Sword Beats Spell: Defending the God-Martial

[Cluedrew]

Some back-ground: Some time ago I created a thread called Sword Beats Spell: Creating the God-Martial. It was supposed to be about what does a god-martial character look like, but it got mixed up with another conversation. Can a god-martial character even exist? This thread is about that.

So what is a God-Martial? Short answer: a martial god-wizard. A god-wizard (or slightly more generically, god-caster) is one who has enough magical power to have practically infinite power, with few to no limits. So a wizard with the power of a god, shouldn't be too much off a surprise. So a god-martial is then any character who has enough martial power and mastery to have effectively unlimited power.

So can such a character exist? I think so and my reason as to why basically boils down to Dragon Ball. Last time I saw anything of Dragon Ball I saw someone tap a table and destroy half a planet. Now, the reason I remembered that bit is because I was wondering how the table withstood that much force, so it doesn't make perfect sense. But then neither does magic.

For some reason people seem to be more willing to accept magic not making sense than the martial case. I guess it is because magic never makes sense at some level. But still, when D&D magic is help up as an example... sure it is internally consistent, because the internal logic is "it works". I think "the tap was actually a couple dozen taps gone in under 1/20th of a second, which caused the table (made of a single material) to resonate back up and down in perfect unison and transfer all the force to the floor" is a more reasonable explanation in terms of the suspension of disbelief. Still that is one point of debate.

Another is what point does it stop being martial power? I have seen martial defined as "one who hits things" and "anything that is not a caster". Sometimes seemingly in conjunction, which I think is a rather narrow view. As for what is martial, if they don't do it by magic (caster), delegation (leader) or sufficiently advanced technology (caster scientist) I think it should work. Common tech is allowed, because then it becomes about mastery and that seems to fit back into martial mastery. So want to start a fire by snapping your fingers, fine by me. Cause a lightning strike by throwing a metal spear so hard it supercharges itself along the way, pass.

And with these things I think you could create a god-martial character. But that is just my opinion. What do you think?

[Inevitability]

It's definitely possible to create an, as you call it, god-martial.

As you already pointed out, many people (DMs, forum-goers, 3.5 designers) had this idea that a martial could do nothing more impressive than a well-trained athlete, which harms the fun and balance of the game and equates the strongest warriors in D&D with the strongest people in real life.

I suggest looking at the various Mythic homebrews floating around on these forums. Some of them are pretty obviously supernatural, but there's also stuff like the Teramach (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?286983-3-5-Base-Class-quot-I-want-to-live-inside-a-castle-built-of-your-agony!-quot), which gets to mundanely smash through Walls of Force and throw mountains.

[gkathellar]

I think the issue is that a martial god and a wizard God are going to be more-or-less indistinguishable in a lot of ways. "Can do anything" really sorta all blends together past a certain point, and many players conceptualize martial characters primarily through their limits, so ... things like this run into visualization issues.

That said, for examples of godlike martial artists alongside other godlike characters, I'd point you to the manga Battle Angel Alita. The sequel series in particular has a lunatic cyborg karate master who literally knife-hands miracles into people. There's another martial artist who's an immortal, regenerating orphanage head who reads so many moves ahead that she's effectively precognitive, and can only be defeated if your dharma is more powerful than hers. At one point a wizard-y side-character shows up with psychic powers, and the resident yoga master/computer hacker/kalaripayattu fighter shatters his illusions and snaps his neck, saying, "You may not alter reality without my consent."

It's that kind of story.

[Cluedrew]

As you already pointed out [...] had this idea that a martial could do nothing more impressive than a well-trained athlete,This has always struck me as odd. You took reality, turned it upside down and shook it. And you want nothing to change because of this? It is a little bit different when there is just one exception, but when magic and or pseudo-science is allowing people to do crazy things all over the place, why not martial power as well? To me is feel out of place that it doesn't amplify like everything else in reality.

On Teramech: I think that qualifies. Is there a calmer variant? That would be slightly more my style.

On Doing Anything: Now, all-powerful characters are hard to use in stories. But if you are going to have one, it could very well be a martial. "A sufficiently skilled fighter is indistinguishable from a wizard", but the wizard just seems to be hand-waved while the fighter must be explained. Not sure why.

On Battle Angel Alita: Sounds interesting, how is in tone (on a scale from comedy to tragedy) and length (on a scale from one shot to one piece) of the story?

[WbtE]

There's some evidence in 1e that levels are a function of supernatural favour, rather than just skill. (Alignment penalties are probably the strongest evidence.) If just being a high-level character is supernatural, defining some high-level characters as mundane and others as magical is arbitrary at best.

[Inevitability]

This has always struck me as odd. You took reality, turned it upside down and shook it. And you want nothing to change because of this? It is a little bit different when there is just one exception, but when magic and or pseudo-science is allowing people to do crazy things all over the place, why not martial power as well? To me is feel out of place that it doesn't amplify like everything else in reality.

On Teramech: I think that qualifies. Is there a calmer variant? That would be slightly more my style.

There's plenty of other mythos classes. The Bellator (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?336731-quot-Today-is-victory-over-yourself-Tomorrow-is-your-victory-over-lesser-men-quot), for example, emulates a less bloodthirsty archetype (though being bloodthirsty is still an option): it may be more to your liking.

[jitzul]

This is my 2 cents/unintelligible ramblings.

I think reason people have a aversion to god Martial's is the same reason people don't like monks and the sort. "They didn't exist in tolken and tolken inspired story's so they have no place in my generic medieval fantasy land." When a large amount of people in the ttrpg community think of a martial character lifting a building and throwing it or a swordsman slicing a tower in half they think of the phrase "anime bullspite". People don't bat a eye at magic and pseudo science because they have been ingrained into the concussion of western culture. Batman is the closest thing we have a god martial in western culture. Meanwhile in more anime then you can count a character that trains hard enough can well lift a building a throw it. See also Charles atlas superpower.
(http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CharlesAtlasSuperpower)
Not really sure where I was going with this at first. But I think it all comes down to god-martials not melding well with a lot of peoples ideal fantasy settings.

[Quertus]

I saw someone tap a table and destroy half a planet. Now, the reason I remembered that bit is because I was wondering how the table withstood that much force, so it doesn't make perfect sense. But then neither does magic.

For some reason people seem to be more willing to accept magic not making sense than the martial case.

What do you think?


People don't bat a eye at magic and pseudo science because they have been ingrained into the concussion of western culture. Batman is the closest thing we have a god martial in western culture. Meanwhile in more anime then you can count a character that trains hard enough can well lift a building a throw it.

So, here's my random thoughts.

In theory, we've all had years / decades to observe how physical reality works, through near-constant interaction. Even though we're probably wrong about a lot of things, we all doubtless have opinions in how the world works.

"Magic", in the other hand, differs from system to system, setting to setting. Few of us can claim compertable experience with even a single system of magic. For most of us, our knowledge of magic is something along the lines of, "fireball can do X, which I can compare to the abstraction of a sword, or stepping into a campfire, and this is easier / harder for a mage to accomplish than Y or Z.". Unless there is something that just feels wrong, like traveling through time or summoning gods being easier than throwing said fireball, it's hard to do more than say, "ok, that's part of how magic works in this system".

But, try and say that a perfectly mundane table can reliably survive being at ground zero of the destruction of a planet, and we have enough experience to feel that this is wrong.

On the other hand, move it outside our experience, with Star Trek technology, or Kryptonian DNA, and the audience can be fine with the "mundane" behaving godlike.

-----

Oh, and, personally, I'm really grouchy about the idea that magic doesn't have to make sense. Of course it does! It just doesn't have to fit a muggle's preconceived notions of how the world works. That would be at least as silly as assuming that Klingon has to follow English's grammar rules. :smalltongue:

[SethoMarkus]

This is my 2 cents/unintelligible ramblings.

I think reason people have a aversion to god Martial's is the same reason people don't like monks and the sort. "They didn't exist in tolken and tolken inspired story's so they have no place in my generic medieval fantasy land." When a large amount of people in the ttrpg community think of a martial character lifting a building and throwing it or a swordsman slicing a tower in half they think of the phrase "anime bullspite". People don't bat a eye at magic and pseudo science because they have been ingrained into the concussion of western culture. Batman is the closest thing we have a god martial in western culture. Meanwhile in more anime then you can count a character that trains hard enough can well lift a building a throw it. See also Charles atlas superpower.
(http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CharlesAtlasSuperpower)
Not really sure where I was going with this at first. But I think it all comes down to god-martials not melding well with a lot of peoples ideal fantasy settings.

I need to slightly disagree with this, because Western culture does have examples of extraordinary "mundane" characters. Beowulf, Fionn MacCumhaill (or more aptly, Cú Chulainn), Hercules, Sanson the Strongman, etc.

There are examples of extraordinarily or supernaturally strong/powerful martial combatants in Western myth, but they are often explained as having some sort of divine, supernatural, or magical source for their strength. I don't think that should disqualify them, but many people feel differently.

Eastern myth should have the same issue, in my opinion, though. Often these martial characters that have trained to the point of super human ability are breaking the same rules as their Western counterparts in terms of thr limits of mundane ability. Goku not only is an alien like Superman, he uses the mystical Ki/Qi energy to fuel his powers. Gon uses Nen. Luffy uses Haki, another spiritual energy, in addition to a superpower granted by a magical fruit! (No, not that kind.)

How is it that anime gets an eyeroll or an automatic pass while a beard favored by the gods or a magic sword is scoffed as "but that's magic!"?

[Frozen_Feet]

The problem with "God-Martial" is that wizard god isn't just a "God-Wizard"... he's "just" God.

That is: a "God-Wizard" already does everything martial. For example, in D&D 3.x., a 10th-level Wizard, with the investment of one spell (heroics), can have all the same powers as 5th level Fighter. A 5th-level fighter may sound underwhelming, but think of it from the in-universe perspective: with knowledge of a single spell, the Wizard is now on par with a trained warrior!

So, in order for a "God-Martial" to make sense as a comparison or contrast point, the "God-Wizard" must be brought down by some pegs so they can't do all things martial just as well.

---

This said: I think actually building a "God-Martial" is conceptually easy. You can start by just taking the d20 system reference document, taking all feats, skills, epic feats and epic skill uses a Fighter gets, and putting them in a single character. You now have a leader of armies and nations who can kill scores of people with a single sword swing, who can leap over mountains, swim to the bottom of the ocean, climb on walls, tame wild beasts of gargantuan size and ride then to battle, can see half across the world and shoot anything he can see perfectly, can bend or break steel with his bare hands etc.

Add in abilities from Fighter sub-classes and prestige classes such as Barbarian, Ranger, Monk, Dreadnought etc. and now you can also walk on water or clouds, see the unseen, hear the unheard, make foes flee before your rage, lift whole hills and fortresses, break through walls of force, be immune to disease, poison, old age and targeted magic, can fire blast of Ki across stellar distances and break the Moon in half with them... so on and so forth.

The problem with martials, even in D&D 3.x., is not that they don't get godly feats... it's just that they get them hopelessly late compared to casters. Do away with redundant feats, make others available easier & earlier, make martials able to benefit from epic skills etc. and you're already on track to make them good.

[Lalliman]

many people (DMs, forum-goers, 3.5 designers) had this idea that a martial could do nothing more impressive than a well-trained athlete
If you consider the way the human body (and biology in general) works, this idea can be subverted to a certain extent even without saying "screw logic". In reality, the highest level of strength a human can achieve, is the ability to just barely lift a thousand pounds. The reason you can't get any higher is not because it's physically impossible for a set of muscles to put out any more power, but because mankind didn't evolve to be that strong. There exist animals that are much stronger than our strongmen, even relative to their size. Gorillas weigh about as much as our heaviest weightlifters, but are estimated to be considerably stronger. The structure of their musculature is simply more effective. Thus, it would be theoretically possible for a human to have superhuman strength if the biological make-up of their muscles was different. And the only reason that our muscles aren't more powerful, is because in our evolutionary history, there wasn't any need to be significantly stronger.

But why would that be the same way in a fantasy setting? We could easily argue that the limits of human ability are simply higher in this world, especially since fantasy settings tend to lean towards creationism over evolution. If some god created humankind, he could've just programmed their DNA to allow them to reach arbitrary levels of strength with enough training. Of course, you will eventually reach a level of power that is truly impossible, but superhuman feats of strength such as, say, chucking a 2000 lbs boulder, are not as impossible as they seem.

TL;DR: The limits of the human body could be much higher if evolution called for them to be. It's not that far-fetched to set the limits of the human body much higher in a fantasy setting than in real life.

Of course, you still wouldn't reach god-martial levels, so maybe this wasn't relevant to the topic. >_> <_<

For something more relevant, I once created a villain who could be described as a god-martial. He was actually a celestial, which might disqualify the non-magical part, but his form and abilities were totally physical. He basically had the abilities of an epic level monk (except this wasn't in D&D), so strong and fast and cunning that almost no amount of attackers could harm him. He controlled most of the civilised world from the shadows simply by strong-arming all the people in power. If you disobey him, he will come for you, and there's nothing you can do to stop him.

It's not as flashy as a god-wizard who can destroy a whole city by snapping his fingers, but maybe god-martials don't need to be. Normal martials are less flashy than normal casters, after all.

(Hope the people who posted while I was writing didn't already invalidate my post.)

[Frozen_Feet]

The limits of human body versus limits of laws of physics is worth of discussing also because the God-Martial doesn't have to be a human, or even a biological entity. You could have a creature with bones of steel, muscles of polyaramids and skin of graphene.

[Cluedrew]

I am going to try to address this by topic, instead of doing a multi-quote.

On Mundane: Fun fact, the reason I use the term martial is not to so much to exclude other non-casters (although I find the martial sub-group to be the most interesting) but because to be mundane means boring before it means non-caster and those are conations I would rather avoid. Mind you I have never actually seen an argument where people have said a mundane character is supposed to be boring, but I have seen some arguments get alarmingly close.

On Setting Expectations: This is definitely part of it, but I don't think it is the whole story. After all the average god-wizard is notable stronger (or at least more direct) than any Tolkien caster. Actually in The Hobbit/The Lord of the Rings most of the casters are not significant because they are casters, the magic is only part of the picture.

On Magic Logic: I also feel magic should follow an internal logic. In fact I think holding it to that is a great way to address the other side of martial-caster disparity by putting some limits that fall out from that logic on casters. Although this thread is more about bring martials up so might not be as relevant, not from that perspective at least.

On D&D 3.5: OK, I knew this was going to come up, in fact one of the things I had planned for the original post but then cut was a variant of this point: This thread includes D&D 3.5 (I would have to be stupid or vastly uninformed to think I could get away not including it) but it is also about a lot of other things. I guess it is mostly about the underlying ideas that lead to the D&D case and others. So they are great to bring up, I just don't want the conversation to stop there either.

On God-Anything: No matter what path you take to ultimate power once you arrive their the differences will be technicalities more often then not. The big question is, can you arrive there by non-magical means? In real life obviously not (well, barring technology which would have to be sufficiently advanced as to be indistinguishable from magic anyways) but in fantasyland, why not?

On Human=Superhuman: That is probably part of the picture. Abilities beyond human obviously exist in many settings, even in humans. But how far does that go? 3 times as strong is pretty significant but that is still not a god-martial, although definitely a step in the right direction. That alone will not allow you to smash a boulder, but what about a non-magic (by not real either) technique that allows one to smash a boulder with your hands? How does that work. How about a !magic technique to climb a wall using only your toes to grip? And so on.

To Lalliman: If you are worried about new posts coming up hit the Preview Post button and scroll down to the Topic Review section, posts made since you stated writing will appear their.

[Quertus]

On Magic Logic: I also feel magic should follow an internal logic. In fact I think holding it to that is a great way to address the other side of martial-caster disparity by putting some limits that fall out from that logic on casters. Although this thread is more about bring martials up so might not be as relevant, not from that perspective at least.

Not from that perspective. But, understanding that perspective can help understand how the martial needs to work. They need to be able to do "anything", but not actually anything, because what they do needs to "make sense", in universe.

Superman can reverse time... by spinning the planet backwards... by flying around it really fast. Does that qualify as a god martial?

[Newtonsolo313]

Not from that perspective. But, understanding that perspective can help understand how the martial needs to work. They need to be able to do "anything", but not actually anything, because what they do needs to "make sense", in universe.

Superman can reverse time... by spinning the planet backwards... by flying around it really fast. Does that qualify as a god martial?

That was Faster than light time travel or so I have heard
But yeah super man is pretty close to what a god martial would look like just without a magic weakness

[Dragonexx]

Superman can reverse time... by spinning the planet backwards... by flying around it really fast. Does that qualify as a god martial?

It's about how broad your concept and what you can do with it. The problem is that "Martial" as a concept has little narrative versatility compared to "Magic" or "Divine" or whatever. Attempting to make it able to do the same things as other concepts tends to break suspension of disbelief hard. It's the reason why Fighters Can't Have Nice ThingsTM. It's a problem that many RPG's run into in trying to justify how martial characters contribute at high levels or can even participate. There are several terms that might explain this better.



QWQW (Quadratic Warriors, Quadratic Wizards)

A method of advancement in which the Linear Warriors are designed in such a way as to gain powers at the same rate as the Quadratic Wizards.
Most aspiring game designers view QWQW as a foolproof way to thwart LWQW, but they come with their own problems that need to be taken care of. Typical issues with Quadratic Warriors, Quadratic Wizards include:

The Captain Hobo Problem: What happens when you allow characters to build their own fluff on top of generic game mechanics.
The Elothar's Gear Problem: What happens when a method of keeping quadratic warriors quadratic by giving them unrelated superpowers, typically granted through magic items and setting rewards, ends up clobbering their previous fluff.
The Magician Superhero Problem: What happens when you have several sources of power that have unequal narrative utility.
Weeaboo Fightan Magic: A derogatory term aimed at fighters who do things deemed as too fantastical or 'anime'.



Elothar's Gear Problem

Named after the model character of the Elothar, Warrior of Bladereach (https://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Elothar_Warrior_of_Bladereach_(3.5e_Prestige_Class )) Prestige Class, this is a method of enforcing Quadratic Warriors that ends up throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Elothar's original flavor was that of a tricksy and elegant mortal swordsman that fought with two weapons; in an actual campaign, however, this signature ability of his becomes less and less important compared to his non-swordsman class feature. By the time he completes the class, his usefuless wouldn't be particularly affected even if had both of his hands chopped off; as long as he is able to use abilities such as Der'renya the Ruby Sorceress and I've Got That! he's still a fully-functioning party member. Similarly, if he traded in all of his non-sword abilities for a boost to attack and damage, he'd be consigned back to the pit of uselessness. In the end, his swordsmanship matters as much to his adventures as the party wizard's 14 ranks in Profession: Cooking.
What this amounts to is that after a certain point of ability acquisition, the Elothar's Gear Problem ends up being a backhanded way to tell the fighter and rogue and similar classes that their character concept truly can't reach the top power levels of the game the way the wizard and cleric are; their original concept must be retired for the game to go on, but the game will distract them from this endgame.
Be sure to check out Captain Hobo Problem to see what can happen when you insist that Elothar's swordsmanship should stay relevant at all levels of play without ensuring that the fluff can actually support this thematic expansion.


Captain Hobo Problem

A theoretical character in a system which generically surcharges game effects based on their utility and directs the player to fluff their effects post-hoc. He's used as a shorthand for the dangers of assigning weak fluff without regards to its relative in-game effect; Captain Hobo's super-speed is described as being the side-effect of 'too much energy drinks and vodka', his 12d6 attack (the max he's allowed to buy out of chargen) is a broken chair leg, his toughness is described as 'layered clothes from Goodwill with cardboard and tape', etc.
The problem with Captain Hobo is that merely by existing he makes everyone else's character less cool. Your badass magical martial artist with mastery over the four elements is only as effective at superheroics as a drunken smelly guy. A less extreme but no less illuminating example would be someone playing a James Bond clone whose PP7 could do more damage than the mortar shots of Artillery Man or someone playing a Conan clone who could outwrestle someone's Superman expy.

Also:

Champions/HERO system is effect-based. That means that the strength of a power is determined by what you paid for it, and you can add whatever flavor you want to that. So Kid Saturn can have 12d6 gamma eye beams, and Battle Machine can have a 12d6 artillery barrage, and everyone's happy.

However, then there's Captain Hobo. He buys similar stats to everyone else, and then gives them extremely weak flavor. His attack is hitting people with a bent golf club, and his armor is cardboard boxes wrapped in duct tape. His reason for moving at SPD 5 is "too many energy drinks and vodka". Captain Hobo makes everyone's character lamer just by existing. Now it turns out your gamma eye beams do the same damage as a drunk guy with a golf club. Not very impressive.

Ok, it's rare anyone would actually play Captain Hobo, and if they did so in a non-joke campaign it would probably be vetoed. But the effect does happen to a lesser degree, just from differences in what people think is cool. Adam makes a non-super secret agent that's just that badass, and now Bob's beam of pure destruction has the same effect as a handgun. Not an insurmountable problem, but it does require getting on the same page from the start.

Stop by Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards and Magician Superhero Problem to see what can happen if you naively attempt to avert the Captain Hobo problem.


Magician Superhero Problem

Imagine you're playing a superhero game where three players build three different characters with different points: one character has power over ice, the other over sound, the other is simply a magician. For typical superhero challenges such as stopping a bus from crashing or thwarting bank robbers or rescuing a building full of hostages, the characters perform equally. Unfortunately, balance problems start to crop up when the heroes are faced with unusual situations. For example, imagine an adventure in which the heroes were attacked by ghosts and they had to travel to the dream world to stop them. The Magician superhero can participate in the adventure very easily (I cast a spell at the ghosts; I cast a spell that lets me transport to the dream world); the sound hero has an easy but not trivial answer to the ghosts (I modulate the frequency of my sound waves) and has to think a little harder about how to go to the dream world (I adjust my binaural beats using my sound powers until I slip into a supernaturally lucid dream state). The ice hero will probably be unable to think of a way to use their powers at all and will have to sit the adventure out entirely. It doesn't matter how good his ice powers are, if he can't think of a way that the situation applies then his score might as well be zero as far as this adventure is concerned.
The Problem is thus this: The Magician Superhero can operate at full theoretical effectiveness no matter what the situation because the player can always go 'it's magic; I don't have to explain it' when asked how their power will apply to their situation. On the far end, less open-ended power sources such as the sound and ice hero will often have to employ more creativity than the magician and if they can't rise to the challenge, face not being able to use their power at all.
The Magician Superhero Problem is somewhat related to Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards except that an especially creative player of a 'weak' power source can still outclass a less imaginative player of an open-ended power source. For LWQW, no amount of creativity in playing your 18th level barbarian will close the gap in utility between you and a properly played wizard.
Unfortunately, naively averting the Magician Superhero Problem by letting people with less open-ended power sources achieve the same effects (the reason I can transport to the dream world with my power over squirrels? Just because, okay?) as those with more open-ended ones has its own set of problems. See Captain Hobo for more information.



VAH (Vanilla Action Hero)

A character common to action movies who has no reliable access to or unilateral control of phlebotinum and has to rely on plot armor and mundane (if preternatural) human abilities to accomplish things. VAHs are allowed to use their plot armor to bend probability--such as being shot at by twenty bad guys and having them all miss--but can't use it to do something that's impossible to a layman's WSoD--such as surviving a harpoon to the heart. Has a lot of overlap with Dumb Melee Fighter, but note that not all VAHs are DMFs; James Bond is a Vanilla Action Hero but not a DMF. Similarly, The Thing is a Dumb Melee Fighter but not a VAH.

From this page: https://dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Canon:RPG_Terminology

[Max_Killjoy]

One thing:


Champions/HERO system is effect-based. That means that the strength of a power is determined by what you paid for it, and you can add whatever flavor you want to that. So Kid Saturn can have 12d6 gamma eye beams, and Battle Machine can have a 12d6 artillery barrage, and everyone's happy.

However, then there's Captain Hobo. He buys similar stats to everyone else, and then gives them extremely weak flavor. His attack is hitting people with a bent golf club, and his armor is cardboard boxes wrapped in duct tape. His reason for moving at SPD 5 is "too many energy drinks and vodka". Captain Hobo makes everyone's character lamer just by existing. Now it turns out your gamma eye beams do the same damage as a drunk guy with a golf club. Not very impressive.

Ok, it's rare anyone would actually play Captain Hobo, and if they did so in a non-joke campaign it would probably be vetoed. But the effect does happen to a lesser degree, just from differences in what people think is cool. Adam makes a non-super secret agent that's just that badass, and now Bob's beam of pure destruction has the same effect as a handgun. Not an insurmountable problem, but it does require getting on the same page from the start.


In HERO (4th and 5th), there is a baseline scale of normal armor, weapons, environmental damage, etc. "Just a gulf club" as an effect is already comparable to what's on that scale, and won't do as much damage as something that can blast a whole in tank armor, and "just cardboard and duct tape" won't stop an bullets, let alone anti-tank weapons or superpowers that are equivalent to anti-tank weapons.

If someone is claiming that special effects in HERO are entirely open-ended by default, they're ignoring the published material in favor of their own interpretation.

[Morphic tide]

Personally, I find the idea of a God Martial stupid. No matter how powerful a Martial is, they always have almost no ability outside of combat. That's why they are called martials. A God-mundane, however, is doable because you are not talking about only fighting, so other competencies are assumed. Let's look at Exalted for inspiration and go with Pathfinder's Path of War third party substystem.

Exalted has a few mystical martial arts that are actually highly structured debating styles focused on the social combat system of Exalted, which has about as much core rulebook material explaining the base system of it as the normal shove-sword-through-person combat.

Path of War is much like Tome of Battle, but it has two additions to the recognizable framework: Groups of manoeuvres have skills they scale off of and weapon groups they use for their manoeuvres, which enables much more varied ones that focus on non-combat things.

Now, Path of War doesn't actually have any non-combat Disciplines, although it does have one or two ranged ones, but it's rule set has the support we are looking for.

Have a few example outlines of disciplines that could be made into foundations for a God Mundane:

Dirges of the Inspiriting Muse:
Character archetype: buffer, debuffer, enchanter
Key Skill: Perform (Wind)
Discipline Weapon(s): Improvised Weapon (Wind instruments)
Fluff Outline: Akin to a Bard, but excluding their touch of magic, practitioners of this discipline inspire courage and skill, or draw others to their cause. The darker or more desperate of it's practitioners use it's skills to draw their foes to their way of thinking against their own interests, gathering a seemingly possessed band of cultists, or driving their enemies to flee in terror. When cornered in personal combat, they prove to be startlingly effecting at using their instruments of song as bludgeons, sometimes going so far as to alter their instruments into weapons.
Actual Abilities: Buffs, Fear effects, Diplomacy checks, Charm-like effects at higher levels. All Area of Effect abilities, letting them screw armies and gatherings of influential people like nothing else. As for actual personal combat, they don't have much available to them. Mostly just "I bludgeon you with my instrument in a shockingly effective way" with a side of dirty fighting, inflicting stuff like Dazed, Blind, Nauseated, Prone and generally using their instrument to inflict many nasty conditions that act like Save or Sucks.

Procedures of the Knowing Assassin:
Character Archetype: burst damage, information gatherer, skillmonkey, "coverup expert"
Key Skill: Gather Information
Discipline Weapon(s): Thrown weapon group
Fluff Outline: Those who know this Discipline can be expected to know many more things beyond fighting. They bring secrets out of mouths, pages, footprints, locks and bodies, learning answers to question almost no others dare ask from evidence few others notice. Those who think to hide from them are found with contemptuous ease, those they seek to end are found dead from an impossibly precise blow. Those who seek to find them face tests of their own skills, because their understanding of what to look for makes them know how to leave no traces.
Actual Abilities: Out of combat, you can get Sherlock Holms level impossible evidence connection and the ability to no-sell it. You also get the ability to make people talk about whatever you feel is needed, given enough time to make checks and pile up Sense Motive DCs. Also, lots and lots of skill bonuses of various sorts, from Heal to Craft to Knowledge, all with minor added effects. In combat, you snipe, you hit with unbelievable power as Precision damage, you can instantly inflict conditions like Helpless, Dying and Dead at various levels without dealing with HP.

Understandings of the Master Craftsman:
Character Archetype: WBL violator, crafter, crippler, DMG abuser
Key Skill: Craft(Armor)
Discipline Weapon(s): Hammer weapon group
Fluff outline: The rare few that decide to follow the path of the Master Craftsman face weeks of work before any new adventures begin, lest they be faced with insufficient equipment. For their dedication to the craft, they gain skills that allow them to create impossibly effective arms and armor without a touch of magic, create lethal poisons and sunder the work of lesser craftsmen, with the life of the Gods-made world being shattered like the weapons and armor of well-equipped foes.
Actual Abilities: The WBL violator and DMG abuser parts refer to using stuff like the Custom Magic Item rules for Clockpunk power armor and weapons, with effects gated behind manoeuvres, as well as using the weapon creation guidelines from Weapon Master's Handbook while making normal items at ludicrous speeds and low costs. Personal combat is Sundering, precision damage, a few creature-type specific Death effects and some ability score damage that needs magical healing to fix, acting as varying levels and types of save-or-suck.


Yes, they are almost mundane in name only. That's what you need to deal with God-Wizards. Thing is, they are closer to mundane than most because they are based on stuff existing mundane classes can do, just wanked to so many levels of hell it's utter nonsense.

Dirges of the Inspiriting Muse is mundane because the existing rules for Perform include Diplomacy synergy and Bardic Music, an only slightly magical thing well within PoW/ToB range, can inflict conditions like Fascinate and give morale bonuses. In this case, there's manoeuvres for Moral and Competence bonuses and penalties and Diplomancy, with a side of save-or-suck in melee by way of beating people down with your instrument. The balance here is largely nonexistent because it's having to compete directly with some of the worst abusers of plotlines in the game, rather than deal with a niche that doesn't have absolute caster supremacy over game balance. I mean, the numbers on the bonuses and penalties wouldn't be entirely absurd, but it's having to compete with Enchantment magic and save-or-suck, it can't skimp on either if you are using it for a God-mundane.

Procedures of the Knowing Assassin is mundane because it's a mix of iconic "bad@ss normals" like Batman and Sherlock Holmes as detectives, the logical extension of such people using their skills of what to look for to know how to cover up evidence and extreme weakness understanding and projectile arc understanding, as well as generic "implausible skill" feats like healing crippling injuries in a matter of minutes or even seconds, making a well-crafted, though ultimately fragile, item from random junk laying around, knowing things you could not have possibly found out about and so on. The balance is in duration and low-relevancy. The healing will keep a guy alive for now, but it's a rush job that leaves them bleeding out, the item will only get a few uses or have only a chance of working, you might only remember the obscure thing or connection for a little while, it's all a case of "it might only be for a minute or two." And how often do you need to find a guy to obliterate the plot?

Understandings of the Master Craftsman is mundane as it concerns only physical crafting. The power armor cannot have effects that require blatantly magical stuff to work, like teleportation and unlimited use fire and acid. Flight may or may not work out, Gliding is a certainty. The WBL violation is basically implausibly good rushing and bizarrely effective crafting, which also is part of the magic item effects on weapons. The WMH weapon crafting is for getting silly things like a Clarinet that is also a Light shield and a Throwing hammer that deals 2d4 Piercing or Bludgeoning damage. With a +2 bonus to slight-of-hand checks to conceal it. And why not throw in a Cybertech improvement or two? Balance is in time needed to make things, needing to use Manoeuvres to use many of the effects, the cost of getting going and the likelihood of the DMG being thrown at you.

If all goes well, the three have large synergy between them that allows for utter nonsense to happen. Like MacGuyvering up a highly customized weapon with properties you desperately need right now from near-worthless scraps you keep with you for just such an occasion that also counts as a Masterwork Bagpipe so you can mind control people with your awesome solo dirge. Or getting a large Craft check bonus to make your awesome Bagpipe/Spiked Shield/Blunderbuss/Axe with 2d6 damage on both Blunderbuss and Axe. Naturally, the Bagpipe is the most dangerous component of this and you craft it in five minutes.

[Potato_Priest]

Thor is a good example of a God-Martial.

[Jormengand]

I suggest looking at the various Mythic homebrews floating around on these forums. Some of them are pretty obviously supernatural, but there's also stuff like the Teramach (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?286983-3-5-Base-Class-quot-I-want-to-live-inside-a-castle-built-of-your-agony!-quot), which gets to mundanely smash through Walls of Force and throw mountains.

Mundanely throw mountains. Okay.

See, I prefer my characters to solve the same kind of problems as could be solved with earth-shattering magic (or earth shattering not-magic-I-promise, a la ToB and Mythos), only in a less unbelievable way. You throw a mountain at a city, sure, that's fine. I start an insurgency and watch the city's inhabitants kill each other and burn down the city. The city's just as destroyed, but one of those attacks was within the realms of human possibility.

[DMfromTheAbyss]

Well we know what a martial only god would look like. Use pure physical power to do anything up to and including break the laws of physics.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eDSt8OHkx0

[Morphic tide]

Mundanely throw mountains. Okay.

See, I prefer my characters to solve the same kind of problems as could be solved with earth-shattering magic (or earth shattering not-magic-I-promise, a la ToB and Mythos), only in a less unbelievable way. You throw a mountain at a city, sure, that's fine. I start an insurgency and watch the city's inhabitants kill each other and burn down the city. The city's just as destroyed, but one of those attacks was within the realms of human possibility.

Human possibility goes out the window at about level 5, when Clerics can pull a good Jesus impression and Wizards can fly. At every two or three levels, ignore more limits. At level one, take the limits of the average human for the standard of mundane. At level three, take the limits of the average professional in a field as your standard for mundane. At level five, go for the known fundamental limits of the human body for your standard of the mundane. At level seven, start throwing out actual reality and dive into low fantasy and minor myths. And on and on until, at level 19, you are able to fist fight the highest Wizards and can be mistaken for something high power from Exalted.

There cannot be denial of "wuxia" and "unrealism" and "anime." You cannot have a mundane keep up with those limits. For example, the Diplomancy Discipline outline I typed up is blatantly unrealistic once you get past level three. But it's based on the already unrealistic Bard and keeps going from there with music instead of magic. It keeps up with main caster Diplomancy by focusing on scale over density. The proper caster Diplomancy can mind control Gods with little issue at high enough levels, while at those levels the Bard-alike Discipline is puppeting cities with their music.

[Efrate]

I don't think Thor works as a god martial, though I appreciate the joke.

He is magic partially by birth, and has a ton of magic gears and power, and his source is cited as being magic almost unilaterally.

Though god mundane does make more sense than god martial for reasons quoted above. I think it largely comes down to source of power to make the concept work. God wizards are tapping an infinite power supply of magic, the universe, what have you. Martials and mundane are tapping a finite source. The finite amount might be immense but it still can be used up. Magic doesn't have that limitation. All the god mundane need X amount of resources, or time, or whatever, to do some of what magic does. Martials are worse.

Superman's power while immense is still finite. Functionally he is nearly limitless, but given an infinite timeline the Sun dies he has no more power, and so on. He is about the closest to god martial you can find since none of his powers are overtly magical, including shooting mini supermen out of his hands. Not sure how Kryptonian DNA makes that work but whatever. However he is weak to magic still.

I think fluff wise it is entirely possible to have a martial or mundane capable of extraordinarily powerful effects and abilities, but not have infinite power. Or the ability to do everything. Throwing a mountain accross the world to hit a microscopic killer robot and destroying it, ok I can see that. Running fast enough to walk on water, ok no problem. Cutting the fabric of space time to access another dimension with a single swipe of your hand? Ok I guess I can see it. Being able to with the same training be able to do all of that successively? That becomes an issue for me. That is hard to justify fluff wise.

Magic is the one stop shop for all of it, and generally, it never has to be explained, it is never used up, and that is the issue. Its also drastically easier to have the ability to do everything in one convenient way than by rigorous specialized training. It autofluffs as "cause magic." and thats the end of that.

[Morphic tide]

I don't think Thor works as a god martial, though I appreciate the joke.

He is magic partially by birth, and has a ton of magic gears and power, and his source is cited as being magic almost unilaterally.

Though god mundane does make more sense than god martial for reasons quoted above. I think it largely comes down to source of power to make the concept work. God wizards are tapping an infinite power supply of magic, the universe, what have you. Martials and mundane are tapping a finite source. The finite amount might be immense but it still can be used up. Magic doesn't have that limitation. All the god mundane need X amount of resources, or time, or whatever, to do some of what magic does. Martials are worse.

Superman's power while immense is still finite. Functionally he is nearly limitless, but given an infinite timeline the Sun dies he has no more power, and so on. He is about the closest to god martial you can find since none of his powers are overtly magical, including shooting mini supermen out of his hands. Not sure how Kryptonian DNA makes that work but whatever. However he is weak to magic still.

I think fluff wise it is entirely possible to have a martial or mundane capable of extraordinarily powerful effects and abilities, but not have infinite power. Or the ability to do everything. Throwing a mountain accross the world to hit a microscopic killer robot and destroying it, ok I can see that. Running fast enough to walk on water, ok no problem. Cutting the fabric of space time to access another dimension with a single swipe of your hand? Ok I guess I can see it. Being able to with the same training be able to do all of that successively? That becomes an issue for me. That is hard to justify fluff wise.

Magic is the one stop shop for all of it, and generally, it never has to be explained, it is never used up, and that is the issue. Its also drastically easier to have the ability to do everything in one convenient way than by rigorous specialized training. It autofluffs as "cause magic." and thats the end of that.

Hence why I went for PoW based Discipline ideas that focus on particularly versatile and setting-warping things magic normally does. Diplomancy can get you people able to do almost anything you could need, Crafting lets you make items that expand your versatility considerably, the skillmonkey setup gives you partial competency in so many thing that would otherwise take magic that it's worth it. Then you have save-or-suck/die/lose and various types of damage.

[Inevitability]

Mundanely throw mountains. Okay.

See, I prefer my characters to solve the same kind of problems as could be solved with earth-shattering magic (or earth shattering not-magic-I-promise, a la ToB and Mythos), only in a less unbelievable way. You throw a mountain at a city, sure, that's fine. I start an insurgency and watch the city's inhabitants kill each other and burn down the city. The city's just as destroyed, but one of those attacks was within the realms of human possibility.

I'll be first to admit that Mythos, and all its creations, are unrealistic. The problem is: D&D is unrealistic by default. Not in the way of the 'there are dragons, so we should take nothing serious' fallacy, but the default game already allows martials to do ridiculous stuff.

