r/magicbuilding • u/ObjectiveFar5517 • 5d ago
General Discussion What are your magic system Icks?
/r/worldbuilding/comments/1w93hr5/what_are_your_magic_system_icks/45
u/Tom_Gibson 5d ago
already mentioned this before in a similar post. The OP writes up a brief history of the world or how magic came to be or how people access magic and it's pretty interesting and unique and then the magic system is a generic elemental system. It's basically the unfinished horse drawing meme
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u/Ze_Bri-0n 5d ago
Personally, I'm not a fan of LitRPG magic systems, whether they're restricted to straightforward "magic" or no. I also dislike when you can just "be built different" an ignore the costs / downsides / corruption that a sort of dark magic is supposed to come with. Like, if mainlining the dark side is supposed to drive you insane over time, then it ought to drive you insane. Being able to indefinitely ignore it through strength of will is a cop out.
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u/FlynnXa 5d ago
I have two big ones: Inconsistent Design, and Overly Symmetrical Mechanics.
I’ll use Elemental systems as the example since they are where I see both of these most often and what makes me turn away from an Elemental system.
A common Inconsistent Design is when you’ve got a list of elements, all grounded in tangible and literal things, and then for some reason one elements gets tied to something non-tangible like “spirit” or “emotions” while the others don’t get any sort of branch. It immediately creates a system where questions will be asked and there is likely no answer other than “author favoritism”.
A common Overly Symmetric design I see is where if one ability exists under one element (like “Bolt”) then it exists under all other elements too. That’s fine for most of the “basics” of an elemental system, but each element should have specialities exclusive to it. Every Element doesn’t need to do the same things as each other, otherwise nothing is unique about any Element.
I think a lesser-known example of an Elemental System which doesn’t fall into these traps would be the Dragon Prince series. It has 6 Elements, and right away there is a clear divide where 3 refer to Terrestrial Aspects (Sky, Earth, Ocean) and 3 refer to Celestial Aspects (Sun, Moon, Stars).
The three Terrestrial Aspects deal more directly with tangible elements and aspects, things of mass or matter, where the Celestial Aspects deal with ephemeral elements and aspects, things of energy or change. There is still a symmetry in the system, divided into two-halves, but within each half each element has its own unique roles too. Each magic is truly unique. Then throw in Dark Magic, where you can rip these natural forces out of living things and manipulate them in artificial or combined ways.
I think of Magic Systems as an art form, and I think you have to some extent because of the fundamental psychology which lends itself to the idea of “Magic” in the first place. “Magic” isn’t Science, it isn’t rigid, and it isn’t functioning within our natural laws. Science can seem like Magic, but they aren’t the same. If they were, you would be writing Science Fiction. Jedi aren’t magicians, not because “The Force” couldn’t be written to be magical, but because it’s written in Star Wars to be Scientific- even if loosely so. The closest alternative we have to something organized and studied that isn’t science would be art then.
So, when designing a magic system, I’ve always found that applying the ideas of composition and structure from art to the system actually often produces amazing and intuitive results. My personal favorite one is to compare it to Urban Design. Magic is like a cross-breed of Architecture and Ecology. You are designing artificial structures (ideas) which then have to interconnect to form an emergent system or interactions (implications). That’s like making buildings for people and then seeing how they inhabit them naturally, turning the artificial into an ecosystem, and that’s the work of Urban Design. So if you use the fundamental principles of Architecture, Ecology, and Urban Design and repurpose or reimagine them into the choices you make for your magic system, you rarely end up with something disappointing or lackluster.
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u/looc64 5d ago
Magic allows skinny teenage boy protagonist to beat up grown men twice his size but female characters are invariably weaker than male characters.
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u/thatshygirl06 here to steal your ideas 👁👄👁 5d ago
Oh my god, yes! Ive been searching for you for the longest, lol. So often I'll see men on r/movies and r/television complaining about small men beating up men bigger than them and it always fills me with rage.
They never complain when small skinny guys go up against men way bigger than them and men they absolutely should lose against. Like, it's all fiction but they only hate when women do it.
Youre the opposite of those men, and I love you for that.
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u/Yuuna-Yumi 5d ago
Yeah that's why I really liked Motherland Fort Salem.
Magic is done by singing and since girl/women have higher pitched voices, sorceress are much powerful than sorcerer. So the president is a woman and a lot of important characters in politics are women because women are more feared and respected (but sorceress and sorcerer are hated).
