I havent had a chance to play WFRP 3 yet but I will be playing a spell caster (divine) and I just wanted to see if i've got this right.

From what I can tell a normal spell is simple(0d) modified by the difficulty rating unless its opposed by defence in which case it is easy(1d).

Is this correct?

Thanks

Kaihlik

Yep, unless it's opposed by a stat in which case you use the standard rules for Opposed rolls, modified by the spell's difficulty.

Thanks, thats what I thought.

One of my favourite things about WFRP 3 is the way action cards are used for spells. I plan on playing a priest of Taal because I like how the Taal spells are the reckless side and the Rhya ones are the conservitive side.

Kaihlik

This is probably a tangential question, but still:

If a spell says "Medium Range" (just for example) in the list of its requirements, what does this mean exactly ?

1. The spell may be used if and only if the caster is exactly at medium range from the target.
2. The spell may be used if the caster is within medium range or closer.
3. The spell may be used with no penalty if the caster is within medium range; it may also be used at long or extreme range, but additional penalties (if so, what are the penalties ?)

Bugmaster,

The answer to your question about ranges is #2. The range requirement on an action card refers to the maximum range at which the action can be used.

-Thorvid

An additional tangent from Bugmaster's question; I've always assumed that you must meet the requirements for a Blessing only when Invoking it and not at resolution. This would mean that if you Invoked a blessing that required Medium Range and couldn't generate enough favour to fuel it that turn, but managed to do so the next turn, the blessing would succeed regardless of range to the target at this point.

I can see an argument both ways; my justification has been that you were in range when you invoked the card, it's only the effects of said card activation that are delayed and need no additional requirement check.

As a GM I think I would require both. It's a requirement for the Invocation action, so should be done at that time. However, the effects as well are oftentimes dependent on the requirements too. The blessing hasn't "finished", so the requirements are really still enforced.

I suppose the only reason I wouldn't require the second check is because the results of the Invokation have already been decided, and it takes no further action by the player for effects to be seen; you've appealed to your God for help, you've rolled and invoked the Blessing (Determining on the effects of said blessing at that time, while still meeting the requirements) and it is the action of the God granting the Blessing once you've generated enough favour.

But, when the Blessing takes effect, what happens if:

The target must be wounded, yet is no longer wounded?

The target must be in Close range, but is now dead, or farther away than Close range?

etc.

Say that the blessing is a ranged attack that causes holy lightning to shoot out and strike a target at Close range. When invoked, the target is in close range, so meets the requirements to invoke. However, when the effects take place a couple rounds later, the target is at Extreme range. So ... are you saying that the divine lightning now can shoot out to Extreme range, merely because several rounds ago the target was at Close range? This seems implausible, hence the reason I would require the requirements to be met both when it is invoked and when it takes effect.

dvang said:

I guess I see the range requirement as a requirement that must be met for the action card to be selected and used; the "holy lightning" is -not- generated by the caster, and once the targetting criteria of the card are met, can certainly be applied to a target at extreme range. If the card states you must be engaged with a target to heal them and specifes something like "Your hands glow with healing energy", then it would still require you to maintain an engagement even at resolution, as the resolution of the effect requires you to be engaged.

If the resolution is range or condition dependent, it would still require that condition be met. If the resolution is not (such as your lightning example, or a healing spell in which it states something like "The healing touch of Shallya cures the target"), then it goes off regardless of requirements at the time of resolution.

Now, if the card said "Lightning bursts from your hand and strikes a target within close range", it's the resolution of the card that applies the requirement, not the initial invocation.

Darrett said:

You select the target when you actually start rolling dice for the blessing and you start rolling dice as soon as the blessing has enough power and at that time you can select any target within range.

It's not in the rulebooks... it's just the almighty voice of reason booming it at us from above

Gallows said:

So by your method, you first roll to Invoke, which would be a simple pass/fail, and then roll Invocation again for effects when you have provided enough Favour?

Your method would seem to mean only one requirement check at resolution, not to mention the ability to swap targets at the time of resolution.

Darrett said:

Yeah I know what you're saying and it's not accurately ruled in the books. I was not really thinking when I wrote that it seems I was mixing it up with the spell casters.

You are right of course and in fact once the priest has done the action and met the requirements at that time it's effect is triggered once there is enough favor on the card.

Even if the blessing requires the priest to touch the subject, it will come into effect later. He has already laid his hands on the target, it just takes time for the God to respond. Otherwise a priest would be tied to that target until the blessing is done and the rules suggest nothing like that. So even if the person you was healing with touch gets up and runs out on extreme range at the time the blessing comes into effect it will still come into effect. Once the priest has met the requirements and invoked the blessing, it's out of his hands so to speak.

