Casting Fluff

[Rorrik]

I grew up on my dad's D&D books (which I always thought were first edition, but recent discussion on these threads has led me to believe may have been second edition) and was always very keen on learning the fluff of the spells it was provided for. Burning hands, put your thumbs together and the fire is shot from the extended fingers, and so on.

That said, my group has tended to homebrew magic systems to give us all something new to master in each campaign, each with a different fluff. Does anyone else have interesting fluff they use for their magic?

A favorite of mine was based on strings imbued with spells. The type of string defined the element or spell and the length modified power modestly. You'd pull it out of its coil, release, and poof! The image of a caster with string wrapped around each of his fingers nimbly unwinding 3 feet of reddish orange and launching a devastating fireball was wonderful.

[Shpadoinkle]

This thread reminded me of Hector Gevillin. (http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files4/115615/eknPCXaFD6t.png)

Anyway, wrapping string around your fingers would... well, be bad. Seriously, get three feet of string and wrap it around your fingers securely. It's going to start to hurt before long.

A more plausible idea that comes to mind is having a special glove (or pair of gloves) made, so that strings can be stored in little compartments on the back of the hand, with an inch or so of one end sticking out so they can be drawn quickly. Maybe have a cover of some sort on it that can be flipped open, so there's less chance of your strings getting caught on something.

[Shpadoinkle]

This thread reminded me of Hector Gevillin. (http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files4/115615/eknPCXaFD6t.png)

Anyway, wrapping string around your fingers would... well, be bad. Seriously, get three feet of string and wrap it around your fingers securely. It's going to start to hurt before long.

A more plausible idea that comes to mind is having a special glove (or pair of gloves) made, so that strings can be stored in little compartments on the back of the hand, with an inch or so of one end sticking out so they can be drawn quickly. Maybe have a cover of some sort on it that can be flipped open, so there's less chance of your strings getting caught on something.

[Shadowknight12]

One of my characters is a sorcerer, and I fluff his spells as things that have never been. For example, Ray of Frost is a song he never heard but still knows by heart, Rage is the betrayal he never felt (but still makes him see red when he casts the spell), Charm Person is a secret he was never told, Warding Weapon is a knight he never met (he knows his full life story by heart and can describe him perfectly, to the birthmark on his shoulder), Mage Armour is a wound he never took (but still gives him phantom pains on cold nights) and Solid Fog is the love he never had (he still sees the silhouette in his dreams, shouting his name in the mists, but he can never reach it no matter how fast he runs).

It's fun coming up with these sorts of things. :smallbiggrin:

[kieza]

I wrote up a wizard who was an "energy-moneychanger." He specialized in manipulating forms of energy (force, fire, cold, lightning, radiance, etc.) and when he cast a spell, he had the exact opposite effect on some object in particular, or the area in general. When he cast a fireball, the entire area except that of the fireball dropped a couple of degrees. When he lifted something with Mage Hand, nearby tables collapsed under increased loads. My favorite was when he froze a bunch of water, and not knowing that water has a high specific heat, promptly keeled over from fever.

[prufock]

A favorite of mine was based on strings imbued with spells. The type of string defined the element or spell and the length modified power modestly. You'd pull it out of its coil, release, and poof! The image of a caster with string wrapped around each of his fingers nimbly unwinding 3 feet of reddish orange and launching a devastating fireball was wonderful.

Sounds like casting via cat's cradle, which is kind of a cool idea. Different cradle patterns give you different spells.

[Prime32]

Is this (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=87) the kind of thing you were looking for?

[jseah]

While certainly not D&D, I described a massive physical explanation for magic and mental control of magical forces, requiring only a concession for lifeforce (which is admittedly a massive handwave for the likes of which I should be hanged on the cross of science forevermore)

Of note, this explanation can recreate common spells that have physical impact, and results in a bunch of incredibly detailed rules for the design of spells.
It does rule out every single spell that violates some form of logic, like all divinations, healing and reanimation/ressurection-like spells. But Fireball, homing arrows, blasting wands and wards, most battlefield control... all easily explained, including all potential interactions.

I'm not about to explain it here since the fluff description that underlies it is a good three pages long and explaining how it translates into spell components takes another twenty...
But suffice it to say, I created an elemental-typed mana system, explained physics and how that tied into normal physics (which is assumed to be newtonian), and some additional mechanics to explain teleport (which is surprisingly similar to some SF FTL drives)

I certainly think it's very neat, but because I am a simulationist, the system is obviously impossible to use in any reasonable form. The one I have often mentioned was that I, the maker of the system, took half an hour to make a fireball spell, of which I could conceive of three variants with slight but important differences.

