Warfare in Fantasy Setting [NO D&D allowed]

[Man on Fire]

The discussion about how warfare would be affected in fantasy settings.

I would like to ask you not to discuss this in Dungeons & Dragons terms, thread about it is already here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=239695) and another here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=240783) and I want to take the discussion out from the game - I'm more interested in actual story than mechanics and sadly, with D&D it's all mechanics, optimization and gaming mentality I don't care about. I want to discuss this in terms of narrative structure, common sense, morality, long-time strategy, tactics, technological advancement politics, society, your average joe and things like that.

[Mx.Silver]

Honestly, wouldn't this rather depend on which fantasy setting we're talking about? Because the big thing in determining how warfare works is tech level and especially how magic works and what it can do. Are wizards rare or common, and does how magic works make them battlefield support and/or mobile artillery (e.g. Warhammer) or are they more suited to campaign logistics (e.g. [i]Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell[i/]). Essentially, the less decisive an effect magic has, the more in common the setting's wars will have with real world wars of similar tech level. Both of these factors can vary pretty hugely in between different tech settings.

[Tavar]

As said before, if you don't specify the rules regarding the fantasy, then there isn't a cogent answer I can give you. There are so many different rules regarding magic, and each results in a different scenario.

[Lord Raziere]

Yea, what Tavar said. "What is Warfare in a Fantasy Setting Like" is like asking "What are People like on this Continent?" the question is too wide and the answers are too many.

[Man on Fire]

I think we could just discuss this from different angles, comparing many settings, but okay, if you guys belive it wo't work and want to have defined setting, I prepared a list of questions we should have answered. I don't want to enforce anything on you, so this should let you create setting you guys want to discuss - treat it as set of guidelines.

1) Is magic common or rare?
2) Is magic respected or feared?
3) Is magic something you can learn or you need to be born with it?
4) Does becoming semi decent wizard is easy and fast or takes many years of hard studies
5) Are the rules of magic understood or does wizard focus a lot of their time and resources to understand it's nature and it's a subject of heathen debate?
6) Is using magic only a matter of skill/knowledge or does it comes with a price?
7) Is magic a powerful force you can use openly, in quick dominating and effective way or more subtle power that works quiletly and slow, almost unnoticed for common people?
8) If kings keep wizards do they are infulential and respected or don;t have more to say than a farm-boy?
9) Is magic tolerated by religion or is it seen as sin/evil force that must be destroyed?
10) Are wizards united in one organization or divided and of various, often mutually exclusive, goals and alliegances?
11) Are humans only one race or there exist others?
12) Are magical creatures common or rare?
13) Are magical creatures easy to tame or hard to control?
14) if there are gods, do they meddle in afairs of mortals or preffer to left them to their own devices?
15) Are magical items rare or common
16) Are magical items incredibly powerful or can do only a little things?
17) Is there only one kind of magic or are there multiple schools that differs in the way of use?

[Maxios]

Dungeons and Dragons enters the room. "Hey every-[sees sign]oh." Dungeons and Dragons sadly walks away.

[t209]

I think we could just discuss this from different angles, comparing many settings, but okay, if you guys belive it wo't work and want to have defined setting, I prepared a list of questions we should have answered. I don't want to enforce anything on you, so this should let you create setting you guys want to discuss - treat it as set of guidelines.

1) Is magic common or rare?
2) Is magic respected or feared?
3) Is magic something you can learn or you need to be born with it?
4) Does becoming semi decent wizard is easy and fast or takes many years of hard studies
5) Are the rules of magic understood or does wizard focus a lot of their time and resources to understand it's nature and it's a subject of heathen debate?
6) Is using magic only a matter of skill/knowledge or does it comes with a price?
7) Is magic a powerful force you can use openly, in quick dominating and effective way or more subtle power that works quiletly and slow, almost unnoticed for common people?
8) If kings keep wizards do they are infulential and respected or don;t have more to say than a farm-boy?
9) Is magic tolerated by religion or is it seen as sin/evil force that must be destroyed?
10) Are wizards united in one organization or divided and of various, often mutually exclusive, goals and alliegances?
11) Are humans only one race or there exist others?
12) Are magical creatures common or rare?
13) Are magical creatures easy to tame or hard to control?
14) if there are gods, do they meddle in afairs of mortals or preffer to left them to their own devices?
15) Are magical items rare or common
16) Are magical items incredibly powerful or can do only a little things?
17) Is there only one kind of magic or are there multiple schools that differs in the way of use?

How about the effectiveness of gunpowder weapons (Magic exist in Warhammer and Warmachines but they have guns)?
P.S- I wonder if there are Fantasy games with gunpowder (It'll be cool to see Paladin looking like Wh40k space marine with flintlock pistol and sword).

[GenericGuy]

How about the effectiveness of gunpowder weapons (Magic exist in Warhammer and Warmachines but they have guns)?
P.S- I wonder if there are Fantasy games with gunpowder (It'll be cool to see Paladin looking like Wh40k space marine with flintlock pistol and sword).

One of my favorite CRPGs was Arcanum, and it had a typical fantasy world going through the industrial revolution. That backstory had a bunch of highly skilled classically trained knights get cut down by unskilled conscripts, who had guns. However, In terms of gameplay the guns were really not as good as melee, magic, or bows.

[Brother Oni]

How about the effectiveness of gunpowder weapons (Magic exist in Warhammer and Warmachines but they have guns)?
P.S- I wonder if there are Fantasy games with gunpowder (It'll be cool to see Paladin looking like Wh40k space marine with flintlock pistol and sword).

I believe in the older versions of Warhammer, Khornate chaos champions could get magic bolters as a champion reward.
I forget how effective they were though.

I think in the Dragonlance setting, they had tinker gnomes that had effectively invented gunpowder weapons and I know Spelljammer had magical equivalents.

[KnightDisciple]

Pathfinder by this point not only has guns (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/firearms), but actually has a paladin archetype (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/paladin/archetypes/paizo---paladin-archetypes/holy-gun) specifically dedicated to using guns.
Heck, if you can convince your DM, you can even run around with revolvers and a lever-action rifle!

[Selrahc]

P.S- I wonder if there are Fantasy games with gunpowder (It'll be cool to see Paladin looking like Wh40k space marine with flintlock pistol and sword).

Have (http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/)you (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_9)really (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Tower_%28series%29)never (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwarf_%28Warhammer%29#Dwarf_technology)encountered (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fable_III)a (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelljammer)fantasy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warcraft)setting (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everworld)with (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_age_2#Setting)widespread (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dresden_files)use of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserk_%28manga%29)gunpowder (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirates_of_the_Caribbean)?

[Ravens_cry]

Pathfinder by this point not only has guns (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/firearms), but actually has a paladin archetype (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/paladin/archetypes/paizo---paladin-archetypes/holy-gun) specifically dedicated to using guns.
Heck, if you can convince your DM, you can even run around with revolvers and a lever-action rifle!
More subtly, but just as important, it also has clockwork, including pocket watches, and printing presses.

[Morty]

There's one issue you seem to be forgetting. There may be no "wizards" at all. Mortals might simply not have access to magic at all, or they may only have stuff like alchemy, rituals or somesuch that has limited or simply no effect on warfare.
Futhermore, plenty of issues regarding usage of magic in combat have nothing to do with actual magic. It may be affected by culture, history, religion... many things.

[Jayngfet]

Really it depends on how anochristic the tech level is and what kind of magic is so widespread.

You could easily have a pseudo-modern soldier with his rapid repeating multi-bow crossbow with a curved groove and an attached sword bayonett, throw in some kind of simple grenades, and wind up with a vaguely modern soldier. It wouldn't be realistic considering how all the individual compnonents developed in different ages in real life, but it'd work for fantasy provided you justified it.

Or if you have a reasonable population of wizards with heavy offensive magic, that changes the game all over again. One fireball would be enough to take down a cluster of cheap conscripts and would probably make metal armor incredibly uncomfortable to say the least.

Hell, one good sized dragon would be a game changer on it's own: It'd be fast enough in the air to get around catapaults and hard to aim for with cannons and ballistas, it'd be thick-skinned enough to avoid worry about arrows and bolts, and a blast of fire would be enough to completley ruin anything in range.

Just a few ogres or trolls would wreck ANYTHING conventional. They'd smash catapults, tear through knights in plate, and if you gave them a ranged weapon even pre-gunpowder the size and power of something to that scale could put a hole in whatever poor fool it hits and probably tear out the other side if there's no armor. Hell, just giving them a sling of that size would tear off any bits of a man they impacted. Lord have mercy if they wear armor, they'd be the fantasy equivalent to an entire tank by themselves.


Terrain is another big factor. I mean those ogres and dragons are all well and good on a hypothetical flat plane where everything is nice and neat but if you have to fight in a densely wooded area with so much rain that catching a good fire is next to impossible a couple of smaller, faster goblin teams suddenly manage to pick your soldiers off with gurella tactics. If you're at sea and your big main ship sinks while your dragon is in the air he's kind of out of luck unless you have something big enough to land on and you've lost it even if you win the battle as a whole unless it can reach the coast.

Just like actual war it comes down to who's got the best stuff in the best conditions very often. Who's got flying units? What's the strongest type of soldier you've got? What's the range on your spellcasters, if they even HAVE that much offensive magic?

[Man on Fire]

There's one issue you seem to be forgetting. There may be no "wizards" at all. Mortals might simply not have access to magic at all, or they may only have stuff like alchemy, rituals or somesuch that has limited or simply no effect on warfare.
Futhermore, plenty of issues regarding usage of magic in combat have nothing to do with actual magic. It may be affected by culture, history, religion... many things.

Yeah, we should take this all also in consideration - in fact, maybe I should change the thread to be about the way magic and magical creatures would have affect the society in general?

[KnightDisciple]

Yeah, we should take this all also in consideration - in fact, maybe I should change the thread to be about the way magic and magical creatures would have affect the society in general?

Hm. I dunno. I think the focus isn't too bad. I mean, it's good for people to ask the questions they are, but at the same time, I think it's fair for you or others to try and construct a hypothetical scenario/setting.

I mean, even that question you propose has thousands of answers, because it depends on the nature of the magic and the magical creatures.

[Morty]

Yeah, we should take this all also in consideration - in fact, maybe I should change the thread to be about the way magic and magical creatures would have affect the society in general?

That's even broader than the original topic, so discussing meaningfully would be even harder.
And besides, why are we focusing on a Tolkienesque fantasy world, anyhow? What about urban fantasy? Or things that are harder to classify, like the Exalted setting?

[Soras Teva Gee]

Way I see it magical warfare depend on a plot along three axises

X: Combat Effectiveness of Magic
Y: Commonality of Magic
Z: Overall Advancement of the Setting.

