Interesting article about magic in RPGs

[Janx]

The exploding PC example, as mentioned, was just an extreme and obvious example.

The cancerous PC is a bit closer to what Jack's talking about. I suspect the conclusion of getting rid of cancerous computers misses a point, however.

As the tobacco industry demonstrates, not everybody gets rid of cancerous products. And that's with actual data backing it up. If we accept that smoking causes cancer, there are plenty of people who know that to be true, yet continue to smoke (or worse, start).

What if the user isn't fully aware of the risk? An exploding PC is pretty obvious. Knowing that 3 out of 30 houses in your neighborhood had their PC explode would probably make you question keeping yourse.

Whereas, you might not realize the source of cancer over 10 years of usage. Its a silent and slow killer. Consider all the places and activities you did over 10 years, how can you pin down the PC as the source?

There's also the deferred payment scenario. If the PC might explode each time I use it, I'd be pretty wary of using it. If I am not going to die each time I use it (but might get cancer later), that's a cost that won't affect me now, and might not affect me later.

Now on Jack's point about magic having non-obvious costs, drawbacks and such, mostly in the psychological realm, I think that might be hard to model in a game. Not a problem for fiction, where the author can get into a character's head. But in a game, not as simple to arbitrate, codify and simulate. Thus, he's probably right that it would be more realistic, but I think in a game it might not play out well.

The reason I think it wouldn't work out well, is because many of these side-effects amount to telling the player, "you're crazy, so you have to act this way..." At least for those side-effects, it's hard to get a proper implementation, that doesn't rely on the player to do it right (since they are going to resent losing control and try to minimize the effect). Not that all side-effects are "insanity rules" oriented.

good observations all around.

 

[Janx]

Magic in Games

The overall thesis of this article is that magic in RPGs doesn't "feel magical" usually, but that's not because the magic is too common; rather it's because they way the magic is presented is, in the author's terminology, "scientific magic" - i.e. it is based on a known system, with effects that are easily reproducible, and is treated as a standard, professional skill - more like modern science and technology than anything resembling how magic actually works in myth and folklore.

I just actually read the article, and I think the OP's point is only 1/3 of the author's point.

The bulk of the article is about how game magic systems differ from "real world" historical fiction view of magic.

Namely, that the D&D healing skill of bandaging wounds, etc IS magic, from a primitive's perspective.

Making a sword IS magic, and if the blacksmith were good enough, he would imbue it with a magic property (no wizard required).

that magic is "added" to the game world, rather than directly part of the game world. It rains, because of magic, not because of clouds...

There's a bunch more examples of how game magic is tacked on as something seperate, whereas "real world" magic in history, things simply were magic, as part of the world.

 

[Jack7]

If doing something via method A is so unreliable and dangerous that its cost-benefit ratio is lower than doing the same thing via method B, then method A would be abandoned in favour of method B. If magic is so dangerous that it almost always gives you magic cancer, people would either a) develop some way of preventing that or b) abandon magic in favour of doing things mundanely. This may not happen for many years, but over time, a society would slowly tend towards abandoning unreliable and dangerous methods in favour of safer and more reliable ones.

That doesn't mean that any particular individual wouldn't be stupid enough to use the dangerous method (afterall, we have tons of smokers in our society). They would just think that the bad things won't happen to them. But this type of situation argues for a setting where magic is rare and frowned upon (if not persecuted) by society. Any type of setting where magic is commonly accepted and looked upon as a useful solution by society at large is incompatible with a magic system that fails often and gives people magic cancer.

To a degree I think you're absoltely right.
That's how progress happens.

But what if magic is either the only real game in town or is perceived to be that way. That is what if the cost-benefit ratio is perceived to be acceptable because of no real alterative, or no current alternative. There are those, for instance, who think we should immediately move to hydrogen cars or alternative energy sources, and those who think without viable development and proven track records such moves are risky and silly. Then again others think such changes are totally unnecessary at this time and that all that is really required is refinement of current methods of use and production of known and proven energy sources. (I can see a really interesting background development in such a game setting where proponents of magic and proponents of science and technology come to logger-heads about which is the better and more proven method of manipulating reality. It would be interesting to see how each faction seeks to best influence both important leaders and political figures, and how each faction would attempt to persuade the public at large.)

