Miscast Table

Some thoughts on miscasts in general: I think spell level should have some effect on the miscast roll... higher level spells should have a higher risk. Could be as simple as adding the spell level to the miscast chance if you fail to cast - I would recommend double the spell level, especially since people who are casting high level spells are going to have high enough WP that failing their roll by huge numbers is very unlikely. On the other hand, I think spell level should be disregarded for the actual effect of the miscast - miscasts should be an equally large problem for everyone, but the current system makes low level miscasts negligible and high level miscasts much more deadly. The good results should still be possible for high level spells, and the really terrible results should still be possible for low level spells.

I had some spare time, so I threw together a larger, sexier miscast chart. Enjoy.

Roll 1-20 on a miscast:
1: The spell pours forth from you in a torrent, your words being forgotten as they spill from your lips. The spell succeeds as normal, but you cannot cast it again this encounter.
2: Magic slips through your fingers but you are able to retain some. The spell fails but you gain a +10 bonus on your next casting roll.
3: The spell slips through your fingers, but you avoid any lasting ill effects. The spell fails to cast, but nothing else happens.
4: The warp pours into your body, filling you with power - if you can control it. For the rest of the encounter, you suffer a -20 casting penalty, but a +20 spell power bonus.
5: The will of Tzeentch nudges your magic slightly. The spell goes off as normal, but targets a random member of the encounter, including the caster. (If this result would be nonsensical for the specific spell cast, the spell simply fails.)
6: Your mind is briefly overloaded by the touch of the warp. You cannot cast a spell on your next turn.
7: A sliver of the warp slips through your defenses and taints your mind. You suffer a -10 penalty to casting for the rest of the encounter.
8: Whispered words fill your mind and flow out of your mouth uncontrollably. You spend your next action attempting to cast a random spell from a random lore at a random target.
9: The power of the warp flows out through the room, mutating and changing briefly, and then returning to normal. Until the end of your next turn, you and one other random participant in the encounter switch stats.
10: The energy you were attempting to harness manifests as bright emerald fire, covering your body. Take one wound per level of the spell miscast.
11: Seeing an opportunity to escape the Realm of Chaos, a minor daemon hijacks your spell. You accidentally summon a single Pink Horror, who begins attacking a random target.
12: Your grasp on the winds of magic slips. You suffer -15 to spell power rolls for the rest of the encounter.
13: You accidentally channel the power of the Screaming Bell, blasting all present with waves of defeaning sound. All non-Skaven present take 5-10 damage.
14: Your body is wracked by arcs of orange electricity, weakening you. Reduce all stats other than W by half for the encounter.
15: You accidentally cast the Tzeentch lore spell Open the Rift in your zone, lasting for exactly 3 rounds. The summoned daemons attack you if able, otherwise they attack a random target in their zone.
16: The Eye of Slaanesh falls upon you. For the rest of the encounter, enemies hit you automatically, as you lose interest in avoiding being struck. Pain is good. In addition, you gain +15 T, as minor wounds only encourage you in this state. If you know the Lore of Slaanesh, you gain an additional +15 T for the encounter.
17: The Eye of Nurgle falls upon you. Your flesh begins to blacken and fall away, as Nurgle's Rot ravages you. You lose 1 wound. On your next turn, you lose 2 wounds. On your next turn, you lose 3 wounds, and so on, until your death or the end of the encounter. None of this damage can be mitigated by armor or prevented in any way. If you know the Lore of Nurgle, ignore this result.
18: The Eye of Khorne falls upon you. You cannot cast spells for the rest of the encounter, and all other wizards take a -10 casting penalty.
19: The Eye of Tzeentch falls upon you. For the rest of the encounter, all spells cast successfully (by anyone) have Irresistible Force. All spells that fail to cast cause a miscast. In addition, you suffer a -20 casting penalty for the encounter, unless you know the Lore of Tzeentch.
20: You catastrophically lose control of the warp energy remaining in your body, causing it to detonate in a massive explosion. You take damage sufficient to reduce you to 1 wound. All others present take half that amount of damage, reducing them to a minimum of 1 wound. This damage cannot be reduced by armor or otherwise prevented.

