The State of Magic

[Wolfbelly]

Not too sure if this would go in here or in the OOC RP thread, but here goes.

I would like to know what you all think about magic in general (pertaining, obviously, to non RL stuff). What's the general story behind magic? How does it work? What's involved in the use of magic? Can anyone use it? Is it a force of nature independant of people, or is it an extension of the caster? <p></p>

[JasonAB17]

zeke.tzo.com/rpgww/rpstuff/gaera_magic.html
zeke.tzo.com/rpgww/rpstuff/gaera_spelltypes.html
zeke.tzo.com/rpgww/rpstuff/philsys_spellbook.html

Edited by: JasonAB17&nbsp; at: 2/2/05 19:21

[BrainWalker]

Somehow, I don't think that's what he was getting at.

This is an interesting question, actually, and my ponderings on it are what mostly lead to the inspiration behind my webcomic project that never got off the ground. I'll be sure to answer this question when I'm feeling less like a lazy ass. <p><div style="text-align:center"></div></p>

[Jak Snide]

My general conception of magic is that it's a raw force, drifting unseen through the universe until tapped by those will sufficient knowledge and will to control it. There's different currents of magic (elements being one term for them) and different people will have affinities with certain sorts and find other currents harder to master. Finally, magic is most defiantly a mystical, unscientific thing. It's much harder to create a specific effect (such as freezing someone in a block of ice) rather than just channeling the energy (like throwing a fireball). It can be understood to a limited degree, but mostly a mage creates specific effects by figuring out how to obtain said effect by trial and error.

[PriamNevhausten]

Hey Pervy. This is the part where I would quote directly from UA's brief description of where magic comes from according to various beliefs, except that you have my book. It then becomes your duty to quote the relevant passage! >={

edit: He can't find it. Soon, though... <p><span style="font-size:xx-small;">"It's in the air, in the headlines in the newspapers, in the blurry images on television. It is a secret you have yet to grasp, although the first syllable has been spoken in a dream you cannot quite recall." --Unknown Armies</span></p>Edited by: [url=http://p068.ezboard.com/brpgww60462.showUserPublicProfile?gid=priamnevhausten>PriamNevhausten</A]&nbsp; at: 2/3/05 17:00

[The Great Nevareh]

I'd follow the "Mage: The Ascension" idea except for the fact that it's entirely incompatible with Gaera- Magic is the will of the user bending the universe's laws, rules, and properties to suit his or her need or want. You become a stronger mage not with practice but with an epiphany in which you manage to shatter or overcome your variety of beliefs of reality as a non-consensual thing. As a mage becomes more able to shrug off the rules that they have been taught since birth, that mage also becomes more able to manipulate reality. <p>[---------------------------]
"There is great disorder under Heaven, and the situation is excellent."
-Mao Tse-Tung

"I eat the talking bees because I am George Washington Christ"
-From "Bob the Ball"</p>

[JasonAB17]

Everything you've mentioned is already defined in the history of magic link, set down by Brian ages ago. <_< And it's very detailed.

Unless you're making a new system and want a different concept for it, I don't see a reason for this thread.

[Jak Snide]

I think he's just curious about what people prefer/think of magic in a fantasy setting, rather than asking what a specific setting is like.

[Zemyla]

Or magic is caused by something powerful sitting outside normal reality, listening for the vocal incantations of would-be spellcasters and altering reality in exchange for service. <p>-----
Do not taunt Happy Fun Zemyla.

<span style="font-size:xx-small;">I think boobs are the lesser of two evils. - Inverse (Pervy)
Dammit, Dan, I'm not dating a damn NPC! - OOC Will (Will Baseton)
Of course! Anything worth doing is worth doing completely wrong! - Travis English
Ultimately, wizards and clerics don't say, "Gee, I want to become a lich because weapons hurt less and I don't have to worry about being backstabbed; that whole 'eternal life' thing is just a fringe benefit."-Darklion
But this one time I killed a walrus with my bare hands, and I suddenly understood spherical coordinates. - KnightsofSquare</span>

Adventurers! | RPG World World | The Phantom Lord's OT Board mkII | Indie Madnesse | Brotherhood of Elitist Bastards</p>

[Wolfbelly]

The reason I asked is I want to understand what you guys just innately think of magic and then see what follows from those thoughts. Jak Snide and the link posted by the non-thinking Jason describe magic as a flowing or drifting force. Going with that, one could liken magic to air or water, something that has currents that could accumulate and recede. From this, you could imagine things like magical tides (a place that is inundated or depleted of magical energies at specific moments in time), or magical fronts (bodies of magic that are perhaps attuned to a specific affinity that enhance the ability of people to use that specific magic while it's in the area).

The Great Nevareh proposes the idea of casters becoming more capable when they come to realize that their preconceived notions of reality don't apply. What follows from that is that these casters manipulate magic with their will, and not through incantations and the like, as it is their fruits of perception that fully deny them from magical power, not specifically their skill. Also, this implies that magic itself is an element seperate from physical reality like fire is seperate from water. If one could only perceive fire, but not water, they would be very inept at the handling of water. Furthermore, they'd believe that the sudden quenching of fire to be an impossibility, unless they shattered their preconceived perceptions and tried out this "water" that everyone's talking about.

Brain-dead Jason's link proposes that various races discovered magic, implying that it's a feature of the natural universe. This implies that it's always there, but only usable by those who understand it/are educated about it. Kind of like how we understand the role of bacteria in life, and are educated about bacteria, and can therefore do ... stuff ... with bacteria. If magic is an everpresent feature within the universe, then it follows that it has a specific rule of physics that it follows (well, I guess physics uses the wrong latin root, but you know what I mean). So, if magic follows a specific universal law, and physical objects exist, then it follows that there are specific laws that determine the interaction of the two. This doesn't mean that mortals can easily understand them, but hey, right now we're struggling with crazy shit like string theory and such, so the possibilities are infinite.

