What is required for spell casting?

[Budoman]

So this has come up in game. 

Do people notice someone casting magic - say an illusion?

Can a spell be cast if the caster is tied up?

What if they are silenced or blind?

Does this depend on the school of magic?

How close does the person need to be to a Grimiore to use it?  

Is the Grimiore actively used?

Do Immutos affect any of the above?

[koronuslight]

I am not seeing any specific restrictions involving that, so I would assume there are currently none. As none of my players currently use magic, but Manifested Powers, I leave that up to them. 

However, they do have a Grimoire in their possession, and it requires spoken incantations and concentration, so speech and Centering checks would apply as a house rule if necessary. 

I would recommend determining a condition for a Grimoire when it is created or acquired. Does the caster need to speak or make specific hand movements? Is the Grimoire itself the focus, and needs to be visible or held to use (a wand, small book, pendant, etc)?

[EnternalVoid]

On 1/18/2017 at 1:00 PM, Budoman said:

So this has come up in game. 

Do people notice someone casting magic - say an illusion?

Can a spell be cast if the caster is tied up?

What if they are silenced or blind?

Does this depend on the school of magic?

How close does the person need to be to a Grimiore to use it?  

Is the Grimiore actively used?

Do Immutos affect any of the above?

Some of these are answered in the Grimoire section on page 227 and others in the spellcasting section that starts on page 228.  But a lot of this is up to either the Fatemaster or the player to a degree.

1) Perhaps.  As per page 228 "It involves performing some bit of ritual (which is personal to the Spellcaster) and then manifesting a Spell-like effect.".  So that personal element is important for defining.  A fatemaster should have them at least give some definition to their magia even if it is general.  Perhaps the person literally throws a fireball for the spell, that makes it kind of easy to notice someone might be casting magic.  At the same time something like Elemental Engulf might involve snapping their fingers and then the target burst into flames, less likely to notice but someone might draw them together.  Others might have magic words or gestures.  That said someone with the Counterspell Skill can feel people using magic around them per the rules on page 245.

2 & 3) Perhaps?  It really depends on what the persons personal ritual is.  If it is hand gestures I imagine being well tied up might make that difficult but if it is word based a gag might be in order.  I imagine being blindfolded would be a big help as the Blind Condition gives a double negative to flips to things that require sight, and most spells likely require you to see what you are targetting.

4) Schools of magic tend to be more how you approach the working of magic rather than visible cues.

5) By page 227 "The character does not need to have the object on his person to access it. He simply needs to declare that this is the magical field of study that he is currently focused on.".  So they don't have to be that close to the Grimoire to use the magia and immutos in it.  But to swap between Grimoires they need to physically have it and spend, as the book puts it, a 'reasonable' amount of time studying the new grimoire.  I am sure the length of time is up to the Fatemaster but I imagine a single evening should be more than sufficent.  Also you can only be actively using one at a time so if you keep your grimoires in your apartment you would have to journey back to swap around.  Now all this of course is up to the Fatemaster as grimoires vary.  Some of the special grimoires in the expansions have additional special rules for their uses so you can do similar things if you want.  I would suggest not putting extra stipulations on any Grimoires that characters start with, such as a Dabbler, Graverobber, or Tinkerer but feel free to have any further ones found have oddities about them.

6) By the rules in the book no, you merely have to study it to gain access.  So the Grimoire is not actively used unless the Fatemaster has ruled it or the specific special grimoire has such rules.

7) Not really per say.  Again it is up to the fatemaster and player to define the details of the spell.  A demonic howl for a terror immuto likely will draw attention for good or bad.  Having glowing eyes as a defining point on a control like spell might make hiding in the dark harder.

[Ergonomic Cat]

I think the your magical theory does impact how you cast spells, though.  Some of them are very clearly rooted in a the traditional gestures/runes/words of power type spell casting and stress ritual very strongly.  I'd think that it would be reasonably easy to identify spells from those casters - they're going to hold up a spell component of some sort, and then say some sort of word or phrase, or make some kind of specific gesture.  I'd think you could even determine their teacher from how they cast spells, if you knew them both.

Someone like a Hedge Witch, though, probably does whatever they think is appropriate.  I assume most of them twitch their noses.

In my head, I imagine most spell casters are either Harry Dresden style, where they have a particular word for each effect, and possibly an item, like an old school D&D wizard who has a specific ritual (throw a pinch of bat guano wrapped in cloth at the target, and it will become a fireball, or they're like the kids in The Magicians (Syfy show/book series) where there's some prescribed series of hand gestures that they practice over and over again.

For my fledgeling spellcaster (currently an Illusionist with a flaw to have a manifested power) she doesn't actually cast any spells yet, but once she does, it will all be flowing gestures of the sort a stage magician uses.  Right now she just utters a pithy phrase when she uses her stuff, like "Oh, don't go" or "Watch your back!"

[Steamtastic Vagabond]

In a game I'm currently running, one of the players' grimoire is the ghost of her dead brother, because of this spell casting can be done without somatic components. It varies from character to character.

[DarkSpade]

My group is still in the creation phase so I'm not sure how useful anything I can add will be, but here's how I'll be handling it as Fatemaster.   Once a player gets access to magic(either at creation or advancement), I'm going to require them to explain to me how they'll be casting spells.  It can be spoken word, hand gestures, tracing runes on the ground with their feet, swing dancing, Elvis style pelvic thrusts, or almost whatever else they can come up with. Once they choose, they'll have to stick with it unless they find a way to train in another method. 

Whatever method they use will have it's pros and cons.  For example, if a player wants to take a page out of Legend of Korra and have their character fling magic around with martial arts moves, they'll be able to do it silently, but they'll be out of luck if they're bound.  Might even get some penalties in tight confined places.

 

For manifested powers, I'll expect more specific descriptions.