Rarity of Magic?

[Manic Typist]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Why wouldn't the psionics wipe the floor with the mages? I mean, typically you can create all the effects of wizardry without many of the drawbacks. Unless of course you create different ones, or the powers of the mind are weaker in nature than magic.

[Sir Ofeelya]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

The difficulties of making up a setting with magic is common have already been described: to make an analogy' date=' I am running my current game on an island group in which there are no large flightless mammals. There are only birds, including large flightless birds, that serve as mounts and resources.cheers, Mark[/quote']

 

 

Hi Mark

 

I was wondering why, in your GE setting, no one has brought riding beasts to the Archipelego? Is it just cultural or something else. I would have thought a Desterier would kick a Phorusrhacoid's flightless ass when it came to being a war mount.

 

Cheers

Bri

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Hi Mark

 

I was wondering why, in your GE setting, no one has brought riding beasts to the Archipelego? Is it just cultural or something else. I would have thought a Desterier would kick a Phorusrhacoid's flightless ass when it came to being a war mount.

 

Cheers

Bri

 

Well, I can see the advantage of a mount that can snap off an opponents head with a single bite

The modern birds that have the closest beak structure, AFAIK, to the phorusrhacoids are parrots, and a 1 pound parrot can snap through a hardwood dowel with a single strike. A 2 meter apex predator with a similar ability, scaled up, is pretty fearsome. They were fast too.

 

On the Topic of the thread... I tend to agree that 'wide magic" (good term that) worlds are uncommon mostly because they require a LOT more work to establish, and usually tend to have a more 'modern" feel... Steven Brusts Dragerea books (Jhereg etc.) are a good example... its a fantasy setting where the vast majority of characters have at least minimal magical abilities, and they are taken for granted. It leads to a different feel... Doing genetic examinations of a suspect to determine his bloodlines, for instance.

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

But now we have an advantage - we can talk about magic on two axis. HEIGHT, or the overall power of magic, and WIDTH, or the overall exposure of magic. In a d20 world, magic is HIGH and SOMEWHAT NARROW - generally reserved for horrible monsters, ancient wizards and PCs. In Eberron, magic is of MEDIUM HEIGHT but VERY WIDE - sure, you can always level to 20 and learn Wish, but it isn't the purpose of the game.

 

My Epic Campaign has NARROW and LOW magic - hence, rare and frightening. Shadowrun, by contrast, is HIGH and WIDE - anyone can learn it, and everyone knows about it.

[OddHat]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Hm.

 

I guess my Londinium campaign had Cube Magic. Village Witches or Hex Men were not all that rare, nor were traveling seers or priests with minor powers, but seriously powerful sorcerers were rare, and magic didn't do much more for most people than replace chemical fertilizers and serve as a stand in for the local pharmacy. Every king would cultivate the favor of a few Shamans, Priests or Wizards, and rare groups like the Knights of the Rose or the Knights of the Cross with multiple combat trained users of magic were major powers.

 

The Atlantean Campaign had High Narrow Magic, but not exactly. The economic and political life of Atlantis was entirely Magic driven, but it was rare and the practitioners (with few exceptions) weak outside of the empire.

[Markdoc]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Hi Mark

 

I was wondering why, in your GE setting, no one has brought riding beasts to the Archipelego? Is it just cultural or something else. I would have thought a Desterier would kick a Phorusrhacoid's flightless ass when it came to being a war mount.

 

Oh, it would. But there's two reasons: one cultural, one practical.

 

The practical is that the archipelago is between a month and a month and a half's sailing time from the mainland (the traditional route is actually to sail west away from land until you hit the edge of the Great Shallows and then the currents and trade winds will deliver you fairly reproducibly to the northern kingdoms). In addition, the typical ships in use are similar to norman warships (about halfway between a cog and a longship) - they're designed for largish crews, rather than lots of cargo, given the proliferation of pirates and (ahem) unofficial toll collection along the coast. Getting a pair of destriers onto a ship like that and keeping them alive for over a month at sea is a pretty big challenge.

 

People could still do it, of course, if they were determined enough, but there isn't that much interest - and the reason for that is cultural. Armigers - the warrior class (who would be the biggest market for that sort of thing) fight mostly on foot.

