Mysterious magic

[Daniel Solis]

After having read all the links (and sub-links) which Ron listed, I have an idea that percolating in my brain for Gears & Spears, but which I hope will be useful for this discussion.

Note my previous example of a character weeping with such sadness that their tears form a lake in the shape of their lost love. There, the core events taking place are the character experiencing an emotion (sadness), the emotion causing an alteration to the physical world (forming a lake), and that alteration being symbolic of the cause of the emotion (the lost love).

Let's say that robots in G&S are relatively docile and personable, like Data. The mythic hero protagonists are more emotional, like Lore, and that emotion is directly linked to their mythic nature. Because this is a mythic setting and it seems that mythic characters are prone to very intense mood swings (especially when closer to godhood), let's say that each hero can experience/express only one emotion at a time. Further, let's say each hero has a limited repetoire of emotions attributed to him. At any time, in any situation, the hero can only act according to one of three emotions but with such intensity that the whole world could change in a manner symbolicly significant to the character.

(Incidentally, this drastically shifts the thematic focus of G&S from tribal faith to magical realism (or perhaps magical surrealism). Maybe I can find a happy medium.)

Besides the links that Ron posted, I reviewed a section of octaNe that I thought might be helpful. In the "Theatrical Modes" chapter, there is an entry for "Arthouse: Mythic Storytelling." Among the more relevant rules for arthouse theatrical mode are that:

[*] Everything should mean something.
[*] Characters can only die in intense, dramatic scenes.
[*] Emotions run strong and deep.
[*] Characters should have strong ties to other characters. [/list:u]
Are these generally good guidelines for settings with a bent for magical realism?

[Harlequin]

They're powerful, but I'm unsure about the heavy emphasis on emotion.  To me, that's really not a strong identifier of the mythic, the fabulous, or especially of magic realism - the latter in fact seems to be driven by a certain laissez-faire attitude, in fact, the opposite of linking everything to emotion.  The entire world does not freak out when the blood flows down the street; in fact, if I'm not wrong, the freakout is because of the suicide that produced the "long distance smear" and not the magical effect at all.  The act of a woman hanging laundry is precisely the opposite of emotionally intense.

We have a habit of assuming massive emotion will get what we want, as designers.  I know I'm guilty of it.  But a detached semi-intellectual state is often as potent, and honestly much harder to create...

Effective magic of the forms we've been discussing seems to me to owe more to the use of the symbolic or the sympathetic, as in my above, than to the emotional.  Which isn't to say that having the robots experience only a limited set of emotions at one time (strongly or otherwise) isn't fascinating in context - it's very suggestive of a robotic nature, to me, and lovely in its own right.  And given this tool, an emotional link is certainly an option, in your shortlist of factors contributing to the shape of the mythic realism effects.  But I think it's unwise to limit yourself to that; there's meat elsewhere on the mythic bone, too.  Motifs, for example, I'd call as powerful a tool... perhaps each PC picks a motif, or you draw one from a deck, or populate a d10 lookup table, or something?

- Eric

[Calithena]

Just a quick comment on this.

One of my frustrations with element-based magic systems where you assemble things out of parts - as in the Spontaneous Magic rules from Ars Magica, or Luke's frickin' awesome free-form system on the Burning Wheel site - is that they seem to tend to reduce the 'mystery' aspect of it. If you define magic at the level of effect - which spell-based systems let you do - it's possible to make things weirder, I think. How would you assemble a spell like Unseen Servant or Mordenkainen's Faithful Hound out of elements? You'd have to make them either extradimensional beings, in which case you bring in this whole apparatus for dealing with demons, etc., or else psychic manifestations, in which case you start asking questions like 'geez, if I'm a first level wizard and I can make this thing following me around and opening doors and stuff, why can't I do a simple 'psychic scissors' that cuts people in half? That seems easier...'

