How does magic work in your setting, /tg/? Can anyone do it or just the special people?
Personally, I've always preferred sorcerors to wizards. I think the implication with Wizards is that basically anyone can learn magic if they just learn it - so magic isn't actually that magical or mysterious. Sorcerors, on the other hand, can "just do it" but don't necessarily understand the hows or why's about it.
So, for games in my setting you can't be a pure Wizard; you have to start Sorceror and then multiclass. The idea is that pure Sorceror works mostly on their gut and doing the magic THEY feel most strongly about whereas a Wizard is someone who has studied academic and technical principles to shape their spells. The analogy I use is that Wizard goes to art school and learns someone else's while the Sorceror just fucking paints until they find their own style.
How does that line up with what you think magic should/could be like? Why am I inevitably a dick-smoking cockshit for having my setting the way I do?
Anyone can do it, but hardly anyone has the patience and introspection it requires.
Which is why those who do are invariably obsessed with it.
>>44238036
Still, that implies a factory process could work where you just set up some schools and churn out (shitty) Wizards, right? Like, sure not many people have it in them to become ARCANE MASTERS but like, level 1 Wizard? At some point as baseline education and literacy levels go up, there's got to come a point where you can pretty much go to Wizard School for five years and come out a level 1 Wizard. At which point, you've got a mega-saturated Wizard market because who wouldn't want that.
>>44237900
Magic and life-force are semi-finite self-replenishing resources. Two mages cannot coexist in the same space for extended amounts of time because they'd use up the mana at an accelerated rate. Druids and the like have an easier time with it because they use less power so to speak and it regenerates faster. Necromancers are really bad because raising the dead uses really excessive amounts of life essence, and drains it from the surrounding area. You can tell when a Necromancer is about because plants shrivel and people/animals start getting sickly looking.
>>44238382
>Still, that implies a factory process could work where you just set up some schools and churn out (shitty) Wizards, right?
Nope, there's where the introspection factor comes in.
You need the studiousness of a D&D Wizard, with all of the focus and control of a Jedi Master.
>>44237900
Magic is a side effect of the fabric of reality being twisted (literaly, the world is a mobius strip twisted by the dual gods Dawn and Dusk) anyone born at either Dawn or Dusk EXACTLY has magical powers... but their personality is also shaped by it, with Dawn mages being impulsive and uncontrolled, why Dusk mages are distant and completely ordered. Basically Lawful and Chaotic.
Magic is the work of spirits. An person who seems to work magic must bribe, cajole, bind, or force spirits to work such magic for them. Some magi take a general approach, and deal with all manner of spirit, others become devotees to the powerful spirits who are worshipped as gods, others take a spirit into their soul, gaining power at the cost of their nature becoming more like the spirits.
Every gifted child knows that they are fundamentally different as they begin to form their selfhood, and the force of the universe (really, the will of the first magic user and his god) draws experienced mages to potential young people unconsciously. Usually, they end up kidnapping the kid, but the teaching process ALWAYS happens one way or another. Witches stealing your baby is a real and terrifying thing. That, along with the general mystery and the hilariously bad legacy of the first mage, has caused magic as a whole to be violently shunned by the normal people of the world.
Magic is a process of words, rituals, gestures, symbols, et cetera, and spells that produce the same effects still vary from culture to culture. However, the spells gain their actual power from two sources working in about a 3:1 ratio.
1. The force of the good it does for others. The very first mage trained his apprentices in order that they may work behind the scenes to safeguard the people (though this fact has been lost to history and everyone, including magic users, sees the archmage as a selfish prick), while the gods do the overt work of ordering their lives in the abstract. The vast, vast majority of wizards do not know that this is where their power really comes from, but their instincts (again, the will of the first) tell them that they should be secretly helping and guiding others despite the scorn they universally receive.
2. The skill, drive, and personal power of the spellcaster. A completely selfish wizard has no one to rely on except himself, and his magic suffers for it. That being said, all spells have this as their base, and some unscrupulous wizards have crowned themselves kings on the back of their own magic.
I am very interested in the concept of "dark magic" in various settings. Is it a completely different type of magic, or just some spells that have been forbidden due to being overly harmful? Or is magic in your setting just a neutral tool, and the darkness is in the mage himself?
