From owner-dq@dq.sf.org.nz Sat Mar 20 17:23:39 1999 Received: (from bin@localhost) by mail.sf.org.nz (8.8.6/NZSFI-19980830) id RAA22559; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:23:39 +1300 Received: from smtp2.ihug.co.nz (tk2.ihug.co.nz [203.29.160.14]) by mail.sf.org.nz (8.8.6/NZSFI-19980830) with ESMTP id RAA22556 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:23:38 +1300 Received: from jimarona.ihug.co.nz (p50-max45.akl.ihug.co.nz [203.109.229.50]) by smtp2.ihug.co.nz (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id RAA05138 for ; Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:17:38 +1300 Message-Id: <199903200417.RAA05138@smtp2.ihug.co.nz> Subject: Re: Shell of Silence Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 17:15:27 +1300 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1155 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: "Jim Arona" To: dq@dq.sf.org.nz Sender: owner-dq@dq.sf.org.nz Errors-To: owner-dq@dq.sf.org.nz X-Loop: dq@dq.sf.org.nz X-Requests: To unsubscribe from this list, or change your subscription address, send a message to dq-request@dq.sf.org.nz. Reply-To: dq@dq.sf.org.nz ---------- > From: Jacqui Smith > To: dq@dq.sf.org.nz > Subject: RE: Shell of Silence > Date: Wednesday, March 10, 1999 10:15 PM > >>'forget the techo analogy, but look at the basis for sound-magics in this > >college. It is rightly here?' > > It seemed at the gods meeting that the consensus was that sound and music > are inseparable, and as a consequence, sound magics do belong in the Bardic > College. While it may be true that music is ordered sound, there is no need to assume that magic based purely on sound is appropriate to the Bardic college. That is a non-sequitur. > > I got the distinct impression that Echosense was a case of a particular > spell that people detested for various reasons which were not primarily to > do with it being sound magic. > I dislike it, and the idea of 'sound' magic, because the effects owe more to science and technology than they do to magic and mysticism. Magic often becomes a technology with a different flavour, and we often seem to end up creating a kind of magical technology, but there seems to me no particularly good reason to make technology the basis of your magic. In the best of all possible worlds, I prefer magic that looks and behaves in some mysterious, arcane fashion, perhaps owing more to chaos than to order, but having a more 'artistic' feel to it than technological one. > >Actually, I voted for this college on the recommendation of certain GMs. They > >later said that they advocated it, just to see it fail later. They beleived > >that two years of play test would see this college killed. I don't know who wrote this, and I don't know who suggested this plan to the writer, but it has to be one of the most poorly thought out plans I've ever come across. Surely, if you don't like something, you vote against it. If you do like it, you vote for it. What possible purpose would be served by voting for something you dislike, because you believe it will fail later? This cunning plan is far too cunning for me, I'm afraid. > > Which again does not appear to be the direction being taken. It will be > very interesting to see who turns up at the next meeting, will it not? Perhaps there is room for a Bardic college, perhaps there isn't. I believe the college is largely a waste of space, but on the other hand, the space we have at the moment is pretty roomy, and we don't have many other things to hang in the wardrobe, so it may provide players with some useful character ideas. I would rather see the college gone utterly, however, than have a college whose magic is really technological effects dresses in the words 'magical spell'. By and large, a spell may be described in many different ways and yet maintain almost exactly the same characterisitics as other spells of it's ilk...bolt spells, for example. It is in large part the description of the effect that determines the flavour of such a micro-rule. If little effort is made to describe the spell in terms more resonant of the wondrousness of magic, then there is little to engage the attention. One is forced to deal only with the gross results of such magic. This is something that could be said of any magical design, it's true. The Bardic college suffers markedly from what I believe to be poor craft in the actual description of the effects. Some spells were hideously tough, and that was probably more of an oversight than any other reason. Some of the magic that was trashed was very good, albeit powerful, like 'The Sound of Trumpets', and I don't know why they went. The distinction between Echosense and The Sound of Trumpets is that Echosense is just a weird sense that would have a marginal right to exist in a fantasy campaign, whereas The Sound of Trumpets has associations which give it some greater right to our acceptance as magic. We can point to the story of Joshua at the Battle of Jericho and say this is appropriate to a fantasy setting. You could argue that the Bard was generating intensely powerful subsonic sound waves at just the right pitch and volume that they cause structures to collapse, but that would be a technological rationalisation. Or, you could say that walking x number of times around a building playing a trumpet conjured otherworldy forces that twisted the fabric of reality and shattered stone...Ultimately, the latter rationalisation does not seek to explain the actual mechanics of the effect. But who cares. The important thing is that if 'feels' like magic, and we understand what it's effect is. Which brings me back to sound and music. Magic does not need any other rationalisation other than it be resonant with the idea behind the college. Music is resonant of what bard's might be said to do...But everyone can make a lot of noise. Jim. -- see unsubscribe instructions in message headers --