So anyway, there's a tradeoff here. Systems where you build spells out of elements are better for unleashing your creativity sometimes, but then there's this chemistry 101 aspect to it that demystifies things a little bit. (Good fumble and experimentation rules can help with this, and do AFAICT in the Burning Wheel rules, though I'm basing this judgment on posts in Actual Play rather than on my own play.) On the other hand, systems where magic is defined around specific effects without explanation seem better at playing up the mystery angle - though again you need some kind of fumble or random effect rules to make that something more mystical than 'here's the situation, there's the spell I use to confront it'. I suppose one thing I'd like to see how to do here would be rules where you just made up effects without explanations and that would be definitive for magic. But then if you don't spend time breaking down the elements, how on earth do you quantify any of this?

By the way, the 'something fabulous happens' rule idea is totally awesome. I'm sort of thinking of an application a little like Donjon's fact-stating, but more random. When characters do things that have no obvious effect but lots of intent behind them, just roll a d10 (more or less depending on the area, maybe). If you get a 10, have something weird and new happen - the stones they're staring at for no obvious reason open their eyes and start to talk, or somesuch. This also fits in with the idea of magical worlds as worlds which respond to will and wish outside the laws of physics (cf. Jorge Luis Borges, "Narrative Art and Magic".)

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Sean,

Actually, I think the elements-based magic (which goes back to Champions and Fantasy Hero, by the way) doesn't lend itself to an engineering-mentality toward the in-game explanation of magic. The central feature of that design is that player and game logic does not correspond to in-game justification at all.

I find spells like Unseen Servant to be crystal-clear in elements-based terms, which all involve aspects of what most systems call psychokinesis - the in-game fact that the thing is a real entity is mechanically irrelevant to the effects-fact that "stuff gets down" around the house.

So if the in-game stuff (explanations, meanings, etc) has mystery and meaning, the points and components of the out-of-game mechanics do not necessarily violate that.

The sorcerous rituals and the demon abilities in Sorcerer are wholly based on this concept, with the added reinforcer of bonus dice to give the in-game explanation (customized by that group) some more weight.

Best,
Ron

[Harlequin]

I think the trouble is, Ron, that the "at all" in your does-not-correspond isn't true.  Yes, one can divorce the two, quite thoroughly.  But there's something about the fabulous that asks for a certain element of surprise - of "it's been there all along, it's always that way."  Moreover, player and game logic invariably possesses a consistency - of magnitude versus effort, of type of effect, and so on - which, as Sean points out, need not be supported the same in an effect-centric system.

Mage: The Ascension suffers badly from this, as a result of their attempt to splice all the magical traditions into one umbrella.  Not that I don't enjoy the game despite this.  But the fabulous is hard to find, because the OOC logic is too close to the surface... it's apparent even to the characters that magus X and shaman Y can do things of the same type and magnitude, when dealing with (say) fire, despite the vast differences in methodology.  At least that's my experience with it, anyway.  If players deliberately relinquish some of the capabilities brought to them by (say) Spirit III, then that helps a lot... but it also jars any Gamists around, fairly badly, to buy something expensive and then relinquish one-third of it for flavour reasons.  Better to come up with a (more tenuous) reason why your magus, too, can open portals to the spirit world, right?  From the Gamist point of view, yes, but therefore the fabulous is shot, because now everybody with Spirit III can do the same shindig with a different paint job.

Now, rereading your post, you do specify that it doesn't produce an engineering mentality toward the in-game justification... which I suppose the above doesn't address.  Perhaps it would be more accurate to say, per the above, that it produces an egalitarian mentality - different paths can all lead to the same end - but that this, too, has a disruptive effect on the fabulous.

Also I suspect there's a subconscious effect from the deliberateness of simply choosing the elements to combine, producing a hint of the engineering mentality in the player, no matter how immersed they may be. This, too, can be disruptive; I suspect that if the fabulous is one's highest priority, then even this might be enough to knock such a fragile quality out of whack.

- Eric

[Daniel Solis]

They're powerful, but I'm unsure about the heavy emphasis on emotion.  To me, that's really not a strong identifier of the mythic, the fabulous, or especially of magic realism - the latter in fact seems to be driven by a certain laissez-faire attitude, in fact, the opposite of linking everything to emotion.

