Magic - Old Revision 1

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What is Magic?

After many centuries, science has accepted magic as a proper field study. Despite this, there are no definitive formulas, charts and graphs that can tell a person how magic will react to any complex situation and likely there never will be. A lot about magic is still unknown, but humanity knows enough to wield it with some measure of reliability. Magic is any effect caused by drawing energy out of the astral planes and into the physical world. There are several ways of accomplishing this and endless methods to achieve the desire effect. Due to it's reliance on spiritual energy, Magic mostly akin to a social science.

The Astral Planes

The Astral planes is a 'dimension' that exists parallel to the earth. Geometrically, it represents a 'sheet' around earth that is actually a 3d dimension volume that contains the whole of humanities spiritual power and the left over spiritual essence from The End. The origin of the Astral Planes is unknown. Some say it always existed and we only became aware of it after the End and some say it is the 'body' of the entity that rescued humanity. Regardless, it is a volume filled with primarily an 'aether' of blank or somewhat elementally aligned spirits. Also existing as points in the Astral Planes are the souls of the living, recently dead and manifested entities, such as powerful spirits and demons. Most view such creatures to be 'constructs', created either by wizards or the shared consciousness of humanity. Powerful spiritual power tends to 'sink' into the center of the planes where it is the hardest to access, while 'aether' is in great abundance on the 'surface' of the planes.

The conversion process from the astral planes to physical space is a near perfect conversion. Magic is the most effective way to convert energy, though doing so consistently and reliably is extremely difficult and no large region has been able to sustain it's self purely on magical energy.

Manifesting magical energy is extremely difficult and, to our current knowledge, can only be initiated by a being who possesses a soul. Manifestation relies highly on intuition and a natural spiritual affinity.

Internal vs External Casting

There are primarily two basic ways to manifest magical energy. The most natural way is Internal Casting, also known as Aura Casting or Focusing. It involves using one's spiritual energy as the catalysis for casting. Internal Casting is the simple and most intuitive method of wielding magical power, but also relies the most on natural talent. There are two primary ways internal casting works. The most basic is metabolic magic, which is turning spiritual energy into physical power. Superhuman strength, speed or endurance are all a manifestation of spiritual metabolic action and is something almost every human is capable of on some level. Projection is the second type, manifesting energy outside your body, usually within a sphere of influence around the caster's body. The borders of this sphere are fuzzy -- it fades off rather than ends abruptly. Individuals capable of large amounts of projection are relatively rare.

External Casting, also known as Manipulation, Invoking, only uses one's spirit to influence free spirits in the Astral planes. A caster is basically commanding the attentions and actions of peripheral spirits(and in the case of powerful casts, spirits deep in he bounds of the astral plane) to do their bidding. There are also generally two forms of External Casting. Empathetic casting influences spirits to execute commands, casting spells through sheer force of personality. A powerful spirit will dominate weaker spirits and 'aether' with ease. Powerful empathic casters can use this to imprint there will

Theurgic magic relies on ritual, runes and wards to trap, confine, focus and direct spirits to do their bidding. Using the same principle as the Empathic caster, a Theurgic caster only needs to program one 'master' spirit to imprint it's will. Binding is done with a process known as "The Array".

In reality, while each type can be distinctly labeled, most mages develop a hybrid that fits their style. and ability. Using a bit of each style is far from unheard of. Most external casters will learn to use their internal energy to supplement or aid in the casting of their spells, while an internal caster with a big enough influence may tend to attract 'free radicals', free spiritual energy that will emulate their internal will. On average, internal casters have more fine control over their magic, though with a more limited rage and supply of energy. They also tend to cast spells much faster. External casters often lack the fine control, but can much easier invoke large effects and do so more often. Theurgic magic is the easiest magic to learn, and can have very precise and reproducible effects, but is hard to modify or improvise. Still Theurgic mages have a high amount of utility and are often the most desirable mages to have as assistants, servants or employees. Thuergic magic is the least reliant on innate magical talent, but is the most complex type of casting. Most primarily Empathic casters generally know some thuergic spells.

The Array

An Array is a marked 2d surface on the physical plane that confines a 3d space in the astral plane, used in Thuergic spells. In olden times casting arrays were drawn in chalk and sand. They still are on occasion, for longer spells and rituals. Arrays are a study in their self. An example of an array, though primitive and outdated, is a pentagram. While capable of controlling the weakest of spirits and perhaps casting mild charms or wards, they are elementally unbalanced and lack the proper control wards.

The most common of the modern arrays are based on the Grand Star. This symbol is placed in a ring, which greatly increases the density of the confined surface. This ring is usually covered in runes designed to help control and sedate more powerful spirits. Other markings and wards are used to create elemental bias and give basic instructions. Others can be used to "shape" the force of the spirits, though this is all extremely advanced. Some arrays have a different amount of points and some none at all. Alchemists use Alchemist Arrays that often have 18 or even 36 points(often called an Alchemists Spindle), used to subdivide major elements into minor elements and even rarely sub-minor elements. Some single element casters place a single large ward or rune as the basis of an array. Even rarer are more artistic patterns which seem to have no obvious benefit but are often much preferred by their casters. An experienced Thuergic Caster will have his own arrays styled to his needs, though they are generally based off of some standard.

