versed in Persuasion, Con/Deceit, Charm, or Intimidation.

Even when contained strongly, an entity may try to break the bonds of the summoning circle via trickery (a broken container loses all its strength, instantly) or by main force (launching attacks through the block, usually with its Willpower as the attacking skill). In the latter case, this is a direct conflict of will against will. The wizard must win in order to maintain his circle and keep the entity trapped (a victory can also be used as an opportunity to banish it). If the entity wins, it escapes the wizard’s grasp, and then it’s free to do as it wishes. This is usually a bad thing. Luckily, with a strong container established, the wizard usually has the upper hand and may be able to inflict some harm on the entity in return (see below).

3. Binding

Binding the entity is a third, optional step. You exert your will over the entity, forcing it into your service. Done as another spell, this is considered a fully transformative effect and therefore requires enough dice to take out the demon as if it were a full conflict.

A more haphazard and dangerous approach is using the entity’s True Name to assault the being directly, trying to wear it down in an actual exchange-by-exchange conflict. In such a case, you can use your Willpower or possibly Lore or Thaumaturgy as the attacking skill, inflicting mental damage on the creature, or you can step it up to genuine spellcraft and assault the creature with spirit evocations.

That True Name must be guarded carefully. Any skilled practitioner that learns a creature’s True Name can make similar attacks to wrest control of the creature away from its original master. (Without the True Name, evocations directed at the creature simply work to disrupt its manifestation and send it away.) Regardless, bindings formed in this way are imperfect and decay more rapidly than those achieved by way of ritual.

Once the entity is bound, you must work to keep the bond reinforced—after the entity has recovered from the damages it sustained in the initial conflict, it will likely attempt to escape and the spell will probably need to be recast. In time, this cycle of need can become a problem of its own. Also keep in mind that most entities really don’t appreciate being controlled in such a one-sided way; a bound entity will likely do everything it can to subtly undermine your control until it can make a bid to break away.

Conjuration

Conjuration is the art of creating objects of seeming substance out of nothing. When it comes down to it, though, this is a shell game. None of the things that conjuration creates are actually real; they’re made of ectoplasm, the nothing-stuff of the Nevernever, and once the energy that’s telling that ectoplasm to be something leaches out, it dissolves—first into goo, then into nothing at all.

Here, the difficulty of the conjuration is a matter of detail and scale (both quantity and size), as well as the believability of the creation. Note: All of these items still look “a little off ” or “unreal.”

Object Difficulty	Difficulty Modifier
Piece of Paper	+3
Simple Weapon no moving parts	+6
Simple Weapon with a few moving parts	+18
Minor Animated creature (frog)	+24
A non functional vehicle	+28
Functional objects of real tech*	Impossible
Quantity	+6 each object or creature

* = Functioning objects of real technology are pretty much impossible (or more accurately, too much work to be worth it).

Scale Chart

Size	Difficulty Modifier
Sub Atomic	+40
Atomic	+35
Microscopic	+27
Tip of a Pin	+25
Gnat	+23
Ant	+21
Plastic Action Figure	+15
Action Figure	+12
Fashion Doll	+9
Breadbox	+6
Small Human Child	+3
Human Size	0
Small Motorcycle	+3
Average Car	+6
City Bus	+10
Two Story Building	+14
Four Story Building	+20
Eight Story Building	+24

In terms of believability, if the wizard wants to pass the conjured object off as real, he must commit more levels of difficulty to the spell—basic conjured objects have an Easy difficulty of believability.

A wizard can use the Sight or other means of divination to figure out that something’s made of ectoplasm, though, so the chances of avoiding supernatural detection are fairly slim.

Often, ectoplasm is used to create a body for a summoned spirit to inhabit so it can physically interact with the world. Most of the time this ectoplasm form is generated by the summoned creature and not the summoner. but in some cases a body must be constructed deliberately in advance.

Divination

Divination can take several forms, all basically falling under the general header of “gathering information.” The most common example from Harry’s casefiles is his tracking spell, but there are several other forms that fall within the scope of divination: direct scrying, forecasting and prophecy, telepathy and psychometry, and various other kinds of sensory magic.

With divination spells, the main things to consider are how much information you want and how hard it would normally be to get that information. That’s why Harry’s tracking spell is ultimately pretty easy to pull off—all he gets is a general sense of the target’s location, but no other information. This makes it a simple action which nearly always has a low difficulty.

