Spells Visual Effect

[wangxiuming]

I support!

[Kitsunestume]

Honestly, spell craft is a little silly. How the heck one skill allows you to know exactly what every single caster is doing . Really.. You studied all the rights of the Church, got those nature rituals down, and ... Oh, by the way... You trained with mages to. It is silly when you think about it.

James has this theory about how the Weave works. Perhaps you've heard of it, he calls it Flux-Field Interpretation. :P

To make a perhaps odd comparison: There are crap-tons of programming languages out there. There are a crap ton of languages out there, for that matter. However, regardless of what someone uses, its usually possible to get the jist of the intent by how it is presented. Some syntax and logic will change, certainly, but just about anyone with a knowledge of psudocode can usually break down another language. With practice, it becomes easier to locate the more subtle details, just by bothering to look at it and trying to follow it.
I'm not saying that Divinities use BASIC, sorcerers use PERL and wizards use C++/Java, but you can still figure out the intent. On a related note: this would be very useful and awesome. [edit] Warlocks use EMAC?

If every warlock did the same thing, it could be taught to other warlocks but warlocks can't learn their invocations from each other. Why? Cuz it's specific to the warlock. Pacts matter as well, I'm sure. I could see Fey warlocks doing weird dances and crap to invoke.

I want a Warlock of the FSM: casting incantations by slurping pasta.

[Mournas]

You really have to understand the broader picture of what the hell is going on literally when these things go down.

You identify a spell because you know THIS gesture is about to do that, or these words invoke this spell and you get AHAH! That guy is casting this spell!

A warlock, on the other hand, isn't casting a spell at all. They are doing gestures, yes, but it's more akin to actions required by a warlock not identifiers for what they are doing, although I suppose it might identify what that specific warlock is doing if you saw it before, but really it doesn't follow the idea that "Every warlock is doing this so it must be Eldritch Chain."

It was literally meant to be more like when Ryu pulls his hands back and then thrusts them forward to do a hadouken. It's their Chi in the end. It's wild energy that is blazing in their souls. They aren't tapping the weave and such.

I fully agree with this. Andelain has a 20 Spell Craft base, he has only seen a very limited selection of warlock invocations used around him, half of those he had a mem wipe from PvP. I RP Andelain as practically clueless when it comes to warlock abilities. He has had enough spells flung at him from the Arcane Schools, and even then there are spells he has never seen in use. Sure the dice might say I know what the spell is, but I don't RP it as such.

[GodBeastX]

Maine was just my most recent thing I've done (Last night) so having that fresh in my mind it's easier to use maine as an example. I'm not trying to hide Maine as a warlock by any means. I'm totally okay with people going "YOU'RE A WARLOCK! DIE MONSTER!" Hell, she calls herself a demon, cackles every time fire is anywhere, and transforms into a giant monster!

If the inquisition comes for her, I expect it! It's happened in the past XD *Shakes fist at Peridan* She's far too chaotic for her own good.

People who know me know I like to have some conflict in RP to overcome as a character. I don't take anything as personal, and I don't sit around going "OH MAN! THAT GUY IS CHEATING!" I just like people to have social RP that isn't just shooting the breeze. Maine has had a lot of character growth because of things where people beat her up.

She was chaotic evil and bowing to Beshaba because she was scared of that goddess beyond words. A lot of people were like "Turn away from your dark ways!" and she got arrested. She wasn't a murderer or a thief, just someone utterly chaotic with their magic, so she got a geas stuck on her. She started to realize "Hey, I should tone down a bit..." but sometimes she makes dumb decisions without thinking about what's around her (8 wisdom means bad perception of the world). She'll probably get in trouble again and maybe it will be more harsh this time around?

I'm 100% fine with that.

I just know there are other warlocks out there that would rather not be known as a warlock so I'm sorta thinking of their plight in regards to these systems. I had requests in the past "Hey, my fey warlock isn't evil. Must all my spellcasts look like I'm summoning demons?"

It's a subtle thing but prepoisons people in RP to each other. We're in an era of SUndren with less forgiveness in our heroes than we used to have. The lines are hard drawn in the sand, and it's probably because good guys are sick of their kindnesses being taken for granted. So when someone who is a player has a distinct disadvantage to hiding what they are when they normally wouldn't, I try to accomodate them.

