Role-playing Games Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for gamemasters and players of tabletop, paper-and-pencil role-playing games. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
One of my players is generating a Herbam-focused Verditus magus.
One of the lab texts that he has is "The winged broomstick." This broomstick, obviously, should be able to fly at some sort of acceptable speed, and should have a candle in front (on its bristles) that produces light.
What would the necessary enchantments be for such a device? Please show your work.
The base effect for controlling wood (ReHe) is level 3. However, since this effect requires precise control, ability to carry a person and a reasonable speed, I guess it should be higher. I would look at the CrAu flying spell, Wings of the Soaring Wind, for guideline, as I don't think a similar effect should be much easier. That spell is base 5, plus 2 magnitudes for a highly unnatural effect and 1 for the rego requisite, which adds up to level 20. Since you can fall off the broom, but not the wind, I would probably take out one level, and have the base effect to be 15, but 10 might be reasonable too. At any rate the effect probably has to have concentration duration (since all controlled moving spells are concentration). So this adds one more magnitude, totaling in 20.
Since this is a Concentration effect, you would probably want to broom to hold concentration for the magus; this will add another 5 to the level. Then there is the number of uses. "Unlimited uses" is +10 to the level, but the magus can use a lot less. Since the broom holds concentration by itself, it can effectively be left "on" all the time, just floating around. As I understand it each use is just needed as you turn it on, or each sunset and sunrise, when it loses concentration. So we'll add +1 for 2 uses a day. The overall total for the flying effect will be 26.
As for the candle light: Base effect to a candle light is 2, but it can be brighter of course, as a torch (3) or more. At any rate to this we should a magnitude for Concentration and +5 levels for holding concentration. And again also a modifier for the number of uses per day.
Going in a different direction, if the magus wants an always on light, it can just add 2 magnitudes for a Sun effect and +4 levels for 2 uses a day and an environmental trigger at sunrise and sunset.
Looking at the literature, we can see that in Magi of Hermes, p45, we have:
Move Gigantic Wicker Basket Which is a ReHe movement item. Now, while it's effectively enchanting an elevator, it can provide a literature-supported appropriate baseline for our item.
ReHe 48 Pen +0, unlimited uses R: Touch, D: Momentary, T: Circle When the right mental command is made, the enchanted ring of stones moves the gigantic wicker basket carriage 50 pac- es in some direction. The destination is set when the enchantment is put down. (Base 15, +1 Touch, +3 Size, +10 lvls Unlimited uses +3 lvls Linked Trigger)
We can see base 15, which matches no CrAu, but instead ReCo as a transport spell. We note that the spell moves instead of teleports, providing the necessary simulacrum of locomotion.
Therefore, is is reasonable to assume that a broomstick with this ReCo equivalent ReHe can provide impetus to its rider.
My player and I settled on:
Base 20, +1 concentration, +5l device maintains concentration, +10 unlimited l40.
This provides an impulse or impetus of 500 paces per six seconds, (translation: wheeee!) and is controlled by pointing it in the right direction. Due to a correspondence with tradition, the broom is "started" by lighting the candle (and the candle will gradually fade at sunrise and sunset, suggesting that the magi should probably get out of the sky.) It's speed can be controlled by dimming or trimming the candle or its flame. All of this, of course, is purely thematic and is reflected in the item only such as that the device maintains concentration and effectively "recasts" the spell every time the change is made. It would be bad for this broom made of apple wood and wicker (iBroom) to run into ("You have reached your speed modifications per day limit.") problems with adjusting speed.
At 35, this item will be about half as fast as wings of the soaring wind. At 40, it's rather faster, just as wings would be at +1 mag.