Things become more complicated when you actively monitor the target in some way. First, if the target is behind a threshold or any other kind of supernatural protection, you have to overcome that. Second, even unaware targets have a natural defense against being “read” or seen against their will—basically a defense roll, just like targets get if you take a swing at them in a fight. This commonly defaults to Willpower or Presence, depending on the context of the scrying. So you will want to beef up the difficulty fairly high to overcome these obstacles, naturally leading to some prep scenes devoted to finding good links to the target and whatnot.

Divining Knowledge	Difficulty Modifier
Scrying/Remote Viewing	+10
Seeing the future	+10-30
Seeing the past, general	+10
Object Reading	Easy, less than two hours into the past Moderate, two hours to a week Difficult, week to six months Very Difficult, six months to a year Heroic, year to two years +10 for each additional year into the past.
Telepathic Sensing	+10-30
Signs of life, level of damage	5+proximity+Relationship

Attempting to sense:	Difficulty Modifier
See a object that the target sees	+5
Sense random information	+10
Sense surface thoughts	+15
Detailed information	+20
Deep Personal information	+25 and beyond.....!

Relationship Chart

User and Target are:	Add to difficulty:
Close Relatives (married, parent-child, siblings)	0
Close Friends	+2
Friends	+5
User and Target are:	Add to difficulty:
Acquaintances	+7
Slight Acquaintances	+10
Met Once	+12
Known only through Reputation	+15
Complete Strangers	+20
Complete Strangers and Different Species	+30

 
Proximity Chart

User and Target are:	Add to difficulty:
Touching	0
In line of sight, less than one meter	+2
Not in line of sight, but 1-100 meters away	+5
101 m to 10 km away	+7
11 to 1,000 km away	+10
Same planet but over 1,000 km away	+15
Same Star System but different planet	+20
Not on the same plane of existience	+30

  Veils

Veils are spirit evocations (page 255) that bend attention, light, and energy away from prying eyes. They typically require ongoing concentration to remain in place. Evocation’s veils also tend to be fairly personal in scale—covering the caster himself and maybe a few of his allies.

However, it is possible to use thaumaturgy to set up a long-term veil, concealing something for days without ongoing concentration. Large White Council convocations, if they occur in public places, usually have a large-scale thaumaturgic veil covering the entire venue to keep normal mortals from getting too curious about the proceedings.

The difficulty of a large veil is equal to whatever difficulty the wizard wants others to beat in order to detect whatever’s behind the veil; as usual, more is better. Plus the size of the area to be concealed.

Veils often block detection in both directions. Perceiving things outside a veil while you are within it faces a similar block, at half the veil’s strength. Increase the difficulty of a veil by 10 in order to create a veil that doesn’t impede looking out at all. (For an evocation veil, this increases the power requirement of the spell by 10.)

In addition, bigger veils mean a higher difficulty. Concealing the caster himself or a small group is within the scope of an evocation veil which equals about 3” to 1” area, at 9 to 3 added to Difficulty. Thaumaturgical veils are not usually mobile and are constrained by thresholds and other barriers that scatter magical energies (such as a river).

Casting a veil as a ritual means the wizard doesn’t really have to worry about maintaining it; if he wants it to last past the next sunrise, he’ll need extra duration levels as noted in Thautmaturgy Duration Chart (page 46).

Veil Modifiers	Difficulty Modifier
Dice of Concealment/Effect	3 pts per Die
Area Effect	3 pts per 1” sq area
Dome	3 pts per 1” radius
Increased Duration	See Thaumaturgy Duration Chart pg 46
Look through a veil without impediment	+10 to Difficulty

Wards

A ward is basically a very potent version of a block using thaumaturgy instead of evocation. It’s intended to protect an area—usually a home or sanctum—from physical or magical intrusion. Wards are similar to thresholds (page 230), except they’re quite a bit more potent. Most wizards need stronger protection against occupational hazards such as hostile demons, malicious magic, and hungry monsters.

A ward’s basic function is reflecting energies back onto their source. Someone who collides with a ward at a brisk walk might experience something equivalent to a hard shove, while someone running full tilt into a ward would most certainly get knocked to the ground. Magical force gets the same treatment—a powerful spell cast on a good ward usually ends up being very bad for the intruder.

In addition to this basic function, wards can be rigged to contain other magic that gets triggered when the ward encounters significant force. The most common of these is a magical “landmine,” where a large evocation effect (such as a fire burst) is encased in a sigil behind the ward. The ward releases its energy when the containment provided by the ward is breached. Other effects are possible, though; the enchantment known as a wardflame can be attached to a ward as an early detection system, showing the wizard when something is coming his way by causing nearby candles to burn bright blue (or some other light-show).

The base difficulty of a ward is directly related to its desired strength, so you should aim for this to be pretty high: 31+ (Heroic) is a pretty good target to shoot for if you’re moderately good. This represents the ward’s capacity for reflecting attacks.

