Gate allows the caster to create doorways between other lands or times, dimensions or worlds—allowing the user to travel great distances with a simple step. Usually a Gate connects to a single other location.

Creation of a Gate requires the permanent expenditure of POW in a sacrifice equal to the log to base 10 of the distance the Gate connects in miles multiplied by five (see

Table: Gate Creation and Travel Costs, and Gates: Sample Locations and Distances, pages 122 and 123). A Gate may take many forms: common ones being indicated by a pattern of painted lines on a floor or wall, or a peculiar arrangement of stones in a field. The media used to “paint”the Gate sigils can likewise take many forms: chalk, paint, blood, carving, and so on.

Using the Gate costs a number of magic points equal to one-fifth of the POW originally used to make the Gate. Each trip through a Gate costs 1 Sanity point. Should the user lack enough magic points for a trip, the traveler expends hit points to make up the cost. Return trips through a Gate always cost the same as the initial journey.

Ordinarily, anyone or anything can move through a Gate, though some have been built so that a certain key—a word or gesture—is needed to activate the portal. Certain versions of the spell are known that also “change” those who pass through, to aid survival on an alien world. There are also hints that some Gates are capable of arriving at more than one destination.

Deeper magic: the caster may elect to prepare a Gate for travel by expending the necessary magic points before the journey. The Gate is thus primed and the next person stepping through the doorway is not required to pay the magic point cost, but will still need to sacrifice 1 Sanity point.