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Local Authors => Brandon Sanderson => Topic started by: Argent on November 05, 2009, 09:00:57 AM

Title: Magic Systems
Post by: Argent on November 05, 2009, 09:00:57 AM
Brandon Sanderson is, I think by popular opinion, well-known for his unique and real magic systems.  Feel free to refer to his Sanderson's First Law (http://www.brandonsanderson.com/article/40/Sandersons-First-Law) essay about his opinion on what makes a magic system believable and interesting. I won't summarize it, as I suspect many of us have already read the article. I will, however, quote the Law:
Quote from: Sanderson's First Law of Magics
: An author's ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.

With all this in mind, and the fact that some of the users in this forum are probably young and aspiring authors, I thought I'd create a game of some sort. Well, not exactly a "game", but a fun and productive activity, which also happens to be a helpful mind exercise, I think. A place to create magic.

Before I go any further, I want to explicitly state that I have no intentions to ask anyone to reveal their writing secrets. If you think you have a magic system so good it will get your novel/short story published, and you don't want to share it - that's great! But if you want to just practice and write some interesting stuff subject to critique from other readers and possibly writers, I think this will be a very interesting place for you to be in.

So here is the deal. You will create a model for a magic system and post it here. It doesn't matter of it's a rough draft, or a system finished to its smallest of details. Post something. Or if you have nothing (like me at the moment, although I am working on an idea), take a look at what others have posted and discuss it with them. Provide feedback, help the rest of the users improve. Let's see if we can start a decent creative process going.

Now, as I said, I have nothing to offer. For now. So I will leave the topic as it is, and see where things are going. Hopefully I will be able to supply my own sample, and we can start from there if things are not getting anywhere. Only time will tell what will happen.

Let magic reign!
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Elwynn on November 06, 2009, 06:46:31 AM
Ok, I've got one I'll share. Came up with it a while back, and it's partly inspired by the taint from wot. Put it aside because, quite frankly I suck at writing political intrigue so far.

The basic idea was power in exchange for going crazy (losing yourself actaully). What I loved about it was the distorted culture. There are no heroes or legends in their world. Anyone who achieved any large scale influence, with either good or bad intentions, ended up detroying the kingdoms they created or killing everyone they came across until armies were raised to bring them down. Scarring their name forever.

I won't bore you with the slowly emerging history, but everyone of a certain bloodline has a Stranger. They are always there, talk to you, and of course are only seen and heard by you. The only way for someone to know you have one is if you slip or are seen wielding power. And anyone will kill you on site for what you are. They are of course pure evil. :)  Talking about doing horrible things, telling you to kill or maim. Imagine Zane on acid.

To get power, different kinds of power for different Strangers, all you have to do is accept them. Then, instead of being an everpresent ghost haunting you they infuse you with power. Everytime you accept them, you lose a little of yourself to them, until they are running the show and you watch from behind the scenes. They crave to be in control and will do their best to get you to accept power. They whisper in your ear about how they can help handle one situation or another, the power they can grant you. And everytime you accept it becomes harder to reject letting them in. They are completely insane, switching moods and how they treat you, to try and gain control depending on how far gone you are.

The jist was that one of the protags figured out how to bottle it all up. To lock away giving over until he's finished what he needs to do. Then he could kill himself before his stranger wrecks everything he does. He becomes the first hero stories are told about in the future. Two povs are opposing rulers trying to deal with their strangers while hiding it from everyone else, had some pretty good scenes with them.
So...critique, love, hate, find faults...I could use them all. It's midnight and I'm tired. Already deleted this once on accident by spell checking, allowing popups, then BAM...it was all gone. This was all I could push out as fast as possible. Good night.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on November 06, 2009, 09:14:15 AM
One concept that i came up with that i think could be really interesting is consciously controlling the unconscious functions of your body.  I think of it like breathing. you don't have to constantly think breathe in, breathe out for it to happen, but if u want u can take control of your breath. what if a person could do the same thing with other bodily functions? growing skin perhaps. people could consciously develop a kind of "callous armor", create disguises, and several other things.

The natural progression of this idea in my mind then was, what happens if these normally unconscious functions become completely conscious. how much time would a person have to spend each day consciously regrowing new skin? what would happen if they ever got injured or cut? in this case, the "magic" could possibly move from being considered an unusual power to a plague, especially if it is genetic.

There are definately some interesting social consequences that could arise from this.  If this power was significant enough for those who had it to gain power over those who don't, what happens when the power changes?

so far i've only thought about this in terms of growing skin, but there are plenty of other bodily functions that would be cool to take control of. take ur pick.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: clarissavandell on November 06, 2009, 04:29:40 PM
For the above idea, what about digestion?  They would have to account for not only eating nutrients, but breaking them down as well. 
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: sortitus on November 06, 2009, 06:11:05 PM
I don't have many original magic systems, but in trying to find an appropriate cost to balance out an overpowered magic in my books I have come up with a few interesting costs.


"But uncle sorty," you say, "you haven't given us anything truly ground-breaking, and you said interesting costs." That I did. More insane ideas will be given starting now.

If this power was significant enough for those who had it to gain power over those who don't, what happens when the power changes?
How and why would the power change? The why is less important in answering your question, so let me refine mine: In what way would the power change? Are you talking like Elantris, where the power just suddenly wasn't working correctly?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 06, 2009, 06:48:01 PM
your shadow is hungry so you feed it other peoples shadows... they must be dieing or recently dead for you to do this as it steals part of their soul, as your shadow feeds it grows.... very slowly. When you shadow is big enough it is more or less a pocket of a universe in which you define the laws of physics... fights of overlapping shadows create interesting possibilities
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: BloodlessVictory on November 07, 2009, 05:36:39 AM
Dirt-fueled magic.

What happens after hundreds of years of being able to do almost anything you want just by bringing a wizard a shovelful of dirt from your backyard and paying a fee for his time?  Huge strip mines miles deep/wide, economic exchanges based on the differences in amount of magical energy released by burning different mixes of elements in the soil... but eventually you get to deal with scarcity and environmental issues: is it cost effective to use magic to transport the dirt great distances to use it?  And what happens when your planet begins to display symptoms of losing mass?  Deforestation, lack of land usable for farming, and ultimately diminishing gravity...
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: lethalfalcon on November 07, 2009, 09:53:48 AM
Forgive me if this sounds a little childish, but I was much younger when I came up with this one, and I really liked playing LOOM (old LucasArts game).

The magic system is based on an alphabet (probably not English, but I'll use it to illustrate). Your tool, be it staff, wand, sword, house, whatever, would be divided up into the letters A-Z. At first, you would only have access to a few letters, say A-E, but over time you would learn new letters and expand your 'vocabulary'. Spells would consist of a variable length of letters depending on complexity, number of targets, power of spells. More difficult and dangerous spells would contain higher letters, with possible earth-changing spells being up in the X-Z range. So far, pretty simple.

What makes it more interesting to me is that the letters are transferable, to a certain extent. For instance, if you had a staff with A-E, and you found another implement with F-I on it, you could graft them onto your existing staff and get instant access to those letters (although you still may not know any spellwords for those letters). Now, a given person may have really powerful letters, and weaker ones, based on how often they were used for spells (it could even be that certain letters were reserved for certain categories of spells—healing uses primarily vowels, attack magic uses hard consonants, defense uses word pairs like th and sm, etc.). So, you might find an old wizard's staff and discover that his K, M, and P were really strong, but most of his other letters were mediocre at best.

