02-18-2016, 08:33 PM | #1 |
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: earth....I think.
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Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
Hello all!
Lately I have been thinking about writing up a new magic system for a new setting I want to hash out. I got very little done due to me staring blankly at my screen every time I try to write some of it down. I want something that marries RPM and Sorcery and Words of Power (WoP). The path skills would be the Verbs and the nouns would be the WoP. All the WoP can be divided up into several Realms. It would use Energy accumulation when casting spells not known (That is to say improvised). You can attempt to use the Word of Power without a filter (straight usage) or you can use a Verb path for a specific effect. Known spells are bought as an A.A. to the WoP associated with it. So if I want to learn "Flame Jet" (burning attack with jet) Then I would buy it as an A.A. to "Word of Power, Fire". Known spells requires 2 of FP, Chanting, or Gestures. Now, My problem is coming up with a list of WoP and Realms. For Realms I thought this would be good: Energy Matter Mind Space Time Life and Death and for Words of Power: Body Distance Boundaries Thought Earth Sand Stone Metal Soil Dirt Water Ice Acid Weather Lightning Hurricane Mist Rain Snow Tornado Air Fire Light and Darkness Magma Cold Heat Plant Wood Grass Flowers Poison Animal Mammal Lizard Amphibian Avian Verb Paths: Communicate (IQ/VH) Control (IQ/VH) Create (IQ/VH) Destroy (IQ/VH) Heal (IQ/H) Move (IQ/H) Protect (IQ/H) Strengthen (IQ/H) Sense (IQ/A) Transform (IQ/VH) Weaken (IQ/H) Last edited by zoncxs; 02-26-2016 at 08:29 PM. |
02-19-2016, 01:58 AM | #2 |
Join Date: Nov 2013
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
Hey...
Sincerely, I believe it would immensely help you if you first decided how magic works into your setting then flash out the system to accomodate that. So far, seems like you want a new magic system just because you want a new magic system for the sake of it. Your correlations don't make sense, as well: Verbs are called as such beacuse they command actions to nouns. So far you have, for example, "Energy" as a verb and "Fire" as a noun... when Fire is basically a sub-type of energy... You're trying to say "Energy Energy!" which basically don't shape into an effect. Verbs should be, for example, Control, Create, Modify and nouns could either be broad as "Energy" or narrower as "Fire" thus you could shape effects building a verb+noun like "Control+Energy" or "Create+Fire", as examples. Words of Power is a much broader correlation system, in that each WoP includes what would correlate to both verbs AND nouns, allowing the full build up of an effect correlating to that WoP, for example: WoP: Earth - Includes, but not limited to, Control, Create, Modify, Negate WHEN refering to Earth and its subtypes (which are setting dependant) like Metal, Minerals... OR WoP: Matter - Includes, but not limited to, Control, Create, Modify, Negate WHEN refering to Matter and all subtypes (which is also setting dependant) like Earth, Plastic, Bodies, Metal... Sincerely, you should define what correlations magic require in your setting and what cost you want casters to pay for their effects (FP, time, negative mods...) and build the system around that if you truly believe the current existing ones don't suit your needs (which I don't believe to be the case). IMO, a good magic system should be relatively easy to understand and learn, fast to use in game and allow a broad range of depth to allow inventive use and customization by players. |
02-19-2016, 06:39 AM | #3 |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
If you want fire and energy to be different things, you might have a system of major and minor nouns, so that you could learn "fire" more easily that "energy" - fire might be an aspect of energy however, so that a master of energy can wield fire, sound, light, kinesis &c. - all of which are also nouns in their own right.
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02-19-2016, 10:41 AM | #4 | |
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: Cincinnati, OH, USA
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
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I don't like Time as a realm. Time can be very abusive if used intelligently. And this problem becomes even worse if you allow actual time travel. I would keep Time as a forbidden realm, though. If you like the idea of there being four realms, here are a few suggestions for replacements. Life would imply that there is something about living things - probably complexity - that makes controlling them by Matter/Energy alone impossible. Mind would be another good choice because the mind is traditionally nonphysical. Separating minds from Matter or Energy also helps prevent those realms from becoming broken. Self would be a strange realm but would be fitting for settings where casting magic on yourself is difficult. Your WoP seem to be based on classical concepts of science. A similar flavor can be achieved using a short realms list: Fire/Heat, Water/Ice, Earth/Metal, Wind/Lightning, Mind, Distance, and Life. Life can be removed if you want healing to be a difficult task requiring mastery of the material elements. Using these realms will be simpler and easier to represent on a character sheet than your hybrid realms/WoP approach. Last edited by Emerald Cat; 02-19-2016 at 10:43 AM. Reason: There vs. their |
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02-19-2016, 10:45 AM | #5 |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
Spirit/Matter/Energy/Space might work...
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02-19-2016, 11:13 AM | #6 | |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
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Words of Power in Thaumatology are very dangerous and hard to control. You may want to tone them down a lot, since you seem to be implying that every single magical working will require using one, along with a verb from the RPM path list. |
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02-19-2016, 11:20 AM | #7 |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
That was my first thought when looking at the thread title as well, but it looks like the OP had something more like noun/verb magic in mind...
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02-20-2016, 12:13 AM | #8 | ||||||||||||
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: earth....I think.
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
Lots to respond to! lets get cracking...
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Here is what I have for Verbs: Create Destroy Weaken Control Move Heal Strengthen Protect Sense Communicate Transform I was thinking of keeping Communicate, Protect and Weaken as part of the Destroy, Strengthen and sense Verbs but I will keep them separate To keep in line with the Sephiroth. Quote:
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Major : Energy Minor: Fire, Air, Lightning, Cold, etc. What I want to try and get is the "major nouns" as Realms, and the "Minor Nouns" as Words of Power with the "Path skills" the Verbs. You can study how to "Create" but unless you know somethings True Name (Word of power) then you can't do anything. Likewise, knowing somethings true name (Word of power) does not mean you have control, unless you get lucky you have no idea what will happen when you speak the word AND it might end up killing you in the process. Quote:
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Energy Matter Mind Space Time Life yay 6! Quote:
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I will post an update soon and also add to the OP what I add... in the morning... |
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02-20-2016, 11:15 AM | #9 |
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: earth....I think.
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
I updated the OP. Now all I need are 36 WoP!
I got a few listed already, I might drop some to add more detail or something but I could use help in coming up with a complete list. As for the Verbs, they are tied to the 11 Sephrioths, the 11th being "destroy" which players might not start with or even know about, in fact a game could literally be about learning all the Paths! I might Drop the Realms in favor of placing those words into the WoP list, or not and just keep it as flavor, Its how the universe is divided up or something. |
02-20-2016, 03:09 PM | #10 | |
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: Cincinnati, OH, USA
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Re: Ritual Path Words of Powerful Sorcery
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I agree that having divination is weird without a Time realm. But I would limit Time to things like simple acceleration/deceleration without invoking the other realms. Effective chronomancers would thus be very multidisciplinary. Here is what I would have each realm enable as part of a Time spell:
Paradoxes and changes to history can become a real headache for the GM. Before implementing reliable time travel in your campaign, I'd check out the discussion of time travel mechanics and paradox resolution from GURPS: Infinite Worlds. This is a good book to get for advice on world building. |
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