Such a theory certainly exists in Eberron, where magic is science, though what that theory is has never been laid out (and probably differs between cultures). In my game, I describe magic as a set of fields, like the electromagnetic field, one for each school of magic. A spell is a unique combination of excitations of these fields at unique frequencies. What it means for a spell to be an evocation spell (or whatever) is that its effect primarily but not exclusively involves the “evocation field.”
Interesting. Why not just one field behaving in different ways?
If you want a general theory of magic and you’re the DM go for it. But I don’t think they’re gonna develop a theory like that for even one world, forget all of them. Most people who play don’t care enough about the theories to even want a detailed explanation.
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I really like D&D, especially Ravenloft, Exandria and the Upside Down from Stranger Things. My pronouns are she/they (genderfae).
Such a theory certainly exists in Eberron, where magic is science, though what that theory is has never been laid out (and probably differs between cultures). In my game, I describe magic as a set of fields, like the electromagnetic field, one for each school of magic. A spell is a unique combination of excitations of these fields at unique frequencies. What it means for a spell to be an evocation spell (or whatever) is that its effect primarily but not exclusively involves the “evocation field.”
Interesting. Why not just one field behaving in different ways?
Because fields typically don't behave in different ways.
A bit like, if you lived in Ancient Rome, people around you thought that the Sun orbited around Earth. It was not true, of course, but it was described in a way detailed enough both to be consistent with people’s observations and to be used for practical proposes (like building meridians).
This is still too orderly and homogenous to be what people want though. They don't want a prevailing theory based on certain established norms. They want Bob to think the sun is a sentient golden coin, Jane to think it's a massive flaming flumph, and Dave to think it's a hole in the rotating skyshell surrounding the world. A world with magic and gods and demons is just going to have so many more ways to describe the unknown around them.
And on a separate note, some players have a lot of trouble with distinguishing between the DM telling them how the world works and the DM telling them how people think the world works. If it seems reasonable and everyone believes it, there's not much reason for a player to question whether it's really true - and worse, some players may start building their story based on that truth to the point that your "reveal" kinda screws up where they were going with it. There's just a lot of potential problems here that really outweigh the benefits. If you want inspiration on magic systems, there is oodles of other media out there to inform your own campaign.
Such a theory certainly exists in Eberron, where magic is science, though what that theory is has never been laid out (and probably differs between cultures). In my game, I describe magic as a set of fields, like the electromagnetic field, one for each school of magic. A spell is a unique combination of excitations of these fields at unique frequencies. What it means for a spell to be an evocation spell (or whatever) is that its effect primarily but not exclusively involves the “evocation field.”
Interesting. Why not just one field behaving in different ways?
Because fields typically don't behave in different ways.
In real life. In a fantasy setting, there are different laws of metaphysics.
I fail to see how that's relevant to a question about why I make decisions about my personal game world.
Because fields typically don't behave in different ways.
Sure they do -- depending on configuration. Essentially all of the properties of ordinary matter are defined by electromagnetic fields; do a rock, a painting, a glass of water, and a fire really seem identical?
I hate to break it to you, but the designers were creating a game and enough lore to support it - they're not going to put enough effort to create such a detailed theory that you tie it in to real physics, even if it were possible. Don't expect any modern physics in the game. I mean, they only just decided that they didn't want phlogiston.
No, sure. But many things in the lore have been detailed later.
Is normal that the DM is filling the necessarily existing holes.
But, of course, if you have (for example) a player that, before starting to rover the world was a very respected professor of theoretical magic, for example you can’t expect to tell him: “the best explanation that you have is that when you move your hands and shout very loud <<CALLILALEGH>> a lightning strike and you have no clue whatsoever of why is that happening. You have no theory at all and none has ever thought why is happening this way.”
Probably even a first level Wizard must have some idea and he must have had very boring hours in which his master was explaining him the theoretical 77 principles of evocation or the theories detailing the differences between how arcane magic flows from the Wave vs divine magic flows from the Celestial planes… WAAAY BEFORE the Wizard apprentice successfully performs his first prestidigitation.
Otherwise what the heck are Wizards studying all their life?
What are Wizards studying all their lives?
I think the short answer is - all the things we as players already know, or don't need to know.
There is the purely game side of magic. Everything about the rules exists for the game to function. Spells have components to limit the spellcasters. You can't cast a Verbal spell when you're gagged. You can't hold a sword in both hands because you need one hand to hold a focus. Most of these ideas probably started with just an image of what a wizard should be. Of old men with pointy hats and staffs. Of certain books with strange magic systems. But they quickly became part of the game balance. Vancian magic was better than Tolkien magic because it provided a nice way to limit spells cast per day. Staffs meant magic-users didn't get to use the big damage weapons that fighters got. Components meant you could actually imprison a wizard in some way, or make some spells more expensive to cast. The game side of magic is often enough for many players.