Building on that concept, there would come a point where a letter would be reclassified to artifact status. This being, it's really freakin' powerful. Any spells created with that implement using an artifact letter would have vastly superior capabilities. Trying to build an implement with as many artifact letters as possible has resulted in numerous wizard wars over time, with many murders to steal others' letters. There are lots of potential story arcs that I can think of with this, with the simplest being that a dire need has arisen for a really powerful complex spell (say, using Z), and the hero needs to find an artifact Z to complete the spell properly, even though his staff isn't even to M yet. He has to not only complete his staff to Y (in order to attach the artifact Z), AND find a letter Z powerful enough to use (which would be found only on ancient wizards or on implements that have been passed down through many generations), but the rest of the letters need to be powerful enough to complete the spellword, which he needs to learn as well.

Anyone want to drag this one into the dirt? I like criticism.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on November 07, 2009, 11:33:11 PM
Im no writer, but I was thinking along the lines of calorie based magic. IE: how much you weigh determines the degree of difficulty of the spell.

For example, a 200 pound man could not cast a spell that used up his 200 pounds or he would die.

The fatter you are, the bigger the spell you can cast, but you lose the weight and have to gain it back.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Argent on November 08, 2009, 02:58:17 AM
I am really happy how the thread is going :)
These days are a little busy for me, so I can't spend the time I want to comment on the posts, but I'll get to theme eventually. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: flyleaffan on November 08, 2009, 03:30:10 AM
One that I've always liked is based on using one's weakness as strength. So my protagonist could be blind, but in using the power would be able to see. But what i was thinking is that the power would swap physical attributes that are weaknesses to the magicians. So a blind person would temporarily blind someone else, while being able to see. As they mature in their understanding of the magic system, they would learn to find weaknesses that are not as obvious, but that would still illicit a victorious outcome. For example, a 90-pound girl could assimilate the strength of her muscle-builder opponent to be able to take him down. Or shyness, intelligence, attitudes, or feelings could be done the same way. The cost of doing so would be fatigue, depending on how long of a duration it was used, the distance it was done, and the difficulty of switching the attributes (not sure how I would rate things yet)

That's one I've kinda been working out for a few years, but I think it's pretty cool.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: lethalfalcon on November 08, 2009, 03:59:21 AM
For the one above, from what I understand, you give your weakness to another in order to "lose" it for awhile.

It would be interesting to figure out what happens when you give your weakness to another wizard. At that point, now they have the weakness, so they can pass it back to you. Are two mages dueling each other at an eternal stalemate because of this? I'm assuming that they are the only two within reasonable distance to pass their weaknesses to. A duel in a city would be almost comical, as people are dropping like flies while the wizards are becoming all-powerful in the wake of their shedding weaknesses.

The only real problem I can see is how you classify a "weakness". To a 90 pound girl, her weight is a weakness against a 200 pound body builder in the sense of raw power. But try to fit that 200 pound man through a vent duct and he'll get stuck, where the 90 pound girl scoots through with no problem. How would you deal with such a situation?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Handsome Bob on November 08, 2009, 06:51:00 PM
I always thought that a music based magic would be neat, that way no one is "more powerful" just more adept.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on November 09, 2009, 02:26:26 AM
Bob, wasn't Donaldson's Covenant series based on musical magic?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 09, 2009, 02:29:36 AM
I'll share one of the magic systems I'm working on in Dreamspace. :)

The basic rules are relatively simple: It's the ability to move and convert different types of energy at the cost of a little wastage- for instance using the wind to move objects around, using a candle to burn things, etc... There's a lot more detail to it than that, such as how the magic was made, (I have human-made magic in this universe) and some extra abilities that have personal costs to the Idamancer, but that's the basics of it. Amusingly, Idamancers also sense magic as music in a similar way to what you've been talking about- to me the musical sense was the familiar idea, and the physics-based energy transmission the strange one.

edit: On weaknesses/costs of magic: Almost any cost can be an advantage in the right circumstances, and you'll notice that Brandon uses this sometimes in his magic systems- eg. giving away Breath as a distraction in Warbreaker. An Allomancer could potentially get rid of incriminating metal items using the "cost" of their magic, too. The trick is coming up with a cost that provides an advantage only in very specific circumstances, and structuring your setting realistically so that the fuel for magic becomes appropriately precious that it stays a disadvantage.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: lethalfalcon on November 09, 2009, 02:37:50 AM
I always thought that a music based magic would be neat, that way no one is "more powerful" just more adept.
I know LOOM (the game) used musical magic, and there was a musical Adept in Piers Anthony's Apprentice Adept series.

It's still a fun system, though. Especially when you start dealing with sympathetic and dissonant combinations in duets/duels

The basic rules are relatively simple: It's the ability to move and convert different types of energy at the cost of a little wastage- for instance using the wind to move objects around

Ari, what's the wastage in your system? Is it that some of the energy is permanently lost? I.e. you're using the wind to move things around, but it's not 100% efficient because you can't concentrate the wind on just the object? Or is it something more personal, such as your Idamancer's personal costs (fatigue, blood loss, memories disappear, somesuch)?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 09, 2009, 04:11:08 AM
The basic rules are relatively simple: It's the ability to move and convert different types of energy at the cost of a little wastage- for instance using the wind to move objects around

Ari, what's the wastage in your system? Is it that some of the energy is permanently lost? I.e. you're using the wind to move things around, but it's not 100% efficient because you can't concentrate the wind on just the object? Or is it something more personal, such as your Idamancer's personal costs (fatigue, blood loss, memories disappear, somesuch)?

Part of the wastage is in the magic used to create Ida, (which I cannot talk about for spoiler reasons, but suffice to say there was a significant up-front cost) and part of it is in the fact that an Idamancer isn't 100% efficient. Unless she uses some sort of magical turbo-charging stunt, of course, which is known to happen in fantasy now and again.

So yeah, you get a weaker wind or tide when you mess around with kinetic energy. If you were to dance a flame across multiple candles, you'd need to give it time to build back up or you'd eventually kill the flame. I have a character who is adept at moving flames, and uses them as punishment.

Innate strength in Ida is about transmission efficiency, which improves to some degree with practice. The best Idamancers in Dreamspace achieve about 90% efficiency. Skill at Ida is the ability to move a larger amount of energy at once while maintaining efficiency, to convert energy types, and to move energy across multiple channels at once. There's also some neat pseudo-chemical themes to the magic, as they think of energy in terms of "elements". ie. chemical potential is called "earth energy", gravitational potential "air", kinetic "water"*, heat "fire", electricity "lightning", and magnetism "metal". Idamancers on Temeros haven't discovered nuclear energy just yet, but I imagine they would call it ambient energy.

*Which leads to some strange talk about wind being water energy moving through the ether and the entanglement of air and water, so that wind contains water energy and rain contains air energy. Pseudoscience is fun. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: lethalfalcon on November 09, 2009, 04:40:27 AM
That sounds vastly more fun than your original description led me to believe, and I'm now much more intrigued. I shall have to read some of this when/if it's ever available. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Handsome Bob on November 09, 2009, 07:08:16 AM
and here i thought i was being unique and different, with six billion people on the planet i guess its a little hard to be different.  :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 09, 2009, 07:13:13 AM
That sounds vastly more fun than your original description led me to believe, and I'm now much more intrigued. I shall have to read some of this when/if it's ever available. :)

I'm first-drafting Dreamspace now, and I intend to make it available over the web under a CC by/nc/sa licence in order to help build an audience while I build up my writing portfolio. Check my website sometime next year, or follow me on twitter if you're curious how I'm going. :) I don't want to pimp my work here though, as this is Brandon's forum and that's pretty disrespectful, so let's stick to magic systems themselves from here on? :)

Ida is one of three primary magic systems featured in Dreamspace, and there are another four or so that get minor roles or foreshadowing. I'll probably talk about Eno here later, (It's the counterpart to Ida, hence the similar yet different names) I just haven't got to drafting the bits that use Eno heavily, so its costs aren't as well thought-out.

and here i thought i was being unique and different, with six billion people on the planet i guess its a little hard to be different.  :)

I think trying to be completely unique is a bit of a fool's errand. The really interesting thing to do is to come up with a really well-themed magic system that suits a particular story, and has interesting mechanics that augment what you want the magic to do in your world.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Fodder on November 09, 2009, 05:40:21 PM
Crazy science fiction based magic.  Some previous entity or culture setup guardian technology (think "memory of earth') that enforces a magic system in a more primitive society.  The trouble is that the bad guy (or simply misunderstood) was able to interfere with the system causing it to change magic systems once a week.

