What would elemental magic look like?

[Gilladian]

I've mentioned my new campaign setting here at least once - I'm still desultorily working on it, and right now I'm thinking about magic.

I want to "recolor" magic (3.5e, E6 variant, to be precise) to be elemental in nature. There are 5 elemental gods (the 5th being void/spirit), and the campaign will have a somewhat steampunkish flavor. I'm thinking that I want to reconfigure potions, for example, so that every potion effect is carried out by tiny elemetals. Healing/Cure potions are actually tiny air creatures that wash and bind and stitch wounds, scour poisons from the blood, etc... Invisibility would be granted by dozens of elementals surrounding the character and "hiding" him by bending light around his form, etc...

But I'm not sure how I want to handle magic items, and spells. Since there are elemental gods, I COULD claim that ALL magic "comes from the gods" and that the different "styles" (sorcery, wizardry, clerical) are just different ways the gods grant power to their followers/creations/dependents.

I could also give each and every magic item an accompanying elemental spirit(s) that gives it it's power(s). But that could get complex, and tiresome as well. Any ideas or suggestions?

[Nomadic]

Here are all the posts lost from the reversion on this thread:

I've mentioned my new campaign setting here at least once - I'm still desultorily working on it, and right now I'm thinking about magic.

I want to "recolor" magic (3.5e, E6 variant, to be precise) to be elemental in nature. There are 5 elemental gods (the 5th being void/spirit), and the campaign will have a somewhat steampunkish flavor. I'm thinking that I want to reconfigure potions, for example, so that every potion effect is carried out by tiny elemetals. Healing/Cure potions are actually tiny air creatures that wash and bind and stitch wounds, scour poisons from the blood, etc... Invisibility would be granted by dozens of elementals surrounding the character and "hiding" him by bending light around his form, etc...

But I'm not sure how I want to handle magic items, and spells. Since there are elemental gods, I COULD claim that ALL magic "comes from the gods" and that the different "styles" (sorcery, wizardry, clerical) are just different ways the gods grant power to their followers/creations/dependents.

I could also give each and every magic item an accompanying elemental spirit(s) that gives it it's power(s). But that could get complex, and tiresome as well. Any ideas or suggestions?

I don't know if you're familiar with Dark Sun, but the clerics there worship the elements and from what I'm reading here it's pretty close to what your looking for.

http://athas.org/products/ds3

It's an official setting, but it wasn't supported in book form during the 3E cycle. The license was extended to some of the fans to create online content though, which is linked above. Just look for "DS3_r7", and that'll give you the 3.5 version. Again the flavor may not be what you want, but it's probably worth looking at.

Also if you're looking for more "avatar" flavored elemental magic....
"COUGH"http://www.d20pfsrd.com/occult-adventures/occult-classes/kineticist"COUGHHUFHUF"

Magic could work by speaking to the elementals and asking them to do stuff. Maybe you need to bribe them with rituals they like (burn something to please fire elementals, empty a bottle to please water elementals, etc) or threaten them to make them cooperate. Spells would be just words in the elemental language you need to speak to request that particular effect. Magical items would have enslaved elementals bound into them. Potions would contain sleeping elementals that were asked to perform a specific service when awakened (which happens when the potion is used).

Magic could work by speaking to the elementals and asking them to do stuff. Maybe you need to bribe them with rituals they like (burn something to please fire elementals, empty a bottle to please water elementals, etc) or threaten them to make them cooperate. Spells would be just words in the elemental language you need to speak to request that particular effect. Magical items would have enslaved elementals bound into them. Potions would contain sleeping elementals that were asked to perform a specific service when awakened (which happens when the potion is used).

How could I possibly forget? In Eberron, they do this exact thing. They bind elementals to crystals and basically manipulate them into fueling the sort of "magitech" in the world. Airships are the most prominent example of this, fueled by either air or fire elementals.

Hmmm... So it looks like I need to investigate Eberron and Darksun, two settings I've never paid much attention to!

Any ideas on how to avoid having to give every magic item's elemental a personality?

