Esoteric Arcana: Basic Magical Aspects And Predefined Magic
More common and tradtional magical paths
Axioms Of Dominion is a game which is designed to have a large array of magical possibilities. All the way back to the original design a vast potential for unique and mindblowing magical capabilities and styles was a primary goal. For that reason there are multiple “systems” through which you can interact with Magical Aspects. Divine Magic, Classes, Research, and especially Talents. Talents and Aspects are how I wish all RPGs were designed. All the best parts of class or skill systems and few of the downsides. In any case this post will cover the common Aspects you encounter in most fantasy stories and games.
Common Elemental Magic
An Aspect in Axioms is the thing over which a certain kind of magic has control. So elemental magic is a system that is comprised of the common elements of traditional fantasy magic. An Aspect can be an Element or a Concept or a Force.
The Common Basic Elements in the Elemental style of magic in Axioms are:
Fire
Water
Earth
Air
The Common Composite Elements in Axioms are:
Steam(Water/Fire)
Magma(Earth/Fire)
Mud(Earth/Water)
Ice(Air/Water)
Dust(Air/Earth)
Smoke(Air/Fire)
Elemental Magic is primarily focused on combat. It has no Rituals and only Spells. Elemental Magic has many basic mechanics in common with other types of magic. Spells are constructed of Components including Aspect, Range, Effect, Cost, Target, Casting Time, and Duration.
A Firebolt for instance could be Fire/20m/15 Damage/15/Single/1/1.
Although you can’t participate in standard battles because the scale of Axioms is too large and this would take forever it is valuable to know how they work. Combat, both battles and special types which the player can personally direct, takes place in 1 second ticks.
So the Firebolt is Cast in 1 tick, dealing damage just prior to the next tick, and deals 15 damage a single time to a single target within 20 meters while costing 10 of some resource. In the case of Elemental Magic probably Fire Mana.
Non-magical combat actions will typically take a single second and be something like stab, slash, smash, block, etc. They’ll work on the same system. Similarly Units will use “formation combat actions” when interacting with other Units. I’ll describe these in a later post but they are slightly different from individual actions and from magic.
Another type of spell would be a Domain spell. It has an area centered on the caster which applies 1 or more effects to each ally or enemy. A Magma Domain for instance might be Magma/20m/Domain(4)/100/AOE/4/10. So costing 100mana starting on the fifth tick, if it was cast on the first, you’d have a Magma Domain effect at Tier 4 that lasts 10 turns affecting everyone within that range. A Tier 4 Magma Domain would, in this example, apply a 2%*4 cost reduction to all spells which are or are composites of Earth and Fire, 2%*4*2 if they are composites containing both. It would also deal 5 Earth and 5 Fire damage per tick/phase to any enemy in range. Domain Spells are perhaps the most complex Elemental Magic Spell.
Predefined Magic
Different types of magic will function different ways. Common Elemental Magic only has pre-defined spells, although there are a lot of them. Class, Talent, and Skill systems are all Predefined Magic. Common Elemental Magic would be a Talent system because you select new Talents or Tier Up existing Talents which are sets of 4 spells. Tier 1 Fire Magic is called Pyromancy.
Pyromancy
Firebolt
Fire
15 damage
Single Target
Ranged 20m
Cast 1s
20 cost
1 tick
Flare
Fire
20 dmg
+1s distract
Single Target
Ranged 20m
Cast 1s
40 mana
1 tick
Fireball
Fire
40 dmg
Sphere 4m
Ranged 20m
Cast 2s
70 mana
1 tick
Fireblast
Fire
50 dmg
Single Target
Ranged 20m
Cast 2s
50 mana
1 tick
Distract is crowd control.
These are just examples are aren’t necessarily the exact numbers you’ll see in the game. You can see here that Pyromancy is damage focused. Pyromancy spells have standard range, mana cost, casting time, and duration for their “level”. They hit harder than comparable spells. I’ll provide an example.
Geomancy
Stone Skin
Permanent
Passive
Absorbtion
5 damage
Mineral Spike
Earth
15 dmg
+1s distract
Single Target
Ranged 20m
Cast 1s
40 mana
1 tick
Rock Shard
Earth
25 dmg
Single Target
Ranged 20m
Cast 1s
30 mana
1 tick
Ground Pound
Earth
25 dmg
3s Stun
Single Target
Ranged 20m
Cast 2s
60 mana
1 tick
Stun and Distract are crowd control effects. Absorbtion is a damage reduction effect reducing physical damage at 100% and magical damage at 50% rounded down. So 5 and 2 respectively. It stacks. Geomancy is a Control and Defensive Talent. It has longer crowd control effects than spells at a similar level but standard cost, range, and casting time. You may notice that for this form of Predefined Magic each “standard deviation” in value has a standard penalty. Cast Time and Mana Cost trade off against the range, duration, damage, and area of the spell. Duration is a bit half and half. That is longer duration spells typically have weaker effects although that isn’t obvious from these Talents.
Common Conceptual Magic
Common Conceptual Magic is the other half of Common Elemental Magic. The four Common Basic Concepts are:
Life
Light
Dark
Force
The Common Conceptual Elements are:
Poison(Dark/Water)
Lightning(Light/Air)
Sound(Force/Air)
Rot(Dark/Earth)
The Common Conceptual Composites are:
Healing(Life/Water)
Shadow(Light/Dark)
Body(Life/Force)
Corrosion(Fire/Dark)
Fortification(Force/Earth)
Velocity(Force/Air)
Common Aspected Magic involves the common Concepts of the world. The Rare Esoteric Concepts will be covered in a later post. Dark is a negative concept while Light and Life are positive. Force is essentially neutral. Light magic has longer range than other spells and usually connect to positive Composites related to healing/purity/protection. Dark magic has a longer duration and is connected to negative Composites related to weakness/constraint/harm. Force has a wide spread covering control and defense but also boosts the offensive power of similarly aligned Aspects like Earth or Light. Life connects to healing and strengthening composites like Healing and Body.
The nature of Aspects is relatively standard across the different kinds of magic. It is more the form than the function that changes. However Predefined Magic provides more “flavor” and “focus” to magic compared to Unconstrained Magic.