Magic is wonderful because you can use it to create any kind of metaphor you need.
The Wild Mages as most name them, or the Free Magi' as they name themselves, insist that there should be no barriers put upon a Person. Each seeks self-actualization, and frequently a Wild Mage may do some kindness or right some wrong, but according to the Guardians their mere existence is wrong. Wild Mages hate nothing so much as Guardians, and think of them, and their deity, the Horned Lord, as 'barbaric, savage, primitivist, hateful, vicious, unlearned, demonic...'
It is only the Right of the Kings of the Forrests that stop the two sides from going to bloody war. Such a war would be relatively short because there are a lot more Guardians than Wild Mages. But a Guardian believes in certain roles and duties, and laws such that it is not his duty to maintain justice...it is the duty fo the King.
Plus the typical Wild Mage is stronger than the typical Guardian, not that in a war with at least ten Guardian adepts versus one Wild Mage that's going to matter that much.
The Guardians are trying to strengthen the social fabric and stabilize things and promote their vision of the good in the limits they set on themselves.
The Wild Mages see no limits but practicality, and they are more than willing to cause bloody revolution in the Forests if they can convince themselves they are likely to win.
A Wild Mage typically has showy attack powers, and subtle draining powers. He is studying to find spells of long life, and he knows how to shift form from Man to Woman, and from Human to Hawk or Bear or.... He also tends to have spells of long distance transport.
All of these spells are forbidden to a Guardian except for the showy attack powers which they rarely use. Most Guardians enchant objects to 'make them more themselves' so that a wagon is stronger and smoother, or a cornfield is heavy with corn. Most Guardians cast such spells on themselves as well which with their other training makes them very formidable in hand-to-hand combat. A typical Guardian can jump twenty feet, and catch an arrow fired out of the air with his hand. He does not teleport, but he can run for twenty-four hours at twenty miles per hour straight, if he is high enough level...mid-level, that is. They also have considerable defensive spells, and spells which can track weaknesses of all sorts so as to make them stronger.
It is said, 'there is nothing worse, nor better to find than a Guardian sitting on your doorstep in the morning.' This is because your problems will be dragged out, but also because they will be healed unless you truly resist.
One of the problems of the Wild Mages is that they teleport. Each time one ports, he leaves a hole in reality. Enough holes and bye-bye reality. The high level Wild Mages know this, but they think they can rework reality into a better formation when that happens. One where the Freedom to be whatever you want to be is paramount and unchallenged.
One thing about teh Free Mages is they tend to leave destroyed lives behind them. They never force someone to agree to an idea, but they have a good sense for weaknesses themselves,a nd they know how to get people to agree to bad ideas, and then leave th e person to take the consequences while the Wild Mage flits free.
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I've been reading Mercedes Lackey's 'Elemental Masters' series. In it, if you're unsensitive to magic, perhaps lacking poetry in the soul, you're pretty much immune to Elemental Magic. That does not protect you if someone coerces ghosts and such like to come after you.
So...XYZ Elementalist Mag Spell, Only to People with at least a 2@1 Mag Spell themselves. +5 Bonus.
Another thing, you can have wards against such things, but there is a possibility of attacks bouncing off your wards and hitting innocent bystanders.
Now, this could be a bonus if you're truly Chaotic Evil, but most other alignements would dislike or profoundly hate this.
I've just started the first book in Robert Jordan's monumental series. The Aes Sedai may heal others, may relieve the need for sleep for a while from others (at what seems to be a cost to the other's long term stamina possibly unless good rest is gotten), but they cannot do it to themselves.
So you could have Save Life Mag Bias 2@1, but only to others +5 bonus.
And I've watched Legend of the Seeker, the Mord Sith can give life back to someone who has died, mostly recently. They call it the Breath of Life. I'm tempted to make it Save Life Mag Bias 2@1, only if someone has apparently died....even if that's not quite accurate. +10 bonus. Must bend over and breathe into subject's mouth (full body involvement.) +15. Time...thirty seconds.
Another limit is such...
The Fire Servants of Kaldora take two extra damage classes from any weapon which is covered in ice or made of ice. In fact, there is the Tale of the Fire Drake, told in the Northlands which has the hero killing a major dragon god with an icicle. Most people, even among the Glacier Fjords down to the Volcano Sea think this is a 'fish story'.
