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Smarter Characters can Stack magic abilities... Potions that increase enchanting ability create a Ring of Potion Enhancing... increasing enchanting, increasing the potion power. LOOP & Stacked Magics are the shortcut to extremely powerful Characters. Enchanted Items increased Smithing & Potion & Spell casting to, logically, increase enchanting powers so Goals & Motives & Beliefs Change. Why fight any dragon when you can charm them or alter their alignment and motives to become a Vegan dragon ? 🙂
You see, I don't actually have to make a magic system until book 3, because the protagonist is new to magic as well. No one explains it to him until way later, but don't worry I totally already planned it out and there will surely be no contradicting information once I reveal how it works.
I love hard-ish magic systems where there are definite rules and limitations, but where those aren't necessarily understood fully in-world, nevermind by the reader. This allows both for well-timed reveals and for SEEMING subversions of the established rules. It's really hard to get it right, because it's so easy to shred the suspension of disbelief, but when a writer gets it right... *chef kiss*
My favourite example is Virtuous Sons. Each culture does cultivation(the generic name of the magic system) differently, both in the perspective of their advancement as well as specific elements that they consider relevant, but there’s still a common thread of personal refinement and moral virtue and excellence being a good way to advance, even if no one can agree on what exactly that entails and what is the best virtue to follow.
Your last point about showing Level 10 magic while the main character is Level 1 is really on-point, since one of my stories starts with an intense competition between the magic users showing how it can be used on an expert level before revealing a poor young girl in patched clothes watching from behind a fence, wishing she could be one of those people.
I made it so that the main trio all have really powerful magic, but can't control it, or even use it to its fullest at will. Kind of like how Percy Jackson can hold back the sea, or choke someone with their own blood, but he doesn't because of mental restrictions. I wish I could explore your idea. A magic contest sounds so cool.
@@GodRyan929 Percy Jackson can't choke someone with their own blood. That's pure headcanon. But he can choke someone with their own saliva, so that's something.
A perfect example of this is the opening of Baldur's Gate 2. The antagonist archmage, Irenicus, demonstrates unassailable power right off the bat, exploding and disintegrating tons of opposing mages with high-level spells, before allowing himself to be captured. It makes it very apparent that the player's party stands no chance against this enemy, but by the end of the game, they have (potentially) mastered spells of similar power themselves, and can fight this mage on equal terms. It's a fabulous introduction to a truly iconic villain.
The "Everything is a nail!" problem can also be the counterpoint to another, equally bad problem: "I've never seen a nail before in my life." In this variation, instead of using the same solution over and over, the character(s) constantly neglect to use previously proven solutions to problems. It is boring when a character uses the same solution over and over, but it's also extremely frustrating when the character DOESN'T do the thing we KNOW they can do that solved the same issue last time!
Yes! Very important inversion to point out! Also described as the "idiot plot," because the only way the plot can keep happening is if everyone is too stupid to solve the problems through the very obvious solutions.
There’s also the other version of this. Where the main character comes up with a “clever” way to use the magic, except it doesn’t really feel all that clever. It feels incredibly obvious, and the reader has to wonder how over 1000 years of magic users haven’t figured it out already. For example, “I can levitate 500lbs of water. Can I levitate the water inside a person to make them helpless?” Once again, Brandon Sanderson did have a reasonable solution to this. The main character was elated that they figured out this cool, but rather obscure idea. Another character pointed out that there’s a much simpler answer. It’s such a powerful technique that those people who have figured it out really don’t want to share it with the general public.
so the key is to balance it so that they use proven solutions for,repeated problems, but are forced to change solutions as the problems dont repeat too often, got it
The cultural and legal one made me think "Harry Potter", I've always said "this probably doesn't happen in the US's magic school" they're probably like "as your first class or protection against the dark arts you'll learn the killer spell as such spell is protected by your first and second amendment rights as the basis to enforce your fourth amendment rights"
Would the 4th amendment protect you from the tracking spell without a court order? Would you be prevented from using scilent attack spells as that would be considered a "fully automatic wand"? Would you need to pay monthly insurance for your wand in case of litigation?
@@VukMujovic I'm assuming the magic school, being secret and secluded, would have it's own jurisdiction and tradition, I doubt they are beholden to the NFA and it'd silly logic. But yeah, I feel like being found to have used a tracking spell would probably be a fourth amendment violation. Probably Dementors are heavily regulated for this very reason, as their ruthless and and relentless aggression would constitute some WMD or biological weapon of sorts.
@@highonquack6622 indeed, given the Specto Patronum doesn't take a toll on the user I bet not helping someone with a Dementor would constitute a crime.
For your first example of anti gravity, MHA did a great job balancing their character. She needs to touch the target with the pads on her fingertips, gets severe nausea when she uses it on herself or exceeds the capacity of ~3 tons, and when she cancels the ability by tapping the pads of her fingers together, everything stops being affected
@@mihaleben6051no, it’s written as an ability with clear limitations and a clear actionable activation/deactivation mechanism. It only feels like a physics problem because of how defined it is, since when you learn a lot about a hard magic system the amount of known variables makes it similar. It isn’t physics, it’s just also got a lot of variables
There is another kind of limitation you can add to magic : danger from being detected. Think Gandalf saying that if he use fire magic, everybody (aka, Sauron and Saruman at least) will know that he is there. Or the way the paradox strikes Mages in the TTRP Mage : the awakening. It's not exactly a physical cost, because it's unpredictable. It's a threat : if the hero use magic, very bad things may happen, and he can't know what because those things have a will. Thus, such a limitation has another advantage, because it gaves more choices to the writer. It's a "deus ex machina" that is a consistent with the world.
Good point. Another "limitation" I like is the "world of cardboard" effect. Essentially, a character with super strength or powerful elemental affect has to take great care when using such power. Otherwise, they could cause unspeakable, catastrophe damage with their power and unintentionally commit horrific acts.
@@Magus_Unionthis connects back to lord of the rings quite well, the Valar could easily destroy Sauron, but not without destroying most of middle earth, so instead they send spirits like Gandalf and limit their powers a bit more than normal.
That doesn't really count as a limitation because nothing is ultimately stopping the character from doing the overpowered thing and the audience knows the writer just chooses whether or not the watcher shows up. If you use it as your limitation, you can never not have the watcher strike in response to excessive power level, or else the illusion of the limitation's existence is shattered.
@@yurisei6732 Eh no. Nothing stopping people from breaking the law either. Soft limits are still limits. You can even build an entire story about how the protagonist keeps challenging the limit and spends the rest of the time running away from the Warden that comes to get them. Actually that's just your average crime thriller storyline.
@@raizors1331 The difference is that people reading crime thrillers are already pretty familiar with how "the consequences of breaking the law" works. Crime thrillers depend on the reader having a pre-established assumption that the police investigate crime and try to lock up or kill the people who do it, and sometimes the assumption that "law enforcement" is morally good, too. This is how crime thrillers manage to get away with almost never actually arresting anyone, especially when from the perspective of the criminals. When you're writing a magical punishment system, you don't have any of that. You have to find a way to make the reader understand what it is and give them a way to believe that it's a significant threat. The only way to do that is to actually show it causing problems, and in a consistent way. Like, imagine what crime thriller would be like if there was no such thing as law or the police in the real world. You'd think any character with a gun was massively overpowered because the only limitation on who they could shoot would be the possibility that after shooting someone, a faceless armoured monster might show up and put you in a room. Except you write it so that that monster never actually shows up, the worst that ever happens is sometimes the characters hear the siren that indicates the monster is approaching. There's no way to believe the monster is a credible threat, and therefore it doesn't really act as a limitation. The reader doesn't think "Oh he can't shoot his way out of this problem because he doesn't want the monster to show up".
I am very autistic, and that may be a reason on why I love HARD magic systems, there is something special about a rule or condition going full circle, or stretching a law to its absolute limit, the how far can I take this… I love the idea of challenges not only the protagonist gets to solve, but also the reader as they go along, how some times the reader, based on the set up of the situation, and the rules, can come up with different solutions to problems, how something this are the same the main character chose, or been surprised by a way a ability was used since they weren’t expecting it, but it also makes sense. Idk why, it’s just so satisfying.
"Everything's a nail" -- or in D&D terms, "I cast Fireball". "I didn't ask if we were fighting Fire Elementals. I said, _I cast Fireball."_ More on-topic, last year I did a Nanowrimo story where curses are literally the residual spirits of the one who died placing them (which is a hard rule), very soft-magicky (limited only by terms intuitive to each curse), and it starts with my main character getting cursed into being a monster (well, more a "magic animal" kind of "monster" but still). But what made it really challenging is that the first-person POV is _from the curse itself,_ who acts as a second voice in the main character's head that nobody else can perceive or knows about. Technically this means my POV gets more visibility into the setting's various soft-magic than the character should normally have, but this also doesn't suddenly turn it into a "hard magic" system either, because the curse more or less "used up" its soft-magic abilities on the main character, leaving it constrained in their new body.
@@andano4055 What, my story? No, I wrote it under the strict time limit that is Nanowrimo so I have no intention of posting the "full thing" as currently written. It has some neat moments to be sure but a completed plot or overall "story arc" is _not_ one of them. For example, late in the story they encounter a monstrous, chimeric beast and the narrator (i.e: the curse inside the main character) is able to detect that the monster is under its own curse -- so the two curses are able to sort of talk directly to each other, end result being the main character was able to befriend the monster, and by the end of the month that monster is now part of the party. For a creature that was intended to be a bit part for the party to fight (not necessarily _kill,_ but at minimum just escape from) this was a completely unexpected development, but it occurred too late in the month to really do much with.
@@Stratelier Thats understandable, sounds like an amazing story though! It seems like you’ve got a lot of unique perspective written into it, and I wish you the best with wherever you go with the rest of the story!
About the "everything looks like a nail" - thing: it could be cool to have the protagonist use his one signature spell for everything, but his opponents getting wind of it so in the gravity example the 3rd time they find a way to tether themsekves to the ground - and then the protagonist has a problem cause he's used to gravity working...
Just be careful with it, otherwise you'll have an entire page of how the villain counters every previous ability that the hero used, like "oh I have this tether to stop your gravity magic and this roof to stop your sun magic and this torch to stop your ice magic and this enchanted armour to stop your sword summoning magic and these enchanted boots to stop your spike summoning magic..." Etc. etc.
Another plausible situation for the “ everything looks like a nail” magic is when it is used as comedic relief. For example, a protagonist can for a very short span of time, temporarily remove all forms of friction on their target. It’s low cost, fast and no direct damage but can disarm or trouble opponents. It is a magic that can absolutely be abused but the writer only uses it sparingly and only for comedic effect. I think it is brilliant.
For me, it's definitely when the system is trivialized by poor writing choices. ie: You have a magic caste system, but the protagonist is either good at them all, or has a unique skill that beats out all other types. Or, like in Harry Potter, you have all these spells and hexes and jinxes and curses had could be used in creative ways, but the enemy faction has the OHKO spell Avada Kedavra. You might as well have given them guns.
The AK isnt really that OP. Harry potter is a pretty equal mix of hard magic and soft magic systems, and the AK has many drawbacks 1: It has a long incantation(AVADA KEDAVRA) compared to other spells like Stupefy, which would effectively do the same thing, or Bombarda. 2: It can't be cast non verbally, so you always get a warning 3: it can be blocked by physical things like cover 4: Most importantly, it needs PURE HATRED to work properly. if you don't HATE something from the bottom of your heart, at max it will give them a nosebleed. So other than people like Voldemort, who's been established to be a hateful litlle bitch, its not useable outside a few niche scenarios 5: it weakens/fractures your soul. 6: IDK the consequence of both eternal suffering in Limbo being stuck, not able to pass on when you die, and the consequence of being chucked in with the dementors no questions asked for life is a pretty big consequence
Some of my ocs are a 'jack of all trades' type. But one of them just recently discovered her powers and doesn't use much aside from simple levitation or similar things to make her life easier. Others have been practicing and studied magic for literal *centuries*. And a couple were trained (harshly, think what happened to the indoraptor) to be weapons of war. And then some have weak magic, or none at all. I try to balance out my cast.
Reincarnated as the 7th prince managed to explore the complex magic system while still being OP by just turning the mc as someone that's just curious about magic. I think the anime is just about the magic system itself with story in the background
it *can* work to make a protagonist good at all of the types of magic, it just gives a very different feel to what the magic's role in the story is, usually, when this is achieved well, it's usually where the magic is mostly trivial in the grand scheme of things, where the real stakes of the story are more social, and the magic is just symbolic, or the story is mostly lighthearted, a more lighthearted story works too
So, here's a story I'm making: In this world magic is pretty common but only non-human races can use it naturally, humans have to work hard for power equivalent to demons to happen. That's why certain people have been trained since childhood to be paladins, mages and clerics. The reason why is because humans and non-humans are in an eternal war, waging each other in the name of their god. And as such, their gods gave them assets: The hero of humanity and the Hero of hell. This is where the main character comes. He's the hero of humanity... Except he didn't want to be that, he expected the girl he's in love with (a renowned paladin considered to be the strongest human alive) to get that title. In a panic, and trying not to get on the bad side of her, he proposed that they could fake it, and say that she was the one chosen by the gods and that she holds the amazing power the gods gave him. The way i limit the clearly overpowered character is by trying to come up with situations in which he's not able to use his powers without outing himself. Since, if they discover the lie, she's getting the axe to the neck. I don't know if that's a good concept, but i wanted to share it to see what people think. I'm new to writing and probably sounds dumb, but i tried. 😂
You may need to provide enough story building reasons as to why it would result with an axe to the neck, especially given the circumstances where an eternal war is going on, every single good fighter counts, whether a blasphemous liar or not, otherwise there's a good chance that it may not be taken too seriously due to the leaps in logic.
I think it would make an interesting story. Reminds me a bit of the movie "A Knights Tale", where the main character comes across a dying knight at the beginning of the film and steals his identity to participate in the tournament. He is eventually outted, but it has a happy ending if I remember correctly. Now to be fair, no one's life was on the line other than his own for lying.
I'd refrain from saying the hero of hell. You are making a parallel to hero of humanity but "hell" isn't the opposite of humanity. Like in LotR you might have heroes of humanity, elves, and dwarves. All are races in that world. Hell isn't a race, so it wouldn't have a hero. If your counterpart race to humanity are "demons," then say the hero of demon kind
@@l.n.3372 The reason why he's called that is because the title was given by humans. Heck, the name "demons" was also given by humans. There's 4 races that make up the demonkind, humans don't care, they're all demons. Also, there's another reason why he's not the hero of the demon kind: He's not a demon. But that's a long story.
The superman thing reminds me... I've had some truly wild conversations with folks who just somehow entirely failed to notice the main conflict, or entire a-plot of a story because they couldn't imagine something like an internal conflict could possibly be the main point. I remember one guy who swore the main character in a movie had no character arc, and it was literally the entire focus of everything.
Reminds me of how battle shonen fans will equate power ups to character development. While the two can interact, you can have a character not grow in power and grow as a person.
@@danthespaceman9747 This reminded me of some comments I saw under a video about how shonen manga/anime often isn't great at representing, or even giving narrative space to, women. The video brought up some good and bad examples etc and at some points mention "strong female characters". Fairy Tail is brought up as a not very good example. Like half the comments are just different variations of "actually, one of the women is a very powerful summoner and has much power and - yadda yadda yadda". To some a characters power and importance is strictly tied to their battle power I guess.
@@danthespaceman9747Omg I was talking to one of my friends about Yuji Itadori from Jujutsu Kaisen, and he was saying how the author dropped the ball with said character because he’s not as powerful as other shounen MCs, and you hit was I was thinking right on the mark
This is why I prefer stories or anime where the battle is just side dish, not the main focus, because crazy powers or crazy visuals often distract people from the decline in stories and characters.
In one of my worlds I had a unique restriction where 2 magic users (Called "Philosophers") can never be close to each other for a long period of time, or their combined presence will attract an ancient being that will literally cause immeasurable loss of life. Therefore, all the powerful magic users stay the hell away from each other and new ones who don't know better get taught by the older ones really quick.
One magic system I enjoy is in the skulduggery pleasant books. It's sort of a mix of hard and soft magic: There are some clear limits established in th beginning of the series, but on the occasions that those rules are broken, the readers don't feel cheated because of the way the breaking of these rules is explained. Additionally, neither the reader nor the characters ever seem to fully understand magic, due to just how vast of a group of forces, entities and abilities it covers.
Not read them so can't say for them specifically, but usually when a hard magic system is "breaking the rules but explaining how", it's not actually breaking the rules, it's just showing that the real rules are different to the rules initially presented. It's still fully hard, it's just maintaining the intrigue instead of loredumping the full explanation upfront.
@@yurisei6732the way I see it, it's "breaking" the Newtonian laws of magic, but it's because Einstein didn't discover Special Magitivity yet, not because the author's a hack. That's an important distinction.
I feel like because the protagonist is on a learning journey herself (and comparatively young) there's some leeway. It's like when you do an advanced science lesson and teacher says "All that stuff we taught you? That was a necessary stepping stone to understanding but throw that out, it's more complex than you knew".
In a world building project I’m working on, the magic system revolves around some weird invisible matter which somehow interacts with the transmission of information in any living organism. Basically, when there is strong emotion or a strong wish or a defensive reflex in any living being magic can be triggered accidentally. So plants, fungi and animals have evolved to either have a more complex way of information transfer like a brain to have better control over their magic or specific behaviours to trigger useful magic reflexively. For humans that means, that they can cast magic with a specific goal in mind but never exactly know how that goal will be achieved but also that getting to know yourself better and having better control over your subconscious will directly correlate to better control over magic, not it’s strength tho, because that depends on the quantity of that magical matter stuff in your vicinity and your willpower. A simpler goal therefore usually creates stronger but less controllable magic than a more specific one.
Reminds me of Dynamis from FF14! It's a hidden second magic system that comes from intense emotion. It's also how the player is capable of intense feats of power in their role (known as Limit Breaks) such as tanks creating a big protective barrier around their allies, healers reviving everyone and bringing them to full health, melee weapon users dealing a devastating blow, or magic users bursting large amounts of concentrated power in an area. Of course, not the exact same magic, but it is also used (shortly) to transfer information as messages between two parties without the need for translation. They will always know what the sender is trying to say without the need of translation.
