You have a problem with magic but I have more of a problem with the "magification" of everything that wasn't magical to begin with: AOE archery, magical bouncing shield throws for tanks, invisibility instead of stealth for rogues, bashes with 2-hd clubs that heal everyone around you... all in the name of balancing and allowing each stereotype to do everything. Nowhere is this more evident than in Rift... especially now that they have added tanking for mages.
As far as books and magic go... it can be done well or poorly but it isn't the magic or the dragons or the hyperspace jumps that are at fault: it's just shitty writers doing it badly or good ones who do it well.
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“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
You have a problem with magic but I have more of a problem with the "magification" of everything that wasn't magical to begin with: AOE archery, magical bouncing shield throws for tanks, invisibility instead of stealth for rogues, bashes with 2-hd clubs that heal everyone around you... all in the name of balancing and allowing each stereotype to do everything. Nowhere is this more evident than in Rift... especially now that they have added tanking for mages.
As far as books and magic go... it can be done well or poorly but it isn't the magic or the dragons or the hyperspace jumps that are at fault: it's just shitty writers doing it badly or good ones who do it well.
so you magnify and bounce your bashing clubs at stereotypical rifts? You are sick
To give my two cents, I tend to think it all depends on the setting. People running around shooting fireballs at eachother, I have to say that sort of fits some settings where as others it would not.
An important thing to note I think is that some settings are designed for gaming from the get-go, Warcraft and Forgotten Realms to name a few. In settings of this kind the overabundance of magic sort of makes sense, and personally I have no problem with it.
An example of the opposite then would be LOTRO, in which I think the setting very much limits gameplay. Not just in magic but in many elements of the game. And I am not saying the developers of the game should've gone against the setting - personally I am very much against thinks like the Rune-keeper class. But the point here is that the setting does limit gameplay to some extent, including in the case of the use of magic.
With all that being said, I think it would be nice to see a setting in which the use of magic wasn't as great a part of gameplay as it is in many current settings. Or that the use of it would be more subtle, and utilized more also outside of combat. And sure, using magic as a plot explanation sometimes does seem a little lazy if nothing else - but then again, MMORPGs aren't famous for their intriguing scripted plots.
If you've played World of Warcraft, you should know the term, faceroll. As http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=faceroll states, originating (presumably) on the World of Warcraft forums, this is an essentially derogatory concept some people employ that means that all that a certain class must do in order to achieve success in the game is to bind every key on their keyboard to one ability that is perceived to be overpowered, and then continue to roll their face across the keyboard. The notion is that this one ability is so amazingly overpowered in relation to those of other classes, all one has to do is absently spam it as much as possible (and they might as well do it with their face, because there isn't any other use for the big stupid thing on top of their shoulders).
Example:
Priest: waah waah I'm a little bitch
Warrior: Oh stfu 1) bind every key on your keyboard to Flash Heal 2) faceroll
P.S. I don't condone the use of vulgarities, all these are just examples(that included vulgarities) taken from the aforementioned website.
I do dislike words like this, that are essentially exclusionary against new people; closing up the community with needless jargon. There is no way anyone could work out the meaning of the word without asking, and any sentence containing it could be better written in standard English. The origin is a lame joke that doesn't need repeating ("you could do as well rolling you face over the keyboard").
Other examples are "mob" and "zerg". "Mob" is an English word which doesn't mean what it's used for on MMORPG forums, and "monster" is a perfectly serviceable and intelligible alternative. "Zerg" is completely unintelligible until you ask what it means, and then you find it actually means a mob ... I mean a real mob.
agreed with the discussion, and that's something i have been trying to break out with my personal project.
magic should be a 4th force in the universe, but a rare one, related to the changes between matter and energy (kinda like a transmutation), and not something people just bring out from their asses. many games point the emphasis in concentration and meditation something illogical when characters just cast a spell in seconds, where's the meditation there? why so much empahsis in using mana as a resource? and why its a self regenerating resource much like health? i'll never understand that. my current iteration of the magic deal is the following:
-a 4th force in the universe, which is not really understood but it can be brought out in certain conditions
-requires players to focus first, if you havent gathered the mental power for castin the spell you wont cast a damn thing, meditation first, no mana potions, no initial casting, mental power doesnt regens itself, you have to focus on it, kinda like physical preparation when doing exercise.
