the categories of magic
Nov. 27th, 2015 08:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marycatelliMagic can be sliced up a lot of ways. . . and indeed they do slice up a lot of ways.
There's the principles used. Similarity vs. contagion vs. identification vs. -- quite a few others.
There's the intention -- protection, order, wilderness, etc. -- which may affect what sort of lore you need to figure out how to apply the principles.
There's the technique -- transformation or alteration or what have you.
And then there's typical use. Household spells. Soldier spells. The first three I suspect I'm going to have to systemize so that the young scholars can study them, but this one I can dismiss with a character's observation that by this classification, you have to learn the spells by rote, they don't really have an organizing principle.
There's the principles used. Similarity vs. contagion vs. identification vs. -- quite a few others.
There's the intention -- protection, order, wilderness, etc. -- which may affect what sort of lore you need to figure out how to apply the principles.
There's the technique -- transformation or alteration or what have you.
And then there's typical use. Household spells. Soldier spells. The first three I suspect I'm going to have to systemize so that the young scholars can study them, but this one I can dismiss with a character's observation that by this classification, you have to learn the spells by rote, they don't really have an organizing principle.