Then there is the story side of magic. What the people in the game world understand it to be. How they interact with it. That part has to be defined by the game side. It has to try to make some kind of internal logical consistency of the mechanical rules. But because we as players face the game side, it's easy to overlook how difficult and complex it must be for the characters in the world. And I think this is the part you are looking for.
To me, there is a lot for a wizard apprentice to study that we take for granted. We know exactly what the Ethereal Plane is, how to navigate it, and what kind of monsters live in. It's all right there in the books. But a wizard in the game world only has theories. The Ethereal is like the deep sea or a distant galaxy is to a scientist, only even harder to reach. They could spend a lifetime collecting stories about the Ethereal, searching through old tomes, learning to cast the spells that will let them get just a glimpse of one part of it. They can try to prepare themselves for the dangers they will face there. Only to add a little to the world's understanding or their own power.
A somatic component is just a letter in a spell description to us. But to the apprentice, it's a very rigid series of motions. Something that will take years of practice to train their hands to get just right. Muscle memory to gain through repetition. Because only that very exact motion will allow them to pull on the Weave in just the right way.
Spells are extremely difficult to get right. If they were a easy as understanding a few simple principles, no wizard would have to search for new ones, they'd just make them on the fly. They wouldn't take hours to copy into spellbooks with expensive inks. They wouldn't take months to create new ones. And even in the real world we understand principles like gravity, but take generations to come up with new uses for it.
I'm sure there are attempts at unified theories of magic in every world. And I imagine each wizard has their own take on it. They probably spend lifetimes thinking about them and arguing with their peers. But if any of them had discovered the whole truth, they would still have to learn how to apply it. And the rules for the game tell us that is very hard to do. Even if it looks easy to the players. There is a reason some wizards turn to lichdom. A lifetime just isn't enough.
That's actually a good point. No one ever asks about the "Disunified" Theory of Magic. Whenever a Wizard learns too much, they get turned into a Nothic. There are overwhelming forces at work actively preventing greater understanding.
Maybe like the tower of Babel, there used to be a master code for magic, but the first deities confused the minds of mortals to prevent them from accessing it, so all of the wizards have to come up with new magical languages that never quite capture the whole picture, be that words of power, or the Weave, or whatever. They're all mostly right, but nonsense when combined.
A bit like, if you lived in Ancient Rome, people around you thought that the Sun orbited around Earth. It was not true, of course, but it was described in a way detailed enough both to be consistent with people’s observations and to be used for practical proposes (like building meridians).
This is still too orderly and homogenous to be what people want though. They don't want a prevailing theory based on certain established norms. They want Bob to think the sun is a sentient golden coin, Jane to think it's a massive flaming flumph, and Dave to think it's a hole in the rotating skyshell surrounding the world. A world with magic and gods and demons is just going to have so many more ways to describe the unknown around them.
And on a separate note, some players have a lot of trouble with distinguishing between the DM telling them how the world works and the DM telling them how people think the world works. If it seems reasonable and everyone believes it, there's not much reason for a player to question whether it's really true - and worse, some players may start building their story based on that truth to the point that your "reveal" kinda screws up where they were going with it. There's just a lot of potential problems here that really outweigh the benefits. If you want inspiration on magic systems, there is oodles of other media out there to inform your own campaign.
What you say can be generally true for different cultures. But one culture, organizations usually have 1 official theories, 1 to 5 theory that is accepted by a minority and rejected by the majority, usually by cohesive groups or sects, many individual theories that are usually rejected as nanny takes by the society as a whole.
Take religion in Medieval Europe (pre Luther). You would have a majority thinking that God=Father+Jesus+HolySpirit And to the official structure of the Catholic Church (the great majority of people). You would have Franciscan monks of course not doubting of the Holy Trinity, but having some doubt on the Pope’s official doctrine. You would have Hebrews, believing in God, but Not in the Trinity. And you will have people with individual personal theories: God is a woman, God does not exist, there are many gods, God is a blue wizard living on the Moon…
While Franciscan monks and Hebrew were certainly cohesive groups and if someone was saying: “The real God is the one described in Torah, not in the Christian Bible” a people would have said: “ok, he is an Hebrew.” But if a person would have said: “God is blue” it would have been just a personal speculation.
