Magic as consistent science with people studying it like scientists

Mine is both. It's actually a science, but it's not very well understood, what is known is mostly superstition with a single grain of truth, and people who experiment usually turn themselves inside out without being able to write anything down.
So like, maybe one guy's big achievement in the field of magic is that he figured out when you do a warding spell, you only need five equally spaced points of silver dust, not a complete star. He find an ancient spellbook which used a pentagon instead of a pentagram, and when he risked his life to attempt it, it functioned as expected. This discovery landed him a job as a court magician for a reasonably rich nobleman in the western hills, until he regrettably set himself on fire arguing that you could perform the spell with any white metal.

>both exist, and their respective practitioners fucking HATE each other

Both, with little rhyme or reason as to which one it will choose to act like at any particular moment.

Former, but it's essentially the early stages of science, rather than science as we know it today. Hermeticism, alchemy, natural philosophy.

It's the understanding, discovering, and manipulation of magical forces.

Option 1 if magic is a positive thing
Option 2 if magic is a negative thing

Both.

The science, the more rules there are, the more interesting it is to break them.

who is this fluid druid?

The best setting is no magic at all

My negroid companions! Hermeticism is GOAT magic.

>tfw some idiot from another world tells me to study magic "scientifically"
>I tell him that the world is based on the manifestations of phenomena derived from the realm of Forms and that the only possible application science could have in the Art is recording of effects, since it functions through a combination of inner willpower and knowledge and the invoking of particular abstract forces and entities.
>He responds "Dude but science lol" and calls me superstitious.

I hate mortals.

this. also, Demon's Souls did this best

Magic is consistent and predictable in the sense that any given mage knows what their own magic will do, but it only grants very specialized powers like in X-Men or One Piece. You shouldn't expect to be able to simply "add a new spell to your spellbook" by levelling up.

The former. Unimaginably so. PCs have enough problems without their shit randomly not working, making them grow dicks from their forehead, permanently draining their stats, etc.

As someone who is working on Veeky Forums's Little Witch Academia homebrew, magic is very much both. There are two sides to magic: one side is mysterious and exciting, relying on intuition and natural talent, while the other is clear-cut and able to be studied, but surprisingly dry.

The greatest magicians are those who can combine these two seemingly disparate aspects of magic and make them work together. An archmage is one whose enthusiasm for magic and knowledge thereof drives them to learning. When magic is fascinating to you, the dry academic stuff becomes painless -- enjoyable even.

In RPGs - the first because players need consistency, unless magic users are all NPCs. In non-interactive fiction - the latter. I'm a sucker for a nice myth that invokes the feeling of uncertainty and mystery.

Magic as an arbitrary force that is best visualized as a naked man on a chair, slapping his knees in giddiness, grinning like an idiot under caked-on makeup, and your role as a magician is to get that guy to do what you want to get done.

>>magic as consistent science with people studying it like scientists

With some mysticizm involved at higher levels cause some powers are still vague.

>magic as mysterious and wondrous miracles with people invoking it in ways they can never fully predict

This interpretation is shit because it ignores how the wizard archetype was born. The wizard as we know it is a combination of many concepts. The stars are a reference to cosmology. Stars are also associated with early mathematicians, and both cosmology and mathematics give wizards their association with study and intelligence.

The second interpretation is also shit because it either contradicts itself or it trivializes the concept of a wizard. If magic is truly unpredictable, then saying magic words or incantations would be just as effective as shitting in your shoes, or even having no intention of performing magic at all. The moment you canonize a wizard that has any greater awareness of magic than another person, you turn the magic into something that can be studied.

The whole idea of magic being incomprehensible in tabletop games is an idea influenced by a very narrow section of real magical beliefs. The closest real world concept to it is a very recent idea
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_magic

Sometimes I like it when it just goes something like, "Do X and Y will happen. Why and how does Y happen? I dunno, we just know it works."

So quantum mechanics is magic? Sounds about right...

Those are some nice fucking feet.

Magic behaves more like people than like physics.

It's generally predictable in a qualitative sense, but hard to pin exact numbers to. You could quantify, say, the average heat output of a fireball, but you could end up pretty far off average on any given day if you're feeling particularly in-tune with magic or managed to tick it off.

This. The real fucking problem is nobody thinks people CAN work out magic =/= people HAVE worked out magic.

It feels like it's either totally unknowable or some ludicrous post-scarcity clusterfuck your engineer buddy jerks off too.

Magic should be understandable to an extent but not FULLY understood.

I prefer unknown armies magic system where magic is based on symbolism and belief.

