Do wizards bred true in your setting?

[hcobb]

Not that wizards need heirs, as they are all ageless, or at least the rich ones are.

[Skarg]

Not necessarily, though there is a tendency.

[larsdangly]

An implicit idea in TFT is that everyone can cast spells if they have a functioning brain and invest the time to learn. Anyone with IQ 8 and 1500 XP to burn can learn to cast a spell as well as any wizard. Given that, what does it mean for a wizard to breed true?

[hcobb]

ITL pg 12 says...

• A “wizard” is a character who has spent all his life studying magic. It comes naturally to him, and he thinks in terms of magic; thus, he is good with spells, and handicapped at almost everything else.
• A “hero,” as far as this game is concerned, is any player character who is not a wizard. A hero may use his weapons, his wits, or both – but he deals primarily with the physical world, rather than the psychic/spiritual one of the wizard.
• Heroes gain talents – physical abilities – easily, but are handicapped in learning spells, since they lack the proper training. By and large, a wizard should stick to spells, and a hero should leave the magic to the wizards. But some very interesting character concepts can arise from combinations of magic and mundane talents.

So all humans are innately wizards, but some are trained for the job?

[larsdangly]

That's the 'meta' suggestion of the language; more compelling to me is that the rules are clear: this is something everyone can do.

[Skarg]

There's also the idea that people are part nature and part nurture, and have certain aptitudes and interests from their nature that combine with what they are raised and taught.

[EKB]

In my setting, becoming a wizard is purely a matter of being willing to buckle down and do the studying. The concept of "Only the Gifted can do magic" is one I generally dislike, whether it's a GURPS-like game-mechanics requirement that your character start with the Magery advantage, or a matter of fluff text and world background.

Now becoming a wizard in Etan does require IQ 8, and those with scores on the lower end won't be very good wizards, but that's different from "Yes, you do have IQ 12, but you cannot become a wizard because you do not have the all-important GIFT."

[malloyd]

It's a weird question in the context of most cultures too. Do garbage collectors breed true? Well on the evidence often yes, lots of cultures have had hereditary castes of garbage collectors.

People often inherit the trades of their parents, but it's a combination of the examples they model themselves on, that's what they're learning from a young age, that's who their parents know well enough to apprentice them to, and [maybe] some genetic or environmental influences.

Who knows, maybe the good mages are the ones that had a lot of childhood exposure to magical radiations - which is a lot more likely if your parents use spells for daily chores than if you've never come within a mile of a wizard. How well could anybody really tell that apart from breeding anyway?

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by EKB

In my setting, becoming a wizard is purely a matter of being willing to buckle down and do the studying. The concept of "Only the Gifted can do magic" is one I generally dislike, whether it's a GURPS-like game-mechanics requirement that your character start with the Magery advantage, or a matter of fluff text and world background.

I'm the opposite. I like the idea that wizards are born and I've even made that a key element of my Cidri's backstory. Plus the fact that your character path must be chosen at creation and dictates your progression scheme forevermore, strongly implies an innate quality IMO.

That said, I certainly won't hold it against those who reject the truth of a wizard's evolutionary superiority.
;)