Quite right. I was confusing "mythic" with "magical realism." I'm not sure which topic this thread is addressing, but I'm keenly interested in connecting "Something Fabulous Happens" to "Because of Something You Feel." I think I'll start another thread.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Eric,

I'm familiar with the arguments/concepts you're presenting. I also think they're the result of two things: (1) over-familiarity with the concept of "the rules are the physics," and (2) excuses to use engineering-mentality for play-purposes that refute the "mythic/wonder" goal from the get-go.

In other words, I think the system features of components-based magic rules (related to the "effects-first" concept) are innocent of the social and creative effects you're talking about.

I also think you're confounding "component-based magic rules" with "rules for components-based magic." Here's an example, taken from my old and unpublished game, Fantasy for Real (with acknowledgment to John Marron). In this case, the components are also improvisational, which underscores the point about their "build it!" principle.

- Characters "know magic," defined on their sheets only as a number of times they may roll when casting a spell.

- Upon casting a spell, its effects are not announced. The player rolls a number of times, each time deriving a term from a separate list of terms. The short list of words is now the spell's name, with whatever of's and the's you need to make it work.

- He or she has one minute to concoct a spell effect from the spell-name. The actual "what the spell does," ranging from damage to travelling to protection to whatever, is set up right then and there. Its power, range, duration, etc, are a function of the number of syllables in the name (terms from each list vary wildly in number of syllables).

- Here's the point: Upon having carried out this procedure, it is now established into the game-world that the character already knew this spell, having learned it with great effort and practice at some old wizard's knee (or whatever). That's right: they knew it all along. They "could have" cast it before.

The player built the spell right there in play. The character knew it all along. Contrary to gamer-intuition, no one ever had a problem, cognitive disconnect, failed "sense of fun and wonder," or any other one of those effects you're talking about when playing this game. I maintain that all such effects are best understood as a faulty shared-GNS understanding among the group, not by system-necessitated mental or creative requirements.

(This is also an example of a specific sub-system in a game design, for those who are hipped on this issue; non-magic resolution in Fantasy for Real doesn't work like this.)

Best,
Ron

[montag]

concerning the in-game vs. player stuff Ron mentioned, IRRC a friend of mine was playing in a game, where the GM made up how magic works in his setting, gave some basic guidelines and the player had to figure out the rest along with his character, usually by casting stuff and noting the effects.

another approach that might satify the demand for mysterious magic is used by another friend of mine in her own system. You can play a chaos mage, whose magic manipulates probabilities. Difficulty/cost depends  mostly on the probability the mage manipulates (and in the case of beings, their resistance), so it isn't necessarily tied to effect. Since almost anything has a probablity between zero and one, this basically means the player gets to state facts, equivalent to having an unlimited supply of hero/action/whatever points. Not suitable for everyone, but I really enjoy mine.

[Calithena]

Ron - I agree with you as a matter of absolute principle (and about Fantasy Hero's precedence in treating magic this way, a game I ran for a while) but Harlequin summed up the practical concerns I have about the issue. There's a certain amount of 'don't look at the man behind the curtain...' that players have to go through in those kind of systems, I think, and then too when you describe the swirling mists and reddish hue there's a tendency of players to think, 'darn, he's got to be packin' at least a 16d6 EB', and that kind of thing.

Part of the question here is how surprising and baffling and mystifying the players connects to surprising and baffling and mystifying their characters. I think of some of Hargrave's techniques, like handing people sealed scrolls that once you (the player) opened the ribbon-tied piece of paper he handed you, you might have it automatically go off, or you might get a scroll you could use when you wanted, and it might be a spell that was in the book, but it might be something he just made up, etc. You just don't know what the hell it's going to be.

