Actual useful magic
Jun. 22nd, 2019 04:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethToday's distraction is
what would I actually do with magic?
Because a lot of the spells are combat oriented meaning they're mean and rude.
I refuse to do mind control.
I don't see the problem with necromancy if it's just messing with old bones, but mind control messes with free will, so big nope.
I won't do fireballs. I'd study some fire college to get Extinguish, and Fireproof, but I'm not interested in blowing stuff up for reals.
I like the beginner spells in Pathfinder that can clean and do the laundry and such. It takes more prereqs in GURPS but I'd like cleaning spells.
Healing magic is awesome, but I have met me, and it requires interacting eith humans.
... I'd probsbly learn it to fix myself up and then... hope no one needed it? Like being a first aider when the announce goes off... which reminds me, currently on more than 25 years of vaguely intending to do a first aid course.
... possibly not healing magic then.
The plant spells are game changers, world changers, in a low TL setting, and pretty damn impressive now. You can double the yield. You can get things ready to harvest in much shorter time spans. You can harvest with a spell instead of a field full of upset overworked humans! Big big changes!
... but I'm not a big fan of plants either, because allergies.
Today I'm thinking, architecture.
I think there's a sequence of spells in GURPS that would let you pirate a building.
As with other big works the powering of it is a Thing but
you can use the spells to copy a spaceship, that's clear in the rules, and a house is much simpler
so unless it's a case of being too simple
you should be able to copy an entire house
from a single tile or brick.
I'm thunking visits to a few stately homes could set up something nifty.
Also combining basic spells could do spectacular things for architecture. I mean you can shape metal like Magneto, or shape stone, or both. You can grow trees and interlace the branches and make a living roof if you feel like it. The construction phase could be one person waving a stick around.
... I admit I've spent some hours now with the higitus figitus song from Sword in the Stone stuck in my head. I think the song and dance would in GURPS mean he wasn't actually very good at the spell, but I think also you can trade doing the full ritual for getting a better result.
So me in my head is doing a song and dance to raise a cathedral.
As you would.
I'd hate to see the planning permission messes you could make.
I mean you could just... raise a building. Like guerilla gardening raises flowers. Like whoosh, oh look, there is a house, who put that there, I wonder who it belongs to?
Though with the spell that starts with a schematic you get a certain amount of material per time unit, so it's more like a house would grow.
Heh, house mushrooms, plant anywhere.
... you know we're thisclose to that being plausible near future SF?
... I mean it's just a specialised form of self building.
If wizard me used mind control then probably getting politicians to agree to build new towns would be thrifty and efficient use of spells. Except I can't believe a world with useful magic wouldn't check their politicians for spells. Hmmm, use the ones tha boost your Charisma? Then actually talk them into it?
... see that's the part I stall on.
I know I have no social skills and can't organise a fun outing let alone a town, but if I had magic and a suitable bit of land I could just... whoosh up some housing.
And possibly a sewer system? Would that count as one thing for making a schematic? And a power grid? And roads?
It could definitely magic up some solar and or wind power, those are one device for the spell to work on, but the connecting infrastructure might not be.
Also if makkng something from scratch would have to study architecture first. Or get really good plans? Or both.
And existing towns have problems and specific landscapes to exist in so you wouldn't want to clone a whole settlement, you'd need to study up on that, or it'll be all houses in the flooding bits again.
I jusr don't feel like a me with a magic would spend as much time at war as the rules seem to think, really.
oooh, borrow skill. Is a spell. So I'd just need to find some people I could borrow and then pull all their skills together,
Of course once I built it I'd have to people it.
... all my plans come back to space colony, which is really about looking after people while simplifying the task as much as sustainably possible.
Probably I need better plans. And to acknowledge that if I want to see good housing built and people being fed and so forth I do not actually need to acquire magic and a space colony, I need to go find people organising that work and join in.
... today I was awake through the small hours again and feel this might get in the way of any cooperate plans even before getting to the part where I... am me.
Ah well.
Still, magic.
I'm boeed of fireballs. It's not even very good artillery, compared to now. It is very good resource creation and shaping. Making and Breaking college for me, with some plant and healing if I can cope with them.
Also, ability to say Shields Up and make the whole place impenetrable. Best castle.
... I keep on concluding that castles aren't the right strategy for a complex modern world, but emotionally, I mostly want a really good castle to hide in.
still, progress.
what would I actually do with magic?