[Thialfi]

Our group required mages to come up with and perform their own incantations before we let them cast spells. Here is the party mage casting wish.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwiKys_gh0M

[jaybird]

One system I'm particularly fond of is something similar to how biotics work in Mass Effect, where each caster has a personal mnemonic for each school of magic that's used to place their mind and body in the appropriate state to cast spells. Alterations to specific spells, such as metamagic, lead to alterations in the mnemonic to trigger the spell.

Among others, there was a Dragon bloodline sorcerer who used Thu'um words as her keys, such as DUN (Grace) for Transmutation and FEIM (Fade) for Illusion. My Wizard (typical CN blaster) was a fan of Full Contact Magic (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FullContactMagic), and his Evocation mnemonic was pretty much just an open-handed push...until he picked up Arcane Thesis for Fireball, at which point his key for that one spell became flipping the bird at whatever he was blowing up :smallbiggrin: the Cleric insisted that the explosion should also be fluffed as a small mushroom cloud...

[Totally Guy]

One of my characters is a sorcerer, and I fluff his spells as things that have never been.

That's really good! Most things people come up with just make me roll my eyes.

[NikitaDarkstar]

I tend to not be very consistent myself, and just make up whatever fits on the spot. (My normal group uses a mana point system instead of the vancian system which gives us a little more freedom.) But a completely refluffed system for a character is.. rare.

But I did do it for a character that I never got to play. Basically he was a wizard and a necromancer. But he used other peoples feelings and emotions to trigger his spells. The stronger the emotions the stronger the spells he could cast, especially negative feelings and pain. As a side effect he avoided crowds (he always picked up on others feelings and to large crowds would sort of overload him.) and was sort of prone to hurt himself if he was in a pinch.

But as I said I never got to play him so all I have is his background story and fluff.

[Frenth Alunril]

For a long time I played a wizard who was a bit of a savant and bit aloof. I had all the components figured out for all of the spells I cast, and I wrote them up and put them in my spell file.

We played a chat based game about 10 years ago.

When ever I needed to cast I spell, I would start writing my pose, and then copy-paste the spell stuff into the post, changing nouns and pronouns as needed.

It made for a wonderful consistency, and I felt a lot better knowing that I didn't have to announce my spell, I would fire it off and the others would cheer, "Yay! Melf's Acid Arrow!" just before I rolled damage.

Fluff is the fun part. A lot of the special feats in 3.5 were great for adding that kind of thing, and I go out of my way for players, and let casters take "Spell Thematics" as a free story feat just to have more fun with descriptions when I play.

I have tried to get my more physical fighters to do the same, but they lack the vocabulary, I feel.

[Shadowknight12]

That's really good! Most things people come up with just make me roll my eyes.

Thank you!

The basic logic behind it is that spells are impossible things, so naturally they'd have impossible causes. Instead of a possible effect (earning someone's friendship through a conversation) stemming from a possible cause (sharing secrets with them), we have an impossible effect (waggling your fingers and muttering some arcane words to make someone your friend) stemming from an impossible cause (a secret you were never told). :smallbiggrin:

[Rorrik]

I certainly think it's very neat, but because I am a simulationist, the system is obviously impossible to use in any reasonable form. The one I have often mentioned was that I, the maker of the system, took half an hour to make a fireball spell, of which I could conceive of three variants with slight but important differences.

I've developed a similar system, and having quantified its effects to a real extent I am coding an interface to it to make it easy to use that sends the kind of data to the DM he needs to decide what it does. I'm quite happy with it.

[jseah]

Perhaps we could compare notes then? =)

Core dump beginning... http://www.scribd.com/doc/23054439/Intralis-Seeds-of-Magic
The magic system starts around page 14.... out of 180. =)

It's still very much WIP despite 3 years of on/off writing, as evidenced by the large amounts of empty space.

Feel free to steal anything you wish.

Oh also, I must disavow responsibility for the names of the elements. Don't bite my head off.

------------------------------------------------------------
The two central keystones of my system are:
1) The spell effects are separated from the spell operation which are separate from the characteristics. I call them Spell Components, Techniques and Actions respectively.

Actions are the things you use. Each action has a list of stuff it can do, the "true" spellcasting actions have shapes/targets on which you can tack Components and Techniques.
Components are the business end. The fire of a fireball is a component.
Techniques are the modifiers. They change how a spell operates... and there are alot of them.


2) Spell Technique is the true innovation, if I may say as much. I realized that to get any kind of flexible behaviour out of spells, they must be able to react to basic information and internal logic.
Thus Spell Technique and the concept of Parameters.

Virtually every Component and Technique has Parameters which are directly related to how they work (eg. size of an AoE, allocation of mp between components, etc.)
They also sometimes provide events, which are pretty much the sensors of a spell.

