Worldbuilding your Magic

Magic In Relation to World Building

One thing I think we all forget when worldbuilding, is how things started, how things exist, how they work with each other. Magic is a fairly big upset to anything and everything. If magic existed from the start, can anyone, in all logical conclusion, say that their world would look anything like Medieval Europe?

Now sure, There were charlatans that claimed that magic existed, and used it to profit, or make a living. Soothsayers, Fortune Tellers, Witch Doctors. For the most part, they used perception tricks, fakery and general human power of belief to cause things to happen.

In that, we had witch burnings, and the inquisition. So imagine if those things were actually real?

A lot of recent discussion n the topic caused me to create this thread and jot down notes in it..

yeah, looks like a random search on google images

Here's what I came up with.

The Early Caveman had Shamans. [Why isn't it Shamen?]Usually a herbalist, soothsayer, most likely predicting events based on his age, experience with things.. The Cave Shaman was the Ancient version of Google. Now imagine if said Shaman had actual powers, not just perceived powers based on wisdom.

Soothsayers predicting weather more accurately with fish bones, means decreased deaths in storms, possibly more predictable travel across oceans.. smaller boats with a weather shamans are now hundreds of years in advance of our history. The Vikings would have become more efficient raiders 200+ years earlier.

Tribes were ruled by Brawn (assumed), would now magic become a more dominant trait? just that one path alone.. ignore all else, and nerds become rulers of society pre-iron-age, God-Kings are not just called God-kings, they are most likely bred together with witches to ensure magic in the royal blood.

Though Magic + Brains becomes the eventual power, the Brawn still has the upper hand in the first few years, would bullies become victims in the later years? would the alpha males be eradicated in favour of the Beta-mages. There was an article recently about a group of monkeys who lost their alpha males to poisoning, and within a generation, the tribe was peaceful, had little to no abuse, females were treated as equals. Would society mature and become utopia without the brutal power hungry alpha?

Assume that Brawn remains equally Dominant, or that Alpha Mages (Brawn + Magic) become leaders,. would now early society break far more into the Elite and the Slaves? The Elite breed with Mages Only to maintain the power, quashing all independent magical bloodlines.

The concept of the Advisor in many societies now becomes the mage, far more real than fictional variants, his/her spells are used to determine visitors/diplomats are being truthful, whole militant situations fall apart when the mage can force the diplomat to reveal all secrets.

On the subject of Wars, would you really arm hundreds of men to fight battles when you can send out a couple of sorcerers and their private guards? Imagine a Game of Civ without armies, because your opponent could just cast flame strike, now instead you need to just hire your own mage, and maybe an assassin+mage to take out his mage.

A lot of writers would probably want to 'balance' the magic, costs to cast, to ensure that the 'world' remains closer to their medieval history + magic vision. Things like, magic costs the user, the ability to procreate, or magic users are one in a million..They have their own work-arounds..

So, given that your brother is a mage, you're likely to be a mage, the council, asks you to not be a mage.. but instead marry a woman who is also asked not to be a mage. because genetically, you're both likely to have double-mage children.

If Magic Users are one in a million, then being the king who has a mage, now becomes supremely important, but careful that the mage doesn't want to be king himself.

When I talk of Wars and Advisors and Diplomats and such, I'm thinking Medieval in my head, but I really should be thinking ancient Greek or earlier.. because of my first few posts about magic coming in much earlier with cavemen, wouldn't it be safe to assume that this culture of magical Advisor to the King, or God-King exists far earlier than Knights on Horseback..moreso because there are more than a few thousand articles on the ideas that Technological advances in warfare came about because of warfare. They invented ways to get around what the enemy had invented, and in turn the enemy invented ways to thwart the new inventions.

Speculation that a "spell slinger" would make Armoured Knight obsolete as what Guns did in our History, should be taken back quite a few steps, where spell slinger comes in pre-Mesopotamia. Would anyone bother to make leather armour if a fireball is going to annihilate you anyway?

In my own world, I saw gunpowder being a very big danger to mages, an invention that gives non-mages the ability to take down a mage, as fast, if not faster than the mage can cast a protective spell, and being mages, they decided that it should not be invented. They dedicated a cult of magic users who learn several specific spells, such as Dimension Door, Scry, Mind-wipe and the like, so if (and when) Gunpowder is invented, they turn up, and erase the idea from the inventor, and destroy the laboratory. Of course a secret cult has developed it in secret, and have begun their development of the Gun, which makes a great back-drop for a campaign that I run.

There are so many possible ways that magic would interrupt, cause, hinder, help, change history, it makes little sense to try and make a medieval+magic fantasy trope.. and yet, if you go too far off from the trope, a lot of readers will not grasp what you're doing and you limit your audience..

I'm looking to put together a massive multi-player game of Civilization, which will explore this concept further, I'm not 100% sure of my approach, and how it will come about.. but stay tuned.  

Spells, Spellcrafting and Components

This is more of an overview as Andreas raised some thoughts on the subject and I wanted to expand on my ideas, without cluttering his blog discussion.

