I would point to Ancient Magus Bride as an example where you have both soft magic such as that used by both creatures of myth and the various magi, as well as the more grounded hard sort practiced by sorcerers. Avatar works with four definite sources of power, which happen to be fire, water, air, and earth. Sorry about the comment length and the long worldbuilding paragraph. Note that most, if not all, superpowers in this generator will belong . In my mind, rituals are the middle ground between divine magic and holy magic. And along the way you provided a lot of good supporting material. The most well known curse is the Demons Mark. It requires words of power, and a magical energy called Deathlight, which is obtained by killing ghosts. I like your idea about the gods randomly interacting with the world. For instance, some animals can also cast magic, and they do it pretty much the same way people do. If youd like additional guidance as you build your storys magic system and other facets of your fictional world, then be sure to check out World-Building Warrior, a workbook that will walk you through the world-building process step by step. These symptoms will get worse over time. Its unclear whether there are any other self-casting old magic spells besides this one. It takes many years to master. ), Im just really curious to know more about your magic! Worldbuilding, Avatar, Magic, Magic Systems. If so, what differentiates them? Actually, the elite technique for Airbending is straight-up flight a la Superman. Hm, I had not planned on it, but it might be interesting. It is divided into two domains: the stone, minerals, and metals of the land, and the flora and fauna of the natural world. (Find out more). Im working on a story that has 3 magic systems. I see the basis of a rational magic system there, and you have good limits. Im going to have to find my Physical Science notes my goodness, that class was boring. Otherwise, how can the effect of the knot be decided? This generator will give you 10 random super powers, which can range from many different types of powers, including magic and superhuman powers. You will see through their eyes, feel what they feel (emotionally and physically), hear their thoughts, and even have their memories. They instead study the laws of nature and learn to manipulate them. Also, how is this energy directed to a specific object and not blocked by everything in the way (including air?) Mages trained in a world with little power usually are very strong in one with more power, because they can make a lot out of a little. Some ideas are more fleshed out than other, if thats saying much. It sounds like youre going the scientific route with energy. Creating a Magic System for Superpowers If the magic youre creating varies from person to person, this article is for you. I think that is arguable, but fine I personally want to read hard magic systems anyway. A rational magic system follows rules, thats what makes it a rational system. Just remember that great ideas are only the start, solid implementation has to follow, and learning that takes a lot of time and practice. When you suddenly decide to change the way magic works or it looks like it, because youre winging it with the system readers get unhappy. If anyone wants more detail and is interested to see the actual magic just comment and feel free to critique. Precursor aliens might do the job if they had certain motivations (such as wanting to set up a certain situation to see how it develops), but this raises questions of how such a large group made of many different individuals could all stay hidden for such a long time. Theres hardly a limit, every wizard and witch (once adult) seems pretty much capable of using all spells (although experience and practice sure play a role). Your story may also include a chosen one thats extra special. Also I thought about it and further developed it. They each have powers, but only relative to what they are. The size of those continental plates and their placement on the planet would be an arbitrary effect of nature, and so the magic they generate might reflect those arbitrary characteristics. Random Treasure Generator. Their powers go far beyond what has ever been shown before and theres no repercussions for them. Another way of looking at sources is from a material point of view. Alternatively, soft magic systems remain nebulous. Electricity So you already know that unraveling a knot has the opposite effect as weaving one. Ive also seen your above comment. Remember that specific effects are better than broad effects. What do the spirits get out of it? There are a few online articles about this: the ones I remember off the top of my head are Universal Fire and Universal Law, found on LessWrong. Dont feel discouraged by the problems of your first draft, remember that you will solve them later. Limited power creates struggle and conflict, the main hero might be strong, but what happens when an army of thousands have cost him all his powers before he could even reach the main villain? Another thing you have to keep in mind is how strong the spells are and if they're overpowered. For example, a tree nymph can make a leaf tornado appear, but cant work with other materials. You can make it mysterious just by hiding how it operates. 