A 20th-level martial in D&D can fall ten miles, smash his head on solid rock, and walk away with most of his HP remaining (depending on your definition of HP, he may not even be physically hurt). Said martial can also smash through a meter-thick iron wall with an axe, survive being on fire for most of an hour, or swing an oversized greataxe a few dozen times in six seconds (with Great Cleave).

None of these things are 'realistic' in the sense that no human could ever replicate them, let alone replicate them consistently. The only reason we accept these unrealistic things, and not others (such as Mythos) is the fact that we're used to them, nothing more.

Your example avoids what we're talking about. 'Destroying a city' is not hard for a high-level character. Not for a default martial, not for a buffed martial, and definitely not for a caster. However, there's plenty of problems that the first can't solve, which is an issue that needs to be addressed.

If, say, a plot-required artifact were at the bottom of an ocean, a caster could teleport down there, change in a giant squid, or summon something to get it for him. A god-martial would be able to hold is breath long enough to swim down, grab the artifact, and bring it up. A 'proper martial', as you sketch one, would probably have to find a dragon turtle or other intelligent marine creature (note that many lack the skills to find one), convince it to bring you the item (note that many lack the skills to convince one), and then wait for it boredly.

And how about having to bring down some great flying beast? A normal martial has a bow, maybe. And who knows, perhaps the monster is within range so he can use this severely-gimped fighting style. The god-martial flings a boulder or precisely shoots an arrow in a way that cripples the beast's flying ability, allowing him to face it on the ground.

It is clear that martials as they are now are useless in many situations, and need patching up. Denying that with a very specific example does not work.


My point: trying to keep any kind of 'realism' or 'believability' in D&D is both counterproductive and inconsistent. The best solution is to throw out all semblances of realism and have fun doing it.

[Max_Killjoy]

Mundane is mundane.

If you're going to say that fighters are doing things that would "break mundane" in our world, then you have two choices:

1) the limits of what people can do "mundanely" are different in the world your game is set in, than they are in ours.
2) fighters are magic, it's just a different sort of magic than wizards or clerics or whoever.

You CANNOT have a world in which the limits of the mundane are the same as ours, AND fighters can "throw mountains" without magic.

If you choose option 1, you have some serious worldbuilding to do in order to both explain it, and fully integrate the implications into the world.

[Cluedrew]

Again, lots of little comments. ... I'm not sure the multiquote actually makes it any easier to follow.


Not from that perspective. But, understanding that perspective can help understand how the martial needs to work. They need to be able to do "anything", but not actually anything, because what they do needs to "make sense", in universe.True enough, but the thing is martial power (or most mundane sources of power) is often held to the restriction that it must also make sense in our universe. And I don't understand why. Why can't the martial artist master a technique that gives him on-touch disintegrate while the wizard is allowed to do it with a laser pointer?

I don't actually want a martial that can do anything (it would be as uninteresting as a caster that can do anything), but I would like to prove that a martial could reach those levels of power so I have the full scale to work with. ... Or maybe you can't prove that. Maybe if you bind any power source to reasonable internal logic it will come up short. I don't know.


It's about how broad your concept and what you can do with it. The problem is that "Martial" as a concept has little narrative versatility compared to "Magic" or "Divine" or whatever. Attempting to make it able to do the same things as other concepts tends to break suspension of disbelief hard. It's the reason why Fighters Can't Have Nice ThingsTM. It's a problem that many RPG's run into in trying to justify how martial characters contribute at high levels or can even participate. There are several terms that might explain this better.I read the problems, and yes those are not great ways to do it. I think martial (or all-non-magic) is pretty broad to. It may not make sense for a golf-club to deal 12d6 damage, but why not let Might Fist's punches do 1d6 damage each, and then combo attack with twelve of them so that they are effectively one strike? Or reach the dream world through meditation? Not to say every martial would be good at both, but I think the god-martial would be.


Personally, I find the idea of a God Martial stupid. No matter how powerful a Martial is, they always have almost no ability outside of combat. That's why they are called martials. A God-mundane, however, is doable because you are not talking about only fighting, so other competencies are assumed.First a bit of clarity, I use the term martial more in the sense of "of the body" not "of war". So to me a martial art is a physical art, not a combat art. And I the mundane meaning boring thing put me off that term. You may use either term but I am using martial in a slightly broader sense than just the fighter who fights.


Yes, they are almost mundane in name only. That's what you need to deal with God-Wizards. Thing is, they are closer to mundane than most because they are based on stuff existing mundane classes can do, just wanked to so many levels of hell it's utter nonsense.And I think that is OK. Because for me there is two types of magic. The first is magic as an exception, or how a story world differs from our own. The second is magic as the occult practice to cause miraculous effects (which really looks like whatever you want it to). The means of a martial/mundane who reaches this level will of course fall into the first group, but must not fall into the second.

The issue is sometimes the two groups are equated, but I don't think they are the same at all. For instance the technology in Star Trek is not magic, despite the fact it operates on hand-wave.


See, I prefer my characters to solve the same kind of problems as could be solved with earth-shattering magic (or earth shattering not-magic-I-promise, a la ToB and Mythos), only in a less unbelievable way.I think you are referring to power level, not martial/caster. And in this conversation we are cranking the power level up pretty high.


I don't think Thor works as a god martial, though I appreciate the joke.

He is magic partially by birth, and has a ton of magic gears and power, and his source is cited as being magic almost unilaterally.He is also a literal god of thunder who fights with martial strength and his hammer, which I think was the point. May have been a joke. Still mulling about the rest of your post.


My point: trying to keep any kind of 'realism' or 'believability' in D&D is both counterproductive and inconsistent. The best solution is to throw out all semblances of realism and have fun doing it.I like that, but why stop at D&D? There are plenty of stories that benefit from being realistic (for example, those set in reality) I think there is also a great number that would benefit from just admitting they are not realistic and running with it.

Swordsaged by Max_Killjoy

[Morty]

Those threads might involve a little less talking in circles if people specified if they're just talking about D&D, or something else. Then again, this is a pretty D&D-specific problem. No other system has its power curve, even if they allow for a similar range of power levels. Nor do they try to have its cake and eat it too, by claiming all character classes are balanced, but then propping some of them up - intentionally or otherwise. And refusing to give the "mundane" classes the kind of abilities even a competent real-world specialist should have. And... well, you get the idea.

Really, though, you can justify pretty much anything if you want to. The question then becomes, do you want to? Again, the reason those threads involve people talking around each other so much is that there's little to no concrete arguments or examples, just nebulous ideas. "Casters", "mundanes" or "martials" all mean very little in a vacuum.

As for whether a character who can parry crossbow bolts, climb an ice wall or sell sand to a mummy counts as "magic", I question if it really matters. To us, it might, but does it for the people living in the universe? Or is it just something some people can do? It of course depends on whether our characters are among the few who can do such things, or if heroes like that are relatively common. After a certain point in a fantasy world's magic saturation, "magic" kind of becomes a useless term. And it becomes a question, again, of what we want to make possible without all the trappings of magic - spells, arcane energies, gods, blood sacrifice, whatever. At which point we can have a real discussion, instead of throwing vague points around.

I'd also argue that if the only way to match up to high-level wizards is to create a functional superhero who shrugs off any danger below a dragon's breath to the face, we're solving the wrong problem. This, to be fair, isn't really a D&D-specific things. Many other high-powered systems have a rocket tag problem, where you either no-sell powerful attacks and hazards, or they splatter you. But I can't really think of a system where anyone could match up to a high-level 3e D&D wizard or cleric. Maybe Exalted, but even high-essence Charms and Solar Circle Sorcery have some limitation. And, again, a D&D-specific problem is trying to be everything and ending up being nothing.

Finally, I'm going to notice that those debates always seem to centre around combat abilities, with other physical abilities being mentioned in connection to those. But no one seems to pay much attention to the more cerebral and social skills and heroic archetypes.

[SethoMarkus]

He is magic partially by birth, and has a ton of magic gears and power, and his source is cited as being magic almost unilaterally.

~ snip ~

Magic is the one stop shop for all of it, and generally, it never has to be explained, it is never used up, and that is the issue. Its also drastically easier to have the ability to do everything in one convenient way than by rigorous specialized training. It autofluffs as "cause magic." and thats the end of that.

And why can't "magic" be the source of the god-martial's abilities?

A wizard's source of power is not magic, a wizard's source of power is their spells. Those spells are fueled by magic.

So why can't a martial type character, a non-spellcaster, punch something hard and fast enough to vaporize their target, or run fast enough to escape the constraints of time and space, with the explanation of "magic"?

Why does that disqualify them from being a god-martial? They aren't using spells for it. They are just deity-level in that aspect.

What about the X-Men? Are they "mundane/martial" or "caster/wizard"? They use supernatural abilities, but these abilities are explicitly the result of genetics, not magic. I could possibly see the argument that Jean Grey or Magneto are "wizards", but what about Juggernaut or Quicksilver?

[Jormengand]

, say, a plot-required artifact were at the bottom of an ocean

What can I say, I'm a really good fisherman. Like, really good.

[ImNotTrevor]

Mundane is mundane.

If you're going to say that fighters are doing things that would "break mundane" in our world, then you have two choices:

1) the limits of what people can do "mundanely" are different in the world your game is set in, than they are in ours.
2) fighters are magic, it's just a different sort of magic than wizards or clerics or whoever.

You CANNOT have a world in which the limits of the mundane are the same as ours, AND fighters can "throw mountains" without magic.

If you choose option 1, you have some serious worldbuilding to do in order to both explain it, and fully integrate the implications into the world.

*but only if that's actually important to you or your game.

If none of the players care, don't bother with the effort. This is the same principal by which Pacific Rim is enjoyed by people like me.

I know it's ridiculous.
I know it's nonsensical.
I just care about that less than I care about how cool it is to watch giant robots punch giant monsters.

[Quertus]

*but only if that's actually important to you or your game.

If none of the players care, don't bother with the effort.

Know your players.

In this case, not something I need to think about, because, in any game I'm in, it'll be important to me. Not as important as getting the low level details right, but getting setting level details right is nice, too.

[Dragonexx]

Pacific Rim is a single narrative. Roleplaying is a shared narrative. Things have to make more sense there, if people want their inputs be reliable.

[Mechalich]

This ultimately comes down to how your fantasy (or science fiction) is set up. There are several scenarios:

1. There's only mundane people.
- The world may have magic, but it's beyond the control of characters and they don't get to access it and it only influences the narrative in relatively obscure ways. This is often the case in pseudo-historical fantasy like the works of Guy Gavariel Kay. This approach has no imbalance issues.

2. There's only people with phlebotinum - everyone's got it to varying degrees.
- This scenario is less common because it creates rather bizarre worlds and presents unusual world-building challenges, but it doesn't have imbalance issues.

3. There are people with phlebotinum and it's sufficiently powerful such that they're the only people who matter.
- This is probably the most common fantasy scenario, where it is presumed that the only people who matter are a group of supernaturally empowered people and all the major characters are part of the group. There's sometimes the corollary that the masses of underpowered people could overwhelm the powered by shear weight of numbers, which is how you end up with masquerades (though this is rarely well justified and is most commonly a dodge to avoid dealing with the implications raised by the phlebotinum). A game like Exalted is basically this situation. Done properly there aren't any imbalance issues, but games of this nature have real issues with elitism.

4. There are people with phlebotinum but it is sufficiently limited and restricted that they don't dominate the people without it.
- This is the fantasy scenario that must people try to produce but that is the hardest to get correct. It is particularly difficult to get right in the context of the ancient or medieval world - because technology empowers ordinary people and means you can make the magic more powerful to compete (ironically this means you can make 21st century wizards have more magic than 2nd century wizards). Worlds like this aren't all that common, but lot's of people like to claim they've created worlds of this kind. ASOIAF is arguably such a world.

D&D is the 3rd scenario but it likes to claim its the 4th. Spellcasters are the only people who really matter (and this was true even in 1e and 2e it just wasn't as obvious and the disparity wasn't as substantial). To make up the difference and actually make D&D a type 4 world-building case you have to limit things to E6 at least and possible more so.

[ImNotTrevor]

Pacific Rim is a single narrative. Roleplaying is a shared narrative. Things have to make more sense there, if people want their inputs be reliable.

The existence of Drunkens and Flagons (aka Roll for Shoes) as a game that both functions and is fun suggests that this is not universal truth. That game is nonsensical and wacky at its core.

If everyone at the table is ok with handwaving the Why in favor of the THAT WAS AWESOME, then there isn't a problem.

Case in point: I allowed one of my PCs in 3.5 to slid between a Large enemy's legs and dual heal two of his allies by grabbing both of them. By the rules, he can't do that.
I don't care. It was cool.
Everyne agreed to let it happen because it was cool.
So it happened. Because it was cool.
Rule of Cool is a valid way to play, too.

If everything needs to make sense for your group's enjoyment, then sure.
If it doesn't, then don't worry about it.

Super simple stuff.

[Arbane]

Though god mundane does make more sense than god martial for reasons quoted above. I think it largely comes down to source of power to make the concept work. God wizards are tapping an infinite power supply of magic, the universe, what have you. Martials and mundane are tapping a finite source. The finite amount might be immense but it still can be used up. Magic doesn't have that limitation. All the god mundane need X amount of resources, or time, or whatever, to do some of what magic does. Martials are worse.


Lies. Spiral Power is INFINITE!

Magic has exactly whatever limitations the writers want it to have - in D&D, it's 'spell slots' and not a whole lot else.



I think fluff wise it is entirely possible to have a martial or mundane capable of extraordinarily powerful effects and abilities, but not have infinite power. Or the ability to do everything. Throwing a mountain accross the world to hit a microscopic killer robot and destroying it, ok I can see that. Running fast enough to walk on water, ok no problem. Cutting the fabric of space time to access another dimension with a single swipe of your hand? Ok I guess I can see it. Being able to with the same training be able to do all of that successively? That becomes an issue for me. That is hard to justify fluff wise.

But it's OK for one wizard to be able to see the future, reanimate the dead, throw fireballs, control minds, turn into a giant snake (it never helps), AND teleport? That's 7 completely different mana-circuits! That's about as easy, metaphysically, as being a prima ballerina AND an Olympic powerlifter! THIS RUINS ALL MY FANFIC!!!!@!one!

[Max_Killjoy]

Pacific Rim is a single narrative. Roleplaying is a shared narrative. Things have to make more sense there, if people want their inputs be reliable.

Pacific Rim was garbage, for starters -- it's "rule of kewl" cranked up to 11 and the dial snapped off. It's the literal embodiment of "Who cares if any of this makes sense or if the plot is any good -- giant robots!"

But yes, in an RPG, if you don't have a coherent* and consistent framework for player input, interpretation of character stats and outputs from rolls, etc, then you have a mess.

(* coherent in the standard sense, not Edwardian drivel )

[Arbane]

D&D specifically, how about giving Fighters some Save or Cry attacks? Killing an opponent with a single stab is VERY realistic, after all, and it's unfair that you need to be a spellcaster to bypass all this unrealistic 'hit points' stuff.

[ImNotTrevor]

Pacific Rim was garbage, for starters -- it's "rule of kewl" cranked up to 11 and the dial snapped off. It's the literal embodiment of "Who cares if any of this makes sense or if the plot is any good -- giant robots!"
None of that makes it garbage.
It makes it "Not a thing Max likes."

This is a statement of opinion worded as a statement of fact. Let's not conflate the two.

Not everyone likes that kind of movie. That's ok. I happen to enjoy that kind of movie just as much as I like deep and riveting stories. It is possible to acknowledge that a movie lacks in the story department and find it fun/enjoy it anyways. Because there is more to the experience than that.



But yes, in an RPG, if you don't have a coherent* and consistent framework for player input, interpretation of character stats and outputs from rolls, etc, then you have a mess.

(* coherent in the standard sense, not Edwardian drivel )

Your problem is in the subtle hinting that mess cannot ALSO be a boatload of fun.
Which it can be.

None of my games of Drunkens and Flagons ever make much sense. But they are very fun! Saying that RPGs must be played in one particular way is functionally the same as making a "badwrongfun" argument. There is no effective difference between "this is the one right way" and "all of these ways are the wrong way." So let's use neither argument.

[Mechalich]

Your problem is in the subtle hinting that mess cannot ALSO be a boatload of fun.
Which it can be.


There's a difference between fast and loose, plays by rule of cool, and 'a mess.' FATE is very loose and plays heavily by the rule of cool, but it is anything but a mess, in fact it's core structure is conceivably much tighter focused than D&D. oWoD, by contrast, is extremely complex, hisses bitterly at the rule of cool, wants to be taken very seriously, and absolutely is a mess, with no consistency to the rules presented from one book to the next and massively unbalanced powers and abilities.

Most systems that are heavily rule of cool regulated and have both mundanes and phlebotinum-empowered individuals have some very serious power imbalances within their settings. It's also common in settings where all the important characters have phlebotinum - like almost every shounen anime ever made - because not all powers are created equal and some powers are just better than others. Also a big issue in super-hero settings. Avengers: Age of Ultron made the point very effectively when Hawkeye gave his little 'and I have a bow and arrow' speech to Scarlet Witch.

You can build the Avengers as a movie franchise and have Black Widow and Hawkeye and it's okay, because the power of plot armor protects them and everyone is down with managing expectations. You can't do that in a game because it isn't fair to the players and unless you have a very mature group it's going to break down very quickly. Good GMs work around this, in the same way good game designers do - how many MMOs have specialized workarounds to allow melee DPS characters to contribute properly in fights where they by rights shouldn't be able to get to the enemy? Oh, just all of them. Ultimately though, a game should be designed to avoid this problem.

[Cozzer]

In general, my favorite distinction between "mundane" and "casters" is variance: a mundane's "skill" (at fighting, at lockpicking, etc) is mostly static, while a caster's skill varies wildly depending on how much magical energy he has expended (or other factors).

So, a fighter would be a 7, a Paladin would be 6 against a wild beast but 8 against an evil creature, a Magus would be 4 when uncharged and 9 while nova-ing, a Wizard would go from 1 to 10 depending on how many spells he has and he's willing to use. A Monk, on the other hand, would be a 6.5: slightly weaker than a Fighter, but even more reliable since you can't take away his weapons or armor.

That said, all the numbers have to go up and down together. If a full-strength wizard (the "10" in this equation) can throw fireballs, it's possible that a fighter (the "7") is simply a very skilled mundane warrior. But if the caster can create demi-planes, resurrect long-dead people and obliterate towns, the fighter's capabilities have to always be 7 tenths of that for the fighter to be a believable companion or enemy to the wizard. How you choose to handwave that isn't really important (innate magic, divine boons, determination...), the important thing is that you accept that you have to handwave that somehow.

[TheCountAlucard]

No other system has its power curve, even if they allow for a similar range of power levels. Nor do they try to have its cake and eat it too, by claiming all character classes are balanced, but then propping some of them up…Star Wars Saga Edition. :smalltongue:

[ImNotTrevor]

There's a difference between fast and loose, plays by rule of cool, and 'a mess.' FATE is very loose and plays heavily by the rule of cool, but it is anything but a mess, in fact it's core structure is conceivably much tighter focused than D&D. oWoD, by contrast, is extremely complex, hisses bitterly at the rule of cool, wants to be taken very seriously, and absolutely is a mess, with no consistency to the rules presented from one book to the next and massively unbalanced powers and abilities.

Most systems that are heavily rule of cool regulated and have both mundanes and phlebotinum-empowered individuals have some very serious power imbalances within their settings. It's also common in settings where all the important characters have phlebotinum - like almost every shounen anime ever made - because not all powers are created equal and some powers are just better than others. Also a big issue in super-hero settings. Avengers: Age of Ultron made the point very effectively when Hawkeye gave his little 'and I have a bow and arrow' speech to Scarlet Witch.

You can build the Avengers as a movie franchise and have Black Widow and Hawkeye and it's okay, because the power of plot armor protects them and everyone is down with managing expectations. You can't do that in a game because it isn't fair to the players and unless you have a very mature group it's going to break down very quickly. Good GMs work around this, in the same way good game designers do - how many MMOs have specialized workarounds to allow melee DPS characters to contribute properly in fights where they by rights shouldn't be able to get to the enemy? Oh, just all of them. Ultimately though, a game should be designed to avoid this problem.

This isn't the point I'm talking about, nor the one I've been talking about. I have been referring mostly to the narrative end of the explanation.

But here's the thing about this whole post:
It does nothing to disprove my point that a mess can still be fun.

I don't consider 3.5 to be my ideal system anymore. It's got a boatload of problems. I would personally consider it a "mess." And yet, it is still very fun. (My reasons for moving away from it are tangential to my enjoyment.)

OWOD, while not a system I've played, is also a system people have had, and still have, fun with anyways. In spite of and occassionally because of said messiness.


Though my point was this:
Having a poorly explained narrative layer for what's going on is only a problem if you and/or your players actually care.
Having rules that don't model a "physics" of the game world is only a problem if you and/or your players actually care.
Balance issues are only a problem if you and/or your players actually care.
Etc.

If you DO care, then it's a problem worth solving.
If you DON'T care, then it doesn't matter.
There's really no point in trying to piss in people's wheaties about this stuff and try to "but that's wrong!" About it. Because there's no "Right" way to play except the one that works for YOUR table.

Some tables are OK with having Hawkeye and Thanos on the same team. Even the players are chill with it. They may not care to ask questions of why Hawkeye can apparrently damage a Tank with his arrows. "Because he's freakin' Hawkeye" is enough for some people. And that's OK.

I'm not sure where the whole "RPGs need to be this one particular way" thing comes from, but it's quickly getting old.

(NOTE! This does not mean balance is a bad thing to strive for in games. It is a great thing to strive for and I approve. But suggesting that you're not allowed or can't have fun with an imbalanced system? Come on, bruh. Ain't true and you know it.)

[Morphic tide]

D&D specifically, how about giving Fighters some Save or Cry attacks? Killing an opponent with a single stab is VERY realistic, after all, and it's unfair that you need to be a spellcaster to bypass all this unrealistic 'hit points' stuff.

Death Effect via Head Smashing attempt, pass and you're Dazed, Prone and get significant reductions to mental stats until you get magical healing, fail and you die. Undead and Construct immunities bypassed. You can also have various drivel about hideously precise blows from Rogues and Rangers(and Scouts), who do Precision damage anyway.

I could see a set of feats or a class built to be entirely mundane yet butcher monsters four times it's power(AKA soloing a creature with CR=ECL). Like, piles of save-or-die, save-or-suck-until-healed-magically, damage based on portions of HP total and Constitution damage for days. One could make a ToB school/Discipline out of it.

[Cluedrew]

Those threads might involve a little less talking in circles if people specified if they're just talking about D&D, or something else. Then again, this is a pretty D&D-specific problem.I'm not sure if you are talking about here in particular but here the conversation is supposed to be about both. Or it is about the issue itself, with examples drawn from any relevant games. D&D is definitely relevant.


Really, though, you can justify pretty much anything if you want to. The question then becomes, do you want to? Again, the reason those threads involve people talking around each other so much is that there's little to no concrete arguments or examples, just nebulous ideas. "Casters", "mundanes" or "martials" all mean very little in a vacuum.I have seen more of the opposite problem, to much arguing over particular points without looking at how they fit together. That being said, what do these words mean... for me it comes down to the idea of power source.

On Martial: This is the one I have thought the most about. One who draws their power from their body. They are able to do things because, through physical strength, dexterity, endurance and conditioning they are able to. They are not necessarily stupid, many are only as powerful as they are because they can direct that power with their intelligence. But at the same time "mental strength" is not a source of power in and of itself.

On Caster: There are really two groups here. "Psychics" who draw power directly from the mind, moving things and effecting the thoughts of others just by thinking. "Clerics" who have some supernatural (as opposed to technological) external source of power and the ability to draw from it. The external source can be something distinct, such as a god (hence calling the group clerics) or something indistinct like magic energy, as in most wizards.

On Mundane: There is mundane as normal (no power source) and mundane as not a caster. The latter includes martials that are not martial-caster hybrids as well as some things that are neither casters nor martials; such as the scientist who uses technology or the bard who uses personality.

I doubt everyone is going to find these to be perfect definitions, I don't, but hopefully it is a step towards making them less nebulous.


The existence of Drunkens and Flagons (aka Roll for Shoes) as a game that both functions and is fun suggests that this is not universal truth. That game is nonsensical and wacky at its core.It always makes me happy when Roll for Shoes comes up. I started carrying dice with me just to be able to play that game spontaneously.

[Martin Greywolf]

In general, it's not the classes, it's the system and the world. And if you don't define those two, you run into a problem when discussing this topic.

1) What are the limits of magic?

In DnD, the answer to that is "None", and that's that. Note that I mean magic itself, not just spellcasters. If you want to have a coherent world where both wizards and non-wizards can contribute, you'll need to limit magic significantly in what it can and cannot do. Many works of fiction do actually have sort of an implied limit to their powers, so let's look at few examples.

Harry Potter

We have some hints of actual laws of magic (like laws of gravity) in the last book, and the point that magic can't really resurrect the dead is hammered home rather extensively. But there's more than that! If you read between the lines, you'll find out that spells apparently affect their targets by hitting them with a blast of light that moves slow enough to dodge (well, either that or everyone has really, really bad aim). That puts a massive limiting factor on what magic can actually do, and while a wizard will beat a non-ranged fighter by virtue of area of effect spells, muggles with shotguns suddenly seem a lot more threatening, because there's something they can do better than wizards (if someone holds you at wandpoint, you can dodge, if at gunpoint, not so much).

Still, with clever application of utility spells, wizards can get that too - can you say enchanted shotguns? It's not a problem for the story much because all of the "PCs" are wizards anyway.

Avatar the Last Airbender

Here we have much, much stronger limits on the magic power. Bending can physically manipulate one of the four elements, with some caveats (can create fire, can change the state of water, can heal with water for some reason, etc). Most importantly, while there are some clever uses of bending (e.g. generating limited thrust with fire), benders don't have any utility powers. You simply can't come even close to creating food or mind-controlling someone.

For the run of original show (tech level of pre-industrial revolution, but with no guns), benders are more powerful than normal guys, but once Korra comes along, and industrial revolution is in full swing, mundane characters get access to remote-triggered explosives, grenade launchers and aircraft of various forms, and playing field is a lot more level. Once they figure out how to make assault rifles, benders will be relegated to utility role on battlefields (creating concealment and cover etc).

2) What are the limits of mundane?

If someone really trains, and does 100 push ups and 100 sit ups and runs 3 miles every day, will he be at the level of a fit person, or will he be able to punch through an asteroid after leaping it to meet it halfway to orbit?

You see these limits broken mostly in wuxia these days, but they were broken all the time in the old stories. Perfectly mundane people kicking a shield so hard into someone's face they shear it off, for example. Sometimes, it was justified with a divine heritage, but not always. If you define your mundane as "only what we can achieve by working out a lot", then that's what you get.

3) How do those two limits match up?

Now, you can imagine a world where magic has some hard limits on it, and while mundane is only what an athlete can do, it still makes them viable because both of them are at the same power level.

An example of this setting is Draci Doupe 2, a TTRPG from Czech Republic, where one of the rules of magic is that it straight up can't kill anyone directly without exhausting the wizard quite a bit. Hurt them, sure, but no one-hit kills. This makes both mundane and magic characters play at roughly the same level, where wizards provide utility and mundanes contribute the punch (roughly speaking).

Alternatively, you have One Piece, where you can punch a dude made of light by concentrating really hard, for the more bonkers end of the scale.

4) How well can they defend themselves from the competition?

DnD, as we know, has many a spell that allows wizards to wreak merry hell with anyone who can't dispell it, starting with Color spray and Grease. Fighters have essentially no way to defend themselves from these properly (saves don't count, especially when compared to magic defenses).

Again, One Piece comes to mind where it seemed for a long time there's no way to defend against a lucky logia user (e.g. can turn to light), but then we found out that if you really believe in your ability to block lasers with your forearm, that's exactly what you can do.

5) Conclusions

To have the god martial characters, you basically need to realize you're trying to play with a few dials - limits of mundane, limits of magic, verisimilitude of both and fun being the most important ones. You can't really go about turning just one of them and forgetting about the rest.

An example of a show where both magic and mundane have no practical limits would be Naruto, starting at Gaara vs Rock Lee fight and ending with Might Guy vs Madara.

[Hawkstar]

When it comes to mundane characters, I always ask myself "What would Doom Guy do?" (The original doomguy - Security Guard who stepped outside the lab on Phobos to take a smoke break just before all hell broke loose. Not this weird demonically-empowered dude from the new game.)

[Shackel]

I think the problem with trying to make a martial that can compare to a wizard is that a wizard can literally do anything: summon monsters, change their forms, drop fireball, scry on people, teleport to different planes, battlefield control, bind extraplanar beings and force them to their will, all in one frankly bland, vanilla class.

It's just a completely generic class that has "do anything" as its class features.

To try and do something similar with a martial would mean that you'd need to have just some generic "Martial" class who can learn how to channel rage and emotion, speak with and ally with critters, use any and every weapon in existence, gain a feat every single level(and can get more just by training and spending some cash), smite, use auras to defend their allies, etc etc.

As such, the main way would probably be to increase just what each one can do: barbarians have rage but they can master other emotions and spread them in an almost shamanistic manner until they can infuriate lands into setting themselves aflame, calm the stormiest of tides, take control of people's emotions(Bardbarian-esque), and so on.

Rangers can traverse through planes simply by walking, can 'summon monster' by calling on the life of the land, can track people through dimensions, hear a cricket a mile away and whose ability to read and locate their quarries become all but precognitive. They gain pseudo-scrying, teleportation, planeswalking and summoning just through being that good at being a ranger.

Rogues should be able to be so good at disguising that they can just become other people, stealth their way into true invisibility, deal a variety of crippling blows in combat and eventually be able to slip out of even the bonds of reality akin to the epic "squeeze through a wall of force".

So on and so forth. Fighters in my opinion probably shouldn't exist due to them being the "Wizard" in that they're just "good at fighting" but a versatile Brawler(PF) or Warpriest(PF)-style class where they are the masters of picking up any tactic, style or weapon and becoming masters in moments could work.

[Lacuna Caster]

Pacific Rim was garbage, for starters -- it's "rule of kewl" cranked up to 11 and the dial snapped off. It's the literal embodiment of "Who cares if any of this makes sense or if the plot is any good -- giant robots!"

But yes, in an RPG, if you don't have a coherent* and consistent framework for player input, interpretation of character stats and outputs from rolls, etc, then you have a mess.

(* coherent in the standard sense, not Edwardian drivel )
Max! Stop bitching and get back to your 5th-century BC setting! I want updates!

I felt like Pacific Rim was a little bit of a missed opportunity. The first 20 minutes were excellent, and hey- it's got a stroppy sword-fu-ninja-chick with a troubled past and adoptive daddy issues who completely steals the show (http://www.themarysue.com/pacific-rim-gender-tropes/), which is always a plus- but the wacky scientists were tonally obtuse and while Ron Perlman is always a joy, he's completely superfluous. If they'd just kept the focus on the pilot relationships and actually expanded on the international cast that the advertising made so much of, it could've rawked.

I'm not sure there's much one can do about the inherent ludicrousness of the premise (starting with how an airborne strain of ebola would be vastly more efficient at wiping out humanity), but I guess if the kaiju were opening portals within urban centres, the jaegers might be less damaging than nukes.

...What were we talking about again?

[Quertus]

Ok, so, if I understand correctly, Superman is a valid example of a god-martial. So we've proven their existence. What's the next step? Where are we trying to go with this?

[arrowed]

I like this thread.
I think I agree that non-magic characters tend to have their hands tied compared to magical characters. I think a part of that problem is that all characters are inherently 'mundane', and then some are magical on top of that. A wizard can swing a sword. A cleric can learn and train to pick locks. A sorcerer can socialize, intimidate, and manipulate. They are still 'magical' characters. But a fighter cannot shoot fire from their fingers without losing the title mundane. A rogue who causes flesh to knit together just by touching it is not mundane.
To make the example clearer, imagine a two-player party.
One is a fighter and the other a wizard. (d&d 5e, if the system matters). The fighter can run up and hit the monster. So can the wizard, but the fighter can do it better. On the other hand, the wizard can cast Teleport, which can move them from A to Z while skipping the rest of the alphabet. The fighter. CANNOT. Teleport. And still be 'mundane'.
Consider the party again. But this time, the wizard is a spirit. They cannot interact with the physical world except through spells. They cannot run up and hit the monster, and (barring using a specific spell to do so) cannot even throw a lever. Now the fighter can do things the spirit-wizard can never do, like drink potions, or even drink! In the eyes of the spirit-wizard, the fighter is like the wizard is to the fighter, capable on levels they don't operate on.
This is a somewhat crude example, as for example telekinesis would give the spirit a lot of the powers of the corporeal fighter. But that mostly illustrates other deficiencies in a fighter-and-wizard system like D&D, which I'd summarize as 'sword for hitting, spell for hitting and anything else', and has been described above. Also, I have defined mundane as limited by physics as we know it.
I'm hardly experienced or knowledgeable in this area, but I hope this is a valid point. :smallsmile:

[Cluedrew]

To Quertus: I personally was expecting a lot more disagreement on this. I have seen the topic discussed twice before and both times it took multiple pages to not-resolve. But so far there has been a bit of disagreement about martial or mundane but that is about it.

The next step might just be sketch out what the god-martial would be, but that would probably look like something like Shackel's post except with all those abilities stuck into one class because balance is not the issue here. Just prove how high you can go.

Or maybe the next step is talking about why the god-martial shows up so much less than the god-caster. Or talk about why does caster vs. martial fall on the caster side so many times (I see I have been swordsaged by arrowed who makes a good point on that).

Or maybe there is no next step, maybe the god-martial doesn't need to be defended and the pervious threads were oddities.

[Lacuna Caster]

Ok, so, if I understand correctly, Superman is a valid example of a god-martial. So we've proven their existence. What's the next step? Where are we trying to go with this?
Well, not exactly. If you define martials as a subset of mundanes, then there's nothing mundane about bench-pressing a continent. I think arowed is on the right track here.

[Jormengand]

Making the spellcasters weak enough that the mundane can operate on their level is easy-mode. Adepts are weak enough that rogues can operate on their level. The hard part is to be able to make the mundanes strong enough to be able to operate on the level of a wizard, without having to suspend your disbelief... from a skyscraper.

[jitzul]

The hard part is to be able to make the mundanes strong enough to be able to operate on the level of a wizard, without having to suspend your disbelief... from a skyscraper.

Impossible.
If you want spellcasters and martials to be at the same "level". Then you either have martials be able to do greek god/anime type stuff when they are at their peak. Or nerf spellcasters to the point where the most powerfull spell caster in the world is (in terms of d&d) level 4 at best. If you don't want to buff marital characters to keep "suspension of disbelief" up then the best answer is to nerf spellcasters or just make it so everybody is magic and the guy throwing the mountain is a epic level muscle wizard.

[Newtonsolo313]

Impossible.
If you want spellcasters and martials to be at the same "level". Then you either have martials be able to do greek god/anime type stuff when they are at their peak. Or nerf spellcasters to the point where the most powerfull spell caster in the world is in terms of d&d level 4 at best. If you don't want to buff marital characters to keep "suspension of disbelief" up then the best answer is to nerf spellcasters or just make it so everybody is magic and the guy throwing the mountain is a epic level muscle wizard.

Heh
Muscle wizard
This muscle wizardry technique has been pased down my family for generations

[Jormengand]

Impossible.

You're saying that to someone who's done it several times over. But tell me, what can the wizard and cleric and druid all do, in core (bearing in mind that all of them are T1 even in core) that the veteran (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?428437-quot-Stand-back-boy-and-let-me-show-you-war!-quot-(3-5-class-PEACH)) and the hypnotist (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?481879-The-Hypnotist-(Hypermundane-Telepath-Class-in-30-minutes-PEACH)) and the virtuoso (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?512886-The-Virtuoso-(3-5-Hypermundane-bard-PEACH)) all can't, all while using abilities which are tantamount to "I lop his head off", "I do basic medieval chemistry," "I'm really convincing," "I sleepwalk", "I'm inspiring" or "I sing loud enough that I burst his eardrum", and therefore fairly believable? What problems can't they, ultimately, solve? And is there really nothing I could add to them which would make up for it?

[Cluedrew]

To Lacuna Caster: Mundane as is boring? No. But mundane as in not-magic? Maybe. So which meaning are you using here? I gave my crack at defining mundane for the purposes of this thread already (and said why I am avoiding that word as well), are you using that definition?

To Jormengand: I'm not sure exactly how much suspension of disbelief 1 skyscraper is but for me D&D style wizards has been "I'm not buying it". Which isn't to say that I haven't enjoyed stories or games with it. But almost every time attention is drawn to it I find myself asking "how" and then answering myself "that is just how it works."

I guess here I use the rule: "The more you explain, the more the readers will let you get away with." That's (roughly) a quote but can't remember from what. Anyways, my point is in D&D nothing about magic is explained (besides some out the outwards effects and requirements) and so there is some part of me that doesn't want to let them get away with anything either.

And to me, the ranger crossing Eurasia in 15 minutes because "I took a shortcut" is about the same level of disbelief.

Triple Swordsaged.

[Max_Killjoy]

You're saying that to someone who's done it several times over. But tell me, what can the wizard and cleric and druid all do, in core (bearing in mind that all of them are T1 even in core) that the veteran (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?428437-quot-Stand-back-boy-and-let-me-show-you-war!-quot-(3-5-class-PEACH)) and the hypnotist (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?481879-The-Hypnotist-(Hypermundane-Telepath-Class-in-30-minutes-PEACH)) and the virtuoso (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?512886-The-Virtuoso-(3-5-Hypermundane-bard-PEACH)) all can't, all while using abilities which are tantamount to "I lop his head off", "I do basic medieval chemistry," "I'm really convincing," "I sleepwalk", "I'm inspiring" or "I sing loud enough that I burst his eardrum", and therefore fairly believable? What problems can't they, ultimately, solve? And is there really nothing I could add to them which would make up for it?

"Sing loud enough that I burst his eardrum" is "fairly believable?" :smalleek:

It takes 160+ db to burst eardrums. Immediate hearing damage starts at 140.

The loudest human voice ever recorded was 129, in perfect conditions.

