02-23-2016, 12:58 PM | #21 | |
Hero of Democracy
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: far from the ocean
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Re: What does magic do?
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It really is an important distinction though. And it can be hard for a GM to pull off.
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02-23-2016, 01:44 PM | #22 | |
Join Date: Dec 2007
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Re: What does magic do?
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"What does spell casting do for a setting that superpowers don't". The essential difference between a spell and a superpower (as I imagine them) is that a spell consists of knowledge that lets you exploit a set of hidden commands somehow built into the universe. Without study to learn these commands you can do almost nothing. It's possible that you were born or initiated with a kind of "sys op" status that gives you access you wouldn't otherwise have, but still you can do little or nothing without learning or developing the "codes". A superpower on the other hand, is an ability to do something impossible for normal humans that you gained at birth, by accident, or through deliberate exposure to something that changes your body into something not quite human and not in an entirely predictable way. While it is possible to gain skill with your super power, you can use it without any skill at all. You'll just be clumsy with it. Shooting energy blasts out of of a body part just by wanting to (or perhaps accidentally) is a super power. Hitting what you aim at is a skill. So being a spell caster is about what you know. Being a superhuman is about what you can do. So to be a good spell caster in theory you have to invest a lot more study in developing your powers. A superhuman child can charge right out and start committing havoc on the streets the day after they get their powers. A spell caster who has just started study will usually be able to do very little. Now spell casters are potentially far more versatile than a typical superhuman. With more skill a superhuman can come up with more applications for their powers, but ultimately they are stuck with with whatever their genetic lottery or super soldier serum gave them at the start. Some consequences of this are: 1. Superhumans generally have less potential for economic impact than because they get whatever they get, regardless of whether there's a market for it and their abilities are usually more individual. You can't usually train an entire class of superhumans in "helping plants grow" or "finding ore". As a result when spellcasters exist in a world that is otherwise like our own, they tend to exist in secrecy, perhaps a hidden culture of their own, because otherwise they wouldn't live in a world like our own. "Occult" means "secret". 2. There is less of a correlation between age and capability with superhumans. The most powerful person in the world could be an adolescent...or a toddler. There also less of a correlation between being studious and being dangerous. 3. Spellcasting tends to have more unpredictable consequences when it goes wrong because miscasting a spell can be the same thing as casting the wrong spell. Last edited by David Johnston2; 02-23-2016 at 02:09 PM. |
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02-23-2016, 03:08 PM | #23 |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: What does magic do?
You could present the campaign as a low magic setting and then never actually produce any genuine magic - perhaps have the PCs on a hunt for genuine supernatural events as Houdini style debunkers.
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02-23-2016, 05:47 PM | #24 |
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Portland, Oregon
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Re: What does magic do?
Assuming that to be true only the GM has to know. In fact the players can roleplay characters that believe in magic like anything else.
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"The navy could probably win a war without coffee but would prefer not to try"-Samuel Eliot Morrison |
02-23-2016, 05:49 PM | #25 |
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Portland, Oregon
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Re: What does magic do?
I was thinking more in line of a historical character who would believe in magic in the context of their character.
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"The navy could probably win a war without coffee but would prefer not to try"-Samuel Eliot Morrison |
02-23-2016, 08:32 PM | #26 |
Join Date: Dec 2007
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Re: What does magic do?
Sure they can. But that will not create a mystic feel, just as playing a paranoid delusional character won't actually create a conspiratorial layers within layers feel.
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02-23-2016, 08:45 PM | #27 |
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: New Zealand.
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Re: What does magic do?
While you will have players who don't believe in the magic of a game world. You can have players that understand how it works and what rules it is built on.
The sign of success is when the players use the rules regarding magic to come up with something you as the gm never thought of but still fits.
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Waiting for inspiration to strike...... And spending too much time thinking about farming for RPGs Contributor to Citadel at Nordvörn |
02-23-2016, 08:47 PM | #28 |
formerly known as 'Kenneth Latrans'
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Wyoming, Michigan
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Re: What does magic do?
Magic does healing better than any realistic scientific or technological medical treatments could in any future I'd find plausible. Or, from a storytelling/worldbuilding perspective, magical healing isn't as straining on suspension of disbelief to bring characters from a wounded state to a fit state or from a dead state to a living state as powers which claim not to be supernatural doing the same.
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02-24-2016, 11:34 AM | #30 | |
Banned
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Europe
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Re: What does magic do?
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It's my guess that the OP may specifically have "arcane" magic in mind. |
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