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Magic can be taught and learned, but like the Arts or sciences, whether someone is good at magic or not depends on their inherent skill, talent, and dedication to their training. Theres a lot to figure out about the basics, before you can think about sub-types. Now you have all the tools you need to create your own magic system. Of course, like any contract, value is relative and subject to change based on circumstances. Ocean magic is strongest during winter. Pick just one source; Ill discuss how to add variety to your magic system in the next section. Are there different types of magic, or did magic diversify over time? For telepathy and telekinesis, you mention sources of energy. He was, um, originally a king that God transformed for his sins into a boar, and his seven sons as piglets, and he had, um, a comb, razor, and scissors between his ears and HE was prophesied to die when he lost them. Originally I was going to go with energy, but thats way too vague. They could solve all problems with a snap of their fingers. Superpower name generator. Dont expect to put out a perfect draft, having to do revisions or rewrites is disappointing, but its a normal part of the process that helps us strengthen our skills. I really need a new name for the holy magic. Im working on setting up a writing blog on WordPress, mirroring it to tumblr. Or it could indeed be a matter of merely thinking things into existence specific ability necessary. Thank you so much! I understand your point. Earth magic: Earth magic draws power from the energy of the land itself. There are roughly two types of fantasy. Imagine if Harry Potter could vanquish Voldemort in the first chapter just by making up a spell called antagonist defeatium. Olwens father told Kilhwch he wanted that comb, razor and scissors to dress his beard with on the day of the wedding, before he would allow him to marry his daughter. Creating a system from scratch can feel incredibly overwhelming. Magic is part of an enormous range of stories, but finding 2 stories which use the same magic system isn't as easy as it may sound. Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones, on the other hand, use soft magic. Ones that havent made many contracts and dont know much about human emotion yet will be much more objective. Anger Heat. As long as your explanation isnt a slap in the face of physical laws we all know, theres no problem from that side. That can create an interesting dilemma if a person primarily driven by a particular emotion starts to lose it, how likely are they to remain committed to their goals? You should ensure that the conflict and resolutions in your story arent as fickle as the magic. This version of my storys magic system is like a combination of magic in the Marvel movies and in The Magicians. Theres no way to please them or ask them for help, they just do stuff because they want to (very much like the Greek/Roman or Norse pantheons we have). Hes also known as the God of Mischief. Havent figured out the second point quite yet. You can certainly use that, even though information might sometimes not be easy to find. The term magical effects refers to the ways in which magic influences and alters the world around it. Yes, first drafts are for your eyes only. For example do you want evil spellcasters to raise undead? I just made it up, I had no idea there was a magic system out there that was so similar. The Soft-Hard magic divide is much more useful for writers and if you listen to Sanderson, he is much more careful not to state hard magic is inherently better than soft magic. If youre still reading, thanks for letting me ramble. The Taran movie also would provide examples for limits through the source with both the magic kettle (stops working when a living thing is sacrificed) and the crystal ball which doesnt work for the villain for some reason, although its owner does well with it. These small but significant changes in their functionality causes untold chaos; billions die and the climate is thrown off by the massive amount of metal particulates now in the upper atmosphere. In Brandon Sandersons Warbreaker, magic is powered by a life force known as breath. Sanderson could have made breath do anything, but instead its mostly limited to animating objects and improving the casters senses. Korra did it but that was more so of Avatar state then an Airbending technique. So Id rather go science fiction, or full-on, its my world, I make the rules magic. Harmony: how multiple different vibrations intermingle and interact, depending on the previous too, some Vibrations can overpower another one If youre working with leylines and the fabric of reality you should model the whole earth as a living thing(as it is)but not necessarily conscious, although that could add tension and the leylines and threads could be like vains in an interconnected system that gets clogged from the knots relating to all manner of natural and unnatural disasters/phenomenon and just like any living thing this system would naturally resemble a circulatory/lymphatic system with currents and nodes to regulate and cleanse said currents. If your mage has no limits to their powers, where would the conflict be? Telekinesis and teleportation require an explanation as to how you direct your power outside of the body. One of my characters is able to beg the Storm God for help without making a proper appeal because they danced nearly every day for 5 years. Some rituals are inherently harmful, like the ritual thats typically used to find missing persons. In the Norse pantheon, Loki is sometimes also referred to as the god of fire despite the fact that hes a frost giant. Those that dont meet the selection criteria die screaming, but in a chosen few, the nanites alter and enhance their hosts, granting abilities that are perceived as mystical by the ignorant population which includes the majority of the Order of Mages themselves as generations of information suppression have led to them buying into their own lies, the truth being known only to the mysterious Council of Nine. We'll also throw some brainstorming questions your way to help get those magical creative juices flowing! All three should work together to create the magic system. Silver drains magic and therefore hurts all creatures that are magic. However, most societies dont have the resources to crank out wizards. Ask