[Jormengand]

"Sing loud enough that I burst his eardrum" is "fairly believable?" :smalleek:

Well, okay, actually it's just "Enemies are deafened while the song continues," so it doesn't literally burst their eardrum.

EDIT: Also, from a quick look, it may very well actually be possible, if highly unlikely.

[Newtonsolo313]

"Sing loud enough that I burst his eardrum" is "fairly believable?" :smalleek:

Hmm maybe you would need some equipment like an air horn:smallamused:

[Cluedrew]

Impossible.
If you want spellcasters and martials to be at the same "level". Then you either have martials be able to do greek god/anime type stuff when they are at their peak.You say it is impossible and then you provide a solution. How does "greek god/anime type stuff"* necessarily require a skyscraper of suspension of disbelief? I have yet to find an anime (well manga, I read more than I watch) that required more suspension of disbelief than a D&D wizard.

... OK, maybe Dragon Ball, maybe.

* I raise you the Norse gods.

[Jormengand]

Hmm maybe you would need some equipment like an air horn:smallamused:

Vuvuzelas are certainly capable of causing NIHL ("Noise-induced hearing loss" - temporary deafness), so a horn isn't a bad idea.

[SethoMarkus]

Vuvuzelas are certainly capable of causing NIHL ("Noise-induced hearing loss" - temporary deafness), so a horn isn't a bad idea.

A vuvuzela is a cursed magic item though.

[Newtonsolo313]

A vuvuzela is a cursed magic item though.
Exactly
It looks like an instrument of death but it's actually an instrument of deaf

[Jormengand]

You say it is impossible and then you provide a solution. How does "greek god/anime type stuff"* necessarily require a skyscraper of suspension of disbelief? I have yet to find an anime (well manga, I read more than I watch) that required more suspension of disbelief than a D&D wizard.

... OK, maybe Dragon Ball, maybe.

* I raise you the Norse gods.

But the fact that wizards require us not just to suspend our disbelief but to hit it with a hammer, set it on fire, throw it off a cliff, and feed it to the nearest unfortunate animal because they are explicitly magical is the sticking point, because mundanes are explicityly not magical. The issue isn't "More suspension of disbelief than a D&D wizard", it's "More suspension of disbelief than, say, James Bond or something." Yes, Bond almost certainly pulls off the type of thing that's not actually possible, but he does it with enough moderation that we don't dwell too hard on it, and we don't think of him as being magical.

This is the point of mundane: the only things that a mundane character should be able to do that cannot at least theoretically be done by someone in the real world are either things that real people never get to try doing (such as surviving a Wizard's death spell or the hypermundanes' "Lookit, I found a handy pre-existing planar overlap") but that doesn't actively require magic in and of itself. If we're allowed a little suspension of disbelief, then that becomes "What can you imagine a real person doing without magic."

This is why the martial-mundane distinction is important. Clerics are martial. They have divine power and righteous might. Hells, wizards get Tenser's Transformation, not that a self-respecting wizard would be caught dead casting it. But they're a far cry from mundane.


A vuvuzela is a cursed magic item though.

Well played, sir. Though technically, cursed items are primarily harmful to the user (with a few exceptions - see cursed -2 sword, dust of sneezing and choking, girdle of masculinity/femininity in the hands [around the waist?] of a trans person) and a vuvuzela is, well, directional. Mostly.

[Cluedrew]

Two points:
What is your definition of mundane? Or martial? I gave the definitions I'm using and nothing has to with "should be able to be done in real life", but yours seem to. But why? We have left reality, why should we still be bound by it?
For me suspension of disbelief is strained a lot less with an explanation, and that is what I was getting at. So "magic exists and works like this" works better for me because when magic is used I can ask "does it follow from the rules" and if the answer is yes than there is no further suspension of disbelief. But if it is just "magic exists" every time magic is used I have to add a "and it does this" to the list which builds up disbelief.

[jitzul]

You say it is impossible and then you provide a solution. How does "greek god/anime type stuff"* necessarily require a skyscraper of suspension of disbelief? I have yet to find an anime (well manga, I read more than I watch) that required more suspension of disbelief than a D&D wizard.

... OK, maybe Dragon Ball, maybe.

* I raise you the Norse gods.

I think something has been lost here.

I love LOVE greek god/anime type martials. Hell one of my favorite manga of all time is one piece. A series where one of the main characters who is not even even the most powerful swordsman in the world can cut a mountain sized man in half while flying through the air after a man lunched him like a bowling ball. When I think about leveling the playing field I think of both magic users and martials being able to change a city though force. A person at peak physical shape being able to throw mountains while the wizard can summon a meteor storm. A god martial to me is basically a guy who is able to do that stuff through hard work trying a self improvement independet of magic. A god magic user is basically a 3.5 wizard. And a mundane is your basic level 0 commoner.


I know some people on this forum really really really really care about realism and stuff like that but I don't. If there is magic or soemthing like it in a setting and mortals are able to do greek god/anime type stuff just because they went through training hell then i'm good.

[Morty]

Star Wars Saga Edition. :smalltongue:

Fair enough, but isn't it a d20-derivative system? It's been a while since I saw it.

Anyway, I feel like this thread is kind of overthinking the whole problem. Or at least, thinking about it from the wrong direction. Trying to match the theoretical power of D&D's core power trio is a lost cause. Even if you could do it, you'd end up with a dull, invincible hero that can do anything so long as it doesn't resemble a spell too much.

Also, balance matters a lot less than people make it out to matter. It's really not a problem if magicians can do things non-magicians can't. It's kind of the whole point behind magic. It does become a problem if people who don't use (overt) magic can't do their actual jobs properly because the system trips them up at every turn and they get upstaged by spells. So the problem needs to be approached from both sides, or you might as well not bother.

This also has a lot to do with how the mechanics are presented than any sort of raw capability. In D&D, a level 5 warblade is generally closer to real-world standards than a level 10 fighter. But the warblade's means of using their skill makes them far better at actually mattering in a world of magic. Stepping outside D&D and its derivatives, a realistic GURPS character is going to have a better shot at keeping up with magic users and fantastic beasts than a "mundane" D&D character, because the system won't repeatedly slam them with irrelevance.

Which brings me to my next point, that is to say, it really helps a lot not to have a power curve that renders low-level people, challenges and obstacles completely obsolete. Which happens to magical and non-magical characters alike. Coincidentally, this makes playing a down-to-earth underdog who survives among mages, dragons and heroes with cleverness and luck, a lot easier.

So I guess what I'm getting as is that talking about god-martials rubbing shoulders with god-wizards asks the wrong question. The right one is how to make different character concepts coexist on a level where dragon-slaying and army-routing are epic challenges, rather than routine.

[Cluedrew]

So it is about the martial-mundane line? That makes sense. I really wish we could sort out what those words mean, I tried by people seem to be using them different ways all over the place and when person A comments one what person B said in reply to person C you can end up with three definitions interacting. Which is confusing. And exactly what I think happened here.

A plea to everyone to be clear what you mean when you say "martial" and "mundane", because they definitely don't seem to mean the same thing to everyone in this thread.

Swordsaged by Morty

[Jormengand]

To be clear, "Mundane" to me means constrained by the world's limits, nonmagical, possible without supernatural abilities (abilities which are beyond the limits of the natural way of things, not just ones marked (su). Tome of Battle and its (ex) teleporation is not the solution either), because that is what mundane has been used to mean since time immemorial. It has recently become used to mean "Boring" or "Ordinary" but no character should be boring or ordinary.

Martial, on the other hand, I use to mean to do with, or specialised in combat, because that is what martial has been used to mean since time immemorial. I'm not aware that it means anything else either.

[Max_Killjoy]

I think something has been lost here.

I love LOVE greek god/anime type martials. Hell one of my favorite manga of all time is one piece. A series where one of the main characters who is not even even the most powerful swordsman in the world can cut a mountain sized man in half while flying through the air after a man lunched him like a bowling ball. When I think about leveling the playing field I think of both magic users and martials being able to change a city though force. A person at peak physical shape being able to throw mountains while the wizard can summon a meteor storm. A god martial to me is basically a guy who is able to do that stuff through hard work trying a self improvement independet of magic. A god magic user is basically a 3.5 wizard. And a mundane is your basic level 0 commoner.


I know some people on this forum really really really really care about realism and stuff like that but I don't. If there is magic or soemthing like it in a setting and mortals are able to do greek god/anime type stuff just because they went through training hell then i'm good.

As I said earlier, you have three choices.

1) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are what they are in our world. No amount of training will allow someone to "mandanely" punch a mountain to dust.

2) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are different -- and then follow through on all the implications of that difference in your worldbuilding.

3) Decide "fighters" are not mundane, and that they're just using magic differently, but admit that they're magic and not doing things that are normally possible.

[Morty]

So it is about the martial-mundane line? That makes sense. I really wish we could sort out what those words mean, I tried by people seem to be using them different ways all over the place and when person A comments one what person B said in reply to person C you can end up with three definitions interacting. Which is confusing. And exactly what I think happened here.

A plea to everyone to be clear what you mean when you say "martial" and "mundane", because they definitely don't seem to mean the same thing to everyone in this thread.

Swordsaged by Morty

I don't use the word "mundane" except in quotation marks. Unless I forget about the quotation marks. But the point is that I don't consider it a very useful word, in the context of this thread. The fact that people can't seem to arrive at a coherent definition of what it means doesn't help.

That, and something being magic from our perspective doesn't mean that it's extraordinary from the in-universe perspective. If, again, we're talking about your average D&D-esque setting, a low-level magician isn't anything to gawk at by most people. A cleric who raises someone from the dead, sure. An acolyte who can mend a broken bone isn't that different from a medical professional in our world. Respected and necessary, but not awe-inspiring. The same difference, in other words, as there is between a professional soldier and a duellist who can outfight a lich-king that rose from a crypt.

[Max_Killjoy]

I don't use the word "mundane" except in quotation marks. Unless I forget about the quotation marks. But the point is that I don't consider it a very useful word, in the context of this thread. The fact that people can't seem to arrive at a coherent definition of what it means doesn't help.

That, and something being magic from our perspective doesn't mean that it's extraordinary from the in-universe perspective. If, again, we're talking about your average D&D-esque setting, a low-level magician isn't anything to gawk at by most people. A cleric who raises someone from the dead, sure. An acolyte who can mend a broken bone isn't that different from a medical professional in our world. Respected and necessary, but not awe-inspiring. The same difference, in other words, as there is between a professional soldier and a duellist who can outfight a lich-king that rose from a crypt.


"Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".

[Cluedrew]

Anyway, I feel like this thread is kind of overthinking the whole problem. Or at least, thinking about it from the wrong direction.All very good points. Now I did start this thread because of the larger issues with martial-caster disparity. Now keeping how this fits into the larger picture is important, but at the same time... it seems a little optimistic to try and solve all of martial-caster disparity in one thread, so I tried to focus in on one part. Maybe it is meaningless, and we shouldn't bother to try to deal with a such as small part, but I think I have to try to find out.

Also if you want to start a thread to solve all of caster-martial disparity, I will join you in that as well.


To be clear, "Mundane" to me means constrained by the world's limits, nonmagical, possible without supernatural abilities (abilities which are beyond the limits of the natural way of things, not just ones marked (su). Tome of Battle and its (ex) teleporation is not the solution either), because that is what mundane has been used to mean since time immemorial. It has recently become used to mean "Boring" or "Ordinary" but no character should be boring or ordinary.

Martial, on the other hand, I use to mean to do with, or specialised in combat, because that is what martial has been used to mean since time immemorial. I'm not aware that it means anything else either.I don't care about since time immemorial so much as I want people to understand what is being said in the conversation that is happening a lot more recently than time immemorial. Also martial as body and mundane as ordinary are just the definitions of the words I grew up with. I could argue fore the definition, but really it is just how people around me use the words. Although I do say the everyman is a valid character archetype in the correct situation.

Swordsaged by Max_Killjoy (x2) and Morty. (I will say that I did try to avoid the word mundane... but I couldn't so I tried to create a useful definition.)

[Newtonsolo313]

"Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".

So stupid?
Like seriously magic is extremely versatile in a high magic setting

[Jormengand]

That, and something being magic from our perspective doesn't mean that it's extraordinary from the in-universe perspective.

Technically, the Spells class feature probably actually is (ex) due to the lack of tag.

(This may actually make a real difference, as otherwise there'd be an argument that Favoured Enemy: Arcanist didn't work on a wizard if he was in an AMF)


So stupid?
Like seriously magic is extremely versatile in a high magic setting

Mundane is versatile. Take a look around you. Imagine even a stereotypical medieval village. Mundane, even if you really do just mean "Boring and everyday", is hella versatile.

[Newtonsolo313]

Mundane is versatile. Take a look around you. Imagine even a stereotypical medieval village. Mundane, even if you really do just mean "Boring and everyday", is hella versatile.

I mean that by d&d raw you can do a lot more with magic than with other classes you don't have to roll to use spells that essentially make skill checks pointless. Plus like every class has an arcane or divine subclass if mundane in 5e

[Jormengand]

I mean that by d&d raw you can do a lot more with magic than with other classes you don't have to roll to use spells that essentially make skill checks pointless. Plus like every class has an arcane or divine subclass if mundane in 5e

This... is about the possibility of there being a d&d god-martial or god-mundane or whatever, not the insistence that one already exists.

[Cluedrew]

This... is about the possibility of there being a d&d god-martial or god-mundane or whatever, not the insistence that one already exists.Technically it is system-agnostic and about the concept of the god-martial as laid out in post 1 (I haven't had to errata what I said there yet, might have to eventually). But most of the examples will probably be coming out of D&D because: The difference is quite pronounced there. It is an example everyone around here will know.If it was just D&D, I would put it down as on oddity. But not only does it go beyond that, there seems to be this pushback against powerful martials* in a way that their isn't for powerful casters. And that is what really strikes me as odd, an all of infinity, why is the slice of it called magic more infinite than the rest? I don't think it is.

* And if anyone has a better word I would be glad to hear it.

[Max_Killjoy]

So stupid?
Like seriously magic is extremely versatile in a high magic setting

You're kinda missing the point entirely.

[Jormengand]

And that is what really strikes me as odd, an all of infinity, why is the slice of it called magic more infinite than the rest? I don't think it is.

The set of things which aren't humanly possible is bigger than the set of things which are. We who create powerful non-magical characters work around that.

[Newtonsolo313]

This... is about the possibility of there being a d&d god-martial or god-mundane or whatever, not the insistence that one already exists.

No I just meant that it's easy to gain magic items or even spell casting ability in dnd so it's a little bit strange to put a no magic items ban on the term mundane

But I think of the term martial as people who hit or shoot others as part of their class.
And yes martials could outdue mages you just need to change some things.
Edit: it was sort of a joke ok but not using magic items is not a good idea

[SethoMarkus]

Well played, sir. Though technically, cursed items are primarily harmful to the user (with a few exceptions - see cursed -2 sword, dust of sneezing and choking, girdle of masculinity/femininity in the hands [around the waist?] of a trans person) and a vuvuzela is, well, directional. Mostly.

The "magic item" bit is the +10 on checks made to annoy all sentient beings that can hear it. The "curse" is the -20 to Diplomacy that it incurs in the user.

[Cluedrew]

You're kinda missing the point entirely.What was your point? Just that that is what you think mundane means?


The set of things which aren't humanly possible is bigger than the set of things which are. We who create powerful non-magical characters work around that.I have very little interest it what is humanly possible. OK I kind of do, but not all explanations about how a character could exceed that have to be magic. Neither superman nor Dr. Who is "magic" but I doubt either could exist in reality. I say this haven't never watched Dr. Who... that backlog is intimidating. Is that what you mean by "work around" because to me that it isn't so much of a work around going a different direction with character ability.

[Jormengand]

What was your point? Just that that is what you think mundane means?

I have very little interest it what is humanly possible. OK I kind of do, but not all explanations about how a character could exceed that have to be magic. Neither superman nor Dr. Who is "magic" but I doubt either could exist in reality. I say this haven't never watched Dr. Who... that backlog is intimidating. Is that what you mean by "work around" because to me that it isn't so much of a work around going a different direction with character ability.

Of course they're both magic. Oh, they might not be called out as magical (in D&D, for example, psionics aren't "Magic" but they're very clearly lowercase-m magic). By "Work around" I mean that you have to give the mundane* characters multiple abilities, all of which are at the peak of human capabilities, all of which are above and beyond what the magical character could do to achieve the same thing - that is, the mundane character can fight, so they have to be fundamentally better at doing so than a mage. A mundane character can pass saving throws to shrug off spells, so they have to be fundamentally better at doing so than a mage. Healing exists in the real world, so the real-world way of doing it has to be better than the magic way. The way to make a competent mundane character who is still relevant when the spells come out is to make them excellent at all of the things that they can actually do, the things which make sense for a mundane character to do. That's how you make them relevant.

Going back to the classes I made to achieve this, the veteran (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?428437-quot-Stand-back-boy-and-let-me-show-you-war!-quot-(3-5-class-PEACH)) can, at level 5, be the proud owner of 6 tricks. They can be:

Combat Coup: Forces an almost impossible fortitude save vs death.
Healing Hands: At-will heal.
Herbalist: Allow allies to make fort-or-die attacks, burn down buildings, give people healing potion-equivalents, stick objects together.
Brewmaster: Send messages, fire long-range artillery shot or other area attacks.
Skilled: Have many skill ranks.
Craft Flying Machine: Because of course I can fly. This is fifth level! What, do I look like some kind of... *shudder*... Sorcerer to you?

None of this - slicing heads, applying bandages, making poison, burning stuff, making fireworks, making a glorified glider - is beyond what a human can do. None of it is Magic. None of it is magic. But it is enough to be the "God-martial".

The main trouble with trying to make nonmagical mean anything other than mundane is that you have a really weird, arbitrary dividing line between magic and not magic. Is tenser's transformation not magic because it's martial? What about Desert Wind manuevers? What about maneuvers which are (ex), but teleport you places or turn your weapon into Mjolnr? You say time travel is nonmagical... are you looking for a really beefed-up version of the psychic warrior for your god-martial?

You're looking for "Enough martial power and mastery to have effectively unlimited power". Quote, verbatim, from you, 2-4-17. How much martial power is that? There is no such amount. Martial** power - that is, power to do with combat and war - will never ultimately grant you the kind of power the wizard has, except maybe, maybe through feats of "I hit things in an impressive manner and people like me and therefore do wizard things for me." If that's what you're after, a bard who uses Perform: Weapon Drill may be the god-martial you're looking for. Mundane power, that is, the kind of power that isn't magical, worldly power used by worldly people, might. Power which is not explicitly called Magic already does - just ask the psion. That's why it's important to be clear about which is which.

*I will continue to use that word to mean what it means.
**That one too.

[Mechalich]

Technically it is system-agnostic and about the concept of the god-martial as laid out in post 1 (I haven't had to errata what I said there yet, might have to eventually). But most of the examples will probably be coming out of D&D because: The difference is quite pronounced there. It is an example everyone around here will know.If it was just D&D, I would put it down as on oddity. But not only does it go beyond that, there seems to be this pushback against powerful martials* in a way that their isn't for powerful casters. And that is what really strikes me as odd, an all of infinity, why is the slice of it called magic more infinite than the rest? I don't think it is.

* And if anyone has a better word I would be glad to hear it.

Ah, this is a tradition specific question, specifically, something that applies to Western European storytelling traditions rooted mostly in the literary traditions of England and France.

In that tradition, the use of magic, due to the influence of Christianity, was questionable at best. Heroic characters might have divine blessing and thereby accomplish superhuman feats occasionally, but that was relying on an external source of power. They themselves had nothing more than the capabilities of a highly skilled human (sometimes tied to racist ideas that certain kinds of humans are better than other kinds of humans, which makes it into literature at least as recent as LotR). For example, in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Gawain has no supernatural abilities, but his enemy the Green Knight does, and Gawain must repeatedly resist supernatural temptation in order to prevail and ultimate his attempt to acquire protection against the prospect of the Green Knight literally lopping his head off is a moral failing for which he is punished by having his neck brushed by the axe. So the pervasive influence of the Arthurian mythos - and even stories that predate it like Beowulf - magic isn't a thing heroic knights are supposed to have and characters who wield magic are usually evil. Even in the atheistic writings of Howard about Conan this dynamic can be clearly seen - Conan does not have supernatural powers and though he meets one wizard after another they are almost universally twisted and evil beings and most of the stories focus on Conan finding an opportunity to stick a sword through them somehow.

The ultimate upshot of this is that a western medieval hero who is spewing mystic energy from every pore is antithetical from what we expect from a medieval story. It doesn't fit the milieu.

This can be contrasted to the wuxia storytelling tradition of China and its descendant the anime tradition of Japan, were the situation is almost completely reversed: the virtuous character is endowed with power and the vile will see their powers abandon them in their time of need due to the influence of Confucian virtue ideals. this is in some sense the root of 'the power of friendship' and other things that occasionally show up in anime where someone is awesome explicitly because they are good. As a result the pushback against 'god-martial' characters doesn't exist. I mean, Guan Yu is literally a martial hero who got defied because he was just that virtuous and awesome.

So, the conceptual space for warrior power and wizard power in the traditions D&D draws upon and is trying to express are not the same. The wizard can have phenomenal cosmic power, but the warrior cannot. This is why King Arthur can perform wire-fu in full armor and wield a giant laser sword that occasionally goes off like a nuke in the anime Fate Stay/Night and its derivatives, but is just another warrior in shows like Camelot or Merlin.

D&D has really never hidden from this - wizards have always risen to heights of power warriors could never match. In earlier editions the 'balance' was supposed to be achieved through secondary effects. Wizards were loners who spent all their time in towers researching the secrets of the universe and had maybe a couple of apprentices, while warriors built strongholds and went out to conquer the world. The game explicitly allowed such characters to amass big armies and was meant to shift to kingdom management at the higher levels in traditional settings all through 2e. And, because the skills system and things like charisma were very ad-hoc to that point this sort of implicit setup was at least nominally valid. It wasn't until 3e changed the construction of the world by codifying non-combat challenges and drastically expanding the upper end of the power curve that this imbalance became totally insurmountable.

Ultimately 3.X D&D and Pathfinder simply exceed the power level of the entire Western Fantasy tradition around level 10 (in 1e and 2e is was more like level 15) and move into a zone that accommodates new traditions. That's perfectly fine, and fantasy has to some extent caught up and integrated new ideas so that it can function at that level of power - the transition might be argued to have begun with Star Wars, which openly integrated Japanese ideas of enlightened samurai warriors with special powers as the Jedi Order. However a lot of discomfort remains and we still get characters like Mat Cauthon in the Wheel of Time (Perrin ultimately acquires some pretty significant magical powers towards the end) who has no business not getting smote and has to be given his own personal anti-magic bubble to survive.

In order to utilize the upper half of its power range and still have characters who represent the 'warrior' archetypes D&D needs to accept that those warriors have to transform into something like Stormlight Archive Knights Radiant at some point in their career, but there's a lot of extant baggage that has to be overcome to do that. Critically there's the baggage that a world with Knights Radiant and high-level tier 1 casters running around doesn't at all resemble the kind of 'middle ages plus magic' ASOIAF-style fantasy world that the average D&D fan thinks they want.

[Arbane]

"Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".

So the spellcasters are playing Epic, and the snivelling peasants 'mundanes' are playing E6. Got it.


But not only does it go beyond that, there seems to be this pushback against powerful martials* in a way that their isn't for powerful casters. And that is what really strikes me as odd, an all of infinity, why is the slice of it called magic more infinite than the rest? I don't think it is.

Two explanations I can think of off the top of my head, both stolen from Grognards.txt, which spent a LOT of pages on this topic:

1: "MY VERISIMILITUDE!" Someone people have the bizarre belief that anything about D&D is 'realistic', and get offended by Fighters doing 'unrealistic' things.
2: Fighters remind D&D players of the guys who shoved them in lockers in high school.

(I didn't say either was a NICE explanation.)

Remember, it's ok for Monks to have magic powers from meditating a lot and punching people, but Fighters can't because.


Ah, this is a tradition specific question, specifically, something that applies to Western European storytelling traditions rooted mostly in the literary traditions of England and France.

Yeah, the idea of a wizard as the hero (rather than, at best, an advisor to a hero) is pretty recent in fiction. I've heard a theory that it mirrors the technological advancement of the 20th century.

[Cozzer]

Two explanations I can think of off the top of my head, both stolen from Grognards.txt, which spent a LOT of pages on this topic:

1: "MY VERISIMILITUDE!" Someone people have the bizarre belief that anything about D&D is 'realistic', and get offended by Fighters doing 'unrealistic' things.
2: Fighters remind D&D players of the guys who shoved them in lockers in high school.

I'm going to add another possible explaination, since if these were the only possible reasons to want "mundane" fighters then we could just dismiss them and be done with this discussion: people like the idea of being the underdog, the one who manages to keep up with supernatural powers using just their wits and skills.

Problem is, this archetype works better in stories (where the main characters can have juust the right insight and stroke of luck at juust the right time, giving them juust the right advantage against stronger opponents) than in RPGs (where the main characters will likely lose if they're against stronger opponents).

So, if you want this archetype to work in RPGs without heavy GM fiat, you need to model it in the rules. Problem is, as the supernatural characters and entities get stronger, the "wits and skill" of the mundane characters need to get more effective too, and after a certain point (different for everyone, probably) the suspension of disbelief will break and you won't be able to see them as not-supernatural anymore.

I mean, let's keep using D&D as an example. A Wizard can kill a dragon in one hit with a save-or-die spell. So you give the Fighter a skill with a similar effect, modeling it as "the fighter is skillful enough to hit a vital point". Now, is a person able to wield a greataxe with surgical precision and enough strength to pierce a dragon hide and quickness enough to do so in the middle of combat a "mundane"? I would argue he's not. He's still a Superman, just in the skills department and not in the raw strength/speed department.

[Lacuna Caster]

To Lacuna Caster: Mundane as is boring? No. But mundane as in not-magic? Maybe. So which meaning are you using here? I gave my crack at defining mundane for the purposes of this thread already (and said why I am avoiding that word as well), are you using that definition?
I think that quote got buried, but I think Max outlined the basic problem (to the extent that it is a problem.) There's nothing to stop you inventing a wizard with d12 hit dice that casts spells by hitting things with metal implements, but... it's effectively another kind of wizard.


Ah, this is a tradition specific question, specifically, something that applies to Western European storytelling traditions rooted mostly in the literary traditions of England and France.

In that tradition, the use of magic, due to the influence of Christianity, was questionable at best. Heroic characters might have divine blessing and thereby accomplish superhuman feats occasionally, but that was relying on an external source of power. They themselves had nothing more than the capabilities of a highly skilled human...
That's an interesting dissection (I'm particularly piqued by the idea that 2e was intended to shift into kingdom-management at higher levels, regardless of how successfully that worked in practice.)

I'm personally more in favour of nerfing casters than I am in favour of buffing archers and fighters, but I'm not sure the internal/external power source distinction is all that valid- Based on my limited exposure, most 'wizards' in European literature were effectively bowdlerised druids, necromancers, demonologists or other echoes of pagan belief systems, who in turn derived their power from divine (or satanic) patronage. The knight in shining armour or the martyred saint wasn't necessarily in a different ballpark.

[Mechalich]

That's an interesting dissection (I'm particularly piqued by the idea that 2e was intended to shift into kingdom-management at higher levels, regardless of how successfully that worked in practice.)

In 2e, hit dice progression came to an end around level 9 (the precise point varied from class to class because 2e was weird like that) and you gained only static HP boosts thereafter. Generally you stopped accumulating new class abilities of any kind at this point to - though if you had spells or thief skills they kept getting more powerful - with the modest exception of the druid class (which was really strange). You explicitly gained the ability to build a stronghold and attract followers at this point as well, and the 2e DMG spilled an almost ridiculous amount of ink talking about hiring followers and soldiers, maintaining them, managing income, and a whole bunch of other broad-scale simulationist stuff that really presumed you weren't actually adventuring all that much. And this was true for all classes, fighters got to have a castle and an army, while thieves got a guild, clerics a temple, and so forth. There's a good example of how this works in the various class-based stronghold quests you get in BG II. High-level characters were simply supposed to have a different role.

[Max_Killjoy]

So the spellcasters are playing Epic, and the snivelling peasants 'mundanes' are playing E6. Got it.


No one said that. It depends on where you draw the line between "mundane" and "magic", and then there's also the question of what "magic" can do, in your setting.

Stop presuming bog-standard D&D worldbuilding (if you can call what goes into the typical D&D setting actual worldbuilding, as opposed to just making a trope salad).

As previously posted:


Mundane is mundane.

If you're going to say that fighters are doing things that would "break mundane" in our world, then you have two choices:

1) the limits of what people can do "mundanely" are different in the world your game is set in, than they are in ours.
2) fighters are "magic", it's just a different sort of magic than wizards or clerics or whoever.

You CANNOT have a world in which the limits of the mundane are the same as ours, AND fighters can "throw mountains" without magic.

If you choose option 1, you have some serious worldbuilding to do in order to both explain it, and fully integrate the implications into the world.



As I said earlier, you have three choices.

1) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are what they are in our world. No amount of training will allow someone to "mundanely" punch a mountain to dust.

2) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are different -- and then follow through on all the implications of that difference in your worldbuilding.

3) Decide "fighters" are not mundane, and that they're just using magic differently (or a different magic), but admit that they're magic and not doing things that are normally possible.


And also why I tried to clarify that "Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".

Note that I didn't define the limits or extent of that realm, only point out how to draw them.

[Morphic tide]

Personally, when it comes to justifying level systems, I usually default to the amount of inherent soulstuff/magic everything with a soul/potential to learn magic has increasing, allowing one to subconsciously augment themselves.

The precise mechanics of the setup vary, for example my application of it to Dark Sun is that the "runoff" of dead creatures sticks around and gets infused into anyone involved in the killing. Whether this is psychic, spiritual or magical, I don't particularly care, although the psychic form allows for the non-killing XP gain. This comes from the way the Dark Sun version of dragons works, namely the bit about forming from genosides.

Then again, I made a multi-page description of possible reasons for Vancian magic in-universe, as in the potential metaphysics of why, exactly, spell slots act the way they do.

[Cluedrew]

Of course they're both magic. Oh, they might not be called out as magical (in D&D, for example, psionics aren't "Magic" but they're very clearly lowercase-m magic).I think this all comes down to magic as occult practices vs. magic as exceptions. Or as you put it "Magic" and "magic". When I say magic I mean the occult/uppercase M magic, which includes the imagery and all the connotations of the magicians of Europe. You seem to be using magic as the exception which covers anything that doesn't work in reality.

So Superman is an exception, but he is not a practitioner of the occult arts, so I would say he is non-magic. And in some cases (say James Bond & Q's gadgets) what is impossible or possible can be hard to tell. So maybe he is completely possible within the realms of science. Probably not but I can't prove that.

All this leads to a question: If a martial (of the body) character is an exception, but completely lacks and of the imagery and internal logic of a magician, are they magical?

I had completely forgotten you wrote the veteran class.


Martial** power - that is, power to do with combat and warDo you have a word that unambiguously means "of the body"? I know martial can mean more than that but I don't have a better word.



In that tradition, the use of magic, due to the influence of Christianity, was questionable at best.I know a little bit about this subject and the "questionable at best" view of magic seems to predate Christianity. However it definitely built on it and created this line between the godly powers of a priest and the pagan powers of a magician. One D&D maintains without the same level of value judgement.


1: "MY VERISIMILITUDE!" Someone people have the bizarre belief that anything about D&D is 'realistic', and get offended by Fighters doing 'unrealistic' things.To this I can only say: Can you really use the magic and realistic in the same description? Without a 'not' or 'otherwise' or something.

Double sword sage, got distracted.

[Max_Killjoy]

1: "MY VERISIMILITUDE!" Someone people have the bizarre belief that anything about D&D is 'realistic', and get offended by Fighters doing 'unrealistic' things.




To this I can only say: Can you really use the magic and realistic in the same description? Without a 'not' or 'otherwise' or something.


Verisimilitude != realism.

This is specifically why the word "verisimilitude" has entered the fiction and RPG worldbuilding parlance. When "realistic" was previously used, it caused confusion, and some people would even use it as an excuse to commit the "dragons = anything goes" fallacy.


On this subject, the problem is not that Fighters might do unrealistic things. The problem is when someone tries to claim that a Fighter is just "a normal person who is really good with a weapon" (in contrast to casting classes), and THEN claims that a Fighter can do really ridiculous things that are impossible for any human being in our world, while ALSO claiming (or through the other details directly implying) that "what normal people can do" is the same in their setting as it is in our world.

It's not about realism, it's about the setting (and the rules used with it) feeling like they could be real. Inconsistency and incongruence between the different aspects of the setting detract from that feeling. There's a major disconnect between "Mundane* people are like mundane people in our world" and "this guy who is a mundane person with a sword, and he can jump 100' straight up and split granite blocks with his attacks".


* Mundane in this case meaning what I defined it as previously -- the limits of what can be done without magic or magic-like enhancement or intervention, by even the most highly gifted and trained human being.


E: and this matters a great deal for me, because whether we're talking about fiction or an RPG campaign, the moment two or more things I've been shown on screen don't line up, that's it, my mind goes completely over to that, instead of the story being to, or the events being played out. It's nearly impossible for me enjoy a story or game that's blatantly doesn't make sense.

For example, when I finally read the Harry Potter series, it was only by combination of my own effort to remind myself over and over that it was written in the vein of faerie tales and children's stories, which rest on just-so explanations and narrative need rather than ground-up worldbuilding... and Rowling's skill as a writer... that I never lost interest. I had to read them for what they were. But I could never enjoy an RPG run in that way, because instead of observing the characters, I'd be trying to take my character through their interaction with the world they live in, and that requires the world to make a sufficient amount of sense.

[ImNotTrevor]

Verisimilitude is a thing that I personally like (within reason, I'm ok with things happening that bend the rules simply because it would be super badass) and it's also not a standard I hold everything to or insist be present always and every time.


If my game is meant to just be a "kill stuff in dungeons and have fun" game, then I'm not really going to worry about Verisimilitude. Because it won't actually matter.

If I'm playing Apocalypse World, I tend to go a bit more verisimilitudinous, though a lot of the limits are left purposefully hazy. (What all can the Psychic Maelstrom do? Kinda fuzzy. We have what the rules explicitly lay out as things it can do, and everything else is up to me.)

[Hawkstar]

You're saying that to someone who's done it several times over. But tell me, what can the wizard and cleric and druid all do, in core (bearing in mind that all of them are T1 even in core) that the veteran (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?428437-quot-Stand-back-boy-and-let-me-show-you-war!-quot-(3-5-class-PEACH)) and the hypnotist (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?481879-The-Hypnotist-(Hypermundane-Telepath-Class-in-30-minutes-PEACH)) and the virtuoso (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?512886-The-Virtuoso-(3-5-Hypermundane-bard-PEACH)) all can't, all while using abilities which are tantamount to "I lop his head off", "I do basic medieval chemistry," "I'm really convincing," "I sleepwalk", "I'm inspiring" or "I sing loud enough that I burst his eardrum", and therefore fairly believable? What problems can't they, ultimately, solve? And is there really nothing I could add to them which would make up for it?

Turn invisible. Travel hundreds of miles in an instance. Raise the dead. Turn someone into an animal. Change a location's environment. Reverse Gravity. Instantly create a massive wall of iron, fire, stone, or gears. Change the weather. Travel to another plane of existence.

[GungHo]

As I said earlier, you have three choices.

1) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are what they are in our world. No amount of training will allow someone to "mandanely" punch a mountain to dust.

2) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are different -- and then follow through on all the implications of that difference in your worldbuilding.

3) Decide "fighters" are not mundane, and that they're just using magic differently, but admit that they're magic and not doing things that are normally possible.

I usually go with #3. If I think there is need to pull some teeth and make them temporarily weak (in the same way you'd make a wizard weak without a spell book), I'll tie the logical magic use (many of the more supernatural feats) to implements like weaponry and armor. Same for rogues. However, usually I don't need to use that trope.

There's also clearly some magic involved when strength and constitution stats go into supernatural levels either through direct ability raises when leveling or when using items to increase them, though maybe I'm "cheating" in this argument by envisioning that we're not just looking at a level 1 fighter.


Remember, it's ok for Monks to have magic powers from meditating a lot and punching people, but Fighters can't because.
Monks explicitly use magic in the form of ki.


Do you have a word that unambiguously means "of the body"? I know martial can mean more than that but I don't have a better word.
"Fai-tan juice"

[Quertus]

So, despite my love of D&D, there's too much D&D in this system-agnostic discussion for my taste.

So let me bring another system to the table: Shadowrun.

Now, I don't actually have all that much experience with Shadowrun - maybe half a dozen characters, and, for those in the know, the amount of Good Karma I've earned can be counted on one hand, with fingers to spare. But hopefully I know enough to make a few points.

Shadowrun is, like D&D, set in the post-return-of-magic future of Earth, filled with odd races* but, in Shadowrun's case, we still know it's Earth, and have even more technology than modern Earth. Cybernetics, cyberspace, and cool toys abound.

Casters are, in some ways, even more powerful than in D&D, as they are not limited by spell slots. Any spell they know, they can cast at will. If you're dumb, or the spell is powerful, it can cause fatigue, so there are some limits, but casting is theoretically unlimited.

For the purposes of this discussion, there are three groups of beings in Shadowrun: Those who wield magic (we'll call them "mages"), those who empower their body with magic ("physical adepts"), and those who are mundane ("mundanes").

Replacing the "meat" with cybernetics reduces your... humanity, called "Essence". Essence is an essential component of one's magical ability. Thus, cybernetics are actively detrimental to the capabilities of mages and physical adepts.

Further, you spend Experience (called "Karma") as you wish. Individual spells cost Karma. The more versatile the Mage's repertoire of spells, the less Karma they have to spend on other things.

So, in Shadowrun, my "God Martial" gets to go 3 or 4 times before** the mage, has cybernetically-enhanced senses, and is skilled at hacking, demolitions, and numerous other useful skills that the party wizard simply doesn't have the points to invest in. Or, rather, has chosen not to invest in in lieu of advancing their casting.

Now, if you try to play a character with no magic, and no advanced technology... hmmm... if you include guns & cars as "advanced" technology... I suppose you could build an elven archer with lots of social skills and act as party Face. Or some other skill-focused build. But that's tricky, as many skills involve using technology. If you don't mind using technology, it's a lot easier to come up with a variety of workable builds.