That is one sexy miscast table. We're going to have to make some kind of table for choosing random magic spells though for that 8 roll.

My thinking was that we would just roll 1 through however many lores there are, then roll 1 through however many spells there are in that lore.

Also, I think some of the more boring ones should be replaced with more interesting alternatives. I had the idea that each Lore should have one miscast result related to their Lore that they get to ignore, or get some benefit from - I did so below with the Chaos lores, but including the other lores would be ideal.

Using Ferret's new sexy miscast table as a base we came up with a whole new series of abilities to screw over our characters. Behold and be amazed!


Roll 1-30 on a miscast:
1: The spell pours forth from you in a torrent, your words being forgotten as they spill from your lips. The spell succeeds as normal, but you cannot cast it again this encounter.

2: Magic slips through your fingers but you are able to retain some. The spell fails but you gain a +10 bonus on your next casting roll.

3: The spell slips through your fingers, but you avoid any lasting ill effects. The spell fails to cast, but nothing else happens.

4: The warp pours into your body, filling you with power - if you can control it. For the rest of the encounter, you suffer a -20 casting penalty, but a +20 spell power bonus.

5: Your spell fails to go off as intended. The spell goes off as normal, but targets a random member of the encounter, including the caster. (If this result would be nonsensical for the specific spell cast, the spell simply fails.)

6: Your mind is briefly overloaded by the touch of the warp. You cannot cast a spell on your next turn.

7: You cut off your spell power quickly to avoid suffering from horrible side-effects. You cannot cast spells with Irresistible Force for the duration of the encounter.

8: A sliver of the warp slips through your defenses and taints your mind. You suffer a -10 penalty to casting for the rest of the encounter.

9: The energy you were attempting to harness manifests as bright emerald fire, covering your body. Take one wound per level of the spell miscast.

10: Your body is wracked by arcs of orange electricity, weakening you. Reduce all stats other than W by half for the encounter.

11: Your body becomes a vortex for magic power. You cannot cast spells for the duration of the encounter and all spell effects, good and bad are transferred to you.

12: The magic flows through your body draining your strength away making your weakness your greatest strength. All your stats are lowered to your lowest total stat (except W) for the duration of the battle.

13: Seeing an opportunity to escape the Realm of Chaos, a daemon hijacks your spell. You accidentally summon a single Daemon with 10W and 10* the miscast spell's level in all other stats, who begins attacking the caster immediately acting just before the casters initiative. The daemon will not attack any other member of the group and vanishes back to the warp at the end of the battle or if the caster dies.

14: Your grasp on the winds of magic slips. You suffer -15 to spell power and casting rolls for the rest of the encounter.

15: You accidentally open a rift in the warp. Daemons pour from the gap and start slaughtering everyone present. 2-4+Spell level daemons are summoned. They have the stats of Pink Horrors.

16. You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Light. It strips away your protections, magical and otherwise. You lose all armor, DR, block, and ward saves for the duration of the encounter. If you know the Lore of Light this surge of magic heals your wounds and restores you to full hp.

17. You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Beasts. Your mouth turns to a feral snarl as your inner beast comes out and you drop your weapons attempting to claw and bite your opponents to death. You may only make basic melee attacks or charges for the duration of the encounter and may not use weapons. If you know Lore of Beasts you gain +5S and whenever you make a basic melee attack you may instead make two attacks.

18. You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Metal. Your body becomes a giant magnet, ripping off pieces of metal and causing them to fly towards your body at high speeds. You take an automatic 1 damage per point of armor possessed by all targets within 1 zone. If you know the Lore of Metal you gain 1 armor for each person who dealt this damage to you. (Apply this after the initial damage).

19: You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Fire. It explodes around you causing you to take an automatic 2 fire damage each round until the end of the battle. If you know the Lore of Fire this also affects all enemies within a zone.

20: You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Shadow. Your body twists and contorts as it turns to shadow. You have a 50% chance each turn of turning completely to shadow. If you do so you cannot take any actions this turn. If you know the Lore of Shadow you are immune to all damage and effects while turned to shadow.

