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Message: <blockquote data-quote="noffham" data-source="post: 2632358" data-attributes="member: 20233">Elements of Magic: Mythic EarthAuthor: Ryan NockPublisher: E.N. PublishingSystem: D20 Modern (with Fantasy D20 conversion appendix)Pages: 56Format: Fully bookmarked PDFPrice: $8.95What you get: The 56 page PDF and front and back cover color jpg files; also a readme file for using layers in the PDF. Interior art is black & white.Disclaimer: I received this as a free review copy. The product contains 56 pages with one used for the table of contents and one for the OGL. The cover and much of the interior art is by J.L. Jones and is uniformly flavorful and sets the tone quite well. Other illustrations are by Susan Knowles and Jen Starling and both suit the book. Much of the art is anime-inspired and fits the “High Fantasy” setting described in the book.I was immediately impressed with the use of PDF functionality in this product. Using the layers tab, you can turn color background, page framing lines and even the illustrations on or off. You therefore have great control over how ink-intensive this is to print out. This obviates the need for a color and b&w version. The bookmarks allow easy navigation throughout.The author starts out explaining that Mythic Earth was meant to bring the Elements of Magic system to the D20 modern game. As the work progressed however, he realized that D20 Fantasy players would also be interested and so the Fantasy D20 applications became a second design goal. Both of these goals have been admirably met.Chapter One: Myths, dives into the subject of Mythic Themes and their application to gaming. The author starts by discussing mythic structure and how they add both depth and context to the game world. Then, with a nod to Joseph Campbell, he looks at the heroic “Monomyth” elements common to all human cultures (Hero leaves home, adventures while learning about himself and returns home a changed person); and how they can apply to a game campaign. The author does a good job of both explaining the structure of the myth and how to incorporate that structure into a game. He also describers a “twist” on the classic structure called the Fellowship Cycle that focuses on the group experience rather than just one primary participant, and so is better suited to a band of adventurers.Chapter Two: Spellcasting and Magical Traditions gets to the meat of the matter explaining the spellcasting mechanic for spontaneous and ritual casting. Both methods involve a “spellcasting check”, for ritual spells it is a Knowledge check to translate and complete the written ritual and for spontaneous spells it is a skill check. Spontaneous spell casting uses various magic skills such as Charm, Defend, Cure, and Summon. Briefly, spells are constructed on the fly as some base effect difficulty modified by enhancements for range, duration, area of effect, etc. The total of the effect and enhancement levels are the final spell level. Casting in this fashion will take two full rounds. (There is also provision made for “signature spells”, pre-made familiar spells that can be cast as a standard action.) Casters can normally cast spells of a level equal to their skill ranks in the appropriate magical skill. Casters may cast overpowered spells of up to five levels higher than their normal limit by temporarily “burning” strength points (which can heal through rest but not magic) or avoid the burn by spending an action point. The degree of success or failure on the casting check determines if the spell works as expected, works but imposes a penalty on future casting checks, or fails and possibly causing a spell mishap. The rest of the chapter goes over various magic feats and spellcasting options (such as communal casting, magical “fonts” or batteries and so on) and creating magic items using this system. There are also two starting D20 Modern occupations, the adept (for startin characters who are aware of magic) and the arcantrepeneur (those who apply magic to thier business). Of primary importance, however, are the Magical Tradition feats. These feats help to define the magical heritage the caster follows, Animism, Blood Magic, Voodoo, Wicca, etc.  Each tradition defines the “flavor” of the magic, which magical skills are class skills for the mage, any special benefits for the tradition (such as a plus or minus adjustment to casting checks for particular races, magic skill types, or targets. Each tradition provides the GM with guidance for the type of mishaps likely to occur when a spell check of that tradition is failed. The traditions presented (23) pretty much cover every magical flavor you could want in a campaign and there are rules for mixing/blending traditions to craft a specific feel for your mage. Admittedly, there are a few “odd” traditions here, such as Anime-ism (casting anime-inspired spells) and another one that must be an inside-joke related to tree-dwelling rodents. ‘nuff said.  Chapter Three: The Magic of High Fantasy, is an example setting for a modern, magical campaign steeped in mythic themes. In the authors’ words “The world of High Fantasy is split in two- Terra, the world we all know and Gaia, the world of the magical races.” Briefly, this is a world in which magic functions and where the otherworldly denizens of Gaia often intrude, violating treaty forged in the age of King Arthur, on Terra. Two secret organizations police the world, one the descendants of King Arthur’s Knights of the Round Table and the other being the inheritors of the Knights Templar mantle who keep knowledge of magic away from the mundane populace. The Mage advanced class is detailed along with a number of example characters statted out and magic items described. The setting seems solidly built and is at least as interesting as the D20 Modern Urban Arcana campaign setting.Chapter Four: Spells, details the magical skills and the enhancements used to create spells. For example, an attack spell that does 5d6 direct fire damage in a 20’ radius at short range would be described as an Attack 5/Gen 3 spell. (5 points in attack for 5d6 damage, +1 for short range (a general or G enhancement) and +2 (G) for 20’ radius.  The total “level” of the spell is 8, (the total of attack level and enhancements) the check DC would be 18 (10 + spell level) and rolled against the Mages’ Attack magic skill. It would take two full rounds to cast, unless it was a “signature” spell for this mage who would then be able to cast it as a standard action. The various skill enhancements increase the difficulty of the spell and some (curative spells) require craft points to use. (Which can be gained by using action points or on a level rise). I would have liked a few more example spells, but I found that I could generate plenty of different spell effects that seemed to be fairly well balanced, (as compared to "standard" spells).Finally, there is an appendix that discusses using this system in a D20 fantasy game rather than D20 Modern. (Replacing craft points with XP and so forth.) The author also details a new Mage base class built around the magic-as-skill paradigm. I found the ideas fairly straightforward and all-in-all I would be happy to run this system in my D&D game. The flexibility to craft the magical effects more than makes up for the small amount of added time it takes to pre-generate signature spells or to cast completely spontaneous spells. My players took a little time to digest the system in a test game one-shot, but they were generally positive about how it worked, at least in a fantasy genre.Whew! This is far more rambling than I intended, but there really is a great deal of information in this book. The Elements of Magic system here is streamlined somewhat from its’ namesake book, skill checks rather than Magic Points specifically, but that is a good thing IMHO. While I have not had the chance to play much D20 Modern, the system looks like a good fit. If you are looking for something different in a spellcasting system for Modern or Fantasy D20, you would be well advised to pick this up.</blockquote>

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