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Inspired by a discussion in the Alphabet of Thorn talk --

Based on Brandon Sanderson's three laws of magic:

"An author's ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic."


"Limitations are more important than powers."


"Expand what you already have before you add something new."


What do you think of these in fantasy? Which do you prefer? What do you think good or bad cases of soft magic, and hard magic?

Actually, I think he pitches it a little high. You don't have to explain the rules. You just have to convince the reader that there are rules enough to explain why the hero doesn't wave the magic wand to fix everything, or the villain, to destroy everything.

Explaining the rules is one way to that, but excellent rhetoric can pull it off too.

I haven't read any Sanderson, so I can't comment on if his rigid ideology regarding fantasy works for him. But I do see him quoted a lot by fandom, I guess because he's a popular writer and has a podcast.

And, I think he is very wrong. Fantasy is the ultimate nonrealist genre, and efforts to define and delineate the fantastical seem counter to what the genre is about.

Books like Perdido Street Station and The Fifth Season give the appearance of "hard magic." In universe, the characters approach magic pseudo-scientifically, but those books end up breaking all of Sanderson's edicts, and they're better for it.

The way that Geezer wrote about the appeal of hard magic, basically that it provides the opportunity for mental puzzles that the reader can solve, makes sense to me. I see how that could be nice. But that's not what I want out of magic in a story.

Ah, but in those stories you cite, does magic solve the characters' problems?

Yes, definitely.

Brendan wrote: "The way that Geezer wrote about the appeal of hard magic, basically that it provides the opportunity for mental puzzles that the reader can solve, makes sense to me. I see how that could be nice. But that's not what I want out of magic in a story. ..."

Sorry to disagree - but that is one of the things that can really help me enjoy a particular style of magic!

This thread looks good! Starting from Sanderson's comments on his own website (linked in the first post) give a really well-structured framework for the discussion.

Rather than spend too much time re-stating my own opinion, I will refer readers to /topic/show/1480849-how-do-you-like-your-magic. Sorry for the length of the first post in that discussion, but it covers this same ground. Brendan probably won't agree, but I hope others will. :-)

I love my magic with structure. I don't love 'Magic-Ex-Machina'.
If a story has a powerful character able to do powerful magic, I'm going to suppose he can save the day. But should he do it? And if he does, should it be all along the story?
I always see this advice as a writer: while writing a world/magic, set the rules then follow them.
I always thought that you don't necessarily need a set of rules stated as such in the book but the writer needs to know what the limit of the magic used is. And to respect it.
- I’m a fan of The Lord of the Rings and this is one of the good example: we have powerful characters that, for many reason, don’t use too often their capacities. Gandalf is a very good example but think about Galadriel and Elrond? Those characters could use their power to speed the mission but they don’t, they could fight but they don’t.
Here, the limitation comes not from the magic itself but more the building of the story. The limitation has been set by the author with the story, with the background, with the millennia of history of Middle Earth and characters needing to redeem themselves�.etc.
- Steven Erikson with his Malazan series has set another type of magic. Here the major limit is the mage him/herself. But not just that, when you read further and further you realize what is the source of this magic, and it’s a very complex set of rules and magic. Sometimes it’s even a little too complicated.
Here, the limitation comes from the magic and its source but it serves the story as well. Not just by giving limits to mage, but by adding another dimension where the reader and the characters want to know what is in those warrens. In this world building magic is a source of power. It can solve problems but it is, more than often, the main source of trouble.
- For Guy Gavriel Kay, magic is not the main point of the story. In some of his books, I wondered where the limits were and sometimes it felt more as ‘Magic-ex-Machina�. Not that magic solves every problem in those books, most the time, there is a price to pay but, in some, it had come a little ‘out of nowhere�, for my taste (and I am a BIG fan of GGK).
- And finally, as a D&D player: a sorcerer or a wizard, magic is controlled, you have set of rules, very strict and you have to know them and use them. Even when you become more and more powerful you just can’t save everyone. So you have to think and calculate. Of course, the fact that it is a RP game is certainly the main reason why magic is so controlled.

By the way, Alan I loved Mary Stewart's Arthurian books!

