Magic With Consequences

[Chaos_Sinner777]

Magic is OP, how to nerf? Or at least limit its use? Welp, here's a magic system I thought up in the shower to give my two cents.

Miracles of Chaos

All living things are born with two special things within them. The soul, and life force. To the layman, the difference between the two is indistinct. But to the select few, they are two halves of a greater whole. A small percentage of sentient beings can shave off pieces of their soul and mingle them with equal portions of life force, then offer that mixture to the Goddess to be granted a miracle. The amount offered does seem to corelate to the extent of the effect, though such comparisons are difficult to make. This magic cannot be controlled, but the outcome is generally good for the caster, or at least aligned with their goals. (Similar to Dragon Magic in the Inheritance Cycle.)

As an example, if a Miracle Caster were seeking to defend a town, they could not simply decide to use magic to build a great wall around it. But their magic would follow their desire to protect it. Creating some monster aligned with the interests of the inhabitants, conjuring a storm around it, or shrouding it in an illusory fog that misleads would be invaders.

Now, to go further into the use of Life Force. Life force is energy that is born of the body, and supports it in turn. When expended, it is normally quick to recover. If one were to expend half of their life, they would recover within a few days. However, if they were to overexert, spending more than half within short order. . . They might permanently reduce their life force capacity or slow down its recovery rate. Burning over ninety percent is a death sentence. A slow, withering death where the body starts to fail over the course of weeks.

The Soul on the other hand, is the core of the being. It is not so fickle a thing as to fade away from overuse. As long as the slightest ember remains, one may eventually recover. However the less of the soul that remains, the fewer emotions the user can feel. Less motivation, decreased feelings of happiness, excitement, or love, and so on. Soul Depression normally starts to set in at forty percent of the soul's typical whole. Additionally, it is very slow to restore. A fragment of about five percent of the soul would only be regained after a month or more. If one were to expend the last spark, it would surely be the end. Not of their life, but of their humanity. A creature without a soul of its own would seek to fill the hole with the souls of others. But can never truly regain what it has lost.

It is important to find a balance in how you use magic. One cannot be frivolous with the soul, nor overextend the life force.

The Final Offering. If a caster were to give up everything to the Goddess, the result would be far greater than anything they could accomplish otherwise. The difference between offering ninety nine percent of both the soul and the life force, and giving up everything, is generally thought to be an entire order of magnitude. But giving up both entirely means certain death, and complete oblivion. (A bit inspired by Death Curses from the Dresden Files.)

Catastrophe. When opposing miracles collide, the outcome serves no one. In a battle of tens of thousands of common troops, there might be ten Miracle Casters on each side. If all twenty of these casters were to make a Final Offering at the same time, seeking to change the course of the battle for their own kingdom, the resulting Catastrophe could well cleave a continent in twain. Naturally, nothing on the battlefield would survive such an upheaval.

Divine Ritual. Through currently unknown means, but surely involving many casters working together, the Goddess can take great actions far beyond mortal power under any other means. As with other magic the exact results cannot be determined. She may gift the casters of a successful ritual special powers, or send them a mighty hero from another realm. Perhaps she could even rewrite the very fabric of reality to allow for new possibilities that we could scarcely guess at. It is thought that legendary monsters were all born from such rituals performed by misguided or evil men. . .



So, anybody else have interesting ideas for limiting magic's use? This one seemed interesting to me, but isn't exactly suitable to the type of LitRPG/GameLit stories I've been writing.

 

[K5Rakitan]

Catastrophe. When opposing miracles collide, the outcome serves no one. In a battle of tens of thousands of common troops, there might be ten Miracle Casters on each side. If all twenty of these casters were to make a Final Offering at the same time, seeking to change the course of the battle for their own kingdom, the resulting Catastrophe could well cleave a continent in twain. Naturally, nothing on the battlefield would survive such an upheaval.

I mean . . . isn't that what's going on in the real world anyway?

 

[Cipiteca396]

Hmm. I'm not really interested in limiting magic. Instead, it's better to bring its competitors into line and make them equally powerful. Having said that...

Generally speaking, people limit magic by; giving it a cost like your soul/life force, directly limiting what it can do like with fire mana = fire and nothing else, indirectly limiting it by making it obscure or mentally taxing, and by making it plain impossible unless you have a special trait/bloodline/ally that lets you do it.

