Magic systems 2

> Example: I see no point at all in a magic system which does BOTH of the following:…

OK, wait... you drifted from "theme of the game/stories" to "theme of magic." Two different things here. If the theme of the game is whitevs. black, it will certainly expand beyond just who uses what magic. Now if we're talking about the theme of the magic... well, I don't know. How does it relate to the rest of the system? The world where the game takes place? Tough call without having the rest of the info...

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RAN HARDIN:

> >In other words, if the whole theme of magic is the conflict between these two styles or methods, then the magical player-character is much more interesting and relevant if he or she has access to BOTH. Therefore the moral choices involved in casting magic are dramatized all the time during play, not only once during character creation.

> I pretty much agree with that. Characters are so much more interesting when they don't fall one way or the other.

Just because I'm in this mood today... ;) I'd say that what would be even more interesting would be a character who STARTED OUT falling very definitely one way or the other, then shaded towards the other side through events in the story. Or (and this would take some doing), a character who started out "in the middle," and found themselves leaning to one side more and more, again powered by events in the story.

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GARETH HANRAHAN:

Sorry to come in on this late. First week back to college, frantic attempts to convince freshers to join gaming society, no time for mail. But anyway...

MECHANICS

Magic, by its very nature as an array of special effects, is going to involve either a lot of special case rules, or a lot of gm calls. Keeping magic simple means keeping it undefined and ambiguous. So...well, basically, if you don't want every spell to be a gm call, then you need to put in loads of magicanics :-).

-have flexible, defined-at-the-moment effects, or highly codified and defined actions instead?

To spell list or not to spell list, you mean. Um...personally, I love Ars Magica. I worship the ground it walks upon - because it allows both. If I ever get around to designing a game, then I'd allow both as well.

- regarding the above point, if flexible, is flexibility only from the player's POV, or from both player and character POV? (we may need to clarify this issue ...)

please, 'cos I have no idea what you mean...

- improvement mechanics: within defined paths of improvement, or open-ended at every step?

I'd suggest that a mage can improve their skill at aspects of magic without learning more spells, and vice versa.

SETTING

- is magic a technology? (please, no Asimov quoting)

That was Clarke, not Asimov. (Asimov's Corollary to Clarke's law: Any sufficiently advanced robot is indistinguishable to the Good Fairy.) Magic should only be a technology in high-fantasy worlds where it's a fact of everyday life. If you've got hot water heaters run by fire elementals and ethereal mail (email), then magic should have defined and stable laws from which spell effects can be extrapolated from. Low fantasy games should have more mysterious magic.

- how is magic taught and learned, or is it a talent/innate thing?

I must say, I don't like the conception of magic as an innate ability. Magic should be a science, or an art, not a psychic power. Training and learning should always be a part of the path of the sorcerer.

- is the WORLD magical? How does a magic-inclusive setting differ from a mythical one (in terms of style)?

A magic-inclusive game assumes magic is a technology, and understandable. A mythical one doesn't.

- how do inhabitants view magic?

Depends on how widespread magic is.

THEME

- does magic MEAN anything to the players, in terms of playing this game?

Again, please clarify. Magic is, to my mind, either a set of rules (the technological, high-fantasy approach), or breaking the rules (the low-fantasy approach).

- are there forms they want to avoid or to approach in a certain way?

The overly mechanical, dice-bound spell list of AD&D, rolemaster, gurps etc etc etc.

- what thematic role is played by magic in the Elric books? In the Earthsea books? In the (original) Conan stories? Or conversely, in the Cugel stories, and the Fafhrd & Mouser stories?

Me computer scientist. Theme is irrelevant.

Or, to put it another way, theme and plot and setting are all mixed in together for me, and it's hard/impossible to pick one out on its own.

- can system reinforce theme? (I suggest that it necessarily does, and that therefore the idea of a RPG that addresses magic is nonsensical)

Agree wholeheartedly. More than anything else, magic should be distinctive. There are only a few ways to swing a sword or fire a gun. Magic should always be different...and inspiring. it should provoke a sense of wonder, whether it's awe at those wacky elementalists who are harnessing the tidal forces of the plane of water and summoning demons to draw ships, or mystery and fear of the figure who breaks the laws of reality by word and thought alone.

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RON EDWARDS:

About that black/white magic thing,

>Just because I'm in this mood today... ;) I'd say that what would be even more interesting would be a character who STARTED OUT falling very definitely one way or the other, then shaded towards the other side through events in the story. Or (and this would take some doing), a character who started out "in the middle," and found themselves leaning to one side more and more, again powered by events in the story.

