My treatment of magick

First off, I always write 'magick'.  I learnt this from Crowley.  But I am referring still to P&P.
Secondly, in order to support my notion of  'story comes first', I have always strived to create the richest possible backdrops for my games to take place in. Regardless of system (no longer an issue, because I use my own) or genre.

In fantasy games, one of the things that frequently frustrated me, was the almost commonplace and throw-away nature of the concept of magick and spell-casting.  This, to me at least, sucked a lot of the atmosphere out of magick.  Magic-users in many games, being as about as unusual as bakers or blacksmiths.  So for my gameworld I set about sewing rich threads of magick into the tapestry of the land.

First came my historical understanding of what magic was, and it is this which I will begin by imparting.

In my games, magick is essentially a dialogue between sorcerers (the generic name for spell-casters) and intelligences that exist in dimensions beyond our own.  By 'our own' I mean those typically inhabited by the players.

And for you to understand what I mean by this, I need to really explain a philosophical concept I have concerning the nature of reality - and this applies to the real world as much as it does any gameworld.

On the one hand I believe that in all likelihood what you see is what you get.  There are no gods, no afterlife, nothing spiritual.  That said, you can kind of leave the subject alone, it requires no more thought.  And that provides one with plenty of opportunity to consider other possibilities.  And one concept that intrigues me is as follows.

And it goes a little something like this:

If one considers that potentiality - i.e. the potential that something might exist is a dimension of sorts, than this could have been the trigger to the big bang.  There was a chance that something could exist, so in one flavour of reality, something did exist, and in realising itself suddenly came into being.

And just as the big bang brought into existence the three physical dimensions we inhabit, and the fourth we call 'Time', then so it also brought into being all the other dimensions that theoretical physics claims may, or must exist.  And the probable many others we (as an inherently limited species) haven't a clue about.

So just as humans have evolved to inhabit and be aware of (to some extent) these four dimensions (we can call them 1,2,3 and T), we can sumise that we may rub shoulders with some other dimensions, and perhaps are even influenced by some we have no real grasp of.

And if you consider that a possibility, then it naturally follows that some other 'intelligences' may also have evolved to inhabit and appreciate other subsets of dimensions.  Some may overlap with ours, and some maybe so far removed from ours that never the twain shall meet.

In this model of the universe, it is not necessarily far-fetched to imagine that some intelligences have evolved which inhabit and largely dominate most dimensions.  To us, these beings would seem as gods.  And to stretch the notion one step further, then one can also describe a Supreme Being as that entity which incorporates all dimensions.  But we really don't need to go there.

Lets then apply this philosophical (dare I say theological) model to the archetypal P&P gameworld.  All of a sudden we are presented with the notion that 'Dream' can be a dimension, and even 'Luck' can be a dimension.  In my games, intelligences can utilise the dimension of Dream to converse through symbol and allegory with other intelligences.  And by studying such symbol and allegory a perceptive man may unlock some hidden secrets of how the universe works beyond the remit of his regular dimensions.  To the uninitiated such feats would appear as magick.

In the history of my gameworld, this is the case.  Gods (read: complex intelligences inhabiting many dimensions) reproduce not in the physical way that corporeal beings do, but by 'evolving' such lesser beings to appreciate (and thus be privy to) extra dimensions.  As such, magick is thus a route to eventual deification.  However, the journey is long and arduous and frought with disaster and the vast majority of sorcerers die before ever attaining the knowledge.

In the history of my world, the first age is known as the Age of Ancients, or the Age of History and although I have never set a campaign or run a game which operates in this first age, it is a backdrop to all of my games.  In this age, people were primitive, tribal and magic had not yet been 'discovered'.  One such tribe, known as the Eidemak, employed a soothsayer / witchdoctor type character to advise of matters spiritual.  During a routine hallucinogenic ritual, he and his apprentice witnessed what they referred to as a Falling Star.  A meteorite, which tore across the heavens and slammed into the earth.  Thanks to the use of their hallucinogens, the passage of this meteor was forever marked indelibly on their minds' eye.

The soothsayer sent his young apprentice out into the snowy wastelands to track the passage of this Falling Star to its resting place.

The star was in fact a method employed by higher intelligences of raising the conciousness of primitive folk such as these, and it contained two materials, a mineral substance, which later became known as Arcanite, and a metallic substance called Star Iron.  In conjunction these two materials served to warp and enhance some subtle dimensions which rubbed shoulders with these physical planes.  And notably that of Dream.  So as the young Eidemak - as it is lost in the history of my world if the name of the people was Eidemak, or it was the name of the apprentice, specifically - gathered up some samples of this meteor, he opened himself up to the realm of Dream and using this channel strange intelligences whispered to him each night as he slept, and taught him secrets about the world.

By the time he reached home, he had become the land's first sorcerer, able to bend reality (albeit not very ably initially).  And so it came to pass that magick was brought to the world.

So thats the first thing I did.  Explain magick.  But in doing so, hopefully I have kept some mystery.

So in the history of my gameworld, all magick can be traced back to these simple origins.  And from there I draw out a family tree of notable sorcerers.  Across the two subsequent ages when magick evolved rapidly, different schools of magick came into being, with notable exponents and originators.  Essentially, what I did here was give a slight nod to D&D and expand massively (on what I believe to be their failing).

In D&D you have spells like Tenser's floating disc, and Milf's magic arrow.  Or something like that. =)  I can't remember exactly, its been a long time.  Because I used the Rolemaster system, I had all the RM spell-lists as the basis for magic in my world, and what I did was create particular and specific personalities to support those spells.  i.e. I have an infamous NPC called Ladumon (of the 2nd Age), who is generally accepted to be the originator of all spells which distort physical dimensions, i.e. teleportation and bags of holding are all down to him.  I have effectively created a Who's Who of Sorcerers for my games.  So any spell a player casts has a history and ultimately an author.  This I have found to be extremely useful in helping to create a rich backdrop, and thus atmosphere for the magickal aspects of my games.

This also provides players with an opportunity to craft their own spells.  Following a school of thought, a particular style of magick, and the teachings of the Past Masters in that school gives them a direction in which to further evolve that school.

The other thing I did with magick is use Presence (Charisma) as the defining stat for sorcerers, and also made magickal aptitude extremely rare and marked by heterochromia (a difference between the colours of each eye, i.e. left eye blue, right eye brown).  This makes sorcerers 1) rare, 2) unusual to look at, and 3) mightily charismatic so you can't ignore them when they walk down the street.  This later element is not always an advantage.  As charismatic people are noticed and thus generally find it hard to blend into a crowd.

What I have found is this approach has certainly spiced up the roles of sorcerers in my games.  All of a sudden magic-using isn't just another character-class option.  It scintillates.

Its in ways such as these that a GM can create mood and atmosphere and ultimately get one step closer to the desired objective or painting the richest, most enthralling picture of an alternate world possible.  And a world that players buy into effortlessly.


I love it when that happens.  As this supports something I mentioned several posts earlier.  Part of the joy of roleplaying for me is setting up a scene and sitting back and listening to the players discuss it.  By providing players with the richest possible tapestry, its far easier to do this.

My recommendation then for those of you wanting to run your own game.  Know your world.  Populate it with well-wrought characters and events.  Create a timeline and well-defined settings, and give your players as much information (that they would be privy to) as possible.  Its like an author knowing their characters, so that when they write dialogue, that dialogue is believable.

This gives me an idea for two new posts:  1) General tips on running a game. 2) General tips on writing dialogue.  All of which under the ever-present IMHO caveat.