Glyphs and ability points

The usage of arcane glyphs and diagrams to power a wide variety of occult rituals.
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Rias
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Glyphs and ability points

Post by Rias »

I don't really like glyphs set up as individual abilities that you have to learn. I'd much rather have them be just glyphs, and have some sort of system that determines who can learn which and how many. The obvious idea is to tie it to Arcana skill, but glyphs are meant to have a wide variety of effects and powers, and I wouldn't feel right having them all available just via Arcana skill while other people are spending ability points on, say, being able to tackle or tumble. (Or get a medical license.)

So I'm asking for help in coming up with a way to use up ability points on general glyph usage, but not having it as it is now with a simple ability point to learn a specific glyph. I also want to maintain the idea that certain glyphs are only available to certain classes. One idea is to have abilities that unlock more slots, more complicated diagram options (separators with more glyph space per diagram, larger circles for group effects), and some other abilities for things like making these slots more "hot swappable" so, for instance, Arcanists can switch up their current memorized glyphs with ease while lesser arcane practitioners might have a harder/more time-consuming time of it.

The overall idea being that you learn abilities to increase your general ability at using diagrams and glyphs, but you learn specific glyphs through a different means (study, most likely) and you can choose to forget glyphs in order to learn different ones within your limited glyph memorization capacity.

I like the above ideas and am already mentally plotting out how to set up all the abilities, but I thought I'd open things up for suggestions if anyone has any. As well as just general feedback on the concept of separating specific glyph knowledge from ability points. I don't know that I want it to complicate things more than they already are with the occult diagram system, so try to keep ideas relatively simple. What kind of abilities would you want to be able to learn to help you become a master with arcane diagrams and glyphs, without worrying so much about the powers of the individual glyphs themselves? What would separate the dabblers from the experts?
<Rias> PUT ON PANTS
<Fellborn> NO
TheCacklackian
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by TheCacklackian »

You could utilize a system similar to the one currently used with recipe, eg the higher your arcana is the more glyph points you have to learn glyphs.
When unlearning a glyph(Or multiple if you're a skilled arcana user) have it act like the exp bucket where points slowly trickle back into your glyph pool, but you can't use the glyph/glyph's your unlearning. The speed of the trickle would depend on your arcana skill as well presumeably.
Agelity
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by Agelity »

The three biggest things I could see as being the difference between a dabbler and an expert in arcana are efficiency, effectiveness, and variety.

Variety is self-explanatory; the more experience and knowledge they have, the more options they also likely have. Different glyphs, different patterns and methods of invoking arcana, etc.

Effectiveness can vary from augmenting the strength of an ability to duration. Distyr illuminating more than a single "level" of illumination, Terlu making you that much harder to detect, Uyto making you perceptive enough to swear you can hear the voices of the dead. Duration also sort of self-explanatory here, though it'd also be a good measure of "efficiency" (only needing to redraw diagrams oh so often).

Efficiency would be in the setup time of the glyphs themselves, the resource consumption (how much chalk is used), how many people a single diagram can effect, the casting time of different spells.

This could mean things like combining dorum (the warding sphere) with distyr and having yourself an illuminated shield, combining something like terlu with some other type of diagram that allows you to cast certain traits to someone else and having it function as a muting or deafening spell, or some type of levitation glyph allowing a brief increase of acrobatic feats (think minor anti-gravity effects) or even increased gravity effects to increase the potential to cause knockdown effects and make it difficult to stand back up).

As far as what those abilities are, I could see abilities that do the following:
  • Decrease setup time/resource usage
  • Be able to store/prep a number of effects beforehand
  • Cast raw force damage when the spell store effect is up. Potentially additional effects when deciding to brawl (like with sorcery)
  • Second tier to the casting effect that allows you to cast certain effects at another
  • Combine certain effects to create new ones, or potentially cause physical and psychological damage if you mess up. Options!
  • Ability to allow group members to gain the benefit of a spell
  • An ability that grants resistance to arcana effects beyond skill points in meditation. Perhaps a "counterspell" of sorts?
  • And "anti" glyph that can cause certain effects to do the opposite of what's intended.
  • An effect that can hide what a diagram actually does (if those with higher arcana can naturally recognize what certain diagrams do). Could make it appear like one diagram but have it function as another (see the anti-glyph above for added fun)
...and plenty of others I haven't thought of or mentioned yet! Most of these could be handled with new shapes or glyphs (or even doubling/tripling glyphs if augmenting certain effects, or some general multiplier glyph), some could just be a potential ability pickup once the Arcanist has reached a high enough skill to make the daily use of their craft less burdensome.

