Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="jgsugden" data-source="post: 9610411" data-attributes="member: 2629">I've grappled with this for 40 years.My best answer: Magic can and should do very specific things.&nbsp; Magic should be tools in a toolkit, without any piece of it being master tool.&nbsp; You should want to switch between tools and find that you don't always have the right tool for the job - so somebody else needs to shine when you're not situated well for the problem... but you should always feel like you had a chance to be situated well had you made other choices. At the highest level magic should approach being able to do anything.&nbsp; You should have more versatile magics available.&nbsp; You should have more powerful magics available.&nbsp; The fantasy of the spellcaster often involves approaching unlimited power - and the system should support that fantasy.&nbsp; What magic should not generally do: Invalidate martial and other non-magical PCs.&nbsp; Your most powerful damaging spells should exceed what the fighter can pull off in a round - but not by much - and you should not be able to keep up that level of damage.&nbsp; The fighter should outclass you over longer combat scenarios by keeping up the damage at higher levels longer.&nbsp; They also should make sense.&nbsp; In a world where people craft magic, the magic they craft should fill a need.&nbsp; One of the biggest gaps I see in most fantasy settings is that 95% of the magic tends to be combat focused.&nbsp; Who has the money to have magic items made?&nbsp; Nobles, merchants and royalty do ... so what items would they have made?&nbsp; Self driving carriages, communication tools, unseen servants at a whim, continual light stones, etc...&nbsp; The rich might give their bodyguard powerful combat magic ... but they're also going to pay a wizard to build a device that casts a 1 hour phantasmal force of their own specification on them ... (if you know, you know).&nbsp; I have a whole book worth of materials devoted to 'Mundane Magics' that list out spells, items, constructs and servants that the rich and powerful would pay to have.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="jgsugden, post: 9610411, member: 2629"] I've grappled with this for 40 years. My best answer: Magic can and should do very specific things. Magic should be tools in a toolkit, without any piece of it being master tool. You should want to switch between tools and find that you don't always have the right tool for the job - so somebody else needs to shine when you're not situated well for the problem... but you should always feel like you had a chance to be situated well had you made other choices. At the highest level magic should approach being able to do anything. You should have more versatile magics available. You should have more powerful magics available. The fantasy of the spellcaster often involves approaching unlimited power - and the system should support that fantasy. What magic should not generally do: Invalidate martial and other non-magical PCs. Your most powerful damaging spells should exceed what the fighter can pull off in a round - but not by much - and you should not be able to keep up that level of damage. The fighter should outclass you over longer combat scenarios by keeping up the damage at higher levels longer. They also should make sense. In a world where people craft magic, the magic they craft should fill a need. One of the biggest gaps I see in most fantasy settings is that 95% of the magic tends to be combat focused. Who has the money to have magic items made? Nobles, merchants and royalty do ... so what items would they have made? Self driving carriages, communication tools, unseen servants at a whim, continual light stones, etc... The rich might give their bodyguard powerful combat magic ... but they're also going to pay a wizard to build a device that casts a 1 hour phantasmal force of their own specification on them ... (if you know, you know). I have a whole book worth of materials devoted to 'Mundane Magics' that list out spells, items, constructs and servants that the rich and powerful would pay to have. [/QUOTE]

Verification