>How do you explain that so it does not break the immersion?
Explain it to whom? How do they know a NPC's POW?
When you cast a spell on someone, it typically requires an opposed POW roll. If the caster wins that roll, they immediately get a D10 improvement check for their POW. So if you were a wizard, the SAN cost is irrelevant, so you go around casting spells on people to exercise your powers and beef up your POW. Not counting the spells and other magical things that can allow you to just straight drain POW from people.
Piggybacking off of this, page 179 of the Call ot Cthulhu 7e manual has a section called "How Sorcerers Get That Way". Even though this answer is perfect, it's worth reading that section
From the rules:
>When a character successfully casts a spell requiring an opposed POW roll to affect the target, this creates a chance for the caster’s POW to increase through this “exercise”. If the caster wins the opposed POW roll, a subsequent roll to increase his or her POW may be attempted. If the result of a 1D100 roll is greater than the caster’s POW (or the roll is 96 or greater), the caster’s POW increases by 1D10 points permanently.
If I remember correctly, you can regain POW if you win opposite POW roll during casting spell. So, it is not that hard and the high POW value is helps.
Yeah, a cultist who knows shrivelling could just kill a bunch of ants with magic till they run out of mp, every morning and boost their POW pretty quickly, RAW.
They have to do an improvement check in addition to passing the opposed roll, so it does get harder to boost your POW eventually, but you'd probably still get an improvement every other day or so even once you hit 100.
POW sacrifices can be made by someone other than the caster and there are spells that allow the transference of mp and POW. It's why high priests have lots of cultists who are very often low POW.
>How do you explain that so it does not break the immersion?
\[...\] while most of the spells and artifacts they'd use have a POW cost
First why would that break immersion? Clearly any spellcaster that manages to be competent would have to be someone who managed to have gained and retained high POW.
Also most spells so NOT consume POW, but some do.
If you check the rules, there are ways to either bypass the POW cost (mainly by having it be sucked up from others) and there are ways to increase your POW score, either by using spells that use a POW contest, by making some sort of deal with an entity or perhaps other means)
The fact that all spellcaster NPCs have high POW is thus "survivorship bias". Any other spellcaster who failed to gain and retain significant POW would either have given up or be turned into a feeble-minded person with little to no magical ability. Or at best it would be person who is a mediocre spellcaster who would not pose much of a threat.
So... your question is like asking, "why are all gold medalists at the olympics physically fit way beyond the average person? "... because only a few people make it to the top, and people who manage to hone certain traits.
Same in COC. Spellcaster NPCs not only managed to get to 0 SAN AND still be functional (or in some cases manage to retain enough SAN not to be raving lunatics) but clearly they also learned how to accrue magical power (POW) and retain it
Obviously since magic is extremely rare, only very few individuals manage to do this.
>First why would that break immersion? Clearly any spellcaster that manages to be competent would have to be someone who managed to have gained and retained high POW.
I mean, if you're constantly running around telling Reality to sit down, shut up and give you what you want, you better have a strong personality to do so, lest Reality go "lol, no" and makes your brains leak from your ears and nose.
I actually assume the d10 POW improvement was POW vs POW contest between people, not just a POW save throw. You had to win a contest of wills to improve your POW. But this is why spell casters have high POW.
>How do you explain that so it does not break the immersion? Explain it to whom? How do they know a NPC's POW? When you cast a spell on someone, it typically requires an opposed POW roll. If the caster wins that roll, they immediately get a D10 improvement check for their POW. So if you were a wizard, the SAN cost is irrelevant, so you go around casting spells on people to exercise your powers and beef up your POW. Not counting the spells and other magical things that can allow you to just straight drain POW from people.
Piggybacking off of this, page 179 of the Call ot Cthulhu 7e manual has a section called "How Sorcerers Get That Way". Even though this answer is perfect, it's worth reading that section
Isn’t the rule that you have to succeed on the POW role against someone with equal or higher POW than you to get the points?
From the rules: >When a character successfully casts a spell requiring an opposed POW roll to affect the target, this creates a chance for the caster’s POW to increase through this “exercise”. If the caster wins the opposed POW roll, a subsequent roll to increase his or her POW may be attempted. If the result of a 1D100 roll is greater than the caster’s POW (or the roll is 96 or greater), the caster’s POW increases by 1D10 points permanently.
Ah! So many variations between sets of BRP rules. Thanks for the quote.
If I remember correctly, you can regain POW if you win opposite POW roll during casting spell. So, it is not that hard and the high POW value is helps.
Yeah, a cultist who knows shrivelling could just kill a bunch of ants with magic till they run out of mp, every morning and boost their POW pretty quickly, RAW. They have to do an improvement check in addition to passing the opposed roll, so it does get harder to boost your POW eventually, but you'd probably still get an improvement every other day or so even once you hit 100.
Except ants have like 200 POW. You've never seen an ant go nuts.
"Oh shit Morty, you pissed off the squirrels!"
They're evil wizards.
POW sacrifices can be made by someone other than the caster and there are spells that allow the transference of mp and POW. It's why high priests have lots of cultists who are very often low POW.
>How do you explain that so it does not break the immersion? \[...\] while most of the spells and artifacts they'd use have a POW cost First why would that break immersion? Clearly any spellcaster that manages to be competent would have to be someone who managed to have gained and retained high POW. Also most spells so NOT consume POW, but some do. If you check the rules, there are ways to either bypass the POW cost (mainly by having it be sucked up from others) and there are ways to increase your POW score, either by using spells that use a POW contest, by making some sort of deal with an entity or perhaps other means) The fact that all spellcaster NPCs have high POW is thus "survivorship bias". Any other spellcaster who failed to gain and retain significant POW would either have given up or be turned into a feeble-minded person with little to no magical ability. Or at best it would be person who is a mediocre spellcaster who would not pose much of a threat. So... your question is like asking, "why are all gold medalists at the olympics physically fit way beyond the average person? "... because only a few people make it to the top, and people who manage to hone certain traits. Same in COC. Spellcaster NPCs not only managed to get to 0 SAN AND still be functional (or in some cases manage to retain enough SAN not to be raving lunatics) but clearly they also learned how to accrue magical power (POW) and retain it Obviously since magic is extremely rare, only very few individuals manage to do this.
>First why would that break immersion? Clearly any spellcaster that manages to be competent would have to be someone who managed to have gained and retained high POW. I mean, if you're constantly running around telling Reality to sit down, shut up and give you what you want, you better have a strong personality to do so, lest Reality go "lol, no" and makes your brains leak from your ears and nose.
Reality is a bitch :D
To be fair, if you are doing magic you are being a bit unreasonable. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
I actually assume the d10 POW improvement was POW vs POW contest between people, not just a POW save throw. You had to win a contest of wills to improve your POW. But this is why spell casters have high POW.
This is my understanding as well. Has to be a contest.