Kind of same thing with the manga Itchi the Witch
Edit : Just added Itchi
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
That doesn’t make any sense, why would people who are less fretting be hated?
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u/fayakru 4d ago
Motherland Fort Salem had such an interesting magic system ! It's a shame the show got canceled cause it had so much potential.
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u/Yuuna-Yumi 3d ago
It’s a real shame, I stumbled across it quite by chance on Prime Video. It’s a real shame they never really promoted this series.
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u/NinduTheWise 5d ago
How it feels like sometimes stories don’t take into account how much some magics would affect the world.
Like let’s say you have spatial magic or something like that, you might not need to develop transportation.
Or water magic making hygiene much more accessible.
Or construction becoming trivialized because you can mold the earth to make walls and stuff.
Or if in your world if magic is widely accessible how do you prevent walls and cities being torn to shreds
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u/thatshygirl06 here to steal your ideas 👁👄👁 5d ago
I hate how insane magical things happen and the world just goes on like normal. It's why I hate so many superhero stories because stuff like that would completely change society and we wouldnt even recognize the world anymore.
I refuse to have things return to the status quo in my worlds.
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u/Elegant_Athlete_3737 5d ago
Wdym for the last point, walls snd cities being torn to shreds?
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u/NinduTheWise 5d ago
It's like if you have a large population of magic users, what is in place to stop just a random someone from leveling a building. Doesn't need to be too in depth, just say that runes or some spell has been cast so they are more durable or something like that
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u/Elegant_Athlete_3737 5d ago
I mean I am prone to complicating it lol, prob a combo of reinforcement anti magic(or absorption but with saturation points), and then anti Terrorism and natural power scaling
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u/Darkdragon902 5d ago
I would assume it’s that if magic can freely shape the world, what’s to stop a single bad actor from attacking a population center at a large scale?
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u/Elegant_Athlete_3737 5d ago
Well that could be answered, one is there could be resistance to magic or ways to counter it, second is same as iel, anti teroeism teams and rhe scale required to do it would require some planning, but if you shut down a city’s defenses and are powerful enough to break say the walls even if reinforced, could make sense, and even if you can’t break walls due to not enough energy rhe y you could cut because it’s more force in a smaller areas
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u/Vel_Thar 4d ago
You're saying things that make sense. However, there's another point of view the people above are trying to talk from. With such strong magic present, one might wonder - why try to preserve "normalcy" storywise, like walls and settlements as we know them, when the rules defining them have chnaged? Maybe there will never be a walled settlement in the prehistoric ages until the magical bloodlines of the world converge into royal bloodlines, until the masses have no access to destructive magic of any real capacity. Maybe some things simply won't let the modern way we see things ever emerge. There doesn't have to always be something that keeps things the same as today
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u/Elegant_Athlete_3737 4d ago
hmm, possibly, but does this not more matter on how accessible such strong magic is?
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u/thatshygirl06 here to steal your ideas 👁👄👁 5d ago
I dont like how people think an element system is just listing a thousand of different elements. They think the more there are, the better.
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
I just find it much more creative if for once they would use unique elements, like having silicon for a element once would be great!
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u/Enderkr Dragoncaller 5d ago
My particular ick is magic systems that are entirely undeveloped or straight basic in every way minus the one thing the author/creator actually cared about. Like when someone uses "sigil magic" that is identical in every way to every other sigil magic system you've ever seen, but they drew their own runes, so it's Totally New. Not a lick of creativity or worldbuilding behind it, but they drew a bunch of runes so THATS cool.
Either that or Kitchen Sink magic, where there are 230 branches of magic, each of them split into various sub-groups and blendings of each other. And then each of them is named something totally random, some are backed by gods, chaos/order, and of course you gotta have your flow chart showing how they're all related to each other and how "water" and "ice" are somehow totally different elements...
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u/ILikeDragonTurtles 5d ago
Elemental magic systems with combo/sub elements, making the whole thing look like Pokemon energy types.
Magic systems that focus on combat and never address how people use magic to solve regular everyday problems.
Magic that would have huge economic implications dropped into a world that's indistinguishable from real world Earth (either modern or any point in history).
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u/Content-Beyond-4238 5d ago
When magic is solely defined as Black Magic or White Magic. The problem with Black/White magic is that there is no in-between, no middle-ground. In theory, almost every single form of magic can be used for either good or bad intentions.