Great fun because you can use all the magic systems from your favorite books in one go. 

This is far in the future and our hero has to ransack a library to discover which magic system is in effect and how to use it.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ajbcool on November 09, 2009, 08:13:13 PM
Oh goody!  This should be fun.

I've got one I've been cooking up.  It's sort of a twist on the traditional four-elements systems....

The world is made of....lots of things.  But without Energy, these things have no shape and form.  Energy molds them together to make the world the way it is.  There are five Streams, and they all act in different ways:

Physical - the most noticeable.  Shapes physical objects.  Users are called Builders.
Temporal - Shapes time.  Users are called Timers.
Mental - Consciousness.  Thought. Sentience.  Users are called Thinkers.
Elemental - What the traditional 'four elements' fall under, like heat, cold, etc. Users are called Chargers, or Burners.   Or something.
Spiritual - The Energy of Energy.  Molds the other four Streams into a cohesive, collaborative whole.  Users are called Binders.

The individual strength in manipulating Energy is different for each person.  The less skill you have in a Stream, the harder it is to get better, but the shorter it takes...does that make sense?    The way someone uses Energy is they merge portions of each Stream together to get a certain effect.  Some mixtures have multiple effects; your Mental strength determines whether or not you get what you want.  Or something...still have things to iron out.  Basically, it's like mixing a formula.  Get it right and you do something.  Also, the general rule is that if you're using more than one Stream, you HAVE to have Spiritual too.  Same goes with 'linking' multiple people together to combine their strengths.


What do you guys think?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 09, 2009, 11:42:05 PM
Am i the only person on this forum who has developed a "magic system" based on mind over matter which in turn utilizes genetics (including mitochondrial DNA which is constantly mutating), ki breathing techniques, and a bizarre interaction with a bacteria that was transplanted to earth by a comet? Ok good.


P.S. the background is that we are in the equivalent of 6000 AD... and around 2400 AD Yellowstone erupts causing the death of most technology and the majority of the race.... Volcanic winter last for the next 60 years (survivors develop mild psychic abilities)... 300-1000 years later Wormtongue (the meteor in Revelation) hits with the bacteria the disaster forcing  us to evolve still further. And by resonanting with the bacteria our developing psychic abilities to are  pushed way past their limit.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Fodder on November 10, 2009, 04:23:56 AM
Champion,

Do you have a story to tell within that version of the future?  I'd read it.

~fodder
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Batchman on November 10, 2009, 05:16:18 AM
Am i the only person on this forum who has developed a "magic system" based on mind over matter which in turn utilizes genetics (including mitochondrial DNA which is constantly mutating), ki breathing techniques, and a bizarre interaction with a bacteria that was transplanted to earth by a comet? Ok good.

Nope ... you aren't the only one.

Though I chose to use a Kestrallian philagree to vorticise the DNA for the intrinsic quantum flux, thereby creating the subserviant race of Ninja Assassin jellyfish. Am still trying to figure out the controlling matrix for that one ... may take me a while.





Nah ... just kidding. You are the only one.

(Madness, I tell you! Dogs and Cats living together in SIN!)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 10, 2009, 03:45:32 PM
There is indeed a story and when i get back from Genetics and Business Public Law i'll post the gist of the plot and the political structure.... if you noticed there is a huge gap from the background to the time the story takes place (6000 AD)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 10, 2009, 08:53:10 PM
Ok well there are two PoVs for the first segement Cain Meyerson (the name is for irony) who is the "sole" survivor of House Clandestine, and Hunter Buchanan (named after my childhood best friend and i have no idea why i did this) of House Virtus (latin for energy). Everyone is organised into Houses based on a genetic mutation both on the X chromosome and your mitochondrian DNA (which can be inherited paternally though it is rare Cain however did inherit his through his father). House Clandestine has no noticable ability which confuses everyone b/c there are 3 noble houses Steel (ability based on vibrating skin= armor), Virtus (can convert matter into large amount of pure energy), and Clandestine (increased perception of electromagnetic waves) your house is ussually determined by your maternal genes. Most of the other Houses owe allegiance to these three houses. Clandestine wishes to set up a global republic and is destroyed by Virtus and Steel. Cain lives and is out to destroy everyone involved or profited from it. He is emotionally unstable and hallicunates that his twin/ lover is constantly ashamed of him as she holds their unborn daughter in her arms. (the fact that he loved his sister isn't a fantasy of mine but gene splicing ecetera would make it safe to reproduce at this time with relatives though it would still be taboo and therefore makes him more unstable). Hunter tried to prevent the violence and is imprisoned only to be accuitted. 4 years later Cain starts to move and Hunter picks up on subtle clues that Cain is alive. Hunter wants peace which Cain thinks is ridiculous because Steel and Virtus are vying for dominance. Hunter sees Cain's revenge as endangering the social order and means to kill him (though at the same time condemns himself for planning to do so to his one time friend). Cain sees Hunter as an obstacle that must be removed, though he owes Hunter a debt and would avoid killing him if at all possible. The story is more or less to very powerful, intelligent friends trying to do what is right and being pitted against each other for it, though it evolves further as the arch continues.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 11, 2009, 03:12:30 AM
Crazy science fiction based magic.  Some previous entity or culture setup guardian technology (think "memory of earth') that enforces a magic system in a more primitive society.  The trouble is that the bad guy (or simply misunderstood) was able to interfere with the system causing it to change magic systems once a week.

Great fun because you can use all the magic systems from your favorite books in one go. 

This is far in the future and our hero has to ransack a library to discover which magic system is in effect and how to use it.

Yeah, I have a draft with a scifi/fantasy crossover a little similar to this. I like the twist about the magic systems getting changed around by the villain though, that's neat! :)

Oh goody!  This should be fun.

I've got one I've been cooking up.  It's sort of a twist on the traditional four-elements systems....

The world is made of....lots of things.  But without Energy, these things have no shape and form.  Energy molds them together to make the world the way it is.  There are five Streams, and they all act in different ways:

Physical - the most noticeable.  Shapes physical objects.  Users are called Builders.
Temporal - Shapes time.  Users are called Timers.
Mental - Consciousness.  Thought. Sentience.  Users are called Thinkers.
Elemental - What the traditional 'four elements' fall under, like heat, cold, etc. Users are called Chargers, or Burners.   Or something.
Spiritual - The Energy of Energy.  Molds the other four Streams into a cohesive, collaborative whole.  Users are called Binders.

The individual strength in manipulating Energy is different for each person.  The less skill you have in a Stream, the harder it is to get better, but the shorter it takes...does that make sense?    The way someone uses Energy is they merge portions of each Stream together to get a certain effect.  Some mixtures have multiple effects; your Mental strength determines whether or not you get what you want.  Or something...still have things to iron out.  Basically, it's like mixing a formula.  Get it right and you do something.  Also, the general rule is that if you're using more than one Stream, you HAVE to have Spiritual too.  Same goes with 'linking' multiple people together to combine their strengths.


