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[spelguru]

But if you are the dark lord, what then?

[Zonk]

i think the magic system should be AS FREE as possibile...and complicated :-)

[ThreeToe]

Don't worry Zonk, I think everyone is with you.  I just brought up Star Wars because everyone was suggesting thier favorate books.  What's going to happen is: T-man is going to take all these ideas and break them into thier component parts.  Then they will be randomly put back together.  So thier will be "Bale-fire" and "The Dark Side" in the same universe, but it will be very unlikely to have an exact replica of an author's majic system unless you request it during the creation of the universe.

So like most things in Armok, how FREE the magic system is, is set up in the beginning.  Personally, I hate magic, so I want a universe where I am Conan and must use my super-combat training to hunt down the last wizards and give thier souls to Armok.

[spelguru]

*glares evily at ThreeToe* Magic hater!!!

[Alanor]

spelguru
what fun would it be to BE the dark lord?
you have to have *someone* menacing over your shoulder forcing you to always act in the favor of the sith lords.
There can only be one dark sith lord...
only one....  (-:<

[spelguru]

Then I, the Sith servant, do the really evil thing and backstab my lord when he is busy thinking about something. Then I will be the NEW Sith Lord!!!

[X]

Should definately be flavour Tarn. I'll de-Americanise you yet.  

Damn that person Y! I'll get him back for killing me, so no need to worry about my feelings Alanor.  

Glad the magic system itself is being thought about, I was just worried that everyone seemed to be throwing spells around without worrying about where they had come from (or who they would hit).
The ideas look good, nice having the way it works change depending on the universe. If you can manage to incorperate every description of magic into the system that would be very impressive. However, i think you'll probably have to make some arbitrary descisions at some point over what is allowed and what isn't - if only for programming and playability concerns.

I see the Wheel of Time rolls ever onwards, hopefully the long winded and over complicated bastard will break on a rock soon. It would probably be a good series if Robert Jordan's editior had been brave enough to tell him to cut half of it. *Lots of imho so people don't bite my head off* If someone wants to start a separate topic about authors I'd love to contribute.  

X

[Toady One]

Yeah, the free-form of the magic "system" will probably make it eminently abusable for a long time.  If that bothers people, I can just have stock spells and stock magic systems along the lines of the current stock creatures available as an option...  actually, one of the most hellish aspects of the randomly generated spell systems is getting computer-controlled creatures to cast spells at appropriate times -- if the spell system involves stringing together effects freely, then the creatures need to be taught what sorts of effects go together well.

Fortunately, magic is three versions away, so I can ruminate on this a little longer.  I just added a more complete healing system (including scars)...  maybe I'll finally finish the creature description synopsis generator by tomorrow.  It should only take an hour or so, now that I've planned it out.  Then I need to write six editors and set up world definition data that takes stock creatures into consideration.  Then release...  then do vegetation and ecosystems and release...  then I can tackle all of this magic nonsense.

[ThreeToe]

Ok, I just had to stay up past 2:00 am to finish a stupid report and I'm pissed off.  As a result I have a new spell request:
Nuclear Bomb.

It works like this: all matter in the center of the blast is automatically sucked into the elemental plane of fire.  The resulting explosion sends a shockwave of fireballs and magic missles incenerating the land for miles around.  The burnt land is then cursed by dark magic that stops anything from growing there for 200 years.  Any person who sets foot on the land will also recieve the curse and all thier offspring will be orcs.  The amount of energy needed to produce to blast will rip holes in the fabric of the universe and open a doorway to hell.  The souls of the murdered will rise up to avenge the outrage.  Ancient monsters will be awakened by the blast.

[spelguru]

Stone Implode: The target person or area becomes to new source of gravity for rocks and the very lands he stands on, depending on skill and power used, different amount of rocks will be affected, and the strength of the targets gravity well.

Single and Dual Reverse of Grav: In single reverse the target just gets affected by grav the opposite way it should. That means whatever targeted get launched into outer space and canīt ever return. If target is indoors the roof may or may not break. In dual reverse the target gets affected normal again by grav after a while (about 10 or 20 secs). Up like a rocket, down like a stone!!!

Shell Acid: From the x files: A poison that blinds the target and turns itīs skin into a hard shell and anything on the inside to fluid. Bottoms Up!!!

Air Blast: Just like a sledgehammer made of air. Can smash walls!

[Demon]

Magic might be internally 'free form' but does that mean in any game we can make the same spell?  I was under the impession that each time a cult sorta thing would be randomly generated with certian spells in it.  Then the people who are in that cult could only cast those spells.  the player could learn many magical traditions or research to get the spells he wants.  But is it going to be more like you can cast anything within your power by making up the spell each time on the fly?

[Toady One]

It depends...  in some universes, there might only be a few types of magic, with very limited spell effects.  Then you can only cast those effects.  You might not even be able to mix and match those different effects to make new spells.  It just depends on how magic works.  At one extreme there's a magical art that has access to every spell effect and can string them together freely, and at the other end there's a magical art that has one stereotyped spell that cannot be altered in any way.

If you have access to the same set of effects as you had access to in a previous universe, and your magic type allows free construction of new spells, then you'd be able to string those effects together to reconstruct a spell that your old character had used.  However, it is very likely that the particular art that you are now using would have different rituals to generate the spell effects, and different side effects, and so on.  So the spell itself would act roughly the same, but you might have to scream obscenities instead of sacrificing a chicken to cast it, and there might be a puff of white smoke instead of a rain of blood as an accompanying side effect.

[spelguru]

*spelguru stands confused and sings childish songs* Say again?

[Demon]

Puff of white smoke or rain (be it blood or water) sound like kewl spells in and of them selves.  Try not to skip over the minor but neat things wizards could do...  I wouldnt want to clean my lab for example...  An anti sullying spell would be great!

[ThreeToe]

There should be a spell like the "time-watch" in the B-movie "Trancers":

Someone shoots an arrow at Jack Deth.
Jack Deth activates his time watch and one second is stretched to ten.  He walks up to the slowly approaching arrow, grabs it out of the air, and pushes it through the archer's wrist.

This spell is a nasty one so it should be hard to caste.  limited to one use of one second.  Afterward you have to spend months searching for spell ingredients of something.