Sorry for being a muppet... I'm a bit dizzy from this weeks tidal wave of meetings

Gallows said:

I know what you mean; I've been compiling parcel conveyances from an 80 page court order myself. Legal description interpretation when dealing with parcels owned by a railway (That means dealing with the State Board of Equalization & Union Pacific) turns my mind to mush.

Had a meeting with PG&E this morning too... I think I prefer my court order to multiple such meetings.

Even if the blessing requires the priest to touch the subject, it will come into effect later. He has already laid his hands on the target, it just takes time for the God to respond. Otherwise a priest would be tied to that target until the blessing is done and the rules suggest nothing like that. So even if the person you was healing with touch gets up and runs out on extreme range at the time the blessing comes into effect it will still come into effect. Once the priest has met the requirements and invoked the blessing, it's out of his hands so to speak.

I see it another way. It is still the responsibility of the priest to gather enough Favour to cause the blessing effects to activate. You aren't waiting on the God to respond, but waiting for the priest to create and offer enough Favour to satisfy the God's demands for the blessing. Successfully invoking means that the priest has successfully "contacted" his deity to petition for the blessing. Until the priest offer enough Favour, however, he isn't really done asking for the blessing. So, the priest is *not* done with a blessing until the effects take place. Note that priests suffer penalties for aborting a pending blessing, for example. It has successfully been invoked, but the effects haven't taken place and the Favour is pooled. It's therefore obvious that the priest is not done when they successfully invoke the blessing, they are done once the effects take place (or is aborted) and the blessing is no longer pending. So a priest *is* tied to the blessing until it is aborted or its effects take place. Thus, it seems to me, that the effects cannot take place if the requirements are no longer satisfied.

dvang said:

Nothing in the rules indicate that the priest must fulfill the requirements of a blessing at any other time than when it is invoked. You can't twist the rules about having to provide favor around to also mean that he has to fulfill the requirements. It very specifically states that he has to fulfill the requirements and THEN he is able to make an invocation check and if it's a success the blessing is invoked and will come into effect once it has enough power. There isn't anything in the rules supporting it. All kinds of rulings could come into effect then... like a spell with a duration that requires you to be within meduim range of the target shutting off once you go out of medium range. Nothing in the rules about it, but the spell is not done yet. Of course we could define done and not done, but I think that is pointless. Once the priest has successfully invoked the blessing, he is done with it in terms of making it happend or not happend and just like everything else in the system those requirements has to be fulfilled at the time he makes the check.

Gallows said:

I'm with Dvang on this even though there isn't anything in the rules to back it up; it just "feels" right (for me).

We've got a high elf in our group and there is no way I would allow his covering fire card to continue having an effect if he put his bow away and started making melee strikes (in subsequent rounds). There is nothing in the rules for ongoing style cards to have to continue to have their requirements met in subsequent rounds for the benefit of the ongoing card to continue, but if it didn't feel right, I'd cut the recharge on that card short; the priest no longer meeting the requirements for a blessing that was still waiting for favour is one of those times when it doesn't feel right...for me at least.

Yeah I can see the point with covering fire Pumpkin, but I don't see the need for it with the blessings. If there was some sort of imbalance to it, then I suppose it was worth a worry.

Still with covering fire I don't know if I would rule like that. There are so many abstractions in 3rd. edition and one of the joys of the system is, that I don't have to make rules for all of them. With covering fire if he was engaged and attacked then logically the card should end as well, because it wouldn't be natural for him to just keep covering an area while getting attacked. Making rules like that just opens up for a flood of other things that needs to be sorted as well.

Except that, technically the priest is *not* done with the blessing as:

- He generates favour to power the blessing

- can can choose to abort the blessing

So the blessing after successful invocation is *not* entirely separated from the priest that cast it, as you suggest. It isn't a "fire and forget" type of deal. Look at it this way, when a priest invokes a blessing he is asking for divine aid. If he doesn't have enough favour at the time, he must continue to wheedle and cajole and send up prayers and litanies to his diety each and every round until his diety believes that the priest has sufficiently proven their dedication and grants the blessing. That continuous prayer/litany/etc is the buildup of Favour with the priest's deity. Even though the priest successfully has the ear of their deity, if they don't have enough favour, part of what they continue to do in subsequent rounds is "court" their diety to try to get enough favour with their deity to have their request accepted. As such, until the blessing is granted, the priest is continually and actively (even if they aren't using a Curry Favour action) working towards gaining the favour to finally receive the blessing. I see no separation or divorce for the priest after the invocation until the blessing is finally granted, other than the fact that a priest can just "pay lip service" while doing other things to slowly gain favour rather than devoted/dedicated prayer (ie currying favour). In essence, the rules allow the priest to multi-task, because while still reciting minor litanies to their deity (equilibrium regain of Favour), they may perform additional tasks.

