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Message no. 1
From: Ivy Ryan <ivyryan@***.EFN.ORG>
Subject: Dragons and Magic
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 1994 08:01:26 -0700
Dragon as it's own Shaman...

Well, to me that made sense. They are, as GLO said, very remarkably old,
and dual natured, and inherently magical. So they cannot have the same
view of magic that a human does.

I have several draconic totems, one of which is LIFE. And to them life
is symbolized by a draconic - dinosaurian figure. Humans are still too
new for most of them to take to take the race seriously.

I wonder which world it is to a dragon. Its the 23rd for one humanish
race in my game, is it the 545th or so for dragons? And have any of them
been alive through half of them all? They sleep through the other half,
of course.

Ivy
Message no. 2
From: Janne Jalkanen <jalkanen@*********.CERN.CH>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 1994 18:01:24 +0200
On Tue, 28 Jun 1994, Ivy Ryan wrote:

> I wonder which world it is to a dragon. Its the 23rd for one humanish
> race in my game, is it the 545th or so for dragons? And have any of them
> been alive through half of them all? They sleep through the other half,
> of course.

And do they care?

Also, they don't even need to sleep through the other half. You are now
assuming that all cycles are alike, but we have no evidence that the
older cycles could have been shorter, longer, more intense or less intense.

*for the mathematically inclined*

The cycles might very well go like this: mana = exp(t/100)sin(t).

*for the less mathematically inclined*

Starts from zero, then goes upward, alternating below and over zero with
increasing amplitude.

Anyway, that rambling above is rather irrelevant. What I think that in
our past, there could have been times, when magic level alternated up and
down, but never went below the line of No Magic. Then it is possible the
dragons (and whatever was there back then.) could live on for millennia.

On the other hand, I believe both the dragons and elves are mortal, since
they breed. No species that breeds affords to live forever, since soon
they'd fill the earth :) Unless, of course, there's something hunting
them down in numbers, keeping the population from increasing... Maybe
we haven't seen them yet... Horrors, perhaps? <insert evil GM grin here>
(I have them already in my campaign, but then again, my players
nicknamed me "The Evil"...)


> Ivy

<The Evil>

Janne Jalkanen ///! For those who have to fight for it
jalkanen@******.cern.ch /// ! life has a flavor
Janne.Jalkanen@***.fi \\\/// ! the protected will never understand
-'Keep on going...' \XX/ ! (anonymous, Viet Nam, 1968)
Message no. 3
From: Darth Vader <j07c@***.UNI-BREMEN.DE>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 1994 20:20:00 +0100
> Dragon as it's own Shaman...
>
> Well, to me that made sense. They are, as GLO said, very remarkably old,
> and dual natured, and inherently magical. So they cannot have the same
> view of magic that a human does.
>
> I have several draconic totems, one of which is LIFE. And to them life
> is symbolized by a draconic - dinosaurian figure. Humans are still too
> new for most of them to take to take the race seriously.
>
> I wonder which world it is to a dragon. Its the 23rd for one humanish
> race in my game, is it the 545th or so for dragons? And have any of them
> been alive through half of them all? They sleep through the other half,
> of course.

Those are viable solutions, but I tend to think a bit more radicaly concerning
magic and ancient creatures. Magic in SR as we all know is highly subjective,
as the rules say ask 10 magicians how they understand magic and you will get
10 different answers. Magic is in a way what you want it to be, it responds
the way you expect it to respond. In essence there are very few constants
in magic and a good example for that are shamans, shamans get bonuses and
penalties from totems that only exist in the shamans imagination, whereas
hermetics dont get them because the deny the existence of totems.
Consider the ways and the paths of the elves of Tir NaN Og, they are
'hermetic' but still get the bonuses but no penalties, just because they
believe that they (in a way) are 'superior' to others.
Now take a person that grew up in a radically different enviroment and or
culture, has a totally different point of view, expectations, potential, etc.
you get the picture, and try to impose on him our 'narrow' rules about
hermetic and shamanistic magic. Thats what happens with immortal elves and
dragons, if you ask me its imposible to say whether Ehran of Dunkelzahn are
hermetic/shamanic or not, because they probably use/understand magic in a
totally different way. I would not find it at all strange if they have managed
to transcend those boundaries and control magic directly in its purest form,
that would give them nearly godlike powers, giving them the possibility to
simply fullfill all their wishes. They would be in the position to make
things happen just because they want them to.

--
Strong am I with the Force... but not that strong!
Twilight is upon me and soon night must fall.
That is the way of things ... the way of the Force.

GCS -d+@ -p+(---) c+++ l++ u+++ e+ m++(-) s+/ !n(---) h*(+) f+ !g w+ t+ r++ y?
Message no. 4
From: Ivy Ryan <ivyryan@***.EFN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 1994 13:50:06 -0700
Elven and draconic immortality:

Why not? Natural causes will get the preponderance of them before they
are 500. And if they are slow breeders...

