Elven Everyday Magic (widespread Magery)

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

There's already a mechanism for mitigating critical failures. If your intent is wholly benevolent in casting a spell, then demons won't show up. So as long as elves cast spells like cooking and healing on behalf of each other without any mercenary intent then there's no risk beyond "Oh no, the souffle is ruined!"

The GM may waive that result if "in his opinion, caster and spell were both lily-white, pure good in intent".

Unless elves are very different from humans, much of their social interactions won't qualify for such a strict criteria. Even between good people who like each other there are often ulterior motives etc.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

There's already a mechanism for mitigating critical failures. If your intent is wholly benevolent in casting a spell, then demons won't show up. So as long as elves cast spells like cooking and healing on behalf of each other without any mercenary intent then there's no risk beyond "Oh no, the souffle is ruined!"

Even if you ignore the demon result, critical failures in casting spells are still pretty dangerous. The analogy here is to Piloting. Critical Failure in an adventure might mean a crash, but it doesn't on a monthly job roll for a airline pilot (probably just means a fine and a suspension). If you want domestic spells you need to treat spells as a domestic skill and reserve the critical spell failure table for adventuring uses.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Even if you ignore the demon result, critical failures in casting spells are still pretty dangerous..

No. They aren't. Not if the spell wasn't very dangerous in the first place. Most of the results on the default table are "nothing happens", "something happens but to the wrong target", "nothing happens, but caster is slightly injured" or "the reverse of the right thing happens".

These things are only dangerous if the spell was something that was liable to save or take a life in the first place. Think about the consequences of any of those results when applied to a hair cut spell or a "cause tree to bear fruit" spell. Now it is true that the result of a critical failure can be any whim that crosses the GM's mind and the table is just for when nothing appropriate comes to mind but even then a spell misfire for a Food spell isn't liable to be any more dangerous than, say a critical failure while using mundane techniques to gather natural ingredients for a meal. Just...weirder.

And I say that as someone who has in fact used the irrational fear of a supernatural fumble to explain why magic doesn't in fact quickly revolutionize the entire economy of a quasi-medieval culture. But universally magic capable elves are liable to take magic with a bit less superstitious dread and accept the occasional misfire as just something that happens. Like traffic accidents, or scalding yourself in the shower.

[fifiste]

If the critical failure chances are kept the same for everyday magic (no TDM) and the society still keeps on using the magic matter of factly then it could make a good case for why the elves civilisation is in a downfall.
The easy magery would be both blessing and a curse. Most elves would probably have a compulsive behaviour etc. disadvanatage on magic use.

It would need to be some disadvantage to risk stuff from turning purple to bodily injury to summoning demons just to get your hair done. (ahh there went your pointy ears)

If you day on day try to make your life more comfortable with magic as such then it would somewhat resemble the oldy newspaper commercials with "NOW WITH RADIUM" for some product that really shouldn't be using it. (Glow in the dark suppository ... stick it where the sun don't shine :D)

So the elves as a race dwindling because their daily life means that sooner or later they get horribly injured, turned into a toad, get sterile, or summon a demon that depopulates their village thoroughly.

It can make for a humorous or horrific picture of society depening on the depiction.

[simply Nathan]

Originally Posted by T.K.

Whaaaa...?? A "normal" elf would have IQ 10 + Magery 1, giving every member around skill level 9 or 10 with barely any training or pratice.

That depends on the elf racial template, which of course most GMs have made several incompatible variants.

Most of the published elf templates I've seen are IQ 11, Magery 0, not IQ 10, Magery 1. Makes a pretty big difference in the spell selection, but still means that most elves would only have a skill of 8 or 9 at one point of investment, not having spells that can be cast at reliable professional levels until 8 points of learning.

3e elves generally had IQ 11 and Magery 1 because Magery 0 wasn't a thing yet.

[Railstar]

Originally Posted by fifiste

If the critical failure chances are kept the same for everyday magic (no TDM) and the society still keeps on using the magic matter of factly then it could make a good case for why the elves civilisation is in a downfall.
The easy magery would be both blessing and a curse. Most elves would probably have a compulsive behaviour etc. disadvanatage on magic use.

I LOVE this idea. Thank you!

[Philosopher Rogue]

Besides the utility type magics think about what else starts to happen:

Communication spells
- at the most basic it would equal telegrams from sender to specialist to specialist to recipient, up to being the equivalent of cell phones and video conferencing.

Illusions and Light
- Yeah, sure, invisibility and disguises. But what about theater performances, concerts, storytelling, education and judicial system as an ancient elf *shows* his audience exactly what he saw on that day 1000 years ago?

And that's just scratching the basics.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by fifiste

If the critical failure chances are kept the same for everyday magic (no TDM) and the society still keeps on using the magic matter of factly then it could make a good case for why the elves civilisation is in a downfall.
The easy magery would be both blessing and a curse. Most elves would probably have a compulsive behaviour etc. disadvanatage on magic use..

Nonsense. That's like saying humans should have been in demographic collapse because "smoking" and "drunk driving". It's a mistake to assume that elves will be going around casually casting spells with a skill level of 10 even when they have IQ 11 and Magery 0 of course. A typical elf may not be an exceptionally gifted magician, but they have the study time to really get the hang of a few low-prereq spells before they starting using them on a regular basis.

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Nonsense. That's like saying humans should have been in demographic collapse because "smoking" and "drunk driving". It's a mistake to assume that elves will be going around casually casting spells with a skill level of 10 even when they have IQ 11 and Magery 0 of course. A typical elf may not be an exceptionally gifted magician, but they have the study time to really get the hang of a few low-prereq spells before they starting using them on a regular basis.

Even with a skill of 15 they will have a ~0.0064% risk of summoning a demon with each spellcasting attempt unless in the GM's opinion "caster and spell were both lily-white, pure good in intent" and the GM choose to waive that result.

Assuming an average of 3 such spellcasting attempts per day, each elf would on average summon ~1 demon per decade. Spellcasting is way more dangerous than smoking or driving. Even the 1 demon per ~3 decades you get with skill 16 or higher makes such spellcasting extremely dangerous.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

But universally magic capable elves are liable to take magic with a bit less superstitious dread and accept the occasional misfire as just something that happens. Like traffic accidents, or scalding yourself in the shower.

What's wrong with treating it like traffic accidents or shower scaldings then? You don't make people roll Driving for daily commutes or Housekeeping to take a shower every day.