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buying preparations on the open market

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Crunch

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« Reply #30 on: <08-12-13/1336:51> »
As for a 'Molotov fireball', the lynchpin would be damaged by throwing it, ruining the preparation.


Even if the potion was the lynchpin, not the bottle?

Mirikon

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« Reply #31 on: <08-12-13/1349:39> »
Spilling the potion would ruin it, so unless you called the command out for it to burst mid-flight, or the time just happened to come up before it hit ground... But otherwise, no. Now, if you had time to prepare, a diagram on the floor, set to a contact trigger, so that the first person to run through that choke point unleashes a Fireball...
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Michael Chandra

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« Reply #32 on: <08-12-13/1358:38> »
Would a throwing knive that you throw by using the handle set off a lynchpin in the tip? And with an arrow, wouldn't you lynchpin the tip as well, which you don't even touch when firing?
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Mirikon

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« Reply #33 on: <08-12-13/1404:31> »
The lynchpin is the object, not a piece of the object. The whole knife or the whole arrow would be the lynchpin. Now, if the arrowhead was removable in some way, maybe... but swichable arrowheads is more advanced manufacturing, which has an increased object resistance you'd need to deal with to make the preparation to begin with. Now, going back to the onmyudo charms as an example, you could tie one around an arrow (like an arrow letter) and then fire it, or tie one to a throwing knife (like the paper bombs in Naruto) and then set them off with a command after impact. If you're careful, you could even do it so that those were contact charms, but you'd probably take circumstance penalties due to trying to avoid touching the preparation, and so on.
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Michael Chandra

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« Reply #34 on: <08-12-13/1407:30> »
So you'd basically have to use Command for it to reliably be able to trigger them. Of course that means you're not allowed to trigger them during the turn you throw/fire them, because of the one-attack rule.
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Mirikon

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« Reply #35 on: <08-12-13/1431:57> »
Exactly. Command preparations are the only ones that are really useful in a free-flowing situation. Timed and Contact preparations are traps, distractions, and the like, pure and simple.

Preparations can be insanely useful, especially with non-combat spells such as Chaotic World or Levitate, when used properly. Combat spells as preparations primarily fall in the line of traps, or something you have as a fallback, preparing six Powerbolt charms, just in case you need to keep fighting, but your normal spells either are ineffective, or you can't risk taking the drain right now, or you've been hit with an effect that reduces your drain attributes (drugs, certain spells, etc.).
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Unahim

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« Reply #36 on: <08-12-13/1612:06> »
My main problem with preparations is that it seems to me like most would last for such a small time that you'd quite possibly be walking into the mission with Drain damage before you even begin. I don't really like that.

Crunch

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« Reply #37 on: <08-12-13/1614:17> »
That's kind of the point though. If you cast the spell normally you'd suffer drain. The preperation gives you extra options, and time to mitigate at least some of the drain.

Slithery D

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« Reply #38 on: <08-12-13/1757:24> »
Yeah, cast everything over six(-ish) hours before you leave for the meet/assault/whatever and plan to do nothing else but rest. If you've got 8 healing dice (body + willpower) that's a pretty safe bet you can heal a minimum of 12 unsoaked drain over that period. (Character's based around Alchemy should take Quick Healing quality.)

That's a few good spells, and you've still got six hours to play with for transport to the run, delays, and then the initial part (at least) of the run before they start losing Potency.

Mäx

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« Reply #39 on: <08-12-13/1827:50> »
As far as combat spells being useful as preparations, I'd say they would be, regardless. However, remember that when you do a 'contact' trigger, the next living being to touch the lynchpin sets it off. Including you, if you pull that knife out of your pocket (or even pick it up to place it in a scabbard).
You don't make the whole knife a lynchpin, just the blade itself.
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Slithery D

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« Reply #40 on: <08-12-13/1830:27> »
You don't make the whole knife a lynchpin, just the blade itself.

It's all one aura, though. The real answer here is gloves, assuming it's skin touch and not aura touch that sets these things off.

Mirikon

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« Reply #41 on: <08-12-13/1843:21> »
It says 'living creature' to touch it, not make skin contact with it. Pretty sure that means aura, so gloves (or a boot, if you stepped on it) would still apply. Tongs or a Magic Fingers spell, however, would not.

And yes, the whole object is the lynchpin, not a part of an object.
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shinryu

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« Reply #42 on: <08-12-13/1935:32> »
we need official rulings on a lot of these assertions, since if they're true then alchemy basically sucks and the rules for it are stupid.

1) when, exactly, did the arrowhead become part of the arrow? i'm pretty sure most pre-modern arrowheads were affixed to the shaft separately, unless twining something together gives it all one "aura." by that definition, anything contacting the preparation becomes part of its aura, meaning if you drop that death touch preparation you just zotted everyone standing on earth. oops. similarly, if i have a prepared blade in a wood handle, i fail to see how the piece of alloy steel and the barely-polished natural wood somehow combine into a single object that is the preparation when they're radically different from a magical point of view in terms of their individual object resistance. if the blade is prepped separately, it's a separate thing, isn't it?

2) Gloves aren't sufficient to keep you from contacting a preparation? seriously? then the things are nothing but landmines (except when they then zap the entire earth when they touch it) if part 1 is true, then... you couldn't ever carry them on your person; by point 1, it's touching the thing you're carrying it in and you're touching it, so zot. even if point 1 isn't true, then i have to carry the goddamn thing in tongs? everywhere? what's the minimum safe length of tongs i need so that it doesn't contact my aura?

3) you can't set off a preparation in the same phase you throw it? if that's true, honestly, fuck 5th edition. that would take one of the best ideas in the game and turn it into the dumbest thing ever. that's like saying you can't cast a touch spell until the pass after you've made the touch attack. might as well call them nice hug spells.  hey, what if i throw the preparation at the ground and set it off, does that make it not an attack action? what if it's a mana barrier prep, not a death touch? is that suddenly ok? oh crap, that barrier manifesting might make that astral creature disrupt? does that make it an attack and not permitted? dumb dumb dumb if true.

4) define "ruins the lynchpin." if it's a thick liquid, as long as most of it stays in one place does that make it okay? you could make a really thick contact preparation and put it in a splash grenade or super squirt capsule then, assuming it stayed in one piece more or less on contact. this, incidentally makes play-doh the preferred medium for touch preparations. does drilling a hole in an arrowhead so you can screw in a modern shaft "destroy the lynchpin?" if you tell me that drilling a hole beforehand into a rock makes it worked enough to qualify for object resistance, i fucking give up; this game is too stupid to live.

suffice to say, i really look forward to these being officially clarified by actual writers of the rules in official errata or faqs at some point.

Crunch

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« Reply #43 on: <08-12-13/1939:20> »
Calm down. We're all just speculating and brain storming here.

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Unahim

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« Reply #44 on: <08-12-13/1940:47> »
If the preparation is a liquid (and assuming it splashing around doesn't ruin that) and you put it in a chemical grenade, what happens when it splashes over multiple people at once?