>>44237900
>>44238036
I'm guessing these universes take the "tool" view.
>>44239011
I guess here it depends on the maliciousness and nature of the spirits. Whether some are inherently good and others bad, etc.
>>44238641
So here, dark magic would just be magic that draws too much and so hurts others. Kind of like depleting natural resources in real life.
>>44238809
I'm guessing that Dusk magic in your world is "dark" in the sense of chaotic or capricious rather than actually evil.
>>44239272
Very interesting. Dark magic comes about when a wizard uses it for their own benefit rather than helping people. And it's not a separate type of magic either, just depowered.
>>44240510
>I guess here it depends on the maliciousness and nature of the spirits. Whether some are inherently good and others bad, etc.All spirits seek to change/corrupt the soul so that when the person dies they can eat the soul and continue existing. Basically souls are nothing but spirit food to stave off entropy and oblivion.
>>44238751
>Nope, there's where the introspection factor comes in.
>You need the studiousness of a D&D Wizard, with all of the focus and control of a Jedi Master.
That's a learnable skill though?
>>44240547
Where do the spirits come from?
Are they a natural force? Are they born, created, or assimilated? Do magic-users eventually become spirits? Or are MUs who take spirits into their souls becoming more spirit-like because the spirit has been gradually replacing them as it eats their soul? How exactly does their ecology work?
>>44240510
>So here, dark magic would just be magic that draws too much and so hurts others. Kind of like depleting natural resources in real life.
Precisely, the setting is actually a fantasy world that's about to go full apocalypse due to the gods dying/leaving and all the major oceans draining into the underdark-equivalent. The gods used to be an unlimited font of magical energy, with only the possibility of temporarily running out in a small area. Now? Now they're starting to run out for real.
>>44240510
Magical traditions exist that work what any reasonable person would consider evil magic, and their practitioners might learn mainly rituals to harm or violate others illicitly or consort freely with malicious spirits. Ultimately, though, whether a tradition is considered "black magic" or otherwise is a matter of the tradition's philosophy towards how magic ought to be used rather than something intrinsic to the rituals themselves. Also whether they're victim to political/religious smear campaigns or not, of course.
>>44237900
Magic works as just another natural energy that flows across the multiverse. Spells are just highly refined versions of the Words of Creation. Spells are basically like calling upon the console commands of a videogame.
Anyone smart enough can use magic, and that's what wizardry is. You need smarts as intelligence is a measure of one's capacity within their soul/mind to hold the energies required to maintain the spell until it's fully casted.
Some are born with power, and that's sorcery. Their magic and spells are stored within their bodies and is called upon with gut instinct and a strong sense of self confidence.
Some are given power through faith, and that's thaumaturgy. They are given spells in service to their spiritual patron and execute its will. The wisdom to see the world and its connections is paramount for them.
Some manifest the power to alter reality by thinking about it, and that's psionics. Their magic comes from their chi focusing outward from their minds, and the more intelligent of them can command great power.
Some never learn to control magic through words and prayer and study but still call upon its power, and that's pretty much everyone else in the setting. Creating shockwaves from your sword that slice people across a room, leaping up a cliff, moving so fast you seem to teleport, making weapons that can chill a man's body or burn with power, and other fantastic things are possible for anyone who trains hard enough in any skill.
>>44240664
Spirits originally came from the Creator, and the First Children who ate the Creator and brought about the first laws. The Law of Consumption "To grow in power one consumes others" and the Law of Destruction. "Without Creation, there is only Destruction"
Man was created when the meals of the elements, beasts, and plants did not satisfy. They were created by a sacrifice of one of the First Children, thus imbuing the race of Men with a shard of the Creator. With this spirits could be made from little power and grow as the Soul. However since Humans have a shard of the Creator, their souls gave birth to new spirits of emotions and human needs, like compassion, greed, lust, etc. Spirits that consumed such aspects would be corrupted by them, and so the inhuman and impersonal spirits became more humanoid and some even took human shapes.
Anyone with a powerful enough Soul can find a way to become like a God, and instead consume other spirits instead of being consumed. This occurs after death, and by legend has happened before.
