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@beth20

Magic systems!

I don’t love too banal systems (you do magic -> you tire) , but I also want my characters to use magic, so it can’t be a demonic witchcraft that costs you your soul / memory / sanity / etc. The solution I came up with is to address magic like, let’s say, sport – On it’s own, it’s neutral and totally fine. The problems start when you use the magic wrongly.

My magic system (it’s half developed and I haven’t use it in writing yet, but I want to, someday) is a nature-bending, that allows the magician to control animals and plants. It’s based on:

• Willpower, that drives and controls the magic – without it, the magic will not be controlled and might cause horrible accidents.
• Energy, that serves as a ”fuel” – without it, the magic can’t occur.
• Music, that serves as a ”medium” – without it, the energy will be loosed for nothing, and no magic will occur.

When used correctly, magic only tires you mentally (because of the use of willpower) and physically (because of the loose of energy) – just like healthy sport, or a combination of homework, fasting and playing music. The problem is that just like in sport, magicians might practice wrongly. For example…

• They may overuse it, what might hurt their physical and mental health, and lead to exhaustion and many other problems.
• Using magic requires a lot of energy, and the wrong diet might lead to malnutrition with all of it’s problems.
• To strengthen their willpower, magicians might use psychoactive drugs, so they’ll hallucinate their worst fears and overcome them. It’s very effective, but it’s also very likely will lead to drug dependence with all of it’s outcomes.

So we addressed cost, what about limits? In my system, I decided that magic can do almost anything with enough skill and practice, except of ”The 3 miracles”, wonders that only God can do, and that His prophets might use to prove their reliability:

1. Creating matter out of nothing.
2. Supernatural healing – magicians might speed up natural processes, like recovering of wounds and fractures, but can’t heal wounds and sicknesses that can’t be healed naturally. For example, they can’t open blind eyes and deaf ears, or restore body members that were cut.
3. Rising the dead.

Who can practice magic? Theoretically anyone, though some people have a natural talent for it – just like drawing, per se. But practically, it’s very dependent on the society, in three main senses…

• If the society is pre-modern and most of the people are poor peasants, it’s very likely that they can’t pay for the necessary education, or even allow their son to leave home because they need him to help them in the field.
• Magic might be owned or associated by a certain group in the society. Maybe only the nobility have the knowledge of using magic, or have access to magic schools? Maybe magic is associated exclusively with one of the genders? Maybe there’s a special caste, cult or social class of magicians? Maybe magic is considered ignoble and not-honorable, so it’s used only by outcasts or the lowborn?
• Even if anyone can learn magic, not anyone will actually learn it. For example, to be a coder is very, very useful in our world, but most people don’t actually learn how to code, because they’re just not interested in it. Maybe, in the same sense, many people in the society don’t learn magic just because they’re not interested in it.

Wow, that was long. But I really enjoyed talking about it so thank you! 🙂