Arcane Science [Magic]

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Kingmaker
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Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Kingmaker »

Magic

Magic, also commonly known as Arcane Science or Arcanics, is the study and application of metaphysical forces and how they affect the world. Magical technology has grown hand in hand with mechanical technology, and in some fields has completely overtaken or displaced it. The origin of the study of magic is unclear, but the most popular theory is that a scholar of some sort bargained with a faust to learn magic. Magic is not an inherent ability, and anyone with the intelligence, discipline, and access to education is capable of learning it.

Using magic requires several things. The first is the arcane symbols: 148 geometric runes that are used to compose all arcane equations. The more complex and precise the arcane working, the longer and more complex the corresponding equation will be. Due to the difficulty of memorizing these equations, foci that store them are a practical requirement. Most commonly, mages will create a focus that spells out the equation but leaves a few variables to be filled in at the time of casting.

The second requirement is a source of metaphysical energy. The most readily available source for a would-be mage is their own soul, but that presents risks. While the human soul is a rich source of arcane energy, extensive use of one’s own soul for energy tends to cause emotional and psychological damage, followed by a rapid decline into insanity. Storing of insane mages come from those who had a tendency to draw on their internal power. More popular are captured elements. In particular solars (sunlight elementals) and yags (fire elementals) are commonly used as power sources, because they are easy to bait and catch, and have little difficulty recharging themselves—though they do tend to be more volatile than karzeleks (earth elementals) or bessemars (metal elementals). Other human’s souls, as well as other metaphysical entities, can also be used to power magic, but are considerably more difficult to obtain. It is impossible to get more energy out of an arcane system than is put in.

The third requirement is the physical components required for the arcane technique. What these are varies. In some cases, no physical components are necessary (i.e. psychonomy, basic transmutations). In most cases, it is whatever object is to be affected, and additional materials may be required. Alchemy is the most common example of this, where creating many special alloys requires certain metaphysical reagents.

Arcane Disciplines

Psychonomy: used in dealing with thoughts, memories, and emotions. It can create, magnify, or suppress any of those things, and is commonly used in treating mental problems. It is also used in crime fighting and the military for interrogation. Psychonomers can also detect the distinct thought patterns of different people, though learning to identify someone solely by their thought pattern is difficult. Because of their ability to subtly alter people’s thoughts, psychonomers are not well liked by many.

Theurgy: used for dealing with metaphysical entities of all kinds, from eidolons to elementals. With the proper preparations and the right kind of vessel, a theurge can summon and bind most metaphysical creatures. Given that these creatures had the ability to affect reality in numerous ways, the applications of theurgy are myriad. Theurgy, along with Alchemy and Cosmourgy, is regarded as one of the primary disciplines of combat mages. It also finds application in computing, manufacture, medicine, and is crucial to transportation technology.

Bioccultics: used for altering and enhancing organic materials. It shares a great deal with Alchemy, and can be used to temporarily endow organic material with properties it would otherwise lack, such as giving a human superior nightvision, or enhanced strength. With more work, these qualities can be permanently worked into the subject. Homunculi, human constructs created with bioccultics, are becoming more common, though the fact that each must be custom made limit them primarily to those among the extremely wealthy who desire designer children. They tend to possess limited superhuman qualities, thanks to the ease of working permanent enhancements into a homunculus. Other kind of bioccultic constructs are called biomorphs and are used extensively across fields. Bioccultics is central to medical technology, being able to regenerate damaged tissue and eliminate most diseases. Cosmetic bioccultics can freeze and reverse aging, and flesh sculpting is both an art form and sign of prestige (if it is done well). More applications for bioccultics are being developed daily.

Alchemy: used for transmuting the qualities of physical, and to a limited extent metaphysical, materials, as well as creating alchemical compounds that possess metaphysical properties. Examples of minor transmutations include altering the temperature of a material (commonly used in warfare), temporarily altering the melting and boiling points of a material, and temporarily altering the hardness—none of which require reagents. The creation of alchemical alloys requires special reagents, and is used extensively for making materials with unusual or blatantly impossible properties. There is a whole family of alchemical alloys of steel, for example (blacksteel, silksteel, aquasteel, etc…). Alchemical drug creation (pharmaceutical alchemy) is another major area. It requires fewer, if any reagents, instead relying upon more complex processes that create the components from a handful of simple reagents. Commonly used drugs include anti-hypnotics (eliminate the need for sleep, temporarily), regeneratives, stimulants, and psychoarchic (influence and control the emotions, thoughts, and perceptions of the user).

