The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

[Guest 7034872]

In my opinion, this is kind of a fallacy. In a lot of settings, like the Cosmere, what we'd call "magic" is just a consequence of that universe having different laws of physics.

And are we just supposed to pretend those are self-consistent physics? I really, really doubt it.

D&D's magic system is constantly trying to explain and justify itself, with the stuff about "the Weave" and its different schools of magic. D&D's magic has rules, and therefore, discussing those rules and their implications is definitely valid.

I don't think you're quite understanding me yet (but I may be wrong): I know full well D&D's magic system is constantly receiving all manner of justifications--that's not the problem. The problem, as I see it, is it's all made up. Make-believe. Fantasy-land hoo-ha from stem to stern. The dilemmas over perceived inconsistencies, the attempts at greater consistency (which only ever comes in degrees in fiction), the new dilemmas arising from those attempts--it's all a bunch of pure we-done-pulled-this-outta-our-butts make-believe. No quantity of detail will change that. Nor will any theory-level storytelling.

 

[Guest 7034872]

In D&D in particular, magic is quantized into levels and spell slots, and quantified into damage or healing dice. It's categorized into schools and domains, taxonomized by "source." It's justified as emanating from vibrations in "the Weave" or some other aether-like substance that permeates everything like quantum foam or magnetic fields. The practitioners of D&D magic are ordered into a hierarchy of power, tapping into this background force, like batteries of different voltages. When you recall that so many gamers are techies or come from hard science or engineering backgrounds, you see that D&D magic is practically begging them to be picked apart pseudo-scientifically.

That's just a quality of highly-structured, D&D-like magic systems, imo. If it was less "designed" and more mystical, it wouldn't lend itself quite so readily to those sorts of discussions, I don't think.

* I say this because I'm guilty, too, as one who had many "conservation of energy", etc, discussions with fellow physics nerd gamers in college 30+ years ago.

Oh, I have no quarrel at all with it receiving a detailed internal structure and all kinds of careful categorization. Not at all, not at all. That's all fine and indeed preferable in my book. But it's a huge mistake to try to make it fit the real world: I mean, that's a major category error right there. Fantasy goes in one box and reality in another; we should never confuse them.

And even within its own box, a world with magic is ultimately (if one looks carefully) going to end up contradicting itself somewhere. The trick is to make one that's pretty darned tidy, but beyond that don't be fool enough to look any closer.

 

[trappedslider]

And even within its own box, a world with magic is ultimately (if one looks carefully) going to end up contradicting itself somewhere. The trick is to make one that's pretty darned tidy, but beyond that don't be fool enough to look any closer.

Magic A Is Magic A - TV Tropes

Works heavy on speculative elements, such as Science Fiction and Fantasy, often have an assortment of fantastic intangibles we cannot even dream of encountering in Real Life — yet act in a completely consistent way, as if governed by …

tvtropes.org

 

[prabe]

Oh, I have no quarrel at all with it receiving a detailed internal structure and all kinds of careful categorization. Not at all, not at all. That's all fine and indeed preferable in my book. But it's a huge mistake to try to make it fit the real world: I mean, that's a major category error right there. Fantasy goes in one box and reality in another; we should never confuse them.

And even within its own box, a world with magic is ultimately (if one looks carefully) going to end up contradicting itself somewhere. The trick is to make one that's pretty darned tidy, but beyond that don't be fool enough to look any closer.

So, on the one hand I agree that trying to fit something that cannot be real into reality makes for issues and is probably an error. But on the other hand, I think there is something to be said for, in any type of fiction (and TRPGs for this purpose can be considered a type of fiction) the need for the setting to seem real enough to enable suspension of disbelief--what this means will vary person-to-person; also, because this is a game there is, I think, some real merit to the setting being predictable, so the players can have some sense of likely outcomes and probabilities. That doesn't mean one needs to go Full Sanderson on the magic in your world--unless you (or someone at your table) needs that kind of structure. An advantage of having things mostly work the way they do in the real world is that it tends to line up with people's expectations in ways that serve both ends, IME and IMO.

As someone whose unrealistic fiction genre of choice is horror, I'd be inclined to say that you can approach the discontinuities you mention in your second paragraph as much by featuring them as by hiding them, but I'll admit that does make for very strange fiction.

If we're disagreeing, it seems as though it's mostly around the edges, here.

 

[Guest 7034872]

If we're disagreeing, it seems as though it's mostly around the edges, here.

I don't think we are. Everything you wrote seems right to me.

 

[Deset Gled]

Of all the threads to resurrect, you chose that one?

Someone start a narrativism thread, and we'll have the trinity.

 

[Mezuka]

THAC0, sorry. People don't read the OP and jump in with serious comments... I should have known! facepalm...

 

[payn]

Gonna just walk out of that thread.

 

[J.Quondam]

Gonna just walk out of that thread.

* knit knit knit *
"Oh, what's this thread?"

. . .

"Alrighty then!"
*unknit unknit unknit *

 

[RealAlHazred]

Of all the threads to resurrect, you chose that one?

Look, there's a reason Necromancy is looked upon as a forbidden abomination...