For World-Builders

First, sorry for posting this in World-builders, not exactly the right group for this, but then I thought, ok, If we preface some points, its still pertinent. So:

Where I say 'you' the player, switch to 'mages in this world', if I'm talking about specific gaming stats, then think of instead as your notes for your characters in your world, I think its important to understand that in your world, that you created, its just as important that you follow your own rules, your canon, your defined reality, because if you break it, your readers (and for gaming, players) are going to break their sense of disbelief, and ruin the experience.

Introduction

My System is fairly robust, As you might know from reading the blog so far, I have included almost every single system that existed in the 90's and amalgamated, I've added all possible styles & types from books that I've read over the last 30 years, Every player who asks: Do you know X-system, or such and such style from this Author, and I say, ok.. describe it.. and the answer is always. Yes that very possible and doable.. So I think its rather robust because no-one has been able to break it yet.

Possibly after writing this, and you read it, you may find a way to break it, upon which the answer would most likely be: I must not have made it clear in my post.. I'll try and clear that up for you.

Spell Casting

When you cast a spell, Depending on how you learnt it, you wave your arms, and/or use ingrediants and/or speak special words and/or commune with nature, demons, elements or 

such and invoke the powers to make the magic happen. 

In Game terms, I use Magic Points.. but I also have sub points called Exhaustion, Persistence, Torpor, Regeneration Rate and Burnout. All Spells have a value assigned to them, typically a Magic Point cost, but any spell can include E, P, T or even Reg as cost too. On top of that, or instead of it, Points can be reduced in their costs, based on external factors, such as gestures, words, components, lost knowledges or gifted aspects from nature, demons, elements or other.. (more on these points later)

Confused? Lets Look at some examples:

Dweguri, Dark Elf Mage, was taught to cast Cave Lights using glow mushrooms, but, if need be, he can summon the inner strength to cast the spell from his magic alone.
Cave Lights, Lvl 1: Magic Points: 3, Component: Glow Mushrooms: Mp reduction 3mp, increases the glow of all cave mould and surfaces by 2 light levels.

NiWalke, Fire Mage, uses fireball as his go-to spell.. he learnt it in the college of fire, and understands its intricate workings, to the point where he can cast small, medium or large fireballs, and throw them great distances on occasion. NiWalke finds himself drained of much of his magic, but facing off against an Ogre, he spots some sulphur on the ground, remembering back to his college years, he manages to scrape together two handfuls of the powder, just in time to throw a great flame into the beast, enough to aid his companions to escape

Fireball (College of Fire, lvl 4: 10 Magic Points Base + 1 Exhaustion: Component: Sulphur -4mp per handful, Coaldust - 3mp per handful) NiWalke, studied Fireball x3 times, reducing base MP to 8 and -2 exhaustion & -2 Torpor) 

While in both cases, I'm using material components, dependant on the school, the culture, the style of your game, any one of these could be replaced with other 'cost reducers'

Spell Crafting

In All Spells, There are basic structures of logic, Whats the basis of the spell, what does it do, outside the normal physical world, then all the nitty gritty: how far will the spell go, whats it do, who/what does it do it to, how fast is it, how hard is it to dodge/resist/unweave.

Then look at Who is crafting this spell. If its a college of magic who have the resources to study this spell and its types, groups, styles, schools, effects, over and over to improve it, get the components right, or more effective, vs if its a Hermit in the woods, who devoted their life to one single spell in one direction.

This usually results in a specific spell value.

Except from my Excel Character Sheet

The Magic Points are related to how much of the physics of the world are being bent to make it happen. Exhaustion is how much power drain the caster is going to feel, (persistance is how much Exhaustion this particular player/character has in store, before it begins to affect him), Torpor is his limit to any given spells power.. a maximum level if you will, and Regeneration, relates to how many magic points he'll gain back after a full nights rest.

Components in Play

So, while you can and probably should use components in some form, it can be time consuming, both for the character, in terms of actions and initiative to get out the components, or prepare them or make them happen, and in battle, you only ever care about MP & time.. Most spells are 'built' with the concept of casting in 1 combat round.. well.. Battle magic is, 

Spells which are far less likely to be used in the heat of battle, will be cast over minutes or even hours.. the better spells, costing hundreds or even thousands of magic points to cast correctly.. impossible in a single round... But.. in a ritualistic manner, reducing the cost to cast (each Combat round is considered a 'component' to reduce MP costs), using candles, materials, and/or including other magi or natively magical creatures, such as fey, demon, elementals or other.. can reduce this 'cost' to a realistic level.. explaining 90% of fantasy authors usage.

I won't go into it deeply, but, using someone elses magic, freely or against their will, your or their blood, or life essence as a component to spell casting, and sacrifice, either willing or otherwise are other aspects of 'components'

So, At the end of the day.. A player decides during character creation, did he get his/her magic from a school, some cult or group, a hermit or is self taught.. (from left to right, with increasing difficulty to create your character, but more freedom of choice) which obviously affects which spells they start with, how they have access to new spells as play progresses but most importantly.. were they taught to cast spells with components.. or just plain magic.