taltamir
2009-09-15, 02:00 AM
Everyone is a Mage
I had often wondered, how is it possible for a warrior to slay a few kobolds and suddenly he can take two sword stabs instead of one to drop? How come melee characters have more health than those who can augment their bodies with arcane energy? How does even a wizard protect himself as he gain in power? How can someone possibly "evade" a fireball? and many other nagging questions. How do the various and completely different "magic" systems coexist and interact?
The solution has recently come to, it is amazingly simple and it requires nothing but fluff reworking. Everyone is a Mage.
Well, not in the traditional way. Put simply, the characters are already exceptional individuals, they are heroes, well above and beyond a normal "average" member of their species (who has all 10s + racial modifiers). Why can they not be special in another way, magic! Some lucky individuals are born with the spark of magic burning within them, they can excel in all walks of life, and can achieve greatness beyond what anyone else dreams of. They all possess a living magic within their soul, magic that grows and strengthens through conflict, allowing rapid advancement in power and skill. Their font of power can take various forms in the psi-plane of their soul; a growing tree, a burning flame, torrent of air or water, or even pure geometry. Variations are endless and are all unique.
Control can be instinct, but it can also be conscious. A fighter is often keenly aware of his magical nature and might actually make conscious effort to exert his magic in certain ways. All of which are martial.
The Basics
HP - Health points, those represent a characters magical ability to maintain the integrity of their own body. Those who specialize in close combat repeatedly get hacked apart, yet maintain their life as long as their magical reserves (of highly specialized type of power) hold. Thus at level up, those characters gain more HP.
XP - XP is nothing short of a measure of the burning spark of magic. It can be reduced and siphoned to imbue items with magic, or due to low grade resurrection, but it is always there, always growing. As it grows, so does the powers of the character.
Spells and Supernatural abilities - Those are direct outward manifastations of the magic. Instead of fortifying their bodies, some specialize in shaping the very world around them.
Healing - Most cannot simply donate or accept reserves of power used to sustain your very body as a living whole. But with the right adjustment, magic can be used to provide such replenishments. The gods are very adapt and providing their clerics with the capability to do so via their divine bond.
Natural healing - Resting heals PCs at an amazing rate, and from crippling injuries. Their personal stores of power replenish and their ability to maintain their body's integrity quickly returns to full capacity.
Multi-classing - While most of their juvenile years were spent learning to control their innate powers and apply them to a basic set of ability of a certain type, once they do so PCs are capable of quickly and easily pick up other skills, ones that might often take a lifetime of study to master.
Endomagical - Abilities that are achieved via internalizing of magical energy and suffusing it within oneself.
Exomagical - Abilities that are achieved via externalizing of magical energy, and putting it to specific use.
Psi-plane - A construct of your very soul, it is unique to each individual. It is residing in their subconscious, and few actually get to see their own, much less others. Psions often do, as to monks in their effort to harden their very soul, to protect themselves from enchantment.
The classes
Barbarians - are those who channel their magic through powerful emotions and brute force. It manifests as short bursts of enhanced power via rage, improved speed and stamina, and even eventually shrugging off minor damage, as their body acclimates to constant damage and repair.
Bards - manifesting their arcane power via music, bards burn brightly with the power of magic, often due to a magical being as an ancestor.
Clerics - Their faith is their strength, they bind their very souls into the service of their gods, their powers are augmented and transformed. No longer mere arcane magic, but divinely infused magic. Most pursue the divine powers with zeal, but a few (magic domain) master some arcane spells of their own powers, some even learn and research their own unique spells. Knowledge of such spells is not granted from the gods, but used with a cleric's own font of power, after proper divine infusion that is.
Druits - Bind themselves to the spirit of the land, their spells focus on the natural, on the neutral, on the the ability to shape shift and commune with and control animals. They gain many gifts from the natural spirits of the land, which they mostly express exomagically
Fighters - They boost their speed and coordination to get a better chance of hitting, and to hit more often in the same period of time, they maintain excellent health, and quickly master complicated and near impossible "martial" moves.
Monks - Monks forgo any focus on armor and exomagical abilities. They internalize the entirety of their magic, they master the flows and ebbs of it within their own body, reinforce their psi-plane, and their body. They become neigh untouchable, and able to deal massive damage with their bear arms and legs. For a monk, their body is their weapon.
Paladins - like clerics paladins bind their souls to a deity. Which gives great powers and rewards. They have a balance of both exomagical and endomagical abilities. Unlike the cleric which is mainly Exomagical.
Rangers - Like druids bind themselves to the spirits of the land, but focus much more on endomagical powers.
Rogues - Rogues apply their magical talent to reinforce otherwise mundane by useful skills. Social skills, a sixth sense for finding traps, and masting a very large of amount of skills in a very small amount of time is a hullmark of this class. They moderately reinforce their bodies with endomagical powers.
Wizards - Wizards apply their magic almost entirely exomagically, making it as available as possible to be shaped and manipulated as they see fit. They approach it in a very structured manner, based on scientific experimentation and learning. They are thus most capable in understanding exactly how those powers work, and how to utilize them in ways others could never dream of.
Sorcerers - Sorcerers are less academic then wizards, they work on intution and force of will. They focus on raw power, and are the most exomagical of any class. They can cast the most spells per day, and do so at will without any preparation. But their lack of knowledge as to the exact means by which they do so prevents them from mastering more than a few spells.
Psions - Psions would seem to be extremely exomagical to some, but are actually highly balanced. They spend little effort masting the ability to toughen their bodies. But they sharpen their mind constantly, and imbue it with fantastical abilities, which then allow it to transform energy and use it exomagically to produce spell like effects, but in ways ungraspable by others.
MORE TO FOLLOW (including some actual alternate rules should they be wished, feel free to only use the fluff though).
