Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Discussion about the occult and arcana in general. (Don't call it "magic" if you want to be taken seriously by scholars.)
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Kiyaani
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Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Kiyaani »

With the idea in mind that characters with points in the same skills should still have the capability of being unique, I wanted to offer up some ideas for potential high-skill Arcana abilities. These could (in theory) replace some physical skills or abilities to some extent, but depending on how they were implemented, could potentially be used only in specific cases, could act as a supplement the physical alternative, or could be far less effective overall. These types of ability options could also open up more variety of things such as traps and locks so that some might be only able to be opened using a physical skill while others might require the use of Arcana or a combination of both to be fully successful. This would mean there's more opportunity for teamwork and collaborative play when exploring.

Also keep in mind that allocating ability points into abilities like the ones I'm suggesting would mean sacrificing other abilities in the same field - again leading back to many unique character builds within the same skill pool. So you could potentially have Arcanists who specializes in cryomancy defensive skills, sorcerous attacks, use of occult diagrams to disarm traps or detect hidden objects or runes, assassins, scholars, or other areas, but all within the skill Arcana and none able to do everything under that umbrella. This way if you end up with 20 players all wanting to specialize into Arcana, each of them could still have a different contribution to the game through various traditional or non-traditional abilities. Since some of these areas are already implemented via traditional CLOK abilities, I wanted to focus on a more exploratory/adventurer focused Arcana character.

That said, would it be possible to have an Arcana/Occult ability alternative to skills like Traps, Locksmithing, Perception, or Tracking? This would be similar to how there are some other skills that take the better of one roll or another depending on your skill allocation. The system in this case would use the Arcana skill roll instead of a physical skill roll and may or may not have he same success rate. This would allow players favoring an Arcana skill set to consolidate points into that specific area and not spread themselves too thin, while also allowing those pointing into the physical side of things unique perks or benefits suited to each of those counterparts. Each of these could be an ability unlocked with a required skill - in the case of those listed here, most likely only unlocked with near Mastery level - or they could be unlocked at low skill and just get progressively more effective, less dangerous, or useful at higher skill. I could see this working in the following ways:

Traps

Physical method: Player puts points into the traditional Traps skill. Used to place and set hunting traps. Used to trigger or disarm physical traps in exploration via activating them or manually disabling them.

Magical method: Player puts skill points into Arcana and an ability point into something like Ritual Disarming, Ritual Binding. They would use occult diagrams to magically bind or trap someone with sorcery (useful for secret lairs or security measures, but not immediate like physical traps since they take prep time). Or they could use something like a sorcerous ritual or spell to burn through an arming device or trigger a physical or magical trap prematurely.

Locksmithing

Physical method: Player puts points in Locksmithing. Using a lockpick or other tools to open a secured object or room. Can be used on pretty much any type of lock without risk of damaging it or having negative consequences unless there's a trap.

Magical method: Player puts skill points in Arcana and an ability point in Ritual of Unbinding, Ritual of Release, Ice-bound Key, Melt Lock, Freeze Lock etc. (whatever name you want depending on the magic type). Uses occult rituals or diagrams to cause a lock to decay or open using sorcery (would permanently damage the lock and leave evidence, might cost an extreme amount of energy depending on the lock or have the risk of negative side effects like damage to contents). Causing nether tendrils to harden within a lock using a combination of cryomancy and sorcery, fitting to it and opening it as though using a key (would not damage the lock or contents). Using pyromancy to melt a lock (could damage contents). In some of these cases the chance of negative outcome might be enough to dissuade players from using magical means over physical.

Perception

Physical method: Player puts points in Perception. Active searching or passive observation letting your character see things others might miss.

Magical method: Player puts skill points in Arcana and an ability point in Ritual of Finding, Ritual Observation, Nether-Vision (or whatever you want to call it). No passive observation option aside from Nether Vision which requires a certain level of darkness to be effective just as the physical equivalent requires light. Using a ritual to discover hidden objects in a room (pseudo-sentient nether pointing things out or whispering ideas - possible negative effects to character's morale or some other stat).

Tracking

Physical method: Player puts points in tracking. Using knowledge of various prints and wilderness habits and habitats to observe recent movements through an area.

Magical method: Player puts skill points in Arcana and an ability point in Ritual Tracking. Uses a ritual to reveal recent movements through an area (detecting thermal changes/footprints/pooling nether in prints to reveal them etc. Can be dangerous or not to persuade use of the physical skill instead. Probably wouldn't be super effective in certain conditions or may only be usable in dark, cold, or indoor areas).
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Rias
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Re: Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Rias »

I'm very much not a fan of having magic that duplicates skills and utilities that other people have put effort into specializing in via nonmagic skills, especially considering the magic thing tends to (in other games) allow branching into a multitude of abilities and utilities simply by virtue of being a magic-user while people with the actual focused skills tend to need to invest in several skill types and yet end up with less variety, because they don't have reality-bending magic at their command.

I'm still curious how other people feel about this, though.
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Lexx416
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Re: Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Lexx416 »

Rias wrote: Mon Sep 11, 2017 5:31 pm I'm very much not a fan of having magic that duplicates skills and utilities that other people have put effort into specializing in via nonmagic skills, especially considering the magic thing tends to (in other games) allow branching into a multitude of abilities and utilities simply by virtue of being a magic-user while people with the actual focused skills tend to need to invest in several skill types and yet end up with less variety, because they don't have reality-bending magic at their command.