 

The reason for that is that the inland part of the western archipelago is fairly mountainous and most people live in the coastal strip. So warfare is a mix of siege warfare and sea battles (if you look at the history all the big battles are either sea battles or coastal raids). Secondly, they fight with a mixture of pikes and two-handed weapons (axes and swords) which makes massed cavalry charges a pretty unappealing prospect. For scouting and light skirmishing cavalry, qurrocks work fine - better in fact than destriers, since they are more mobile in rough terrain.

 

cheers, Mark

[Markdoc]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I have both, in my game. The current setting (the archipelago) has low, wide magic. Many people have a magic gift, or learn spells, or both. However, most people only know a few spells - to become a powerful mage requires years of dedicated study (ie: lots of XP) - and usualy lots of gifts to potential teachers, so warriors normally know 3 or 4 combat spells, a wealthy fisherman might know a water-breathing spell, a weather-predicting spell and a fish-finding spell - but a poor fisherman, or a farmer, who couldn't afford the gifts needed to join a cult, would probably have have no magic at all.

 

In contrast, some of the older, more established cultures have high magic which can be either narrow (The Empire of New Saharn, which views magic as a potentially destabilising dangerous force and strictly controls who can learn magic and what kind) or wide (the Dymerian Empire, where ordinary folk don't learn magic, but mages are regarded as skilled craftsmen like goldsmiths and every wealthy person has several mages on staff).

 

I actually have barbarian magic of various kinds as well, but in general it is less efficient (and often much more dangerous to the user) than "civilised" magic. The Vanaquisl, for example, do all of their magic by summoning spirits and letting them possess the summoner. That actually gives them very powerful magic, but often with nasty (and occasionally fatal) side effects. Nobody said being a hero-warrior was an easy job! So that's high and narrow.

 

cheers, Mark

[Lucius]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

 

For that matter, in any world where magic can be written in books, taught in schools and learned, doesn't that mean, by definition, that it's fully understood?

 

Many things are written in books, taught in schools and learned, and not understood all that well.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

With thanks to Brianca Alexander for the palindromedary avatar

[Lemurion]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Many things are written in books, taught in schools and learned, and not understood all that well.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

With thanks to Brianca Alexander for the palindromedary avatar

 

I agree, being taught in schools simply implies that the results are reproducible, not that something is understood.

[Kortay Mirlor]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I've noticed that it's quiet common in discussions on magic systems and magic use for comments to pop up to the effect that someone wants magic to be rare and difficult, and/or that it should be restricted to specialist casters, at least to some degree.

 

I have two questions for those expressing such sentiments.

 

First, why is this?

 

It'll be in the campaign I'm going to start because the players said they wanted magic to be awe-inspiring. We talked it over and agreed that meant magic was POWERFUL and that meant magic was rare (cause otherwise it would disrupt society and daily life to shreds).

 

Second, is this simply what you prefer in your games/settings, or is it something you think should be the case in most/all settings and campaigns?

 

Thanks.

 

It is what I prefer, but it's part of the campaign setting because the players wanted it.

[Cantriped]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Why wouldn't the psionics wipe the floor with the mages? I mean' date=' typically you can create all the effects of wizardry without many of the drawbacks. Unless of course you create different ones, or the powers of the mind are weaker in nature than magic.[/quote']

Simple Demographics, Psionics was a rare talent among humans, and was generally seems limited to telepathy, mindscan, and occasionally telekinesis (for the really powerful ones)

On the otherhand, Each and every Elven Lord (and lady) had some level of magic. Though the women were presented as barely capable of cantrips, and some males wern't far above it it woudln't take that much "magic" to plug a valve in sombodies heart.

Elven magic was also far more useful in that they could store power away in items (End Reserves), and the effects they could create were often of the flashy verity (glamours and evocations).

They were also presented as having a certain amount of enchantment capability, frequently laying down spells to change the weather, (often so overused that they screwed up the ecology in areas or the spells simply collapsed from having 5 or 6 different weather enchantments all layered on top of one another), or magically breading new species of animal.

[Kristopher]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I prefer a world in which simple, small magic that doesn't change the world and is just another tool for small tasks is somewhat common, and where anything more than that is rare and usually difficult.