What do you guys think?

Sounds a lot like TOP from Wheel of Time- which is not necessarily a bad thing, that was somewhere between being a hard and a soft magic system. I assume you've got more rules to it than you've outlined? Because essentially what you've posted is more of a "theme" for a magic system than a set of rules governing its use. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 11, 2009, 06:23:28 AM
Was my earlier post coherent? i didn't check it and didn't realize how much i posted.... there are probably gaps in my thoughts....
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Valkynphyre on November 11, 2009, 06:31:50 PM
I have One I'm ok with sharing.

Cannibalism. You eat human muscle, you get stronger. You eat a human eye, your vision increases. The amount by which your abilities increase is directly proportional to how  'fresh' the meat is.

Often, in their wills people will bequeath body parts to their kin.

Simple, yet creepy.

I think what I like most about this is that it gives me the opportunity to create a serial killer who is a hero.


So, answer me truly. Am I a bad person?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 11, 2009, 07:37:45 PM
Maybe.... Zelazny has a story in which Jack the Ripper is the savior of man!
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: sortitus on November 12, 2009, 01:39:16 AM
So, answer me truly. Am I a bad person?
No way! I think Dinosaur Comics had a strip about gaining the power of everything you eat, but it was a little less creepy and more "I've eaten so many steaks, I have the strength of five cows."

I'm all for serial killers as main characters! Heck, the MC in my life is a serial killer!
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on November 12, 2009, 02:08:38 AM
i like it Valkynphyre.  very simple, but a lot of possibilities.  and i don't think ur a bad person. the main character in the story i'm writing right now is becomes suicidal halfway through it.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 14, 2009, 12:44:31 AM
I have One I'm ok with sharing.

Cannibalism. You eat human muscle, you get stronger. You eat a human eye, your vision increases. The amount by which your abilities increase is directly proportional to how  'fresh' the meat is.

Often, in their wills people will bequeath body parts to their kin.

Simple, yet creepy.

I think what I like most about this is that it gives me the opportunity to create a serial killer who is a hero.


So, answer me truly. Am I a bad person?


You're not a bad person, but you may be a horror writer. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on November 14, 2009, 06:02:45 AM
Cannibalism Magic is not much different than feruchemy, to a degree (from a "horror" standpoint anyway)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 14, 2009, 11:20:44 AM
Cannibalism Magic is not much different than feruchemy, to a degree (from a "horror" standpoint anyway)

Except from the part where you're eating bits of other people who you may even have killed yourself.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Argent on November 14, 2009, 11:43:33 PM
It's a lot more like Hemalurgy.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Andrew the Great on November 15, 2009, 12:26:54 AM
Pretty sure they meant to say hemalurgy. Otherwise, they wouldn't have mentioned the horror standpoint. I don't recall Feruchemy ever being associated with horror.

Frankly, I think the cannibalism magic is pretty freaking awesome, though it is more than a little disturbing. And no, that doesn't make you a bad person, just willing to discuss slightly morbid things.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on November 15, 2009, 02:48:29 AM
yes, Hemalurgy, sorry for the confusion.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 16, 2009, 01:30:23 AM
That makes more sense than Feruchemy, hah! Sorry about that :)

Anyways, I've finished drafting costs for Eno now so I thought I'd share that, too. Eno has the traditional fantasy "see magic through fantastic glows and auras" magic detection system, unlike Ida. Also unlike Ida, Eno has a balanced effect on the world- every action needs an equal and opposite reaction. Instead the cost is personal, and unlike most personal costs, Eno doesn't make you tired, it makes you sick.

There's also some thematics to the personal cost: Enomancers can alter physical constants, like making things more flammable, weakening the nuclear force so things fall apart more easily, setting up anti-gravity fields, etc... To make an antigravity field, you have to make another equally sized field with double-gravity. Each of these abilities brings on different sicknesses: working with flammability gives you a fever, messing with gravity upsets your sense of balance, working with nuclear forces makes you tired, playing with momentum makes you queasy if you move, and so on.

So the depth of someone's power is their state of health, not an abstract magical strength. An Enomancer needs to be in top condition to perform large quantities of magic, and can quite easily kill himself if he don't know his limits.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Batchman on November 16, 2009, 02:00:35 AM
You know, Ari, that sounds pretty interesting! It will be cool to see where that goes!

Like many of the others around here, I am also a writer, but unlike Brandon and all the others around here, I am nowhere near being ready to write any massive, involved fantasy books. Unfortunately, at this point almost all of my writing is in the form of short fiction. And writing short fiction, I don't really end up with in-depth magic systems.

If there is any magic, it is a minor side-point, and not something that you learn anything about how the magic works.

Instead, my short stories are usually a fantasy treatment of a non-fantasy setting. For example, I was working in a cellular provider call center for a few weeks, and really hated a lot of the stupid things they had us do, as a part of the job. I wrote up a humorous story about somebody working in a wizard's supply company off of the situation.

It's a short story, only three or four pages, and I enjoyed writing it quite a bit.

Would be glad to post it here, if anybody else would like to see it.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Andrew the Great on November 16, 2009, 04:05:00 AM
Sounds fun! I'd like to take a look at it, at least. You could always email it to me if you're thinking about ever trying to get it published. My emails in my profile.

And as for some of us around here writing big involved fantasy novels, we never said they were any good...
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 16, 2009, 04:24:27 AM
I can build a world give you all the information in atlas form... write summaries of the history for the last 100 years and then write a detailed outline. I however have very little "authorship" ability and can't write all that well. It appears that my creativity, like most of my other talents, is half of the whole.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Batchman on November 16, 2009, 05:33:48 AM
I know how that goes.

I can write some nice scenes and dialog, I can word things well, but when it comes to actual plotting, not so much.

Instead, I get so far into a story, and then no longer know how to get to a conclusion.

I manage to avoid that problem with the short stories, though.

I'll post my story in it's own thread, and wait to see if it gets any comments, or possibly gets deleted for not being appropriate for the forum.

Just reread it tonight, and still found it funny, though perhaps a little bit rough.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 16, 2009, 08:06:37 PM
I can develop a plot and narrate but that's it, my dialog ect. sucks.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: zas678 on November 18, 2009, 06:36:19 AM
Kaz- I think that having one of the character's names being Cain is a little to obvious. But it doesn't look too bad when it has the last name attached

EDIT- In Valkynphyre's story, it would be awesome if someone (a Marshish character) was forced to be super-powerful (by a father or something) and so he was a good character that had this evil power. He tries to use his power for good, and in order to defeat Evil Man, he has to gain more power, darkening him further.....

Ari- Eno kinda sounds like an Idea of the Day that Brandon had a while back, only it was the opposite. It was were if you cought a cold, then the cold would give you powers(because the virus wants you to live so that it can live). This made it so that the strongest people in the world are actually the weakest. And visa versa
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 18, 2009, 09:47:17 PM
The name is for irony because instead of murdering his brother he is revenging him and everyone else.... and yes it is meant to be obvious... though i could spell it with as Kaine or something
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 22, 2009, 03:13:07 AM
Ari- Eno kinda sounds like an Idea of the Day that Brandon had a while back, only it was the opposite. It was were if you cought a cold, then the cold would give you powers(because the virus wants you to live so that it can live). This made it so that the strongest people in the world are actually the weakest. And visa versa


As I said earlier, there's a certain amount of overlap inherent to science fiction and fantasy ideas. Didn't expect to be an example though. :) I picked the way Eno works because, as you'll eventually find out in the beginning of Dreamspace, everyone that wields Eno are men. (Likewise, Idamancers are women) The idea that fighting off physical sickness was the cost of the magic seemed amusingly appropriate, and offered a good opportunity to contrast some characters.

