Using different types of magic in a standard Fantasy Setting

[yipwyg]

One of the things that I like about Runequest is the different ways you can handle magic. Now let me see if I get this right.

Rune Magic:

You have to get integrated to a corresponding rune to learn spells of that rune. You gain the Runecasting (type of rune) skill that is used to cast it. You lose mana points equal to the magnitude of the spell, and you can choose to overcharge it.

Divine Magic:

You learn the Lore (Specific Theology) Skill that you use to cast your spells. You lose Pow equal to the magnitude of the spell. Once you cast it you regain the Pow but you can no longer cast the spell again, until you go to a Holy site and pray for the spell again, which costs you time and money. You can also choose to overcharge the spell.

Sorcery:

Each spell is it is own skill that is used to cast the spell. Casting the spell does not cost any magic points to cast. To increase the magnitude of the spell (or other modifications to the spell) you have to also have the corresponding manipulation skill. It costs one magic point to attach a manipulation affect.

Now according to what I read in a post about Magic of Glorantha, all spells could be learned as a Sorcery spell, up to GM discretion of course. This makes sense in for the God Learners supposed to being pretty powerful.

My question is how is the above 3 magic systems compatible in a more traditional setting. I mean would it be better to just adopt say the Sorcery system for the default magic system of the world, and depending on what cults you join determines what you can learn.

Take for example the Turn Undead spell. If you allowed this to be learnt as Sorcery and you have two characters with 15 Pow each this is what happens.

The Divine character loses 1 point of pow and has to pray for it each time he wants to cast it. He only has 1 skill to worry about though. Of course after he casts all of the ones he has available that is it. It costs him 1 point of mana to raise the magnitude for each additional creature he wants to affect

The sorcerer learns the Turn Undead skill. It costs him nothing to cast it at the default magnitude of 1 to affect one creature. It costs him 1 point to attach multiple targets to the spell. Of course this means he has another skill to worry about.

Again this is perhaps not bad in a Glorantha type campaign. I do not know right now how this is in a standard fantasy campaign though (say like Lankhmar).

I may just use the Sorcery rules for all magic. I would then have certain spells anyone can learn no matter what cult/school/etc.. you belong to. I would then have spells tied to specific cults, Turn Undead only tought by divine cults that battle undead for instance.

Thoughts

 

[Quintus]

I found the Magic System incredibly well balanced - until the Magic of Glorantha (wish I had never layed eyes on that volume) declared that "Godlearner" Sorcerers (only) can learn spells from all Runes and Devine Spells.

I ran into a serious problem with that though. I have a starting Wizard, whom I allowed to learn the Magnitude Skill at start (kinda similar to the old system, where Wizards actually started with one or two manipulation skills, and sorcery spells, instead of rune/spirit magic).

Then he chose the Lightning Spell from the Devine List. Last weekend, they ran into some giant spiders. In 2 actions, he downed 2 spiders - large giant ones, by-himself!!!!

How? Easy. Cast Lightning at Magnitude 5. Each magnitude is 1d4 random damage. He blasted those spiders into pulp. 5d4 with no armor reduction...blehhh. And the fighters in the group could not touch them. 1-8 damage weapons, minuses to their to Hit, and the 3 AP's and the Dodge SKill spiders have gave them a real hard time - for 2 actions anyway: The the wizard flayed them with lightning - cooked spiders anyone?

If the world crawls with Godlearners as it does, and the Seek Runestone spell actively used to scan, are there ANY runes left in the world? Should not, I'm thinking. Put a fly spell on, and do the Spy Satalite thing. Fly over populated area's of foreign peoples, seek oout the ones who have runes, kill them in the night, done deal. Another spell thats gona cause problems...blehh.

Q...

 

[Exubae]

Until the Magic of Glorantha (wish I had never layed eyes on that volume) declared that "Godlearner" Sorcerers (only) can learn spells from all Runes and Divine Spells.