[assault]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I tend towards "wide, low".

 

This partly stems from a period I spent in Papua New Guinea, crossed with a generally "Greek Mythology" feel to my (main) setting.

 

Essentially, almost everybody is under the protection of one or another spirit of deity. Magic is then essentially a matter of the right prayers, sacrifices and charms to draw upon this protection.

 

You still have to farm, but most people would never dream of farming without honouring the relevant supernatural entity or entities at the appropriate times.

 

The people with the greatest access to magic are the people with the greatest degree of divine ancestry. Being a Demi-God has its advantages, but it tends to draw divine attention to you.

 

My "other" main setting is broadly similar, but with a more Scandinavian feel...

[Cantriped]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I've never been fod of divine magic, theres just something inherently unpalatable about drawing upon the power of some incalcuable goddly figure, as opposed to "doing it yourself" though I don't mind so much when it's more of a shamanistic drawing upon to "spirits" of specific archetypes.

but I supose that partially my own views on religion hampering my gameplay.

 

As far as magic I've used, I like somewhat narrow caster demographic, with mid level power caps. basicly by and large the things you can do with magic really arn't any easier to do with non-magical means, just a bit faster

[Lemurion]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I've never been fod of divine magic, theres just something inherently unpalatable about drawing upon the power of some incalcuable goddly figure, as opposed to "doing it yourself" though I don't mind so much when it's more of a shamanistic drawing upon to "spirits" of specific archetypes.

but I supose that partially my own views on religion hampering my gameplay.

 

As far as magic I've used, I like somewhat narrow caster demographic, with mid level power caps. basicly by and large the things you can do with magic really arn't any easier to do with non-magical means, just a bit faster

 

Reminds me of a mage I once played who dismissed all clerics as "pipes." They weren't real spell casters, just pipes to bring down divine power.

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Reminds me of a mage I once played who dismissed all clerics as "pipes." They weren't real spell casters' date=' just pipes to bring down divine power.[/quote']

 

I generally take the position that it's the cleric's faith, not any direct intervention from a diety that may or may not exist*, that supplies the divine magic. Belief matters, not gods (hence, clerics devoted to a philosophy or cause).

 

 

*I use the distant gods theory, where they never directly appear or intervene; whether or not the gods even exist is unproven. They could be real, but they could merely be anthropomorphizations of belief. Nobody knows for sure either way (but everybody has an opinion).

[assault]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

*I use the distant gods theory' date=' where they never directly appear or intervene; whether or not the gods even exist is unproven. They could be real, but they could merely be anthropomorphizations of belief. Nobody knows for sure either way (but everybody has an opinion).[/quote']

 

I prefer my approach since it has a more "pre-modern" feel, in my opinion.

 

Of course there were philosophers, gnostics and so on in the Ancient world, but I prefer things a little simpler.

 

The local River Goddess lives in the local River. The King of the Gods lives on the Sacred Mountain, except when he manifests in that Temple up there on the hill, or when he seduced your (PC's) mother. Your ancestral spirits really do keep watch on your/their family from that little shrine on the wall. Oh, and impiety is the greatest sin of all...

 

My campaign world is flat, too.

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I prefer my approach since it has a more "pre-modern" feel, in my opinion.

 

Of course there were philosophers, gnostics and so on in the Ancient world, but I prefer things a little simpler.

 

The local River Goddess lives in the local River. The King of the Gods lives on the Sacred Mountain, except when he manifests in that Temple up there on the hill, or when he seduced your (PC's) mother. Your ancestral spirits really do keep watch on your/their family from that little shrine on the wall. Oh, and impiety is the greatest sin of all...

 

My campaign world is flat, too.

 

Personal preferences and all that, I s'pose. I've always hated interventionalist gods.

[Lemurion]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I think different approaches to gods work for different campaigns. Since I started with old D&D, there's always that back of the mind concern that if it appears someone will try to kill it. Given that old idea, even if it doesn't apply to most HERO gamers I still prefer to keep them primarily in the background even when they're not "distant gods."

[Springald Jack]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Hm.