But yeah, "the weak become strong" is certainly a theme both systems share. Eno as a magic system is intended to reveal how characters deal with their shortcomings, while Ida is more revealing about how characters see the world, how subtle they are, and so on. One's an emotional crucible, the other's an intellectual one.

The name is for irony because instead of murdering his brother he is revenging him and everyone else.... and yes it is meant to be obvious... though i could spell it with as Kaine or something

Spellyngs don't tend to make much of a difference in my experience, unless they result in a new pronunciation. Just go with Cain. I think it's tricky using a "talking name"* for irony, and it would probably go over best if this Cain character instead fitted with the profile his name gave him a little- maybe he's so set on revenging his brother because he's ashamed of having wanted to kill him himself.

*ie. a name intended to and generally read to have a specific meaning, like Victoria Major might be someone who wins a great victory.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 22, 2009, 04:51:33 AM
He always came before his brother b/c he is a super genious in everything but at the same time he is traumatized from his own actions and the fact that he witnessed the massacre of his friends and family.... though i could name him Abel and that would be an interesting reversal of names....
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Argent on November 22, 2009, 05:32:50 AM
I've been tinkering around with the idea of instant magic. I haven't worked out the limitations and specifics, but I think I like the concept of being able to do almost anything... and it barely lasts a second.  You can stop a blade aimed at you, but only if you create your shield at the right moment, at the right place.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 23, 2009, 04:05:33 AM
I've been tinkering around with the idea of instant magic. I haven't worked out the limitations and specifics, but I think I like the concept of being able to do almost anything... and it barely lasts a second.  You can stop a blade aimed at you, but only if you create your shield at the right moment, at the right place.

Hmmm. While I can see that being interesting sometimes, it strikes me as a boring limitation in the same way "you get tired" is- it just tends to result in important characters having incredibly fast reaction times. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 23, 2009, 10:57:40 PM
Well mine is mental exhaustion caused from over processing.... though the complexity of science makes it all worth while... and i'm using breathing techniques and actual combat forms ect. ect.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Argent on November 24, 2009, 05:51:31 AM
I think of it not as reaction times, but as experience. If you are new to the whole concept, you are a lot more likely to create your spell at the wrong time, possibly even the wrong place. When there is a charging berserker running towards you, and you know you have to block his attacks at the exact moment, things can get pretty intense.

I am going to consider your comment though. Not sure what else I can add, but it may come to me - I haven't spent enough time on it to be confident about its functionality.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 24, 2009, 04:36:53 PM
There's a tendency for magic systems to inflate as a story develops. (partially because it's more entertaining) If you don't have an active plan for how you're going to inflate (or at least deepen) your magic systems, it tends to be by reducing the impact of the costs- that is, mages start finding it easier to deal with being tired, to react faster, to cope with sickness better, etc...

The best way to do this is to start your characters in ignorance of significant parts of the magic system. It can also help you create intimidating villains, by letting you make the villain have more powerful magic than the hero. Brandon uses this technique himself a lot, and it's a general trope of "low" fantasy.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on November 28, 2009, 09:30:51 AM
Here's one. If you touch someone, you can steal their soul. Everyone would have this ability since birth, and would be able to use it without having to learn how. (For the sake of this magic system, if you lose your soul you are more or less a vegetable--it's much worse than Mr. S's Drab idea.)

What kind of bizarre society would that make?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on November 28, 2009, 10:53:49 AM
Here's one. If you touch someone, you can steal their soul. Everyone would have this ability since birth, and would be able to use it without having to learn how. (For the sake of this magic system, if you lose your soul you are more or less a vegetable--it's much worse than Mr. S's Drab idea.)

What kind of bizarre society would that make?

I have something similar to this in one of my books, except it's not quite as easy as just "touching" them, and you also get all of their magic.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on November 29, 2009, 11:32:52 PM
Still, the main thing that makes my suggestion so interesting is how extreme it is. Would babies accidentally steal their parents' souls? Would people avoid touching each other, or would people just wear full-body clothing all the time? What kind of magic would people be able to perform by having other people's souls?

I figure if that stealing someone soul left them as a mindless vegetable, the magic you'd be able to do with souls would be much more powerful than Mr. S's use of Breaths because taking someone's Breath only leaves them as a drab.

Imagine if leaders met to make a pact or an agreement, and it ended with them chasing each other with knives trying to cut through each other's full-body clothes to steal their souls?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 30, 2009, 01:06:14 AM
It's too extreme... so much so that it borders the ridiculous. If touching did thus you could never breed with out one parent becoming a vegetable and you would need to have twins to continue the species... scratch that. Babes would steal their mother's souls at birth and would die of starvation or the populace would die out because of a lack of kid that aren't vegetables. It doesn't border ridiculous IT IS. However if you tweak it , it may be worth a read.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on November 30, 2009, 05:50:32 AM
Oh, let me make myself clear. You'd only steal someone's soul if you deliberately tried to. If two people trusted each other, they could hold hands without much fear of getting their soul sucked out. Babies probably wouldn't be able to steal their parents' souls (I've decided), they wouldn't know how to use their ability.

Most likely, children would be repetitively told from a young age not to touch anyone, and to not let strangers get too close to them. People would most likely wear full-body clothing and get nervous if other people went near them. Romantic relationships would take far longer to get to intimate stages. There'd probably be a myth of a shadowman who sneaks up on people and steals their souls, and there most likely would be thieves who would harvest people's souls.

What really needs defining is how the souls could be used to perform magic. It wouldn't be very useful to steal people's souls if all it did was work like Breaths in Warbreaker. In fact, it wouldn't even be that effective if it taught you everything the person who used to own the soul knew. Now, if souls granted magical power that couldn't be used up, each soul increased this power, and the power was something ridiculously powerful like being able to throw large fire-balls or mind-control people or... anyway, that really needs defining. Another question is, if gaining someone else's soul gave you those powers, would each person's own soul give them these powers?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on November 30, 2009, 08:24:07 PM
Also what is the consequence of possesing to many souls...i mean your body would be "filled to the brim".
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Xegnma on December 01, 2009, 06:12:58 PM
Also what is the consequence of possesing to many souls...i mean your body would be "filled to the brim".
That reminds me of a Highlander episode...can't remember which though...
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on December 02, 2009, 01:39:34 AM
the last movie, End Game - other personalities came out of Duncan as he fought the last battle.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on December 02, 2009, 06:30:25 AM
Regarding my magic system, it would be really cool if absorbing someone's soul gave you all their memories, skills and experience... What if you could allow them to temporarily control you in order to do things that you couldn't do, but in return that would graft the soul you stole to yours a little bit more? If you stole enough souls, you could have the skills of an assassin, an artist, a king (that is, if you could get your hands on one)... Maybe that's powerful enough in and of itself.

It would also be interesting if people had forms of magic unique to them that you'd inherit if you stole their soul.