With respect to the demonology in Sorcerer, I think the fact that you have an ongoing relationship with your demon(s) and the dice rolls that go along with that go a long way towards preserving mystery and uncertainty in both the player and the character, which is good. Also arguably good in Sorcerer from the 'less is more' when it comes to mystery point of view is that the powers aren't as 'grainy' as those in Fantasy Hero, Ars Magica, or the Burning Wheel alternate rules. I suppose what Harlequin and I are driving at is that the more 'graininess' there is in a magic system, the more of a tendency (albeit, as you say, not a necessity) there's going to be for players to start thinking about the in-game magic in terms of the game-mechanical components of it. Or that's what I was worried about this morning anyway.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Increased tendency toward those problems, due to finer-grained components rules? Absolutely. That is a system-effect worth discussing. One possible reason for that is Gamist opportunism, the bete noir of Simulationist play. The other is diversity among Simulationist priorities - the "engineer tussles with poet" issue.

But that is a how-to issue of components-based magic/power design, not a fundamental feature of such design. That's why I suggest avoiding ratios in the mathematics of role-playing in my GNS essay.

I think I need to back up a little, though. Looking every use of your word "players" in your post, you know what I see? [Social Contract [Exploration [GNS]]] That's what I see. Hell, you are verbalizing so much fear and distrust and lack of connection at these higher levels, that poor ol' Techniques will get swept up in those negotiations with hardly any voice of their own.

Can rules for Techniques be constructed to decrease opportunities for such things to arise? Sure - in this case, avoid the ratios and keep the points' value high per component. But can Techniques (i.e. the rules describing them) be constructed (or blamed) to set and to define the interations at these levels. No, a thousand times no, never.

You and Eric are presenting arguments, terms, clarifications, explanations, and so on that I have dealt with for decades. In all that time, I consider the issues to have been GNS-based, not "how-to" based. When the GNS-stuff gets resolved among the group, the issues vanish, the "how-to" becomes supportive (Drifted if necessary), and all that wonder, mythic-ness, surprise, non-engineering, thematic, and perhaps romantic quality of magic or powers appears consistently in play.

Best,
Ron

[talysman]

I think what we are starting to see in this thread is a breakdown in agreement on how terms are defined. Eric's first post in the thread introduced the idea of "fabulous" magic, which he defined as "Magic like it works in fables or legends, not like it works in D&D or Tolkein or Crowley." (although, as an aside, I don't think Tolkein belongs there, because he didn't really have a magic system at all.)

the post went on to give examples of characters who aren't mages but who can figure out how to do magic, one magical effect at a time, with the implication that there are no broad principles involved (magic is unique.) however, there are a number of ways to interpret that, and we've seen the following definitions rise up in the thread:

[*] "non-scientific magic", magic which doesn't follow any rules at all and isn't repeatable;
[*] "deep structure magic", magic which has an inherent order but which could take a lifetime of exploration even to figure out a tenth of it;
[*] "symbolic magic", magic which expresses a deep connection to mythic and archetypal imagery;
[*] "emotional magic", magic with a strong connection to personal convictions and passions.
[/list:u]

now, although the first two choices are incompatible with each other, they can be used in a magic system alone or combined with one or both of the last two, so you really have 11 different concepts of what might consititute "fabulous magic", and you'll find examples of each in traditional tales. the problem is that different people involved in this discussion each have their own favorite definition and see all the other people as "missing the point"... which means that the discussion has degenerated into a "whose viewpoint is best?" one, which won't resolve anything.

so let's instead acknowledge that there's more than one interepretation and instead focus on how to solve the problems of implimenting each interpretation.

for "non-scientific" approaches, I think the solution has already been provided: the "something fabulous happens on a roll of 10" rule. or, if you wanted more variety, you could assign broad categories of fabulous events to specific numbers, sort of like the motif approach I used in Court of 9 Chambers (and which I plan on using in a couple other games as well.) just improvise something when the moment calls for it; that mixes up the structure nicely.

"deep structure" is going to require more of a "magic is in objects" approach, sort of what I was describing earlier, although there are other ways of going about it than the Nethack approach.

"emotional magic" is probably best implimented using passion-powered bonuses, either in the form of narration for bonus dice or linking in a bonus from something like a "spiritual attribute" from TROS.

there are, of course, possible elaborations on these approaches, and I'm not sure what can be done for "symbolic magic". perhaps we can concentrate on that approach, either here or in another thread.

