22 KiB
[Q][MK] Help me break my magic system
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Author: u/Sagebrysh Rank 7 Pragmatist*
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URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/4tp86j/qmk_help_me_break_my_magic_system/
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Score: 16
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Created: 2016-07-20T03:34:42
Post:
Heyyyy guys,
Its been a minute huh? I'm not dead or anything, I just got really busy with work and haven't been able to contribute much to discussions.
Just so anyone who might have been reading it are aware, Fall of Oso isn't dead. I'm just not very happy with it. I will continue it, but as I've improved as a writer I'm coming to realise its just...not very good. I didn't hash the plot out enough ahead of times, and writing on the seat of my pants like I had been resulted in a work I can't say I'm particularly proud of. That was mostly my fault, I set myself a waaaay too ambitious goal of updating three times a week, which just was not remotely sustainable. I'm definitely still interested in telling the story of Fall of Oso though, and its currently my only outlet for sharing the Aeria universe. What will probably happen is I'll pull down all the existing chapters, do some heavy editing on them, finish writing at least rough drafts for the rest of the story, and start reposting again from the beginning. I worry a lot that I'm just not a very good writer, and that I won't be able to create something that is actually up to my standards as a reader. But then, you learn by doing, only way to strengthen those neural connections is by doing the thing. If anyone is interested in helping me with behind the scenes plot related stuff for Fall of Oso, hit me with a PM. I don't want like, editing help or anything that meticulous, just feedback on characters, how to improve the plot flow, general things like that. I might also switch from first to third person, I'm not sure about that yet and I'm curious about people's general attitudes towards first vs. third person perspectives.
Okay so anyway, one of the few things I'm pretty pleased with is how the magic system came out in Aeria. I think it's pretty interesting. However, I'm also concerned that it has some...bugs that would give a sufficiently munchkinned characters effective omnipotence. I'm not opposed to leaving some channels for misuing the magic for fun and profit in, but it needs to be non-obvious. I worry there's some obvious things you could do with the magic system that I'm author-blind to catch. This not only limits what I can have the characters do, since if I can't think of some niche use for magic, then they can't either, but it also leads to "Why didn't they just do X" scenarios, which are generally something you try to avoid in rational fiction afaik.
Thus I come to you all, with the question: Given the system of magic I describe in this article (magic system) and this article (magic particle physics) How quickly can you break the magic system and achieve effective omnipotence? What are some patches I can introduce to it to make it less prone to potential godmoding while still keeping in a few non-obvious godmode hacks for the main characters to potentially exploit?
Comments:
u/AmeteurOpinions [+14] Finally, everyone was working together. (an hour later)
Aara can be given five basic commands, on which the foundations of Amat constructive and destructive magic are built. These five commands are: move along a specified path, accelerate at a specified rate, respond to a specific instruction from another specified aara or set of aara, consume a specified material, and extrude a specified material.
It'd take me an afternoon to start walking the path to godhood. The first question for breaking a magic system is always "Can you make a computer" or, more generally, "Can you automate the magic?"
In your system, not only is the automation built into the base level, but so is material manipulation, granting nanotechnology.
It'd take anyone with a decent amount of math-related knowledge a week to ruin the local economy, but worse, only a few hours to come up with some recursive world-eating grey goo. You need some hard, hard limits on the capabilities of Amat.
u/thrawnca [+3] Carbon-based biped (2 hours later)
not only is the automation built into the base level
Ah, I didn't notice this phrase the first time I read it:
"respond to a specific instruction from another specified aara or set of aara...The full extent of this center command is unknown, but it is theorized to be Difference-complete"
The path to omnipotence is pretty clear: https://xkcd.com/505/
u/xkcd_transcriber [+2] (2 hours later)
Title: A Bunch of Rocks
Title-text: I call Rule 34 on Wolfram's Rule 34.
Stats: This comic has been referenced 322 times, representing 0.2713% of referenced xkcds.
^xkcd.com ^| ^xkcd sub ^| ^Problems/Bugs? ^| ^Statistics ^| ^Stop Replying ^| ^Delete
u/Sagebrysh [+2] Rank 7 Pragmatist (2 hours later)
Yes, you can make a computer. This is definitely something I wanted to be possible when I first came up with the magic system. However, there is some inbuilt balancing, and it seems like enough, but it might not be. I don't know enough about ground up basic computing and programming to know how exactly you would do that though, which might be a problem.