At the high end on all three you have say Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, where magic is common enough for a full on magitech society. Tech level is above our own and the dimensions are open for travel, leading to something around magic based Star Trek level. And on the fighting end.... its where elementary aged school-girls can level cities while flying like fighter jets. And TSAB ships can just skip the nuke scale and go for somewhere between a Krakatoa and Yellowstone Eruption Event. (And historically it was even worse)

Then there's say the DC/Marvel one where classic Doctor Strange killed seven Elder Gods before breakfast and Galactus roams (he's de facto magical despite claims to the contrary) but where magic is broadly speaking sufficiently rare enough it doesn't effect things overall that much.

Dropping the setting advancement to preindustrial while being rare enough to not dominate society as a whole and and your high mark is probably the Wheel Of Time. Where a couple hundred Channelers can annihilate a 40k army like that isn't even a thing. And the two most powerful artifact working together could crack the planet like an egg, literally.

Dropping the power of magic but going back up on the advancement level you have like the Dresden Files where magic looses badly. As Harry is one of the brawniest wizards on the planet but a single .50 cal round smashed his defense and was only stopped by where his duster double layered. On Harry is like top ten for power in his setting, while .50 cal weapons are common as dirt.

Finally on the low end for magic you probably have A Song of Fire and Ice where its not only ridiculously and extremely rare but is of little use for direct combat.

[Surfing HalfOrc]

Some of it depends upon on what you mean by fantasy.

"Any sufficiently advances technology is indistinguishable from magic."

In the Safehold novels by David Weber, the main character Merlin Athrawes is actually a cybernetic avatar of a woman named Nimue Alban. He/she introduces small but vital technological changes to a pre-steam technology. So is Merlin a wizard, or just an android? Merlin also uses his technology to help in the war efforts, using nearly microscopic "bugs" to eavesdrop on the enemy commanders, his android's greater strength and speed, aircraft, and his own weapons are designed to look like medieval weapons, but are made of modern materials.

So, clairvoyance/clairaudience spells, haste, bull's strength, flying carpet/broom of flying, and magically enhanced weapons? Merlin introduces a revolver, a small but significant advance from a muzzle-loading pistol of one or two barrels. The line between technology and magic blurs...

Look at what spells might be available to a Battle Wizard, and look across sources. You've eliminated D&D, but look at World of Warcraft, GURPS, regular fantasy, whatever.

The books themselves are focused on this type of warfare. Most of the battles are cannon equipped sailing ships and single shot rifle or sword equipped Marines vs. mostly equally equipped humans. The minor technological advantages are just enough to swing the battle the way of the protagonists.

[Aux-Ash]

Like I mentioned in another thread: One thing that must be considered is scale. It is very easy to overestimate magic's importance because it seemingly can do "anything".

It is quite frankly not enough that magic can do a lot. It needs to be able to do so consistently and in enough quantity if warfare and/or society are to be changed by it. The same thing applies to all things fantastical.

Warfare isn't changed by a single flying pegasi. But the warfare (and society) is irrecognicable if every nation breeds them in the hundreds.
Just because a giant has the brute strength and size to smash a formation doesn't mean you can field them, because the pivotal question is if 80+ pikes/polearms is enough to prevent him from doing it easily.

An exploding fireball sounds impressive. But if it can only be used a handful of times a day at at worst only takes down a few dozen then hundreds of fireball-throwers are needed before conventional strategy needs to account for them.

Teleportation doesn't nullify overland travel before it becomes cheaper, simpler and can take greater quantities of cargo.

Magic (and other fantastical elements) does, almost by definition, sound impressive. And on a individual level it can very easily seem so significant that it's impossible to at a glance consider how it couldn't change the world.

But it's so very easy to underestimate just how large the world is. Especially in this age when we casually talk to people on the other side of the world and can fly to them within a couple of days if we need to.

But the world is actually mindboggingly big. It's difficult to fathom the scales and numbers that shape society and when we do work with them it's only on an abstract level. If what the fantastical elements can only affect what is essentially a drop in the water next to the scale that society and or warfare actually uses... then it's impact is at best limited.

And if magic is on such a level that it equals or surpasses what the common world achieves... then nothing we know or take for granted is necessarily true anymore.

[Selrahc]

It wouldn't be realistic considering how all the individual compnonents developed in different ages in real life, but it'd work for fantasy provided you justified it.

You mean it wouldn't be historical. Since most fantasy worlds aren't based on the actual real world, that doesn't really mean it isn't realistic.

[t209]

Have (http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/)you (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Fantasy_9)really (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Tower_%28series%29)never (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwarf_%28Warhammer%29#Dwarf_technology)encountered (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fable_III)a (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelljammer)fantasy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warcraft)setting (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everworld)with (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_age_2#Setting)widespread (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dresden_files)use of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berserk_%28manga%29)gunpowder (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirates_of_the_Caribbean)?

BTW, Beserk is only Cannons (Gunpowder as in pistols and rifles). I know these fantasies but I wanted to know about flintlock firearms in D&D style games (not a crappy one or the one in Pathfinder).
Okay! Do you think a person with muskets is like WH40k Imperial Guard equivalent (In Warhammer, musketeer always get beaten by Armored Chosen).

[Corvus]

My view is that the more powerful and ubiquitous the magic, the more irregular the warfare becomes. If you can start tossing out clouds of death or balls of fire, mass units of troops are going to serve little purpose.

Instead you have strike teams of special units running around nuking stuff.

[SoC175]

How about the effectiveness of gunpowder weapons (Magic exist in Warhammer and Warmachines but they have guns)?
P.S- I wonder if there are Fantasy games with gunpowder (It'll be cool to see Paladin looking like Wh40k space marine with flintlock pistol and sword).Well, in D&D (*duck*) on the campaign world of Oerth (Greyhawk Setting) there's a hero-deity of technology and he just happens to have an order of paladins that are among the rare users of gunpowder weapons.

[Wardog]

I suppose a good way to do this would be to consider all the technological and social changes that significantly altered warfare in the real world, and then see what fantasy elements would duplicate / accelerate / negate those changes.

A few examples:
Firearms: eventually made medieval-style full armour obsolete (and ironically made swords useful again, because armour had become effectively sword-proof).

Now, in many fantasy settings (including but by no means limited to D&D), magic generally ignores armour. So if wizards shooting balls of fire or magical missiles becomes a common sight in warfare, then (in contrast to most games), heavy armour may become obsolete. (Other changes brought about by firearms probably won't be duplicated, unless entire regiments of wizards become commonplace).


Cannon/artillery: made major changes in castle/fortress design necessary, because old-style high-walled castles could easily be demolished, and were replaced with this sort of thing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_fort).

So if wizards can easily demolish castle walls with earthquakes, blasting spells, then similar design changes may be necessary. On the other hand, if a fireball is more like a gas explosion, or unconfined gunpowder than an artillery shell (lots of heat, and enough force to injure or kill a human, but not much good for demolition), then they might make traditional castles even better defences, because a wizard on the walls will make it much harder to use any attacking strategy or siege equipment that requires having a lot of men in a tight formation (ladders, battering rams, etc).


Moving away from tactical considerations, any magic that can make food production and healthcare more like that of the present day than of the middle ages will mean you can field much larger armies (because you can feed more people, and don't need to keep so many of them back at the farm). This will also cause other major changes to society, creating a larger urban population, perhapse leading to increased industrialization (maybe an early industrial revolution), or a larger educated class (maybe resulting in magic users becoming far more common, and exagerating and accelerating all the changes just described).

[Lothston]

I'm more interested in actual story than mechanics and sadly, with D&D it's all mechanics, optimization and gaming mentality I don't care about. I want to discuss this in terms of narrative structure, common sense, morality, long-time strategy, tactics, technological advancement politics, society, your average joe and things like that.

That's funny on a number of levels.

First, probably the most extensive example of how magic affects "narrative structure, common sense, morality, long-time strategy, tactics, technological advancement politics, society, your average joe and things like that" is (surprise surprise) D&D. If you count the novels, it becomes utterly ridiculous, but the sourcebooks are an excellent source of all that by themselves. E.g. the descriptions of how magic would affect combat on a large scale, posted by some fellow forumites above, have long been available in significantly greater detail in books such as "Heroes of Battle" and "Power of Faerun".

Second, "mechanics, optimization and gaming mentality" is, sadly, exactly how people would react to magic should it ever become real. After all, that's how our civilization was built.

So, I believe your premise is deeply flawed from the get-go: you're trying to build an interesting story while at the same time denying the basis and underlying structure of any such story: the world mechanics and the "gaming mentality" of pro-active people.

However, to reply to your question on a substantial level:

I believe the greatest "game-changer" of magic would be the ability of people to become demigods: effective immortality, instant travel, time distortion, shapeshifting, extreme destructive power all in the hands of a single human being.

All rationally minded people would undoubtedly seek this power. Civilization as we know it will cease to exist, and an entirely new culture - unfathomable by our mentality - will appear in its place.

[The Glyphstone]

As has been said many times previously, it depends on what sort of fantasy and how much, and how close to the real world it hews in the first place. What comes to mind immediately for me is the Temeraire series - quite literally, 'Napoleonic Wars...WITH DRAGONS'. Dragons are real, come in a wide variety of sizes and breeds, and - at least in Europe - are more-or-less domesticated for the purposes of warfare. What this does is turn the Napoleonic Wars into a weird fusion between what they actually were and World War I - the best and commonly accepted use for dragons are (A) fighting off enemy dragons, and (B) strapping crews to their backs to use as bombing platforms, like fighter planes and bombers were used for. Breeds with special attacks like fire or acid breath are prized for their bombardment value, small, speedy 'lightweights' act as message couriers and scouts, while ground troops have invented things like barbed cannonballs to tear wings and grapeshot infused with hot pepper as deterrents against strafing runs.

[Man on Fire]

That's funny on a number of levels.

First, probably the most extensive example of how magic affects "narrative structure, common sense, morality, long-time strategy, tactics, technological advancement politics, society, your average joe and things like that" is (surprise surprise) D&D. If you count the novels, it becomes utterly ridiculous, but the sourcebooks are an excellent source of all that by themselves. E.g. the descriptions of how magic would affect combat on a large scale, posted by some fellow forumites above, have long been available in significantly greater detail in books such as "Heroes of Battle" and "Power of Faerun".

Second, "mechanics, optimization and gaming mentality" is, sadly, exactly how people would react to magic should it ever become real. After all, that's how our civilization was built.

So, I believe your premise is deeply flawed from the get-go: you're trying to build an interesting story while at the same time denying the basis and underlying structure of any such story: the world mechanics and the "gaming mentality" of pro-active people.

However, to reply to your question on a substantial level:

I believe the greatest "game-changer" of magic would be the ability of people to become demigods: effective immortality, instant travel, time distortion, shapeshifting, extreme destructive power all in the hands of a single human being.

All rationally minded people would undoubtedly seek this power. Civilization as we know it will cease to exist, and an entirely new culture - unfathomable by our mentality - will appear in its place.