Given that then I don't really think it is always a definite delineation between risk to reward, but also towards perceived risk to reward, in both individuals and in social groups. A sort of background balancing act is always in play I suspect between future and potential/possible benefits, and what people know to work now and what cost they are willing to pay in regards to that certainty (even if that certainty is questionable in either immediate or long terms). In other words people become comfortable with things out of habit and there is a certain inertia towards change, regardless of whether that change is necessary and good, or unnecessary and counter-productive.

But otherwise I agree. Generally speaking, and assuming you can disseminate an improvement and demonstrate it conclusively, most people will choose superior and safer methods over inferior and more risky methods. Of course educational levels, societal values, religious beliefs, beliefs about science and magic, cultural norms, and other factors would all have modifying effects.

Now on Jack's point about magic having non-obvious costs, drawbacks and such, mostly in the psychological realm, I think that might be hard to model in a game. Not a problem for fiction, where the author can get into a character's head. But in a game, not as simple to arbitrate, codify and simulate. Thus, he's probably right that it would be more realistic, but I think in a game it might not play out well.

I think it would be much harder to model (if modeling is the way you went about it) than typical systems now employed in games. Not impossible, but much harder than current systems and allowances would have to be made.

For instance you'd probably have to modify the psycho-centric expression of magic to be at least partly objective, and partly subjective. But I think it could be done.

One thing I've thought about is the creation of a "magical and miraculous space" which exists concurrently and basically occupies the same space as the physical space in which events are occurring, but that events within this magical space are occurring in a different way from physical space. To put this in science terms, the magical space, which would be partially physical and partially psychological, would be the hyper-space or worm-hole space of the psyche, but it would interact with normal space-time in a sort of constant fluctuation or oscillation. Then again I hate talking that way about magic, because once again it is reducing magic to technological construct, so let me put it this way, in the magical realm weird things happen, and in the mundane realm ordinary things happen, and when they overlap and vibrate against each other violently they alter each other in unpredictable ways. The magical realm or space might or might not be apparent or visible to all parties within the area it encompasses, and maybe the level of power or subtlety under which it operates would determine how it functions and appears (or fails to appear).

That's one idea that has occurred to me.

I just actually read the article, and I think the OP's point is only 1/3 of the author's point.

I agree here too. I think the paper is about much more than the point the OP concentrated upon, though that is also a valid point, or one way at looking at the primary objective of the piece.

 

[nightwyrm]

I just actually read the article, and I think the OP's point is only 1/3 of the author's point.

The bulk of the article is about how game magic systems differ from "real world" historical fiction view of magic.

Namely, that the D&D healing skill of bandaging wounds, etc IS magic, from a primitive's perspective.

Making a sword IS magic, and if the blacksmith were good enough, he would imbue it with a magic property (no wizard required).

that magic is "added" to the game world, rather than directly part of the game world. It rains, because of magic, not because of clouds...

There's a bunch more examples of how game magic is tacked on as something seperate, whereas "real world" magic in history, things simply were magic, as part of the world.

That's really hard to do with game systems simply because we know so much about how our world (and worlds similar to ours) works. In the past, everything was magic because we know so little about it. Magic was the explanation trotted out just to give our ignorance a label. But now, even the most ignorant of us don't believe that rain, or disease, or iron smithing etc. is magic.

I suppose you could come up with a system or setting where the explanation for everyday occurances really was magic. But I suspect that most players would have a difficult time suspending their disbelieve in such a world.

 

[nightwyrm]

stuff

Sure, progress isn't ever a clean and simple line. Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel" have a number of examples where better technology or inventions is ignore and forgotten due to societal inertia. But in very general terms, the better/more efficient techs or methods usually do become adopted over a long enough period of time as organization or societies that maintains the less efficient methods become dominated by their rivals using the more efficient method.

Good book, btw, I highly recommend it.

 

[Janx]

I think it would be much harder to model (if modeling vis the way you went about it) than typical systems now employed in games. Not impossible, but much harder than current systems and allowances would have to be made.

For instance you'd probably have to modify the psycho-centric expression of magic to be at least partly objective, and partly subjective. But I think it could be done.

