FASA Games, Inc.

Greetings all,

My friends and I have recently transitioned our characters from Ed3 to Ed4 and have been having a decent bit of fun with it! Our newest member to the group, who has no previous Earthdawn knowledge, asked a question that had us kind of scratching our heads and was wondering how other people view this about Spells as they interact with physical beings.

Can any type of Spell Magic be reacted to or avoided at an early circle?

Here is an example:
Riska, the Circle 2 Elven Archer, is loaded to the gills with combat applications. He has Talents/Skills like Avoid Blow, Awareness, Great Leap and Danger Sense. Would it be possible for him to use a combination of these skills to detect and react to Mind Dagger (Wizard), Ephemeral Bolt (Illusionist) or Earth Darts (Elementalist)?

I referenced PG-Ed4 Pg 255 which has some help in this under "Observing Spellcasting", however I thought I would get some extra opinions!

Thanks a bunch in advance and GAME ON!
-Lazerus

Also, which is great for archer/magician tactics against other archer/magician is Splitting Movement combat option and use of covers the way they give you Full cover, or at least Partial. So you take a peek, shoot/cast spell and hide again.

The above mentioned Talents, and Cover would be your best bet.

When rolling spellcasting tests, the mage connects the target's pattern with the spell's pattern (held in the Matrix, etc) with what is called an "Astral Arc". This can be thought of as a line of energy connecting the two patterns, much like , which "ionizes" a channel of air with a laser, and then send a lightning bolt down the "arc" of ionized particles.

So, as long as a spellcaster can physically locate you in relation to themselves (touch, hearing, astral sensing) they can start to draw the astral arc. Cover would then modify the Spellcasting test, as it is more difficult to perceive the target and connect the target and spell patterns with the Spellcating roll.