-it is impossible to cast or summon it by just spontaneous thinking, arcane constructs use an actual attunement process in order to channel it, or otherwise they dont work.
-only the most mentally focused can try to cast magic, and that means years of practice in neurological stuff.
the problem with magic in many games is that it follows the "infinite resource avaliable to anyone without some kind of drawback or initial requirement, it just comes out from nothing and if much you just spend mana"....this is one of the most boring cliches for a roleplaying game, seriously....
Magic is just like any other weapon and should scale accordingly.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
Subjective really.. I don't see a problem with the use of magic in games. If you start applying subjective reality to MMOs then you may as well remove everything that makes it a fantasy in the first place and call it Second Life.
Games are designed to be fun, engaging and ultimately unrealistic experiences that take you away from how dry life can be sometimes.
The problem isn't how much magic is over-used in the MMO genre, the problem is how much EVERYTHING is over-used in the genre. The whole space is nothing but safe, overused concepts done time and time again and until someone stands up and really tries to evolve the genre (no, not just some new gimmick combat system or voice acted quests) then I see the genre ultimately dying off in the next few years.
agreed with the discussion, and that's something i have been trying to break out with my personal project.
magic should be a 4th force in the universe, but a rare one, related to the changes between matter and energy (kinda like a transmutation), and not something people just bring out from their asses. many games point the emphasis in concentration and meditation something illogical when characters just cast a spell in seconds, where's the meditation there? why so much empahsis in using mana as a resource? and why its a self regenerating resource much like health? i'll never understand that. my current iteration of the magic deal is the following:
-a 4th force in the universe, which is not really understood but it can be brought out in certain conditions
-requires players to focus first, if you havent gathered the mental power for castin the spell you wont cast a damn thing, meditation first, no mana potions, no initial casting, mental power doesnt regens itself, you have to focus on it, kinda like physical preparation when doing exercise.
-it is impossible to cast or summon it by just spontaneous thinking, arcane constructs use an actual attunement process in order to channel it, or otherwise they dont work.
-only the most mentally focused can try to cast magic, and that means years of practice in neurological stuff.
the problem with magic in many games is that it follows the "infinite resource avaliable to anyone without some kind of drawback or initial requirement, it just comes out from nothing and if much you just spend mana"....this is one of the most boring cliches for a roleplaying game, seriously....
If you are working on a project that involves magic, I wouldn't view magic as 'the problem'. View it as a set of rules your universe must adhere to. Pretty much all of the problems discussed in this thread are problems created by lazy writing & design, not magic itself. Most of these same problems exist in games without magic, but get explained away (or not) by some other means instead.
There are also a few good literary sources you can use for ideas on how to make magic interesting, without it completely breaking your game.
Having an abundance of magic isn't a bad thing. But to do it correctly, you can't have a bunch of exceptions to your own rules. I.E. if everyone can cast fireballs freely, then starting fires within your world should be very easy. Furthermore, you would expect such a world to have plenty of ways to defend against fire, given it's abundancy, as well as numerous alternative uses for such magic.
Also, I wouldn't focus too much on punishing the use of magic. You can limit it to resources (like runestones, for example), but if it's not fun, you'd be better off with taking a more LotR approach and making it a much more scarce (maybe not even playable) aspect of the game. That you really only see from pseudo gods, mythical creatures, and ancient artifacts enchanted by them.
magic is the way it is in games because for the bulk of the gaming population limited magic is less fun, as well as makes story telling lazier(thus ultimately cheaper to produce). most people don't play soley for story so game mechanics have to be taking into consideration and most people simply don't find perma-deathing themselves with a rng based critical fail fun.
agreed with the discussion, and that's something i have been trying to break out with my personal project.
magic should be a 4th force in the universe, but a rare one, related to the changes between matter and energy (kinda like a transmutation), and not something people just bring out from their asses. many games point the emphasis in concentration and meditation something illogical when characters just cast a spell in seconds, where's the meditation there? why so much empahsis in using mana as a resource? and why its a self regenerating resource much like health? i'll never understand that. my current iteration of the magic deal is the following:
-a 4th force in the universe, which is not really understood but it can be brought out in certain conditions
-requires players to focus first, if you havent gathered the mental power for castin the spell you wont cast a damn thing, meditation first, no mana potions, no initial casting, mental power doesnt regens itself, you have to focus on it, kinda like physical preparation when doing exercise.