The one that I always think of is from a story I read a long while ago. The use of magic just cuts your life shorter. Every spell literally takes 'time' off the end of your lifespan.

LitRPGs actually have some of the hardest limits. It costs mana, it is limited to what the system will allow you to do, you need to grind for stats, levels, and skills, and you need a class or magic item to even have the option of using it.

I wanted to say more, but I got bored, I guess?

 

[TotallyHuman]

I don't really see a reason to limit magic, or nerf it, or whatever. I've read novels where despite the lack of limitations, the scenarios played out quite interestingly, mostly driven by the characters and a better rendered image of the overall scene. A magic system with many limitations, however, is simply one waiting for the author to get tired of it and say "fuck it" and start bulldozing things.
TLDR: no need to come up with magic systems for the sole reason to nerf magic or whatever, focus on better settings instead.

 

[greyblob]

make the lifeforce and soul irrecoverable. mages would have a 50 or so low levelled casts within their lifetime. a leeway would be some unique fruit to recover what's lost, or the ability to leech off other creatures. depending on how you go you could make all mages vampiric lifesucking monsters or maybe you'd have two factions: the good guys, and the lifeforce vampires.

 

[Chaos_Sinner777]

Hmm. I'm not really interested in limiting magic. Instead, it's better to bring its competitors into line and make them equally powerful. Having said that...

Generally speaking, people limit magic by; giving it a cost like your soul/life force, directly limiting what it can do like with fire mana = fire and nothing else, indirectly limiting it by making it obscure or mentally taxing, and by making it plain impossible unless you have a special trait/bloodline/ally that lets you do it.

The one that I always think of is from a story I read a long while ago. The use of magic just cuts your life shorter. Every spell literally takes 'time' off the end of your lifespan.

LitRPGs actually have some of the hardest limits. It costs mana, it is limited to what the system will allow you to do, you need to grind for stats, levels, and skills, and you need a class or magic item to even have the option of using it.

I wanted to say more, but I got bored, I guess?

Limiting how much you can use it short term and what it can actually do is good. But it still often ends up feeling stronger than other options at similar levels. Not to mention it's easy to come up with ways that an isekai'd MC can bullshit their way into being way better at it. Like "What happens if I use wind magic to feed extra oxygen into my fire magic?" To say nothing of how it could interact with a Unique Skill. I could probably work this magic system into a LitRPG with some alterations. Sort of a Chaos Mage class? With there being other magic options probably. It'd be powerful but unpredictable. But it feels weird to make it the only form of magic for that kind of story. Specifically because it's hard to control.

I don't really see a reason to limit magic, or nerf it, or whatever. I've read novels where despite the lack of limitations, the scenarios played out quite interestingly, mostly driven by the characters and a better rendered image of the overall scene. A magic system with many limitations, however, is simply one waiting for the author to get tired of it and say "fuck it" and start bulldozing things.
TLDR: no need to come up with magic systems for the sole reason to nerf magic or whatever, focus on better settings instead.

No need to bulldoze anything! The Goddess, I.E. Chaos, can simply rewrite the laws of reality in response to a big enough ritual. Anyway, a fair part of why I went down this magic system tangent was that I was thinking of less typical magic systems, then I thought, "Huh, that's a dangerous type of magic to actually use." Hence the "Magic with Consequences" angle.

make the lifeforce and soul irrecoverable. mages would have a 50 or so low levelled casts within their lifetime. a leeway would be some unique fruit to recover what's lost, or the ability to leech off other creatures. depending on how you go you could make all mages vampiric lifesucking monsters or maybe you'd have two factions: the good guys, and the lifeforce vampires.

Now that is a severe limitation. I'd want to make sure each cast, even when used with only small portions can have a big effect then. And that vampiric monster idea works perfectly for a thing that happens when a caster in the current framework expends the last portion of their own soul. Overall, I'd make soul the irrecoverable one, rather than both. Then the "Vampires" could freely use souls they steal, but would still be at risk of overextending their own lifeforce.

 

[hauntedwritings]

There is a number of ways to nerf magic, some of which have been mentioned in one way or another.