[Calithena]

Hi Ron -

The way you phrase that final paragraph, taken in isolation, seems to veer dangerously close to a 'system doesn't matter' claim. I don't think that's what you really mean though - what you're really saying I suppose is that the play-experience I'm basing my judgment on has been so GNS-unclear as to swamp out any meaning in the evaluations of the techniques I have employed.

I plead guilty to having participated in some incoherent play in my day. I don't think there's been that much by way of fear or distrust, though some here and there, sure, but lack of connection there has been, though again plenty of honest discussion to get back on the same page when things get murky.

Here's a form of distrust that might be implicit in what I just wrote though: if the players have a toolkit for putting together magic, you won't be able to stop their Sim/Engineer from dominating their Sim/Poet, or from Gamist minimaxing, or whatever, with that system, no matter what your agreed-upon creative agenda. Which isn't true, and you rightly slap that idea down.

(Also, your description of the magic system in Fantasy For Real (does that exist anywhere accessible, for sale or otherwise?) seems to be a clear counterexample to that claim taken in abstraction, but it seems primarily to be one because of the random access to the elements. Making 'mana' or 'elements' depend on your current situation is another way to defuse that aspect of the thing.)

To get clear on what I'm looking for out of these recent threads, which is not what everyone else is looking for, but bears some connections to it: I'm looking for a magic system that allows for an injection of the weird and wonderful into a primarily Gamist sort of play, where I'm expecting the players to do whatever they can with what they have. Consequently, in that context, I don't want an element-based magic system unless there's some uncertainty in its foundations, because I don't want that kind of calculation going on during that part of play. What I want is the magic stuff to be weird and spooky and unpredictable, to generate lots of 'wow' moments, and to seem a little bit dangerous and out of control, but not so much so that it doesn't remain a necessary tool of in-game problem solving. In other words, I expect my players to be trying to win, and to use magic to do it, but I don't want the magic itself to reduce to something comfortably predictable (D&D), or maximally engineerable (Fantasy Hero).

If I were trying to do something different, these assumptions wouldn't hold, and then element-combination stuff involving more player control of the elements would be back on the table.

[talysman]

To get clear on what I'm looking for out of these recent threads, which is not what everyone else is looking for, but bears some connections to it: I'm looking for a magic system that allows for an injection of the weird and wonderful into a primarily Gamist sort of play, where I'm expecting the players to do whatever they can with what they have. Consequently, in that context, I don't want an element-based magic system unless there's some uncertainty in its foundations, because I don't want that kind of calculation going on during that part of play. What I want is the magic stuff to be weird and spooky and unpredictable, to generate lots of 'wow' moments, and to seem a little bit dangerous and out of control, but not so much so that it doesn't remain a necessary tool of in-game problem solving. In other words, I expect my players to be trying to win, and to use magic to do it, but I don't want the magic itself to reduce to something comfortably predictable (D&D), or maximally engineerable (Fantasy Hero).

then you basically want what I called "non-scientific magic", perhaps with a symbolic component. however, if you want this in Gamist play, this implies some degree of predictability (otherwise, there would be no advantage to risking the use of magic, so players would avoid it.) I think this means you want a predictable base component + an unpredictable fabulous component.

here's an idea I just had based on Jonathan's reference to metaphors in the mythic magic thread. treat magic the same as any other activity in the system, with the purpose of magic being to generate extra successes or improve die roll bonuses or whatever is appropriate for your resolution system. however, when using magic, on a particular unmodified die roll result, draw a card from a small stack of index cards. these have been prepared in advance with animals, simple activities, weather conditions, and so on. the player or the GM describes something unique that happens by creating a metaphor using that word on the card and either the target of the spell or the tool/effect used in the spell.

examples: player casts a fire spell to attack the enemy, draws a card that says "lion", and describes the flames leaping in the shape of a lion... player casts a knock spell to open a door, draws "snake", and describes his wand turning into a snake, slithering into the lock, and opening it... player casts healing on another injured player, draws "battle", and describes the image of the last combat being replayed in miniature, in reverse, in ghostly forms that float above the injured character's wounds.

for further variability, after drawing the card and describing the results, the player writes another word in secret below the original word, then shuffles the card back into the deck. on the next draw, either word on the card can be used.