In Rq3 the background history always concluded that the God Learners used sorcery, but also had access to the divine magic they plundered... this 'unbalanced' nature was one of the cause of their eventual demise.

Admitedly MOG is unbalanced on the power front but that fairly accurately reflects the state of affairs of the God Learners as they begin their fall.

 

[Quintus]

Until the Magic of Glorantha (wish I had never layed eyes on that volume) declared that "Godlearner" Sorcerers (only) can learn spells from all Runes and Divine Spells.

In Rq3 the background history always concluded that the God Learners used sorcery, but also had access to the divine magic they plundered... this 'unbalanced' nature was one of the cause of their eventual demise.

Admitedly MOG is unbalanced on the power front but that fairly accurately reflects the state of affairs of the God Learners as they begin their fall.

Yea. Thats the reason...see, I can understand powerful magic and all, but I just fail to see how they (the people who came up with this stuff) thought this was possible. Any other mythology, you start messing with a god devine providence, your in serious trouble. Are they somehow "immune"? Ohh, the god rule of not interfering in worldly affairs. Ok...If I was that God, I'd given my followers whatever powers they needed to wipe those bastards from the face of the earth.

The best example I can cite is the Kinpriest if Istar...guess what happened: a mountain fell on them. No more Kingpriest of Istar, and no more Divine spells either...talk about pissed of gods. Just dont see how the logic behind that made that work...whimpy gods?

Q...

 

[Banned Beetle]

I found the Magic System incredibly well balanced - until the Magic of Glorantha (wish I had never layed eyes on that volume) declared that "Godlearner" Sorcerers (only) can learn spells from all Runes and Devine Spells.

I ran into a serious problem with that though. I have a starting Wizard, whom I allowed to learn the Magnitude Skill at start (kinda similar to the old system, where Wizards actually started with one or two manipulation skills, and sorcery spells, instead of rune/spirit magic).

Then he chose the Lightning Spell from the Devine List. Last weekend, they ran into some giant spiders. In 2 actions, he downed 2 spiders - large giant ones, by-himself!!!!

How? Easy. Cast Lightning at Magnitude 5. Each magnitude is 1d4 random damage. He blasted those spiders into pulp. 5d4 with no armor reduction...blehhh. And the fighters in the group could not touch them. 1-8 damage weapons, minuses to their to Hit, and the 3 AP's and the Dodge SKill spiders have gave them a real hard time - for 2 actions anyway: The the wizard flayed them with lightning - cooked spiders anyone?

If the world crawls with Godlearners as it does, and the Seek Runestone spell actively used to scan, are there ANY runes left in the world? Should not, I'm thinking. Put a fly spell on, and do the Spy Satalite thing. Fly over populated area's of foreign peoples, seek oout the ones who have runes, kill them in the night, done deal. Another spell thats gona cause problems...blehh.

Q...

This is not RQ2 or RQ3, you need to do some houseruling. For example, do not allow the use of sorcery skills with divine spells (I didn't even know that was possible), and reduce the amount of true God Learners in your world. Say there are a lot of "God Learners", but most are just wannabees, hoping for the honour of being tutored the coveted secrets from one of the masters. (that way you balance the GL and EWF fractions a bit too). And erase the Seek Runestone spell of course.

Trifle.

 

[Quintus]

Good idea! Yes, thats what I'm mostly confused about. For instance, what happens when you add a bunch of Magnitude to a Disrution Spell? Do I roll 1-3 for each Magnitude? Boosting spells that are Runecast costs tons of magic points...not so Sorcery. In the end, it is confusing who and what channels magic. A rune, I felt was a power source, a link to the greater runes. A sorcerer, I thought, just tapped into these lay-lines (aka Runesight or something) for power. But to increase their power beyond the basis of the originals spells magnitude is not really covered...and can cause severe side-effects.

Why bother playing with Runes...? Learn a Sorcery Spell...

