Thursday, October 18, 2018

Magic - Dungeon Fantasy Martial Artist Spell List

I mean, this is basically unarmed
combat, right?
Someone on a forum was discussing the possibility of a small buff to martial artists in Dungeon Fantasy. The suggestion was to allow them access to the body control magic college and base it off of their Chi power. I think that's an interesting start, but because I can't think of anything interesting to write this week, let's go with a slight refinement of that concept.

Basics

So, maybe we start by saying that casting is based on the Chi Talent, and Chi Talent is already pretty expensive so let's not make any adjustments. The most chi-ish stat for magic-ish abilities is either Will or HT, but since Barbarians in Dungeon Fantasy Denizens already use HT as a casting stat, let's just go with Will for differentiation's sake. Someone might complain that Will is too cheap for a casting attribute, but on the other hand, Chi Talent is too expensive for a pretty limited casting talent, so I'm not worried about it; if you are, change it to any attribute you want; almost any of them might seem appropriate depending on how you justify the exercise of chi. I've included suggested alternate attributes by each spell as appropriate. The seeming most appropriate type of "magic" would be buff spells or special attacks. Buff spells should probably only be able to affect the self, and special attacks can use Karate instead of innate attack to simulate projected blows, a la something similar to Hadoken.
Talents in Dungeon Fantasy go up to 6 levels for the nominal profession critical talents, and eyeballing an appropriate spell count from DF9 for some light caster classes, I figure 12 is a pretty good ceiling for a totally non-caster occupation that also happens to be easily divisible by 6. So unlocking access to two spells per level of talent. Let's take a look at a suggested list:

Level 1:

Might (HT) and Grace (HT) (both M37); these are simple straightforward buffs for attributes Martial Artist get a lot of mileage out of; these spells are nearly mundane; I mean, becoming suddenly stronger isn't mundane, but it's not a lot of razzle dazzle, so it feels appropriate for an entry level.

Level 2:

Haste (HT) (M114), Resist Pain (Will) (M38) still relatively mundane, but getting into cooler special effect and cinematic ability territory.

Level 3:

Resist Poison (HT)(M91) Cure Disease (HT) (M91) Being extraordinarily healthy defeats ailments by strength of mind and body.

Level 4:

Paralyze Limb (DX) (M40), Monk's Banquet (Will) (M79) at this point, the abilities are becoming more esoteric and special.

Level 5:

Hide (Will) (M113) is kind of a ninja-y ability, but extinguishing one's aura so they can be nearly invisible in plain sight seems good. Death Touch (Will) (M41) is a kind of cool way to make an unarmed martial artist do some very big damage. Hardiness (Will) (M167) Is the ability to concentrate so hard, one is able to safely absorb more damage for a single attack.

Level 6:

Fireball (Will) (M74) is the typical awesome "magic" attack for a martial artist, and Wallwalker (M144) is an improvement over Lizard Climb or the like.

Other Thoughts and Conclusion

It was harder to come up with a list than I thought at first. I wanted to make sure I wasn't simply copying the list for Barbarians, and I didn't want to overlap the existing esoteric skills if I could help it. I don't mind if anyone has any constructive criticism on this list though.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...