Emmanuelle wrote: "By the way, Alan I loved Mary Stewart's Arthurian books! ..."
Thanks Emmanuelle.
I just looked at the free sample of Christmas Ball. Sorry, a little too young for me - it reads like something I might have used a few years ago when I was teaching junior school, but I am now retired.
Cheers

There are fascinating discussions in The Belgariad between Garion and Belgarath and at times Polgara about what can and can't be done with magic. Trying to unmake something is a big no no.

I don't mind any magic so long as it is logical within the framework of the novel & doesn't suddenly change to fit situations within the story. This often happens in the 'science' of the old SF pulps. I've never been totally sold on them being classified as SF given the magical nature of the science.

Logical magic can be strained if it's done properly. Feist has a kind of goofy character that keeps pulling oranges out of a pouch. He eventually admits he's not sure how he made a hole in the bag into a portal to the warehouse of a fruit seller & he can't replicate it, so it worked for me. It's a bit of much needed comic relief which helped the otherwise bleak situation.

If magic requires a lot of study & imaginative thought, the practitioners need to act as if they're intelligent. IIRC, that was one of the things that turned me off in Erickson's first Malazan book - really powerful characters in complex situations winding up in stupid situations due to really dumb actions. I think they were supposed to be complex & mysterious, but didn't impress me that way.

Terry Brooks first "Word & Void" book had a similar issue - a really nasty demon who was supposed to be courting the heroine, but was so nasty that he kept alienating her instead.

@Gary: absolutely! I remember a moment in the Belgariad (or is it in the second series... I don't remember) where Garion try to solve a situation by using lightning. Afterward Belgarath is pretty much mad at him because it took some time to regulate the weather pattern he had affected just to obtain this one lightning.

@Jim: I suppose the pretty powerful mage should be 'intelligent' but, for what I understand in this series, the warren magic can be use 'instinctively' as well. There is a pretty good example in one of the last book where a man with the mind of a child can use mutiple warrens at once. I'm not saying it's such a good thing, or that we shouldn't expect them to act intelligently. On the other hand, in Erikson work, most of the actions in the first book are linked to event that are explained later on. And, in life, being intelligent does not mean you're not going to act dumb if you're emotionnaly involve (but I am biased positively so I may be tempted to defend the Malazan series, don't mind me!!!).

Jim wrote: "...really powerful characters in complex situations winding up in stupid situations due to really dumb actions..."

You'd be surprised, book learning and common sense are not the same thing. Think Big Bang theory and the character Sheldon, he's the smartest person there but he can't ride on the bus because he might pick up germs form the seat. Yes I know it's a TV show but it wouldn't be funny if there wasn't a grain of truth in it, if people didn't see people they actually know in the characters!

Logical smarts (say math) and emotional smarts (say understanding other people) are two very different skills, and often people have only the one. So the logical wizard can get into all kinds of trouble when he has to deal with other people, since people are not logical.

Now, don't know if Erikson was intentionally doing that or just making it convenient for the plot (I haven't read the series). Both the smarts and the ineptness needs to be a consistent core part of the character otherwise people will react the way you did.

I think you both missed the "If magic requires a lot of study & imaginative thought..." that preceded that example. I realize book learning & common sense are not always present in the same person. The absent-minded genius is an old cliche. One is fine, but not most especially if misuse can lead to self-immolation or other dire consequences. Fiction needs to maintain a balance or it loses me & Erickson did. It's been a while since I tried reading the book, so I don't recall the particulars.

Good examples that take place in a third book are irrelevant when the author can't hold my attention through the first nor does an example from a modern TV comedy prove a point in a rather dark fantasy novel where people are dying in droves through seemingly constant, unrelenting warfare.

In the first Malazan book even the *gods* were acting pretty stupidly. I'm with Jim in that I'm not interested in reading through 3 more massive books to get to the author's fix-up.

Thanks for setting up the thread, Mary. I hadn't really thought about it before this.

I can appreciate a good magic system, especially if it's part of a novice's journey, like in The Name of the Wind.

What I really want, though, is to be awed. It should be an extraordinary event when someone breaks the laws of the universe. Two examples come to mind.

The first one is the spell that someone casts near the beginning of The Worm Ouroboros. It's intense. There's so much preparation and sweat going into this incantation that you think the wizard might die while casting it.