Darrin, a verser who had learned magic from the Selighe Court of Greater New York, faced off against a mugger with a dagger in a dark alley, and he prepared to call fire, and then to curse the human thug who did not know who he was messing with....waking up covered in roaches every day for the next ten years sounded good to Darrin...and then the thug sliced Darrin's hand just a bit with a wild knife swing. The knife was stolen from a rich man, and it was cold iron. Darrin had not realized that using the High Court's spells made him equally vulnerable to salt, and four-leaf clovers, and cold iron as the Fae, and of course, his teacher, teh Queen had not told him because what Fae mentions everything? And so Darrin fell over, and versed out from a two point damage cut to his hand by an imcompetent thug.
Second Post.
In the advertisement for the second season of Warehouse 13, the heroine sees a box in the Warehouse that is tilted on its side.
"How messy." She says, and straigthen it up. On the other side of the globe, the Leaning Tower of Pisa straightens up. She does not realize anything has happened. She leaves.
The hero, who does things like this sometimes, put the box back. And the Tower went back to its old configuration without him aware of anything either.
This sounds like a Active by Trigger Device.
Um...Mord Sith? That's from the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. The breath of life wasn't a spell...it was CPR. It was seen as magic because it was unknown by almost all the citizenry of the Midlands and of Westland.
Not that your example was a bad spell or anything. Just pointing it out.
Legend of the Seeker...wasn't that the TV adaptation of the Sword of Truth series?
Mord Sith is from the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind of which I've read most, and from the Legend of the Seeker tv series based on the books, but I'd forgotten that possibility in the books someone pointed out to me earlier. However in the Legend, it is clearly a magical ability.
A Mord Sith in Legend will lean over a person, and breathe out a whisp from a few inches from their face, and then they will revive. No touching necessary so clearly not CPR.
Hmmmm. I always wanted to see Legend. I have read the first 6 books of the Sword of Truth series, and own them as well. I would have the rest, but I'm poor.
Bit off-topic, but how long is Legend? How much of the story did it cover?
Anyone planning to watch Legend of the Seeker that has huge issues with spoilers don't read my post, some spoilers are needed to answer Brock's question.
Legend of the Seeker has 2 seasons out. From what I'm told the first is relatively true to the series while the second is more like a fan-fiction tale of what happens after the books, although I have not read the books so I don't know this for a fact. The first season ends when Raal (spelling?) is killed by the Seeker. The second season has to do with the Keeper of the underworld. It's worthwhile to watch in my opinion, although perhaps not entirely true to the books.
End of spoiler.
As to the mention of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series I played a MUD based on he series for 6 years I guess. I didn't read the books but if you want I can share the mechanics they used for some of the spells. It was a neat game.
It's Rahl, with an H.
I've read the first five or six books, but haven't seen the series. From your summary, it sounds like the second season could very well be an adaptation of the second novel, rather than merely "fan fiction." If it were a loose enough adaptation, of course, it could still garner that description by way of criticism.
@Glantri(spoilers)Killing Lord Rahl was the end of Wizard's First Rule, the first book. The second season Sounds like the Stone of Tears, the second book. So it seems each season is a book (or close enough). Sweet.
It's been a long time since I read the second book. I've read most of them.
Especially in the earlier books, they focused on the various Wizard Rules with each book focusing on the next one.
Wizard's First Rule is people see what they want to see or they fear to see.
Basically, yes. Snippet of text from the Wizard's First rule:
"Wizard's First Rule: people are stupid." Richard and Kahlan frowned even more. "People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People’s heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. People are stupid; they can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool. Because of Wizards First Rule, the old wizards created Confessors, and Seekers, as a means of helping find the truth, when the truth is important enough. Rahl knows the Wizard's Rules. He is using the first one. People need an enemy to feel a sense of purpose. It's easy to lead people when they have a sense of purpose. Sense of purpose is more important by far than the truth. In fact, truth has no bearing in this. Darken Rahl is providing them with an enemy, other than himself, a sense of purpose. People are stupid; they want to believe, so they do"
Hedges and Fears
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On Beltane Night, a bone-worker tossed the skull of a murderer into the dying coals of a fading fire built upon the sacrificial table which had drank the blood of many innocents. He then spoke the words of summoning.
And the Imp of Lost Fires crawled out of the mouth and the eyes of the skull, ignoring basic physics as irrelevant.
"Yes, Master." It intoned, its voice overlain with gloom and horror.
"I want you to go forth and slay Merlin."
"What? Say again?" The gloom was gone, replaced by surprise.
"I command you to kill Merlin."
"You're kidding, right?"
"No. We had a deal."
"A deal that did not involve myself throwing my immortal existence away to spend the next ten millenia picking up the tattered fragments of my identity from the Abyss after ..."
"I demand it!" The boneworker shook his rattle made of traitor's fingerbones, and tried to sound imposing.
"...an archangel summoned up by Merlin explodes his sword through my chest."