Well drown my demon, but that's exactly what the Gray Magick system was designed. Maybe I really should dust that ol' thing off.

RON EDWARDS:

And then Ran lets us all have a blast of icy, high-pressure Energy Blast, area effect (cone), extra knockback! That was a Champions reference. On to the topic...

Topic #1: Flash and Bang

> The fact is, you can dig up many mythologies of magicians that are far from being subtle, empathic beings, and contain *much* flash-bang... Norse, Finnish, Vedic deities and their children and related ilk,

This is true. I at least am not too concerned with the visibility or flashy aspect of magic as an issue. High or low F&B seem equally fun to play or write about. However, I will stick to my idea regarding THEME -- these same deities and beings have "their" spheres of magic or effect and they are expressing "the world's" opinion toward the target of their magic as well as their own. Or, in the case of the sorcerer who bends or warps the "world" to get something down, you have an act of blasphemy.

I do mean literature and myth -- Narnia, Norse myth, and some Greek stuff. Flash and bang, yes; empty of "meaning" in metaphysical terms, no. I think.

Topic #2: Player vs. character feelings & beliefs, "grounding"

>I would ask: to what extent a *player's* beliefs should be of consequence, anyway? ...

...

>I would feel a certain letdown at having *my* fears being played upon to have an effect on the story revolving around my *character.* *I* am not my character, and it is doubtful that the two personalities would share a group of fears. ... If my own strings are plucked for effect, why would that affect my character?

Now this is way interesting. I see some points along a spectrum, which correspond to different kinds of RPG design.

- we have total separation of player and character, such that the character's sanity, emotional state, fear levels, etc, are quantified and treated as a score of some kind. Call of Cthulhu is the obvious example, Kult, Deadlands, and some others.

- we have "dualist" systems in which the character is materially quantified very carefully but also has a set of adjectives on the sheet, which in many cases gave the character "extra points," and the player is therefore expected to abide by them in terms of roleplaying. (Hero System, GURPS, many others imitating these; also, more originally, Everway's use of the Fate card)

- we have at the other end no psychological indices of any kind: just strength, etc, on the sheet, and all emotional/reactive input is entirely player-driven. (rare in post 1985 magic-oriented RPGs, but I could probably dig some up with effort)

I can't say, though, that any of these is "better" than others; in fact, I can find some disadvantages in each. What DOES occur to me is that there surely has to be SOME influence of player-emotions on the character-emotions ... not to throw a guy's own words back in his teeth, but I was thinking of Ran's great example in the "Scariness" discussion of the enraged infant ghost who had to be comforted, and the impact that scene had on the *players* (as opposed to the PCs). Otherwise in #1 the Sanity score (etc) is just a number and in #2 and #3, the emotional stuff can be simply ignored.

Topic #3: magic system stuff [my "forthcoming point" about spell lists to come later]

>To be blunt, my point is, So what? Who cares what *you*, the players/GMs, think? ... rejecting the design of a RPG because you yourself have philosophical differences with the system is like rejecting a play because you don't agree with the philosophy of the playwright.

OK, that's fair, I think. Clearly there's a limit to this in that I'm not interested in playing something that is ENTIRELY irrelevant to me, but that's probably an obviosity (not a word, I just like it).

Topic #4: magic and theme

>> In my opinion, the use of "magic" in story-telling of any kind is entirely wasted UNLESS it reinforces the story's theme.

>I would argue that Zelazny had a host of heroes who use their magic pretty damned pragmatically... I'm assuming you're generally referring to the "D&D" class of mainstream fantasy, a la David Eddings or someone like that?

Yes, I do mean Eddings, Feist, Friedman, and all the rest of that damned scribbling mob. But in terms of pragmatism and Zelazny characters, their use of magic almost always dramatizes their cynicism and (for all their temporal power) spiritual/psychological childishness. I, anyway, get the idea that the Amberites and the techno-Hindu gods in Lord of Light are "dabblers" -- and their childish approach to truly potent (spiritually, not just materially) things is very harmful to all involved.

After all, only when Corwin got kind of self-help-ish about himself AND, I note, started thinking in strictly image-emotional terms, was he able to inscribe the New Pattern. Arguably Jack of Shadows is the "foundation book" for the bulk of Zelazny's writing -- and Jack's whole schtick was to find his soul ...

>But I disagree with your basic point. I dunno, maybe pragmatic magic needs a different name, or something? Why does magic HAVE to reinforce theme? Why does it have to the Great Googlymoogly? Why can't it be a tool, like a sword or a screwdriver? ... I just don't see why magic has to contain some sort of higher, spiritual importance, or why it needs to have a strong connection to the theme of a story. Does a person's boots have strong connections to a theme? Does his front door knob? Why, then, magic?