Q...

 

[ninthcouncil]

Sure the Godlearners can learn Divine spells. But that shouldn't be read as implying that all Godlearners can learn all Divine spells all the time. I'd have it that individual Godlearner characters have either to steal the spell secrets themselves (and you've then got an enormous stock of adventure situations sitting right there, waiting to be used), or receive instruction in it from another GL who has obtained it. That sort of knowledge isn't given out for free; you have to butter someone's bread. Just because Nozbert the Inquisitive has managed to steal Axe Trance from the Babeester Gor doesn't mean every Godlearner everywhere in Glorantha instantly gains access to it. They're not a hive mind, and each has his own agenda (in fact, I'd guess that many of them are very selfish and protective of their ill-gotten knowledges).

Quintus ... if you want to get any helpful feedback, you're going to need to:
- put your thoughts across a bit more clearly so people can understand what the hell it is you want
- stop threadcrapping every discussion you can find
- stop SHOUTING
At the moment, you are just an annoying wally.

 

[Banned Beetle]

Sure the Godlearners can learn Divine spells. But that shouldn't be read as implying that all Godlearners can learn all Divine spells all the time. I'd have it that individual Godlearner characters have either to steal the spell secrets themselves (and you've then got an enormous stock of adventure situations sitting right there, waiting to be used), or receive instruction in it from another GL who has obtained it. That sort of knowledge isn't given out for free; you have to butter someone's bread. Just because Nozbert the Inquisitive has managed to steal Axe Trance from the Babeester Gor doesn't mean every Godlearner everywhere in Glorantha instantly gains access to it. They're not a hive mind, and each has his own agenda (in fact, I'd guess that many of them are very selfish and protective of their ill-gotten knowledges).

I'd say heroquesting be the only way a God Learner could learn a divine spell.

Quintus ... if you want to get any helpful feedback, you're going to need to:
- put your thoughts across a bit more clearly so people can understand what the hell it is you want
- stop threadcrapping every discussion you can find
- stop SHOUTING
At the moment, you are just an annoying wally.

That's kinda rude...

Trifle.

 

[yipwyg]

So in a non Glorantha campaign type setting, say a homebrew, the magic systems are pretty balanced with each other so far. IE not having characters able to learn Divine spells as Sorcery Spells. I really did not just want to choose one magic system and stick with that.

I like the idea of primitive/barbarian cultures being shamans and using the shaman magic rules.

Civilized type cultures being the priests, and using the divine magic system.

Sorcerers would also be used by more civilized cultures.

Rune magic would be used for everyone.

I also think it would be neat having it based on racial cultures.

Elves being more druidic in nature so are shamans
Humans, and others being priests
Dwarven magic being Runecasting.
Any culture would be able to learn Sorcery

Will have to think more about this for my homebrew setting.

 

[Utgardloki]

Balance in Runequest is a problematical exercise. One thing the much-maligned D&D system does is to balance abilities by dividing them among the classes, so that each class plays an essential role. But balance in Runequest means something else.

I've decided that in my Iron Kingdoms conversion, I'll advise all the players to play sorcerers, so as to not worry about whether sorcerers are more powerful than non-sorcerers. (Of course, in Runequest, sorcerers are not placed in the kind of box they are in D&D, so this shouldn't restrict the players concepts.)

This is more problematic in my proposed Runequest Modern setting. I've listed 11 different types of magic, and the question becomes how to balance all types so that one type of spellcaster does not feel cheated.

I guess the best advice is to consider from the player's point of view. If one player were a runecaster and another a divine caster, would either one feel cheated?

 

[weasel_fierce]

Honestly, I've found that balance revolves far far more about each character having something fun, whether its his tricks, his sword or his being chased across the realms by a lovesick troll.

It also depends on how quickly you advance the characters. If advancement is fairly slow, and there's lots of focus on ordinary skills as well, I dont think things will get out of hand at all. Characters that load up on lots of cool spells wont have much else.

