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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6279287" data-attributes="member: 4937">You are complaining that I invented a new rules set which I control; I'm complaining that you've invented a new dictionary and version of the English langauge which you control.Divorsed of context, you have no means of evaluating that.A home game is more preeminently a test case for the flexibiltiy of a system.  Since we are having an argument over the definition of 'magic', I don't see how that follows.  It would seem that if we are arguing over what 'psionic', 'magic', 'mutant', and 'supernatural' mean, that things like etymology and the evolution of terms of art are very much relevant.I have the complete works of Jack Vance on my shelf, and you are wrong in that regard.  The real origin of present D&D spellcasting is play testing a system and imposing mechanical limits on what you are able to do in order to implement both mechanical balance and immulation of the narrative conceit of magic from mythology and story - namely that it is rarely used, even by those capable of doing so.  It's a way of turning the usual 'power of plot' magic possesses in stories into something more limited.  It only very loosely resembles Vancian spell-casting as presented in the books, save in the names and effects of a few spells.  But the general idea of 'ritual casting' is common to almost all real-world magical traditions, and specific examples were borrowed from a much more diverse set of sources, including actual Hermetic tradition spellbooks.Well, spider-man was in fact mutated by a radioactive mutagen.  I'm not sure how that doesn't make him a "mutant, per se", but he's certainly a mutant by any ordinary usage of the word.   Oh, so now I've got homework.  Don't expect me to turn it in.  Whether spidey's abilities are magical are not is something they've kept very open in the story line because the writers are quite aware that there is certainly no scientific explanation for his abilities as they've evolved over the years.No, I didn't.  I handwaved the gadgetry on the grounds that in most recent versions of spider-man, his web ability is owed to organic spinnerettes and not gadgets.   However, handwaving gadgetry as 'super-science' is quite frankly, also waving it away as magic.Debatable, even within the terms of the comics themselves.  But, at a metagame level whatever the source of his powers like 'sixth sense' (surely a magical term if any is) doesn't really matter.   We can still implement his abilities at the meta level as selected slotted reusable powere. Sure.  We could easily create dozens of different ways to implement inherent magical abilities, and then naturally not every character with inherent magical abilities is a sorcerer.  But as you yourself complained, in doing so we freight each mechanic with undesired mechanical baggage and flavor.   I repurposed the sorcerer as a univeral generic class for any character that had inherent supernatural or superhuman power.Like all RPGs, I created a simplified model.Long duration spell effect, so it seldom comes up in the story.  But the somatic component of his web splat is assuredly extending his arm wrist facing up with his palm turned down and one finger curled in a circle to point at his palm.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />And in any event, when is the last time you actually saw someone play out the somatic components in game? I came to 3e from GURPS.  Every system is exception based.  I don't have a particular bias for or against classes or point buy systems.  Both have ultimately quite similar problems.Psionics as it exists in D&D is magic.As if synonyms didn't exist, especially in cases where people use words loosely without even understanding what they mean - case in point 'psionics'.  The evolution of the term in D&D parlance is an interesting discussion.  But the end of it is this -psionics as it exists is superlatively magic.My system can't handle you saying "That's not so", but yes I think supernatural power = magic, and that selectable spells slots are generic magic system.No.  Mechanics are defined by the system in question.  The player chooses from among them as their prerogative, but that's not the same thing.Among other things, I deny that the Sorcerer is - even RAW - "Vancian-style spellcasting" save where that is a term of art for "as D&D does things".And yet mechanically disruptable, requires time, and concentration and provokes attack of oppurtunity.  We're talking about a tiny amount of flavor that rarely comes up in game.  The commonalities between the two are far greater than such minor differences, and are now pretty much official now that 'transparency' is default.  The main real difference is at the meta-level - power points rather than spell slots.Notice the lack of symmetry here?</blockquote>

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