DnD magic is just fine, if you're playing in "D&D world". For any other world, it is a barrier to emulation. OSR TTRPGs with settings/genres different from "D&D world" need to adjust accordingly.

Well I want to start off by saying thank you for a fantastic video.
One thing I think plays in to the way magic is portrayed in a number of ttrpgs is the needed work to have a magic system where spells are not fixed formulas is the amount of work involved.
One thing I learned working on my own game is that even a simple spell or ability that does one or two simple things is  a pretty good chunk of work all by it self. Simple ideas like lightning lash or heated hands need a good bit of work to fill them out beyond guy gets hit it hurts him.

Making D&D magic feel more Vancian/Magical

A simple thing I do at my table; and have been thinking about doing as a blog article. is spell slots are directly tied to your INT score for Magic-Users.

1.  E.g. A wizard with an INT of 12 can hold twelve 1st level spells, or two 6th level spells or any combination there in.

2. Spells are not fungible, no two spells are identical in the setting and only one instance of a spell can be memorized, meaning you can't have twelve light spells or magic missiles.

3. Players roll to see what spells they have in their spell book at first level, and can only get spells from learning and adding them to their book, not from leveling.


In effect this makes magic users are both way weaker (but also more powerful in some ways) but more magical feeling, more arcane and odd. it also is a way of emulating Jack Vance better without really a major overhaul of the D&D spells themselves, as the DM just includes or excludes what feels right for the setting.


The Pundit Style of Magic


I'm currently running a playtest of a modern day OSR monster hunter game I've dubbed Be Not Afraid. for a year now plus change. while the game is not directly centered around magicians (As the game is more about playing everyday people or the those graced by the divine) I do have it as an option to pursue being a chaos magician. as a placeholder for this I've used Invisible Collages magic for this purpose. This is what I've gathered so far.

1. Players are very receptive to the ritual nature of the magic, they think in terms of prep and conditions for casting and trying to time shit for when they need it, it leads to a more methodical use of magic at the table I quite enjoy.

2. The magic itself is rather evocative and never not interesting, outside of basic bitch sigil work every time magic has been used at the table it was typically pretty eventful.

3. More so For the Invisible collage than say Lion & Dragon, the book is a bit uptuse to use at the table itself, it's one of those things you almost need to memorize or have a player tell you in advance what they plan to cast or do because finding stuff and understanding on a first pass what needs to be done I find hard. This could be more a formatting issue but it does niggle at me.

4. Attainment is a super interesting mechanic, what I love about it the simple principle of doing magic makes you better at magic (combined with the rituals required to get over certain thresholds) makes it an interesting mechanic, I have something quite like it called Conviction in my game setting.

What I don't care for is maybe  more of a setting based issue, but the idea of the sum total of one's magical power being tied up in one stat seems a bit odd, I do understand the way occultism is lensed through a Masonic universalist viewpoint. it mechanically makes sense to make it a single streamlined stat but it really doesn't make sense why a rando chaos magic user is better at Voudon magic than a dedicated Bokor Priest who's done that their whole life. (I know Voudon/Voodoo isn't in your system but I was using it as an example)

I had an idea for a magic system I might do, by breaking up a stat like Attainment into the theories and practices, each theory and each practice goes from 0-100 like Attainment. adding together the bonuses, it means a player could super specialize on being super good at Runic Divination or CyberSigils. or more generalize and pick up a lot of +1 in everything.


EDIT: I don't really have a lot to say on Lion & Dragon / Baptism of Fire's magic system other than to say like how standard D&D magic perfectly fits a setting like Mystera, so does the magic of those games, combined with the good layout makes it breezy to use at the table and they are purpose fit those game settings.

Thank you for the video. I've long felt that D&D magic doesn't fit anything other than the feel of D&D worlds, and it's also why strap-on additions (e.g., Incarnum, Name Magic, etc.) always felt weird to me. For that matter, D&D psionics has never been something I love, and its hardwiring into Dark Sun is one of the few strikes against that setting for me.