7 is a lucky number and the 3rd time really is the charm because humanity as a collective believe it, and to work real "k" magik, you have to believe in your delusion so much that reality breaks to accommodate you.

also anything can be a school of magic as long as long as it has a firm place in the collective conscious of humanity and you believe that its the foundation of life.

I liked how magic worked in a really unknown ttrpg I found once, where spells are agreed upon prayers to whatever gods rule that sort of magic, and subject to occasional 'quirks' depending on the mood of said gods. Or just as an excuse for times when the players and GM forgot how something worked. "Well now it works like it was supposed to because the deity is paying attention again."

Crafting magic items was similar, each was a ritualistic recipe that resulted in the desired item, but tended to be very unique and non-researcheable. Most magic item rituals were favors from the gods granted to heroes long ago, and passed down generations as highly guarded secrets. Items ranged from healing potions and repeating grenades to cheese that never ran out or a pillow that stored extra sleep with interest.

I usually go somewhere in the middle, perhaps closer to consistency than mystery.

My typical comparison is with feats of athleticism. So there's variance in that you have good days and bad days; the "limits" are only as firm as what the best person has done so far and they're broken every few years or decades; and how much you practice a spell has way more impact on it than what spell it is. At the same time, it can still be counted on to do roughly the same thing every time it's used and its changes are something that can be studied and understood.

So, y'know, more sports medicine than physics.

This

I like my magic like a complex legal system with a good sprinkling of special exceptions and loopholes. Following the rules only gets you so far, you often need to charm and bullshit your way through a spell. Its like pilpul in that you can have a nillion interpretations on something, essentially allowing you to do anything if you make a good enough argument for it

I don't know if you're being fetishy or not, but I'll admit they're well-drawn.

I mean that's pretty clearly intentional in the picture. The toes all seem to be individually defined despite her wearing stockings and there's no seams or anything around the toes from where individual toe-pockets could be sewn, even though the artist drew said stockings so sheer such seams should surely be seen.

Both.

Lessor acts of "magic" are predictable and somewhat understandable or at east as much as warping our reality using energy from another reality can be. The more powerful and strange acts of "magic" are less understood if all but most of the time these acts are rare. Of course some of the more esoteric disciplines can not be understood by normal mortal humans. The fact that many of its more powerful practitioners have their minds and souls warped over time to comprehend such things doesn't help as well.

Throwing lighting bolts and conjuring barriers is simple enough to be understood. Creating a magitech device that produces large amounts of essentially free energy is incredibly difficult and can only be understood by the best most intelligent and some might say slightly insane practitioners. Performing complex rituals to summon exterarealital entities that warp reality by merely existing and that drive nearby people insane is not something a normal human can understand or perform.

I think there should be a bit of both. There are wizards who study magic like a science and practice it as a sort of technical profession, and then there are sorcerers, gods, or other magical beings who just have magic as an inherent part of themselves and can just do it, without having to figure it out first.

That being said, I'd definitely prefer to play a sorcerer than a wizard. I like it when my magic has more mystery and romance about it.

Porque no los dos?

Here's a little bit of how I've done it in my setting.

1/2
To the hill-peoples of the Mecava Belt, it is called the “madness of the gods”. To the sea-peoples of the Jyodwar Archipelago, it is known as “the litany of demons”. And to others, those touched by magick are called “the gods’ chosen”. In any case, it is widely considered to be both a blessing (in the mildest sense of the word) and a terrible curse. Its origins are unfathomable, though myth and religion have provided their own explanations. It is, if not exceedingly rare, at the least not prevalent in most human populations. It is transmitted hereditarily, though often many generations will pass in which no magickal person is born. It emerges in the intermediate stages of adolescence, a little before or a little after the onset of puberty. Immediately following its development, the recipient’s life is irrevocably changed. Vitae, or magickal energy, begins to rush through the body, and, if not stopped, will quickly overflow, resulting in disastrous consequences both for the individual and their surroundings. Some, who do not have the privilege of being taken in by a Magi House or educated by a hedge mage, will either die (usually taking others with them) or become a deformed creature, commonly called witches.

However, even when properly controlled and equipped with a magickal Limiter, the Art is taxing and often dangerous. Even magi who serve in a mostly scholarly capacity suffer greatly reduced lifespans. Additionally, many magi, especially those belonging to the greatest of the great Houses, are employed as soldiers either in the continental wars of their patron state (as all Magi Houses swear fealty to a sovereign master) or in bloody inter-House warfare. Even so, magick offers great benefits. Natural philosophy and medicine have achieved important advances through magickal intervention.

