Magic Traditions That Mean Something

[Kesendeja]

I'm creating a setting where there is a noticeable diffrence in the methods used in magic. For example a Navjo Shaman, Catholic Priest and a Deciple of the Golden Dawn are going to have drastically different ideas on magic, spirits and the like.

It's not to say you can't learn another tradition.

That's where my problem comes in. I know they should be more expensive than a perk, but should they be advantages, extra skills, techniques of existing skills, or something else entirely?

[Polydamas]

That sounds like what GURPS Thaumatology was written to help you think through?

[baakyocalder]

GURPS Thaumatology Magical Styles would be good. While built for the standard spell system, it does group abilities together based on a style. So, that should help with magical tradition inspiration regardless of which flavor of magic you use in GURPS.

http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/books/magicalstyles/

[Refplace]

You could use different magic systems for each, apply different spell lists or types, change skills and offer different traits to each tradition or type of magic.

[mlangsdorf]

Even using advantage based magic for everyone, a Chinese Elementalist, a Divine Power petitioner, and a Sorcerer feel different in play. The elementalist has a variety of low powered effects that they can use indefinitely but cannot improvise at all; the petitioner has several, often higher powered effects and can unreliably petition for just anything; the sorcerer is fatigue limited but can predictably improvise very low powered effects.

There's a couple of ways to split up magic so that different traditions feel different. I think the first concern is what overall framework to use: standard GURPS magic vs advantage based magic vs ritual path magic (RPM). Any of the three can be modified, but I don't think they're well balanced against each other. It's probably best to pick one and then work from there on distinguishing traditions.

[Shostak]

Have you had a look at Holy Hunters?

[Kesendeja]

Originally Posted by Shostak

Have you had a look at Holy Hunters?

I hadn't, but will now.

[Kesendeja]

Originally Posted by baakyocalder

GURPS Thaumatology Magical Styles would be good. While built for the standard spell system, it does group abilities together based on a style. So, that should help with magical tradition inspiration regardless of which flavor of magic you use in GURPS.

http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/books/magicalstyles/

Sounds like it should work, I'll give it a closer look and see. Thanks.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by Kesendeja

Sounds like it should work, I'll give it a closer look and see. Thanks.

This page lists various types of magic systems (near the botom) and those links go to more detailed pages and some blog posts.
You might pick up something useful. I need to revisit this and rewrite as well as format it bnetter.
http://refplace.blogspot.com/p/other...ides-that.html

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by Kesendeja

I'm creating a setting where there is a noticeable diffrence in the methods used in magic. For example a Navjo Shaman, Catholic Priest and a Deciple of the Golden Dawn are going to have drastically different ideas on magic, spirits and the like.

I once ran a game using Path/Book magic (aka limited spell selection vanilla Magic), Ritual Path Magic (from Thaumotology and the RPM book), and Sorcery (Advantages as Magic)...

It was a bit wild. I wouldn't recommend it to GMs who don't have a lot of GURPS experience under their belt.

It's not to say you can't learn another tradition.

That's where my problem comes in. I know they should be more expensive than a perk, but should they be advantages, extra skills, techniques of existing skills, or something else entirely?

It depends on how you run it...

If they are different power sources* then they should be separate UBC Backgrounds. Say if the shamans have Power Investiture (Spirit) and Golden Dawn mages have Magery (Hermetic) and Catholic Priests have Power Investiture (Divine), then they are separate Advantages. However if they are just different flavors of magery then allowing them to pick a new flavor tends to cost 2 points per level of the new flavor... and whatever other Advantages go with it.

So if a Navajo shaman has Magery (Spirits) and needs Medium and Spirit Empathy to get that Magery, but a Golden Dawn Disciple has Magery (Hermetic) and needs Rank 1 (Golden Dawn) which requires 2 points in Thaumatology, 1 point in History (Godlen Dawn) and Savoir-Faire (Golden Dawn), while a Catholic Priest has Magery (Theurgy) but needs Clerical Investment and Rank 1 (Catholic Church), which in turn requires Theology 1 point... then getting the 'new flavor' is a bit more of an undertaking.


* The above way I did it they were, kinda. They were all 'magic', however Path/Book had an external Patron, either a demiigod, fey, spirit, etc for Path; or empowered book that they drew their Magery from. RPM ritualists had Magery in their own right, and the Sorcerors were possessed by elemental spirits




Honestly though, I'd strongly consider doing all three differently. I get that those three were just examples, but using those examples... I'd do the priests as Divine Power, straight out of GURPS Divine Power, I'd do the shamans as shamans, IE, they have a few spells that deal with spirits (and undead) but mostly rely on spirit allies and by talking to local spirits and bartering favors from the local nature (or city, etc) spirits, and the "hermetic" mages all use vanilla magic, or Path/Book (which is just a way to limit what spells practitioners can get and how fast their power grows).