Agreed! I have been sitting on ideas for so long with no idea how to write them down. This videos are helpful and are giving me some much needed guidance on how I might be able to write my own novels
I always write the worldbuilding first. But that usualy ends up with me going way too in-depth, and coming up with historical events and mythical creatures/places/things that end up never actualy making it into the story 😅
Yeah, a common trap I fall into. I got around that in my TTRPGs magic system by litterally writitng out the tenants of this magic. I can never break those meaning my world has a clear and logical progression that can't be broken without feeling jarring.
Great video as always. I would dissagre partially on the sloppy buffet part. I really like when magic is this huge thing that affects the world. So when there is many different sort of mini magic systems it gives feeling of diversity. Of course if done badly then it is just a jumbled mess.
There's a very fine line between diverse and arbitrary though. Good diversity is variation that retains a feeling of connection and unity. A good diverse magic system still feels like one coherent magic system just with many intricacies. It's pretty much the same as in population dynamics: when you look at statistics, diverse societies and segregated societies are often indistinguishable in terms of things like number of people of each group within a certain area, but they function completely differently. The reason this is important is because if your buffet is too sloppy, you can't actually write interesting scenarios using it. You end up with a Marvel situation where the interior workings of any given person's ability is irrelevant because only the end results of powers interact with each other, and ultimately every fight devolves into punching and laser beams. When Iron Man fights Hulk, it doesn't matter that Iron Man's power is being a technological genius with a magic rocket-powered cybersuit and a sapient AI copilot, because all of those words are only used to generate punches, and Hulk has no way of interacting with any part of that power except the punches generated by it. If the magic system was a coherent "tech" system though, Iron Man's enemy could be a hacker who is able to disable parts of his power, and now he's in a fight that only him and this nemesis could ever have - Hulk can't be hacked and doesn't fight hackers on any different ground to anyone else - they all just die to punch.
Yeah, I think I understand what you mean, and I agree that worlds with multiple types of magic are super interesting. But I think the sloppy buffet still applies, actually it probably applies more. In order for that world to still be interesting, each different type of magic needs to have very distinct differences, which would lead to each one being very good at its one thing. It's like what he said, but multiplied by however many different magic systems you have. Think X-Men, where each character is very different, but has their own well defined strengths and weaknesses.
Are 2 mini magic systems fine? Like in my world, there's a stronger but less versatile magic bound to a God that must be worshipped to gain. Called Worship. And the other system is where one uses the soul of themselves and others to create a weaker and unpredictable but more versatile form of magic. This system is called Paganism.
4:15 Like in Re: Zero when Subaru over uses his magic gate and he needs healing from the best healer maybe in the world, than he has to leave mid way through his treatment to save everyone from the witch cult, eventually destroying his magic gate beyond repair. Though he does inherit the authority of sloth from Petleguse. To those who don't know about Re: Zero it's basically a phycological horror story with an extremely weak main character that somehow manages to pull through most situations with minimal long term damage other than extreme PTSD. One of the best stories I've ever watched, though they do make it rather complicated to the point it's hard to follow sometimes with the shear amount of things that did and didn't happen to remember.
The Re:Zero magic system is interesting, in the sense it isn't that Hard as a magic system, because there are PLENTY of different schools of magic. There's curses, witchcraft, spirit magic, classic elemental spells, blessings, martial techniques, weapons imbuing, and so on. But every character have his own personal limits, which make the magic system secondary to what can this or that character do with it. Subaru is a very poor mage, but it's proven afterward he's very gifted in witchcraft even if witchcraft have its limits, and he rely mostly on his contract with a spirit. You know what you can and can't expect from him. In the same way, Roswaal is a classic archmage, with powerful and destructive spells, but he can't use healing magic. It's the diversity of characters that make the magic system shine, not the intricacies of the magic system itself which is often loosely defined by how the people of this world use so many different techniques.
In my book i have a cursed physically impaired protagonist who wants to learn magic that changes her reality. This magic is wielded by (what are functionally) guardian angels and wings are a symbol of experience, power, and freedom. In the end of book one, she overcomes a great adversary and earns her magic wings at a very young age, but afterwards she struggles to make them appear, much less control her flight. Many people told me to save the wings for the end of the trilogy, because when you get the power to fly you’re already godmode. And that’s a valid concern. I avoided giving anyone wings for a long time because it felt like it cheapened the difficulty of certain conflicts. But there's no reason to assume that flight becomes the solution to every conflict, when it's just another tool the protagonist needs to learn how to use and when to use it. A lot of games will give you a glide early on and then more advanced flight later. This opens up the world without cheapening the conflict. I don’t like stories featuring magic where the protagonist can’t do any magic until the finale and then they struggle to do magic for 2 more releases. It’s far more interesting to me to give them power and watch them struggle to control it or watch it corrupt them - rather than have them squeeze droplets out of a dry sponge. A good example of this is Lord of the Rings. Frodo has the ring in the beginning but it is only used in certain situations, and if it's overused it will alert the enemy to their presence and begin to corrupt him. A bad example from the same story is how Gandalf doesn't do magic until the fellowship needs him to, and then he conveniently disappears so he doesn't become overpowered to the story. But in these kinds of stories, these guardian type figures are very much forces of nature who guide heroes on their quest within the parameters they are permitted to rather than directly intervene. Another bad example of this is Rey in the Star Wars sequels: she magically uses the force to win every scenario and never struggles to wield it or control it, much less is she tempted or corrupted by it. The concept of a protagonist who is very powerful early on yet unable to control it would have been very compelling for Star Wars as a stark contrast to Luke who had to learn from the bottom and train. But they just repeated Luke's arc and took out all of his hard work and internal conflict.
As an avid gamer, I agree: if the feedback is "flight seems too OP for this point in the story" then it sounds like they're assuming this ability is the solution to their central conflict, when (from your perspective as the writer) it's actually _not._ In many a Metroidvania, for example, you don't truly get an "OP" ability until the final areas, areas which no prior abilities will help you navigate. And, since you mentioned flight specifically, it reminds me of the movie _Rio,_ about a blue parrot who, due to a traumatic childhood incident, believes he's incapable of flying. Physically he's fine and flightworthy, but mentally, any time he's in the air he panics, flails, and falls.
Flight is OP? From the standpoint of military fiction fans, that's arguable. They even have a meme for it "What do you call flying soldiers? We call them skeets" Flight by itself is not OP. On the other hand, super fast flight tend to be. Flight by itself just give a new dimension to fight, aka, flexibility. A slow plane has to be forced to make very careful approach otherwise they're shot out of the sky.
And there could be physiological limitations. How fast can she go before the forces acting upon her body maim or kill her? Think fighter pilots. Also it's cold up in the air. How would she stay warm? Have you ever ridden a motorcycle while there is frost on the grass? Your hands and face will hate you, plus any holes or vents will become very obvious. She will need to protect herself from projectiles if she flies fast and how will she stop herself becoming a slow moving target if she cannot fly very fast? I like that you have included it early enough that the reader can discover along with her how she will overcome the limitations.
About the flying concern: I also think it depends on the limitations, right? If the flying takes just as much ressources as running, it ain't THAT OP anymore, is it?
Cal Kestis on the other hand was done right. The man’s a legit Jedi from the old days, but his original training ended at Padawan lvl because of Order 66, and on top of that it’s taking him multiple games to reconnect with the Force after the trauma from his past severed it
I litteraly found a magic system that ties into character, plot and setting and i'm so hyped. It just clicked, it makes sense thematically, it just works and it's beautiful
Another trap that particularly (though not exclusively) authors of hard magic systems suffer from is when they make all magic follow the same rules, they interpret that as basically just giving everyone the same power set. This is kind of a variant of 2, as it sort of implies that the level of skill in all fields of magic scale together (rather than - say - one wizard being better at enchantments while another is more skilled at alchemy), and results in issue 1 where it means the solution to every problem is the same because every threat is essentially the same but of more or less intensity. To use a superhero example, one of the great things about Spiderman's rogue's gallery is that that they challenge his abilities in different ways. He can't fight Green Goblin the same way he'd fight Doc Oc. Mysterio is of "ordinary" power but master of illusion making Spidey's strength the less important factor in the battle but relying on his senses vital. Venom on the other hand doesn't trigger Peter's Spider Sense at all so can't be approached in at all the same way. These are all different villains that offer different challenges, ensuring that Peter can't just approach every fight in the same fashion.
with most hard magic systems in theory everyone has the same things they are theoretically capable of, which can actually be a great way to make those fights interesting, with the consequences of fights being things like learning new abilities, and when victory is achieved, it isn't necessarily a rock paper scissors thing, it could really be described as the character's skills being ultimately why they won, which is incredibly satisfying, but this does require actually using the tools such a system gives the characters access to, make the fight a back and forth where both are trying whatever they can to win
Hard vs. soft magic depends a lot on how much access and control the main characters have with it. Soft works well if it's something the main characters can't do, and mostly see done in the world around them (in which case it can be just as mysterious and magical for them as it is for us), or if it's something they don't have great control over (if they did, then either they know how it works, so we the audience should as well, or it looks like the characters are just pulling things out of their magic asses). Hard magic is kind of needed if it's something the main party's going to be relying on and using a lot. We need to know their abilities, restrictions and at least a bit about how it all works for their actions and tactics to make sense. Or at least a blended system where we have a hard understanding of our characters' magic, but not about the broader magic of the setting.
I'm actually trying to explore "innate ability" where my MC has genetic innate ability placing him leagues above most others, but has close to zero talent for learning spells. Because he didn't train and learn on time, he needs to use other skills to compensate, and rely on other people. Magic systems, in the end, are just allegories for real life and there are limits to everything and everyone, and we need to work around them.
Talking about hard vs soft magic systems around 7:20 reminds me of another benefit of a hard system. Subversion. Tell the reader what the rules of the magic system is, but do so in the voice of one or more characters. Then reveal later on, subtly at first but eventually undeniably, that the rules as they were explained are wrong. Let someone find out the hard way that there are unspoken rules that prevent certain things that are supposedly permissible, or specific circumstances where the rules as they are currently understood to be may be broken. The effect when a magic user, be they hero or villain, suddenly finds out that their magic doesn't quite work the way they thought, for good or ill, can be very dramatic.
As a gamer writing a comic, I can only relate this video to the Every Frame a Painting video on Chuck Jones. Read/consume as much as you can (comics, videogames, books) and show discipline, since you can do everything, show everything, you'll be defined by what you don't do.
This has given me so much confidence since they are things I've thought of on my own. To hear someone who actually knows what theyre talking about say these things has really relit my fire to finish my story
Kevin Hearne's magic system in his Plague of Giants series was fascinating: to get a certain kind of magic you had to literally risk your life. If you over used that magic--it aged and eventually kill you. Great series.
Funny i always thought the key to the dune magic system was genetics and not spice. I mean spice is needed for sure, but your genetics are more important. Like gebetics are the spells and spice is the mana.
My (likely incorrect) understanding was that it was essentially an extension of Paul's mentat abilities, which let him do insane calculations very quickly. So he was basically doing calculations while tripping on mushrooms, which meant that he could fully visualise all of these possibilities he was calculating. No idea if that's correct though, just what I assumed.
@@i.cs.z It's not themed as magic, but structurally, it's magic. Some entities have the literal ability to perceive possible futures (with the limitation that prophets acting on their foresight cloud that portion of the future for other prophets). People can unlock the memories of all their ancestors up to conception/birth of the next ancestor in the line. Clones can remember their originals' lives - possibly even the lives of other clones of the same original. Then there's super speed, reversing the ageing process, various forms of mind control, etc. Strictly speaking, sure, it's based on speculative fringe science of the second half of the 20th century, so it's technically science fiction more than fantasy, but Clarke's Third Law is always lurking, blurring the lines between technology and magic.
@@i.cs.z The genetic memory bit, sure. The ability to perceive the future? That's based on other fringe and/or pseudo- science. The other abilities? Largely extrapolated from the claimed abilities of real-world mystics. Is it "magic"? How are you defining the term?
The Wizard of Earthsea did it years before Eragon. We can go all the way back to (to my knowledge) ancient egyptian mythology, where Toth was able to make things into existance by naming them.
My favorite magic system is the one in Light Novel Mushoku Tensei. At first it's described as generic mana based 4 elements + healing magic, you cast by shaping mana by chanting or drawing a magic circle. But later you realize that: 1. It can do anything as long as you have enough mana, understand the effect you wanna make and know how to shape mana to achieve it. 2. It's functionally simple elemental system because of a cultural framework around it, making it easier to understand and learn + magic is relatively new branch of science so it's still not fully developed.
I'm currently working on my 6 book fantasy series right now... so thanks for sharing great pointers for me to work upon to make my book better each day. You're really a great person for helping out the world of writers. Thank you, Jed. ❤
I'm glad I've dodged all of the mistakes and have done pretty well with my magic systems, based on these suggestions! I have a semi-hard system, with a ton of range, but also a lot of limitations. Some forms of magic are softer in execution but require greater effort to learn, and the others have harder rules but are less difficult to learn. Something I love about having more thought out rules for a magic system is that you can naturally "discover" things you hadn't originally planned. An example for me is my Pyromancy magic, which in my universe allows the caster to create and move flame and heat around. Much later on I realized that the way it worked would mean a sufficiently powerful Pyromancer would effectively become capable of a kind of Cryomancy (ice magic), because they can yank all of the heat out of things (or people.)
Im currently working on a weird-ish magic system based around light and lanterns and whatnot Lanterns are the inner light of the soul, this allows you to project the energy of the world and greatly increases your ability to control it, but you dont need it to internally manipulate it. Lanterns have a few unique properties in this world, one of which is attracting fragments of fallen deities. What attracts these fragments is the true light if your soul, and after a certain amount of fragments have been gathered, your lantern will undergo a change do represent the ability of the deity that has been attracted to your light. A few examples of abilities would be: Manipulating plants, clouds, or disease. The next unique feature is that lanterns can absorb elemental crystals. Elemental crystals are colored crystals that are specific elements depending on their color, for example: Orange = fire, Blue = Water, etc. these crystals are the basics of the magic system outside of the lanterns, but they work hand in hand with each other. Lanterns absorb crystals to "dye" your light to the element of the crystal, which also changes the lantern's ability slightly. For example, Someone with the lantern that manipulates the weather, specifically clouds, whom also has a crystal of fire, will be able to conjure dark almost flame like clouds that rain down fire. theres more to the powersystem but they remove the ability for a lantern, or might make it so instead of just "replacing" the lantern, one just replaces the crystals and the ability of the lantern. TLDR: Making a power system revolving around light, lanterns, crystals and blindfolds Crystals = elemental abilities Lanterns = natural occurrences (typically) beast wills = animal based powers (this might just instead of replacing lanterns will make the lantern and body become one, using this core as the center, idk how i wanna do it)
All of this good advice, in my Sovereign Species story, there are multiple magic systems at work within the story, one plain to see for everyone that the main characters use, another more esoteric and soft one that the villains have at their disposal, that none of the heroes know the rules to. The two factions are so fundamentally anathema to eachother that even their magic systems are trying to destroy the other. For example, the Aldokk need to go through extremely specific rituals in order to sieze the Arek's power without dying, and even when they succeed, they only have access to a select few abilities, and even then, the weakest of them completely lose their cohesion, turning into living masses of fleshy paste without dying. Whilst the Arek seek to annihilate everything of the Aldokk, they literally exorcize objects that the Aldokk have imparted their own magical energy into, and embracing the Aldokk's magic, or even tolerating the existence of the Aldokk themselves, causes the Arek's own might to wane as their souls slowly erode from living amongst the Aldokk's presence for too long.
Reminds me of a story I tossed out when the MC gained godlike power in the first few pages.. all his statistics were literally infinite, infinite strength, health, magic.. one of the first things he did was create a sort of heaven for himself to live in, bring his dead parents back to life and give them near infinite power and look into the future to all the fights he'd win one day.. all this in the first few pages of the story. There was no struggle, no growth, and his future was set in stone with him as the perpetual victor. Even his backstory of pain and suffering was thrown out. I still can't shake my head at that. So I say, never give the MC too much power or an ability that solves every problem.
Infinite power stories can work if you're going for an emotional story rather than an adventure/action story. What does being infinitly powerful do to them? How do others react? That sort of thing.
Not a bad idea though, you just have to make a magic system that makes "infinite something" bad. For example, maybe "infinite health" within the context of the magic system means your cells are incapable of changing, meaning your body is always that of an infant with all the limitations that brings.
This is a great video. I've always wanted to write a novel but can never get more than a few pages written before the fear of failure makes me quit. I have this idea for a magic system where mages channel residual magical essence in the air into their body then back out into the world to create effects but everyone has a limit to both the rate they can channel it at, and the capacity they can hold at one time. More powerful spells require higher capacity and high throughput is needed for maintaining continuous effects. Going over this limit can result in horrible injuries, dangerous accidents and death so mages must spend years training to increase their limit.
For mistake 2: One of my favorite ways a book series got around this is that the character would go insane if he used it to much so he had to chose when he should use it
Id love to see somebody with Gravity magic do a quick change on an opponent when fighting inside. At first, they are running, fleeing, swapping from wall to ceiling, to floor at will. Then, they burst into a hallway or other small area and realized their is nowhere left to go. They turn to face their opponent and, as they leap at them to attack, they catch them with their magic or step aside and touch them as they fly by. Now, they are in their power and, while they can't send them into the sky that doesn't mean they can't do anything. Gravity swaps, the enemy smashes into the roof, it swaps again, they smash into the floor, and that just keeps happening, the opponent being pummeled against whatever now counts as the floor until they are beaten well beyond consciousness. It wasnt that all the hero could do was send people away with gravity.... They just didn't want to hurt anybody so that was their go to move.
Or you can turn your bad writing into good writing by making your characters flaw the fact that they treat everything like a nail and they have to overcome it 😂
My thoughts exactly. In my story (that takes place more in my mind than paper) a “human” teenager becomes immortal and gets other powers, so you have a character who is trying to protect the world, while simultaneously trying to keep himself from going insane. Variety is something that makes a story great. :)
One could even use it intentionally to make it clear the allies of the person with the super-effective power are too reliant on that person, then take that person out.
Reminds me of Nikaro from Yumi and the Nightmare Painter who just paints a bamboo for every nightmare instead of painting the most appropriate picture.
