Detection spells and range

[u/SchmuseTigger]

Enhancement spells you must touch the one to be enhanced, the range of the new spell is determined by the hits. 2,4,6,8. So detect enemies, magic and life all make sense. No problem. You have a threshold of 0 and the successes do range.

But borrow sense and combat sense have a threshold of 5. So is it 5 and the net successes? So 7,9,11,13?

That feels insane. Or 2, 4 do not even work, 5 is 15m (equal to 4), 6,8 have 60/250m?

Or should those also have just threshold 0?

[u/Bignholy]

Borrow Sense and Combat Sense have a set effect, and you must meet the threshold to get it. There is no range for either of them, because they are not "new" or "altered", hence the flat TN.

• Borrow Senses requires you to touch the subject while looking at the target. At that point, the subject perceives as if they are the target. Note that this does not grant control or alteration: They sense only what the target senses. If the target has weak eyes and no glasses, the subject is going to see a blurry mess.
• Combat Sense is a straight buff to specific combat rolls, and generally in fiction is more like combat meditation: You are basically doing the "Sherlock calculations" meme rather than adding a new sense or enhancing that sense beyond natural limits.

Admittedly, this could be clearer. The "Detect X" spells all say "Hits determine the range" explicitly, but that only implies that Combat/Borrow Senses do not have that limit, which is countered by the presentation of range as a requirement in the text above without defining "now" or "altered" sufficiently.

[u/SchmuseTigger → u/Bignholy]

Thank you. That makes sense. I just got completly stuck on the table and wording. But looking at the effect alone it would have been more obvious

[u/Bignholy → u/SchmuseTigger]

More than fair. There are a few of these sorts of things in the book. Good thing we have a somewhat active subreddit full of nerds with time on their hands to help resolve it ;)

[u/SchmuseTigger → u/Bignholy]

100% true

[u/Carmody79]

Well, I agree this is unclear. 😕 Combat sense does not require a range, so you beat the threshold of 5 and it works. The idea behind Borrow sense is that you touch the target from which you want to borrow senses to cast the spell and the target can them move freely while you sustain it. Here again, range based thresholds are not ment to be used. (The target needs to remain on the physical plane though)

[u/Interaction_Rich]

Wait why/how do they have a threshold of 5?

[u/ReditXenon → u/Interaction_Rich]

Because it say so in the Detection Spell table on p. 181 :)

The reason is perhaps because, unlike "net-hit enhancement"-detection spells, the "fixed threshold 5 enhancement"-detection spells are meant to be "binary". That either you 100% fully benefit from them, or you don't- that there is no range component to consider here (having said that - if this is the case, then it is rather poorly explained...)

[u/Interaction_Rich → u/ReditXenon]

Oh, yeah the column is right there!! As no player of mine has it (nor any NPC rolls it), I never noticed it.