In the same way I think that is impossible that in a society where magic is pervasive, but mysterious and in which there is a codified knowledge, written a by a small group of people relying on accumulated knowledge (Wizards are a bit like Priests relying on the Bible and on all the doctrine produced by the Church in centuries), doesn’t have some well established theories, that most (cultured) people agrees to.
Regarding how to make players clear that those are rumors, beliefs, etc and not the Final Word of DM, you can make it easily: have the PC in a tavern or in a doctrinal debate in a Wizard conclave or anywhere else hearing NPCs debating two opposite theories. Make it clear that one of the two theories is more accepted by the audience and the other is still something that NPCs generally see suspiciously.
Is well different from the DM saying. Make a knowledge roll: that’s what you know.
Science doesn't apply to magic, that's what makes it makes it magic. You're not going to find answers involving probability and quantum mechanics and strong and weak forces.
If sufficiently high technology is indistinguishable from magic, then magic is indistinguishable from sufficiently high technology.
There has to be some logical structure to it or Wizards, as a class, do not make any sense.
Science doesn't apply to magic, that's what makes it makes it magic. You're not going to find answers involving probability and quantum mechanics and strong and weak forces.
If sufficiently high technology is indistinguishable from magic, then magic is indistinguishable from sufficiently high technology.
There has to be some logical structure to it or Wizards, as a class, do not make any sense.
I didn't say there wasn't logical structure, I said that science in terms we know it doesn't apply.
Also that quote isn't a universal law of technology nor magic, it's an idiom for that may or may not be true depending on the fictional context.
The wizard class can totally make sense without magic fitting into the same structural framework as science.
The Arthur C Clarke quote refers to; if you do not know how something works it might as well be some supernatural force doing it.
Unified Theory of Magic: One of the often common things is fiction is magic works differently and the author goes into detail how that works in their book or work. This provides background color and gives depth to the story and character. For rpg game worlds to me having unique magic explanations in the game world can provide a lot of fun and be interesting...but at the same time it is hard to make a unique magic system for each game world. In general I do not like flavor text that does not match the rules, so a rpg game world that says magic happens this way but just use the basic rules even though they do not match the flavor text are very disappointing.
Also it is much easier for most authors to just wing it as they may not have a strong background in science and or building a unified theory's like we see in physics, astronomy, zoology, botany, etc.
The Arthur C Clarke quote refers to; if you do not know how something works it might as well be some supernatural force doing it.
Unified Theory of Magic: One of the often common things is fiction is magic works differently and the author goes into detail how that works in their book or work. This provides background color and gives depth to the story and character. For rpg game worlds to me having unique magic explanations in the game world can provide a lot of fun and be interesting...but at the same time it is hard to make a unique magic system for each game world. In general I do not like flavor text that does not match the rules, so a rpg game world that says magic happens this way but just use the basic rules even though they do not match the flavor text are very disappointing.
Also it is much easier for most authors to just wing it as they may not have a strong background in science and or building a unified theory's like we see in physics, astronomy, zoology, botany, etc.
The point is that magic working 'differently' does not equate to magic not having rules. We can see from both the material component choices the authors have made (which are actual rules, not merely 'flavour text' despite there being ways to circumvent them) and the little information we have on item creation, that 5e, like every version back to the beginning, has a magic system that functions at least in significant part on principles of sympathetic magic. This is often a bit tongue in cheek but nevertheless follows principles of sympathetic magic
Booming Blade: A melee weapon, clearly drawing on the fact that blades can be loud, under the right circumstances.
Dancing Lights: A bit of phosphorus or wychwood, or a glowworm, all light sources.
Friends: Makeup, because you look more attractive with it and that is a property for the spell to work on.
Infestation: A living flea... pretty obvious
Light: A firefly or phosphorescent moss
Mending: two lodestones: To pull the target object back together, of course.
I could go on. Foci, arguably draw on the connection between caster and focus rather than that between component and effect
Now not all spells have material components, but the somatic or verbal components are almost never described. There is no reason to doubt they follow similar rules, but it could be that the sympathetic magic aspects really are only one aspect and there is something else happening with the other two component aspects. There is no special casting language, though, so it does make more sense that the verbal aspect is sympathetic magic, too.