1. Reduce the level of power. This means that while there are magicians, their individual power isn't that significant. In essence, the vast majority (or all) that know magic are essentially viewed as capable of doing a neat trick, something comparable to a street preformer. Alternatively, you can make the ability to use magic exceptionally rare. We don't think the ability to read and write is something amazing these days, because a lot of people know how.

2. Reduce variability. Just because you know magic, it doesn't mean you can do anything you imagine. This is essentially what things like the spirits of the elements do when used as a setting.

3. Increase the cost / repeatability. Essentially what has been mentioned, where a mage can only cast a certain number of spells - where the cost can be either recovered over time, or not at all if you want to make it hardcore.

4. Introduce mediums as requirement. Things like wands or other physical items that are needed to use magic efficently and accurately - where you can scale the rarity and usefulness of these items.

5. Increase casttime. Essentially, magic can't be cast on the fly, but rather has to be treated as a form of ritual. Takes time to prepare, during which the caster is vulnerable.

6. Reduce accuracy. (Similar/can be linked to point 4.) Just because you know what you want the magic to do, doesn't mean it will happen exactly as intended.

 

[greyblob]

Now that is a severe limitation. I'd want to make sure each cast, even when used with only small portions can have a big effect then. And that vampiric monster idea works perfectly for a thing that happens when a caster in the current framework expends the last portion of their own soul. Overall, I'd make soul the irrecoverable one, rather than both. Then the "Vampires" could freely use souls they steal, but would still be at risk of overextending their own lifeforce.

yup. it gives sorcery a very grand feeling instead of just being a convenience, which makes more sense with the whole offering to the gods ordeal. Mages are a few great beings who literally sacrifice their lives for the people. While the vampiric ones are murderous greedy ones looking for personal glory and achievement. Could also play around with the leeching conversions so that only 1% can be extracted from a single person. Meaning, in order to recover fully, vampires would need to slaughter a village.

 

[NotaNuffian]

The whole "use lifeforce" portion can be mitigated with sacrifice, ie human sacrifice.

In the first place, using both your hitpoints and mental points as casting resource is not a new idea, but the reason why it is OP is because you deciding to use it as a resource for the Wish spell, THE MOST POWERFUL SPELL in the known universe.

Why do we have chanting? Hand signalling? Material consumption? It is all to create a limiter. Which you are not imposing other than the hitpoint recovery and mental point. Also, you made it so that even if the spell is to fail or go unexpected ways, it still works, this should not be the case.

1. Casting from hitpoints should count, if you use one year of your life, you need to take more than one years to get it back. No elixirs.
2. Casting from mental points affects the outcome, the lower your remaining mental point, the higher the rate of failure. Example is to make emotion the key point of magic, the more emotional you are, the higher the chance of success and vice versa.

 

[SailusGebel]

Magic is OP, how to nerf? Simply don't make magic OP.

 

[Chaos_Sinner777]

The whole "use lifeforce" portion can be mitigated with sacrifice, ie human sacrifice.

In the first place, using both your hitpoints and mental points as casting resource is not a new idea, but the reason why it is OP is because you deciding to use it as a resource for the Wish spell, THE MOST POWERFUL SPELL in the known universe.

Why do we have chanting? Hand signalling? Material consumption? It is all to create a limiter. Which you are not imposing other than the hitpoint recovery and mental point. Also, you made it so that even if the spell is to fail or go unexpected ways, it still works, this should not be the case.

1. Casting from hitpoints should count, if you use one year of your life, you need to take more than one years to get it back. No elixirs.
2. Casting from mental points affects the outcome, the lower your remaining mental point, the higher the rate of failure. Example is to make emotion the key point of magic, the more emotional you are, the higher the chance of success and vice versa.

Can the wish spell in D&D even fail? Oh well, having a failure chance would be a solid alteration to this idea. After all, I Chaos, am the so called "Goddess" they are making offerings to, so nothing should be certain.

And I had not intended for casters to be able to use resources from other people so freely. Nor had I intended the outcome to usually be as powerful as a wish spell. Perhaps the Final Offering casting would be equivalent to a wish in D&D. Where as the Divine Ritual option would be like a high ranking god casting the wish spell. If a god casting wish would make the spell better somehow? I'm unfortunately not that into D&D. I think I would like to be, but have not had the opportunity.