Some of the effects I could see requiring a "research project" of sorts (ie, guild task) to gather supplies and spend time practicing certain things, exploring specific places, or visiting various instructors across the lost lands (not everything can be found within a single library, sorry bookworms 8-) ). Others just readily available in the library to practice/learn since heck, not everything needs to be researched a second or third time.
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by nobody »

Here are some ideas I've got so far:
  • Ability slot management
    • Have a set of general abilities (occult diagrams, lumourgy theory, sonourgy theory, fortourgy theory) that are tiered.
    • Each ability unlocks a group of glyphs, subject to tiering.
    • Tiers can be based on skill, guild/class, additional abilities, occult lore objects studied, affinities, studying arcana in specific locations, etc.
    • 'Occult diagrams' handles circles, lines, and activators
    • Move distyr to lumourgy with iquaj (this asks a steeper ability investment from non-arcanists to dabble in magic, and a less steep ability cost for arcanists, which seems right to me.)
    • Sonourgy and Fortourgy contain their respective glyphs, again subject to tiering
  • Hot-swappability:
    • Add an arcanist only shop that sells quills, anomalum ink, and arcanist flash paper.
    • Add an ability for scroll-writing that includes an activator glyph that activates when the paper is lit on fire.
    • When the scroll is lit, the circle activates on the lighter OR the circle on the paper becomes active on the ground in the room (essentially magical transference of the circle from the paper media to the ground), choose whichever makes the best lore sense.
    • Limit the number of them that can be created by a given arcanist at once based on arcana skill and have created scrolls automatically fade/lose their magic after a day (this prevents some kind of market flooding of arcana scrolls and also prevents the arcanist from being handicapped by losing a scroll).
    • Alternatively (or additionally) when an arcanist creates a circle on a scroll in this way, have some portion of their energy not recover until the scroll fades or is used. This will naturally set a functional limit to the number of scrolls created.
    • Maybe add a scroll affinity or specialization ability to expand the number that the arcanist can create.
  • Additional ability slot uses:
    • Arcanists might have access to some abilities that add meta-effect glyphs that extend glyph durations, add additional targets, or otherwise enhance effects, either as multiple abilities or a tiered ability.
    • Add an ability that allows creation of anomalum chalk, anomalum ink and arcanist flash paper (if those become a thing), etc.
    • Add an ability to reduce roundtime and/or energy consumption of circle creation.
Edit to add: Add a 'glyph' or 'glyphs' command to list your known glyphs and get details on them as you currently can with ability describe. It'd be nice to see the details on my distyr glyph ;)
Last edited by nobody on Fri Sep 11, 2020 8:26 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by nobody »

Agelity wrote: Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:41 am The three biggest things I could see as being the difference between a dabbler and an expert in arcana are efficiency, effectiveness, and variety.

Effectiveness can vary from augmenting the strength of an ability to duration. Distyr illuminating more than a single "level" of illumination, Terlu making you that much harder to detect, Uyto making you perceptive enough to swear you can hear the voices of the dead. Duration also sort of self-explanatory here, though it'd also be a good measure of "efficiency" (only needing to redraw diagrams oh so often).
Also part of effectiveness: reduction of negative side effects (when an arcanist uses blur, they know how to do it right and don't have as severe of perception penalties), lower likelihood of bad stuff happening if/when that is a thing, and maybe greater resistance to bad stuff when bad stuff happens.
TheCacklackian
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by TheCacklackian »