MU who take spirits into their souls take on the nature of that spirit. It does not replace, but it does corrupt, so that when the MU dies, their soul strengthens the aspects of the spirit instead of corrupting it into a mad abberation.
Ecology wise, spirits seek to change souls to be more like their own aspects. Gods do this with followers, crafty spirits do this through bargains. Demons are more direct in their corruptions. A spirit that wildly consumes all aspects goes mad and becomes an abberration.
>>44240510
>Dark magic comes about when a wizard uses it for their own benefit rather than helping people. And it's not a separate type of magic either, just depowered.
Dark magic is just a name. If you take your life views from priests, kings, and academics, then all magic is dark. To mages who follow their inclination to help from the shadows, magic used selfishly or purposefully hidden away out of fear might be called dark. To the wizard who made himself a king and now aids the poor from on high, dark magic may simply be that which threatens his position.
As a side note, one of the ways you can tell selfish magic from regular magic is how the user goes about casting. A normal spellcaster might gather mystical resources and create small supernatural items, but ultimately their decision to work a spell will almost always be spur of the moment, and their casting time relatively short (ie. no more than a day or two). Conversely, a magician using their own power exclusively might spend days or even months on a single spell, and often plan it out very meticulously. Of course, the only people who are going to notice such things are those who specifically look out for them.
All magic comes from spirits, which there are seemingly infinitely many of. However, most spirits aren't very powerful. 7 particular spirits are extremely powerful and are worshipped as gods. They bestowed specific types of magic to their followers. A jealous non-worshipper used the magic of several other spirits to drain the life force from a massive region of the continent, killing off his own people, and used the energy to attempt to kill the gods and take their power. He was only semi-successful. The gods' magic power can now be used by anyone , but it is far weaker than it once was, and requires intensive focus and training. The gods themselves are in a near-death state from which the PCs may be able to save them or finish them off.
Mechanically, players have to unlock levels in each school of magic, and then individual spells can be unlocked once prerequisite levels in certain schools of magic are unlocked. Most mages don't put levels into more than 2-3 schools of magic.
In my setting, all magic users (commonly referred to as spirits) share the same origin. One, each and every one of them has at one point, been dead or otherwise incapable of thought/biological processes. Two, while in this state, they've hung onto, or otherwise asserted their sense of self. If you fulfill these two criteria, then it just so happens that part of the setting's physics elevates whoever/whatever achieves this feat to a state where they can utilize magic.
From here, spirits progress in roughly the same fashion. They begin with little mastery of and power over magic overall, but are unlimited in scope. The more a spirit uses and masters magic, the narrower the scope of their magic becomes as their sense of self asserts its power over magic, and there is no way to, for the lack of a better word, be looser once your scope begins tightening.
A side effect of all this is that the more damaged a spirit's sense of self becomes, the more they fade from the world, and subsequently, the less they can affect it. This works in reverse, with a stronger sense of self making the spirit stronger and more real(I haven't thought this part out at all). if a spirit ever loses its sense of self, then it completely fades, and no spirit has ever come back from losing its sense of self a second time.
You can of course, kill them the normal way, though illness tends to not stick due to their extra-worldly nature.
>>44241232
Describe the schools.
>>44239272
>3:1 ratio
Woops, should have reversed that. It's mostly personal power; the gift of beneficence is just a boost.
In my world, magic is very rare. Only elves have any predictable ratio of mages to non-mages. Lycans are entirely separated from the weave, a result of their creation. Pretty much the only magic users are those born with the ability, though there are a handful of exceptions. "Wizards" are just people born with it who study extra hard and have different methodology.
But there's another caveat: entropy. The use of magic essentially relies on the chaotic energies contained within and immediately around the caster, mostly within. As the caster uses magic, they increase entropy, and thus energy, within their bodies (the system). The area around the mage will often grow cold, and the mage's body will start to heat up significantly. Even a short fight can leave the average mage running a fever of 101. If a mage attempts to cast magic for too long, their bodies will eventually go into hyperthermic shock. If they try to cast too large of a spell at once, or if they cast multiple large spells in rapid succession, they will literally self-immolate, with magical flames spewing from every orifice.
My sorcerer is going to have a VERY bad time. (Pic kinda related, an early boss of theirs. He is going to be one of the few members of his order who uses magic, and if they hold him off long enough without being able to kill him, he'll literally burn to death.)