Cosmourgy: used for manipulation of force and energy. Includes telekinetics and teleportations, though the later in extremely difficult. Cosmourges can also manipulate sound, electricity, and other forms of energy. Commonly used in combat and entertainment (for the creation of illusions).

Technomagy: used in the creation of constructs, automata, and the like. Metaclockwork devices can replicate the effects of other schools of magic, though typically with less fine control. They are also used in the creation of prosthetic limbs. The development of technomagy is responsible for the Arcane Revolution, in which magic was industrialized.

Credit to Tim Powers for calling fire elementals yags.
(I'll expand Cosmourgy and Technomagy at some point; I was tired when I wrote them)
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Heading said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Kingmaker »

So basically I'm asking what souls actually do in this universe. Can messing with someone's soul be the equivalent of a low-level brainhack? Are souls singular, non-reducible? Or are they made of more simple bits that can be in turn reduced to more simple bits?
They already have an entire school of magic focused on brain-hacking--it's called psychonomy. Souls are important to cognition (I think. I may end up changing what they do) as well as magic use.
Souls can be broken down into smaller chunks of soul, if that is what you mean. I think for now, I won't have it so that high energy soul fragment collisions create sub-soultomic particles like soulquarks and soulmuons. But I might change my mind, because that could be pretty cool.
What IS soul-forging? And are there soul-forged animals as well? Biomancy on animals? I mean, imagine industrialized magic... but magic doesn't have to work solely on "industrialized" machinery or shit. You can magick the entire ecosystem! Elongate the legs of elephants and make something that looks like a Salvador Dali painting!
Soul-forging is using magic (usually a mix of bioccultics and technomagy) to alter or augment an organism by adding extraneous bits or building enchantments into them. And yes, they do have soul-forged animals. Probably elephants that squirt napalm out of their trunk or something. There's also the occasional naturally occurring hive mind that can alter the animals under its influence.
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Heading said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
-Rudyard Kipling
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Booted Vulture »

This is pretty interesting. How do you go about capturing spirits for their magic energy then? I mean do you basically make a giant mystic solar panel to draw them in or something?
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Magister Militum »

I have to agree that this is also quite interesting. I wonder, however, as to how metaphysical entities are used in the field of computing, as you mentioned?
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Acatalepsy »

Kingmaker wrote:They already have an entire school of magic focused on brain-hacking--it's called psychonomy. Souls are important to cognition (I think. I may end up changing what they do) as well as magic use.
Souls can be broken down into smaller chunks of soul, if that is what you mean. I think for now, I won't have it so that high energy soul fragment collisions create sub-soultomic particles like soulquarks and soulmuons. But I might change my mind, because that could be pretty cool.
That would be pretty cool. The reason I was thinking about it was that you had souls having an effect on the mind, but yet being separate somehow. I was thinking more about causaul mechanisms - can you reduce a soul in this 'verse to components that are not supernatural?

The reason I ask is because nothing so far has been explicitly supernatural - everything could be reduced to entirely naturalistic components. And while you might not have an answer (nor should you want or need to) for asking what causes a soul to work, you should be able to say whether or not it is reducible. Presumably, if it is reducible, then Theurgy would include the study of those components.

I have to agree that this is also quite interesting. I wonder, however, as to how metaphysical entities are used in the field of computing, as you mentioned?