1) I think that novels actually should be allowed, D&D-related threads about this topic are all about the rules.
2) It is my belief that omnipotent, undefeatable wizards, who can solve all their problems in three seconds doesn't make a good story. Good game characters? Yes. somebody I would like to have in my part? Sure. Somebody I would like to read about? No.
3) It is also my belief that a strategy always tryumphs over the power, no matter how large it wouldn't be (and before somebody will bring Start of Darkness - despite what he's saying there, Xykon is using a strategy, his entire build is made to let him beat casters and even in that battle he is using a reasonable tactic). As I once said, Sun Tzu's Great Book Of War isn't going to be made obsolete just because of one guy in pijamas who can summon tornado made out of bees.
4) I think we should have put other things in consideration, not only magic, and sadly, D&D thread devolved into "Wizards Are Awesome", completely ignoring pretty much everything else - political and sociological impact, existence of fantastic creatures, human nature (and there is much more to it than "we want more power" - what about fear, prejudice, distrust, convervativism, greed, jealously) change of the society or industrial impact in favor of wizard utopia. D&D also ignores settings which are anything but standard D&D setting - this game does horrible job at reflecting any kind of fantasy aside High Fantasy and some High-Power Heroic Fantasy, where magic is omnipotent and common. What about setting where it's powerful but rare ( like Black Company or Berserk), common but very limited or even rare and limited? What about settings that doesn't work on vacian casting or where you cannot mix different schools of magic? D&D utterly and completely fails at reflecting any of them without massive homebrewing, at which point you aren't playing D&D anymore but your own game. Look at Temeraire Glyphstone mentioned - Dragons there are rare and look what impact they made, series would look completely different if they were as common as chickens.

[Lothston]

1) I think that novels actually should be allowed, D&D-related threads about this topic are all about the rules.

The novels are deeply rooted in the rules. So is non-RPG fantasy, though it might seem strange to you. Every writer who invents a fantastic world also invents its rules, otherwise it's not professional writing, just bad fanfiction.


2) It is my belief that omnipotent, undefeatable wizards, who can solve all their problems in three seconds doesn't make a good story. Good game characters? Yes. somebody I would like to have in my part? Sure. Somebody I would like to read about? No.

Then why do you want magic in the first place?

Also, who says powerful wizards are omnipotent and undefeatable? Just because you can't imagine ways to defeat them doesn't mean a good writer can't. E.g. Sauron in Lord of the Rings was very powerful, practically a demigod himself, yet was defeated - though it took three books of excellent writing to do so.


3) It is also my belief that a strategy always tryumphs over the power, no matter how large it wouldn't be (and before somebody will bring Start of Darkness - despite what he's saying there, Xykon is using a strategy, his entire build is made to let him beat casters and even in that battle he is using a reasonable tactic). As I once said, Sun Tzu's Great Book Of War isn't going to be made obsolete just because of one guy in pijamas who can summon tornado made out of bees.

Your eloquence on the topics of strategy and power is substantially undermined by your inability to spell. And you probably mean The Art of War, not "Great Book of War". As for tornadoes and summoning thereof, let me offer a simple metaphore: imagine, instead of a scrawny wizard, a modern tank with thermal vision, two machine guns and a large-caliber main gun putting cumulative rounds through a man-sized targer at a distance of over 2,000 yards. What strategy could a medieval force employ to "tryumph" over this machine over the course of a single battle? And over the course of a campaign, add to the tank some modern infantry, field recon, artillery and air support. Any ideas?

That's the kind of force multiplyer magic is. Actually, scratch that: satellite reconnaissance, long-range strategic bombers and nuclear warheads, that's more like it. Against a medieval army. Yeah, right.

And it's funny you invoke Xykon, since he's a notorious believer in power.

Bottom line: "strategy always tryumphs over the power" is an oversimplification with no connection to reality.


4) I think we should have put other things in consideration, not only magic, and sadly, D&D thread devolved into "Wizards Are Awesome", completely ignoring pretty much everything else - political and sociological impact, existence of fantastic creatures, human nature (and there is much more to it than "we want more power" - what about fear, prejudice, distrust, convervativism, greed, jealously) change of the society or industrial impact in favor of wizard utopia.

Fear, prejudice, distrust, conservativism, greed and jealousy all either cause people to desire power, or appear because of not having enough power, or both.

Needless to say, wizards (or rather, magic-users as such) are an excellent solution to this conundrum: they offer power the likes of which has never been seen in this world. Who cares about fantastic creatures or the emotions of others when you can have that?


D&D also ignores settings which are anything but standard D&D setting - this game does horrible job at reflecting any kind of fantasy aside High Fantasy and some High-Power Heroic Fantasy, where magic is omnipotent and common. What about setting where it's powerful but rare ( like Black Company or Berserk), common but very limited or even rare and limited?

A horrible job, you say? How about just, you know, making magic rare in your campaign? Populate the world with non-spellcasting classes and only a few casters of the limited sort? Disallow classes like Wizard and Cleric, or stop them half-way? What's stopping you, if that's the game you want to play you can do it easily with D&D mechanics.

In fact, if you wanted a low-magic world, you should have specified it in your starting post, no?


What about settings that doesn't work on vacian casting or where you cannot mix different schools of magic? D&D utterly and completely fails at reflecting any of them without massive homebrewing, at which point you aren't playing D&D anymore but your own game.

Non-vancian magic? Warlocks, psionics, binders, Incarnum, "blade magic" to name a few.

Really, it seems you're just crusading against D&D without a good reason.

[Lord Raziere]

Lothston, if he doesn't want DnD in the thread, don't bring DnD into the thread. Thats thread logic 101. Chill ok? let a dead thread die, or at least let a sleeping thread lie….

[Man on Fire]

The novels are deeply rooted in the rules. So is non-RPG fantasy, though it might seem strange to you. Every writer who invents a fantastic world also invents its rules, otherwise it's not professional writing, just bad fanfiction.

As you said, every writers gives his own set of rules for magic. And you know what? D&D supports only their sets of rules and not any other. I want the discussion to be about all those other kinds, because limiting your imagination and way of thinking about magic just to one set of rules and worse, to set of rules estabilished by a game somebody didn't think through twice...I find that poisonous to the mind.


Then why do you want magic in the first place?

What? What kind of question is that? Jut because I don't want magic to be instant "I win" switch doesn' mean there shouldn't be any magic at all. You're creating false dichotomy here - either magic is all-powerfull or there is no magic. Which is stupid, there are many good books in which magic isn't all powerful yet they still are good and made more interesting by it's pressence, like Black Company where wizards are powerful but not invincible. If you cannot think of magic as anything other but what it is in D&D then that's another reason to don't talk about D&D.


Also, who says powerful wizards are omnipotent and undefeatable? Just because you can't imagine ways to defeat them doesn't mean a good writer can't. E.g. Sauron in Lord of the Rings was very powerful, practically a demigod himself, yet was defeated - though it took three books of excellent writing to do so.

The only problem is that in D&D wizard aren't just quite powerfull, they are undefetable, ask about tier system or look up Emperor Tippy's posts in thread about Warfare in 3.5 setting and how he argues that yes, wizards can beat everything.


Your eloquence on the topics of strategy and power is substantially undermined by your inability to spell.

What Did I spelled wrong?


And you probably mean The Art of War, not "Great Book of War".

That's a term I seen used as a synonymous to the title of that book. Sorry for the confusion.


As for tornadoes and summoning thereof, let me offer a simple metaphore: imagine, instead of a scrawny wizard, a modern tank with thermal vision, two machine guns and a large-caliber main gun putting cumulative rounds through a man-sized targer at a distance of over 2,000 yards. What strategy could a medieval force employ to "tryumph" over this machine over the course of a single battle?

Steal it? Kill the crew when they're takin dump? Seize something enemy general hold in value and order them to hand over the tank? Led it into a large hole? Sneak behind and drop greek fire into the cabin? Sneak into enemy camp kill the crew? Made it run out of fuel? Make it go foward and sacrifice few of your troops for the diversion while you're attacking from behind?


And over the course of a campaign, add to the tank some modern infantry, field recon, artillery and air support. Any ideas?

Where is all that coming from and how does it manage to sustain itself?

And introducing all of that in real life still didn't made Art Of War obsolete, you know?


That's the kind of force multiplyer magic is. Actually, scratch that: satellite reconnaissance, long-range strategic bombers and nuclear warheads, that's more like it. Against a medieval army. Yeah, right.

Only if you want it to be that. I made this threat to be not D&D to avoid a setting that enforces this kind of magic, because there are many others.


And it's funny you invoke Xykon, since he's a notorious believer in power.

He may belive in power, but he still uses strategy and tactics - in that very duel he admitted beliving in power he was using very basic, yet clever tactics of exploring enemy's obvious weakness. He just doesn't admit or even realize that.


Fear, prejudice, distrust, conservativism, greed and jealousy all either cause people to desire power, or appear because of not having enough power, or both.

Humans aren't all thinking the same way, not all of them have the same priorities, some of us may not desire power, some may follow belief that power corrupts, just degrading everything to "people wants power" is, how you said it, oh, yes, oversimplification with no connection to reality.


Needless to say, wizards (or rather, magic-users as such) are an excellent solution to this conundrum: they offer power the likes of which has never been seen in this world. Who cares about fantastic creatures or the emotions of others when you can have that?

And that's the kind of thinking that made me move away from those threads. I have no interest in setting where everybody vary between giving wizard a round of oral pleasure and asking for more. I dislike the idea of magic as easy cure for all worries and problems, it stips magic of it's beauty and the story of any reason to read it. I'm not interested in those stories nor I think they have place to be discussed in this thread. Or anywhere aside in use of terribly lazy writers.


A horrible job, you say? How about just, you know, making magic rare in your campaign?

There are entire threads about why it's a bad idea and how it makes the game unplayable.


Populate the world with non-spellcasting classes and only a few casters of the limited sort? Disallow classes like Wizard and Cleric, or stop them half-way? What's stopping you, if that's the game you want to play you can do it easily with D&D mechanics.

Because I would have to change so much it's easier to just play different game.


In fact, if you wanted a low-magic world, you should have specified it in your starting post, no?

I don't want only low-magic world. I don't want only single kind of world. Any single kind. I want to discuss all possible kinds. As I said, D&D allows only one without loads of banning or homebrewing, which means it doesn't have what I want.


Non-vancian magic? Warlocks, psionics, binders, Incarnum, "blade magic" to name a few.

Eh, I'll formulate the question differently. "What about setting that doesn't use any kind of magic offered by D&D?". Now, happy?


Really, it seems you're just crusading against D&D without a good reason.

For me it's seems you are just getting defensive because somebody doesn't like your favorite game. And quite frankly, I must ask you to stop. If we will be talking about D&D more we will get this thread closed and that's the last thing I want, especially after people started posting interesting things. You want to talk about warfre in fantasy setting? Okay, but please, don't metion D&D. If you want to talk about warfare in D&D, my OP post has links to two threads about it, go there.

[Man on Fire]

Sorry, not seeing my post again.

[Lothston]

{Scrubbed}

[Lord Raziere]

Yea…. "Prejudice" whatever…..and the thought that you might be the one thats prejudiced against him never crossed your mind? That your the one being the jerk stirring up business that was long buried and didn't have to be brought up again?

