Laws of magic

I have been working on something on the backburner for years.

The original idea came from Greg Bear's Songs of Earth and Power. It is for want of a better name a Unified Theory of Metaphysics. it borrows from many sources from RPGs and fiction to real-world sources on metaphysics.

Many RPGs have rules and various explanations as to the how and why of magic and related phenomena. I began to see a common thread between what is spelled out and what is implied. What follows is what has come together and I have started to use in one form or another in many of my games for when characters decide to dig into such matters.

I apologize in advance if the examples I give offend some closely held beliefs but please remember this is intended to be applied to fictional work, not real life.

All magic is essentially one differing only in application and detail. Under it all are some basic principles that apply to every manifestation of the gift or power. By the definition of magic I am using this applies to all directed supernatural manifestations from traditional spells to miracles.

Magic requires 3 elements to function. The sources of these elements may vary and a deficiency in one element is often countered by greater strength in one or more of the others but all the elements are present when the magic works.

The elements are Will. Belief, and Ritual or Formula.

Will powers the spell. Belief prepares the place for the magic to work, something like fertilizing a field before planting. The formula gives shape to the power applied.

In a traditional spell, all these elements come primarily from the caster though others input on the first two elements can also affect the spell. The caster must, first of all, believe he is capable of casting the spell. Doubt will sabotage or completely derail his attempt. He must apply his will through attention and concentration to draw in or cast forth the power needed to drive the spell. And finally, he has to give his effort form through the use of a formula to give it shape and direct his power in the desired direction.

For prayers or miracles, it gets a bit more complicated. Belief comes not only from the enactor of the ritual but also from those around him. Their belief makes the environment around the enactor fertile for the desired results. Likewise, the will of the enactor is sustained and supported the believers joining in the prayer. In this case, the prayer itself is the formula that focuses the invoked power into the miracle.

The belief by a group or congregation an also works in the other direction. A location consecrated against "magic" is in itself a form of magic focused towards suppressing or deflecting other magic. The ritual of consecration gives it form focused on the location powered by the collective belief of not only the congregation present but also by all those who believe in the source of the consecration. Thus while the will may come from those present at the point of consecration it is sustained by collective belief and can actually become stronger over time as more people attend adding their belief in the original ritual.

In a fantasy setting these become easier for the casters as the entire world/realm is made fertile by the "common knowledge" that magic exists. In a modern arcana setting the worldbuilder has to decide how much of the common belief or lack of it defines the difficulty faced by those who wish to draw on magical power.

Since much of my mental work on this came from my development of a modern fantasy setting inspired by Songs of Earth and Power by Greg Bear I will give you some examples of how I applied these principles in the setting.

The quick and dirty synopsis of the setting is that far in our past humanity were the slave race of the Fae and our connection to magic came about primarily due to interbreeding between them and humans. On the flip side, Fae who have human blood in their ancestry are more likely to be able to access the High forms of magic while all human casters can cast both forms. The Fae all are capable of casting the low form as their birthright. We eventually drove them from Earth but the realm they retreated to has collapsed and they have returned.

Within this setting, magic comes in three main forms. Also in this setting belief comes both from conscious and unconscious sources. The hereditary nature of magic is sustained by rituals that were enacted when both races were young that spelled out our strengths and encoded them into our fundamental beings on the level of instincts. While most humans have some trace of Fae blood in their far ancestry some cultures and bloodlines do seem to have a stronger link to the arcane.

First, is traditional magic divided into High and Low forms but essentially working in a fairly recognizable form with the 3 elements primarily supplied by the mage.

The second form is known as Haloka or the Inner Fire. To use it one must have some blood connection to the fae races. though this is also a requirement for any human who wishes to practice traditional magic. In this form, the mage directs his inner fire to sustain him physically enhancing things like speed, endurance, strength, and even his resistance to weather and poisons. An advanced adept is literally able to run at incredible speed, perform superhuman feats of strength, and even stand naked in a blizzard without sustaining harm. In this form Belief and Will are paramount as a shortage of either can be fatal. The formula is very much internal and more a matter of personal perception as no two practitioners seem to use identical techniques to direct their power, in fact, some individuals are able to perform techniques that elude others with much more time and effort invested in the discipline.

The third form seems to defy the rules but remember what i said about racial instincts and ancient rituals. The third form is known as the Wyrd and is unique to each race that has contact to magic in any form. The Wyrd is part of these rituals and is made up of charms and rhymes that allow each race to command spirits, creatures, and elementals to perform certain tasks. All one needs to know is the proper charm and to have the proper blood tie. What this means is that any human who performs a human charm will get results whether he even knew what the charm did prior to doing it or even that it was magic in the first place. This also means that most magi can draw on both the Human and Fae Wyrds. The will and belief elements are instinctual and are backed by the entirety of the race involved.

There are rules about misuse of the Wyrd in each case but they are more serious for the Fae Wyrd than for the Human Wyrd. This is because the Fae had a hand in the creation of our Wyrd and it backfired on them. It was their intent to assure we would not be a threat to them by "helping" the humans who enacted our ritual to write our powers to be limited and to ensure those who knew the charms would have little reason to share their knowledge by making those who were initially taught the charms responsible for all those who used the Wyrd. In comparison in the Fae Wyrd, each individual is responsible for the consequences of their own use of the charms. What the Fae did not realize is that each race is allotted an equal measure of power and by trying to short change Humanity they made our charms much more flexible so we are the only race who can create new charms for themselves. The classic example of how this has worked is the story of how the Chestnut charm came to be. the story goes that a woodsman returning to his home in the dead of winter encountered a group of Redcaps who had lost their way in the forest and were on the verge of dying of hunger. In return for a promise to cut a cord of wood for him, the woodsman gave the Redcaps a barrel of chestnuts he had set aside for his winter provisions. In the process of the transaction, the wording fell into enough of a ritual on both sides that it locked into place as part of our Wyrd. So today someone who knows the charm and has a measure of chestnuts can summon a group of Redcaps and get a service from them proportional to the size of the offering.
While all of this grew out of an attempt to explain magic for my modern arcana setting I have since found myself using it to implement arcane phenomenon in other settings including my far future campaign.