"Ridiculous, Imp. Merlin would not summon such a creature." The boneworker tried to persuade the cowardly demon.
"You're probably right. For such as me, he'd only summon a Lord of Fire from the nearest volcano."
"Now look..."
"No."
"I demand..."
"I would ask if you were completely nuts, but since you're trading your soul for power to the Shadows, I think we can take that as a given."
"Listen here, imp..." The boneworker had begun to get seriously angry.
"No. Not happening. Not now. Not ever."
And the Imp disappeared with a loud 'Pop' because this time it felt more insulting to obey Newton.
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"No master, I could not do that." The witch said as she crouched by the fire in her rocking chair. Her ill-favored face gleamed with malicious amusement as she took in the heavily cloaked and scarfed man who sweated in the late spring heat. He was standing bent over under her low thatched roof of the cottage situated by the waste from which she drew her power.
"I would pay good gold." He spoke muffled through the twin scarves around his face.
"My lord baron..." She began knowing it would set him off.
"How? What treason?"
"Baron Worthington-Smythe. There are few in this poor land of ours who could wear silk scarves to hide themselves, and only one with a lame leg."
The man grunted, and threw back his scarves to reveal an ambitious face with hard lines.
"Which my brother, my younger brother, gave me thanks to his servants who beat me on that night."
The witch hid a smile. Oh, men had indeed crippled the Count to be, but it had been men moved by her will.
"Thus barring you from the Countdom of this land, and making you your brother's servant, for only the perfect of body may hold the Countship. Still, the peasants call him Harry the Generous, the Count with an Open Hand."
The Baron ground his teeth at the reminder of the love the people of Long Valley held for their Count.
"So as you see, I need a slaying spell to kill the Count's only son. And since the Count is failing, they will be forced to recognize me as the Heir. Law allows this."
"Indeed, an excellent plan, my lord, but for one thing, my patrons are not allowed to directly strike at the royal blood."
"Useless." The baron snarled, and rose taking his gold with him.
"Not so fast, my lord." The witch said seeming to placate. "I can wrap a spell of bleeding on your lance head."
"Yes?" The baron said cautiously.
"You're accounted a good lanceman. But pierce the skin of the heir with the head of your lance in the tournameant, and he will bleed, and not stop till he die."
"Ah." The baron said weighing the plan. "But is this not...?"
"No, my lord. It is you who chose the target, your will, and there are no banns on your using your weapons as you will."
"Then do it, witch." The baron laid a bag of gold on the floor, and walked out contemptuously. The witch smiled. What the proud baron did not know was that the count's court sorceror could surely trace the spell back to who had most directly caused it, and thus the baron would face his brother's justice. And then the baron would find himself making a deal with her for his soul in exchange for his life. The powers she served would grant her much power in exchange for the soul of a baron soon to be count.
Grammar note: you seem to have trouble with the imperfect tense. Here you wrote
the sacrificial table which had drankand in Cereal Novel: You Elsewhen: Bowl Eight I spotted the similar
you had not even sang.
Sang is a simple past tense; it expresses an event in the past. Had sung is the imperfect, which can be used for a process in the past or in contrast to the past for a yet further past. The same distinction is made between drank and had drunk.
I don't usually correct people's grammar, but
- you are a published author and
- that was in essence the same mistake twice in one day, and also
- I know that Scott is around, so if I'm wrong he'll correct my correction.
Now I'm going to go read the rest of the post.
--M. J. Young
Feel free to correct my grammar at any time. I need to get better.
To correct my errors, let me propose the following examples: the sacrificial table which had drunk, and you had not sung.
The first is for a process starting in the fairly distant past as it were and stretching out from the viewpoint of the mage to the even more distant past where it began. The second is of course for the immediate past.
Danke schon, Herr Young as he also practises his minimal German. Perhaps next time I will inflict my French on others.
Yes, those are correct.
The imperfect is often used in fiction because most (English language) fiction is written in the past tense. That is, we describe "The priest put him on the table, and stood beside him on the dais, and held the knife to his throat," all in the past tense even though it's what is happening now. A story teller, live, might say, "The priest puts him on the table and stands beside him on the dais, and holds the knife to his throat," all vividly in the present tense and all feeling wrong for our storytelling mode--we expect stories to be told in the past tense as things that happened, not in the present as things that are happening. Because of this, the present-tense vernacular storyteller can say, "The priest puts him on the table that drank a lot of blood over the generations," but to achieve the same effect the writer has to use the past tense and the imperfect tense, "the priest put him on the table which had drunk a lot of blood over the generations," in order to get the past of the past.
Make sense?
(I always think it's easier to remember things if they make sense.)
--M. J. Young