Vorstallen Magic Preparatory - The Third-Best School for Young Mages in the Nation! Enrol Today!

Some questions first.

If we purchased a Tutoring session, would it then start a relationship with the tutor or we would have the option to reschedule more tutoring, or would we have to go back to the Marketplace and re-buy another Tutoring session in the same subject?

How does Lore: Alchemy and Craft: Alchemy interact? Would it make sense for someone to have a Craft:Alchemy high but with a much lower Lore: Alchemy or do they usually go hand in hand?

I 100% understand why we have Souls and Spirits, we need to try and unlock our channeling 6 as soon as we can. But by the same token Souls and Spirits is ultimately a Cha based school. Long term I wonder if we might want another option to devote time to once we have Channeling unlocked.

I originally thought Alchemy as we have the Mushroom information and Alchemy supplies. But thinking on it don't we already have some skill in Runes? And if we get our theory up we should be right in time for dropping in when the class changes from Theory to Practice.


[X] Plan Runes and Save
-[x] Buy Full Camping Gear 7 coins
-[x] Buy Potion of Speed 18 coins
-[x] Buy Tutoring (Lore: Runes) x 3 60 Coins
-[x] Buy Superior Writing Equipment 22 coins
-[x] Buy Quality Geometric Tools 52 Coins
-[x] Sell Average Quality Measures and Weights 32 Coins
-[x] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife 90 Coins

This Plan leaves us with 201 Coins left to help with use however we need to. I got the speed potion because it lasts 30 minutes and running fast has a lot of uses. Other than that I value the flexibility of having the cold hard cash over a bunch of items that could help us.
 
Let's talk action economy. We have 8 actions/week. We've got 1 locked due to tutoring, 1-2 for study group, 1-2 to rivalry (it's going to eat our time, you know), 1-2 to some personal things (explore, spend time with friends etc). That means we have 1 to 4 actions free. I don't think we can fit more than one extracurriculum subject into this. I don't think plans where we go for both, say, alchemy and spirit binding, are viable.
 
Let's talk action economy. We have 8 actions/week. We've got 1 locked due to tutoring, 1-2 for study group, 1-2 to rivalry (it's going to eat our time, you know), 1-2 to some personal things (explore, spend time with friends etc). That means we have 1 to 4 actions free. I don't think we can fit more than one extracurriculum subject into this. I don't think plans where we go for both, say, alchemy and spirit binding, are viable.
I'd argue we have even less than that given we have the meditation action, and ideally we'd want to get to channeling 2 before next semester so we can take the normal class. This IMO is another reason against alchemy given the time it'll take, along with us ideally not keeping all the items we stole. One or two may make sense, but all four is suspicious if they come up, particularly having quality equipment for an elective we didn't take.

Regarding the Souls and Spirits argument, I'd agree but we took it, we're doing well in it, our teacher has noticed us, so we should expand upon it and the circle eliminates one of Ulos weaknesses in his arts. Regardless, the Souls part is likely to be useful in understanding his curse and perhaps in conjunction with the meditation.

The try and unlock channeling 6 isn't going to happen though, the most likely thing that gets us that back is if one of the Necromancers rivals kills him. Ulos himself can't really do anything about it though.
 
I'd argue we have even less than that given we have the meditation action, and ideally we'd want to get to channeling 2 before next semester so we can take the normal class. This IMO is another reason against alchemy given the time it'll take, along with us ideally not keeping all the items we stole. One or two may make sense, but all four is suspicious if they come up, particularly having quality equipment for an elective we didn't take.
Yeah, forgot about meditation. So, we have magical theory, study group, rivalry, meditation, personal actions and we can half-ass one more focus (souls and spirits preferably because we have the class, so it'll be a little better than half-assing).
 
