How to handle the magic

One of the first things I decided is that this game will not be a literal interpretation of the novels. Not every person who uses magic will have it function exactly the way Harry Dresden's magic works. There's precedent for this in the books: Molly doesn't need a physical focus to cast her veils. But on the other hand, very few people will be as powerful as Harry. Similarly, those with the Arcane Background (Miracles) will probably be able to cast more overt spells than we ever saw from Michael.

So, what kind of characters can we expect? Mages and wizards, certainly. Perhaps a werewolf or other forms of shapeshifters. Street-saavy cops, ex-military snipers, or hardboiled detectives should all be capable characters. That's one reason I decided to go with Savage Worlds as the game system - it's specifically designed for characters of differing abilities to be able to work together. I'll talk more about other character options in a later post.

Let's start with mages. I'm using the Savage Worlds Explorer's Edition rules, and not much else, so I need to be able to duplicate the types of things we see with the core rules. Harry's magic seems to follow two different routes: either he channels his own energy through a focus item (blasting rod, shield bracelet, etc.), or he uses items that have their own supply of stored energy (like his force rings).

When I first began this conversion, the first thing I had to figure out was whether Harry had the Weird Science background, or straight Magic. I mean, he uses lots of magic items, right? But the power for those items comes from Harry, not the items themselves - that's clearly Magic rather than Weird Science. The items represent added flavor to his powers, more specifically, his need for these external foci sounds a lock like some kind of Hindrance to me.
So, Harry would have the standard Magic arcane background, but with a Focus Hindrance. This was suggested by one of the smart people (Noshrok Grimskull) on the Pinnacle Entertainment message boards. Here's how I'll define it:

Arcane Focus - the mage requires a physical item to focus his magic. Without the focus, channeling magic is more difficult for him; spells are harder to cast or drain more power then normal. As a minor hindrance, the mage receives a -2 penalty on his Spellcasting skill rolls OR the spells cost 2x the power points. As a major hindrance, both versions of the minor form apply (-2 on skill checks AND 2x point cost), OR the spellcasting penalty is increased to -4, OR the caster cannot cast at all without his focus. The player may choose how the hindrance affects his or her character.

In Harry Dresden's case, each spell requires its own focus for best control, but we've also seen him use his staff as a multipurpose focus when his preferred item wasn't available. And when he doesn't have the focus, his spells are less accurate, more difficult to cast, and use up more of his energy supply.

Magic items have their own internal power supply and work just like items created by someone with the Weird Science arcane background. Other characters could spend an advance to purchase a magic item, although some in-game explanation is required too. To play a character who relies on their own arsenal of magic items, I'll use a magic version of the Weird Science arcane background. I'll call that the Artificer or something. I'll let someone else come up with a name for it.

So as I mentioned, this was the first hurdle I needed to cross in order to feel like I could successfully pull off a rendition of Butcher's world. In my next post, I'll discuss the different kinds of mages that'll be showing up in my game.