D&D General When did we first hear of "The Weave" in FR, or elsewhere?

[Swarmkeeper]

Possibly Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, book 1, The Eye of the World - released 15 January 1990

Weave

A weave is a combination of One Power flows manipulated by a channeler to elicit a specific effect.[1] During the Age of Legends channelers refered to the concept as a Web.[2] There are five different flows that can be manipulated with the One Power: Air, Earth, Fire, Spirit, and Water; these...

wot.fandom.com

 

[Yaarel]

Recently, I began treating the Ethereal Plane and the "Weave" as the same thing. Ether, magical energy, psychosensitive telekinetic force, and the stuff that conjurations are made out of are all the same thing.

I am happy with this.

Meanwhile, Feywild and Shadowfell are parts of the Deep Ethereal, nearer and farther from the Plane of Positive Energy, respectively. So the Fey and the Undead are innately magical.

Note there is a difference between ambient magic and the focused magic of spells. Antimagic negates focused magic but doesnt negate ambient magic.

 

[jgsugden]

If anyone has thoughts on anything prior to 1992, I'd be interested in hearing them. I have definite notes referencing the Weave (capitalized) dating back that far. I wonder if it might have been in the Avatar Trilogy (Time of Trouble) novels... City System / Waterdeep Boxed Set?

 

[jgsugden]

Double post

 

[Maxperson]

I thought the Time of Troubles took place in 1989-1990, at the changeover to AD&D 2nd edition?

You are correct.

 

[Maxperson]

Possibly Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, book 1, The Eye of the World - released 15 January 1990

Weave

A weave is a combination of One Power flows manipulated by a channeler to elicit a specific effect.[1] During the Age of Legends channelers refered to the concept as a Web.[2] There are five different flows that can be manipulated with the One Power: Air, Earth, Fire, Spirit, and Water; these...

wot.fandom.com

That's a completely different kind of weave. The One Power in that series would be the equivalent of the Weave in Forgotten Realms. The spell users drew upon the one power and wove threads of it together to create spells.

 

[Zardnaar]

Just checked FR adventures 1990 and the rules on wild and dead magic. No mention.

So 1996 at the earliest so far.

 

[Demetrios1453]

I don't know if this the earliest, but from the Prologue of the novel Shadowdale (first printed in April of 1989):

"The Goddess of Magic studied the ruined castle for a moment, then silently cursed Ao. Even when that ruin was newly built, it was but a closet in my home, Mystra thought bitterly, and the image of her magnificent shimmering palace came unbidden to her mind. The castle that filled her realm was built of pure magical energy, drawn directly from the weave of magic that surrounded Faerun."

Edit - that's not just the only use, a quick scan forward to later chapters shows it gets used a lot in Chapters 6 and 7, as the heroes attempt to help Mystra return to the Planes. It's not The Weave (with a capital "W"), but just the "weave of magic". It must have picked up that capital "W" at some point later...

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

This is an interesting thread, but I think it would be also interesting (maybe a separate thread?) to see where the first antecedent in literature is for the idea of "The Weave."

I'll start by shooting out 1980- Changeling (and later Madwand) by Roger Zelazny.

The magically gifted can see the magic around them and pluck at the magic to weave spells.

I'm not saying it's the first, but I'll throw my hat in the ring and see who one-ups that!

 

[Voadam]

I did a quick check in my dragon archive and the earliest it pulls up is a Dragon issue from 1997 in a review of the Netheril boxed set. So after the 1996 Faiths & Avatars reference.