You make some goods points here. The one you make about the limitations of skill seems to me, the most useful for avoiding the other mistakes. *a novice is only going to know a little bit of magic, so no sloppy buffet * a novice isn't going to be as powerful as a master, so no instant resolution of problems *a novice will work on their skill over time. Finding new information about magic, new mentors to teach them, time to practice, etc. all that can be part of the story that is told. Or NOT finding those things, and making due. Kudos for that thing about the campfire ambush. That sounds clever.
In school I had a story of a teen boy whose mother was a Master Mage. In that world only a minority of people can cast magics and constant use causes a condition called 'Magi Fatigue' and she has an advanced case of it where she is more or less bed bound and unable to use magicks anymore. She pushes him to joining the Guild who controls who can and can't do magicks through permits. He has zero aptitude for magic, shows no potential to cast it, but a voice in his ear keeps feeding him incantations when he really needs it and a lot of times, they're the highest level ones that are overkill. He thinks he's going crazy, the other students think he's entitled since he got past the inspector by his mother's name alone and the teachers keeps trying to humble him with restrictions and hard physical work. It was therapeutic work to get my frustrations out in school.
I'm working on a story that doesn't exactly have magic, but the main character is a shape shifter based on genetics. He is a hybrid between a human and an alien and the accident that altered the parent's genes allowing the two characters to produce a child together also made the shape shifting possible. The shape shifting heals wounds, but the character's mass is lowered by the amount of mass loss that the wounding caused and he has to regain that mass to be fully healed. For example if he lost an arm he could heal the wound, but he would need to replace the lost mass before he could be as strong in that replacement arm. Also if he lost too much mass he could die from being diminished below a level that he can recover from. He had a brother with the same powers who died from trying to regenerate too many times without rebuilding body mass. His shape shifting does have the advantage of perfect regeneration which could allow him to live forever if he doesn't die from loss of body mass. Anyway, your talk on magic systems made me wonder if I in effect had some sort of magic system with this character.
Yeah, "magic" can mean either of two things - it can be literal magic - the use of will and skill to manipulate mystical forces - or it can be used much more loosely to apply to anything beyond mundane everyday life that follows the same writing rules as magic, whether that's fringe science, nanotechnology, sufficiently advanced technology, alien physiology that might not respect the laws of physics, or anything else that gives some characters special abilities. There are also times when literal magic isn't magic in storytelling terms - a handful of Palantiri in the world is magic in both senses; a scrying crystal in every pocket is just a fantasy-world smartphone.
This video actually encouraged me and gave me some inspiration. I was surprised that the magic system I've been cooking up for a while didn't suffer from most of the pitfalls mentioned (I've never dabbled in fantasy writing before so it's my first one)
I really like the magic in lord of the mysteries. The more you use them, the closer you get to madness, and mastery of your abilities comes more with dealing with the side effects rather than using the powers themselves
The Stormlight archive honestly does this well. While it is a hard magic system the rules make it feel soft as characters figure out what they can do. From the diffent surgbindings to the oath's along side the other cosmer stuff that interacts with it and mudies the water in the best way.
First-time watcher. Two rules of thumb I like to keep in mind; Soft Magic can be hard magic from a different perspective. Hard magic is good at solving issues. Soft magic is good at making them. When I make a setting I like to tell a lot of different stories in that setting, and even if in one story I explained how the magic works, it doesn't mean I need to in the next, especially if the characters don't actually use it at all.
Hi Jed! Well sadly I write in secret from my family, I cant tell them I like to write cause I know they wont see Writing as a real job. So I cant really pay for your classes but I just wanted to tell how greatfull I was to you and your youtube videos. My writing has gotten way better from the first time I started and your videos have helped me so much. I fixed lots of things in my WIP´s and you cant imagine how happy I am. I cant thank you enough. Thank you so much for being there by my side while I go after my secret dream even tho you dont know you are doing it. Thank you
I’m currently working on a 5 book series, and my protagonist has one of my favorite powers: Atom Manipulation. Basically, they can rearrange the atoms of anything, and reform it into a material or state of matter they choose. But the biggest drawback they have, is that they can only manipulate what they can touch. Throughout the series, i want him to learn his power from the very beginning, but improve as time moves on. Like in the beginning, he’ll only be able to manipulate things that he directly touches, but by the end, he’ll be able to manipulate an object several yards away. If it’s touching the ground that his feet are standing on, he can control it.
Hey Sounds cool, for claritys sake, do you mean Manipulation of Atomic bonds? So rearranging of the Atoms in an existing Molecule, or the Manipulation of Proton count, basically turning one Element into a different one, for example turning O2 into Fe (Oxygen into Iron)? Or a combination of both. How Spicy do you intend to go? I mean after all just turning some Water into Hydrogen and Oxygen would be enough to blow a Building Sky High and turning the Nitrogen in the Air into Chlorine Gas would basically make your MC a walking War Chrime. (Not necessarily a Protagonist Move, but maybe?) Would probably require some proper Control since MC would have to change the Air he breathes back or leave unaffected. The Ground thing is due to Visualization? Since Air is also full of Atoms I mean, or is it the higher Density of Atoms? In any case seems to be an Interesting Power with quite a lot of Applications, even peaceful just changing Dirt to Gold would make you an instant Millionaire, and Money is Power after all.
@@Fushur7 Behold! *turns dirt into gold* I call this spell... THE Inflation And this is how entire world economy was shredded in a matter of months, kickstarting new dark age of war and struggle Jokes aside, neat ability. Only concern is how powerful it can be without any kind of regulation
@@Fushur7 I don’t know how I’ve never seen this. I’m sorry. Better late than never. About the specifications of his power, he can control all matter as long as he’s touching it. But it gets exponentially harder as the state of the matter changes. Solids are easiest because he can… you know. Feel it. Liquids by itself is already in another class. I do try to implement some development where he learns to manipulate it. And I’m not even gonna try gases 😭. Also, it’s not necessarily the exact rearrangement of molecules. It limits my options to what I want him to achieve. It’s more of a visualizing thing. He crumbles a rock to basic matter and rearranges it into any shape/material he wants.
@@М.О.Н.С sorry I haven’t seen this four months later. And about the regulations. There will be none. The reasons for that are to come if I hopefully ever finish my series. His only weakness is keeping him stranded in the air with nothing to grab onto or keeping him contained in un-manipulatable objects(results of another magic system).
I would add one more to your list of magic limitations: there is an element of luck. For example: maybe when a character casts a spell there is a chance that something else will happen instead of what they want (useless, bad, or different entirely). In this setting, the characters trying to take into account for when things don't go the way they hoped is where the intrigue lays. The average characters look for ways to minimize loses, but the clever ones look for ways that make situations so that whatever happens when the magic is cast it will benefit them.
One of the most thought-provoking takes on magic I've come across is in Uprooted by Naomi Novik. "The Dragon" tries to teach spells to the main character in an academic way, and she makes little progress. But then, she looks into some notebooks he thinks worthless, which outline a more intuitive form of magic, and this works for her. This started me thinking... what if magic is like music? You can approach music through theory (a hard system), or you can play by ear (a soft system), or you can bring the two together. And what if casting a spell is like a musical performance, where you being your learning, your years of practice, your raw ability, together in the moment? "Stage fright" might cause the spell to fail. A virtuoso might cast the same spell as a novice, with vastly greater effect, but a very few might work great magic by instinct. Some might be able to improvise spells hitherto unknown, while others spend years creating them.
The type of magic system I hate the most is monetary magic. It's one thing to have a magic shop that charges money to buy magical tools, but that's not the problem. The problem is when you have a magic spell that materializes something out of thin air, but drains your bank account by the monetary value of the thing you created. Or the ability to teleport two objects to each other's locations, but only if those objects have the same monetary value. And yes, I've seen both of these examples in anime. What happens when someone sells something at a yard sale at a record low price? It wouldn't just crash the economy, it would crash the whole fabric of monetary magic!
A lot of the magic system problems can be solved by giving it a lot of limitations. I won't go into great detail for obvious reasons, but I have a system where in order to even use it, something has to have happened in the past in that area. So, not only can you not use it a lot - every 'solution' ends up different because you have to 'reach back" to a scenario that happened in that place that differs from the situation you're in anyway. The effects of the magic are dictated by those events also, so, casting the same exact thing twice is unlikely. It also causes Harmonic Drain - the user starts getting disoriented and sometimes confusing themselves with different versions of themselves, or even someone else all from different realities. Also, this video was awesome. Just the conjecture alone gave me a ton of ideas. Thanks man.
I have a magic system which instead of manipulating the elements themselves, you manipulate the natural laws and mechanisms associated with them. For example, Fire deals with redox reactions, Ice deals with the lowering of kinetic energy, etc. However, methods of fighting aren’t limited to just the obvious as for example, a character fights using exploding ice blossoms or how same element users have wildly different fighting styles (one focuses on manipulating atmospheric pressure while the other focuses on controlling the speed of a battle). Some people even choose to use their resonances as a tool instead of their weapon such as a character who fights using multi-elemental paints. Magic is an energy produced by the world, one that bends the rules but cannot break them as it cannot create, cannot destroy and only convert. If magic goes in a mechanism, the same amount will go out, whether or not it’s split between different forms. How much a person can bend the natural laws is proportional to how much magic is supplied (a little can cause static, a lot can form a ball of electricity). If a ‘natural’ reaction or outcome isn’t possible or takes too long, magic is the trigger and catalyst whose entropy bends physical laws in a way that exceeds comprehension. Everyone resonates with an ‘element’ at birth, but can switch around and even add a resonance through really complicated ways. However, people can only hold up to two resonances at a time or else their body and soul can’t handle it, no exceptions. A person’s mastery of their resonance depends on their understanding of these natural laws and mechanisms. A lot of the time, modern users are more powerful than past ones because people have managed to discover what truly causes these phenomena to occur, instead of blindly attributing everything to magic. Past Fire users perhaps only melted metal, but modern ones can cause it to rust instead due to a better understanding of fire as a whole.
the issue with stands is that it does establish rules, and fights are given tension because of those rules, or those fights were only winnable because of those rules, but then in the next season every one of those rules is thrown out and not even acknowledged as having been a thing, it's an incredibly bad magic system, saved by the choreography and character writing being just that good
These tips work for sci-fi as well. Random genetic mutations, genetic manipulation, virus that gives abilities, psychic abilities, exotic energy sources…
This is why I always tell people that A certain magical Index has the best magic system in all of ani/manga/LN, and is top tier in fiction, is deserves to be more popular, for me, it's the top 1 in fiction. It did the exact opposite of every mistake you talked about in the video while being extra unique and so perfectly done. The MC, Kamijou Touma, has a seemingly overpowered ability, being simply "negates all supernatural phenomena", sounds bland and lame at start, when you realize it has severe weakness: He's still a human, it only works on his right hand, he gets extremely unlucky, and it has a limit on it's cancelling speed, so even if it can negates miracle from god or an attack that can destroy the universe itself, it can't negate contant strong fire magic being poured upon it. And the lore doesn't just stop there, how would you feel if an already bland ability is actually bland? No no no, the lore on the ability, the mysteries behind the ability itself is unveiling slowly, which made the ability become so interesting. And yes, because of it's nature, he has to outsmart his opponent, analyzing his opponent's spells and tons of other stuff, which make all of his fights really interesting. Magic in Index are hardcore on rock paper scissor, it's not just "I has level 10 magic and is infinitely stronger and more advanced than yours so I win", but rather "I have the exact magic to counter you + I have more knowledge, GG". Even godlike beings are beatable, because even if they're godlike, even if they can end the world, change how it look at their will, their human side and how the world works made them beatable, it's honestly such a good way to treat godlike characters rather than just make them so overpowered for the sake of it. The magic system in Index is built in it's cosmology, it's world building and it's characters. The reason why it achieved that is first thanks to Idol theory, where the original can affect the replicas and even the opposite way, a simple theory that just works and make the system more vast than ever while helping the magic to be a part of the world, of the story. And the second reason is that the magic is born from the world, not that the magic is just there because it's there, the magic works because the world itself allow it to work, the magic change the world and the world change the magic, basically it's all thanks to Phases, Phases make religion and myths true to the world, while the people are the ones who brought religions to the world thus creating Phases, that's why it can be so diverse and connected to each other. The Magic in Index exists for the character, not the other way around, this is due to the fact that Magic was just a thing people use to achieve their goals, and that's what make a magician a magician in Toaru, this is also what made the Magic system a part of the story. The system could be called hardcore magic system while being soft magic system at the same time, while the lore is there, the explanation is never too deep to the point that it require you to be a hardcore mythology fans to be able to enjoy it, it always a bit vague, leaving space for the casual fans to enjoy while also giving the hardcore fans the chance to get real. We have the science side with esper powers for the casual fans and the magic side for the more hardcore fan that loves magic. Both have their own charm, their own story, their own world that the events take place in, both have their own focus for their own settings, and that's what make it rather than a sloppy buffet, a whole 5 star course meal. Instant mastery? In index, in order to use magic, it's not as simple as "feel your flow of mana" or some simple stuff like that, you have to understand every aspect of the magic you're using, especially it's lore, either from an existing myth/religion, or you can spend time creating your own mixed style, or if you have even more time and knowledge, you can create a whole new myth/religion for your magic. All of which needs time and knowledge, and a lot of studying. You got a grimoire? Cool! Now decipher it, and careful, it will poison your brain with otherworldly knowledge and kill you if you're not skilled enough or it finds you to be unsuitable. You want to become godlike? You will have to master every single magic, ascend on the Sephiroth and many other stuff, oh, and you'll have to give up being human if you want to ascend to the top of the tree! Basically, it's a headache being a magician, things aren't as easy as "more mana = better" or "I somehow learn ridiculous magic through some way", and raw power isn't always better, magic in Index are rock paper scissor, for example if you only have fire power, another magician with some magic that allow them to instantly attack you will just win, even if they don't have a high fire power, cause you're a glass cannon. Every fantasy writers could learn from A Certain Magical Index, it will inspire you a lot. And finally, read Toaru Majutsu No Index, peak fiction.
So happy to see Jade City mentioned. She basically hits I think 6 out of the 8 points you mention for what can make a good system or limitation of magic. Such a fantastic martial arts series.
Naming was the first system that came to mind when you mentioned good soft magic systems, glad you mentioned it. Also glad you mentioned Luxin from Lightbringer, which I consider a pretty great magic system as well.
im currently just struggling to stay motivated and intrested in writing my story, after a moment of writing it i get bored and want to play video games instead :(
I developed a magic system where magic is based on classes. The classes are Warrier (melee weapons), Fighter (physical attacks and Martial arts), Archer (ranged weapons), Mages (rune magic), and the rare Mancers (elemental powers). Every person is born with one of these classes and can obtain the rest via secret quests unique to each person. You may have to massacre a thousand monsters in a minute or you might get the warrior class while chipping down a tree
One magic system I really appreciate is from the Eragon series. With the exception of innately magical being like dragons, the entire magic system is based around the language of magic. You could just say "fire" to make your arrow explode into flames, or you could make figurative connections in your mind to do something like saying "water"->shimmering blue surface-> create a blue gem. A character's skill with magic is just as dependent on how much magic vocabulary they know than their actual magic pools. And while there is a lot of creativity to how magic can be shaped, it does still follow certain rules distance weakens magic (whence why a flaming arrow is better than just snapping a fireball onto your target), the magic needs to be done with intent and planning to not backfire (the protag almost kills himself the first time he casts magic because he didn't know how to shut off the magic and nearly drained himself to death), and more complex spells and enchantments needing to be step by step like programs to run properly. Even beyond casting, magic still is part of the world. While less than a quarter of the population seem to be casters, anyone can be trained to block their minds from mental probing, for instance. And because the language of magic is the language of power, no one can lie when speaking it. While you can find some flaws in characterization or developments in the books, the magic system remains the most fascinating for me almost 20 years later.
Not going to lie, this video alone helped me reach the point where I'm ready to start writing. After years of visualizing and trying to think of how to start, where this is going to go... this pushed me over the edge Thank you
Another issue is making the magic system a dependency for resolving the theme. This is similar to how some sci-fi stories will resolve by whoever has the best technology, or how in a super hero story will rely on super powers to resolve the theme. The issue with this is that it it removes universality from the moral argument. We really shouldn't be telling our audiences morality is only reserved for those who have magic/technology/superpowers, it should be solvable for anyone (the theme is universal). This is why I can't stand most sci-fi and super hero stuff. Fantasy has a better track record but I feel it is falling down the sci-fi path of people just wanting to show off how smart they are by making the most contrived magic system known to man.
It seems to sound like you attribute agency to the magic system, I think that even if a character needs to use magic to solve the problem, the conflict is still fathomable and within the realm of morality and that's what the audience can understand. I can understand it from a different angle like power-scaling like "who's more powerful" and not using magic and its systems with brains like how a fire magic user might defeat a water magic user (in the most simple rock-paper-scissors logic I can imagine) if the fire user is smart and play his cards right. Also there is a virtue ethic side to the moral argument, and that is that, sure you won't have magic and powers, but strong people, mighty people, people with power can solve problems more easily and it's harder to give them a shake-down without retaliation from them, while weak people will fall in line more easily and audience they can if not understand it, they can at least internalize it.
@@Saint_Wolf_ Disagree. While the morality of something might be comprehensible for the audience, acting with virtue is universal and should not be locked away for the select few with magic/powers/whatever. This is the theme that lead to the near decade of trash known as "Marvel Movies." For your other point, it's essentially "Might makes right" which isn't a virtue. I should clarify the magic system my issue applies to the most is the type where it is unearned, such as Harry Potter or Luke Skywalker. If magic is like physics and everyone in the setting can understand and interact with it and gain skills over time, I have much less of an issue with that. However that type still seems to be used for the "Might makes right," for the most part.
@@iiisaac1312 But the scale of the threat is also ridiculous, it's not some story where some almighty powerful hero is fighting everyday hurdles, it's super powered threats and super powered heroes. And I know, but you need might and strength to encounter, discourage and stop a person who might try to use the logic of "might maketh right" following some consequentialist set of ethics. And doesn't Harry Potter have enough qualified mages to meet your standard? They literally all go to a school, the thing is that Harry is a piece of Voldemort's puzzle unlike the other mages. Sure there are "special people" with innate abilities but there are enough of the special people where it's kinda irrelevant that not 100% of the population can't use the magic, but in Hogwarts it is 100% of the people who can use magic, then comes to skill, knowledge and tactics which seems to be what you prefer out of a magic system. I know I sound combative but I actually find this conversation kinda fun.