Yes other game systems have had special languages for spells as well as other options in fiction like all magic must be filtered through otherworldly beings as well as a number of other options to explain why magic works in that setting and even at times why magic works differently in different settings linked gates and or other such passageways. These types of rules can add a lot of flavor to a game system if done well and the system supports it. But IMHO 5e is not that type of system, it is more on the simple side (which is its strength and weakness) and trying to tie complex rules to it might/would break it. Why? Well again IMHO you need more things to be able to differentiate different ways to cast spells then 5e has and IMHO some have to be positive in nature and some have to be negative (which again 5e tries to stay away from negative factors).
IMHO 5e's magic system either spell points or spell slots work well for how the foundation of 5e is designed and built.
The Arthur C Clarke quote refers to; if you do not know how something works it might as well be some supernatural force doing it.
Unified Theory of Magic: One of the often common things is fiction is magic works differently and the author goes into detail how that works in their book or work. This provides background color and gives depth to the story and character. For rpg game worlds to me having unique magic explanations in the game world can provide a lot of fun and be interesting...but at the same time it is hard to make a unique magic system for each game world. In general I do not like flavor text that does not match the rules, so a rpg game world that says magic happens this way but just use the basic rules even though they do not match the flavor text are very disappointing.
Also it is much easier for most authors to just wing it as they may not have a strong background in science and or building a unified theory's like we see in physics, astronomy, zoology, botany, etc.
The point is that magic working 'differently' does not equate to magic not having rules. We can see from both the material component choices the authors have made (which are actual rules, not merely 'flavour text' despite there being ways to circumvent them) and the little information we have on item creation, that 5e, like every version back to the beginning, has a magic system that functions at least in significant part on principles of sympathetic magic. This is often a bit tongue in cheek but nevertheless follows principles of sympathetic magic
Booming Blade: A melee weapon, clearly drawing on the fact that blades can be loud, under the right circumstances.
Dancing Lights: A bit of phosphorus or wychwood, or a glowworm, all light sources.
Friends: Makeup, because you look more attractive with it and that is a property for the spell to work on.
Infestation: A living flea... pretty obvious
Light: A firefly or phosphorescent moss
Mending: two lodestones: To pull the target object back together, of course.
I could go on. Foci, arguably draw on the connection between caster and focus rather than that between component and effect
Now not all spells have material components, but the somatic or verbal components are almost never described. There is no reason to doubt they follow similar rules, but it could be that the sympathetic magic aspects really are only one aspect and there is something else happening with the other two component aspects. There is no special casting language, though, so it does make more sense that the verbal aspect is sympathetic magic, too.
I agree. A focus could drive a sympathetic / synchronic connection between unrelated elements. I think that in some way magic involves conscience and the ability to manipulate an energy source, maybe a quantum field, able to make interact things that won’t interact in the usual cause / effect pattern, as per deterministic physical laws.
Even magic artifacts required at some point a conscious act of a sentient being (funneling and taming energy magic in the given object in a given structure).
I think that verbal, somatic, material components and foci are all part of an “exact science” that allows magical energy (otherwise chaotic) to assume a foreseeable pattern.
A spell is forcing magic energy in a specific funnel, in a way that can interact with the physical world in a specific way.
Talents that avoid a spellcaster avoiding to use some specific component maybe are acquired abilities that allows the spellcaster to interiorize (in a thought path) the pattern that would have otherwise needed a somatic component, for example.
Anyway a Wizard need to “study” for one hour, so I guess that the spellcaster is already preparing the funnel (inside his own mind) for the energy and is just releasing it when he casts the spell. Casting the spell is just the final act of spellcasting, something that the Wizard is already doing, when he is studying.
If he doesn’t cast the final part of the spell within the end of the day the funnel is dissipated, since, during the long rest the wizard’s mind is readjusting and losing the “neural pattern” that makes possible to cast the spell.
The Arthur C Clarke quote refers to; if you do not know how something works it might as well be some supernatural force doing it.
Unified Theory of Magic: One of the often common things is fiction is magic works differently and the author goes into detail how that works in their book or work. This provides background color and gives depth to the story and character. For rpg game worlds to me having unique magic explanations in the game world can provide a lot of fun and be interesting...but at the same time it is hard to make a unique magic system for each game world. In general I do not like flavor text that does not match the rules, so a rpg game world that says magic happens this way but just use the basic rules even though they do not match the flavor text are very disappointing.
Also it is much easier for most authors to just wing it as they may not have a strong background in science and or building a unified theory's like we see in physics, astronomy, zoology, botany, etc.
The point is that magic working 'differently' does not equate to magic not having rules. We can see from both the material component choices the authors have made (which are actual rules, not merely 'flavour text' despite there being ways to circumvent them) and the little information we have on item creation, that 5e, like every version back to the beginning, has a magic system that functions at least in significant part on principles of sympathetic magic. This is often a bit tongue in cheek but nevertheless follows principles of sympathetic magic
Booming Blade: A melee weapon, clearly drawing on the fact that blades can be loud, under the right circumstances.
