Taking the Science out of Magic

[Nemi3e]

So I read this article here and I got to thinking about it.

tl;dr is that historically magic wasn't as we portray it now. There's no mystery, it's known, and it shouldn't be. One of the ways he suggests is hidden variables/rules for the player to discover.

Has anyone tried this yet?

I'm playing with an idea to correlate a random draw of tarot cards into modifiers for each battle.

[Bergjylt]

Server isn't responding; did we mob its bandwith out or something?

Anyway, I think I get the idea, and in principle, I like it. Putting it into practice seems a bit difficult. The idea of magic as irrationality or at least differently rational means it is anthitetical to games as we play them - with predictable rules which allows us to strategize and plan.

Maybe you could play it a little like calvinball; every time the wizard wants to cast a spell, go round the table; each player represents a Spirit or whatever fits the cosmology, and gets to change a rule or set a condition that must be fulfilled for the spell to work.

[Nemi3e]

Originally Posted by Bergjylt

Server isn't responding; did we mob its bandwith out or something?

It may be!

Originally Posted by Bergjylt

Anyway, I think I get the idea, and in principle, I like it. Putting it into practice seems a bit difficult. The idea of magic as irrationality or at least differently rational means it is anthitetical to games as we play them - with predictable rules which allows us to strategize and plan.

True, but it doesn't preclude premade enchantments, Path/Book style, I think.

Also, do we not surprise our players with hidden enemies and concealed weapons and skills? Consider the rule changes to be more akin to the fog of war.

Originally Posted by Bergjylt

Maybe you could play it a little like calvinball; every time the wizard wants to cast a spell, go round the table; each player represents a Spirit or whatever fits the cosmology, and gets to change a rule or set a condition that must be fulfilled for the spell to work.

I think it might be a bit...They'll make easy requirements for themselves and harder ones for the enemies. Also, they'll know the rules.

My tarot deck ideas as follows, the GM draws seven cards, three positive, three negative, one neutral; this can be parred down to 3 cards.

Castings get a bonus or penalty equal to the card's value divided by two rounded down. Even numbered cards apply to the main element, odd cards apply to the secondary element.

i.e.: The Suit of cups is water, the two of cups gives a +1 to water, and the three of cups gives a +1 to emotion spells.

Face cards, including the Ace, have different, partially non elemental effects at a flat level (I think 3, but I haven't decided yet). Bonuses are for maintaining spells, aiming, multitasking, etc, for spells and magical effects.

Major Arcana have effects that will even reach into the mundane world and can be serious game changers, and some effects might only kick in on criticals. Though I haven't decided on all the effects yet.

The seventh card is mostly there as a place holder if a major arcana is pulled it gets shifted over to that spot.

[namada]

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[Kuroshima]

Originally Posted by fartrader

I remember once, with this, the wizard went to sleep one night with a really high tally, recovered very little, then the threshold dropped for the next day, which was enough to cause him to make a calamity roll at dawn (all recoveries and tally resets occurred at dawn to keep things simple), while still asleep!!
That was the only time I recall a player ever being unhappy with this system.

Personally, this is the only thing I would object here. Calamities should be tied to the act of spellcasting. A temporary decrease in thresh should not cause calamities, any more than recovering tally but still being over thresh would.

Now, I'm no organized enough to use this, but neat idea!

[jason taylor]

Some of the original ideas of magic were a study of how to communicate with neutral spirits that are neither angelic or demonic. From that idea it could be considered an eccentric variation of Savoir-Faire rather then Science. That is seeking the patronage of a Jinn would be like seeking the patronage of a Nobleman; it would just require knowledge of what Jinn regard as appropriate courtesy.

[The Colonel]

I'd second the social skills idea - a lot of magical traditions involve dealing with the spirit world and persuading them to do favours for you, so if your magic user characters are having to track down spirits and persuade them to help, that might well lead to far less scientific magic.

This, and symbol magic which relies to some extent on the PC's ability to play scrabble with rune tokens are covered in Thaumaturgy if that's any help...

[Murrkon5]

The Deadlands (Savage Worlds) magic system has a taste of this. An element of negotiation symbolized with dealing out poker hands.

I've tried to develop some system to emulate the mysteries of magic, but have had little success. I've found the patience of PC's that use only sword and bow is already strained by some magic PCs. Even with "cookbook recipes" in front of them, magician players can use up more than their share of time dithering over the choice of the best spell. Making the spells even more indefinite and throwing in cards or spirit rolls or whatnot takes even more magic time. When the spell is finally cast, the warrior players are totally out of the moment, discussing some movie or comic or if a pizza should be ordered. They're not being rude, per se, their attention has legitimately eroded away.

I've also found that the more I try to take magic away from the cookbook system, the more the magic player is required to use their imagination. This usually works, but even the hottest creative mind goes dull after a few hours of hard RPing. Then a new campaign is started, the prime creative mind decides a change would be nice and creates an axe-wielding barbarian. The eager young rookie with the least command of the rules and RP flow wants to be a wizard.

So, with the right group, it can be done. But that mix of players is a rare treasure.