Right based on the price I think we could sell the weights.
I'm hesitant to sell the bone wand because it could be useful, but I understand that it could also be dangerous to us if Thomas decided he wants that back.
Items that I think we should get:
Should Get
Full Camping Gear
Draught of Wakefulness
Quality Geometric Tools
Tutoring : Skill: Merchant Etiquette, Skill: Haggling

Good to get:
Training Cube
Tutoring: Alchemy, Lore: History

That said I think I'm going to vote for this plan
[X] Plan Crafts & Tutoring
 
I'd argue we have even less than that given we have the meditation action, and ideally we'd want to get to channeling 2 before next semester so we can take the normal class. This IMO is another reason against alchemy given the time it'll take, along with us ideally not keeping all the items we stole. One or two may make sense, but all four is suspicious if they come up, particularly having quality equipment for an elective we didn't take.

I might've been a little unclear when I wrote the bit about meditation. Your teacher believes you have untapped reserves because there seems to be power beyond you yet untapped.

This is technically correct, but that power is locked behind your Curse. A Curse of Transferal is an incredibly rare piece of magic and most people unless they specialise in long-term magics effecting human beings won't have any real method of identifying one. This is actually to your advantage - if someone from Narubar found out you were carrying a curse empowering a necromancer from the Empire, they'd certainly consider having you killed. If someone from an opposing Undying Clan found out, they'd do more than consider it.

Meditation might help you find a way to get some of that magic back, but I wouldn't count on it. The main advantage would be figuring out exactly what is happening to your magic, which would give some insight into how the Curse works and how it might be broken (or whether it can be at all).

Because I don't want us to roll for concentration while we're on fire, our friends are on fire and our things are on fire and everyone's screaming. Also, if we're out of juice, our friends can make some water out of thin air. Or Ulos will be able to just make those sigils himself if he takes training? @occipitallobe

You can make sigils yourself given training. The main problem with a sigil on paper is this:

You don't know a sigil is good until you try and cast it. If you make small mistakes on paper (or use inferior ink that blots a little) and then rely on that sigil to be a combat item, you've just spent a whole lot of mana (and expensive paper) for absolutely nothing. Sigils on paper are also less forgiving about inaccuracy - the longer ago a sigil was drawn, the more accurate it needs to be. The ones you buy are high-end sigils written by professionals who specialize in this - they won't ever fail unless you damage the paper they're drawn on. They're usually hugely complex sigils that do something really specific and difficult (responding to your hand-pointing and your intentions relative to that is an incredibly complex piece of magic, casting it in combat would take too long and it's really easy to screw up).

Essentially you gain a single-use highly-complex spell that might ordinarily take very high Spellweaving to cast correctly without a big casting time that doesn't fail. The Sigil of Water, for instance offers crowd control (blast an enemy with water to knock them down), fire suppression, and it'll even work to summon water to drink in a pinch. Essentially, a Sigil makes you the equivalent of a highly skilled combat mage for one spell.
 
@occipitallobe do we need to know the spell to make a sigil? Do we need to practice the spell to make better sigils? Does magical theory help in making sigils? Can we practice sigil-making for a spell we can barely cast?
 
[X] Plan Crafts & Tutoring
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Five Families Etiquette
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Haggling
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Combat - Retreat
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Artifact Use & Identification
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Basic Alchemy x2
-[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x2
-[X] Buy Potion of Speed
-[X] Buy Itching Powder
 
Plan We're A First Year
-[X] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife
-[X] Sell Average Measures and Weights
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear x2
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Itching Powder
-[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x2
-[X] Buy Potion of Speed
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Tutoring Skill: Combat-Retreat
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Traps & Tripwires
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Artifact Use & Identification
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Five Families Etiquette
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Merchant Etiquette
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Haggling

Leaves us with a fair amount of money and gives us options to cover our weaknesses while playing to our Magic Theory strength.
 
@occipitallobe do we need to know the spell to make a sigil? Do we need to practice the spell to make better sigils? Does magical theory help in making sigils? Can we practice sigil-making for a spell we can barely cast?

All spells you simply cast are sigils. The deal with sigils is this: they care about intentionality (you need to be intending to write a spell down), level of humanity (you can't be intending to write a spell down by having a machine do it, a pen or a wand is about as far as you can get away from human hands), and order and direction of brush strokes (if a spell sigil was just a top-to-bottom line, it'd be an entirely different spell depending on whether you started from the top or bottom).