@@Saint_Wolf_ Action and Might = Right I still hold as not part of virtue. They are ultimately both violence at the end of the day, and violence isn't a virtue. There are many ways to create suspense, tension, and drama without the use of either, and books are better suited for this. 1984 is good at this and it isn't a book filled with action or might = right. While Action and Might = Right might make good spectacles for film (But are still poor moral themes), books aren't the same as film and action can get exhausting to read. Most written action takes too much inspiration from the visuals of film and winds up not advancing plot or character. Strength only applying to consequntialist ethics really only proves its lack of universality. Outside of the morality, there are ways to solve issues while not being in a position of any power that are probably more tense and interesting than a typical power vs power conflict. For instance, a slave might have a violent master that likes to drink a lot of alcohol. All the slave would need to do is just make sure his master's shot glass is always filled and let him suffer the consequences of his own gluttony in the form of liver failure and not get caught in the process. This would make a more dramatic scene compared to a fight scene between a super hero and a super villain because there is a much greater power imbalance between the master and the slave. The hero/villain scene is like bringing a gun to a gunfight, while the master/slave scene is more like bringing nothing to a gun fight. One of these will just be more tense than the other. Harry Potter did not earn his magic. While he might have had to go to school (an exclusive club btw) to practice it, it was something he never had to earn. He was just lucky enough to not be born a muggle. Being born with the right characteristics is not a moral achievement. One of the themes that can be observed in Harry Potter is: You can achieve excellence without doing anything, just wait for an owl to tell you you're special.
@@iiisaac1312 No, violence isn't a virtue, but violence is autistic, what are you using violence for is the determining factor, nuanced apply, is it to rob someone? Compel them to divulge a secret, moderate their behavior? Or is it to stop a robbery? protect an innocent? Punish a wrong doing? It's like the argument you'd give to a twig shaped "pacifist": can you be a pacifist if you're weak to defend yourself or others from aggression? It reminds me of Starship Troopers "Violence is the sole authority from which all other authority is derived". Coercion, to compel a man to act, it all comes from someone twisting someone else's arm. Now I'll divulge I'm a visual storyteller so we might find some misalignment as I'm less of the written format, but I still hold true that conflict in essence requires the seeking leverage and underlying beneath that will always be a threat of violence, not necessarily explicit, but implicit. And I think on your slave tension example compared to a fight scene is where one can draw certain points of friction, mainly because given a visual media people wanna see spectacle, now one of the better movies of last year was men walking, talking in close up and arguing… and then there was like a bomb or something, idk, but I liked Einstein. Jokes aside though I do think there is a form of aggression involved in the slave example, it's just a matter of outlets. But there's also an angle of real politik that applies to it. Let me explain, and not to mock your example, but what service does the slave offer? Does he just pour drinks? Is him alone the sole servant? Are there other slaves with him? Is the master violent in spite of it compelling no good behaviors? Are the slaves tools of a plantation or servants? Is he violent when sober becuase he's got sadists whims or is it just a matter of alcohol? Becuase just badgering and battering your "tools" if I may use such crude language yields subpar results. Sure he can slowly poison his master but then what? Who takes over after that? If the master blinds himself with drink does he have others overseeing his operation and for his slaves to not run away? There is no way the slave can cozy up to his master to detir the punishment? And I see where you're coming from, but I think you're reading it a little too literally, like one cannot expect the reader to separate fact from fiction and understand that a owl or many owls swarming your house with letters doesn't literally happen, when I think most people, even children as old as 7 can understand that, they may daydream and fantasize about it, but they understand it doesn't happen like that. But many people have innate abilities, sure in western societies and even in Oriental societies, it may seem like we only value intelligence, becoming doctor, engineer, surgeon, but there are skills one can develop with hard work that aren't that. Not to saying the like that "everyone is special" but that everyone can develop a skill and improve it, painting Warhammer figures, writing, doing marketing campaigns, doing comedy, teaching math, cooking, translating texts, doing sign language. If anything one can read the metaphor that sometimes people who don't share what make you special will dismiss you and try to bring you down (muggles), but with some help, from teachers, from a school, from a different environment, and specially with hard work, with a good circle, and work ethic you can thrive, bring forward and develop what makes you special. Sure it sometimes feels like Harry doesn't have anything to prove, while Hermione really became a bookworm to prove to herself and others she's a good witch, but on that end sometimes it feels Ron doesn't have anything to prove either. Then there is the life and death aspect to Harry Potter to drive conflict. I really hope the slavery words don't get this comment sent to the shadow realm, that would suck.
I have a "magic" system that goes a little something like this: 1. No resource dependence 2. Using either side of this system causes psychological harm *(one side more so than the other)* 3. Practitioners of this system *(both sides)* require the ability to hear it, and in most cases, must be female *(with some exceptions)* 4. Knowledge and skill play a major part in whether the user has less or more power *(though knowledge can be a greater ally in this area)* 5. There are no cultural restrictions, but the use of this system is deemed illegal unless you are a member of a particular group *(with the other group being outlawed and banished)* 6. Interference can be caused by the system itself. Basically, practitioners are constantly being whispered to about the "secrets of the universe" and "greater power." Those on the Light Side train their minds to either ignore the voices or make deals with weapons they wield *(the whispers come from a particular part of their weapons)* to harness that power *(while those on the Dark Side of the system will immediately give in to desire, performing great acts of evil to attaint said promised power)* 7. There are no restrictions on time and place, but their power can be interrupted or halted temporarily using certain mana waveforms. 8. As a special note, my story does contain a "chosen one" (many, in fact), but there is actually an opposing "chosen one" who is destined to be their adversary. They each represent either side of the system.
I personally like the 3rd Point the most. I enjoy hard Magic Systems, but sometimes I feel people go to far. Magic is, at least in my eyes a Force of Wonder, but some Hard Magic Systems basically turn it into Sience Class with extra steps. If your Magic can't surprise your Readers at all and make them feel Wonder it isn't Magic. Which isn't necessarily Bad, after all the Valid Excuse, in a World with Magic, Magic probably would be a Science exists. But sometimes it's just taken to far. If I want to read a bunch of thesis papers on convoluted Rules and Laws to explain weird Stuff I can read Science Fiction after all ;)
I have a fun one for my fantasy setting. Light and Seed Sorcery. Light is the resource for the magic. Little pinpoints of light within the body of the user that augments their physical abilities when focused in parts of the body, such as focusing it into your ears to enhance hearing or balance. They're also connected by threads of light. The threads of light are the actual resource as the pinpoints can be put into a cycle, forming a circle as the threads build up around the pinpoints spinning. This is called a seed. The seed builds up these threads slowly and can be sped up, but you speed it up too much, and the seed will crack (will get to that in a sec). Every user has lenses that can be used to color the seed towards specific effects, usually linked to a single word. Most users have between two and four lenses with specific races in setting (sapphire goblins in particular) having more. Additionally, there is mist (foundation for a second magic system but linked to the first one), which can be used as a lens by encircling it in a seed. Once a seed is formed, it can be cracked to cause the built-up energy to become usable. Then, the mage can use the imbued qualities from the lenses or the mist used in it to create Magix effects. A blank seed, one untouched by a lens or mist, instead supercharges the physical effects of light.
This will lead to a new problem called the ladder villains where you'll have to always make the next bad guy stronger than the last in the long run this will make you first villains look like shit
I love the hard magics in Name of the Wind, as well, and how they look to us readers in our world of science. Sympathy magic, for example, where the arcanist makes bonds between similar objects to cause some effect. The magic is often powered by a nearby fire or other energy source, but if one isn’t available, you can use your own body as the source. Do that too much however, and you get the Binder’s Chills, which can become debilitating or even fatal. We look at it and say “Yeah, you’re using your body heat, and causing hypothermia if you aren’t careful.”
I love the Eragon series, and I think that its magic system works so nicely. The fact that you need to know all the ancient words and know precisely what you want to do and construct a sentence using the right words and the right sense is really interesting. Besides that, the magic cost is the same as the physical cost, so in order to do something amazing, you spend as much energy as you'd do doing it physically.
I love the food analogy. I was thinking my world's magic system having one basic core mechanic was too simple but now im gonna focus on it even more and keep using it as fuel for the story's primary conflict
Your video has really given me hope for the magic system in my first book that I am writing! :) Thank you! It is good to know that I am heading in the right direction with it.
I love blends of Hard magic and Soft magic. it is the best way (in my opinion) to have a "chosen one" character, you create a "hard system with rigid rules" and then break the shell occasionally letting the reader know that the rules don't necessarily work exactly how you or the people in the story believed, but also keeping things that happened possible with the change in the system. Like peeling a shell off a hard boiled egg.
First point springs to mind the existence of "Avadra Kadavra" Instant kill spell from Harry Potter with barely any consequence besides being "Evil" This comment has been brought to you by _The Best Fight in Harry Potter and why Avada Kedavra is a Stupid Spell. th-cam.com/video/qqwc7Kgon1k/w-d-xo.html
Avada Kedavra has always bothered me. Fine, it kills you but how? What does it do? You can easily kill a person by flooding their lungs, freezing their brain, shattering their heart. With your mind set to ending someone, anything can become a weapon. So why do we need a spell that does nothing else but kills? IMO, that was some sloppy writing. On the other hand, I guess no magic system is bulletproof
No? Well, Harry potter is a pretty equal mix of hard magic and soft magic systems, and the AK has many drawbacks 1: It has a long incantation(AVADA KEDAVRA) compared to other spells like Stupefy, which would effectively do the same thing, or Bombarda. 2: It can't be cast non verbally, so you always get a warning 3: it can be blocked by physical things like cover 4: Most importantly, it needs PURE HATRED to work properly. if you don't HATE something from the bottom of your heart, at max it will give them a nosebleed. So other than people like Voldemort, who's been established to be a hateful litlle bitch, its not useable outside a few niche scenarios 5: it weakens/fractures your soul. 6: IDK the consequence of both eternal suffering in Limbo being stuck, not able to pass on when you die, and the consequence of being chucked in with the dementors no questions asked for life is a pretty big consequence.
@@normalchannel2185 1. 2. That requires a certain level of experience to dodge even after the warning. 3. They can cast it again. 4. I meant consequence and requirement of being evil. 5. 6. This does not impact a fight these only matter if they are dead. If there are so many drawbacks, name at least three ways to beat this spell when they start casting it.
OK. You see a dude casting Avada Kedavara. By the time he speaks AVADA. (avada and the gap you must have to start saying kedavara), you can get out a STUPEFY, since both have 3 syllables, BUT stupefy's syllables follow each other(as in the end of stu forms the start of pe, so you dont have to waste time moving from one syllable's ending state to another's starting one.) You can test this by just trying to say Avada and Stupefy. Both roughly equal out(the avada and the gap and stupefy) Now if spells travel instantly, then you either force them to abort the AK and defend themselves, or you hit them and they are out of the fight. You can use Bombarda, or really any other quick spell(i think Duro is one that turns you to stone, and its the fastest too) If spells don't travel instantly, then you can dodge the AK. And most importantly, in order to effectively use the AK, you must HATE SOMEONE with the BOTTOM of your heart, and it takes time to summon that hatred. Thats why the Death Eaters, in the OOtP chase scene did not use AKs, it was too difficult.
this video reminded me of another video about magic systems and how even the most mundane things could be turned into a magic system. i had a discussion with a friend afterwards and ended up having to turn baking bread into a magic system... it was actually surprisingly easy. i made an alchemy/summoning system. based on real world breads, the types of bread decide the types of beings summoned and their overall characteristics. certain types of ingredients affect behavior while others potency or add extra abilities. so a gingerbread man turns into a loyal servant, while a melon bread turns into a hungry monster that tries to eat everything. different alchemical salt types change aggressiveness, while sugar types their energeticness and overall spell duration, and so on. it took me not even an hour to get that far, showing just how easy it is to make a creative and unique magic system. and how much fun it is to bounce stupid ideas with a friend until it works!
1) Think of unique ways for your character to utilise their magic 2) Consider limitations. A character mustn't be able to simply summon their magic to solve every problem. Create a story that has limits. 2.1) Resource dependance. Maybe you need mana or something like that. 2.2) Physical/mental cost. Maybe the magic drains your stamina. It must have a cost, making it more meaningful 2.3) Innate ability. Only some people can use magic. 2.4) Knowledge/Skill. Maybe the magic needs training to use. 2.5) Cultural/legal. Maybe the magic is seen as taboo 2.6) Magic interference. Maybe somethings interrupt the use of magic. 2.7) Time/Place. Magic can only be used at certain times/places 2.8) Binding Agreements. A higher power has to be negotiated with to use the magic. 3) Thinking you need a hard magic system. A system with lots of rules and restrictions is good, but one without is just as good. Hard magic systems are good because once rules are established, you can play with those rules. Soft magic systems: 1) Is this the right choice for my story?
"No consideration of limits" is also so much fun to work on. The OC I am making currently has e types of abilities: 1. Basic abilities (Fire, Water, Ice, Lightning, Wind, Earth) 2. Specific abilities (Teleportation, Switching places, telekinesis, looking into the past) He can use 1 all the time, for 2 he has to go into a powered up state where he hurts himself everytime he uses a more advanced abilities and how much he hurt himself is only found out after leaving the powered up state. And as you said, I can use these limits for the character's personality ^^
Thank you so much for this video. This made me completely rethink the way magic would effect and interact with the world (in a good way). It made me realize that my magic was way too broad for a new writer, it made me make it so magic was a plot device, not the plot device, and it made me make my magic more power based, not spell based, which adds more places for creative writing and creative uses of my powers.If you want a full idea of my system (which you probably don't) here you go. In my world there are a couple different factions (continents? countries?) that are only at peace with each other because they have a monopoly on a certain magic type. There will be 4, and the magic system will be tune based. Runes can be cast to give the caster a certain power or ability for a short period of time. After the time is up, the rune will break. Only users born with an innate magic power can make runes, but anyone can use them. People can only be born with one magic type, and they are usually sold to the faction that magic type is controlling. This is because if a faction finds out that a different faction is hoarding magic users of their type, they will stop sending runes, which will cripple society in some way. The main plot is that the main character somehow end up doing a big favor for an underground mafia assassin. The mafia is smuggling runes, and the favor is help them with their biggest smuggling project yet. Before this video, it would be completely different and worse, with way too many magic types and more spell based not power based, so thank you.
Sometimes I just love it when a character's first nature is to do it themselves instead of using magic. For example: if someone had the power of teleportation and they were running late. They immediately run to their car and start driving instead of just teleporting there. Then when they arrive at the place late the people that they are with just ask why they didn't teleport; and the main character is just like "Oh. I forgot that I could do that."
5:26 This is interesting, because yes, there are limitations to my world. Magic only works for a few hours at certain times, it doesn't work during the summer because of the heat/fire restriction. It does tend to tire a person out if they use too much of it too soon. Magic exists for a short time. They gain it around 12, and lose it around 40 when they go through the Phase.
The magic system im trying to implement is a nature based elemental magic tied to the balance of nature. Fire magic for example is relatively simple, but the cost is heat from something. If you produce it out of nothing, it actually saps at your body heat and therefore, make enough fire and you will paradoxically become freezing cold. The magic does become more complex later on but at its heart that's essentially how it works.
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Writing a great magic system is just one piece of the novel-writing puzzle. If you want my help to outline your fantasy novel, check out my Fantasy Outlining Bootcamp: jedherne.com/outline
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Smarter Characters can Stack magic abilities... Potions that increase enchanting ability create a Ring of Potion Enhancing... increasing enchanting, increasing the potion power. LOOP & Stacked Magics are the shortcut to extremely powerful Characters. Enchanted Items increased Smithing & Potion & Spell casting to, logically, increase enchanting powers so Goals & Motives & Beliefs Change. Why fight any dragon when you can charm them or alter their alignment and motives to become a Vegan dragon ? 🙂
You see, I don't actually have to make a magic system until book 3, because the protagonist is new to magic as well. No one explains it to him until way later, but don't worry I totally already planned it out and there will surely be no contradicting information once I reveal how it works.
Is there no magic in the first two books?
I'm guessing the joke is that the magic is soft in the first two books and the author is a Gardener
hey, is this a personal attack or something!!! 😂
I feel this post in my bones lol
Smart guy overe there
I love hard-ish magic systems where there are definite rules and limitations, but where those aren't necessarily understood fully in-world, nevermind by the reader. This allows both for well-timed reveals and for SEEMING subversions of the established rules. It's really hard to get it right, because it's so easy to shred the suspension of disbelief, but when a writer gets it right... *chef kiss*
Yeh. Hard and Soft Magic is not mutually exclusive. Not only they can coexist, they may be result of each other.
Perhaps we can call those chewy magic systems. Not hard, not soft, but you best hope they made it right or it'll be kinda gross.
I think a good example of this would be the titans in attack on titan
@@ianlindstrom2019time for my slightly undercooked spaghetti magic system
My favourite example is Virtuous Sons. Each culture does cultivation(the generic name of the magic system) differently, both in the perspective of their advancement as well as specific elements that they consider relevant, but there’s still a common thread of personal refinement and moral virtue and excellence being a good way to advance, even if no one can agree on what exactly that entails and what is the best virtue to follow.
Your last point about showing Level 10 magic while the main character is Level 1 is really on-point, since one of my stories starts with an intense competition between the magic users showing how it can be used on an expert level before revealing a poor young girl in patched clothes watching from behind a fence, wishing she could be one of those people.
Yo wait just from how this sounds I need to read it
I made it so that the main trio all have really powerful magic, but can't control it, or even use it to its fullest at will. Kind of like how Percy Jackson can hold back the sea, or choke someone with their own blood, but he doesn't because of mental restrictions. I wish I could explore your idea. A magic contest sounds so cool.
@@GodRyan929 Percy Jackson can't choke someone with their own blood. That's pure headcanon. But he can choke someone with their own saliva, so that's something.
@@en4833 and their own poison
A perfect example of this is the opening of Baldur's Gate 2. The antagonist archmage, Irenicus, demonstrates unassailable power right off the bat, exploding and disintegrating tons of opposing mages with high-level spells, before allowing himself to be captured. It makes it very apparent that the player's party stands no chance against this enemy, but by the end of the game, they have (potentially) mastered spells of similar power themselves, and can fight this mage on equal terms. It's a fabulous introduction to a truly iconic villain.