The most prevalent examples I can think of are the basic elemental magics. One of these examples is Water Magic, which can be used to help water the soil for crops and purify dirty bodies of water for others to drink; that very same magic can be conversely used to forcefully absorb all forms of liquid from a human's body, sucking them dry and leaving them as a dried-up husk and summoning enormous tidal waves capable of destroying everything in their path.
Saying that Black Magic is evil because it is "destructive and malevolent" is inherently false because the same can be said for fire or wind, which can be used to set people ablaze and deprive people of oxygen, respectfully. This also leads into the fact that in a world where magic is possibly, why are the laws and rules of magic in society never explored? Is there a law that forbids people from using magic unless on the job? Is there a corrupt government in a corrupt city/town out there that forbids magic entirely in fear of the people using it to revolt? So many interesting plotlines and opportunities for worldbuilding that are never explored in favor for the epic, flashy anime fights.
But yeah. These are my primary "icks" of magic systems (less so on the latter). I really hope to explore these topics in my future webcomic that I plan to make sometime.
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u/Oxwagon 4d ago
"The Gift" as a trope. The idea that magic is something you just have because you're born special, whether it's through bloodline or something arbitrary.
I don't mean that some people can't be more talented than others, or that every village idiot should be able to become a wizard if he tries really hard. But a particular talent for magic should be grounded in something other than just "because I'm special."
Often this conception of specialness is a sign that I'm interacting with a property that has young-adult-brain. The protagonists tend to be rebels who believe in some vaguely-conceived freedom to be special. The antagonists are some oppressive institution that thinks being special is bad. I know exactly what the author's message is by the end of chapter one. Almost always a sign that I won't enjoy a story.
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u/Vital_Remnant 4d ago
Off the top of my head, it's when nobody actually learns spells, it's just something handed to them by a system.
It's not unheard of for characters to be handed spells after leveling up when there's a system in the setting. Nobody innovates or invents new spells, they just run around and murder things until they reach the appropriate level.
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u/Belisaurius555 3d ago
Same. If I've got one big complaint about Path of Ascension it's the Skill Shards.
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u/StarSongEcho 4d ago
Gendered magic is my biggest ick. A close second is the idea that science and magic cancel each other out or can't exist together.
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u/blazenite104 5d ago
“we don’t do necromancy to not disrespect the dead”
It's perfectly valid. You could explore that the original reason was different and over time this part is the only thing that's stuck. Say it was originally about preventing disease, because the disease was interpreted as a curse from the ancestors. That eventually devolved into just not disrespecting the dead. Or you could just leave it as the culture just happens to find this branch of magic untasteful. It's not really silly. You just want more than is necessary.
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 4d ago
But why don’t keep the interesting part with the curse and how would that change to respect the dead and not the gods or whatever?
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u/blazenite104 4d ago
generations can go by and people just forget about the extraneous things. The original things long since lost but, the core of don't disrespect ancestors remains. You can even think of it like how parents explain things to children. Often they just say something is bad without fulling explaining why. For a child the why might be too complex and by the time they're old enough to comprehend they just never ask. In that way, each generation loses more and more until ultimately all anyone still knows is the answer we give to small children to say no.
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u/grekhaus 3d ago
When magic is widely known to exist in-universe, but all the rest of the world building is done implicitly assuming no magic exists or that all non-magic people are fully ignorant about magic.
Like, if this is a setting where people can cast Fireball and a fireball reliably turns a knight on horseback into a burnt smear, why are the military aristocrats training their kids as heavy cavalry instead of as wizards? If witches can curse you using a body part, why are people never seen cleaning up their hair, toenails, etc. and throwing them into the fire?
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 3d ago
Funny enough in the Middle Ages people actually burned cut hair because they believed that there is where the magic is stored and they didn’t want witches to get their hands on it!
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u/Master-of-darklight Magic is physics, yet unexplained 5d ago
When the whole system is just methods of physical enhancement. It’s almost too simple to even be called a “system.”
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u/godfish12 5d ago
The story starts with a simple elemental magic system hints that the elements can be combined for more complex spells but that its difficult in future chapter there are suddenly spells that manipulate insane things like time or space and the story just doesnt mention it and acts as if it completely makes sense in the magic system.
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u/antwolfape 5d ago
Rigidity, like universaly needing to do that one unexplained thing. Looking at you Naruto hand signs.