I'm sure a lot of people noticed the nondetection stuff I put in. I felt bad for those level 5 banites that had Dain detect evil on them then treat them like crap when they just joined the server! XD

So no, nobody in my particular RP did anything wrong. You have 1000 reasons to suspect and hate Maine. I'll even write them for you if you want, this is just me using my own examples for discussion.

[Valhalla]

I'm not really even arguing this from a last-night standpoint. I recently retired my own Warlock, so definitely see both sides of the fence here.

It'd for sure be nice to have some kind of OOC warning that the mechanics you're seeing play out (like spellcraft) might not actually represent what you know ICly, though. Also 100% support non-devil/demon word of changing spell. Fey pacts are cool and shouldn't be shoe-horned into a Pit Fiend/Balor, much like the Gate spell.

[Doubtful]

Surely draconic is the ur-language of magic.

Though
10 print "explosive runes"
20 GOTO 10

Does hold a certain appeal

[GodBeastX]

Also 100% support non-devil/demon word of changing spell. Fey pacts are cool and shouldn't be shoe-horned into a Pit Fiend/Balor, much like the Gate spell.

Haha, you're going to laugh, but I JUST posted this an hour ago for discussion in developer room. I was thinking "They need a fey form" and I was also thinking about the fact Maine turns into a devil instead of a demon when she changes.

[Lotus]

hentai winter tentacles

hentai winter tentacles

hentai winter tentacles

hentai winter tentacles

hentai winter tentacles

Got distracted.

[Kitsunestume]

Surely draconic is the ur-language of magic.

Though
10 print "explosive runes"
20 GOTO 10

Does hold a certain appeal

I tried RPing James using Object Oriented spellcasting once: and stopped about ten minutes later when I relaised it ended up looking like the spell source-code:

import fire semicolon
new Target equals JFrazer semicolon
fire dot burningSword dot cast openParen target dot heldWeapon closeParen semicolon

On the plus side: the spells actually have source-code, so I guess it was a step in the right direction!

[Shadechild]

Haha, you're going to laugh, but I JUST posted this an hour ago for discussion in developer room. I was thinking "They need a fey form" and I was also thinking about the fact Maine turns into a devil instead of a demon when she changes.

Don't forget Succubus form! =x

[GodBeastX]

I tried RPing James using Object Oriented spellcasting once: and stopped about ten minutes later when I relaised it ended up looking like the spell source-code:

import fire semicolon
new Target equals JFrazer semicolon
fire dot burningSword dot cast openParen target dot heldWeapon closeParen semicolon

On the plus side: the spells actually have source-code, so I guess it was a step in the right direction!

This is actually what these magic systems tend to be based on.

If you actually did investigation into the real world information on Thaumaturgy and such, which 95% of magic systems are based on, you'd find that there are rules, workings, and logic that actually have flow control.

Any magic system based on "True Names" and what not follows this. ANd D&D happens to be based on that.

Wizards really are programmers.

[Kitsunestume]

This is actually what these magic systems tend to be based on.

If you actually did investigation into the real world information on Thaumaturgy and such, which 95% of magic systems are based on, you'd find that there are rules, workings, and logic that actually have flow control.

Any magic system based on "True Names" and what not follows this. ANd D&D happens to be based on that.

Wizards really are programmers.

Puts another spin on the term 'life-hacking'.

Also:

"Magic is an Excuse. It is the simple-cop-out for those unable or unwilling to explain or validate causality.
[. . .]
There is no doubt of the existence of a system behind it all, a reason why it all works, and a means to predict what will happen in a given circumstance. This is not Magic, This is Science. And as with any science, there is procedure."

Try asking him to perform magic for you. Just try.

[sonuvalich]

You have 1000 reasons to suspect and hate Maine. I'll even write them for you if you want, this is just me using my own examples for discussion.

Dammit, I need an annulment!

Wizards really are programmers.

Wasn't that the basis of that shitty Nicholas Cage is a sorcerer movie? They did science/programming with their minds and it was MAGIC!

[Rekov]

I just wish Bark/Spider/Stoneskin didn't have visual effects. If we're speaking PnP here, which we seem to have done at great lengths when it comes to spellcraft, they shouldn't have visual effects at all. Stoneskin makes your skin as hard as stone; it doesn't make it look like stone, or turn it to stone.

It's especially awful in NWN2 with any models that use transparency, like hair.

[wangxiuming]

Gasp! Are we going to get options to change into for Word of Changing? Or will it become alignment based? Because either one would be really cool.