>>44241328
>Energy magic
Using magic to add energy to the surroundings; heat, light, motion, etc.
>Cryomancy
Often refers to "cold" magic, is basically the opposite of energy magic: Using magic to remove energy from the surroundings.
>Conjuration
Converting magical energy into matter. At lower levels no complex objects can be made with this. It takes a heavy focus on conjuration to make it worthwhile, but it gets very powerful eventually.
Those are the ones I've put the most development into so far. This is all a WIP, but here are the basic outlines of the rest:
>Magic Resistance
The ability to resist the effects of others' use of magic.
>Soul Magic
Manipulating spirits and souls, basically any kind of life force, usually for the purpose of enchanting items. This can also be more directly used to drain life force from opponents, at high enough levels.
>Healing
Exactly what it sounds like. I'll probably throw a few stat-boosting spells into this school too.
>Runic Magic
Can't take a level of rune magic without having at least one level in another school of magic. Allows you to create runes, basically pre-made spells. Runes will have probably the most complexity out of anything in my setting.
Every rune is made out of several pieces that can be put together however the player wants. So they could make a "touch-triggered small inferno" rune, if they had enough levels in rune magic to use trigger effects and modify the size of the effect, and they would also need a certain number of levels in energy magic for the inferno spell.
For balancing, runes become unstable and can end up wildly destroying themselves if too many are held too close to each other. Higher-level rune mages make their runes less unstable, so they can carry more with them.
>I think the implication with Wizards is that basically anyone can learn magic if they just learn it - so magic isn't actually that magical or mysterious.
My take on it is that they don't and can't just learn 'magic'. That would kinda be like saying scientists just learn science and can know everything about how the world works. A wizard learns magical things and can become quite knowledgeable in areas he's studied, but even at a high level they don't truly know the insides and out of 'magic'. Magic has patterns, because it's not completely random, but they can be incredibly complex and often don't make clear sense. Plus education and spread of knowledge in magical settings is a lot less efficient or even available, so much of these wizards end up working off very little and mostly alone or in small groups.
Basically they only know what they know what they've managed after ages of research, and probably not even why. Taking advantage of the magic they know in different contexts can be dangerous because of the differing factors. Wizards and sorcerers and clerics and any other magic-users are all dealing with powers beyond their control and understanding, it's just how they've harnessed (for now) it that is different.
>>44241841
Thank you.
Personally, I really prefer "learnable" magic. I honestly don't really like mystical and mysterious magic most of the time. I want to invoke inverted Clarke's Third Law: sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from science.
If I do want mystical and mysterious, I always go 100% the opposite way. No rare "gifts" or special people. It's full Tolkien, "magic" is something humanity doesn't do directly; but maybe begs angels and demons for occasionally.
Honestly, any story about people just being born super extra special bugs me. I much prefer the trope of people finding their talent and then making the most out of it, and I bring that to my RPG settings too.
In fact, that's a big part of why I like fantasy settings so much; when magic, or supernatural powers generally, is something a person can learn or develop, it makes things even more about personal development, instead of buying toys. Imagine a world where laser guns existed, but to shoot one you had to understand how to make one from scratch.
In my most recent setting, magic is in fact ubiquitous. Housewives joined dweaomercrafting circles and learned the best charms to make their bread rise better; fighters learned techniques that summoned auras to enhance their arms and armor; architects were a deeply magical profession, up there with research wizards, because they had to understand the spiritual nature of the space they designed, and choose which runes go where in the foundation.
>>44242145
In my next game, magic is something learnable, but requires something like 10 years minimum of intensive training to develop the knack for it. So wizard becomes a profession that requires a huge professional investment, like being a doctor or lawyer, except more so, and honestly isn't even as profitable.
>>44237900
>How does magic work in your setting, /tg/?
When I homebrew I always use a magic vs logic system.
Magic and science are inherently the same thing and come from the same source but express it differently. They are also miasmas to each other.
Magic runs off of creativity and emotion. "Anything is possible if you can think of it and have the drive to achieve it."
Science is the same process but applies rules that it has to follow. "Fire is hot because we believe and say it is hot." Everyone believes it so it is true. This is also why science can do "anything" There is always an answer to it you just have to find the correct set of rules.