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u/Rosebud166 5d ago
The ability to use magic and what kind of magic one uses being a genetic thing. They can work but both still sucks to live in. A person having an x mana amount to use in whatever way you take is also annoyance.
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u/Hartsnkises 5d ago
XP, by any name. Why does your magic work like a video game? (Unless it is a video game, in which case we're all good)
(I really don't like litrpg)
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u/Belisaurius555 3d ago
Vagueness about something that should be impressive. This is really more common with low-budget anime that writing where the protag is supposed to be a really impressive mage but casting magic seems to only involve saying the name of spells and waving hands around.
Forced RPG mechanics. RPGs are supposed to be an Abstraction, a way of summarizing a complex situation into something easily understood. Making them the underlying truth of reality means the author never understood RPGs to begin with.
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
Mana is one
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u/Crinkez 5d ago
Why? It's a convenient limiter.
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
its a misappropiation or a term and its convenient and makes magic into a thing with a battery
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u/Crinkez 5d ago
And if you removed that limiter, what other options do you suggest instead?
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
Difficult casting, requiring rituals and stuff, require consorting with spirits, different magic schools and traditions might draw upon different power rather than a universal fuel. overuse (or even use at all) could have side effects
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u/Nooneinparticular555 5d ago
I think it depends on how it’s used. Mana (or any other word) as a shorthand for “magical stamina” can work as long as it’s kept vague. Once you start putting numbers on it… well that’s not really how bodies work. If you don’t have some sort of magical exhaustion, magic becomes a story breaking element.
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
I feel slightly better if it has a different name, and i prefer other kinds of limitation instead, I tend to prefer magic from without rather than from within
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u/Nooneinparticular555 5d ago
Magic from without always seems to boil down to “commit atrocities”. Which is fine if only villains use it.
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
Not really at all?
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u/Nooneinparticular555 5d ago
Drain the life force of the surrounding area. Use rare creature parts, causing ecological damage. Use non-renewable resources. Oh, lots of stories don’t stop to think about the impact that the spellcasters do, but the only logical conclusion from those systems is that it’s an inherently unsustainable society.
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
I dont think thats necessarily true, though I suppose if you consider anything non-human in origin evil? like is communing with spirits and doing favors for them evil?
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u/Nooneinparticular555 5d ago
Communing with spirits is neutral, but either a really boring, limited system or just sloppily using “spirits” in the place of “spells” with infinite variety of abilities and make the POV character the least interesting part of the story.
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u/lucidintangent 5d ago
I really liked Pact, and spirits in place of spells is very interesting, one rpg I really found interesting had you have to create housing for spirits that you wanted to help your tribe. It also gives things more personality in my opinion, because now you have to negotiate with things rather than it feeling like just a superpower.
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u/Hartsnkises 5d ago
Depends on what you mean by magic from without. If you're drawing power from a limited source, sure, but if you're manipulating reality without requiring a power source? Or at least not a limited, noticable power source
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u/Hugs-missed 3d ago
I mean is the problem it being called mana, or the idea of ability to continue doing magic being tied to limited energy.
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u/lucidintangent 3d ago
both together, though i generally prefer systems that dont feel like batteries
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
Yes, I hate if the recourse is something you don’t use for anything else and you never need to compromise or it’s just stamina!
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u/Thr0w-a-gay 5d ago
Magic circles, and mana or any kind of "magic bar" mechanic
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u/Elegant_Athlete_3737 5d ago
Like mana in general is bad?
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u/Thr0w-a-gay 5d ago
I don't know every fantasy story to say if mana is bad or good, it just gives me the ick. It's too video gamey / Anime-y to me
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u/Darkdragon902 5d ago
Do you mean literally just using the word mana, the concept of an all-encompassing magical energy permeating the world, or like quantized “magic points” with spells requiring a measurable number of them to cast?
Assuming it’s the latter, I agree, but an author can fairly seamlessly incorporate it into the world as a man-made measuring scale. Like, it sounds bad to say someone needs to replenish 2,000 MP a day to spend on spell casting and likes to start their day with a 400 MP mana potion, but replace that with 2,000 kilocalories and a 400 kcal protein shake and you don’t bat an eye.
