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[Eagle_eye]

I'm currently working on a mod to add magic to adventure mode. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions. Here's the plan so far:

Druidic-Nature magic, focus on alchemy and indirect attacks
Necromantic-Death magic, focus on direct attacks and enhancing combat abilities
Entropic- Spells of an entropic nature tend to be more aggressive in nature, and also less controlled
Ordered- Ordered spells tend to focus more on helping the caster than harming the target, but should the forces you've forced into taking physical form escape, expect damage to yourself

Druidic+Entropic=Stormcalling- Focus on freezing and paralyzing enemies and destroying equipment
Necromantic+Entropic=Cursing- Focus on debilitating enemies combat abilities
Druidic+Ordered=Stonemelding- Focus on enhancing caster's defensive abilities
Necromantic+Ordered=Spiritbinding- Focus on enhancing the caster's offensive abilities

Spells will require energy from each of the qualities their school has, with order having the same source as entropy, and nature having the same source as death. As a result, it may be difficult to specialize in all schools of magic.

Each school has four levels- novice, where the only thing that can be done is attempting to learn, apprentice, which has basic spells, magi, which has more advanced, specialized spells specific to the school, and archmagi, which contains permanent bound equipment, AOE, etc.

Spells-
   Nature-   
      Draw natural energy- this takes a corpse and absorbs the residual life within it, fueling the caster's magic
   Death-
      Draw necromantic energy- this takes a corpse and binds the energy of the spirit to the caster
   Entropy-
      Draw entropic energy- this takes a crafted rune and destroys its order, absorbing the entropic energy from the destruction
   Order-
      Draw ordered energy- this takes a crafted rune and absorbs the energy within the carefully placed markings to fuel your magic

   Stormcalling
      Novice-
         Learn Stormcalling- takes entropic and natural energies and infuses you with knowledge of stormcalling
      Apprentice-
         Freezing Blast-This damages some equipment and causes frostbite on the target
         Lightning Bolt-Creates a powerful projectile that damages the outer layers of tissue, but has almost no impact force
      Magi-
         Numbing cold- temporarily numbs you and anything in the vicinity, preventing pain but also weakening anything relying on manual skills
         Greater lightning- In addition to doing damage, it temporarily paralyzes the affected body parts as the nervous system is overloaded with electricity
         Frozen Hands- Summons gloves that are permanently cold, allowing you to handle most materials easily and potentially cause frostbite to enemies, but may damage your hands if worn too long
      Archmagi-
         Ice armor- Like frozen hands, but covers the whole body, and is equivalent to bronze
         Master Lightning- Causes severe damage to all tissue layers, and permanent loss of function in the affected body part
         Icy Mist- Creates a cloud of freezing mist around the caster that will destroy flesh and cloth alike- ice armor will protect you from its effects, while enemies with any exposed body parts are at risk
   Cursing
      Novice-
         Learn Cursing- self explanatory- Note that some other cursing spells have a chance of affecting the caster as well
      Apprentice-
         Sluggish reactions- numbs the target entirely, and causes severe swelling for a short time
         Debilitating Bolt- A projectile that on contact with the enemy causes severe nausea and mild pain
      Magi-
         Crushing weight- immensely heavy projectile that will burden the target considerably if it sticks in
         Open wound- target will begin to bleed from the body part for a short time
         Miasma- Creates an explosion of toxins with random effects on everyone contained within
      Archmagi-
         Corruption- All fat exposed to this spell becomes rapidly necrotic, allowing your strikes to go deeper
         Disabling Pain- Severe pain in any affected body parts for the victim
         Cloud of Darkness- Causes anyone caught in it to go instantly blind for a while
   
   Stonemelding
      Novice-
         Learn Stonemelding- Self explanatory
      Apprentice-
         Stone Shield-creates a shield of thick stone that protects well but weighs down the user considerably
         Earthen Conversion- Turns raw materials like leather and cloth fire and cold-proof
      Magi-
         Stone shell- Creates a suit of armor that is as effective as steel against blades, but poor against blunt weapons. It will eventually disintegrate
         Stonefist- Creates a heavy blunt projectile designed to break bones and cause blunt trauma
         Magma Blast- Creates a cloud of superheated stone around the caster
      Archmagi-
         Gauntlets of magma- creates superheated gloves that will light anything flammable they come in contact with on fire- use with care
         Gemblade- Creates a sword of solid diamond- razor sharp, but it will eventually return to the earth
         Grind Materials- Allows you to grind  materials ordinarily inaccessible into essences for powerful alchemical potions


   Spiritbinding-
      Novice-
         Learn Spiritbinding- self explanatory
      Apprentice-
         Bind spirit dagger- Binds a weightless, razor sharp dagger to you for a short time
         Bind spirit robe- Binds a weightless, somewhat protective robe to you for a short time
      Magi-
         Create soul flask- Creates a flask from a dead soul, able to hold the most caustic of potions
         Trap wild spirit- Creates a projectile that causes random debilitating effects in the target
         Divide Spirit- Allows you to break a corpse into many small projectiles that can easily lodge in the target
      Archmagi-
         Demonic Possession- Temporarily transforms you into a demon of varying strength
         Sandman- A cruel spirit puts the target to sleep, but temporarily curses you with minor afflictions as payment
         Bind greed spirits- Sacrificing gold coins as bait allows you to bind some greedy spirits into arrows, which when freed upon hitting the target or remaining with you too long, will curse everyone around.
         