To answer your question Kaz, absorbing too many souls could cause you to lose control of your identity. Having too many could cause them to all collapse into each other and become one person... who knows what that would do to you. If many different sets of memories and skills mixed, it would most likely cause you to go insane and maybe act like you have dissociative identity disorder (darn, that's too much like Rand). And if you have that many souls compressed inside you, the power of your abilities would most likely multiply.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Xegnma on December 02, 2009, 03:10:24 PM
the last movie, End Game - other personalities came out of Duncan as he fought the last battle.
It wasn't one of the movies, but an episode where this other immortal had too many malevolent souls inside him and after Duncan killed him he had to purify himself or become evil himself...
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on December 02, 2009, 07:01:41 PM
But if you fill a wine skin with too much wine it can only expand so far it eventually breaks.... not too mention some vessels are stronger than others and so are souls/ personalities
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on December 03, 2009, 05:37:19 AM
Having too many souls would cause problems with what's controlling the body, but it wouldn't cause your head to explode. ;) If you stole the soul of someone stronger than you, there would probably be danger of it taking over your body. However, the less you called on a soul's abilities and memories, the harder it would be for it to take over you, the less leverage it would have--and the opposite is true, too. Calling on any one soul too much would put you in danger of allowing it to take over you, particularly if it's a strong soul.

I'm making this up as I go along, but this is really turning out to be a fascinating magic system! :D I loved magic systems even before Sanderson. In fact, I loved them even before RJ.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on December 03, 2009, 09:30:03 AM
my thoughts on magic systems are that they don't necessarily have to be complicated, but they do need to be well thought out, and the ways in which people interact with the magic are always complicated, but should still make sense.

For example, right now i am developing a story that revolves around the "magic" of a god "blessing" his people with the knowledge of how they are going to die.  the concept is simple, but the ramifications are enormous and need to be thought through.  it would make sense for the government to train all the people destined to die in battle for war, since that where they will be when they die, but a more clever leader might send all the people destined to die of old age to war, creating a force that could be captured at worst, but never killed.  and if this is a religious gift how does it tie into religion?  what would the clergy think of their Lord's gift being turned into a weapon?
also, within the society, how would this knowledge of how u r going to die affect how people interact? would a person be more likely to marry a person destined to die of the plague or someone destined to be murdered?  would a person destined to die of old age have a higher or lower social status then someone else?  how would a person who knows they will eventually be murdered act?  How would people from other cultures view this gift if it consistently proves to be accurate?

but yeah, that's what i'm working on right now. any thoughts?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: happyman on December 03, 2009, 03:11:56 PM
my thoughts on magic systems are that they don't necessarily have to be complicated, but they do need to be well thought out, and the ways in which people interact with the magic are always complicated, but should still make sense.

For example, right now i am developing a story that revolves around the "magic" of a god "blessing" his people with the knowledge of how they are going to die.  the concept is simple, but the ramifications are enormous and need to be thought through.  it would make sense for the government to train all the people destined to die in battle for war, since that where they will be when they die, but a more clever leader might send all the people destined to die of old age to war, creating a force that could be captured at worst, but never killed.  and if this is a religious gift how does it tie into religion?  what would the clergy think of their Lord's gift being turned into a weapon?
also, within the society, how would this knowledge of how u r going to die affect how people interact? would a person be more likely to marry a person destined to die of the plague or someone destined to be murdered?  would a person destined to die of old age have a higher or lower social status then someone else?  how would a person who knows they will eventually be murdered act?  How would people from other cultures view this gift if it consistently proves to be accurate?

but yeah, that's what i'm working on right now. any thoughts?

My first thought was "Wow!  That's a clever idea."

It is, it really is.  My second thought is that you would have to take some care as to what stories you would place in this context.  It's a good gimmick, but I think it needs something more to get real mileage.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: melbatoast on December 03, 2009, 08:35:34 PM
For example, right now i am developing a story that revolves around the "magic" of a god "blessing" his people with the knowledge of how they are going to die. 
I like this idea. A few thoughts for you:

Quote
and if this is a religious gift how does it tie into religion? 
When do they find out how they die? At birth or maybe some type of coming-of-age ceremony?

Quote
also, within the society, how would this knowledge of how u r going to die affect how people interact?
How would people know how everyone is going to die? Is there a public registry or does only the government know?  Could people lie about it?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on December 03, 2009, 11:36:15 PM
The way i've thought about it is that you find out at a coming of age ceremony type thing in which you get a kind of symbol tatooed on your arm that tells you how you will eventually die. because this is very personal information, normally it then is up to that person who they show their mark to, but the member of the clergy who performs the ceremony will always know. the history leading up to the story i'm developing involves the government taking control of this process in order to find the Age Mark super soldiers needed for conquest.  The story begins with the nearing of an end of an Age Mark generation when, for some reason, no more Age Marks are being given.
as for whether someone could lie about how they are going to die or fake a mark, it's possible i suppose...
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: melbatoast on December 04, 2009, 12:00:58 AM
Very interesting ideas. I hope you keep going with this story.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on December 04, 2009, 12:29:07 AM
Plasman, your idea is awesome but I'd like to know one important thing. Is someone's death set in stone, or can they change the future based on their actions? Is it like fate in The Wheel of Time where certain things happen certain ways no matter what, or is it like atium in MB?
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on December 04, 2009, 01:56:55 AM
The fate divined by the participating member of the clergy is absolute and will happen no matter what, but like i mentioned earlier it may be possible for a mark to be faked. plus, there is no absolute assurance that a person's divined fate is the same as the tattoo they are given. some members of the clergy may have been corrupted when the government took over...
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on December 04, 2009, 05:02:47 AM
So, if someone was told they would die horribly and decided to take their own life, it wouldn't work? Would fate prevent them from taking their own life, or would they be immune to dying entirely? Or, would it prevent them from wanting to take their own life?

I guess if fate took into account that people would know their deaths but it happened the way it was predetermined to, it could be very interesting. There would be some very interesting twists if people didn't die the way they thought they would, such as Macbeth's death.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on December 04, 2009, 08:16:01 AM
you keep asking questions that have me reveal more and more of my story, but then i shouldn't be complaining, at least someone is interested.
one of my characters is actually an Age Mark who at one point in the story goes suicidal.  as for whether she succeeds or not, i did say that a person's fate is absolute, but then it may be possible her mark is a fake.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Ari54 on December 04, 2009, 06:07:13 PM
I think Plasman's idea hits on something I decided when I included my own oracular magic into the Worldcrystals universe: Seeing the future is much more interesting when it's extremely limited. :)

Plasman has people knowing how they're going to die, and I have a character who knows who his greatest (remaining) enemy will be. :)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on December 06, 2009, 04:25:22 AM
Plasman, is this you? This is a featured piece of prose on deviantART. http://guiltywhiteboy.deviantart.com/art/C-O-D-49569045 It's your idea exactly... it'd be a very weird coincidence if it wasn't you.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Plasman on December 06, 2009, 11:01:18 AM
Unfortunately this is not me, meaning my idea is not as original as i thought (and trust me, i didn't think it was incredibly original to begin with).  i think the idea of knowing how you are going to die is an intriguing one.  it doesn't surprise me too much that someone else decided to use it in a story too.

however, in my defense although the basic idea is the same, the way we have executed and developed the idea is different, as is the setting and direction of the stories.  My story is a fantasy, while this other one is science fiction.  In my story the knowledge of a person's fate comes from magic rather than science.  It's interesting to see another person's take on the idea. thanks for posting it.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: happyman on December 06, 2009, 09:11:48 PM
Plasman,

I think I actually first saw the "Know how you're going to die." bit on the movie Krull.  It was probably the most interesting idea in the movie.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Curious on December 08, 2009, 01:25:41 AM
I've always wanted to see a magic system that isn't catastrophically powerful like the One Power or Allomancy. A magic system that relies mainly on the resourcefulness of the user.

