Another homebrew Magic System in need of help

[Intregus182]

I need help with my homebrew magic system.

Each school of magic is also a skill in the game. Skills have 4 levels to them, Untrained, Trained, Expert, and Master.

When you become trained in a magic school you get to choose 1 cantrip from that magic school. And as you advance your level of training in a magic school not only will those cantrips get stronger but you will also be able to learn more powerful spells (I.E. Firebolt is available to you as a cantrip when you become trained, whereas fireball is available to an expert).

I currently have the following schools of magic grouped by source of power:

Primal Magics
Aeromancy - thunder, lightning, and winds, movement spells, haste spells, etc.
Druidic - Plant magic, animal magic, life, healing.
Hydromancy - water, restoration, cold, and the ocean. Heals conditions and HP
Pyromancy - fire, heat, destruction, resurrection magic
Terramancy - effects based around earth, stones, minerals and ores, Defense
Arcane Magics
Alteration - alter reality or physics but not the inward physical self
Cerebromancy - Spells that affect one's mind: Charms, fear, illusions
Conjuration - Spells that bring creatures or materials to the caster
Divination - spells that reveal information and perceive reality
Transmutation - transform matter or the physical world but not the outside intangible world
Unholy Magics
Necromancy - Anything to do with undead and manipulating others life forcey
Shadowmancy - Effects around trickery, corruption, and dread
Holy Magics
Sacred - focused around healing, restoring and encouraging/buffing

Is this too many schools of magic and should they be simplified?

Am I missing any popular magics that couldn’t be represented by one of the current schools?

Should I roll necromancy and shadowmancy into 1 school called profane to mirror the only holy school, Sacred?

Should there be a holy/unholy divide or should I combine those into 1 source called divine?

If I go that route, should I come up with 2 more schools of magic to fall under the divine source so each one has 5 or should remove druidic completely and then flip divination down to the divine source giving each one 4 schools of magic?

Any help would be very much appreciated!

For reference here is the shadowmancy school of magic as a skill
Shadowmancy
The darker aspects of existence are embodied in Shadowmancy. Magic laced with shadow magic has dread infused into it. Shadowmancy is generally wielded by those driven to its use out of desperation, or tricked into its use through the lure of power. Regardless, shadowmancy is more malevolent than any other magic as it always corrupts those who use it. Shadowmancy seems to have an awareness all its own as if it has a will of corruption it seeks to impose. Not all who tap into shadow magic do so deliberately however, as shadow magic awaits to find an opening it can exploit. Careless use of this sinister power, will break the soul, allowing the shadow in forever……..As they say it’s best not to give the devil a foothold. Shadowmancy spells usually deal naether or cold damage and attack one’s Dodge along with their Innate. A Shadowmancy specialist is called a Shadowcaster, Shadowmancer, or Warlock. You learn one of the following Skill Powers when you become Trained in Shadowmancy. In addition you learn another Skill Power when your skill level advances to Expert and again when you become a Master.

The following powers are only available to you if you are Trained.
Manipulate Shadows- You can spend two actions to control a shadow in a very minor way within 30ft of you for as long as you concentrate on this ability. You can alter the size and shape of a shadow to be twice as big or as big. You can make the shadow look like the shadow of a different object or creature. You can only have one instance of manipulate shadows active at a time.

Shadow Bolt- You can spend two actions to launch a bolt of shadow at a creature within 30ft of you. Make a spell attack against the target's Innate. On a hit you deal 1d6 naether damage.

Umbral Sight- You can spend two actions to gain low-light vision 30ft for 1 minute or as long as you concentrate. This uses your concentration.

The following abilities are only available to you if you are an Expert.
Improved Manipulate Shadows- You can now manipulate shadows in the following ways. The shadow can make the shadow act independently of its owner, move up to 30 feet away from its owner. You can have two instances of manipulate shadows active at a time.

Improved Shadow Bolt- Increase the damage of your shadowbolt to 1d8 naether damage.

Improved Umbral sight- You can spend two actions to gain darkvision 30ft vision for 1 minute or as long as you concentrate.

Trik Light- You can spend two actions to create or destroy ambient shadows changing the level of light in a 30ft burst for 1 minute. You can create shadows which reduce the light level by one step, from bright light to normal light, normal light to dim light, or from dim light to darkness. In addition you can destroy shadows to increase the light level by one step. Non Magical light sources cannot raise the light level in an area affected by this spell.
This uses your concentration.

The following abilities are only available to you if you are a Master.
Master Manipulate Shadows- You can make the shadow disappear. Manipulate shadows now lasts for 1 minute or until you stop concentrating on this ability. You can have three instances of manipulate shadows active at a time.

Master Shadow Bolt- Increase the damage of your shadowbolt to 1d12 naether damage.