Really, Lothston why did you feel it necessary to dredge this up and go all JUSTICE on him over a game? A game he specifically requested that we not talk about in this thread? because the other thread got filled up too much with talk he didn't want, cause it wasn't the direction he was thinking?

It just doesn't feel like something defensive at all, you get my meaning?

[Lothston]

As you said, every writers gives his own set of rules for magic. And you know what? D&D supports only their sets of rules and not any other.

First of all, D&D supports a number of different types of magic, each with its own rules, some of which are significantly more powerful than others (e.g. compare Wizard magic to Incarnum and see the difference).

Secondly, even within one magic type D&D supports various classes which are different in power. E.g. compare Cleric to Ranger: both use divine spellcasting, yet one is Tier 1 and the other Tier 4.

Thirdly, no one says you have to allow all of D&D magic in your campaign. Access to magic can be severely limited without actually "breaking" anything.

Finally, there's this one thing called "houserules". Which are, actually, supported by D&D.

If in spite of all this variety you still have difficulties creating a campaign to your liking, I dare say the problem lies with you and not with the gaming system.


I want the discussion to be about all those other kinds, because limiting your imagination and way of thinking about magic just to one set of rules and worse, to set of rules estabilished by a game somebody din't though through twice...I find that poisonous to the mind.

Problem is, if you want to actually play a game with other people, you'd need a uniform set of rules to go by. And if D&D, despite all its infinite possibilities, is so "limiting" on your "imagination" that it "poisons" your "mind", I shudder to imagine what you think about chess.


What? What kind of question is that? Jut because I don't want magic to be instant "I win" switch doesn' mean there shouldn't be no magic at all. You're creating false dichotomy here - either magic is all-powerfull or there is no magic. Which is stupid

I'm glad you understand that, because it's actually you who's creating this dichotomy. See:


The only problem is that in D&D wizard eran't just quite powerfull, they are undefetable, ask about tier system or look up Emperor Tippy's posts in thread about Warfare in 3.5 setting and how he argues that yes, wizards can beat everything.

It's just like saying "in chess, a Queen can beat anything". Just because it's potentially the most powerful figure, doesn't mean it will always win the game. A chess master can play without a Queen and still defeat a rookie easily. And in some positions, a pawn can be more powerful than a Queen.

Furthermore, as I've noted above, wizards are by far not the only spellcasting class in D&D, and their kind of magic is not the only kind of magic.

So it's you who's creating the false dichotomy: "In D&D, all magic is wizard magic, and all wizard magic is undefeatable".


Which is stupid

Yep, you said it, dude.


there are many good books in which magic isn't all powerful yet they still are good and made more interesting by it's pressence, like Black Company where wizards are powerful but not invincible.

There you go again - "magic is all powerful", "wizards are invincible". Hello, false dichotomy! There is a number of non-magic builds which can give wizards a good run for their money, especially at low to mid levels (which is where most campaigns are played).


I you cannot think of magic as anything other but what it is in D&D then that's another reason to don't talk about D&D.

Thankfully I've read enough fantasy - and studied enough real-world occult practices - not to be dependent on D&D novels when judging magic (and honestly, most of these novels are poorly written trash, with some shining exceptions though).


What Did I spelled wrong?

Erm, never mind.


Steal it?

How? The crew's inside and they ain't coming out. During the course of a single battle, remember? (read: combat encounter).


Kill the crew when they're takin dump?

Again: not coming out. Single battle.


Seize something enemy general hold in value and order them to hand over the tank?

More value than a tank? That thing costs over a million bucks! Good luck finding something as valuable in your medieval society.


Led it into a large hole?

How? By posing as living bait? Remember: thermal vision and 2,000 yard range.

Also it's a tank, not a frikkin boar.


Sneak behind and drop greek fire into the cabin?

A) How will you sneak? Remember, your medieval guys don't know anything about thermal sensors, infrared scanners and long-range optics.

B) All hatches are closed, so there's no way to drop anything into the crew compartment.


Sneak into enemy camp kill the crew?

Again, single battle. If you want to fight a campaign, add infantry, recon etc. (in wizard terms, divination magic, magic item crafting, various minions - undead, dominated, constructs etc.)


Made it run out of fuel?

By squishing your guys with its treads? Good idea. Also, can't outrun a bullet.


Make it go foward and sacrifice few of your troops for the diversion while you're attacking from behind?

How are you going to attack a tank from behind? With swords? Remember you're medieval, you don't even know how tanks work.


Where is all that coming from and how does it manage to sustain itself?

It's to simulate a wizard. A wizard is perfectly self-sustainable, and if given downtime (out of battle conditions) can go to town on a whole new angle.


And introducing all of tht in real life still didn't made Art Of War obsolete, you know?

I think you understand Sun Tzu a lot less than you think you do.


I made this threat to be not D&D to avoid a setting that enforces this kind of magic, because there are many others.

And again, in D&D there are many kinds of magic to choose from. Hell, you can even make a campaign completely devoid of magic, and D&D will still have more than enough stuff to play with.


He may belive in power, but he still uses strategy and tactics in that very duel he admitted beliving in power he was using very basic, yet clever tactics of exploring enemy's obvious weakness. He just doesn't admit or even realize that.

Strategy and tactics are force multipliers, but to use them, you got to have force in the first place. Xykon is an epic-level sorcerer lich, possibly the single most powerful non-divine (and non-infernal) creature in OoTS. How did he get there? Because he always sought more power. And he's doing it even now, what with his master plan and all.


Humans aren't all thinking the same way, not all of them have the same priorities, some of us may not desire power, some may follow belief that power corrupts, just degrading everything to "people wants power" is, how you said it, oh, yes, oversimplification with no connection to reality.

Oversimplification? Maybe. No connection to reality? Hardly. See human history. Its entire course is driven by struggle for power (and of course by the basic desires).


And that's the kind of thinking that made me move away from those threads. I have no interest in setting where everybody vary between giving wizard a round of oral pleasure and asking for more. I dislike the idea of magic as easy cure for all worries and problems, it stips magic of it's beauty and the story of any reason to read it.

Well, for me if magic isn't a solution to problems, then it has no point, no beauty, and no reason to exist. But here you go again with your absurdisation: magic is not an "easy" cure for "all" worries. Ask anyone if it's easy to play a wizard. The answer is - it's not, unless you know extremely well what you're doing, which requires having a high skill with the game. A sloppily played wizard is worse than a fighter - much much worse, if it's a properly played fighter.

Furthermore, it's the DM's job to challenge players. If he feels the wizard - or the entire party - is getting out of hand, he can (and should) design some extra-challenging foils to keep the game interesting. And once an arms race like that starts, all bets are off - the PCs are absolutely not guaranteed a win.


Because I would have to change so much it's easier to just play different game.

All right then, how would you propose to play magic?


Eh, I'll formulate the question differently "What about setting that doesn't use any kind of magic offered by D&D?". Now, happy?

Since D&D offers so many kinds of magic, you'd be a little hard pressed. But go ahead, don't let it stop you. Give it your best shot.


For me it's seems you are just getting defensive because somebody doesn't like your favorite game.

Not at all, I was feeling you were being unfair to it, that's all. It's ok not to like, so long as you don't misrepresent its qualities.


You want to talk about warfre in fantasy setting? Okay, but please, don't metion D&D.

No problem, I think I've got my point across. Standing ready not to mention "the you-know-which gaming system" any more.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

@Man_on_Fire: You're grammar is actually quite bad. Proof-read before posting.

But as to your original point, how about we specify a few rules at a time and then discuss a world with magic under those rules? All good fantasy with magic has magic act according to internally consistent rules. I'll go first, and make it simple.


Magic-users cannot conjure anything for themselves (the Voodoo Rule)
Magic items react violently if used together (no stacking) and cannot be used by casters themselves (Voodoo Rule)
Armor slows and can even negate magic.
Magically enhanced armor and weapons (save amulets, rings, cloaks, etc) act as magnets towards magic. Anyone wearing a magic cuirass will find fireballs and lightning bolts redirecting in mid-flight towards them.
Magic is 1/2 Willpower, 1/4 Knowledge, and 1/4 Luck (will a fireball into being, know how fire/burning O2 molecules work, hope like hell it goes the direction you want)
Magic cannot return someone to life. Anyone resurrected through magic is considered an entirely new person, with no memories of their previous life (skills that rely on muscle memory are retained). Regular unthinking undead still exist.


How would such a world work?

[Ninjadeadbeard]

:smallsigh: Doublepost, of course. Server! *shakes fist*

[SoC175]

Your eloquence on the topics of strategy and power is substantially undermined by your inability to spell. And you probably mean The Art of War, not "Great Book of War". As for tornadoes and summoning thereof, let me offer a simple metaphore: imagine, instead of a scrawny wizard, a modern tank with thermal vision, two machine guns and a large-caliber main gun putting cumulative rounds through a man-sized targer at a distance of over 2,000 yards.Except the man-sized target will be invisible (the tank crew doesn't even know there's someone to aim at) and incorperal (even if they just randomly shoot and happen to hit the right spot, the wizard won't take any damage from non-magical attacks).

And even if he is someone killed, that was just his astral projection and he awakes in his realy body in his own demiplane (that you can't attack/access without magic) has breakfast and starts all over again with a new projektion.

Bottom line: "strategy always tryumphs over the power" is an oversimplification with no connection to reality. Well, the issue with that statement is the "always". It all depends on how big the gap in power is and how good the strategy is.

The best strategy falls before a too large gap in power, but a the gap in power that can be made up for with a far superior strategy is surprisngly large (just note infinitely large).

[Lothston]

All good fantasy with magic has magic act according to internally consistent rules.

Exactly. And your list isn't half bad, I have to say.


Magic-users cannot conjure anything for themselves (the Voodoo Rule)

Weird but cool. But weird, and not just from the personal perspective (will certainly cause some headscratching from players), but also from the mechanical standpoint.

If a magic user cannot "conjure" anything for themselves, that means their main power is not self-sufficient. I.e. it does not work in absence of others (allies with whom you could trade, for instance).

That can create a number of difficulties in an actual game. Or even in a story, for that matter. But it's also an interesting foundation to work from. A challenge, so to say. It would, however, require a very precise delineation of what is actually considered "conjuring for oneself".


Magic items react violently if used together (no stacking) and cannot be used by casters themselves (Voodoo Rule)

I'd accept that.


Armor slows and can even negate magic.

"Negate" as in failing the wearer's casting, or as in "anti-magic field"? Because the latter would be quite powerful by itself.


Magically enhanced armor and weapons (save amulets, rings, cloaks, etc) act as magnets towards magic. Anyone wearing a magic cuirass will find fireballs and lightning bolts redirecting in mid-flight towards them.

Wait, so you have fireballs and lightning bolts, i.e. direct damage spells?

So does casting a damage spell at one's enemy count as "conjuring something for yourself"? If not, I smell a rather biggish hole in your system.

Also, if magical items are gonna attract fireballs, they better have some damn good bonuses to make them worthwhile.


