Deciding between magic systems

[dorchadas]

I went back to my old Dark Places/Avernum game idea, stripped out the Avernum part, and decided to make a more traditional fantasy setting using the Exalted-derived system that I started with Warlords of the Mushroom Kingdom and have been developing since then, that I called "E10" in its latest incarnation. It turns out there's not much market for a skill-based, dice-pool, adventurer fantasy game, so I've got to make it myself.

Anyway, I'm trying to decide between three ways of handling magic:

Sorcerer Revised

The first system is based on the one from Mage: Sorcerer Revised, where there's a bunch of paths divided by effect, so a sorcerer with the Path of Healing can heal increasingly worse wounds and cure increasingly more fatal diseases as they gain dots in the path, or a sorcerer with the Path of Enchanting can make more potent magical items, or one with the Path of Fortune can bless or curse from further away and with greater efficacy. Each path also has rituals that take longer than a few moments, so there's a ritual in the Path of Hellfire that can rain fire down somewhere but it takes half-an-hour to cast. Magic here is generally slow--a lot of effects require the sorcerer to build up to them over multiple actions or spend a scarce resource in order to ensure they can cast their spells quickly. However, it is possible to perform a ritual and then "hang" it so its effects can be used quickly, a bit like spell memorization in D&D.

Pros

• The original is for a World of Darkness system, so conversion would be minimal.
  
• Magic almost always takes time, which prevents wizards from dominating combat situations. They can spend a bunch of mana to incinerate a group of soldiers or or teleport the party away from danger, but it's generally a better and safer idea to cast more slowly.
  
• More a sword and sorcery feel, where wizards can do a few things off the cuff but generally need to prepare.
  
• Players have a flexible set of possibilities to draw on. If facing a group of hobgoblins and the sorcerer isn't powerful enough to kill them all, perhaps she can burn one to death so the rest of the party has fewer enemies, or maybe she can try to hit all of them with an ice storm that won't even hurt them very much but will slow them all down.

Cons

• I'm not a big fan of effects-based systems from a roleplaying perspective, since it's more fun to say "I cast Fires of Uuhl" rather than "I'll use Path of Hellfire ●●●"
  
• Some things that I'd definitely want magic to do, like "create zombies"-style necromancy or any kind of natural world druid magic, don't exist and I'd have to write rules for them.
  
• Division of paths means it's harder to build a wizard around a unified theme. Some kind of poison-based "venomancer" would probably need Path of Alchemy, Path of Fortune, Path of Hellfire, and maybe path of Summoning/Binding/Warding for calling poisonous animals. If I wanted an ice wizard under the Warhammer system, I just make one.
  
• This might discourage people from playing sorcerers if they feel that everything they can do is very limited or takes too long. If most magic requires ritual and is thus out of scope of adventuring, why take it?

Warhammer

The second system is based on the one from Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying Second Edition, with the Winds of Magic. Magic is divided into discrete "winds," each of which covers a group of related concepts--the Bright Wind involves burning things and fire, but also hot emotions like anger or lust, warmth and heat, cooking, or movement, whereas the Amber Wind involves physical transformation, instinct, and communication or summoning animals. A sorcerer picks a single wind and draws on it for their powers through a list of discrete spells. This system has generally a more high-fantasy feel, where a hierophant can fill an entire building with light or blast a demon with bolts of holy fire, or a druid can vanish into the earth in an instant and reappear nearby or transform an enemy into stone.

Pros

• A list of spells means players have a better idea of their own capabilities. Instead of looking at the Path of Conveyance and having to decide if the chasm is too wide, or if there are too many people in the party, or if they have the skill or the time to cast a ritual to teleport the party to the other side, they can just check their spell list and instantly know if the party needs to learn how to swim very quickly.
  
• Similarly, the list of spells is already all written and I'd just have to convert them.
  
• Strong thematic typing means that it's easy for the PCs to figure out the capabilities of their enemies. A wizard wearing grey with a shadow that has blurred edges even in strong light? Probably an illusionist. A wizard with bright red hair and a large burn scar? Probably a pyromancer.

Cons

• The high fantasy feel isn't quite what I'm looking for. Sorcerers are immediately and usually flamboyantly obvious, which changes the setting in various ways.
  
• A powerful wizard can warp a battle around them. A high-powered pyromancer can incinerate an entire squadron of soldiers or inspire their allies to courage, and a high-powered illusionist can convince an enemy that a rampaging dragon is attacking.
  
• Warhammer Fantasy's balance for magic is the possibility of spells going horribly wrong, and while Storyteller has a botch mechanic, it becomes less likely rather than more as a wizard gains power. I'd have to come up with a similar mechanic for E10.

Changeling

The third is based on the Contracts system from Changeling: the Lost. Each Contract contains five powers, ranked from one to five, and thematically linked. For example, the Contract of Vainglory is about being metaphorically and socially above others, and starts with being able to give orders more effectively and moves up to being so imposing the others cannot attack you or are forced to flee from you and ends with being able to tell stories that others believe due to the sheer force of your personality. The Contract of Fleeting Summer is about rage, from sensing the angriest person nearby, rousing up or dampening anger, or channeling anger into battle fury. There are a couple dozen of these and more written by fans, so there's plenty of material to draw from.

The five-level, each-level-is-different structure also means I can go plunder all those thaumaturgical paths in all the Vampire: the Masquerade books I have and adapt them to magic system. Do I need wizards to be able to do stuff with dreams? Steal Path of Morpheus. Become a magic-empowered battlemage? Path of Mars. Etc.

