Introduction

I (Kyokai) been approved to start describing the magic system for TMW, so here it is... Magic system status

Here it is: Magic master list Also, the Magic system GUI notes If you want to see how skills affect your magic: Skill system Get in touch with the Mana World's Spirits and Sages: Important NPCs

I wanted to capture the feel of Secret of Mana's magic system (ie: calling creatures that are affiliated with the certain elements, who then perform spells and vanish)

So there are 9 elements in the world. Fire, Water, Earth, Wind, Light, Darkness, Space, Time, and Life. (Pretty self-explanatory) Each of the 9 elements has a great spirit, as well as a sage, and a temple where the two reside. These temples are located at the edges of the Mana World (the temple of Life is at the center)

To learn magic: You must journey to the temple of the spirit you wish to learn magic from. Talk to the sage there, who gives you a quest. Upon completing the quest, the elemental spirit will bless you with the ability to call on it to perform 1 spell. After that, you may learn additional spells by completing increasingly difficult quests for the sages. Some sages may have certain requirements other than just completing a quest.

The spells

Each elemental spirit has 9 spells:

• 1 single target damage dealing spell - hits a targeted being within range
• 1 bestow elemental state spell - puts the chosen element on a being
• 1 bestow elemental attack spell - puts the chosen element on a being's attack
• 1 summon familiar spell - calls a creature born of that element to fight by your side.
• 5 specific spells - which are suited to the element's play style.

That's a total of 9 * 9 spells, or 81.

Story Writers! It's your cue! Use this section to write histories of the temples, sages, and elemental spirits. make sure they coincide with the backstory first! Check the World development section.

Elemental spirit names are subject to change, but at present they are:

• Fire elemental - Epyri
• Water elemental - Merene
• Air elemental - Izurial
• Earth elemental - Geon
• Light elemental - Lumine
• Dark elemental - Tenebrae
• Time elemental - Chronos
• Space elemental - Teless
• Mana elemental - Gen

Levelling up your magic

Getting better with spells is a matter of practice. When you use a spell, the Magic skill (Skill system) associated with the spirit you call will gain experience. When you surpass a certain amount of experience, all the spells for that spirit level up. Magic, like all skills, starts at level 0. Level 50 is generally as high as players will want to go, but with extensive use, you can surpass this.

General spell information

• Damage spell - each element has one direct damage spell which targets a single enemy. This is to balance elements by preventing one elemental monster type to go without a spell weakness.
• Bestow elemental attack - aligns the character's weapons with the element, dealing 50% damage to creatures of that element and 200% to creatures of opposing elements.
• Bestow elemental state - aligns the character himself with the element, giving him weaknesses and resistances as necessary.
• Familiar spell - Summons a creature born of the element for the player to command. Familiars work essentially like pets, except that they increase the magic ability of the summoner in that element by 20%, while decreasing his magic ability in opposing elements by 20%. Familiars drain a small amount of MP as long as they remain summoned (1 per 20 seconds) and can be dismissed at will the same way as a pet is left. Familiars are immune to bestow element and bestow elemental attack, and are aligned with their elements 150% (i.e. they absorb attacks of their element and take 4x damage from opposing elements). When familiars take damage, the damage is dealt to the summoner's MP at a rate of 1 MP per 20 HP damage, rounded up.

Spell progression

Spirits bestow spells on players in this order: The first column shows the number of spells you have in an element, the second explains which are available to you to learn at that point.

Have- Available

• 0 - Choice of 1 of the 3 Element attack, bestow element, bestow element attack.
• 1 - Choice of 1 of the 2 remaining.
• 2 - Choice of 1 of the remaining spell and any of the first 3 general spells.
• 3 - Choice of 1 of the remaining spells and another specialized spell.
• 4 - Choice of 1 of the remaining spells.
• 5 - Choice of 1 of the remaining spells.
• 6 - Choice of 1 of the remaining spells and the summoning spell.
• 7 - Choice of 1 of the remaining spells.
• 8 - The final specialized spell.

The quests for spells remain the same no matter when they are taken. More spells simply become available as you complete more quests.

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The thread for discussing the magic system in the forum: themanaworld.org forum

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Notes from WakkaCraft:

• Familiar should be a quest, having it as a spell would lessen its usage.
• Since the general spells take up three slots, this should be compensated for by adding more spells to each circle.
• Due to the power of the bestow property spells, they should be tweaked to require reagents or some other limiter. There are other spells as well that were written to have duration or need for reagents tweaked to provide balance.
• The spells of each individual element are listed in the order in which they are acquired.
• Rather than monsters and players having a particular element with which they are aligned, everything should have an individual table of resistances (a la Battle for Wesnoth) loosely based off of the "standard" resistance percentages arrived at mathematically. The embrace spells, then, change the target's resistances into the standards for a creature aligned with the appropriate element.