It just occurred to me that using Maho seems relatively... safe in this edition. The bloodletting usually associated with it seems to be mostly narrative, unless the maho-tsukai chooses to channel (in which case, it does inflict a bit of fatigue), and the nastiest side-effect is limited to the spiritual backlash, which can be avoided if you're careful.

Now, the backlash itself can hurt a lot, and Taints the maho-tsukai with no hope of resisting it. 5 balcklashes and you're Lost for good.

But aside from that, I did not see anywhere that practicing Maho was a sure way of becoming Tainted at all! Someone could safely practice it for years and not have a single Ring with the disadvantage. Is that how it works or am I missing something? What incentives do the Kansen have to lure the maho-tsukai into accepting the "Dark Lord's blessing"? Currently, only Grip of Anguish gives a slightly better damage rating linked to the number of Tainted Rings that the caster has. That does not seem worth the risk of being caught especially since there is no particular bonus in triggering a backlash (unlike, say, with Fire incantations).

I am assuming more detail will be in Shadowlands which will have "more guidance for using Maho". Not everybody want to jump into dark magicks after all, it's not necessarily a universal campaign component.

Honestly, I rarely say that, but in that case, doing maho have heavy narrative consequences. It does not really need mechanical drawbacks (though it could be nice) to put your character in trouble, a maho user will be unplayable in most campaigns anyway.

Not something that bothers me as much (or at all) compared to balance and issues on some core elements of the rules.

Well it is mostly interesting for NPCs and adversaries... but as things stand, I fail to understand how any but the most foolish Maho-tsukai would end up with a Taint disadvantage, which would make most of them actually difficult to ferret out.

On PC side, without Taint, it becomes quite easy to hide your dark hobby even from party members (in character). That becomes hardly worse than being a Kolat member (which I understand has a school in EE, so is intended for PCs too).

But I suppose we will indeed have more of that in the next supplement ;)

5 minutes ago, Franwax said:

Well it is mostly interesting for NPCs and adversaries... but as things stand, I fail to understand how any but the most foolish Maho-tsukai would end up with a Taint disadvantage, which would make most of them actually difficult to ferret out.

Taint should be difficult to ferret out. Jade or a relevant spell are the only real ways to make sure. And maho use should be even harder to detect. That said, I would also prefer there being a mechanic that ensures continued maho use will inevitably lead to becoming tainted. Right now it's a choice, and it should be more insidious than that.

I'd be happier with a solid errata doc and "optional" new rules for duels.

But I can sympathize.

9 minutes ago, Avatar111 said:

I'd be happier with a solid errata doc and "optional" new rules for duels.

But I can sympathize.

It's on the list. Not at the top, just on the list.

Yeah, like I said, it’s just something that struck me. Not a very big deal, for sure.

Now other Maho techniques that become only interesting if you are Tainted, or some spectacular effects provoked only during backlash would go some way towards making the temptation believable. Otherwise, it looks like the Kansen are not trying very hard to peddle their merchandise

Lore wise, as I recall it, the Taint took hold from the very first incantation. Not at a detectable level at first, but first accepting a Kansen did put you on a slope that was impossible to recover from. There should be a sense of dread and fatality to it.

I suspect the maho and Shadowlands Taint stuff in the Core Rulebook is a bit of a "placeholder" i.e. FFG wanted to introduce it because it's such a fundamental part of the setting, but realized they didn't have enough word count to fully develop it. So, they compromised and introduced enough that players had a mechanical way of using it, but really left most of the serious consequences as narrative ones. I don't know this for sure, because I didn't work on that part of the book. I do know that the upcoming products will have substantially more to say about maho, the Shadowlands and its denizens, the Taint, etc.

Yeah, Emerald Empire already introduces a new mechanic where Schools have required Disadvantages (False Identity), I expect Shadowlands will follow up on this with like a "Cultist Sleeper" or something type school or tradition which will pre-taint you in exchange for better maho access and synergy. Possibly involve scaling up in Taint as you rank up.

While limited use of maho is certainly not auto-Tainting in the RAW, I'd suggest that lore-wise most people turning to it are not going to be content with simple invocations/rituals, and certainly not in holding back (even when doing said 'simple' acts), and if you don't hold back, getting Tainted is going to happen sooner rather than later. By having the option though, it lets stuff like Tadaka's flirtation with maho be far more recoverable, and also potentially more tragic (held off for years, got into terrible situation, used enough to become Tainted. . . something that would have been impossible if they'd not meddled in the first place). So I'm fine with it, though if I had a player try to power game this, I'd get real strict, real quick (potentially even having to leave maho to the NPCs).

15 minutes ago, Isawa Miyu said:

While limited use of maho is certainly not auto-Tainting in the RAW, I'd suggest that lore-wise most people turning to it are not going to be content with simple invocations/rituals, and certainly not in holding back (even when doing said 'simple' acts), and if you don't hold back, getting Tainted is going to happen sooner rather than later. By having the option though, it lets stuff like Tadaka's flirtation with maho be far more recoverable, and also potentially more tragic (held off for years, got into terrible situation, used enough to become Tainted. . . something that would have been impossible if they'd not meddled in the first place). So I'm fine with it, though if I had a player try to power game this, I'd get real strict, real quick (potentially even having to leave maho to the NPCs).

It doesn't have to be a steep descent into the dark side, but right now it's barely a slippery slope.

Well atm Maho is already basically GM fiat, you have to place an appropriate source of evil lore in the game and say it allows the person to learn from it.