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A new kind of magician



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Wed Oct 08, 2008 2:59 am
ankhirke says...



Bickazer, tactile/kinesthetic magic is a wonderful idea, though, of course, as with most things, it has been used before. Avatar the Last Airbender immediately comes to mind (complete with Dragon Dance and an army of firebenders), though in that case, schools of magic were broken up by element, and i believe bending ability was inherited, not learned.

In any case, it's a beautiful idea, and I'd love to see what you'd come up with using it. There are several other things that need to be known to make it a full blown magic system - namely, why magic works that way. Are they directing some kind of latent magical energy through their bodies? Is it invoking spirits through dance? Where does the actual magical power come from, and what is it about physical movement that harnesses it? Are the schools of magic different in power source, or are they simply different styles of the same thing that work off the same principles? What does a resurrection dance look like? How about a killing dance? And of course, all magic needs limits. If you can overcome any obstacle with magic, then it doesn't make for a very interesting story.

Here's a great resource for any one interested in building magic systems: http://www.sfwa.org/writing/worldbuilding4.htm

Limits are the first thing on there. Some great questions to get you thinking, and to help you figure out exactly what you need to know.

~Annie
  





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Wed Oct 08, 2008 9:51 pm
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Bickazer says...



Whew, glad to hear that my magic system isn't totally tacky or weird...yeah, I know about Avatar, but I was thinking less martial arts than dancing. I was just worried there was some high-fantasy novel I haven't heard of that uses the same idea. >_>

To be perfectly honest, you seem to have thought it out a lot better than I have. XD I'm completely nebulous on many aspects of this magic--such as why it works. I was mostly thinking magicians channel "energy" from the earth, whatever that means...>_> I do know the different classes of magician are divided primarily by the technique they use, not power source...that's about it. The magic isn't that powerful at all; stronger spells require more than one magician to cast them. I'm thinking a lot of magic (particularly that of girl-mages) is more ceremonial/decorative than anything...but I'm unsure. Like I said, I haven't thought this through.

That site is fascinating; thanks for the link! :D I'll keep it in mind if I ever feel like writing this (or another fantasy) down...but for now I'm relegating this idea to the backseat and focusing on another, epic science fiction, idea of mine. Which obviously doesn't require magic. XD
Ah, it is an empty movement. That is an empty movement. It is.
  





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Thu Oct 09, 2008 4:55 am
W says...



I've got this sortof magic system. Blank, in the D World, can 'Create' using the essence of Darkness (his manifested heart) to spike his senses by 200% and generally do crazy things, like leap off buildings and make a lance peirce a person's soul, ect. He's like, the weakest person cmpared to everyone else though, since until he gets his weapon card, he's actually just using his imagination to alter a world of his own creation. : (

I also carried this heart-soul-body thing from this other idea from KH. When you kill a person in the Real World, you actually take their heart as part of your own, and thus, they're soul has nothing to command and their body has nothing to be controlled by, Platinum was a mass murderer in the R World so that when he was transmitted into the D World (Blank's world), his fifty-two hearts transformed into a deck of cards he uses to attack, and divinitate with. It's really convient for plot twists, though it means my characters have to kill more people than originally planned. : (
el oh el
  





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Fri Oct 10, 2008 9:31 pm
Stori says...



What you could do... is have magic be a substance. And if a mage uses too much of it too fast, he gets a sickness.

Say he tries to lift a boulder with magic. But if he uses too much magic, the spell fails and he gets sick. It's possible.
  





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Sat Oct 18, 2008 3:48 am
Rubric says...



Sounds like drugs Kyte :P.

Crazy Hallucinogenic drugs.

Oh and Miles, that still isn't turning a man into a frog. I maintain that if you're going to have energy correlate to between magic and physical labour, you need another standard to quantify magical effects that you couldn't get through physical means.
As for Pratchett, I've only read the colour of magic, but I was under the impression that magic required as much effort as it would take normally, which is why wizards arent all that fantastic? Maybe it's just been too long since I read it, oh well.

Cheerio,
Rubric
So you're going to kill a god. Sure. But what happens next?

Diary of a Deicide, Part One.


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Sat Oct 18, 2008 2:19 pm
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Stori says...



Hey, don't belittle my efforts, Jack! Although, you do kinda have a point.
  





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Thu Aug 09, 2012 2:57 am
OokamiKitsune says...



My characters are mages. The girls are born with the ability to use magic-they were gifts from their deities.The guys can use magic but only if they create a contract with a girl- girls can only have one contract but the guys can have multiple.
Contracts are not a marriage-like thing but exactly the opposite. If either of the party has a abnormal heartbeat when they using magic together the magic backfires and injuries the mage.

Most girls can only use one type of magic. Fire Water Lightning Earth Wind Ice Space Time Light or Dark. Some can use two or three, but only very talented mages can use more than four.

Don't know if this helped but I thought it was a good idea and its a new type of way to use magic. :smt003
Every hello is the prologue to the knowing farewell, so make as many stories as you can:)
  








Work expands to fill the time available for its completion.
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