Tell me more ×
Role-playing Games Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for gamemasters and players of tabletop, paper-and-pencil role-playing games. It's 100% free, no registration required.
up vote 11 down vote favorite

Lets say I have a rote spell set up with 4 shifts for a straight attack. Because it's a rote spell I don't have to make a 4 on my discipline roll, but I still role the discipline for the attack.

So, does that mean that if I role a discipline of 2 that I do 6 stress (excluding any defense)?

Or am I wrong and I just do the 4 stress?

share|improve this question

1 Answer

up vote 6 down vote accepted

It's still an attack, so an opposed roll is still required. Since it's an attack evocation, your "attack roll" uses Discipline. The only difference is that you're not also using this same roll to control the energy of the evocation: you automatically get a roll of 0 to control it.

So yes, you still roll Discipline in an opposed roll against the target's defense, and if you win the contest, you get to add the rote's weapon rating (4) to the shifts you got in the opposed roll to determine the total stress inflicted.

share|improve this answer
You are not required to have Discipline be the skill for the "attack". It can be Fists, Guns, or any other appropriate skill. For instance, if I were making a rote that mimicked Harry's force rings, I'd make Fists or Athletics be the attack roll. But most wizards have higher disciplines that Fists, in general! – gomad Jul 5 '11 at 6:24
The implied question was whether anything has to be rolled, which is yes, but I'll amend it a bit to leave room for alternatives. – SevenSidedDie Jul 5 '11 at 6:31
@Seven-thanks. I find that the majority of the very few DFRPG players I encounter think that Discipline is the only choice. I thought the rules and examples made it pretty clear, but apparently not clear enough. – gomad Jul 6 '11 at 19:59
@gomad I've been trying to find the exact place that covers this: do you have a page number that would be useful? – SevenSidedDie Jul 6 '11 at 20:24
Oh, man, I have been doing this wrong the whole time! I tracked down the reference I remembered seeing (YS280) and lo and behold - it's about Enchanted items! The Discipline roll of any Evocation is also the targeting / attack roll, and it's automatically a zero. The rules state (YS258) that you can invoke aspects and apply other modifiers after the fact to improve that result. I must slink away into a cave to hide now and hope that my players never read this answer. Fortunately, since, as I mentioned, wizards have high Discipline compared ot other skills, they've only used that! – gomad Jul 6 '11 at 21:31
show 3 more comments

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.