CaptainManbeard

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

<Snipped quote by CaptainManbeard>

Yeah, I’m probably going to use the Universal magic route.

@Crimson Flame

Okay, cool! Though, you'd still be attuned to one of the four elements, so feel free to toy around with that. And for the appearance altering part, you could always have that as a racial trait, similar to a Changeling or a Skrull.

Shit, I totally forgot about that option before. Racial abilities not tied to magic. So, as long as it's not too overpowered, everyone can feel free to add racial traits to their characters, such as wings, darkvision, heightened senses, form-shifting (such as lycanthropes), etc.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

That system sounds interesting. I’m fine with that, as long as I can keep my character ideas lol.

Also, now that we’ve got a bunch of people interested in this, do you think we should get everyone into a discord server? Might be easier to talk back and forth between each other that way

@Blizz

I haven't logged in to Discord in a while, need to figure out my log-in credentials, lol. But yeah, once I do that and have a server ready for us, I'll send a group PM with the invite, though I won't be super active in the chat myself until I have everything for the IC, intro post, and character sheet template written up.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

Hmm, so if I wanted to keep the casting illusions and telekinesis, what plane would I go with?

@Crimson Flame

Telekinesis would be covered by Universal Magic, and you could flavor some of the elements to cast illusions, such as using water vapor/moisture in the air to reshape the flow of light through the atmosphere around you, kind of like casting a rainbow. Or you could use air itself to reshape the light. Or you could have that covered by Universal Magic as well by using mild telepathy similar to the original idea for Cerebromancy.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

So, to recap, if we go with this newest idea, these are the magic types I'm thinking:

Universal Magic (any magical effect not tied to the Elemental Planes, the Infernal Abyss, or the Cosmic Void)
Fire Magic (powered using Raw Mana from the Elemental Plane of Fire)
Water Magic (powered using Raw Mana from the Elemental Plane of Water)
Air Magic (powered using Raw Mana from the Elemental Plane of Air)
Earth Magic (powered using Raw Mana from the Elemental Plane of Earth)
Infernal Magic (powered using Raw Mana from the Infernal Abyss)
Cosmic Magic (powered using Raw Mana from the Cosmic Void)
Chaos Magic (extinct form of magic without a known source, thought to originate with the gods)

Of course, none of our characters will touch Chaos Magic (at least not until much later on), but I included it because it has historical context within the world. I'm thinking the ultimate goal of Tiamat is to return Chaos Magic to the Mortal Planes so that she can be free of all constraints, and perhaps our characters eventually hunt down the Vestiges of Bahamut, which can be super-powerful Arcane Conduits that allow them to temporarily use Chaos Magic themselves to thwart Tiamat and her forces. But that's a long ways off, we'll worry about that when we get there XD.

So, does that sound good to everyone?

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

@Light

Oh, and I forgot to answer the other part of your question - Yes, natural affinities would only be tied to the four Elemental Planes. To harness magic from the Abyss, one must plunge their mind into the farthest depths of their own inner darkness, which requires training and meditation, unless they've experienced some horrible trauma that caused them to draw upon the Abyss subconsciously. Conversely, to reach the Cosmic Void, one must attain a keen mind through rigorous emotional and academic self-discipline.

And to make things easier, we'll just say Raw Mana is an invisible energy that doesn't take form or color until it is filtered into the Mortal Planes through the Magi channeling it. There can be some abilities known as Universal Magic that just use Raw Mana regardless of what Plane it comes from, which any Magi can easily use. The easier abilities from this would include stuff like magical blasts without a particular element and force/sound effects, while more advanced applications can be telepathy, greater telekinesis, etc.

To give everyone creative freedom for how their magic looks, we'll just say the color of their summoned Mana and the subsequent magical effects are purely visual flavoring, like the color of one's hair or clothing. That means if someone is attune to the Plane of Fire, for instance, their flames can be any color they want.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

<Snipped quote by CaptainManbeard>

I like this approach. It's open ended in picking what kind of magic we use, and it only makes sense that there would be teachers that instruct students how to do certain things with it. I'm just double checking that you did intend for us to only start with one affinity this way then (and only from among Air, Earth, Fire and Water), and we'd have to learn others as we go?

@Light

Well, we can probably say they learned some from their parents or mentors in high school, so that they can start the RP with some knowledge of other elements beyond the one they're attuned to. For instance, let's say a character was born attuned to the Plane of Air, but then learned from an uncle how to draw Mana from the Plane of Fire to create tiny flame tornadoes or something. They can still use magic from different Planes, we can just say their attuned one is easiest to use, kind of like cantrips in D&D.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

Hmmm... So I'm considering a simplified version that combines my ideas with some of Light's:

The Aetherscape is a giant energy bubble around the Mortal Planes and is split into four quadrants - the Elemental Planes of Air, Earth, Water, and Fire - and in the center between them is the Infernal Abyss, where all dark magic is pulled from. Beyond the outer edges of the bubble is the Cosmic Void, where magic pertaining to space, time, and gravity is pulled from. Any character can learn to harness any kind of magic with the right training, but they are born with a natural affinity to one of the Elemental Planes.

The actual classes at the Academy focus on different methods to use the magic. So, for instance, the Professor in Evocation class would teach students how to evoke blasts and such of their attuned element, the Enchantment Professor would teach them how to enchant items, the Runology Professor would teach them the various runes of the Ancient Tongue, etc.

What does everyone think?