Sigils also seem to care as to what they're scribed on to some degree. A sigil scribed in the air is more tolerant of mistakes than a sigil scribed on paper, which is in turn more tolerant than a sigil scribed in iron.

So to make a sigil, you don't need to know the spell, but you do need to perform it correctly. Practicing leads to superior accuracy, which in turn leads to better spell sigils. Magical theory helps in inventing sigils and modifying them - the sigils you can buy in the marketplace are absurdly complicated fire-and-forget style spells that no combat mage could afford to cast in real combat. Rather than 'shoot at the thing I am pointing reasonably near and am intending to point at', a combat spell is more like 'shoot stream of water with sufficient force to propel water thirty metres, starting one metre in front of sigil'.

Practicing casting and sigil-making is very much the same thing. Writing a sigil on paper just requires a great deal more accuracy than your usual 'wave the hands and/or wand' style of casting, and you have no way of knowing if it worked beyond trying to activate the spell (which destroys the written sigil). Compare this to a rune, which you can test and if it doesn't work it'll just do the wrong thing and use up its charge.

One of the reasons you pay more for marketplace ones is because the failure rate is very close to zero.
 
Due to counting manually, (the vote-counter was being weird), the two options with the most votes are Crafts and Tutoring and Runes and Saves. That being said, around half the votes were not part of these two plans, and they're pretty different, so!

Time for a runoff vote.

Both Plans Have:
Full Camping Gear
Quality Geometric Tools
Potion of Speed

Only Crafts and Tutoring:

Major Item:

Runic Binding Circle

Minor Items:
Draught of Wakefulness
Itching Powder

Tutoring & Lessons:
Tutoring, Skill: Haggling
Tutoring, Skill: Combat - Retreat
Tutoring, Skill: Artifact Use & Identification
Tutoring, Skill: Basic Alchemy x2

Sales:
Sell Bone Wand

Unsold:
Average Quality Measures and Weights
Masterwork Cutting Knife
Artifact: Iron Amulet


Coins Remaining: 0

Only Runes and Save:

Items:

Superior Writing Equipment

Tutoring:
Tutoring (Lore: Runes) x3

Sales:
Average Quality Measures and Weights
Masterwork Cutting Knife

Unsold:
Masterwork Bone Wand
Artifact: Iron Amulet

Coins Remaining: 171




[ ] Crafts and Tutoring: Hey big spender! Come in and get the goods while we've got the biggest Crafts sale of the year! Arts? Well, no, no Arts, sorry.

Crafts and Tutoring largely has an Alchemy focus, buying two Alchemy training sessions, and keeping both Alchemy-related items in our possession. It also offers Haggling (for future better prices), training Combat: Retreat (for obvious reasons), and Artifacts (most likely in order to deal with the artifact we current possess and to allow us to look at crafting Artifacts in future). It does, however, take up a grand total of five Actions to take do all this Tutoring. It also offers the Binding Circle to help Ulos in his Spirit-related shenanigans.

It sells the Bone Wand, looking to focus on crafting options over possible spellcasting ones, and takes a Draught of Wakefulness as a backup option, along with Itching Powder for that short-term offensive power. It does, however either plan on using every item remaining (beyond possibly our Artifact), and leaves Ulos with 0 Coins, which can be a dangerous position...

[ ] Runes and Saves: Do you like spending money, but not a lot of money? Then trust me when I say you'll love the savings offered here.

Runes and Saves offers more-or-less what the plan says. Superior Writing Equipment for writing down sigils and runes on paper, as well as the bare necessities that both plans offer (the camping gear, geometric equipment, and potion of speed). All of the money spent outside that goes on Tutoring for Runes - allowing us to fast-track our runic skill ASAP. It also sells off both Alchemical-related items, meaning we lose a possible +5 Craft: Alchemy on a good number of Alchemy rolls if we decide to take it. One might say this is the 'Ulos crafts Sigils and Runes' route, as opposed to the 'Ulos focuses on Spirits and Alchemy' route above. Of course, this choice won't lock you in to either class, but having items specced for one class or another definitely makes taking that class more effective.