So, does Shadowrun qualify as an existing system where god-martials walk aside god-wizards?

* In Shadowrun, this process happened suddenly with the return of magic, in a process called "Goblinization"; I'm really not sure where all the odd races were supposed to come from in D&D. Anyone know the answer to that one?
** Yeah, I played early editions, where initiative was awesome.


(I'm particularly piqued by the idea that 2e was intended to shift into kingdom-management at higher levels, regardless of how successfully that worked in practice.)


I'm kinda sad that I didn't really get to do much with this in 2e :smallfrown:

[Max_Killjoy]

So, despite my love of D&D, there's too much D&D in this system-agnostic discussion for my taste.


It seems like no matter what you say, people will come right back to presuming D&D.






Shadowrun is, like D&D, set in the post-return-of-magic future of Earth,


???? That's Dying Earth specifically, source of much Vancian goofiness -- is it actually supposed to be true of the specific settings of the various D&Ds?

[GungHo]

So, does Shadowrun qualify as an existing system where god-martials walk aside god-wizards?
I'm not sure I'd consider an augmented street samurai that's .5 essence points away from being the Terminator as "mundane".

However, if they had power armor that did all that stuff, I might consider them mundane and think of the power armor as a vehicle.

I'm not necessarily consistent.

[Max_Killjoy]

I'm not sure I'd consider an augmented street samurai that's .5 essence points away from being the Terminator as "mundane".

However, if they had power armor that did all that stuff, I might consider them mundane and think of the power armor as a vehicle.

I'm not necessarily consistent.



Technology is a different thing. Getting on an airplane and flying to Denmark doesn't make you superhuman. Humans use highly complex tools to overcome other limits of being human, that's part of what we do as a species.

Walking out your front door in a funny costume and literally flying to Denmark under your own power, WOULD make you superhuman.


E: Second paragraph assumes our world or a world like it. If a fictional setting includes "flight under own power" as a typical human ability, then it doesn't make an individual superhuman.

[Newtonsolo313]

Technology is a different thing. Getting on an airplane and flying to Denmark doesn't make you superhuman. Humans use highly complex tools to overcome other limits of being human, that's part of what we do as a species.

Walking out your front door in a funny costume and literally flying to Denmark under your own power, WOULD make you superhuman.
so if we created a non magic artificer class would that count
like one that focused around creating non magic items like machines and using the equipment list to its greatest extent

[Quertus]

It seems like no matter what you say, people will come right back to presuming D&D.




???? That's Dying Earth specifically, source of much Vancian goofiness -- is it actually supposed to be true of the specific settings of the various D&Ds?



Playground Fallacy. :smallwink:

And, yes, yes it is, at least historically, for some / most settings. And since, historically, they're all connected, it is therefore the case that all D&D worlds are set in Earth's future, even if they aren't all Earth.


I'm not sure I'd consider an augmented street samurai that's .5 essence points away from being the Terminator as "mundane".

Agreed - unlike most muggles, they aren't terribly boring to play. Of course, that probably isn't what you meant by "mundane".

Can I propose "muggle" as a clarifying word, to mean those who do not wield magic?

[Cluedrew]

Verisimilitude != realism.For me "Does that make sense?" is about the first while "Is that plausible?" is a matter of the second.

Neither the god-martial* nor the god-caster are plausible, it would require a complete overhaul of most of what we know about the universe to work. However, can they make sense, given the correct setting and background?

* Physical


[Things a martial/mundane cannot do:] Turn invisible. Travel hundreds of miles in an instance. [And so on]I will ask you a question: how can a wizard do these things and still make sense? What force allows them to be unseen but still see? To change a location without crossing the space in between?

P.S. If you reply magic, I will reply skill.


So let me bring another system to the table: Shadowrun.
[...]
So, does Shadowrun qualify as an existing system where god-martials walk aside god-wizards?Are Shadowrun casters strong enough to be considered good wizards? If they are than it seems it would be.

Swordsaged by Quertus (Muggle, non-magic folk; seems to work)

[SethoMarkus]

I still don't understand how the handwave "because magic" can be applied to a god-wizard but not a god-not-wizard.

Maybe it's because I see the term "god-wizard" as meaning "spellcaster" and "god-martial/mundane" as "not a spellcaster", rather than martial/mundane meaning "nothing supernatural allowed at all". Because if we are talking the later case, how do these terms apply to Elves, Orcs, and Tieflings?

Is it all just the fluff? So a "god-wizard" uses magic, and a "god-not-wizard" is fine as long as they use not-magic? So an android with a quantum-fission power generator, hyper-plasmatic projectile lazers, atomic-reconstructor array, chrono-spatial transmogrifier, and electromagnetic gravitron shield generator is more "acceptable" as a god-not-wizard than some guy who punches so hard and fast that he can rip the space-time continuum?

I guess I am just with some od the others that magic already is a strain on suspension of disbelief; why is it impossible for a woman to run faster than the speed of light, but she can teleport via magic without an issue?

[Max_Killjoy]

I will ask you a question: how can a wizard do these things and still make sense? What force allows them to be unseen but still see? To change a location without crossing the space in between?

P.S. If you reply magic, I will reply skill.


Again, that depends on exactly where you set the limits of what can be accomplished with just skill (train, experience, etc) by people who "don't do magic".

Magic can be a skill, but not all skills are magical.




I still don't understand how the handwave "because magic" can be applied to a god-wizard but not a god-not-wizard.

Maybe it's because I see the term "god-wizard" as meaning "spellcaster" and "god-martial/mundane" as "not a spellcaster", rather than martial/mundane meaning "nothing supernatural allowed at all". Because if we are talking the later case, how do these terms apply to Elves, Orcs, and Tieflings?

Is it all just the fluff? So a "god-wizard" uses magic, and a "god-not-wizard" is fine as long as they use not-magic? So an android with a quantum-fission power generator, hyper-plasmatic projectile lazers, atomic-reconstructor array, chrono-spatial transmogrifier, and electromagnetic gravitron shield generator is more "acceptable" as a god-not-wizard than some guy who punches so hard and fast that he can rip the space-time continuum?

I guess I am just with some od the others that magic already is a strain on suspension of disbelief; why is it impossible for a woman to run faster than the speed of light, but she can teleport via magic without an issue?


"BUT DRAGONS!" fallacy.

(Not to mention technobabble.)

[SethoMarkus]

"BUT DRAGONS!" fallacy.

(Not to mention technobabble.)

That was precisely my point, actually. The android in the example was, in my conception, a wizard merely refluffed as a technological wonder. All magic will always be mago-babble; why are they the only ones to be given that allowance?

And that technobabble has realistic inspirations/foundations. A quantum-fission power generator is merely a highly advanced nuclear fission generator. The hyper-plasmatic projectile lazers are merely devices that super-heat gasses and project them in a high-speed pulsr. An atomic-reconstructor array alters objects on an atomic level to rearrange their molecular structure, creating new elements and objects. A chrono-spatial transmogrifier alters an object's (or individual's) position in space and time in relation to observers through manipulation of density and acceleration. The electromagnetic gravitron shield generator uses electromagetic waves to create a repelling force, protecting anything within.

Yes, this is all made up with very loose understandings of physics, but if they are internally consistent within the setting, does it matter?

The root of my issue, I suppose, is that a caster is inherently supernatural. Why can't a muggle (great term for this discussion) become supernatural over time while still remaining a muggle? (That is, if they exceed normal "human" limitations without resorting to casting spells or manipulating "magic", why can't magic or any other hand-waved construct be the source of their power? What is wrong with a "muscle mage", and why are they called a mage at all if they do not cast spells?)

[Max_Killjoy]

The root of my issue, I suppose, is that a caster is inherently supernatural. Why can't a muggle (great term for this discussion) become supernatural over time while still remaining a muggle? (That is, if they exceed normal "human" limitations without resorting to casting spells or manipulating "magic", why can't magic or any other hand-waved construct be the source of their power? What is wrong with a "muscle mage", and why are they called a mage at all if they do not cast spells?)


I've already posted this multiple times -- here it is again, with some clarification:


Mundane is mundane.

If you're going to say that fighters are doing things that would "break mundane" in our world, then you have two choices:

1) the limits of what people can do "mundanely" are different in the world your game is set in, than they are in ours.
2) fighters are "magic", it's just a different sort of magic than wizards or clerics or whoever.

You CANNOT have a world in which the limits of the mundane are the same as ours, AND fighters can "throw mountains" without magic.

If you choose option 1, you have some serious worldbuilding to do in order to both explain it, and fully integrate the implications into the world.



As I said earlier, you have three choices (I said two, but this breaks it out more clearly).

1) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are what they are in our world. No amount of training will allow someone to "mundanely" punch a mountain to dust, or throw a mountain. Train 1001 years, push to the very limit of the very edge of human capacity, and you still can't rip a mountain off and throw it.

2) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that in your fictional world, the limits of human ability, sans magic, are different -- and then follow through on all the implications of that difference in your worldbuilding. All of them.

3) Decide "fighters" are not mundane, and that they're just using magic differently (or a different magic), but admit that they're magic and not doing things that are normally possible. Don't kid yourself or your readers that the fighters are "just well-trained people with weapons and armor".



The "BUT dragons!" fallacy is the assertion that all breaks from hard reality should be treated equally in terms of acceptance and skepticism. "This setting has fantastic element X, nothing has to make sense now, free for all!" or "Your setting has fantastic element X, why can't it have fantastic element Y?"

[SethoMarkus]

I've already posted this multiple times -- here it is again, with some clarification:


Mundane is mundane.

If you're going to say that fighters are doing things that would "break mundane" in our world, then you have two choices:

1) the limits of what people can do "mundanely" are different in the world your game is set in, than they are in ours.
2) fighters are "magic", it's just a different sort of magic than wizards or clerics or whoever.

You CANNOT have a world in which the limits of the mundane are the same as ours, AND fighters can "throw mountains" without magic.

If you choose option 1, you have some serious worldbuilding to do in order to both explain it, and fully integrate the implications into the world.



As I said earlier, you have three choices (I said two, but this breaks it out more clearly).

1) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are what they are in our world. No amount of training will allow someone to "mundanely" punch a mountain to dust, or throw a mountain. Train 1001 years, push to the very limit of the very edge of human capacity, and you still can't rip a mountain off and throw it.

2) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that in your fictional world, the limits of human ability, sans magic, are different -- and then follow through on all the implications of that difference in your worldbuilding. All of them.

3) Decide "fighters" are not mundane, and that they're just using magic differently (or a different magic), but admit that they're magic and not doing things that are normally possible. Don't kid yourself or your readers that the fighters are "just well-trained people with weapons and armor".



The "BUT dragons!" fallacy is the assertion that all breaks from hard reality should be treated equally in terms of acceptance and skepticism. "This setting has fantastic element X, nothing has to make sense now, free for all!" or "Your setting has fantastic element X, why can't it have fantastic element Y?"

I never said that any of those examples were mundane. I am in agreement with you now that "god-mundane" is ludicrous ("god" precludes "mundane"), and that "god-martial" is too limiting. Please do not use "mundane" in a reply to these examples.

I am looking for further clarification on points 2 and 3 of your "choices".

For 2, why must we follow through on all of the implications? Is it not enough that those who train to that degree are the exceptions? They are special. Yes, anyone can train to that degree, but they don't. Anyone can become a wizard and master magic to the point of being a god-wizard, but they don't.

For 3, why must we separate training from magic? Why can't god-not-wizards be both alternatively magical and "just well-trained people with weapons and armor"? Wizards train in spellcasting, clerics train in communing with deities, and fighters train in fighting. Why can two reach god-hood through that path, but the other's success is accredited to external magic?

There are plenty of real-world myths about elite warriors reaching levels of mystical ability through concentration, discipline, and training. Shaolin monks, for example. I would absolutely count them as muggles and even as martials. If the myths were true, how is it any different from "just well-trained people"?

Edit: Additional clarification: I disagree that extensive world building is necessary to allow for non-spellcasters to break the ordinary rules of the world that most inhabitants must follow.

[Max_Killjoy]

I never said that any of those examples were mundane. I am in agreement with you now that "god-mundane" is ludicrous ("god" precludes "mundane"), and that "god-martial" is too limiting. Please do not use "mundane" in a reply to these examples.


I don't have another word for "within the limits of what people can achieve without supernatural means, as defined for world in question".




I am looking for further clarification on points 2 and 3 of your "choices".

For 2, why must we follow through on all of the implications? Is it not enough that those who train to that degree are the exceptions? They are special. Yes, anyone can train to that degree, but they don't. Anyone can become a wizard and master magic to the point of being a god-wizard, but they don't.


Because the limits are part and parcel of the specific nature of that world. If the limits of human jumping (from a standing start) at the extreme of innate potential and dedicated training are around 4 feet in our world, and 40 feet in a different world, then something has to explain that difference. SOMETHING is different about that world, and that changes other things, and so on. If the strongest humans can lift 5000 lbs over their head, then that implies other things about bone and muscle and tendons.




For 3, why must we separate training from magic? Why can't god-not-wizards be both alternatively magical and "just well-trained people with weapons and armor"? Wizards train in spellcasting, clerics train in communing with deities, and fighters train in fighting. Why can two reach god-hood through that path, but the other's success is accredited to external magic?


Because the wizard and the cleric are training to access magic. And in many settings, there's something special about those who can access magic, that no amount of training will give you. Bloodlines or blessings or surviving something or whatever, there's a "passcard" needed to access magic.

If the fighter is just training to maximize his mundane (see above) potential, then he's not training to access magic.




There are plenty of real-world myths about elite warriors reaching levels of mystical ability through concentration, discipline, and training. Shaolin monks, for example. I would absolutely count them as muggles and even as martials. If the myths were true, how is it any different from "just well-trained people"?

On this one, you answer your own question. Those are myths. In our world, they're not part of reality, they're exaggerated tales and fables. In our reality, no amount of training will allow you to break the laws of physics, the absolute limits of physiology, etc.

[SethoMarkus]

None of that actually answers or addresses my issues.


I don't have another word for "within the limits of what people can achieve without supernatural means, as defined for world in question".

Several have been offered. Muggle, non-wizard, physical, etc. I am specifically allowing supernatural. That is "supernatural" meaning "beyond real-life abilities". It may or may not be comsidered "supernatural" within that game world setting.



Because the limits are part and parcel of the specific nature of that world. If the limits of human jumping (from a standing start) at the extreme of innate potential and dedicated training are around 4 feet in our world, and 40 feet in a different world, then something has to explain that difference. SOMETHING is different about that world, and that changes other things, and so on. If the strongest humans can lift 5000 lbs over their head, then that implies other things about bone and muscle and tendons.

Why can the explanation not simply be "it works different here"? What is your explanation for magic and spellcasting that makes any more sense? I can already hear it, "Dragon Fallacy!". Yeah, well you still need to answer the question. The game world setting doesn't follow real-world physics, it only resembles it on the surface. Magic exists, strength isn't based on muscle density rather it opperates on a meta-physical "Strength Score" construct, and dragons both exist and can fly. It is a fantasy world.




Because the wizard and the cleric are training to access magic. And in many settings, there's something special about those who can access magic, that no amount of training will give you. Bloodlines or blessings or surviving something or whatever, there's a "passcard" needed to access magic.

And the fighter is training to access higher degrees of strength, to which the only limit is the self. In some settings, there is something special that allows casters to be casters, in this setting there are not. Like learning math or a second language, anyone can learn magic with the proper training. Additionally, who is to day that there can not be a "passcode" for unlocking further physical potential? In real life humans only use a small percentage of the power their muscles can generate, as a self-imposed limit to prevent damage. Maybe learning a secret way to unlock the full potential of a muscle is the "passcode" for fighters, like unlocking the arcane secrets of magic is the passcode for wizards?



If the fighter is just training to maximize his mundane (see above) potential, then he's not training to access magic.

And if the fighter is training to unlock the extra-mundane potential? Potential that our world would consider supernatural, but in her world, where Hercules was a historical figure and not a myth, it is within the realm of possibility, though rarely achieved and still extraordinary?





On this one, you answer your own question. Those are myths. In our world, they're not part of reality, they're exaggerated tales and fables. In our reality, no amount of training will allow you to break the laws of physics, the absolute limits of physiology, etc.

And in a world where it is more than just myth? Goodness, I'm not implying you can achieve this in real life! But in a world where fact resembles our myth? Are these wizards? To me, a wizard casts spells. They are not casting spells. They are unlocking internal potential.


Really now, this is supppsed to be a discussion of fantasy worlds. I can appreciate if you wouldn't play in a setting that didn't specifically detail every single possibility with an internally consistent explanation of how it was possible, but is that really required for the concept to exist at all?

[Jormengand]

So the spellcasters are playing Epic, and the snivelling peasants 'mundanes' are playing E6. Got it.

It's funny how often people refute this utterly, and then we still see people say it.


I think this all comes down to magic as occult practices vs. magic as exceptions. Or as you put it "Magic" and "magic". When I say magic I mean the occult/uppercase M magic, which includes the imagery and all the connotations of the magicians of Europe. You seem to be using magic as the exception which covers anything that doesn't work in reality.

So Superman is an exception, but he is not a practitioner of the occult arts, so I would say he is non-magic.

Then I would say you're looking for the psion. Or a less occult re-fluff of the wizard.


All this leads to a question: If a martial (of the body) character is an exception, but completely lacks and of the imagery and internal logic of a magician, are they magical?

Do you have a word that unambiguously means "of the body"? I know martial can mean more than that but I don't have a better word.

Corporeal or corporal? The former can mean "With a body" and the latter can of course be a military rank.


Turn invisible. Travel hundreds of miles in an instance. Raise the dead. Turn someone into an animal. Change a location's environment. Reverse Gravity. Instantly create a massive wall of iron, fire, stone, or gears. Change the weather. Travel to another plane of existence.

Hide. Send a message to your agent in that location (or find a pre-existing planar rift, which exist in D&D). That's easy mode; I've DONE THAT (death is weird). What the hell kind of problem can only be solved by turning people into animals? What the hell kind of problem can only be solved by changing an environment? What the hell kind of... look, you're not posting problems to be solved. Yes, I agree, I can't change people into animals, but why would I need to? That's why I said "What problems can't they, ultimately, solve?". I'm afraid "Josh isn't a bear" is not a real problem.

EDIT: Also, all of these are things that only some of the three casters can do anyway.

[Drascin]

Monks explicitly use magic in the form of ki.

That's sort of an important thing though. Chi is not supposed to be magic. Chi is supposed to be an entirely natural thing. Every living being has some chi. The warrior is simply the one that cultivates his waaaay beyond what most people do.

That is where a lot of the disconnect between people seems to come from. To some people, including apparently the people who made 3.5 for some reason, they see a dude jumping a hundred feet into the air and landing gracefully atop needle and call the vital energy that allows that "magic". But that is a pure D&Dism that is in no way a thing that is necessary. In the milieu things like monks are inspired from, that is absolutely not "magic". It's pure skill and body knowledge and attunement with the world. Magic looks very different.

If you define "magic" as "anything that doesn't exist in the real world according to our scientific knowledge of the laws of physics", then sure, there is no way to make a powerful nonmagic anything, because you're by definition disqualifying anything that is even vaguely mythically-inspired, in a fantasy game. But then, the Fighter class also must be "magic", because any level 6 character, including a fighter, can take a bullet to the face at three steps and be fairly okay, which is obviously not possible according to the laws of physics.

[Jormengand]

If you define "magic" as "anything that doesn't exist in the real world according to our scientific knowledge of the laws of physics", then sure, there is no way to make a powerful nonmagic anything

Are you sure? Look around you.

[Cluedrew]

I still don't understand how the handwave "because magic" can be applied to a god-wizard but not a god-not-wizard.I mostly agree, the only point I would change is I understand why "because magic" works, because then they would not be a not-wizard. Rather why doesn't because X work for other values of X. Why not because skill, because physical conditioning, because of a multitude of other personalities.


Maybe it's because I see the term "god-wizard" as meaning "spellcaster" and "god-martial/mundane" as "not a spellcaster", rather than martial/mundane meaning "nothing supernatural allowed at all". Because if we are talking the later case, how do these terms apply to Elves, Orcs, and Tieflings?Well if we define supernatural to be relative to that world, instead of our own than you can apply it to orcs. Mind you, then magic stops being supernatural in many cases because it is part of nature.


I don't have another word for "within the limits of what people can achieve without supernatural means, as defined for world in question".Muggle is growing on me.


Because the limits are part and parcel of the specific nature of that world.But don't the limits of magic imply similar things about the specific nature of the world? Even more in fact because it is part of the fabric of reality instead of just some beings who live there.

Triple swordsage.

[Quertus]

Is it all just the fluff? So a "god-wizard" uses magic, and a "god-not-wizard" is fine as long as they use not-magic? So an android with a quantum-fission power generator, hyper-plasmatic projectile lazers, atomic-reconstructor array, chrono-spatial transmogrifier, and electromagnetic gravitron shield generator is more "acceptable" as a god-not-wizard than some guy who punches so hard and fast that he can rip the space-time continuum?

Personally, I'm more fine with Mr roboto in my fantasy simulator with elves and wizards than I am with an unexplained god martial who can split atoms with his bare hands because "training".

And, of course, I'm fine with Mr. Roboto in a sci fi setting. :smallwink:

[Newtonsolo313]

Are you sure? Look around you.

i was gonna point out that it couldn't get to the sort of level god wizards get to
then i remembered nukes

[Drascin]

Are you sure? Look around you.

Pretty sure, yeah, because I am near certain that any GM that is the type to go "verisimilitude!" as an excuse for not letting martial-type characters do much will also not allow the martial [whatever] to invent anything that can actually change any balance of power even slightly, either. Likely citing known arguments like "well if it was so easy to create [X] then someone would have done it already!" (which generally betrays a complete lack of understanding of how progress works), "if anything would be invented it would be by wizards, who are a lot smarter, and therefore also be magic", and "but that technology would clash with the genre, so it doesn't work in this world" (also known as the White Wolf method).

In the end, it's not really about verisimilitude. Worldbuilding to allow characters that break the limits of normal men through training and willpower within the setting is the easiest thing in the universe. It's much more often just about zones of comfort, favoritism, and personal hangups.

[SethoMarkus]

That's sort of an important thing though. Chi is not supposed to be magic. Chi is supposed to be an entirely natural thing. Every living being has some chi. The warrior is simply the one that cultivates his waaaay beyond what most people do.

That is where a lot of the disconnect between people seems to come from. To some people, including apparently the people who made 3.5 for some reason, they see a dude jumping a hundred feet into the air and landing gracefully atop needle and call the vital energy that allows that "magic". But that is a pure D&Dism that is in no way a thing that is necessary. In the milieu things like monks are inspired from, that is absolutely not "magic". It's pure skill and body knowledge and attunement with the world. Magic looks very different.

If you define "magic" as "anything that doesn't exist in the real world according to our scientific knowledge of the laws of physics", then sure, there is no way to make a powerful nonmagic anything, because you're by definition disqualifying anything that is even vaguely mythically-inspired, in a fantasy game. But then, the Fighter class also must be "magic", because any level 6 character, including a fighter, can take a bullet to the face at three steps and be fairly okay, which is obviously not possible according to the laws of physics.

Thank you, this sums up my thoughts much more nicely than I have been able to express them.

[Arbane]

I'm going to add another possible explaination, since if these were the only possible reasons to want "mundane" fighters then we could just dismiss them and be done with this discussion: people like the idea of being the underdog, the one who manages to keep up with supernatural powers using just their wits and skills.

Problem is, this archetype works better in stories (where the main characters can have juust the right insight and stroke of luck at juust the right time, giving them juust the right advantage against stronger opponents) than in RPGs (where the main characters will likely lose if they're against stronger opponents).

So, if you want this archetype to work in RPGs without heavy GM fiat, you need to model it in the rules. Problem is, as the supernatural characters and entities get stronger, the "wits and skill" of the mundane characters need to get more effective too, and after a certain point (different for everyone, probably) the suspension of disbelief will break and you won't be able to see them as not-supernatural anymore.

I mean, let's keep using D&D as an example. A Wizard can kill a dragon in one hit with a save-or-die spell. So you give the Fighter a skill with a similar effect, modeling it as "the fighter is skillful enough to hit a vital point". Now, is a person able to wield a greataxe with surgical precision and enough strength to pierce a dragon hide and quickness enough to do so in the middle of combat a "mundane"? I would argue he's not. He's still a Superman, just in the skills department and not in the raw strength/speed department.

Good point. I tend to discount that type of player, but they surely exist. And the dice often betray them at the worst possible moment.

[Cluedrew]

Then I would say you're looking for the psion. Or a less occult re-fluff of the wizard.I suppose at the point of absolute power when everyone can do anything, I would guess they are all just flavours of the same. Still it is not only the aesthetics, but also the justification of how it happens. And of course the abilities they gain on the path to all-powerful is also important because most uses of this will probably actually stop short of god level power.


Corporeal or corporal? The former can mean "With a body" and the latter can of course be a military rank.I'm sorry I phrased that badly. So not just "of the body", but "one who draws strength from the body". It is the opposite of the god-caster, not god-magic.

Double swordsage.

[Arbane]

Because the limits are part and parcel of the specific nature of that world. If the limits of human jumping (from a standing start) at the extreme of innate potential and dedicated training are around 4 feet in our world, and 40 feet in a different world, then something has to explain that difference. SOMETHING is different about that world, and that changes other things, and so on. If the strongest humans can lift 5000 lbs over their head, then that implies other things about bone and muscle and tendons.

"Because they're Heroes" isn't good enough for you, you need the kind of hilariously overdetailed psuedoscientific rationalization that filled up so much pagecount in the old "Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe"?

It's because of Quantum Flux (http://www.theonion.com/article/sci-fi-writer-attributes-everything-mysterious-to--2781). Happy now?


Pretty sure, yeah, because I am near certain that any GM that is the type to go "verisimilitude!" as an excuse for not letting martial-type characters do much will also not allow the martial [whatever] to invent anything that can actually change any balance of power even slightly, either. Likely citing known arguments like "well if it was so easy to create [X] then someone would have done it already!" (which generally betrays a complete lack of understanding of how progress works), "if anything would be invented it would be by wizards, who are a lot smarter, and therefore also be magic", and "but that technology would clash with the genre, so it doesn't work in this world" (also known as the White Wolf method).

In the end, it's not really about verisimilitude. Worldbuilding to allow characters that break the limits of normal men through training and willpower within the setting is the easiest thing in the universe. It's much more often just about zones of comfort, favoritism, and personal hangups.

Yep. For added hilarity, they often have fighty-types being quantifiably LESS capable than their verified real-world equivalents at everything except withstanding physical abuse - sometimes even that. (RL people have survived some fairly horrendous things, and I doubt they were level 10.)

[Newtonsolo313]

Sufficiently advanced tech is indistinguishable from magic

A nuclear winter seems a lot like an epic level spell to me
edit
So yes mundanes can be as strong as spellcasters
It's just harder the farther back in history you go

[Max_Killjoy]

That's sort of an important thing though. Chi is not supposed to be magic. Chi is supposed to be an entirely natural thing. Every living being has some chi. The warrior is simply the one that cultivates his waaaay beyond what most people do.

That is where a lot of the disconnect between people seems to come from. To some people, including apparently the people who made 3.5 for some reason, they see a dude jumping a hundred feet into the air and landing gracefully atop needle and call the vital energy that allows that "magic". But that is a pure D&Dism that is in no way a thing that is necessary. In the milieu things like monks are inspired from, that is absolutely not "magic". It's pure skill and body knowledge and attunement with the world. Magic looks very different.


It has NOTHING to do with "D&Dism".

Magic is as magic does -- I don't care if it's called "attunement".




Pretty sure, yeah, because I am near certain that any GM that is the type to go "verisimilitude!" as an excuse for not letting martial-type characters do much will also not allow the martial [whatever] to invent anything that can actually change any balance of power even slightly, either. Likely citing known arguments like "well if it was so easy to create [X] then someone would have done it already!" (which generally betrays a complete lack of understanding of how progress works), "if anything would be invented it would be by wizards, who are a lot smarter, and therefore also be magic", and "but that technology would clash with the genre, so it doesn't work in this world" (also known as the White Wolf method).


Wow, that's... really, really presumptuous, belittling, and dismissive.




In the end, it's not really about verisimilitude. Worldbuilding to allow characters that break the limits of normal men through training and willpower within the setting is the easiest thing in the universe. It's much more often just about zones of comfort, favoritism, and personal hangups.


No, actually, it is about verisimilitude -- and none of your self-serving presumptions about other people's motives will change that.



"Because they're Heroes" isn't good enough for you,

No. It isn't.

And you can shove the rest of your snark.

[Drascin]

It has NOTHING to do with "D&Dism".

Magic is as magic does -- I don't care if it's called "attunement".

It has everything to do with D&Disms and zones of personal comfort and this super weird concept (that far as I can tell was born wholecloth from RPGs and fiction based on them) that anything even vaguely supernatural must be another flavor of mage. I mean, heck, listen to yourself. "Magic is as magic does"? Really? Which magic?

Dude, look at concepts of fantasy beyond D&D. Look at Wuxia. Do you think the dude that breathes carefully, concentrates, and punches a palace in half is magic? Because he isn't. That is the entire point. He can do that because he learned how to. If you spent the twenty years he spent learning to do that, you could do that too, that's the entire conceit of the milieu.

[Max_Killjoy]

{Scrubbed}

[Jormengand]

Pretty sure, yeah, because I am near certain that any GM that is the type to go "verisimilitude!" as an excuse for not letting martial-type characters do much will also not allow the martial [whatever] to invent anything that can actually change any balance of power even slightly, either.

Well, anyone who doesn't want martial characters to do stuff "Because verisimilitude" isn't someone I want to consider. People who want to work with verisimilitude are people I want to consider.

Plus, even if you just consider what people in medieval times actually did, there's a lot of versatility there.

Essentially, I don't see why we can't work within the limits of what people can actually do and create someone who can do relatively extreme things, when people who have done relatively extreme things actually exist.

[Newtonsolo313]

{Scrubbed}

[Jormengand]

{scrub the post, scrub the quote}

No, he is not, much though it may be news to you that some people don't like being told things about themselves that aren't true as though they were fact.

[Arbane]

[QUOTE=Newtonsolo313;21684649]{Scrub the post, scrub the quote}/QUOTE]


Hey, elfgames is Serious Business, and we're RUINING it with our historically inaccurate fighter-man. You know, the one standing next to the elf wizard.

I'm guessing Max has either never read any actual mythology, or decided that Cu Chullain and Heracles are spellcasters.

[Max_Killjoy]

None of that actually answers or addresses my issues.


It addressed the issues that were expressed by the words in the post I was replying to.




Several have been offered. Muggle, non-wizard, physical, etc. I am specifically allowing supernatural. That is "supernatural" meaning "beyond real-life abilities". It may or may not be comsidered "supernatural" within that game world setting.


"Allowing?"

I think I'll stick with "mundane". I'm certainly not using "muggle"... this isn't a Harry Potter fan-forum.




Why can the explanation not simply be "it works different here"? What is your explanation for magic and spellcasting that makes any more sense? I can already hear it, "Dragon Fallacy!". Yeah, well you still need to answer the question. The game world setting doesn't follow real-world physics, it only resembles it on the surface. Magic exists, strength isn't based on muscle density rather it opperates on a meta-physical "Strength Score" construct, and dragons both exist and can fly. It is a fantasy world.


If in this hypothetical world, human beings can lift 5000 kg overhead and hold it there, that's not just a matter of raw force applies. In our world, if a human just had muscles that strong, they'd rip clean away from the tendons or yank bones out of sockets/joints. Holding 5000 kg overhead would cause bones to break and sinews to shred. So, being able to lift and hold 5000 kg overhead also means that bones and tendons and ligaments and muscles more durable, by far actually. In fact, someone with a body able to do that would be far more resistant to many forms of injury. Being that strong (without an increase in body weight) also implies that they're able to jump farther, to. It implies a lot of things.

Dig deeper, and it implies that maybe some elements or compounds have different properties, maybe even that there are changes in the fundamental functions of atoms. You can keep going.

Or maybe they're lifting an object that massive, but because gravity is lower... but if gravity is lower, why aren't the mountains taller and the atmosphere thinner?




And the fighter is training to access higher degrees of strength, to which the only limit is the self. In some settings, there is something special that allows casters to be casters, in this setting there are not. Like learning math or a second language, anyone can learn magic with the proper training. Additionally, who is to day that there can not be a "passcode" for unlocking further physical potential? In real life humans only use a small percentage of the power their muscles can generate, as a self-imposed limit to prevent damage. Maybe learning a secret way to unlock the full potential of a muscle is the "passcode" for fighters, like unlocking the arcane secrets of magic is the passcode for wizards?


Fine, but then follow through with that. Don't ignore the implications, and don't fall back on "just so" stories.





And if the fighter is training to unlock the extra-mundane potential? Potential that our world would consider supernatural, but in her world, where Hercules was a historical figure and not a myth, it is within the realm of possibility, though rarely achieved and still extraordinary?


Fine, but admit to yourself as the "worldbuilder" and to your audience (readers, gamers, whoever it is) that you're no longer dealing with a world where the limits of what is "humanly possible" are the same as ours. Don't try to have it both ways, don't try to have your cake and eat it to -- I see too many settings that try to do that.




And in a world where it is more than just myth? Goodness, I'm not implying you can achieve this in real life! But in a world where fact resembles our myth? Are these wizards? To me, a wizard casts spells. They are not casting spells. They are unlocking internal potential.


Why presume that "magic" means "wizards"?

1. the power of apparently influencing the course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces.
2. used in magic or working by magic; having or apparently having supernatural powers.
3. wonderful; exciting.
4. move, change, or create by or as if by magic.

[Max_Killjoy]

{Scrubbed}

[Drascin]

Well, anyone who doesn't want martial characters to do stuff "Because verisimilitude" isn't someone I want to consider. People who want to work with verisimilitude are people I want to consider.

Plus, even if you just consider what people in medieval times actually did, there's a lot of versatility there.

Essentially, I don't see why we can't work within the limits of what people can actually do and create someone who can do relatively extreme things, when people who have done relatively extreme things actually exist.

Basically, the problem seems twofold.

One, people's suspension of disbelief radars are calibrated waaaaaaay too fine when it comes to nonmagical stuff, meaning that a lot of things like you mention, that actual real outliers have done, get instant pushback as "obviously unrealistic".

And two, well, when you place people who are limited to medieval achievement next to characters that seem to be given full carte blanche to do whatever the heck they want without having to justify anything "because magic", then something in the game has to give. That is, in the end, the biggest problem. The dichotomy between the guys that have to do all the work for the sake of "verisimilitude", and the guys who get to shrug and do whatever and nobody disagrees because, hey, magic!

This second one is the biggest rub when you're talking about a game where different people are going to be playing. The sheer difference in the amount of work needed for the different classes to be allowed to do stuff. This dichotomy is poison, and what's worse, tends to feed upon itself, until we end up with the 3.5 style of "nonmagic classes aren't allowed to do stuff". So we need to break that dichotomy of effort somehow. For this, I see four primary options:

Option one: Simply build the world with the assumption that martial outliers are a thing that happens within the logic of the world, and it is a known factor. That people can, via whatever justification you devise and the appropriate amount of grueling training and innate talent (I'm always partial to things like "breaking out from the Fate you were supposed to have" and the like), end up able to punch a river in half and shoot down the chariot of the sun himself with their arrows. This one is honestly easiest and requires the least amount of changes.

Option two: Make what magic can do a lot more restricted, with a very specific set of magical rules that cannot be contravened, much like the martial guys have to deal with gravity and don't get to say "well, my school of swordsmanship doesn't have to deal with gravity, so I get a sword technique that lets me fly". Maybe mages in this setting are purely animistic, and they need to parlay with spirits and manage the favor of spirit courts to get anything done, and their spells are gifts from allied or bound djinni, and any new feats by the mage need to justify themselves in this context. Or something. Hermetic magic or Alchemy would be good starting points - these were definitely things that had a hell of a lot of asumed rules!

Option three: Technology. Break the fantasy stasis over your knee and let the nonmages of the world develop all sorts of crazy stuff. Basically go full Arcanum up in the house. "The mages can do weird stuff, but then the muggles just invented the airplane last month, so, you know, pretty even overall :smalltongue:" kind of thing

Option four: Make nonmagical characters simply not playable options , thereby eliminating the dichotomy entirely. Any warrior types are made into swordmages and the like.

Those are about the only ways I can think of, right now, at 2 AM.

[Arbane]

Basically, the problem seems twofold.

One, people's suspension of disbelief radars are calibrated waaaaaaay too fine when it comes to nonmagical stuff, meaning that a lot of things like you mention, that actual real outliers have done, get instant pushback as "obviously unrealistic".

And two, well, when you place people who are limited to medieval achievement next to characters that seem to be given full carte blanche to do whatever the heck they want without having to justify anything "because magic", then something in the game has to give. That is, in the end, the biggest problem. The dichotomy between the guys that have to do all the work for the sake of "verisimilitude", and the guys who get to shrug and do whatever and nobody disagrees because, hey, magic!

This second one is the biggest rub when you're talking about a game where different people are going to be playing. The sheer difference in the amount of work needed for the different classes to be allowed to do stuff. This dichotomy is poison, and what's worse, tends to feed upon itself, until we end up with the 3.5 style of "nonmagic classes aren't allowed to do stuff". So we need to break that dichotomy of effort somehow. For this, I see four primary options:

Option one: Simply build the world with the assumption that martial outliers are a thing that happens within the logic of the world, and it is a known factor. That people can, via whatever justification you devise and the appropriate amount of grueling training and innate talent (I'm always partial to things like "breaking out from the Fate you were supposed to have" and the like), end up able to punch a river in half and shoot down the chariot of the sun himself with their arrows. This one is honestly easiest and requires the least amount of changes.

Option two: Make what magic can do a lot more restricted, with a very specific set of magical rules that cannot be contravened, much like the martial guys have to deal with gravity and don't get to say "well, my school of swordsmanship doesn't have to deal with gravity, so I get a sword technique that lets me fly". Maybe mages in this setting are purely animistic, and they need to parlay with spirits and manage the favor of spirit courts to get anything done, and their spells are gifts from allied or bound djinni, and any new feats by the mage need to justify themselves in this context. Or something. Hermetic magic or Alchemy would be good starting points - these were definitely things that had a hell of a lot of asumed rules!

