|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|
|||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||
|
WFRP Frequently Asked Questions Special thanks to the all the contributors: Felix Eisen ...and the other members of the WFRP-mailing list past and present. |
Questions about Magic Q: What is Up With These Spell Ingredients? A: Some spell ingredients are strange, a pint of Dragon's Blood for Zone of Steadfastness and a Giant's Brain for Cause Stupidity. In a letter page in White Dwarf, the designers acknowledged the strangeness of the ingredients but noted that ingredients were not an error on their part. Q: When I Cast Petty Magic With a Few Magic Points, Do I Need to Make a Magic Roll? A: No, Petty Magic spells do not require a Magic Roll. Graeme Davis in "On the Boil" in WD 102 clarifies this on page 59. (Official) Q: When do Spells Take Effect? A: The WFRP rulebook does not explain when spell casting begins, for how long it continues, or exactly when the spells take effect. If the spell caster begins the spell at the beginning of the turn, then they remain static until the spell caster's initiative allows them to take their turn. If the spell casting begins at the spell caster's initiative phase then they remain static until the end of the turn when the spells then take place in order of initiative at the end of the turn. There has been no official answer on this yet. An official answer was introduced in the official Realms of Sorcery by Ken and Jo Walton for those using the Effective Initiative system introduced in Restless Dead and Apocrypha Now: spells begin at the caster's Initiative phase in the round and the spell is completed at -40 EI later. This is similar to the suggestion in the unofficial Realms of Sorcery manuscript by Ken Rolston in which the initiative phase occurred at -30 Effective Initiative. Q: Is the Glowing Light Spell Too Powerful? A: Any object can be used as the ingredient for the Glowing Light spell, after which it disappears. Does this mean the lock on a door of a prison can be used as an ingredient, after which it disappears and the characters are free? Or perhaps a giant, evil, ancient artifact? What about a person or an animal? Can you cast Glowing Light on an animal? No official response to this spell exists yet, but the book does state any object, rather than person or animal. As for the rest of the possibilities, here is a suggestion to deal with the ingredient needs of this spell: In this case, any simple object comprised of non-moving parts and non-magical could be used if of a reasonable size, such as easily held in the hand. The object may not disappear after the spell use, but may be brittle and unusable. It is really up to the GM to consider the options. (Unofficial) "Any small object that can be completely held in the wizards fist [is a suitable ingredient for this spell] ...this discounts anything that is built into anything else, or part of a chain etc." (Graeme Gregory) "Assume that the Glowing Light spell works by pumping magical energy into the object thus creating a glow as it becomes sort of overloaded. Then it would make sense that any contact between the object and anything else other than the wizards hand would act as a sort of earth and allow the charge to escape. Thus in order for the spell to work the caster must be able to pick the object up and keep it suspended in mid-air. That discounts dragons and most living things anyway but we could also insist that the object must be inanimate just to make sure we don't get glowing mice or something. That means daggers, sticks and swords are OK! As are hairbrushes. But chains and ropes still attached to something and anything sitting on the ground or attached to a wall won't glow. So no disappearing doors, house, or wizards towers." (David Hatch) "My rule-of-thumb would probably be what most GMs is: 'Are the players using the spell as a weaselly way of knocking something off or accomplishing something 'impossible', i.e. trying to cheat?' Hell, if you got down to it, Einstein's general theory applies, because this entire problem regards the transformation of mass into energy. It gives off light (energy), therefore an amount of mass must have been turned into that energy. In this scale, maybe an atom. Maybe less." (Felix Eisen) Q: Can A Wizard's Apprentice Go Straight to any Specialist Wizard Career Without Becoming a Level One Wizard First? A: The early editions of WFB made all Wizards at least a Level One Battle Magic Wizard, and this tradition continues in WFRP. Page 138 in the WFRP book states that "A Wizard who has fully completed a level 1 career may choose to specialise in another field of magic instead of becoming a level 2 Wizard." Furthermore, the Wizard's Apprentice allows access only to the Wizard career, not any specializations, and the only Career Entries listed for the Specialist Wizards (other than Alchemist) are Wizard, rather than Wizard's Apprentice. So in order to become a specialist Wizard, one must pass through Battle Magic Wizard Level One. (Official) Q: Do Clerics need to complete all four