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[JohnieRWilkins]

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it's that extra-special time of month again. The time when someone posts another magic thread and we all politely refer him to the 500 other magic threads already in existence.

But Johnie, what is the purpose of this thread, you ask? You see... I'm tired of vague magic discussions that lead nowhere. I want to use this thread to simply make a case for object magic and to discuss points for and against it with other handsome and brilliant bay12ers. Let's try to make magic discussion less abstract from now on.

1.) What is this general object centric magic?
Ideally, it's an expansion of the artifact system to encompass other "spherical" objects too. So a foul blendec's corpse can be just as magical as the artifact spiked obsidian coffer. Skilled mages can "extract" the spherical energy from the magical object and use it to their own ends. The possible methods of magic "extraction" are explained later.

Magic depletion is central to object centric magic, but should generally only be applied to a wizard's use of an object. That portal into the nether sitting in your noble's room should never run out of charge if dwarves naturally walk through it, but if a wizzard snatches it, then uses it to cast a spell, that coffer's batteries should reduce. When the wizzard depletes the object, it becomes a non-magical artifact quality item. Maybe a skilled enough wizard can transfer some magic from a blendec's blood into the rags of clinical immortality to make them magical again?

Spheres naturally limit the utility of magical items. Can't cast a wall of fire without a fire item. And if you want a wall of fire, you better be a good enough mage, because you could potentially summon a spirit of fire which would immediately turn you into ash. More on that later.

Some objects should be able to naturally recharge their magical batteries to mix things up. These objects should be (choose two out of three) exceptionally rare, weak, and recharge slowly.

2.) But why?
This system would promote rarity of magic, and provide additional tension between elder horrors/mages/adventurers/kingdoms for the magical resources of the world. Wizards would finally have good reason to be paranoid megalomaniacs intent on blowing away all other wizards, creating epic fantasy battles. Players would be able to conjure their highly expensive fireballs, but only after defeating the entire dwarven kingdom for their fifty artifacts, only one of which can actually cast the ten fireballs, before becoming a useless trinket.

Magic would be so much more magical and complex than just leveled combat magic, but not common enough to create a magic based economy where each peasant, and their horse can afford magical farm machinery and farm plots that farm themselves.

3.) How does one cast such magic?
Well, the one thing about magic is that it's exactly like electricity. Magic "flows" from an object with a high concentration of magic, to an object with a low concentration of magic. The ground beneath having the lowest concentration of magic possible. Unless it's magical ground beneath your feet, in which case everything can backfire. Skill with magic is all about understanding magical circuits and how magical devices operate, as well as basic, and refined knowledge of the magical spheres. A wand is very important, because a good wand acts exactly like an electrical conductor would. If you have artifacts on your person, and you touch the wand to the ground, you'll complete the magical circuit and magic happens.

Will this explanation make magic seem less magical? No! If the player chooses the wizard's tower mode, they'll surely want to know how his mage character is making all of this happen. The game can't just abstract everything away to "fdsadjakdjal." That won't make magic any more magical. That will just make it gibberish. Gibberish isn't magical.

Why is it so much like electricity? I feel that this is the only way to outline the lore for consistency's sake without it completely violating logic and creating more problems than it solves. For example:
MagicMaster: Mages use chants to create spells.
MagicStudent: Why do chants do magic? The vibrating vocal chords create magical oscillation in the various air molecules, the mechanics of those oscillations being far more magical than the regular oscillations from normal speech? Or am I missing some great mystery of this universe?
MagicMaster: Well... fdsadjakdja

If someone feels the need to nitpick at the electricity deal, I can always refer them to the second law of thermodynamics. This pertains only to the mechanics of the magic though, I really have no claim to realism/consistency of the spells, nor is there any way to explain any of them away without crushing Toady's spherical creativity. At least half of this system would make sense, unlike the chanting example where everything is gibberish. Yes, that's an improvement over the gibberish system.