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

<Snipped quote by CaptainManbeard>

If I may, I'd like to suggest a bit of a simplification to the system, mostly just a condensing of schools into categories that capture more under one umbrella, so people can pick more freely and still play into niche power fantasies. The core idea is the same- give people the ability to pick schools and still have the freedom to express how their character uses that school, potentially differently from others. I just believe that with less schools, we can achieve that "unique expression" even more, and have less edge cases of "I want to use a certain kind of magic but there isn't a school that really captures/allows it."

There are 7 schools/attunements/affinities this way: Air, Cosmic, Earth, Fire, Occult, Radiant and Water.

Air, Earth, Fire and Water would be the central schools, focusing on manipulation of the world around us. Air would take on the responsibilities of electromancy. Earth would be the unions of geomancy, metallurgy and the magic of nature's plant and animal life. Fire is mostly unchanged, as it's a well-established archetype that needs little more than heat, flames, embers and smoke. Water would inherit cryomancy as well.

The remaining three schools of Cosmic, Occult and Radiant would take on the job of more esoteric magics, with perhaps Radiant still being allowed as a non-forbidden school.

Occult represents most of what you'd consider forbidden magic. Hellish or eldtritch rituals, illusions and mental manipulations, and of course all forms of dark life-exchanging magic such as sangromancy/hemeomancy, osteomancy and fully fledged necromancy.

Cosmic would be a fringe case on how/if its use is allowed. As likely the least undstood school, Cosmic reaches deepest into the void to control space and time with telekinesis, chronomancy, and teleportation. Cosmic would also be responsible for "null type" magics such as force, kinetics and sound.

Radiant is the closest one could analog to divine magic. Still a scholarly and learned art, it would encompass light (both illumination and hard-light objects), order, and most other magics you could associate with prototypical clerics and paladins from other fantasy settings.

I want to point out that I did not attribute healing to any of the schools here, any school should be able to interpret their magic in a way that allows them to heal in some way.

Edit: my phone can't spell Cosmic apparently, and thought I was still talking about Occult.

@Light

Thanks for the input! You make a lot of good points there! I'm going to wait to make any final decisions until everyone speaks their mind, and then I'm gonna hop into a blank Google Doc and spend a few days writing out the finalized magic system. Another idea I have is to just use the Schools of Magic from D&D5E (Abjuration, Transmutation, Conjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Illusion, Evocation, and Necromancy) and classify everything under those. I'll wait and see what everyone thinks.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

Gonna stick with cryo but trying to decide if I want to go with maybe electro as the pairing in some way. Still trying to figure out, but that feels kinda fun to me.

Definitely interested in playing a darker character, I haven’t gotten to do that in a long time and I love the idea of blood magic. Might go with that route in some capacity and mixed with cryo/electric feels fun.

As for the XP, it would make it feel a lot more video gamey, but I’m open to the idea. Would it be similar to a a PbtA game where you have a list of abilities that are accessible and you spend the XP to get them? Or is it you need a certain number of points to unlock an ability?

@PrankFox

I just meant using XP to signify how well a Magi knows a specific Arcane Art, which each spell/effect requiring a certain proficiency in that Art to use that spell/effect, but I understand how that may seem a bit too video gamey. Instead of using XP/numbers, we could use terms to denote proficiency, like Untrained, Initiate, Novice, Intermediate, Adept, and Master. For instance, someone would need to be an Adept in Pryomancy to use an Adept-level spell.

I'm also wondering if I should separate the colors from the specific Arcane Arts so that everyone can just pick whatever colors they want and say their Auras and magic are that color regardless of powers. For instance, right now, I have Pyromancy as Red Mana, but what if someone wants to be a Pryomancer with blue flames or purple flames or any other color? If we do end up changing the magic system to allow more freedom, we could just have White Mana from the Inner Core of the Aetherscape and Black Mana from the Outer Void, and each one is tainted to a specific color when channeled by a Magi. To allow more freedom, we can just say the color is just a personality trait and has no effect on how the magic works. So, you could have a Pryomancer who lobs purple fireballs or an Electromancer who unleashes blue lightning or a Hydromancer who summons tentacles of pink liquid.

As for how the magic physically works, we could say there are genetic factors in Magi bloodlines that allow their brains to reach out into the Aetherscape like a wireless router and channel Mana, which is then refined through a Magi's Conduit and/or Arcane Tongue/Runes into specific effects. But all this is quite a big shake up from what we all were already discussing, so before I finalize the magic system, I want to know everyone's thoughts. What are some aspects you'd like to see? Any preferences? I want to use everyone's input to refine the magic system into a final form that everyone will enjoy XD.

Qrowdell Academy (magical school RP)

Is there any capacity for people to learn magic beyond the kinds they are naturally attuned to? I'd assume it's possible, else how would the black mana arts have been discovered to begin with? Unless I'm mistaken and that an individual can be born with attunement to a kind of black mana.

@Light

Yeah, people can learn more than their naturally attuned Auras, it's just that those are the focus when they're first starting out at the Academy.

Hmmm... Now I'm wondering if maybe I should switch up the magic system to instead give every character ten experience points to place in the different Arcane Arts. Like, they could have a Primary Arcane Art that automatically starts out with five XP, and then they have ten additional XP to use for various Secondary Arts or further amplify their Primary. Then they can train to earn more points over the school year, signifying their magical progress. If we do that, it would give everyone a lot more freedom and I can make a list of various spells and magical effects and the points required to use them.

What does everyone think?