I had often wondered, how is it possible for a warrior to slay a few kobolds and suddenly he can take two sword stabs instead of one to drop? How come melee characters have more health than those who can augment their bodies with arcane energy? How does even a wizard protect himself as he gain in power? How can someone possibly "evade" a fireball? and many other nagging questions. How do the various and completely different "magic" systems coexist and interact?
The solution has recently come to, it is amazingly simple and it requires nothing but fluff reworking. Everyone is a Mage.
Well, not in the traditional way. Put simply, the characters are already exceptional individuals, they are heroes, well above and beyond a normal "average" member of their species (who has all 10s + racial modifiers). Why can they not be special in another way, magic! Some lucky individuals are born with the spark of magic burning within them, they can excel in all walks of life, and can achieve greatness beyond what anyone else dreams of. They all possess a living magic within their soul, magic that grows and strengthens through conflict, allowing rapid advancement in power and skill. Their font of power can take various forms in the psi-plane of their soul; a growing tree, a burning flame, torrent of air or water, or even pure geometry. Variations are endless and are all unique.
Control can be instinct, but it can also be conscious. A fighter is often keenly aware of his magical nature and might actually make conscious effort to exert his magic in certain ways. All of which are martial.
The Basics
HP - Health points, those represent a characters magical ability to maintain the integrity of their own body. Those who specialize in close combat repeatedly get hacked apart, yet maintain their life as long as their magical reserves (of highly specialized type of power) hold. Thus at level up, those characters gain more HP.
XP - XP is nothing short of a measure of the burning spark of magic. It can be reduced and siphoned to imbue items with magic, or due to low grade resurrection, but it is always there, always growing. As it grows, so does the powers of the character.
Spells and Supernatural abilities - Those are direct outward manifastations of the magic. Instead of fortifying their bodies, some specialize in shaping the very world around them.
Healing - Most cannot simply donate or accept reserves of power used to sustain your very body as a living whole. But with the right adjustment, magic can be used to provide such replenishments. The gods are very adapt and providing their clerics with the capability to do so via their divine bond.
Natural healing - Resting heals PCs at an amazing rate, and from crippling injuries. Their personal stores of power replenish and their ability to maintain their body's integrity quickly returns to full capacity.
Multi-classing - While most of their juvenile years were spent learning to control their innate powers and apply them to a basic set of ability of a certain type, once they do so PCs are capable of quickly and easily pick up other skills, ones that might often take a lifetime of study to master.
Endomagical - Abilities that are achieved via internalizing of magical energy and suffusing it within oneself.
Exomagical - Abilities that are achieved via externalizing of magical energy, and putting it to specific use.
Psi-plane - A construct of your very soul, it is unique to each individual. It is residing in their subconscious, and few actually get to see their own, much less others. Psions often do, as to monks in their effort to harden their very soul, to protect themselves from enchantment.
The classes
Barbarians - are those who channel their magic through powerful emotions and brute force. It manifests as short bursts of enhanced power via rage, improved speed and stamina, and even eventually shrugging off minor damage, as their body acclimates to constant damage and repair.
Bards - manifesting their arcane power via music, bards burn brightly with the power of magic, often due to a magical being as an ancestor.
Clerics - Their faith is their strength, they bind their very souls into the service of their gods, their powers are augmented and transformed. No longer mere arcane magic, but divinely infused magic. Most pursue the divine powers with zeal, but a few (magic domain) master some arcane spells of their own powers, some even learn and research their own unique spells. Knowledge of such spells is not granted from the gods, but used with a cleric's own font of power, after proper divine infusion that is.
Druits - Bind themselves to the spirit of the land, their spells focus on the natural, on the neutral, on the the ability to shape shift and commune with and control animals. They gain many gifts from the natural spirits of the land, which they mostly express exomagically
Fighters - They boost their speed and coordination to get a better chance of hitting, and to hit more often in the same period of time, they maintain excellent health, and quickly master complicated and near impossible "martial" moves.
Monks - Monks forgo any focus on armor and exomagical abilities. They internalize the entirety of their magic, they master the flows and ebbs of it within their own body, reinforce their psi-plane, and their body. They become neigh untouchable, and able to deal massive damage with their bear arms and legs. For a monk, their body is their weapon.
Paladins - like clerics paladins bind their souls to a deity. Which gives great powers and rewards. They have a balance of both exomagical and endomagical abilities. Unlike the cleric which is mainly Exomagical.
Rangers - Like druids bind themselves to the spirits of the land, but focus much more on endomagical powers.
Rogues - Rogues apply their magical talent to reinforce otherwise mundane by useful skills. Social skills, a sixth sense for finding traps, and masting a very large of amount of skills in a very small amount of time is a hullmark of this class. They moderately reinforce their bodies with endomagical powers.
Wizards - Wizards apply their magic almost entirely exomagically, making it as available as possible to be shaped and manipulated as they see fit. They approach it in a very structured manner, based on scientific experimentation and learning. They are thus most capable in understanding exactly how those powers work, and how to utilize them in ways others could never dream of.
Sorcerers - Sorcerers are less academic then wizards, they work on intution and force of will. They focus on raw power, and are the most exomagical of any class. They can cast the most spells per day, and do so at will without any preparation. But their lack of knowledge as to the exact means by which they do so prevents them from mastering more than a few spells.
Psions - Psions would seem to be extremely exomagical to some, but are actually highly balanced. They spend little effort masting the ability to toughen their bodies. But they sharpen their mind constantly, and imbue it with fantastical abilities, which then allow it to transform energy and use it exomagically to produce spell like effects, but in ways ungraspable by others.
MORE TO FOLLOW (including some actual alternate rules should they be wished, feel free to only use the fluff though).