The Array works because Aether has very consistent predictable behavior. Arrays serve as an abstract type of 'electrical programming' and can perform logical operations. While all attempts to make complex 'electronics' from magic have failed, a knowledgeable mage can perform many complex operations with magical energy.

The Spellbook

Spellbooks are complex and often very personal and are used for many reasons. They notate all gestures and comments to a spell, how and why a spell works and often a custom array for casting the spell. Despite being small, such an array is often more powerful then a basic drawn array as it is optimized for a quick and powerful casting of a single spell. These arrays are commonly tweaked and improved over many many years and usually are very personal, making a shared array less effective in the hands of a different caster. These custom arrays can be drawn larger for even greater effect, though the time to do so is often prohibitive. They also relate to two concepts of casting in growing usage.

The Light Array

A relatively new technique in magical casting in the Light Array. A light array starts as a complex, but easy to activate array that draws an array of light around the caster. From there the light array can be used to create additional light array, literally 'decompressing' a caster's spellbook into a 3d dimensional, glowing spell array. The system quickly compounds into a complex, automated casting platform. While sometimes slow to activate and somewhat draining to maintain, light arrays cover a much larger area than a book page and can bind in 3 dimensional space, raising their power exponentially. They can be programmed to adjust spells, detect ranges, show somatic spell components and quickly cast spells.

Light Array casting is an advanced art and is often ignored in favor of furthering ones magical studies toward more powerful spells and not different ways to cast the same ones. Light Casting is very time intensive to learn and prepare for and integrating new spells into a light array is much more difficult than integrating one into a spellbook. On the other hands there are those with amazing talents who are known as Lightcasters, who no longer use spellbooks. This requires an enchanted object which cares the initial spell information, often engraved artifacts or gems.

Magic's Effect on Technology

Little is known about how The End came to happen, but both theorize that it was technological in origin, likely a nuclear holocaust. This is suspected because of the reaction of souls to technology. It is theorized that the 8 billion killed during The End were left with an animosity toward technology. Technologically malicious spirits chip away at, weaken or short out technology in the process known as 'magi-degeneration'. It is theorized as those bitter souls have melted into ether or have been reformed, that the effect has lessed and eventually advanced technology will be able to exist safely with magic forces.

Magi-Degeneration is what limits advanced technology primarily Cimera and most of Gainsbrok, though some basic devices can be operated reliably in other parts of the world

F-Clips and Other Adaptions

F-Clips basically act as a magazine of redundant fuses. As spirits most often attack points of weaknesses on technological devices, fuse clips in a sense act as replaceable 'bait' to placate spirits. Disposable F-Clips are the most reliable, as a device will simply turn off if all the fuses are broke. Many batteries have F-Clips built in so thyey can be replaced at the same time. These allow some simple devices to operate in otherwise hostile environments. Repeater-Clips, featuring resettable fuses can be used in some parts of the world where the magic presence is weak. This cases a device to occasionally 'click' as fuses cycle to maintain operation. The downside to this besides bulk is that if there is enough magi-degeneration in an area, a device will likely be shorted out eventually. Some devices automatically shut down if the fuse is excessively triggered.

Redundancy and scale are other tactics to maintain function, even in places like Shiv. Circuitry must be designed carefully to protect from easy shorts and redundancy allows compromised components to be deactivated before damage is done. Sometimes magical composites are used to 'mask' devices from spiritual energy. This is most commonly used on dense, vulnerable components like processors. Due to all of this, while there has been a lot of technological advancement beyond that of the Old World, many consumer goods are much bulkier.

Zeppelins are used for most air transportation in the world because their lift natural lift protects them from engine failure. Magical elements such as Element Zero can also be used to generate massive amounts of lift at minimal energy cost.

Magical Elements and Composites

A magical element exists that interacts with matter to create new elements. A new periodic table has been developed to list these magical elements. While most are unstable, "Element Zero", magic's equivalent to Hydrogen, is the most useful. Due to it taking up space while existing in the Astral Space, it has a negative mass. When used as a gas, it creates a vacuum that still exerts pressure. When a charge is applied to the gas, the space it occupies in the astral planes expands, creating a negative vacuum and even more lift. Element Zero (sometimes simply referred to as "null"), can exist as crystal. These Null Crystals have even more extreme effects than the gas counterpart and are what support the floating islands that travel around parts of the world. Null Gas is preferred though due it being both stable and behaving better with technological components. While the crystals do not cause magi-degeneration, they can leak strong magnet energy if not properly contained.

Most higher weight magical elements also tend to behave well with technology and are used to shield important technological components. Even a room temperature super conductor has been created, but has not been made economically viable yet.

Atomic Traits

Magical elements are created with praetons and aetherons. Praetons are a particle that can take the place of either a proton or a neutron. A Praeton forces the existance of an aetheron. Aetherons are, basically, magic versions of electrons that interact with aether fields. Aetherons do not require praetons and standard elements can be imbued with aetherons to make them more magically conductive. Enchanted equipment generally contains atoms with aetherons.

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