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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by speaker-to-trolls »

I have a couple of questions: Why are the arcane symbols needed, if they are strictly needed at all? And are the powers of things like fausts and elementals things that require arcane symbols (I'm supposing they don't, especially the elementals, but only you know)?
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Kingmaker »

This is pretty interesting. How do you go about capturing spirits for their magic energy then? I mean do you basically make a giant mystic solar panel to draw them in or something?
Depends on the kind of elemental. Yags (fire elementals) for example, would be drawn to an extremely hot, large fire, at which point you can trap them. Solars are caught using funky mirror arrays that concentrate sunlight. So yes, mystic solar panels.
I have a couple of questions: Why are the arcane symbols needed, if they are strictly needed at all?
Let me think on that some more. The original idea was a language of magic, with the symbols reflecting metaphysical constants/principles, but I'm not sure how much I like that now. How I got 148, I don't remember (prime numbers were involved). Suffice to say, I'm taking a lot of cues from Platonism and Cartesianism.
And are the powers of things like fausts and elementals things that require arcane symbols
No.
The reason I ask is because nothing so far has been explicitly supernatural - everything could be reduced to entirely naturalistic components. And while you might not have an answer (nor should you want or need to) for asking what causes a soul to work, you should be able to say whether or not it is reducible. Presumably, if it is reducible, then Theurgy would include the study of those components.
I'm curious as to what you mean by 'everything could be reduced to entirely naturalistic components'.
However, it is clear that it is time for me to review dualism. That may help some.
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Heading said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
-Rudyard Kipling
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Acatalepsy »

Well, if you don't mind reading a bunch of stuff, this site here has the best definition of the supernatural I've seen.

If you do, then what I think is the most reasonable difference between a supernatural explanation and a non-supernatural explanation is that a supernatural explanation appeals to non-reducible mental concepts, where a naturalistic explanation can always be reduced to simpler, non-mental things.

A supernatural explanation of why fire appears to rise would be that "the fire wants to be higher." It's taking an entirely mental concept - a concept about a mind, and then applying it to something that can't have a mind. A naturalistic approach would be to look at what exactly fire is, what it does, what is really happening to the materials. Reducing the mind to something that can be described in terms of motion.

A supernatural fire spirit would be something that, for example, could understand spoken words despite having no mechanism to actually translate vibrations in the air into neural impulses. It couldn't be reduced to more simple components, whose pieces could be described in terms of motion rather than mind. A naturalistic fire spirit could be reduced to more simple components. That's not to say it would have to be made of the same stuff/matter as humans - in fact, I would not expect it to be, probably made out of the stuff souls are made of - but the stuff it reduced to would ultimately be some form of stuff, not a mental concept.

The reason this sort of matters for your 'verse is that fantasy and cyberpunk have very opposite views on the subject, so putting them in one 'verse creates a sort of issue - not a problem, but something that should be resolved, one way or another. Cyberpunk has the "we aren't special!" message, where fantasy has the "we are special!" button pressed hard.
Anything that can be done to a rat can be done to a human being. And we can do most anything to rats. This is a hard thing to think about, but it's the truth. It won't go away because we cover our eyes.

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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Kingmaker »

Acatalepsy wrote:Well, if you don't mind reading a bunch of stuff, this site here has the best definition of the supernatural I've seen.
I'm not sure I agree with his definitions, but I won't argue the point.
A naturalistic fire spirit could be reduced to more simple components. That's not to say it would have to be made of the same stuff/matter as humans - in fact, I would not expect it to be, probably made out of the stuff souls are made of - but the stuff it reduced to would ultimately be some form of stuff, not a mental concept.
This is tricky because we are essentially talking about a universe where mental concepts are stuff--i.e. greed is a biochemical state in the brain in regards to matter, but there is a corresponding "pneumatic molecule" (yeah, lets call it that) that forms the mental concept of greed. Which is why a faust can eat it. Whether greed (and the faust) can be broken down into pneumaons is a point that I have yet to decide on.
The reason this sort of matters for your 'verse is that fantasy and cyberpunk have very opposite views on the subject, so putting them in one 'verse creates a sort of issue - not a problem, but something that should be resolved, one way or another. Cyberpunk has the "we aren't special!" message, where fantasy has the "we are special!" button pressed hard.
I was about to dispute this, and then I remembered I read post-cyberpunk to the almost complete exclusion of cyberpunk. :lol:

