Forbidden Magic, Fantasy Religions, and other Thoughts

[Arith Winterfell]

I've been working on designing a fantasy setting, but I've been struggling for ideas and narrowing down ideas from a general vague pool of ideas I have.

I've also been reading over Mailanka's Communion building ideas for inspiration and thoughts. The article: Here

Now, I mention IRL religious stuff here not to focus on it, but rather to explain my starting point and thus explain what "creative influences" shape my setting design. I'm an atheist IRL, so my point of view tends me toward a great distaste for religious zealotry and extremism. I admit, I tend toward religions in my setting that tend toward being good at first glance, but whose insistence on dogma and tendency toward Us vs. Them mentality ultimately mark them as being constrictive and tending toward a "Us/Righteous vs. Them/Wrong/Sinful."

That said, I'm mostly concerned with the inter-relationship between the Fantasy setting's religion and "Arcane" wizard magic. I've already established that there is an Arcane College in the setting which has political power and protects wizards and their usefulness in the setting.

I don't want to have an absolute antagonism between the Arcane College and those religions however either. That's too black and white a division. That said, I wanted to figure out a good way to use the default magic system to explore ideas of magic that religions forbid, but aren't directly crippling to player characters.

At the same time, I'm fascinated by the idea of "Forbidden Knowledge" in the vein of Lovecraftian Horror and would like to capture some element of that. At the same time I don't want to create a situation that disincentivizes actually learning and using Forbidden Knowledge/Magic.

So I'm just looking for general feedback and ideas on how to approach these elements in my setting from a design point of view?

[Dalillama]

Stereotypically, the definition of "forbidden" or "unholy" magic starts with necromancy. Mind control is anothe classic, and sometimes mind reading as well.

[Fred Brackin]

Planar Summons is mostly left blank about _what_ it summons (besides "not Demons" because there's already a spell for that) but Planar Summons is in there as a "blank template" for summoning Things Man Was Not Meant To Know.

[whswhs]

I've read an account of actual medieval European thought about magic. There were very specific forms of magic that were forbidden; it wasn't as simplistic as "all magic is evil." What was forbidden was, first, summoning (since you might summon devils); second, any magic whose rituals approximated to prayer and sacrifice (magic based on impersonal forces was okay); third, magic that trespassed into the domain of divine omniscience, particularly magic that foretold the future. On the other hand, oneiromancy was approved of, since there was scriptural precedent for God sending dreams and prophets interpreting them.

It's not necessary to copy this sort of thing slavishly. But I suggest thinking about what a particular religion puts forth as dangerous or improper, and asking what forms of magic fall into that domain.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Arith Winterfell

. . . I wanted to figure out a good way to use the default magic system to explore ideas of magic that religions forbid, but aren't directly crippling to player characters.

To do that, you need to decide what magic the various religions forbid, and why they do so. That might be as simple as forbidding duplicating the aspects of a deity: the church of healing claims a monopoly over Healing magic, and the church of agriculture claims Food magic, and so on. The spells of those colleges exist, and can be learned by non-religious magicians, but are illegal.

Originally Posted by Arith Winterfell

At the same time, I'm fascinated by the idea of "Forbidden Knowledge" in the vein of Lovecraftian Horror and would like to capture some element of that. At the same time I don't want to create a situation that disincentivizes actually learning and using Forbidden Knowledge/Magic.

There's the Demonic Contracts and Black Magic material on p. 156 of Magic. If those rules bite magicians too hard for your taste, you can reduce the penalties.

[WingedKagouti]

Fantasy religions are usually backed by actual gods with very real power, which makes atheism and agnosticism silly notions for those worlds. Many of them are also polytheistic, which essentially means that no single church can lay public claim to having the "one true morality", but instead have to acknowledge that their chosen god is just one aspect of the world. There will certainly still be those who are too dogmatic to acknowledge non-believers as people.

On the other hand, a church or deity can certainly ban their own priests from using certain types of magic. If the church is against it but the deity isn't, the repercussions will be purely social. But if the deity is against that type of magic, things might be really bad for any faithful that breaks a ban.

Additionally, mages will probably also be at least a bit religious themselves in such a world. If there is no god of magic (or mages), they'll probably lean towards a god of knowledge or mysteries if they don't have reasons for worshipping a different god (eg. a mage who grew up as the child of farmers might worship an agricultural deity). In most settings, mages and priests will understand that the power of a mage comes from a non-divine source, without magic itself being more inherently evil than any other tool or weapon.