4.) How does magic happen, in game terms?
Well, you choose the artifacts you want to employ in the magic process. Then you choose the wand you want to augment the magic with. Then if you're good enough, you choose the magnitude of the spell, which direction you want to cast the magic in, whether the magic is harmful, or not. Maybe if you're really the masterful grandmaster of grandmastery, you'd be able to say that you want to rain hail on that elven retreat 25 world squares over. But most of the time you should just be choosing "misery sphere, augmented with the fire sphere sword as the wand*, harmful, maximum magnitude, that way on this map, just past the brook." I don't think that dwarves should be able to control magic wizard style in dwarf mode, but they should still be able to interact with the objects normally. (Teleport through the portal of teleportation, have zombies rise up from the dead and attack them due to the cursed armor stand, etc...)

*Maybe the fire sphere sword signifies harm, while the fertility sphere staff signifies a blessing? This would add the hillarious FUN possibility of randomizing spheres and whether they modify the ability to cause harm in your specific genned world or not, so one world would have a BENIGN modifier for fire and a HARMFUL modifier for fertility, and the inverse for a different world.

Addendum:
I think that this random->controlled progression is what people from the other magic threads really wanted. This would make magic mysterious. That is unless you want it to not be mysterious, by making an adventurer, or a mage dedicated to scooping up every single magical item in the world and reading every magic "skill book" in existence. In that case you would feel a sufficient command of the awesome powers, while still being limited by the difficult resource collection.

This magic system would complement a ritual system, and just plain magical creatures who have no need of magical objects to perform magic. Maybe an adventurer who befriended the intelligent dragon can ask the dragon for a favor, to create an eternal fire for his village that burns throughout the winter. Maybe if you're playing the said dragon, you'd have access to all of the magic related to your sphere. The spells available to you can be leveled by improving your spherical skill. Dabbling Fire Creature would let you spit embers from your mouth, while Legendary Fire Creature would let you create firestorms that engulf entire world squares.

A ritual system would let you potentially summon a demon/deity with mastery of their sphere. Then you could attempt to convince the demon/deity to throw a bone your way, possibly by offering something in exchange. Maybe some generous deities would accept the ritual itself as enough of a good deed to do you good in return. Deities are genned with worlds, so mileage should definitely vary there.



Don't stray too far off-topic! We're discussing object magic here, but if you'd like to argue why your system of magic is better than this one, please do.

[Neonivek]

What is odd is that realistically a Fireball is actually no where close as good as any other ranged weaponry

Yet it is refered to as if it was a nuke.

I am aware that is how other games handle it but shouldn't we treat it like a ball of fire? something that isn't so effective in Dwarf Fortress without extreme heat?

Fireball doesn't outdo a crossbow why should we be compensating for it by making it expencive? Your system needs work ultimately, you need to think of things in practical terms rather then trying too hard to restrict magic.

Why do chants do magic?

Because there are two reasons
1) there is a belief in the power of words themselves. For example the True Runes of Norse mythology
2) Your speaking to gods and spirits themselves. In essence praying to your god and casting spells are very much the same in some respect. Some stories even call Priests who call upon the power of their diety a sorcerer.

Magic is used by the lazy as a way to get out of explaining things. It however can be even more involved then even advanced science.

With people putting magic as the polar opposite of science, there is a formed belief that while science is logic and reason, that magic is the defiance of such and thus I feel it suffers from that treatment.

---

Spheres are in essence themes, frankly I think it would be extremely interesting if ANY spell could be charged with any sphere. Sure it could have the Patron Sphere, representing the sphere it was created for, but I can only imagine the dynamics of having all the spheres function with all the spells.

How would a Fireball charged with music instead of fire function? What is a Ball of music? What about a Fertility ball? Animal Ball?

[JohnieRWilkins]

What is odd is that realistically a Fireball is actually no where close as good as any other ranged weaponry

Yet it is refered to as if it was a nuke.

I am aware that is how other games handle it but shouldn't we treat it like a ball of fire? something that isn't so effective in Dwarf Fortress without extreme heat?

Fireball doesn't outdo a crossbow why should we be compensating for it by making it expencive? Your system needs work ultimately, you need to think of things in practical terms rather then trying too hard to restrict magic.

Under my system, no mage would ever cast a fireball. Beginner mages would cast a fire sphere spell and pray for the best. Weathered mages would use their mana efficiently and cast the actual nukes if they ever have to. But they'd be severely limited by the supply of mana, since that most likely means a supply of artifacts.

Fireballs would be something fire imps throw at you, and for free.

Why do chants do magic?

