>But I am _not_ compensating for the increased cost, I am
>compensating for _no improvisation_! Your two issues are
>hence irrelevant.
I don't think essentially unrelated issues compensate in this way, as is probably clear by now.
And the second objection has nothing to do with the motivation of your suggested mechanic at all - I was simply pointing out that it slows the game down, for little narrative benefit. Narrative benefit is always a matter of taste, I guess.
> > Augments are an interesting, and important, game mechanic -
>>but where we can avoid making them relatively routine, we should.
>>Once they become routine, they become an additional dice roll with
>>little narrative purpose.
>
>I'm sorry? How else is most magic supposed to take effect in
>Hero Wars if augments and edges are to be avoided?
Routine is the key distinction. It looked to me like your suggested mechanic encouraged useof augments before every single use of spell casting. Which adds very little to the narrative, but slows the game down significantly.
Wanting to augment because you want to perform some action best described as an augment (say, blessing the knights sword) is a good idea. Using an augment just because you want to use sorcery and you can do so a little more effectively isn't a particularly worthwhile aim.
Which isn't to say its wrong - if you really want to get sorcerers to take slightly longer to cast slightly more powerful spells, a la a cut down RQ3 Intensity skill, its probably the way to do it. I don't know that that is a particularly worthwhile objective though, as it makes sorcery twice as complex to play for a marginal increase in utility (they would still be the second weakest magic system, though by a smaller amount).
Cheers David
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