Dungeoneering Again

[Nexaduro]

Seems like it might be Necromancy, though the two can be combined... Hm...

 

You're right. I can't really think of a magic that is evil by nature. Blood Magic, perhaps? The way I use it, Soul Magic involves sacrifice as well.

[Seraphi]

That would be soul magic... Anyone can use it, really. No alignment specification. It might not be as effective in somebody who has inner conflict or some other metaphysical jazz, but then again, it might be stronger in another aspect.

 

And Nex, remember: SHADES. OF. GREY.

[archimage_a]

Mind, Science or Rock&Roll would be my three guesses.

[Nexaduro]

Oh shush MI. There IS Good and Evil, it's a roleplaying game. You can make it as Grey as you want, that won't change morality. If accidents happen, accidents happen.

 

And Soul Magic, by definition, is righteous... you can't use it thinking what you're doing with it is Evil. Besides, it's MY magic. MINE! :evil:

[Icuownage]

-uses soul magic on purpose-

 

No magic is COMPLETELY evil, as anything can be done for a good cause. As 'good' is only what we see as 'good'.

 

An easy example is religious conflicts.

 

Personally I've never seen soul magic as evil.

[Retech]

Random question, but do elements have personalities? And will someone will a matching personality perform better using the element?

 

 

Or are elements just generally there are merely dependant on skill (and the dice roll).

[archimage_a]

@Nex

 

"The god of the cannibals will be a cannibal, of the crusaders a crusader, and of the merchants a merchant."

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

"There are three truths: my truth, your truth, and the truth.

~Chinese Proverb

 

"[belief], comprises a system of wishful illusions together with a disavowal of reality, such as we find in an isolated form nowhere else but in amentia, in a state of blissful hallucinatory confusion."

~ Sigmund Freud

 

 

 

Also the God of Fire is Jeremiah, so I would assume that the Elemental Magics have the personalities of their deity.

[Nexaduro]

Looking at Briar, Trent, Vyne, and the other tutors... I would have to say that magic is strongly linked to personality.

 

Since we players obviously won't change our feelings that well, it's probably a requirement to use magic with the right mindset.

[Retech]

I meant whether magic necessarily had a personality. It would make sense that someone would choose a magic based on their personality, but I'm wondering if the magic would be affected by their personality.

[Seraphi]

Well, imagine this... A certain kind of thinker is drawn towards a certain type of magic... They are not naturally adept at it.

 

And Nex, evil is a point of view. You just contradicted yourself by saying that good and evil must be determined... But that you can't use soul magic unless you believe what you are doing is right. So if somebody destroys a town and kills thousands to buy a better house, using soul magic because they believe they were right, does that make them chaotic good?

[Alg]

Soul as:

Calming, purifying, etc. as a "good" option.

Or

Manipulation, torture, etc. as an "evil" option.

:?:

 

The gray options would come in from evil uses of the good powers and good uses of the evil powers.

Gray and grey morality is all well and good, though not all grays are the same, right?

 

It's also the player's choice as to where on the spectrum they personally land. Soul magic could have the most vile applications in the game but that doesn't mean the player has to use them.

[Jehosaphat]

the God of Fire is Jeremiah

Wait, what? I thought that was Theros, or Gavrill.

 

Okay, time to define the religious pantheon...

[Retech]

Do the characters actually know about the pantheon? Like is it an overarching religion that most of the world (or the continent) follows?

[Icuownage]

Gavrill is blatantly the god of evil, jokes.

 

Though, me and Jen were probably the only 'evil' characters in space.

[Retech]

Vengeance is totally not evil. It was mixed in with misguided righteousness as well. :)

[archimage_a]

Gavril was hunting if memory serves.

 

 

I know Jeremiah was Fire since I suggested it to Ross originally, which sparked the 'Space Characters = Gods'...If he changed it since then I don't know.

 

 

 

On the magic/personality thing...I don't think magic has a defined personality.

Ice, which is harsh and cold, can make igloos and snow, which are warm and soft.

Fire, which is destructive, can forge steel and iron, and cooks food.

Nature, which is creation, but nature is a destructive cycle of feed or become feed.

Water, which is the lifeblood, but can also drown and swell.

 

Magic is a tool.

[Icuownage]

Well, if my plan worked, it would have the unity working for Russia in the destruction of Britain/Swiss

 

:P, but i failllllled.

[Grim_]

Well we could define it as different sub types of each magic with white (constructive) and black (destructive) applications to them. For instance white fire magic would be used to create steel/items while wholly black fire magic would be something along the lines of hellfire. Another example would be healing magic, White healing magic would be used to heal injuries while black healing magic would be used to warp the flesh of enemies/cause mutations. But, then again neither of those applications are wholly evil or wholly good; so, yeah magic is basically a tool with which to achieve your ends.

[Retech]

So further subdividing skills and making it take even longer to get to a usable level?

 

I think everything is fine the way it is. Magic can be used for both "good" and "evil" purposes, and it only depends on the intention of the magician.