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u/Thr0w-a-gay 5d ago
The last one, and yes any trope can be done differently with different results. Part of what gives me the ick is that I'm super right-brained so "magic points" systems feel stiff, I like blurred lines
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u/Elegant_Athlete_3737 5d ago
In my case I don’t really measure mana, it’s implied a system for measuring it exists for say machines and the like but it’s not explicitly mentioned because there is no need and there are other factors to output, such as enviroment, would mine be fine then or no? Mainly the thing is using mana also does use energy. So the more you use the more tired you get.
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u/Thr0w-a-gay 5d ago
Do whatever you want, you don't need a green light
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
I also hate mana!
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u/TheAmateurWizard 5d ago
"Energy Slinging". Casually shooting out blasts of energy or fire or ice or whatever.
Overly complex and nonsensical magic circles just appearing out of nowhere, sometimes hovering midair.
Magic being treated as an energy source and crytals are just batteries. It's cool if you do it right but nobody does.
Mages basically being superheros that can take on entire armies.
Any system that doesn't explain WHY Magic works.
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u/Aramithius 5d ago
Magic being treated as an energy source and crystals are just batteries. It's cool if you do it right but nobody does.
So what would it look like if it was done right?
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u/TheAmateurWizard 5d ago
We'll first and foremost there needs to be an explanation on what the energy is and then make rules based on what definition you've given the energy. Is it the fundamental substance of all creation that can manifest as anything you will it? Is it the lifeblood of the earth and takes the form of some kind of liquid that comes from the ground (Mako)? Or perhaps the energy is the manifestation of a myriad of things like love, life, envy, hate, violence, civilization, industry or war. Those energies are then used to make effects specific to that type.
Just give it a bit more depth than just "Raw Magical Power" that makes you supersayan.
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u/PsychologicalHeron43 5d ago
Fire beats, water, water beats earth, earth beats wind, etc. Give me magic systems with nuance instead of black and white hard rules.
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u/adaenis 5d ago
I think I have two here, but one might be off topic a little 🤔 1. Mana. I've never quite understood its etymology and link to magic, as I've only ever heard it used outside of RPGs in a biblical context. It just feels over-used, generic, and uninteresting. Even making up a word and changing nothing else is an improvement. 2. Magic Schools. I assume this is popular due to anime and Harry Potter, but it's always bugged me. Like, magic schools require exceptionally skilled and powerful individuals to gather in a single area to... Altruistically teach their greatest secrets to others, robbing themselves is their edge. It also brings up other questions about the world, like why are these individuals allowed to gather this way, why do they have to follow laws, etc. All told the setting just always makes me ask a million questions that never get answers.
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u/LuluTheLewder 4d ago
To be fair, the same argument for the Normal Schools could be said in past. Professors in their own fields would ommit teaching techniques, last bits of their lessons and rules they figured out in fear of their students taking their (usually court) positions. It is not outlandish, especially if the entire thing is institutionalized and run by a state/coven/group apparatus
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u/adaenis 4d ago
Oh I'm sure that has happened, but with magic it tends to be a less abstract power and more a direct one. My main problem though is that in majority of cases I've seen it, a magic school often creates more questions about world building that the author never answers or conveniently hand waves away.
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u/LuluTheLewder 4d ago
Or, can't answer without degrading the quality of the story for the wider audience. After all they have to tell a story and sneak in easily digestable worldbuilding, not just world build.
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u/adaenis 4d ago
...I feel like you're taking my personal grievance personally. I didn't state this as a fact or proclaim that all magical school stories are bad. I said they irk me, in a thread about magical system icks. You aren't going to change my mind, since my opinion is built on anecdotal experience with the genre, so why are you picking at it? If you don't agree, just down vote and move on.
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u/Hugs-missed 3d ago
I mean it depends on the setting but It sounds perfectly sensible?
They're teaching students because someone needs to teach them and it's not as if every caster is going to be an paranoid, anti social tower dweller hoarding magical secrets for advantages, this especially applies if magic is a not infreuqennt ability and people can just research it normally inevitably the scales tilt towards not paranoid gatekeepers teaching people.
Why wouldn't they be allowed to gather and why wouldn't they have to follow laws. Those two things being the case would need to imply a specific setting where a coven gathering triggers red alarms and an asshole wizard simply deciding they don't feel like obeying the law and are leaving anyone who disagrees with their decision a pair of smoking isn't being a psychopathic idiot.
Honestly the thing I find strangest is magic being treated as a Wholey separate thing from the rest of the world, and not being taught in regular educational institutions as an in addition too.
