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The Old Hack

Story Monday January 29, 2018

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24 minutes ago, ChronosCat said:

I thought for sure it had been established that wands store power, but I'm not sure where to look for confirmation.

At any rate I suspect he has a lot more details about the magic system worked out than he's had a chance to explain in the comic; coming up with rules and figuring out details seems to be something he likes doing.

http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1710

Mentioned in that Q&A.

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1 hour ago, ChronosCat said:

coming up with rules and figuring out details seems to be something he likes doing.

I consider this to at least potentially to be an argument in favour of the possibility of system change. Dan might have worked out an entirely new magic system on the side and be itching to try it. At least that is a temptation I personally would be able to understand. :danshiftyeyes:

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1 hour ago, The Old Hack said:

I consider this to at least potentially to be an argument in favour of the possibility of system change. Dan might have worked out an entirely new magic system on the side and be itching to try it. At least that is a temptation I personally would be able to understand. :danshiftyeyes:

But it wasn't all that long ago that Dan spent a lot of EGS: NP time explaining Ellen's magic is great detail.  Purely playing the meta game, that information is not likely to be invalidated, so some magic and spells for some people are likely to be salvaged into whatever changes occur.

Besides, we don't know what spell Elliot got after he reached transgender nirvana.  That spell is likely to come into play dealing with Sirleck, so at the very least magic can't change anything too drastically until sometime after that Big Reveal.

EDIT: As an aside, I mildly surprised myself, rediscovering that I pulled my avatar from the comic I linked to.  :)

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12 hours ago, Vorlonagent said:
14 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

I consider this to at least potentially to be an argument in favour of the possibility of system change. Dan might have worked out an entirely new magic system on the side and be itching to try it. At least that is a temptation I personally would be able to understand. :danshiftyeyes:

But it wasn't all that long ago that Dan spent a lot of EGS: NP time explaining Ellen's magic is great detail.  Purely playing the meta game, that information is not likely to be invalidated, so some magic and spells for some people are likely to be salvaged into whatever changes occur.

Besides, we don't know what spell Elliot got after he reached transgender nirvana.  That spell is likely to come into play dealing with Sirleck, so at the very least magic can't change anything too drastically until sometime after that Big Reveal.

EDIT: As an aside, I mildly surprised myself, rediscovering that I pulled my avatar from the comic I linked to.  :)

Another thing to consider is that making magic public, and therefor allowing magic for everyone, is the major goal of two characters, Tedd and Pandora. Pandora set the events that built up to this in motion with that in mind (so Adrian would be more free to act) and Tedd started his research into the watches with that in mind. Tedd winning the argument here would be a victorious completion of those arcs. Pandora might have recanted on this objective, but that was only because Magic was being a buttface.

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8 minutes ago, Drasvin said:

Pandora might have recanted on this objective, but that was only because Magic was being a buttface.

And it turns out, it wasn't quite a butt face, it just did what Seers always told it to do.

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3 hours ago, partner555 said:

And it turns out, it wasn't quite a butt face, it just did what Seers always told it to do.

Not so much told it to, but gave a good enough reason to. As is already evident just saying "change it" or "don't change it" isn't enough, Magic needs to understand why the Seers want it that way and this is the first time there are differing opinions so it would need a lot more from both sides to determine how it should proceed.

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On 1/30/2018 at 0:26 AM, ChronosCat said:
On 1/29/2018 at 11:40 PM, CritterKeeper said:

That was one of the options on my ignored post for the previous comic....

You suggested one of the ways magic could change was limiting how much magic was available. I'm suggesting that the magic supply is already limited and the only thing the Will of Magic can do about it is change how many people can use magic. (Though if the Will of Magic allowed more people to use magic, that would produce similar results to your scenario, with individual magic users not able to cast as many or as powerful spells as they can at this point.)

If there is limit on magic, how could Pandora cast her world-wide anti-aberration spell? While fairies may use different sources, it doesn't seem magic supply is THAT much limited.

On 1/30/2018 at 2:21 AM, CritterKeeper said:

If, on the other hand, ambient magic was sharply curtailed, and all magic came from the spellcaster, then it would be very difficult to become Dreaming and to Awaken, because those who didn't already have a big enough pool of personal magic to cast simple spells with a wand would have to hope training such as ASMA would work for them.  Someone like Sarah, who can get a spell but doesn't have enough personal energy to cast it, would be no better off than someone with no spell at all.

Outside Moperville, seems the ambient magic is already so low DGB didn't even bothered measuring it.

On 1/30/2018 at 6:50 PM, Scotty said:

But that has the potential of either turning Seers into outlaws to be hunted down and imprisoned, or raise them to celebrity status.

Or both.