I agree that there doesn't appear to be much support for this in the rules, though. It doesn't really cover this question well at all, either way. Since we know requirements are needed when the action is taken, but since the effects don't take place until later ... the rules don't say anything about those. My common sense tell me that the requirements should be examined at both points, or else you'll get some very strange results.

pumpkin said:

What if he fired his bow at a target by estimating the position of the target, getting on his radio, and calling in an airstrike? His presence at a particular spot is only necessary for the initial estimate of position. He can walk away as the barrage of arrows rain down.

That's what a divine blessing is, from what I can tell. You cast the blessing, indicate your target to your deity, and then you pray for enough juice to fill it up so your prayers are answered.

...more like a Tomahawk cruise missile, because no matter where the target goes, whether it is in the next building over, the next city over, the next country over, the next continent over, the thing will follow him and hit him.

Something just seems ... wrong ... with the way that relates to blessings IMO. Maybe it reminds me too much of the old D&D Monk's Quivering Palm trick, where you could poke someone and a few rounds later they suddenly keel over dead. Maybe it's just because it feels like there is the possibility for munchkinism with this (whether or not that's actually true). I'm not sure, but something about this just really puts me off, and I'm usually a pretty easy-going guy and pretty lenient when it comes to rules things like this.

EDIT:

Some additional thoughts. So, if the requirements are not looked at, and the invocation action is "over", do the effects affect the targets specified at the time of the invocation, or the time the effects actually come into effect? It seems like, if the requirements only matter at the beginning, and the invocation card is "no longer used", then the targets at the beginning are also the only ones affected. So, when a blessing affects "all enemies in a target engagement", you will need to track all enemies that are in that engagement, because it is possible for them to no longer be in that engagement by the time the blessing takes effect.

For example, say a group is in a building. Their priest casts an area heal, that has requirements only for some favour and friendlies within Close range. The priest deliberately delays the effect of the invocation by invoking a minor blessing and drainging his current favour to 0. Quickly everyone except the priest runs across the street (we'll call it extreme range) and gets into a big fight. A few round later the priest has accumulated enough favour and the healing blessing takes effect. Suddenly, all his friend that are at extreme range, out of sight, engaged in combat, and now wounded ... get healed with the priest safely sitting on the couch in his house across the street while sipping cocoa. That doesn't seem right to me.

A couple quick Blessings I found that work strangely if the requirements aren't checked when the effects take place:

"Mother's Comfort" (Rank 1, Ryha)

Req: 4 Favour, must be in an area with a wealth of growing things

Effect: While this blessing is recharging, each time you suffer stress you suffer one less stree to a minimum of 0.

So, a priest of Ryha invokes this in a garden, then races down into a steel-lined man-made dungeon, when the effects now suddenly go off despite there not being a single natural nor green/living thing within hundreds of yards. Certainly Odd.

"Divine Prowess" (Rank 2, Myrmidia)

Req: 6 Favour, Must have a Melee Attack or Ranged Attack action available (ie not recharging)

Effect: You may select a Melee Attack or Ranged Attack action and donate it to an ally within long range. That ally may use that action once, and when it recharges it returns to you.

So, the priest can invoke this blessing. What happens if the Melee Attack action in question is available at the time of invocation, but not at the time the effects of the blessing go off. Say it was used and is recharging now, or the GM put a recharge on it b/c of a rolled delay symbol. If the requirement isn't checked a second time, then the action is technically allowed to be passed to an ally ... but that makes no sense since the rest of the effect results don't work if the action is recharging (hence the reason the requirement specifies that the action can't be recharging in the first place). However, if the requirements are checked again at the time the effects take place, a recharging action cannot be selected to pass, and everything works correctly.

These were just found after a quick glance through the pile of Blessings, and trying to find some of the most obvious issues. I'm sure there are plenty more with "strange" or downright "illegal" issues b/c of the effects taking place without requirements being checked.

Fluffwise you can say some things are odd of course, but some of your examples are so extreme that by that logic everything can be considered odd. But for me the priest only needs to be in that garden to invoke the right feeling in himself to invoke the blessing.

I think most area of effect spells/blessings always have a target (either a specific spot or a creature). When the blessing comes into effect later it's still this central target that decides where the area of effect is in effect, so there is no need to complicate it that much.