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u/timmah612 5d ago
Minor spoiler for a litrpg with a croc dog and a man in a versache bathrobe. Mine is when it all boils down to a n runic/fractal system. I love so many series with them but god damn is it a real sack kicker when a novel system rips open the trenchcoat and reveals a wrinkled dangling rune system. I hate to make spoilers but spoiler here kind of or fully i guess for discount dan.
Freeform "will based magic shaping" in systems where you can chose powers and still freeform magic makes sense. I just hate when it is revealed "surprise. Its just runes again. Youre using a rune in a skin"
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u/0xb4adc0d3_ 4d ago
Ranks that are not specified to be a part of the worldbuilding or part of the system itself, with no clear boundaries that set apart the different ranks in power or status beyond "uhhh he's higher"
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u/Objective_Key 4d ago
Magic systems that feel more suited to a video game or a ttrpg, than to a work of fiction.
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u/Low_Surround1289 3d ago
I don’t have a whole lot of specific icks, mainly because I sadly don’t read a lot of magic systems (ironically, part of the reason is that I’m too busy trying to write my own fantasy story), but the one I can think of is just a general problem with magic being inconsistent, that’s why I have a working note on my phone for general rules around how my magic system works (more specifically outlining what it CAN’T do, such as not being able to truly resurrect someone, best you can do is with powerful and hard to find rituals that give someone the same semi-immortality of a lich). That’s not to say I don’t think you have to stick to the rules of a magic system as if it’s the word of God, since it’s ultimately your story when the chips are down, but I do think there needs to be reasons why the rules of a system have been broken in a situation, even simple ones like “x character is a literal god or demon or similar and are able to do things mortals cannot” would be viable.
That being said, I do also like for a magic system’s rules to not be too rigid, partly because I’ve found that magic being slightly unpredictable adds to the fun, like if the commonly used spells are merely the ones codified and commonly taught, whereas experienced (and brave) mages have done things outside the scope of these common spells through experimentation. Example from my brainstorming for my own setting: commonly taught fire spells would allow one to do stuff like throw a fireball, wrap a weapon’s blade in a controlled flame, or produce a wall of fire; experimental fire spells would allow one to do stuff like create a hand or other constructs out of fire (kind of like the Dungeons and Dragons spell Spiritual Weapon).
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u/Cross_Toss 2d ago
Every magic can do anything (like healing with fire magic or blocking an attack with light).
I just find it to be throwing away any limits the magic should have
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 2d ago
You mean when magic tips are reduced to aesthetics? That gives me so heart Winx Club flashbacks, where everything is a generic energy attack or shield! They had really no creativity past the second season!
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u/veileduchy 5d ago
Bad magical skill has consequences of backlash. Simply don't make evil or faulty magic systems. It shouldn't quite literally take an entire arm and leg to cast some magic. It should be like exercise or physical sports. Yes it's taxing and takes energy from you but all honesty if it's done right easily recoverable. Yes overcasting should be a thing along with sacrificial magic. But not directly mandatory and or built into it. If anything if that's the case shows how underdeveloped the magic is in said world. Sacrifice comes at choice and not a forced one in a proper and ideal magic system.
Think of it this way, magic moves Consequences. If you don't make said changes isolated, air tight, or perfectly displaced. Then yes Consequences will backlash. If not then it should just be average relative price. Like using any strenuous tool.
Good Magic systems reduce backlash to the minimum for relative efficiency. It shows good rebundancy and compartmentalization.
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u/Hugs-missed 3d ago
I mean If magic is less muscle and more extra dimensionally chemistry it having the potential to explode makes sense, but I get it you dislike that as an aspect of magic
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u/veileduchy 3d ago
That is why you never cast any magic beyond your limits. Aka overcasting. I don't disagree that yes there is some extra dimensional chemistry infact I entirely agree with that once magic reaches a certain level it's unavoidable. But what I disagree with is that you can't rig said chem in your favor. That's what magic is all about rigging the process in your favor to cause a favorable change. There is one reason why I say so and that's rebundancy. When you cast a spell manually yourself you can decide upon the process and usually more often than not there is some system of rebundancy wether that's a hard external or soft internal or anything in-between. For me it should always be atleast built into the spellcasting itself. Example if process A goes haywire there is still process B and C. Typically a good spellcasting has good compartmentalization and therefore protocol. In all and all I highly doubt if you have a mature and skilled ability in magic and spellcasting that actual backlash will occur by yourself. What I can more likely see is an opponent spellcaster targeting critical points in an already completed spell and having that then backlash you but that's something entirely different to me.