Because a lot of the spells are combat oriented meaning they're mean and rude.
I refuse to do mind control.
I don't see the problem with necromancy if it's just messing with old bones, but mind control messes with free will, so big nope.
I won't do fireballs. I'd study some fire college to get Extinguish, and Fireproof, but I'm not interested in blowing stuff up for reals.
I like the beginner spells in Pathfinder that can clean and do the laundry and such. It takes more prereqs in GURPS but I'd like cleaning spells.
Healing magic is awesome, but I have met me, and it requires interacting eith humans.
... I'd probsbly learn it to fix myself up and then... hope no one needed it? Like being a first aider when the announce goes off... which reminds me, currently on more than 25 years of vaguely intending to do a first aid course.
... possibly not healing magic then.
The plant spells are game changers, world changers, in a low TL setting, and pretty damn impressive now. You can double the yield. You can get things ready to harvest in much shorter time spans. You can harvest with a spell instead of a field full of upset overworked humans! Big big changes!
... but I'm not a big fan of plants either, because allergies.
Today I'm thinking, architecture.
I think there's a sequence of spells in GURPS that would let you pirate a building.
As with other big works the powering of it is a Thing but
you can use the spells to copy a spaceship, that's clear in the rules, and a house is much simpler
so unless it's a case of being too simple
you should be able to copy an entire house
from a single tile or brick.
I'm thunking visits to a few stately homes could set up something nifty.
Also combining basic spells could do spectacular things for architecture. I mean you can shape metal like Magneto, or shape stone, or both. You can grow trees and interlace the branches and make a living roof if you feel like it. The construction phase could be one person waving a stick around.
... I admit I've spent some hours now with the higitus figitus song from Sword in the Stone stuck in my head. I think the song and dance would in GURPS mean he wasn't actually very good at the spell, but I think also you can trade doing the full ritual for getting a better result.
So me in my head is doing a song and dance to raise a cathedral.
As you would.
I'd hate to see the planning permission messes you could make.
I mean you could just... raise a building. Like guerilla gardening raises flowers. Like whoosh, oh look, there is a house, who put that there, I wonder who it belongs to?
Though with the spell that starts with a schematic you get a certain amount of material per time unit, so it's more like a house would grow.
Heh, house mushrooms, plant anywhere.
... you know we're thisclose to that being plausible near future SF?
... I mean it's just a specialised form of self building.
If wizard me used mind control then probably getting politicians to agree to build new towns would be thrifty and efficient use of spells. Except I can't believe a world with useful magic wouldn't check their politicians for spells. Hmmm, use the ones tha boost your Charisma? Then actually talk them into it?
... see that's the part I stall on.
I know I have no social skills and can't organise a fun outing let alone a town, but if I had magic and a suitable bit of land I could just... whoosh up some housing.
And possibly a sewer system? Would that count as one thing for making a schematic? And a power grid? And roads?
It could definitely magic up some solar and or wind power, those are one device for the spell to work on, but the connecting infrastructure might not be.
Also if makkng something from scratch would have to study architecture first. Or get really good plans? Or both.
And existing towns have problems and specific landscapes to exist in so you wouldn't want to clone a whole settlement, you'd need to study up on that, or it'll be all houses in the flooding bits again.
I jusr don't feel like a me with a magic would spend as much time at war as the rules seem to think, really.
oooh, borrow skill. Is a spell. So I'd just need to find some people I could borrow and then pull all their skills together,
Of course once I built it I'd have to people it.
... all my plans come back to space colony, which is really about looking after people while simplifying the task as much as sustainably possible.
Probably I need better plans. And to acknowledge that if I want to see good housing built and people being fed and so forth I do not actually need to acquire magic and a space colony, I need to go find people organising that work and join in.
... today I was awake through the small hours again and feel this might get in the way of any cooperate plans even before getting to the part where I... am me.
Ah well.
Still, magic.
I'm boeed of fireballs. It's not even very good artillery, compared to now. It is very good resource creation and shaping. Making and Breaking college for me, with some plant and healing if I can cope with them.
Also, ability to say Shields Up and make the whole place impenetrable. Best castle.
... I keep on concluding that castles aren't the right strategy for a complex modern world, but emotionally, I mostly want a really good castle to hide in.
still, progress.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-29 01:35 pm (UTC)AWESOME