Personally, these are the following tweaks I would make:
• Limit the force of freecast spells to the casters Magic attribute or their Spellcasting skill (whichever is lower) + Initiation Grade. This seems to work with the spirit of the existing magic system much better.
Hmmm. That makes sense, actually. Though it allows for some potentially powerful freecasting affects for skilled and initiated mages, who ideally will have a wider range of known spells and will have to rely on freecasting less anyway. Meanwhile, freecasting should be more attractive to magicians just starting out, who have a smaller number of spells and rarely have Magic ratings high enough that the 5 cap is an issue. I realize 5 is a fairly arbitrary cap, but it keeps things sane; I want freecasting to be the exception, not the rule. I don't want to invalidate the current magic rules by making freecasting too attractive.
I dunno, your idea seems like a good one. I'll have to think about this one. Anyone else wanna weigh in?
• Every freecast spell is considered "overcasting" for the purposes of drain. i.e.: freecast spell drain is always physical. this makes sense from a "focusing and shaping raw magic in a not-fully-controlled-or-understood" point of view... fluff wise.
I figured using the full Force of the spell for base Drain covered that. I wouldn't want to do both base Drain = [full Force] and make drain physically. People would be coughing up their spleens after freecasting even minor effects. I may go with physical Drain by itself instead.
• Every freecast spell is considered a glitch. I don't dig this idea. It could be interesting, but I just don't think it jives with the spirit of the glitch rules. Glitches are generally negative, and I think there's enough penalties for freecasting without making every attempt into a bad thing. I do like the idea of making every freecast have some sort of entertaining and interesting side effect, but not necessarily a bad one.
Glitches aren't always that negative; while they can be inconvenient, sometimes they're just interesting story-wise. I want people to use freecasting, since it'd be pointless to create a house rule no one would want to use, right? But pulling off effects on the fly is a potentially powerful advantage, and as I explained before, I don't want it to be too advantageous for players to rely on this option. Imposing a glitch-like effect on freecasting makes it an actual risk. It reflects a magician just barely maintaining control over forces she doesn't fully understand; her control is never complete, and there's always something unexpected that happens, and more than often that something isn't good. Giving a random effect that may be beneficial is basically giving them a potential extra affect for free some of the time, potentially making freecasting too attractive. These glitches are often inconvenient, but are rarely all that bad, since they accompany
successful freecast effects. It's up to the GM whether to impose a negative effect or just an "interesting" one, just like it's his call what happens when someone glitches while firing a gun, vaulting over a fence or negotiating with a mark. And the glitch system already exists and does exactly what I want for "uncontrolled" magic, as opposed to having to create a new sub-system around "random" effects ala the Wild Magic table from 2nd Ed AD&D or something.
Feel free to disregard the glitch thing if you don't like it, or come up with an alternative that works for you; I don't insist people use my house rules unadulterated and without adjusting them for their own play styles and sensibilities.
One thing I will do is add a rider that prevents "double-glitch" effects for freecasting -- if you roll an actual glitch while shaping imperfectly controlled magic, your glitch is already covered by dint of your freecast attempt, and you don't get hit twice. That seems fair. Though if you fail a freecast effect at all, sucks for you because you've just critical glitched; that's
always bad.
• Optionally: Considering that many groups already have a house rule of "don't divide drain by 2 when calculating drain codes". Drain for freecast spells could be "(Calculate drain as normal) x2". This will generally lead to slightly higher drain (but not tons higher), which makes sense, as there will never be overcasting when freecasting, so drain values would tend to be lower than normal anyway. Doing this ensures that its actually a draw back.
Eh. I can't write my house rules around the house rules other people may or may not be using in their games, right? I have to write my rules around the game as it's written, since it's a known quality and it makes my rules accessible to more players. Full Force as base Drain for all spells seems punitive to me; that's the reason I use it for freecasting. I don't imagine groups that stamp down on magic this hard would allow freecasting in the first place, since magic is apparently already overpowered in their view anyway. (I can't think of another reason anyone would apply that rule.) If groups want to use my freecasting house rule while using increased Drain for spells, they can house rule it somehow.
That said, if I decide to treat freecast effects as overcasts, Drain-wise, this won't be an issue anyway.
Thanks for the feedback! You've given me a lot to think about.
