Uh, oh . . . it's magic

[Aminar]

Why ?

Relativity isn't intuitive.  Quantum physics isn't intuitive.  Economics clearly isn't intuitive, or people would not disagree on it so.

The real world doesn't fit entirely into neat little boxes.  A setting that does is failing at realism.

Because not many people want to have to spend the mental time to understand relativity just to understand the magic system of your book.  We aren't creating real worlds, we are creating entertaining worlds, and while I enjoy a good debate on non-intuitive things, I have yet to find a writer capable of making a non-intuitive magic system make sense within the structure of a narrative.(So Human limitations.)

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Because not many people want to have to spend the mental time to understand relativity just to understand the magic system of your book.

Oh, I agree entirely.  I'm just not seeing why you think understanding it in every detail makes it entertaining.

while I enjoy a good debate on non-intuitive things, I have yet to find a writer capable of making a non-intuitive magic system make sense within the structure of a narrative.(So Human limitations.)

Intuitively clear varies far too widely between different people for me to back off on something interesting because it strikes me as non-intuitive.

[o_O]

It strikes me that intuitive magic systems will also be existing magic systems (meaning some culture somewhen has  devised it as a belief) unless the basic physics is also different.


(and I must say I'm coming away from this thread with a craving for magic in highly accelerated systems, a craving strong enough to impress pregnant women)

[OZ]

How precisely I want my magic defined depends on why I have the magic in the story. If magic is mostly just for setting, I may define it a little but I'm not going to define it in detail any more than I am going try to explain astonomy because a character is looking at the stars. If understanding how the magic works is important to the central conflict in the story then I am going to want it more well defined so that the conflict resolution won't feel cheap. I do like complex magical systems. In Chalker's Dancing Gods series it is explained that magic is too complex and requires too much work for most people to ever use it. It wasn't a matter of being born with a "gift" or having a magical gemstone it was just a matter of aptitude combined with a lifetime of study. This was not the most fun magical system that I have ever read about but in many respects it was probably the most logical.

In some books the lack of knowledge about how the magic works is what makes the book ...well...magical. Sometimes, for some fantasy settings, it works much better if the characters knowledge about magic is similar to earlier civilizations understanding of science. Some things they may understand while other things they may know work but have no idea why they work. There may be some things that they think work a certain way but actually something completely different is going on and some things are just a mystery. There is no unifying field. In the right stories this can work very well. Of course the author has to keep a hand on it to preven Deus Ex Machina type endings (unless that is what he/she wants). Much of the horror genre would not be nearly as affective (or effective either for that matter) if the magic in the stories was well understood.

[o_O]

How precisely I want my magic defined depends on why I have the magic in the story. If magic is mostly just for setting, I may define it a little but I'm not going to define it in detail any more than I am going try to explain astonomy because a character is looking at the stars. If understanding how the magic works is important to the central conflict in the story then I am going to want it more well defined so that the conflict resolution won't feel cheap.

Fully agreed, I have expressed similar sentiment above.

I do like complex magical systems. In Chalker's Dancing Gods series it is explained that magic is too complex and requires too much work for most people to ever use it.

He did have a bit of fetish for body changing and its impact on self-definition though.

In some books the lack of knowledge about how the magic works is what makes the book ...well...magical. Sometimes, for some fantasy settings, it works much better if the characters knowledge about magic is similar to earlier civilizations understanding of science. Some things they may understand while other things they may know work but have no idea why they work. There may be some things that they think work a certain way but actually something completely different is going on and some things are just a mystery. There is no unifying field. In the right stories this can work very well.

Like Fritz Leiber's  Lankhmar or maybe Lustbader's Silent Warrior cycle?    Sure, that can be fun.   

On the other hand I absolutely adore novels with systematic magical reasoning (Zahn's Triplet comes to mind here)  and books with counterintuitive consequences to apparently intuitive systems (Cherryh's Rusalka and its sequels).

[OZ]

He did have a bit of fetish for body changing and its impact on self-definition though.

I don't know if I have read every series that he wrote but I have read a lot of them. I noted that in every series of his that I have read a man ends up in a woman's body at least once and often multiple times. Usually it's temporary but not always.

I have read some Zahn but I don't believe I have read Triplet. I will have to look at it.

[Aminar]

Oh, I agree entirely.  I'm just not seeing why you think understanding it in every detail makes it entertaining.

Intuitively clear varies far too widely between different people for me to back off on something interesting because it strikes me as non-intuitive.