When something hits the ward, compare the damage values. If the ward prevails, hit the attacker with an effect of the appropriate type for equal dice. So if someone rolls a Moderate (15) attack against a ward, he has to try to avoid a Moderate (15) attack from the rebounding force. If someone hits it with a 6D evocation, he has to dodge a 6D evocation.

If the attack surpasses the block strength of the ward, then the ward is breached; apply whatever damage that gets through to the target just like bypassing a block. Alternatively, the attacker may apply the excess damage directly toward getting rid of the ward itself; each breach will reduce the value of the ward by 1D or 3 points until it’s gone. While a ward is technically still around at 0 point strength, most lack the energy to hold themselves together at that point; a ward needs to be reduced to –4 points or -1D+1 to be considered completely nullified.

By default, a ward lasts until the next sunrise unless you add difficulty to make it last longer, use the Thaumaturgy Duration Chart. In addition, any spells you wish to include as part of the ward construct add their difficulty values directly onto the ward. It must all be cast as one spell. If you want a layered defense, you’ll have to spend a bit of time setting it up.

Wards don’t have a “scale” concern, the way that veils do, and they cannot move. They are almost always tied to a particular place’s natural thresholds—think of them as a super-boosted immune system—so they are limited by the size of that threshold. Without a threshold they can only be set up to cover a small area at most—usually a point of transition such as a doorway or intersection.

Linking to a warning system such as Wardsflame increases difficulty 3 per die of Ward protection.

Creating a symbolic link to warn you of intrusions increases difficulty 2 per die of Ward protection. (though the message may get delayed or blocked by intervening thresholds)

Landmines—nasty, damaging spells that are triggered on a breach—add difficulty equal to the power of the evocation spell stored within the ward. The effective targeting roll will be equal to the power of the evocation, though the spell’s difficulty may be increased on a one for one basis to add to the targeting roll (wizards heedful of the First Law may well want to avoid inflicting undiscriminating, lethal force). Thaumaturgic spells might be done as landmines as well—simply add their difficulty to the base difficulty of the ward.

Note: Specialized practitioners focused on wards are able to embed other effects in their wards—such as wardflames or landmines—even if they cannot create those spell effects independent of a ward.

Getting Selective with Conditions

Wards (and possibly veils) normally manifest broad effects that target everything. To make a ward or veil more selective, you can add simple conditions to the spell, increasing its difficulty by 2 for each simple condition added.

Make no mistake—a ward spell can’t “think” for itself, but it can be taught to recognize something incorporated into its symbolic links. You might establish a condition that allows someone to pass through unaffected so long as he’s wearing one of five amulets; you might add a drop of your blood to the ritual components to ensure that you can pass through. Regardless, conditions must be based on something observable, without any element of decision-making: wearing an amulet, living beings, people who say “open sesame,” that sort of thing. These aren’t detection systems—though a divination spell could be combined with a ward to create a more actively discerning ward.

With all of this, the ability to produce a relevant symbolic link is key for each condition. A vial of White Court vampire blood could be used to create a ward that only repels those of the sexy-deadly persuasion (or create a veil that masks one’s presence from their kind alone). Without it, such selectivity just couldn’t be achieved.

Effect	Difficulty Modifier
Dice of Protection	+3 per die
Linked to Wardsflame	+2 per die
Link to Symbolic Link	+2 per die
Landmine	+ Difficulty of Evocation or Thaumaturgy Spell
Landmine self-targeting	+1 per die of target skill
adding Simple condition(s)	+2 per condition added

Winging It With Wards and Landmines

These rules are pretty intricate, giving you a lot of options for how you can set up wards and defenses. But it’s a pretty safe bet that any ward capable spellcaster worth his salt will have his base of operations protected by at least a basic ward.

If it hasn’t been explicitly declared otherwise, assume a wizard’s ward strength to be equal to the highest of Willpower, Evocation, Thaumaturgy, or Lore. In fact, that’s a reasonable assumption for any kind of “preset” magical effect if the GM or player needs to establish one in the course of play. Just assume the caster’s highest magical stat is what you’re dealing with, and use aspects to bolster the totals as appropriate.

So if the PCs are breaking into an NPC wizard’s sanctum, and the NPC wizard has a Superb (6D) Thaumaturgy, you can safely assume that the fire trap he has set up is a 5D evocation. Tick a couple of Action Dice, invoke a couple of Feats, and now it’s a 9D evocation. And so on.

