All right Pundit you finally got to me. I've ordered Invisible College.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on December 08, 2021, 08:21:21 AM
So, how many magic systems do we have here? Let's dust for prints.

Vancian (memorize spell, spell lost when cast). Classic D&D style.

Spontaneous casting (spells cast from a pool of slots). 3E/PF sorcerers, and (to an extent) 5E casters in general.

Magic point system (all spells draw from a magic resource). Too many systems to name, really. Runequest, CoC, etc.

Skill based casting (you cast using a skill check). Shadowrun (with a side of the next item).

Fatigue based casting (spells draw on an endurance/fatigue mechanic, and can leave your PC exhausted). SR and a couple other systems.

Point and Skill go together in a number of systems. You need to make a skill roll, and a point cost prevents you from rolling all day.

There are also systems that consume some kind of resource other than mana points, like spell components or attribute scores. I've never seen a system that is solely based on non-mana resource consumption, so maybe it isn't a primary category.

Something else to consider is bookkeeping.

At higher levels, spell management in a Vancian system is fucking annoying. A mana pool/magic point system, or the spontaneous casting system, can be much less hassle.

One virtue of a Vancian system is the segregation by spell level encourages a wide variety of spells. You have high and low level spells, and the system encourages mixing them up because you only have a finite number of each. Conversely, a spell point system encourages spending all your points on the most effective spell or spells, and just spamming them endlessly.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on December 08, 2021, 08:21:21 AM
Fatigue based casting (spells draw on an endurance/fatigue mechanic, and can leave your PC exhausted). SR and a couple other systems.

I haven't heard that one but I like it. Imagine every spell level costs a HP to cast. 4th level spell is 4 HP. Recovered at the normal rates which means rests for Fighters and Wizards are basically the same. you could even let your Wizard cast high level spells if they are willing to pay the price.

Mix that up with the by skill casting and you can have fumbles cost double HP and magic becomes a bit unpredictable and possibly deadly.

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 08, 2021, 12:52:02 PM

Quote from: Ghostmaker on December 08, 2021, 08:21:21 AM
Fatigue based casting (spells draw on an endurance/fatigue mechanic, and can leave your PC exhausted). SR and a couple other systems.

I haven't heard that one but I like it. Imagine every spell level costs a HP to cast. 4th level spell is 4 HP. Recovered at the normal rates which means rests for Fighters and Wizards are basically the same. you could even let your Wizard cast high level spells if they are willing to pay the price.

Mix that up with the by skill casting and you can have fumbles cost double HP and magic becomes a bit unpredictable and possibly deadly.

Shadowrun isn't exactly like that, but it's close. Every spell has a Drain Value. If you successfully cast the spell, then you have to resist the Drain by checking (I believe) your Magic + spellcasting attribute. If you succeed, no problem -- but failing causes you stun damage. Now, you can ameliorate this with stims, but it's a limited resource... and you can't heal stun damage with magic.

I don't know if it's true for 6E, but in a couple past editions you could overcast to do more damage but you'd have to resist actual physical damage with the drain check. Kind of a high-risk high reward tactic.

For me, in order for a different system to be worth the trouble, it needs to bring something to the table. 

Skill-based spellcasting: each school of magic is it's own skill.  Divine casters perhaps use Religion instead of schools of magic.  Perhaps there are ways to apply similar schools at an increased risk of something bad happening if you want to cast a spell from a school you don't have a sufficient level of skill in.  Also, skill-based allows magic duels between casters to be a bit easier since it can just be a comparison of skill checks.

Other things to consider - it'll work with regular and when dice pool mechanics.  It'll work with spell crits and fumbles. It'll work with just about any type of flavor (gemcasting, soul casting, Dark Sun defiling, etc.)

The biggest concern is how to allow you to scale spells in a less fixed manner - perhaps skill checks compare to a target number that varies based upon what you want to change about the spell.

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 08, 2021, 12:52:02 PM

Quote from: Ghostmaker on December 08, 2021, 08:21:21 AM
Fatigue based casting (spells draw on an endurance/fatigue mechanic, and can leave your PC exhausted). SR and a couple other systems.

I haven't heard that one but I like it. Imagine every spell level costs a HP to cast. 4th level spell is 4 HP. Recovered at the normal rates which means rests for Fighters and Wizards are basically the same. you could even let your Wizard cast high level spells if they are willing to pay the price.