The short of it is that aara essentially lacks ontological inertia, it takes a constant focus from the mage to keep the aara doing stuff. A mage could create a computer out of Aara, but it would take a certain amount of mental concentration to control the computer the aara is made out of. If they for instance, passed out, their computer might evaporate.
u/Frommerman [+3] (3 hours later)
Or their computer might become self-replicating. The way you described it, Aara can receive orders from each other effectively indefinitely.
u/Lugnut1206 [+1] (a day later)
What? Under "listening magic" you mention that aara can be put into an object and set to respond to environmental triggers.
Are you saying the mage needs to focus on his wand to make sure it doesn't stop being a wand?
u/Sagebrysh [+1] Rank 7 Pragmatist (2 days later)
That in particular is something I'm not sure if I should change or not.
I like the idea of it since it opens up the development of magical items that could be used by a non-mage. This wouldn't be done in the story at the start for cultural reasons (that would be like, sinful and stuff), but I want it to be a possibility.
However, it also might let you have self replicating superswarms of aara, which is not good for balancing. Any way to balance so I can have one but not the other?
u/Frommerman [+7] (37 minutes later)
If you haven't read Ra, you should. That should about cover all the ways this magic system is completely broken in half.
u/thrawnca [+2] Carbon-based biped (an hour later)
Er...how, exactly, would one defend against aara? I mean, it would be ludicrously easy to assassinate someone when you can command 100,000 particles inside their body to wreak havoc.
What impact do ingestion and extrusion have on conservation of momentum? If the consumed matter ceases to have inertial effects (apparently the case, since "Careful study has shown that materials ingested by the aara simply vanish"), then it's very easy to build a perpetual motion machine. If, on the other hand, the mass and momentum are transferred to the consuming aara, then it sounds like you have an efficient way to create black holes.
What constraints are there on the scope of aara control? Can a mage order them to consume a planet? A star? If not, then what is the limiting factor?
u/Frommerman [+2] (an hour later)
Aara appear to be made of chemical matter, so presumably they will just disintegrate in a star. They probably also have problems in lava, just judging by their chemical structure.
Aara basically are a nanotech swarm. That's the problem.
u/Sagebrysh [+2] Rank 7 Pragmatist (2 hours later)
Er...how, exactly, would one defend against aara? I mean, it would be ludicrously easy to assassinate someone when you can command 100,000 particles inside their body to wreak havoc.
Its very hard. However going for those 100,000 already present particles would not be a good idea in combat. Aara are very small, they're effecting a cell-width cross section. It would take a while to kill someone with the Aara in their body, and doing so would actually take a good bit of focus on the part of the mage.
What impact do ingestion and extrusion have on conservation of momentum? If the consumed matter ceases to have inertial effects (apparently the case, since "Careful study has shown that materials ingested by the aara simply vanish"), then it's very easy to build a perpetual motion machine. If, on the other hand, the mass and momentum are transferred to the consuming aara, then it sounds like you have an efficient way to create black holes.
Eat a bunch of mass, take it up high, drop it, and collect the energy from its fall? Something like that? This is the sort of thing I hadn't thoroughly considered, however, there are easier, more mechanical ways of creating an over unity engine/thruster in this setting. Those haven't actually been discovered yet either, but that's really a matter of certain other fields of engineering catching up, and there are likely rudimentary designs for non Aaara-based over unity engines floating around, its just that the level of industrialisation required to make the parts for the designs haven't caught up with the tech base.
Aara is a physical object, but things passing through its centre go away and lose all previous properties until later ejected. It can also not do that. In truly massive swarms you could get some powerful stuff out of it, but that would take more aara then most armies could usually control.
What constraints are there on the scope of aara control? Can a mage order them to consume a planet? A star? If not, then what is the limiting factor?
The limiting factor is the focus of the mage.
For starters, a single mote has an upper limit of material it can ingest of about a gram, so doing anything involving moving large amounts of mass around, you need quite a lot of aara.