Magic is 1/2 Willpower, 1/4 Knowledge, and 1/4 Luck (will a fireball into being, know how fire/burning O2 molecules work, hope like hell it goes the direction you want)

I'd accept that (only don't overdo the luck angle, it can get ridiculous very fast). However, I'd also suggest a magical way of augmenting luck. For those situations when you absolutely must be sure of the outcome.


Magic cannot return someone to life.

Sure, but what are you going to do if a PC gets himself killed? Roll a new char and lose many, many hours of leveling just like that? It's pretty harsh.


Anyone resurrected through magic is considered an entirely new person, with no memories of their previous life (skills that rely on muscle memory are retained).

Skills that rely on muscle memory include physical combat skills? If so, loophole for warriors. Also, one could argue that somatic components in spellcasting also rely on muscle memory.

And, of course, this raises the question of the afterlife. Do people have souls in this setting? Do these souls depart somewhere after death? Can they be contacted, summoned, reincarnated via magic? Etc.


Regular unthinking undead still exist.

How about sentient undead? Can a player become one? And how is monstrous propagation handled - e.g. do vampire bites turn you into a vampire?


How would such a world work?

It's an interesting premise, but a little rough around the edges. However, looks pretty promising for those seeking a setting with low - and different - magic.


Except the man-sized target will be invisible (the tank crew doesn't even know there's someone to aim at) and incorperal (even if they just randomly shoot and happen to hit the right spot, the wizard won't take any damage from non-magical attacks)

You missed the point. The tank was the wizard - or rather, the metaphorical representation of one. It was an illustration of how a vastly superior force may triumph with virtually no regard to the enemy's tactics.


Well, the issue with that statement is the "always". It all depends on how big the gap in power is and how good the strategy is.

The best strategy falls before a too large gap in power, but a the gap in power that can be made up for with a far superior strategy is surprisngly large (just note infinitely large).

Yep, I'd say that's about right.

[Man on Fire]

Lothston, I must sadly inform you that I reported your post. wo people asked you to not bring up D&D, yet in the same post you agreed not to talk about it you talked about almost nothing but D&D and acted like if all arguments discussed applied only to roleplaying games. I welcome you into the discussion. But I don't want to see this thread locked because somebody keeps bringing up the topic that has two (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=240783) separate (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=239695) threads for itself. I'm asking you once again to stop. If you cannot stop brining up D&D, you have two threads for it, go there.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Weird but cool. But weird, and not just from the personal perspective (will certainly cause some headscratching from players), but also from the mechanical standpoint.

If a magic user cannot "conjure" anything for themselves, that means their main power is not self-sufficient. I.e. it does not work in absence of others (allies with whom you could trade, for instance).

What I mean by "Conjure" would include magic items, defenses and buffs. A wizard can make his ally as strong as stone or increase their stamina, or heal them or make them faster. He can't do so for himself. An Area-of-Effect defensive shield can be laid down, but a Wizard cannot create a personal shield. A wizard can craft a wondrous item, such as a magic amulet that deflects (some) arrows, but it has no power while they wear it. So they need other people.

The obvious workaround would be having more than one magic-user in the immediate party to buff each other, but that still means you need two magic-users. Depending on how long it takes to get good at magic, and the abundance/scarcity of people with the appropriate talent, this might be difficult, and both wizards would be somewhat dependent on each other. Trust issues could be a big problem.


"Negate" as in failing the wearer's casting, or as in "anti-magic field"? Because the latter would be quite powerful by itself.

"Negate" as in armor can deflect much of the energies inherent in magic, sometimes totally at the highest end of armor quality. A foot soldier is gonna get scorched fighting a wizard. A well-off knight has an even shot in a fair fight (hence the wizard should never engage in a fair fight). And a King or sufficiently wealthy nobleman will be nearly immune to direct magical attack.

I'm not sure if it would be a good idea to have wizards suffer no issue from wearing armor in this setting. Any idea on the rationale for doing so?


Wait, so you have fireballs and lightning bolts, i.e. direct damage spells?

So does casting a damage spell at one's enemy count as "conjuring something for yourself"? If not, I smell a rather biggish hole in your system.

Also, if magical items are gonna attract fireballs, they better have some damn good bonuses to make them worthwhile.

The Voodoo Rule doesn't apply to offensive spells (although in keeping with Voodoo Rules, perhaps cursing someone is easier if you know their truename/get their permission. No idea how to do that last one reliably). Voodoo Rule only applies to spells that directly benefit you in a way similar to buffs, defenses and healing. A wizard could craft an item of healing and have someone else use it to heal them, but of course cannot do it themselves.

As for armor bonuses...magical armor and weapons should be used against mundane forces. A knight in mundane armor armed with a mundane shield and sword cannot stand against an equally skilled knight in armor that increases his reflexes and armed with a shield that reflects the force of a blow back onto it's attacker, and a sword that magically ignites any (in)flammable(?) material it strikes. A magically-clad knight can annihilate mundane foes with little effort, but even a low-end wizard can mess him up in a bad way due to his equipment's magical saturation. That Helm of Flight may be friggin' sweet, but you're a huge, glowing target to every magic-user who wants to take you down. I'm not sure that magical armor would appear very often under such conditions.


I'd accept that (only don't overdo the luck angle, it can get ridiculous very fast). However, I'd also suggest a magical way of augmenting luck. For those situations when you absolutely must be sure of the outcome.

Luck in this case just represents the roll of the dice (metaphorically, not gameplay). Magic should always be dangerous, and should always carry risk. Casting fire and lightning is all well and good, but the wizard should be aware that he can still burn.


Sure, but what are you going to do if a PC gets himself killed? Roll a new char and lose many, many hours of leveling just like that? It's pretty harsh.

It is harsh, if we were talking about a gaming setting. In that case, a resurrection still kills the original character, forcing them to re-roll a new one. But the new one retains the same skills and effective level as previous, but now with a new personality (requires good roleplayers), and a new class. If we take physical skills to mean that the resurrected character retains the same ability scores, then this would discourage minmaxing and/or optimizing to too great an extent. That's how I see it anyway, I could be wrong.


Skills that rely on muscle memory include physical combat skills? If so, loophole for warriors. Also, one could argue that somatic components in spellcasting also rely on muscle memory.

It makes sense. While fighting is in no way as easy as people think, there's a lot of muscle-memory involved if stances and styles are anything to go by. And I supposes somatic components would also fall under that description. So yeah, it is a loophole if you die and don't want to role a new class.


And, of course, this raises the question of the afterlife. Do people have souls in this setting? Do these souls depart somewhere after death? Can they be contacted, summoned, reincarnated via magic? Etc.

I'd say no. Dead is Dead. The souls depart, and a new one is formed when a body is animated. So they are not the same person, though they are the same body. It's almost like Doctor Who. If he dies, he comes back...but he's someone else. The difference here is that personal memories are not retained by the body. People in this setting honestly don't know what the afterlife is truly like, as there is a barrier between that world and this one. If a soul makes it through, it never comes back (so Liches have to be careful).


How about sentient undead? Can a player become one? And how is monstrous propagation handled - e.g. do vampire bites turn you into a vampire?

Hmmm...Sentient Undead (eg; Vampires) are not resurrected people. They are parasitic lifeforms masquerading as people. A Head Vampire is merely the oldest "Queen" of a particular hive. They kill victims and imprint their own soul onto the corpse as they use magic to resurrect them, leading to sentient, independent appearances. It is all a masquerade where a magical-humanoid plague propagates itself.

So, players can't become Vampires, but Liches are different (even from tradition). Vampires are a hive-monster of impossible cunning and cruelty forged by millennium of collective unlife. Liches are spellcasters who forced their souls to remain in their rotting forms (and phylacteries on occasion). But due to the Voodoo Rule, Liches should be created in pairs, as one wizard cannot hit himself with the spell to become one.


It's an interesting premise, but a little rough around the edges. However, looks pretty promising for those seeking a setting with low - and different - magic.

Well, thank you. And I hope I've cleared up some of the rough edges.

[Lord Raziere]

Magic-users cannot conjure anything for themselves (the Voodoo Rule)
Magic items react violently if used together (no stacking) and cannot be used by casters themselves (Voodoo Rule)
Armor slows and can even negate magic.
Magically enhanced armor and weapons (save amulets, rings, cloaks, etc) act as magnets towards magic. Anyone wearing a magic cuirass will find fireballs and lightning bolts redirecting in mid-flight towards them.
Magic is 1/2 Willpower, 1/4 Knowledge, and 1/4 Luck (will a fireball into being, know how fire/burning O2 molecules work, hope like hell it goes the direction you want)
Magic cannot return someone to life. Anyone resurrected through magic is considered an entirely new person, with no memories of their previous life (skills that rely on muscle memory are retained). Regular unthinking undead still exist.


How would such a world work?

Well, I'm imagining that NO ONE would wear anything magical then if there are spellcasters around, and would actually enchant things just to be big magic attractors, redirect all the magical spells to one location while your assassins sneak up behind the mages and kill them all with normal stuff.

That and corrupt gov's/armies will be eternally resurrecting a gullible labor force/army because they have no memory, there is no worries about family or anything? who needs zombies? we have a disposable force of thinking human beings! hooray for exploiting the dead and their lack of memory!

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Well, I'm imagining that NO ONE would wear anything magical then if there are spellcasters around, and would actually enchant things just to be big magic attractors, redirect all the magical spells to one location while your assassins sneak up behind the mages and kill them all with normal stuff.

Let me rephrase that: Magic armor and weapons are bigger than, say, rings. Magic Rings do not sufficiently pull on magic to cause a redirect. The redirect was my (poorly worded) way of describing the traditional auto-hit nature of magic missile. Therefore, magic weapons and armor cause auto-hits to occur if spells are directed at them.


That and corrupt gov's/armies will be eternally resurrecting a gullible labor force/army because they have no memory, there is no worries about family or anything? who needs zombies? we have a disposable force of thinking human beings! hooray for exploiting the dead and their lack of memory!

Yup. Pretty much. Though I'm fairly certain there would be people against such actions, including civil liberty types and the resurrected themselves since they still have minds, just no direct personal memories pre-rezz.

[Lord Raziere]

That would still mean that no one would wear magical stuff, and would still go for the giant magical attractor thing, as they would think that if magical stuff attracts spells, then its not smart to wear them and that we should find a way around such spells, like exploiting the very problem to become a solution, and thus making a big attractor that makes all spells go to one place then killing the mages with normal weapons, even if that isn't apart of the rules really.

[Jothki]

If teleportation exists, it changes everything. The easier the teleportation the more it does, but even if you can only bounce one person around every week or so, it still revolutionizes scouting and communications. If you can open semi-stable portals of moderately large size from anywhere to anywhere at will, the countryside might as well no longer exist. If you can freely create portals and your opponents can't, and don't have any defenses against that, the average length of a war should be roughly five minutes. Heck, it'd probably be worth your time to flood your rivals' strongholds with troops every month or so just in case they've already declared war and notice just hasn't reached you yet. It'll probably save you time in the long run.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

That would still mean that no one would wear magical stuff, and would still go for the giant magical attractor thing, as they would think that if magical stuff attracts spells, then its not smart to wear them and that we should find a way around such spells, like exploiting the very problem to become a solution, and thus making a big attractor that makes all spells go to one place then killing the mages with normal weapons, even if that isn't apart of the rules really.