The biggest draw of this plan, though, is the savings. Ulos walks away with 171 silver numismata (Coins, for the viewer at home) in his pocket, and even if Crafts sold the extra item Runes does not, Runes would still be 139 Coins ahead. That's a good amount of money for future uses. Runes and Saves offers flexibility when it might be needed, saving a large amount of money for the future. Of course, money not spent doesn't exactly offer any power-up right now facing Thomas...



There being a large numbers of plans, I opted to send the two most popular into a runoff. They're very different, both in focus and expenditure, so hopefully the thread will prefer one or the other.
 
Yeah, I had to go through and count everything up. Basically every plan was the one-man vote, so I figured I'd divide it between the two most popular options, that also conveniently managed to have major differences in both money spent and schools of magic focused.
 
[X] Crafts and Tutoring

Deleted previous comment; it was dumb.

What ended up being the choice for the Magical Theory tutor, by the way?
 
Oh, it was 100% take that option. Which I expected it to be - sometimes the quest unlocks really powerful options, but I like to include the chance to turn it down for completeness' sake and offer alternatives.
 
I dislike both of them honestly. Anyway here's a tally using the application given it presents better results; both a plan version and an individual version.
Vote Tally : Fantasy - Vorstallen Magic Preparatory - The Third-Best School for Young Mages in the Nation! Enrol Today! | Page 22 | Sufficient Velocity
##### NetTally 1.7.10.1

[X] Plan Crafts & Tutoring
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Five Families Etiquette
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Haggling
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Combat - Retreat
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Artifact Use & Identification
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Basic Alchemy x2
-[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x2
-[X] Buy Potion of Speed
-[X] Buy Itching Powder
No. of Votes: 3

[X] Plan Runes and Save
-[x] Buy Full Camping Gear 7 coins
-[x] Buy Potion of Speed 18 coins
-[x] Buy Tutoring (Lore: Runes) x 3 60 Coins
-[x] Buy Superior Writing Equipment 22 coins
-[x] Buy Quality Geometric Tools 52 Coins
-[x] Sell Average Quality Measures and Weights 32 Coins
-[x] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife 90 Coins
No. of Votes: 2

[X] Plan Neptune
-[X] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife
-[X] Sell Average Quality Measures Weights
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Runic Binding Circle
-[X] Buy tutoring skill - Five Families Etiquette
-[X] Buy tutoring skill - Combat: Retreat
-[X] Buy tutoring Skill: Haggling
No. of Votes: 1

[X] Plan Think of the future
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Spell Training: Mind Magic
-[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x 2
No. of Votes: 1

[X] Plan Zaratustra
-[X] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife
-[X] Sell Average Quality Measures Weights
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Itching Powder
-[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x2
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Runic Binding Circle
-[X] Buy tutoring Skill: Haggling
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Plan Get out Of Jail Free Cards
[x] Buy Full Camping Gear x2 14 coins
[x] Buy Itching Powderx3 27 coins
[x] Buy Sigil of Water 10 Coins
[x] Buy Draught of Wakefulness 22 coins
[x] Buy Draught of Healing 24 coins
[x] Buy Potion of Speed 18 coins
[x] Buy Tutoring (Artifact use and identification) 20 Coins
[x] Buy Tutoring (Lore: Magical Plants) (Especially Mushrooms) 20 Coins
[x] Buy Spell Training: Elemental Manipulation 100 Coins
[x] Buy Superior Writing Equipment 22 coins
[x] Buy Quality Geometric Tools 52 Coins
[x] Sell Average Quality Measures and Weights 32 Coins
[x] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife 90 Coins
No. of Votes: 1

