Making Magic feel Magical - part 1
Where It Started
The other night as I was drifting off to sleep I was yet again thinking of one of my personal white whales in RPGs, making Magic feel Magical! I want to feel like a wizard when I play a wizard damn it! Some games do this far better than others, for example Mage: The Ascension vs D&D 5th edition.
Others have gone down this path, this is my attempt.
The idea is a mini game that can be played as a City or Camp Action, it could be done during the Crawl phase… if you’re willing to risk the time.
Jump to the more polished version
Jump to my notes from playtesting
My Rough Notes
When you want to do magic you draw, from the second major arcana, a number of cards equal to your wand attribute. You want to hit 14, going over means extra power flows though you, less then that and the spell fizzles.
Grand Rituals
Draw a number of cards equal to your wands.
A ritual has a number of stages one card must be played per stage, you can use components, rites, pre operations etc. to add bonuses to that card or in extreme cases replace a card entirely!!!
Ritual steps could require a certain number, planet, element, or even a specific card
Examples, bind death (taken from the sandman) create a magic item, defend a city, make a golem or homunculus
Preparation cards are played face down each one grants one +/- 1token that can be used.
Failure!
Check the preparation cards to see what can be salvaged.
Any card played in the inverse is a bad item and can’t be salvaged.
If a player accidentally plays a card in the wrong orientation this represents them unknowingly being a bad or sabotaged component.
You can save a number of slots equal to the valid preparation components / 2
Players should be involved in the creation of components
Component names, use a Syllables or word count for the name, more the more powerful
A More Polished Version
Ritual Magic
To attempt greater works of magic then the small spells most adventures learn, one must turn to ritual magic.
Anyone can attempt to preform a ritual, provided they have studied the ritual see the Read a Book camp action or Research City action.
Rituals are composed of two parts, components, and participants, the number of each differs from ritual to ritual.
Components are things like chanting, a summoning circle, specific materials, person, time, or place, etc. Participants are the needed people to preform the actions and ritual. Components are rare, costly, or otherwise difficult to obtain and may require a separate quest.
Each participant draws a number of cards equal to their Wands score, and uses this to contribute to the tests required for the ritual.
Each component will require a test, how many people must participate will again depend on the ritual.
Summoning and Binding a Death Knight - Sample Ritual
Components:
- A summoning circle made of fine chalk. The chalk must be mixed with the bone ash and blood of a victim of the Death Knight.
- This should be two components, making the chalk and scribing the circle.
- The Blood of a murderer.
- The skull of a murderer.
- The bladed murder weapon.
- During the ritual it is driven into the skull.
- Candles made from the rendered fat of a murderer and the murders victim.
- The Death Knights true name, when spoken it burns the lips of the living.
- Chanting, participants must chant a poetic version of the Death Knights story.
- This should be two components, researching / writing the poem, and preforming it.
- New Moon.
- The site of a death.
Participants
At least four, one leader who invokes the Death Knight true name, the rest chant the story.
Playtesting the Ritual
I had 5 playtesters, they picked one as the leader who had a 4 in wands, of the rest one had a 4, two had 3s, and the last had a 2.
They discussed how they acquired the items and who was responsible for what, one asked what would happen if they intentionally played bad cards more on that later.
Acquiring the items was deemed low risk and so the player with the 2 was put in charge of that, an initiation hazing.
The 3s made the candles, and chalk, and prepared the circle. The two 4s found the name, wrote the poetic story.
Then it was time to draw cards, I should have noted what they drew/played, instead of just the result.
| Component | Result | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Summoning Circle | Success | Both in making the chalk, and scribing the circle, I should have made it clearer this was two actions |
| Acquiring the body parts | Success | The player had to spend some resources and call in a few favors in order to do so |
| Making the candles | Success | |
| Researching the Death Knights True Name | Success | Failure should be fleshed out with a chart |
| Chanting - researching | Success | Again should have made it clear this was two actions |
| Chanting - preforming | Failure | One short, again should have made a failure chart ahead of time and players should have some idea of what is on the failure chart. I ruled that they summoned the Death Knight but only had partial control. |
| Time & Location | Success | Time was easy, for the location they decided they ritually murdered someone there instead of trying to find a location |
Notes from Playtesting
It went well enough? I found a number of issues, namely when removed from the context of the game it is FAR less interesting, both narratively and mechanically.
I think there is something here, but it needs work and is prep heavy. I plan on re-reading the Blades in the Dark ritual rules, as they are more player facing.