Contents
Last updated: February 2020
BDI is a high magic setting. What this means is that magic is moderately easy to access, and many players and NPCs are capable of wielding arcane powers of various kinds with varying degrees of skill. Many apprentice mages have earned livings lighting lamps or enchanting anti-fire charms on buildings. Drache itself sits atop a confluence of magical ley lines that have attracted the attention of demons, undead, and other evil sorcerer types over the years. As a storytelling based game, the mod team wants to ensure that the focus is on the content of a narrative rather than how powerful a given character is by instantly solving the problem with a snap of their fingers. As such, we have some guidelines about magic use.
This guide is not an exhaustive list of all magic used in the setting and is only meant to address certain magic use that hasn’t been conducive to story building. The mod team reserves the right to address magic use not in this guide as necessary through our Character Sheet Review. Other types of magic might be added to this list as necessary.
Convenience Magic
Convenience magic is the use of magic as a quick fix-it-all for any in character conflict. It can easily become exploitable to do anything and tends to derail player generated story lines. When someone has the instant, unearned fix, why bother with trying to do it the hard way? Interesting narratives contain conflict. If your character is seen using magic to immediately solve every situation after approval, you will be asked to tone it down.
- General Potion Use: Characters with a potion for every conceivable need will be asked to tone it down. Potions are very expensive to make and buy, and would not be accessible to commoners. They should be treated as the expensive items they are, not like the ale you’d chug at the Inn.
- Generalist Mages: A Jack of All Trades is a master of none. Mages cannot perform every conceivable spell, especially not as required by the current situation. Moderators are likely to deny character sheets for mages who can pull a spell of every type for any inconvenience.
- Healing Magic: Healing magic is a rare commodity to the general populace in the setting. It takes a lot of energy, skill and concentration to knit flesh back together to stabilize a victim, let alone completely heal everything. Healing critical wounds should take at least two rounds of posting, and cause a character to decrease in energy.
- Healing Potions: Healing potions are great for minor wounds, but they will not heal severe injuries with organ damage and profuse bleeding. Healing potions must be imbibed to work.
- Teleportation: Teleportation is an act of magic that is supposed to require a lot of energy and coordination to perform, let alone to perform rapidly and often. It is not to be used in rapid succession within a short period of time. Due to the chaotic nature of combat, teleportation can only be to a point within line of sight. Portals are treated the same as teleportation in and out of combat and should, again, cost a lot of energy to perform. Distances covered over fifty miles by is an ability that requires augmentation through a personal device or enchanted object and are subjected to limitations of use. Teleportation over distances greater than 100 miles is an ability restricted to characters whose players have been active here for two months, and it can only be done once per day and limits what magic a character can do afterwards.
Moderator Approval Magic
- Large Areas of Effect: As noted in the GMing in #BlkDragon*Inn section of the policies, creating large areas of effect that must be described to other players requires approval. This includes the use of excessive or large magic. Anything that other players must be informed about requires prior moderator approval.
- Resurrection: As noted in the policies, resurrection is not an easy, get out of jail free card. It must be earned, and requires another player who in story line not only knows the deceased character, but also has good reason to perform the resurrection. Resurrection should be limited to approved characters whose backgrounds are actually suited to the magic, such as priests, clerics, paladins or even necromancers. It should be exhausting or requires the involvement of additional support of PCs or NPCs.
- Weather Manipulation: Weather magic affects the setting in ways that must be described to other players. It’s also a very powerful type of magic that should not be performed easily or without consequences. Any player that wishes to affect the weather must speak to the mods prior to playing out the act.
Overpowered Magic
This is a list of magic that is considered overpowered for the setting.
- Chronomancy/Time Magic: The ability to control, stop or otherwise effect time
How many different types of magic should my character use/know?
When reviewing sheets, moderators will look for abilities that match the character’s age and background.
We allow players to have characters that have existed for quite a long time, but in a setting like BDI no character can truly know everything there is about magic. Also keep in mind that we want players to be active in BDI for two months before we allow them to have undead, demonic, or more powerful characters.
Young characters (less than middle-aged or equivalent in a character’s race) would know less than older ones. In general, it’s a safe bet to have a young character know up to four magic abilities (for example: pyromancy, illusions, healing, force magic). Anything more than that is up to moderator discretion based on whether or not the abilities fit the background.