nobody wrote: Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:59 am Here are some ideas I've got so far:
  • Ability slot management
    • Have a set of general abilities (occult diagrams, lumourgy theory, sonourgy theory, fortourgy theory) that are tiered.
    • Each ability unlocks a group of glyphs, subject to tiering.
    • Tiers can be based on skill, guild/class, additional abilities, occult lore objects studied, affinities, studying arcana in specific locations, etc.
    • 'Occult diagrams' handles circles, lines, and activators
    • Move distyr to lumourgy with iquaj (this asks a steeper ability investment from non-arcanists to dabble in magic, and a less steep ability cost for arcanists, which seems right to me.)
    • Sonourgy and Fortourgy contain their respective glyphs, again subject to tiering
  • Hot-swappability:
    • Add an arcanist only shop that sells quills, anomalum ink, and arcanist flash paper.
    • Add an ability for scroll-writing that includes an activator glyph that activates when the paper is lit on fire.
    • When the scroll is lit, the circle activates on the lighter OR the circle on the paper becomes active on the ground in the room (essentially magical transference of the circle from the paper media to the ground), choose whichever makes the best lore sense.
    • Limit the number of them that can be created by a given arcanist at once based on arcana skill and have created scrolls automatically fade/lose their magic after a day (this prevents some kind of market flooding of arcana scrolls and also prevents the arcanist from being handicapped by losing a scroll).
    • Alternatively (or additionally) when an arcanist creates a circle on a scroll in this way, have some portion of their energy not recover until the scroll fades or is used. This will naturally set a functional limit to the number of scrolls created.
    • Maybe add a scroll affinity or specialization ability to expand the number that the arcanist can create.
  • Additional ability slot uses:
    • Arcanists might have access to some abilities that add meta-effect glyphs that extend glyph durations, add additional targets, or otherwise enhance effects, either as multiple abilities or a tiered ability.
    • Add an ability that allows creation of anomalum chalk, anomalum ink and arcanist flash paper (if those become a thing), etc.
    • Add an ability to reduce roundtime and/or energy consumption of circle creation.
I think that we should avoid having each 'group' of occultism be a separate ability, at least for minor glyphs like the ones available to all classes, maybe have those abilities add tertiary effects to the basic glyphs while allowing the use of advanced glyphs(Though it shouldn't teach you the glyphs), but I do think adding 'theory' abilities that are required for glyphs defeats the point of moving away from having glyphs be abilities.

I would love to see an ability for the 'occult flash paper', I had a very similar idea back on the thread 'Occult Ideas'.

When it comes to abilities, if we're going to add one that reduces roundtime, it should increase energy cost, and vice versa. Maybe have exclusive abilities like 'speed scribe' and 'effective channeler' the former which increases the energy cost while reducing roundtime, the latter increases roundtime, while decreasing the energy channeled into the glyph.

In regards to effectiveness, I do think it would be neat to have better occultists have 'stronger' glyphs, or glyphs that grant additional benefits. However I'm still very much of the opinion that 'hearing the dead' should be in the realm of warlock, not arcanist.
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by nobody »

TheCacklackian wrote: Fri Sep 11, 2020 8:36 am I think that we should avoid having each 'group' of occultism be a separate ability, at least for minor glyphs like the ones available to all classes, maybe have those abilities add tertiary effects to the basic glyphs while allowing the use of advanced glyphs(Though it shouldn't teach you the glyphs), but I do think adding 'theory' abilities that are required for glyphs defeats the point of moving away from having glyphs be abilities.
My suggestion there is less for the current set up where there are only 2 light glyphs, 3 sound glyphs, and 1 force glyph, but for the future I imagine with perhaps 4-6 or more glyphs in each arcane discipline.

@Rias it would help to know if there are other planned disciplines though beyond sonourgy, lumourgy, and fortourgy if you're willing to offer anything with regards to that.

Edit to add: I suppose if you wanted significantly fewer abilities you just have occult diagrams by itself as a tiered ability, taking it up to two more times to represent the advanced investment.
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by nobody »

Having seen part 1 of the overhaul, I feel like I have a little more vision of what you're looking for - for example I had assumed previously that there would be some separation of known glyphs and memorized glyphs (being a proper subset of known glyphs) and I now understand that those two terms are interchangeable. Given that, I wanted to take another go at some of these ideas. Also, apologies, this post is more rambly and meandering than I prefer, but I like the tangential ideas too much to edit them out.
Rias wrote: Wed Sep 30, 2020 3:55 pm Still working on:
- A way to intentionally forget a glyph in order to free up mental space for learning a different one. This will be fairly expensive and have a lengthy wait time involved, as well as some other repercussions that may be a result of tampering with one's mind in such a way.
In terms of making glyphs more hot-swappable for arcanists specifically I have three ideas:
1. Some kind of ability that gives a separate pool of 'short term arcane mental capacity' or 'fluid arcane mental capacity' - glyphs can be learned into that pool (via some alternative syntax such as 'study plate temporary' or 'study plate fluid' though I dislike both of those even as I write them) or the standard long-term arcane mental capacity pool, with the glyphs in the more fluid pool able to be forgotten with minimal effort/impact. It may be a good idea to have the pool replenish over time after a glyph is forgotten rather than immediately. Other things to set this ability aside from just spending more on glyph retention could be decreasing the capacity (1 or 2 capacity per ability point instead of 3), limiting the availability more (once per 100 ranks of arcana instead of 33 ranks), or adding a tiered benefit to glyph retention (increasing it's capacity above 3/ability for arcanists).
2. A service that grants one the ability to forget a known glyph, possibly with a reduced cooldown, cost, and/or sanity impact compared to what will be publicly available. I imagine this as some hooded, robed arcanists taking you to a back room to a specially prepared table with all kinds of glyphs and protections already in place and poking and prodding at your mind.
3. An ability that grants one the ability to forget a known glyph, possibly with a cooldown and/or sanity loss.

