Some sorcerers are former wizards who can't let go of the science aspect of wizardry. And this was fine, as some wizards would create the semantics and words of the previous spells...those things themselves were not powering the spell, the sorcerer was...but using those old semantics and words helped them concentrate.
Sorcerers use semantics and materials and words as pneumonic devices...but they are not necessary for the spell to work. They create each spell anew...every time they cast it.
If Sorcerers are the philosophers of magic, then Wizards are the scholars of it. Each spell is a specifc equation of words, semantics, and materials to elicit the same magical response every time they cast a spell. Wizardry is an exact science...one that must be studied and practiced to perfection. It is very structured, and very critical of versatility.
Anyway...I know this doesn't really work so much with new game mechanics...but to me, that's really the major difference. The difference between structured science and versatile art. It's a difference in view point of the magic...nevermind that the two magics aren't really the same anyway...the major difference between the two spell casters is really just philosophies.
Does that even make sense to anyone but me?
Dragonhelm wrote:
One mechanical aspect plays in nicely with this theme. Wizards use Int when casting spells, while sorcerers use Cha. Intelligence is what a scholar is all about, while Charisma can be used to express one's inner self - sort of what sorcerers do with magic.
I don't think wizards and sorcerers have to be enemies, either. Rather, they could just be rivals. Imagine two friends, one a wizard, the other a sorcerer. The two go on long walks, and debate the very nature of magic.
So the difference is in how they approach magic.
Great topic, Tobin!
Sorcerous DMs are people like myself, who use published adventures as a (very) loose guidebook and wing the rest like crazy. It's a morphic artform for me, so I just go with it as best I can at the spur of the moment.
Wizardly DMs are people like my friend TheBlackRobedArchmage. They like to plan every little thing out ahead of time and don't adapt as well when something comes up the way they hadn't planned it to.
Neither is "wrong" and they don't have to be anathema to each other.
So really, what we need is for a Sorcerer to come forward on Krynn and "make peace" with the WoHS. Rebuild the Academy of Sorcery so that there is a place for all Sorcerers to gather and put Magic first. Make sure to teach the history of Magic and try to learn from the mistakes of the previous Sorcerers so as to not nearly unmake the world.
-TRRW
Ambient magic is what I sometimes refer to as "everyman" magic.
I don't know. I know what you're trying to say...but I'm not sure "everyman" magic is a good term.
Here's an example:
I can play the saxophone and piano really well. I'm an excellent "technical" player. You give me a symphonic piece, or a concert piece of music...I will play it perfectly (or close too, anyway).
But if you just want me to sit down and just play something...anything that comes to mind...that just sounds cool...I can't do it.
Now...maybe it's just because I don't practice enough, I don't know...but I kinda see this as the same way. There some people out there who just have natural talent for music...and some people don't. Sure, people can learn how to play and learn how to play sheet music and play it correctly, even beautifully...but it's not the same thing as the person who plays from the heart.
It's not that one way is better than the other...they're just different. Both can be beautiful...but they are different approaches to the same field.
So, I don't think you can really call it the "everyman" magic...if anything, I'd say it's the other way around. Anyone can be taught how to do something (if they have the capacity and willingness to learn)...but not everyone can be born with the natural talent in said field.
The magic of High Sorcery is a science. It's pretty cut-and-dry. You study spells, and those are the ones you can cast the next day. Wild Sorcery, on the other hand, is an art with multiple schools of thought. The Academy of Sorcery's teachings are the most prominent, but are not the only ways to tackle wild magic.
Agreed. And I think this can help justify the changes in sorcery from the SAGA system to the D&D system as well.
Wizards also tend to be more lawful, while sorcerers tend to be more chaotic. I think this is due to Chaos' influence on wild magic.
This one I disagree with...not that wizards lean more towards lawful and sorcerers lean more towards chaotic, that I agree with. What I don't agree with is the reason. I think Chaos' influence on wild magic is what causes the energy to fluctuate, and why mishaps can occur...essentially, it's responsible for the chaotic nature of ambient energy. But I think it's just the nature of how one taps into sorcerer or wizardry...and because of the methods used (and the people who tend towards one or the other)...they're personalities just mesh better with their chosen magic (chaotic-sorcery, lawful-wizards).
It's certainly not a rule...but it's a generalization, I think. I mean, you do tend to occaionlly find "free-thinking" engineers or "a-retentive" artists (to break it down into simple terms
)Also consider how each class may be approached by a commoner. A sorcerer may very well be trusted over one of the aloof and mysterious Wizards of High Sorcery.