Crafting (Items and Potions)

While crafting things like focus items and potions is considered a type of thaumaturgy, it isn’t something that has a very active presence in these game mechanics. Crafting magical items is, by and large, a very boring process that quickly lends itself to bean-counting, resource management mini-games. Even the simplest focus item requires weeks or months of the wizard sitting in his study, gradually aligning the item with the proper energies through repetitive motion and thought—not really stuff you want to spend time describing or talking about.

To avoid that boring repetition, the game handles crafting through the application of stunts. Wizard characters get a number of “slots” for different kinds of items, under the assumption that there is a practical maximum of items that a wizard can make and maintain at one time. That number rises via character advancement, allowing the wizard to either possess more items or to create stronger ones.

There are two basic kinds of magical items:

1. Focus Items-enhance and facilitate the magic of the user in a particular way
2. Enchanted Items-store energy and release it again in some predetermined manner, sort of like a “spell in a box.”

Harry Dresden’s usual kit of magic items includes three focus items (staff, blasting rod, and shield bracelet) and a few enchanted items (his duster, the kinetic force rings, and the occasional potion).

Potions and their ilk are a kind of fire-and-forget enchanted item. They store energy, but once consumed, the energy is used up and the item is effectively destroyed.

Focus Items

Focus items are very straightforward. They enhance a wizard’s spellcasting in a particular fashion by providing a bonus to one part of the spellcasting effort. Typically hand-crafted by the wizard, focus items are bound to the particular magic they’re intended to work with through a monotonous process of ritual attunement, where the wizard sits with the item in a casting circle or similar ritual space and visualizes its use for hours on end. After a period of weeks or months, the item is ready.

Evocation Grants two free Focus Item Slots or four Enchanted Item Slots Thaumaturgy Grants two free Focus Item Slots or four Enchanted Item Slots

A single focus item slot, as granted by various Spellcraft powers (page 179), grants a +1D bonus.

For evocation focuses, this bonus may be applied to either the wizard’s Targeting or Damage/Effect rolls.

For thaumaturgy focuses, this bonus may be applied to the wizard’s upper limit of difficulty (Lore) for thaumaturgy or to the wizard’s control Thaumaturgy rolls for casting. The type of bonus must be determined and locked down at the time the item is created.

In addition, you must specify which type of evocation or thaumaturgy is enhanced by the item’s bonus.

1-An evocation focus is specified to work with a particular kind of element (e.g., fire, spirit).

2-A thaumaturgy focus is specified by any of the thaumaturgic types listed in this section, whether by function (e.g., summoning, veils, wards) or theme (e.g., biomancy, ectomancy, necromancy).

Subsequent focus item slots allow you to create new focus items. Alternatively, one or more slots may be spent to add greater capacity to an existing focus item.

The total number of slots a focus item uses is equal to the number of elements or types multiplied by the total of the bonuses. So an item that offered +1D Targeting and +1D Damage/Effect to fire and earth evocations would take up 4 slots. (2 elements, 2D total bonuses=4 slots)

All bonuses of an item always apply to all of the types on the item: you can’t have +2D Lore for necromancy and +1D Lore for wards in the same focus item, because the +2D Lore should apply to both necromancy and wards.

This makes for narrow, potent focus items (one element or type with a large bonus) and broad, less potent focus items (many elements or types with a small bonus). Broad, potent focus items are very rare. As a result, most wizards tend to have many small bonus items for specific jobs, like a craftsman’s toolbox.

The one restriction on the bonuses provided is that they may not total to a number greater than your Lore. So if your Lore is Good (3D), you can have an evocation focus item that provides +3D to Targeting, offensive effects, defensive effects, or defensive targeting, or a focus item that provides +1D to three of those, or +2D to one and +1D to another, but you can’t construct one that provides bonuses totaling 4D or more.

The number of elements or types is not restricted, so long as you have enough slots to accommodate them.

If you are willing to lock the item down to only ever being useful for one specific spell— such as an established evocation rote or a divination spell that always looks for the same thing—then you get a single free “slot upgrade” to add an extra +1D bonus.

You can’t benefit from the same type of bonus (e.g., a control bonus) from two or more items at the same time—so if you had two items, one with a +2D Targeting bonus and another with a +1D Targeting bonus, the total effect is a +2D to Targeting.

Enchanted Items

Enchanted items are intended to hold a single, pre-generated effect that is stored until released, after which the energy in the item must be recharged. The construction process is very similar to the process for creating a focus item, except that the wizard also imbues the item with minute amounts of spell energy as he goes through the attunement process, gradually shaping it to hold the energy it’s designed for.

Making an enchanted item requires one enchanted item slot, which can be acquired by trading in a focus item slot for two enchanted item slots.