"the Great Googlymoogly" .... I love it! The only author who I think really made purely-pragmatic magic work well is Jack Vance, in his Dying Earth series. I'm trying to think of some others ...

You know, the sociologist Roland Barthes would suggest that a character's use of boots, doorknobs, etc (or more accurately, the *author's* use and the *reader's* reaction) are in fact significant at an important level -- "ideology," a set of (literal) values associated with appearances and reinforced by repetition. I'm not a hard-core Barthes-ian, but sometimes he makes a lot of sense to me.

Now I'm all tired.

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RAN HARDIN:

"Drown my demon?" Is that a euphemism? ;) Anyway, I vote yes.

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RAN HARDIN:

> And then Ran lets us all have a blast of icy, high-pressure Energy Blast, area effect (cone), extra knockback! That was a Champions reference. On to the topic...

Hah! You know, a friend of mine who I used to play Champions with *way* too much recently purchased a big box of 3rd-rate action figure knockoffs... which he proceeded to paint up to resemble the hero-group we ran in his game way back when. If anyone still plays the goofy game, it's a GREAT way to add some color...

but I digress. Badly.

[...]

> I can't say, though, that any of these is "better" than others; in fact, I can find some disadvantages in each. What DOES occur to me is that there surely has to be SOME influence of player-emotions on the character-emotions

> ... not to throw a guy's own words back in his teeth, but I was thinking of Ran's great example in the "Scariness" discussion of the enraged infant ghost who had to be comforted, and the impact that scene had on the *players* (as opposed to the PCs). Otherwise in #1 the Sanity score (etc) is just a number and in #2 and #3, the emotional stuff can be simply ignored.

Very true... but I'd have to add that the *story* affected me, the player; the immediate effect of the situation affected me the character. Reading Romeo and Juliet is much different than acting in it.

[...]

> Topic #4: magic and theme

>But in terms of pragmatism and Zelazny characters, their use of magic almost always dramatizes their cynicism and (for all their temporal power) spiritual/psychological childishness. I, anyway, get the idea that the Amberites and the techno-Hindu gods in Lord of Light are "dabblers" -- and their childish approach to truly potent (spiritually, not just materially) things is very harmful to all involved.

> After all, only when Corwin got kind of self-help-ish about himself AND, I note, started thinking in strictly image-emotional terms, was he able to inscribe the New Pattern. Arguably Jack of Shadows is the "foundation book" for the bulk of Zelazny's writing -- and Jack's whole schtick was to find his soul ...

Good points there. How do you "Classify" Madwand and, uh, that other related book? Or the Dilvish stories? Veddy interesting...

>Barthes …

Yes, I agree with that, and it warms my ex-literary-critical heart to mull over Barthes again. In a way, though, Barthes-ianism only begs the question. Supposing that all of a character's trappings are symbolic and thematically related in some way, what rule says magic must be special among them? "Realistically" speaking, even the sturm-and-drang sorcerers of the old myths carried context in the spellbooks, if you will (as Ron pointed out); but so what? Isn't one of the nice things about RPGs the fact that you don't have to go by what reality dictates? So what if every culture establishes pretty strong ties between magic and spirituality? How much more interesting, then, if an RPG takes place in a culture where that isn't the case?

And I'm NOT talking about the generic D&D world, where merchants sell +2 swords and flying carpets on every street corner... ;)

************ RON EDWARDS:

>>have flexible, defined-at-the-moment effects, or highly codified and defined actions instead?

>> regarding the above point, if flexible, is flexibility only from the player's POV, or from both player and character POV? (we may need to clarify this issue ...)

>please, 'cos I have no idea what you mean...

That makes two posts that require me to turn the above gibblegabble into meaningful sentences. (big inhale)

OK, ever since the middle 80s, I've been grappling with a real contradiction in RPG design. This reached a crisis when I realized that not even my favorite system at the time (Hero System/ Fantasy Hero), which I thought was the ultimate in flexibility, was addressing that contradiction.

The contradiction is this: a fantasy-author (of the sorts I respect most, Howard, Moorcock, LeGuin, Leiber, others) is not working with a spell list. He or she is writing a story, and I think the creative process goes something like this: "I want Bogart to get into quick, nasty trouble and use some cool magic to get out of it. Okay, the Slime Rats ambush him!" write write write "Hmm. What's a cool spell for him to know? I got it! He'll invoke, um, Minggo, spirit of evisceration!" write write write

This could be reversed, of course: start with the neat spell you just thought up and then decide upon the Slime Rats as the adversaries. And certainly the author may spend some time devising the magic, the scene, and the plot in such a way as to be more meaningful than my superficial example (e.g. the closing of the Gate of Immortality at the climax of the Earthsea trilogy, which requires that Ged know the rune of Closing).