                  

   Alchemy- Unlike the other schools, alchemy requires no energy to use, though it is dependent on some other schools for its more powerful potions
      Novice-
         Learn Alchemy- Self explanatory
      Apprentice-
         Create potion of pain- creates a potion that when shattered on the ground will cause severe pain on uncovered feet
         Create Flask- necessary for most alchemical reactions
      Magi-
         Create sanguine potion- Causes severe bleeding on any exposed parts
         Create frostbite potion- causes cold damage to anything exposed to it
         Create flame potion- causes heat damage to anything exposed
      Archmagi-
         Create Corrosive Substance- A highly corrosive potion that damages almost anything, requires a spirit flask to hold
         Create magma potion- Creates a potion of artificial magma- requires a spirit flask
         Create paralysis potion- paralyzes anything exposed to it

EDIT: Also, obviously, runecrafting will be part of it... I forgot to put that.

[Deon]

I am eager to see how do you plan to make it using the existing limited crafting options. Some effects look very ambiguous but cool.

[Eagle_eye]

yeah, I intend for most of the specifics to be discovered by trial or error. or raw diving, if people want to cheat .  Mostly it'll be using syndromes and modified heat/colddam points to achieve the more difficult effects...

[magistrate101]

I approve and demand notification once it starts to work

[Eagle_eye]

I'd estimate anywhere from 1-2 weeks.

[Eagle_eye]

UPDATE: Most of the necessary items are complete, now moving on to the materials...

[Eagle_eye]

Also, would anyone happen to know if its possible to utilize the ash on the ground you get from burning grass in a reaction? I'm thinking about potentially making a fire school of magic as well...

[i2amroy]

This looks pretty cool but I just can't imagine how some of these things are going to work in the current version, the major one being how are you going to get projectiles that cause symptoms? I mean, right now even if a projectile sticks in someone it still won't poison them. The only thing that I can think of is making a bolt that boils/melts at body temp but even that has some severe drawbacks. Just wanted to say that if you knew a way around that problem I would really like to know.

[Eagle_eye]

well, when the things are spawned, they're always in solid form, so you have at least one turn to throw it. For those things where it's possible, I'll be using fixed temperatures to cause burns and frostbite, but for the most part it will probably be reliant on splatters + contact syndromes. I've already got a few of them done and its working fairly well: there are still a few issues to be worked out, but no major problems yet.

[i2amroy]

Ok, so they always are solids for at least one turn, that should help out a lot with what I was doing. Hmmm, I wonder what would happen if something that boiled at room temperature was thrown so it boiled mid toss? Would it just evaporate or would the clouds continue their inertia? Anyways, thanks for the info, I look forward to when your mod comes out eventually.

[Jordrake]

Damn, if Toady ever implements actual magic in Vanilla, modders will be able to make Gods.
This looks amazing and awesome. Looking forward to trying it out.

[Eagle_eye]

ok, I've got a workable system for skill level advancement, though random chance could have you become an archmagi at everything very quickly. There's really nothing that can be done if/until toady implements skill restricted reactions for adventure mode.

[RysanMarquise]

Is it possible to make reaction success rate dependent upon skill? I would presume so, but I personally do not know how.

Here is the list of power sources that will actually lead to interesting results:

Expensive sources: Gold coins and the like

Difficult to move sources: Corpses and the like

Environmental Resources: Still-living trees (not sure if this can be done).

Rare but cheap resources: Coal, soap

Time-Based Resources: A very low chance of success per use or a particularly long crafting time for an unstable item (not sure how the second can be done). In theory items that have an annoyingly long set of preparatory steps but are stable fall under here, but they are not very fun or interesting.

This has interested me, so I am going to attempt to create my own requirement system.

[Eagle_eye]

gold coins work, but they're really easy to get

corpses are rather inconvenient- I'm going to allow you to turn them into "energy" of either life or death on the spot

trees can't be used- yet

coal and soap are both found exclusively in player forts

[RysanMarquise]

I think a necromantic power created from fresh corpses would be quite interesting. Rather than storing their power, which is little better than a very dull quest to kill wild-life, it becomes a combat decision to murder someone and use their power.

Creating interesting choices is the goal of any gameplay enhancement. Unfortunately I discovered that reactions are not only fast, but are entirely instant, so my last example doesn't quite work.