Master Umbral sight- You can spend one action to gain darkvision 60ft vision for 1 minute or as long as you concentrate.

Master Trik Light- You can use the trick light ability as an action and increase it’s area to a 60ft burst.

[NichG]

Is 'being a caster of X magic' a full character identity, or are characters expected to mix magic with lots of other competencies or have multiple schools of magic? That is to say, do you want a character concept like 'I am a user of necromancy' to be able to encompass everything that character is going to need to do, or would it be more like 'I'm a master necromancer and a novice of these five other schools and also I have professional training in sailing, gymnastics, and swordfighting'? Also there's the consideration of the degree to which a school is basically going to be niche or useless for low-budget characters - if it costs a significant portion of your build to be able to get low light vision, that's a different story than if its something you can pick up on the side.

How much of the identity of magic users in this setting do you want to be about service (in that they have a small number of fixed things they can do with magic) versus exploration and research (in which case you wouldn't necessarily want to pin spells known with skill ranks this way)? How versatile do you want magic to be - should someone be able to improvise new uses of a set of core effects by being clever about them, or is magic supposed to be very formulaic and specific - the 'water heating' spell can't heat oil, etc.

[Intregus182]

Is 'being a caster of X magic' a full character identity, or are characters expected to mix magic with lots of other competencies or have multiple schools of magic? That is to say, do you want a character concept like 'I am a user of necromancy' to be able to encompass everything that character is going to need to do, or would it be more like 'I'm a master necromancer and a novice of these five other schools and also I have professional training in sailing, gymnastics, and swordfighting'?

The idea would be to be a necromancer you would only need the necromancy school. however this gets more muddy depending on the character concept. For example if you want to be a shadow caster well you might want to pick up Cerebromancy as well as shadowmancy etc.

I'm also toying around with the idea that for spells like blizzard maybe you need to have expert level training in both hydromancy and aeromancy etc.


Also there's the consideration of the degree to which a school is basically going to be niche or useless for low-budget characters - if it costs a significant portion of your build to be able to get low light vision, that's a different story than if its something you can pick up on the side.

Schools shouldn't be niche, they should service a full idea for the most part.


How much of the identity of magic users in this setting do you want to be about service (in that they have a small number of fixed things they can do with magic) versus exploration and research (in which case you wouldn't necessarily want to pin spells known with skill ranks this way)?

Spells known won't be tied to skill ranks. to put it into dnd terms level of spell would be tied to skill ranks but the number of spells one could know is tied up in class features. essentially at ever level you gain a talent. and you choose which talent you want to take. so at level 5 you could take the Skill Expert talent to increase your level of training in Necromancy from Trained to expert OR you could take "learn Spell" where you can learn 1 spell from a school of magic you are trained in.
Does that make sense? did I understand this question correctly?


How versatile do you want magic to be - should someone be able to improvise new uses of a set of core effects by being clever about them, or is magic supposed to be very formulaic and specific - the 'water heating' spell can't heat oil, etc.

I would like spells to be versatile, so in your example if a spell like water heating existed i would expect it to work on oils acids, etc but not blood in a person.

Thanks for the feedback!

[NichG]

The idea would be to be a necromancer you would only need the necromancy school. however this gets more muddy depending on the character concept. For example if you want to be a shadow caster well you might want to pick up Cerebromancy as well as shadowmancy etc.

I'm also toying around with the idea that for spells like blizzard maybe you need to have expert level training in both hydromancy and aeromancy etc.

Schools shouldn't be niche, they should service a full idea for the most part.

Spells known won't be tied to skill ranks. to put it into dnd terms level of spell would be tied to skill ranks but the number of spells one could know is tied up in class features. essentially at ever level you gain a talent. and you choose which talent you want to take. so at level 5 you could take the Skill Expert talent to increase your level of training in Necromancy from Trained to expert OR you could take "learn Spell" where you can learn 1 spell from a school of magic you are trained in.
Does that make sense? did I understand this question correctly?


In a sense that's even more severe than getting spells when you rank up in a magic school because it means that you have to choose between learning a spell or becoming more skilled, so spells are a very finite resource for characters along their full career path. To me that suggests more of a sort of mercenary mage feeling than a researcher mage feeling. Also if all talents are equal, its 4 talents to get one thing to the highest possible level or 4 talents to learn 4 cantrips.

Given that you want these things to be versatile, and given the way talents relate with levelups, what I'd be tempted to do is something similar to a superhero system I'm using. That is to say, rather than buying a 'spell', you'd buy a 'modality'. A character can then construct effects by combining a chosen school (or multiple schools) of magic with a chosen modality (or multiple modalities). Modalities could also be upgraded, similarly to how schools can be upgraded. If you want there to be specific pre-written spells, they could have prerequisites like School 3, Modalities X,Y; then a character could in principle just learn any spell they qualify for, though they would need to find a copy or research it themselves.