As for the couch healing priest. I don't see an issue. He calls for help from his god and when he has been praying long enough he is answered and the blessing comed into effect. It's the whole idea behind blessings being delayed. It's a perfectly valid tactic for a priest to bless the warrior with a healing blessing before he is even wounded (UNLESS the blessing requires the target to be wounded), and then wait and let the blessing go off much later as the warrior priest throws himself into melee while chanting. For me it's actually quite fine and the way I see the whole system with priest blessings intended. Otherwise it's way to similar to wizards.

For a priest to be able to do a blessing, then let favor flow slowly by being below equilibrium while he is fighting in melee is the very core of how I think the system should work.

The priest lays his hands on his friend to bless him with healing and then throws himself into combat while chanting loudly for the power of his god to come into effect.

As for the melee attacks being transfered to an ally. If it is recharging it is just moved to the ally with recharge tokens on it. Once they are gone he can use it once and then it recharges again. I don't see an issue unless you really work at making one. I don't think available means not recharging. They use not recharging plenty of other places, so I don't know why they wouldn't here. In any case it's not an issue. As I said, even if it is recharging he can still use it once and return it once it has recharged.

It's the whole idea behind blessings being delayed.

No, the whole idea of blessings being delayed is so that invoking blessings is less dangerous than a wizards spellcasting, as there is a far less chance of drawing excess power. Obviously we have a difference of opinion here that my priest-on-a-couch example is reasonable or not. What if none of his allies actually got hurt? Would his diety be happy and indeed execute a prayer of healing when none of the requested recipients were injured. I don't see this as reasonable, nor the other way even if allies get hurt. <shrug> Praying for healing for damage that might or might not occur at a point sometime in the future?

For a priest to be able to do a blessing, then let favor flow slowly by being below equilibrium while he is fighting in melee is the very core of how I think the system should work

And, for the most part, this is still exactly how it works. I am not changing this. The only difference is that when the blessing fires off, the requirements must still be met. In general, it's just favour, but sometimes there's a range requirement. The priest can still go about performing other actions, he just needs to be cognizant that that might be some restrictions on his movement depending on the pending blessing. I must admit, though, that I think the "core" intent is that a priest should still Curry Favour to complete blessings, rather than slowly let equilibrium fuel a blessing. That is an option, yes, but IMO it isn't the primary way a priest should be casting blessings. Those blessings that can be fueled this way (to allow melee combat) don't have the same sort of requirement restrictions and aren't affected by this discussion (those generally only require favour, and protect/buff the priest himself, etc)

The priest lays his hands on his friend to bless him with healing and then throws himself into combat while chanting loudly for the power of his god to come into effect.

If he wants it to come into effect before he throws himself into a distant battle, then he needs to curry favour, otherwise he can still fight, but he must remain close to his ally until the blessing comes into effect. This does not sound unreasonable to me. The priest has a choice.

As for the melee attacks being transfered to an ally. If it is recharging it is just moved to the ally with recharge tokens on it. Once they are gone he can use it once and then it recharges again. I don't see an issue unless you really work at making one. I don't think available means not recharging. They use not recharging plenty of other places, so I don't know why they wouldn't here. In any case it's not an issue. As I said, even if it is recharging he can still use it once and return it once it has recharged.

The card specifies "available (not recharging)". I don't have the card in front of me to specifically quote it for you, but I'm 99% sure it said that, I just didn't write the whole thing out in my previous post. To me, its just silly to pass it with recharge tokens on it and saying the ally "can use it", when they can't unless they get rid of the recharge tokens. Otherwise, why does the card bother to have the restriction in the first place if it wanted to allow that to happen? IMO, this blessing intends/is designed to not allow a recharging card to be passed to an ally (just as its requirements say). If you do not check the requirements when the effects take place, then you are breaking the intent/design of the card.

I havent read all the posts but since this is my thread thats been hijacked I reserve the right to leap in with my view .

In the players handbook all references to the requirements are made when the invocation is made and as such I would say that requirements only have to be made at that point. This is as a newcomer to the game who has not studied the rules much.

Kaihlik

I will point out (since it has been glossed over) that I previously admited (and currently admit) that by the rules it is true that the only mention of checking requirements is when using the action card.

Of course, the rules don't mention anything about cards whose effects occur later ... whether that is because the requirements do not apply, or it was an oversight, we don't know for sure.

I am just stating my *strong* opinion, based on my knowledge of the rules and my interpretation/reading of the intent of the rules (and cards), that the requirements for an action card should/need to also apply when the effects occur. I find it highly dubious, on multiple levels, that they wouldn't, from both a gameplay and roleplaying perspective. It is, currently, however, just my opinion and my ruling for my games.