Cleric levels before taking another career? A: WFRP states on page 151 "once a Cleric has completed the level 4 Cleric career, another roll is made on the Cleric Advance table. The result must be obeyed as usual, except that instead of moving on to another level, the character may take any of the listed Career Exits, without losing any spell use. Players who reach this exalted height must remember, however, that their characters are still Clerics; the change in career in no way affects their commitment which the deity expects of them" This seems to suggest that with the exception of Clerics of Ranald and Myrmidia who have specific religious requirements, that Clerics may not cast spells while pursuing another career even though "Demagogue" and "Witch Hunter" are listed as Career Exits along with "Cleric- of next level". They may only move onto these levels and cast clerical spells if they have completed the fourth level of their clerical career. The above quote from WFRP has never been clarified by any official sources. Contradicting this are examples in WFRP products of clerics in other professions who can cast spells but have not fulfilled the requirements above, examples: Karin Krumbach (Demagogue of Sigmar, Empire in Flames p. 121) and Sister Astrid von Nimlsheim (Dying of the Light, p 71). Therefore, while it does seem to be a rule, it is not one religiously followed and the best response is to decide on a case by case basis whether or not a Cleric should be allowed to keep his or her spell casting abilities while pursuing other careers. (Unofficial) "A thought I have been toying with is creating a table similar to the cleric progression table for 'retired' clerics. Let them keep whatever spell ability they have but when they first change careers and every now and again, at my benevolent discretion the player must roll, with behaviour modification like the progression table, to see if the god is happy with the way they are carrying on. Other penalty/bonuses could depend on the career they have chosen. Failure could include penalties like, loose a particular spell they have been abusing, Loose highest spell level until atonement, Loose all spell casting ability, other sundry nasty stuff, Gain another spell for token XP (if they have been very good), increase/lower maximum MP. All sorts of plot hooks while they go to a temple and ask for some task to help them atone. That way they retain the spell ability if they remain a devout follower, but it can get nasty if they misbehave." (labrat@ihug.co.nz) Background Questions Q: When Does the Enemy Within Campaign begin? It is provided on the handout from The Enemy Within Campaign. It reads "Player Information" in the header of the page and the page title reads "Your Homeland - The Empire" and the actual date is given under the sub-heading "Using the Calendar" - year 2512. The actual date of the game starts on the next page "Days of the Week": "the campaign starts on the evening of Festag, 24th Jahrdrung." Q: Are the Population Figures Wrong in the Gazetteer? A: The gazetteers given in TEW campaign do seem off, some evidence suggests that the census figures for most places only include the heads of households and those paying taxes, thus the numbers do not include migrant laborers or transient populations, undocumented households, the family members of the households, or beggars and others who would not be included. Suggestions have ranged from increasing the actual population size from four to twenty times the number suggested. Q: What Happened to Malal? A: Malal, a god described in the WFRP rulebook, was a chaos god created by a comic illustrator for the Kaleb Daark comic strip that ran in the early series of Citadel Journal, and is not the property of Games Workshop. Thus GW no longer makes extensive use of Malal since it is not their intellectual property. Malal is believed by many to make a reappearance in Mordheim. In a interview in Warpstone magazine, Graeme Davis
explains that Malal was originally in "Something Rotten
in Kislev" but was changed to Zuvassin when the legal issues
surrounding Malal was raised. Miscellaneous Questions
Q: What Does [Initials] Mean? A: Q: Is there Errata for the WFRP rulebook? A: Yes, for the first hardback edition Games Workshop published errata in the "Fistful of Misprints" article in WD 92. Many of these misprints were corrected in later editions and in the Hogshead edition. Errata can be found at http://www.warhammer.net/anonftp/Rules/Errata.txt Official Frequently Asked Questions were published in "On the Boil" with answers in issues 98, 102, and 103. Q: Is there a WFRP index? A: Yes, one is included in the WFRP GM's screen
while an index for magical rules is at the back of Realm of
Sorcery, both published by Hogshead. An unofficial fan index
is available at:
|
|||||
|
|
||||||
| All Pictures on this page © 2001 by Games Workshop Ltd. Used without permission. Please also read our Web Policy. | ||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| [main] [articles] [workshop] [downloads] [community] |
| [web policy] [about us] [faq] |