As to the type of cycles that magic does, I personally think that a sine
wave is the most likely, with roughly equal time above and below the
median. Conserves energy nicely, if fact, if anything, the times above
and below might be getting shorter, not longer. Where would the energy
come from to raise the amplitude? Decreasing amplitude is more
reasonable, to my eyes at least.

Ivy
Message no. 5
From: Chris Lubrecht <lubrecht@***.EDU>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Wed, 29 Jun 1994 09:38:32 -0400
Is it possible that dragons use magic in the same way that we breath? Is
it possible they don't even know how they do it, they just do it and
don't worry about the how? This is an idea already expressed in several
different fantasy worlds in countless novels. Hey just a thought.

Nigel
Message no. 6
From: Marc A Renouf <jormung@*****.UMICH.EDU>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Wed, 29 Jun 1994 13:37:45 -0400
On Tue, 28 Jun 1994, Ivy Ryan wrote:

> Elven and draconic immortality:
>
> Why not? Natural causes will get the preponderance of them before they
> are 500. And if they are slow breeders...
>
> As to the type of cycles that magic does, I personally think that a sine
> wave is the most likely, with roughly equal time above and below the
> median. Conserves energy nicely, if fact, if anything, the times above
> and below might be getting shorter, not longer. Where would the energy
> come from to raise the amplitude? Decreasing amplitude is more
> reasonable, to my eyes at least.
>
> Ivy
>

You are confusing amplitude with period. Generally, in any given
oscillatory system in which several wavelengths are represented, there is
a transfer of energy to the lower frequencies, i.e. the larger periods.
This even happens in systens where only one wavelength is present, such
as calm water capillary waves. The whole process slows down as energy
moves to lower frequencies due to the non-linearity of the systems.

Not that any of you care. Just wanted to throw fuel on the fire. By the
way, I'm a Naval Engineer, so I really do have a reason to know this
stuff. I'm not just crazy. Really. I swear.

Marc
Message no. 7
From: Ivy Ryan <ivyryan@***.EFN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Wed, 29 Jun 1994 17:16:09 -0700
Nope, I spent 20 years doing the electronic thing for uncle sham. Didn't
confuse amplitude and period, didn't bother to explain fully. In any
circuit as the amplitude runs down, so does the period. Caused by the
power running down. It don' go up so high so it don' stay up so long.

From my other background, that of Shamaness (Priestess, whatever, no real
difference to me) the cycles don't seem, from records, to be changing in
duration, and who knows about amplitude? (I'm eagerly waiting to see if
it happens at all!)

But, looking from the POV of energy and conservation I would estimate
that if the amplitude is unchanging then we have an energy loop here. Or
the time frame is just too long to consider as yet.

Incidentially, the reason I argue some of these points so tenasciously
(?) is that I really like the solid background in SRII and I hate to see
people going all fuzzy with it. For instance: Hermetic is a very
precise word, and it was used as a descriptive by a designer who knew
exactly what it meant, being a practitioner of the Hermetic style himself.

From his POV every other style 'was' basically shamanic.

Also, being a trained Shamaness right now is painful. I know the steps
and the movements but there's no music. Really painful. Com'on 2012!

Ivy
Message no. 8
From: Ivy Ryan <ivyryan@***.EFN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Thu, 30 Jun 1994 12:49:11 -0700
Yes, it is.

On Wed, 29 Jun 1994, Chris Lubrecht wrote:

> Is it possible that dragons use magic in the same way that we breath? Is
> it possible they don't even know how they do it, they just do it and
> don't worry about the how? This is an idea already expressed in several
> different fantasy worlds in countless novels. Hey just a thought.

They learn it as hatchlings just like some people use language.

Ivy
Message no. 9
From: Chris Lubrecht <lubrecht@***.EDU>
Subject: Re: Dragons and Magic
Date: Fri, 1 Jul 1994 14:20:24 -0400
On Thu, 30 Jun 1994, Ivy Ryan wrote:

> Yes, it is.
>
> On Wed, 29 Jun 1994, Chris Lubrecht wrote:
>
> > Is it possible that dragons use magic in the same way that we breath? Is
> > it possible they don't even know how they do it, they just do it and
> > don't worry about the how? This is an idea already expressed in several
> > different fantasy worlds in countless novels. Hey just a thought.
>
> They learn it as hatchlings just like some people use language.
>
> Ivy
>
What I think I am leaning to here is the inate ability thing. I don't
think a dragon would think "ok, I am going to cast a mana ball now". I
think he would just use a type of attack he knows and laugh at the stupid
mortals who name them. Names are such a transient thing , don't ya know.
In other words, I don't think he learns anything. He is hatched and just
knows it. Maybe the force of the spell grows with the dragons age? Just
a thought.

Nigel

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