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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!princeton!tilt!chenr
From: chenr@tilt.FUN (Ray Chen)
Newsgroups: net.games.frp
Subject: Re: Limiting Magic
Message-ID: <260@tilt.FUN>
Date: Wed, 3-Apr-85 01:43:30 EST
Article-I.D.: tilt.260
Posted: Wed Apr  3 01:43:30 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 3-Apr-85 07:59:44 EST
References: <1179@reed.UUCP> <26000002@siemens.UUCP> <12303@watmath.UUCP>
Organization: Princeton University EECS Dept
Lines: 34

> 			Jim Gardner, University of Waterloo
>
> In article <26000002@siemens.UUCP> steve@siemens.UUCP writes:
> 
> >By the way, I have a really neat magic system, but it has one flaw that
> >the obvious solutions won't really fix:  a magic user can go off and spend
> >some huge amount of time making an arbitrary number of potions or enchanted
> >swords or whatever and then carry huge amounts of magic with him.  Any
> >suggestions on "realistic" reasons why magic users cannot do this, that don't
> >restrict the ability to make a few potions or swords or whatever?

The three solutions Jim mentioned are all silly.  Encumbrance is a good
idea but making magic items oversized (a potion == the size of a bottle
of soda.  Be real.) is overdoing it.  The critical-mass concept of magic is
just plain stupid.  Can you imagine 2 high-level MUs shaking hands.  Whoops,
too much magic in a certain volume.  BOOM!!  Magic as manna is pretty bad,
too.  It made for a great story, but think about the implications.  Do
you REALLY want to tie your world to this kind of system.  Imagine keeping
track of how much manna has been drained from each area of your world.  Ugh.

My solution:  Let'em cart around as much magic as they want.  First,
figure out how much they'll be bogged down by all the junk they're
hauling around.  If somebody wants to carry around two staves, 10
wands, and a 2-handed sword, let him.  What with all the other stuff
that adventurers normally carry, he'll be lucky if he makes it down the
hallway without tripping.  Then, when they need something in a hurry,
figure out how long it'll take them to find the one thing they want.
If they answer "I put it in my bag of holding along with the other 99
potions..." they're hosed.  And don't tell them about the party of
NPC's who're after them because they did a "Detect Magic" and almost
had their eyes burned out by the aura.

	Ray Chen
	princeton!tilt!chenr