Because there are two reasons
1) there is a belief in the power of words themselves. For example the True Runes of Norse mythology
2) Your speaking to gods and spirits themselves. In essence praying to your god and casting spells are very much the same in some respect. Some stories even call Priests who call upon the power of their diety a sorcerer.

Magic is used by the lazy as a way to get out of explaining things. It however can be even more involved then even advanced science.

With people putting magic as the polar opposite of science, there is a formed belief that while science is logic and reason, that magic is the defiance of such and thus I feel it suffers from that treatment.

I guess I don't like any of this stuff because I haven't ever touched D&D. I've been annoyed by every other fantasy RPG for evading physics with their explanations of magics. I know power words to be mechanically impossible for example, so mentioning power words is instantly immersion breaking for me. Prayer is a similar concept, but not as alienating to me. I'd be fairly disappointed if prayer was the main method for doing magic.

Yea magic can try to not overtly contradict logic, which is what I did with the electricity theory. I don't think that magic is the polar opposite of science, but it's incompatible with science because it's bound to violate physical laws all over the place. That wasn't a point I was arguing and it's probably irrelevant to the case for object centric magic.

Spheres are in essence themes, frankly I think it would be extremely interesting if ANY spell could be charged with any sphere. Sure it could have the Patron Sphere, representing the sphere it was created for, but I can only imagine the dynamics of having all the spheres function with all the spells.

How would a Fireball charged with music instead of fire function? What is a Ball of music? What about a Fertility ball? Animal Ball?

Yea fusing spheres like that is literally an impossible amount of work. There are probably over 100 spheres. The amount of fused sphere effects toady would have to come up with would be at least in the high thousands. (100factorial?)

What can happen is that a sphere can augment another sphere in a predictable way. Like the music sphere would cause fire to be benign. If you cast a music augmented fire sphere spell on yourself, you'd be enveloped in a warm glow that would keep you warm through the cold night. Some cool stuff like that.

[Neonivek]

fusing spheres

Fusing? I was talking about powering spells with different spheres then what was intended.

I've been annoyed by every other fantasy RPG for evading physics with their explanations of magics.

Magic cannot be taken entirely into science in most systems, I've seen some where magic is simply a dimensional portal to a universe made entirely of a psychoprotean energy but that was as close as possible, mostly because science deals entirely with quantitative qualities.

When your dealing with magic you have a tool to handle the world in a much less litteral, but in many ways much more litteral, sense. You alter the world not in terms of physically altering them in the way a scientist would, but in a way of changing the details in the way of an author. Magic often deal with themes and concepts.

Science and Magic can come to the same result but through different conclusions.

I'd be fairly disappointed if prayer was the main method for doing magic

Well there is Final Fantasy Tactics. Though what is prayer but ritualised communication?

Yea magic can try to not overtly contradict logic

What magic can often do better then science is deal with logic on a qualitative level. Thus magic is illogical to science because it deals with a logic that it inherantly cannot deal with.

Heck you yourself said "Absorbing spheres" but spheres are just concepts given form as well.

[bucket]

FUCK MAGIC, ACQUIRE ADAMANTIUM

[irmo]

FUCK MAGIC, ACQUIRE ADAMANTIUM

It's "adamantine", but other than that, yeah.

[Silverionmox]

I don't know whether it would fit the concept of magic to make it into one single all-encompassing logical system. There should be room for quirks and unexpected effects. It's still possible to have several smaller logical magical systems existing next to, or amongst and between, each other.

In addition there's replayability/semi-randomized content to consider: logical systems can fudge the numerical parameters a bit, but that's about it. A system where quasi random elements play a major role in the practical applications of magic is much more promising (eg. consider two worlds: in one fasting enhances magic, in the other it diminishes it. The application and uses of magic will be very different in those two worlds, even if everything else were the same).

[JohnieRWilkins]

I don't know whether it would fit the concept of magic to make it into one single all-encompassing logical system. There should be room for quirks and unexpected effects. It's still possible to have several smaller logical magical systems existing next to, or amongst and between, each other.

In addition there's replayability/semi-randomized content to consider: logical systems can fudge the numerical parameters a bit, but that's about it. A system where quasi random elements play a major role in the practical applications of magic is much more promising (eg. consider two worlds: in one fasting enhances magic, in the other it diminishes it. The application and uses of magic will be very different in those two worlds, even if everything else were the same).