Agreed. 'Cause when you think about it...a lot of the "champions" of the early 5th Age were the magic users (mystics and sorcerers). I think they've finally started to be trusted. While they may still feel some weariness or perhaps even down right hostility and annimosity towards followers of the gods.
I could also see sorcerers being able to tap into the energies of creatures with innate spellcasting ability, such as how a dragon mage can tap into the magic of a dragon. I'm not sure I would allow that with a wizard.
Given the structured nature of wizardly magic...I'm not sure that would allow for the flexibility of dragon mages. I'm not 100% I'd even allow a wizard to leech magical items (like sorcerers were doing during the War of Souls).
All good points/ideas, Trampas.
For Wizards for example, If we are going to follow through on the scientist idea, that of someone who studies something concrete, I would not assume a empirical approach to magic. After all, magic is exactly the opposite of empiricism. However, what if we approached it like the learning of the Rennaissance where they had a desire to study the natural world, but their conception of the natural world was coloured by various principles.
For example they had a firm belief in the inherent divine order of the universe in a very platonic (and christian) way. When you studied the natural world, you gained an understanding of those divine secrets. Which is why you had various ideas like thoughts that the human body was a microcosm of the universe (which is why a lot of medicine depended on astrology) or why Issac Newton, the father of this "scientific age" spent most of his time concerned with bibliomancy and number mysticism. You had pythagoran ideas of how shapes and musical notes displayed a divine order. Music when taught in ancient universities for example had little or nothing to do with learning to play musical instruments and everything to do with learning the harmonies of the universe.
I think this model would work very well for wizards on Krynn. After all, magic's power is tied to the movements of the heavens (bonuses to spells based on moons), through musical notes (proper incantations) and proper gestures of the body (movements of the microcosm causing movements in the macrocosm). The study of magic is thus the study of the harmony of the universe, and how the wizard can add to the divine order (music? equations?) of the universe through knowlege of it.
Now if we have wizards being inspired by these enochian rennaissance scholars, how would we expand upon the idea of Sorcerers as artists? We have to first think about how the magic is summoned. Even in SAGA days it could not have been a matter of desire, because it had specific effects rather than wish fullfillment aka Terry Brook's "Wishsong". It cannot be a matter of education because while it takes practice and self-realization, it does not require study.
So therefore we are left to conclude that the means of summoning sorcerous energies is essentially intuition and will. If that is the case, sorcery is a creative and experiential process. However, there must be another factor in deciding what form the magic takes. More specifically if you are using SAGA why does the magic express itself as a particular element, or if you are using D20 why does it manifest as D&D spells?
I would argue that a means of working with the intuition and will model would be to assume that the magic could be consciously and unconciously by the individual himself. As such, a person chooses the element which bests suits him in SAGA while in D&D a person chooses to shape the spells which he feels suits him.
Now let's take this another step. Assuming that these models are true for Sorcery and Wizardry, what Prestige Classes would work for the Sorcerers that would not work for the wizards?
I don't know. I know what you're trying to say...but I'm not sure "everyman" magic is a good term.
So, I don't think you can really call it the "everyman" magic...if anything, I'd say it's the other way around. Anyone can be taught how to do something (if they have the capacity and willingness to learn)...but not everyone can be born with the natural talent in said field.
Hrm, good point.
I think I might have meant "everyman" slightly differently. In my mind, the WoHS is more of an "elitist" group, where anyone can become a sorcerer. Or at least it seemed like the talent for ambient magic was much more readily available in SAGA.
Yet you make a very good point as well. So maybe either way you go, not just anyone can tackle magic.
This one I disagree with...not that wizards lean more towards lawful and sorcerers lean more towards chaotic, that I agree with. What I don't agree with is the reason. I think Chaos' influence on wild magic is what causes the energy to fluctuate, and why mishaps can occur...essentially, it's responsible for the chaotic nature of ambient energy. But I think it's just the nature of how one taps into sorcerer or wizardry...and because of the methods used (and the people who tend towards one or the other)...they're personalities just mesh better with their chosen magic (chaotic-sorcery, lawful-wizards).
Really, that's what I'm getting at. A lawful person is one who can understand formulas a lot better, so the tendency is for them to become wizards. Chaotic individuals are more of your free thinkers, so they're more prone to becoming sorcerers.
Now, it could be too that since wild magic is "Chaos enhanced" that those with a chaotic alignment are more likely to tap into it. *shrugs*
My thoughts...
