dxContent - New Magic Effects generator

[Wheelmanforhire]

Hey all, I wanted to tell you about the new Magic Effects generator up in the dxContent random generator library. It produces random descriptions of magical effects to help overworked DM's flesh out descriptions of magical phenomena. Check it out here!

~~~~Overworked DM (Before)~~~~

DM: "You see a magic... dark blob thing... kinda glowing in the middle of the room. Oh and it makes scary noises."

Player 1: "Is this like the other magic 'thing' in the other room, because it was 'kinda glowing' also?"

Player 2: "Scary? Like how?

~~~Still overworked DM with dxContent to spark his ideas (After) ~~~

Takes this random result...

"An arcane Conjuration magic (moderate)
Aura: An intensely luminescent, vibrant, cascading black amorphous nexus. The sounds is like periodic screeching chorus. The overpowering smell of pepper fills the air."

and turns it into this...

DM: You see an intensely luminescent, vibrant-black amorphous nexus in the middle of the room. Whips of smoke cascade out of it and flow across the floor. The strange periodic screeching chorus you've previously heard is clearly coming from it. The overpowering smell of pepper fills the air!"

Player 1: I call for the party to step back and cast detect magic!

DM: You detect that it is an arcane Conjuration of moderate strength...

Player 2: I don't want that smoke touching me! Drake climbs up the door!

 

[Fooly_Cooly]

Definite overuse of the word cacophonic in that generator. I saw it almost every other spell description. Seems all right other wise though. Wish you could type in the spell name THEN get an effect that fits the spells purpose. That would make more sense.

 

[Wheelmanforhire]

[MENTION=6688511]Fooly_Cooly[/MENTION] - thanks for the feedback! I've modified some of the noise descriptors to reduce the frequencey of the overused cacaphonic (which I've also corrected to to "cacaphonous"). I'll give some though to your other suggestions.

 

[Fooly_Cooly]

No problem. I like the idea of what you got going though. I as a not so magic savvy DM could always use help describing spells seen with detect magic and such.

 

[Nebten]

I like that you started this project. I typically know what spell will be cast or will be in effect. If I have a random description, now I have to figure out something that matches said description. We are kinda doing things in reverse order here.

 

[Wheelmanforhire]

[MENTION=79391]Nebten[/MENTION] - I understand where you are coming from. A random description without any "steering" might not be as useful as a response to some initial criteria.

My concept for this generator was not to describe "every day" spell effects (magic missile, fireball, etc), but to help the GM come up with descriptive ideas for special magical effects that come during a campaign's climatic events like... when the PCs first see the magical portal that appeared in the lowest level of the abandoned local mine, or the visual aura that surrounds Kajeldora the legendary War axe of the great hero Niorj, or the unholy msgical shroud that surrounds Grishnakul the undead king... That sort of thing.

I'd like the crux of your suggestion... Here is what I'm thinking... instead of telling the generator a specific spell, you tell it some things about the nature if the effect - is it neutral, evil, or good? What "power level" is it?, etc. This way the DM can get relevent results back - if I need a decidedly "evil" sounding/looking/smelling effect, I can avoid descriptions that are contrary.

I'd love to get some input on the initial 2-4 big up front questions to ask. Feel free to sound off!

 

[Nebten]

I understand coming up with an effect for every spell would be nuts.

You have all the components, I just have to be able to select them.

Let's say I want an effect for Antiplant Shell.

I want to be able to select a "Moderate" and "Abjuration", then give me the random discription.

 

[Fooly_Cooly]

I agree. Not specific spells but there strength and school would be great deciding factors.

 

[Wheelmanforhire]

I've updated the Magic Effects Generator. I love the idea of schools affecting the ultimate effect description, but I needed to find a happy medium for this first step.

I've added a "general appearance" option (Good, Neutral or Evil) that influences the description.

So, in Nebten's example of needing an effect for Aniplant Shell you could simply choose "Neutral" and in the result ignore the random school/strength that you already know.

If the PC's encounter a vile doorway into the netherworld, you could chose "evil" as the "apperance" and the random description will be skewed to more vile/evil/sinister results.

Like wise choosing "Good" would skew the description the other way.

I did make the School and Strength "clickable" so that you can tweak the results... but I'm thinking in most cases the DM will know that already, so maybe in the next tweak I"ll simply make random school/stength an optional output.

Anyway, check it out and let me know what you think!

 

[redboxrazor]

This is a really cool project! Thank you for your work on this.