-[X] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife
-[X] Sell Average Measures and Weights
-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear x2
-[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
-[X] Buy Itching Powder
-[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x2
-[X] Buy Potion of Speed
-[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
-[X] Buy Tutoring Skill: Combat-Retreat
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Traps & Tripwires
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Artifact Use & Identification
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Five Families Etiquette
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Merchant Etiquette
-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Haggling
No. of Votes: 1

[X]Plan Modified GUFF
No. of Votes: 0

Total No. of Voters: 10
Vote Tally : Fantasy - Vorstallen Magic Preparatory - The Third-Best School for Young Mages in the Nation! Enrol Today! | Page 22 | Sufficient Velocity
##### NetTally 1.7.10.1

[X] Buy Superior Writing Equipment
No. of Votes: 7

[X] Buy Quality Geometric Tools
No. of Votes: 7

[X] Buy Full Camping Gear
No. of Votes: 6

[X] Buy tutoring Skill: Haggling
No. of Votes: 6

[X] Buy Draught of Wakefulness x 2
No. of Votes: 6

[X] Buy tutoring skill - Five Families Etiquette
No. of Votes: 5

[X] Buy tutoring skill - Combat: Retreat
No. of Votes: 5

[X] Buy Itching Powder
No. of Votes: 5

[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Artifact Use & Identification
No. of Votes: 4

[X] Buy Potion of Speed
No. of Votes: 4

[X] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife
No. of Votes: 3

[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Basic Alchemy x2
No. of Votes: 3

[x] Buy Potion of Speed 18 coins
No. of Votes: 3

[x] Buy Superior Writing Equipment 22 coins
No. of Votes: 3

[x] Buy Quality Geometric Tools 52 Coins
No. of Votes: 3

[x] Sell Average Quality Measures and Weights 32 Coins
No. of Votes: 3

[x] Sell Masterwork Cutting Knife 90 Coins
No. of Votes: 3

[X] Sell Average Quality Measures Weights
No. of Votes: 2

[X] Buy Runic Binding Circle
No. of Votes: 2

[x] Buy Full Camping Gear 7 coins
No. of Votes: 2

[x] Buy Tutoring (Lore: Runes) x 3 60 Coins
No. of Votes: 2

[X] Buy Spell Training: Mind Magic
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Full Camping Gear x2 14 coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Itching Powderx3 27 coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Sigil of Water 10 Coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Draught of Wakefulness 22 coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Draught of Healing 24 coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Tutoring (Artifact use and identification) 20 Coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Tutoring (Lore: Magical Plants) (Especially Mushrooms) 20 Coins
No. of Votes: 1

[x] Buy Spell Training: Elemental Manipulation 100 Coins
No. of Votes: 1

-[X] Sell Average Measures and Weights
No. of Votes: 1

-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Traps & Tripwires
No. of Votes: 1

-[X] Buy Full Camping Gear x2
No. of Votes: 1

-[X] Buy Tutoring, Skill: Merchant Etiquette
No. of Votes: 1

Total No. of Voters: 10

Edit - if people still want to go for my plan, I'll edit in a wakefulness drought and itching powder given some of your said you wanted it.
 
Last edited:
[x] Runes and Saves
I don't like any of them but this one is less commiting.
If it will change your mind my plan lets us identify and possibly use our artifact and will allow us to identify and use/sell the mushrooms we found, as well as make potions in the future. I.e. it's less flexible immediately but offers potent benefits within the week.

Frankly, the main differences are: 1) my plan buys the runic binding circle and the Runes + Saves plan doesn't, a 150 coin difference, 2) my plan offers training in haggling and retreat.

We both otherwise focus on some kind of craft and have a mere net 1 action difference, due to draft of wakefulness.

@occipitallobe Would a high Runic Theory stat bleed into artifact identification or no?
 
Last edited:
*grumble grumble*
[X]Runes and save
I guess. I really don't like either plan which is why I MADE my three or four different plan variants. This will let us do a plan thing later.
 
Last edited:
[x] Runes and Saves

Hopefully not selling the artifact doesn't come back to bite us. It would be safer to do so but its price is so low compared to the other artifacts for sale, makes it hard to do it.
 
Back
Top