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Old 02-05-2008, 11:39 PM   #1
macphersonrants
 
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Default GURPS LOTR Magic

I have been thinking about how one might approach magic in a GURPS game set in Middle Earth. I am assuming that the goal is to be true to the books.

Can some of you Tolkien fanatics help me find examples of magic use and other supernatural powers in the various books and give me your ideas on how to model them under the GURPS rules.

I am most interested in magic for player character types. Gandalf, Saruman, Sauron, Melian, and so on are Maiar, basically angels or demi-gods. The stuff they do is worthy of discussion regarding what is possible in the setting, but I don't think it is very useful for giving an idea of what a PC should realistically be able to do. I'm most interested in what is possible for elves, dwarves, and men.

So far the stuff I have personally run into seems to mostly be enchanting. However, I am pretty sure that powerful elves at the least, show examples of some other stuff that probably should be dealt with using Powers.
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Old 02-06-2008, 12:36 AM   #2
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

Well player (for muted elves, men, hobbits, etc) accessible magic is 'common' in terms of herbalism / alchemy to some areas. The Hands of the Healer has piles of good crafted tools that would make an envious grimoire in terms of normal magic. Definitely some stuff that makes most Magic enchantments and elixirs look tame as well and that are an adventure in and of themselves to obtain.

A lot of the other magic is as you mentioned racial in nature or your seeing via the use of other magic items. Gandalf using his ring of power, the elves theirs and what not. The gimmick of avoiding mortal coils and the bestowing of life force materially in middle earth is sort of a powergamer dream for making items or using 'powers'. Players with those abilities would be pretty burdensome I would think.
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Old 02-06-2008, 08:49 AM   #3
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

Off the top of my head, some examples of magic I remember and how to respresent them:

Gandalf the Grey uses some basic fire spells. He latter states he cannot create fire from nothing... so I'm thinking basically Shape Fire, or limited Powers.
He also uses Magic Lock on a door inside Moria, wich is then shattered by the Balrog's stronger counter-spell or Magic Unlock spell (I forget the name in GURPS).

??? the Brown (can't remember his name) is a hedge wizard, wich uses either hedge magic or animal and plant college spells. Probably some empathy and talents of that sort too.

Saruman uses a booming voice that can charm people, that can either be settled with emotion, empathy, comunication and mind control spells, through the enthrall skills (hipnosis seems too subtle for it).

The Rings have powerful but very non-flexible powers. I'd treat them as artifact items, and not a bunch of enchantments.

The door to Moria is enchanted and has a Password.

The King Regent of Gondor displays some mild abilities, I forget wich.

Descendants of the Kings of Numenor have minor healing powers, and/or healing aptitude.

Some descendants of Beor are shapeshifters.
Sauron has a lot of remote vision and comunication spells. Probably mind-control is his core college (after his crafting and enchanting skills, offcourse).

---

Overall, I get the feeling that LotR passes from subtle to over-the-top without going in-between. You get subtle stuff like Saruman's enthralment kills, to massive auras of magic and rejuvenation like Galadriel's ring (wich dabbles in temporal magics too). So you don't see fireballs, elemental flashy magic, etc... but you get a lot of subtle effects that you can explain in a ton of ways, to the more powerful mathematical-nightmares.

There's also a few spells that are taboo and that would cripple the world, much like they would criple a lot of fantasy settings: flight, teleport, long-range telepathy (except extremely limited), reliable divination of any sort (except for the Valar and Maiar who have witnessed the song, and in that case it's more like Racial Memory). You don't want fast transportation and flashy powers, and nothing that would screw with medieval economics.

Above all, keep magic rare and limited. One-College Magery would be the least I'd require of my players if I allowed them to be mages in a LotR setting. GM Pact would be a good idea, gadget limitations is another... and so on. Keep in mind that even Gandalf kept a healthy share of mundane skills (diplomacy, riding, swordsmanship, languages...) and didn't rely much on magic.
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Old 02-06-2008, 09:46 AM   #4
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

I've considered this problem recently myself. I'm not completely satisfied with what I came up with, but maybe somebody else can run with it.

1) Low mana world.
2) No energy reserve
3) No Recover Energy spell
4) FP are capped at 20
5) Spell must be learned at IQ to count as a prerequisite

This makes it very expensive to be good at all with magic. Elves have plenty of time to learn it, but humans very rarely do. Still, a few conjurer's tricks go a long way in the setting. Aspected magery may improve this, but I'm not sure. Probably an unusual background cost? I'm just not sure where to go from there.
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Old 02-06-2008, 03:18 PM   #5
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

Well, that would fit with the elves and wizards being nigh immortal, or at least ageless, and the wizards roughly akin to lesser angels (even the Brown -- What can Brown do for you?). There are a few rare humans, with royal or noble bloodlines, with some minor powers and a family of shapeshifters, but that's pretty much it.
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Old 02-06-2008, 03:55 PM   #6
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

Gee, and I thought I was going to get work done this afternoon and then I see this post. I still have the GURPS books thrown all over my floor from where I was working on this a few nights back. First off I would say that the magic of Middle-earth can be very difficult to try and adapt to a RPG system. It is a tremendous challenge. People cast “spells” in a variety of different ways. That said, here are my thoughts on the matter:

Middle-earth is clearly high magic, but with low accessibility to that magic. You don't need low mana to account for why most people don't use spells. I have divided magic into several categories.