-it is impossible to cast or summon it by just spontaneous thinking, arcane constructs use an actual attunement process in order to channel it, or otherwise they dont work.
-only the most mentally focused can try to cast magic, and that means years of practice in neurological stuff.
the problem with magic in many games is that it follows the "infinite resource avaliable to anyone without some kind of drawback or initial requirement, it just comes out from nothing and if much you just spend mana"....this is one of the most boring cliches for a roleplaying game, seriously....
If you are working on a project that involves magic, I wouldn't view magic as 'the problem'. View it as a set of rules your universe must adhere to. Pretty much all of the problems discussed in this thread are problems created by lazy writing & design, not magic itself. Most of these same problems exist in games without magic, but get explained away (or not) by some other means instead.
There are also a few good literary sources you can use for ideas on how to make magic interesting, without it completely breaking your game.
Having an abundance of magic isn't a bad thing. But to do it correctly, you can't have a bunch of exceptions to your own rules. I.E. if everyone can cast fireballs freely, then starting fires within your world should be very easy. Furthermore, you would expect such a world to have plenty of ways to defend against fire, given it's abundancy, as well as numerous alternative uses for such magic.
Also, I wouldn't focus too much on punishing the use of magic. You can limit it to resources (like runestones, for example), but if it's not fun, you'd be better off with taking a more LotR approach and making it a much more scarce (maybe not even playable) aspect of the game. That you really only see from pseudo gods, mythical creatures, and ancient artifacts enchanted by them.
i have quite some inspirations from several sources and each relatesto a different approach in magic, from the creation of symbols for wards or explosive runes, to hemomancy and the spend of your own health for powers. but my main concern is to make something outside of the box, not take something done already, that's why i added the mental force limit. so people actually plan a strategy before entering the fray, mental power isnt as restrictive anyways, it can be bypassed to some degree with what i call "neural enhancers" (or drugs if you look it that way, and it should be logical, potions should be possible to). the idea lore and mechanic wise is that magic is not something you know from the start, in my game you dont choose a class, you seek the knowledge you need in order to create your own. magic isnt out of the rule, you dont train into mental power, you cant cast magic then, the same as if you dont know how to armed combat then you wont be able to make the most of your sword. simple tradeoofs and nothing more....
Comments
Subtle magic works fantastic in books and some movies. Otherwise it is really lousy for games or movies with heavy visuals.
That said, yes not every weirdness or plot hole needs to be explained with "Because magic!"
But I think especially for games flinging around fireballs and lightning bolts works exceedingly better than some sleight of hand and card tricks.
Help support an artist and gamer who has lost his tools to create and play: http://www.gofundme.com/u63nzcgk
You have a problem with magic but I have more of a problem with the "magification" of everything that wasn't magical to begin with: AOE archery, magical bouncing shield throws for tanks, invisibility instead of stealth for rogues, bashes with 2-hd clubs that heal everyone around you... all in the name of balancing and allowing each stereotype to do everything. Nowhere is this more evident than in Rift... especially now that they have added tanking for mages.
As far as books and magic go... it can be done well or poorly but it isn't the magic or the dragons or the hyperspace jumps that are at fault: it's just shitty writers doing it badly or good ones who do it well.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
so you magnify and bounce your bashing clubs at stereotypical rifts? You are sick
To give my two cents, I tend to think it all depends on the setting. People running around shooting fireballs at eachother, I have to say that sort of fits some settings where as others it would not.
An important thing to note I think is that some settings are designed for gaming from the get-go, Warcraft and Forgotten Realms to name a few. In settings of this kind the overabundance of magic sort of makes sense, and personally I have no problem with it.
An example of the opposite then would be LOTRO, in which I think the setting very much limits gameplay. Not just in magic but in many elements of the game. And I am not saying the developers of the game should've gone against the setting - personally I am very much against thinks like the Rune-keeper class. But the point here is that the setting does limit gameplay to some extent, including in the case of the use of magic.
With all that being said, I think it would be nice to see a setting in which the use of magic wasn't as great a part of gameplay as it is in many current settings. Or that the use of it would be more subtle, and utilized more also outside of combat. And sure, using magic as a plot explanation sometimes does seem a little lazy if nothing else - but then again, MMORPGs aren't famous for their intriguing scripted plots.