 

[NotaNuffian]

Can the wish spell in D&D even fail? Oh well, having a failure chance would be a solid alteration to this idea. After all, I Chaos, am the so called "Goddess" they are making offerings to, so nothing should be certain.

And I had not intended for casters to be able to use resources from other people so freely. Nor had I intended the outcome to usually be as powerful as a wish spell. Perhaps the Final Offering casting would be equivalent to a wish in D&D. Where as the Divine Ritual option would be like a high ranking god casting the wish spell. If a god casting wish would make the spell better somehow? I'm unfortunately not that into D&D. I think I would like to be, but have not had the opportunity.

Yes.

You still recall the entity known as the Dungeon Master?

When you decided to go gungho and let the magic users just, and I quote, "use magic with the two resources and not citing any other limitations", to me that is just Wish.

Also, Wish can be use for large magnitude/ world altering effect or it can be something small like "I wish to cast fireball", "I wish to have coins for the inn tonight", "I wish to get the affection of the princess even though I am ugly as heck". In those cases, the respective spells are "fireball", "minor Wish (does not exist in D&D but Mages are too OP, a shitty CN novel)" and "charm, but with autolocking".

Your magic is basically Timmy Turner wishing to his fairy godparents and having the effects popping out thanks to Chaos indulging them.

 

[Cipiteca396]

Sort of a Chaos Mage class?

More like a cleric or even warlock, honestly. The need to appeal to a higher power really informs the nature of the class. Chaos Cleric does work though.

and I quote, "use magic with the two resources and not citing any other limitations", to me that is just Wish

That's not a quote, this is a quote. It at least needs to be word for word and not summarized in your words.

"I wish to have coins for the inn tonight",

That would be the Creation spell, or maybe just a super long lasting prestidigitation. Or Teleport Object, where some random person's coin pouch just got lighter. Though if you have access to Wish, you don't really need money anymore, at least in such small amounts.

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Why do we have chanting? Hand signalling? Material consumption? It is all to create a limiter. Which you are not imposing other than the hitpoint recovery and mental point. Also, you made it so that even if the spell is to fail or go unexpected ways, it still works, this should not be the case.

Your magic is basically Timmy Turner wishing to his fairy godparents and having the effects popping out thanks to Chaos indulging them.

I guess the real problem here is the idea that magic is OP. It's only that way if you as the author make it so. Even if your super powerful mage has world altering abilities, like meteor storm and mass teleport... So what if you're in a Sci-Fi setting where millions of starships can blow a planet in half or hyper-warp across galaxies?

In such a scenario, the imposed limits would be a crippling disadvantage since you can do the same stuff without sacrificing your soul or lifeforce. Hell, at that point it would be better to rely on the tech than a random chance spell. About the only time anyone would bother using magic is in an emergency when they had no other choice.

Limiters aren't some universal virtue. They only exist to make the world seem fair. So if you start imposing limits based on other settings because you like them better, the result is just a mess. Let Timmy have his damn wish.

 

[NotaNuffian]

More like a cleric or even warlock, honestly. The need to appeal to a higher power really informs the nature of the class. Chaos Cleric does work though.

That's not a quote, this is a quote. It at least needs to be word for word and not summarized in your words.

That would be the Creation spell, or maybe just a super long lasting prestidigitation. Or Teleport Object, where some random person's coin pouch just got lighter. Though if you have access to Wish, you don't really need money anymore, at least in such small amounts.

---

I guess the real problem here is the idea that magic is OP. It's only that way if you as the author make it so. Even if your super powerful mage has world altering abilities, like meteor storm and mass teleport... So what if you're in a Sci-Fi setting where millions of starships can blow a planet in half or hyper-warp across galaxies?

In such a scenario, the imposed limits would be a crippling disadvantage since you can do the same stuff without sacrificing your soul or lifeforce. Hell, at that point it would be better to rely on the tech than a random chance spell. About the only time anyone would bother using magic is in an emergency when they had no other choice.

Limiters aren't some universal virtue. They only exist to make the world seem fair. So if you start imposing limits based on other settings because you like them better, the result is just a mess. Let Timmy have his damn wish.

Then in the case, balance the book then. Imho balance in the world isn't real, or at least true balance and what you are implying as an example is a cross-universe event that puts a football plaher into a basketball match.