The Innate Magic Of Middle-earth: This the essence do the Middle-earth that reinforces emotions, rightness or wrongness, and makes things like speaking the name of Elbereth in dire situations actually have tangible effects. There is no game mechanics to cover this, instead it is all controlled by GM fiat. But I have been trying to write on it fairly extensively in it because getting this right is a large element in roleplaying magic in Middle-earth. The GM needs to use this to his or her advantage in order to make Middle-earth a character in the game.

Craftmanship: Needless to say a lot of the magic in Middle-earth is tied to items. Even people who are not "wizards" can create powerful items. Thus have pulled this mechanic out a separate section, very different from GURPS enchantment. I posted an early draft of this mechanic in this thread.. The idea has been slightly revised since then and I need to streamline it a bit more, but the core of the ability is there.

Spell-like Abilities: Then there are a number of "spell-like abilities" used in the stories that I feel are best represented by Powers instead of outright spells. A very artificial way of making this distinction are those things in the stories that don't require spoken word to use. There are lots of these things. The Voice of Saruman for example just works, he does not have to actually "cast a spell' to make that work. Some of these things are innate abilities of the Valar and Maiar. Others can be learned as abilities from dusty tomes. I'd like these to be written out and purchased as powers.

Incantations: These are the spells in the most classic sense. Roughly, they require words to be spoken. There are lots of these. Gandalf talks about opening spells being in the tongues of Men, Elves, and even Orcs (so even Orcs can have magic users). Distinguishing between these kinds of magics can be difficult. For example, a craftsmen should be able to create a door that only opens when a password is given, but a spell caster in the more traditional sense should also be able to produce the effect. These kinds of spells I would like to have stated in a variety of ways: 1) GURPS spells, 2) a power and 3) a syntactic magic system. In fact, given Tolkien’s affinity for language , I thought about going all syntactic magic. Who knows it might end up like that. Obviously the chain of prereqs will be totally redesigned. Casting magic is also perilous in Middle-earth. There are all kinds of dark things that can detect you. Heck, just creating fire caused Gandalf to think he had announced his presence to the entire world.

Psi Powers: Yes, there is psi in Middle-earth and no system of “magic” for Middle-earth would be complete without it. I have been going through the psi powers and stripping out the ones that do not fit. On the short list of psi powers I think I will be including are: telepathy, telesend, mind probe, mind reading, mind control, mind shield, mind link, and maybe special rapport.

So what do I have in the Grimorie of Middle-earth?

Beast Speech I
Beast Speech II
Beast Summoning
Blinding Flash
Blinding
Burning Sparks
Calling
Counterspell: A meta-magic type “spell”
Create Light
Darkness
Decay
Display of Power
Evoke Awe
Evoke Fear
Flaming Missile
Flaming Weapon
Fireshaping
Flash I
Flash II
Flash III
Fog-raising
Fog-weaving
Forgetfulness I
Forgetfulness II
Forgetfulness III
Hair-growing
Kindle Fire
Lightning I
Lightning II
Mastery of Shapes
Opening
Quench Fire
Paralysis
Paralyze Limb
Rain
Rain-ward
Ruin
Sense Power – another meta-magic ability
Shutting
Slumber I
Slumber II
Smoke-raising
Smoke-weaving
Sundering I
Sundering II
Sundering III
Thunderclap
Voice of Command
Voice of Suasion
Water-shaping
Wizard’s Guise I
Wizard’s Guise II
Wizard’s Hand
Word of Command – another meta-magic thing
(If you are going with the movies then you might want to add fireball and “wizard’s fist”)

That is the list I have right now. Sometimes these are cast as spell-like abilities and sometimes they are cast in more traditional magic fashion. My system must support both.

Other Notes: Restrictions of magery are common. For example, Luthien, Finrod Felgund, and even Sauron might all have Magery (Song -40%). Night-aspected magery might also be common for the darker powers. The musical instrument limitation might also fit well with the story.

There should also be a divide between magic from the “good side” and magic in the “bad side”. There needs to be a game mechanic for it to be dangerous for the good guys to study too deeply in Black Arts, but the only way to counter enemy spells is to have studied them. So you can study the Black Arts for good reasons, and then become ensnared.

I have also made multiple levels of cosmic, as per Powers. The Valar pay a full +50% for their powers, and he Maiar operate at a lower level of cosmic. Some of the Maiar powers come from elemental sources. I have been going over powers to distribute among the Valar and Maiar.

So that is my initial thinking on the matter.
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Old 02-06-2008, 04:00 PM   #7
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

It's Radagast.

"Radagast the fool! Radagast the simple! Radagast the bird-tamer!"

Also, Saruman seems to have had some kind of illusion powers. He could make himself look however he wanted to and he seemed to have an interest in the scientific properties of Light that Gandalf did not share.
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Old 02-06-2008, 04:23 PM   #8
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

I forgot to mention that a great way to allow some mortals to skip ahead a bit in the magic department would be get the "sell your soul to a demon" rules going for you. This should be mainly (or only) for tapping into The Dark Arts. In this case, you have essentially sold your soul to a rogue Power, say Morgoth or Sauron.
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Last edited by Gavynn; 02-06-2008 at 04:29 PM. Reason: spelling
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Old 02-06-2008, 05:29 PM   #9
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

Quote:
Originally Posted by YunusWesley
There is a body of magic independent of Gandalf's angelic maiar-powers.
Him having Narya helps.
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Old 02-06-2008, 05:54 PM   #10
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Default Re: GURPS LOTR Magic

Wow, you mean LOTR uses spell colleges like GURPS Magic suggests? Weird.
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