yourself if your antagonist will be a magic-wielder, and if there will be magical creatures in your story. If you want conservation of energy, you could show those who use specific powers, magical or psychic, having to replenish that energy in some way (through food, meditation, or something similar). Magic does exist and it follows rules is the first rule of a rational system. Now paint may sound op but it has very risky limitations. Because I have 3 systems and they all lean soft-irrational, Im concerned that I have glaring problems that I overlooked. the primary topics discussed in a story). Having people combine spells into more powerful versions could make for a great epic battle at the end, but at the same time not allowing them to be able to combine spells could provide for epic fights as well. I really hope you go through with it! (Storm God = sky domain = bird ? *someone like me* well dont I feel important! Thank you! Fortunately it's not that hard to create a magic system, so this guide will be relatively short, but the amount of work you'll have to put into the creation of your magic will depend entirely on how detailed you want to get. A grammar checker, style editor, and writing mentor in one package. Some well-known examples of soft magic systems: In The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. ^_^. would be for instance the power to congure spectral weapons like a sword or bow and arrow, though they are powerful magic and would be taxing on ones body and life. Fantasy Random Generator. How to Create an Eclectic Magic System For those who want casting to look or work a certain way, I created another method that starts with the casting and works backwards. Because there is no sunlight and no heat, the water is frozen and white, and blankets the ground. It violates local conservation laws and relativity (whats simultaneous in one reference frame is not in other frames). Now, there is a scene in the Silmarillion where Luthien goes to rescue Beren, the mortal man she loves, from the dungeons of Sauron (who is a corrupted angelic spirit somewhere around the same level in the angelic hierarchy that her mother occupies on the good side); and in the process she engages in a duel of song with Sauron himself, since song/music is the primary metaphor Tolkien chose to express the use of this spiritual/magical energy in the writings which were collected into the Silmarillion. In the same way that you can learn to control your emotions, you can learn to control the magic that comes from those emotions. Basically, all magic in the world draws power from six Primals, vast entities of the natural world: the Sky, Sun, Moon, Earth, Ocean and Stars. My protagonist would be one of the paranoid who wants to conserve the thread. You neednt appropriate any that have extant adherents, of course, but looking at what people believe can be a touchstone for how an invented system of magic could work. Using items means a disarmed magic wielder might be powerless, it could also mean every magic wielder has an item unique to that person, perhaps even with their own unique abilities. to be a Mind, whose role is to Think; and the Magic comes when it is possible to use that Thinking to affect what Is and what is possible to Be. A being of a higher Plane has the opposite effect, their presence and consciousness being far too much for the Universe to handle, and so it would just collapse on itself wherever the being would go. However, certainly Interferers might be rewriting history to make themselves look better. Brings back memories of the magic system I was working on for a really trippy book not really super Lovecrafty per se, but set in modern day Maine among a world of dark magicks and secret cults, so in that sense an echo I lost track of back in my 30s and am just now remembering. Visit her new website . There are clear limits of what they can do, and things like resurrection and time manipulation are some of these limitations. If one were to observe the Vibrations and the way they Flow(this is another process, different from the other Four Laws) it would seem whacky, but they are extremely intricate and complex. Brandon Sanderson is fantastic at crafting magic systems. Magicians summon magical spirits, like djinni, and command them to do their bidding. The magic of Avatar feels like the natural result of a different set of physics, whereas the magic of Harry Potter feels like the arbitrary inventions of an author. If a mage has no limit to what they can do, why not simply find one who solves all the problems for your hero with the snap of a finger (or a well-conducted ritual)? Telekinesis: You mention psychics using their own energy for telekinesis. Re: hollow mages this is the fate of the previous mage who had the protagonists familiar she traded away bits of her life in order to extend it, until she ends up functionally immortal but with very little of her original self left, (she breaks the bond with her familiar in the process in order to make deals with more powerful spirits). Theyre both perfectly legitimate forms of doing magic in a story IF DONE RIGHT. Perhaps they only manifest 1 (or 2?) There are 7 types of energy that all link with one another (the first two I made up as a pseudo science which explains the workings of Life & Sentience in a pre-modern scientific age), Sentience Limits can come in all sorts of varieties, the ones we've covered are: how to wield it (being disarmed), how to gain power, power limit, limited power source, cost of powers, the ability to combine powers or not, racial differences and whether or not you're born with a specific amount of power and talent or not. Another limitation is that you have to touch whatever youre casting a spell on, e.g. Should I make what Interferers can do more specific (not just adding-energy-to-system)? Sounds right to me). One