I...would hesitate to say it's possible to create an artifact of sufficient power to attract all spells in the setting. Magic is still incredibly useful for one side to have, so there's less incentive to make such a thing. You'd eliminate all buffs, all healing (sans mundane) and tactical magicks like scouting and divination. Saying there's an artifact capable of essentially nullifying all magic via attracting it like a magnet is the setting equivalent to anti-nuke devices.

tl:dr, It's much more efficient and simpler to just get more and better magic-users than the other guy.


If teleportation exists, it changes everything. The easier the teleportation the more it does, but even if you can only bounce one person around every week or so, it still revolutionizes scouting and communications. If you can open semi-stable portals of moderately large size from anywhere to anywhere at will, the countryside might as well no longer exist. If you can freely create portals and your opponents can't, and don't have any defenses against that, the average length of a war should be roughly five minutes. Heck, it'd probably be worth your time to flood your rivals' strongholds with troops every month or so just in case they've already declared war and notice just hasn't reached you yet. It'll probably save you time in the long run.

Behold the birth of a Tippyverse! :smalltongue: Following the rules I established earlier, teleportation is less useful for wizards if such counts as "Conjuring for Oneself". Voodoo Rule. Portals could be a preferred alternative, although I never specified anything in the example rules that would easily explain how they would work. Energy and Labor-intensive to be sure, just so we don't recreate the Tippyverse via portals.

Opinions?

[The Glyphstone]

Maybe fragile as well. If teleportation can only be conducted through two-way portals, and the portals must be physically drawn/constructed in place rather than created remotely, then you still need, at minimum, a special forces or commando team capable of infiltrating behind enemy lines and drawing the portal diagram so your reinforcements can come through. And if maintaining the portal means maintaining the diagram that fuels it, it would need to be actively and heavily protected to prevent disruption; comparatively, a hard-to-break portal is easier to defend, but if it's captured, you've opened a direct line straight to your own heartland.

[Lord Raziere]

I...would hesitate to say it's possible to create an artifact of sufficient power to attract all spells in the setting. Magic is still incredibly useful for one side to have, so there's less incentive to make such a thing. You'd eliminate all buffs, all healing (sans mundane) and tactical magicks like scouting and divination. Saying there's an artifact capable of essentially nullifying all magic via attracting it like a magnet is the setting equivalent to anti-nuke devices.

tl:dr, It's much more efficient and simpler to just get more and better magic-users than the other guy.



How? It would seem pretty easy from the rules you laid out, and it wouldn't have to do it all spells in the world, just the ones on one battlefield and would probably be reusable.

Or, just make a bunch of magical magnets for different types of magic, put them all in single location, watch the spells get sorted into each lightningrod, heck make them store the magic and you got a good way to get some extra magical energy to use.

[The Glyphstone]

Seems like it would just create a different kind of magical arms race. The defensive side would build bigger and more powerful attractors, the offensive side would be conjuring stronger spells with a bigger 'seeking' component to keep them on-target and not get diverted into the attractors. Plus, unless the attractors strip spells off people, it'd just mean magic was applied pre-battle in the form of buffs.

[Lord Raziere]

Hey maybe they would try to combine the tracking and the attracting elements of the magic? basically enchant this little thing to be this big attractor, put it on someone/thing important, then activate it while firing off a bunch of spells so that they all attract towards the thing and destroy it. then its just a question of how powerful the magical magnets are.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Hey maybe they would try to combine the tracking and the attracting elements of the magic? basically enchant this little thing to be this big attractor, put it on someone/thing important, then activate it while firing off a bunch of spells so that they all attract towards the thing and destroy it. then its just a question of how powerful the magical magnets are.

You'd see a lot more infiltrators and spies crop up who can reverse pickpocket the item onto a major target. So there'd be an escalation in magic invisibility and See Invisibility right along the Attractor/Seeker escalation. I don't see this setting lasting long past a major global war (unless you count craters).

[averagejoe]

The Mod They Call Me: This discussion on roleplaying games is very off topic. Please don't continue it.

[WalkingTarget]

Seems like it would just create a different kind of magical arms race. The defensive side would build bigger and more powerful attractors, the offensive side would be conjuring stronger spells with a bigger 'seeking' component to keep them on-target and not get diverted into the attractors. Plus, unless the attractors strip spells off people, it'd just mean magic was applied pre-battle in the form of buffs.

This reminds me of Steven Brust's Dragaera setting.

Pretty much everybody has access to magic, but if you're some poor peasant you don't have a lot of time to dedicate to personal study nor can you afford a tutor. Professional soldiers have a good reason to learn individual attacks or defenses, but the true scholars of magic involved are the main thing.

The book that goes over this stuff, Dragon, mentions that the arms race has gone back and forth in the setting's history. By the "present" of the books, defense is on top, so long-range/large-area reconnaissance or attacks are not much use, but that's because everybody has dedicated casters to make sure of it.

Teleportation is possible in general, but can be warded against and usually has to be to a place that's in sight or that the mage knows well (and is generally limited in numbers, there aren't portals or other semi-permanent means of moving large numbers). You might be able to move a small force around this way, but the armies still march and fighting is still up close and personal. Sure, you might be able to throw some short-range badness at an opponent, but they're just as likely to be able to do something to defend against it (excluding peasant conscripts, of course). Although, any amount of concentration exerted in using magic isn't being used to prevent other guys from sticking sharp pieces of metal into you.

Metal armor is also mentioned as attracting sorcery, so it's generally avoided. That's a way to justify the author's preferred swashbuckling style more than anything, though.

Basically, it's a high-magic setting that approaches Tippyverse in how magic has affected the day-to-day lives of the characters, but there's justification given for why armies still fight with swords (it also calls out the fact that this could change pretty much at any time depending on if some battle-mage subverts the standard defensive magics). Other books mention the after effects of what looks like a private wizard duel - a keep/manor/something and the surrounding countryside blasted by fire with no (known) survivors - theoretically launched from the caster's home (we only get details from a peasant who wandered in wondering why the local Lord hadn't been through the area this season).

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Other books mention the after effects of what looks like a private wizard duel - a keep/manor/something and the surrounding countryside blasted by fire with no (known) survivors - theoretically launched from the caster's home (we only get details from a peasant who wandered in wondering why the local Lord hadn't been through the area this season).

I seem to recall a bit in a Discworld novel saying it was very difficult to tell which greasy smear had been the winner of a wizard duel. Magic in that setting is exactly like a nuke. It's okay if you have it, but everybody's screwed if you use it.

[Avilan the Grey]

I like the Arcanum setting and others like it. Basically I am quite tired of traditional high fantasy worlds (except Tolkien, who's world is not as similar to those copying him as some people thinks). Not that I like dirty and gritty as much as I prefer down-to-earth. I also enjoy "primitive and rustic", like the modern incarnation of Drakar och Demoner (Swedish tabletop RPG, which in it's latest incarnation draws heavily from viking lore and 19th century fantasy artists rather than Tolkien and D&D) resulting in miles and miles of mossy pine forests, trolls and giants looking and behaving according to Norse and Scandinavian folklore, and most magic being ritualized etc.

I also have a soft spot for Gotterdammerung, a Swedish tabletop RPG that mixes early 18th century, demons, magic... (mages in powdered wigs and sky-blue silk stockings... :smallwink:) I have never played it, but I love reading the rule books.

ANYWAY:

In a not-too High Fantasy world I would expect to see tanks and mechs in the form of Iron or stone golems.

IF direct spellcasting is possible, I expect to see both artillery (fireballs, meteors, ice storms) as well as underhanded tactics (mind controlling enemy officers, confusing troops, using poisonous clouds on troops etc). However I expect the troops to have non-magical weapons. It is not economically sound to let your wizards become front line troops, or to forge 200 000 magic missile launchers.

However I think the biggest revolution would be communication: direct comlinks, telephathy, skrying enemy settlements and troops, finding good entrypoints for charging castles etc.

And of course, the biggest and most important job for your mages in battle is to block the other side's mages.

[Lothston]

Hey maybe they would try to combine the tracking and the attracting elements of the magic? basically enchant this little thing to be this big attractor, put it on someone/thing important, then activate it while firing off a bunch of spells so that they all attract towards the thing and destroy it. then its just a question of how powerful the magical magnets are.

What a wonderfully insidious subversion of the rules :amused: I believe you are entirely correct, Raz: if magical items attract magic, then it should be possible to use this quality to divert enemy casting towards either a decoy, or the enemy themselves. Moreover, it would indeed be conceivable to create an attractor so powerful it will "draw in" all magic in a very large radius - maybe across the entire continent or the whole planet.

Color me impressed - this could make an excellent plot! And it works either way - the protagonists could be the ones making the attractor to oppose some aggressive magical empire, or the attractor could be the Big Bad's doomsday device. Perhaps it would even kill magical creatures by "sucking out" their magic essence (evil!), or threaten the entire cosmology by upsetting the magical balance (think CERN supercollider creating a black hole).

We should try to develop this further, looks like a promising setting! And it would be a good place for non-magical characters (since they would be immune to the attractor).


I...would hesitate to say it's possible to create an artifact of sufficient power to attract all spells in the setting. Magic is still incredibly useful for one side to have, so there's less incentive to make such a thing. You'd eliminate all buffs, all healing (sans mundane) and tactical magicks like scouting and divination. Saying there's an artifact capable of essentially nullifying all magic via attracting it like a magnet is the setting equivalent to anti-nuke devices.

tl:dr, It's much more efficient and simpler to just get more and better magic-users than the other guy.

No, see, it's called lateral thinking and it's exactly how the biggest breakthroughs in warfare theory were developed. Winning wars by throwing in more cannonfodder than the other guy is a tedious, long-winded and very expensive business. WWI worked itself into a stalemate with this approach. However, once tanks were invented they became a huge force multiplyer and game-changer. Same with blitzkrieg. Same with nuclear weapons and ICBMs.

If you're inventing a setting, you have to be prepared for the possibilities of it being exploited in unconventional and imaginative ways. Because that's how the human mind works - and it's a good thing.

In terms of narration and story-telling it makes for great twists, surprising the reader and making a story interesting as well as original, and not merely a copypaste of a 1,000 similar fantasy stories.


The Mod They Call Me: This discussion on roleplaying games is very off topic. Please don't continue it.

Wait, I'm confused: the topic was "about how warfare would be affected in fantasy settings". Fantasy settings would include RPGs, right? (excluding the "you-know-which" particular gaming system). But even apart from that, as we have established, any fantasy narrative is built upon a certain system of rules, even if the exact details are hidden by the author from the audience (who only see the effects). So what are the actual limits here?

