Questions and answers: Magic and Spells

"Well, I'm supposed to be a mage, so I really, really need to learn about magic," You say with a grimace. "I know from discussions we had before that there's a difference between the two types of magic I know, Fire Magic and Vivimancy, but that's preeeetty much all I know."

Brighid holds a fork-full of food up to your mouth for you to eat while she launches into an explanation, "Fire Magic and Vivimancy are different types of magic. Fire is what is called a Common Magic, while Vivimancy is Esoteric Magic. There's also Arcane Magic. The main differences between the types are how common the affinity for the magic is -- you get to cheat that, you asshole -- how it is accessed, and how difficult it is to control. Common Magic is obviously the most common, and is generally quicker and easier to control than the other types. Common magic is cast using Spells, which usually only require knowledge of the Spell's formula, the ability to make the right gestures and sounds, and enough spare Concentration to maintain the Spell for however long it lasts. Esoteric Magics are less common, although it varies a lot more than the Common Magics. Vivimancy -- the magic of life -- is only a little less common than the basic elements, while Astramancy and Oneiromancy, the magic of the stars and of dreams, respectively, are pretty rare. Esoteric Magics are cast through Rituals rather than Spells; Rituals tend to take longer to cast and always have some other requirement than just sounds and gestures. The type of component depends on the specific Ritual and school of Magic. Arcane Magics I do not know much about; they are very rare and very mysterious. Most of what I know about them is from stories and myths rather than day to day experience. Mother might be a better person to ask, if you are interested. I will note that your guaranteed 100% affinity for all Skills means you have the ability to learn all of the Arcane Magics, and that means you have the potential to be the most terrifying mage ever to exist. If even half the myths have even a grain of truth in them, those who are skilled with even one Arcane Magic are on a level with the Powers of the Realms. Someone skilled with more than one Arcane Magic ..." She shivers, and not with arousal. "Aidan, you must be very careful if you choose to pursue that kind of knowledge. Arcane Magics are the sort of thing which will inevitably draw the attention of the very powerful, perhaps even the Powers themselves. One day you may be strong enough to defend yourself from that attention, but not soon."

You nod, taking Brighid's meaning, and say to her, "I don't have any ambitions in that regard, for now at least. I won't rule it out in the future but I will be cautious. I'm not really the power-mad type. Here's another question, though: what are all the actual schools of magic that you know of? If they're all open to me, I should at least know my options."

"Well, let me think. For Common Magics, there is Fire, of course, and the other four basic elements, Air, Water, and Earth. There are also Wood and Metal, Light and Dark, and Beast. The Esoteric Magics I know of are Astramancy, Oneiromancy, and Vivimancy, then Sanguimancy -- blood magic -- Animamancy -- soul magic -- Necromancy -- **** magic -- and, ah, Coitimancy, which is sexual magic. There may be more. Arcane Magics..." She shrugs. "They are so rare that I do not even know of the name of the Skills for them. One deals with runes, and another with raw chaos. There are mythical mages who have cast powerful magics but I do not know if they were Arcane or just very advanced Spells or Rituals. I am sorry, I really do not know much in that regard, they never seemed very relevant to my life."

You give Brighid a kiss and feed her some more breakfast. "No, don't apologize, if you don't know then you don't know. I'm not expecting you to be Wikipedia." At her confused expression, you mentally face-palm and then apologize to her and explain, "Sorry, that is a repository of knowledge back on Earth where anyone can go to find out information of varying accuracy on pretty much any topic they can properly articulate. It is one of the wonders of the modern age, in my opinion. Anyway, neither here nor there. As always, I have more questions! How rigid are the differentiations between the different schools? What I mean is, I could see, say, Earth and Metal having very similar Spells, and you I already know that you have a Fire Magic spell which sort of heals, but that my Patch Wounds ritual is better at it for what it does."

Brighid nods. "Yes, that is quite true. There is quite a lot of overlap between what different magical schools can do. There are Light Magic spells which can deal fire damage by concentrating a lot of light into a narrow point, my own Cauterize spell which stops bleeding and converts some very serious wound types into others which are less immediately life-threatening, and so on. The catch is that Spells and Rituals which **** magic to work in ways that do not follow its inherent biases are less efficient or has drawbacks that magic better suited to the task does not have. Again taking Cauterize and Patch Wounds as an example, your Ritual heals damage without scarring and completely removes Minor Wounds. Cauterize actually deals fire damage -- and won't work at all on someone who is immune to fire -- and doesn't remove Wounds of any type but rather converts ones which deal ongoing damage to ones which do not. Cauterize can save lives, but it is not really healing. Fire Magic is destructive in nature, so using it to directly keep someone alive is difficult. Vivimancy, on the other hand, does not have many Rituals which deal damage, and all the ones I am aware of will only harm creatures which are antithetical to life itself; undead and the like."

