Topic: Casting Spells in Animal Form

[providence13]

Many Spell Lists (Aquatic Forms for example) allow a caster to assume non-humanoid or animal form.

Some of these Lists allow spell casting, some don't. But with Skills such as Spell Trickery, Spell Mastery, etc, would having no hands be any different than not using hands?
Would having no vocal chords be any different than not using Voice or something similar, from Spell Trickery?

Do you guys allow it? What if the caster has skills that enable them to cast unawares. You don't have to be obvious, if you have the skill to hide it. If you can hide your casting, then why not cast Lightning Bolt as an eagle, for instance...
Lightning Eagle!

[markc]

I want to think about this for a little while before posting. 
MDC

[yammahoper]

The easiest way is to demand SCSM and use all the mods (no voice, etc).

I would also not give the base +50...if using the later table were the base +50 if figured into the table, then a penalty of -50 will do.  This penalty would reflect the general alieness of the form to the caster.

[providence13]

On a suggestion, I checked out Merge, Merging, Merge True/Organic..

I guess the implication is "this spell has an effect and a higher level version states that spells can be cast while under the effect; so you can't cast spells while under the effect of the lower level spell".
In other words: you can't because the spell says so. 

Other than that, casting spells in animal form and merging seem like different spells and issues.

On the animal body is an animal mind issue: (at least enough of one that you can't cast spells). Reminds me of The Belgariad books. Turning into a bird is very distracting. What if you could see every mouse for miles? Still, if you have enough skill Ranks... anything may be possible.

I could go with the -50...

[markc]

Providence13;
 What I might do is create some talents that have a DP cost that specific "types" of PC and NPC's could learn to offset the penalties or even cast spells in animal forms. I might require the learner of the Talent to have specific ranks in a skill or take a specific training package to represent the unique nature of this ability. If on the other hand it is a common ability in your game world then I would let anyone buy the DP Talents to represent the ability.


 I would also allow SM to offset the penalties but I would have the penalties be fairly massive, IMHO. I do not know why I would but it just seems a better way to handle it would be a DP Talent. I also know that DP based Talents do not exist in the Core Rules but I think it should be fairly easy to add to them, the problem is keeping them balanced and limiting their scope to where they belong.


Does that help at all? Or were you looking for a RAW answer?
MDC 

[Marc R]

would a mentalist in non human form be unhindered?

[markc]

would a mentalist in non human form be unhindered?

 That is a good question that I thought of also. I do not know the official rule off the top of my head but I might say yes they do not have the same penalties as the other realms.




 Another way I thought to go was to use the Control Lycanthropy (CL) skill in conjunction with SM, in that if you make a CL skill roll you can cast spells as you keep your higher mind and do not fall into the animal state. The other option I thought about was to have the CL skill be the max skill SM bonus someone could have when in animal state. Then you would have to roll to see if you could cast spells with SM. Both of the above add new breadth to the CL skill (IIRC I did not go back and read the skill description but I seem to remember it as your ability to control shape shifting in the RAW) which may or may not be a bad thing in your game.


MDC

[providence13]

Control Lycanthropy is a close enough skill to use...

I know the RAW answer, I just don't like it.
The RAW answer is "do whatever that specific List says".

Centaurs can use skills, Trolls can use skills, but when you are a Unicorn (20th lvl), you may cast spells as a Unicorn. That's 4 or 5 Lists to 20th lvl, IIRC. A bit lopsided, imho.

[yammahoper]

A mentalist would still use the mods from the mentalism colum when calculating SCSM, so yes, they would also be affected.

Imagining a more intimate relationship between a spell users body, soul and aura than we as non spell users isn't to hard...what I'm trying to say, and very poorly, is that in a universe of magic there are bound to be many aspects of spell casting that we mundanes fail to imagine and the impact on the ease or difficulty of casting "spells."

[markc]

 The reason I said above that ment casters do not have the same penalty as other realms is that in my game world mentalism is more in tune with shape shifting spells. This is a House Rule in that I tend to bend the RAW to fit my game world. As a side note this also applies to Arcane casters as in my game they have the same spell casting methods as mentalism casters. There is nothing in the RAW that gives this impression though.
MDC

[yammahoper]

They do have less penalties on the SCSM table.  I think RAW agrees with your perception of Mentalism casting.

[mightypawn]

I may be throwing a rock in the pond here...  And I'm not saying I have any definite answers

But...

Familliars can learn and cast spells....

Also:

As for the speaking and hand gestures....

I would definitely lean toward the premise that the words spoken and the specialized gestures do not do much magically on their own.  The vocal and physical elements of Magic, in my mind at least, are instruments to focus the powers of the mind. 

Thus in human form, Vocalization, and hand gestures play a great part in magic, but in animal form the same thing would be accomplished quite differently, and it would be based on the form of the animal, how it moves and navigates, and how it relates to others of it's own species. 

Yes, I'm implying a learning curve for the caster...  I think that's only fair to the system and in keeping proper balance.  But I would love to see that Lightning Eagle!