The reason they can not work together is because as science applies its rules magic has less options to work. Less possibilities.
>Can anyone do it or just the special people?
With high magic most can not. They just either don't have the emotional fortitude to forge on or they don't have the creativity to come up with the solution to the problem. So they are poor peasants with nothing.
In high logic everyone has "magic" in the form of technology and real magic is very rare. So the power structures are much more even.
>>44237900
In my setting, magic comes from the mix of four different kind of energies that are sensitive to the force of will. They flow from almost deity-like sources called Pillars. Spellcasting is learning how to mix and match the Pillar power without killing yourself doing so.
Wizards are those that learn how to train your will in a way to effectively (and safely) cast spells.
Sorcerers are those that are born with the talent to do so, though they tend to a more raw/powerful kind of spellcasting that is usually unsafe to them and others around.
The main problem with arcane magic in my setting is a political one: the world lives a magocracy, and only rulers have the right to learn spells. Sorcerers are hunted as illegal spellcasters, which the government says is done to the safety of the people, but is actually a way to maintain control over who have power in their hands.
>>44240510
Dark magic in my setting is magic that have been tainted by demons, spellcasters can imbue their spells with this "fifth source" to make them more powerful and risk having a big aftershock.
>>44237900
>D&D 5e
Literally anyone can take magic initiate, and anyone with a mental stat 13 or higher can either take ritual caster or get levels in a real caster class.
>>44237900
Its the utilization of natural occurring energies emitted by the world and the things that exist in it.
The intensity and power of a spell can wax and wane depending on the location. The energies are or the mana are seemingly finite, but the downside is that it takes out a lot on the caster.
For example a wizard that overdo or loss control of a spell can die from exhaustion, or in the worst case scenario be completely diluted into the magical energy he/she is channeling.
And due to that, creatures that can channel the energies effortlessly are revered and feared.
So I'm guessing this is one of those threads where everyone posts but nobody reads other people's posts?
>>44244151
I always lurk these threads to steal ideas
>>44242181
This one is dumb. Very dumb.
In my setting magic is some kind of nebulous, ill-defined energy that permeates everything. Magic was originally learned as the way the Titans (and their horrid little giant spawn) shaped the world and moved on to the next one. Mortals learned magic by meditating and living nearby great sleeping giants, many of whom don't even know those are there. Their dreams and thoughts can be picked up by humans and that information can somehow be copied down into magic. It's working; how these divine beings cast spells is essentially the same way Wizards do, but we only get a tiny picture. Long story short, magic is a power you are born with, but there is a bit of leeway with this as there are a few ways non-magical people can acquire the power.
To expand on the above; essentially magic users can cast spells because they naturally restore Potency to their body and can cast it, potentially there could be those who don't get Potence naturally but could somehow learn to cast spells and then gain it through that, but this is uncommon. Most people just swallow a black parasitic worm that lives in your lower gut and generates mana for you along with making you a skinny anemic twig for the rest of your life and probably lowering your life expectancy for a few years to go with it.
The term Wizard, Sorcerer, Witch, Warlock, etc. All basically mean the same thing, the only real exception is the reverence the speaker has for the magic user in general. Typically people call them Wizards or Arcanists to be polite, Sorcerer as a neutral term, and Witch and Warlock is when you are insulting. In some cultures though Witch is actually the respectful term, since the Witches may be like Witch-Doctors to them, etc.
Finally, magic is cast off in ritualistic spells or as magical 'blasts' from wands and staves. This is more of a gameplay thing, but it also gives Wizards a useful weapon in the form of a magical wand or staff that is always useful, but can be disarmed.
>Can anyone do it or just the special people?
Everyone has varying degrees of talent - some people next to nothing, some people have so much that it'll manifest sooner or later. Most people fall in-between and for the magic to manifest itself, have to work hard for it.
>>44237900
I wouldn't know how generic this is, but I don't care here goes.
Magic in my universe is the same thing the stuff of souls are made of; indeed, souls themselves are in fact constructs designed to hold enough power to give a creature life. Before any life existed in this place, there were only daemons, which are made of raw magic and cannot be sustained for long in realspace...but that's a different story. It's hard to justify what magic is in a pure form (other than a daemon), but certain objects can radiate it like light (such as the Magus Star, a magically charged binary star that orbits the main sun of the world).
