Ok Padawan, we've established that per Ars4 your spell reads as follows: Body of Stone that moves Muto Corpus Requiste Terram Base Level 40 T: I D: S R: T (Highly Unnatural +2) Spell Level 50 But we have yet to detaile what this means. By that, I mean how having a body of stone alters your game stats. This is why you want a body of stone, right? So per Ars it would influence your Soak, which is likely what your mainly interested. It's also sensible that it influence Encumbrance. One could argue that it changes your Quick or Dexderity, but I think altering encumbrance is an easier way to achieve the same goal. One alters encumbrance by changing a players Load, so we will need to alter Load. Let us begin. What should the soak bonus be for having stone skin? The first thing you should do is to look to other spells for guidance. Do not simply make it up. You'll always be wrong. Look at other spells, look at weapons, always base your stats on preexisting stats. What is simular to stone skin? Well first it's easy to say that if we look to armor is should be considered "Full" protection. Remember to be *conservative*. If we look to armor then let us compare it to the *lowest* metal armor. That is Steel Scale. Full Steel Scale has stats of: Protection 10 Load: -5 We will keep this a reference point. Under Creo Terram we can look to Wall of Stone which vaugely says that miner's tools can break through it. Beyond this no real stats are given for the wall. The Miner's Pick is an interesting point and we should keep this in mind. Perhaps a bonus to attack for people using pointed weapons/miner's tools? Muto Terram provides no spells with stats that can aid us. Rules of breaking through objects provide no assistance in determining stats. It would seem that Armor stats are likely our best source of guidance. Again Full Steel Scale has stats of Protection: 10 Load: -5 Typically armor is well crafted metal built for an individual. Stone skin is 'tighter' than the best built armor. Load is more than just weight, it is also impedance caused by the armor being bulky. Remember to be conservative, so I will lower the load by ONE. However, stone skin probably weighs a lot more than steel, that will raise it by one. So let's call it even, Load: -5 Stone is rather generic, but it conjures enough of description to clarify one point. "Stone", whatever it might be, is not as strong as tempered Steel. I'm going to be crazy here and be 'generous'. I will *only* lower the protection by ONE. That means Stone Skin, is a Protection: 9 a Load: -5 Essentially it is sort of between Full Leather and Full Steel Scale We discussed a possible bonus for pointed weapons/miners tools. I've decided there is enough difference between weapons and miners tools to say "pointed weapons" does not count. If one wants to include this then one must also include additional botch die to account for the fact that the weapons are being misused and could break. For simplicity, I will say no to "pointed weapons" bonus. However "Miner's Tools" recieve a +2 to damage. Why +2? Ars4 allows for some vaugeness. +2 is neither a significant or insignificant bonus. Furthermore, who's going to bring miner's equiptment to a fight? So lets finalize this spell: Body of Stone that moves Muto Corpus Requiste Terram Base Level 40 T: I D: S R: T (Highly Unnatural +2) Spell Level 50 Protection: 9 Load -5 Miner's Tools get +2 Damage This seems like a reasonable spell. I'd welcome corrections if people see them. For what it's worth AbRay, there are better ways to protect oneself in Ars Magica. The game allows for all sorts of spell effects, some are better than others. For instance, a simple Rego Terram spell would keep swords away for about half the price. Chuck
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