But here's the thing. Each aara, and I mean every single one that a mage is exerting influence on require a small quantity of focus. You could tell Aara to make more of themselves, but you couldn't control all of them, so they would sit inert. I haven't done much from the perspective of an Amat character which is part of the problem, but roughly speaking, most amat don't fly, that would take more concentration then they'd be capable of without specialist training.
I imagine the absolute upper limit that a god level mage could control at once would be a sphere of pure aara .25 meters in diameter. This would contain something on the order of 500 quadrillion aara. Even that number is probably too high for story balancing purposes, and it might be better to have it lower, I'm not sure yet. I don't have numbers put to the amount of kinetic energy that an individual aara can exert, which I really need to calculate so I can reverse derive how many it would take to lift a given amount of mass without consuming it.
u/thrawnca [+6] Carbon-based biped (6 hours later)
It would take a while to kill someone with the Aara in their body
No, it really wouldn't; you just ingest a cross-section of their spinal cord. Or, with greater medical expertise, you could target smaller and thus faster critical nerves. As a bonus, start extruding random nerve material as you go, to short-circuit things before they're fully severed.
I've often wondered why more villains don't break the limbs or spines of their prisoners.
If you can strike without being seen, you also have lots of ways to surreptitiously poison the target.
Eat a bunch of mass, take it up high, drop it, and collect the energy from its fall? Something like that?
Attach weights to a flywheel, use computerised timing to consume at the bottom and extrude at the top. Just off the top of my head. No doubt there are endless better ways.
The limiting factor is the focus of the mage.
But that cannot be irreplaceable, because aara are non-sentient, barely alive, suspected to communicate via electromagnetism or similar. Therefore, whatever controls them can be artificially simulated. Therefore, you can design a computer to do it. Bam, self-replicating nanotech.
And if one aara can give orders to multiple others, then you don't even need to solve the mysteries of inter-aara communication to get astronomical force multipliers.
u/Sagebrysh [+1] Rank 7 Pragmatist (16 hours later)
No, it really wouldn't; you just ingest a cross-section of their spinal cord
That would mean moving all of the Aara in the person's body to their spinal cord, and I still don't think that few aara would be able to sever it quickly.
But that cannot be irreplaceable, because aara are non-sentient, barely alive, suspected to communicate via electromagnetism or similar. Therefore, whatever controls them can be artificially simulated. Therefore, you can design a computer to do it. Bam, self-replicating nanotech.
Hypothetically yes. But a lower hanging fruit would first be to figure out how aara communicate at all. Electromagnetism is the prevailing theory, but converting that into even a simpler device then an 'order giving machine' but a 'spelljammer' has yet to be done.
And if one aara can give orders to multiple others, then you don't even need to solve the mysteries of inter-aara communication to get astronomical force multipliers.
that middle command might just end up being too powerful to fit in the story, not sure yet, but I really like the idea of a turing complete magic system, and the idea of doing things like 'programming' with magic. I'm just not sure how to have that and also keep the setting and not instantly causing a hard takeoff.
u/HiEv [+1] (20 hours later)
Actually, you already stated, "A misstep on the part of the healer will often prove fatal as their magic unintentionally wreaks havoc upon the body." So this means that killing people intentionally with magic should be a snap.
Piercing or blocking the two internal carotid arteries should be sufficient to quickly deprive the brain of oxygen. Keep in mind that they're only a couple of millimeters in diameter.
u/Sagebrysh [+1] Rank 7 Pragmatist (2 days later)
True, but the first step most healers take is to add a large amount of aara to the body to bring the quantity up to a 'workable' amount.
Now, you could kill someone with their internal aara, but it would be harder then if you were allowed to use the aara in the environment.
u/thrawnca [+1] Carbon-based biped (4 days later)
bring the quantity up to a 'workable' amount
For healing, yes, you would need quite a bit. If you're going to remove a tumor or set a broken bone, you need a fair bit of manipulation. But to kill someone is much quicker and easier.
This seems pretty similar to the "Twelve Words of Death" in the Inheritance cycle, except that if aara control currently requires concentration, then there doesn't seem to be any real possibility of warding (at least not anything that would stop an ambush).
u/Sagebrysh [+1] Rank 7 Pragmatist (4 days later)
This seems pretty similar to the "Twelve Words of Death" in the Inheritance cycle, except that if aara control currently requires concentration, then there doesn't seem to be any real possibility of warding (at least not anything that would stop an ambush).
