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.

I always thought the old Sovereign Stone magic system was fun.  Mages could cast their spells as much as they wanted, no /day or MP or anything.  It could fatigue them though.

Spells had a Casting Threshold.  The more powerful the spell, the higher the CT.  You rolled a d20 + spell casting modifier (any bonuses or penalties from other sources).  The roll results accumulated over successive rounds and the spell goes off once you hit the CT value.  So if you need a 28 for a fireball and get an 18 on round 1 you roll next round to try and get the last 10pts needed.  If you only get an 8 then you can keep going on round 3.

Every round you spend casting you need to make a Fortitude save.  The save DC goes up by 1 each successive round you spend casting.  Every time you fail the save you take 1d4 subdual damage.  So you can potentially knock yourself out casting a spell if you can't hit the CT in a reasonable amount of time.

I really liked the Earthdawn magic system. It was heavily tied to its setting and combined several aspects of magic, such as replicating and thread weaving to create something that felt far more fleshed out than D&D or any of its direct derivatives.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 06, 2021, 08:29:17 PM
The "vancian" magic system of standard D&D is not without its benefits, but for a broader type of fantasy could there be a magic resolution system that would be more broadly functional and better emulate the western tradition of myth?

Have the right components, spend some time, and make a success check the odds of which are based on level, an ability, or level in a class.

For the purpose of this post let's call it a ritual even if it can be done within a combat round. Spells will be considered traditional D&D spells regardless of edition.

Rituals have an effect. Effects can be random, based on the components used, based on the what determines the odds of success, can be based on the class, skills, or attributed used. Can based on setting circumstances like phases of the moon, or stellar alignments.

Rituals may not have a relationship which each being it own special things that are separate.

Rituals may have a relationship organized as a series of prerequisites. 
Rituals may organized into colleges, arts, schools, etc.
Rituals may be  organized by difficulty.

And so on. But in my opinion the heart of "casting" magic in western myth (as opposed to having magic as a inborn power) is that you need to have gathered the right stuff (component) take some amount of time (doing the steps of the spells), and finally have the skill to pull all this off.

And you have to look carefully whether the magic described is something that inborn or learned. As inborn powers are effectively fantasy superpowers.

The starting point in my opinion is to describe how it works if the individual was standing there seeing all this play out. Then devise the mechanic to fit the description. This avoids creating dice games that only work by game logic.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 06, 2021, 08:29:17 PM
The "vancian" magic system of standard D&D is not without its benefits, but for a broader type of fantasy could there be a magic resolution system that would be more broadly functional and better emulate the western tradition of myth?

Whoa, for a second there I thought that I was reading an article from a 1980's issue of Dragon. 

You can tailor your spellcasting to whatever system fits your genre the best. The thing is that after almost five decades of D&D, that D&D itself is a genre and "vancian" casting is the standard. If you deviate from that standard far enough, you will lose people interested in playing the game.

The only modification to spellcasting that has stood the test of time for me has been what we called "The Cocaine Rule". Once your spell slots were used up, a magic-user could still cast spells but the cost was in hit points of damage per level of the spell cast.

Quote from: jeff37923 on February 23, 2022, 11:29:17 AM
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You can tailor your spellcasting to whatever system fits your genre the best. The thing is that after almost five decades of D&D, that D&D itself is a genre and "vancian" casting is the standard. If you deviate from that standard far enough, you will lose people interested in playing the game.
...

People have ever been complaining of D&D's influence in the hobby, and the lack of D&D players willingness to try other systems.

It might be just me but the past few years this effect seems even more prevalent.

I've seen lots of commentary about players just not playing anything unless it's 5e D&D.

In the 90' and early 2000's It used to be players that had issues finding a GM that didn't run D&D. Now I see lots of comments to the effect that it is GM's that are having issues finding players interested in non-D&D games...

Largely anecdotal, but IMHO the new 5e player base seems to be separating itself from the rest of the RPG hobby far more than it used to be in the past.

Pocket Fantasy uses battle magic and freeform magic.

In combat a Wizard gets 2 spells per battle.  They're chosen from a fixed list of 6 spells.  Two buffs for friendliest, a direct damage spell, an area effect spell, a crowd control spell, and a summon pet monster.

Out of combat you get two spells per session that can be anything the GM will allow.  The GM sets a difficulty level, and the Wizard rolls a skill check to cast that spell.