Spell Acquisition

[The Undying]

First, to be clear, there's nothing wrong with your posts, they're just in the wrong place. If you would like to talk about spell valuation (which are good, which are not, if X is better than Y), I'm sure there's lots of greater interchange that can be had. If you want to talk about which extra threads are better than others, again, it's an interesting topic, I'm sure there's lots of great opinions our there and maybe some perspectives you hadn't thought of, definitely post a topic on it. If you want to talk about the LP cost of magicians versus non-magicians, yes, a lot has already been sad about it, but much of that has been lost in the forum migration, so a new post on the current forum could be a useful thing. Those would just be best served in a relevant topic. Putting them here minimally makes them get lost under an unrelated topic, making the content harder to find. Separately, and this is likely more a personality thing that anything else, it's a bit frustrating when every post on a topic is off-topic.

So, to answer your question:

The "threadweaving tax" is a term I've used to describe the impact (hard to say "problem" since it's design) Threadweaving has on spell casting. Threadweaving isn't fun, and the more turns lost to it are more fun lost. This was a thing in earlier editions, but it has become significantly larger now in ED4 with the extra thread mechanic.

Other things feed into this tax. For example, a design idea going in to ED4 was that some spells were reduced in power because "the magician can always weave in more threads," meaning magicians actually have to put in more work to get the same old effects. Additionally, spell damage output is pretty meager, and to even make a dent in the continually scaling armor of adversaries, magicians pretty much get forced into extra threads, which take longer, whereas close/range combats get things that scale effectively without lost turns. All of these FEED INTO the tax (because the tax increases by the ever-increasing requirement of threads) but they are separate from the tax discussion: whether spells are generally underpowered is different then it takes a lot of threads to get spells powered up.

The community has discussed the tax a lot in the past, with various ideas thrown around on how it could be addressed. Much of this knowledge may have been (probably was) lost in the forum migration. There were A LOT of ideas proposed.

This specific topic was to address one specific lane of the tax: if magicians can generally accomplish two threads in a turn, does that alleviate or eliminate people's concerns about the tax. The tax obviously exists, because a turn is lost to Threadweaving, but the magician is nearly guaranteed to pull off two threads, meaning most spells - either native Thread 2 spells or empowered Thread 0/1 spells - only take one turn to pull together. THIS specifically is the question being posed.

[Lys]

One pretty simple way to ameliorate the Threadweaving tax is to simply let casters roll Threadweaving first, and then decide how many extra threads they're weaving. This way players can take advantage of good rolls to make their spells more powerful, or keep going despite bad ones. For example under the rules as written system you might declare one extra thread on a one thread spell, because you're expecting to get two successes on the Threadweaving test. Under the rules as written system if you get three successes and you're at least Journeyman the third success is lost, similarly if you only get one success you're required to spend the next turn weaving that extra thread you declared. Under the system where you declare extra threads after you roll, then you don't lose that third success if you roll high, and you can decide to just cast with no extra threads if you roll low. Though obviously you still need at least one success because it's a one thread spell. On the whole, i feel it makes the whole extra threads mechanic a lot more usable.

[Tattered Rags]

A middle ground to that idea is to have people declare the number of threads they want, but let them weave fewer if they don't get the successes but not add more if they roll well.

Nevermind. People would just declare 5 threads every time.

[Loba]

THIS LAST THING is really what I wanted to explore in this thread - if players are buying "cheap" spells, and as a result are capable of getting 2 successes per Threadweaving more than 50% of the time, does that help (or maybe fully) negate the sadness that is the whole "you lose a turn Threadweaving" problem. The first problem - that has been debated up and down, back and forth, to the moon and back, etc, etc, etc.

I've read some responses.... I can tell you this is my experience:

• Circle 4 Below: Adds an extra thread in general.
  • Targets: There are a surprising number of spells that add extra targets for a single extra thread. This is VERY useful.
  • Time: There are some spells that add extra time - even change the time from rounds to minutes or minutes to hours. This is VERY useful.
  • Effect: Some spells give an outright +2 or +3 to effect (not effect test) for an extra thread. So mage armor which was +3 is now +5 for free, essentially.
• Spells in General:
  • Lower circle spells aren't often high damage but they ARE often very effective. Extra stealth, armor, movement.
  • High Circle spells are cool and all but aren't the end all be all. More threads can make them tedious.
  • Grimoire Casting: High Circle spells can be cast through a found grimoire without learning it. This is often ALL you need for a lot of high circle spells which only really add long term benefit or situational benefit and surprisingly often not useful in round based thinking.