example is that because the laws of physics are invariant with respect to time translation (they dont change over time), energy is conserved. Fantasy Name Generator. (oops, forget this one!). thanks for the feedback! They can only work through people that do their will voluntarily. I want to encourage writers and worldbuilders to stray from this formula. However, it had similar things to our universe, stars and planets and lifeforms that could look somewhat like ours, so it needed to follow most of them, at least, the ones that allowed for these things. Maybe there are a few things that the sorcerer cant do, but basically its just whatever they want to happen, happens. The plants arent like people, the magic doesnt just happen to them. He exerts his own living will in opposition against the tendency towards balance. Oh! Like if in Harry Potter, wizards murdered all the muggles. Dryads are usually depicted as tree spirits, or tree nymphs. Good luck! The knots must be undone, causing the reverse effect as the original magic, and rewoven into the fabric of reality. 7 Ways To Create A Magic System For Your Novel 1. Im going for rational semi-soft I hope I pull it off. It is an epic drama that, year by year, is played out before humanity. If you can convey the rules of your system in a way the reader can understand, you have a rational system. Well, there is the Restricted Section, which includes books on the Dark Arts, I made a magical system right after I read this article and this is what I came up with: Magic is powered by emotion and certain emotions affect your environment in different ways. Like something to do with the changing of the victims skin? GIVEN: obtained magic through an illegal potion or spell cast by a very powerful mage. Perhaps magic-users know what magic can be used for but are not concerned about why it works that way; for all we know, that could be the way most wizards and witches feel in Harry Potter. Well, your protagonists will use magic to solve some of their problems. I would skip chemical energy though opens up too many things. Divine magic comes from appeals to the gods. Caster is Shocker, Given is Air and Weather However, most people wont deviate from what they know to work to avoid wasting their time on a failed ritual or potentially hazardous consequences. Another option is that there is a background magic field (see the TVTropes article) present everywhere that psychics draw on. Its crazy long but definitely adds logic to the system :D and its a nerdy heaven. Generally that means their strengths and weaknesses will be roughly equivalent. 2023 Mythcreants LLC, all articles, art, recordings, and stories are the copyright of their respective authors. This may or may not be an insuperable obstacle. It will allow to make some zones where one or other magic will not work, or otherwise where will be much easier to cast specific spells. Finally, there are magic uses who seem to draw magic from the earth itself. A mage activates the contract by speaking the spirits name, with the price being the spirit experiencing everything the mage does while using the spirits power. Muggles are not going to have much luck oppressing wizards. Directing magic can involve a range of activities, but it commonly includes these aspects: The more elaborate your direction method is, the harder youll need to work to make it feel rational. Then use the answer to characterize all of your nature spirits. I like the fact youve got a cool new way people gain magical abilities- FAR FAR FAR to many high fantasy novels just have it be the usual theyre born with it (theres nothing wrong with that way- heck Ive even used that, its simple and the easiest way to have it)- but I love seeing unique ways besides just being born with it. I just think that Sanderson hard-soft magic divide is much more useful for novel writers. Do you think the metaphor works when stretched so far? Ill consider what you said and make some changes. Now the magic is tied directly to ones own life force, the more magic they use the weaker their magic becomes and the weaker they become, with rest their strength will come back but their magic will not and if they run out means they used up their entire life force so they die and the only known way to regain all their magic and life force is to take the life of another completely consuming their victims life force\magic. The system makes no sense so I cant possibly reason that theres a reversal of this! The definitions for these are as follows: You can take the time to practice it yourself, but youre better off finding a teacher. We learn the limits of the hard magic systems in the series, such as Sympathy and Sygaldry, while we never learn the limits of Naming. . Common People (Theyre so common that they dont really have a name.) I gave the most basic rundown I could. In many worlds such as Star Wars, this force is generated by living things. If I were you, I would make sure every complication you have is something thats important to you. Creating a rational magic system allows you to add realism and depth to your world while still leaving room for new and interesting changes. About the Avatar thing, what you are saying makes more sense to me now. You could even have a combination of two or more sources, but choosing which are best suited for your system will largely depend on what you need from your magic within your story universe. Everyone has their own power level amount of energy they can produce in one go. Some people make a long-term contract with a particular spirit to channel its energy themselves, with the spirit becoming the casters familiar. man to machine interfaces, nanites cluster on nerve ending allowed some individuals to easily interact with ancient tech, or even graft it into their bodies. Caster is Eco, Given controls animals, which is basically mind control.