When you create an enchanted item, you must specify the effect that the item performs. Nearly any effect within the range of thaumaturgy or evocation is allowed (though evocation tends to be easier because the amount of power involved is usually comparatively small), subject to two limitations:

1. The effect has a strength equal to your Lore
2. It may only be used once per game session. After it’s used, the item requires time to recharge by some means that you determine; this is assumed to take long enough to reach into the next session.
3. You may increase the number of uses per session by one by reducing the base strength of the item by one.

Example: So if you have Good (3D) Lore, you could create an enchanted item with an effect strength of Good (3D) that you can use once per session, or an item with an effect strength of Average (2D) that you can use three times per session. When doing this, the base strength of the item may not go below 2D.

4. The effect strength of an enchanted item may be reduced by one to make it usable by someone other than the caster, such as a magically armored coat that anyone can wear.

Note: It’s possible that using an enchanted item will require some kind of skill roll, particularly if it needs to be targeted in some way; discuss this with the GM and follow whatever course seems logical Defensive items (ones that provide armor or a block, for example) often consume a use at the time of defense and don’t require a separate action to activate. If an enchanted item runs out of uses in a session, if wielded by a practitioner, he may make additional uses anyway by taking one level of damage per use.

Subsequent enchanted item slots allow you to:

1. Create a new enchanted item with a new effectŠŠ
2. Add +1D to the strength of the default effect on an existing enchanted item, per slot given.
3. Add 2 to the uses per session for an existing enchanted item, per slot given

IMPORTANT: Regardless, an item’s casting strength after all bonuses are totaled should never exceed 2x the crafter’s Lore rating—at least not without a very good rationale and a ton of baggage.

Crafting Specializations

Crafting specializations, under the Thaumaturgy attribute, are usually for frequency or effect strength without making you spend an extra slot to do it.

1. A frequency specialization allows you one more use per session.

2. A strength specialization increases the effect strength of your basic enchanted items by 1D (this strength specialization bonus can’t be traded in for an additional per-session use).

For Potions: this can create stronger potions, or ones that you can get two uses out of.

Note: A crafting specialization may be applied to increase the limit on how many bonuses may be placed on a single focus item (a focus specialization).

You can create focus items of which are used to provide frequency and strength bonuses for crafting when making other items and potions. That said, you can’t create a focus item that helps you create other focus items. It’s... uh, it’s a magic thing. Just doesn’t work. (Law of Conservation? Anyone?)

Potions

Potions are created through a fairly complex process that involves combining ingredients into some sort of base liquid and using it as the focus of a thaumaturgical ritual to put power into the potion. Many wizards have workspaces that they use for this purpose, complete with shelves full of odd ingredients from diamond dust to eye of newt. The ingredients that go into a potion metaphorically signify its effects. In addition to the base liquid, each potion requires one ingredient for each of the five senses (touch, taste, smell, sight, and sound), one ingredient for the mind, and one for the heart. These ingredients don’t have to be consumable; the magic that creates the potion makes a potable substance.

Potions are very similar to enchanted items in terms of function (and, in fact, even use enchanted item slots to make), but are both more limited and more flexible. To be able to make a potion, you must commit an existing open enchanted item slot to be a potion slot. When you’re outfitting your wizard, consider leaving some enchanted item slots unallocated so you can create potions as you need them.

At the beginning of each session, you may declare what potions you have on hand to fill those slots, or otherwise leave them open. If you have an open slot and a successful Lore roll or a Action Dice to spend, you may later declare that you coincidentally have an appropriate potion. A given potion can only be used once, period, but it doesn’t face a surcharge for being usable by someone else.

The effect strength of a potion, like enchanted items, is equal to the wizard’s Lore. Multiple slots devoted to potions allow the wizard to either:

1. Have multiple potions at one time; or,
2. Add +1D to the strength of any potion

Unlike a normal enchanted item, the effect strength of the potion may be boosted on the fly or at the time it is created with the invocation of feats or conditional modifiers. Each invocation allows the potion’s strength to be increased by 2D.

Hidden Power

Power is hard to squirrel away without it being noticed. This is particularly true where items are concerned, both in terms of their physical and supernatural dimensions. First, is the physical dimension. Use this chart as a guideline, counting up the number of slots spent on a single item.

Focus Item Slots	Enchanted Item Slots	No smaller than........
1-2	1-4	Ring (ear or finger)
3-4	5-8	Fist or Rod
5-6	9-12	Basketball or Staff

And so on. The size of an item will play into how hard it is to physically detect. Fortunately, even when a magic item is physically obvious, it’s not always obvious what it’s for. A beat cop might not look at a staff as much more than a funky walking stick, even though such a thing is as lethal as a machine-gun in the hands of the right wizard.