[Grim_]

Well what I proposed would be how it was viewed, magic could be used for a black or white application but would still use the same skill (the difference would just be in the perception by others not in any crunch).

[Nexaduro]

I actually like the divided skill idea. I like it alot. We're gaining skills at a ridiculous rate anyways, it should be going much much slower.

[archimage_a]

Well, originally the leveling tree was split very wide to prevent leveling by vaguely related ways...Like going to a beach and turning it into glass for fire magic XP with no discernable goal...instead you would've got glassmaking or whatever.

 

But subdividing into aggressive and domestic magic subgroups seems like a bad idea...While power leveling by turning a whole beach into glass should be frowned upon, it would kinda suck to be able to conjure flame to melt steel, but be totally powerless to defend yourself from a man with a pointed stick(or a banana, for MP fans).

 

I suppose...If I were to somehow gain the reins of power I would construct a hierachy of skills...

You could get to level 5 fire magic with any type of fire magic, then the branches would split into Offensive and Domestic. Offensive would then split into Hellfire(Short range) and FireBall(Long range), while Domestic would split into Smelting and Burning.

 

Though training the sub skills would still boost up the major skill, but to a lesser extent...So as the game progressed it would be harder to level up fire magic itself.

So...Say a person was Level 3.2 Smelting, Level 1.2 Hellfire and 3.7 FireBall, that would equate to 6.6 Domestic and 7.5 Offensive, and that would then equate to level 7 Fire magic.

 

Which looks difficult to keep track of, but, realistically, there isn't a whole great deal of point keeping track of the basic levels, but the final subset.(And people seem pretty adept at keeping track of their own skills)

It would also mean that a person summoning a fireball at level 90 magic could still get .3-.4 or however much XP they would normally get...But that XP would be worth 1/262,144th in the fire magic skill itself.

 

It would mean that someone who pured Fire-Domestic-Smelting-Small Forge-Glass-Free Blown-Ect would have levelled up basic fire magic as well, without being an expert at all arts of fire magic.

 

It would also bring actual currency to the idea of Specialisms...Since they would be a lower general level, but much higher in individual skills, while generalists would have the reverse.

 

 

As long as no one ran away with the idea that you could only use skills at a certain level...In the above example Free Blown Glass would be possible from level 1 fire magic, it is just after 30 levels of only ever free blowing glass you would no longer be able to level up lots of other skills just by doing that one skill.

 

 

The system could be applied to practically any skill.

Soul magic could divide into Selfish and Selfless, then Betterment or Greed and Charity or Sale, and so on and so forth.

Illusion could divide into Deception and Revelation, then Concealment or Projection and Discovery(hidden doors and such) or Observation(codes in text)...and so on and so forth.

Melee into Offensive and Defensive, then Crush or Slash and Block or Parry.

 

Ultimately, though, it would just be that, when the player reached level 5, the mod would look at what they have done recently and then sub-divide into 2 categories.

 

 

There are two draw backs(that I can see anyway):

 

First, the moderator would need to keep a running record of skills, or face having to guess from 30 or 40 skills which to award points for any given action.

(I didn't find this terribly hard when I was pencil and papering the original dungeoneering, but I believe Ross is using a more complicated system, more suited for storytelling (Which I avoided like the plague)...so it may not be compatible.)

 

Second, some people have over level 5, so would either be forced to redistribute, which brings up its own problems...or given points in all the sub skills equal to that level, which is mildly unbalancing.

[Retech]

Well it would be simple for the moderator (or tell the player to put down)to simply make a little note on what the person has done most with a skill. For example, if someone uses fire magic for only glassblowing, it would be notated that their specialty is glassblowing, and then presumbly they would get a larger bonus and generally know more stuff about glassblowing or whatever.

 

My only problem with Archi's system is that it uses lots of fractions (which leads to some problems) and the redistribution issue. There is no issue if it were adjusted in the future, but usually you're not supposed to lose skills that you've already learned before.

 

Instead you can still specialize with the current system. I'm sure that Ross will know that if you've been cranking out a special kind of fire spell for a while, then you'd be more comfortable with it than someone who just saw you do it, so he can just make little adjustments on that.

 

---

 

Also, specialisms are the reason that multiple magicks exist, since they each have their own "character". If you want to fly for instance, better start wind magic (or to some extent some other magicks might do it too, but probaly not nearly as well).

[Alg]

Perhaps have the skill itself evolve rather than branch. Say, level 5 swords becomes level 5 offense or defense and has a slightly better success rate for actions that go along with that style (The difference between counterattacking and rushing) and no change for the opposite level.

Or the skill develops as it's used: attacking with a fireball could give +.3 fire experience and .1 offense, where level 1 offense changes the skill to offensive fire, and a higher rating in offense or defense makes the rolls better/worse? L5 offense could end up having a higher fail rate for a support application simply because the character is so good at nuking things from orbit instead.

 

Of course, that'd probably be even harder to track.

[Jehosaphat]

My problem with Archi's system is that it puts a mild limit on creativity. After all, if I wanted to falcon-punch something, or put an arrow on fire, what would it be classed under?