The other is the Conan stories in general. The wizards in those stories are not fully human, and their magic is surrounded by a Lovecraftian fog. Magic is no casual thing in the Howard universe- it warps reality in dark ways and causes the magician to stop being fully human.

Basically, I don't care too much how the magic works as long as there's a cost.

We recently read the book Alphabet of Thorn, which was pretty good in some ways. The ending fell flat, though, because it was resolved when one of the characters cast a massive spell, seemingly with minimal effort, minimal preparation, and no real cost. It felt like nothing much changed. I think that was the let-down.

And the limits can be made in so many interesting different ways.

Like in the Power Mage trilogy where the powder mages will go powder blind if they abuse their powers and cease to be able to use them at all (in addition to becoming addicts). On the other this same series suffers from each character that comes along turns out more powerful than the last, to the point it gets a little ridiculous.

Or in Dragonlance, where mages forget the spells after casting them and then have to relearn them again. So it also means if you've got some really cool powerful spell, even if you're strong, you can only cast it once. Here also magic can be slow and requires complete concentration, so you need someone with a sword to protect you while you're busing casting.

Phil wrote: "What I really want, though, is to be awed. It should be an extraordinary event when someone breaks the laws of the universe."

This can be interesting when the main character is a wizard. . . I've got one story where, after deep philosophical reflection, I concluded that I was going to have the heroine have a thread about how, since it has become a job, the magic has gone out of her magic.

and THEN smuggled in some sense of wonder when she wasn't expecting it

Andrea wrote: "Or in Dragonlance, where mages forget the spells after casting them and then have to relearn them again."

I'm pretty sure Jack Vance invented that in The Dying Earth, which is a group read next month.

Oh, yes In fact that's called "Vancian magic". Mind you, it made somewhat more sense in Vance who didn't have to consider game balance.

I'd read an article in the past that talked about this unwritten set of rules and or laws of magic that most fantasy authors draw from.

It seemed to paint any author who strayed away from these " rules " in a bad light, but that is why I've always been drawn to fantasy. Magic, whimsy, and all things Fey are what makes it fun.

I've read several books were magic was the deus ex machina to save everyone, or everything in a pinch. Sometimes it's ridiculous, or the author trying to wrap up a book in a lazy fashion, but that's alright with me if it's been a fun read.

Magic shouldn't have rules placed on it, when it does, I think it makes it a bit less magical. I figure as long as I can make sense of what is happening, and it's a good read, let the imagination do what it does best!

I much prefer hard magic, myself. It doesn't need to be as rigid as what Brandon Sanderson does, but it's a little frustrating to me when we have no idea what magic can even do in the world of the story.

Now, I certainly understand and respect the view that the mystery is what makes it magical, but at the same time, the story needs to feel real (even if it is totally impossible, in a real-world sense). No matter how mystical and mysterious, if the magic is being done by real people, I want to know how they do it and what the limits are. If the magic users themselves aren't totally clear on that, that's fine, but I'd like to know that as well.

What I don't like is when magic can do just about anything--but it is clear what those things are and are not--and those who can do magic seem to choose whether or not to use it for no discernible reasons.

Mary wrote: "Oh, yes In fact that's called "Vancian magic". Mind you, it made somewhat more sense in Vance who didn't have to consider game balance."

Seems like it's a good thing that we're reading The Dying Earth next month as it appears to be a huge gap in my fantasy background. I was reading Meditations on Middle-Earth in which authors write about how Tolkien influenced them, but Vance came up often too. And I was reading some Lightspeed issues and came across the serial Kaslo Chronicles by Matthew Hughes which also is highly influenced by Vance (and yes I see the similarities in what Raistin does to cast a spell and what the wizards in this story do)

Appendix N! The famous list! You're starting it!

This month's Clarkseworld Magazine offers a take on the evil of hard magic systems. . Who knew reading Le Guin made you a Nietzschean ?

The article sounds so much like the short video essay that I assume "Nerdwriter" & "Christopher Mahon" are clones.

That was a nice essay, and unsurprisingly I agree with its main thrust. Obviously it's unpopular to accuse contemporary fantasy readers of excessive passivity, but I do think it's true.