That’s where the supernatural dimension comes in. Those who are in the know (generally, those with actual occult training) can use their Lore skill to pick up on the presence of an item of magical potency, getting a +1D to the roll for every two enchantment slots or one focus slot spent in the item’s construction. A staff composed of 4 focus item slots provides a whopping +4D bonus to that roll—so while it might look like a funky walking-stick, a trained pro will recognize right away that it’s an object of absolutely lethal potency. This isn’t the same as knowing what the staff does, mind you—it only identifies it as an item of supernatural power.

Few supernatural types take kindly to someone walking into their establishment while loaded down with big, nasty enchanted and focus items—the same as anyone wouldn’t react well to someone showing up toting two assault rifles and a bandolier of grenades. This is why many wizards go for multiple small items, rather than a single, multi-functional whopper of a thing (this also helps spread out the risk of loss).

Transformation and Disruption

Thaumaturgy that fundamentally, lastingly changes the target—whether it’s the target’s body, mind, emotions, or even luck—falls into the category of transformation and disruption. Often, this is dark stuff—curses, mind control, destructive shapeshifting, and death magic.

Of all the methods available through thaumaturgy, these are the ones most prone to run afoul of the Laws of Magic (page 232). Regardless of what the spell changes, this is a violent act to the target: people and things are very good at being what they are, and this sort of magic forces them to be what they aren’t.

As such, these forms of thaumaturgy rely on the same mechanical principle—most of them inflict damage or temporary aspects on a target. Entropic curses inflict aspects that reflect bad luck and other kinds of misfortune. Emotion magic inflicts aspects related to emotional states (lust, anger, fear, etc.) that the victim can fall prey to. Mind control is just that—the aspect, when compelled, forces the victim to act in a certain way. In rarer cases, a curse might actually be fully transformative, changing the shape or nature of a being permanently.

Because these forms of thaumaturgy function via consequences, a wizard needs to make sure that the spell is complex enough to overcome any resistance the target might be able to raise (defense rolls, stamina, or strength rolls, etc.), as well as add enough dice for the desired level of consequence (4D for a temporary aspect, 5D for mild, 6D for moderate, 8D for severe, 10D for extreme). Anything that is fully transformative must be powerful enough to achieve a “mortally wounded” result on the target, which can be extremely complex, which isn’t to say there aren’t sorcerers out there practicing that kind of black magic. Sadly, there are plenty.

Type of Attack	Defending Roll
Emotional Attack	Willpower, Conviction, Discipline
Mental Attack	Willpower, Conviction, Discipline, Stamina
Transformative	Strength, Stamina, Willpower, Conviction, Discipline
Entropy/Luck related	Dodge vs. Whatever comes your way...?

The Wizard’s Death Curse

The wizard’s death curse is actually very easy to model. It’s a ritual, but with all of the preparation ready to go. The components of preparation are the circumstances of the wizard’s death—He can cast it all in one round, because elements of fallout and backlash are of no concern to him, either. The wizard throws everything he has into this one spell, this one final moment of his life, and the effects of it can be incredibly devastating, whether they play out short term or, as is the preference, long term—often by transforming the very nature of the target’s fate.

Transportation and Worldwalking

Transportation magics are all about getting the wizard (or someone—or something—else) from one place to another. Teleportation is rare if not completely absent—though a clever wizard can certainly make it seem like that’s what he’s done. Instead, there are spells which impart speed or other kinds of motion, and those which rip holes into or out of the Nevernever.

Thematic Thaumaturgy

All the types of thaumaturgy listed so far are divided along functional lines. Plenty of spellcasters focus their specializations by function—you have divinators, wardsmen, crafters, summoners, and the like. But just as often, thaumaturgists specialize not along functional lines, but instead along thematic lines. A thematic specialization looks at the subject matter in which all the various functions of thaumaturgy are applied—an ectomancer will be particularly effective with summoning, binding, divining, veiling, warding, crafting, transforming, disrupting, and transporting ghosts and other non-demonic spirits, for example.

Following this paragraph are a few thematic specializations, but the possibilities are as varied as spellcasters themselves. If you want to introduce a new specialization for your character, that’s totally fine. The main thing the GM needs to watch out for here is ensuring that the theme is both strongly expressed and limited in scope; a theme which really amounts to “everything” in application is no theme at all—it’s a cheat.

Many thematic approaches to thaumaturgy run some sort of risk of skirting—if not outright violating—the Laws of Magic. Nearly all of them can be used to kill. Biomancy can be used to transform another; necromancy often reaches beyond the borders of life; psychomancy might be used to invade the thoughts of another. Tread lightly!

