Spells and Combat

A couple things:
A) When you declare you are casting a spell, must you declare the exact spell or just “I am casting a spell”?
I’ve been ruling that you need to declare the specific spell (this way enemy casters can determine what spell they are using and issue commands based on that - conversely, I know what spell the monsters are about to cast and allow the PCs to determine this).
B) The rules say you must have an intended target. Does a spell go off anyways if you have a target at the beginning of initiative but the target is gone by the time your initiative comes around? Or, do you lose the spell? Or, can you “power down” the spell and keep it for later?
C) Related to B, let’s say I start casting a spell on a round and my target leaves visual range. Or, let’s say I know someone is coming around a corner but I can’t see them just yet. Can I “ready” a spell to be cast (assuming I take no other actions whatsoever) when someone comes into visual range or leaves visual range and I’m waiting for them to come back?

Nothing ACKS official:
A) In our BECMI-games we announced the exact spell and targets
B) The spell is cast to no effect and is wiped from the list of prepared spells. You cannot change targets if your original target(S) are out of range/line of sight
C) There is no official Ready-action that I know of. We had a houserule for that: you can lower your initiative (wait) and act later but cannot disrupt someone’s turn and interrupt someones action (this is why you roll initiative). Hope the one rounding the corner has used enough of his movement to not be able to reach you…
Hope that helps

A) When you declare you are casting a spell, must you declare the exact spell or just “I am casting a spell”?
APM: You are declaring a specific spell.
B) The rules say you must have an intended target. Does a spell go off anyways if you have a target at the beginning of initiative but the target is gone by the time your initiative comes around? Or, do you lose the spell? Or, can you “power down” the spell and keep it for later?
APM: You can never “power down” a spell and keep it for later, but you can stop casting it and lose it.
C) Related to B, let’s say I start casting a spell on a round and my target leaves visual range. Or, let’s say I know someone is coming around a corner but I can’t see them just yet. Can I “ready” a spell to be cast (assuming I take no other actions whatsoever) when someone comes into visual range or leaves visual range and I’m waiting for them to come back?
APM: In the case of the target leaving visual range, you’d lose the spell. In the case of the target not being in visual range yet, you can delay the unleashing of your spell. You can virtually always act on a lower initiative number.

//APM: In the case of the target leaving visual range, you’d lose the spell. In the case of the target not being in visual range yet, you can delay the unleashing of your spell. You can virtually always act on a lower initiative number. //
But, you cannot hold a spell over multiple rounds right? At the end of the round, the spell is lost, correct?

No, you cannot hold a change over multiple rounds: end of round. spell cast / lost and wiped from prepared list of spells…
Only one of the retro-clones has such an option. The text there says: …“some spells
require the caster to make a successful melee attack in order to touch the target SNIP if the attack misses *SNIP the spell that the caster was attacking with will stay “primed” for ten minutes or until they cast another spell…”

No, you cannot hold a spell over multiple rounds. If it’s not used by the end of the round, the spell is lost.
Unlike 3.5, you cannot walk around with a glowing touch-attack-of-doom.

Sweet, thanks for the clarifications guys!