With our group - the Magician most often uses the lower tier spells and they seem to love it and put the other players in awe. So - mission accomplished.

Some other comments:

• Combat Casting: I heard someone mention combat lasting only 3-4 rounds? This is true if you just fight random small encounters - however if you are boarding a vessel or raiding a castle or fighting a swath of baddies - then this isn't true at all. Further, unless you are going down corridors - rarely do you not have foresight of a coming battle and even two rounds is not much for a Warrior (unless they haven't used Earth Skin or something yet) but for a caster - you can pack a LOT of extra umpf in those two rounds. (Just as an example: the group recently encountered 200+ Gnashers - this is a running battle you aren't likely to win - only escape - and any Magician can shine in this scenario)
• Carry Threads Over: An amusing idea, actually. I'll avoid discussion of this to appease the request made by Undying.
• Non-Combat: I'd say our adventures are 85% non-combat - even based in time. The group isn't there to slay and slay (though there are adventures where that is, indeed, the purpose - but they are few and far between). The group is there to do epic things (free the minds of an entire city, pull one over on Garlthik One-Eye, perform espionage on the Therans in order to gain a new magical secret or item or for bragging rights, be pirates and raid Theran airships [combat], forge a new trade route that changes a war effort). In these cases - slow casting spells are not only easy but super impressive.

[Dougansf]

One pretty simple way to ameliorate the Threadweaving tax is to simply let casters roll Threadweaving first, and then decide how many extra threads they're weaving. This way players can take advantage of good rolls to make their spells more powerful, or keep going despite bad ones.

This is what I'm considering for my group. Mainly because spell threadweaving is one of the few Talents that doesn't get a reward for extra successes.

Though we haven't made it to 5th Circle yet, so there aren't many extra threads the magician could apply.

I also like the idea of 2 or 3 extra Successes allowing immediate casting. Which would lead to an important decision for the lucky caster.

[The Undying]

With the addition of maneuvers to close/ranged combat, the "two successes in Threadweaving allows Spellcasting of that spell as though it were a Simple Action that turn" just feels natural to me. It doesn't NEED to be accompanied by the "declare extra threads as you achieve successes" idea but it's peanut butter and jelly, they just go together too well to ignore.

[Kosmit]

Two successes is too low. In earler editions you needed extraordinary success to weave additional thread, here you have it by default.

[The Undying]

Two successes is too low. In earler editions you needed extraordinary success to weave additional thread, here you have it by default.

If you go back through the forums, you'll note pretty much everyone chimes in with two successes being their preferred cost. Two successes also fits in perfectly well with close/range combat maneuvers. Regardless, the point about earlier editions requiring higher successes for something that is now baked in is somewhat beside the point - it's baked in now, and if anything, that should suggest it was previously over-costed.

[Kosmit]

But having spell cast in one round is not regular combat maneuvers.

If those successes count after weaving all threads (3 thread Spell requires 5 successes) I could agree it's not high.

And I am saying that as a mage player.

Casting bone pudding in one round would be a bit OP.

[The Undying]

I think many of us have played or are playing magician characters, so take that for what you will.

Casting Bone Pudding in a single round using the two success idea would either require 6 successes in a Standard Matrix of 5 success in an Enhanced Matrix. I think someone who can get 5+ success on a roll should be rewarded. Bear in mind that, with a Weaving Difficulty of 11, we're talking about a result of 31 on a roll, which would be pretty impressive, even for a Circle 15 Adept (PER 8, Rank 15 Threadweaving, Karma Step 5 = Step 28).

Plus, people like to trot out Bone Pudding as the holy grail of combat spells. I agree, it IS nasty - but it requires the Nethermancer eat something messy. Are most people saying that their Nethermancers run around with natto or congealed pudding in a squeeze tube hanging off their shoulder??

As to the comment about combat maneuvers, you are correct, this is not a combat maneuver, it is comparable to combat maneuvers. The fact that close/ranged combat got maneuvers and spell combat got ... nothing ... is a crying shame to me. It's about time they got some maneuvers.