The modalities I use are: Absorb, Apply, Augment, Change Form, Control, Create, Destroy, Fortify, Invent, Invest, Know, Restrict, Minion, Movement, Project, Reaction, Sense, Transmute, World, and Zone

So something like the low light vision effect of Shadow magic would be Shadow 1 + Sense - e.g. a spell which lets you Sense that which is within Shadow. If you instead did a variation of Shadow 1 + Know, it would let you Know about things which are within shadows (perhaps your own shadow at low levels, or any shadow at high levels). If you instead did Shadow 1 + Absorb you could do the trick of lighting an area by removing the shadows in it, or alternately Shadow 1 + Destroy.

That sort of thing would let someone who goes all-in on magic create more and more complex effects and basically do spell research trying to figure out how to get their magic to do a particular thing they wanted to work towards. Shadow 5 + World + Movement to shadow-port between planes of existence, etc.

[Intregus182]

In a sense that's even more severe than getting spells when you rank up in a magic school because it means that you have to choose between learning a spell or becoming more skilled, so spells are a very finite resource for characters along their full career path. To me that suggests more of a sort of mercenary mage feeling than a researcher mage feeling. Also if all talents are equal, its 4 talents to get one thing to the highest possible level or 4 talents to learn 4 cantrips.

Given that you want these things to be versatile, and given the way talents relate with levelups, what I'd be tempted to do is something similar to a superhero system I'm using. That is to say, rather than buying a 'spell', you'd buy a 'modality'. A character can then construct effects by combining a chosen school (or multiple schools) of magic with a chosen modality (or multiple modalities). Modalities could also be upgraded, similarly to how schools can be upgraded. If you want there to be specific pre-written spells, they could have prerequisites like School 3, Modalities X,Y; then a character could in principle just learn any spell they qualify for, though they would need to find a copy or research it themselves.

The modalities I use are: Absorb, Apply, Augment, Change Form, Control, Create, Destroy, Fortify, Invent, Invest, Know, Restrict, Minion, Movement, Project, Reaction, Sense, Transmute, World, and Zone

So something like the low light vision effect of Shadow magic would be Shadow 1 + Sense - e.g. a spell which lets you Sense that which is within Shadow. If you instead did a variation of Shadow 1 + Know, it would let you Know about things which are within shadows (perhaps your own shadow at low levels, or any shadow at high levels). If you instead did Shadow 1 + Absorb you could do the trick of lighting an area by removing the shadows in it, or alternately Shadow 1 + Destroy.

That sort of thing would let someone who goes all-in on magic create more and more complex effects and basically do spell research trying to figure out how to get their magic to do a particular thing they wanted to work towards. Shadow 5 + World + Movement to shadow-port between planes of existence, etc.

Depending on the talents one takes spells will be more finite but other talents allow you to learn multiple spells or to learn spells as you encounter them similar to a wizard in D&D being able to copy spells into their spell book etc. And cantrips are gained when you rank your skill up, spells do require a separate talent though.

Either way this is by design so that in order to be good at magic and versatile in magic it will require you to invest a lot to balance out against the martial characters.

In your example though you mention the modalities and list the different kinds. if I were to take this approach there would be 20 modalities and 13 schools of magic. Is that too many schools of magic and should they be simplified?

Am I missing any popular magics that couldn’t be represented by one of the current schools?

Should I roll necromancy and shadowmancy into 1 school called profane to mirror the only holy school, Sacred?

[NichG]

Depending on the talents one takes spells will be more finite but other talents allow you to learn multiple spells or to learn spells as you encounter them similar to a wizard in D&D being able to copy spells into their spell book etc. And cantrips are gained when you rank your skill up, spells do require a separate talent though.

Either way this is by design so that in order to be good at magic and versatile in magic it will require you to invest a lot to balance out against the martial characters.

In your example though you mention the modalities and list the different kinds. if I were to take this approach there would be 20 modalities and 13 schools of magic. Is that too many schools of magic and should they be simplified?

Am I missing any popular magics that couldn’t be represented by one of the current schools?

Should I roll necromancy and shadowmancy into 1 school called profane to mirror the only holy school, Sacred?

I think the numbers are fine, though some schools are much better than others here with e.g. Alteration vs a single element school. Especially if you're worried about niche protection, more schools with individual buy in means you won't get a single generalist 'magic user' who can do everything.

You could certainly drop several of the modalities I listed. Invent may not be appropriate, and World is quite potent conceptually so may be inappropriate. You also might simplify Apply/Create/Destroy/Transmute.

In my system, the modalities had mastery levels but the 'school' e.g. the theme of the powers didn't. Characters did often get stretched thin on the modalities they needed to construct a specific power set they had in mind.