To tamper with magic is to tamper with the very core of your being, your soul. Some people simply can't do it (Dwarves were engineered by the gods to be unable to expand their magical potential as an anti-daemon weapon). As you dabble in the arcane, you saturate your soul with magical energy. You must expend the power of your soul to cast magic; casting too much can fatigue, or even kill you. Over time, this causes the soul to burn brighter, as the mage becomes capable of "storing" more magic potential inside themselves.
This can corrupt in the long run, as almost by nature a more powerful mage becomes more and more egocentric, their empowered soul driving them harder than any mortal should be pushed. A potent mage is a very dangerous thing if left unchecked, for they almost instinctively yearn to build towers and rain fire on everything in the surrounding area, ESPECIALLY other wizards. Indeed, the mage colleges across the land are for keeping elder mages in and regulating magical development just as much as they are for teaching others.
I have a lot more ideas to flesh it out with, but I'm probably already going on too much. I just wanted to develop a world with magic in it, but also justifying the advent of more advanced technology such as black powder and some steampunk-y elements.
well magic in my setting is alien to the setting itself. If that sound weird let me explain...
Basically a god of magic was traveling the multiverse colleting various styles of magic with the intent to absorb all of them to become an overgod, a god of gods. However he didn't think on how to keep all those powers from conflicting and thus it exploded sending it out into the universe he was keeping the styles in seeking people who could use them as magic wants to be used.
One of the planets that that was near by and thus got hit the most by the magic wave was earth about 5 years into the future. Suddenly thousands of people were getting powers to raise the dead, become mighty dragons, summon otherworldly beasts and more. These people gained the sum total of knowledge of one magic style and became known as adepts. They had to work at the knowledge themselves and how the powers worked but they would soon find that they can teach others how to use their kind of magic and that their students were not locked to one style like the adepts were. and thus begin the age of magic...
>>44242145
I like mystical and mysterious to be learnable. Secrets whispered in quiet corners, ancient rituals performed in dark shadows, magic so ancient and obscure even it's practitioners don't quite get how it works, only that it does. Anyone can learn it, but is it wise to play with power you don't understand?
That kind of shit gets my dick hard.
>>44246309
Sounds like the plot to a saturday morning cartoon.
I miss those.
In my setting, it's something seriously anyone can do. Any of the options available to players are stuff anyone can do, if they work really hard at it and eat their wheaties.
I hate, hate hate hate, magic-snowflake 'ohh, you can do this because of inborn talent!' bullshit. I'll admit I'm pretty inspired by Elder Scrolls, where everyone and their fucking aunt has some shiny magic quest reward stowed away under a mattress for a rainy day. But mostly I don't like the idea of anyone being able to claim 'special snowflake' status for any reason but their own hard work and iron will to be the absolute best.
>>44249148
But Elder Scrolls has MULTIPLE examples of the stuff you hate. Like, the Dragonborn just IS the Dragonborn. He didn't Dragonborn himself up by his Dragonboot-straps. And some races ARE inherently more or less magical than others in that setting.
>>44249148
>I hate settings where people have magic blood
>But I love Elder Scrolls, where the descendants of Tiber Septim are fucking double-magic.
>>44237900
>How does magic work in your setting, /tg/? Can anyone do it or just the special people?
Let's see.
>Setting one (Low Fantasy High Magic)
Magic is divided into three Tiers.
>Common Charms
Can be done by any woman of 'marriageable age'. Fairly small-scale stuff such as keeping a jar of honey from attracting vermin or keeping a sword from catching rust.
>High magic
Only works for witches and dragonblooded. The first are women chosen by the divine feminine, the second is the inborn ability of men descended from dragons. Fairly powerful.
>Totem magic/Thaumaturgy
The strongest but also most dangerous. It calls directly upon one's connection to the Goddess/one's ancestors and us usually reserved for the creation of potent artefacts or summoning of WMD-tier attacks.