You start to ask another question, but she holds up a finger to stop you while she wolfs down some more food. After quickly chewing and swallowing, she smiles at you and says teasingly, "I need to eat, too! Anyway, in addition to that sort of overlap, there are also spells and rituals which are of multiple schools. Fire and Earth can be combined to create and manipulate molten rock, for example. The actual implementation of that sort of spell is usually very efficient for what it does, but the trick is that you have to have the appropriate Skill level in every school of magic involved in casting it. Those are much less common because outside of a certain Realms-shattering unique Trait," She jabs you in the side, "very few people have high affinity in multiple magic schools. Mother is relatively skilled at Beast Magic and Vivimancy, and there is another mage in the tribe with moderate Air, Water, and Wood magic affinity, but otherwise I think everyone else with any affinity for magic at all only has a single school. If you level your Magical Theory up to a point where you can make your own spells, it is hard to imagine just how wide the array of possibilities is for you even sticking purely to Common Magic schools. I cannot emphasize enough to you, Aidan, that your Trait is utterly terrifying in how it completely bypasses one of the basic rules of how the Realms work."

You nod solemnly and agree, "I'm beginning to see that." You feed her some more breakfast while pondering your next question. "OK, so I have a little better grasp of magic itself now, but I still have some questions about Spells, Rituals, and the like, and how Concentration works. Let's start with that last. I have done some experimenting on my own but with my limited list of ways to use my Concentration it's hard to draw any conclusions. I know that Concentration decreases while casting or maintaining magic and recovers extremely rapidly as soon as the magic is released, but what happens if you try to cast magic which costs more than your available Concentration?"

"If you are maintaining other magics or effects -- magic is not the only thing which uses Concentration, by the way; some Abilities do as well, and anything which requires intense mental effort or focus will use up Concentration -- then one or more of them will be canceled at random until you have enough Concentration to maintain the new effect. Usually it is better to free up the Concentration yourself ahead of time but if you are ****, you cast anything you have the actual capacity to Concentrate on. Before you ask because I know you will, trying to cast a spell or use an ability you do not have enough potentially available Concentration to use will just give you a massive headache and drain your Concentration completely for a length of time based on how badly you tried to go over your limit. I really do not recommend it, it is a miserable experience."

You grin at Brighid and she begins to blush. "Know that from personal experience, do you?" Her blush grows brighter.

"When I first earned my Class I was experimenting with the new Spells it gave me and was not really paying close attention to the costs. This was several years ago, understand, and I had been neglecting my Willpower up to that point. It turns out that one of the spells I gained maaaaay have cost more than my maximum Concentration at the time by a significant margin. I was useless for hours afterwards. I can cast that spell now -- I invested two whole levels into Willpower since then -- but it still takes almost everything I have."

You nod and smile sympathetically. "I used to get really bad headaches back on Earth sometimes that would make me miserable for hours, so I have some idea how that must have felt. You mentioned earning spells from your Class; how is it that one goes about getting new Spells and Rituals?"

"Well, Classes often give access to them, like I said. You can use the Magical Theory skill to make your own spells, with enough levels in it. Outside of that, you can read a spellbook or grimoire, be taught by someone else who knows it, or learn it naturally through Skill leveling. Normally you get one Spell or Ritual with each new Rank in a magic Skill; given that you are Novice rank in Fire Magic and Vivimancy, you should actually have two Fire Spells and two Vivimancy Rituals. It is extremely curious that you do not. You appear not to have received the Unskilled rank Spell and Ritual which you should have gotten. It is not a big loss, though. Usually the Unskilled ones are very weak and basic, like lighting a candle or torch with your finger for Fire Magic. The common Vivimancy initial Ritual enhances the natural healing rate of a single creature by a small amount. Nice for long term care of a badly hurt person but not really useful in day to day situations."

You frown. Missing any spells kind of ticks you off, but there's nothing to do about it right this second so you move on. "Okay, so explain to me the other methods. What's the difference between a spellbook and a grimoire, and what's the process for teaching magic?"

Your lover responds, "Spellbooks contain a single spell and crumble into dust after being read once, regardless of whether you succeed at learning the spell or not. Grimoires can contain numerous spells and are permanent, but they are extremely rare and jealously guarded. Grimoires are tools of kingdoms, not individuals. Teaching magic requires the teacher to have at least one rank higher in the appropriate magic Skill or Skills than the Spell or Ritual in question requires to cast, and takes a considerable amount of time. I am an Apprentice level Fire Mage, so I could teach any of my Spells of Initiate rank or lower -- but you are only Novice rank, so you could only learn Novice and Unskilled Spells."

You see an opening and pounce. "Will you teach me your initial Unskilled rank spell, since I don't have one of my own?" She cocks her head at you, then shrugs.

"Certainly, if we can find the time. Even an Unskilled rank spell takes an entire day worth of teaching to impart. It does not have to be all at once, but it is a lot of time to put in to learn a Spell which only replaces having to carry a flint and steel."

"Easy for you to say!" You respond with a laugh. "You know how to make fire without magic! Right now I'd be using Flame Jet to light a torch and that seems ... less than ideal." Brighid laughs with you and promises to teach you her Spark spell when you can find the time. You consider what other questions to ask.

Congratulations! You have reached level 5 in Magical Theory! You are now a Novice in Magical Theory; from now on, when you attempt to learn a spell, the chance of success is increased by +5%.
You have gained 50 experience for advancing a Skill to Novice rank.