Dancing Lights: A bit of phosphorus or wychwood, or a glowworm, all light sources.
Friends: Makeup, because you look more attractive with it and that is a property for the spell to work on.
Infestation: A living flea... pretty obvious
Light: A firefly or phosphorescent moss
Mending: two lodestones: To pull the target object back together, of course.
I could go on. Foci, arguably draw on the connection between caster and focus rather than that between component and effect
Now not all spells have material components, but the somatic or verbal components are almost never described. There is no reason to doubt they follow similar rules, but it could be that the sympathetic magic aspects really are only one aspect and there is something else happening with the other two component aspects. There is no special casting language, though, so it does make more sense that the verbal aspect is sympathetic magic, too.
Yes other game systems have had special languages for spells as well as other options in fiction like all magic must be filtered through otherworldly beings as well as a number of other options to explain why magic works in that setting and even at times why magic works differently in different settings linked gates and or other such passageways. These types of rules can add a lot of flavor to a game system if done well and the system supports it. But IMHO 5e is not that type of system, it is more on the simple side (which is its strength and weakness) and trying to tie complex rules to it might/would break it. Why? Well again IMHO you need more things to be able to differentiate different ways to cast spells then 5e has and IMHO some have to be positive in nature and some have to be negative (which again 5e tries to stay away from negative factors).
IMHO 5e's magic system either spell points or spell slots work well for how the foundation of 5e is designed and built.
There can be an assumed system that comes up occasionally as a plot device without having to write everything out in detail.
And 1e through 3.5e had a magic language. Hence the Read Magic spell was necessary to interpret it.
I am talking broadly and not just including D&D. If you are talking D&D only then I think the rule system needs to be more complex to deal with the issue. Using 5e as an example it is a 0 to +3 system, no neg modifiers, tries for "one simple rule to rule them all" style of ruling, thus to me it is too simple to provide the needed options to make many different forms of magic and other abilities have valid meaning and not just fluff text.
There are other games in which that separate spell groups require a new language to be able to cast, spells like read language can let you read the info but often we played you needed to have the language to cast those spells or risk a higher rate of failure. At times this was called a language tax on spell casters and a way to limit their accesses to power but also in our games tended to lend to more RP or different RP then a more simple system. Some of those games have good systems and some poor, for example I have never seen a good power word system of magic, that is to say often 80%-90% of the system is ok but the edge cases break the system and cause problems (often this is do to not having a very complex system in place to support the idea and this type of system would make it a lot harder for GM's and players to play their PC).
The Arthur C Clarke quote refers to; if you do not know how something works it might as well be some supernatural force doing it.
Unified Theory of Magic: One of the often common things is fiction is magic works differently and the author goes into detail how that works in their book or work. This provides background color and gives depth to the story and character. For rpg game worlds to me having unique magic explanations in the game world can provide a lot of fun and be interesting...but at the same time it is hard to make a unique magic system for each game world. In general I do not like flavor text that does not match the rules, so a rpg game world that says magic happens this way but just use the basic rules even though they do not match the flavor text are very disappointing.
Also it is much easier for most authors to just wing it as they may not have a strong background in science and or building a unified theory's like we see in physics, astronomy, zoology, botany, etc.
The point is that magic working 'differently' does not equate to magic not having rules. We can see from both the material component choices the authors have made (which are actual rules, not merely 'flavour text' despite there being ways to circumvent them) and the little information we have on item creation, that 5e, like every version back to the beginning, has a magic system that functions at least in significant part on principles of sympathetic magic. This is often a bit tongue in cheek but nevertheless follows principles of sympathetic magic
Booming Blade: A melee weapon, clearly drawing on the fact that blades can be loud, under the right circumstances.
Dancing Lights: A bit of phosphorus or wychwood, or a glowworm, all light sources.
Friends: Makeup, because you look more attractive with it and that is a property for the spell to work on.
Infestation: A living flea... pretty obvious
Light: A firefly or phosphorescent moss
Mending: two lodestones: To pull the target object back together, of course.
I could go on. Foci, arguably draw on the connection between caster and focus rather than that between component and effect
Now not all spells have material components, but the somatic or verbal components are almost never described. There is no reason to doubt they follow similar rules, but it could be that the sympathetic magic aspects really are only one aspect and there is something else happening with the other two component aspects. There is no special casting language, though, so it does make more sense that the verbal aspect is sympathetic magic, too.