By model, I mean "make rules for". Consider the scenarios:

using a scrying ball can have the side effects of:
getting misleading/incomplete info. Kind of easy for DM to handle
getting corrupted by power ala LotR. Bit harder to simulate on a PC

Summoning a spirit for information too often:
opens door for others to get through...easy to model
exposes PC to mind alterting wisdom ala cthulu. Bit harder to model the effect realistically

Channeling too much power for spells:
causes harm. easy to model with HP damage, stat loss, etc
leads to addiction. tricky to model, most likely use rules that give a penalty if t user does NOT use power within a frequency

Trying to alter another against their will:
causes an extreme result. ex. love spell causes the target to be extremely infatuated
causes karmic retribution against the caster (the 3x payback)

One thing I've thought about is the creation of a "magical and miraculous space" which exists concurrently and basically occupies the same space as the physical space in which events are occurring, but that events within this magical space are occurring in a different way from physical space. To put this in science terms, the magical space, which would be partially physical and partially psychological, would be the hyper-space or worm-hole space of the psyche, but it would interact with normal space-time in a sort of constant fluctuation or oscillation. Then again I hate talking that way about magic, because once again it is reducing magic to technological construct, so let me put it this way, in the magical realm weird things happen, and in the mundane realm ordinary things happen, and when they overlap and vibrate against each other violently they alter each other in unpredictable ways. The magical realm or space might or might not be apparent or visible to all parties within the area it encompasses, and maybe the level of power or subtlety under which it operates would determine how it functions and appears (or fails to appear).

That's one idea that has occurred to me.

There is precedent for this already. Jim Butcher's NeverNever in the Dresden Files is really based on the older concept that the faery exist in a parallel plane. Things like mirrors, shadows, edges of things are where one might slip between.

So the idea isn't far fetched.

One might take a pseudo-science quantum theory approach that for a given x/y/z location, all things exist at all times in some parallel quantum reality, and thus magic might simply be the act of shifting something desirable from another quantum reality to ours. Crighton's TimeLine novel was based on this premise (one shifted to a parallel quantum reality that was running behind our own). I would think this model would work for conjuration/summoning effects. Summon a dragon, or a fireball to a specific location (fire being from a reality where there happens to be fire in that spot, say from a star).

 

[Byronic]

I haven't read the stuff yet but.. what if instead of seeing magic as a "science" we see it as "awareness". It's special kind of senses that reach out to other worlds. It's knowing that thing at the tip of your tongue. It is not however Abra Kadabra, a bit of bat guano and you've just spend your daily fireball.

As for a protagonist, how about Elric? While he only rarely uses sorcery he always does it well. Now there's some mysticism.

 

[Janx]

That's really hard to do with game systems simply because we know so much about how our world (and worlds similar to ours) works. In the past, everything was magic because we know so little about it. Magic was the explanation trotted out just to give our ignorance a label. But now, even the most ignorant of us don't believe that rain, or disease, or iron smithing etc. is magic.

I suppose you could come up with a system or setting where the explanation for everyday occurances really was magic. But I suspect that most players would have a difficult time suspending their disbelieve in such a world.

That's a fair point, though I think there's some middle ground. We already accept in D&D that "somebody" can make a magic sword.

Therefore, it is plausible to simply rule that a "craftsman" of sufficient rank in skill can make a product that has magic powers.

The same could be of the "healing" skill. Rewrite the rule so at each rank, it heals more HP, more faster. Low level, its measured in days, higher levels, its rounds. Dump the healing spells, and clerics will run this skill to max ranks.

It would only take some game re-design to "fix" magic items and spells/effects for PCs.

Probably harder is mating the physics of the world to magical causes, as you say.
where does rain come from?
why are you alive?
why do things fall down?
what is lightning, fire, wind?

On the other hand, some are easy and quite fitting. It rains because the "goddess" is saddened by something on the mortal plain. Thus, it always rains at funerals. I just explained away a common movie trope.

 

[Celebrim]

Good book, btw, I highly recommend it.

Completely aside, but really terrible book. I highly recommend against it, precisely because it is so powerfully subversive that it can easily fool you into thinking it's a good book and so assassinate your powers of reasoning. If you must read it, read it with the following in mind:

1) The writer was not an expert in any of the fields he was covering. He's a physiologist, and otherwise a well studied amateur. A trained historian or trained anthropologist is likely to find this much less of a compelling read.
2) The writer makes claims about what he has explained that are actually far grander than the limited (albiet important) things he's actually demonstrated.
3) The writer himself has been gradually distancing himself from his thesis (or if you prefer, modifying it) in later writings.
4) The book is Western-centric, explaining things that Westerners would currently want to believe in a way that is currently fashionable and omitting arguments that would occur easily to non-Westerners. For example, if you were from China you'd likely be much more skeptical of this attempt to explain all of history.

However, if I go much further than that, we'll be really off topic.

