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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hirou" data-source="post: 7352704" data-attributes="member: 6776023">Oooh, ooh, I like this kind of stuff. If you're looking for facts established in canon to base your campaign "scientific" magic rules, from the top of my head, in no particular order:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> It's never directly stated anywhere, but I always assumed that ZG's world is part of usual D&D Multiverse, which just happened to be blocked off by Axis Seal Ritual. Then all usual sources of magic can be applied, e.g. there's still Weave of Mystra in the world, it's just the goddess herself, who is absent in this world. Actually, this sounds like a great idea for "scientific news": after many unsuccessful attemps, researchers of Pardwright University develop the Unifying Magic Theory, which is presented at some international conference (tied to internation peace talks, maybe?). It neatly explains the observed quirks of magic, but some fellow from Danor studies it in details and proves that it explicitly requires an existance of an exterior "Architect" of unmeasurable but defined power. And this Architect is nowhere to be found in the world, which puts the theory under heavy criticism.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> It's mentioned in one of the last Adventures that when one of Risuri Titans dies, animals/spirits of the area kinda start a vaguely described competition trying to take its place. The winner eventually fully replaces the slain titan, perhaps with slight change of domain. This also implies that the current titans are not the original ones, and they kinda seem different from one another: Grandma Allswell is notably (and contextually befitting) ancient, Voice of Rot seems timeless, Father of Thunder (I think? I always mix up the deer and the wolf ones) is noted to have had a family and progeny.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> ZG was stated to happen in the same world as War of the Burning Sky, which explicitly have some Great Primordial Spirits. There are dragon, eagle, leviathan and earthwyrm, I think, which bear names of Jiese, Avilona, Mavisha and Shimbul (which raises some very interesting questions about Urim), details mentioned in "Sleep, Ye Cursed Child", if I'm not mistaken.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> It's debatable whether divine source of power is actually present in ZG world. Triegenis, as it's revealed, has never actually ascended to godhood, at least - not visibly, which does not hinder the believers to create miracles in his name. Perhaps it's psionics all the way down (this is why, deep down in the depth of my fanon, ZG's world may actually be Athas of Dark Sun, millenia in future). I'm not sure if my memory is playing tricks on me, but I think it's mentioned somewhere, that some adepts of Millerism started manifesting psionic/miraculous powers recently, further bridging faith and mind power.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">One thing that I like about ZG's magic in particular is that it may not be bound by cause-effect rules. Problems of air magic appear not because white pillar at Axis Island was broken, they just coincide with pillar breaking, Avilona's eagle being wounded millenia ago and its condition worsening, and Ob's unsuccessful tinkering in Ziggurat of Avilona - three completely unrelated thing just happening at the same exact moment with the same result. It kinda rhymes with the fact that the final battles in the Gyre and on the Seal just accidentally happen at the exact same time, which is also accidentally the one day Nicodemus is trying to redo the ritual and Voice of Rot is consuming Reida and ascending to true godhood. There is no reason why all these things happen simultaneously but for the fact, that the world is on the brink of change in more than one way, and the Universal Natural Law of Narrative Fairness demands it to be a equal opposing force (party of PCs) in each case.</li> </ul></blockquote>

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