 

[duncan_disorderly]

Quintus ... if you want to get any helpful feedback, you're going to need to:
- put your thoughts across a bit more clearly so people can understand what the hell it is you want
- stop threadcrapping every discussion you can find
- stop SHOUTING
At the moment, you are just an annoying wally.

That's kinda rude...

Trifle.

But true. Quintus has a couple of good points, but they are in danger of being lost behind his "I doan wanna play a godlerner" rants, and his somewhat idiosyncratic approach to the English language...

 

[ninthcouncil]

That's kinda rude...

Trifle.

Maybe. But Quintus is in danger of being totally ignored because of his tendency to bomb the entire sub-forum with semi-coherent ranting. He's already rubbed DBC up the wrong way and, as we've found out already, Aaron is very helpful if you've got the common sense just to be nice to him.

 

[soltakss]

I've never liked the "One Magic System" idea that has crept in since RQ3.

Basically, I've never understood it, but perhaps I'm going over old ground.

I know the theory, you've tied yourself to a particular belief system, so you can't access the beliefs of other systems. Then various RW examples are trotted out of Catholic Saints and so on.

But, I don't know of anyone in the RW who is unable to learn new things (assuming they can learn things at all). So, someone who has a Doctorate in Theology can quite easily learn how to cast spells and conjure up spirits. They just generally choose not to.

Similarly, in RQ, the setting should determine what people are forbidden to learn, what they are discouraged from learning and what they are allowed to learn.

What should not happen is for people to be unable to learn a particular magic system because they already know another system.

So, a Sorcerer in Glorantha may well be able to learn Divine Magic, but doesn't because his Church does not allow it. A Preist may well be able to learn sorcery but once again doesn't because it is against the rules of his cult. Where it isn't forbidden or restricted, I can see no good reason why a Priest can't learn Sorcery or a Sorcerer can't learn Divine or Runic Magic.

In RQ2/3 we had a crossover where cults taught Spirit and Divine Magic. In HeroQuest there are cults that teach all the different types of magic. So, why can't we continue this?

I have never liked the idea that I am restricted because of something I have already learnt. It should be culturally restricted, not rules-restricted.

 

[soltakss]

Sure the Godlearners can learn Divine spells. But that shouldn't be read as implying that all Godlearners can learn all Divine spells all the time.

Absolutely. It depends on the different belief systems and on the individuals concerned.

I'd have it that individual Godlearner characters have either to steal the spell secrets themselves (and you've then got an enormous stock of adventure situations sitting right there, waiting to be used), or receive instruction in it from another GL who has obtained it.

That's where cults or sorcery schools come from. They get a secret, build a school around it and then teach it to their members.

I would hazard a guess that after the God Learners purged all the Malkioni Sects of their pagan parts, they then looked at the Pagan cults and realised that they could include some of them in strict Malkioni terms, which would give them access to the cults' Divine Magic. It's not quite the same way as the EWF have Drconised their cults, but you get Saint Humakt being worshipped by some of the Middle Sea Empire.

That sort of knowledge isn't given out for free; you have to butter someone's bread. Just because Nozbert the Inquisitive has managed to steal Axe Trance from the Babeester Gor doesn't mean every Godlearner everywhere in Glorantha instantly gains access to it. They're not a hive mind, and each has his own agenda (in fact, I'd guess that many of them are very selfish and protective of their ill-gotten knowledges).

Exactly.

Individuals could also get access to Divine Magic from various sources, perhaps from HeroQuesting, but that could be heretical or could be OK. It depends on how they did it and what the results were.

I don't have a problem with Malkioni belonging to cults and getting Divine Magic that way.

Nor do I have a problem with Malkioni getting Divine Magic through HeroQuesting.

After all, Arkat did both and did pretty well out of it.

Of course, the Godlearners despise Arkat as a heretic, but that won't stop them from using his tools to get similar benefits.

