Mon/Fri: Methods Behind Magic

How the arcane sausage is made.

Today, I'm tipping my hand and sharing with you the method how I'm driving magic forward in River and Road, at its basic levels: the Subtle Methods.

Subtle Methods are meant to represent a magician's cantrips, tricks that they can just do, seemingly without outward effort. This is represented by the fact that most Subtle spells are cast with only Focus, and not a spellcasting check- the magician is simply focusing, concentrating and authoring with their mind and senses. You're not staring down someone while shaking and some chorus of hell-voices suddenly start shouting like you're Michael Ironside in Scanners; if you're even looking at all, you're looking with intent, but also somewhat vacantly, like you're someplace else.

This is the Basic-level Subtle Method for the Reality school of magic. As you might be sensing a theme, at this level, every school's subtle method is a means of discerning what force you're interacting with on a level that is functionally an extra sense, a seventh sense beyond instinct even instincts. You have come into a contact with something that's deeper than matter and energy, something that's both at once, and also other stuff at the same time- you should be able to know what it is you're dealing at when you're in its presence, so you first develop the sense to even detect it in different ways.

As you become more adept in your school, you begin learning what you can do with this altered sense beyond just using it to detect which lines in the Architecture you can work with. You begin to grow more attuned to it, and now you're noticing details you didn't see before, and now that you can observe such previously unnoticed things now, you can either draw knowledge from them, or tweak them. If the Basic level represents you learning how to properly shoot a cue ball, the Expert level is you learning the usefulness of putting a little English on and curving your shot now and again. In this case, the pool analogy sorta tips off the table, but magical forensic evidence is also useful.

A Master at a form of magic is someone that can take what they've learned before and gain enlightenment from the act of putting it together, and exploring it to deepen their understanding of what they can make it do. They have the sense, and they know what they can apply it to, a new expression of their senses resolved in something intangible that can nevertheless be touched, blown, shifted around; though exploring this world within the Worlds, they've learned the nifty ways they can flick it and poke it, and barely do anything to it, yet still get a result. This isn't you spinning a basketball on the tip of your finger, this is you learning how to do that same spin on the tip of your finger, while flying through the air after you jump up into your layup form, and turn it into a finger-roll shot that effortlessly puts the ball through the hoop, allowing you to drop gracefully, making barely a sound when you touch back down on the court.

Next week? More Magic. MORE.

-G