Rare magic and godlike sorcerers — settings?

[Roger]

The Hyperborea setting of Conan tends towards this sort of thing.

The world of Fafhrd and Grey Mouser also has its share of mysterious, godlike magic-users. Well, two of them, mostly.



Cheers,
Roger

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The original version of Stormbringer was very much like this.

A PC's magical potential was measured by his Power (POW) score, and POW was almost entirely determined by your race or country of origin.

Melniboneans had a high starting POW, Pan Tangians had one nearly as high...others? Not so much.

To balance this, the default ChaGen system determined race randomly- IOW, you rolled for your PC's race, THEN made all of the rest of the relevant decisions. There was, as I recall, only a 2% chance of being Melnibonean, perhaps 4-10% chance of being Pan Tangian. (Odds were similar about being one of the bestial races.)

One other balancing feature was that, true to the source material, the sorcerers weren't slinging around lightning bolts, etc. in combat. Almost all magic was ritual magic- and that mostly to bind Demons, Elementals or Virtues into items. A sorcerer in the party wasn't going to dominate combat, but he sure could help his teammates tear it up.

As such the nature of the game entirely depended upon what kind of PCs you had in the party. The very first game of Stormbringer I played, the party consisted of 2 Melniboneans, a Pan Tangian, and about 4 normal humans. This statistically improbable group gained powerful weapons fairly quickly, and were able to act with impunity.

OTOH, a second campaign had only a single sorcerer who was a non-Pan Tangian human and a Myyrhyn (winged person), so the power curve was much flatter.

It was like the difference between a Funny Car and a Model T.

 

[jdrakeh]

Dark Sun- magic-users are powerful and very dangerous... and also hated by everyone else, mostly because their magic comes from sapping the life-force of living things. Wizards are largely responsible for Athas being mostly a giant desert. Here's more info http://athas.org/products/ds3

Yeah, I thought of that after I logged off last night and Dark Sun is a perfect example of rare, powerful, wizards — but not so much rare, powerful, wizards that the PCs could play as heroes

 

[jdrakeh]

So, er... what's wrong with Ars Magica?

Nothing, system-wise. Again, though, it's not really a high fantasy setting but, rather, an alt-history setting that supposes real magic. I'm looking more for completely imaginary worlds, as opposed to fantastic versions of our world.

 

[jdrakeh]

No problem -- very minor retool of Ars Magica -- simply remove the Code of Hermes, the Church and the social restraints of the Gift.

At that point there would be no contraints on the magi and they would rule everything in a New York minute...

Again, though, I'm looking for a purely fanatstic setting that is not an alternate version of our own Earth. Yes, Ars Magica would work fine if I dropped this, retooled that, and added a whole new setting to it It's not what I'm looking for.

 

[jdrakeh]

The Hyperborea setting of Conan tends towards this sort of thing.

I'm aware of this as well, though I was kind of hoping to fins such a settign where sorceres aren't viewed as evil

The world of Fafhrd and Grey Mouser also has its share of mysterious, godlike magic-users. Well, two of them, mostly.

I suppose it's possible that Nimgauble and Sheelba are two examples of a more secretive cabal. Hmmm. . . .

 

[jdrakeh]

It's modern-day, after a fashion.

Well, it's another alternate Earth, though. I'm not really looking for that in a setting (as noted several times above) — though if I were looking for just a system, Mage would be among one of the first games I turned to.

 

[Remathilis]

Honestly? Star Wars. Jedi (and Sith) are supposed to be rare, and they are leagues above normal non-force users (esp true pre-saga rules).

IIRC, someone converted the SAGA rules for d20 Swords & Sorcery (search around the forums) and such mechanics might suit you.

 

[Evilhalfling]

I second Black company[d20]. It has 4 power ranks for wizards:
and its a pretty sharp progression,1-dabbler; 2-student, 3-professional,
4-archmage, 5-godlike
1-2 seem easily on par with other PCs, requiring alot of effort to be more effective than a bow. Level 4 sorcerers can wreck legions, and yet still be (nearly) killed by a well organized mundane ambush.
I haven't read the rules about progressing from one rank to another, but its not common to ever gain more than 1 rank.

 

[NerfedWizard]

I get that you want magicians to be rare so that magic is still *magical*

- does that mean you want *magic* to be rare too?

If you have few magicians, but each of them can tap vast, almost infinite power without real constraints, the world will be flooded with magic...

Do you want the common folk to be aware of magic as a fact, or to have heard of it through legends but have no real knowledge of its existence?

Do you want ALL sorcerers to be enormously powerful, or do you just want the potential for enormously powerful sorcerers (PCs and NPCs)? Does EVERY sorcerer have to be mightily powerful? If so what other constraints will there be upon sorcerers flooding the world with magic? As other posters have suggested, there could be game-balance issues too.

And when you say, in effect, "not an alternate Earth" - where do you draw the line? How about a world with countries which borrow some of the flavour of real-world countries, but have different names, totally different geography, different history etc.? (Even Middle Earth borrowed some real-world flavour...)