>Setting 2 (Urban Fantasy)
You need to die in order to access magic, it's simple as that. If you can return from the land of death (which all mages vainly seek to even obtain the faintest recollection of) you'll gain a contract with a spirit that'll allow you to use either Life or Death energy. Magical energy and power are obtained by bargaining with the spirits of various things or concepts. Oftentimes they'll just ask for some of your power (yes magical energy is essentially the basis of a supernatural economy), other times it'll require a specific task for be carried out.
>Setting three (SciFi)
Magic is... hard to explain. It's works beneath even the Quantum level and is where information and information carrier are one and the same, as the universe itself is MADE of this information. Think of The Matrix, only the simulation is a product of itself. Magic is fairly rare, and so-called psychic powers are an "incomplete" way to access them.
As consciousness is information, it can access this "layer" of reality.
Think of Telekinesis. There's no "psi" moving it. Instead, the very fact of the user desiring it to move imposes the movement onto the world. It's rare, but people can be trained in it.
>>44249699
Does setting three have magi tech? It better have.
>>44249699
First setting sounds SJW as fuck.
>>44249803
>Does setting three have magi tech? It better have.
No. They can - and do - apply the scientific method to magic, but it doesn't gel with any other established scientific theories nor does it reliably work in the absence of someone consciously directing it. It's like trying to run a generator on music. Sure, musical theory is fairly well-established, but that doesn't make the two any more compatible.
>>44249822
>First setting sounds SJW as fuck.
I'm sorry?
>>44237900
I treat sorcery like some sort of spiritual electricity - Every animated body is capable of acting as conductor, but it takes special training of body and mind to be capable of actually refining the raw energy into a stable stream that can then be utilised to cast spells (physical contact or extreme proximity required) or infuse inanimate objects through rune-inscriptions. Runes are basically circuits.
>>44246438
well it's for a superhero story, I wanted to advert the whole "if your not in spandex you don't matter" thing in most comics. adepts are still stronger then most but only in their own style while non-adepts are more versatile if somewhat weaker.
>>44249699
>Only works for witches and dragonblooded. The first are women chosen by the divine feminine, the second is the inborn ability of men descended from dragons. Fairly powerful.
?
>>44251886
It was strongly inspired by that and general oriental mysticism, yes.
>>44237900
>Can anyone do it or just the special people?
Kind of both. To practice magic in my setting a character requires one of two things:
Gnosis; mystical insight which grants perception of, understanding of, and the ability to manipulate the deeper forces of reality.
Auctoris: the spiritual authority to call upon mystical powers to reveal and/or control the aforementioned deeper forces of reality.
In theory, anyone can gain these qualities; just like in theory anyone can learn quantum physics. In practice, only exceptional people succeed in developing these qualities to any extent.
>>44237900
>How does magic work in your setting
My setting is metaphysically balanced between processes of creation and destruction. The Divine continually emanates Anima into the Void. As the Divine Anima spreads through the Void it losses energy. Divine Anima cools into Fire. Fire Anima cools into Air. Air Anima cools into Water. And, Water Anima cools into Earth.
Beyond Earth, Anima takes strange forms. Shadow Anima is formed from Anima released by Fire in the form of Light which has then been filtered through physical objects. Hell-fire Anima is drawn from releasing the Anima embodied in various physical forms of creation.
Magic is what you get when a being manipulates Anima, either from themselves or from the world around them, to create certain effects. Each elemental form of Anima tends to produce different physical, mental, or mystical effects.
>>44237900
My favorite spellcasting archetypes are Bloodline magic, which gets passed down along familial lines and usually has a theme based upon what type of bloodline it is, Contract magic, which is the sort Warlocks or Clerics would get in exchange for working for a higher power and doing their bidding, and Spirit magic, where you instead communicate with lesser elementals and spirits and convince them to lend you their power in exchange for something. The last two are similar, but its a difference of quality and quantity.
I tend to find this covers a lot of ground, and can even allow for more stereotypical wizards whose research and spell books simply center around the various names and types of minor spirits and how to convince them more easily.
There are only so many spirits to go around though, so you couldn't easily train up an army of wizards
Ritualistic as fuck; inspired by Planescape.
Magic happens when enough people believe something so strongly that it would be unthinkable for it to not happen. The closer they are to whatever they're trying to affect, the more their beliefs and thoughs affect it. Think placebo effects, but applied to everything and by everyone.
