[DF] How Many Different Types of Magic?

[DAT]

Have a question for folks who run or play in DF games.

How many different magic systems are used in the DF games you play or run?


So the standard DF mix is:
Basic Magic with Sanctity (Holy/Unholy) Modifier for Clerics
Basic Magic with Druidic (Nature) Modifier for Druids
Basic Magic with Mana Modifier for Wizards
Basic Magic with Demonology Modifier for Demonologist
Basic Magic with Elemental Modifier for Elementalist
Basic Magic with Necromancy Modifier for Necromancers
Basic Magic with Shamanic Modifier for Shaman
Basic Magic with Bard-Song Modifier for Bards

But then all Wizards also have "Advantage/Powers Magic" with the same modifiers for their Abilities.
And you could classify Martial Artists as having Advantage/Powers Magic with the Chi Modifier, and Psi as having Advantage/Powers Magic with the Psionics Modifier.

So my count for RAW DF is two types (Basic and Advantage/Powers) of Magic with 10 modifiers.


But have folk had other system(s) in their DF games?
RPM?
Wild Card?
Syntactic?
Symbol?
Threshold?
Or other types from Thaumatology?

I'm really interested in how many types folks have seen successfully used in the same campaign.
-Dan

[simply Nathan]

Personally I consider weaboo fightan magic (Chi powers) and psi to be types of magic.

And in my own games I only plan on allowing standard mana magic with specific Magical Styles emulating the cleric, druid, bard, and possibly martial artist and Divine Favor with a small collection of Holy-modified advantages for the truly divinely gifted.

[mikeejimbo]

My group plays a game set in Dragonlance, and while we don't use everything from the DF line it's very similar in tone and style. We have been using Realm Magic for all magic in the setting, and based the Realms on the Mage: The Awakening Arcana. It has been working fairly well for us.

Although this is the only system we use. Clerical and Wizard magic were just differentiated by the Clerics needing to take Arcana that their deity would approve of and/or use said magic in line with their deity's wishes. We didn't have any sanctity modifiers or anything. And also right now we have messed up the world so much that there are no longer any gods. Well they're somewhere but the world is hidden from them. Again.

[weby]

In my current game it depends on how you see "type of magic."

The game is not strictly DF. but a kick in the door, kill monsters and steal their loot type game nevertheless.

There are five basic "realms" of magic, but two are fairly close to each other. And then there are 22 types of elemental magic, but only 6 in common use.

Each realm has several types of powers, both spell based, powers based and "special power based"

In addition you have chi and psionics that could be seen as "magic"

The basic realms of magic are:
Essence: Indirect manipulation of the overall magic field around you to produce magic effects. Affected my area mana. Essence users are in many ways generalists, having the the broadest options of learning magic.
Mentalism: Close to essence in that you manipulate the surrounding magic field, but with the difference that you use your mental powers to do it resulting in mind affecting magic being easier but affecting other beings in other ways is hard. Affected my area mana. They are very limited in the number of spells they can learn, but tend to be much better at the spellss they know.
Channeling: Priests and similar that use magic stored by their god to casts spells. Basically the prayers of followers generate magic power into a central battery that the channelists can use. Affected by sanctity
Nature: Druids,rangers and similar use the power of the life force around them to do magic. They are affected by the amount of life force around them.
Arcane: Is the core manipulation of magic forces, they are affected by mana, nature and sanctity combining elements of all. They are very rare as to learn such you need to know some spells from all the 4 other realms.

All the different elementalists manipulate their own elemental force and are affected by the availability of their element in the area. Then to make things "fun" there are also elemental priests that use power like a channelists, but instead of a deity acting as the battery it is some elemental force and some rare elementalists that manipulate the element with their mind...

Psionics is the manipulation of the things directly by the power of your mind without affecting magic fields or similar.

Chi is indirect manipulation of things by your will/concentration.

Manipulation types:
Essence,Nature, Chi and elementalism are fairly similar in the way they manipulate their different power sources. They are all much harder if you are in armor.
Mentalists, psionics and the rare elemental mentalists are similar in that they manipulate things with their minds. They are all much harder if your head is covered.
Priests and elemental priests are similar in that they use power stored in a battery by prayers.


So you have 3 basic manipulation ways, 3+2+22 power sources manipulated and their combinations.. combined with the different power types..

[T.K.]

I believe this is one of those cases where quantity is not necessarily an improvement over quality.

Certainly choices and flavor is what you're looking with different types but my point is that 1) It needs to make sense in the setting 2) It's only worth to go as far as there's an actual justified difference between the types

In my setting, which is a mix of old school mindless beat-em dungeon crawling with high social RP interactions/plots in-betweens (or the other way around, depending on what type of player you are ^_^), I have these:

Base, traditional magic is divided in 2 big venues ---

Vancian-ritualistic-recipeish magic - Follows the Magic rules, but with a new setup of schools and spells inside them that I did create based on the universe schools of thought;

Reality shaping magic - Follow a complete new built system I made that allows users to alter reality directly through 9 different pillars that control everything that exists and that do not;

Then I have Spiritual Magic/Shamanism ---

Shamanism - Uses a mix of Magic base system with Ritual Magic, depending on spirits contacted and so on.

Then I have what could be loosely related to divine magic, in my setting ---

Primordial Planes Magic - There're 6 Primordial planes correnponding the base elements and a primordialist can attune itself to one of these planes and start infusing himself and the world around it with the element, manifesting spetacular effects the more attuned it gets.


These are the real magic systems in the setting. On top of that, there're other "power source" systems in place, but even though they're interchangeable and comparable, are not treated as "magic" in the setting...they are:

Chi Manipulation - There're some traditions of Chi manipulation in the setting, but the interaction between it and magic is only mechanically interconected where it makes sense due to effects and causes;

Psionics - Manipulation through mind of the reality present in the plane where all the gaming happens. (only accessible to a single race, the one original from the plane);

Earth Manipulation - There's a race that uses a type of martial art + earth magic, to create a fantastic style that intermix some martial stunts and techs with earth magic and powers;

Cinematic styles - The world has some lines of cinematic combat styles that can deal really amazing feats with techniques going well beyond the Cinematic Techs in Martial Artsand going into Magic territory, but being completely "physical";

And to finish all that jazz, a few main races have racial powers and abilities they can develop, using rules from Powers, depending on the race and their background.

[GoldenMonkey]

Rune magic, but as a stand-alone not one of many.

[DAT]

I appreciate the ideas.

I am looking at a multi-cultural setting, and am thinking about having different magic traditions and systems based on the culture.

So rune magic for some, basic for others, etc. or at least that is the idea.