I agree. A focus could drive a sympathetic / synchronic connection between unrelated elements. I think that in some way magic involves conscience and the ability to manipulate an energy source, maybe a quantum field, able to make interact things that won’t interact in the usual cause / effect pattern, as per deterministic physical laws.
Even magic artifacts required at some point a conscious act of a sentient being (funneling and taming energy magic in the given object in a given structure).
I think that verbal, somatic, material components and foci are all part of an “exact science” that allows magical energy (otherwise chaotic) to assume a foreseeable pattern.
A spell is forcing magic energy in a specific funnel, in a way that can interact with the physical world in a specific way.
Talents that avoid a spellcaster avoiding to use some specific component maybe are acquired abilities that allows the spellcaster to interiorize (in a thought path) the pattern that would have otherwise needed a somatic component, for example.
Anyway a Wizard need to “study” for one hour, so I guess that the spellcaster is already preparing the funnel (inside his own mind) for the energy and is just releasing it when he casts the spell. Casting the spell is just the final act of spellcasting, something that the Wizard is already doing, when he is studying.
If he doesn’t cast the final part of the spell within the end of the day the funnel is dissipated, since, during the long rest the wizard’s mind is readjusting and losing the “neural pattern” that makes possible to cast the spell.
Yes those are all options that may vary from game world to game world and creating a system to deal with all of those different casting methods and have those methods be meaningful would require a more complex system then would fit within 5e's fundamental rule design.
To start you can take an idea from magic the gathering and make a table with all the options and then decide what spheres of magic (Divine, Arcane, Primordial, God, special abilities, class abilities, + others (maybe alchemy, magic item creation, etc)) do which things better and worse then others. The list the options you want for casting, material components, somatic, catalyst, ritual only, other options to allow room for things you do not see right off the bat.
Sorry need to go so have to stop there but you get the idea.
Easy language example for D&D: an easy example would be for wizards each school of magic has a language for each level of spells, so there would be a language for zero level necromancy and 0 level evocation, etc and to cast higher level spells of that type you need to know the language or have it in an item or in a special medium (maybe unique to spell or spells type and level). But again 5e does not have a lot of options for players to decide on every level by design and trying to shoehorn a more complex system into 5e is a very tough task and probably and impossible task, but there are geniuses out there so maybe they could do something like this if they put there mind to it.
Note: I think the question above has been asked before and you could get some good info from past discussions.
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Interesting. Why not just one field behaving in different ways?
If you want a general theory of magic and you’re the DM go for it. But I don’t think they’re gonna develop a theory like that for even one world, forget all of them. Most people who play don’t care enough about the theories to even want a detailed explanation.
I really like D&D, especially Ravenloft, Exandria and the Upside Down from Stranger Things. My pronouns are she/they (genderfae).
Because fields typically don't behave in different ways.
This is still too orderly and homogenous to be what people want though. They don't want a prevailing theory based on certain established norms. They want Bob to think the sun is a sentient golden coin, Jane to think it's a massive flaming flumph, and Dave to think it's a hole in the rotating skyshell surrounding the world. A world with magic and gods and demons is just going to have so many more ways to describe the unknown around them.
And on a separate note, some players have a lot of trouble with distinguishing between the DM telling them how the world works and the DM telling them how people think the world works. If it seems reasonable and everyone believes it, there's not much reason for a player to question whether it's really true - and worse, some players may start building their story based on that truth to the point that your "reveal" kinda screws up where they were going with it. There's just a lot of potential problems here that really outweigh the benefits. If you want inspiration on magic systems, there is oodles of other media out there to inform your own campaign.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
I fail to see how that's relevant to a question about why I make decisions about my personal game world.
Sure they do -- depending on configuration. Essentially all of the properties of ordinary matter are defined by electromagnetic fields; do a rock, a painting, a glass of water, and a fire really seem identical?
What are Wizards studying all their lives?
I think the short answer is - all the things we as players already know, or don't need to know.
There is the purely game side of magic. Everything about the rules exists for the game to function. Spells have components to limit the spellcasters. You can't cast a Verbal spell when you're gagged. You can't hold a sword in both hands because you need one hand to hold a focus. Most of these ideas probably started with just an image of what a wizard should be. Of old men with pointy hats and staffs. Of certain books with strange magic systems. But they quickly became part of the game balance. Vancian magic was better than Tolkien magic because it provided a nice way to limit spells cast per day. Staffs meant magic-users didn't get to use the big damage weapons that fighters got. Components meant you could actually imprison a wizard in some way, or make some spells more expensive to cast. The game side of magic is often enough for many players.
