I see all this talk about Vancian magic. Jack Vance is alright - but I mostly know his Sci-Fi stuff.

The first time I ever tried to run a typical D&D-esque fantasy adventure with GURPS was back in the late '80s...with third edition GURPS of course.

Well, I didn't grow up playing D&D as my primary RPG - for me it was TRAVELLER.  The most recent "Fantasy" books that I had read that involved magic was Roger Zelazny's The Changeling. (Thats the one where a infant with magical ability from a fantasy world gets switched at birth with a kid from our world - that really screws up things for the other world. )

In the Zelazny book magic is described as something threads and strands that only the magically gifted can see to weave and create their spells.

 SO, thats the way I described it when I ran my GURPS:FANTASY one-off.

The players loved it .

After a while they also caught on that I was associating different colors with different types of MAGIC and spells - and they used that to the group's advantage.  (This was maybe a year or two BEFORE Magic:The Gathering was released...by-the-way...)


Anyone else use Zelazny type magic in their games?

 Are there any other Zelazny books I should read up on if I ever eecided to do it that way again?

Got a frequent player who says she usually HATES the way that magic is handkled in most D&D and roleplaying games. She vaguely remembers the unusual way I described it that night and said she preferred my angle on it vs. other GMs.


- Ed C.

The sequel to Changeling is Madwand, which goes even more into magic and Pol's family history.  These were two of my favorite books back in the day; if its been a while it might be worth rereading the first before you get into the second.  AFAIK he wrapped up the storyline and didn't set any other books in that world.  I haven't read all his other books, so I can't say what else might be useful, but my impression has been that his settings and styles vary somewhat between books and series.

I don't, off the top of my head, know of a rules set othat explicitly uses the Zelaznian paradigm, rather than a set list of spells.  Be interesting to see one.

Earthdawn has a Magic as Threads setup too.

The magic in the Zmber series' (showcased more in the Merlin books) is different from that of Changeling / Madwand, but still pretty cool. The underpinnings of it are very much Vancian in that it's asystem where spells are prepared and used up, but instead of squeezing it into your head you "hang" a spell by performing all but the last few syllables and hand gestures.

Quote from: James McMurrayEarthdawn has a Magic as Threads setup too.

The magic in the Amber series (showcased more in the Merlin books) is different from that of Changeling / Madwand, but still pretty cool. The underpinnings of it are very much Vancian in that it's a system where spells are prepared and used up, but instead of squeezing it into your head you "hang" a spell by performing all but the last few syllables and hand gestures.

This, by the way, is what spell magic in D&D 3.X is actually like for spell-casters that prepare their spells (Clerics, Druids and Wizards in the core rulebooks), and why it's more accurate to call it "Zelaznian" than "Vancian".