Absolutely. The Offense/Defense balance heavily heavily skews towards offense, similar to our world. There aren't usually sieges in Aeria, the battles either culminate quickly with shock and awe tactics devastating an enemy quickly, or it bogs down into something approximating WWI style trench warfare.
Point taken regarding the ease of killing someone. It might be best to balance that by giving the aara a very simple sort of log that could be interrogated later by a mage. Still undetectable to a non magic user, but not completely invisible either.
The problem I have regarding wards and persistent effects is the same problem I have with magic items. I want them, but if aara are allowed to 'save instructions for later' then you can make a self replicating swarm of manites.
Not sure how to get around that one yet.
u/thrawnca [+1] Carbon-based biped (4 days later)
a very simple sort of log
Ooh, extra information storage. The capabilities of the nanotech swarm are getting even better :)
Perhaps it would be better to take a page from Trudi Canavan's writings, and consider the skin to be a natural barrier?
u/Jiro_T [+1] (2 days later)
Actually, you already stated, "A misstep on the part of the healer will often prove fatal as their magic unintentionally wreaks havoc upon the body." So this means that killing people intentionally with magic should be a snap.
This was my reaction to the Dr. Who episode "Father's Day". The Doctor finds that if he tries to save someone by changing history the planet is destroyed. My reaction: This means that the Doctor now has the ability to destroy a planet anytime he wants.
u/FeepingCreature [+1] GCV Literally The Entire Culture (7 days later)
He pretty much has that anyways.
The issue is that he's usually trying to avoid planets being destroyed.
u/Gurkenglas [+2] (17 hours later)
Could you use Healing/Constructive magic to copy an organism? Anyone who succeeds in copying himself achieves global victory in O(log n). Similarly, brain modification. At the least, the results of making a newborn's head gradually bigger (evolution did it too!) should tell our aspiring dark lord how to do better with the next baby. Can you implant personality/skills? Somewhere there's bound to be a cult of a guy who's managed to copy himself into other brains.
u/Sagebrysh [+1] Rank 7 Pragmatist (2 days later)
All that stuff is hypothetically possible but practically impossible. It would take perfect knowledge of the human body, which we still don't have today.
Adding memories has the same problem, it requires enough knowledge of neuroscience to pull it off. Aara doesn't hold your hand or make any of this easy.
u/serge_cell [+1] (2 days later)
The description of magic is very vague. The healing and listening magic imply that either magic particles had hardcoded information about structure/functioning of human body and format of human senses or they actually analyse mage brain signals, deduce his intentions and after that analyse subject body for healing . The former imply that magic is in fact sock puppet for some higher power, this power tailor magic specifically for human and specifically for some functions. The latter imply some kind of near-sentience for magic particle swarm and immensely exploitable.
u/Sagebrysh [+1] Rank 7 Pragmatist (2 days later)
The healing and listening magic imply that either magic particles had hardcoded information about structure/functioning of human body and format of human senses or they actually analyse mage brain signals, deduce his intentions and after that analyse subject body for healing
Its a lot more complex then that. The way with which a mage controls aara is not fully understood for one. The theory that it analyses brain signals for the controlling mage and interprets it kind of must be happening at some point, but how that happens is a mystery. This is a victorian era level civilisation without the foundation in neuroscience to really puts a damper on that sort of higher level research.
The problem with healing magic is that the aara is only as useful as the mage's knowledge of biology. With perfect knowledge of the human body, you could do some impressive stuff, but again, victorian era level of science, medical science included. You're moving tiny tiny particles around through layers of bone and muscle and telling them to deposit stuff in specific places or pick stuff up from specific places. If the mage makes a mistake, you could end up...for instance...scooping up all the red blood cells instead of all the bacterial cells if you're trying to treat an infection.
u/serge_cell [+1] (2 days later)
The problem of that explanation is that if it's true no healing should be possible at all. Human can't possibly "move tiny tiny particles around through layers of bone and muscle and telling them to deposit stuff in specific places". Human don't have enough processing power for it even if we assume some form of clairvoyance into human body on microscopic level. No amount of biology knowledge would help. You need Taylor Hebert with Queen Administrator shard for that kind of multitasking.