On 1/31/2018 at 4:02 PM, Drasvin said:

Also a thought I just got, WoM might be only changing magic for humans because the way magic works for them is not intrinsic to their nature. For Uryuoms, their transformation magic is intrinsic to their nature (and explicitly something different, yet similar to Earth magic). For Immortals, the way their magic works is intrinsic to what they are. For humans however, magic isn't inherently part of their nature. Potential for magic is intrinsic to humans, but how that magic works isn't. That also fits with why people with hereditary talents wouldn't lose the talents even if they lose their current spells related to the talent. The talent is an intrinsic part of the person.

... I though that was basically said explicitly in comics ...

On 2/2/2018 at 7:02 PM, Scotty said:
On 2/2/2018 at 3:39 PM, partner555 said:

And it turns out, it wasn't quite a butt face, it just did what Seers always told it to do.

Not so much told it to, but gave a good enough reason to. As is already evident just saying "change it" or "don't change it" isn't enough, Magic needs to understand why the Seers want it that way and this is the first time there are differing opinions so it would need a lot more from both sides to determine how it should proceed.

I would actually expect that even Seer arguing for magic becoming public might argue in way which made magic decide to change.

 

 

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Meanwhile, Van is happy to have those bloodlines rubberstamp muggles' decisions.  Anyway, my Doylist arguments for no reset still hold; since we don't yet know what Magic is actually looking for, I don't really have anything else to say.

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7 hours ago, hkmaly said:

If there is limit on magic, how could Pandora cast her world-wide anti-aberration spell? While fairies may use different sources, it doesn't seem magic supply is THAT much limited.

 

The amount of magic is stupendous in comparison to a few thousand Immortals casting a big spell, but when spread to seven and a half billion people it gets rather thin.

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Also, there's no reason to think that Magic has anything to do with immortals'/fairies' "magic," any more than with Uryuoms' "magic."  Besides, at least one vampire survived Pandora's spell, and who knows how many more.

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Just now, WR...S said:

Also, there's no reason to think that Magic has anything to do with immortals'/fairies' "magic," any more than with Uryuoms' "magic."  Besides, at least one vampire survived Pandora's spell, and who knows how many more.

It's obvious that Immortals use the same energy as humans since Pandora tapped into the ambient energy to add to her power in ensuring that all Immortals could cast that spell. So either Immortals are like Seers and automatically know what the new system is when it changes, which is possible considering what her memoirs told her about the the feelings of change her previous self experienced, or the WoM is strictly tied to how Humans interact with magic.

Here's another theory, the WoM is also a construct of a higher being or multiple beings. It's behaviour during this meeting, that fact that it requires the perspective of humans to determine how Magic should change, that it has safeguards to prevent exploitation of the system, suggests that the WoM could be a form of AI, that it's programed to analyze the use of magic and determine if it's getting out of control and change it to prevent catastrophic damage, the meetings with Seers could be to determine whether it's no longer needed for the task and that Humans are capable of self regulating magic.

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If the WoM is an AI (probably powered by Magic instead of technology) it might wonder what happens after the cycle of change ends. A good tactic might be to reassure it that it will still have a purpose and won't suddenly be decomissioned.

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28 minutes ago, Haylo said:

If the WoM is an AI (probably powered by Magic instead of technology) it might wonder what happens after the cycle of change ends. A good tactic might be to reassure it that it will still have a purpose and won't suddenly be decomissioned.

... considering the seers have no idea about what will happen with WoM after the cycle and WoM KNOWS it, how exactly would you imagine the reassuring to go?

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19 minutes ago, hkmaly said:
49 minutes ago, Haylo said:

If the WoM is an AI (probably powered by Magic instead of technology) it might wonder what happens after the cycle of change ends. A good tactic might be to reassure it that it will still have a purpose and won't suddenly be decomissioned.

... considering the seers have no idea about what will happen with WoM after the cycle and WoM KNOWS it, how exactly would you imagine the reassuring to go?

Everyone believes that the WoM has a flair for the dramatic. If that is really the case, then it should persist if the cycle is broken so the WoM might not become completely obsolete. There's also the possibility that the WoM might continue to monitor things and step in once more if it turns out that making magic public was a mistake.

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13 minutes ago, Scotty said:

Everyone believes that the WoM has a flair for the dramatic. If that is really the case, then it should persist if the cycle is broken so the WoM might not become completely obsolete.

Doesn't change the fact there is no reassuring seers can give to magic. They know less that it does.

13 minutes ago, Scotty said:

There's also the possibility that the WoM might continue to monitor things and step in once more if it turns out that making magic public was a mistake.

Depending on who created it, that may not be expected to be necessary. Which would be mistake, of course.

Note that making magic public by itself is really inevitable and therefore not mistake. Some specific rules could be mistake, yes.

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