Pros

• Much like Sorcerer Revised, the Contracts are already written in the Storytelling system so conversion is minimal.
  
• Since my idea is that magic in this world was learned from the Fair Folk, the system from a game about the Fair Folk makes a lot of thematic sense.
  
• The "Catch," a series of actions that reduce the cost of a power, means that sorcerers would be creepy weirdos always doing bizarre things, which fits a dark fantasy feel. The average person wouldn't understand why the sorcerer is inviting people to a party when she's expecting an assassination attempt or spending an hour polishing the statue in the town square, they'll just think wizards are crazy, but the sorcerer would be doing it to use magic easier.
  
• I could make orders of wizard by saying this group teaches this Contract, and that Contract, and this other Contract but only up to ●●●. Like, a theoretical School of Pyromancy would teach Contracts of Punishing Summer, Contracts of Fleeting Summer, Contracts of Verdant Spring, Contracts of Communion (Fire), Contracts of Elements (Fire) to ●●●●, and Contracts of Thorn and Brambles (fire-themed) to ●●●. That's a nice spell-list.
  
• Contract effects are generally low-scale. A sorcerer won't be destroying an army here, though I could make ritual magic more powerful if I wanted.

Cons

• The links between powers are much less obvious. Unless the players are very familiar with the whole list, a wizard using one power isn't going to tell them anything about other powers that they have. There's an in-game way to get around that for the same Contract (Occult rolls to recognize it), but it won't speak to other Contracts.
  
• Since it's Storytelling instead of Storyteller, it requires more conversion than Sorcerer Revised (but less than Warhammer)
  
• It's less amenable to having a particular type of sorcerer in mind (without the schools I mentioned above), since the Contracts are so varied and can have such different effects. All wizards will by definition be weird.

I actually came up with basing them on Contracts while I was writing up the pros and cons of the other two and now I'm really leaning toward it, but I'm willing to consider counterarguments.

So, here's a poll:

Poll #23315 Magic System Poll

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 3

View Respondents

Which magic system seems the better option?

View Answers

Mage: Sorcerer-based system
0 (0.0%)

Warhammer Fantasy-based system
0 (0.0%)

Changeling-based system
3 (100.0%)

Comments

[shadaras]

I think it depends on the feel you're going for? I'm only familiar with C:tL out of these systems, which gives me a strong bias towards that.

With either C:tL or Mage, I'm wondering if you could like... divorce paths from effects? Like, if you want people to theme it better, you could just like... say that it takes some amount of XP to buy an n-dot contract/spell? And then people could just pick and choose. Maybe with a thing like, "You need at least one spell of the previous dot level before you buy up a new one" or something, so that people didn't just load up on 5-dot effects? Then you could get the ease of "There's a spell list" along with the thematic flexibility you seem to like about the Warhammer system, but you've also for the relative ease of conversion from the WoD games?

[dorchadas]

Make everything a discrete power like Goblin Contracts, you mean? Just have a series of spells of levels one through five?

Hmm...that might work...

[shadaras]

Yeah, exactly. :)

I'm curious to hear about what you end up going with!

[dorchadas]

I started trying the Contracts-as-spells system and I actually really like it! It gives spells like

Conspirator’s Confidence

Cost: 1m		Casting: Speed 6
Duration: One scene	Target: One yard
Keywords: None
Difficulty: N/A		Attribute: N/A
Catch: The sorcerer is speaking to someone she knows has an embarrassing secret that they do not wish to be revealed.

The sorcerer draws close to a person, veiling her words from passersby with the murmurs of suspicion. For the duration of the spell, the sorcerer and anyone she speaks to at less than a shout cannot be clearly overheard by mundane means. Effects with the Scrying Keyword still function, but the sorcerer is alerted that someone is listening unless the eavesdropping party wins a Clash of Wills.

Skinmask

Cost: 1m		Casting: One minute
Duration: One Scene	Target: Self
Difficulty: 1 		Attribute: Stamina
Keywords: Polymorph, Stackable
Catch: The sorcerer has an object belonging to the person whose features they plan to copy

The sorcerer alters his flesh to appear as another individual. This change affects only a single limb or other aspect of the character, so only his hands or his face or his back can be made to resemble that of another person. This spell is often used to enhance disguises, though it is some-times used to emulate unique birthmarks, signature tattoos, etc. The feature so modeled must be a real feature that exists on a known subject. The sorcerer can use this spell multiple times to reproduce multiple features, but the cost must be paid each time and the roll must be made each time, as well.

Reminder of Duty

Cost: 2m, 1w		Casting: Speed 6
Duration: One Scene	Target: 20 yards
Difficulty: 1 		Attribute: Presence
Keywords: Compulsion
Catch: The target has expressed intent to break a vow he has sworn with the sorcerer

Taking on the bearing of the imperious judge, the sorcerer interdicts the target of this spell from breaking any promises he has sworn. The spell is resisted with Resolve + Integrity, but if successful, the net successes on the roll are treated as an Unnatural Intimacy binding the target to the promise.

...all of which are suitably sword-and-sorcery weird like I was going for. Thank you for the idea!!

[shadaras]

Awesome! These do indeed look really cool, and I'm happy that it's working so well for you! :)

[draxil]

I'd recommend thumbing through GURPS (4th ed) thaumatology, it's got a lot of adaptable ideas for magic systems.