What results is essentially an event-driven scripting language for spells.

------------------------------------------------------------
I also manage to handle magic item creation, long term wards, ritual casting and cooperative spells. All with the same system.

EDIT:
The Em is a new thing I only recently added. So far, I'm intending it to be the 'warrior's' magic, hence it uses no actions and are pretty much activate/deactivate.

IE. more classical magic system with defined effects.

[Rorrik]

Very interesting. I don't think we're approaching it from the same direction and so our ideas may not be compatible, but I'd be interested in seeing yours in play. It seems like the power and versatility of the caster is almost entirely dependent on the cleverness of the player. I say that because it was a problem in my system I resolved by making the components learned as the player leveled and by creating abilities like "magical intuition" that allow the GM to warn how the spell will be interpreted.

My system uses a component system with three classes of component: arms, hands, and words.

Arms offer precision. They move through the arcane circle, whose radii represent the "temperaments" of the spell and whose arcs represent the elemental "spirits" of the spell. There are six arcs and six radii, each with two levels of mastery.

Hands offer power. Each finger is associated with an "element" and can be held in four positions(including closed) which dictate the capacity in which the element is applied to the spell. Fingers can be changed and even reiterated as arcs are drawn to increase power, but this takes more time and mana.

Words offer control. There are 6 power words that dictate the power of the spell, 10 purpose words(heal, destroy, augment, diminish, etc) that dictate it's, well, purpose, and 8 form words(storm, discharge, gate, detect, etc).

There are seven casting styles(pure, swift, stealth, battle, manipulation, elemental, arcane) that use different combinations of the three component types, pure magic being the style that uses all three. As players take levels in a style, they gain a diminishing number of components used in that style. For example, a mage taking swift magic for the first time would gain 6 fingers(specific positions) and 6 words, the next time he would only get 4 of each. If he took elemental magic, he would get 8 fingers, and choose one he can use at will without mana cost.

In this way I get a large variety of caster types, as they have to choose their components carefully for their character(in our current campaign we have a fire cleric, an earth cleric, and a light/mind mage). The limitation of components known based on intelligence also factors in at higher levels. It makes making BBEG's really fun when you get to plan what spells they will be able to cast based on the components you've given them. Based on their work so far, the PC's try to guess at what components they have and what spells might be leveled against them.

Thanks for sharing.

Edit: I should note that spells tend to take more than 1 turn, sometimes 3 or 4(really powerful spells like teleport could take dozens of turns) and astute enemies will tend to take aim at the man waving his arms about to interrupt the spell.

[jseah]

I say that because it was a problem in my system I resolved by making the components learned as the player leveled and by creating abilities like "magical intuition" that allow the GM to warn how the spell will be interpreted.
There isn't actually a "interpretation" of a spell so much as a simulation of it.

I could literally point to each part of a fireball spell and tell you what that part did and how it made a specific behaviour of the fireball. Change a part in some tiny way, I can tell you what effect it would have on the fireball.

You don't actually need a DM to tell you how your spell works. The rules completely describe it.

Example spoilered for length
Name:
Fireball

Effect Type:
Direct Effect

Level:
4

Components and Techniques:
Channelling 2 (Pulse), Spell Technique 0, Fire 0
Channelling 1 (Area)

Fire component applied to Pulse effect shape
Spell Technique applied to spell (Area effect shape used in behaviour)

Prerequisites:
30mp, 10 Control
Channelling 2, Spell Technique 0, Manifest Material 0, Fire 0

Mechanics:
Casting Decisions: Point in range, a direction, a value (Distance in meters), a value (Size in meters, must be 1 or larger)
Casting Time: 2 seconds + 0.1 seconds per mp spent
Duration: Until impact (and then 1 second) or mp exhausted
Cost: 20 mp
Mp Range: 20 to 50 mp

Spell Technique
Initial mp distribution: All in Fire component
Spell Technique algorithm: (3 events, 4 actions)
- Time Elapsed = 0;; Delay Fire component
- Collision Or Solid Collision (any above 1cm2) Or Liquid Collision (any above 1cm2);; Time Elapsed = Distance value (Note: this instantly triggers the detonation)
- Time Elapsed = Distance value / 10;; change Effect Shape to Area (sphere Size meters in radius, centered on current location), Activate Fire component

Effect:
Caster must use Fire mana to cast this spell

This spell ties a large packet of magical energy into a Pulse and converts it all to Fire upon impact or reaching a destination point.

