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Path: utzoo!utcsri!ubc-vision!ubc-cs!andrews
From: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews)
Newsgroups: net.games.frp
Subject: Re: Social implications of magic
Message-ID: <198@ubc-cs.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 1-Apr-86 13:25:32 EST
Article-I.D.: ubc-cs.198
Posted: Tue Apr  1 13:25:32 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 1-Apr-86 19:25:05 EST
References: <9865@ucla-cs.ARPA> <386@weitek.UUCP> <1249@udenva.UUCP>
Reply-To: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews)
Organization: UBC Department of Computer Science, Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Lines: 31
Summary: 

>In article <386@weitek.UUCP> robert@weitek.UUCP (Robert Plamondon) writes:
>>          ... There IS magic, and it IS powerful, but very few people
>>have the ability to use it. You have to be in the 99.5th percentile
>>just to have measurable aptitude, but only with 99.99 is the ability
>>very powerful.

In article <1249@udenva.UUCP> showard@udenva.UUCP (Mr. Blore) writes:
>  That sounds interesting, and plausible.  But how do the players feel about
>being unable to use magic?  Let's face it, being able to decimate those pur-
>suing orcs with a fireball is fun!

     But you could still role-play that .5% of the population if you wanted.
Assuming 8 people to a party in its lifetime, only about 4% of all parties
would contain any mages at all over their lifetime, and only about .07% would
contain more than one.  For the sake of the play, you could assume that you
were playing the *interesting* 4% of parties, and allow one "free" mage per
party lifetime.  But if a mage entered the party at any point and were killed,
you would have to roll to see if another interested mage were around to join
-- 02 or less on percentile dice would be being generous.

     One consequence of this would be that mages would be well protected
and respected in the party, and might only join if there were a good deal of
benefit in it for them.  Depending on the dungeon setup, the mage might be
able to stay in town most of the time, being brought in only for tough jobs.
I think this would be closer to the legendary concept of magic than these
parties where first-level mages are as common as rats and just about as
expendable.

--Jamie.
...!ihnp4!alberta!ubc-vision!ubc-cs!andrews
"It's just a rumour that was spread around town"