[Harlequin]

(Crossposted.  John, nice, though I'm not sure that the Gamist desire necessarily implies that solid an understructure.  Gamism could function within an uncontrolled fabulism.  Have to see what Sean says.)

Thank you, Sean.  I agree with you that while Ron is right, that resolving GNS priorities at the table causes immersion-loss (or other dysfunction) due to improper techniques to go away (by Drifting said technique if need be), the techniques discussion we've been having nonetheless matters a lot.  

There are many possible techniques kicking around, and quite apart from being shackled by obsolete assumptions, it's not clear to most of us what a given technique will communicate, or which techniques to best apply to achieve a desired result.  That can't be incorrect, it's perfectly legitimate discussion.  Ron is quite right that it goes straight back up to GNS issues, but those GNS issues are strongly affected by how the book gets written and what rules govern, for example, magic.

Per your last post, I think my own thinking is clarified somewhat to something along these lines:  As a designer, you can envision points in play.  In particular, you can envision someone trying to do something because the rules are giving them that chance - you built a magic system, therefore people are trying to do magic.

Inside each player is an assortment of screaming little GNS-extremists wanting to get out.

A given inner extremist - say, the gamist-strategist, or the sim-poet - can have his expression (in your play) facilitated by the rules, or inhibited.  He can also - and this is subtly different, it has to do with expectation instead of fact - be tempted to come out, or he may be disinclined to do so.  Bandwidth via your mouth is limited, so there's competition, and a compromise committee made up of some of these little imps eventually expresses itself.

This is exactly the level we're discussing.  We're trying to envision play.  We would like the sim-poet/magus to come out and play around, revelling in the mythic, fabulous, or magic-realist fun to be had in the explored universe.  We're trying to work out which techniques might facilitate this guy coming out, and disincline the others to hog his space.  At points, we find that a technique tempts one of the other imps to emerge, which scores points against it.  As Ron said, Gamist opportunism popping forth.

The social contract obviously has a huge amount to do with this; the techniques are only a piece of the picture, and frequently a small one.  But to nix the discussion at the technique level and say "solve it at the social contract" isn't useful, because techniques do have that acknowledged effect.

To linger in the realm of taxonomy too long - as, IMO, this thread has done - does indeed mean that its focus is being narrowed and spoilt, but cracking all the way out to discussion of social contract isn't necessary.  Nor is anyone innocent of that slip - Ron, yes, the use of an "elements" system which uses randomized or unpredictable elements does indeed work better than one which uses known and predictable elements, and yes, the "known and predictable" had been implicit.  But correct the semantic error and stop, please.  The example is lovely, but doesn't imply that:

...the system features of components-based magic rules (related to the "effects-first" concept) are innocent of the social and creative effects you're talking about.

Known and predictable element choices continue to have the effects we discussed, of inhibiting the fabulous.  They're just not wholly to blame.

So.  No longer blaming techniques for causing GNS issues (such as believing the rules to be the physics, which is indeed insidious), what kind of properly supportive "how-to" techniques can we come up with, toward the several kinds of magic that talysman picks out?  (I disagree slightly with that taxonomy, BTW, preferring to think of it in terms of the literary form imitated, but taxonomy deserves as few words as it can be given.)

Or is there any meat left on this bone at all?  Gobi, I think I'll join you on that other thread; the specificity of the gears&spears design means that we can get to the nitty gritty of what and why.

- Eric

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Sean and Eric,

Your last two posts nail the issue to the wall good and proper, as far as I'm concerned. Now the questions being asked are going to be extremely useful.

Sean, your call for such elements in magic/powers for a specifically Gamist context is worth a whole thread in itself. Damned if I have a good answer for you, though.

Best,
Ron