The "Everything is a nail!" problem can also be the counterpoint to another, equally bad problem: "I've never seen a nail before in my life."
In this variation, instead of using the same solution over and over, the character(s) constantly neglect to use previously proven solutions to problems. It is boring when a character uses the same solution over and over, but it's also extremely frustrating when the character DOESN'T do the thing we KNOW they can do that solved the same issue last time!
Yes! Very important inversion to point out!
Also described as the "idiot plot," because the only way the plot can keep happening is if everyone is too stupid to solve the problems through the very obvious solutions.
There’s also the other version of this. Where the main character comes up with a “clever” way to use the magic, except it doesn’t really feel all that clever. It feels incredibly obvious, and the reader has to wonder how over 1000 years of magic users haven’t figured it out already. For example, “I can levitate 500lbs of water. Can I levitate the water inside a person to make them helpless?”
Once again, Brandon Sanderson did have a reasonable solution to this. The main character was elated that they figured out this cool, but rather obscure idea. Another character pointed out that there’s a much simpler answer. It’s such a powerful technique that those people who have figured it out really don’t want to share it with the general public.
sukuna
Watching remuru fight opponents when he could just eat them 😂
so the key is to balance it so that they use proven solutions for,repeated problems, but are forced to change solutions as the problems dont repeat too often, got it
The cultural and legal one made me think "Harry Potter", I've always said "this probably doesn't happen in the US's magic school" they're probably like "as your first class or protection against the dark arts you'll learn the killer spell as such spell is protected by your first and second amendment rights as the basis to enforce your fourth amendment rights"
Would the 4th amendment protect you from the tracking spell without a court order? Would you be prevented from using scilent attack spells as that would be considered a "fully automatic wand"? Would you need to pay monthly insurance for your wand in case of litigation?
@@VukMujovic I'm assuming the magic school, being secret and secluded, would have it's own jurisdiction and tradition, I doubt they are beholden to the NFA and it'd silly logic.
But yeah, I feel like being found to have used a tracking spell would probably be a fourth amendment violation. Probably Dementors are heavily regulated for this very reason, as their ruthless and and relentless aggression would constitute some WMD or biological weapon of sorts.
@@Saint_Wolf_dementors are also certainly a cruel and unusual punishment. The founding fathers never intended soul suck as a punishment for murder
@@highonquack6622 indeed, given the Specto Patronum doesn't take a toll on the user I bet not helping someone with a Dementor would constitute a crime.
This has me laughing my ass off at how accurate it is.
For your first example of anti gravity, MHA did a great job balancing their character. She needs to touch the target with the pads on her fingertips, gets severe nausea when she uses it on herself or exceeds the capacity of ~3 tons, and when she cancels the ability by tapping the pads of her fingers together, everything stops being affected
Bro that is just physics...
@@mihaleben6051What? They described the characteristics of a fictional power, not gravity itself, what does physics have to do with it?
@@FranciscoPetrucioJunior this is written like a physics problem.
@@mihaleben6051no, it’s written as an ability with clear limitations and a clear actionable activation/deactivation mechanism. It only feels like a physics problem because of how defined it is, since when you learn a lot about a hard magic system the amount of known variables makes it similar. It isn’t physics, it’s just also got a lot of variables
@@thomasfrye6335 stage 1; denial
There is another kind of limitation you can add to magic : danger from being detected. Think Gandalf saying that if he use fire magic, everybody (aka, Sauron and Saruman at least) will know that he is there. Or the way the paradox strikes Mages in the TTRP Mage : the awakening. It's not exactly a physical cost, because it's unpredictable. It's a threat : if the hero use magic, very bad things may happen, and he can't know what because those things have a will.
Thus, such a limitation has another advantage, because it gaves more choices to the writer. It's a "deus ex machina" that is a consistent with the world.
Good point. Another "limitation" I like is the "world of cardboard" effect. Essentially, a character with super strength or powerful elemental affect has to take great care when using such power. Otherwise, they could cause unspeakable, catastrophe damage with their power and unintentionally commit horrific acts.
@@Magus_Unionthis connects back to lord of the rings quite well, the Valar could easily destroy Sauron, but not without destroying most of middle earth, so instead they send spirits like Gandalf and limit their powers a bit more than normal.
That doesn't really count as a limitation because nothing is ultimately stopping the character from doing the overpowered thing and the audience knows the writer just chooses whether or not the watcher shows up. If you use it as your limitation, you can never not have the watcher strike in response to excessive power level, or else the illusion of the limitation's existence is shattered.
@@yurisei6732
Eh no. Nothing stopping people from breaking the law either. Soft limits are still limits. You can even build an entire story about how the protagonist keeps challenging the limit and spends the rest of the time running away from the Warden that comes to get them. Actually that's just your average crime thriller storyline.
@@raizors1331 The difference is that people reading crime thrillers are already pretty familiar with how "the consequences of breaking the law" works. Crime thrillers depend on the reader having a pre-established assumption that the police investigate crime and try to lock up or kill the people who do it, and sometimes the assumption that "law enforcement" is morally good, too. This is how crime thrillers manage to get away with almost never actually arresting anyone, especially when from the perspective of the criminals.
When you're writing a magical punishment system, you don't have any of that. You have to find a way to make the reader understand what it is and give them a way to believe that it's a significant threat. The only way to do that is to actually show it causing problems, and in a consistent way.
Like, imagine what crime thriller would be like if there was no such thing as law or the police in the real world. You'd think any character with a gun was massively overpowered because the only limitation on who they could shoot would be the possibility that after shooting someone, a faceless armoured monster might show up and put you in a room. Except you write it so that that monster never actually shows up, the worst that ever happens is sometimes the characters hear the siren that indicates the monster is approaching. There's no way to believe the monster is a credible threat, and therefore it doesn't really act as a limitation. The reader doesn't think "Oh he can't shoot his way out of this problem because he doesn't want the monster to show up".
I am very autistic, and that may be a reason on why I love HARD magic systems, there is something special about a rule or condition going full circle, or stretching a law to its absolute limit, the how far can I take this…
I love the idea of challenges not only the protagonist gets to solve, but also the reader as they go along, how some times the reader, based on the set up of the situation, and the rules, can come up with different solutions to problems, how something this are the same the main character chose, or been surprised by a way a ability was used since they weren’t expecting it, but it also makes sense.
Idk why, it’s just so satisfying.
I KNOW RIGHT
Same, hard magic is just so satisfying. Have you considered learning to program? Really scratches the autistic itch to see systems at work.
@@yurisei6732 Guess what carrier im following on college...
Same. Although I'm less down the spectrum.
Liking something complex doesn't mean you're autistic.
Nor being autistic mean you automatically do. Don't make it your personality.
"Everything's a nail" -- or in D&D terms, "I cast Fireball".
"I didn't ask if we were fighting Fire Elementals. I said, _I cast Fireball."_
More on-topic, last year I did a Nanowrimo story where curses are literally the residual spirits of the one who died placing them (which is a hard rule), very soft-magicky (limited only by terms intuitive to each curse), and it starts with my main character getting cursed into being a monster (well, more a "magic animal" kind of "monster" but still). But what made it really challenging is that the first-person POV is _from the curse itself,_ who acts as a second voice in the main character's head that nobody else can perceive or knows about. Technically this means my POV gets more visibility into the setting's various soft-magic than the character should normally have, but this also doesn't suddenly turn it into a "hard magic" system either, because the curse more or less "used up" its soft-magic abilities on the main character, leaving it constrained in their new body.
Player: "I cast fireball!"
Ancient Fire Dragon: "That ain't a fireball... THIS is a fireball..."
there is no "I" in the team, however there are six "I's" in "fuck it, i don't care how big the room is "I cast a fireball"" :3
Wait that’s such an awesome concept???? Is the full thing available to read anywhere?
@@andano4055 What, my story? No, I wrote it under the strict time limit that is Nanowrimo so I have no intention of posting the "full thing" as currently written. It has some neat moments to be sure but a completed plot or overall "story arc" is _not_ one of them.
For example, late in the story they encounter a monstrous, chimeric beast and the narrator (i.e: the curse inside the main character) is able to detect that the monster is under its own curse -- so the two curses are able to sort of talk directly to each other, end result being the main character was able to befriend the monster, and by the end of the month that monster is now part of the party. For a creature that was intended to be a bit part for the party to fight (not necessarily _kill,_ but at minimum just escape from) this was a completely unexpected development, but it occurred too late in the month to really do much with.
@@Stratelier Thats understandable, sounds like an amazing story though! It seems like you’ve got a lot of unique perspective written into it, and I wish you the best with wherever you go with the rest of the story!
About the "everything looks like a nail" - thing: it could be cool to have the protagonist use his one signature spell for everything, but his opponents getting wind of it so in the gravity example the 3rd time they find a way to tether themsekves to the ground - and then the protagonist has a problem cause he's used to gravity working...
Just be careful with it, otherwise you'll have an entire page of how the villain counters every previous ability that the hero used, like "oh I have this tether to stop your gravity magic and this roof to stop your sun magic and this torch to stop your ice magic and this enchanted armour to stop your sword summoning magic and these enchanted boots to stop your spike summoning magic..." Etc. etc.
@@Ammiad of course, this is only interesting if the hero really is a specialist.
That sounds great though? @@Ammiad
@@Ammiadlooks like "no u" competition lol
Another plausible situation for the “ everything looks like a nail” magic is when it is used as comedic relief.
For example, a protagonist can for a very short span of time, temporarily remove all forms of friction on their target. It’s low cost, fast and no direct damage but can disarm or trouble opponents.
It is a magic that can absolutely be abused but the writer only uses it sparingly and only for comedic effect.
I think it is brilliant.
For me, it's definitely when the system is trivialized by poor writing choices.
ie: You have a magic caste system, but the protagonist is either good at them all, or has a unique skill that beats out all other types.
Or, like in Harry Potter, you have all these spells and hexes and jinxes and curses had could be used in creative ways, but the enemy faction has the OHKO spell Avada Kedavra. You might as well have given them guns.
The AK isnt really that OP.
Harry potter is a pretty equal mix of hard magic and soft magic systems, and the AK has many drawbacks
1: It has a long incantation(AVADA KEDAVRA) compared to other spells like Stupefy, which would effectively do the same thing, or Bombarda.
2: It can't be cast non verbally, so you always get a warning
3: it can be blocked by physical things like cover
4: Most importantly, it needs PURE HATRED to work properly. if you don't HATE something from the bottom of your heart, at max it will give them a nosebleed. So other than people like Voldemort, who's been established to be a hateful litlle bitch, its not useable outside a few niche scenarios
5: it weakens/fractures your soul.
6: IDK the consequence of both eternal suffering in Limbo being stuck, not able to pass on when you die, and the consequence of being chucked in with the dementors no questions asked for life is a pretty big consequence
Some of my ocs are a 'jack of all trades' type. But one of them just recently discovered her powers and doesn't use much aside from simple levitation or similar things to make her life easier. Others have been practicing and studied magic for literal *centuries*. And a couple were trained (harshly, think what happened to the indoraptor) to be weapons of war. And then some have weak magic, or none at all. I try to balance out my cast.
Reincarnated as the 7th prince managed to explore the complex magic system while still being OP by just turning the mc as someone that's just curious about magic. I think the anime is just about the magic system itself with story in the background
it *can* work to make a protagonist good at all of the types of magic, it just gives a very different feel to what the magic's role in the story is, usually, when this is achieved well, it's usually where the magic is mostly trivial in the grand scheme of things, where the real stakes of the story are more social, and the magic is just symbolic, or the story is mostly lighthearted, a more lighthearted story works too
Don't worry, you always have expeliarmus to ruin every magic fight scene
So, here's a story I'm making:
In this world magic is pretty common but only non-human races can use it naturally, humans have to work hard for power equivalent to demons to happen. That's why certain people have been trained since childhood to be paladins, mages and clerics.
The reason why is because humans and non-humans are in an eternal war, waging each other in the name of their god. And as such, their gods gave them assets: The hero of humanity and the Hero of hell.
This is where the main character comes. He's the hero of humanity... Except he didn't want to be that, he expected the girl he's in love with (a renowned paladin considered to be the strongest human alive) to get that title.
In a panic, and trying not to get on the bad side of her, he proposed that they could fake it, and say that she was the one chosen by the gods and that she holds the amazing power the gods gave him.
The way i limit the clearly overpowered character is by trying to come up with situations in which he's not able to use his powers without outing himself. Since, if they discover the lie, she's getting the axe to the neck.
I don't know if that's a good concept, but i wanted to share it to see what people think. I'm new to writing and probably sounds dumb, but i tried. 😂
Sounds good to me!
You may need to provide enough story building reasons as to why it would result with an axe to the neck, especially given the circumstances where an eternal war is going on, every single good fighter counts, whether a blasphemous liar or not, otherwise there's a good chance that it may not be taken too seriously due to the leaps in logic.
I think it would make an interesting story. Reminds me a bit of the movie "A Knights Tale", where the main character comes across a dying knight at the beginning of the film and steals his identity to participate in the tournament. He is eventually outted, but it has a happy ending if I remember correctly. Now to be fair, no one's life was on the line other than his own for lying.
I'd refrain from saying the hero of hell. You are making a parallel to hero of humanity but "hell" isn't the opposite of humanity.
Like in LotR you might have heroes of humanity, elves, and dwarves. All are races in that world.
Hell isn't a race, so it wouldn't have a hero. If your counterpart race to humanity are "demons," then say the hero of demon kind
@@l.n.3372 The reason why he's called that is because the title was given by humans. Heck, the name "demons" was also given by humans. There's 4 races that make up the demonkind, humans don't care, they're all demons.
Also, there's another reason why he's not the hero of the demon kind: He's not a demon. But that's a long story.
The superman thing reminds me... I've had some truly wild conversations with folks who just somehow entirely failed to notice the main conflict, or entire a-plot of a story because they couldn't imagine something like an internal conflict could possibly be the main point.
I remember one guy who swore the main character in a movie had no character arc, and it was literally the entire focus of everything.
Reminds me of how battle shonen fans will equate power ups to character development. While the two can interact, you can have a character not grow in power and grow as a person.
@@danthespaceman9747 This reminded me of some comments I saw under a video about how shonen manga/anime often isn't great at representing, or even giving narrative space to, women. The video brought up some good and bad examples etc and at some points mention "strong female characters". Fairy Tail is brought up as a not very good example.
Like half the comments are just different variations of "actually, one of the women is a very powerful summoner and has much power and - yadda yadda yadda". To some a characters power and importance is strictly tied to their battle power I guess.
@@danthespaceman9747Omg I was talking to one of my friends about Yuji Itadori from Jujutsu Kaisen, and he was saying how the author dropped the ball with said character because he’s not as powerful as other shounen MCs, and you hit was I was thinking right on the mark
problem is, what we call "character development" they call "filler".
This is why I prefer stories or anime where the battle is just side dish, not the main focus, because crazy powers or crazy visuals often distract people from the decline in stories and characters.
In one of my worlds I had a unique restriction where 2 magic users (Called "Philosophers") can never be close to each other for a long period of time, or their combined presence will attract an ancient being that will literally cause immeasurable loss of life. Therefore, all the powerful magic users stay the hell away from each other and new ones who don't know better get taught by the older ones really quick.
One magic system I enjoy is in the skulduggery pleasant books. It's sort of a mix of hard and soft magic: There are some clear limits established in th beginning of the series, but on the occasions that those rules are broken, the readers don't feel cheated because of the way the breaking of these rules is explained. Additionally, neither the reader nor the characters ever seem to fully understand magic, due to just how vast of a group of forces, entities and abilities it covers.
Not read them so can't say for them specifically, but usually when a hard magic system is "breaking the rules but explaining how", it's not actually breaking the rules, it's just showing that the real rules are different to the rules initially presented. It's still fully hard, it's just maintaining the intrigue instead of loredumping the full explanation upfront.
@@yurisei6732the way I see it, it's "breaking" the Newtonian laws of magic, but it's because Einstein didn't discover Special Magitivity yet, not because the author's a hack. That's an important distinction.
I feel like because the protagonist is on a learning journey herself (and comparatively young) there's some leeway. It's like when you do an advanced science lesson and teacher says "All that stuff we taught you? That was a necessary stepping stone to understanding but throw that out, it's more complex than you knew".
In a world building project I’m working on, the magic system revolves around some weird invisible matter which somehow interacts with the transmission of information in any living organism. Basically, when there is strong emotion or a strong wish or a defensive reflex in any living being magic can be triggered accidentally. So plants, fungi and animals have evolved to either have a more complex way of information transfer like a brain to have better control over their magic or specific behaviours to trigger useful magic reflexively. For humans that means, that they can cast magic with a specific goal in mind but never exactly know how that goal will be achieved but also that getting to know yourself better and having better control over your subconscious will directly correlate to better control over magic, not it’s strength tho, because that depends on the quantity of that magical matter stuff in your vicinity and your willpower. A simpler goal therefore usually creates stronger but less controllable magic than a more specific one.
Is that not pretty much toon force but without the jokes and insta-kills?
Reminds me of Dynamis from FF14! It's a hidden second magic system that comes from intense emotion. It's also how the player is capable of intense feats of power in their role (known as Limit Breaks) such as tanks creating a big protective barrier around their allies, healers reviving everyone and bringing them to full health, melee weapon users dealing a devastating blow, or magic users bursting large amounts of concentrated power in an area. Of course, not the exact same magic, but it is also used (shortly) to transfer information as messages between two parties without the need for translation. They will always know what the sender is trying to say without the need of translation.
As someone who’s begun writing their first book in the past year, these videos are super helpful and informative. Keep up the videos dude
What about 'Terrible Writing Advice' and 'Hello Future Me'?
Big same. Also recommend Alexa Donne, Yinka and Just in Time Worlds
Agreed! I have been sitting on ideas for so long with no idea how to write them down. This videos are helpful and are giving me some much needed guidance on how I might be able to write my own novels
I always write the worldbuilding first. But that usualy ends up with me going way too in-depth, and coming up with historical events and mythical creatures/places/things that end up never actualy making it into the story 😅
Yeah, a common trap I fall into. I got around that in my TTRPGs magic system by litterally writitng out the tenants of this magic.
I can never break those meaning my world has a clear and logical progression that can't be broken without feeling jarring.