[WalkingTarget]

What a wonderfully insidious subversion of the rules :amused: I believe you are entirely correct, Raz: if magical items attract magic, then it should be possible to use this quality to divert enemy casting towards either a decoy, or the enemy themselves. Moreover, it would indeed be conceivable to create an attractor so powerful it will "draw in" all magic in a very large radius - maybe across the entire continent or the whole planet.

Color me impressed - this could make an excellent plot! And it works either way - the protagonists could be the ones making the attractor to oppose some aggressive magical empire, or the attractor could be the Big Bad's doomsday device. Perhaps it would even kill magical creatures by "sucking out" their magic essence (evil!), or threaten the entire cosmology by upsetting the magical balance (think CERN supercollider creating a black hole).

We should try to develop this further, looks like a promising setting! And it would be a good place for non-magical characters (since they would be immune to the attractor).

This reminds me of J. Gregory Keyes' book Newton's Cannon (the first book in his Age of Unreason series). They are alternate histories where the point of divergence is that Isaac Newton succeeded in getting alchemy to work. A main plot point of the first book (which sets up the action for the other 3) is that a young Ben Franklin figures something out.

One of the new tools developed is a "telegraph" of sorts. A clockwork armature attached to a pen is linked to a single duplicate by means of them sharing a part (each incorporate half of an alchemically treated crystal that was then split - the correspondence between the two things that were once one thing being the means of setting up the connection). The receiving machine is wound up and then will copy the motions of somebody writing at the other. Franklin accidentally breaks his crystal, but finds a way to make adjustments to a replacement that allows him to "tune in" to whatever aetheric frequency the matching one operated on - or scan around and connect to different machines.

Once word gets out that there's a way to set up correspondences between objects that weren't once part of a single whole:
French agents use the technique to create a link between London and an asteroid. This does not end well for London.

[Lord Raziere]

What a wonderfully insidious subversion of the rules :amused: I believe you are entirely correct, Raz: if magical items attract magic, then it should be possible to use this quality to divert enemy casting towards either a decoy, or the enemy themselves. Moreover, it would indeed be conceivable to create an attractor so powerful it will "draw in" all magic in a very large radius - maybe across the entire continent or the whole planet.

Color me impressed - this could make an excellent plot! And it works either way - the protagonists could be the ones making the attractor to oppose some aggressive magical empire, or the attractor could be the Big Bad's doomsday device. Perhaps it would even kill magical creatures by "sucking out" their magic essence (evil!), or threaten the entire cosmology by upsetting the magical balance (think CERN supercollider creating a black hole).

We should try to develop this further, looks like a promising setting! And it would be a good place for non-magical characters (since they would be immune to the attractor).



the best part of that idea? put the magical magnet on the enemy, then activate the magical magnet right as the enemy starts firing spells at you. Then they end up shooting themselves into oblivion :smallamused:

In fact you could say their spells…

:smallcool:

Backfired.

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!

[Ninjadeadbeard]

No, see, it's called lateral thinking and it's exactly how the biggest breakthroughs in warfare theory were developed. Winning wars by throwing in more cannonfodder than the other guy is a tedious, long-winded and very expensive business. WWI worked itself into a stalemate with this approach. However, once tanks were invented they became a huge force multiplyer and game-changer. Same with blitzkrieg. Same with nuclear weapons and ICBMs.

If you're inventing a setting, you have to be prepared for the possibilities of it being exploited in unconventional and imaginative ways. Because that's how the human mind works - and it's a good thing.

I've slowly come around to the magnet idea (despite it resulting from a miscommunication on my part). It seems to me though, that the magic has to go somewhere. Lightning rods drag lightning down into the earth, or I suppose into a large battery (duracell of course). So where does all that magic go, and how much can a single magnet hold?

If you could attract enough magic towards your side, could you convert it into a usable fuel? Imagine Sentient Warforged Tanks suddenly coming to life late in a battle...


Wait, I'm confused: the topic was "about how warfare would be affected in fantasy settings". Fantasy settings would include RPGs, right? (excluding the "you-know-which" particular gaming system). But even apart from that, as we have established, any fantasy narrative is built upon a certain system of rules, even if the exact details are hidden by the author from the audience (who only see the effects). So what are the actual limits here?

I think the OP was hoping we'd avoid Gaming-Style Rules at all, and I think a few of us (myself included) may have used one too many allegories to illustrate our points using Game-equivalents. I'm sure there's no problem if we stick closer to Setting Rules rather than Dice Rules, as you said.


the best part of that idea? put the magical magnet on the enemy, then activate the magical magnet right as the enemy starts firing spells at you. Then they end up shooting themselves into oblivion :smallamused:

In fact you could say their spells…

:smallcool:

Backfired.

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!

Bad! :smallfurious: Bad Lord Raziere! We do not pun! No Pun! :smallwink:

Backfire, heh heh heh, classic!

[Man on Fire]

Metal armor is also mentioned as attracting sorcery, so it's generally avoided. That's a way to justify the author's preferred swashbuckling style more than anything, though.

Like it needs justifing. Armors are terribly heavy, needs long time to dress in and out, require specialistic knowledge to take care of, which is time-consuming and hard and you need to do on regular basis ad walking in it it like wearing a jacket fresh out of wather with pockets full of rocks and wet backpack with even more rocks. In real world people were using them only in wars and tornaments.

[Lord Raziere]

yea, a person who could wear metal armor daily without fatigue would basically be superhuman. I'd actually be making justifications for why their armor is so light that they can wear it daily. like y'know, using magic to make it very light, or a magically made metal that makes the armor as light as a feather. swords too, weapons aren't sticks y'know.

[Tavar]

Like it needs justifing. Armors are terribly heavy, needs long time to dress in and out, require specialistic knowledge to take care of, which is time-consuming and hard and you need to do on regular basis ad walking in it it like wearing a jacket fresh out of wather with pockets full of rocks and wet backpack with even more rocks. In real world people were using them only in wars and tornaments.
Considering that he's talking about wars, and that in those cases Armor can easily save your life, I'd say one does need to justify it.


This reminds me of J. Gregory Keyes' book Newton's Cannon (the first book in his Age of Unreason series). They are alternate histories where the point of divergence is that Isaac Newton succeeded in getting alchemy to work.

Heh, I remember that series. Did you finish the series, and if so how were the latter books. I stopped

At the point where Ben was back in the colonies, and organizing a rebellion/resistance against the Angel things.

[Man on Fire]

Of course thee are other inconviniencies related to armor, magic would be most useful in taking care of it - some spell that repairs it every day would be a blessing. Richer or more connected would probably buy enchantments to make it not being a giant microwave you put yourself in or to not obscure your vision, while poorer knights might not be even able to afford standard armor modifiers. And some really poor knights were wearing improvised armors made from parts of different sets, so if the enchanctments aren't made to extend on whole armor, we may have a guy who doesn't feel weight of his arms armor but does feel the weight of his torso armor.

If enchanctments would be granted by incorporating some magic items (magic crystals or something) into the armor, I can see people randomly trying to enchance the armor by incorporating any artifact they find into it, which would give us a) a lot of "magic" armors with things like dragon fangs made part of it b) a lot of armor with bizarre efects made when dumb knight combined some strange artifacts into his gear and c) armors with outright terryfing enchanctments made when some idiot added dangerous artifact into his gear.

And of course it they may react strangerly with any other magic used by that person. Sorta like Berserker Armor form Berserk (more in spoiler)

It's a cursed armor that doesnt seem to have any boundaries of traditional armor and grants the user terrifing strength, but at the price of driving them into berserker rage and damaging their bodies and even outright eating them (it's implied that Guts' ally and mentor, Skull Knight, it's terrifing Nazgul/living armor-esue thing that eats cursed artifacts, because of wearing it too long). tl;dr it makes you God Of War Incarnate, but also eats you.

Guts has a curse placed on him, that, among other things, created demonic dog-like spirit, The Beast, that feeds on his hate and anger and tries to drive him into becoming murderous monster. Once Guts was put into Berserker armor, Beast jumped into it and now they struggle over who's in control whenever he uses it, which is indicted by deformations of the helmet - when Guts is in charge, it reveals his jaw and eyes, and looks like black helmet with dog-like (or Batman-like) features, when the Beast is in control, it covers Gut's face completely and looks like Beast's head.


Also, there is possibility to make impractical armors useful in combat with magic - in Black Company it was done with Windowmaker and Liveeater armors, which weren't made to be useful, but to look scary - anti-arrow enchancments and some others and people can actually fight in them.

[WalkingTarget]

Heh, I remember that series. Did you finish the series, and if so how were the latter books. I stopped

At the point where Ben was back in the colonies, and organizing a rebellion/resistance against the Angel things.

I finished it, but remember being less than wowed by the last two books. The ending, if I'm remembering right, was that
The French woman who had been central to the plot simply does something like she did at the end of book 2 (involving her son and one of her hands) and turns the magic off. I forget the exact details (it's been over a decade since I read them), but it seemed like a cop-out to me.

[Tavar]

I finished it, but remember being less than wowed by the last two books. The ending, if I'm remembering right, was that
The French woman who had been central to the plot simply does something like she did at the end of book 2 (involving her son and one of her hands) and turns the magic off. I forget the exact details (it's been over a decade since I read them), but it seemed like a cop-out to me.

Ah, yeah, the first two books were good, but it felt that after that, the author just didn't know what to do with the plot or anything. Pity, the first book was really good.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

Of course thee are other inconviniencies related to armor, magic would be most useful in taking care of it - some spell that repairs it every day would be a blessing. Richer or more connected would probably buy enchantments to make it not being a giant microwave you put yourself in or to not obscure your vision, while poorer knights might not be even able to afford standard armor modifiers. And some really poor knights were wearing improvised armors made from parts of different sets, so if the enchanctments aren't made to extend on whole armor, we may have a guy who doesn't feel weight of his arms armor but does feel the weight of his torso armor.

Just wanted to point this out, but armor isn't as heavy as I think you think it is. I think a good Plate suit is around 70 lbs, and that's distributed all across your body. There are a set of videos on Youtube (that I've been trying to find again) where a couple of guys in Germany put on plate armor and showed off just how quick and flexible you could still be in them. Basically, an armored knight can do low-key martial-arts, including arm-locks and holds.

Although the heat is a genuine concern. I'd actually point out that it might be easier to enchant the surcoat underneath the armor with an "Air-Conditioning" Spell. Also, perhaps armor has to be enchanted as a set? I don't think it's possible to mix-n-match armor in real life without problems arising, so designing armor enchantments to only work with the whole set would make sense.

Poor knights...I believe feudal knights received a lot of their gear and armor as a boon from their liege-lord. And a lord is in serious trouble if he can't afford to outfit a couple of knights.

[Avilan the Grey]

Just wanted to point this out, but armor isn't as heavy as I think you think it is. I think a good Plate suit is around 70 lbs, and that's distributed all across your body. There are a set of videos on Youtube (that I've been trying to find again) where a couple of guys in Germany put on plate armor and showed off just how quick and flexible you could still be in them. Basically, an armored knight can do low-key martial-arts, including arm-locks and holds.

