RPGWW

Since doing this would mean potentially screwing with a lot of past events, wanted to post this up and get some opinions.

When I first made characters to roleplay here, they fell into various class stereotypes for Final Fantasy. Daniel Hyral was the noble Paladin, ala Cecil. Stephan was the (semi) evil and sinister Dark Knight, like Golbez. And Midoku was a Blue Mage, known for mimicing spells. Back in the spammy days, and before Philsys was in common use, this really wasn't too big of an issue.

Fast forward to today.

Daniel has been little problem integrating into RP systems, since he can multi-class fighters and priests to get a 'similar' effect to his pseudo-paladin status, or just take appropriate abilites in Philsys. Stephan, having renounced being a Dark Knight, can play a casting/fighter hybrid without much issue as well. Though there is a lot of inconsistancy between his Philsys and D&D versions.

Then there's Midoku.

Blue Magic, ever since I've tried to make it work with system RP's, has always been a massive headache. No such thing exists in most gaming systems, and the rules debated for it in Philsys were never settled on.

Therefore, I want to retcon Midoku. I'd just like him to have an unusually high bond with the Astral Plane, which is essentially what the blue magic ability was supposed to imply. Just have him be a rather adept magic user, so I can finally put *something* together for system RP's.

As far as explaining all the past RP's where he reflected spells back at people attacking him... I really don't know. All I know is, right now I can't use him for system-based RP's. If I don't do something about that soon, his own development as a character is going to suffer eventually, if the only ones who get RP'ed are the Hyral siblings.

Thoughts?

I don't really think that's necessary; I know we discussed Blue Magic in PS at one point or another, and even if we didn't "settle on something then" that doesn't mean there isn't room to do so now.

PS is one hell of a versatile system. If I can make Ky Kiske and people can make plausible stat sheets for rocks, ducks, and metamorphing goo-children, we can do a blue mage. <p>

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It's not just issues with Philsys, I probably should have explained that a bit better.

I just don't like how it makes him difficult to 'port' over to other gaming systems. A big example, as implied above, is a D&D version of him. The only 'blue mage' class I've seen is the fan-made one ArchMage linked awhile ago, and it just doesn't seem worth the extra headaches, to me anyway.

Getting back to Philsys too, as I recall, you said yourself that one of the goals of Philsys is to not be overly complicated. I think adding this would go against this quite a bit. I can't really think of 'simple' rules for Blue Magic that won't get horribly abused, and adding several rules to cover it will just be more overhead for the GM, if I pop Midoku into a Philsys RP

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adding several rules to cover it will just be more overhead for the GM, if I pop Midoku into a Philsys RP

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*raises hand* I'd be willing to deal with it. It's not that bad. If I can learn Philsys to GM here, I can learn a different build in Philsys to GM for a character I find interesting.

As for the D&D thing, if it would be too much trouble for you, that's definitely your call, but as a GM I would have no problem with it. I'd welcome Midoku in an RP, and as I recall I actually offered you a chance to play him in FtA if you wanted.

If it would help you play him more often, then I can understand that. I just wanted to get it out there that it wouldn't really be much more of a hassle than GMing for any other character. <p>-------------------------
"It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes. But the half-wit remains a half-wit and the emperor remains an emperor." -- Sandman "The Kindly Ones" </p>

It also occurs to me that crafting his regularly used spells wouldn't be that hard. His Flame-Thrower, for example, seems to work in precisely the same fashion as, say, Burning Hands does.

After that, couldn't he potentially learn most anything cast on him in the game that he has spell levels to learn? Just make a Spellcraft check to see if you've learned it?

I'm sorry, this just doesn't seem like it needs to be very complicated to me. o.o <p>

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As far as d20 goes, having him be a "wizard who learns from experience" doesn't seem unreasonable to me, but I'm not your DM. Ultimately, that'd be up to him.

As far as PS, I have a lot of ideas that can change Mid's talent from being "I learn spells you blast me with," especially if you want to recreate him as a studious type who doesn't pick up his magic from being set on fire.

The main idea I have is to rework the whole idea of blue magery as a mage who is such a quick study that he learns magic and can duplicate its effects after having seen it cast only once. If he doesn't have a sufficient rank to learn the spell permanently, he can't necessarily make it part of his permanent repetoire; blue magic becomes a supplementary technique to his other arcane skills. An idea I had for a tech or whatever he might have is the ability to cast any spell he's just seen cast within the past round or two, even if he couldn't normally cast the spell himself; in effect, he mimics the spell (paying whatever cost is appropriate plus TP). This gives him the power to turn spells back on his enemies or to fill whatever role is necessary, such as casting a healing spell if he's just watched one of his allies do it. After the round or two of "copy time" is up, or he's cast the spell once, he loses the ability to cast it until he can mimic it again.

Plus, he has the potential ability to duplicate non-spell innate effects of monsters, such as a dragon's breath, a vampire's bite, or a basilisk's gaze. This is ultimately dependant on the GM, but what isn't? As long as there is at least ONE other spellcaster in the party (or battling him), Mid has a spell pool to draw on other than his own knowledge. Mid becomes incredibly dangerous in a wizard's duel; you can't risk throwing a big spell at him because you might get it right back! <p>

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D&D? Spellthief multiclass might work. Maybe make a Blue Mage PrC to go along with it (ONLY so that he can "copy" Spells he's seen).

Also: at one point there were some things worked out for Mid in PS. Honestly I don't see why you should Retcon his powers just because they're a little difficult to define in some systems. We like you and Mid and are willing to do said work, or at least I'd like to think so. If you want to use him elsewhere, say in your D&D campaign or something, I'm sure something could be worked out if you want. <p><span style="font-size:small;">

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Currently idolizing - Roger Bacon, Shadow Hearts
Likes : Forbidden magics, Determined people, His teacher
Dislikes : Stupid people, Church officials, People that prey on the weak
Method of Destroying the World : Feh. God can do it for me. >:{
Becomes Super Powerful When : ... well F***. When ISN'T he?</span>

"Lunatic? The sages of EVERY age were called that! Let HISTORY decide whether my actions were good or bad. For now, we must forge ahead!"</p>

As a completely unrelated note, I'm damned proud of that metamorphing goo child sheet. <p>

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I'm with Nakibe on this one. For D&D it shoudl be pretty easy to make up a Blue Mage PrC. Spellthief also seems to work pretty well as a blue mage-esque base class. If I were you I'd do a spellthief with a Blue Mage PrC. If you make up your own PrC, you'll even be able to make your character exactly the way you want, instead of sort of kind of porting over your character, but missing small details. <p>

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"En Taro Washington!" -Spleen.</p>

Dear Dave,

www.returnergames.com

Blue Mage class is in there somewheres. Not too hard to convert that to PS, if I remember right.

Also, I like AM's idea.