Great video as always. I would dissagre partially on the sloppy buffet part. I really like when magic is this huge thing that affects the world. So when there is many different sort of mini magic systems it gives feeling of diversity. Of course if done badly then it is just a jumbled mess.
There's a very fine line between diverse and arbitrary though. Good diversity is variation that retains a feeling of connection and unity. A good diverse magic system still feels like one coherent magic system just with many intricacies. It's pretty much the same as in population dynamics: when you look at statistics, diverse societies and segregated societies are often indistinguishable in terms of things like number of people of each group within a certain area, but they function completely differently.
The reason this is important is because if your buffet is too sloppy, you can't actually write interesting scenarios using it. You end up with a Marvel situation where the interior workings of any given person's ability is irrelevant because only the end results of powers interact with each other, and ultimately every fight devolves into punching and laser beams. When Iron Man fights Hulk, it doesn't matter that Iron Man's power is being a technological genius with a magic rocket-powered cybersuit and a sapient AI copilot, because all of those words are only used to generate punches, and Hulk has no way of interacting with any part of that power except the punches generated by it. If the magic system was a coherent "tech" system though, Iron Man's enemy could be a hacker who is able to disable parts of his power, and now he's in a fight that only him and this nemesis could ever have - Hulk can't be hacked and doesn't fight hackers on any different ground to anyone else - they all just die to punch.
Yeah, I think I understand what you mean, and I agree that worlds with multiple types of magic are super interesting. But I think the sloppy buffet still applies, actually it probably applies more. In order for that world to still be interesting, each different type of magic needs to have very distinct differences, which would lead to each one being very good at its one thing. It's like what he said, but multiplied by however many different magic systems you have. Think X-Men, where each character is very different, but has their own well defined strengths and weaknesses.
Are 2 mini magic systems fine?
Like in my world, there's a stronger but less versatile magic bound to a God that must be worshipped to gain.
Called Worship.
And the other system is where one uses the soul of themselves and others to create a weaker and unpredictable but more versatile form of magic.
This system is called Paganism.
4:15 Like in Re: Zero when Subaru over uses his magic gate and he needs healing from the best healer maybe in the world, than he has to leave mid way through his treatment to save everyone from the witch cult, eventually destroying his magic gate beyond repair. Though he does inherit the authority of sloth from Petleguse.
To those who don't know about Re: Zero it's basically a phycological horror story with an extremely weak main character that somehow manages to pull through most situations with minimal long term damage other than extreme PTSD. One of the best stories I've ever watched, though they do make it rather complicated to the point it's hard to follow sometimes with the shear amount of things that did and didn't happen to remember.
The Re:Zero magic system is interesting, in the sense it isn't that Hard as a magic system, because there are PLENTY of different schools of magic. There's curses, witchcraft, spirit magic, classic elemental spells, blessings, martial techniques, weapons imbuing, and so on. But every character have his own personal limits, which make the magic system secondary to what can this or that character do with it. Subaru is a very poor mage, but it's proven afterward he's very gifted in witchcraft even if witchcraft have its limits, and he rely mostly on his contract with a spirit. You know what you can and can't expect from him. In the same way, Roswaal is a classic archmage, with powerful and destructive spells, but he can't use healing magic. It's the diversity of characters that make the magic system shine, not the intricacies of the magic system itself which is often loosely defined by how the people of this world use so many different techniques.
> minimal long term damage other than extreme PTSD
This sentence caught me off guard lol
Whos rem?
You forgot about his death retry function, which is mostly the reason why he managed to pull through most situations
@@nise6699 I did that to avoid spoilers
In my book i have a cursed physically impaired protagonist who wants to learn magic that changes her reality. This magic is wielded by (what are functionally) guardian angels and wings are a symbol of experience, power, and freedom. In the end of book one, she overcomes a great adversary and earns her magic wings at a very young age, but afterwards she struggles to make them appear, much less control her flight.
Many people told me to save the wings for the end of the trilogy, because when you get the power to fly you’re already godmode. And that’s a valid concern. I avoided giving anyone wings for a long time because it felt like it cheapened the difficulty of certain conflicts. But there's no reason to assume that flight becomes the solution to every conflict, when it's just another tool the protagonist needs to learn how to use and when to use it.
A lot of games will give you a glide early on and then more advanced flight later. This opens up the world without cheapening the conflict. I don’t like stories featuring magic where the protagonist can’t do any magic until the finale and then they struggle to do magic for 2 more releases. It’s far more interesting to me to give them power and watch them struggle to control it or watch it corrupt them - rather than have them squeeze droplets out of a dry sponge.
A good example of this is Lord of the Rings. Frodo has the ring in the beginning but it is only used in certain situations, and if it's overused it will alert the enemy to their presence and begin to corrupt him. A bad example from the same story is how Gandalf doesn't do magic until the fellowship needs him to, and then he conveniently disappears so he doesn't become overpowered to the story. But in these kinds of stories, these guardian type figures are very much forces of nature who guide heroes on their quest within the parameters they are permitted to rather than directly intervene.
Another bad example of this is Rey in the Star Wars sequels: she magically uses the force to win every scenario and never struggles to wield it or control it, much less is she tempted or corrupted by it. The concept of a protagonist who is very powerful early on yet unable to control it would have been very compelling for Star Wars as a stark contrast to Luke who had to learn from the bottom and train. But they just repeated Luke's arc and took out all of his hard work and internal conflict.
As an avid gamer, I agree: if the feedback is "flight seems too OP for this point in the story" then it sounds like they're assuming this ability is the solution to their central conflict, when (from your perspective as the writer) it's actually _not._ In many a Metroidvania, for example, you don't truly get an "OP" ability until the final areas, areas which no prior abilities will help you navigate.
And, since you mentioned flight specifically, it reminds me of the movie _Rio,_ about a blue parrot who, due to a traumatic childhood incident, believes he's incapable of flying. Physically he's fine and flightworthy, but mentally, any time he's in the air he panics, flails, and falls.
Flight is OP? From the standpoint of military fiction fans, that's arguable. They even have a meme for it
"What do you call flying soldiers? We call them skeets"
Flight by itself is not OP. On the other hand, super fast flight tend to be. Flight by itself just give a new dimension to fight, aka, flexibility. A slow plane has to be forced to make very careful approach otherwise they're shot out of the sky.
And there could be physiological limitations. How fast can she go before the forces acting upon her body maim or kill her? Think fighter pilots.
Also it's cold up in the air. How would she stay warm? Have you ever ridden a motorcycle while there is frost on the grass? Your hands and face will hate you, plus any holes or vents will become very obvious.
She will need to protect herself from projectiles if she flies fast and how will she stop herself becoming a slow moving target if she cannot fly very fast?
I like that you have included it early enough that the reader can discover along with her how she will overcome the limitations.
About the flying concern: I also think it depends on the limitations, right? If the flying takes just as much ressources as running, it ain't THAT OP anymore, is it?
Cal Kestis on the other hand was done right. The man’s a legit Jedi from the old days, but his original training ended at Padawan lvl because of Order 66, and on top of that it’s taking him multiple games to reconnect with the Force after the trauma from his past severed it
I litteraly found a magic system that ties into character, plot and setting and i'm so hyped. It just clicked, it makes sense thematically, it just works and it's beautiful
Could you please tell me about it a bit?
@@shadowgacha9055I’m also very curious about this magic system 🤧
Another trap that particularly (though not exclusively) authors of hard magic systems suffer from is when they make all magic follow the same rules, they interpret that as basically just giving everyone the same power set.
This is kind of a variant of 2, as it sort of implies that the level of skill in all fields of magic scale together (rather than - say - one wizard being better at enchantments while another is more skilled at alchemy), and results in issue 1 where it means the solution to every problem is the same because every threat is essentially the same but of more or less intensity.
To use a superhero example, one of the great things about Spiderman's rogue's gallery is that that they challenge his abilities in different ways. He can't fight Green Goblin the same way he'd fight Doc Oc. Mysterio is of "ordinary" power but master of illusion making Spidey's strength the less important factor in the battle but relying on his senses vital. Venom on the other hand doesn't trigger Peter's Spider Sense at all so can't be approached in at all the same way.
These are all different villains that offer different challenges, ensuring that Peter can't just approach every fight in the same fashion.
with most hard magic systems in theory everyone has the same things they are theoretically capable of, which can actually be a great way to make those fights interesting, with the consequences of fights being things like learning new abilities, and when victory is achieved, it isn't necessarily a rock paper scissors thing, it could really be described as the character's skills being ultimately why they won, which is incredibly satisfying, but this does require actually using the tools such a system gives the characters access to, make the fight a back and forth where both are trying whatever they can to win
Hard vs. soft magic depends a lot on how much access and control the main characters have with it.
Soft works well if it's something the main characters can't do, and mostly see done in the world around them (in which case it can be just as mysterious and magical for them as it is for us), or if it's something they don't have great control over (if they did, then either they know how it works, so we the audience should as well, or it looks like the characters are just pulling things out of their magic asses).
Hard magic is kind of needed if it's something the main party's going to be relying on and using a lot. We need to know their abilities, restrictions and at least a bit about how it all works for their actions and tactics to make sense. Or at least a blended system where we have a hard understanding of our characters' magic, but not about the broader magic of the setting.
I'm actually trying to explore "innate ability" where my MC has genetic innate ability placing him leagues above most others, but has close to zero talent for learning spells. Because he didn't train and learn on time, he needs to use other skills to compensate, and rely on other people. Magic systems, in the end, are just allegories for real life and there are limits to everything and everyone, and we need to work around them.
So essentially how being a “gifted students” in elementary school, gets you absolutely no where as an adult most of the time? 😅👀
I mean even if you suck at learning spells, most characters get them through pure hard work. That's a common troupe in anime.
Talking about hard vs soft magic systems around 7:20 reminds me of another benefit of a hard system. Subversion. Tell the reader what the rules of the magic system is, but do so in the voice of one or more characters. Then reveal later on, subtly at first but eventually undeniably, that the rules as they were explained are wrong. Let someone find out the hard way that there are unspoken rules that prevent certain things that are supposedly permissible, or specific circumstances where the rules as they are currently understood to be may be broken. The effect when a magic user, be they hero or villain, suddenly finds out that their magic doesn't quite work the way they thought, for good or ill, can be very dramatic.
As a gamer writing a comic, I can only relate this video to the Every Frame a Painting video on Chuck Jones. Read/consume as much as you can (comics, videogames, books) and show discipline, since you can do everything, show everything, you'll be defined by what you don't do.
This has given me so much confidence since they are things I've thought of on my own. To hear someone who actually knows what theyre talking about say these things has really relit my fire to finish my story
Kevin Hearne's magic system in his Plague of Giants series was fascinating: to get a certain kind of magic you had to literally risk your life. If you over used that magic--it aged and eventually kill you. Great series.
KH is my current favorite author. Nice shoutout!
sounds interesting, thanks
Ah, Mistborn, great series. Really loved the magic system in that one.
Funny i always thought the key to the dune magic system was genetics and not spice. I mean spice is needed for sure, but your genetics are more important. Like gebetics are the spells and spice is the mana.
My (likely incorrect) understanding was that it was essentially an extension of Paul's mentat abilities, which let him do insane calculations very quickly. So he was basically doing calculations while tripping on mushrooms, which meant that he could fully visualise all of these possibilities he was calculating.
No idea if that's correct though, just what I assumed.
Isn't the whole thing of Dune is that it doesn't have magic, just advanced cognitive and physical abilities?
@@i.cs.z It's not themed as magic, but structurally, it's magic. Some entities have the literal ability to perceive possible futures (with the limitation that prophets acting on their foresight cloud that portion of the future for other prophets). People can unlock the memories of all their ancestors up to conception/birth of the next ancestor in the line. Clones can remember their originals' lives - possibly even the lives of other clones of the same original. Then there's super speed, reversing the ageing process, various forms of mind control, etc.
Strictly speaking, sure, it's based on speculative fringe science of the second half of the 20th century, so it's technically science fiction more than fantasy, but Clarke's Third Law is always lurking, blurring the lines between technology and magic.
@@rmsgrey So it's not magic, it's speculative science based on genetic memory actually being a thing.
@@i.cs.z The genetic memory bit, sure. The ability to perceive the future? That's based on other fringe and/or pseudo- science. The other abilities? Largely extrapolated from the claimed abilities of real-world mystics.
Is it "magic"? How are you defining the term?
"Knowing the true name of something gives you power over it" Eragon did that years prior to Name of the Wind.
The Wizard of Earthsea did it years before Eragon.
We can go all the way back to (to my knowledge) ancient egyptian mythology, where Toth was able to make things into existance by naming them.
My favorite magic system is the one in Light Novel Mushoku Tensei. At first it's described as generic mana based 4 elements + healing magic, you cast by shaping mana by chanting or drawing a magic circle. But later you realize that:
1. It can do anything as long as you have enough mana, understand the effect you wanna make and know how to shape mana to achieve it.
2. It's functionally simple elemental system because of a cultural framework around it, making it easier to understand and learn + magic is relatively new branch of science so it's still not fully developed.
yeah, it's ultimately a rather well thought out magic system, which does a lot to convey the overall state of the world it exists in
I'm glad you brought up Sanderson. He's such a brilliant writer.
I'm currently working on my 6 book fantasy series right now... so thanks for sharing great pointers for me to work upon to make my book better each day. You're really a great person for helping out the world of writers. Thank you, Jed. ❤
I'm glad I've dodged all of the mistakes and have done pretty well with my magic systems, based on these suggestions!
I have a semi-hard system, with a ton of range, but also a lot of limitations. Some forms of magic are softer in execution but require greater effort to learn, and the others have harder rules but are less difficult to learn.
Something I love about having more thought out rules for a magic system is that you can naturally "discover" things you hadn't originally planned.
An example for me is my Pyromancy magic, which in my universe allows the caster to create and move flame and heat around. Much later on I realized that the way it worked would mean a sufficiently powerful Pyromancer would effectively become capable of a kind of Cryomancy (ice magic), because they can yank all of the heat out of things (or people.)
Loved the sneaky Stormlight reference at the start as well as the Mistborn reference. Both fabulous series
I was looking for this comment 😅
Im currently working on a weird-ish magic system based around light and lanterns and whatnot
Lanterns are the inner light of the soul, this allows you to project the energy of the world and greatly increases your ability to control it, but you dont need it to internally manipulate it. Lanterns have a few unique properties in this world, one of which is attracting fragments of fallen deities. What attracts these fragments is the true light if your soul, and after a certain amount of fragments have been gathered, your lantern will undergo a change do represent the ability of the deity that has been attracted to your light. A few examples of abilities would be: Manipulating plants, clouds, or disease. The next unique feature is that lanterns can absorb elemental crystals. Elemental crystals are colored crystals that are specific elements depending on their color, for example: Orange = fire, Blue = Water, etc. these crystals are the basics of the magic system outside of the lanterns, but they work hand in hand with each other. Lanterns absorb crystals to "dye" your light to the element of the crystal, which also changes the lantern's ability slightly. For example, Someone with the lantern that manipulates the weather, specifically clouds, whom also has a crystal of fire, will be able to conjure dark almost flame like clouds that rain down fire.
theres more to the powersystem but they remove the ability for a lantern, or might make it so instead of just "replacing" the lantern, one just replaces the crystals and the ability of the lantern.
TLDR: Making a power system revolving around light, lanterns, crystals and blindfolds
Crystals = elemental abilities
Lanterns = natural occurrences (typically)
beast wills = animal based powers (this might just instead of replacing lanterns will make the lantern and body become one, using this core as the center, idk how i wanna do it)
All of this good advice, in my Sovereign Species story, there are multiple magic systems at work within the story, one plain to see for everyone that the main characters use, another more esoteric and soft one that the villains have at their disposal, that none of the heroes know the rules to. The two factions are so fundamentally anathema to eachother that even their magic systems are trying to destroy the other. For example, the Aldokk need to go through extremely specific rituals in order to sieze the Arek's power without dying, and even when they succeed, they only have access to a select few abilities, and even then, the weakest of them completely lose their cohesion, turning into living masses of fleshy paste without dying.
Whilst the Arek seek to annihilate everything of the Aldokk, they literally exorcize objects that the Aldokk have imparted their own magical energy into, and embracing the Aldokk's magic, or even tolerating the existence of the Aldokk themselves, causes the Arek's own might to wane as their souls slowly erode from living amongst the Aldokk's presence for too long.
love that you don't just point out mistakes but also provide samples and solutions.
you have helped me through my writing soo much jed, your content never ceases to aid me
Reminds me of a story I tossed out when the MC gained godlike power in the first few pages.. all his statistics were literally infinite, infinite strength, health, magic.. one of the first things he did was create a sort of heaven for himself to live in, bring his dead parents back to life and give them near infinite power and look into the future to all the fights he'd win one day.. all this in the first few pages of the story. There was no struggle, no growth, and his future was set in stone with him as the perpetual victor. Even his backstory of pain and suffering was thrown out. I still can't shake my head at that.
So I say, never give the MC too much power or an ability that solves every problem.
Infinite power stories can work if you're going for an emotional story rather than an adventure/action story. What does being infinitly powerful do to them? How do others react? That sort of thing.
Not a bad idea though, you just have to make a magic system that makes "infinite something" bad. For example, maybe "infinite health" within the context of the magic system means your cells are incapable of changing, meaning your body is always that of an infant with all the limitations that brings.
And that's why most LitRPG stories are trash...
This is a great video. I've always wanted to write a novel but can never get more than a few pages written before the fear of failure makes me quit.
I have this idea for a magic system where mages channel residual magical essence in the air into their body then back out into the world to create effects but everyone has a limit to both the rate they can channel it at, and the capacity they can hold at one time. More powerful spells require higher capacity and high throughput is needed for maintaining continuous effects. Going over this limit can result in horrible injuries, dangerous accidents and death so mages must spend years training to increase their limit.
go for it! the only failure is never writing anything, if its still something you want to write
That's a very interesting magic system, I don't think I've seen before. For sure go for it! I'd love to read it.
For mistake 2: One of my favorite ways a book series got around this is that the character would go insane if he used it to much so he had to chose when he should use it
Id love to see somebody with Gravity magic do a quick change on an opponent when fighting inside. At first, they are running, fleeing, swapping from wall to ceiling, to floor at will. Then, they burst into a hallway or other small area and realized their is nowhere left to go. They turn to face their opponent and, as they leap at them to attack, they catch them with their magic or step aside and touch them as they fly by. Now, they are in their power and, while they can't send them into the sky that doesn't mean they can't do anything. Gravity swaps, the enemy smashes into the roof, it swaps again, they smash into the floor, and that just keeps happening, the opponent being pummeled against whatever now counts as the floor until they are beaten well beyond consciousness. It wasnt that all the hero could do was send people away with gravity.... They just didn't want to hurt anybody so that was their go to move.