The imposed limiter in the magic world is for the magic users, at least for the noobs, to not spam them like uzi because of the term "use with consideration". If your actions have no consequences, would you still be a good person or would you go rogue? Would you vouch for the rest of the mage community that they will not go rogue? Here is how society works, we have laws as government sanctioned limiters, societial etiquette as limiters set by the community to keep each other in their pants. Does limiter sucks? YES. But do you want your world to get warped every minute because someone who has magic can't do jack shit about control? That depends solely on you and how the author crafts his work.

The one thing that I dislike the most of your reaaoning is that you coining the mage goes into a scientific world and the limiters are killing him/ her. Who is barring them from adapting, ie using the damn tech? There is something called "survival of the fittest" and somewhere in the evolutionary line, the mage's ancestors decided that magic > science and therefore magic all the way, so are the non-mages damned for life? Yeah!

If the author wants, he/ she can do a short realisation that magic isn't omnipotent, it is just another tool. Then have the character work to improve and learn from their "competitors".

For the record, in the case of no limiter but just the hitpoint and mental point usage for the mage who goes into the scientific realm, here is a quote for the mage to learn, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." He will be in a world where he might stand out as "the guy who warps reality around". If it is played for laughs, it is just mob psycho or that pink hair guy with glasses and a random assortment of ESPs. If it is for serious shit, then he might get a bunch of people hunting for him. For the record, the mage's power depends on three things, his hitpoints, mental points and the ability to think what he wants. On the scientific side, they depend on these few variables, resources and knowledge (stemmed from innovation and countless testings).

Why in some cases where science beats magic is because magic is unknown, something that we find it hard to quantify and therefore either too underwhelming or too overpowered. You want the magic to be OP af and curbstomp all, that is fine if you think that is your cup of tea. But OP here specifies to put limiters for their magic system because they understand vaguely that it is broken. So I am answering to OP about adding a few locks and speedbumps so that the book can balance in the magic world. Your idea of a visit to the scientific world can be an arc, but your reasoning on arguing the need of a limiter for the mage in that world is irrational to me.

 

[Cipiteca396]

If your actions have no consequences, would you still be a good person or would you go rogue? Would you vouch for the rest of the mage community that they will not go rogue? Here is how society works, we have laws as government sanctioned limiters, societial etiquette as limiters set by the community to keep each other in their pants. Does limiter sucks? YES

This is irrelevant. Those are artificial limits, and we are talking about physical, reality(read: author) defined limits. The mages didn't collectively get together and decide, "Well, since Larry decided to nuke Reality #1 out of existence, NOBODY gets nuke magic in the next version. Way to go Larry, this is why we can't have nice things." Although I actually have seen that idea used effectively before. But it still isn't on topic.

The one thing that I dislike the most of your reaaoning is that you coining the mage goes into a scientific world and the limiters are killing him/ her. Who is barring them from adapting, ie using the damn tech?

This is a misunderstanding. I'm not talking about Isekai. In my example, say every person in a science fiction, far future setting is a mage. But they aren't OP because their power is on par or possibly weaker than the technology at their disposal. Maybe the limits imposed by the original post make sense in another setting, but here they make magic redundant to the point of asking, "Why even have it?"

You stated that the limits imposed weren't good enough. My point was that limits must take the setting and the author's intent into account, that even the ones you said were too loose would be too restricting in another setting. There's no hard and fast correct answer that justifies your passive aggressive responses.

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It seems like everything you wrote to me was based on those two points. I can't find anything actually related to my points. Actually, maybe this one line?

But OP here specifies to put limiters for their magic system because they understand vaguely that it is broken

The original post asked for interesting magic systems based on limits that we've created or encountered, not to 'fix' the one they provided as an example. Technically, it's fine to make improvements as you see fit, but scolding them for not getting it 'right' is unpleasant at best.

As a side note, I seem to get in a lot of random arguments that derail the thread. If you choose to respond to this post, I'd appreciate it if you really thought about whether it would be better to start a private conversation instead. This thread potentially has room to be further explored, but it seems like people don't like interrupting arguments and end up leaving without saying anything.

 

[ElijahRyne]

Plague Doctor did something like this. The more you use magic the more mad you became. In that universe people who are crazy are more susceptible to higher beings influence.