My major concern with approaches 2 and 3 is
Rias wrote: Wed Sep 30, 2020 3:55 pm - Chance for limited-use glyph-teaching items in the treasure system.
can the arcanist re-learn a glyph they once knew without having to regain access to a new limited-use glyph-teaching item? With the service (2), it might make sense if they could use your memory to produce some kind of arcane bauble that can be used (possibly with the same service or possibly just with study) to restore that knowledge (to you and only you, though some shady arcane society(ies) might be willing to experiment with putting someone else's glyph understanding memory in your head - as long as you're willing to pay upfront). I'm drawing a blank on how to regain access to formerly known glyphs if it's just an ability to forget a glyph you know (3). It's possible that it could be set up such that if you have some expensive ingredients on hand you could prepare such an arcane bauble yourself that would allow you (and only you, and with limited use?) to study the bauble to learn the glyph again. That'd function as something of a riln sink and I suppose is about as easy to explain away as the service option (2) only working on the original person (trying to study an occult glyph of power from someone else's purged memory is ill-advised at best and dangerous at worst, you just don't know how their mind works). Depending on the cost of bauble making ingredients though, it may prove prohibitively expensive to be truly "hot swappable" though it would be a great use for all those gems lying about the market (at least, until lapidary is a thing, but even then "this ring is inset with my memory of how to make myself glow" is kind of great).
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Re: Glyphs and ability points

Post by nobody »

Rias wrote: Thu Sep 10, 2020 8:27 pmWhat would separate the dabblers from the experts?
I've really enjoyed messing around with the new shaol glyph, and thinking about it has given me another idea for an answer to this question: control.

Currently the distyr, iquaj, terlu, uyto, and dorun glyphs have a duration based on skill, solca is single-use, and shaol is ongoing/single-use. It would be cool to be able to change those up, like after drawing the distyr glyph, modifying the glyph to pull from bodily energy like shaol's default. Similarly, it'd be nice to be able to offer someone a more limited shaol that is time based for a discount on the service or for an individual that doesn't want to risk the energy maintenance cost. It would also be really cool to set up any glyphs for an alternative energy source (such as a campfire, or an unwilling/unwitting mob trap-style). Well worth an ability point.
draw occult small circle
draw occult line
draw occult beldi
draw occult distyr
draw occult modify distyr duration ongoing -> makes the duration permanent with an energy maintenance cost

draw occult modify shaol duration timed -> makes the duration timed without energy maintenance cost
As additional ability possibilities for control, most glyphs that exist currently could be tweaked in at least one way:
  • Distyr: increase or decrease the brightness
  • Iquaj: increase blur buff or decrease blur buff and remove blur debuff
  • Terlu: increase muffle buff or decrease muffle buff and remove muffle debuff
  • Uyto: increase hearing buff or remove ability to hear whispers or remove ability to eavesdrop
  • Dorun: increase or decrease shielding buff
  • Shaol: increase or decrease weight limit, increase or decrease energy impact of the object
  • Solca: decrease volume to only adjacent rooms rather than whole zone
Ability [glyph modification] - you can diminish the effects of most glyphs, and you may be able to enhance some glyphs with enough skill.
draw occult modify distyr diminish effect -> make it darker
draw occult modify shaol diminish effect;draw occult modify shaol diminish cost -> reduce the weight capacity and the energy maintenance cost
draw occult modify solca diminish effect -> make it quieter
draw occult modify uyto duration ongoing;modify uyto enhance effect -> make it last based on energy maintenance and enhance the buff (likely increasing that maintenance cost?)
Modifying a glyph should always cost more round time, energy, and anomalum chalk. The effort could be wasted (no impact) on a low arcana roll, or on a very low roll arcana roll could cause the glyph to fail (and circle to disappear) or misfire (damage, sanity loss, non-dismissible reversed effect, other bad stuff). Diminishing for most effects should probably be a lower skill roll than enhancing the effects. Multiple modifications to a glyph (or modifying multiple glyphs in one circle or modifying glyphs in someone else's circle) should likely grant fewer or negative rerolls.
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