Mage spells that further duplicate the agent's normal orders, much as the
scrying spells duplicate the agent's scouting ability to some extent, would
require a new order "cast warding spell" in the late 500s (before the agent
orders that it can affect), or maybe cast as conjuring spells at 330:
Ward Population Center -- a spell that does the equivalent of the Guard
Population Center order, with a range of 12 hexes, uses the mage's rank as the
effective level of guarding, but does not increase mage rank if the spell
prevents an agent action from succeeding. The spell helps protect the warded
location from hostile agents, by making vulnerable locations resistant to damage
or detection or infiltration or whatever, much like a Hidden pop center but
less globally effective.
Ward Character -- a spell that does the equivalent of the Guard Character
order, with a range of 12 hexes, uses the mage's rank as the effective level of
guarding, but does not increase mage rank if the spell prevents an agent
action from succeeding. The spell helps protect the warded character by making
him harder to find, or by giving him a warning when he is under hostile
observation, or giving him a danger sense, whatever.
Ward Population Center could be a prerequisite for a Hide Population Center
spell, a mage could have at most one population center Hidden by his magic,
much like a Hiding artifact does. Could be modified by size of population
center, the larger the pop center the more difficult to hide. Like Reveal Pop
Center, would have to be at the location to be hidden.
Some spells which duplicate the emissary's basic orders, 520 and 525...but
cast as conjuring spells using the 330 order:
Bless Population Center -- a 12 hex range, would increase pop center
loyalty, using mage rank instead of emissary rank, but no rank gained from success.
Curse Population Center -- a 12 hex range, would decrease pop center
loyalty, using mage rank instead of emissary rank, but no rank gained from success,
and the mage cannot take control of the population center even if it drops to
rebellious.
Here's an bizarre idea for a change to some existing spells, the movement
spells. We already know that the Blue Wizards (in 4th Age) can teleport a
target character to some other hex. How about modifying the movement spells so
that they target a character?
Added required info would be character ID, and the character targetted would
have to be in the same hex. The default would be the character id of the
mage. Putting in another character ID would attempt to move that target
character. The spell would automatically fail on anyone who had already moved that
turn (so it could not be used to send someone away moments after they
themselves got there), which is the case anyway for the normal use of the spell,
and it would also fail if attempted on an army, navy, or company commander.
Relations of the target's nation towards the mage's nation would affect the
chance of success for characters other than the mage -- the character's own
nation would have the equivalent of Friendly relations (which would keep the
chance of success normal), Tolerated would have a slight penalty, Neutral
relations a larger penalty, Disliked even larger, and Hated relations the largest
penalty, similar to other orders affected by relations. I'll use the combat
modifiers as a base and assume that the current spell success chance
includes the +25% for Friendly relations. So if your mage would be 79% likely to
Fast Stride himself, he would have that same 79% chance towards any other
character of the same nation or of allied nations with Friendly relations, but
might have only a 64% chance to affect a character at Tolerated relations, a 54%
chance to affect a Neutral character, a 44% chance to affect a character
that Dislikes the mage's nation and only a 29% chance to affect a character that
Hates the mage's nation. Because the spell would be cast as normal at order
825, characters that move normally at 810 or in a company at 820 would not
be affected, as they would not be valid targets anymore, and most hostile
actions would already have taken place, so the spell could not prevent a 330 or
525 or 615 on that turn, but it could conceivably get a character out of the
hex that turn so the next turn would be safer. ALSO -- a mage could be moved
into someone's capital as part of a company, navy or army move and use the
movement spell to get someone else out of the hex immediately after moving in.
A wide variety of other uses exist. Dragon Lord's main mages don't want to
travel from Dol Guldur to the far corners of the earth to try to get an
artifact? Send a random agent or even an allied nation's characters from Dol
Guldur with the Teleport spell, and let the guy find his own way back however he
chooses while you stay at the capital and work on your mage rank... Elrond
not feeling like leaving Rivendell? Use Path Mastery to send one of your
Arthedain or Cardolan pawns travelling... But more useful, if certainly with a
more chaotic impact on the game, would be the sending of enemy characters
farther away than they can move back in one turn...assuming the spell works after
relations are taken into account. Din Ohtar shows up at Rivendell? Have
both of the twins try to Long Stride him 14 hexes due east to 3409...and hope
he doesn't know Long Stride himself. (I really like the idea of being able to
sometimes move someone else's characters -- would be a way for mages to try
to breakup an agent or emissary assault at their location, yet not able to do
so before they get at least one chance to be annoying.)
Okay, got carried away on that one, but there you go, some random spell
ideas...
-- Ernie III
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