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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5308683" data-attributes="member: 4937">Hmmm....1) To me the 'divine' vs 'arcane' distinction is less a distinction between mode of operation as it is a distinction between the actor.  In 'divine' magic, you persuade or compell someone or something to perform magic on your behalf.  'Arcane' magic suggests a more 'do it yourself' approach.  Thus I think you make a false distinction in your question.  I consider 'divine'/'arcane' to be part of a unified single system.  A unified single system is my preference, but that doesn't mean I reject a divine/arcane divide.2) I prefer Vancian on the whole.  What I've discovered over the years is that while Vancian has very poor emulation of the mechanics of magic in fantasy fiction (except of course for Vance himself), it does a very good emulation of the general outcome of magic in fantasy fiction.  The exception to that is settings where everyone who is anyone is a magic user of some sort and everyone generally uses magic all the time, where I might prefer some other mechanic.  But for any setting where magic is relatively rare and those who know magic generally refrain from practicing it for whatever reason whether moral prohibition, inherent danger, rarity of mana, stresses and rigors of frequent casting, Vancian does a good job of recreating outcomes in terms of the frequency of spellcasting and the powers and abilities displayed when those restrictions are temporarily abated from necessity or because of the prodigal power and ability of the protagonist.3) Magic is generally ubiquitous, but awesome magic such as encounter and eventually wielded by PC's is extremely rare.4) Magic is extremely difficult to learn, but no more difficult than say learning the combination of advanced mathimatics, playing classical piano, and learning ancient greek.5) Magic is metaphysically explainable, but may not be any more understandable in practice than any complex real world phenomena.  Likewise, there may be limits on the understanding of magic in the society just as a 18th century scientist might fail to understand what he observes despite the fact that it is explainable (but perhaps not actually understood) by an average 20th century student.6) Magic is treated as a technological force.  This does not necessarily mean that this is the proper way to treat it in all cases, and just like other technologies, not everyone that uses it uses it ethically and few if any of its users necessarily understand all the consequences of their actions.7) Non-magic users are extremely fearful of magic users, often with just cause.  Even a low level wizard can do things like rape your mind with 'charm person', causing you to behave contrary to what may be your wishes, or decieve your mind with illusions causing you to see things that are not there, or summon up fiendish monsters to attack you.  This is a level of power over your person not even possessed by modern technology.  Inhabitants of my magical worlds tend to feel things are largely out of their control and that this in fact often sucks.  Additionally, high level magic spawns an uncomfortably high number of world threatening events.  Thus, pretty much everyone agrees that keeping wizards in their place and fully under the control of the community (or at least fully outside of it where they can do less harm) is in everyone's best interests - and even quite a few wizards would agree.  Of course, in a world where magic was more limited in scope magicians would likely be less feared.</blockquote>

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