The caster chooses a direction and a distance, defining a point relative to the place he casted the spell at. The spell does not miss this point.
Upon collision with any solid, liquid or magical barrier, the spell detonates. The spell also detonates when it reaches that point defined above if it has not done so already.
The caster may intentionally choose to try and hit a specific target by defining distance and direction appropriately, this has a base Accuracy of (2 / distance to the target in meters) maximum of 1 - 0.1 x distance
- A target hit in this way will be in the center of the created sphere

At casting time, the spell Delays the Fire component, allowing it's transport in a Pulse Effect Shape without losing too much mp.
When the indicated distance is covered, the spell turns into a stationary sphere centered on that point and Activates the Fire component
The spell takes Distance in meters/10 seconds to reach the target point.

All similar size objects in the sphere receive approximately equal proportions of Fire mana. This deposits heat over the period of 1 second before disappearing.
- Catching an object in the sphere has a Base Accuracy of 1 x distance to edge / (speed of target * 1 second)
- Damage is spread approximately evenly across all solid and liquid targets in the area, dealing Offense value of 100 / number of targets
- Damage is also proportional to size. The formula applies to human sized targets. Larger targets count as more than 1 target and receive more damage. Smaller targets count as fractional number of targets and receive less damage.
- Objects with magic resistance have the Offense value for them reduced by the magic resistance stat (as per Direct Effect type spells)
Damage type is Energy Heat
I might like to mention that every single line in that spell description of fireball comes out of the rules or is an explanation of how the Spell Technique operates.

Most of the Effects description is just quoting the relevant sections of rules for convienience. The spell is actually completely defined after the end of the Spell Technique section.

Obviously, you understand the problem facing actually using this system in play. It's impossible to run as a DM unless you literally know the rules like the back of your hand. Which at this point, I can safely say, even I forget things at times.
There are 180 pages right now. And the system... is about 40% done.

[Rorrik]

There isn't actually a "interpretation" of a spell so much as a simulation of it.

There are 180 pages right now. And the system... is about 40% done.

You may want to start writing a compiler to simulate the spell, otherwise I don't see the system being within reach of mere mortals.

[jseah]

Don't think that's gonna help. Spell Technique trivializes some incredibly difficult problems... for computers.
Like manipulating shapes, deforming them and detecting overlaps/interfaces. Manipulating 2D shapes.

Those are not things you can trivially program, and even after you solve it, doing it efficiently will be a right mess.
Gotta love it when your system too clunky for even computers. =)


Nah, for most cases it'll be fine.
Casters can't actually make up spells on the spot so in most cases, the majority of rules digging and stuff can be done in the creation of the spell instead of using it.

If you look at the fireball spell, adjudicating how it would work against a standard target of a few humans would be quite simple for the GM (work out how many targets, how big the floor is, allocate damage)

Now, if you wanted to use edge cases like using fireball to boil some water... now THEN you go back to the rules to see what happens.
And before you ask, yes, I have the heat output of fire in the rules. As well as its density, heat capacity, melting point and a dozen other things not included in the fireball spell as it would almost certainly never come up. In fact, I actually wrote those before deciding on a proper Offense multiplier.
You can bet that the Earth spell for creating walls will use density.


So, the third cornerstone of my system:
3) Rules contain some incredibly detailed information. Only use that which applies to your situation. Often, only the few central portions will apply most of the time so focus on knowing those.
In edge cases, the description and fluffier explanations of how they work should guide GM adjudication.

[J.Gellert]

All magic is possible by the presence of spirits.

When you cast a fireball, you are not really throwing it - instead you command a lesser fire elemental to set fire to the place.

When you raise a skeleton, you command an evil spirit to inhabit the corpse. When you turn into a vampire, a co-existing evil spit sustains your own body (and hungers for blood).

When you cast confusion, you command a trickster spirit to make a mess in your enemy's mind.

At least that's the prevailing theory :smallbiggrin:

[PersonMan]

I have a character concept (well, more of a character/potential organization/setting concept) who uses magic which is fluffed as the person's level of enlightenment and total understanding of the balance of the universe.

[Man on Fire]

I'm playing a character who tells the stories to make them affect the world around her - when she casts Enlarge Person, she tells a story of a boy who grew really big and stomped on his bullies, when she casts Black Tentacles she tells a story of captain being dragged into the sea by Kraken, things like that.

[Morph Bark]

Casting Fluff should be relatively easy. It doesn't have any material components and it doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity if you do it right.

[Rorrik]

I'm playing a character who tells the stories to make them affect the world around her - when she casts Enlarge Person, she tells a story of a boy who grew really big and stomped on his bullies, when she casts Black Tentacles she tells a story of captain being dragged into the sea by Kraken, things like that.

Wow, that sounds like a lot of fun! Is it a different story every time?