2/2
Over generations of use and study, the magickal arts have been structured into a general hierarchy of various Canons, which are classified as either Greater or Lesser. This system was codified and disseminated by House Anselmo, the magi pledged to the Imperial Demesne, during the height of the Potentate. Of course, it was not always thus. The magickal commentator Deomondel notes, “...In the ancient days a magus might work the Art with abandon, had they the mettle and means. Thus are the exploits of the grand magisters, of Dagobed and Dilö, of Igbeldassa and Lehenna, of Opilbanda and Ibb, are chronicled and studied by all magi of consequence. But the high bloodlines have thinned, and we cannot even work our own Art, given to us by the gods, without the aid of the Limiter. Neither can we work it without the ignoble apparatus, that is to say the “Omnibus”, to confine us. The spark of those ancient magisters has left Feol, I fear, and Magick, perhaps once a veritable Art, is now something far lesser...We cannot very well classify magick as of it were a tree or a flower.”

But Deomondel’s contemptuous attitude is not shared by the majority, and the Omnibus has generally been considered to be a congenial influence on the magickal arts, if perhaps a less “creative” one than Deomondel might have liked. And, contrary to his claim that the potency of magick has declined over time, one could rather assert that the structure of the Canons allows for deeper study of a given magickal discipline, and, as a consequence, creates a more powerful magus.

Seconded, this is a really cool way to do it

>science vs religion
Historically, that was never really a thing. It's only very recently that anyone has come to think there's an inherent conflict there.

For centuries it was thought that men had one fewer rib than women because of the one taken from Adam because any kind of dissection was prohibited by the church.

It's true religious fundamentalism has only been a thing since the 19th century, but they've never exactly been buds.

Well, okay, Christianity and science. Islam and science were best bros back in the Caliphate days.

This is how I do it too. A good analogy is fire, at least the way early humans likely understood it. They know more or less what it does and what it is but not the chemistry or thermodynamics behind it.

Magic ripped from another realm that could suck the user's soul out at any moment or cause them to explode into demons.

Yeah, I hate the do anything kind of wizard but from a game perspective you have the spergs freak out because now they can't batman wizard their way through things

It's atypical of a culture regardless of religion being okay with dissection. On a service level it seems kind of sadistic.

Should I bring up Galileo, then? Or how long it took to embrace Gothic architecture?

I like both, with the "normal" kind being possible to learn for most people but of very limited scale, while also existing bizzare, unfathomable magic, the realm of true wizards and saints which defies logic and conventional counter measures.

>Should I bring up Galileo, then?
You mean the guy whose story is completely distorted by dumbshit atheists? The guy who was put under house arrest (NOT thrown in a dungeon) because he was a total prick to literally everyone, including the Pope who financially supported his work (NOT because he said Earth goes around the sun and the stupid church couldn't handle that)? The guy who, at the time, didn't actually have very good evidence for his theories but called his critics a bunch of dumbasses anyway?

i prefer the first, with the logical conclusion of magitek being something i love as well

You're a fucking retard who's been brainwashed by fucking memes. The Islamic intellectual "golden age" was conquering India during ITS intellectual golden age. Meanwhile the church sponsored and supported the great minds which created basically every field of modern science. Including Galileo himself, who's work was beloved by church members, but got into trouble for breaking a court order and making fun of the pope for no reason

Yes, I do mean the guy who was tried for heresy and excommunicated because he published new evidence that supported the theory of a book that was also banned for being heretical, including changes in celestial bodies which would make no sense in geocentrism but which click nicely into place with heliocentrism, along with models of said motion, which were later corroborated by other astronomers. I think we're on the same page here.

I like "magic as a science" where the fundamental nature of the phenomenom is a blackbox and nobdy has any understanding of how it truly works

but

with ages of experimentation and testing, people have been able to define some limited rules on *what* it will do in certain circumstances, just not *why* it does it.

Copernicus proposed the same model years earlier and he wasn't prosecuted because he wasn't a huge fag

>...to check unbridled spirits, [the Holy Council] decrees that no one relying on his own judgement shall, in matters of faith and morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, distorting the Scriptures in accordance with his own conceptions, presume to interpret them contrary to that sense which the holy mother Church... has held or holds...

>All our Fathers of the devout Convent of St. Mark feel that the letter contains many statements which seem presumptuous or suspect, as when it states that the words of Holy Scripture do not mean what they say; that in discussions about natural phenomena the authority of Scripture should rank last... [the followers of Galileo] were taking it upon themselves to expound the Holy Scripture according to their private lights and in a manner different from the common interpretation of the Fathers of the Church...