Then there is the story side of magic. What the people in the game world understand it to be. How they interact with it. That part has to be defined by the game side. It has to try to make some kind of internal logical consistency of the mechanical rules. But because we as players face the game side, it's easy to overlook how difficult and complex it must be for the characters in the world. And I think this is the part you are looking for.
To me, there is a lot for a wizard apprentice to study that we take for granted. We know exactly what the Ethereal Plane is, how to navigate it, and what kind of monsters live in. It's all right there in the books. But a wizard in the game world only has theories. The Ethereal is like the deep sea or a distant galaxy is to a scientist, only even harder to reach. They could spend a lifetime collecting stories about the Ethereal, searching through old tomes, learning to cast the spells that will let them get just a glimpse of one part of it. They can try to prepare themselves for the dangers they will face there. Only to add a little to the world's understanding or their own power.
A somatic component is just a letter in a spell description to us. But to the apprentice, it's a very rigid series of motions. Something that will take years of practice to train their hands to get just right. Muscle memory to gain through repetition. Because only that very exact motion will allow them to pull on the Weave in just the right way.
Spells are extremely difficult to get right. If they were a easy as understanding a few simple principles, no wizard would have to search for new ones, they'd just make them on the fly. They wouldn't take hours to copy into spellbooks with expensive inks. They wouldn't take months to create new ones. And even in the real world we understand principles like gravity, but take generations to come up with new uses for it.
I'm sure there are attempts at unified theories of magic in every world. And I imagine each wizard has their own take on it. They probably spend lifetimes thinking about them and arguing with their peers. But if any of them had discovered the whole truth, they would still have to learn how to apply it. And the rules for the game tell us that is very hard to do. Even if it looks easy to the players. There is a reason some wizards turn to lichdom. A lifetime just isn't enough.
That's actually a good point. No one ever asks about the "Disunified" Theory of Magic. Whenever a Wizard learns too much, they get turned into a Nothic. There are overwhelming forces at work actively preventing greater understanding.
Maybe like the tower of Babel, there used to be a master code for magic, but the first deities confused the minds of mortals to prevent them from accessing it, so all of the wizards have to come up with new magical languages that never quite capture the whole picture, be that words of power, or the Weave, or whatever. They're all mostly right, but nonsense when combined.
What you say can be generally true for different cultures. But one culture, organizations usually have 1 official theories, 1 to 5 theory that is accepted by a minority and rejected by the majority, usually by cohesive groups or sects, many individual theories that are usually rejected as nanny takes by the society as a whole.
Take religion in Medieval Europe (pre Luther). You would have a majority thinking that God=Father+Jesus+HolySpirit And to the official structure of the Catholic Church (the great majority of people). You would have Franciscan monks of course not doubting of the Holy Trinity, but having some doubt on the Pope’s official doctrine. You would have Hebrews, believing in God, but Not in the Trinity. And you will have people with individual personal theories: God is a woman, God does not exist, there are many gods, God is a blue wizard living on the Moon…
While Franciscan monks and Hebrew were certainly cohesive groups and if someone was saying: “The real God is the one described in Torah, not in the Christian Bible” a people would have said: “ok, he is an Hebrew.” But if a person would have said: “God is blue” it would have been just a personal speculation.
In the same way I think that is impossible that in a society where magic is pervasive, but mysterious and in which there is a codified knowledge, written a by a small group of people relying on accumulated knowledge (Wizards are a bit like Priests relying on the Bible and on all the doctrine produced by the Church in centuries), doesn’t have some well established theories, that most (cultured) people agrees to.
Regarding how to make players clear that those are rumors, beliefs, etc and not the Final Word of DM, you can make it easily: have the PC in a tavern or in a doctrinal debate in a Wizard conclave or anywhere else hearing NPCs debating two opposite theories. Make it clear that one of the two theories is more accepted by the audience and the other is still something that NPCs generally see suspiciously.
Is well different from the DM saying. Make a knowledge roll: that’s what you know.
Exactly my point!
I didn't say there wasn't logical structure, I said that science in terms we know it doesn't apply.
Also that quote isn't a universal law of technology nor magic, it's an idiom for that may or may not be true depending on the fictional context.
The wizard class can totally make sense without magic fitting into the same structural framework as science.
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The Arthur C Clarke quote refers to; if you do not know how something works it might as well be some supernatural force doing it.