If we're talking about this magic system, then the quirks and unexpected effects have been considered, which is what the spherical spell-casting system does. You can't cast fireballs, you can only cast fire sphere spells. If you accidentally cast a mushroom cloud right next to yourself instead of a fireball, well, you should've read more skill-books. It wouldn't be fair to make this system any more random due to how expensive magic casting is. If you defeat the goblin civ just to butcher their demon for his magical demon horns, you'd want those horns to do useful things, not just backfire and destroy you.

If you're talking about all magic systems. Well, I don't personally know how a coherent magic system can be randomized unless Toady codes several systems of magic into this game, then has worldgen pick from one/several types of magic based on low/high magic setting. You mentioned the fasting example, but didn't outline what magical system it modifies. Is fasting its own magical system? That could be somewhat fun, but I definitely would want an alternative.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

fusing spheres

Fusing? I was talking about powering spells with different spheres then what was intended.

I've been annoyed by every other fantasy RPG for evading physics with their explanations of magics.

Magic cannot be taken entirely into science in most systems, I've seen some where magic is simply a dimensional portal to a universe made entirely of a psychoprotean energy but that was as close as possible, mostly because science deals entirely with quantitative qualities.

When your dealing with magic you have a tool to handle the world in a much less litteral, but in many ways much more litteral, sense. You alter the world not in terms of physically altering them in the way a scientist would, but in a way of changing the details in the way of an author. Magic often deal with themes and concepts.

Science and Magic can come to the same result but through different conclusions.

I'd be fairly disappointed if prayer was the main method for doing magic

Well there is Final Fantasy Tactics. Though what is prayer but ritualised communication?

Yea magic can try to not overtly contradict logic

What magic can often do better then science is deal with logic on a qualitative level. Thus magic is illogical to science because it deals with a logic that it inherantly cannot deal with.

Heck you yourself said "Absorbing spheres" but spheres are just concepts given form as well.

TOO ABSTRACT. NEED MORE CONCRETE. Why is Objective magic bad. GO! Poin1, Point2, Conclusion.

[irmo]

If we're talking about this magic system, then the quirks and unexpected effects have been considered, which is what the spherical spell-casting system does. You can't cast fireballs, you can only cast fire sphere spells. If you accidentally cast a mushroom cloud right next to yourself instead of a fireball, well, you should've read more skill-books. It wouldn't be fair to make this system any more random due to how expensive magic casting is. If you defeat the goblin civ just to butcher their demon for his magical demon horns, you'd want those horns to do useful things, not just backfire and destroy you.

I'm not seeing how anyone manages to become any good at magic in your system. Each sphere has its own skill, each artifact is bound to a specific sphere, so training up your skill in any sphere is going to require burning a ridiculous number of artifacts to cast spells. Which will most likely blow you up. If you survive the initial blowing-yourself-up novice phase, then congratulations, you now have to burn more artifacts every time you want to cast spells. You do understand that there's no reliable way to produce artifacts in this setting, right?

TOO ABSTRACT. NEED MORE CONCRETE. Why is Objective magic bad. GO! Poin1, Point2, Conclusion.

If by "objective magic" you mean "the kind that operates according to some pseudo-physics", like you've described, I think it's bad because it's not magic, because magic is not physics. Magic works by the power of symbols and interconnections. I make a doll that looks like you and has some of your hair in it. It's now connected to you, so anything I do to the doll affects you. Or: I'm a vampire. I drink the blood of mortals to unnaturally extend my life past the point of death. This works because blood is symbolic of life. (And, more specifically, because drinking blood to gain eternal life is a symbolic thing in Christianity, and vampires practice a twisted form of that.)

Whereas your system is like the technology on Star Trek: the power supply system on the ships is some kind of plasma trickery, which is exactly analogous to having a boiler and a system of steam pipes. (And saying that it's "just like electricity" is exactly as much of a handwave as talking about magical vibrations. Electricity doesn't have different "spheres", it doesn't randomly backfire and cause you to explode, you don't normally complete electrical circuits by connecting things to the ground, etc.)

