Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Magic System Conundrum
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Oversquid" data-source="post: 6421504" data-attributes="member: 6684394"><p>One thing I've been doing lately for my homebrew game with a D&D Legacy is in designing its magic system. I like where the magic system idea is right now, but I found myself hitting a wall all of a sudden; and I'm wondering how you would tackle this problem that I will explain to you below.</p><p></p><p>(By the way if any of you are familiar with the D&D skill system starting from 3.X and up, its the same general idea)</p><p></p><p>To understand the magic system better, I will explain the skill system I'm using. Basically, skills are expressed as general themes for its functions. So things like climbing, lifting, swimming, and running a marathon would fall under the Athletics skill for example; or sensory functions like listening, smelling, or seeing would fall under the Perception skill. You get the idea.</p><p></p><p>Well, the magic system I have come up with is very similar conceptually and functionally. Except instead of a category for mundane tasks such as Athletics and Perception, you instead choose some other more mystical or philosophical concept, such as Time, Fire, or Plants. Once you choose a concept, you are able to magically work that concept; be it in manipulating the concept itself, or manipulating others with that concept. For example, let us say we have chosen Time. With Time chosen, we are now able to manipulate everything to do with Time, and we can manipulate other things with Time as well.</p><p></p><p>This means that you can use this Time-Magic Skill to make a pot of water boil faster, or make a arrow heading towards you fly slower, or some other thing like that. Any time you use such a Magic Skill, you are casting a spell. These spells cast from Magic Skills are called Cantrips (Or Orisons if you're more priestly), and like skills, you can use these Magic Skills at will. Your goal with those Magic Skills is to use them creatively and within reason that your DM allows.</p><p></p><p>(I should also mention that you can only take those skills so far in certain directions, as some functions of magic are way too powerful to be used at a whim.)</p><p></p><p>So basically, its all about picking a magical category, and then you're more or less home free to use it as you like to help with whatever situations may come to pass.</p><p></p><p>Now the conundrum.</p><p></p><p>When it comes to priests, they choose a deity, a powerful entity, or some other divine source to get their power from. When it comes to priests, they get a magic skill that is specifically anything within a divine portfolio. Perhaps a divine source presides over Murder and Death for example. Then a priest of that source attains a magic skill specific to the manipulation of Murder and Death, or manipulating others with the power of Murder and Death.</p><p></p><p>Now, what if there is a priest who worships a divine source whose portfolio encompasses everything that exists, and everything that doesn't. </p><p></p><p>The question becomes, how can I employ this magic system while still having it be open to deities with a portfolio of any size, while still not completely outsourcing other magic users who cast spells from a more limited selection?</p><p></p><p>I did consider having the priestly characters have to select specific aspects of said deity of everything, but that doesn't feel right personally (At least not in a way I can think of). </p><p></p><p>At this time, I am going to say to "Talk to the DM about how far you should go with such a massive portfolio compared to others", and while most of an RPG is handwaving and flexibility, I feel like I should still provide more of a solution for this problem aside from handwaving (Unless you have an argument for the contrary.)</p><p></p><p>So yeah, how would you tackle this problem? Or is it a problem at all?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Oversquid, post: 6421504, member: 6684394"] One thing I've been doing lately for my homebrew game with a D&D Legacy is in designing its magic system. I like where the magic system idea is right now, but I found myself hitting a wall all of a sudden; and I'm wondering how you would tackle this problem that I will explain to you below. (By the way if any of you are familiar with the D&D skill system starting from 3.X and up, its the same general idea) To understand the magic system better, I will explain the skill system I'm using. Basically, skills are expressed as general themes for its functions. So things like climbing, lifting, swimming, and running a marathon would fall under the Athletics skill for example; or sensory functions like listening, smelling, or seeing would fall under the Perception skill. You get the idea. Well, the magic system I have come up with is very similar conceptually and functionally. Except instead of a category for mundane tasks such as Athletics and Perception, you instead choose some other more mystical or philosophical concept, such as Time, Fire, or Plants. Once you choose a concept, you are able to magically work that concept; be it in manipulating the concept itself, or manipulating others with that concept. For example, let us say we have chosen Time. With Time chosen, we are now able to manipulate everything to do with Time, and we can manipulate other things with Time as well. This means that you can use this Time-Magic Skill to make a pot of water boil faster, or make a arrow heading towards you fly slower, or some other thing like that. Any time you use such a Magic Skill, you are casting a spell. These spells cast from Magic Skills are called Cantrips (Or Orisons if you're more priestly), and like skills, you can use these Magic Skills at will. Your goal with those Magic Skills is to use them creatively and within reason that your DM allows. (I should also mention that you can only take those skills so far in certain directions, as some functions of magic are way too powerful to be used at a whim.) So basically, its all about picking a magical category, and then you're more or less home free to use it as you like to help with whatever situations may come to pass. Now the conundrum. When it comes to priests, they choose a deity, a powerful entity, or some other divine source to get their power from. When it comes to priests, they get a magic skill that is specifically anything within a divine portfolio. Perhaps a divine source presides over Murder and Death for example. Then a priest of that source attains a magic skill specific to the manipulation of Murder and Death, or manipulating others with the power of Murder and Death. Now, what if there is a priest who worships a divine source whose portfolio encompasses everything that exists, and everything that doesn't. The question becomes, how can I employ this magic system while still having it be open to deities with a portfolio of any size, while still not completely outsourcing other magic users who cast spells from a more limited selection? I did consider having the priestly characters have to select specific aspects of said deity of everything, but that doesn't feel right personally (At least not in a way I can think of). At this time, I am going to say to "Talk to the DM about how far you should go with such a massive portfolio compared to others", and while most of an RPG is handwaving and flexibility, I feel like I should still provide more of a solution for this problem aside from handwaving (Unless you have an argument for the contrary.) So yeah, how would you tackle this problem? Or is it a problem at all? [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Magic System Conundrum
Top