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Another Magic System...

Discussion in 'Original Fiction Discussion' started by Goreshade, May 7, 2013.

  1. Goreshade

    Goreshade Fourth Year

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    As I finished A Memory of Light (the last Wheel of Time novel) the character Androl reminded me of an idea for a magic system that I had a couple years back. I have no idea if it is in the least bit original, but I thought I'd revisit it, and I noticed there's been a lot of good feed back for magic systems here. I am going with a system where humans are very limited, but have a type of magic that allows them to do almost anything with proper application of imagination and creativity. Which then coexists with a more 'reliable' form of magic that requires this magic to gain.

    Portal Magic

    1. The only known function of 'magic' innately usable by humans is to open portals.
    2. Dimensional portals are strictly regulated as not only can traveling to another plane be dangerous, you might let something terrible in, despite the fact that most planes are simply void.
    3. Certain planar 'codes' are commonplace, a mage throwing a 'fireball' will often open a small portal to a known plane of nothing but fire, the pressure build up launching a burst of flame, but he could just as well open a portal under his campfire and drop it on someone.
    4. The size of a portal and the distance of its destination is dependent on the mage in question, usually the further away from the destination the smaller the portal.

    Pact Magic

    1. A type of being exists in other planes that is willing to bargain for access to their own powers, this is how humans may gain other forms of 'power'.
    2. These beings take on many forms, but are most commonly considered Fae or Demons.
    3. Often these pacts are strange, and lead to bad things happening to the people who made them and the people they care about.
    4. As these beings are fickle, the powers often don't work out as the pact bearer expects, especially when they need it most.
     
  2. Striker

    Striker What's up demons?

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    Believe it or not, I actually had that first magic system penned in for an original series I'm planning to a tee in one of the earlier versions. It's a cool concept, but kind of limited. The second magic system sounds like just about any other generic DF-esque bargaining system.

    From what you have here, there's just not enough magic to blow anyone away, so you'd have to pair your systems with a solid plot/world if you wanted your story to go anywhere.
     
  3. R. Daneel Olivaw

    R. Daneel Olivaw Groundskeeper

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    One of the problems with the ability to use portals is that unless you have some very careful restrictions put on their application, it can be overpowering: Open a portal around someone's neck, let the head pass through but nothing else, then close it. Portal opens in someone's heart. As Androl did, open portals that catch incoming attacks and put them directly behind the attacker.

    This can be avoided by making the portals more like a warping and blending of two places, no sharp edges. If portals take time to open that will also help eliminate the potential for them being overpowered.
     
  4. Panther

    Panther Third Year

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    So Pact Magic allows a sorcerer to use other Magic systems? Like the ability to predict the future or something?
     
  5. Ched

    Ched Da Trek Moderator DLP Supporter ⭐⭐

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    So, let's see if I'm reading this right...

    The only magic that humans can normally do is open portals. You aren't supposed to open portals to other dimensions b/c that stuff is dangerous. Not just for the human in question but for others if they let something in. (Safeguards in place to prevent jerks from doing this for fun?).

    Not sure what you mean by planar "codes," but my impression is that there's a planefor just about everything you can think of. Therefore if you can locate (how?) the right plane you can create an effect that appears to be summoning fireballs and whatnot, but in reality you're just opening up a hole to a place with loads of fire and some of it comes through. (Need to differentiate between dimension/plane better, but it seems like planes are mostly okay to open but a dimension portal is not?).

    As for the campfire bit -- if you open a portal under the campfire to drop it on someone... is that someone in another plane? Or can you open a portal from one location in this plane to another location also in this plane?

    Pact magic makes sense and gives you a lot of flexibility. There could be minor/less-dangerous beings to make pacts with as well as the more BAMF variety that really mean business. Given the limitless (?) places portals could open to you could even get away with having a lot of variation in the abilities we see humans showcasing.

    What you are terming "Pact Magic" is pretty standard fare. One way you could make it unique is to have a whole bunch of people doing it and all of them bargaining with something different -- but that might make it a bit too hard to balance in terms of storytelling. Usually when I see this kind of magic it's not the norm, so making it the norm would be neat.

    The Portal magic is somewhat original. I've seen similar things here and there but nothing that I can easily pinpoint/remember as a primary magic system. It doesn't feel super fleshed out in your description though, but perhaps a few details were lost for the sake of being brief (probably wise, as you're likely to get more people to read it).