21. You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Heavens. A giant comet is summoned and uses you as a beacon for its landing. The comet strike you and all characters within 1 zone. All characters struck by the comet suffer a S(30+10*Spell Level) hit that deals 5 damage. You are automatically wounded by the attack. If you know the Lore of Heavens you may make a free casting roll each turn (with the standard +10 per successful cast) to delay the comets arrival by 1 round. Regardless of the delay it always arrives in your current zone.

22. You accidentally draw your power from the Lores of Necromancy and Death. Your soul is drained and you lose 50% of your current health. All necromancy summons gain +10 Ws, S, and T and are restored to full Hp. You also make a Wp roll against all non-necromancy summons on the battlefield. If you succeed that target loses 50% of their current W, if you fail they only lose 25% of their current W. If you know the Lore of Death or Necromancy you gain +5 Wp for each target you succeed your Wp against. This bonus fades by 5 Wp per round.

23. You accidentally draw power from the Lore of Waaaggghh. The great green foot of Gork, or possibly Mork descends from the sky and steps on you for 2 damage per spell level, ignoring armor. After you are struck, Mork or Gork has a 40% chance of striking a random enemy, a 30% chance of striking a random ally (including yourself), and 30% chance to walk away. If you know the Lore of Waaaggghh Mork or Gork has a 60% chance to strike an enemy, 20% chance to strike an ally, and 20% chance to wander off.

24: You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of High Magic. All casters suffer a -20 penalty to their casting rolls. You are bound to the flow of all the winds. Whenever a wizard fails a casting check, you take damage equal to the level of the spell. If you know the Lore of High Magic, you heal equal to the level of any successfully cast spell.

25: You accidentally draw your power from the Lore of Dark Magic. For the rest of the encounter, you gain access to the Dark Bolt spell at Rank 1 and you suffer double the normal penalty for missing W to your casting roll. Each round you fail to harm an opponent with a spell you suffer 2 damage. This damage increases by 2 for each round you fail to cast a spell. If you successfully harm an opponent with a spell this damage resets itself to 0. If you know the Lore of Dark Magic you gain a bonus to your casting roll equal to the number of W you've lost instead of a penalty.

26: The Eye of Slaanesh falls upon you. For the rest of the encounter, enemies hit and wound you automatically, as you lose interest in avoiding being hurt. Pain is good and your addiction to pain grants you DR 5. If you know the Lore of Slaanesh, you gain an additional +10 Ws, S, T and Ag for the encounter as the pain fuels you to greater exploits.

27: The Eye of Nurgle falls upon you. Your flesh begins to blacken and fall away, as Nurgle's Rot ravages you. You lose 1 wound. On your next turn, you lose 2 wounds. On your next turn, you lose 3 wounds, and so on, until your death or the end of the encounter. None of this damage can be mitigated by armor or prevented in any way. If you know the Lore of Nurgle, you increase your max Wounds by 10 for the encounter and immediately heal 10. If you end the encounter with less than 10 wounds, the end of this effect kills you.

28: The Eye of Tzeentch falls upon you. For the rest of the encounter, all spells cast successfully (by anyone) have Irresistible Force. All spells that fail to cast cause a miscast. In addition, you suffer a -20 casting penalty for the encounter. If you know the Lore of Tzeentch you gain a +10 bonus to your casting instead of a penalty.

29: The Eye of Khorne falls upon you. You cannot cast spells for the rest of the encounter, and all wizards take a -10 casting penalty. The magic you relied upon overloads your mind, and you begin to lose control of it. Each turn you struggle to keep it contained: Each round you must pass a casting check to keep the magic under control with the usual +10 difficulty for each successful cast. Failure to cast results in an automatic miscast. (Reroll additional Eye of Khorne results.)

30: You catastrophically lose control of the warp energy remaining in your body, causing it to detonate in a massive explosion. All players on the field suffer 5*Spell Level damage. This damage cannot be reduced by armor or otherwise prevented (Ward saves still apply). If you, the casting wizard, manage to survive the attack you are immediately reduced to 1W and have a 50% chance of dying instantly.

I still can't believe that the one miscast I was afraid of happening on that table was the first one a PC managed to get.

Happy to help <3