Option three: Technology. Break the fantasy stasis over your knee and let the nonmages of the world develop all sorts of crazy stuff. Basically go full Arcanum up in the house. "The mages can do weird stuff, but then the muggles just invented the airplane last month, so, you know, pretty even overall :smalltongue:" kind of thing

Option four: Make nonmagical characters simply not playable options , thereby eliminating the dichotomy entirely. Any warrior types are made into swordmages and the like.

Those are about the only ways I can think of, right now, at 2 AM.

Very good analysis!

There is an option 5: make MAGICAL classes not playable, but that would be wildly unpopular with a lot of players. (People like cool powers.)

[Max_Killjoy]

No, he is not, much though it may be news to you that some people don't like being told things about themselves that aren't true as though they were fact.

Indeed.

Sometimes it seems like certain posters are reading less than half of what I post on a topic, skimming the posts they do read, and then making these ridiculous dismissive insulting assumptions about my opinion, my thought-process, and everything underlying and informing it all.


E: And then there's the irony of being told "stop falling back in D&Disms" while I'm the one trying to point out that "magic" and "spellcasting" are not synonyms. Or being told that my ideas "come from D&D" by people who assume "character classes" as a default. Never mind that I can't stand a good chunk of D&D, such as levels, classes, mushing armor and evasiveness, giant HP pools...

[Mechalich]

Dude, look at concepts of fantasy beyond D&D. Look at Wuxia. Do you think the dude that breathes carefully, concentrates, and punches a palace in half is magic? Because he isn't. That is the entire point. He can do that because he learned how to. If you spent the twenty years he spent learning to do that, you could do that too, that's the entire conceit of the milieu.

Yes he is 'magic,' in the generalized sense of using power that allows someone to surpass ordinary physical limits. 'Channeling your ki' or any other form of phlebotinum (to use the TV tropes term) is still accessing supernatural power. It is not mundane.

Wuxia is a milieu where everyone who matters has phlebotinum, whether they are a warrior or a sorcerer, and everyone who doesn't have it is a faceless mook. This reaches its natural endpoint expression in something like Dynasty Warriors. That fine, for what it is. You can play wuxia games, there's plenty of them, like Exalted. Exalted, however, illustrates one of the world-building problems of wuxia - that when you reduce 99.5% of the population to faceless masses that the heroes can hew through by the hundreds there are worldbuilding consequences. Such a setting, when developed by the ruthless ethics of modern gamers, ends up with the grimdark madness of oppression that characterizes Exalted. It's not a nice place to live unless you happen to be one of the chosen. Actual wuxia is guided by Buddhist and Confucian ethics and elides that particular issue most of the time (though it's not without its hypocrisies, liking making Nobunaga Oda into a Demon King while lauding the equally violent Toyotomi Hideyoshi as a brilliant strategic hero - guess which of the two concentrated his violence on a foreign power as opposed to native opposition).

The problem is you can't put a wuxia setting into medieval Western Europe - because wuxia rules don't produce medieval Western Europe. If you turn King Arthur into Saber suddenly her kingdom looks very, very different and you basically need to start over completely, which is a massive world-building challenge.

Now, D&D rules don't naturally produce the Forgotten Realms either (they naturally produce some sort of bizarre hyper-magic reality of which the Tippyverse is one example), but the storytelling conceit is that they do, in the same way the wuxia storytelling conceit is that it produces imperial China, so you can get away with eliding the problems in a way that you can't if you try to do something original.

The western European tradition provides an upper bound for martial characters, and its someone like Beowulf or Lancelot. Those dudes were formidable, but they are entirely within the boundaries of what typical fighters (or occasionally paladins) can accomplish. The problem D&D has is that the capabilities of spellcasters were so much greater and that when they made D&D they didn't split off everyday casting and ritual casting so instead of having raising the dead - which is absolutely a thing such a character might be capable of doing - take weeks of preparation and impose massive stamina and material costs, it's something you can do all afternoon, heck in 3e it doesn't even cost the caster XP.

[Newtonsolo313]

No, he is not, much though it may be news to you that some people don't like being told things about themselves that aren't true as though they were fact.


Hey, elfgames is Serious Business, and we're RUINING it with our historically inaccurate fighter-man. You know, the one standing next to the elf wizard.

I'm guessing Max has either never read any actual mythology, or decided that Cu Chullain and Heracles are spellcasters.
{Scrubbed}

[Drascin]

Very good analysis!

There is an option 5: make MAGICAL classes not playable, but that would be wildly unpopular with a lot of players. (People like cool powers.)

True. The fact that it didn't even occur to me probably says something about my own preferences. I like magic and would rather magic was a thing that the players could use.

I just also really believe that a game with such a stark dichotomy of "nonmagical people have to abide by this set of extremely specific rules, magical people get to do anything without any aprticular effort" couple with "also players can play both types but player characters of the first type get no exemption ever" is simply harming itself.

Either give more freedom to group one, limit the freedom of group two, or limit the playability of either group.

[SethoMarkus]

It addressed the issues that were expressed by the words in the post I was replying to.

And you are getting upset for others being presumptuous and smug? How about this, then. "Address my questions to my satisfaction within the parameters that I set."





"Allowing?"

Yes, "allowing", because I thought I had made it clear that I make a distinction between magical and supernatural. Please answer the questions making the dame distinction
That is why I moved away from the term "mundane", an effort to move to a playing field where we understand the meanings intended by the terms the other used.



I think I'll stick with "mundane". I'm certainly not using "muggle"... this isn't a Harry Potter fan-forum.

You will not stick with "mundane", because what I am talking about does not coincide with the definition of mundane that you use.
You don't have to use "Muggle" (again, the condescension towards Harry Potter is not necessary; it is a term that happens to apply here), but you cannot continue to use "mundane".




If in this hypothetical world, human beings can lift 5000 kg overhead and hold it there, that's not just a matter of raw force applies. In our world, if a human just had muscles that strong, they'd rip clean away from the tendons or yank bones out of sockets/joints. Holding 5000 kg overhead would cause bones to break and sinews to shred. So, being able to lift and hold 5000 kg overhead also means that bones and tendons and ligaments and muscles more durable, by far actually. In fact, someone with a body able to do that would be far more resistant to many forms of injury. Being that strong (without an increase in body weight) also implies that they're able to jump farther, to. It implies a lot of things.

This hypothetical world does not concern itself with such things. It is not the same as our world and does not follow the same rules. It appears to be so on the surface, but the root physics do not match up to ours. In our world, it would imply a lot of things, but here it merely implies that a sufficiently strong man can lift 5000kg uninjured.



Dig deeper, and it implies that maybe some elements or compounds have different properties, maybe even that there are changes in the fundamental functions of atoms. You can keep going.

There are no such thing as elements or atoms in this setting. There are metaphysical concepts.



Or maybe they're lifting an object that massive, but because gravity is lower... but if gravity is lower, why aren't the mountains taller and the atmosphere thinner?

This isn't another planet we are talking about, it is another realm of existence that takes place in a fantasy setting.





Fine, but then follow through with that. Don't ignore the implications, and don't fall back on "just so" stories.

I already laid out the basics. Metaphysical constructs of an individual's "Stats" that determines how the individual interacts with the world around them. They are X strong so they can do Y feats of strength.

If you want more in depth than that, you are free to expand on it. However, not all tables care about that level of detail, and I don't think that such things disqualify such a setting from the discussion. Why must every implication of great strength be carried theough the entire setting when only two individuals in the history of the setting have accomplished such proficiencies? They are the exceptions, not the rule.






Fine, but admit to yourself as the "worldbuilder" and to your audience (readers, gamers, whoever it is) that you're no longer dealing with a world where the limits of what is "humanly possible" are the same as ours. Don't try to have it both ways, don't try to have your cake and eat it to -- I see too many settings that try to do that.

I never imagined that I was. In fact, I believe the majority of those in this discussion are not imaginging this to be in a world where "humanly possible" is identical to real life.




Why presume that "magic" means "wizards"?

1. the power of apparently influencing the course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces.
2. used in magic or working by magic; having or apparently having supernatural powers.
3. wonderful; exciting.
4. move, change, or create by or as if by magic.

Because I have time-and-again referred to it as "Non-Caster", and because the terms initially presented were God-Martial and God-Wizard. Why presume that anything beyond real-life human capability is magic?

I am fine with a God-Muggle being capable pf such legendary feats because of "magic", but I refuse to refer to them as a wizard unless they cast spells (rather than rely on skills enhanced by a passive, even magical, source), and I find it wholey unnecessary to follow through with the ramifications of this through the entire setting.

[Quertus]

Why can't a muggle (great term for this discussion)


Muggle is growing on me.

:biggrin:


Why can't a muggle (great term for this discussion) become supernatural over time while still remaining a muggle? (That is, if they exceed normal "human" limitations without resorting to casting spells or manipulating "magic", why can't magic or any other hand-waved construct be the source of their power? What is wrong with a "muscle mage", and why are they called a mage at all if they do not cast spells?)

I like this idea. Well, not so much the hand waving, as making it make as much sense as magic should. The Physical Adepts of Shadowrun are physical characters who break human(oid) limits because magic.


Pretty sure, yeah, because I am near certain that any GM that is the type to go "verisimilitude!" as an excuse for not letting martial-type characters do much will also not allow the martial [whatever] to invent anything that can actually change any balance of power even slightly, either. Likely citing known arguments like "well if it was so easy to create [X] then someone would have done it already!" (which generally betrays a complete lack of understanding of how progress works), "if anything would be invented it would be by wizards, who are a lot smarter, and therefore also be magic", and "but that technology would clash with the genre, so it doesn't work in this world" (also known as the White Wolf method).

In the end, it's not really about verisimilitude. Worldbuilding to allow characters that break the limits of normal men through training and willpower within the setting is the easiest thing in the universe. It's much more often just about zones of comfort, favoritism, and personal hangups.

Well, historically, in D&D, there were hard limits on what you could invent, because there were hard limits on the tech level. Any pre-existing "advanced technology" that survived to "modern times" became an artifact. Similarly, if you were to travel back in time, grab a car, and bring it forward with you, it would stop being technology and start behaving as an artifact. Just the way the world works.

But plenty of systems allow for innovation, and I've seen GMs who were good at balancing "mundanes are believable" with "innovation is awesome". So, while probably rare, they do exist.

[Max_Killjoy]

Yes he is 'magic,' in the generalized sense of using power that allows someone to surpass ordinary physical limits. 'Channeling your ki' or any other form of phlebotinum (to use the TV tropes term) is still accessing supernatural power. It is not mundane.


And this is what I mean by "magic is as magic does". If a character breaks the limits of mundane people in the setting, then it's magic in the broad sense.

Yet for some reason, there's this "magic" = "casting spells" thing has been really hard to get past in this discussion (and yet I'm the one being accused of falling back on D&Disms...)




Wuxia is a milieu where everyone who matters has phlebotinum, whether they are a warrior or a sorcerer, and everyone who doesn't have it is a faceless mook. This reaches its natural endpoint expression in something like Dynasty Warriors. That fine, for what it is. You can play wuxia games, there's plenty of them, like Exalted. Exalted, however, illustrates one of the world-building problems of wuxia - that when you reduce 99.5% of the population to faceless masses that the heroes can hew through by the hundreds there are worldbuilding consequences. Such a setting, when developed by the ruthless ethics of modern gamers, ends up with the grimdark madness of oppression that characterizes Exalted. It's not a nice place to live unless you happen to be one of the chosen. Actual wuxia is guided by Buddhist and Confucian ethics and elides that particular issue most of the time (though it's not without its hypocrisies, liking making Nobunaga Oda into a Demon King while lauding the equally violent Toyotomi Hideyoshi as a brilliant strategic hero - guess which of the two concentrated his violence on a foreign power as opposed to native opposition).

The problem is you can't put a wuxia setting into medieval Western Europe - because wuxia rules don't produce medieval Western Europe. If you turn King Arthur into Saber suddenly her kingdom looks very, very different and you basically need to start over completely, which is a massive world-building challenge.

Now, D&D rules don't naturally produce the Forgotten Realms either (they naturally produce some sort of bizarre hyper-magic reality of which the Tippyverse is one example), but the storytelling conceit is that they do, in the same way the wuxia storytelling conceit is that it produces imperial China, so you can get away with eliding the problems in a way that you can't if you try to do something original.


When the worldbuilder says "this is how many world is different from the one we live in and know", and then fails to follow through with the consequences of those changes, it causes dissonance.




The western European tradition provides an upper bound for martial characters, and its someone like Beowulf or Lancelot. Those dudes were formidable, but they are entirely within the boundaries of what typical fighters (or occasionally paladins) can accomplish. The problem D&D has is that the capabilities of spellcasters were so much greater and that when they made D&D they didn't split off everyday casting and ritual casting so instead of having raising the dead - which is absolutely a thing such a character might be capable of doing - take weeks of preparation and impose massive stamina and material costs, it's something you can do all afternoon, heck in 3e it doesn't even cost the caster XP.


The limits of what real people in our world have been able to physically and mentally accomplish are astounding, and leave a lot of room.

But the topic at hand gets into characters who can do things multiple orders of magnitude beyond that in scope and power.

[Drascin]

Yes he is 'magic,' in the generalized sense of using power that allows someone to surpass ordinary physical limits. 'Channeling your ki' or any other form of phlebotinum (to use the TV tropes term) is still accessing supernatural power. It is not mundane.

Wuxia is a milieu where everyone who matters has phlebotinum, whether they are a warrior or a sorcerer, and everyone who doesn't have it is a faceless mook. This reaches its natural endpoint expression in something like Dynasty Warriors. That fine, for what it is. You can play wuxia games, there's plenty of them, like Exalted. Exalted, however, illustrates one of the world-building problems of wuxia - that when you reduce 99.5% of the population to faceless masses that the heroes can hew through by the hundreds there are worldbuilding consequences. Such a setting, when developed by the ruthless ethics of modern gamers, ends up with the grimdark madness of oppression that characterizes Exalted. It's not a nice place to live unless you happen to be one of the chosen. Actual wuxia is guided by Buddhist and Confucian ethics and elides that particular issue most of the time (though it's not without its hypocrisies, liking making Nobunaga Oda into a Demon King while lauding the equally violent Toyotomi Hideyoshi as a brilliant strategic hero - guess which of the two concentrated his violence on a foreign power as opposed to native opposition).

Exalted is... not terribly good at Wuxia, for the reasons you describe and many others. It's "Wuxia and also post-apoc and also imperialism and also some seriously bloody weird societal views and also **** D&D specifically" (some of us do still remember the ad campaigns for Exalted 1) as seen through the lens of White Wolf philosophy of life. Exalted is Exalted and can't really do anything that is not specifically Exalted (and as a longtime Exalted player, let me tell you,ssometimes even saying that is a stretch. Bloody White Wolf mechanics). For a game that hews a lot closer to actual wuxia, can I recommend Legends of the Wulin?


The problem is you can't put a wuxia setting into medieval Western Europe - because wuxia rules don't produce medieval Western Europe. If you turn King Arthur into Saber suddenly her kingdom looks very, very different and you basically need to start over completely, which is a massive world-building challenge.

Now, D&D rules don't naturally produce the Forgotten Realms either (they naturally produce some sort of bizarre hyper-magic reality of which the Tippyverse is one example), but the storytelling conceit is that they do, in the same way the wuxia storytelling conceit is that it produces imperial China, so you can get away with eliding the problems in a way that you can't if you try to do something original.

That has always been one of the things that made me most frustrated, actually, and thanks for bringing it up. The conceit is that the rules create the setting here, so we can't change the rules too much without the setting being transformed, but in fact they absolutely don't and you have to ignore half the ruleset so the setting can happen. But doing the same thing with a new thing is apparently too much? Why can't one elide the (comparatively super minor) problems caused by big-ass martial monsters in the same way you can elide the fact that the magic in the rulebook makes the setting in the rulebook impossible anyway? It's just a book! Just because it is not printed it doesn't mean it has to be a worse idea than what is printed! (I mean, if published content was always better than GM ideas Complete Psionic would have never existed, for one :smalltongue:)

And even more if you're making your own setting, like many of us do. If you're making a new setting anyway why not take the time to bake things in better and make playing a nonmagical dude less of an uphill battle?

[Jormengand]

Option one: Simply build the world with the assumption that martial outliers are a thing that happens within the logic of the world, and it is a known factor. That people can, via whatever justification you devise and the appropriate amount of grueling training and innate talent (I'm always partial to things like "breaking out from the Fate you were supposed to have" and the like), end up able to punch a river in half and shoot down the chariot of the sun himself with their arrows. This one is honestly easiest and requires the least amount of changes.

Option two: Make what magic can do a lot more restricted, with a very specific set of magical rules that cannot be contravened, much like the martial guys have to deal with gravity and don't get to say "well, my school of swordsmanship doesn't have to deal with gravity, so I get a sword technique that lets me fly". Maybe mages in this setting are purely animistic, and they need to parlay with spirits and manage the favor of spirit courts to get anything done, and their spells are gifts from allied or bound djinni, and any new feats by the mage need to justify themselves in this context. Or something. Hermetic magic or Alchemy would be good starting points - these were definitely things that had a hell of a lot of asumed rules!

Option three: Technology. Break the fantasy stasis over your knee and let the nonmages of the world develop all sorts of crazy stuff. Basically go full Arcanum up in the house. "The mages can do weird stuff, but then the muggles just invented the airplane last month, so, you know, pretty even overall :smalltongue:" kind of thing

Option four: Make nonmagical characters simply not playable options , thereby eliminating the dichotomy entirely. Any warrior types are made into swordmages and the like.

Those are about the only ways I can think of, right now, at 2 AM.
There is an option 5: make MAGICAL classes not playable, but that would be wildly unpopular with a lot of players. (People like cool powers.)

Option Six: make it so that nonmagical characters can solve the same kind of problems that magical characters can, without having to break the laws of physics wide open, which has already been demonstrated to be possible several times.

[Max_Killjoy]

And you are getting upset for others being presumptuous and smug?


I can't answer questions that aren't asked.



How about this, then. "Address my questions to my satisfaction within the parameters that I set."


When did we appoint you the setter of parameters for the discussion?




Yes, "allowing", because I thought I had made it clear that I make a distinction between magical and supernatural. Please answer the questions making the dame distinction
That is why I moved away from the term "mundane", an effort to move to a playing field where we understand the meanings intended by the terms the other used.


Magic is as magic does. "Supernatural" and "magic" may as well be interchangeable, especially in this context.




You will not stick with "mundane", because what I am talking about does not coincide with the definition of mundane that you use.
You don't have to use "Muggle" (again, the condescension towards Harry Potter is not necessary; it is a term that happens to apply here), but you cannot continue to use "mundane".


Did I miss the announcement that you're taking over Arbiter of Word Usage position?

(And there was no condescension towards the Harry Potter works -- this isn't a Potter forum, and the word "muggle" has a whole set of baggage that dwarfs your objection to "mundane".)




This hypothetical world does not concern itself with such things. It is not the same as our world and does not follow the same rules. It appears to be so on the surface, but the root physics do not match up to ours. In our world, it would imply a lot of things, but here it merely implies that a sufficiently strong man can lift 5000kg uninjured.

There are no such thing as elements or atoms in this setting. There are metaphysical concepts.

This isn't another planet we are talking about, it is another realm of existence that takes place in a fantasy setting.


If this is all true of a setting, then its creator has a lot of worldbuilding to do, and consequences to take into account, to maintain even a modicum of coherence.




I already laid out the basics. Metaphysical constructs of an individual's "Stats" that determines how the individual interacts with the world around them. They are X strong so they can do Y feats of strength.


Which is pretty much treating the rules of the game system as literal physics, and a complete inversion of anything I'd find useful in a setting OR in a system.




If you want more in depth than that, you are free to expand on it. However, not all tables care about that level of detail, and I don't think that such things disqualify such a setting from the discussion. Why must every implication of great strength be carried theough the entire setting when only two individuals in the history of the setting have accomplished such proficiencies? They are the exceptions, not the rule.


Then what they accomplished is either within the realm of the possible for other people in that setting, or they had some form of extraordinary distinction or power -- that is, they were in some way supernatural / magical.




I never imagined that I was. In fact, I believe the majority of those in this discussion are not imaginging this to be in a world where "humanly possible" is identical to real life.


Some of them appear to be imagining worlds in which what is humanly possible isn't consistent, and certain characters get to "have their cake and eat it to".




Because I have time-and-again referred to it as "Non-Caster", and because the terms initially presented were God-Martial and God-Wizard. Why presume that anything beyond real-life human capability is magic?


Because English, and words? https://www.google.com/search?q=magic+definition




I am fine with a God-Muggle being capable pf such legendary feats because of "magic", but I refuse to refer to them as a wizard unless they cast spells (rather than rely on skills enhanced by a passive, even magical, source), and I find it wholey unnecessary to follow through with the ramifications of this through the entire setting.


I don't recall insisting that you call them wizards...

[Cluedrew]

For this, I see four primary options:
There is an option 5Well if "dichotomy is poison" is the problem than there might also be a 6th 7th option: Play with the dichotomy. I think Ars Magica (?) might fall into this group. Casters are more powerful but the game plans for that. In fact in a sense it is based around that.


And this is what I mean by "magic is as magic does". If a character breaks the limits of mundane people in the setting, then it's magic in the broad sense.

Yet for some reason, there's this "magic" = "casting spells" thing has been really hard to get past in this discussion (and yet I'm the one being accused of falling back on D&Disms...)To be fair... that is exactly how it has been described for this thread. Because we can talk about magic as the exception (both within a world or between them) or magic as the collection of themes and imagery associated with the manipulation of occult forces. I suppose magic can be used to describe either, but are very different meanings and confusing the two is a problem. Especially this thread which could be described as about the difference between those two meanings of the word "magic".

Also the association of the two is very present in D&D, but in many other places as well.

Double Swordsaged.

[Morphic tide]

I bring back up my idea of Path of War or Tome of Battle disciplines that replicate particularly broken things casters can do as a sidegrade to the caster equivalent.

Casters take on Gods, Mundanes take on Nations. That's the dynamic that works best. The high end mundanes focus on getting armies and cities and making them unbelievably overkill, while the casters screw over single city and nation ruining foes.

You can have high-powered mundane Bard and Artificer equivalents, rolling in elements from other classes for more effects. The key is in leaving the idea of medieval stasis and high fantasy to be something the players choose at higher levels rather than something for the DM to define. After all, the only thing stopping a 15th level Wizard from instigating the Tippyverse is DM fiat and the player not feeling like pulling a magical industrial revolution entirely in RAW, so why not give mundanes similar potential to warp the setting?

A Bard equivalent can have four Disciplines quite easily as a ToB or PoW class. One for Feign on crack for actual personal combat, one for moral and/or competence bonuses, one for Fear effects and Moral penalties and one for a grab bag of information gathering, talking people into doing what you want and various other social things, with a side of Charm effects. Breaks verisimilitude? It's taking Feigns and making a fighting style based on the idea of them, two of them are historic uses of music cranked up and the last one is a grab bag of social skillmonkey.

The mundane Artificer equivalent would have to run on something else, possibly needing a new subsystem altogether to properly describe crafting the stuff they make, but if you did make a new subsystem you could easily use it for better balanced crafting classes in general. But the point is essentially taking all the non-magical craftables and wanking them to the high heavens, getting "build an item" effects all over the place(I'm rather partial to the idea of a shotgun-shield-bagpipe) to make stuff able to compete with magic items at a fraction of the cost, but with the disadvantage of not being quite as durable and impossible to just upgrade, instead needing to scrap and reforge to get improvements.

Basically, Bard-alike is the guy who becomes the king by either brainwashing everyone or becoming a war hero and then does either one more to screw over the setting, while the Artificer-alike screws with the setting by making nastily effective equipment that destroys the balance of armies and lets the empire takeover the world via superior arms.

[Arbane]

Wuxia is a milieu where everyone who matters has phlebotinum, whether they are a warrior or a sorcerer, and everyone who doesn't have it is a faceless mook. This reaches its natural endpoint expression in something like Dynasty Warriors. That fine, for what it is. You can play wuxia games, there's plenty of them, like Exalted. Exalted, however, illustrates one of the world-building problems of wuxia - that when you reduce 99.5% of the population to faceless masses that the heroes can hew through by the hundreds there are worldbuilding consequences. Such a setting, when developed by the ruthless ethics of modern gamers, ends up with the grimdark madness of oppression that characterizes Exalted. It's not a nice place to live unless you happen to be one of the chosen.

I suspect that's supposed to be part of Exalted's theme, really.

In actual wuxia, any random scrub could theoretically train their way to heroism, it's just most people aren't that driven.



The western European tradition provides an upper bound for martial characters, and its someone like Beowulf or Lancelot. Those dudes were formidable, but they are entirely within the boundaries of what typical fighters (or occasionally paladins) can accomplish.



You.... haven't actually READ Beowulf or the old Knights of the Round Table stories, have you.

Beowulf:
Kills Grendel by ripping his arm off and beating him with it.
Swims for 6 days in armor, loses the race only because he stopped to kill some sea monsters.
Can hold his breath long enough to swim underwater for hours, and fight Grendel's Mother.
Dies fighting a dragon. Nobody's perfect.

The Knights were significantly weirder (http://prokopetz.tumblr.com/post/127347909207/on-legendry) than most modern retellings will admit.

And, of course, there's PRE-medieval European legends (https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3098558&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=800#post388526421), which are often so over-the-top I suspect an anime fan stole the TARDIS to spread them. And they're STILL not as ridiculously OP as a high-level D&D wizard.

[Drascin]

Option Six: make it so that nonmagical characters can solve the same kind of problems that magical characters can, without having to break the laws of physics wide open, which has already been demonstrated to be possible several times.

That seems difficult while keeping to the strict "only stuff that humans in reality can do" "verisimilitude" guidelines.

I mean,, just the first thing that comes to mind, from a campaign I did have: You have rescued the king's son, who his father thought dead and for whose death he has declared war. A horrible battle will start within minutes unless you can get news to his father, in the battlefield more than a hundred miles away, that he is alive, in time!

Mage's solution: Lol Teleport (what we actually did). Alternately, various kinds of telepathy, illusory messages, the works.

Warrior's solution: Under verisimilute constraints, can't think of any that aren't "have a magical gizmo or magical cohort/mount that can replicate the previously mentioned mage solutions". Under mythology rules, the warrior asks the prince to write a letter to his father of his own hand, as the king will surely know it, ties it around an arrow, draws his mighty bow, and lands the arrow a hundred miles away, at the feet of the king, who reads it and calls off the attack.

That's just a random thing that came to mind in a second.

[Lord Raziere]

No.

Wuxia is super powers without phlebotinum.

In Wuxia, only the weak need something like that to become strong. The entire point is that there is no secret to the strength, no special condition that separates one person from another- only skill and hard work. If a person knowing basic punches and kicks but has practiced them for years versus a guy who has tons of special techniques but never really practiced them, the basic punches guy wins because they earned their skill.

Ki is only a word for energy. all things have energy. the martial simply has a more advanced use of energy than most, the sun may have more energy, but the martial artist has more control of the energy they have than the sun.

a martial artist is not a wizard, for there is no secret to their craft. There is no knowledge that is hidden. There is nothing separating ki from the warmth of the sun or the flight of a bird or the words you speak or the energy one uses to eat food. Ki is all of these, and all of these ki, to dismiss ki as phlebotinum is to dismiss the universe as such. For all things are connected.

The only thing that separates the martial master from the student is the dedication. A young wizard could learn a powerful spell and overthrow their mentor, but no matter what technique that student of a martial artist learns, its the skill behind it that matters more than the technique itself. It matter not what power you have if you cannot control it.

Wizards mistakenly believes that power and control are the same thing. They are not.

Furthermore the very existence of actual magic itself should change medieval fantasy as well, but everyone ignores that. Has ignored that for decades. Yet people hypocritically say to disallow one thing on the ground that it would change too much, yet ignore the thing you add that should already change it, if not more?

Furthermore using Exalted as an example of Wuxia is kind of misleading at best. its more accurate to say that it has Wuxia elements. In truth, Exalted is just as much of a mash-up fantasy as DnD is, just using sources that DnD does not. Exaltation is not within the confines of the Wuxia as it conflicts with Wuxia's "anybody can be this strong, anyone could be stronger than you" paradigm of hard work.

DnD is honestly closer to Wuxia in some ways than exalted, because you have a gradual increase of abilities earned through hard work and effort. The only thing missing is if some rival or person you left behind at level one suddenly comes back to fight at level 20 and is now some uber-wizard rival seeking to challenge you. After all, there is nothing stopping any of the NPC's from going forth to earn class levels themselves.

They just aren't interested in doing so, which makes more sense than any weird secret or phleb-force thing. A good example of this is Gohan from DB Super: potentially strongest fighter in the universe.....but instead chooses to be a good family man and worker so that his daughter can have a good future, and turns out you can't be both the greatest fighter ever and be a good family man at the same time. You either eventually learn to balance it and thus miss out on some strength that will hold you back, or you become Goku and sacrifice everything on the altar of martial might for more battle.

[Jormengand]

You have rescued the king's son, who his father thought dead and for whose death he has declared war. A horrible battle will start within minutes unless you can get news to his father, in the battlefield more than a hundred miles away, that he is alive, in time!

Mage's solution: Lol Teleport (what we actually did). Alternately, various kinds of telepathy, illusory messages, the works.

Warrior's solution: Under verisimilute constraints, can't think of any that aren't "have a magical gizmo or magical cohort/mount that can replicate the previously mentioned mage solutions". Under mythology rules, the warrior asks the prince to write a letter to his father of his own hand, as the king will surely know it, ties it around an arrow, draws his mighty bow, and lands the arrow a hundred miles away, at the feet of the king, who reads it and calls off the attack.

That's just a random thing that came to mind in a second.

What do you mean war will start? I already convinced the king before we left not to do that. Jeez, wizards, making everything more complicated than it has to be.

Next problem to be solved?

[Morphic tide]

*snip*

Okay, can you actually set aside your disbelief for the sake of mundanes at all?! Because you are sounding like anything beyond IRL human limits needs, absolutely requires, every possible side effect of it examined for you to be willing to play it, or even accept the setting. Ignoring the fact that Vancian magic, and the vast majority of magic in general, has no apparent impact on the settings at all, when doing anything like what you are requiring of mundanes for casters results in Tippyverse levels of hypermagic nonsense.

You are giving a ridiculous request inherently incompatible with the idea of a God-Martial of any kind other than crafter, and even then you probably require reasons why the world isn't a cyberpunk dystopia or why normal weapons are used by anyone important ever. Suspension of disbelief is supposed to cover things like breaking physics in not-entirely-blatant ways and impossible levels of skill for people who've trained their asses off for those skills. Verisimilitude isn't realism, bending and breaking physics for the sake of gameplay and ignoring implications are part of it.

[Max_Killjoy]

No.

Wuxia is super powers without phlebotinum.

In Wuxia, only the weak need something like that to become strong. The entire point is that there is no secret to the strength, no special condition that separates one person from another- only skill and hard work. If a person knowing basic punches and kicks but has practiced them for years versus a guy who has tons of special techniques but never really practiced them, the basic punches guy wins because they earned their skill.

Ki is only a word for energy. all things have energy. the martial simply has a more advanced use of energy than most, the sun may have more energy, but the martial artist has more control of the energy they have than the sun.

a martial artist is not a wizard, for there is no secret to their craft. There is no knowledge that is hidden. There is nothing separating ki from the warmth of the sun or the flight of a bird or the words you speak or the energy one uses to eat food. Ki is all of these, and all of these ki, to dismiss ki as phlebotinum is to dismiss the universe as such. For all things are connected.

The only thing that separates the martial master from the student is the dedication.


Then you're presenting a fictional setting in which the limits of the mundane are different than in our world -- option #2 on my earlier list. A world in which anyone, with enough dedication and training and learning, can become a legendary fighter.




Furthermore the very existence of actual magic itself should change medieval fantasy as well, but everyone ignores that. Has ignored that for decades. Yet people hypocritically say to disallow one thing on the ground that it would change too much, yet ignore the thing you add that should already change it, if not more?


You're right, it should change it. I think I've been pointing out the general principle there for a few pages now. I'm not sure "everyone" is the word you're looking for.

See also, Tippyverse, for a really detailed examination.

[Drascin]

What do you mean war will start? I already convinced the king before we left not to do that. Jeez, wizards, making everything more complicated than it has to be.

Next problem to be solved?

I mean, if your solution to a problem presented is "the problem doesn't happen", you are not actually terribly useful as a character in a player table. Player characters live in the world where they have to deal with problems as they appear, not just say problems don't happen, and plans never go according to plan (this, incidentally, is also why wizards in actual tables are a lot less Batman than this board would have you believe, because nothing ever goes smooth when you're a PC), and a player character skillset needs to be able to deal with things.

I mean, really, you're telling me that your solution to a begriefed king calling for war in the name of his son is "I told the king to not be silly and not do that" and expect that to solve the problem? Really? Are you being serious right now? :smallconfused: (Not being flippant, I'm actually kind of unsure right now if you're being facetious. Lord knows I frequently do jokes mid-conversation myself)

EDIT: Anyway, it's 3AM and I really should go to bed. See you guys tomorrow.

[Max_Killjoy]

{scrubbed}

[SethoMarkus]

I can't answer questions that aren't asked.




I am tired of this running in circles, so I will give one last, direct question to you.

If God-Wizards use "magic" to solve any problem, and magic works because of the set of rules XYZ (inserting the spellcasting and/or "magic" rules of a given sysetm or setting);

And God-NotWizards use "superhuman/supernatural" ability to solve any problem, which works because in this setting hard work and training can result in such ability (another type of "magic", in your consideration);

And my table does not care about the finer implications this has on the setting, such as bone strength, muscle density, or force of gravity; we are content to accept that "that's just how it is";

Then why must I go through "a lot of worldbuilding"?

This is not for your enjoyment; I can understand if you would not want to play in such a setting, but why, then, is that requirement being extended to others?

And whether intended or not, it absolutely was condescension towards Harry Potter. This is a generic fantasy discussion, as much as it is influenced by D&D and Tolkein, and Harry Potter absolutely has a place in this discussion just as much as Wuxia or Shadowrun.

[Cluedrew]

I mean, if your solution to a problem presented is "the problem doesn't happen", you are not actually terribly useful as a character in a player table.It is a mildly contrived situation. Not horribly so but some what. By the way, I'm all for the Bow & Arrow solution.

[Max_Killjoy]

I am tired of this running in circles, so I will give one last, direct question to you.

If God-Wizards use "magic" to solve any problem, and magic works because of the set of rules XYZ (inserting the spellcasting and/or "magic" rules of a given sysetm or setting);

And God-NotWizards use "superhuman/supernatural" ability to solve any problem, which works because in this setting hard work and training can result in such ability (another type of "magic", in your consideration);


Can any person in that world hypothetically do what the "notwizard" is doing, if they also just work hard and train the same way? If so, then maybe your setting has a different set of limits on what's humanly possible, and the line between "not magic" and "magic" is in a different place.




And my table does not care about the finer implications this has on the setting, such as bone strength, muscle density, or force of gravity; we are content to accept that "that's just how it is";

Then why must I go through "a lot of worldbuilding"?

This is not for your enjoyment; I can understand if you would not want to play in such a setting, but why, then, is that requirement being extended to others?


That sounds fine until the first time there's a disagreement that can't be resolved from the underlying principles of the world because everything is "just the way it is" and isn't actually internally coherent.




And whether intended or not, it absolutely was condescension towards Harry Potter. This is a generic fantasy discussion, as much as it is influenced by D&D and Tolkein, and Harry Potter absolutely has a place in this discussion just as much as Wuxia or Shadowrun.


"Unintended condescension" makes about as much sense as "falling upwards".

The term "muggle" doesn't fit because of its setting-specificity and its baggage carried in therefrom. This has nothing to do with any sort of negativity towards that particular setting or fiction.

[Jormengand]

I mean, really, you're telling me that your solution to a begriefed king calling for war in the name of his son is "I told the king to not be silly and not do that" and expect that to solve the problem? Really?

Social skills are a thing that's in the limits of human abilities. You can rephrase the problem like this:

Problem: The king will declare war if his son isn't found and brought to him.

Magic solution: Go get son, bring him back, show king.

Mundane solution: Talk him down and make him see reason.

Only, for some reason, you've decided that we've done half of the magic solution, and then are expecting the mundane person to come up with a substitute for the second half. Mundane characters do have agency at every step of the game, you know. Deciding that the mundane is in that situation where he's been caught with his pants down is like saying "You have a few minutes to get the prince back to the king; oh and by the way you have no spells prepared, have fun wizard."

[Newtonsolo313]

Can people PLEASE stop presuming that I'm somehow an advocate for D&D, or the way D&D does anything, or the various settings for D&D? Nothing I've said should give that impression, and my broader posting history should make it clear that I harbor a deep dislike of most of D&D's mechanics and assumptions. To be blunt, I consider it a broken, terrible system, and I left it behind over 20 years ago now.

Seriously, you either have to be skipping 80+% of what I've written or just more interested in arguing with someone else instead of me, to ever have any sort of impression that I'm standing up for anything about or from that game.




See signature.

Beyond that, stop making unfounded assumptions about other people's positions.

First off you are on a forum for a website that primarily hosts a webcomic about d&d 3.5 in the section of the forum that deals with roleplaying games in a section that details a problem most prominent in d&d taking an opinion that often also goes hand in hand with their assumptions. although it may not be prudent to make assumptions peoples minds make them anyway and indeed had some basis to found the assumptions however trivial it may seem. and neither is an excuse to tell someone to go die in a fire.

moving on many people do not have the same level as others. many people are okay with not thinking about the implications of magic to create a setting more fun. in fact some people can suspend there disbelief almost infinitely in the name of having fun. a good example of that would be people who are fans of tengen toppa gurren lagann and other shows where reason is thrown out the window in the name of fun. i would assume that you have a low tolerance for suspending your disbelief based of your post history and signature and based of your post history i would assume that assuming that will make you mad. i would imagine that you most likely have some clever retort against my argument which would be beneficial to hear assuming that it is well thought out and rational.
edit since i don't know how to add in referenced quotes to an edit and i don't want to double post here is what max killjoy said
That sounds fine until the first time there's a disagreement that can't be resolved from the underlying principles of the world because everything is "just the way it is" and isn't actually internally coherent.

but what you can do is say "okay yeah but can we get back to the game now." not all people get hung up on inconsitencies and are able to accept them for what they are and move on. even if something isn't consistent or logical it can be fun if you have the right kind of people to play with.