___
Changing subjects, while working on the story I've been writing for this setting, I've been running into a dilemma--what is the point of learning applied magic? If a technomage can build a doohickey that can replicate the effects of any arcane technique, why bother? I've come up with a couple of possible reasons, buy I'm soliciting feed-back, both on my ideas and on ideas other people having. Ideas so far:
-they can't. There are somethings that can't be duplicated with technomagy yet (I'm not sure about this, as it seems to violate the basic premise of the setting)
-a mage can do it better. A technomagic device may be able to reproduce the effect, but it won't be as high quality
-a mage can be more flexible. You may have a gun that shoots bolts of weaponized greed, or a wand that can transmute oxygen into sulfer, but a mage can do both (problem with this is, most mages can't--that would take years of study).
-doohickey is so complex you'd need a mage to use it anyway.

thoughts? suggestions? vitriol?
When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Heading said: "Stick to the Devil you know."
-Rudyard Kipling
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

Kingmaker wrote: And yes, they do have soul-forged animals. Probably elephants that squirt napalm out of their trunk or something.
YES
Changing subjects, while working on the story I've been writing for this setting, I've been running into a dilemma--what is the point of learning applied magic? If a technomage can build a doohickey that can replicate the effects of any arcane technique, why bother? I've come up with a couple of possible reasons, buy I'm soliciting feed-back, both on my ideas and on ideas other people having. Ideas so far:
-they can't. There are somethings that can't be duplicated with technomagy yet (I'm not sure about this, as it seems to violate the basic premise of the setting)
-a mage can do it better. A technomagic device may be able to reproduce the effect, but it won't be as high quality
-a mage can be more flexible. You may have a gun that shoots bolts of weaponized greed, or a wand that can transmute oxygen into sulfer, but a mage can do both (problem with this is, most mages can't--that would take years of study).
-doohickey is so complex you'd need a mage to use it anyway.
All of the above. I mean, if people today in real-life can buy guns and kill people with it, then why would anyone bother with learning kung-fu? And if there was a martial art or science today that can teach people how to kill a yak from two hundred yards away, with mind bullets, I'm sure a whole crapload of people would want to learn how to do that - even though we've already got guns for sale!

It could be a matter of personal power, and it could be also that learning technomagy requires an understanding of magic - and through that understanding of magic, that allows technomagy, applied magic can also be developed? There could be a whole lot of cross inter-disciplinary whatevers between applied magic and technomagy. A lot of technomagical applications can be designed by mages in their pursuit of magic. Other mages won't like technomagic because, as you say, it's too specific and it is complex and all mechanical - certainly those abnormally powerful godlike mages probably won't give a fuck about building doohickeys because they can do it themselves (because their personal power is so great and blah). Whereas other mages would prefer machines, because it amplifies their not-so-strong powers or because it makes magic easier for them (because, hey, not all magicians are equally skilled) since they're limp-wristed sissies who need mechanical assistance. And there are the muggles, who might not have magical talents at all, so to even the score with the mages the muggles end up building obscene mago-technological edifices that can do all sorts of crazy shit! While one muggle will never match a super-powerful mage, a bunch of muggle scientist eggheads with goggles and glasses and labcoats and paperclips and charts and blackboards might end up designing an ungodlily terrible magical-version of an A-bomb because of SCIENCE!
thoughts? suggestions? vitriol?
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Re: Arcane Science [Magic]

Post by Acatalepsy »

Perhaps you could even distinguish between high order technomancy - they study of machinary and automation in its purest form - and lower order technomany, the art of getting an assembly line to turn out tons of magi-laser cannons. Distinguish between the "science" and the "engineering", so to speak. The Mages are somewhere between traditional wizards and scientists; powerful in their own right but truly valuable for the knowledge and skills they can put to good use working with others. They don't go to learn how to shoot fireballs out of their hands because they expect to use it in combat (well, most don't anyway), but rather the ability to shoot fireball out of your hands is a side effect of having the knowledge and understanding of the universal laws that makes a mage so valuable in the first place.

Thus high order technomacy stays around as the art of automation in general, low order technomancy is more like engineering - you need the specialists to make it work. A low order technomancer (or should we call him an enginseer?) can make an assembly line and set up the automated spellcasting process, but he needs a specialist to actually make a useful produce beyond mere trinkets.
Anything that can be done to a rat can be done to a human being. And we can do most anything to rats. This is a hard thing to think about, but it's the truth. It won't go away because we cover our eyes.

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