In fact, plate was a huge improvement over mail coats in this regard; a mail coat is as heavy as a full plate armor, but ALL the weight is on your shoulders.

Speaking of armor, it all depends on settings and rules. There are quite a few fantasy settings where magic is incompatible with iron (and steel). That causes... problems.

[Man on Fire]

Speaking of armor, it all depends on settings and rules. There are quite a few fantasy settings where magic is incompatible with iron (and steel). That causes... problems.

Which may lead to interesting situation of magically enchanted leather armor being much better than full plate or attempts at making armor from alternative materials.


Poor knights...I believe feudal knights received a lot of their gear and armor as a boon from their liege-lord. And a lord is in serious trouble if he can't afford to outfit a couple of knights.

I'm not sure, but I belive I once read that many knights couldn't aafford an armor and even if they were given one (which I'm not sure was that common), they had to take care of it themselves and if they screw up somehow, they wouldn't get another one.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Just wanted to point this out, but armor isn't as heavy as I think you think it is. I think a good Plate suit is around 70 lbs, and that's distributed all across your body. There are a set of videos on Youtube (that I've been trying to find again) where a couple of guys in Germany put on plate armor and showed off just how quick and flexible you could still be in them. Basically, an armored knight can do low-key martial-arts, including arm-locks and holds.

It should also be noted that a modern soldiers kit between gear, weapon, and body armor comes out too much the same weight and people operate successfully in it.

(I've also heard accounts of people swimming in armor. Though you'd need to be pretty good to make any kind of distance which presumably most medieval folk would not be)

[Avilan the Grey]

Which may lead to interesting situation of magically enchanted leather armor being much better than full plate or attempts at making armor from alternative materials.

On the other hand: Backup weapon for every muggle: a small bag filled with iron filings. Let's see how long it takes that wizard to get all of THAT out of his beard...

[Man on Fire]

If iron is going to be magical kryptonite, wouldn't that mean return of bronze armor and weapons? They are lighter than iron, they may be magically enchanced to be as good and hard and even magically forged into full-plate armors (or even non-magically, if that's possible). In fact, if iron is anti-magic, would it even be used for making armors and weapons, when you can enchance bronze?


On the other hand: Backup weapon for every muggle: a small bag filled with iron filings. Let's see how long it takes that wizard to get all of THAT out of his beard...

I liek this idea. Maybe in this world the equivalent of Iron Age is one where people armed in it managed to throw out wizards who ruled them during bronze age? Wizard were dominating on the battlefields and suddenly found themselves defenseless against knights in iron armors.

[Soras Teva Gee]

If iron is going to be magical kryptonite, wouldn't that mean return of bronze armor and weapons? They are lighter than iron, they may be magically enchanced to be as good and hard and even magically forged into full-plate armors (or even non-magically, if that's possible). In fact, if iron is anti-magic, would it even be used for making armors and weapons, when you can enchance bronze?

If iron is anti-magic then it wouldn't it cleave right through those enchantments voiding them as if they weren't there?

(Also economics, mages are normally rare and so enchantment will be much more expensive. even if the scale between bronze and steel can be crossed)

[The Glyphstone]

If iron is anti-magic then it wouldn't it cleave right through those enchantments voiding them as if they weren't there?

(Also economics, mages are normally rare and so enchantment will be much more expensive. even if the scale between bronze and steel can be crossed)

It depends on what flavor of Antimagic we use. If it's just 'magic slides off', then it would just be un-enchantable and give resistance or immunity to hostile magics. A more active 'Magic-killing' sort of antimagic could dispel and cut through spells.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

If iron is going to be magical kryptonite, wouldn't that mean return of bronze armor and weapons? They are lighter than iron, they may be magically enchanced to be as good and hard and even magically forged into full-plate armors (or even non-magically, if that's possible). In fact, if iron is anti-magic, would it even be used for making armors and weapons, when you can enchance bronze?

Iron magic makes a lot of sense being a Magic-Resistant, what with Cold Iron being the traditional kryptonite of the Fair Folk (as well as bells, what?). But yeah, I don't think people will go back to Bronze just so they can enchant stuff. Historically only the highest quality bronze armor and weapons could withstand combat with their iron equivalents, and it makes more sense to be immune to something as face-wreckingly powerful as magic rather than just gaining a slight bonus to one's physical/mental abilities. As Soras Teva Gee said, if iron is anti-magic, no one will want bronze because one guy with an iron sword will mess. them. up.


I liek this idea. Maybe in this world the equivalent of Iron Age is one where people armed in it managed to throw out wizards who ruled them during bronze age? Wizard were dominating on the battlefields and suddenly found themselves defenseless against knights in iron armors.

If Iron is so resistant to magic in a setting, then what about Steel? Steel's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_metallurgy#Sources_of_ore)been around a long (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel#History_of_steelmaking) time as well, and it's superior to Iron in every way. Does steel count as resistant as well?

[Man on Fire]

It depends on what flavor of Antimagic we use. If it's just 'magic slides off', then it would just be un-enchantable and give resistance or immunity to hostile magics. A more active 'Magic-killing' sort of antimagic could dispel and cut through spells.

There is also middle option - iron just disturbs magic, making it weaker - the more iron you're wearing, the less effective every spell hitting you is, on the other hand, the more iron touches the wizard or magic object, the weaker their magic is. This way dropping iron filings are still going to help weakening wizard and single iron sword might not be enough to tear through magical armor or shield. Through that would probably mean that everybody would switch to larger weapons, like big warhammers, which touches larger part of target's body, weakening the magic more.


If Iron is so resistant to magic in a setting, then what about Steel?

Yeah, steel should work against magic the same way. And any other ferroalloy.

[Soras Teva Gee]

It depends on what flavor of Antimagic we use. If it's just 'magic slides off', then it would just be un-enchantable and give resistance or immunity to hostile magics. A more active 'Magic-killing' sort of antimagic could dispel and cut through spells.

Which either way should still go a long way to not mattering. Afterall how can enchantment help against what it should slide off. How is an enchanted sword not a hostile magic afterall.

Removed from problematic gameplay mechanics anything resistant to magic has far greater implication. The loopholes vanish when applied as a concept.

I'd also submit you'd need magic to be extremely common to be actually be economical enough change armoring practices especially even without any magic resistant properties. Resistance/countering only raises said threshold.

[Ninjadeadbeard]

I'd also submit you'd need magic to be extremely common to be actually be economical enough change armoring practices especially even without any magic resistant properties. Resistance/countering only raises said threshold.

Depending on how people acquire the ability to use magic, a setting could feature cheap and plentiful armor enhancements, or a scenario where only a handful of such armor exists in the whole world. I think the best way to split the How is between Learned and Innate Magic.

In an Innate magic system magic is more wild, less stratified and controlled. People are born with the power, so the number of them in existence is dependent on birthrates. Innate Casters dying in battle might mean a generation with little to no magic on your side if enough get themselves killed in battle at once.

Learned magic, on the other hand, assumes that anyone can cast magic if they spend enough time and energy. This system depends on a nation's infrastructure and education. The former because people in backwaters will have a hard time getting anywhere so they'll end up farmers or laborers or what have you. The latter so that when they get to your major population centers they can be trained to cast spells. Learned magic does hit a snag in a traditional medieval setting where such education may be rare. Though once the Renaissance roles around, and then the Industrial Revolution Learned Magic beats out Innate in numbers every time (unless everybody's a mage).

[Man on Fire]

Renaissance would one so many possibilities. Leonardo Da Vinci working with magic to create even more fantastic machines than his projects or just bring those projects to life would be enough to advance entire civilisation hundreds of years foward.

[Lord Raziere]

Heh, I once made a setting imagining what would really happen if magic really existed and Alchemy really did find the Philosopher's Stone.

yea….that was a crazy setting. imagine a parallel universe of immortal famous people running around with strange steampunk technology and immortal wizard fake messiah Napoleon ruling most of the world. then I decided to add in crazy necromancer HP Lovecraft and zombie Robespierre, zombie Genghis Khan and zombie Caesar, along with vampire Lincoln while Stalin and Hitler are the worlds greatest freedom fighters allied together in the resistance against Napoleon. :smallbiggrin:

I should really get around to developing that setting more, its crazy awesome.

[The Glyphstone]

Which either way should still go a long way to not mattering. Afterall how can enchantment help against what it should slide off. How is an enchanted sword not a hostile magic afterall.

Removed from problematic gameplay mechanics anything resistant to magic has far greater implication. The loopholes vanish when applied as a concept.

I'd also submit you'd need magic to be extremely common to be actually be economical enough change armoring practices especially even without any magic resistant properties. Resistance/countering only raises said threshold.

The problem is, where does it stop? Cutting something made of magic like a summoned demon or a force barrier would make sense, but if an enchanted sword is 'hostile magic', than the enemy wielding the perfectly non-magical sword who happened to have his bum leg fixed with a magic healing spell could also be 'hostile magic', and it makes no sense at all to throw iron nails at him and suddenly he's a retroactive cripple.

[Tavar]

The problem is, where does it stop? Cutting something made of magic like a summoned demon or a force barrier would make sense, but if an enchanted sword is 'hostile magic', than the enemy wielding the perfectly non-magical sword who happened to have his bum leg fixed with a magic healing spell could also be 'hostile magic', and it makes no sense at all to throw iron nails at him and suddenly he's a retroactive cripple.

Probably the difference is active magics, and one shot stuff. I mean, once a Wall of Stone is cast, it's just like any other wall of stone, and thus not susceptible. On the other hand, if Wall of Fire is cast, it's fueled and shaped by magic, and thus would be weak against the bane.

[Soras Teva Gee]

The problem is, where does it stop? Cutting something made of magic like a summoned demon or a force barrier would make sense, but if an enchanted sword is 'hostile magic', than the enemy wielding the perfectly non-magical sword who happened to have his bum leg fixed with a magic healing spell could also be 'hostile magic', and it makes no sense at all to throw iron nails at him and suddenly he's a retroactive cripple.

If said bum legged is healed then the magic is done. If its being held together by some ongoing magical effect then the magic hasn't really healed a damn thing its just crutching it. Which might be all that setting could do but its a meaningful difference in conceptual structure.

The problem is for the +1 weapon is that whatever the magic is doing it must must be doing it constantly. Otherwise you don't have an enchanted sword, you have a magically forged sword. Or to get away from weapons, the difference between magic making something as strong as carbon nanotube and just making carbon nanotubes. The former requires a constant magical presence of some kind, the latter is just an impossible manufacturing method.

And now there are ways properly conceived magical enchantments could help but one has to get beyond just "+1" enchantments of vagueness. For example an repair enchantment that allowed a sword to keep its edge sharp combined with one sharpened as far as chemically possible. It wouldn't have that nice vorpal-esque absurdity of say cutting down a tree with a swipe but it would be sharp and should be unaffected by impacts with a sufficiently narrow anti-magic material. Because its not technically making the sword sharp, only repairing that state.

A true can cut anything blade though wouldn't against anything claiming to disrupt/resist magic as a material.