The real point is that the scene establishes to the reader that Bogart knew that invocation ALL ALONG. Even though this is the eighteenth story written about Bogart's exploits, and that invocation had never shown up or been referred to before, once we read that scene, we know that he "does"/"did"/"always did" know the spell.

So I suggest an author works out the details of the spellcaster's knowledge AS HE DEVISES THE PLOT -- armed with nothing but a general IDEA of the magic: look, feel, some notion of how much plot-impact it's allowed to have, and what I've been calling "theme." (Jack Vance's Dying Earth stuff plays games with this phenomenon: its memorize-shoot-and-forget magic is funny specifically BECAUSE it turns out the pre-memorized spells are effective no matter what the situation.)

Now we turn to role-playing ... and instantly I saw that the whole "spell list" idea was absolutely contradictory to the process of creating the adventures of a spell-caster. The character has a list. The writer does not. Which is the player?

From the method-acting standpoint, the player should "be like" the character, and so you have to have the list known first. From an equally Narrativist but more director-author standpoint (still talking about the player, not the GM), the player ESTABLISHES the character's "list" THROUGH PLAY.

This is totally different from the idea of improvisational magic, where BOTH the character and player are improvising a new spell or twist on a magical principle (e.g. Mage, at least as presented in the core rules). I'm saying that the player (there in the living room) is improvising a new thing and the character is (in the game world) remembering an old thing.

Sorcerer, frankly, ducks and covers regarding this issue. The GM and player are simply encouraged to decide whether the character is using "established" rituals or improvisational ones.

To my knowledge, few or no RPGs have addressed this issue. The use of the vari-pool in Champions was very similar in a big supplement regarding magical superheroes. I think Faerie Queen & Country, a supplement for The Amazing Engine, came closest. Castle Falkenstein does play some games with the idea, but doesn't achieve that player/character separation I spoke of. Around 1992, I wrote a very sketchy RPG and played it a few times, which I called "BSL," ie, bullshit-less. It was built specifically to give the spellcasting player this improvisational power while restricting the spellcasting character to a very well-defined school or mode of magic.

More recently, I took an idea from my friend John Marron and really shook the "player improvises magic" and "character decides which spell" idea into shape. That's the core of my little game Fantasy for Real, which is kind of a sister game to The Human Machine -- one dark, deep, and intense; the other light and fast and fun. FfR has been playtested several times and I think the magic works perfectly (combat less so).

Whew! I knew this was gonna be a big discussion ...

RON EDWARDS:

>Very true... but I'd have to add that the *story* affected me, the player; the immediate effect of the situation affected me the character. Reading Romeo and Juliet is much different than acting in it.

But roleplaying throws a kink into that distinction, doesn't it? Are you acting or writing when you roleplay? The script is retro-active. I suggest RPing has elements of both.

> How do you "Classify" Madwand and, uh, that other related book? Or the Dilvish stories? Veddy interesting...

The theme in Changeling (the first book) was that of creativity: we had the magic-guy in the tech-world, and the tech-guy in the magic-world; each uses his distinctive creativity to work "magic" (all the more so to the respective locals). That's right, magic in the magic-world ISN'T very magical in the thematic sense. That's one reason why I like Changeling better of the two books, because when the magic-guy goes to the magic-world and just starts learning how to be a bad-ass, it's just a coming of age story and not especially interesting. I thought the tech-guy got the short end of the stick in the two books, personally (Zelazny tends to Luddism on occasion).

The Dilvish stories -- going by The Changing Land (the novel) -- have black and white magic highly codified and defined. Of course, it turns out at the very end that these distinctions are very limited to the human scale of perception and the deities are doing nothing but rolling dice ... kind of a big take-off on roleplaying there that I think IS relevant to and supports my basic "magic as theme" point.

> In a way, though, Barthes-ianism only begs the question. Supposing that all of a character's trappings are symbolic and thematically related in some way, what rule says magic must be special among them? "Realistically" speaking, even the sturm-and-drang sorcerers of the old myths carried context in the spellbooks, if you will (as Ron pointed out); but so what? Isn't one of the nice things about RPGs the fact that you don't have to go by what reality dictates? So what if every culture establishes pretty strong ties between magic and spirituality? How much more interesting, then, if an RPG takes place in a culture where that isn't the case?

All the more interesting, or all the less? Going by the available literature, I'd favor interpreting it as "the less." But that's not to say you or someone couldn't make it happen the other way and leave me standing there looking silly.