Will the real Gandalf please stand up

Bob, Rowan and I are at PAX this weekend, and I went to a panel called: “Making Magic Work: Designing Magic Systems for Games and Books.” The panel was packed with writers and gamers. Favorite line of the night: “Can anyone be Gandalf?”

That question arose out of a discussion of how you construct your magic system. Who is granted magic? Is it hereditary? Is it learned? Can anyone be Gandalf?

These questions snowballed into a great discussion filled with examples from D&D, NK Jemison, and, of course, Harry Potter. You see, in Harry Potter’s world, magic is hereditary, but it is also learned. So, with time and proper training, Harry could grow up to be Dumbledore (or, perish the thought, Gandalf). Many of the other examples we explored were hooked around the hereditary idea, and one very intriguing issue came up: the MarySue effect. Susan J Morris explained that this is when your main character ends up, through hard work and dedication, being the most powerful character in the book.

This has somehow become the industry standard. We start with the naive uninitiate, and end up with the UberMage. Frodo would be the antithesis of this…but he still ends up saving the world. Can you guys think of any fantasy characters who don’t fit this bill?

Harry Potter definitely fits this standard, and brings us to another issue: for every magical element you add, you need to think it through to its logical conclusion. Consider the Avada Kedavra curse. As one panelist pointed out, you can use this whenever you want. There’s nothing holding you back (besides mores and such). So why weren’t the Death-eaters always trolling that one out? When they were just knocking somebody over, or dangling them in the air, were they just being sassy? You get the point. Add any magical element in, you have to deal with its consequences.

Once you decide how your magic is going to manifest (be it wands, spells, tattoos, teeth), it is your job to stick to the rules you have created with your system. Some writers create rules to help reign back some of those Avada Kedavra issues. For example, many authors build in the idea that using magic demands some type of payment or sacrifice. We see this most literally in games like Diablo and WOW. Casting spells costs mana. Some authors mention that a spell caster is left drained, while other authors build in actual physical side effects. Take a trip back to Buffy and recall that Willow had a headache for weeks when she used that powerful teleportation spell on Glory. Of course, I would take a week-long headache if it meant I could teleport things. Hello! Avanti’s bread? Lou Malnati’s?

So, quite a few things to think about. When you walk away from a fantasy book or a movie thinking “that’s implausible,” it’s probably because of a flaw in their magic system. The panelists kept pointing to Transformers. And all I kept thinking was, “they’re giant transforming robots from space! And you have an issue with their particular capabilities?!” Convince your reader that your premise is possible first, my friends.

Rod Sterling noted that fantasy makes the impossible probable. I would amend that good fantasy does that. Bad fantasy makes the impossible problematic. On that note, I have some work to do…