[Cluedrew]

If so, then maybe your setting has a different set of limits on what's humanly possible, and the line between "not magic" and "magic" is in a different place.Did you read my thing on magic vs. the exception? If you did and disagree could you tell me why?


Problem: The king will declare war if his son isn't found and brought to him.OK, what is if you need to get information across an incredible distance in a few minutes? Also although talking the king down is a non-magical solution, it is not a physical one. Although I gather you don't care about that line.


many people are okay with not thinking about the implications of magic to create a setting more fun.Mechs in general. I can go on for ages about exactly why giant robots are terrible weapons of war. I still enjoy things with them because they are awesome. Usually.

[SethoMarkus]

Can any person in that world hypothetically do what the "notwizard" is doing, if they also just work hard and train the same way? If so, then maybe your setting has a different set of limits on what's humanly possible, and the line between "not magic" and "magic" is in a different place.

Yes on both accounts. Anyone can achieve the same level, very few actually do. The setting absolutely has different limits. A typical commoner reflects the abilities of the real world, but heroes (and villains) are exceptions to this; not because they are the only ones that can surpass those "limits", but because they are the ones that did. Anyone can become a hero (villain) if they have the drive to do so. However, for those that do not have the drive, they resemble a typical real world human.





That sounds fine until the first time there's a disagreement that can't be resolved from the underlying principles of the world because everything is "just the way it is" and isn't actually internally coherent.

We are fine overlooking the internal incoherence. Any disagreements will be dealt with when we cross that bridge, with the GM acting as arbiter, hearing the player's justification/thought process and making a ruling based on that. We are friends and trust each other to have everyone's enjoyment in mind.

Is this enough information to answer the question?




"Unintended condescension" makes about as much sense as "falling upwards". The term doesn't fit because of its setting-specificity and its baggage carried in therefrom. This has nothing to do with any sort of negativity towards that particular setting or fiction.

As this is a text based medium, of course "unintended condescension" is possible; it can be difficult to parse sarcasm or derision through text accurately, missing it when intended or inserting it when unintended.

And "upwards" is merely a direction relative to the orientation og the speaker, so it is absolutely possible to "fall upwards", although I admit "fall" might not be the best descriptor, the meaning would generally be understood. (Examples, "floating" in a low gravity situation, such as a space station, or underwater with no visual indication of thw surface.)

But that is all needlessly convoluting the conversation. I undstood what you meant.

[Jormengand]

OK, what is if you need to get information across an incredible distance in a few minutes? Also although talking the king down is a non-magical solution, it is not a physical one. Although I gather you don't care about that line.

You can build some kind of rocket firework and have it about your person for that kind of thing, if it's really necessary to communicate with people across long distances. Or you use your general ability to Know A Guy Who Knows A Guy to communicate through a pre-existing network of smoke towers or something.

And no, I don't really care that it's not a physical solution. Even real martial people would have talked to people. Everyone, nearly everyone, talks to people.

[Lord Raziere]

And no, I don't really care that it's not a physical solution. Even real martial people would have talked to people. Everyone, nearly everyone, talks to people.

Then simply figure out a language that takes advantage of really long distance sound waves which you then speak in the direction of the king that then collapse into comprehensible message when it reaches the kings ear. Super-linguistics is a super-mundane skill to, and that doesn't sound out of bounds to me. Its talking, its just a very advanced way of doing it.

[Jormengand]

Then simply figure out a language that takes advantage of really long distance sound waves which you then speak in the direction of the king that then collapse into comprehensible message when it reaches the kings ear. Super-linguistics is a super-mundane skill to, and that doesn't sound out of bounds to me. Its talking, its just a very advanced way of doing it.

A little bit too advanced to be mundane, but there we go.

[Lord Raziere]

A little bit too advanced to be mundane, but there we go.

Then its super non-magic. its.....Extraordinary.

[Max_Killjoy]

Did you read my thing on magic vs. the exception? If you did and disagree could you tell me why?


I might have missed it in the flurry of people asserting they could read minds, and that I'm really a closet apologist for bad worldbuilding and unbalanced systems.

Was it this?



I think this all comes down to magic as occult practices vs. magic as exceptions. Or as you put it "Magic" and "magic". When I say magic I mean the occult/uppercase M magic, which includes the imagery and all the connotations of the magicians of Europe. You seem to be using magic as the exception which covers anything that doesn't work in reality.

So Superman is an exception, but he is not a practitioner of the occult arts, so I would say he is non-magic. And in some cases (say James Bond & Q's gadgets) what is impossible or possible can be hard to tell. So maybe he is completely possible within the realms of science. Probably not but I can't prove that.

All this leads to a question: If a martial (of the body) character is an exception, but completely lacks and of the imagery and internal logic of a magician, are they magical?



To be fair... that is exactly how it has been described for this thread. Because we can talk about magic as the exception (both within a world or between them) or magic as the collection of themes and imagery associated with the manipulation of occult forces. I suppose magic can be used to describe either, but are very different meanings and confusing the two is a problem. Especially this thread which could be described as about the difference between those two meanings of the word "magic".

Also the association of the two is very present in D&D, but in many other places as well.


I don't disagree, but I think the broader use is absolutely valid, as is "mundane" contrasted with "magic".

"Supernatural" and "superhuman" both carry other sets of baggage, and I'm not sure why some might think them clearer than "magic".




Mechs in general. I can go on for ages about exactly why giant robots are terrible weapons of war. I still enjoy things with them because they are awesome. Usually.


"30-100 foot tall 'mechs as the primary weapons of war, replacing the tank and maybe even the combat aircraft" is a bad idea.

There are some more constrained ideas that can at least fit through the "good enough for entertaining fiction" doorway if they kinda crouch down. :smallwink:

[Jormengand]

Then its super non-magic. its.....Extraordinary.

So is tome of battle teleportation. You're going to have to come up with better than "I slap an ex tag on it" to convince me.

[Max_Killjoy]

Then simply figure out a language that takes advantage of really long distance sound waves which you then speak in the direction of the king that then collapse into comprehensible message when it reaches the kings ear. Super-linguistics is a super-mundane skill to, and that doesn't sound out of bounds to me. Its talking, its just a very advanced way of doing it.


Just how far away is this supposed to be functional? :smallconfused:

[Lord Raziere]

Just how far away is this supposed to be functional? :smallconfused:

How far are radios supposed to be functional?

Edit: and entirepoint of the Extraordinary tag is that its power as magic without being magical. That is literally why it exists. I don't see why people don't use it more often?

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff: Please keep it civil in here.

[Max_Killjoy]

How far are radios supposed to be functional?

Radios don't work by sending sound waves that collapse 100 miles away.

[Lord Raziere]

Radios don't work by sending sound waves that collapse 100 miles away.

Your point is? My point is not that its literally a radio, its that its like or comparable to one. It has a degree of consistency because it has a real-world parallel that already makes sense.

[Max_Killjoy]

Your point is? My point is not that its literally a radio, its that its like or comparable to one. It has a degree of consistency because it has a real-world parallel that already makes sense.

The mechanism is, however, if not "magical" in the broad sense, at least flirting with it.

[Cluedrew]

I might have missed it in the flurry of people asserting they could read minds, and that I'm really a closet apologist for bad worldbuilding and unbalanced systems.Well I'm not going to tell them what they were telling you, but the point I understood was that a lot of your ideas (as I have understood those as well) also appear in D&D. And I will say... in a moment.


I don't disagree, but I think the broader use is absolutely valid, as is "mundane" contrasted with "magic".

"Supernatural" and "superhuman" both carry other sets of baggage, and I'm not sure why some might think them clearer than "magic".Yes those are the ones. And I also don't disagree, I use both meanings of magic myself. But here in this thread getting them mixed up is an issue so I am avoiding it.

Anyways, the joining of the two (which is what I think they thought you were arguing for, now I'm not so sure) is an idea very present in D&D. It is however it is present elsewhere as well. Example, in Vampire: The Masquerade my assassin needed magic to stand in bad lighting and go unnoticed.


There are some more constrained ideas that can at least fit through the "good enough for entertaining fiction" doorway if they kinda crouch down. :smallwink:I enjoy that metaphor.

6 times swordsage?

[Newtonsolo313]

"30-100 foot tall 'mechs as the primary weapons of war, replacing the tank and maybe even the combat aircraft" is a bad idea.

There are some more constrained ideas that can at least fit through the "good enough for entertaining fiction" doorway if they kinda crouch down. :smallwink:

Counterpoint I find that if a series does not take itself seriously you can suspend disbelief to the moon but often when it is supposed to be series it falls flat for me. For instance gurren Lagan took this concept of huge mech turned past eleven until the knob came of and then dug into the control panel and turned the rod until it snapped. Yet it was one of the most entertaining series I have watched.

[Lord Raziere]

The mechanism is, however, if not "magical" in the broad sense, at least flirting with it.

Magic? What really IS that?

What if magic is just some arcane way to achieve what is already naturally possible? You can either train to actually be strong enough to lift a car and such, or you can just cheat and trick the universe into temporarily THINKING your that strong for a few minutes through magic, but the guy who trained is going still have that strength while you have to wait until you can trick the universe into thinking your strong again. Is it really power if you can lose it so easily? All magic really seems to be is a temporary state where a set of rules work differently then collapse into normalcy.

Therefore is it really magic if you can always speak a language that can always be spoken and thus always be heard a hundred miles away? its a permanent alteration achieved through actually learning the language, not just applying ki and knowing then not-knowing it. This language can't be dispelled or unenchanted. Its just a bunch of sound structures achieved through your mastery of sound using only your mouth and applied to a useful effect like any skill.

[Max_Killjoy]

Well I'm not going to tell them what they were telling you, but the point I understood was that a lot of your ideas (as I have understood those as well) also appear in D&D. And I will say... in a moment.

Yes those are the ones. And I also don't disagree, I use both meanings of magic myself. But here in this thread getting them mixed up is an issue so I am avoiding it.

Anyways, the joining of the two (which is what I think they thought you were arguing for, now I'm not so sure) is an idea very present in D&D. It is however it is present elsewhere as well. Example, in Vampire: The Masquerade my assassin needed magic to stand in bad lighting and go unnoticed.


Your assassin wasn't allowed to make a stealth roll to stand in a sufficiently large shadow the way any normal human being would be able to? Obfuscate, or some other "power", should only be needed when the "bad lightning" wouldn't be enough on its own.

Anyway, when I say "mundane contrasted with magic", I'm most certainly not pushing a "fighters versus wizards, norms versus wonderfuls" split -- as I've said, I don't limit my use of the term "magic" to "casting spells". I'm not arguing for a joining of "magic" and "spellcasting" .

[Max_Killjoy]

Magic? What really IS that?

What if magic is just some arcane way to achieve what is already naturally possible? You can either train to actually be strong enough to lift a car and such, or you can just cheat and trick the universe into temporarily THINKING your that strong for a few minutes through magic, but the guy who trained is going still have that strength while you have to wait until you can trick the universe into thinking your strong again. Is it really power if you can lose it so easily? All magic really seems to be is a temporary state where a set of rules work differently then collapse into normalcy.

Therefore is it really magic if you can always speak a language that can always be spoken and thus always be heard a hundred miles away? its a permanent alteration achieved through actually learning the language, not just applying ki and knowing then not-knowing it. This language can't be dispelled or unenchanted. Its just a bunch of sound structures achieved through your mastery of sound using only your mouth and applied to a useful effect like any skill.

For starters, let's not assume that we're discussing Vancian spellcasting, and let's also not assume that "magic" is a synonym for "spellcasting" of any sort.

Moving on, there's literally no way to do what you're suggesting in a world that works just like ours.

So what you're suggesting either requires a fictional world with different physics and/or different human capabilities... or "magic" in the broad sense, that is, a supernatural power or method of achieving ends beyond the normally possible.

[Newtonsolo313]

So what you're suggesting either requires a fictional world with different physics and/or different human capabilities... or "magic" in the broad sense, that is, a supernatural power or method of achieving ends beyond the normally possible.
I'm sorry if I read your post wrong but did you just say that something to the extent that this world needs to either have different physics or have magic refer to supernatural powers. Because that sounds like stating the obvious but it is more likely that I got something wrong
Yep I see the mistake

[Arbane]

Then simply figure out a language that takes advantage of really long distance sound waves which you then speak in the direction of the king that then collapse into comprehensible message when it reaches the kings ear. Super-linguistics is a super-mundane skill to, and that doesn't sound out of bounds to me. Its talking, its just a very advanced way of doing it.

Oh, that's ridiculous. And worse, overcomplicated.

Just shout loudly enough to be heard clearly hundreds of miles away.

[Mechalich]

I'm seeing a lot of people in this thread saying, basically, 'screw verisimilitude, screw consistency, my group has tons of fun without those things!'

That's fine, but you need to recognize that it only applies to the special case of your group. A small group of people can decide to do things a certain way as a just so agreement because they've all agreed its more fun that way, but if you're exposing the experience to a general audience (as in writing a novel or designing a game setting) or even to a large rotating group (as in the case of soliciting players online or running a large-scale LARP) then you have no way of assuring everyone buys in to your specific vision and you need to make certain your setup has enough internal consistency such that someone with different ideas can't take a wrecking ball to it.

To make a demonstrative case involving the tropes of wuxia, I'll use Jet Li's Hero.

In that movie armies are irrelevant. True masters, such as the Nameless Prefect, Broken Sword, and the other characters, can defeat infinity elite troops even if they're all fighting together at once with good coordination. The situation where Broken Sword and Flying Snow storm the palace in flashback makes this abundantly clear.

The immediate follow-up question is then, why bother with armies at all? What do they offer you in this universe? Why does the Emperor need them if they can't stop a single martial master? Wouldn't it make more sense to not bother with the immense expense of equipping, feeding, and training tens of thousands of men and reorganize the state's finances accordingly. Shouldn't you decide all battles between states using duels between champions rather than pointless blowing blood and treasure? And if you have no armies, and fortifications are useless against martial masters (which they quite clearly are), then why build walls around anything?

Also pertinent, how do you contain a martial master who's gone off the rails and just starts murdering whole villages? The authorities are powerless, and if they move quickly and stay ahead of other masters they could depopulate whole regions before being stopped. There's no safety in numbers so society will develop completely differently.

Now, within trope, this doesn't happen, because there's a whole set of unwritten (and insofar as Confucianism applies actually written) tropes governing how these kind of people act and what they do, but in a game setting you can't rely upon that, or if you do - like FR does via it's little pleading sidebar 'the role of the mighty' in the FRCS - you look pathetic. Seriously, Ed Greenwood pretty much flatly admitted that, if you don't play nice my house of cards of a fantasy world crumbles at the first stiff wind, but it's really beautiful, so please don't breathe hard.

[RPGuru1331]

Yes he is 'magic,' in the generalized sense of using power that allows someone to surpass ordinary physical limits. 'Channeling your ki' or any other form of phlebotinum (to use the TV tropes term) is still accessing supernatural power. It is not mundane.
Define 'mundane', and define 'magic'. Within wuxia, those feats are within ordinary physical limits. It's not 'supernatural' (by far, one of the most meaningless terms; thanks for popularizing it White Wolf), anymore than you sneezing is. And as has been stated, all but the most ordinary peasant within DnD is capable of feats of survival that have rarely been accomplished in the real world. As a rule, in the real world a hit is, if not a kill, a removal from the fight. Yet we think nothing of a fighter calmly walking into a veritable forest of blades, even without access to things DnD would tag (su). And again, a pistol shot to the face is just fine and dandy to deal with for a meager 4th level fighter, at least provided it's a blackpowder pistol



You can play wuxia games, there's plenty of them, like Exalted. Exalted, however, illustrates one of the world-building problems of wuxia - that when you reduce 99.5% of the population to faceless masses that the heroes can hew through by the hundreds there are worldbuilding consequences.
I'm just going to point out that this forum, if I'm not mistaken, developed the tippyverse, allegedly using standard DnD rules and concepts (That it breaks the rules in occasionally subtle, but often not, ways is besides the point), and the Tippyverse is far more evil than most of what Exalted has to offer. This argument, that "These kinds of fictional rules must produce that exact setting", doesn't hold much water either. Heck, no edition of Exalted, including the current one, really has a mechanism for how the Great Curse caused the specific forms of vanity and cupidity that lead to either the Solars' misrule, or the coup against them. It's simply left as a matter of narrative fact, generally not mechanically relevant to your game in particular (A curious oversight, given that establishing a demesne or three is an expected course of action for a Circle, if not necessarily the default assumption of play.)


Such a setting, when developed by the ruthless ethics of modern gamers, ends up with the grimdark madness of oppression that characterizes Exalted. It's not a nice place to live unless you happen to be one of the chosen. Actual wuxia is guided by Buddhist and Confucian ethics and elides that particular issue most of the time (though it's not without its hypocrisies

I feel compelled to point this out: Exalted is not actually wuxia fiction - if you want to talk worldbuilding, there are countless settings and stories within that genre. Exalted is 'inspired by' Wuxia, but the simple fact that the only real path to power is either lineage or divine intervention equally means it cleaves very far from the ideas that shape much of wuxia fiction. Exalted also, quite fairly, claims descent from the same myths that DnD often does (minus the Lord of the Rings itself). Gilgamesh and Herakles are generally given as the most common examples of what a Solar can expect to do - You would be hard pressed to find Song Jiang's name come up, though I seem to recall Zhuge Liang for Twilights, and much of what the Romance credits to him has been reflected in Wuxia. The Grimdark oppression has nothing to dow ith 'the ethics of gamers', but everything to do with White Wolf's milieu of angst and habit of providing tiny slivers of hope alongside a metaplot that likely won't bear it out.

I also want to point out- 'The ruthless ethics of modern gamers' is a bit of a red herring. Generally, treating everything as a vehicle of XP delivery and loot to greyhawk, would be termed some variant of evil, selfish, or similar. The justification for why that fails that tends to be pretty simple, though specifics vary heavily within genre. I imagine, at the least, that you're familiar with why capital-E Evil has problems in DnD settings. And of course, this says nothing for how the rules of fiction tends to lend virtue a hand (a hand conspicuously absent in DnD rules, I'm aware.)


liking making Nobunaga Oda into a Demon King while lauding the equally violent Toyotomi Hideyoshi as a brilliant strategic hero - guess which of the two concentrated his violence on a foreign power as opposed to native opposition).
Samurai Warriors is not Wuxia, it just has superhuman Great Men and Women - it's not really that far off from many, if not most, video games, regardless of national origin. Master Chief's absurd body count may not be as absurd compared to a Warriors Game's, but it's still quite absurd. Conflating Japanese fiction with wuxia will not get you far.

Incidentally, Monkey is not the right target here - according to the pop culture narrative, he was the loyal retainer of his Lord, carrying out his wishes even in death. Heavy was his head, for he never sought the (figurative) crown, but he was the only of Nobunaga's retainers who would continue his goals, rather than seeking personal power. The 'hypocrisy' is ignoring the stated differences, by the narrative. Nobunaga sought power, and Hideyoshi didn't. This isn't some variant of uniquely Japanese ideals either - such myths are pretty common, such as Cincinnatus.

As far as 'native opposition' vs 'foreign powers'... In the Sengoku period, for pretty much all intents and purposes, the other lords were in fact foreign powers, just ones that had a more similar culture to each other than Korea did to Japan. There was little sense of national unity, and hadn't been since... oh, charitably, perhaps in the first Hojo's rule?


The problem is you can't put a wuxia setting into medieval Western Europe - because wuxia rules don't produce medieval Western Europe. If you turn King Arthur into Saber suddenly her kingdom looks very, very different and you basically need to start over completely, which is a massive world-building challenge.
Neither do DnD rules, though. Or really, any other ruleset, because that's not generally how a ruleset works. DnD Rules have about as much to do with period-accurate europe as wuxia has to do with period-accurate China - which is to say, less than nothing. DnD rules would likely produce considerably more magocracies and theocracies, and while the latter did have some place in medieval europe, it wouldn't be to the extent that you'd most likely end up seeing, if your worldbuilding is flowing from your rules, rather than your rules being in service to the worldbuilding. Worldbuilding doesn't typically flow from rules, though, absent silly exercises like the Tippyverse. The rules flow from worldbuilding. You acknowledge half of this, and yet you don't act on the obvious conclusion - if you want to claim your RPG has much to do with genre-fiction, you... kind of have to start assuming the rules are in service to that fiction, rather than vice-versa.

Frankly, Wuxia-style rules have far more of a place producing medieval europe fantasy than any modern iteration of DnD- Most of the systems I've seen actually allow virtuous action, however you define that, to lead to power without having deities intercede - both combat power (which medieval european-styled fantasy tends to lend to Kings to some degree; Aragorn, son of Arathorn would be a relatively low powered version, but so too would Turai Ossa of Guild Wars, or Varian Wrynn of Warcraft) and temporal power (which a King, more or less by definition, has to have at least some measure of). A King is rarely a Majesty-style non-presence completely incapable of direct action in fiction. DnD fiction is included - we simply skip to the kings already having levels, through means we don't explain, and that couldn't be replicated by applying the rules 'fairly' (which is impossible at any rate). The only thing really missing in Wuxia is the particular stylings of Wizard, some of which still have a place. And given the frequent antagonism of wizards, one can simply say omitting wizards is by design, if you were to try this adaptation.

It's also worth noting that in most western fantasy, non-magical characters are typically perfectly well capable of things that are 'impossible' in the real world, without the aid of magic. This strict adherence to what is possible in the real world is detrimental to your stated goals of producing western-style fiction.

Interestingly, older DnD (by which I mean 'Advanced Dungeons and Dragons', not '2nd Edition') was better capable of producing this fiction, by intent. Those swarms of followers that pop up with no actual explanation as you level, were meant to represent becoming in charge of a demesne, through any of a dozen means I can imagine (the most obvious, of course, being granted one by a sovereign.)

Also, you seem to think Wuxia means 'works like an anime', which it. doesn't. Stop that.


The western European tradition provides an upper bound for martial characters, and its someone like Beowulf or Lancelot.
Roland, of the Twelve Paladins, formed a mountain pass in the pyrenees as a byproduct of destroying his sword. He wore armor as a matter of ceremony, for his skin was better able to turn aside the blades of his foes. His blade was, variously, either divine or simply forged by a man, but even if it were magical, the rules don't permit this because that isn't 'possible' with a sword unless the sword has that as an explicit power. Given that he was trying to break the sword, he could not reasonably be said to be activating such a power.
Additionally, the Twelve Paladins were not what DnD would consider Paladins (The irony is not lost on me.)

Herakles diverted a river with aught but digging tools and his own prodigious strength ('but he was a demigod!' irrelevant, based on the rules under discussion. DnD rules credits Demigods with power similar to Gods, true, but Herakles did not accomplish this through any particular action DnD would tag with even an (su). He dug with his shovel.) For taht matter, he, and Atlas before and after him, held up the physical sky. Not with magic, just by being really really strong.

Hermes, for that matter, as a babe crafted the first lyre, and charmed Apollo with its music. This was not done through his connection to some numinous concept of a portfolio of music (which would be Apollo's, at any rate) - this was the baby figuring out how music works, and creating an instrument through simple craftsmanship. Impossible, certainly, but done just the same.

"All of those people are higher power than Beowulf though :("
Yes, but they come from the fantasy tradition you claim to be emulating. There is no valid reason to stop at Beowulf or Aragorn (both of whom surpassed the laws of physics as we know them), without stopping at Gandalf for the Wizard. Frankly, Wizards as DnD writes them dwarf Odin, who learned all Magic by hanging himself from a Tree and consulting with the head of Mimir. Which, I mean, I don't care, that's fine, be as high powered as you want. But it doesn't make much sense to deny the Fighter reaching or surpassing Thor in the same breath.

Those dudes were formidable, but they are entirely within the boundaries of what typical fighters (or occasionally paladins) can accomplish. The problem D&D has is that the capabilities of spellcasters were so much greater and that when they made D&D they didn't split off everyday casting and ritual casting so instead of having raising the dead - which is absolutely a thing such a character might be capable of doing - take weeks of preparation and impose massive stamina and material costs, it's something you can do all afternoon, heck in 3e it doesn't even cost the caster XP.
The problem DnD has, was better put above. It claims 'real life' is the ending to where a Fighter can go. It then expects them to play with a wizard, who has no limits whatsoever. You're also inventing the 'upper bound' of western fantasy out of wholecloth. The Lord of the Rings is not really limited by real life either, given many of the individual feats within the books (to say nothing of the shield surf that is as much a part of 'western fantasy tradition' as the books themselves), and the Lord of the Rings is very much on the lower bound of most western RPGs.


I'm seeing a lot of people in this thread saying, basically, 'screw verisimilitude, screw consistency, my group has tons of fun without those things!'

That's fine, but you need to recognize that it only applies to the special case of your group. A small group of people can decide to do things a certain way as a just so agreement because they've all agreed its more fun that way, but if you're exposing the experience to a general audience (as in writing a novel or designing a game setting) or even to a large rotating group (as in the case of soliciting players online or running a large-scale LARP) then you have no way of assuring everyone buys in to your specific vision and you need to make certain your setup has enough internal consistency such that someone with different ideas can't take a wrecking ball to it.

To make a demonstrative case involving the tropes of wuxia, I'll use Jet Li's Hero.

In that movie armies are irrelevant. True masters, such as the Nameless Prefect, Broken Sword, and the other characters, can defeat infinity elite troops even if they're all fighting together at once with good coordination. The situation where Broken Sword and Flying Snow storm the palace in flashback makes this abundantly clear.

The immediate follow-up question is then, why bother with armies at all? What do they offer you in this universe? Why does the Emperor need them if they can't stop a single martial master? Wouldn't it make more sense to not bother with the immense expense of equipping, feeding, and training tens of thousands of men and reorganize the state's finances accordingly. Shouldn't you decide all battles between states using duels between champions rather than pointless blowing blood and treasure? And if you have no armies, and fortifications are useless against martial masters (which they quite clearly are), then why build walls around anything?

Oh good, you finally referenced wuxia. That took long enough. Okay, this is pretty simple - your core premises are wrong. Assuming the fights in Hero happened as they are depicted (Not actually born out by the text, given its nature, but a reasonable assumption nonetheless), you have one master, backed up by a contingent of troops, credibly defeating two in a fight. Troops, clearly, are not pointless - they are the death by a thousand cuts - they tire, they exhaust. They may not strike the telling blow, but this is not necessary for them to be useful. You keep armies because when states clash, they too will have recruited heroes to their cause - if yours are supported by a superior army, yours have an edge in the fighting. This notwithstanding that master swordspeople do not grow on trees - someone must enforce the laws of the emperor under tianxia. Even if your assumptions held water, there would be a purpose to a military.

And not only are you making unsupported assumptions, within the text of one work, you are ignoring other genre fiction to do so. In Water Margin, the 108 heroes do not fight alone, even after serving under the Emperor. They are part of the military; they go on campaigns, along with his armies. And something like 60 or 70 of them die in battle, often against enemy peons, with their own peons supporting them.

Frankly, the way you claim Wuxia works, is simply how Fiction tends to work - armies are a backdrop, and what matters the most are the named characters. This is true in most of fiction, because fiction is not typically a simulation. It's not that the emperor's army can't, if gathered in one place, credibly kill Snow and Sword. It's that the Emperor's Army does not gather that many troops, because they have Nameless leading them.

[Arbane]

Herakles diverted a river with aught but digging tools and his own prodigious strength ('but he was a demigod!' irrelevant, based on the rules under discussion. DnD rules credits Demigods with power similar to Gods, true, but Herakles did not accomplish this through any particular action DnD would tag with even an (su). He dug with his shovel.) For taht matter, he, and Atlas before and after him, held up the physical sky. Not with magic, just by being really really strong.


Plus, just about EVERYONE worth mentioning in Greek myth was descended from some god or nymph or something, thanks in no small part to Zeus's inability to keep it in his toga.


"All of those people are higher power than Beowulf though :("
Yes, but they come from the fantasy tradition you claim to be emulating. There is no valid reason to stop at Beowulf or Aragorn (both of whom surpassed the laws of physics as we know them), without stopping at Gandalf for the Wizard. Frankly, Wizards as DnD writes them dwarf Odin, who learned all Magic by hanging himself from a Tree and consulting with the head of Mimir. Which, I mean, I don't care, that's fine, be as high powered as you want. But it doesn't make much sense to deny the Fighter reaching or surpassing Thor in the same breath.

Odin knew 18 whole spells, bless his little heart. :smallbiggrin:


The problem DnD has, was better put above. It claims 'real life' is the ending to where a Fighter can go. It then expects them to play with a wizard, who has no limits whatsoever. You're also inventing the 'upper bound' of western fantasy out of wholecloth. The Lord of the Rings is not really limited by real life either, given many of the individual feats within the books (to say nothing of the shield surf that is as much a part of 'western fantasy tradition' as the books themselves), and the Lord of the Rings is very much on the lower bound of most western RPGs.

I came here to post this quote, and here you've given it an excuse to be quoted. Thanks!

As always, magic is limited by your imagination - if you can imagine it happening, it does. And martial powers are limited by your imagination - if you can imagine a reason why it can't happen, it doesn't. - ProfessorCirno

[Max_Killjoy]

Define 'mundane', and define 'magic'.


We have been.



It's not 'supernatural' (by far, one of the most meaningless terms; thanks for popularizing it White Wolf),


Not really.

[Max_Killjoy]

I'm seeing a lot of people in this thread saying, basically, 'screw verisimilitude, screw consistency, my group has tons of fun without those things!'

That's fine, but you need to recognize that it only applies to the special case of your group. A small group of people can decide to do things a certain way as a just so agreement because they've all agreed its more fun that way, but if you're exposing the experience to a general audience (as in writing a novel or designing a game setting) or even to a large rotating group (as in the case of soliciting players online or running a large-scale LARP) then you have no way of assuring everyone buys in to your specific vision and you need to make certain your setup has enough internal consistency such that someone with different ideas can't take a wrecking ball to it.

To make a demonstrative case involving the tropes of wuxia, I'll use Jet Li's Hero.

In that movie armies are irrelevant. True masters, such as the Nameless Prefect, Broken Sword, and the other characters, can defeat infinity elite troops even if they're all fighting together at once with good coordination. The situation where Broken Sword and Flying Snow storm the palace in flashback makes this abundantly clear.

The immediate follow-up question is then, why bother with armies at all? What do they offer you in this universe? Why does the Emperor need them if they can't stop a single martial master? Wouldn't it make more sense to not bother with the immense expense of equipping, feeding, and training tens of thousands of men and reorganize the state's finances accordingly. Shouldn't you decide all battles between states using duels between champions rather than pointless blowing blood and treasure? And if you have no armies, and fortifications are useless against martial masters (which they quite clearly are), then why build walls around anything?

Also pertinent, how do you contain a martial master who's gone off the rails and just starts murdering whole villages? The authorities are powerless, and if they move quickly and stay ahead of other masters they could depopulate whole regions before being stopped. There's no safety in numbers so society will develop completely differently.

Now, within trope, this doesn't happen, because there's a whole set of unwritten (and insofar as Confucianism applies actually written) tropes governing how these kind of people act and what they do, but in a game setting you can't rely upon that, or if you do - like FR does via it's little pleading sidebar 'the role of the mighty' in the FRCS - you look pathetic. Seriously, Ed Greenwood pretty much flatly admitted that, if you don't play nice my house of cards of a fantasy world crumbles at the first stiff wind, but it's really beautiful, so please don't breathe hard.

Any setting can stay standing so long as every agrees to very carefully not burn it down.

Consistency, coherence... those are how one fireproofs a setting so that it stands up to people with flamethrowers.

[Lord Raziere]

Any setting can stay standing so long as every agrees to very carefully not burn it down.

Consistency, coherence... those are how one fireproofs a setting so that it stands up to people with flamethrowers.

Except this discussion has nothing to do with setting consistency.

It has everything to do with wanting martials to actually have an equal footing with wizards, setting consistency has nothing to do with that.

I mean what if the premise starts with "wizards and fighters are equal in this setting."? If your so set upon coherence and consistency, start with that premise and come up a setting where that hold true and everyone can enjoy high level powers because of it. I can just insert this into a setting I just come up off the top of my head, your the one who is pushing for the higher standards, so come up with a setting that meets your standards. I'm not going to play "mind read/trial and error guess Max Killjoy's standards of coherence and consistency" with you, so if you want a setting that coherent, come up with it yourself.

[RPGuru1331]

We have been.
Humor me, if you're this confident with them.


Any setting can stay standing so long as every agrees to very carefully not burn it down.

Consistency, coherence... those are how one fireproofs a setting so that it stands up to people with flamethrowers.

I sincerely doubt you have ever truly 'fireproofed' a playable setting by any standards you claim to have. Ultimately, a differing set of assumptions is all that's required to dismantle any set of actually playable rules.


Plus, just about EVERYONE worth mentioning in Greek myth was descended from some god or nymph or something, thanks in no small part to Zeus's inability to keep it in his toga.
And to make the obvious connection, if this is what you require to make sense of 'mundane' people breaking the laws of physics, why aren't you simply doing it? If you really just need an (su) tag, why don't you just do that? I do not accept the excuse "I require verisimilitude." when the evidence doesn't support it, and the rules have their ways of providing it.




Odin knew 18 whole spells, bless his little heart. :smallbiggrin:
He could probably have averted ragnarok without serious effort if he had spells roughly equivalent to 6th level slots. Gandalf, of course, was also a variant of god or demigod in his own right, and could have finished The Lord of the Rings ins omething like 24 seconds, if he had access to a spell repertoire that resembled a Dungeons and Dragons Wizard




I came here to post this quote, and here you've given it an excuse to be quoted. Thanks!

As always, magic is limited by your imagination - if you can imagine it happening, it does. And martial powers are limited by your imagination - if you can imagine a reason why it can't happen, it doesn't. - ProfessorCirno
o>
Makes as much sense as anything else.

[Jormengand]

Humor me, if you're this confident with them.



I sincerely doubt you have ever truly 'fireproofed' a playable setting by any standards you claim to have. Ultimately, a differing set of assumptions is all that's required to dismantle any set of actually playable rules.

Don't worry, Max, I got this one. Or rather, past you has:


As I said earlier, you have three choices.

1) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are what they are in our world. No amount of training will allow someone to "mundanely" punch a mountain to dust.

2) Decide "fighters" are mundane, and decide that the limits of human ability, sans magic, are different -- and then follow through on all the implications of that difference in your worldbuilding.

3) Decide "fighters" are not mundane, and that they're just using magic differently (or a different magic), but admit that they're magic and not doing things that are normally possible.

And also why I tried to clarify that "Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".

Note that I didn't define the limits or extent of that realm, only point out how to draw them.

[RPGuru1331]

Don't worry, Max, I got this one. Or rather, past you has:


And also why I tried to clarify that "Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".
By this definition, most iterations of qi count, you realize?

I'll do you one better: Dungeons and Dragons vancian casting is mundane by this definition.

[NichG]

Mundane vs magic is misleading. That was never really the problem that martials faced. The problem is the mindset of defining martials as 'excluding other methods' versus the mindset behind characters like a god-wizard which pull power from any and all available sources and blends them together to achieve the ultimately desired outcome.

Lets even leave out the 'wizard' part and just imagine a literal overdeity who wants to achieve something, versus a character with infinite power but who must match the archetype and mindset behind 'martial'. If the task is 'kill someone' then of course both can do it.

But what if the task is 'build a city'? 'Ensure that a particular bloodline remains loyal to the character for the next thousand years?'. 'Create a new form of life that can turn fire into jewels?'

The martial character in this case has infinite power, so whether they're powerful enough isn't the question. 'I destroy every universe except for the one in which my will is made reality'.

The issue is that in order to satisfy the meaning of 'martial', the concept behind their proposed solution must somehow have to do with fighting or warfare in a way that satisfies the player. Even if they could destroy every universe other than the one in which the city was built or the lifeform existed, they'd probably say 'this doesn't feel like playing a martial character anymore'. Whereas the overdeity can just proclaim 'let it be', and that's fully centered on their core theme.

Back to the god-wizard, players don't tend to think things like 'this method feels insufficiently magical or wizardly, so I won't do it'. Wizards can summon powerful creatures to do things for them, can buff themselves and enter combat, etc. If anything, going against the old guy with a white beard and a pointy cap archetype is celebrated - playing a wizard who wears heavy armor and bashes heads or who buffs out their grapple check and can out-wrestle a kraken or so on are fairly celebrated demonstrations of the flexibility of wizards. So the mindset embraces a more diverse interpretation of the archetype, and that naturally puts it closer to the overdeity situation where if you can find a way to have enough power to do it, there's no need to justify it according to theme.

So the real thing needed for a god-martial to emerge is a change in player mindset. If a player can suppress that thought of 'wait, is this actually still martial?' and use all means at their disposal then it should be possible.

[Mechalich]

Except this discussion has nothing to do with setting consistency.

It has everything to do with wanting martials to actually have an equal footing with wizards, setting consistency has nothing to do with that.

I mean what if the premise starts with "wizards and fighters are equal in this setting."? If your so set upon coherence and consistency, start with that premise and come up a setting where that hold true and everyone can enjoy high level powers because of it. I can just insert this into a setting I just come up off the top of my head, your the one who is pushing for the higher standards, so come up with a setting that meets your standards. I'm not going to play "mind read/trial and error guess Max Killjoy's standards of coherence and consistency" with you, so if you want a setting that coherent, come up with it yourself.

Actually it has everything to do with setting consistency.

Here's the thing. 20th level wizards, to say nothing of epic-level ones, are so powerful that they shatter settings just by existing. That's what the Tippyverse exercise illustrates, the rules of D&D allow characters to obliterate any constraints the fluff intends to impose. Again, the FRCS outright admits this, and Ed Greenwood's solution is to ask everyone to play nice and put the flamethrowers away. We should all be mature enough to recognize the futility of that particular gesture.

If the premise is fighters and wizards are equal. Then the premise, under d20 rules, is E6, or something close to it. A 6th-level fighter is quite potent. They can take on a very large, but not infinite, number of level 1 warriors (meaning town guards or basic infantry) and win. That's probably where most people want capable warriors to be - because the consequences of being able to defeat infinite mooks are lousy.