One thing in that Gaera article that's kind of interesting, it says that magic is molded by people's auras. This shows that for some reason, living creatures have a unique quality, perhaps a magical solidity, that other objects do not have. The description of magic as a flowing thing further enforces this difference between living and non-living. What, then, does this raise about constructs? Undead? Souls? Constructs are generally purely physical beings animated by magic. Does that mean that they have an aura? Undead are commonly referred to as having negative energy. Would this be an anti-matter of sorts? Souls have the magical solidity without the body, is then the act of living essential to magical usage? Or is it something more self-determining that allows magical use?

And Zemyla, I'm glad you raised the uttered word as a magical cause. While I'm not too sure about the gods thing outside of reality (which is, in my opinion, impossible), your suggestion raises a few questions about power. What does a god have to gain from specific intonations and phonetic utterances that give it the desire to alter reality for those who stumble upon those intonations and utterances? Also, let's assume that the God aspect is seperate for a moment and it's just intonations and utterances that are essential. This opens up a world of magical possibilities with creatures that speak in frequencies well beyond the range of human vocal chords. Suddenly, "Faerie magic" becomes a shitload more exclusive. Also, doesn't it follow that some magical effects may happen randomly in nature during, say, a rockslide? Or perhaps as waves break upon rocks?

Now, answer my original question further. I would like to know what you all think about magic in general.

[Nakibe]

Personally I see it as was said before, as a sort of energy that is all around a person at all times, exerting small amounts of force on the surrounding world as the world exerts on it, so to speak.

To do magic, a person would have to view this invisible flow, and give it a direction to move in. Depending on HOW it is directed, it creates different effects in the real world, from burning things to making them colder to making brains work different ways and so on and so forth.

The main problem with doing any sort of magic in my view is time. Spells have to be set up, forces have to be redirected, etc. Skillful casters find it easier to set up the proper conditions for complicated changes, whereas unskilled or untrained casters find that even the simplest effects are hard (But not impossible).

In general, though, a lot of the way I've thought of this comes from the idea that ANYONE can use magic. Mages aren't "special" people so much as people who care enough to train with this power. Many people who aren't mages per-se may use these powers in the form of prayers or traditions that draw upon magical power. The people may not SEE them as magic becaose they're so common and/or accepted, but they are magical. <p>

---

*lurks*<br /><br />Warning: The previous was a work of Chaos. Anything said above was written by a certified nut. Caution is advised<br /><br /> MY head, Dia!!! eVe</p>

[Choark]

As a small note that I in no way have a chip in my sholder about, honest:

I remember it is in fact easier in Gaera's magical terms for a powerful mage to use magic to make food, such as bread, that can be eaten and sustain them and feel no drain on there aura or powers (like loosing any MP) but it is draining to make Fire, or Lightening. Or any other 'normal' spell. But calling forth wine and a sandwitch? No problem! I also remember the explaination just prooved to me I didn't care enough to argue in all its flaws because... who am I to stop some fun?

Anywho:

Magic.

Apprently some people have more of it then others, so there is a personal generator of magic within us all as well. I remember reading a book/story where only those with any small amount of magic in them could be effected by magic, but those with none could never have magic, nor could magic ever effect them... unless... I suppose (didn't happen in the story mind you) that a mage uses magic to lift the ground the non magic dude was standing on, throw it high in the air then just left it drop. <p><div style="text-align:center"> </div>
<div style="text-align:center"> </div>
<div style="text-align:center"> Something cute plots your death </div></p>

[PriamNevhausten]

Everyone talks about Murphy's Law, and the strength of irony and preparedness as far as affecting fate. If you meticulously buckle your seat belt every time you are in a car, but one time say 'fuck it' and ride without, under normal circumstances you should be incredibly unlikely to be involved in any sort of car accident. Most people will tell you, though, that you're pretty much asking to get in a wreck, and would put the chances closer to 25% than the more normal estimate of 0.0005%.

Magic, to make this relevant, does not necessarily have to be blatant and ooh-wow. If you can draw upon this whimsy of fate, then you can create amazing changes all without actually appearing to have done anything. This can either be a force of you believing it strongly enough, or we can go with the 'consensual reality' bit and say that if you wanted to topple a building you had to convince enough people that there was something wrong with the building's foundation or structure, and their collective force of belief that the danger was just lurking in wait actually caused said danger to manifest.

If it IS the thaumaturgist (a convenient catch-all term for mages, willworkers, or any other magic-type-person) whose will is rewriting reality, then common conception is that there must be some sort of focus. Physical reagents, gestures, spoken word...ways to differentiate from one casting to the next. The belief that such a thing is inherently necessary is fallacy; if we believe that magic is possible, then there needs be no more than a simple exertion of will. But is this part even really necessary? Is it possible, by definition, to work miracles without actually willing them? Or does that exclude one from being a thaumaturgist, and degrade them to merely a state of being the origin or conduit of the effect?

For that matter, let's eschew this discussion of how magic works for a moment to ponder what magic exactly means. Are we talking necessarily fireballs and shit? Or does this simply mean anything that we don't understand precisely how it works, as a society? Perhaps, in another world or time, our computers would be legitimately 'magic.' God forbid you should realize what a telephone really is, in essence: A way to disregard distance when communicating verbally with another. It is possible, then, that we are performing magic daily, just by doing what comes naturally to us.

Also, I'm being extremely boring about this shit. Yay! <p><span style="font-size:xx-small;">"It's in the air, in the headlines in the newspapers, in the blurry images on television. It is a secret you have yet to grasp, although the first syllable has been spoken in a dream you cannot quite recall." --Unknown Armies</span></p>