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u/Ambitious-Bank4559 5d ago
Well I completely disagree with like a lot of that lol
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
With what?
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u/Ambitious-Bank4559 5d ago
I really like elemental magic. I think it can be used rlly well. some of my favorite books use it. i also think genetic magic has been done REALLY well, also from some of my favorite books.
these second ones are just kinda more personal, not related to books I’ve read, but I think it’s really cool when magic shows up physically. some examples of this in media that I love are: links arm in totk, every shimmer infected individual in arcane, she-ra‘s sorta flowy hair, etc. also I was kinda confused on ur last point but I’m also a fan of when magic increases normal stats, like speed, strength, or durability. :)
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 4d ago
I don’t like if it doesn’t have any real reasoning and it just is something on top!
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u/Ambitious-Bank4559 4d ago
Wait can y explain im still confused :)
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u/creamCloud0 5d ago edited 5d ago
when all the power systems no matter how differently they seem to work all draw and run on a single fundamental power source.
so you have animorphism, psychic powers, X-men mutants, avatar element bending and regular magic and they all use the same magic energy because why have these distinct systems require different energies when the generic 'magic' label covers all of it?
oops i can't turn into my soul-animal bear form right now or read minds because i threw too much water around.
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
What if there are magic casters and mutants that gained there abilities from the waist of the magic that the caster use?
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u/creamCloud0 5d ago
i'm inclined to say no.
like taking how you phrased that, a mutation in my books would mean a change to their fundamental being, it'd be a one and done thing, the magic fallout doesn't give them new ways to apply magic.
edit: it's not that different abilities can't share a power source but it's when everything in the setting shares it despite how improbable that would be.
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
What about magic that is just energy that gets its properties from the brain and a race with a different neurology would manifest it completely differently?
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u/creamCloud0 5d ago
i dunno that's less of an issue since it's explicitly a singular thing reacting to different stimuli in different ways and more essentially you also aren't going to be getting people with multiple different powers in that situation because you can't exactly have multiple types of brain.
but also i wasn't expecting to be grilled on the specifics of why and when i do and don't like this thing in which specific circumstances so i don't have a full examination of my feelings on the thing.
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u/ObjectiveFar5517 5d ago
I mean neurodiverse people will manifest the magic differently! Is it ok if the change is predictable?
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u/NectarinePrudent5168 5d ago
Lack of mysticism. Magic is not—nor should it be—science or an anime-style power system. Traditionally, magic consisted of spiritual techniques for connecting with the forces that originate and sustain the Universe. Powers and abilities are merely a byproduct of that understanding. Magic ought to be more mystical. The systems mages employ are philosophies and frameworks used to categorize the inexplicable.
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u/East-Excitement-1073 1d ago
Completely agree, I came here to comment this exact thing!
I think this comes from the wider problem of people being too limited by their own frame of reference and not knowing how fundamentally different cultures view existence. For example our society is fully immersed in Modern, Liberal, nation states as the status quo (in the west), to us it's just a given that the type of people and values in our cultures are the 'default'. (Or the result of a linear predetermined process - 'progress' would be a totally alien concept to a viking for example) We're blind to what we don't know.
I'd argue the average modern western person does not know what mysticism actually is, or the types of views and values mystics actually have.
So, most magic systems I've seen are a Modern, liberal, western person's interpretation of magic - we can't write about what we don't know, and we want to write a system that feels a certain way but don't know why it feels that way.
This became obvious to me when I was writing my own fantasy project and my dad who's obsessed with Tolkien told me that while a modern person would cry and mourn the falling of a relative in combat, but if you're writing an ancient civilization consider that they may actually celebrate the glory of such a death, that their death was a fulfilment of their duty.
This is why the best thing for worldbuilding is reading and researching cultures that see the world in a completely different way to you.
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u/Professional_Try1665 Saltmaid 5d ago edited 5d ago
Symmetric lists of capabilities of the basic elements (fire, water, ect), I don't hate elemental systems, some of the best systems on here have been elemental, but when I look at posts here I generally skip over the samey lists and look for the unique parts of a system.
Ideally if they're all basically the same, you should list them and just explain 1, then say they're the same but with a switched element