D&D magic has been around long enough to go full circle, with magic from some serious literature seeming to emulate it.  The best example is Zelazny's second amber series - Merlin (of Chaos and Amber, not Camelot) "hangs" a limited number of spells before use which are one shot only.  I don't know for sure that D&D inspired this, but I do know that the author got into RPGs late in his life, so it's certainly possible.  I'd probably be contemptuous of anyone else that did this, but everything Zelazny wrote is gold.

Quote from: Mishihari on December 29, 2024, 04:38:11 AMD&D magic has been around long enough to go full circle, with magic from some serious literature seeming to emulate it.  The best example is Zelazny's second amber series - Merlin (of Chaos and Amber, not Camelot) "hangs" a limited number of spells before use which are one shot only.  I don't know for sure that D&D inspired this, but I do know that the author got into RPGs late in his life, so it's certainly possible.  I'd probably be contemptuous of anyone else that did this, but everything Zelazny wrote is gold.

The Merlin series started before Zelazny played any RPGs, though he was aware of them as a thing. Furthermore, he had the idea for the character long before he wrote the books. It's not clear from his notes and his other writings, but I suspect that the idea came from his widespread reading of other authors.  Zelazny believed that a writer should read fiction and non-fiction pretty much continuously as part of learning how to write. Plus, he was often experimenting in his published writing.

Quote from: kosmos1214 on December 28, 2024, 05:58:20 PMWell I want to start off by saying thank you for a fantastic video.
One thing I think plays in to the way magic is portrayed in a number of ttrpgs is the needed work to have a magic system where spells are not fixed formulas is the amount of work involved.
One thing I learned working on my own game is that even a simple spell or ability that does one or two simple things is  a pretty good chunk of work all by it self. Simple ideas like lightning lash or heated hands need a good bit of work to fill them out beyond guy gets hit it hurts him.

Thanks!

Quote from: Socratic-DM on December 28, 2024, 05:59:30 PMMaking D&D magic feel more Vancian/Magical

A simple thing I do at my table; and have been thinking about doing as a blog article. is spell slots are directly tied to your INT score for Magic-Users.

1.  E.g. A wizard with an INT of 12 can hold twelve 1st level spells, or two 6th level spells or any combination there in.

2. Spells are not fungible, no two spells are identical in the setting and only one instance of a spell can be memorized, meaning you can't have twelve light spells or magic missiles.

3. Players roll to see what spells they have in their spell book at first level, and can only get spells from learning and adding them to their book, not from leveling.


In effect this makes magic users are both way weaker (but also more powerful in some ways) but more magical feeling, more arcane and odd. it also is a way of emulating Jack Vance better without really a major overhaul of the D&D spells themselves, as the DM just includes or excludes what feels right for the setting.


The Pundit Style of Magic


I'm currently running a playtest of a modern day OSR monster hunter game I've dubbed Be Not Afraid. for a year now plus change. while the game is not directly centered around magicians (As the game is more about playing everyday people or the those graced by the divine) I do have it as an option to pursue being a chaos magician. as a placeholder for this I've used Invisible Collages magic for this purpose. This is what I've gathered so far.

1. Players are very receptive to the ritual nature of the magic, they think in terms of prep and conditions for casting and trying to time shit for when they need it, it leads to a more methodical use of magic at the table I quite enjoy.

2. The magic itself is rather evocative and never not interesting, outside of basic bitch sigil work every time magic has been used at the table it was typically pretty eventful.

3. More so For the Invisible collage than say Lion & Dragon, the book is a bit uptuse to use at the table itself, it's one of those things you almost need to memorize or have a player tell you in advance what they plan to cast or do because finding stuff and understanding on a first pass what needs to be done I find hard. This could be more a formatting issue but it does niggle at me.

4. Attainment is a super interesting mechanic, what I love about it the simple principle of doing magic makes you better at magic (combined with the rituals required to get over certain thresholds) makes it an interesting mechanic, I have something quite like it called Conviction in my game setting.