    Honestly clever use of Portal magic interests me more (at this point) than your Pact magic. I'd like to see a protagonist who is always coming up with some neat way to use a portal to get the better of his opponents, since that sort of cleverness seems like it would fit well with that system. Granted if you made the beings who make the pacts really interesting, or use the powers really creatively, that could change.

    But these magic systems don't make me immediately curious to read a book featuring them. The story would also need other things to get me to want to read it.
     
  6. Goreshade

    Goreshade Fourth Year

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    The idea for the story behind the system is that in general most people prefer to make pacts and take the easy route rather than become proficient in use of portals because it is both taxing and requires a lot of training. People good with portals make quite a bit of money by finding pacts for other people. These sellers are commonplace enough that in general the government turns a blind eye despite the dimensional travel restrictions. (Bribes may be involved)

    I figure it's a safe bet to make a pact with a being that has proven useful before, but humans are often greedy and want to be unique, so they search out for powers that haven't been seen before. Balancing this, like Ched said, could take a lot of work. I see most people as having at least one of the safe pacts, possibly these would even be findable through the government. Some beings would not want to make a pact with someone who has a pact already as well.

    The main character would be one of the exceptions who uses portal magic exclusively, using it cleverly to defeat opponents who have crazy and overpowering abilities.

    As for planes and dimensions, I was kind of using the terms interchangably, but a plane would basically signify a place that was legally 'okay' to open a portal to, somewhere that is basic or lacks intelligent life. While a dimension could be somewhere in which other intelligent life could be or what have you. The equivalent of scientists in this world go through A LOT of trial and error to find safe planes.
     
  7. Corsair

    Corsair First Year

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    Idea is interesting - but it may be hard to do in interesting way. Both types of magic, portal and pact would need to me very carefully limited, to prevent certain effects being overpowering. For example, simplest logical use of portal magic is to open 10cm wide portal ending ten or twenty kilometers down. Efect? Stream of magma flying with force able to shatter castle wall, buring everything it touches. One second of that would be enough to decimate an army.

    As a whole, portals could be seen as mastery of physical realm, while pact magic would have exclusive access to mental and emotional areas... Unless you want to allow more interesting usage of portals - for example, portal leading to astral realm, to person dreams or Socrates ideal world?
     
  8. Goreshade

    Goreshade Fourth Year

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    I was thinking a good way of limiting things like Corsair mentioned would simply be that opening a portal to somewhere further away is simply harder. In fact it's often easier to open a portal to another dimension or plane than to somewhere else in the same realm as those dimensions/planes are in a way right beside you and are an infinitesimal distance away.
     
  9. Corsair

    Corsair First Year

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    Distance limitation it beginning, but I think, not nearly enough. Main point of protagonist using portals was him to use them in intelligent way - and for that, portals needs to be versatile, allowing plenty of permutations. And, with plenty of permutations, it's hard to create solid restriction rules.

    Hm, one possible permutation is different types of portals. There are full portals, yes - but it may be easier for a mage to create portal that transfer only light. Simply put magic in such portal would be far to fragile for matter transfer. Result would be a type of fragile window, collapsing on touch. Other type of portal could be portal for heat energy or sound - and those would be interesting, since both could be invisible.

    Fragility is interestng issue - especially it pact magic in any form was highly disrupting for portals. Then duels could be interesting from strategy point of view. For example, pact user it attacking. His pact magic allows him to create invisible force-field armor, equivalent of heavy chainmail. Protagonist needs to escape - and uses portal to move into unaccessible possition. Then he turns back to try to show pact user THROUGH portal. Pact user cannot follow - his magic armor would automatically dirupt the portal... unless he turns it off for a moment. Perhaps a trap on the other side would do a trick? But how to tempt pact user to do it?

    Other permutation is time limitation on portal destination or portal types. I.e. - if several portals to plane of fire were to be opened in short time, each subsequent portal is harder to open. Then, it would require quite a bit creativity to battle the strong opponent.

    All in all, it al really depend on what type of story it would be - level of magic, and it's importance. Low level encounters when portal magic is used to transfer heat from cooking fire to person shoes differs from cataclysmic battles, full of lava, explossions an hordes of demons howling in the background.
     
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