Colors of Magic

durath · Apr 8, 2002

Just out of curiousity.....

ON your world are these colors going to manifest whenever a spell is cast? Is magic going to be that obvious?

It would be really hard to fail those spellcraft checks if you see a purple aura spring up around the evil bad guy and all of a sudden your buddy doesn't think the bad guy is so bad anymore.

Could be kinda kewl.

Xaven · Apr 8, 2002

Well, I like the idea of different orders of magic, and the distinctive colors that the spellcaster wears will be based upon the order that they choose (like in dragonlance, but they will not be required to wear robes of those colors). THat is basically all this is for. Yes, it would be too obvious if every time a spell was cast it gave off that aura.

Dr. Zoom · Apr 8, 2002

But you could use it for spells like detect magic where the school of magic is revealed with a successful spellcraft check. Instead of telling your player that he detects transmutation magic, tell him that the object/creature gives off a blue (or whatever) aura.

Xaven · Apr 8, 2002

Yeah, I was going to do that. I just started to do this today, though I have been thinking about it for awhile. I decided to do that magic part of the world first, as that is what is going to be the thing that puts it apart from standard D&D.

Daniel Knight · Apr 8, 2002

PenguinKing said:
Thing is, black isn't a mixture of all colors - that would be white. Sure, black is a mixture of all pigments, but pigments are subtractive - so you have no reflected light, not all of it.

Very true. But I think you'll find that this is the very reason we see witches and warlocks traditionally depicted wearing black. Even modern day witches continue to wear black for this very same reason.

Grayswandir · Apr 8, 2002

I put a bit of thought into this once upon a time. Here's what I came up with, and my reasoning:

Abjuration: White. Protection seems the most good-aligned type of magic possible.

Alteration (or Transmutation now): Blue. I've always considered blue to be the color of magic in general, probably because magic was colored blue in the old Dungeon Hack computer game (except cursed items were red), and Transmutation has always been the "generic" or "catch-all" school.

Conjuration: Purple. Rulership over summoned creatures.

Divination: Gray. Parting the murky fog of uncertainty.

Enchantment: Green. Something to do with envy, I think.

Evocation: Red. Seems right for battle magic.

Illusion: Yellow. The most cowardly of the eight schools, focusing on deception and trickery.

Necromancy: Black. The (supposedly) evil school.

Tangentially, wild magic was orange, mostly because I used to play a wild mage named Omar the Orange. He was fun.

On a related note, check page 147 of the PHB for the canonical sigils of each school of magic.

Grayswandir · Apr 8, 2002

Well, out of five sets of replies so far (including mine), we seem to have:

Abjuration: who knows (blue, black, silver, violet, white)
Conjuration: orange with two votes (others gray, gold, purple)
Divination: white with two votes (others yellow, blue, gray)
Enchantment: green with two votes (others purple, blue, yellow)
Evocation: unanimously red
Illusion: yellow with two votes (others indigo, purple, white)
Necromancy: black with three votes (others gray, violet - all dark)
Transmutation: Green (3) edges out blue (2)

Interesting.

hong · Apr 8, 2002

All this talk about eight different colours brings back memories of Ultima 4....

NiTessine · Apr 8, 2002

Well, in my Warhammer-based campaign, the Colleges of Magic go like this...

Abjuration: Grey
Conjuration: Amber
Divination: Celestial (Dark Blue)
Enchantment: Jade
Evocation: Bright (Fiery Orange)
Illusion: Light
Necromancy: Amethyst
Transmutation: Gold

Hmm... These names are from the last edition, though. Well, I doubt it matters here.

Fade · Apr 8, 2002

Octarine.

Colors of Magic

durath

First Post

Xaven

First Post

Dr. Zoom

First Post

Xaven

First Post

Daniel Knight

First Post

Grayswandir

Just a lurker

Grayswandir

Just a lurker

hong

WotC's bitch

NiTessine

Explorer

Fade

First Post

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