Looking at it more broadly, a high-level wizard is someone like Dr. Strange - extremely powerful with extremely broad applications. Now, which of Dr. Strange's fellow Marvel compatriots can successfully hang with him: Thor and the Hulk, sure (which is why those are the ones Strange is palling around with in Thor: Ragnarok). Scarlet Witch and Vision, yeah, them too. Iron Man? Maybe, on a good day and if he gets to bring his lab so he can swap suits out. After that...well it drops off fast. War Machine, no. Captain America, nope. Black Panther, not a chance. Spider-Man, no. Any of the Guardians of the Galaxy, yeah no. Ant Man, ha. Black Widow or Hawkeye? You've got to be kidding.

Now, in some sense that's okay. If you wish to build a superhero setting that has 'must be this cosmically powerful' to play, that's okay. Certainly it's largely the premise behind justice league (Batman has a special Batman exemption from marketing). However, you're still stuck with that 'no flamethrowers pretty please' problem, since in a setting where one of the characters is superman there's really nothing to stop them from murdering everyone on a planet whenever they wish. Heck it happens in the comics all the time, Dark Phoenix anyone?


I sincerely doubt you have ever truly 'fireproofed' a playable setting by any standards you claim to have. Ultimately, a differing set of assumptions is all that's required to dismantle any set of actually playable rules.

Nothing is perfect, but a solid setting is one such that the power structure in place actually makes sense and can reliably withstand the errant whims of a player. That's not to say that a player couldn't conquer a kingdom or something (kingdom conquering is a good thing to have available), but that a player shouldn't be able to walk into the capital city and storm the palace and murder the king on a whim.

In an E6 setting, this is generally true. If the GM puts 1000 level 1 warriors between the party and a goal, then the party needs to find a way around.

That's a good benchmark. Once you've reached the point where very large numbers of tiny mans cease to matter, you have problems. And yes, I know that means almost all superhero settings have problems, and, yes, they sure do.


By this definition, most iterations of qi count, you realize?

I'll do you one better: Dungeons and Dragons vancian casting is mundane by this definition.

Does he really need to add "In the real world according to the known laws of physics" to that? At some point your requests for clarification become deliberately obtuse.

[Jormengand]

By this definition, most iterations of qi count, you realize?

No, I realise that they most definitely would not, given that Max and I are using magic to mean anything supernatural and not just Vancian magic. Come on, you can't come into a thread without a basic understanding of the discussion at hand and tell us we're all doing it wrong. That's not how discussions work.


I'll do you one better: Dungeons and Dragons vancian casting is mundane by this definition.

Or maybe your entire head just switched off when the words "Without magic" were mentioned. Maybe you're being deliberately intellectually dishonest.

[RPGuru1331]

Does he really need to add "In the real world according to the known laws of physics" to that? At some point your requests for clarification become deliberately obtuse.

The known laws of physics? So the Alcubierre Drive would be magic (as opposed to unfeasible) 10 years ago? GPS would be magic 100 years ago?


No, I realise that they most definitely would not, given that Max and I are using magic to mean anything supernatural and not just Vancian magic. Come on, you can't come into a thread without a basic understanding of the discussion at hand and tell us we're all doing it wrong. That's not how discussions work.

Define supernatural.





Or maybe your entire head just switched off when the words "Without magic" were mentioned. Maybe you're being deliberately intellectually dishonest.
I'm not going to lie: I don't think you appreciate how difficult the task you have set for yourself is. What is Magic, specifically? Based on the setting of dungeons and dragons, magic is entirely mundane. These are abilities nearly anyone can learn - in fact, they almost always operate by very well-understood rules. "Magic", as a game rule, is simple to define. As a metaphysical one? Oh my stars and garters, that is much harder.

[Jormengand]

The known laws of physics? So the Alcubierre Drive would be magic (as opposed to unfeasible) 10 years ago? GPS would be magic 100 years ago?



Define supernatural.

At this point, your requests for clarification and exceptional pedantry are serving only to slow down proper, real discussion of the issue, and here's one for you, I think that you know it, and choose to do it for exactly that reason.

[RPGuru1331]

At this point, your requests for clarification and exceptional pedantry are serving only to slow down proper, real discussion of the issue, and here's one for you, I think that you know it, and choose to do it for exactly that reason.

Yeah, I'm not really expecting you to be able to manage this. The point is thus:
The definition of 'mundane' and 'magic' is entirely arbitrary. There is no grand metaphysical reasoning for it, because they are simply game terms that have been elevated beyond that status. As game terms, they can serve a purpose, but as game terms, they do not really mean anything whatsoever - 'magic' does not, itself provide justification for the 'physically impossible'. Neither does 'mundane' really prevent it (After all, a Dragon can exist, but the SQuare-cube law has something to say about their shape, and their flight is (Ex)). Even magical creatures rarely wink out of existence in an anti-magic sphere.

I am trying to get you to use a definition for the mundane that would, at minimum, not disinclude the GPS 100 years ago, while disincluding Qi, and a definition for magic that would, at minimum, not include the GPS 100 years ago. At that point, you would have met the minimal standards that you, or at least they, claim to be operating under. There's a number of unspoken, and unnecessary assumptions going into preventing martially-oriented characters from doing Cool Things Reality Says No to.

[Jormengand]

Yeah, I'm not really expecting you to be able to manage this. The point is thus:
The definition of 'mundane' and 'magic' is entirely arbitrary. There is no grand metaphysical reasoning for it, because they are simply game terms that have been elevated beyond that status. As game terms, they can serve a purpose, but as game terms, they do not really mean anything whatsoever - 'magic' does not, itself provide justification for the 'physically impossible'. Neither does 'mundane' really prevent it (After all, a Dragon can exist, but the SQuare-cube law has something to say about their shape, and their flight is (Ex)). Even magical creatures rarely wink out of existence in an anti-magic sphere.

I am trying to get you to use a definition for the mundane that would, at minimum, not disinclude the GPS 100 years ago, while disincluding Qi, and a definition for magic that would, at minimum, not include the GPS 100 years ago. At that point, you would have met the minimal standards that you, or at least they, claim to be operating under. There's a number of unspoken, and unnecessary assumptions going into preventing martially-oriented characters from doing Cool Things Reality Says No to.

The "But dragons" fallacy has already been covered in this thread. The meaning of mundane and magic has already been clarified in this thread. The reason that slapping an ex tags on things doesn't make it nonmagical has already been argued to death in this thread. You're not bringing any new challenges to the table.

[RPGuru1331]

The "But dragons" fallacy has already been covered in this thread. The meaning of mundane and magic has already been clarified in this thread
I have no reason to believe this is true. I listed a nominally minimal standard. You haven't met it. You certainly haven't presented a satisfactory definition to me - I already pointed out that Qi counts (It is, in fact, still occasionally taught as part of a ruleset by which the human body operates under; who's definition says it isn't natural, right now?). When you insisted the 'supernatural' is 'all magic', I asked you to clarify 'supernatural'. Perhaps you don't understand my perspective? By my count, all of the rules of a setting are natural. They are observable, repeatable rules that can be learned and used. Perhaps some requirements are very specific - perhaps it must be Zeus who brings down the lightning (unlikely; Cronus did it before), but the rules are very much real. They're as natural as breathing. 'Supernatural' is almost always grounded in what we think is true of the world, which is not always what is actually true of the world.

Don't forget - the reason this matters is for a specific purpose about the nebulous 'believability' of an action, as justification for limiting the actions of players in a game. I listed what I did as a minimal standard for a reason - it's not enough, for purposes of the thread, to manage that. THEN you have to apply it back to a real world situation.


The reason that slapping an ex tags on things doesn't make it nonmagical has already been argued to death in this thread.

I mean, if that's actually true, feel free to just present the argument?

[Mechalich]

The known laws of physics? So the Alcubierre Drive would be magic (as opposed to unfeasible) 10 years ago? GPS would be magic 100 years ago?


Bluntly, yes.

If you include a futuristic technology that you cannot explain on at least the theoretical level, then yes, it's handwavium magic. Now GPS might have been theoretically feasible 100 years ago, General Relativity, which GPS requires to be correct due to being so precise, was published in 1915, so that's just barely 100 years, but in 1900, when neither special or general relativity had been published, GPS would be magic, because ever if you could conceive of satellites, the math of the time wouldn't allow the necessary precision to make it work.

[RPGuru1331]

Bluntly, yes.

If you include a futuristic technology that you cannot explain on at least the theoretical level, then yes, it's handwavium magic.
Oh? You couldn't explain special relativity 100 years ago? I'm reasonably confident you could explain the theory fine, barring linguistic drift. The problem was, that theory was not really known or accepted. This is putting aside it was also not actually demonstrated.

Any explanation that carves an exception into known physics explains a thing fine, because 'known physics' is merely what has failed to be disproven. I can talk in terms of Zero-point energy, or for that matter, orgone - things we have no reason to believe are true. But because they carve an exception into the known laws (Or did, at the time), they strictly followed your definition.

[Jormengand]

I have no reason to believe this is true.

It's in the goddamn thread. There's your reason. I don't understand the issue you're having with "This already has been covered in this discussion, which is not private and which you are therefore allowed to access to validate this information."

[RPGuru1331]

It's in the goddamn thread. There's your reason. I don't understand the issue you're having with "This already has been covered in this discussion, which is not private and which you are therefore allowed to access to validate this information."

It's a sufficiently big thread. There's a lot of repetition of words. 'Magic' is not exactly a helpful search term.

Let me reiterate: You already claimed to meet my standards once, with a definition that would have struggled to hold a thimble-ful of water. You clearly remember where it was done.

At this point: I have seen nothing that looks like what you describe. I have read over the thread. Either I have missed it, or you are drastically overestimating something. And you've already done the latter.

[Jormengand]

If something is possible in the real world, it is mundane. If not, it is magical. The "But dragons" fallacy is the fallacy of assuming that because something that is impossible in the real world occurs, there is no longer any value in trying to conform to the real world. Slapping ex tags on teleportation does not make it mundane because, well, duh.

[Arbane]

If something is possible in the real world, it is mundane. If not, it is magical. The "But dragons" fallacy is the fallacy of assuming that because something that is impossible in the real world occurs, there is no longer any value in trying to conform to the real world. Slapping ex tags on teleportation does not make it mundane because, well, duh.

Dwarfs can see in complete darkness. They're magical. ALL OF THEM, EVEN THE FIGHTERS.

[Jormengand]

Dwarfs can see in the dark. They're magical.

Some animals can see in the dark. Notice the bit where I never said "Humanly possible", just "Possible"?

[RPGuru1331]

If something is possible in the real world, it is mundane.
There's a non-trivial amount of evidence for qi-based theories - even some fairly outlandish claims.

I mean, I don't think it's particularly good, nor do I find it helpful, and I certainly wouldn't want a doctor using it on me. But 'possible' is not actually the same as very well established.

And well, knowledge is always expanding. It is within the realm of possibility that there is, in fact, something to the idea of meridians upon which energy travels. It would certainly have interesting implications for medicine.

Faster than light travel is possible. Miniaturization of the technology is possible. Production of the energy sources necessary is possible. That FTL travel is completely unfeasible, that miniaturization of such technology is not actually necessarily likely, and that we currently have no earthly idea where that energy would come from is not actually the same as impossible.

In fact, I'll just jump to one of the obvious points here. It's possible we might find Thor battling ice giants, and the previously-understood formation of all climate was ultimately a byproduct of the ringing of Mjollnir upon the skulls of his enemies. I mean, it's incredibly unlikely, to the point we can discard it as a useful point in making predictions about the world,b ut it is possible that it will occur. It is in fact, entirely impossible to disprove that something is possible, because literally one counterexample is all it takes - and since we can't observe all of space, at all times, it's possible that the violation already occured.

My two examples were carefully chosen (Although I forgot that ti's now 103 years for Special relativity.) And the 'current laws of physics' gets pretty wonky as we start walking back too. Heck, most of the baseline used for 'magical' ideas was thought to simply be how the world works.


If not, it is magical. The "But dragons" fallacy is the fallacy of assuming that because something that is impossible in the real world occurs, there is no longer any value in trying to conform to the real world. Slapping ex tags on teleportation does not make it mundane because, well, duh.
If a dragon can power its own flight with such small wings, why can't my fighter cleave a pass into a mountain range? Why can't I divert a river by digging with a shovel? Choosing one, and not the other, is very arbitrary, and leads to very real issues with player satisfaction.

[Arbane]

Some animals can see in the dark. Notice the bit where I never said "Humanly possible", just "Possible"?

No, actually, they can't. Sight requires light, even just a little. Whatever Dwarves are doing, it's ESP.

Oh, yes, a perfectly non-magical mid-to-high-level fighter can survive taking a dunk in lava with no lasting ill effects. VERISIMILITUDE!

[Jormengand]

There's a non-trivial amount of evidence for qi-based theories - even some fairly outlandish claims.

I mean, I don't think it's particularly good, nor do I find it helpful, and I certainly wouldn't want a doctor using it on me. But 'possible' is not actually the same as very well established.

And well, knowledge is always expanding.

Faster than light travel is possible. Miniaturization of the technology is possible. Production of the energy sources necessary is possible. That FTL travel is completely unfeasible, that miniaturization of such technology is not actually necessarily likely, and that we currently have no earthly idea where that energy would come from is not actually the same as impossible.

In fact, I'll just jump to one of the obvious points here. It's possible we might find Thor battling ice giants, and the previously-understood formation of all climate was ultimately a byproduct of the ringing of Mjollnir upon the skulls of his enemies. I mean, it's incredibly unlikely, to the point we can discard it as a useful point in making predictions about the world,b ut it is possible that it will occur. It is in fact, entirely impossible to disprove that something is possible, because literally one counterexample is all it takes - and since we can't observe all of space, at all times, it's possible that the violation already occured.

My two examples were carefully chosen (Although I forgot that ti's now 103 years for Special relativity.) And the 'current laws of physics' gets pretty wonky as we start walking back too. Heck, most of the baseline used for 'magical' ideas was thought to simply be how the world works.


If a dragon can power its own flight with such small wings, why can't my fighter cleave a pass into a mountain range? Why can't I divert a river by digging with a shovel? Choosing one, and not the other, is very arbitrary, and leads to very real issues with player satisfaction.

Either it is possible to teleport or it is not. We don't, technically, know which of those is true, but then we don't, technically, know anything. Sure, one day I may look back on those tome of battle manuevers that let you teleport and go "Wow, waddayaknow, that WAS mundane" but somehow I find it unlikely.

Ex dragon flight shouldn't be a thing EITHER, but just because it IS a thing doesn't mean we're honour-bound to make further mistakes.

EDIT: Also, Arbane, you're kinda proving my point about the whole But Dragons thing.

[Lord Raziere]

I feel this is like one thing that videogames do better than DnD.

You go play a videogame, and your warrior can beat anything if you level them up enough, and no wizard can outshine you. you could can play Skyrim without investing a single point into any magic and still beat everything there, from bandits to the greatest of dragons. You can be the greatest smith ever, the greatest talker, the greatest sneaker and so on without ever involving yourself with the main quest or acquiring supernatural powers. in Skyrim, you can take out your foes however you want, even if its just with heavy armor and a big ax. many other videogames do this well as well, taking on basically all the foes DnD has but without any magic involved.

Ancient myth has had fighters do awesome things. medieval myth has fighters doing awesome things. even videogames both old and new has had fighters doing awesome things. DnD is not the trend setter here, but the exception in how much it cleaves to the 3.5 model of vancian godliness. not only is it outdated, with many videogames featuring protagonists defeating many foes with nothing but physical might, but it has never been accurate to the fantasies throughout all of human history since the myths that inspire us all, with both western and eastern myths telling of heroes who were great fighters and did fantastic things beyond normal men.

There are in fact many worlds in which fighters being equal to wizards works and is not even an issue. Many fantasies where its accepted. There is no reason why DnD should be the exception. If I want to be god-martial, I do not want to be dismissed as magic and pigeonholed into one groups preconception of how this should work. Why should one group define what is or isn't magic? What gives the people who want setting consistency the right to define this over me? None.

We can have martial-caster equality in the top videogames, we can have great godly fighters in our most well-known myths, our most well-known comic books, movies, even books. why can't we have it in the rpgs based upon these things, that draw inspiration from them? This topic keeps coming up, not because of its normalcy, but because people keep noticing the exception and how its causing a problem when compared to the rest of our culture.

[RPGuru1331]

Either it is possible to teleport or it is not. We don't, technically, know which of those is true, but then we don't, technically, know anything. Sure, one day I may look back on those tome of battle manuevers that let you teleport and go "Wow, waddayaknow, that WAS mundane" but somehow I find it unlikely.
You asked for the possible in defining the supernatural. Such a thing is possible. Therefore, the ToB teleport was, in fact, entirely mundane, regardless of tags.


Ex dragon flight shouldn't be a thing EITHER, but just because it IS a thing doesn't mean we're honour-bound to make further mistakes.
Who said it was a mistake? Dragons are iconic. Their flight is fairly iconic. Their flight not being magical is pretty normal. I've seen games explain Dragonbreath too - sure, evolution by natural selection would probably not lead to that, but why the hell should we care? A basic ability that nearly every setting makes possible completely negates the laws of thermodynamics (Fireball, not dragonbreath). The hell are we quibbling about precision in aerodynamics or mass and force for?

[Jormengand]

You asked for the possible in defining the supernatural. Such a thing is possible. Therefore, the ToB teleport was, in fact, entirely mundane, regardless of tags.

What? No. Teleportation is not possible. Technically we don't know this, true, but practically we do.


Who said it was a mistake? Dragons are iconic. Their flight is fairly iconic. Their flight not being magical is pretty normal. I've seen games explain Dragonbreath too - sure, evolution by natural selection would probably not lead to that, but why the hell should we care? A basic ability that nearly every setting makes possible completely negates the laws of thermodynamics (Fireball, not dragonbreath). The hell are we quibbling about precision in aerodynamics or mass and force for?

If may not be capital-M Magic but it is lowercase-m magic. And I am NOT going to keep finding where I differentiated things earlier in the thread for you.

[RPGuru1331]

What? No. Teleportation is not possible. Technically we don't know this, true, but practically we do.
Oh ho? Because we haven't actually established it well?

Causality has not actually been established well, we just take it on faith because if we didn't there's a good chance we'd go crazy. The same is true of reality. Yet, causality is almost definitely a cornerstone of your RPGs (After all, there are rules.) Reality is the cornerstone of what you will accept as the basis for those games, it seems.



If may not be capital-M Magic but it is lowercase-m magic. And I am NOT going to keep finding where I differentiated things earlier in the thread for you.
I'm not sure how you think that's a response. I indicated the 'mistake' isn't. It's important to keep the wingspan as it is. But if you're keeping that wingspan, what basis do you have to deny any of the equally (less, really) nonmagical actions that have been taken in myth from your playerbase?

Especially given that you've decided that the laws of thermodynamics hold no bearing to your universe.

[NichG]

I feel this is like one thing that videogames do better than DnD.

You go play a videogame, and your warrior can beat anything if you level them up enough, and no wizard can outshine you. you could can play Skyrim without investing a single point into any magic and still beat everything there, from bandits to the greatest of dragons. You can be the greatest smith ever, the greatest talker, the greatest sneaker and so on without ever involving yourself with the main quest or acquiring supernatural powers. in Skyrim, you can take out your foes however you want, even if its just with heavy armor and a big ax. many other videogames do this well as well, taking on basically all the foes DnD has but without any magic involved.

I think the key point here is that at least during normal play, the condition for success is being provided by the video game developer rather than the player. The game developer can only express it in terms of the concrete mechanics of the game. So all that needs to be done to ensure any archetype can equally succeed is to give every archetype a way to interact with those mechanics.

But you can actually still find archetypes that don't work because of those assumptions in video games, its just maybe a bit more self-evident. For example, trying to play a true pacifist character in Skyrim or Fallout is possible, but the game is set up in such a way that many quests will become impossible to complete because the hard-coded condition is 'X NPC is dead' (though you can get away with being a 'technical pacifist' and having a companion kill things for you). And, even if you're a god-like wizard or martial or whatever and can succeed at all the concrete tasks put in front of you, there are things you should be able to do but you literally can't because the game developer didn't create a way for it to happen. E.g. you can personally win the civil war for either side by slaying hundreds of soldiers, become head of all the guilds, kill the World-Eater, etc, but you can't go and break the Black-Briars' hold on Riften no matter what, short of finding/writing a mod for it.

Whereas in a tabletop game, the condition for success may in some cases not be provided by anyone (GM doesn't know how you'll stop the evil empire, but trusts that it'll get figured out during play), or it may be specified by a player in a way which is impossible (player chooses 'literally kill death' as their character goal, but it turns out death isn't personified in this setting and the player isn't actually satisfied by making everyone immortal).

So the bar for power in a tabletop game is the ability to render something possible that was otherwise impossible, rather than the ability to competently complete the challenges placed in front of you. That's a lot harder to balance.

[Jormengand]

Oh ho? Because we haven't actually established it well?

Causality has not actually been established well, we just take it on faith because if we didn't there's a good chance we'd go crazy. The same is true of reality. Yet, causality is almost definitely a cornerstone of your RPGs (After all, there are rules.) Reality is the cornerstone of what you will accept as the basis for those games, it seems.



I'm not sure how you think that's a response. I indicated the 'mistake' isn't. It's important to keep the wingspan as it is. But if you're keeping that wingspan, what basis do you have to deny any of the equally (less, really) nonmagical actions that have been taken in myth from your playerbase?

Especially given that you've decided that the laws of thermodynamics hold no bearing to your universe.

Ugh, I don't know why I even started this discussion, as all that it's done is made it more and more clear that you're not arguing in good faith. Plonk.

[RPGuru1331]

Ugh, I don't know why I even started this discussion, as all that it's done is made it more and more clear that you're not arguing in good faith. Plonk.

Buddy, your unwillingness to engage with the central point, on either the axiomatic or practical level, is not actually a demonstration of my operating in Bad Faith.

[Poison_Fish]

Ugh, I don't know why I even started this discussion, as all that it's done is made it more and more clear that you're not arguing in good faith. Plonk.

You know, plonking someone after accusing them of arguing in bad faith when you've been internally inconsistent in your own attempts at definitions reflects pretty badly here.

Actually, no one ever answered for why a 6th level fighter can jump into lava or take a caber to the face no problem.

Or even more mundane, apparently a 4th level anyone, commoner included, can just recover from a knife wound in 8 hours of sleep.

[Mechalich]

I feel this is like one thing that videogames do better than DnD.

You go play a videogame, and your warrior can beat anything if you level them up enough, and no wizard can outshine you. you could can play Skyrim without investing a single point into any magic and still beat everything there, from bandits to the greatest of dragons. You can be the greatest smith ever, the greatest talker, the greatest sneaker and so on without ever involving yourself with the main quest or acquiring supernatural powers. in Skyrim, you can take out your foes however you want, even if its just with heavy armor and a big ax. many other videogames do this well as well, taking on basically all the foes DnD has but without any magic involved.

Ancient myth has had fighters do awesome things. medieval myth has fighters doing awesome things. even videogames both old and new has had fighters doing awesome things. DnD is not the trend setter here, but the exception in how much it cleaves to the 3.5 model of vancian godliness. not only is it outdated, with many videogames featuring protagonists defeating many foes with nothing but physical might, but it has never been accurate to the fantasies throughout all of human history since the myths that inspire us all, with both western and eastern myths telling of heroes who were great fighters and did fantastic things beyond normal men.

There are in fact many worlds in which fighters being equal to wizards works and is not even an issue. Many fantasies where its accepted. There is no reason why DnD should be the exception. If I want to be god-martial, I do not want to be dismissed as magic and pigeonholed into one groups preconception of how this should work. Why should one group define what is or isn't magic? What gives the people who want setting consistency the right to define this over me? None.

We can have martial-caster equality in the top videogames, we can have great godly fighters in our most well-known myths, our most well-known comic books, movies, even books. why can't we have it in the rpgs based upon these things, that draw inspiration from them? This topic keeps coming up, not because of its normalcy, but because people keep noticing the exception and how its causing a problem when compared to the rest of our culture.

The thing is, games like Skyrim mostly achieve balance by limiting wizards, not by empowering warriors.

If you look at what the dragonborn can do, yes the upper-level perks give some minor situational magical abilities (temporary paralysis for certain power attacks, slow time aiming for archery, a little hide in plain sight sneak trick, etc.), but mostly the martial dragonborn approach involves charging enemies and hitting them in the face repeatedly. The dragonborn can't jump particularly high, can't do any sort of crazy martial arts moves, doesn't have any weird movement types at all, or really much in the way of non-mundane abilities of any kind without casting spells or using shouts. However, this is not a problem in terms of completing any in game challenges.

Then look at what wizards can do. Well, they can blast, they can produce summons of limited power, they can raise wards (which are very limited compared to D&D defensive spells), and they can heal. There's none of the utility magic common to tabletop wizards of all kinds. Most NPC wizards in Skyrim just blast you, which is really no more or less dangerous than shooting arrows, depending on defenses.

Balancing the combat is easy - in fact even in 3.X D&D if you limit a wizard to no save or dies and make them a blaster+buffer you'll probably be okay (I mean, that's basically the warlock, and there are no major problems with that). It's balancing all of the non-combat abilities that are a problem. Wizards fly, and teleport, and travel to other planes, and that's just movement.

Video games limit options - you don't really have to deal with flying enemies in skyrim at all, dragons eventually land and let you hack at them and there really aren't other flying enemies, or truly invisible enemies, and so on.



Actually, no one ever answered for why a 6th level fighter can jump into lava or take a caber to the face no problem.

Many games don't accept HP abstraction the way D&D does, but within the framework of D&D that particular abstraction applies to everyone, not just fighters. A wizard can take a caber to the face too. Anyway, damage tolerance is an unrealistic ability extended to characters in all sorts of games because super-high-lethality is problematic even for groups that are down with it, simply because making new characters all the time is cumbersome and hurts the story. The only real way around that if to structure the game such that characters are in combat a whole lot less - which there are systems that do - but if characters are going to fight even once per session, some level of abstract and unrealistic toughness is necessary.

[RPGuru1331]

The thing is, games like Skyrim mostly achieve balance by limiting wizards, not by empowering warriors.
I mean, fiction limits wizards. Again, a DnD wizard shames Odin with their mastery of magic. As in, the Odin of the Sagas (that we actually remember). This doesn't strike me as a problem on its own merits.


Balancing the combat is easy - in fact even in 3.X D&D if you limit a wizard to no save or dies and make them a blaster+buffer you'll probably be okay (I mean, that's basically the warlock, and there are no major problems with that). It's balancing all of the non-combat abilities that are a problem. Wizards fly, and teleport, and travel to other planes, and that's just movement.
I seem to recall that even after stripping save or sucks, a buffer wizard is still an enormous problem, it's just not one that comes up as frequently in practical terms because someone else gets to do heavy lifting, and gets to feel cool.


Video games limit options - you don't really have to deal with flying enemies in skyrim at all, dragons eventually land and let you hack at them and there really aren't other flying enemies, or truly invisible enemies, and so on.
Why wouldn't dragons land (or more accurately, remain at a range where they can generally be reasonably engaged from the ground)? Typically, their ranged options are at least somewhat limited, and can easily prove insufficient; for instance in something like Monster Hunter, a Rathalos is perfectly capable of recognizing that the tiny Hunter is dodging the fire, and if it wants to kill the Hunter, it needs to start using its tail or claws.

Also, you in particular have a lot of 'splaining to do. Realism did not have a lot to do with your points before - your reasoning for denying things was that 'western fantasy does this', with the implication that, quite bluntly, to not do this would be 'anime'. People have cited a great deal of western fantasy that explicitly does what you deny. In fact, you namedropped Lancelot, and Lancelot's Peers were very capable of bizarre or 'unnatural' feats with no real explanation given, and given that only the explicit sorceror was nearly hanged for being a witch, it was considered normal enough. And you have not even met that minimal standard, of a definition of 'realism' or 'non-magic' that permits GPS and denies Qi, and a definition of magic that doesn't reasonably permit GPS. The latter is equally important - if 'magic' can merely mean the ignorant describing the possible, then there isn't a lot of cause to deny the implausible, or even seemingly impossible, because it could actually be possible and we just don't get it yet.

[Poison_Fish]

Many games don't accept HP abstraction the way D&D does, but within the framework of D&D that particular abstraction applies to everyone, not just fighters. A wizard can take a caber to the face too. Anyway, damage tolerance is an unrealistic ability extended to characters in all sorts of games because super-high-lethality is problematic even for groups that are down with it, simply because making new characters all the time is cumbersome and hurts the story. The only real way around that if to structure the game such that characters are in combat a whole lot less - which there are systems that do - but if characters are going to fight even once per session, some level of abstract and unrealistic toughness is necessary.

I'm well aware that abstraction is necessary for games as a rule set, particularly of the various interpretations of D&D HP.

It's within that context though that the mundane vs magical breaks down as case examples are brought up.

[Jormengand]

Actually, no one ever answered for why a 6th level fighter can jump into lava or take a caber to the face no problem.

Or even more mundane, apparently a 4th level anyone, commoner included, can just recover from a knife wound in 8 hours of sleep.

Because the rules for lava, cabers (which IIRC don't actually do any damage unless the creature can't move, in which case they deal 2d6 damage independent of the strength of the wielder or size of the weapon) and natural healing need to be rewritten.

If you can explain how you think I've been consistent in a way that isn't as intellectually dishonest as "You don't KNOW that teleportation isn't possible but causality is!" then I'm prepared to listen.

[Sneak Dog]

I have but one thing to say to this argument. In D&D, wizards are far too free in their spell selection and spells have far too many effects for non-casters to keep up without it getting to silly levels where a lot of players don't want to be. The god-wizard is just too versatile. Imagine a non-caster that versatile.

Limit casters in their spells, make them for example focus on fire spells, teleportation spells or healing spells rather than having everything and they're a lot easier to balance. Add to this the removal of spells that outright replace a non-caster and there's niches for everyone to fit in.

Then also start considering that classes should be relatively balanced in each of the main activities of D&D, combat, exploration and social encounters, and you can start designing a system.

[Max_Killjoy]

By this definition, most iterations of qi count, you realize?

I'll do you one better: Dungeons and Dragons vancian casting is mundane by this definition.

Both those claims have been addressed multiple times already, in this thread.

Honest question -- did you read the thread from the start, or just jump to the last page?

[Mechalich]

I mean, fiction limits wizards. Again, a DnD wizard shames Odin with their mastery of magic. As in, the Odin of the Sagas (that we actually remember). This doesn't strike me as a problem on its own merits.

Have you read the Wheel of Time? Or Sword of Truth? Or Mazalan? Or Saga of Recluse? (note that I don't actually like a lot of these sources, just kind of working through the best-seller list here) They all feature monstrous god-wizards who can shatter the world. Seriously, Rand al'Thor comes quite close to literally doing so. God-wizards are absolutely a thing in modern fiction, as are disparities between them and their non-wizard counterparts. High-level D&D characters are simply a particularly extreme case.


Why wouldn't dragons land (or more accurately, remain at a range where they can generally be reasonably engaged from the ground)? Typically, their ranged options are at least somewhat limited, and can easily prove insufficient; for instance in something like Monster Hunter, a Rathalos is perfectly capable of recognizing that the tiny Hunter is dodging the fire, and if it wants to kill the Hunter, it needs to start using its tail or claws.

In Skyrim, specifically, the example that was being discussed, dragons are quite capable of killing you from range - using their breath weapons and using the occasional shout at higher levels. Within the mechanics of Skyrim the simple act of hovering ten feet off the ground, which is something they can explicitly do, or perching atop a building, also a known approach, is enough to put them out of the range of melee attacks. If your dragonborn doesn't have much bow or magic attack skill, they could easily smear you that way (and dragons are supposed to be intelligent in Skyrim), but the game's algorithms will prevent that from happening.

Skyrim, as a game, is very careful to avoid placing obstacles in front of the character that only certain builds can solve. With very few exceptions (casting a spell to get into the college of winterhold), a character can complete all quest lines without using any specific abilities. Once you get into the college you can complete it's questline without casting any other spells. You can complete the Theives' Guild and Dark Brotherhood questlines without using any stealth or anything beyond the lockpicking you start the game with. It's very careful. If it were even slightly less careful the dragonborn could end up with dead end questlines that they were unable to complete all the time.


And you have not even met that minimal standard, of a definition of 'realism' or 'non-magic' that permits GPS and denies Qi, and a definition of magic that doesn't reasonably permit GPS. The latter is equally important - if 'magic' can merely mean the ignorant describing the possible, then there isn't a lot of cause to deny the implausible, or even seemingly impossible, because it could actually be possible and we just don't get it yet.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Sir Arthur C. Clarke.

GPS, for an observer from 1900, even a well educated observer with a good grasp of speculative technology, would qualify. That which is possible, but is still unknown to us, is functionally magical. It cannot be justified using present principles, there's no evidence to support any piece of fiction which presents it as existing.

Superintelligent AI absolutely qualifies as magic, from the perspective of 2017. It may be possible - a lot of smart people think so, some of them even worry about it's potential to destroy the world - but it also may not be possible, there may be physical limits at atomic scales that prevent such advancements from occurring, the fact that the galaxy is not currently being converted wholesale into computronium (so far as we can observe anyway) suggests that.

Advanced technology, if inserted into a setting were it doesn't belong - such as through time travel - is going to function as if it were magic from the perspective of the residents of the setting. Heck, that's even a very well worn premise, Mark Twain wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court and made that point far more capably than I possibly could. Your idea that sufficiently advanced technology - tech from a more advanced Tech Level to use the GURPS terminology - isn't encompassed within 'magic' is absurd. Connecticut Yankee additionally illustrates how the insertion of high-level magic that doesn't belong into a setting tends to be destructive to the setting in a form that has been specifically emulated by gamers on many occasions (seriously the number of people who try to industrialize D&D settings...).

Possibly, from a storytelling and game-design perspective, a more useful definition of capabilities can be determined by genre. Non-magical or mundane or whatever term you choose capabilities can be represented by what characters are capable of in time period and culturally matching Historical Fiction, as opposed to in Fantasy. Or for modern settings, modern thrillers, as opposed to science fiction set in a contemporary timeframe. Admittedly that boundary can get a little blurry at times - does a shaman do magic or just read people really well and manipulate the placebo effect cunningly? - is Jack Ryan really that good, or does he lead a charmed life? - but it tends to be a lot more obvious.

[Max_Killjoy]

You know, plonking someone after accusing them of arguing in bad faith when you've been internally inconsistent in your own attempts at definitions reflects pretty badly here.

Actually, no one ever answered for why a 6th level fighter can jump into lava or take a caber to the face no problem.

Or even more mundane, apparently a 4th level anyone, commoner included, can just recover from a knife wound in 8 hours of sleep.

Neither of those is really that important to the discussion at hand. Despite the Playgrounder's Fallacy being as alive as ever, we're not having a discussion about D&D.

Yes, the scaling large HP pool is a broken mechanic, as illustrated by the examples you give... but that's an entirely different discussion.

[Cluedrew]

What happened to this thread?

Can I propose a rule? Well I'm going to, if you refuse to engage someone's argument because "it has already been covered in this thread" you must point them to where it has been covered. Because honest I can't remember when "But Dragons" or where magic falls on the natural/supernatural line were discussed. That being said:

On But Dragons: Like most logical fallacies, the non-argument it covers can actually be correct in certain situations. For instance if you called "but dragons" on me when I said the setting could have rocs (very large birds who live in mountains as I recall, not a super popular creature) because it had dragons... well the existence of dragons implies that large flying creatures can exist in the setting.

On Supernatural: Is magic supernatural? (Here using "relative to the setting in question", because in our world it doesn't exist either way, I think.) That entirely depends, magic is a broad category so it doesn't hold across for all those things. So druidic magic is probably natural, as it flows directly from nature itself so it is natural both as in having to do with nature and in that it is exists on the same level as nature. On the other hand, divine magic on the other hand (especially, asking the creators of the universe to intercede on your behalf type) is very supernatural, no rule within nature can prevent it from working because it can override those rules itself.

There was a lot of other things I wanted to say, but in this deluge of posts if I tried to address every post I would be here for a long time.

[Poison_Fish]

Because the rules for lava, cabers (which IIRC don't actually do any damage unless the creature can't move, in which case they deal 2d6 damage independent of the strength of the wielder or size of the weapon) and natural healing need to be rewritten.

If you can explain how you think I've been consistent in a way that isn't as intellectually dishonest as "You don't KNOW that teleportation isn't possible but causality is!" then I'm prepared to listen.

So your logic doesn't seem to get the purpose of abstraction of game rules, to which you accurately correct my one off in describing cabers, because your solution is to rewrite the fundamental rules to fit your narrow categorization of 'mundane' and 'magic'. That seems much less homebrew and much more a different system at that point. Especially that categorization matters within the context of the rules of the game.

I'm not going to assume intentional bad faith debating on your part like you do to others, but you don't seem to grasp that we are discussing roleplaying games here. You are claiming axioms when they are self evidently still in question.


Neither of those is really that important to the discussion at hand. Despite the Playgrounder's Fallacy being as alive as ever, we're not having a discussion about D&D.

Yes, the scaling large HP pool is a broken mechanic, as illustrated by the examples you give... but that's an entirely different discussion.

The source of the OP of this discussion has been using D&D and D&D is an ur-example that is common language for everyone to discuss within the forum.

I am beginning to think neither of you understand what a fallacy actually is. Perhaps it would be to everyone's benefit if you re-established what you wish to convey?

[Cluedrew]

As it has been coming up:

Playgrounder's Fallacy: Assuming a system agnostic discussion is about D&D 3.5. (Or more generally, general D&D.)

It does not mean that you can't talk about D&D in a system agnostic discussion as an example. It is logically valid to do so, so it wouldn't be a fallacy to do so.

[Max_Killjoy]

I'm not sure if there's ever been a formal statement, but as I understand it, the Playgrounder's Fallacy is to assume that every discussion is about D&D.

E: Using D&D as an example is not committing the fallacy. Saying "Your argument is invalid because you haven't addressed these things that D&D specifically does" in a system-agnostic discussion would be at least flirting quite strongly with the fallacy. Of course, once even one person uses D&D as an example, it seems inevitable that others will use that as an "indication" that the thread is "about" D&D.


