Archive/Metaforce

This is a depreciated article from a very old version of the game, if you are reading this in 2021, ignore everything below this line

Overview

Metaforce is the general field of manipulating Magical and Psionic energy and using it to affect the material plane. A malleable, intangible, reality-bending effect used commonly in the manifestation of Magic, Ki, Psionics and other supernatural phenomena. It can be harnessed by living beings as well as manipulated by various objects, including those created by Metascience. While the ability to use Metaforce can be found innately or obtained via certain rituals, all rely on a common elements known as a Spark. Those who can wield magic or psionics innately are said to be Self-Sparking and generally have more options regarding the mastery of such powers than those who rely on other means.

For the purposes of adaptations: Metaforce covers Magic, Psionics, Ki and any other Supernatural phenomenon in regards to character ability.

Sparking (Magical and Psionic)

The definition of Sparking is the ability to generate, recharge and manipulate Metaforce and is the most essential component of any potential Spellcaster or Psion. Without a spark, a user has no source to be able to manipulate Metaforce at all. A user who gained a Spark from another source can maintain it so long as they retain some Metaenergy resource. If they expend all their resource they can up losing their spark and be unable to recover nor use Metaforce. Those with the ability to Self-Spark are unique in not only having the capacity to use Metaforce from birth but they are given the ability to recover Metaenergy even when they expend it all, hence the term Self-Sparking.

The odds of a person possessing a Self-Sparking ability is 8% among Smallfolk and Natives, the odds are less for Bigfolk at 6% and 4% for Giantfolk. The odds are increased by +1% for each Luck point a character possesses from creation. Note: Self-Sparking is not a restricted Character Creation element, Player Characters have different rules regarding their abilities compared to NPCs.

Metaforce Resource Management

• Regardless of user, a Metaforce user recovers about 20% of their current resource of energy every hour, 200% if they are resting. It means that a user with 20/100 resource will recover 5 units in the span of an hour whereas a user with 40/80 resource will recover 10 units in an hour. The user's maximum capacity does not matter, only the current energy they hold.
  • The more resource a user holds at a time, the more units of energy they can 'recover' per hour, so there is a benefit to having a higher metaforce capacity even if it does not directly affect how fast one recovers resource.
• Self-sparkers have an innate +1 unit recovery per hour. Which means even if they expend all their resource, they can always have 1 unit of resource in a hours time. This amount increases to +5 per hour while resting.
  • While not everybody can Self-Spark manipulating Magic, all Psions are Self-Sparkers.

Magical Arts (Spells) / Psionics (Powers)

Size and Scaling

One of the most daunting aspects of Magic/Psionic users is that everybody has the potential to wield them, including Giants. It is also proven that Giantfolk spellcasters and psions are capable of manipulating vasts amount of energy to create giant-sized versions of normal spells and powers. Bigfolk and Giantfolk have increased amounts of Metaforce capacity compared to Natives and Smallfolk and thus have the best flexibility regarding how big they can cast their spells or manifest their powers (although Smallfolk surprisingly have similar capacities to Natives, it is not diminished due to their small size). However even if Giants can use giant spells/powers, such manifestations also require a lot of energy and as their immense resource pool does not affect the speed at which they recover their expended energy, it can mean giants take a lot longer to recover their full resource pool compared to a native. Giants must scale down their spells/powers similar to that of native casters/psions in order to manage their energy correctly and benefit from their huge resource pools.

• The user's size modifier for their Spark capacity is a linear multiplier based on their size compared to a native. A Bigfolk who is 3x bigger than a human has 3x the Spark capacity. A giantfolk who is 12x larger has 12x greater Spark capacity. A smallfolk who is 0.35x the size of a native still has 1.00x Spark capacity.
  • The default 'spell size' cast/manifested by a user is the same as their size modifier. Giantfolk cast Giant spells costing 12x much as a Native's. Smallfolk cast Small spells costing 0.35x as much as a Native's.
• If a non-sparking Native (100) and Giantfolk (1200) both have 20 resource points and do not rest: it will take the Native 8 hours to recover back to capacity while a Giant will take between 18-19 hours to recover.
• Users can, if they possess the skill, up or downscale the size of their spells or powers, expending the appropriate resource when casting. A Native could risk enlarging a spell for a large cost while a Giant can try downscaling a spell to consume less energy.
  • Users can channel energy together to create group/combination casting/manifestation. This is in some ways the only way for non-Giants to cast giant spells by splitting the necessary energy required amongst multiple users. A group can also gain an effective recovery rate that outstrips that of a single giant caster.
    • Experienced users can channel resource into another compatible user to restore their reserves at the cost of their own. Channeling resources into a single user can help them achieve a higher recover rate (if they are not at maximum capacity) or use their higher reserves to give others a boost. A giant can effectively restore many smaller individuals with a lesser cost to their overall reserves than someone of smaller size.