He wasn't persecuted because he published it on his deathbed specifically to avoid persecution.

Smart move, considering his work was banned for being heretical.

Islam threw out science like a whore caught cheating the moment it began to be used to subvert the caliphrate, just like Christianity did.

In 1533, Johann Albrecht Widmannstetter delivered a series of lectures in Rome outlining Copernicus's theory. Pope Clement VII and several Catholic cardinals heard the lectures and were interested in the theory. On 1 November 1536, Cardinal Nikolaus von Schönberg, Archbishop of Capua, wrote to Copernicus from Rome:

Some years ago word reached me concerning your proficiency, of which everybody constantly spoke. At that time I began to have a very high regard for you... For I had learned that you had not merely mastered the discoveries of the ancient astronomers uncommonly well but had also formulated a new cosmology. In it you maintain that the earth moves; that the sun occupies the lowest, and thus the central, place in the universe... Therefore with the utmost earnestness I entreat you, most learned sir, unless I inconvenience you, to communicate this discovery of yours to scholars, and at the earliest possible moment to send me your writings on the sphere of the universe together with the tables and whatever else you have that is relevant to this subject ..."

The standard of the church was that if science revealed something that was not consistent with their interpretation of the biblical doctrine, they had obviously misinterpreted the doctrine. This applied to Galileo as well, who's work was lauded by church officials, and only caused him trouble for publishing unproven theory as fact in spite of promising otherwise, and for in his publication insulting the pope as a dullard despite the fact that the pope personally met with him out of genuine interest in his studies.

Both, just like real life.

I don't need if this is the right thread to ask this but fuck it, I'll do it anyway. Also, sorry if either my english or my explanation are shitty.
I'm working on a magic system for the setting of a story I'm writing (or at least trying to force myself to write). Explaining the whole magic system would be kind of hard, mainly because I haven't really defined its rules yet but it's basically one where magicians cast spells by using the true name/magical name of certain things or concepts to force mana (which in this setting is something akin to the basic component of all of creation) to take the form of said shit. People can learn the magic language needed to use magic by connecting their minds to some sort of dictionary of magic names.
Now, I have two problems:
First, I don't know how to make it so people can't just learn the name of literally anything. The idea is that it should be harder to learn the magical name of things depending on how complex they are (so, for example, every loser can learn the magical name of "Fire" but learning the magical name of something like "Restore" is extremely difficult). I want to have some kind of process as to how someone can learn a concept's magic name so I also can explain why someone couldn't do it.
Second, I want to have magic be more of a wild and mystical thing in the setting's backstory. Basically, humans barely understood magic back when they were living in tribes and only got a true grasp on it after seriously researching it. The problem is that I don't see how this could make any sense considering my magic system doesn't leave too much room for wild magic-like shit.

Both are inevitable. The methods taken to form a hypotheses, even if that hypotheses is that something is will never fully be knowable, is science. Likewise, since we are limited by our senses to never be omniscient, there will always be mystery and wonder and things that can never fully be predicted.

This
>Thread over

...

What about a setting like Conan where Magic is shrouded in poorly understood mysticism and conflates with religion in many cases even among its practitioners because of the spread of ignorance and barbarism in the wake of the fall of past magical civilizations and history's degradation into mythology because of the onset of a Dark Age?

The solution to your problem is relatively simple: make it so the "language," that the True Names is something that takes intense study and focus to "speak." Make it a divine language that mortal tongues can not naturally speak and mortal voices can not naturally intone. Just because you know what the right word is doesn't mean you can actually SAY the word, that takes a whole different level of effort and study.

This. Kind of.

>Wizards: After years of studying the great cosmic secrets of the world I have discovered to twist the arcane to my will.

>Clerics: After years of faithfulness, which may or may not consist of vague rituals and sacraments, sacrifices, and acts of worship that would seem mysterious or downright silly to others, my God has blessed me with the ability to call down their power from the heavens.

Wizards are the guys who tear back the layers of mysteries of the universe to achieve power, while Clerics are the ones who dip their ladles into the 17 different contradictory prophecies well of the divine to get theirs.

This is why Wizards always fall short of actual Godly powers, they're just getting a taste of the divine's workings. They will never know the true nature of the servants of heaven and hell.

I like both but the second sometimes invokes the ''Muh science is way better than magic because reasons'' meme

>meme
Are you saying science being better than magic is just a meme?

Yes

Well you're wrong.

No i am not