 

[yipwyg]

After reading the some of the posts I would like to clarify some things that I was thinking.

I do not mind a character learning Sorcery, and then say learning Divine Magic, Rune Magic or even any other form of magic. I think though that if the character casts a divine spell he would be using the divine rules, sorcery spell the sorcery rules and so on.

What I have read on various other posts is the, and this is fine in a Glorantha type enviroment, using just the sorcery rules to not only cast just about any divine magic spell, but prob all rune magic spells.

I think it would be better to just use say Sorcery for all magic, and then the spells that you have access to would be based on cults and culture.

or

Allow players to have the ability to learn all forms of magic, but they must follow the individual magic rules of the corresponding spell. IE want to cast a divine spell you must go to a temple and pray, lose magnitude in Pow for dedication, same character might have some runes integrated and uses Runecasting (rune) to cast them, and might have 1 or 2 sorcery spells, and have some manipulation skills to affect only these two spells.

 

[weasel_fierce]

Allow players to have the ability to learn all forms of magic, but they must follow the individual magic rules of the corresponding spell. IE want to cast a divine spell you must go to a temple and pray, lose magnitude in Pow for dedication, same character might have some runes integrated and uses Runecasting (rune) to cast them, and might have 1 or 2 sorcery spells, and have some manipulation skills to affect only these two spells.

Thats how it does work. The idea of using sorcery to cast other spells is AFAIK, pretty specific to god learner sorcery

 

[Utgardloki]

I have never liked the idea that I am restricted because of something I have already learnt. It should be culturally restricted, not rules-restricted.

I have to say "Amen" to that. A major difference between Runequest and D&D is that the latter puts characters into boxes called "classes", while the former allows characters to pick up whatever skills and abilities are logical to the character.

But as for Glorantha, I need to read more to determine how non-runecasters fit into the setting. It seems that divine magic and rune magic mix pretty readily, since I imagine most divine casters would have to rely on rune magic until they could earn the right to cast divine spells.

Sorcery seems like it would be very rare and difficult to find a tutor. Thus an aspiring sorcerer would also want to pick up some rune magic before she got a chance to learn any sorcery. A divine caster might be forbidden to cast sorcery, but that would depend on the cult.

In Iron Kingdoms, I've decided that sorcerers as described in the Runequest Companion don't exist: sorcerers are runecasters who are born with the ability to learn and cast spells associated with one or more runes, without having to find/create the rune.

 

[soltakss]

Reading the original post again (always a good idea), I think the main problem is the increasing of the Lightning spell's magnitude.

I would play that the Sorcery Manupulates can only be used with Sorcery spells. It might be possible to use them with Runic spells, in the same way that Lunars in the 3rd age can manipulate spirit magic.

But, because Divine Magic costs POW, they should not be bumped up with a Magnitude skill. Unless, of course, the sorcerer was prepared to use POW not MPs to manipulate the spell, which might be an effective compromise.

So, Godlearners could affect Divine Spells with their sorcerous ways, but it costs POW rather than MPs. Useful in a fix, but too expensive to do very often.

Of course, a reasonable GM would tell the player that he thought that was too powerful an effect to get and he wouldn't be allowing it again in the game. If that doesn't work, then have them face an NPC Godlearner who does the same to them, do it a few times and they'll suggest the rules limitation.

 

[soltakss]

Sorcery seems like it would be very rare and difficult to find a tutor. Thus an aspiring sorcerer would also want to pick up some rune magic before she got a chance to learn any sorcery. A divine caster might be forbidden to cast sorcery, but that would depend on the cult.

In the Middle Sea Empire, Malkionism is the Official State Religion, so sorcery should be fairly easy to learn. I'm not sure what the caste situation is with them, do Wizards get certain skills that the other castes don't get?

But, outside of Malkioni areas, sure, wizardry would be hard to find and learn.