[JohnieRWilkins]

If we're talking about this magic system, then the quirks and unexpected effects have been considered, which is what the spherical spell-casting system does. You can't cast fireballs, you can only cast fire sphere spells. If you accidentally cast a mushroom cloud right next to yourself instead of a fireball, well, you should've read more skill-books. It wouldn't be fair to make this system any more random due to how expensive magic casting is. If you defeat the goblin civ just to butcher their demon for his magical demon horns, you'd want those horns to do useful things, not just backfire and destroy you.

I'm not seeing how anyone manages to become any good at magic in your system. Each sphere has its own skill, each artifact is bound to a specific sphere, so training up your skill in any sphere is going to require burning a ridiculous number of artifacts to cast spells. Which will most likely blow you up. If you survive the initial blowing-yourself-up novice phase, then congratulations, you now have to burn more artifacts every time you want to cast spells. You do understand that there's no reliable way to produce artifacts in this setting, right?

The sphere skills exist only for magical creatures. A mage probably won't have a "High Master Fire Creature" skill if he's a non-magical human/elf/dwarf. If he's a fireman, he'll have fire creature skill, but probably doesn't have canlearn tag so his skill is static. I haven't discussed how mages gain skills at all. I didn't discuss mage skill gains because I'm not sure how much work Toady should put into the magic system.

Ideally mages would have 3 skills under this system.
Lore - Spherical knowledge. Increasing it lets you choose specific sphere related spells, rather than just spheres. Dabbling in lore lets you choose the artifacts, and the spheres by extension. Legendary lets you pick out specific spells.
Magical Devices - Magical device knowledge. Increasing it lets you know which sphere your object belongs to and how much mana it has left.
Magic User - How good your aim is. Legendary magic user can cast any spell a great travelmap distance away. Dabbling magic users can specify directions and pray for the best.

Skill books are a must for the magic arc. The player should be able to learn how to do all of this stuff in the classroom before attempting any of it. Although collecting the magical skill books should be extremely challenging. Probably as challenging as

TOO ABSTRACT. NEED MORE CONCRETE. Why is Objective magic bad. GO! Poin1, Point2, Conclusion.

If by "objective magic" you mean "the kind that operates according to some pseudo-physics", like you've described, I think it's bad because it's not magic, because magic is not physics. Magic works by the power of symbols and interconnections. I make a doll that looks like you and has some of your hair in it. It's now connected to you, so anything I do to the doll affects you. Or: I'm a vampire. I drink the blood of mortals to unnaturally extend my life past the point of death. This works because blood is symbolic of life. (And, more specifically, because drinking blood to gain eternal life is a symbolic thing in Christianity, and vampires practice a twisted form of that.)

Whereas your system is like the technology on Star Trek: the power supply system on the ships is some kind of plasma trickery, which is exactly analogous to having a boiler and a system of steam pipes. (And saying that it's "just like electricity" is exactly as much of a handwave as talking about magical vibrations. Electricity doesn't have different "spheres", it doesn't randomly backfire and cause you to explode, you don't normally complete electrical circuits by connecting things to the ground, etc.)

You misunderstood. The electricity explanation has nothing to do with it. I can delete that part and my general idea won't be affected at all. The object centric magic is the system of artifacts = mana. Using artifacts to use their mana depletes these artifacts. I don't really want a discussion on the physics, I want a discussion on why this system of magic is the best system of magic/why it isn't.

A non-abstract argument would be you telling me why this system of magic is bad. Not why star trak. Why physics. Why star wars. Why magical vibrations.

(The electricity explanation is bad, but it's far better than complete hand-wavium. It adds consistency to the world. How do you cast something? You take a stick, hook a magical battery to one end, and the ground to another end and you have magic flow. When magic reaches the end of the wand, a magical mechanism is activated and sends the spell in a direction. That's how magic is cast. What are spells? Nobody knows.)

[tsen]

I feel it's important to note that *all* of these ideas have merit. Given that magic is another thing that's intended to be procedurally generated, there really might be an underlying language for reality that makes music of certain types cause supernatural effects, or magic might just be a thermodynamically regulated hyperphysics sort of thing. I think the real trick is to figure out how it ought to be *constructed* randomly, not how it should work, per se.

Like, figure out how to construct a procedural/nodal map of system generation; THEN work out different sorts of nodes that can be combined in different ways.