The "But dragons!" fallacy is to assert that once you allow one fantastic element, you have no grounds to disallow any other fantastic element -- that magic A justifies by its mere inclusion all magics B-Z and beyond. That is, anything "unrealistic" fully opens the door, anything-goes, to whatever, no limits. "You allowed Jan's character to bring Bob's character back from death's door by praying to her goddess all night and promising a year a service in the grand temple! Why can't my new character be a ninja with spirit powers? It's not fair!"

[Cluedrew]

On But Dragons!: My point was though that you can use that "type" of argument in a cogent (fancy word alert) way if you can also for instance draw implications from the existing element that would suggest or even prove. For instance if magic users project magic through concentration, it would also make sense for monks to create anti-magic with an empty mind meditation technique. Not to say that will necessarily true, but those two things seem to fit together to me.

(Whether this makes said monks magical is a different point.)

As for D&D examples, maybe bringing more other systems explicitly would help. We already have Shadowrun and some mentions of Exulted. Is there more we can say about those? Any others we can bring in?

[Lord Raziere]

The thing is, any system I can think of where wizards have power comparable to 3.5 wizards, is a system where they're specifically designed to be about wizards being reality-warpers. which is fine if you want to play that, I have no problem with those systems and don't demand any god-martial in a game so clearly designed to be about a wizard being wizardly such as Mage: The Ascension or Mage: The Awakening (which ironically both have ways to be a god-martial anyways using magic) or Ars Magica or whatever else.

While a more universal, generic system is generally fine because in something M&M, you just spend power points to make sure your hero is a super-strong badass who can leap buildings and whatnot and your good to go. for example:

Super-Punch:
Damage, Strength-based, 10 points, rank 10

Super-Leaping:
Leaping, 10 points, rank 10

Tough skin:
Protection, Permanent, 10 points, rank 10

Adamant Bow:
Damage, Ranged, Removable, 16 points, rank 10

Super-Running:
Speed, 10 points, rank 10

and so on and so forth. Fate is narrative enough to easily work things so that the wizard can't outshine the fighter. Generic/universal systems, if they're good enough to model magic they generally are good enough to model a god-martial without any trouble.

Exalted solves the issue by simply making a sorcerer and a warrior being two completely scales of conflict. warriors generally solve personal combat with swords and bows and such like everyone else, which a pure sorcerer cannot participate in- sorcery simply isn't practical for personal combat, a sorcerer would have to invest in combat skills like any other exalt. For entire battles and wars however, a single sorcerer spell used at the right moment could pretty much the tide of battle or end it entirely. If they're being a dedicated sorcerer of course, their entire army will just be a bunch of first circle demons they summoned that they send to kill for them, but any Dawn general could probably outfight them using pure super-tactics with the super-army they trained using their super-skills combined with their own super-swordplay. Meaning both warriors and sorcerers have a way of building up an army and fighting others, its just that the sorcerers have no special personal combat option and have to rely on either warrior skills for that or have a lot of demon bodyguards.

Anima Beyond Fantasy has magic, psychic powers and ki-users all as core book classes, with some of the things that all three can do being pretty ridiculous at high levels, so they've got that "equality through evenly spread awesome" down.

Aside from DnD, I honestly can't think of any rpg that has this problem at least to DnD's degree. Maybe I haven't been reading the right rpg books, but honestly from my experiences people arguing over martials not having nice things seems to a DnD phenomenon and everyone else outside of it just gave martials nice things at the start just as a part of good common sense design. Its only a certain type of DnD player that argue for this "setting consistency" when arguing against the god-martial (aside from Max Killjoy, who doesn't identify himself with DnD)

So while technically this in theory could be a universal rpg problem, the evidence from what I've seen indicates that its not, and the reason that DnD is so often used as an example is because, DnD is honestly poorly designed and therefore the ONLY example. Its to be honest, a game where the playerbase puts WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY much more thought into everything than the developers ever do. Like, the 3.5 developers were just y'know, designing a game where you could reasonably play a bunch of adventurers going forth to kill dudes and loot treasure, were a little lazy about playtesting, and the fanbase turned it into a mess of over-analysis, alignment arguments, class tiers, rules-lawyering, theoretical optimization, and a tippyverse-inspired obsession with batman wizards. Which then caused the players of 3.5 to grow fond of it in fascination of a glitchy abusive design that is beautiful to people who love exploiting loopholes and ugly to everyone else. To the point where these same people hate a game that actually had good playtesting, balanced design and actual effort put into making sure it all worked right when it came out and replaced it. and we wonder why we can't have nice things.

[NichG]

On But Dragons!: My point was though that you can use that "type" of argument in a cogent (fancy word alert) way if you can also for instance draw implications from the existing element that would suggest or even prove. For instance if magic users project magic through concentration, it would also make sense for monks to create anti-magic with an empty mind meditation technique. Not to say that will necessarily true, but those two things seem to fit together to me.

(Whether this makes said monks magical is a different point.)

As for D&D examples, maybe bringing more other systems explicitly would help. We already have Shadowrun and some mentions of Exulted. Is there more we can say about those? Any others we can bring in?

Nobilis would be a good system to discuss if you want to look at rules, attitudes, and themes which are explicitly intended for god-X's (for whatever value of X you like). Aspect 9 miracles in particular would be the relevant examples - at that point you can e.g. blow out the sun with a single breath (though probably someone would immediately put it back). Aspect miracles aren't mundane nor are all aspect miracles necessarily 'martial', but pretty much anything a god-martial character could or would ever possibly do would fall somewhere on that line.

[Max_Killjoy]

Can I propose a rule? Well I'm going to, if you refuse to engage someone's argument because "it has already been covered in this thread" you must point them to where it has been covered. Because honest I can't remember when "But Dragons" or where magic falls on the natural/supernatural line were discussed.


Normally I'd agree. This was a very particular case of someone making a stink and claiming "victory" because others didn't want to go back and yet again retread the same ground that's been covered in a multitude of posts before that person started reading the thread.





That being said:

On But Dragons: Like most logical fallacies, the non-argument it covers can actually be correct in certain situations. For instance if you called "but dragons" on me when I said the setting could have rocs (very large birds who live in mountains as I recall, not a super popular creature) because it had dragons... well the existence of dragons implies that large flying creatures can exist in the setting.


The existence of one invalidates the specific argument of "too big to fly" directed at the other.

Problem is, some will use that inch to take a mile, and start making the broader "one thing justifies all things" argument at the core of the fallacy.




On Supernatural: Is magic supernatural? (Here using "relative to the setting in question", because in our world it doesn't exist either way, I think.) That entirely depends, magic is a broad category so it doesn't hold across for all those things. So druidic magic is probably natural, as it flows directly from nature itself so it is natural both as in having to do with nature and in that it is exists on the same level as nature. On the other hand, divine magic on the other hand (especially, asking the creators of the universe to intercede on your behalf type) is very supernatural, no rule within nature can prevent it from working because it can override those rules itself.


Here's where we get into the problem with using natural - supernatural as the line, rather than mundane - magic, or something else we haven't hit on yet. An argument can be made that if magic is part of the fabric of the world, then from some angles it can be seen as natural.


You know, I started out trying to lay out a logical set of considerations that might help someone construct a setting in which specialized "spellcasters" and specialized "I fight with physical stuff" characters might be on par -- a setting which would also be internally coherent and consistent. (For some readers, please again note that "spellcaster" and "fighter" is not the same axis as "magic" and "mundane", or "supernatural" and "natural", in the context of this topic.)

[Max_Killjoy]

On But Dragons!: My point was though that you can use that "type" of argument in a cogent (fancy word alert) way if you can also for instance draw implications from the existing element that would suggest or even prove. For instance if magic users project magic through concentration, it would also make sense for monks to create anti-magic with an empty mind meditation technique. Not to say that will necessarily true, but those two things seem to fit together to me.

(Whether this makes said monks magical is a different point.)


That type of consideration, following through with the implications of setting elements, making sure the elements mesh well together, is, to me, exactly the sort of worldbuilding craft that those who fall back on the But Dragons! fallacy are trying to avoid, or even denigrate, demean, and belittle. See also, the sort of "contributor" who says "Y so serious, it's elfgames, nerd!" whenever someone tries to set forth any sort of coherent standard for setting and/or rules.




As for D&D examples, maybe bringing more other systems explicitly would help. We already have Shadowrun and some mentions of Exulted. Is there more we can say about those? Any others we can bring in?


Well, going to HERO, in that system damage is as damage does. If a max-strength, max-skill "sword-fighter" can do X dice of killing damage with their sword, and you want some balance, then spells max out around the same number of damage classes. Any spell that goes beyond that because the special-effect would reasonably set it higher, gets more Limitations applied, like extra casting time, concentration, side effects on the caster, costs extra Endurance, etc, to create a drawback for the caster going into "beyond normal" territory.


Honestly, I think part of the problem with D&D in particular would be the very notions of character classes and steep advancement by levels. In a system where anyone can hypothetically "spend the points" to get some spells, and character growth is more horizontal than vertical, there should never be a bright line between "this guy uses swords!" and "this guy casts spells!", and there shouldn't be a way for someone to "go quadratic".

[Frozen_Feet]

Let me make a point of how words are commonly used outside fringe groups like the RPG crowd:


mag·ic (măj′ĭk)
n.
1.
a. The art or practice of using charms, spells, or rituals to attempt to produce supernatural effects or control events in nature.
b. The charms, spells, and rituals so used.
2. The exercise of sleight of hand or conjuring, as in making something seem to disappear, for entertainment.
3. A mysterious quality of enchantment: "For me the names of those men breathed the magic of the past" (Max Beerbohm).
adj.
1. Of, relating to, or invoking the supernatural: "stubborn unlaid ghost / That breaks his magic chains at curfew time" (John Milton).

Bolded parts for emphasis.

In any case in which you find yourself wondering or arguing about whether "magic" should be considered natural, you should probably stop using the word "magic". Magic is, by definition, supernatural when not used to refer to sleight-of-hand.

If you try to reduce "magic" to just "using charms, spells or rituals in attempt to produce or control events in nature", you may as well use "technology" or just "knowledge". In such a case, the only reason you might opt for "magic" instead is if you are fundamentally ignorant of how the charms, spells and rituals achieve the effect they do (see: Clarke's Third Law).

Let me point out another common use factor:


god (gŏd)
n.
1. God
a. A being conceived as the perfect, omnipotent, omniscient originator and ruler of the universe, the principal object of faith and worship in monotheistic religions.
b. The force, effect, or a manifestation or aspect of this being.
2. A being of supernatural powers or attributes, believed in and worshiped by a people, especially a male deity thought to control some part of nature or reality.
3. An image of a supernatural being; an idol.
4. One that is worshiped, idealized, or followed: Money was their god.

A "god", too, is supernatural by definition in common parlance. So read like the words are commonly used God-Martial is a supernatural being of war. It should, by definition, be able to break from natural laws.

If breaking from natural laws is not desired, then you are not, in fact, trying to create a "God-Martial", you are trying to tackle some different question entirely. Like, perhaps, trying to achieve parity between natural and supernatural. Such effort is absurd, as "supernatural" by definition is above and beyond what's natural. Same goes for "mundane" versus "magic". Trying to frame the discussion using such terms is fruitless, as to even begin you have to twist the meaning of the words to something completely different than how they are normally used.

---

So once we skip the re-definition games, what, exactly, is being discussed? For the most part, it seems to me to be about aesthetics of power. A Wizard knows stuff. They say the right words and reality is shaped according to their will. A God-Wizard knows all the right words. A martial person engages in war. They slash, burn, maim, shoot, terrify, command and beat stuff into submission to get their will done. A God-Martial can slash, burn, maim, shoot, terrify, command and beat into submission anything and everything. A God-Wizard opens up a book of eldritch lore to find a spell which allows them to disintegrate a mountain. A God-Martial picks it up and throws it away. A God-Wizard uses hypnotic powers to subjugate those weak of will. A God-Martial intimidates them to his will. A God-Wizard polymorphs into a seabeast to venture into forgetten ruins of submerged civilizations. A God-Martial draws their lungs full of air and dives in. A God-Wizard flies around on his broom or flying mattress. A God-Martial leaps above buildings and walks on clouds. A God-Wizard reads libraries full of dusty tomes to increase in powers. A God-Martial does 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats and runs 10 km every day.

So on and so forth. This an infinitely easier discussion than what most people make it to be. No-one needs to come up with a general rule of what is or is not magic, you only need to decide 1) what do you want the "God-Martial" to do, 2) how they are going to do it and 3) what breaks from reality can your suspension of disbelief withstand?

[RPGuru1331]

Have you read the Wheel of Time? Or Sword of Truth? Or Mazalan? Or Saga of Recluse? (note that I don't actually like a lot of these sources, just kind of working through the best-seller list here) They all feature monstrous god-wizards who can shatter the world. Seriously, Rand al'Thor comes quite close to literally doing so. God-wizards are absolutely a thing in modern fiction, as are disparities between them and their non-wizard counterparts. High-level D&D characters are simply a particularly extreme case.
Sword of Truth? Its Mary Sue just as often doesn't use magic, relying on good-old-fashioned effort, skill, and hard work. Saga of Recluce looks like it has primarily limited wizards- powerful, but not actually capable of whatever-they-damned-well please. In point of fact, Wheel of Time primarily limits its wizards as well. Rand is an exception, owing to his nature as, again, a Mary Sue. This is not a point well-proven by relying on settings that already limit their wizards, then just build an exception in for <x> character - I don't just mean their raw power, I mean their scope. Magic typically permits very particular interaction with the world. Again, a specialist wizard would be the norm, and not only would they be specialists, but they'd sacrifice, at best, all but one other school. Alternately, wizards may work more like a priest, if a priest were restricted to a domain or three - the cheese wizard of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is indeed capable of divination, but only through the medium of cheese. And he is very much not a fight wizard.

And again, your argument doesn't address the central point - why does the fighter stop at Aragorn, when the wizard doesn't stop at Gandalf? Again, you've decided to shame Odin and Freya, but not Thor. Your argument is 'it's not possible in real life', but neither is the magic. As the setting maker, you choose where and how the limits are placed.



In Skyrim, specifically, the example that was being discussed, dragons are quite capable of killing you from range - using their breath weapons and using the occasional shout at higher levels. Within the mechanics of Skyrim the simple act of hovering ten feet off the ground, which is something they can explicitly do, or perching atop a building, also a known approach, is enough to put them out of the range of melee attacks. If your dragonborn doesn't have much bow or magic attack skill, they could easily smear you that way (and dragons are supposed to be intelligent in Skyrim), but the game's algorithms will prevent that from happening.
Poppycock. Those aren't trivial to dodge, but they're dodgable, and can easily be healed through. And again, even in skyrim, there exists plausible reasons - "I can't realistically shoot fire that much", "Hovering is really tiresome" being first and foremost.


"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Sir Arthur C. Clarke.

To avoid belaboring the point: throwing a platitude at me is not actually defining your terms to meet the minimal standards. To repeat myself, those standards are minimal for a reason. If 'magic' includes the well-established, physically possible, or if the 'mundane' includes things we have relatively little good reason to think is true, then treating them as non-overlapping magisteria is an arbitrary decision, not actually one born out by anything. And while you can make arbitrary decisions, you should consider recasting them when people aren't satisfied.


GPS, for an observer from 1900, even a well educated observer with a good grasp of speculative technology, would qualify. That which is possible, but is still unknown to us, is functionally magical. It cannot be justified using present principles, there's no evidence to support any piece of fiction which presents it as existing.
Then your definition of the possible has little business being restricted - if the possible can include things that aren't, as far as we know, possible, there is no reason to be this skeptical. Magic isn't special - it's merely unexplained by current phenomena. This is, by far, one of the worst stances you can take while limiting 'mundane' action. Perhaps your protagonists are simply tapping equally unknown magical currents - I promise you, few players on earth will care if nominally their warrior makes limited conscious use of magic. This is, in fact, part of the premise of Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2, as well as Final Fantasy XIV - the magic of Tyria is so common that simple signets are used to help everyone of consequence tap into it, and Eorzea is so abnormally full of aether that even the native schools of swordsmanship work it into their bladework - not by creating flaming swords, or anything so overt, but simply by strengthening their blows. In either case, they ultimately can work magic in through physical action - and both very much follow the styles of western fiction.

Or perhaps, the protagonists aren't realistically limited by mundane physics after all - after all, you're already existing in a world where thermodynamics is pointless and impossible. We don't really know what actually happens when thermodynamics are entirely suspended, after all.

Advanced technology, if inserted into a setting were it doesn't belong - such as through time travel - is going to function as if it were magic from the perspective of the residents of the setting. Heck, that's even a very well worn premise, Mark Twain wrote A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court and made that point far more capably than I possibly could. Your idea that sufficiently advanced technology - tech from a more advanced Tech Level to use the GURPS terminology - isn't encompassed within 'magic' is absurd. Connecticut Yankee additionally illustrates how the insertion of high-level magic that doesn't belong into a setting tends to be destructive to the setting in a form that has been specifically emulated by gamers on many occasions (seriously the number of people who try to industrialize D&D settings...).
I mean, he 'demonstrated' the lattermost point by not understanding how logistics constrains action and technology. There are always missing steps that the protagonist doesn't plausibly know. But setting that aside... 'from the perspective of the characters, it's magic. To the knowledge of the audience, it's not.' You're not helping yourself here, by muddying the concept of 'magic' to be meaningless, you know.


Possibly, from a storytelling and game-design perspective, a more useful definition of capabilities can be determined by genre. Non-magical or mundane or whatever term you choose capabilities can be represented by what characters are capable of in time period and culturally matching Historical Fiction, as opposed to in Fantasy. Or for modern settings, modern thrillers, as opposed to science fiction set in a contemporary timeframe. Admittedly that boundary can get a little blurry at times - does a shaman do magic or just read people really well and manipulate the placebo effect cunningly? - is Jack Ryan really that good, or does he lead a charmed life? - but it tends to be a lot more obvious.

Sure, sure, but you know, that doesn't really have anything to do with what you've actually said. You claim you're limited to 'realistic' humans, because of western fantasy, while ignoring that western fantasy has a rich history of ignoring the physically possible - even with nominally normal humans, like the Knights of the Round Table.


Both those claims have been addressed multiple times already, in this thread.

Honest question -- did you read the thread from the start, or just jump to the last page?
It's funny to me that you're saying this right now; do you not recall my stating that I've read the thread? I have seen nothing that addresses them remotely satisfactorily. The last person to make this claim made a definition of the 'supernatural' that patently, if unintentionally, disincludes qigong, and when held to scrutiny, does not realistically disinclude time travel or faster-than-light travel, without also disincluding the basic concept of reality.

[Jormengand]

read like the words are commonly used

I think the OP makes it exceptionally clear that they're referring to the set phrase "God wizard" as used mostly by D&D players to describe "one who has enough magical power to have practically infinite power, with few to no limits. So a wizard with the power of a god, shouldn't be too much off a surprise. So a god-martial is then any character who has enough martial power and mastery to have effectively unlimited power." So they're not actually trying to use "God" to mean literally a supernatural being with worshippers. The god-martial has nothing to do with martial gods.

[Red Fel]

So once we skip the re-definition games, what, exactly, is being discussed? For the most part, it seems to me to be about aesthetics of power. A Wizard knows stuff. They say the right words and reality is shaped according to their will. A God-Wizard knows all the right words. A martial person engages in war. They slash, burn, maim, shoot, terrify, command and beat stuff into submission to get their will done. A God-Martial can slash, burn, maim, shoot, terrify, command and beat into submission anything and everything. A God-Wizard opens up a book of eldritch lore to find a spell which allows them to disintegrate a mountain. A God-Martial picks it up and throws it away. A God-Wizard uses hypnotic powers to subjugate those weak of will. A God-Martial intimidates them to his will. A God-Wizard polymorphs into a seabeast to venture into forgetten ruins of submerged civilizations. A God-Martial draws their lungs full of air and dives in. A God-Wizard flies around on his broom or flying mattress. A God-Martial leaps above buildings and walks on clouds. A God-Wizard reads libraries full of dusty tomes to increase in powers. A God-Martial does 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats and runs 10 km every day.

So on and so forth. This an infinitely easier discussion than what most people make it to be. No-one needs to come up with a general rule of what is or is not magic, you only need to decide 1) what do you want the "God-Martial" to do, 2) how they are going to do it and 3) what breaks from reality can your suspension of disbelief withstand?

But therein lies the problem.

If we say, "magic is anything supernatural, not just clever manipulation or sufficiently advanced technology," and "the wizard is the one that uses magic," okay, fine. But if the martial can do everything that the wizard can do, at what point is the martial using magic, and thus just a wizard in a different hat?

Wizard's fireballs are magic, because he conjures supernatural force into the form of fire. Okay. But when the martial swings his sword so fast that it ignites the air, is that a different thing? Or is it still supernatural, thus magic, thus wizard? Wizard's flight is magic, because he channels supernatural energy to slip the surly bonds of earth, fine. But when the martial channels his inner strength to readjust his personal gravity, thus ascending effortlessly to leap amongst the clouds, at what point is it supernatural, thus magic, thus wizard?

If we break it down to "wizard has a repeatable methodology that allows him to do seemingly impossible act, and thus magic is just another kind of science," then we can accept the martial doing the same thing in a different way - it's effectively a different discipline of science producing the same outcome. But if we say, "no, wizard does it because it's supernatural," then doesn't the martial's ability to reproduce that effect constitute something supernatural, and thus wizardly?

[Max_Killjoy]

It's funny to me that you're saying this right now; do you not recall my stating that I've read the thread?


Yes, and yet I still had to ask to make sure, given your replies.




I have seen nothing that addresses them remotely satisfactorily.


Or rather, doesn't address them to your satisfaction. And given the next bit...




The last person to make this claim made a definition of the 'supernatural' that patently, if unintentionally, disincludes qigong, and when held to scrutiny, does not realistically disinclude time travel or faster-than-light travel, without also disincluding the basic concept of reality.


Yeah, I saw you twist their statements around to get to that point.

It's not even clear what you're actually arguing in this thread, other than just attacking for the sake of attack.

[Max_Killjoy]

So once we skip the re-definition games, what, exactly, is being discussed? For the most part, it seems to me to be about aesthetics of power. A Wizard knows stuff. They say the right words and reality is shaped according to their will. A God-Wizard knows all the right words. A martial person engages in war. They slash, burn, maim, shoot, terrify, command and beat stuff into submission to get their will done. A God-Martial can slash, burn, maim, shoot, terrify, command and beat into submission anything and everything. A God-Wizard opens up a book of eldritch lore to find a spell which allows them to disintegrate a mountain. A God-Martial picks it up and throws it away. A God-Wizard uses hypnotic powers to subjugate those weak of will. A God-Martial intimidates them to his will. A God-Wizard polymorphs into a seabeast to venture into forgetten ruins of submerged civilizations. A God-Martial draws their lungs full of air and dives in. A God-Wizard flies around on his broom or flying mattress. A God-Martial leaps above buildings and walks on clouds. A God-Wizard reads libraries full of dusty tomes to increase in powers. A God-Martial does 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats and runs 10 km every day.

So on and so forth. This an infinitely easier discussion than what most people make it to be. No-one needs to come up with a general rule of what is or is not magic, you only need to decide 1) what do you want the "God-Martial" to do, 2) how they are going to do it and 3) what breaks from reality can your suspension of disbelief withstand?


And that's one possible solution, firmly in the #3 slot of my earlier list.

However, it's possible that "god wizard" and "god martial" might not the most productive terminology, as I don't know if literal gods are really the matter at hand.

[RPGuru1331]

Or rather, doesn't address them to your satisfaction. And given the next bit...




]Yeah, I saw you twist their statements around to get to that point.
There was no twisting to get to qigong. There is nontrivial evidence for qigong - what we have is nowhere near enough to overturn modern medicine or physics. And yet, what we have, we have. Science is not in the business of proving things true, or even really definitively disproving things - it's in the business of getting to a more-or-less working model, using the best-established knowledge we have. But, it can be upended. And if we have outliers, it's difficult to discard things as possible. True, they're not likely, and you're better off hedging your bets against htem, but they aren't impossible.

What I used to demonstrate the definition doesn't disinclude qigong, is the definition itself. And again, if you say 'okay, we need things that are proven to be true', well. Causality and Reality await in a nearby back alley, scowling, with brass knuckles and a revolver.


It's not even clear what you're actually arguing in this thread, other than just attacking for the sake of attack.
I mean, I laid it out pretty clearly. At the end of the day, all of the justifications I've been talking about have been used to limit the actions of players who are using a specific type of aesthetic, but don't think that aesthetic should limit them as you do. Given that genre fiction doesn't do that, and that your definitions of 'realistic' have ultimately been wide enough to drive... oh let's say the Enterprise, through, the justifications offered do little to really provide a good reason for the fiction you prefer.

I mean, you're obviously perfectly within rights to re-enact that fiction anyway. There can be a lot of fun to be had in those premises - like the less gonzo strips of **** Tracy But there's been a lot of high-minded rhetoric that isn't really born out, as well.

[Frozen_Feet]

@Red Fel: I'm left wondering how the answer to your questions isn't glaringly obvious from what I just wrote. Or in some cases, what you wrote.


If we say, "magic is anything supernatural, not just clever manipulation or sufficiently advanced technology," and "the wizard is the one that uses magic," okay, fine. But if the martial can do everything that the wizard can do, at what point is the martial using magic, and thus just a wizard in a different hat?

I just said the discussion is about aesthetics of power. Aesthetics. The hat is what matters and it is the shape of the hat which makes all the difference. You can accept from the get-go, like I proposed, that the God-Wizard and God-Martial are both supernatural - they just do their supernatural schtick differently. Like here:



Wizard's fireballs are magic, because he conjures supernatural force into the form of fire. Okay. But when the martial swings his sword so fast that it ignites the air, is that a different thing? Or is it still supernatural, thus magic, thus wizard?

The wizard's conjuring and the martial's swinging are obviously different operations because you just described them as such. Even when both are supernatural. You might as well be asking "when a scientist hits a watermelon with a hammer, the force breaks the melon. Okay. But when a thug swings a club to crack a skull, is that a different thing? Or is it still natural, thus science, thus scientist?"

All magical things are supernatural. It does not follow all things supernatural, or even all things magic, are wizardly. Your question is mindless.

[Flickerdart]

A distinction between natural and supernatural is only as useful in a game as the mechanics need it to be. So basically, for antimagic field to work. Remember that dragons (not dragon spellcasting, just dragons) are natural in a fantasy setting. Hell, every human is supernatural in a sense - they are a soul that drives a body around until the body dies, and then they travel to another plane and transform their essence. Are you going to put a SU tag on dying? Are purely martial characters unable to ascend to the afterlife?

[Max_Killjoy]

There was no twisting to get to qigong. There is nontrivial evidence for qigong - what we have is nowhere near enough to overturn modern medicine or physics. And yet, what we have, we have. Science is not in the business of proving things true, or even really definitively disproving things - it's in the business of getting to a more-or-less working model, using the best-established knowledge we have. But, it can be upended. And if we have outliers, it's difficult to discard things as possible. True, they're not likely, and you're better off hedging your bets against htem, but they aren't impossible.

What I used to demonstrate the definition doesn't disinclude qigong, is the definition itself. And again, if you say 'okay, we need things that are proven to be true', well. Causality and Reality await in a nearby back alley, scowling, with brass knuckles and a revolver.


If you're somehow putting qigong on the same level as causality in terms of the empirical underpinnings, I'm not sure there's any ground to start from.

The stated definitions clearly shove qigong way off into the "safely disregard" category, and leave causality and objective reality firmly in the "repeatedly confirmed enough that still demanding yet more confirmation is deliberate refusal" category.




I mean, I laid it out pretty clearly. At the end of the day, all of the justifications I've been talking about have been used to limit the actions of players. Given that genre fiction doesn't do that, and that your definitions of 'realistic' have ultimately been wide enough to drive... oh let's say the Enterprise, through, the justifications offered do little to really provide a good reason for the fiction you prefer.


It's more like you're shoving the Enterprise through a rabbit hole, and then claiming it fits.

[Max_Killjoy]

But therein lies the problem.

If we say, "magic is anything supernatural, not just clever manipulation or sufficiently advanced technology," and "the wizard is the one that uses magic," okay, fine. But if the martial can do everything that the wizard can do, at what point is the martial using magic, and thus just a wizard in a different hat?

Wizard's fireballs are magic, because he conjures supernatural force into the form of fire. Okay. But when the martial swings his sword so fast that it ignites the air, is that a different thing? Or is it still supernatural, thus magic, thus wizard? Wizard's flight is magic, because he channels supernatural energy to slip the surly bonds of earth, fine. But when the martial channels his inner strength to readjust his personal gravity, thus ascending effortlessly to leap amongst the clouds, at what point is it supernatural, thus magic, thus wizard?


I'd say that "the wizard is the one who uses magic" is part of the problem here. I don't think there's a useful definition of "magic" that's based on the superficial trappings or on who is doing the things in question.

In a fairly "normative*" setting, the "martial" changing his personal gravity or lighting the air on fire with his sword is still doing something "magic", even if he's not consulting a tome or reciting a chant or making arcane gestures or wearing a pointy cloth hat.


* because I can't think of a better shorthand right now for "has the same basic expectations for what's possible as our own real world, setting aside all sorts of nitpicking about edge cases and wacky froo-froo".

[RPGuru1331]

If you're somehow putting qigong on the same level as causality in terms of the empirical underpinnings, I'm not sure there's any ground to start from.
I'm really not; Qigong has better empirical underpinnings than Causality. Some evidence has been found for it. There are people who can, for instance, walk, after being told it's completely impossible and you will never walk. Causality is an axiom we assume to avoid going mad. You can't empirically prove it true, because the very notion of empiricism rests on its shoulders. To empirically prove Causality is to assume Causality.

I mean, as far as assumptions go, it looks pretty good, don't get me wrong. But no proof for causality exists that can't equally be used as proof of say, Monads. Reality is more or less in the same boat (Slightly worse, since we already know our senses can be fooled with almost trivial effort). They're really useful assumptions, but they're not, themselves, scientifically testable hypotheses. Which suits me fine, since trying to come up with a way to definitively disprove their competition has given better educated people than me migraines.


The stated definitions clearly shove qigong way off into the "safely disregard" category
Really? The definition given was:

And also why I tried to clarify that "Mundane" in the context of this discussion would appear to mean "entirely within the realm of normal human abilities sans any and all magic, and accomplished without magic".

Magic is as magic does -- I don't care if it's called "attunement".


That's. Rather badly defined. However, the one Jormenkanden was operating under, was
If something is possible in the real world, it is mundane.

"Possible" is a rather big word, I'm not sure if you're aware.


and leaves causality and objective reality firmly in the "repeatedly confirmed enough that still demanding yet more confirmation is deliberate refusal" category.
Science does not, and can not, 'confirm' something. It fails to disprove something. A failure to disprove even a basic principle does not actually mean that principle is true - Several mangled parts of newtonian physics lie right over there, as does all of Lamarkian descent. It means, to the best of our knowledge, this is true. But our knowledge is always incomplete - basic research's core premise is 'our understanding of the universe is flawed; how can we improve it?'.


It's more like you're shoving the Enterprise through a rabbit hole, and then claiming it fits.
If the enterprise went through the rabbit hole, and the rabbit hole is still the same size and shape before and after, it clearly does, in spite of our expectations.

Alternately, 'clearly, that rabbit was a cousin of the Giant Space Hamster'. Or perhaps 'well, it was a model of the enterprise, so I would expect it to.' For someone complaining of 'twisting words'...

[Frozen_Feet]

I don't think there's a useful definition of "magic" that's based on the superficial trappings or on who is doing the things in question.

Yes there is.

Close your eyes for a second and think of the word "wizard". What is the first image that pops up to your mind? Chances are, it is someone like Gandalf, an old, bearded man leaning on a staff.

Now think of the phrase "god of war". What is the first image that pops up to your mind? Chances are it is not the same as the one you associate with "wizard".

For those in this discussion who don't trust their imagination, you may as well use Google Image Search. Repeat the process with "witch", "ghost", "prophet", "angel", "genie" etc.. These are all supernatural, magical things, but most people wouldn't expect them to act in identical ways.

The key is to not overthink it. Accept that there is no unified theory of magic. Accept that the variery in aesthetic implies actual variety in methodology... as is, you know, the normal case in fantastic fiction, mythology and even real-life magic systems.

[Max_Killjoy]

I'm really not; Qigong has better empirical underpinnings than Causality. Some evidence has been found for it. There are people who can, for instance, walk, after being told it's completely impossible and you will never walk. Causality is an axiom we assume to avoid going mad. You can't empirically prove it true, because the very notion of empiricism rests on its shoulders. To empirically prove Causality is to assume Causality.

I mean, as far as assumptions go, it looks pretty good, don't get me wrong. But no proof for causality exists that can't equally be used as proof of say, Monads. Reality is more or less in the same boat (Slightly worse, since we already know our senses can be fooled with almost trivial effort). They're really useful assumptions, but they're not, themselves, scientifically testable hypotheses. Which suits me fine, since trying to come up with a way to definitively disprove their competition has given better educated people than me migraines.


Is the chair real? If your butt isn't on the floor, then it is. End of story. Have effects ever been observed to proceed causes? No. Good enough.

As for the rest, there's simply no common ground from which to start a discussion, when one party takes mystical froo-froo at all seriously and then asserts a postmodernist view of empiricism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empiricism), etc. We're going to waste bunch of time arguing about that instead discussing the actual questions at hand.

Bye.

Qigong (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3046559/)indeed... :smallconfused:

[Max_Killjoy]

Yes there is.

Close your eyes for a second and think of the word "wizard". What is the first image that pops up to your mind? Chances are, it is someone like Gandalf, an old, bearded man leaning on a staff.

Now think of the phrase "god of war". What is the first image that pops up to your mind? Chances are it is not the same as the one you associate with "wizard".


You've just put forth visual definitions to "wizard" and "god of war", not to "magic" and "hitting stuff".




For those in this discussion who don't trust their imagination, you may as well use Google Image Search. Repeat the process with "witch", "ghost", "prophet", "angel", "genie" etc.. These are all supernatural, magical things, but most people wouldn't expect them to act in identical ways.

The key is to not overthink it. Accept that there is no unified theory of magic. Accept that the variery in aesthetic implies actual variety in methodology... as is, you know, the normal case in fantastic fiction, mythology and even real-life magic systems.


Mythology and beliefs about magic in real life are varied and mysterious and even self-contradictory because magic isn't real.

Given a setting in which magic were real, it's quite possible that regardless of aesthetic or application, magic would be magic and work on one set of core principles. It's possible that in such a setting talking about "different magics" would make as much sense as talking about "different forms of gravity" or whatever.

[RPGuru1331]

Is the chair real? If your butt isn't on the floor, then it is. End of story.
Look, I'm going to make this simple for you: It really feels like I'm stationary when I'm sitting down, doesn't it? Assuming I'm not moving my office chair, and the like, right?

Yet, we know I'm not actually stationary. My senses have deceived me to believe as such, but I'm hurtling through space at somewhere in the neighborhood of 108km, plus or minus some change. I'm relatively stationary, but I couldn't, through my senses, determine my 'actual' speed. But my 'actual' speed, at the same time, isn't particularly relevant to me in practical terms. If my senses can be deceived so easily, on such basic information, what else about observable reality might I be mistaken on? How much of my observation can genuinely be taken seriously?

This is much harder than you seem to think it is.


Have events ever been observed to proceed causes? No. Good enough.
If you think that's the primary competing theory, you have a long list of philosophers to read up on. You can read up on Hume and Kant's feud for a primer.


As for the rest, there's simply no common ground from which to start a discussion, when one party takes mystical froo-froo at all seriously and then asserts a postmodernist view of empiricism, etc.
...Karl Popper and David Hume are postmodernist now? That word really does mean 'anything I want it to mean because it's irritating for me in a discussion', doesn't it? Regardless, my definition of 'supernatural' is that there is no such thing. If it can be done, it's natural. This isn't really to mean I 'accept all manner of mystical froo-froo' (a curious claim, given that I pointed out it's still probably not true, and that you're better off hedging your bets against qigong), but to say that they're not really meaningful terms, except inasmuch as game rules give them meaning.


We're going to waste bunch of time arguing about that instead discussing the actual questions at hand.
Considering I keep bringing up the actual, practical rammifications of your points, and you keep studiously ignoring them, this is inaccurate at best.


Qigong (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3046559/)indeed... :smallconfused:


Therefore, it would be unwise to draw firm conclusions at this stage.

[Arbane]

The thing is, any system I can think of where wizards have power comparable to 3.5 wizards, is a system where they're specifically designed to be about wizards being reality-warpers. which is fine if you want to play that, I have no problem with those systems and don't demand any god-martial in a game so clearly designed to be about a wizard being wizardly such as Mage: The Ascension or Mage: The Awakening (which ironically both have ways to be a god-martial anyways using magic) or Ars Magica or whatever else.

And it's worth noting that both Mage:The A games have a mechanic to DISCOURAGE magic use when there's a normal way to solve a problem - Paradox.



Exalted solves the issue by simply making a sorcerer and a warrior being two completely scales of conflict.

Also, ALL cool powers in Exalted are explicitly magic, and magic is explicitly what the world is built on. Magic predates physics in Exalted, as the existence of the Wyld demonstrates.



Aside from DnD, I honestly can't think of any rpg that has this problem at least to DnD's degree.


Possibly Shadowrun has a lower case of the same problem, but it also spawned the adage 'Geek the Mage First', so it's slightly self-balancing. :D



So while technically this in theory could be a universal rpg problem, the evidence from what I've seen indicates that its not, and the reason that DnD is so often used as an example is because, DnD is honestly poorly designed and therefore the ONLY example. Its to be honest, a game where the playerbase puts WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY much more thought into everything than the developers ever do. Like, the 3.5 developers were just y'know, designing a game where you could reasonably play a bunch of adventurers going forth to kill dudes and loot treasure, were a little lazy about playtesting, and the fanbase turned it into a mess of over-analysis, alignment arguments, class tiers, rules-lawyering, theoretical optimization, and a tippyverse-inspired obsession with batman wizards. Which then caused the players of 3.5 to grow fond of it in fascination of a glitchy abusive design that is beautiful to people who love exploiting loopholes and ugly to everyone else. To the point where these same people hate a game that actually had good playtesting, balanced design and actual effort put into making sure it all worked right when it came out and replaced it. and we wonder why we can't have nice things.

Pretty much, yeah. 3.5 players can't have nice things, because a loud portion of the fanbase doesn't WANT nice things.