The Art that Raistlin Majere spoke of is magic in general. You can't remove the power and wonder from the Wizardry anymore than sorcery. A good comparison is that sorcerers have their power refined through THEMSELVES while Wizards have said power refined through the Moons.
The difference is between Elementalism of the Earth and the Estoric "forbidden knowledge" of the High Wizards. Its the difference between Wicca I suppose and High Hermeticism. Both have very strong religious components but both also have a magical tradition.
It's interesting though how Dalamar and Palin describe the Art through the Moons as raptuorous bliss while Coryn seems to find the Moon Art the cold and sterile stuff. It seems to me that personally the drug like joy of divine magic is largely an illusion generated by the person in questions own feelings of inadequacy vs. their new found might.
Sorcerers are furthermore the substitute, at least in my game, for psionicists. Its an inborn and internal power that is very different from that which is learned. Ironically, it is also available to all beings.
Sorcery is about "Ki" while High Wizardry is about internal laws.
Thus, as weird as it may sound, sorcery is about Self-Will vs. Science. Mage the Ascension's "Paradigm" is a good example for sorcery. The magic works because you BELIEVE it to work and that's actually how I differentiate it from Magic that is born from "loopholes" in reality's law.
"Nothing is impossible"
vs.
"Its impossible save for this method."
This is the root of geomancy, aeromancy, hydromancy, and pyromancy. The foundation of cryomancy, electromancy and spectromancy. The essence of divination, summoning, and enhancement.
This primal magic behaves as it always has, intrinsically bound within the world, one with creation, but when touched with Chaos, when suffused with his power, the bonds that tie it so closely and inextricably with the world are loosened. The sorcerer works his will upon it, draws it out from these places, unwinds it and weaves it together as he wishes. It takes practice, patience, and an impressive amount of personal strength of self-awareness to accomplish it, and all the intelligence and reason in the world won't help you if you cannot marshal that force within you.
Sorcerers can. Wizards may have the power within them that comes with the connection to the moons, know the secrets and rituals that can command these same elemental forces together in concert with the gods of magic's tradition, but only sorcerers draw so fully upon these energies with their spellcasting.
Cheers,
Cam
It's interesting though how Dalamar and Palin describe the Art through the Moons as raptuorous bliss while Coryn seems to find the Moon Art the cold and sterile stuff. It seems to me that personally the drug like joy of divine magic is largely an illusion generated by the person in questions own feelings of inadequacy vs. their new found might.
I wonder if we actually read the same book. Because Coryn experiences a rapturous reaction to High Sorcery in Wizard's Conclave. Indeed, it says in the book (Chapter 24) that watching Solinari rise in the sky she felt "a dizzying rush of power, release, escape and freedom - all embodied in the white sphere"
So where is this "cold and sterile stuff" you're talking about?
But the musical metaphor raised by Brimstone is an excellent, and I would like to expand upon it.
Consider if you will that art is work. Not just spontaneous talent, because relatively few people are truly capable of simply picking up an instrument and producing coherent music with it. There is certainly a skill associated with playing an instrument, and innate talent doesn't hurt either.
But now consider that the number of people who can pick up that instrument and, untrained, produce even tolerable music from it are exceedingly rare. Virtually anyone, no matter how clearly they can imagine the music they wish to produce in their minds, still needs some knowledge of how to make the instrument produce the sounds they want.
Thus it is with the sorcerors. They are not all spontaneous talent, which is why Takhisis needed to sneak around teaching people in order to spread the use of wild magic in the world. People could "feel" the music they wanted to make. But they didn't know how to actually make it. For sorcerors as much as wizards, practice and a certain amount of knowledge was needed to actually shape the ambient power into spells, much as a musician needs certains skills to vibrate the air in such a way as to produce music.
In order to excel at their art though, they must ultimately practice and learn and develop skill.
Now you could liken many wizards to "technical" musicians. And you would be correct. But this is only half the story.
High Sorcery has a long body of lore, a history of songs if you will. And like music students that study in schools and conservatories, wizards learn the "songs" produced by earlier artists and in so doing learn more about how to perform theri craft.
But some wizards are also more like composers. For a composer knowledge is especially key. They may have great innate talent like some musicians do. But they must also learn many things, because a symphony requires more elements than a solo piece. It is by nature more complex and requires an understanding not only of the individual pieces that make it up, but also of how to make those pieces work together. High Sorcery is like that symphony, and the wizard needs to have broader knowledge to make it work, but can produce great results from their knowledge of how to weave the threads of song together.
Wizards must create as much as sorcerors, because new spells do not come from the gods often. To expand their art they must learn to create new pieces on their own.