One of the best I've read of this kind was Goblin Wood by Hillary Bell. It was based around drawing runes, and the main character is actually quite weak in that power, but her use of the magic is impressive nonetheless. Another magic system that I found wasn't particularly complex but was very interesting was The Magician's Guild by Trudi Canavan.

The Bartimaeus Trilogy magic system was also very interesting, in which the magicians had no actual power themselves. Instead, they enslaved djinnis to carry out their will.

Has anyone read these? ;D
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on December 09, 2009, 06:56:07 PM
I thought of a magic system based of contracts made with dijjins so that they could influence the "human" world. But i didn't think it was that intriguing and stopped expanding on it in less than a week.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: clarissavandell on December 21, 2009, 06:28:12 PM
I've read the Bartimaes trilogy.  One of the better ones, I'll say.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Seaoftrouble on December 28, 2009, 07:24:15 AM
Im no writer, but I was thinking along the lines of calorie based magic. IE: how much you weigh determines the degree of difficulty of the spell.

For example, a 200 pound man could not cast a spell that used up his 200 pounds or he would die.

The fatter you are, the bigger the spell you can cast, but you lose the weight and have to gain it back.

I love it because it is such a tangible mundane Source  of fuel, and brings up issues involving peoples Prejudices. A well written book with this mechanic would have allot possibility!!   

People would study the process just to burn off calories to maintain there figure and eat whatever they want. Others would get huge to store up reserve energy. Also hitting them with some permanent or temporary issues like hanging extra skin when the 800 pound man creates a new continent and becomes a 120 pound pink koloss ;D. It could easily be foreseeable that being overweight would become illegal >:( (or cost extra for a air plain ticket :o) do to fear of what an obese person might be capable of unleashing on the world or more importantly the controlling powers (government). Those who control the world would keep the process secret while vilifying unhealthy people. Possible propaganda “Respect your body to show your respect to the creator” and “your body is your temple by disrespecting your health you disrespect the lord ruler" :o.

As you can see from this individuals (my) opinion who looks at everything threw his game master/dungeons master / keeper's eyes it would work fantastic. I would run a campaign using this mechanic the rest of you should wright the book 8). 
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on December 30, 2009, 07:41:31 PM
thanks for the vote Sea. I had some similar ideas, but didnt want to prejudice people's imagination by going any further :)

In most fantasy novels, science is not advanced, possibly due to magic, or not. I like Sea's nod towards a modern world version as well. I think that could be very interesting, but I am no writer, thats for sure. World building totally escapes me.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on December 31, 2009, 03:14:01 AM
Study social sciences if you understand them well enough you should be able to come up with a hypothetical world.
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: mtlhddoc2 on December 31, 2009, 03:46:46 PM
Oh, I am sure I could come up with something basic, thats easy. But true world building? I would be bored within the first 10 minutes. Not my thing. Im a Roman, not a Greek ;)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Seaoftrouble on January 09, 2010, 04:56:19 AM
I was not placing the concept in any particular setting I was just throwing out generic hopefully entertaining situational examples. The concept would work well if not best in a fantasy setting. ;D 
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Fireborn on January 23, 2010, 09:36:56 AM
I'm seeing a lot of great stuff here and thought I'd make a few comments before unveiling a couple of ideas I have.

Im no writer, but I was thinking along the lines of calorie based magic. IE: how much you weigh determines the degree of difficulty of the spell.

For example, a 200 pound man could not cast a spell that used up his 200 pounds or he would die.

The fatter you are, the bigger the spell you can cast, but you lose the weight and have to gain it back.

I love it because it is such a tangible mundane Source  of fuel, and brings up issues involving peoples Prejudices. A well written book with this mechanic would have allot possibility!!   

People would study the process just to burn off calories to maintain there figure and eat whatever they want. Others would get huge to store up reserve energy. Also hitting them with some permanent or temporary issues like hanging extra skin when the 800 pound man creates a new continent and becomes a 120 pound pink koloss ;D. It could easily be foreseeable that being overweight would become illegal >:( (or cost extra for a air plain ticket :o) do to fear of what an obese person might be capable of unleashing on the world or more importantly the controlling powers (government). Those who control the world would keep the process secret while vilifying unhealthy people. Possible propaganda “Respect your body to show your respect to the creator” and “your body is your temple by disrespecting your health you disrespect the lord ruler" :o.

As you can see from this individuals (my) opinion who looks at everything threw his game master/dungeons master / keeper's eyes it would work fantastic. I would run a campaign using this mechanic the rest of you should wright the book 8).
I like this idea a lot, but one thing I might bring up is that when the the bigger you are the more power you have and people are attracted to/intimidated by power, this will skew people's perceptions.  Weight might be considered more attractive, a big man would walk down the street without fear of being mugged, etc.  One thing I might actually be better at is considering possible psychological implications of different magic rather than actual magic.  :P

Quote from: lethalfalcon
Forgive me if this sounds a little childish, but I was much younger when I came up with this one, and I really liked playing LOOM (old LucasArts game).

The magic system is based on an alphabet (probably not English, but I'll use it to illustrate). Your tool, be it staff, wand, sword, house, whatever, would be divided up into the letters A-Z. At first, you would only have access to a few letters, say A-E, but over time you would learn new letters and expand your 'vocabulary'. Spells would consist of a variable length of letters depending on complexity, number of targets, power of spells. More difficult and dangerous spells would contain higher letters, with possible earth-changing spells being up in the X-Z range. So far, pretty simple.

What makes it more interesting to me is that the letters are transferable, to a certain extent. For instance, if you had a staff with A-E, and you found another implement with F-I on it, you could graft them onto your existing staff and get instant access to those letters (although you still may not know any spellwords for those letters). Now, a given person may have really powerful letters, and weaker ones, based on how often they were used for spells (it could even be that certain letters were reserved for certain categories of spells—healing uses primarily vowels, attack magic uses hard consonants, defense uses word pairs like th and sm, etc.). So, you might find an old wizard's staff and discover that his K, M, and P were really strong, but most of his other letters were mediocre at best.

Building on that concept, there would come a point where a letter would be reclassified to artifact status. This being, it's really freakin' powerful. Any spells created with that implement using an artifact letter would have vastly superior capabilities. Trying to build an implement with as many artifact letters as possible has resulted in numerous wizard wars over time, with many murders to steal others' letters. There are lots of potential story arcs that I can think of with this, with the simplest being that a dire need has arisen for a really powerful complex spell (say, using Z), and the hero needs to find an artifact Z to complete the spell properly, even though his staff isn't even to M yet. He has to not only complete his staff to Y (in order to attach the artifact Z), AND find a letter Z powerful enough to use (which would be found only on ancient wizards or on implements that have been passed down through many generations), but the rest of the letters need to be powerful enough to complete the spellword, which he needs to learn as well.

Anyone want to drag this one into the dirt? I like criticism.
This is good, but one recommendation I'd make is changing it from being the roman alphabet (the ABCs) to a set of runes, similar to Brandon's Steel Alphabet, but with more in-world applications.  This also removes the limit of how many runes you can have and how powerful the "highest" level of magic actually is.  You could have undiscovered runes all over the scale.  You could have your story where the "Z" is thought to be the highest level of magic and needed to save the world, and it does, but there's more.  The characters could discover that the rune they had before was more of a "T" with even more powerful things to be discovered.

@Kaz: There's a good magic system that blends together magic and science in creative ways, and then there are systems so mired in science that the magic kind of disappears.  I'm not saying you fall into one or the other, I'm saying be careful not to make it too complicated.

All right, I've put out my two cents on other people's systems.  Not the others aren't good, I just didn't have any particular thoughts on those.  Now here are a couple I came up with while reading through here!  Now, these particular ideas focus less on what the magic does as much as how properly using it works.