Any ideas on how to avoid having to give every magic item's elemental a personality?

A simple answer would be that most elementals just aren't that sophisticated. This would also avoid ethical issues involved in keeping them. They'd be more like plants or insects, in the sense that they do things and react to stimuli in some fashion and can be considered 'alive' but just do not have the sophistication to where you'd have to worry about captivity or any potential suffering or the like.

Any ideas on how to avoid having to give every magic item's elemental a personality?

A simple answer would be that most elementals just aren't that sophisticated. This would also avoid ethical issues involved in keeping them. They'd be more like plants or insects, in the sense that they do things and react to stimuli in some fashion and can be considered 'alive' but just do not have the sophistication to where you'd have to worry about captivity or any potential suffering or the like.

I guess it depends on the feel you're looking for. In Eberron the primary users of "elemental magic" are gnomes, and for years they tried to write off elementals as dumb animals, and while that's probably true for lesser elementals, the greater elementals who power the vehicles are very much intelligent, and they are pissed off. It slowly came to light that elementals are intelligent beings, and now there are gnome radicals who are trying o revolutionize the way that elemental interaction works to make it more humane. Eberron is meant for that sort of moral ambiguity, but it really depends on the feeling you're looking for. If you want a slavery undertone do it how Eberron did it, but if you want a clean conciounce, I would take Sparkletwist's advice.

Any ideas on how to avoid having to give every magic item's elemental a personality?

A simple answer would be that most elementals just aren't that sophisticated. This would also avoid ethical issues involved in keeping them. They'd be more like plants or insects, in the sense that they do things and react to stimuli in some fashion and can be considered 'alive' but just do not have the sophistication to where you'd have to worry about captivity or any potential suffering or the like.

I guess it depends on the feel you're looking for. In Eberron the primary users of "elemental magic" are gnomes, and for years they tried to write off elementals as dumb animals, and while that's probably true for lesser elementals, the greater elementals who power the vehicles are very much intelligent, and they are pissed off. It slowly came to light that elementals are intelligent beings, and now there are gnome radicals who are trying o revolutionize the way that elemental interaction works to make it more humane. Eberron is meant for that sort of moral ambiguity, but it really depends on the feeling you're looking for. If you want a slavery undertone do it how Eberron did it, but if you want a clean conciounce, I would take Sparkletwist's advice.

So I haven't read through this admittedly short thread (sorry) but what if the elements where not based on the World so much as they were based on the players? Take this as you will:

Calcium/crystal - bone
Iron/water - blood
Vegetation/fire - muscle
Acid - bile
Void/Aether/? - nerves and brain (soul?)

Just thoughts.

[Seraph]

There are also other ways to make it less complicated.  Regarding magic items, maybe a bound elemental doesn't have much conscious influence, so you could avoid having to give it a personality at all.  Or else give it a single personality trait keyed to that element (fire is temperamental, earth is stubborn, etc.).  Maybe the elementals have to be bound into a certain kind of gem. 

I am thinking of the idea of maybe a certain spellcaster would always work with certain specific elementals, rather like the concept of a familiar.  This would at least be the case with most average spellcasting.  Creating magic items would be another matter.

[Rhamnousia]

I had a magic system in mind for a setting I can never quite sum up (based on "The Peerage" idea that a friend of mine wrote on here years ago) that revolves around sorcerers commanding, among other varieties of being, elemental spirits and what I came up for it was that the magic itself extremely physical. One does not simply toss a fireball from their fingertips, for example; instead, their victim is bored-into by molten serpents or enveloped by a swarm of fiery butterflies. A scrying spell requires an invisible fairy to go and observe the target and then return to the sorcerer with what they saw. A freezing spell would drain the heat from the target into a suitable sink, such as melting every candle in the room or boiling an undine into a sylph. The spirits in question may or may not be invisible, but working magic always requires tangible work on their part.

[Gilladian]

Thanks! Things are coming into shape for me. I have a week of vacation at the end of the month and I hope to get a few solid hours work done on the setting and outline ideas for my first adventure...

I'll post a link to whatever I get done.