 

[Jack7]

I haven't read the stuff yet but.. what if instead of seeing magic as a "science" we see it as "awareness". It's special kind of senses that reach out to other worlds. It's knowing that thing at the tip of your tongue. It is not however Abra Kadabra, a bit of bat guano and you've just spend your daily fireball.

That's an interesting concept. Knowing without knowing, perceiving without perceiving. Of course the magical space, or terrain as someone else originally mentioned it (in a different context) and thereafter gave me the idea for this, might involve heightened or overlapping sensations and states of existence and being (and perception). This would augment and amplify "psychological magic" without necessarily diminishing "physical magic."

There is precedent for this already. Jim Butcher's NeverNever in the Dresden Files is really based on the older concept that the faery exist in a parallel plane. Things like mirrors, shadows, edges of things are where one might slip between.

So the idea isn't far fetched.

One might take a pseudo-science quantum theory approach that for a given x/y/z location, all things exist at all times in some parallel quantum reality, and thus magic might simply be the act of shifting something desirable from another quantum reality to ours. Crighton's TimeLine novel was based on this premise (one shifted to a parallel quantum reality that was running behind our own). I would think this model would work for conjuration/summoning effects. Summon a dragon, or a fireball to a specific location (fire being from a reality where there happens to be fire in that spot, say from a star).

Yeah, I like Butcher's books. I've read them all. I'm not necessarily talking about "stepping into the Fairy world" as much as creating a space where normal reality and other realities overlap (and then trying to think of how that might affect this overlap space and the surrounding nearby normal terrain). But given your response I think you're sort headed down the same path, or at least in the same direction, as I'm considering, generally speaking.

For instance in this overlap space or realm both matter and energy could be exercised in a way that it could not be exercised in any of the original realms. For example within this overlap terrain mental images and ideas and objects could become real (the degree of reality being determined upon how much energy is given them, though other methods might also have other effects), psychological powers could be focused or concentrated (like laser beams), psychic battles could be fought, terrains could be modified in ways not possible in physical realities, time could fluctuate in different ways, illusions could be crated, and magic could itself be modified into new and novel forms. Depending on other factors such realms or spaces and the events transpiring within them or the forces being manipulated within them might then leak back out or be focused back out into the surrounding normal or mundane space or space/time.

Mainly in a system like that I'd be interested in "impressing psychological and magical force" in a way that might be totally invisible or undetectable to many in the surrounding normal environment but that would still have effects which are both "real" and sometimes even unpredictable. The magically, psychically, and/or supernaturally sensitive would be able to perceive and to be influenced by such magical spaces, others might seem to ignore them completely, or to be only covertly or indirectly influenced by such magical spaces.

In other respects I wonder would there be a natural relationship between levels of unpredictability and danger in the magical space and unpredictability and danger (types and degrees) in the mundane world, or would they operate on different principles of unpredictability, or would they even amplify possibly dangerous levels of unpredictability only when they overlap in operation? It would be interesting to play around with.

But one thing that just occurred to me is that such a system would definitely add some of the 'magical feel" back into magical game systems and here is why I think that would be.

1. At any given point the unpredictable might occur.

2. The atmosphere would be charged with magic, because the space being created is an overlap space of different realities and different potentialities instantly and potently interfacing and interacting.

3. A lot of stuff would be occurring all at once, that is to say it wouldn't simply be an atmosphere of linearly based spell-executions, but rather more like a plethora-space in which an enormous number of forces are interacting and overlapping at once with any number of things being able to occur in ever changing "delimited fashion."

4. A lot of separate forces would be simultaneously interacting with unforeseen results. For instance psychological forces would be interacting with magical forces with possible supernatural forces and beings with perhaps item-oriented (or space and object concentrated magical implements and tools) with sensory input and imaginings in a confused and excited environment. That is to say a spell wouldn't be thrown from beginning to end (moving form A to B to C in manner of execution), but it might change along the way, becoming stringer, less effective, or different (or maybe all of these things) as it progressed, interacted with other forces and powers, or was alerted by its shaper or by other parties (or maybe even by the magical space environment itself). Or in other words the magical space itself would always be at a high level or oscillation or excitement which would effect everything in the surrounding environment. (Spells might move from A to Q to M in execution, might oscillate in force and time, might adjust themselves in effect and function, or might even transform themselves into something wholly unanticipated. Magical powers might temporarily animate and become living beings or forces, might possess another, or dissolve into useful by-products or other items. A lot of possibilities could occur.)