I'm still curious how other people feel about this, though.

This is basically my general train of thought. Magic is special because it's magic, and can do things other mundane skills can't necessarily do, and it's just... Cool. If you give magic the same versatility as other skills, you're taking away the general value of those skills, and basically transmitting to the playerbase "Yeah, you COULD be a regular thief, or... You could be a WIZARD THIEF!", and unless your muds theme is "WIZARD CITY!", I think that's detrimental. Give occultism its own, cool stuff. Make people choose between being an awesome, high level occultist/arcanist, and investing points in other stuff. I firmly believe that someone who sinks a decent amount of points into Arcana and Lore SHOULD be spread thin elsewhere. That's the trade off.
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Arphaxad
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Re: Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Arphaxad »

I think it is a good concept and worth considering.
If you look at the examples, it would be the occultist who would have to spend considerably more points and use abilities to achieve the same effect as the physical skill user.

I think others would share my concern that at 'endgame' (whatever that is) that all the skill sets look painfully the same. The setup of COGG doesn't lend itself to that and the ability to arcanely duplicate physical effects would as some flavor. This would come at the cost of additional skills and abilities, making it truly a RP choice.

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Rias
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Re: Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Rias »

I don't think occultism will have any trouble being varied while also not duplicating the effects and stepping on the toes of existing specialized skills. I very much have specializations and varying abilities in mind for arcanists, which is honestly more than can be said for, say, locksmithing and tracking, which ultimately only allow you to ... locksmith and track. They don't have the option of branching out or duplicating effects of other skills.

If you want to track, take up tracking. If you want to open locks, be a locksmith. If you want to do awesome and often mysterious, experimental, and unknown things that mundane skills can't already accomplish, that's when you should study arcana.
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Kiyaani
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Re: Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Kiyaani »

I think the difference here is that if you put points in locksmithing or tracking that means you're the expert. It also means you have all the ability points available to each of those skills to spend on just those areas because there are fewer branches. In Arcana you would have ability points to spend in multiple branches (diagrams, sorcery, thaumaturgy, cryomancy, etc. - whatever you made them to be to fit COGG) and have to choose or sacrifice certain aspects of study to make your character concept work.

A master of Arcana can't master all areas of the arcane, but rather just a few parts because it's so diverse. A master of locksmithing or tracking can fully master that skill. I don't see this as taking anything away from those specialists, but rather giving Arcanists an option to branch out and provide further utility in these areas. Arcane versions would be rudimentary and not as precise as the physical counterpart or would be purely situational. They would have far less overall usability, but would be good as supplements to those other skills or as emergency methods that are likely to be higher risk or cost more in the end than they're necessarily worth. Essentially, this would make these types of abilities- as Arphaxad said - an RP choice, not meant to replace their physical counterparts, but to encourage unique builds and character concepts for those willing to sacrifice pure function for fun and the potential consequences that follow from tempting fate using unnatural methods.
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Re: Occultism and Arcana as Alternatives - Unique Character Concepts at High Skill

Post by Rias »

I guess I've just never enjoyed the "anything you can do, magic can do too" concept. There's little more frustrating than sitting there and plying your trade, only to see someone come in and do similar with magic despite having no knowledge or expertise in the field. Even if they're not quite as good as you are, it makes your skills and expertise feel significantly cheapened.

I think part of the issue is your examples, and how they're presented as substitutes.

- Locksmithing: I can't see how sorcery, druidry, or thaumaturgy would be particularly suited to opening a locking mechanism. Brute-forcing with nether then begs the question "If it can be done with nether, why can't it be done all these other ways?" and I don't want to go down that road. We want to keep the actual skill relevant.

- Traps: Setting occult-based traps/wards/whatever we want to call them - yes. That's always been a plan. Disarming physical traps though, same as above. Without knowing how the traps work, how do you know how to prematurely trigger it with nether? And if you can simply trigger it with nether without knowledge of the trap mechanism, why can't anyone do it with a stick or a thrown rock? Again, don't want to go down that road. We want to keep the actual skill relevant.

- Perception: I can see some Druidry possibility of enhancing, but not serving as a substitute for, the Perception skill. If Nether Vision makes the cut (uncertain, it wasn't an ability I came up with), that would be more of a "see in the dark and suffer fewer darkness penalties" ability than "this can serve as an alternative Perception/Search skill check" thing. Hidden items tend to be physically blocked from view, and that would impede the established echolocation-like Nether Vision as well.

This isn't to say I don't want -any- overlap at all. Like I said, could see Druidry enhancing perception, and there's already a way for it to enhance stealth and at least the foraging part of Herbalism as well, but those are enhancements, not substitutes. Then there's the limited healing capacity of Thaumaturgy, which is admittedly a semi-substitute of Medical. It's good for flesh wounds, not so great for bonemending or dealing with infections (and virtually useless against diseases or poisons). And there's also the fact that Thaumaturgy is rare and fickle, and won't be available to many characters just by its nature and demanding behavioral standards.

So I guess I'm saying I don't want to be too discouraging, but it'd be best to present ideas as enhancements rather than substitutions, so people don't feel their dedicated skills are being obsoleted by magic.
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