I'm mainly just saying it shouldn't pop the reader out of the story as they go huh?  For instance, Sanderson's Time Bubbles ignore red/blue shift not because he didn't think of them but because they would just get in the way of the story and confuse people unfamiliar with the phenomenon.  Water magic shouldn't start fires without explanation.  That kind of thing. 

[o_O]

That would seem to be substantially contained within 'use language appropriate to the readership', no?    Fire resulting from water magic seems to clash with the basic definition of 'water'.

[gatordave96]

Well, let me see if I can get your take on what I am trying to build in my system of "magic."  I always had some fascination with the idea of psionics in the old AD&D system.  There was a Dragon magazine article on the subject way back when, I think.  Wish I still had it as a reference, but lost it long ago.  So I am trying to base a system of magic based on the use of the mind to alter probabilities.

And the purpose of creating a believable system of magic is to create friction or a hierarchy in society.  Those with the most ability are a select few with both telepathic and kinetic abilities; they also hold the greatest risk of losing grip with reality when they manipulate probability.  Beneath that are those with kinetic ability (run faster, jump higher, limited control over energy).  And then there are the normal humans that hold a lot of fear, jealousy, loathing, etc.  Throw in the additional friction of those with power versus those who have none, economics, and religion and stir vigorously. 

I thought it would be fun to start with a very ordered society and then watch it all come tumbling down.  The "new order" is saved for the sequel, I think.

Now it is just a matter of trying to figure out the limits of power and what happens when one goes too far.  I have kept it simple, with those practitioners who push themselves making themselves ill both physically and mentally.  Megalomania takes a prominent role with the antagonist.  But it is difficult to know the difference between straining credibility and creating a situation where the reader sits back and says, "hey, that was cool!"

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

  For instance, Sanderson's Time Bubbles ignore red/blue shift not because he didn't think of them but because they would just get in the way of the story and confuse people unfamiliar with the phenomenon. 

And not having red/blue shift in is what popped me out of the story.

All other things being equal, I'd sooner err on the side of overestimating the reader than of treating them as dumber or less informed than they are.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Fire resulting from water magic seems to clash with the basic definition of 'water'.

If you correlate lightning with storms, I can buy that as a method for water-aspected magic to start fires.

[Aminar]

And not having red/blue shift in is what popped me out of the story.

All other things being equal, I'd sooner err on the side of overestimating the reader than of treating them as dumber or less informed than they are.

But imagine the stupid complications that would have on the story.  He'd have to explain red shifts and blue shifts first off, from the perspective a fairly primitive society.  He'd have to do so in a way that made sense to them.  And it wouldn't add anything of interest, as well as ruining the stealth factors of the time bubbles.  Basically, it would be detrimental to the story.  Sure, it popped you out, but for every you that reads the story there are four people who have no idea what red and Blue shift are and ten that don't care/ didn't think about it.  It's not marketable.(I could go into the number of things his time bubbles don't do that they should.  It's a long and interesting list.  For instance the slow time ones should create wind tunnels.)   It would have been a better book for you but a worse book overall. 

Everybody has sciency bits that they've come across that most people won't.  I got popped out of Alloy by the compounder's lack of pain.  Anybody with healing factor should feel pain far more severely than you or I do to nerve's regenerating.  We can't fix everything, nor see every scientific bit.  Hence going with intuitive.  It makes sense that a man who has been shot hundreds of times and heals constantly would have epic pain tolerance until you look at the science, but its better to ere on the side of intuition.

If you correlate lightning with storms, I can buy that as a method for water-aspected magic to start fires.

You can also use the heat index of water, showing just how much heat is stored in water like Dresden.  There are ways to explain everything, just explain it if it defies common sense.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

But imagine the stupid complications that would have on the story.  He'd have to explain red shifts and blue shifts first off, from the perspective a fairly primitive society.  He'd have to do so in a way that made sense to them.

No he doesn't. It just has to be obvious to a reader who expects that.  It can look like incidental flash and bang to a reader who doesn't.

 

[Aminar]

No he doesn't. It just has to be obvious to a reader who expects that.  It can look like incidental flash and bang to a reader who doesn't.

Yes and no.  But I mainly look at it this way.  Every single superspeedster in comics has ignored red/blueshifting since the beginning of comics.  One of the best lesser used aspects of superspeed is being able to move quickly to turn invisible, an effect that showing a puff of blue light(which isn't really what would happen either) every time a time bubble is used and somebody moves would nullify.  Lastly he interviewed his readership base on the subject and was convinced by them that red/blueshifting was overdoing the science.

[o_O]

Too bad.   Red shifting down to radio range would have been awesome on a radio-interference level and blueshifting up into the Xray range would have been awesome on a "get a free chest Xray" level.