What I don't care for is maybe  more of a setting based issue, but the idea of the sum total of one's magical power being tied up in one stat seems a bit odd, I do understand the way occultism is lensed through a Masonic universalist viewpoint. it mechanically makes sense to make it a single streamlined stat but it really doesn't make sense why a rando chaos magic user is better at Voudon magic than a dedicated Bokor Priest who's done that their whole life. (I know Voudon/Voodoo isn't in your system but I was using it as an example)

I had an idea for a magic system I might do, by breaking up a stat like Attainment into the theories and practices, each theory and each practice goes from 0-100 like Attainment. adding together the bonuses, it means a player could super specialize on being super good at Runic Divination or CyberSigils. or more generalize and pick up a lot of +1 in everything.


EDIT: I don't really have a lot to say on Lion & Dragon / Baptism of Fire's magic system other than to say like how standard D&D magic perfectly fits a setting like Mystera, so does the magic of those games, combined with the good layout makes it breezy to use at the table and they are purpose fit those game settings.

That's some really great analysis of how magic works in the Invisible College!

Quote from: HappyDaze on December 29, 2024, 12:40:40 AMThank you for the video. I've long felt that D&D magic doesn't fit anything other than the feel of D&D worlds, and it's also why strap-on additions (e.g., Incarnum, Name Magic, etc.) always felt weird to me. For that matter, D&D psionics has never been something I love, and its hardwiring into Dark Sun is one of the few strikes against that setting for me.

Spread the word, share the video!

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on December 29, 2024, 08:29:13 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on December 29, 2024, 04:38:11 AMD&D magic has been around long enough to go full circle, with magic from some serious literature seeming to emulate it.  The best example is Zelazny's second amber series - Merlin (of Chaos and Amber, not Camelot) "hangs" a limited number of spells before use which are one shot only.  I don't know for sure that D&D inspired this, but I do know that the author got into RPGs late in his life, so it's certainly possible.  I'd probably be contemptuous of anyone else that did this, but everything Zelazny wrote is gold.

The Merlin series started before Zelazny played any RPGs, though he was aware of them as a thing. Furthermore, he had the idea for the character long before he wrote the books. It's not clear from his notes and his other writings, but I suspect that the idea came from his widespread reading of other authors.  Zelazny believed that a writer should read fiction and non-fiction pretty much continuously as part of learning how to write. Plus, he was often experimenting in his published writing.

If I had to guess, he may have been inspired somewhat by Vance.

Didn't Ars Magica release their magic rules into an SRD?

They released the older edition for sure.  I have that on the mighty to-read and may play pile.

My idea for magic is for it to be variable. 

Casting a spell to bend a spoon you're holding is easier than a spell to lift an army tank out of the mud from a mile away.

Both are telekinesis.

Let the GM set the target number for each time you cast a spell.

The target number can even change every time, even for the exact same task.  Why?  It's magic. It waxes and wanes based on mysterious patterns that nobody knows about. 

Fixed effects for fixed costs with exact numbers shouldn't be a thing. 

Quote from: weirdguy564 on December 29, 2024, 09:21:42 PMThe target number can even change every time, even for the exact same task.  Why?  It's magic. It waxes and wanes based on mysterious patterns that nobody knows about. 

Can't say as I or any of my players would like that. In most heroic fantasy game settings, magic is generally well understood and fairly predictable (even when it is not, such as "chaos magic"). When it stops following those rules, it's generally a big problem that PC-types have to go fix.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on December 29, 2024, 09:21:42 PMMy idea for magic is for it to be variable. 

Casting a spell to bend a spoon you're holding is easier than a spell to lift an army tank out of the mud from a mile away.

Both are telekinesis.

Let the GM set the target number for each time you cast a spell.

The target number can even change every time, even for the exact same task.  Why?  It's magic. It waxes and wanes based on mysterious patterns that nobody knows about. 

Fixed effects for fixed costs with exact numbers shouldn't be a thing.

Yes, and that reduces the number of spells you need. You don't need multiple healing spells, just multiple difficulties on the check necessary to cure stuff. You don't need dozens of attack spells, you just need different difficulties depending on the strength of the spell you want to cast, and maybe variations on the type of damage it does (ie. fire vs cold vs lightning).