Biomancy- Biomancy is a term used for those who work magics upon the body. Shapeshifting is an extreme application of this art, whether in part or in full (see “Transformation and Disruption,” page 33), but it’s hardly the only application. Healing magics fall under this specialization. The main problem with healing magic is that it can’t do much more than modern science can—and it requires just as much real, mundane knowledge of biology as a surgeon to wield well. Still, biomancy can be used to lessen pain, provide first aid type treatment and other forms of physical therapy, and examine the physical conditions of someone’s body (that’s a biomantic divination, right there) including nifty Star Trek style tricks like “scanning for life-forms.” The main advantage of healing magic in the game is in providing justification to begin the recovery process (page 220) without any other effort. Use the damage level, modified by relationship as the spell complexity. (Wounded (Moderate), Wounded Twice (Difficult), Incapacitated (Very Difficult), Mortally Wounded (Heroic)) Remember, the recovery time can’t be shortened with these kinds of magics—the target still has to go through the healing naturally. Biomancy can also be used for short-term supercharging. Look to the early part of “Transportation and Worldwalking” on page 34 for some possible applications (e.g., boosted running speed, etc.). Biomantic rituals, items, and potions can be used to boost strength, speed, perception, and other functions of biology—provided that the body being boosted can withstand the stresses of such an effort. Just because muscles have been supercharged to lift a small car doesn’t mean they’re built to withstand the damage that would do; inflicting consequences on the beneficiary to boost spell effectiveness is not uncommon (Torn Muscle Tissue, etc.).

Diabolism- Diabolism refers to spellcraft involving a demonic component. This is usually very bad news, but a specialization in demonic thaumaturgy can also be used to effectively combat the influences of demons—locating demons, purging the possessed, constructing wards that are especially potent against demons, binding and banishing demons that have gotten loose. But it’s just as easy to cross the line and start using demons for your needs. Demons can be consulted for information via divination (though this invariably produces hazy, vague results—demons would rather be summoned), or by summoning them and entering negotiation for the particulars. They can be bound into service and sent out as infernal attack dogs. While information gathering is something of a grey practice, summoning a demon and putting it into service to kill is a clear-cut case of black magic (there’s a straight line of connection between the intent to kill and the summoning of the demon; cue the First Law).

Ectomancy- Ectomancy is the practice of spellcraft involving (generally non-demonic) spirits, focused especially upon ghosts. Conceptually, ectomancy has much in common with diabolism and necromancy, but it mostly stays within the safe zone in between. It manages to neatly dodge the Fifth Law thanks to the nature of ghosts themselves; ghosts aren’t actual dead people—they’re the supernatural “echoes” of the dead. That said, ghosts can put on quite a convincing show, often possessing some or most of the knowledge and skills of the person that cast the echo, and this makes them potentially useful to a talented ectomancer. Ectomancers tend to get noticed by ghosts and often find themselves haunted by those who are looking for a way to speak to the living. Many ectomancers develop a natural ability to see—or at least acutely sense—the presence of ghosts, simply using Lore as the perception skill. In application, ectomancy can access all of the functions of thaumaturgy as applied to (or by) ghosts and spirits. Ghosts can be summoned and bound into service, sent away or used to kill via disruption, used as a ritual component to enchant items or divine information, and so on. Ectomantic spells can be constructed that specifically target ghosts as well, whether it’s a ward against spirits or a scrying attempt to divine their presence. Some ectomancers may even be able to access a skill from a ghost’s skillset, in an act somewhat like voluntary possession; here, the skill acquired is limited by the level of skill the ghost possesses, and the value of the skill rating is added to the complexity for the binding spell.

Entropomancy- Entropomancy goes by a variety of names— malocchio, maladicto, katadesmoi—and in all cases it amounts to essentially the same thing: the refined art of inflicting curses on targets, driving their lives toward greater disarray (and at its extreme, death). So long as the magic follows the principle of “things fall apart,” entropomancy has an affinity for it. This sort of magic doesn’t have to kill its target—it can just make things suck for them. At its weakest, the curses inflicted by a malocchio are transitory: maneuver-equivalent, inflicting temporary aspects ranging from Bad Luck to Two Left Feet to Comes Off Like A Jerk. Curses might carry a little bit of deliberate hexing with them (page 258), causing technology to fail around a target even though he isn’t a practitioner himself. It’s entirely possible to play a low-level entropomancer in this way, focused not on death but on mischief. The problem, of course, is that magic is tied closely to what you believe you are, what you believe you’re capable of doing. Entropomancers face regular temptation to make the next curse a little worse, because they already believe in their hearts that they’re the sort of people that make sure other folks have a bad day. Sure, you could hit someone with a curse that makes him stumble at just the wrong moment…but why not have him stumble in front of a car? Eventually, cursing tends to become more vicious and direct; giving someone a heart attack is entirely possible and—while it takes a lot of energy to do it—can be done in such a way as to be nearly undetectable as foul play (our example of Victor Sells set aside). The classic is the full-on entropy curse that gives entropomancy its name. This is a dark seething invisible force that follows the victim around and encourages the environment to kill him a lot—falling power-lines, cars full of bees, frozen turkeys plummeting from an empty sky. It’s not a very precise or very quick way to do it, but dire entropy curses do tend to get the job done, often as bizarrely as circumstances will allow.

