(2e) Secrets Ripped From The Sky

[Bloodyquill]

I feel like I missed something. Tier 2 of Secrets Ripped From the Sky says it summons a meteor to slam against a target. There's a roll to avoid knock down but there's zero mention of how much damage it does.

[Satchel]

The Tier creates the Inferno Environmental Tilt, and Mummy's iteration of it lists this under the "Causing the Tilt" section:

A meteorite from the dawn of time does the trick.

The Collapsing Ceiling Environmental Tilt is also applied to the insides of buildings hit with the Utterance, and that's another damage-per-turn effect, and even without the Inferno Tilt it also specifies the size and intensity of the fire the meteor creates in the terms that define how much damage such a fire does per the rules for Fire on page 189.

[Bloodyquill]

Thanks! I guess I was expecting something closer to the 1e version

[Tessie]

It's still weird how there's no impact damage from a meteorite hitting a target so hard buildings within a large area starts to collapse.

[Satchel]

It's still weird how there's no impact damage from a meteorite hitting a target so hard buildings within a large area starts to collapse.

Hitting people directly with a scene-long disaster-maker is always going to produce weird results if chunky-salsa rules aren't being applied, and "if you don't roll to stay on your feet at the start, you're going to be in the vicinity of a fire that does five damage per turn and at least one damage-over-time Tilt" is a lot more impressive mechanically than "roll Pillar + Occult + Sekhem as a ranged attack without range penalties to do lethal damage."

SRFS is much more an atmospheric power than a Hitting Things With Magic power, and making its second tier a Set The Place Ablaze effect instead of a ranged weapon is probably for the better in that regard.

[Tessie]

You say it's not a "Hitting Things With Magic power" but it explicitly hits a target. They could at least type out what they intend to happen to the target, even if it's just "it takes xx aggravated damage" or "it dies unless it's invulnerable".
There are multiple ways in the game to greatly reduce damage taken from fire and/or Environmental Tilts. Most of those does not also protect against physical force, but could apparently still fully protect you from a meteorite to the face.

[Satchel]

You say it's not a "Hitting Things With Magic power" but it explicitly hits a target. They could at least type out what they intend to happen to the target, even if it's just "it takes xx aggravated damage" or "it dies unless it's invulnerable".
There are multiple ways in the game to greatly reduce damage taken from fire and/or Environmental Tilts. Most of those does not also protect against physical force, but could apparently still fully protect you from a meteorite to the face.

I say an ability available to any mummy with Sekhem 3+ that hits "one known target within a mile, exposed to the open sky" by retroactively triggering a meteorite impact that can (with the maximum possible Sheut rating) collapse a building half the size of an apartment complex and goes on to talk about "the targeted area" and "the scene of the impact" (and the combined unleashing at the third tier talks about targets rolling chance dice to see if a meteorite hits "their location") is not a "meteorite to the face" power, on account of that introducing the ugly question of whether to make the power unfun for player characters to deal with or dramatically undersell the raw damage of a meteorite to the face.

It hits an area exposed to your senses and the open sky, setting it on fire and (if it's indoors) making rubble fall for a scene (or, per the Tilt, until there is no more ceiling left to collapse). Small structures probably can't stand up to it for the length of the scene, and the Environmental Tilts involved make the roll to avoid being Knocked Down and losing at least one turn a meaningfully lethal threat for anyone who can't run away to Neter-Khertet or otherwise ignore or negate the flames.

It's the middle Tier of an Utterance whose other effects are information-based; the effect is "a meteorite strikes a nearby area," which is more appropriate to Utterances' aesthetics of awful and glorious Biblical miracles than "hit a guy with a space rock for huge direct damage."

[SpoonR]

I’d have to agree with Satchel - an actual meteor strike would have to be statted like a nuke. Any nuke rules in Mage, btw? As is, it sounds like a blast wave creating a Tunguska-like event. Which sounds more cinematic than tiny rock drills hole in head or medium rock pulverizes victim. So, descriptive exaggeration in service to the game?

Actually, I think a real meteorite of this small size would burn up in atmosphere and mostly do damage from the heat and pressure wave, not like bullet or punch. You’d need protection from fire and explosions.

Actually actually, it also sounds more like you target an area, which might have a person located at ground zero, actual damage beyond “at the center of a circle of massive structural damage, damaged terrain” is kind of a bonus in that case.

Must get paycheck so I can pick this up.

[TyrannicalRabbit]

I would not underestimate the damage and it's hardly the only damage trick in the Deathless arsenal.

[TyrannicalRabbit]

According to a random comment from Dawkins and co they didn't want to use wordcount or some such on an instakill, which in regards to op is a justifiable confusion given the text. But the intention apparently is that it kills the target.

[Demigod Beast]

It’s magic. Maybe the Utterance has a built-in safeguard? The Judges can’t harvest Sekhem if millions of humans die from one Utterance.

[ArcaneArts]

It’s magic. Maybe the Utterance has a built-in safeguard? The Judges can’t harvest Sekhem if millions of humans die from one Utterance.

I think you underestimate how much the Judges can feed Ammut in any given go.

(Oh yeah, minor clarification, the Judges don't themselves need Sekhem, they gather it for the purpose of feeding Ammut her due. Some of it gets sidetracked to the Shan'iatu in Duat, but most of Shemzu's wine is for She Whose Teeth Are Mountains.)