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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannager" data-source="post: 5993960" data-attributes="member: 73683">And, of course, the aesthetics of the Mona Lisa have stayed the same, barring degradation over time and a handful of restorations. The original still resides in the Louvre. It's there, and as far as I know it's not going anywhere anytime soon.That said, it hasn't stopped countless people from reinterpreting it over the years, both as ostensibly serious art and as parody, pop, or contemporary. The fact that something has always been a certain way doesn't mean that it represents everything it could be, and should never hold a creative vision back.The aesthetics of magic are similar, but much less sacred. They exist to facilitate a game, and thus are governed in part by what is enjoyable to play with, rather than purely by what sits well in one's personal sense of aesthetics. One could certainly argue for a mathematically-rich interpretation of magic wherein intricate formulae govern its use, and one's aesthetics may prompt them to argue for those formulae being translated into gameplay mechanics. That does not, however, recommend them for the role, as such a system would almost certainly turn magic into a tedious slog.The question then becomes: to what degree do we allow personal aesthetics and the-way-it's-always-been thinking determine how game mechanics should evolve moving forward? I would much rather err on the side of developing mechanics that are fun to play with rather than developing mechanics that are familiar. The hobby's success depends on a steady influx of new players, and they don't care at all for what is familiar, because they aren't familiar with anything - they only care about whether the game is fun. The only ones who care about familiarity are those who have been playing the game for a protracted period of years.Obviously the ideal solution is a system that is both familiar and imminently playable. I'm not sure that's possible, since those in the familiarity camp are relatively inflexible in what they will accept, it seems, and the magic system as it's worked in the past has often been quite far from imminently playable.The best possible scenario would be one in which the game's designers weren't afraid to make bold design choices that are attractive to new players and capable of making the game appealing to a generation of young people, and where the current D&D fanbase took the changes like a group of grown-ups capable of getting past the changes without destroying the hobby from the inside-out.</blockquote>

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