 

I guess my Londinium campaign had Cube Magic. Village Witches or Hex Men were not all that rare, nor were traveling seers or priests with minor powers, but seriously powerful sorcerers were rare, and magic didn't do much more for most people than replace chemical fertilizers and serve as a stand in for the local pharmacy. Every king would cultivate the favor of a few Shamans, Priests or Wizards, and rare groups like the Knights of the Rose or the Knights of the Cross with multiple combat trained users of magic were major powers.

 

Sounds a little like magic in the Earthsea trilogy (please ignore the awful miniseries) One of my favorite depictions of Magic.

 

Every village had some sort of Village magician, but Wizards like the main character are much rarer...

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I prefer my approach since it has a more "pre-modern" feel, in my opinion.

 

Of course there were philosophers, gnostics and so on in the Ancient world, but I prefer things a little simpler.

 

The local River Goddess lives in the local River. The King of the Gods lives on the Sacred Mountain, except when he manifests in that Temple up there on the hill, or when he seduced your (PC's) mother. Your ancestral spirits really do keep watch on your/their family from that little shrine on the wall. Oh, and impiety is the greatest sin of all...

 

My campaign world is flat, too.

 

This is a style I quite dig on too.

 

Probably due to MANY years of Gloranthan Runequest.

Athiests were a distinct minority

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

This is a style I quite dig on too.

 

Probably due to MANY years of Gloranthan Runequest.

Athiests were a distinct minority

 

In a world where deities and their powers manifest regularly, the definitions of "atheist" and "agnostic" need to change. In such an environment, I wouod suggest:

 

- an "Agnostic" would be one who acknowledges the existence and power of Gods, but does not acknowledge that any of them are worthy of his worship.

 

- an "Atheist" would be one who acknowledges the existence and power of these beings, but does not accept that they are "Deities", simply otherplanar beings possessed of great powers (no more a "God" than a dragon or an elemental is).

[atlascott]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

Keep magic rare and you will keep some wonder about it. No matter how whirling a dervish your resident swordmaster is, even he will give pause when he sees the miracles real magic can do. Parties SHOULD have a single spellcaster, at most...it makes their presence properly important and significant.

 

I am running a FH game right now, and the stated rules are "Low Magic" where there is little in the way of magic items, spellcasters are rare, etc.

 

Yet, in the first 3 or 4 adventures, the PC's have suddenly been getting their hands on alot of magic items....hmmmm....

 

Well, the real reason for it is that the Wurld is due for a new age of magic, not heralded in by the forces of good, but rather, because the servitors of Dark Gods have reinstated magic to its rightful place in the world. You see, in aeons long past, curbing magic was the only way to seal the door between our world and the dimension of chaos from whence these Dark Gods spring.

 

Of course, the PC's do not know this...but they will soon find out. Next session, I am going to hit the sole spellcaster with a 10 pt pool bonus, and not explain why. This should be fun...I love large story arcs and themes...

[PhilFleischmann]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

I also use "low, wide" magic in my campaign. It need not change the world as some have claimed. Just because it exists doesn't mean it's powerful or reliable or available enough to alter the structure of society. And magic that exists in one place might be very different from the magic that exists in another place.

 

And just because magic is potentially accessible to almost everyone doesn't mean it loses it's "magicalness," it's sense of awe and wonder. In the RW, we can still be amazed by feats of skill of various kinds (athletic, intellectual, artistic, etc.) even though we know that just about any of us could develop those skills if we devoted the time and effort to doing so.

 

That's the way my FH world works: each village has it's own style of magic - it's own set of magical effects it can achieve - that it teaches to it's people. Magic from your own village might not seem so special - it's just a useful tool that provides a convenience in day-to-day life. But magic from another village can be strange and wondrous. The needs of their day-to-day lives are different from yours.

[Lucius]

Re: Rarity of Magic?

 

One of the interesting things about this topic is that it's not a simple question with simple possible answers. The permutations are endless.

 

For example, no one has yet (that I noticed) mentioned that distinction between how GENERALLY known or available magick is, and how available it is to the player characters.

 

It would be quite possible to have a game where the player characters are all wizards, in a world where wizards are few.

 

It would also be possible to have, for example, a game where the player characters are all questing knights who must contend with a world full of faeries, enchanters, sorceresses, and even dragons, giants and trolls endowed with their own dweomers.

 

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Insomniac with a palindromedary