Mystify
2012-02-11, 12:36 PM
Its a common trope. There is good magic which is pure, and dark magic, which is powerful and alluring, but very dangerous and corrupting.
I have never seen a system properly great a proper balance between the two. Darkl magic shouldn't be stronger, but it should appear to be stronger and a fast path to power.
So I thought of a method to so that. Dark magics stated effects are, in fact, stronger than light magic. However, dark magic is taboo, and there is not much information available. It is common knowledge that it is dangerous. Each spell has some unstated negative effects.
However, if the spell has extra effects, they have to be written somewhere. Even if the DMG equivalent has a section called "The negatives of spells", and you keep the players from reading it, the DM still reads it. Then next time you run a campaign and he is a player. Now the player knows what the downside is, and the mysterious temptation is gone.
Of course, he could play like he didn't know, but it would be better if he truly didn't know. It also helps to tempt the player, not just the character.
To get around this problem, I came up with the idea of random repercussions. The list of random repercussions should be hidden and not read, but even if you do read it then its not as big a deal, since you still don't know what will happen. When a spell is used in a campaign, the DM randomly selects the reprecussion of the spell, and that is how the spell works in this campaign.
For instance:
Raise dead
by performing dark rites, you bring a person back from death.
Possible reprecussions:
1. Caster gains a ton of corruption, but spell works
2. Zombies. Nuff said.
3. Requires a sacrificial life force; if none is provided the caster's is used
4. ironic twist of fate. The person is brought back, but not to the end the caste desired. If he brought back an old girlfreind, she will turn out to not love him, for example. This will proceed to tear his life apart.
5. Dead person's body is possessed by a malevolent spirit.
6. Person is brought back to life, but their body is still dead. They suffer the agony of a rotting body, and will not heal or die unless the body is destroyed.
7. Balance of fate. Somebody else close to the caster will die in an ironic manner
8. half-life. The dead person must feed on life force to sustain themselves.
9. ghost. The persons spirit returns as a ghost, trapped in the mortal realm.
10. Failure. The person is not brought back, and the caster loses something important in the attempt. An arm, a leg, a few years of life, etc.
These will be weighted, so corruption is the most common result. This means the spell works as advertised, but gaining corruption would have long term negatives, and would probably feature elements of addiction. This means you can't dismiss the spell as not working. It might work. It might go horribly. wrong. Its risky and dangerous, but you know that just due to it being dark magic, reading the options doesn't change that.
The actual reprecussions are not told to the player. Any corruption is tracked by the DM. Downsides are not stated, but the results of the downsides are told to the players. They can observe that the raisee is feeding on people's life force, but that it is an effect of the spell is never stated.
If corruption starts having effects on the character, they are told the effects, but not the source. They can only track their corruption by seeing the effects it has on them. This also helps lure people to dark magic. It works, nothing bad seems to have happened, so they keep doing it.
I have never seen a system properly great a proper balance between the two. Darkl magic shouldn't be stronger, but it should appear to be stronger and a fast path to power.
So I thought of a method to so that. Dark magics stated effects are, in fact, stronger than light magic. However, dark magic is taboo, and there is not much information available. It is common knowledge that it is dangerous. Each spell has some unstated negative effects.
However, if the spell has extra effects, they have to be written somewhere. Even if the DMG equivalent has a section called "The negatives of spells", and you keep the players from reading it, the DM still reads it. Then next time you run a campaign and he is a player. Now the player knows what the downside is, and the mysterious temptation is gone.
Of course, he could play like he didn't know, but it would be better if he truly didn't know. It also helps to tempt the player, not just the character.
To get around this problem, I came up with the idea of random repercussions. The list of random repercussions should be hidden and not read, but even if you do read it then its not as big a deal, since you still don't know what will happen. When a spell is used in a campaign, the DM randomly selects the reprecussion of the spell, and that is how the spell works in this campaign.
For instance:
Raise dead
by performing dark rites, you bring a person back from death.
Possible reprecussions:
1. Caster gains a ton of corruption, but spell works
2. Zombies. Nuff said.
3. Requires a sacrificial life force; if none is provided the caster's is used
4. ironic twist of fate. The person is brought back, but not to the end the caste desired. If he brought back an old girlfreind, she will turn out to not love him, for example. This will proceed to tear his life apart.
5. Dead person's body is possessed by a malevolent spirit.
6. Person is brought back to life, but their body is still dead. They suffer the agony of a rotting body, and will not heal or die unless the body is destroyed.
7. Balance of fate. Somebody else close to the caster will die in an ironic manner
8. half-life. The dead person must feed on life force to sustain themselves.
9. ghost. The persons spirit returns as a ghost, trapped in the mortal realm.
10. Failure. The person is not brought back, and the caster loses something important in the attempt. An arm, a leg, a few years of life, etc.
These will be weighted, so corruption is the most common result. This means the spell works as advertised, but gaining corruption would have long term negatives, and would probably feature elements of addiction. This means you can't dismiss the spell as not working. It might work. It might go horribly. wrong. Its risky and dangerous, but you know that just due to it being dark magic, reading the options doesn't change that.
The actual reprecussions are not told to the player. Any corruption is tracked by the DM. Downsides are not stated, but the results of the downsides are told to the players. They can observe that the raisee is feeding on people's life force, but that it is an effect of the spell is never stated.
If corruption starts having effects on the character, they are told the effects, but not the source. They can only track their corruption by seeing the effects it has on them. This also helps lure people to dark magic. It works, nothing bad seems to have happened, so they keep doing it.