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I didn’t read all of this but watch owl house.
Reddit STEMlords love Brandon Sanderson style hard magic systems because they have no imagination and even magic has to make “logical” sense.
Give me magic that is weird and inexplicable and terrifying ty
There’s this need to acquire the best magic and knowledge is hoarded. Even in franchises I love like Full Metal Alchemist, the magic system is kept behind several walls of secrecy and exclusivity.
I always hated that part of secrets in the world that are accessible to the people at large.
In Harry Potter for example, I hated the idea that magical people could help with so many real-world problems. They just choose to stay exclusive. Magic knowledge is kept from people they deem unworthy, even if you have magical ability.
I can accept secrecy and such in super hero type fiction sometimes like in Sailor Moon. Nobody else can use those powers and fight against the villains on the same level.
Dragon Ball Z had an interesting concept when they had Gohan teach Videl about using ki. This is knowledge that could help a lot of people but they keep that knowledge and the reality of their global threats to themselves. It baffles me that no human outside current canon discovered how to use ki in the years since Dragon Ball started. There were androids and stuff, but nobody would stumble onto that information ever? To seek to get to the level of at least Yamcha?
In Harry Potter for example, I hated the idea that magical people could help with so many real-world problems. They just choose to stay exclusive.
Harry Potter is the absolute worst about this, because seemingly there’s no real limit on magic and it’s abilities. There’s no pool of magic energy to deplete, it’s not a scarce resource in anyway, the only reason they don’t share is because they just don’t feel like it.
I think FMA handles it pretty well actually. A lot of the information is available as long as you’re willing to study complicated chemistry and physics to be able to do it, and most of the actual secrecy is specific to the military. Atomic theory is public, blueprints for how to build an atom bomb are secret.
There’s almost no way to come up with a system that somehow excludes the majority of society from casting spells without appealing to some racist (muh elven blood, muh dragon grandmother) or classist (muh royal bloodline, muh selective school of magic) bullshit. I think magic being almost written in an exclusionary way is the root of the problem.
Magic is also almost written in an exclusively individualist way as well. Why isn’t communal magic more of a thing? Imagine if the Harry Potter series ended with Harry and Voldemort each casting some communal spell against each other and since Harry isn’t some freaky weirdo, his side has more wizards which means their communal spell is stronger by virtue of having more people behind him.
I could do one even better. What if Voldemort was able to obtain some magical MacGuffin that made him insurmountably powerful and as a final gambit, Harry tear apart the masquerade (or whatever it’s called in the HP universe) that separates magic users from nonmagic users and on the knowledge of Voldemort’s atrocities, humanity’s collective contempt for Voldemort is so great that humanity unconsciously casts a communal spell that, powered by every single living human in existence, was able to simply will Voldemort from existence?
Magic being written in an exclusionary and individualist way has ideological baggage. It’s not “what if I’m able to cast fireballs” but “what if I’m able to cast fireballs, but the filthy plebs aren’t able to.” This is why magic quickly devolves to some shitty power fantasy or is filled with racist and classist bullshit that does nothing but ideologically reproduces the status quo in capitalist hellworld. It should be no surprise the Harry Potter series was written by some fucking Blairite terf.
There’s almost no way to come up with a system that somehow excludes the majority of society from casting spells without appealing to some racist or classist bullshit
I find appealing the chi system similar to DBZ, minus the races/aliens stuff. I suppose it makes sense that elves would have a slightly higher propensity to do magic than humans, but that’s an option I’m not about to talk about.
Of course, nothing particularly interesting would stop the world builder from deciding that some people are genetically more likely to do magic, in the same way that some people are just taller.
Drop from DBZ the concept that everybody is ripped and punches and that chi is mostly used for punching/defending punches, if you want.
There is a bit of a skill ceiling in using chi. IDK how you would explain that, depends on how much you want to gate keep it. After all, nothing really stops you all from becoming programmers and contributing to hexbear’s rust backend, AFAIK.
Once you’ve gate-kept, have a second skill ceiling. Some people can shoot fireballs out of their hands, fly, etc., whatever. But some people can create advanced chi procedures and store them inside objects or people. For example, create a scroll that shoots fireball when read, or plant in a person’s brain/soul the ability to use a fireball technique without the formal chi training it would normally require.
Decide how rare the scroll-makers are, if they are alive, etc…
You make a valid point anthropology wise. Can you think of a time where magic being fundamentally unknowable like you said was narratively satifying?
See, when I was thinking of a soft magic plot I honestly first hit on like slipstream scifi. Moeibious kinda stuff. Where I can’t myself feel any magic about the world I can about the universe. Magic? Bullshit. Le Incal? A magic pyramid fought over by the technopriests with unknowable magic powers? Obviously plausable and emotionally relevant.
So there is a synthesis here. As star treck is that same science fantasy kidna setting.