Necromancy- Ah, necromancy. The art of death magic barely needs an introduction, and nearly all of it is in violation of the Fifth Law. Whether used with good intentions or bad, reaching beyond the borders of life is bad news, no matter if it’s reanimating a dead body as a zombie, calling back a departed soul moments after death, or engaging in human sacrifice to harness the power of death. Zombies and the like are a case of summoning and binding an animating spirit—usually a really stupid one that just knows how to follow instructions—into the flesh of a dead man, then convincing that flesh to get up and start walking again (this typically requires the inclusion of something to stand in for a heartbeat, like a drum or a bitchin’ set of subwoofers and the latest gangsta rap on loop). Where the flesh is weak, ectoplasm suffices, conjured in sufficient quantities to give the body the musculature it needs to move. The dark grey area here—deepest, darkest grey—involves the manipulation of ghosts (usually by doing something unspeakable with their physical remains as part of the spell) and the reanimation of dead creatures that never had a soul in the first place (say, a dinosaur). Such necromancers exist, but rarely without sanction. The Wardens of the White Council like to exercise a fairly broad interpretation of the Fifth Law, given half the chance. And with reason; those who practice necromancy inevitably seem to seek out the lost and hidden lore of the great necromancer Kemmler, engaging in Kemmlerian Necromancy (page 291), becoming even more powerful than before. It’s all bad.

Photomancy- Photomancy is the art of manipulating light and imagery with magic. The most obvious application here is with veils, but disguise and illusion are also along for the ride. Focused light can also produce heat-based effects; on the evocation side, photomancy tends to manifest as a manipulation of fire. Disguises and illusions created by photomancy operate much like veils, save that they’re oriented on fooling someone rather than simply hiding from them. This is a block action against visual detection of the disguise, though if an illusion or disguised individual behaves in a way obviously out of character, the block isn’t going to be much help. Less obvious applications of photomancy include bending light away from an area (a maneuver, to place a Shadowed aspect on a location, for example) and divinations that seek out a particular image and/or cause something you’re seeking to glow. Focused practitioners that use photomancy exclusively seem to have no aptitude for manipulating ectoplasm—meaning their illusions never have any physical substance to back them up unless they’re wrapped around an actual physical object. More broadly talented wizards often incorporate a little bit of ectoplasm into their photomantic efforts, creating illusions that can actually interact with the environment.

Psychomancy- Practitioners that read and manipulate minds are called psychomancers (or sometimes neuromancers). Given that these acts violate the Third and Fourth Laws of Magic, they may also be called headless, thanks to the action of the Wardens. Psychomancy is neither well documented nor condoned, though it seems every now and again some new wizard comes along with a talent for it, trained or not. The Council does its best to intercede as quickly as possible in such cases. There are some grey areas that can be explored, mostly safely. Psychomancy might be used to draw the thoughts out of the brain of a dead man—no living person nor active mind is violated in such a case, and the borders of life are not crossed. Empathically reading the emotional state of someone isn’t a violation of his thoughts so much as an application of psychomancy to boost your ability to perceive such information (done as a divination). And then there’s the legal but dangerous area of wielding psychomancy against yourself—supercharging your brain for an all-nighter or to improve your reaction time, digging into your own memories to pull out information you didn’t realize was there, removing your ability to feel fear, and so on. But synapses and minds are fragile—when you can plug right into your brain’s pleasure-center and press the big red MORE button, or accidentally destroy your ability to feel inhibition, it’s not long before you’re indistinguishable from a meth-head. Just because you’re doing it to yourself doesn’t make the act any less violent. See the “supercharging” discussions about transportation (page 33) and biomancy (page 35) for guidelines on the dangers of this. Some alternative forms of psychomancy specialize in a particular range of thought— phobomancy focuses entirely on fear, for example. These variants are encountered almost as often as psychomancy itself.