Or you can turn your bad writing into good writing by making your characters flaw the fact that they treat everything like a nail and they have to overcome it 😂
My thoughts exactly. In my story (that takes place more in my mind than paper) a “human” teenager becomes immortal and gets other powers, so you have a character who is trying to protect the world, while simultaneously trying to keep himself from going insane. Variety is something that makes a story great. :)
One could even use it intentionally to make it clear the allies of the person with the super-effective power are too reliant on that person, then take that person out.
Yeah, but that one's more satirical in nature and is an exception to the norm
Congratulations! You have created worst writing!
Reminds me of Nikaro from Yumi and the Nightmare Painter who just paints a bamboo for every nightmare instead of painting the most appropriate picture.
You make some goods points here. The one you make about the limitations of skill seems to me, the most useful for avoiding the other mistakes.
*a novice is only going to know a little bit of magic, so no sloppy buffet
* a novice isn't going to be as powerful as a master, so no instant resolution of problems
*a novice will work on their skill over time. Finding new information about magic, new mentors to teach them, time to practice, etc. all that can be part of the story that is told. Or NOT finding those things, and making due.
Kudos for that thing about the campfire ambush. That sounds clever.
I feel like there were a hundred tips crammed into this video. In a good way!
In school I had a story of a teen boy whose mother was a Master Mage. In that world only a minority of people can cast magics and constant use causes a condition called 'Magi Fatigue' and she has an advanced case of it where she is more or less bed bound and unable to use magicks anymore. She pushes him to joining the Guild who controls who can and can't do magicks through permits. He has zero aptitude for magic, shows no potential to cast it, but a voice in his ear keeps feeding him incantations when he really needs it and a lot of times, they're the highest level ones that are overkill. He thinks he's going crazy, the other students think he's entitled since he got past the inspector by his mother's name alone and the teachers keeps trying to humble him with restrictions and hard physical work.
It was therapeutic work to get my frustrations out in school.
I'm working on a story that doesn't exactly have magic, but the main character is a shape shifter based on genetics. He is a hybrid between a human and an alien and the accident that altered the parent's genes allowing the two characters to produce a child together also made the shape shifting possible. The shape shifting heals wounds, but the character's mass is lowered by the amount of mass loss that the wounding caused and he has to regain that mass to be fully healed. For example if he lost an arm he could heal the wound, but he would need to replace the lost mass before he could be as strong in that replacement arm. Also if he lost too much mass he could die from being diminished below a level that he can recover from. He had a brother with the same powers who died from trying to regenerate too many times without rebuilding body mass. His shape shifting does have the advantage of perfect regeneration which could allow him to live forever if he doesn't die from loss of body mass.
Anyway, your talk on magic systems made me wonder if I in effect had some sort of magic system with this character.
that's interesting.
What ways can he use to regain mass? I assume chowing down on a shit ton of food to be a way to do so?
@@TurtleDudeProd Mainly by eating, but it takes time and he has to work out to use the nutrients to rebuild mass within himself.
@@arnoldfossman1701 Ahh, that makes sense!
Yeah, "magic" can mean either of two things - it can be literal magic - the use of will and skill to manipulate mystical forces - or it can be used much more loosely to apply to anything beyond mundane everyday life that follows the same writing rules as magic, whether that's fringe science, nanotechnology, sufficiently advanced technology, alien physiology that might not respect the laws of physics, or anything else that gives some characters special abilities.
There are also times when literal magic isn't magic in storytelling terms - a handful of Palantiri in the world is magic in both senses; a scrying crystal in every pocket is just a fantasy-world smartphone.
This video actually encouraged me and gave me some inspiration. I was surprised that the magic system I've been cooking up for a while didn't suffer from most of the pitfalls mentioned (I've never dabbled in fantasy writing before so it's my first one)
i was literally working on this right this second, you couldnt have uploaded at a better time haha
I really like the magic in lord of the mysteries. The more you use them, the closer you get to madness, and mastery of your abilities comes more with dealing with the side effects rather than using the powers themselves
Always look forward to your stuff, Jed. You put out very helpful content!
The Stormlight archive honestly does this well. While it is a hard magic system the rules make it feel soft as characters figure out what they can do. From the diffent surgbindings to the oath's along side the other cosmer stuff that interacts with it and mudies the water in the best way.
First-time watcher.
Two rules of thumb I like to keep in mind;
Soft Magic can be hard magic from a different perspective.
Hard magic is good at solving issues. Soft magic is good at making them.
When I make a setting I like to tell a lot of different stories in that setting, and even if in one story I explained how the magic works, it doesn't mean I need to in the next, especially if the characters don't actually use it at all.
Hi Jed! Well sadly I write in secret from my family, I cant tell them I like to write cause I know they wont see Writing as a real job. So I cant really pay for your classes but I just wanted to tell how greatfull I was to you and your youtube videos. My writing has gotten way better from the first time I started and your videos have helped me so much. I fixed lots of things in my WIP´s and you cant imagine how happy I am. I cant thank you enough. Thank you so much for being there by my side while I go after my secret dream even tho you dont know you are doing it. Thank you
I’m currently working on a 5 book series, and my protagonist has one of my favorite powers: Atom Manipulation. Basically, they can rearrange the atoms of anything, and reform it into a material or state of matter they choose. But the biggest drawback they have, is that they can only manipulate what they can touch. Throughout the series, i want him to learn his power from the very beginning, but improve as time moves on. Like in the beginning, he’ll only be able to manipulate things that he directly touches, but by the end, he’ll be able to manipulate an object several yards away. If it’s touching the ground that his feet are standing on, he can control it.
Hey Sounds cool, for claritys sake, do you mean Manipulation of Atomic bonds? So rearranging of the Atoms in an existing Molecule, or the Manipulation of Proton count, basically turning one Element into a different one, for example turning O2 into Fe (Oxygen into Iron)? Or a combination of both.
How Spicy do you intend to go? I mean after all just turning some Water into Hydrogen and Oxygen would be enough to blow a Building Sky High and turning the Nitrogen in the Air into Chlorine Gas would basically make your MC a walking War Chrime. (Not necessarily a Protagonist Move, but maybe?)
Would probably require some proper Control since MC would have to change the Air he breathes back or leave unaffected.
The Ground thing is due to Visualization? Since Air is also full of Atoms I mean, or is it the higher Density of Atoms?
In any case seems to be an Interesting Power with quite a lot of Applications, even peaceful just changing Dirt to Gold would make you an instant Millionaire, and Money is Power after all.
@@Fushur7 Behold!
*turns dirt into gold*
I call this spell... THE Inflation
And this is how entire world economy was shredded in a matter of months, kickstarting new dark age of war and struggle
Jokes aside, neat ability. Only concern is how powerful it can be without any kind of regulation
@@Fushur7 I don’t know how I’ve never seen this. I’m sorry. Better late than never. About the specifications of his power, he can control all matter as long as he’s touching it. But it gets exponentially harder as the state of the matter changes. Solids are easiest because he can… you know. Feel it. Liquids by itself is already in another class. I do try to implement some development where he learns to manipulate it. And I’m not even gonna try gases 😭. Also, it’s not necessarily the exact rearrangement of molecules. It limits my options to what I want him to achieve. It’s more of a visualizing thing. He crumbles a rock to basic matter and rearranges it into any shape/material he wants.
@@М.О.Н.С sorry I haven’t seen this four months later. And about the regulations. There will be none. The reasons for that are to come if I hopefully ever finish my series. His only weakness is keeping him stranded in the air with nothing to grab onto or keeping him contained in un-manipulatable objects(results of another magic system).
I would add one more to your list of magic limitations: there is an element of luck.
For example: maybe when a character casts a spell there is a chance that something else will happen instead of what they want (useless, bad, or different entirely). In this setting, the characters trying to take into account for when things don't go the way they hoped is where the intrigue lays. The average characters look for ways to minimize loses, but the clever ones look for ways that make situations so that whatever happens when the magic is cast it will benefit them.
I clicked on this just to see if your advice was "write hard magic". Glad it wasn't. Great advice! Specifically the triangle was on point 👌🏼
One of the most thought-provoking takes on magic I've come across is in Uprooted by Naomi Novik. "The Dragon" tries to teach spells to the main character in an academic way, and she makes little progress. But then, she looks into some notebooks he thinks worthless, which outline a more intuitive form of magic, and this works for her.
This started me thinking... what if magic is like music? You can approach music through theory (a hard system), or you can play by ear (a soft system), or you can bring the two together. And what if casting a spell is like a musical performance, where you being your learning, your years of practice, your raw ability, together in the moment? "Stage fright" might cause the spell to fail. A virtuoso might cast the same spell as a novice, with vastly greater effect, but a very few might work great magic by instinct. Some might be able to improvise spells hitherto unknown, while others spend years creating them.
Good advice, it helped me with my current fantasy book.
The type of magic system I hate the most is monetary magic. It's one thing to have a magic shop that charges money to buy magical tools, but that's not the problem. The problem is when you have a magic spell that materializes something out of thin air, but drains your bank account by the monetary value of the thing you created. Or the ability to teleport two objects to each other's locations, but only if those objects have the same monetary value. And yes, I've seen both of these examples in anime. What happens when someone sells something at a yard sale at a record low price? It wouldn't just crash the economy, it would crash the whole fabric of monetary magic!
1:10 ..... congratulations you just described gravity rush....
Long live the Gravity Queen!
A lot of the magic system problems can be solved by giving it a lot of limitations. I won't go into great detail for obvious reasons, but I have a system where in order to even use it, something has to have happened in the past in that area. So, not only can you not use it a lot - every 'solution' ends up different because you have to 'reach back" to a scenario that happened in that place that differs from the situation you're in anyway. The effects of the magic are dictated by those events also, so, casting the same exact thing twice is unlikely. It also causes Harmonic Drain - the user starts getting disoriented and sometimes confusing themselves with different versions of themselves, or even someone else all from different realities.
Also, this video was awesome. Just the conjecture alone gave me a ton of ideas. Thanks man.
Great video. I always look forward to watching. 😊
I have a magic system which instead of manipulating the elements themselves, you manipulate the natural laws and mechanisms associated with them. For example, Fire deals with redox reactions, Ice deals with the lowering of kinetic energy, etc. However, methods of fighting aren’t limited to just the obvious as for example, a character fights using exploding ice blossoms or how same element users have wildly different fighting styles (one focuses on manipulating atmospheric pressure while the other focuses on controlling the speed of a battle). Some people even choose to use their resonances as a tool instead of their weapon such as a character who fights using multi-elemental paints.
Magic is an energy produced by the world, one that bends the rules but cannot break them as it cannot create, cannot destroy and only convert. If magic goes in a mechanism, the same amount will go out, whether or not it’s split between different forms. How much a person can bend the natural laws is proportional to how much magic is supplied (a little can cause static, a lot can form a ball of electricity). If a ‘natural’ reaction or outcome isn’t possible or takes too long, magic is the trigger and catalyst whose entropy bends physical laws in a way that exceeds comprehension.
Everyone resonates with an ‘element’ at birth, but can switch around and even add a resonance through really complicated ways. However, people can only hold up to two resonances at a time or else their body and soul can’t handle it, no exceptions. A person’s mastery of their resonance depends on their understanding of these natural laws and mechanisms. A lot of the time, modern users are more powerful than past ones because people have managed to discover what truly causes these phenomena to occur, instead of blindly attributing everything to magic. Past Fire users perhaps only melted metal, but modern ones can cause it to rust instead due to a better understanding of fire as a whole.
the best magic system for me so far.....JoJo, every stand is unique and the author made it extremely creative
the issue with stands is that it does establish rules, and fights are given tension because of those rules, or those fights were only winnable because of those rules, but then in the next season every one of those rules is thrown out and not even acknowledged as having been a thing, it's an incredibly bad magic system, saved by the choreography and character writing being just that good
@@tomykong2915 can you give me an example of a rule they threw out?
These tips work for sci-fi as well. Random genetic mutations, genetic manipulation, virus that gives abilities, psychic abilities, exotic energy sources…
This is why I always tell people that A certain magical Index has the best magic system in all of ani/manga/LN, and is top tier in fiction, is deserves to be more popular, for me, it's the top 1 in fiction. It did the exact opposite of every mistake you talked about in the video while being extra unique and so perfectly done.
The MC, Kamijou Touma, has a seemingly overpowered ability, being simply "negates all supernatural phenomena", sounds bland and lame at start, when you realize it has severe weakness: He's still a human, it only works on his right hand, he gets extremely unlucky, and it has a limit on it's cancelling speed, so even if it can negates miracle from god or an attack that can destroy the universe itself, it can't negate contant strong fire magic being poured upon it. And the lore doesn't just stop there, how would you feel if an already bland ability is actually bland? No no no, the lore on the ability, the mysteries behind the ability itself is unveiling slowly, which made the ability become so interesting. And yes, because of it's nature, he has to outsmart his opponent, analyzing his opponent's spells and tons of other stuff, which make all of his fights really interesting.
Magic in Index are hardcore on rock paper scissor, it's not just "I has level 10 magic and is infinitely stronger and more advanced than yours so I win", but rather "I have the exact magic to counter you + I have more knowledge, GG".
Even godlike beings are beatable, because even if they're godlike, even if they can end the world, change how it look at their will, their human side and how the world works made them beatable, it's honestly such a good way to treat godlike characters rather than just make them so overpowered for the sake of it.
The magic system in Index is built in it's cosmology, it's world building and it's characters. The reason why it achieved that is first thanks to Idol theory, where the original can affect the replicas and even the opposite way, a simple theory that just works and make the system more vast than ever while helping the magic to be a part of the world, of the story. And the second reason is that the magic is born from the world, not that the magic is just there because it's there, the magic works because the world itself allow it to work, the magic change the world and the world change the magic, basically it's all thanks to Phases, Phases make religion and myths true to the world, while the people are the ones who brought religions to the world thus creating Phases, that's why it can be so diverse and connected to each other. The Magic in Index exists for the character, not the other way around, this is due to the fact that Magic was just a thing people use to achieve their goals, and that's what make a magician a magician in Toaru, this is also what made the Magic system a part of the story.
The system could be called hardcore magic system while being soft magic system at the same time, while the lore is there, the explanation is never too deep to the point that it require you to be a hardcore mythology fans to be able to enjoy it, it always a bit vague, leaving space for the casual fans to enjoy while also giving the hardcore fans the chance to get real. We have the science side with esper powers for the casual fans and the magic side for the more hardcore fan that loves magic. Both have their own charm, their own story, their own world that the events take place in, both have their own focus for their own settings, and that's what make it rather than a sloppy buffet, a whole 5 star course meal.
Instant mastery? In index, in order to use magic, it's not as simple as "feel your flow of mana" or some simple stuff like that, you have to understand every aspect of the magic you're using, especially it's lore, either from an existing myth/religion, or you can spend time creating your own mixed style, or if you have even more time and knowledge, you can create a whole new myth/religion for your magic. All of which needs time and knowledge, and a lot of studying. You got a grimoire? Cool! Now decipher it, and careful, it will poison your brain with otherworldly knowledge and kill you if you're not skilled enough or it finds you to be unsuitable. You want to become godlike? You will have to master every single magic, ascend on the Sephiroth and many other stuff, oh, and you'll have to give up being human if you want to ascend to the top of the tree!
Basically, it's a headache being a magician, things aren't as easy as "more mana = better" or "I somehow learn ridiculous magic through some way", and raw power isn't always better, magic in Index are rock paper scissor, for example if you only have fire power, another magician with some magic that allow them to instantly attack you will just win, even if they don't have a high fire power, cause you're a glass cannon.
Every fantasy writers could learn from A Certain Magical Index, it will inspire you a lot.
And finally, read Toaru Majutsu No Index, peak fiction.
So happy to see Jade City mentioned. She basically hits I think 6 out of the 8 points you mention for what can make a good system or limitation of magic. Such a fantastic martial arts series.
0:40 **Megalovania starts playing**
Naming was the first system that came to mind when you mentioned good soft magic systems, glad you mentioned it. Also glad you mentioned Luxin from Lightbringer, which I consider a pretty great magic system as well.
im currently just struggling to stay motivated and intrested in writing my story, after a moment of writing it i get bored and want to play video games instead :(
I developed a magic system where magic is based on classes. The classes are Warrier (melee weapons), Fighter (physical attacks and Martial arts), Archer (ranged weapons), Mages (rune magic), and the rare Mancers (elemental powers). Every person is born with one of these classes and can obtain the rest via secret quests unique to each person. You may have to massacre a thousand monsters in a minute or you might get the warrior class while chipping down a tree
I like how he references Brandon Sanderson's magic system as a example for each part.
One magic system I really appreciate is from the Eragon series. With the exception of innately magical being like dragons, the entire magic system is based around the language of magic. You could just say "fire" to make your arrow explode into flames, or you could make figurative connections in your mind to do something like saying "water"->shimmering blue surface-> create a blue gem. A character's skill with magic is just as dependent on how much magic vocabulary they know than their actual magic pools. And while there is a lot of creativity to how magic can be shaped, it does still follow certain rules distance weakens magic (whence why a flaming arrow is better than just snapping a fireball onto your target), the magic needs to be done with intent and planning to not backfire (the protag almost kills himself the first time he casts magic because he didn't know how to shut off the magic and nearly drained himself to death), and more complex spells and enchantments needing to be step by step like programs to run properly. Even beyond casting, magic still is part of the world. While less than a quarter of the population seem to be casters, anyone can be trained to block their minds from mental probing, for instance. And because the language of magic is the language of power, no one can lie when speaking it. While you can find some flaws in characterization or developments in the books, the magic system remains the most fascinating for me almost 20 years later.
Frieren. I would enjoy your take on the pacing, magic system, and the “Beyond Journey’s End” approach to telling this high-fantasy story.