Mix that up with the by skill casting and you can have fumbles cost double HP and magic becomes a bit unpredictable and possibly deadly.

Check out the Microlite 20 series of games. They were a hugely simplified restatement of the 3E SRD. Also for this:
Spell Level              1         2         3           4             5                6
HP cost                   2        3           5          7             8               10

Spell casting HP losses cannot be magically healed but are recovered after 8 hours of sleep.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on December 06, 2021, 08:39:08 PM
Heresy. Everything about the baseline 0D&D system was perfect up until a bunch of assholes ruined it for no reason except they wanted some storygaming/snowflake/munchkin/powergamer/SJW experience!
There is no reason to change or advance anything in the system because its perfect. And anybody who disagrees is just some wuss.

Except whatever you make pundit. That stuff must be good.

Don't conflate powergamers with SJWs. That's not really fair.

Look at any 3.5 powergamer. They work within the system, not against it.

As for a magic system, I had an idea for one that could work, but it does have some issues. I'm not sure how to emulate the "Word" progression I have here. https://www.therpgsite.com/pen-paper-roleplaying-games-rpgs-discussion/an-interesting-spell-system/

Quote from: PsyXypher on December 08, 2021, 02:19:07 PMDon't conflate powergamers with SJWs. That's not really fair.

I was being ENTIRELY sarcastic.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on December 08, 2021, 09:59:19 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 07, 2021, 09:17:30 PMDid you watch the video? I specifically call out "mana point" mechanics as boring.

And if you said so, it must be true!

I substitute dice rolls for games of chess. So its less boring that way.

Mana points aren't chess. They're Accounting. There's hardly any element of strategy involved, only resource management. Even Vancian memorization is more strategic because you have to decide AHEAD of time which spells you memorize and hope you picked the right bunch.

Quote from: rytrasmi on December 08, 2021, 11:39:42 AM
All right Pundit you finally got to me. I've ordered Invisible College.

Thanks! I really hope you enjoy it!

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on December 08, 2021, 02:36:49 PM

Quote from: PsyXypher on December 08, 2021, 02:19:07 PMDon't conflate powergamers with SJWs. That's not really fair.

I was being ENTIRELY sarcastic.

Oh. Alright then. My bad.

I was thinking about modification of Warhammer 2e style with certain changes to encompass lessons took from 4e, Foxhammer and DCC.
I think it can work without Winds, however you wanna divide it.

You got your Power Pool - meaning how good you are to enforce your will on whatever source of magic (obviously it won't work with very natural law systems and other natural philosophy/quasi science systems where personal might is less relevant). Roll it. Doublets means problems. Each spell has numeric level.
Rolls for Incantation, Channeling can add extra points above pool. Additional material implements can also add points.

This is less for - magic as chess, and more like magic as juggling with nukes.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 07, 2021, 09:17:30 PM

Did you watch the video? I specifically call out "mana point" mechanics as boring.

Mana points by themselves are boring, but you can add any number of mechanics on top of them to make the game more interesting.  They lend themselves to this approach.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 08, 2021, 02:46:16 PMMana points aren't chess. They're Accounting.

Im being fascetious. I just find the confidence with what you dismiss things you personally dislike and prop up things that you personally like, funny.

How reliable a magic effect is and the limits of their abilities depends on the myths and such. To say magic is unreliable in myth I find is not a fully accurate statement. From my experience with russian folk-tales (and eastern ones), the proper descriptor is arbitrary.

In a folk tale 'spellcasters' don't generally 'fail' a casting roll. Baba yaga just flies always and her spells work always, but have somekind of 'undo' clause (and not always). Spirit binders from eastern mythology might need to make a ritual (generally quick), but there is no chance in will fail until some bumbler messes up the paper runes or something.

Mythological magic is.....purely a construct of narrative. A way to make it work in a game would require it to be a narritivistic 'storygame'. So we instead compromise with making it somesort of limited resource.

If you wanna frame the designwork in terms of making it strategic, thats a completly different ballpark from making it mythological.

Edit: But so far Im rolling with Savage Worlds which is a spellcheck system+spellpoints. And the powers a character has are very limited.