The Weekly Wizardry blog
I do dislike words like this, that are essentially exclusionary against new people; closing up the community with needless jargon. There is no way anyone could work out the meaning of the word without asking, and any sentence containing it could be better written in standard English. The origin is a lame joke that doesn't need repeating ("you could do as well rolling you face over the keyboard").
Other examples are "mob" and "zerg". "Mob" is an English word which doesn't mean what it's used for on MMORPG forums, and "monster" is a perfectly serviceable and intelligible alternative. "Zerg" is completely unintelligible until you ask what it means, and then you find it actually means a mob ... I mean a real mob.
agreed with the discussion, and that's something i have been trying to break out with my personal project.
magic should be a 4th force in the universe, but a rare one, related to the changes between matter and energy (kinda like a transmutation), and not something people just bring out from their asses. many games point the emphasis in concentration and meditation something illogical when characters just cast a spell in seconds, where's the meditation there? why so much empahsis in using mana as a resource? and why its a self regenerating resource much like health? i'll never understand that. my current iteration of the magic deal is the following:
-a 4th force in the universe, which is not really understood but it can be brought out in certain conditions
-requires players to focus first, if you havent gathered the mental power for castin the spell you wont cast a damn thing, meditation first, no mana potions, no initial casting, mental power doesnt regens itself, you have to focus on it, kinda like physical preparation when doing exercise.
-it is impossible to cast or summon it by just spontaneous thinking, arcane constructs use an actual attunement process in order to channel it, or otherwise they dont work.
-only the most mentally focused can try to cast magic, and that means years of practice in neurological stuff.
the problem with magic in many games is that it follows the "infinite resource avaliable to anyone without some kind of drawback or initial requirement, it just comes out from nothing and if much you just spend mana"....this is one of the most boring cliches for a roleplaying game, seriously....
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
Subjective really.. I don't see a problem with the use of magic in games. If you start applying subjective reality to MMOs then you may as well remove everything that makes it a fantasy in the first place and call it Second Life.
Games are designed to be fun, engaging and ultimately unrealistic experiences that take you away from how dry life can be sometimes.
The problem isn't how much magic is over-used in the MMO genre, the problem is how much EVERYTHING is over-used in the genre. The whole space is nothing but safe, overused concepts done time and time again and until someone stands up and really tries to evolve the genre (no, not just some new gimmick combat system or voice acted quests) then I see the genre ultimately dying off in the next few years.
If you are working on a project that involves magic, I wouldn't view magic as 'the problem'. View it as a set of rules your universe must adhere to. Pretty much all of the problems discussed in this thread are problems created by lazy writing & design, not magic itself. Most of these same problems exist in games without magic, but get explained away (or not) by some other means instead.
There are also a few good literary sources you can use for ideas on how to make magic interesting, without it completely breaking your game.
Having an abundance of magic isn't a bad thing. But to do it correctly, you can't have a bunch of exceptions to your own rules. I.E. if everyone can cast fireballs freely, then starting fires within your world should be very easy. Furthermore, you would expect such a world to have plenty of ways to defend against fire, given it's abundancy, as well as numerous alternative uses for such magic.
Also, I wouldn't focus too much on punishing the use of magic. You can limit it to resources (like runestones, for example), but if it's not fun, you'd be better off with taking a more LotR approach and making it a much more scarce (maybe not even playable) aspect of the game. That you really only see from pseudo gods, mythical creatures, and ancient artifacts enchanted by them.
magic is the way it is in games because for the bulk of the gaming population limited magic is less fun, as well as makes story telling lazier(thus ultimately cheaper to produce). most people don't play soley for story so game mechanics have to be taking into consideration and most people simply don't find perma-deathing themselves with a rng based critical fail fun.
i have quite some inspirations from several sources and each relatesto a different approach in magic, from the creation of symbols for wards or explosive runes, to hemomancy and the spend of your own health for powers. but my main concern is to make something outside of the box, not take something done already, that's why i added the mental force limit. so people actually plan a strategy before entering the fray, mental power isnt as restrictive anyways, it can be bypassed to some degree with what i call "neural enhancers" (or drugs if you look it that way, and it should be logical, potions should be possible to). the idea lore and mechanic wise is that magic is not something you know from the start, in my game you dont choose a class, you seek the knowledge you need in order to create your own. magic isnt out of the rule, you dont train into mental power, you cant cast magic then, the same as if you dont know how to armed combat then you wont be able to make the most of your sword. simple tradeoofs and nothing more....