Religions are the main source of magic. Religious sites and artifacts have power, though what power is only rarely specified exactly, since the religious communities tend to disagree, even within a religion. A specific religious site can have different powers depending on who is currently occupying it - since their beliefs will help shape its power more than people who are far away.
Any kind of large congregation caries power - and can usually be quite a source of power when led by charismatic persons persuading groups to believe something specific. Priests performing miracles, kings leading armies that are seemingly unharmable in combat, stage magicians doing actual magic, bards and other cults of personalities getting their power from the people they lead. The problem with harnessing this kind of magic is that it takes a huge amount of people to do anything useful. A priest might be capable of performing small miracles - but he'll need hundreds of people or a very devout following to do so.
The other main source of magic is ritualistic magic. Trance-like rituals designed to direct the thoughts of a smaller group of people in such a way that they can perform magic without needing a horde of people praying for them. This is the kind of magic that a party of adventurers can use, though you will need a party, and not just one dude.
The last thing that sometimes happen is that people whose legend precedes them will start gaining minor powers, as more and more people hear of their deeds. Sometimes this ends up being a self-reinforcing effect, and warriors of legend and their equipment gain power from the legends surrounding them.
>>44238382
>not wanting a setting where there's a 50% chance that any given commoner is a level 1 wizard. 50% chance he can only cast level 0 spells
>>44237900
There are very few innately magical people. Most magic is bound to objects like books, wands or staves.
Magic is very limited and weak compared to other settings.
>Can't really conjure anything, water mages need to cart around water to places that don't have it. Fire mages need light a flame before they can control it. People that control plants need to carry seeds around etc.
>Magic has very little utility outside of combat. You can't use it to make shelter or grow food or anything.
>Magic in combat isn't much stronger than running around with a sword.
There's still incredible things that can be done with it and people that dedicate their lives to mastering it. Having magic be like this keeps everyone on an even level of power and makes actually doing things more impressive. There's no challenge if you can just pull something out of your ass in any given situation.
Making magic weak also makes it so real magic practiced by godlike beings is just as as impressive and mysterious as it should be, so you get the best of both worlds.
>>44237900
Magic is non mortal in origin. Humans (and other races) can do it, but it's not something they can fully replicate without "external" aid.
Sorcerers: born magical, or imbued somehow. Ultimately they aren't 100% mortal. A higher (magically capable) being has altered their physiology and their magical affinity is tied to that (dragons, fey, demons, etc).
Wizards: study and learn to replicate magic. However, no matter the technique, they require a staff/focus object/farmiliar (which again traces it's origin to a truly magical creature like dragons, fey or demons). A wizard is just a channeler, an invoker of an external force. A wizard without his staff is just a mundane human and can't do shit magically speaking.
Clerics: basically a wizard, but without the learning, and more directly and personally invoking a divine or supernatural being (how directly varies on the deity). Hardly special at all, basically mundane mortals if their deity tells em to fuck off.
Studied magic is normal as the books dictate for me, but every kind of inborn magic is fundamentally the same, with different kinds of manifestation and direction based on simple life choices. A Warlock is just a Sorcerer who said 'fuck off' when someone tried to teach him to control his gifts.
>>44238382
>>44254576
>degree mill wizards
>>44237900
>he doesn't make magic wildly availible in his high fantasy setting
>laughingelves.painting
There are several strains of magic, which have to be "passed down". A magic user can bestow a tiny fragment of magic upon another, who can then strengthen it with diligent practice. The strain of magic has a huge influence on exactly what the magic is and how it's used. Witchcraft/Magery/Sorcery/Wizardry are all the same thing, using the same fundamental magic force that underlies the world. The difference between them is the education that one receives; the words, gestures, and other ceremony used to invoke the magic changes between disciplines (going from least formal to most formal). However, ANY magic user can mark another, for example the fae. Fae magic is a manipulation of reality itself, rather than a utilization of a magical force. Fae magic, as a result, is world-rulingly powerful, but the fae are notoriously fickle and generally only ever mark children with no understanding of the power they wield.
You can also be marked by dragons, which is the goal of most magic users. While normally each strain prevents the adopting of any others, dragon magic is the magic of creation and destruction itself, and overrides anything else.