Not going to lie, this video alone helped me reach the point where I'm ready to start writing. After years of visualizing and trying to think of how to start, where this is going to go... this pushed me over the edge
Thank you
Another issue is making the magic system a dependency for resolving the theme. This is similar to how some sci-fi stories will resolve by whoever has the best technology, or how in a super hero story will rely on super powers to resolve the theme. The issue with this is that it it removes universality from the moral argument. We really shouldn't be telling our audiences morality is only reserved for those who have magic/technology/superpowers, it should be solvable for anyone (the theme is universal). This is why I can't stand most sci-fi and super hero stuff. Fantasy has a better track record but I feel it is falling down the sci-fi path of people just wanting to show off how smart they are by making the most contrived magic system known to man.
It seems to sound like you attribute agency to the magic system, I think that even if a character needs to use magic to solve the problem, the conflict is still fathomable and within the realm of morality and that's what the audience can understand.
I can understand it from a different angle like power-scaling like "who's more powerful" and not using magic and its systems with brains like how a fire magic user might defeat a water magic user (in the most simple rock-paper-scissors logic I can imagine) if the fire user is smart and play his cards right.
Also there is a virtue ethic side to the moral argument, and that is that, sure you won't have magic and powers, but strong people, mighty people, people with power can solve problems more easily and it's harder to give them a shake-down without retaliation from them, while weak people will fall in line more easily and audience they can if not understand it, they can at least internalize it.
@@Saint_Wolf_ Disagree. While the morality of something might be comprehensible for the audience, acting with virtue is universal and should not be locked away for the select few with magic/powers/whatever. This is the theme that lead to the near decade of trash known as "Marvel Movies."
For your other point, it's essentially "Might makes right" which isn't a virtue.
I should clarify the magic system my issue applies to the most is the type where it is unearned, such as Harry Potter or Luke Skywalker. If magic is like physics and everyone in the setting can understand and interact with it and gain skills over time, I have much less of an issue with that. However that type still seems to be used for the "Might makes right," for the most part.
@@iiisaac1312 But the scale of the threat is also ridiculous, it's not some story where some almighty powerful hero is fighting everyday hurdles, it's super powered threats and super powered heroes.
And I know, but you need might and strength to encounter, discourage and stop a person who might try to use the logic of "might maketh right" following some consequentialist set of ethics.
And doesn't Harry Potter have enough qualified mages to meet your standard? They literally all go to a school, the thing is that Harry is a piece of Voldemort's puzzle unlike the other mages. Sure there are "special people" with innate abilities but there are enough of the special people where it's kinda irrelevant that not 100% of the population can't use the magic, but in Hogwarts it is 100% of the people who can use magic, then comes to skill, knowledge and tactics which seems to be what you prefer out of a magic system.
I know I sound combative but I actually find this conversation kinda fun.
@@Saint_Wolf_ Action and Might = Right I still hold as not part of virtue. They are ultimately both violence at the end of the day, and violence isn't a virtue. There are many ways to create suspense, tension, and drama without the use of either, and books are better suited for this. 1984 is good at this and it isn't a book filled with action or might = right. While Action and Might = Right might make good spectacles for film (But are still poor moral themes), books aren't the same as film and action can get exhausting to read. Most written action takes too much inspiration from the visuals of film and winds up not advancing plot or character.
Strength only applying to consequntialist ethics really only proves its lack of universality. Outside of the morality, there are ways to solve issues while not being in a position of any power that are probably more tense and interesting than a typical power vs power conflict. For instance, a slave might have a violent master that likes to drink a lot of alcohol. All the slave would need to do is just make sure his master's shot glass is always filled and let him suffer the consequences of his own gluttony in the form of liver failure and not get caught in the process. This would make a more dramatic scene compared to a fight scene between a super hero and a super villain because there is a much greater power imbalance between the master and the slave. The hero/villain scene is like bringing a gun to a gunfight, while the master/slave scene is more like bringing nothing to a gun fight. One of these will just be more tense than the other.
Harry Potter did not earn his magic. While he might have had to go to school (an exclusive club btw) to practice it, it was something he never had to earn. He was just lucky enough to not be born a muggle. Being born with the right characteristics is not a moral achievement. One of the themes that can be observed in Harry Potter is: You can achieve excellence without doing anything, just wait for an owl to tell you you're special.
@@iiisaac1312 No, violence isn't a virtue, but violence is autistic, what are you using violence for is the determining factor, nuanced apply, is it to rob someone? Compel them to divulge a secret, moderate their behavior? Or is it to stop a robbery? protect an innocent? Punish a wrong doing? It's like the argument you'd give to a twig shaped "pacifist": can you be a pacifist if you're weak to defend yourself or others from aggression? It reminds me of Starship Troopers "Violence is the sole authority from which all other authority is derived".
Coercion, to compel a man to act, it all comes from someone twisting someone else's arm. Now I'll divulge I'm a visual storyteller so we might find some misalignment as I'm less of the written format, but I still hold true that conflict in essence requires the seeking leverage and underlying beneath that will always be a threat of violence, not necessarily explicit, but implicit.
And I think on your slave tension example compared to a fight scene is where one can draw certain points of friction, mainly because given a visual media people wanna see spectacle, now one of the better movies of last year was men walking, talking in close up and arguing… and then there was like a bomb or something, idk, but I liked Einstein.
Jokes aside though I do think there is a form of aggression involved in the slave example, it's just a matter of outlets. But there's also an angle of real politik that applies to it. Let me explain, and not to mock your example, but what service does the slave offer? Does he just pour drinks? Is him alone the sole servant? Are there other slaves with him? Is the master violent in spite of it compelling no good behaviors? Are the slaves tools of a plantation or servants? Is he violent when sober becuase he's got sadists whims or is it just a matter of alcohol? Becuase just badgering and battering your "tools" if I may use such crude language yields subpar results. Sure he can slowly poison his master but then what? Who takes over after that? If the master blinds himself with drink does he have others overseeing his operation and for his slaves to not run away? There is no way the slave can cozy up to his master to detir the punishment?
And I see where you're coming from, but I think you're reading it a little too literally, like one cannot expect the reader to separate fact from fiction and understand that a owl or many owls swarming your house with letters doesn't literally happen, when I think most people, even children as old as 7 can understand that, they may daydream and fantasize about it, but they understand it doesn't happen like that. But many people have innate abilities, sure in western societies and even in Oriental societies, it may seem like we only value intelligence, becoming doctor, engineer, surgeon, but there are skills one can develop with hard work that aren't that. Not to saying the like that "everyone is special" but that everyone can develop a skill and improve it, painting Warhammer figures, writing, doing marketing campaigns, doing comedy, teaching math, cooking, translating texts, doing sign language.
If anything one can read the metaphor that sometimes people who don't share what make you special will dismiss you and try to bring you down (muggles), but with some help, from teachers, from a school, from a different environment, and specially with hard work, with a good circle, and work ethic you can thrive, bring forward and develop what makes you special. Sure it sometimes feels like Harry doesn't have anything to prove, while Hermione really became a bookworm to prove to herself and others she's a good witch, but on that end sometimes it feels Ron doesn't have anything to prove either. Then there is the life and death aspect to Harry Potter to drive conflict.
I really hope the slavery words don't get this comment sent to the shadow realm, that would suck.
I have a "magic" system that goes a little something like this:
1. No resource dependence
2. Using either side of this system causes psychological harm *(one side more so than the other)*
3. Practitioners of this system *(both sides)* require the ability to hear it, and in most cases, must be female *(with some exceptions)*
4. Knowledge and skill play a major part in whether the user has less or more power *(though knowledge can be a greater ally in this area)*
5. There are no cultural restrictions, but the use of this system is deemed illegal unless you are a member of a particular group *(with the other group being outlawed and banished)*
6. Interference can be caused by the system itself. Basically, practitioners are constantly being whispered to about the "secrets of the universe" and "greater power." Those on the Light Side train their minds to either ignore the voices or make deals with weapons they wield *(the whispers come from a particular part of their weapons)* to harness that power *(while those on the Dark Side of the system will immediately give in to desire, performing great acts of evil to attaint said promised power)*
7. There are no restrictions on time and place, but their power can be interrupted or halted temporarily using certain mana waveforms.
8. As a special note, my story does contain a "chosen one" (many, in fact), but there is actually an opposing "chosen one" who is destined to be their adversary.
They each represent either side of the system.
Feminist ahh power system
I personally like the 3rd Point the most.
I enjoy hard Magic Systems, but sometimes I feel people go to far.
Magic is, at least in my eyes a Force of Wonder, but some Hard Magic Systems basically turn it into Sience Class with extra steps.
If your Magic can't surprise your Readers at all and make them feel Wonder it isn't Magic.
Which isn't necessarily Bad, after all the Valid Excuse, in a World with Magic, Magic probably would be a Science exists.
But sometimes it's just taken to far.
If I want to read a bunch of thesis papers on convoluted Rules and Laws to explain weird Stuff I can read Science Fiction after all ;)
To each their own. I personally enjoy Magic Science myself.
Science does not make you experience wonder??
@@paigeepler No it doesn't.
I have a fun one for my fantasy setting. Light and Seed Sorcery.
Light is the resource for the magic. Little pinpoints of light within the body of the user that augments their physical abilities when focused in parts of the body, such as focusing it into your ears to enhance hearing or balance. They're also connected by threads of light.
The threads of light are the actual resource as the pinpoints can be put into a cycle, forming a circle as the threads build up around the pinpoints spinning. This is called a seed. The seed builds up these threads slowly and can be sped up, but you speed it up too much, and the seed will crack (will get to that in a sec).
Every user has lenses that can be used to color the seed towards specific effects, usually linked to a single word. Most users have between two and four lenses with specific races in setting (sapphire goblins in particular) having more. Additionally, there is mist (foundation for a second magic system but linked to the first one), which can be used as a lens by encircling it in a seed.
Once a seed is formed, it can be cracked to cause the built-up energy to become usable. Then, the mage can use the imbued qualities from the lenses or the mist used in it to create Magix effects. A blank seed, one untouched by a lens or mist, instead supercharges the physical effects of light.
When my characters are too strong I just make villains that are stronger.
This will lead to a new problem called the ladder villains where you'll have to always make the next bad guy stronger than the last in the long run this will make you first villains look like shit
I just make their abilities drive them mad or make them mentally unstable.
So basically, if you have a Gojo, just make a Sukuna.
I love the hard magics in Name of the Wind, as well, and how they look to us readers in our world of science. Sympathy magic, for example, where the arcanist makes bonds between similar objects to cause some effect. The magic is often powered by a nearby fire or other energy source, but if one isn’t available, you can use your own body as the source. Do that too much however, and you get the Binder’s Chills, which can become debilitating or even fatal. We look at it and say “Yeah, you’re using your body heat, and causing hypothermia if you aren’t careful.”
Instant mastery: Mary Sue/Stew or Rey Syndrome.
I love the Eragon series, and I think that its magic system works so nicely. The fact that you need to know all the ancient words and know precisely what you want to do and construct a sentence using the right words and the right sense is really interesting. Besides that, the magic cost is the same as the physical cost, so in order to do something amazing, you spend as much energy as you'd do doing it physically.
I love the food analogy. I was thinking my world's magic system having one basic core mechanic was too simple but now im gonna focus on it even more and keep using it as fuel for the story's primary conflict
Your video has really given me hope for the magic system in my first book that I am writing! :) Thank you! It is good to know that I am heading in the right direction with it.
You know you have no idea how happy it makes me to see you reference, Mistborn. Sanderson is my favorite living author!
I love blends of Hard magic and Soft magic. it is the best way (in my opinion) to have a "chosen one" character, you create a "hard system with rigid rules" and then break the shell occasionally letting the reader know that the rules don't necessarily work exactly how you or the people in the story believed, but also keeping things that happened possible with the change in the system. Like peeling a shell off a hard boiled egg.
First point springs to mind the existence of "Avadra Kadavra" Instant kill spell from Harry Potter with barely any consequence besides being "Evil"
This comment has been brought to you by
_The Best Fight in Harry Potter and why Avada Kedavra is a Stupid Spell.
th-cam.com/video/qqwc7Kgon1k/w-d-xo.html
Avada Kedavra has always bothered me. Fine, it kills you but how? What does it do? You can easily kill a person by flooding their lungs, freezing their brain, shattering their heart. With your mind set to ending someone, anything can become a weapon. So why do we need a spell that does nothing else but kills? IMO, that was some sloppy writing. On the other hand, I guess no magic system is bulletproof
No? Well, Harry potter is a pretty equal mix of hard magic and soft magic systems, and the AK has many drawbacks
1: It has a long incantation(AVADA KEDAVRA) compared to other spells like Stupefy, which would effectively do the same thing, or Bombarda.
2: It can't be cast non verbally, so you always get a warning
3: it can be blocked by physical things like cover
4: Most importantly, it needs PURE HATRED to work properly. if you don't HATE something from the bottom of your heart, at max it will give them a nosebleed. So other than people like Voldemort, who's been established to be a hateful litlle bitch, its not useable outside a few niche scenarios
5: it weakens/fractures your soul.
6: IDK the consequence of both eternal suffering in Limbo being stuck, not able to pass on when you die, and the consequence of being chucked in with the dementors no questions asked for life is a pretty big consequence.
@user-gt7vi9jm9m Only hints?
@@normalchannel2185
1. 2. That requires a certain level of experience to dodge even after the warning.
3. They can cast it again.
4. I meant consequence and requirement of being evil.
5. 6. This does not impact a fight these only matter if they are dead.
If there are so many drawbacks, name at least three ways to beat this spell when they start casting it.
OK. You see a dude casting Avada Kedavara. By the time he speaks AVADA. (avada and the gap you must have to start saying kedavara), you can get out a STUPEFY, since both have 3 syllables, BUT stupefy's syllables follow each other(as in the end of stu forms the start of pe, so you dont have to waste time moving from one syllable's ending state to another's starting one.) You can test this by just trying to say Avada and Stupefy. Both roughly equal out(the avada and the gap and stupefy)
Now if spells travel instantly, then you either force them to abort the AK and defend themselves, or you hit them and they are out of the fight.
You can use Bombarda, or really any other quick spell(i think Duro is one that turns you to stone, and its the fastest too)
If spells don't travel instantly, then you can dodge the AK.
And most importantly, in order to effectively use the AK, you must HATE SOMEONE with the BOTTOM of your heart, and it takes time to summon that hatred.
Thats why the Death Eaters, in the OOtP chase scene did not use AKs, it was too difficult.
this video reminded me of another video about magic systems and how even the most mundane things could be turned into a magic system.
i had a discussion with a friend afterwards and ended up having to turn baking bread into a magic system...
it was actually surprisingly easy. i made an alchemy/summoning system.
based on real world breads, the types of bread decide the types of beings summoned and their overall characteristics.
certain types of ingredients affect behavior while others potency or add extra abilities.
so a gingerbread man turns into a loyal servant, while a melon bread turns into a hungry monster that tries to eat everything.
different alchemical salt types change aggressiveness, while sugar types their energeticness and overall spell duration, and so on.
it took me not even an hour to get that far, showing just how easy it is to make a creative and unique magic system.
and how much fun it is to bounce stupid ideas with a friend until it works!
1) Think of unique ways for your character to utilise their magic
2) Consider limitations. A character mustn't be able to simply summon their magic to solve every problem. Create a story that has limits.
2.1) Resource dependance. Maybe you need mana or something like that.
2.2) Physical/mental cost. Maybe the magic drains your stamina. It must have a cost, making it more meaningful
2.3) Innate ability. Only some people can use magic.
2.4) Knowledge/Skill. Maybe the magic needs training to use.
2.5) Cultural/legal. Maybe the magic is seen as taboo
2.6) Magic interference. Maybe somethings interrupt the use of magic.
2.7) Time/Place. Magic can only be used at certain times/places
2.8) Binding Agreements. A higher power has to be negotiated with to use the magic.
3) Thinking you need a hard magic system. A system with lots of rules and restrictions is good, but one without is just as good.
Hard magic systems are good because once rules are established, you can play with those rules.
Soft magic systems:
1) Is this the right choice for my story?
"No consideration of limits" is also so much fun to work on.
The OC I am making currently has e types of abilities:
1. Basic abilities (Fire, Water, Ice, Lightning, Wind, Earth)
2. Specific abilities (Teleportation, Switching places, telekinesis, looking into the past)
He can use 1 all the time, for 2 he has to go into a powered up state where he hurts himself everytime he uses a more advanced abilities and how much he hurt himself is only found out after leaving the powered up state.
And as you said, I can use these limits for the character's personality ^^
Thank you so much for this video. This made me completely rethink the way magic would effect and interact with the world (in a good way). It made me realize that my magic was way too broad for a new writer, it made me make it so magic was a plot device, not the plot device, and it made me make my magic more power based, not spell based, which adds more places for creative writing and creative uses of my powers.If you want a full idea of my system (which you probably don't) here you go.
In my world there are a couple different factions (continents? countries?) that are only at peace with each other because they have a monopoly on a certain magic type. There will be 4, and the magic system will be tune based. Runes can be cast to give the caster a certain power or ability for a short period of time. After the time is up, the rune will break. Only users born with an innate magic power can make runes, but anyone can use them. People can only be born with one magic type, and they are usually sold to the faction that magic type is controlling. This is because if a faction finds out that a different faction is hoarding magic users of their type, they will stop sending runes, which will cripple society in some way. The main plot is that the main character somehow end up doing a big favor for an underground mafia assassin. The mafia is smuggling runes, and the favor is help them with their biggest smuggling project yet.
Before this video, it would be completely different and worse, with way too many magic types and more spell based not power based, so thank you.
Sometimes I just love it when a character's first nature is to do it themselves instead of using magic. For example: if someone had the power of teleportation and they were running late. They immediately run to their car and start driving instead of just teleporting there. Then when they arrive at the place late the people that they are with just ask why they didn't teleport; and the main character is just like "Oh. I forgot that I could do that."
Or "why? i have two perfectly good legs to walk with."
5:26 This is interesting, because yes, there are limitations to my world. Magic only works for a few hours at certain times, it doesn't work during the summer because of the heat/fire restriction. It does tend to tire a person out if they use too much of it too soon. Magic exists for a short time. They gain it around 12, and lose it around 40 when they go through the Phase.
The magic system im trying to implement is a nature based elemental magic tied to the balance of nature. Fire magic for example is relatively simple, but the cost is heat from something. If you produce it out of nothing, it actually saps at your body heat and therefore, make enough fire and you will paradoxically become freezing cold. The magic does become more complex later on but at its heart that's essentially how it works.