Unified Theory of Magic: One of the often common things is fiction is magic works differently and the author goes into detail how that works in their book or work. This provides background color and gives depth to the story and character. For rpg game worlds to me having unique magic explanations in the game world can provide a lot of fun and be interesting...but at the same time it is hard to make a unique magic system for each game world. In general I do not like flavor text that does not match the rules, so a rpg game world that says magic happens this way but just use the basic rules even though they do not match the flavor text are very disappointing.
Also it is much easier for most authors to just wing it as they may not have a strong background in science and or building a unified theory's like we see in physics, astronomy, zoology, botany, etc.
Yes other game systems have had special languages for spells as well as other options in fiction like all magic must be filtered through otherworldly beings as well as a number of other options to explain why magic works in that setting and even at times why magic works differently in different settings linked gates and or other such passageways. These types of rules can add a lot of flavor to a game system if done well and the system supports it. But IMHO 5e is not that type of system, it is more on the simple side (which is its strength and weakness) and trying to tie complex rules to it might/would break it. Why? Well again IMHO you need more things to be able to differentiate different ways to cast spells then 5e has and IMHO some have to be positive in nature and some have to be negative (which again 5e tries to stay away from negative factors).
IMHO 5e's magic system either spell points or spell slots work well for how the foundation of 5e is designed and built.
I agree. A focus could drive a sympathetic / synchronic connection between unrelated elements. I think that in some way magic involves conscience and the ability to manipulate an energy source, maybe a quantum field, able to make interact things that won’t interact in the usual cause / effect pattern, as per deterministic physical laws.
Even magic artifacts required at some point a conscious act of a sentient being (funneling and taming energy magic in the given object in a given structure).
I think that verbal, somatic, material components and foci are all part of an “exact science” that allows magical energy (otherwise chaotic) to assume a foreseeable pattern.
A spell is forcing magic energy in a specific funnel, in a way that can interact with the physical world in a specific way.
Talents that avoid a spellcaster avoiding to use some specific component maybe are acquired abilities that allows the spellcaster to interiorize (in a thought path) the pattern that would have otherwise needed a somatic component, for example.
Anyway a Wizard need to “study” for one hour, so I guess that the spellcaster is already preparing the funnel (inside his own mind) for the energy and is just releasing it when he casts the spell. Casting the spell is just the final act of spellcasting, something that the Wizard is already doing, when he is studying.
If he doesn’t cast the final part of the spell within the end of the day the funnel is dissipated, since, during the long rest the wizard’s mind is readjusting and losing the “neural pattern” that makes possible to cast the spell.
I am talking broadly and not just including D&D. If you are talking D&D only then I think the rule system needs to be more complex to deal with the issue. Using 5e as an example it is a 0 to +3 system, no neg modifiers, tries for "one simple rule to rule them all" style of ruling, thus to me it is too simple to provide the needed options to make many different forms of magic and other abilities have valid meaning and not just fluff text.
There are other games in which that separate spell groups require a new language to be able to cast, spells like read language can let you read the info but often we played you needed to have the language to cast those spells or risk a higher rate of failure. At times this was called a language tax on spell casters and a way to limit their accesses to power but also in our games tended to lend to more RP or different RP then a more simple system. Some of those games have good systems and some poor, for example I have never seen a good power word system of magic, that is to say often 80%-90% of the system is ok but the edge cases break the system and cause problems (often this is do to not having a very complex system in place to support the idea and this type of system would make it a lot harder for GM's and players to play their PC).
Yes those are all options that may vary from game world to game world and creating a system to deal with all of those different casting methods and have those methods be meaningful would require a more complex system then would fit within 5e's fundamental rule design.
To start you can take an idea from magic the gathering and make a table with all the options and then decide what spheres of magic (Divine, Arcane, Primordial, God, special abilities, class abilities, + others (maybe alchemy, magic item creation, etc)) do which things better and worse then others. The list the options you want for casting, material components, somatic, catalyst, ritual only, other options to allow room for things you do not see right off the bat.
Sorry need to go so have to stop there but you get the idea.
Easy language example for D&D: an easy example would be for wizards each school of magic has a language for each level of spells, so there would be a language for zero level necromancy and 0 level evocation, etc and to cast higher level spells of that type you need to know the language or have it in an item or in a special medium (maybe unique to spell or spells type and level). But again 5e does not have a lot of options for players to decide on every level by design and trying to shoehorn a more complex system into 5e is a very tough task and probably and impossible task, but there are geniuses out there so maybe they could do something like this if they put there mind to it.
Note: I think the question above has been asked before and you could get some good info from past discussions.