Take something like the ancient Egyptians, Greek or even the Norse. While an individual might favour a specific deity, (or at least close to) everyone acknowledged the other deities and offered sacrifices of some sort to ask for favours or placate them. Greek epics often touch upon people who worshipped one deity and forgot to offer a sacrifice to another before undertaking some task, which was then punished by the ignored deity.

City- and nation-wide bans on various types of magic are more likely to come from whatever government is in place than from religion(s) (theocracies being a special case). From them you're likely to see bans and heavy restrictions on any type of magic that has a risk of causing major damage, disrupting the economy or otherwise usurping the minds, abilities or wealth of those in power.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by WingedKagouti

Fantasy religions are usually backed by actual gods with very real power, which makes atheism and agnosticism silly notions for those worlds.

Not necessarily. Depending on the details, someone could easily adopt a position that the power claimed to be from the gods isn't, or that the beings that claim to be gods aren't. A lot of people believe Prince Philip existed, but only a small portion of them believe he was a divine being.

[Arith Winterfell]

Originally Posted by WingedKagouti

Fantasy religions are usually backed by actual gods with very real power, which makes atheism and agnosticism silly notions for those worlds. Many of them are also polytheistic, which essentially means that no single church can lay public claim to having the "one true morality", but instead have to acknowledge that their chosen god is just one aspect of the world. There will certainly still be those who are too dogmatic to acknowledge non-believers as people.

***

City- and nation-wide bans on various types of magic are more likely to come from whatever government is in place than from religion(s) (theocracies being a special case). From them you're likely to see bans and heavy restrictions on any type of magic that has a risk of causing major damage, disrupting the economy or otherwise usurping the minds, abilities or wealth of those in power.

Some good points (both in the above quote, and from everyone else more broadly too!) What follows is what I'm toying with so far.

I'm pondering more of a Lovecraftian approach perhaps like that taken by the video game Fear & Hunger where there are primeval god-like beings, but they are deeply alien to humanity. These would offer real Power Investure, but are so distant, alien, and often cruel that they have largely faded from human society except as cult fringes. (Could potentially use Symbol Magic for these, maybe?)

Potentially more recent human based gods are actually illusions built around concepts and spells empowered by collective belief and sanctity levels reflecting strength of shared belief in the holiness of locations. Power is drawn to power spells (which really still use the casters fatigue anyway) from collective belief in an illusion that there is a divine consciousness behind a concept (like The Sacred Light faith).

Or maybe clerics use Threshold Magic system, representing that calling down too big of miracles (exceeding their Threshold) demands too much from the pool of collective belief and distortions of reality result. Perhaps the churches interpret such backlashes as divine punishment for calling too much for a deitiy's power for unworthy purposes.

Thoughts?

[The Colonel]

Originally Posted by Arith Winterfell

Or maybe clerics use Threshold Magic system, representing that calling down too big of miracles (exceeding their Threshold) demands too much from the pool of collective belief and distortions of reality result. Perhaps the churches interpret such backlashes as divine punishment for calling too much for a deitiy's power for unworthy purposes.

Thoughts?

Any magic system which includes significant side effects and backlashes that could harm the greater community would provide an excellent rationale for pretty much anyone to dislike magic. Even more so if human sacrifice and similar things are a cheap and easy source of power in the setting...

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Arith Winterfell

Potentially more recent human based gods are actually illusions built around concepts and spells empowered by collective belief and sanctity levels reflecting strength of shared belief in the holiness of locations. Power is drawn to power spells (which really still use the casters fatigue anyway) from collective belief in an illusion that there is a divine consciousness behind a concept (like The Sacred Light faith).

The core issue with systems like this is probably how much alignment of belief is required, and how do you judge it. With an actual god, it's easy, the god decides, but anything else and the issue of what happens to heretics (or lunatics) is more open.

Suppose a sincere believer in the Good God follows all his commandments without flaw in all cases whatsoever. But is also delusionally certain girl children with red hair are demonic witches and faithfully follow his command not to suffer them to live. Can he draw on this pool to cast "divine" spells in general? What about when specifically slaughtering a demonic witch? Why or why not?