I've seen a couple of ideas on music based magic, so I extrapolated the concept a little and came up with what I think may be good set up for costs on such a system:

Music Magic
Performing music while accessing your magic allows you to cast spells, but the less precise you are while cast a spell, the worse it goes, especially during important parts of the tune.  Different types of music do different things.  The emotional range, length, difficulty and number of parts/instruments affect the level of power and complexity, but the more important a note is, the worse things can go if you screw it up.  If you're trying to play a major scale to start a fire and one of your note goes sharp the fire could go out of its specified bounds, potentially hurting someone.  Your epic, orchestra piece meant to restore the planet's life-force could be going great, but at the climax of the song, your soprano soloist goes flat on the big note, causing a world shattering earthquake.  The bigger the risk, the bigger the return.  Precision is key.

Now the idea of thought based magic is an interesting one.  It can be used in a lot of ways.  The biggest issue is how much control someone has over the magic.  I like Eragon, I'm not afraid to say, and an interesting bit of backstory they gave on the magic system is that in ancient times the only thing that limited a person's magic was their own mind and the other rules already defined in the series, which was the reason they put limits on it, in this case a language to cast spells through.  But what if that magic was completely without limits, but had extremely high costs?

Thought Magic
You can make anything you think a reality, if you're willing to pay the cost (temporary brain death? loss of self control?) and have the concentration not to let your mind wander while casting.  A single stray thought can shatter everything you were trying to accomplish.  Most mages spend years, decades even, mastering their minds to use this magic.  Even with this heavy training, the costs can be high.  Discipline is key.

Quote from: ArgentSun
I've been tinkering around with the idea of instant magic. I haven't worked out the limitations and specifics, but I think I like the concept of being able to do almost anything... and it barely lasts a second.  You can stop a blade aimed at you, but only if you create your shield at the right moment, at the right place.
Maybe this could be combined with my above idea, one of the best ways to keep concentration is to only use magic in extemely short bursts.  The length may not be an enforced rule, but simply a useful and common tactic.  Part of what makes a master of the magic could be that their discipline allows them to use extended amounts of magic without flinching.

Quote from: Curious
I've always wanted to see a magic system that isn't catastrophically powerful like the One Power or Allomancy. A magic system that relies mainly on the resourcefulness of the user.
You mean something like this?  Note: Yes, I read Bartimaeus, it was really good.  This was a partial inspiration.

Demon Magic
A mage casts spells by summoning a demon to do what he designed the spell to make it do.  The focus is not of what it does, but the cost.  In exchange for the task, the demon is given freedoms depending on the power, difficulty, type and scale of the spell.  This makes every spell a risk.  Is it worth it to cast a spell to lift boxes when the demon who does the heavy lifting will go on to smash up a good chunk of your warehouse?  There is also the possibility that the spell is simply not enough to contain certain demons who can only come through the most demanding of spells.  Summon a mind controlling demon to turn the enemy army on itself?  You might end up with it ruling your country since a demon with power on such a scale is both clever and strong enough to escape the bonds of nothing short of the most skilled sorcerer.  This makes the user look for alternative solutions to their problems that either don't require magic or allow them to summon low power demons.  Instead of an epic level mind control demon you could summon a demon who simply looks like he could wipe the army in one go and make them break ranks through sheer intimidation.  Resourcefulness is key.

The last system is the one I'm most interested in, but I think the others have a lot of potential.  My big issue is classifying exactly what they do. ::)
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Seaoftrouble on January 23, 2010, 12:46:02 PM
Demon Magic
A mage casts spells by summoning a demon to do what he designed the spell to make it do.  The focus is not of what it does, but the cost.  In exchange for the task, the demon is given freedoms depending on the power, difficulty, type and scale of the spell.  This makes every spell a risk.  Is it worth it to cast a spell to lift boxes when the demon who does the heavy lifting will go on to smash up a good chunk of your warehouse?  There is also the possibility that the spell is simply not enough to contain certain demons who can only come through the most demanding of spells.  Summon a mind controlling demon to turn the enemy army on itself?  You might end up with it ruling your country since a demon with power on such a scale is both clever and strong enough to escape the bonds of nothing short of the most skilled sorcerer.  This makes the user look for alternative solutions to their problems that either don't require magic or allow them to summon low power demons.  Instead of an epic level mind control demon you could summon a demon who simply looks like he could wipe the army in one go and make them break ranks through sheer intimidation.  Resourcefulness is key.

The last system is the one I'm most interested in, but I think the others have a lot of potential.  My big issue is classifying exactly what they do. ::)
Demon systems do humble the casters because of their reliant s on a outside and unpredictable source for their power. The Al-Qadim Ginnie system used the same type of mechanic. In the book Master of the Five Magics there was a great mechanic involving demon summoning, every time you summoned a demon there is a battle of wills the stronger the demon the harder it is to beat them and each time you summon the same demon that demon has a better chance to beat you the next time he is summoned. This keeps the caster from pulling out the big guns every time and even a week faithful demon will eventually become unreliable. If a battle of wills is lost the demon can do as they please.   
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Patriotic Kaz on January 23, 2010, 11:08:18 PM
It isn't supposed to be "magic" but more of a theoretical way to achieve the legendary heroes that exist in history....the whole world would also have very advanced technology including guns/ bombs and now shields against them, so walled cities are back. I have other magic systems developed i.e. humans are made in the image of beings who were made in the image of god and more or less "half-breeds" who come into their power control elements...the lead controls "command" and can force people and objects to his will unless they are also "half-breeds".
Title: Re: Magic Systems
Post by: Fireborn on January 24, 2010, 12:05:22 AM
Demon Magic
A mage casts spells by summoning a demon to do what he designed the spell to make it do.  The focus is not of what it does, but the cost.  In exchange for the task, the demon is given freedoms depending on the power, difficulty, type and scale of the spell.  This makes every spell a risk.  Is it worth it to cast a spell to lift boxes when the demon who does the heavy lifting will go on to smash up a good chunk of your warehouse?  There is also the possibility that the spell is simply not enough to contain certain demons who can only come through the most demanding of spells.  Summon a mind controlling demon to turn the enemy army on itself?  You might end up with it ruling your country since a demon with power on such a scale is both clever and strong enough to escape the bonds of nothing short of the most skilled sorcerer.  This makes the user look for alternative solutions to their problems that either don't require magic or allow them to summon low power demons.  Instead of an epic level mind control demon you could summon a demon who simply looks like he could wipe the army in one go and make them break ranks through sheer intimidation.  Resourcefulness is key.

The last system is the one I'm most interested in, but I think the others have a lot of potential.  My big issue is classifying exactly what they do. ::)
Demon systems do humble the casters because of their reliant s on a outside and unpredictable source for their power. The Al-Qadim Ginnie system used the same type of mechanic. In the book Master of the Five Magics there was a great mechanic involving demon summoning, every time you summoned a demon there is a battle of wills the stronger the demon the harder it is to beat them and each time you summon the same demon that demon has a better chance to beat you the next time he is summoned. This keeps the caster from pulling out the big guns every time and even a week faithful demon will eventually become unreliable. If a battle of wills is lost the demon can do as they please.   
Well, point of this system I've put up here is that every spell sets the demon free within certain limitations such as time, area, or capabilities, depending on the spell.  A typical magical duel with this system has three major factors: 1) a mage's ability to counter their opponent, 2) their magical resources, because, even though there's already a cost they still need to construct their magic, and 3) their ability to deal with the consequences of their magic.  A duel between competent mages will often result in swarms of small demons throughout the battlefield.