Kindle

Kindle is an Intuitive Cantrip perk found on MS26. It references B433 which contains Making Things Burn tiers.
==Flame not Igniting==
Given that it creates a standalone flame without needing to actually burn something, it presumably creates a small amount of light, which could be useful. Taking Torch as a perk should obviously give MORE light though, since it can't destroy stuff.
==Damage==
This is similar to the Accessory perk of Ignition in GURPS Supers, it does not explicitly inflict Burning Attack damage, but has similar repercussions.
*"equivalent to a 1-FP Ignite Fire spell with no range" is presumably describing the EFFECTS and not other aspects (no mention of requiring a skill roll, "never require concentration or rituals" per M25) including "don’t work if there’s no mana"
The spell Ignite Fire never explicitly causes damage, just the creation of fire which would then inflict damage per standard fire rules.
The approach to representing that in GURPS Sorcery is to treat it as a Burning Attack with the No Wounding limitation. This prevents it from inflicting direct injury, but the damage still determines the impact on Flammable things.
*interestingly it would actually be cheaper to take No Wounding with Incendiary on a Small Piercing Attack instead
Prior to sorcery, that ability to still set fires w/ No Wounding hadn't been clarified: it's the damage that matters, not the injury!
Flammability Class is sadly not actually represented by traits for characters. There's one trait that's similar but uses entirely different rules.
Hazard (Heat) also seems like maybe a better representation of Ignite Fire's fluff as compared to it's crunch. This was introduced in PU4, prior to that the closest was Hazard (Dehydration).
==Fatigue cost==
MS25 says "rarely call for FP" though it's not clear there which ones would fall under it. The only ones besides Kindle to mention FP are these two:
*Mystic Gesture: "pay 1 FP to change it"
*Rinse: "Each use costs 1 FP"
Kindle is less explicit about the cost: "equivalent to" could be seen as implying you would pay 1 FP as for the spell (if so, then as per the spell, you should get that refunded if you use it in Very High Mana : since there is no skill roll you can't cast it for free on a critical success)
*the "save 1 FP when you cast it" makes it sound like this is a "zero energy" sort of benefit. It effectively is giving +5 to effective skill for purpose of ritual discount.
==Functions==
It works on "Highly Flammable" and above.
*also with Melee Attack -30% meaning that this is sort of a "less than 1 point" perk
*PU4p19 allows the Incendiary enhancement for Burning Attack to move the MTB level of things "up one step" (for example: [[Highly Flammab]e]] objects would operate like Super-Flammabe, requiring negligible damage instead of 1 point, to ignite. "Candle flame" is used as an example of "negligible damage".
"Light a candle" happens to be the 1st tier of Ignite Fire, but "heat produced by a lit candle wick" and "heat required to light a candle wick" are perhaps slightly different? Or maybe they're always the same? PHYSICS... radiation/convection/conduction?
Since it "never require concentration or rituals" it presumably uses an Attack maneuver rather than a Concentrate like Ignite Fire which it emulates.
"these perks don’t work if there’s no mana" implies the Mana-Sensitive limitation on Innate Attack, however "these aren’t subject to modifiers for mana" runs in contrast to that: MS is supposed to give -5 to use abilities (those which require rolls, not all do) in Low Mana.
==Skill Bonus==
Sort of... beyond it's independent operating parameters, this perk subtracts 1 from the FP cost to cast Ignite Fire ONLY when used in touch (close combat) otherwise if used at distance (Regular -1/yard modifiers) there is no FP discount.
*unclear if wand/staff allow this to be "touch by staff" instead of "touch by finger"
As this gives a situational bonus to a skill (effectively +5 to skill only for purposes of determining energy cost, only at close range) it might be related to P162's Abilities Enhancing Skills. This is pretty close to the +4 it can give for "miraculous aid" (literally creating flame by itself, something Ignite Fire can't actually do without fuel) but allowing a larger bonus since it applies in fewer situations (only for FP cost, only at close range)
"only give bonuses if they work" often requires rolling (IQ to get +4 for Manual Dexterity from Telekinesis on a fine skill for example) but presumably not for abilities which are automatically successful.
Innate Attack would normally require a roll to hit, but that is very easy with a Melee Attack due to +4 Telegraphic Attack + 4 Determined Attack (all-out) with other options like Evaluate stacking / doubling Evaluate as house rules.
You would normally roll a melee attack anyway if doing a "touch" spell, which is valuable when trying to use Regular Magic against targets which are not visible (eg to avoid -5 to Ignite Fire a candle in darkness).
Probably makes sense to apply that to bad lighting too: if you are -5 to ignite fire in -10 dark penalties, then -4 at -8, -3 at -6, -2 at -4 and -1 at -2 could also make sense.
Much as All-Out Concentrate mentions spells in Psionic Powers, other parts of PP might be floated to spells too... PP6 Additional Contact for example: +1 to "touch" (ie works through clothing), extra +1 for "true touch" (ie "skin to skin", or "skin to wick" in this case)
Inanimate targets can suffer blatant contact (ie 2 hands touch) for a third +1 for +3 total.
Psi also enjoys:
:the GM should assign appropriate task difficulty modifiers (p. B345) for any particularly easy or difficult uses of an ability
This might be banned for magic, but maybe not?
"non-attack abilities may be able to use the rules for time spent" would be banned since this would qualify as an attack ability. This is similar to the prohibiotion on Reduced Time reducing attacks to less than 1 second as free.
"treat the base time as one minute or the ability’s activation time, whichever is longer." is probably a good balance guideline from there to prevent making it too easy.
Applying that to ignite fire would require 60 seconds to cast instead of 1, 6x longer than even doing it with Ceremonial Magic.
If a blanket x60 base casting time (rather than "whichever is longer") is used then it could be balanced to allow that for higher level magics.
Keep in mind that this would mean x120 casting time just to get a +1... Magic already suggests a x2 time to get a +1 which is equivalent to Time Spent without requiring 60-second minimums!
Category:Spells