Alternative Magicks: The Sources of Magic

Following on the last post, in which I laid out my thoughts on the spectrum of spellcasting types in a Oe/1e context, there are some immediate implications for spellcasting character classes that directly follow.

One last note on the Octagram I showed you as a handy graphic reference to the relationships of the various flavors and inflections of magic in this schema before I start talking about character classes. In addition to the magic types arranged radially in a spectrum, and the inflections from light to dark to indicate value, we must also consider the source of the magic in the world.

The core D&D rules contemplate two fundamentally different sources for magical power: the Arcane and the Divine. Those who deal in arcane magic are magic users, who study magical forces accessible in the world and learn technical methods for manipulating them. Those who deal in divine magic are clerics, who pledge personal obedience to divine sources of power and receive magical abilities in return, channeling the divine magic. This is a fundamental divide that represents a profound difference in approach.

However, the source of the magic doesn’t affect the types or value of the magic as I’ve already outlined them. Some spells are purely wizardry – accomplished by a sort of technological means and tapping into deep underlying forces – while others are purely miraculous – accomplished by commune with the divine. But there are many spells that will derive from either source, and some substantial areas of overlap.

So there is one last distinction that is symbolically recorded in the Octagram above:  Arcane vs. Divine:

ARCANE MAGIC

Signified by a square.

 

DIVINE MAGIC

Signified by a diamond.

 

Which, of course, combines in the Octagram like this…

 

 

 

…to represent the source of all magic (the Octagram being the symbol for magic of all kinds in this system I’m cooking up). Look familiar?

Now, this probably seems like a lot of effort to go through for some dubious reasons, and far off the track of superimposing a mana-based magic system on D&D. In my next post, covering spell-casting character classes and variants under this system, it will become a little more clear why I’m doing all this cogitating and diagramming. However, there are several aspects of the exercise of creating all this symbolism that should not be underestimated.

1. These symbols can be used by a GM to add a lot of flavor to a campaign. In fact, any GM could use this magical cosmology without any of the mana-based rules and it would work just fine. The players won’t necessarily know what all of this means when they’re first exposed to it. Spell-casters should be given some of the basics, but not all of it. They will know the meaning of symbols associated with their own realm of magical contact (and should treat them as profound secrets), but little else. Every piece of knowledge associated with it should be a puzzle (it being arcane knowledge, after all). Scrolls and magic items will almost certainly have some of this symbolism integrated into them. Having learned about while campaigning, players will learn how to begin decoding some of the mysteries of their world and take pleasure from doing so.
2. Visual symbols are a very efficient way to communicate a lot of information in a very economical way. Once the players learn that wizards wearing yellow are prone to conjuring horrors from mid-air or that a faint magenta glow likely means some sort of protection spell at work, they will start to pay attention to details in their environment and pick up a lot of information by doing so.
3. One of the biggest problems with many game mechanics is that they are conceived as game mechanics first, and don’t always have the sort of logical, holistic consistency and integrated complexity to them that we expect from a fully realistic world. They’re fundamentally arbitrary, and this is especially problematic when it comes to inherently non-realistic areas like magic. By having a clear cosmological framework for how magic works in the game world, especially when this can be summarized consistently in some symbolic ways, with add to the realism and satisfaction of the game.