Creating a magical system is sooo hard š Does anyone have any advice that can help me?
I remember seeing a tweet about it somewhere that has stuck with me for a long time. Since then, I have built my own list of points, and I always use them as building blocks for my magic systems. Hopefully theyāll be of help to you!
ā¤ The main foundations:
- What can be done with magic?
- What canāt your magic do.
- Is there a price/cost of using said magic?
- What does it feel like to use magic?
- For conflict reasons: What can go wrong by using or having said magic?
ā¤ I also expanded these points to write down the following:
- Who does magic affect?
- What can/canāt magic affect?
- Can everyone do magic?
- Does magic have a feeling even when not being used?
- Do people have to learn magic or is it intuitive?
- Who teaches magic?
- Is magic inherited by blood?
- Does the magic tie in with the religion of my world and if so, how?
- Do people need instruments through which to use magic? ie. a talisman or wand
- Is magic a thing a person has or is it acquired? ie. do they just have magic they can access at any time or do they need to drink magic juiceā¢ļø for a quick burst of power?
- How is magic used in daily life?
- Can anything stop a personās magic?
- Can magic be found anywhere?
For an extra bit of pizzazz, I sometimes like to write down different scenarios using the answers to these questions, and that helps me decide on whether I like the way Iāve set up the magic system!
You can also look at the worldbuilding and characterization youāve already down to see how your system would affect and be affected by said magic system.
I hope this helps, and good luck!
This has helped me a lot with building my magic system. I think Brandon Sanderson does a really great job of explaining here how he goes about creating magic in his worlds.
Hello Future Me/Tim Hickson on YouTube has some videos about creating hard and soft magic systems that I thought were pretty cool (a bit old, visual quality-wise, but cool). They incorporate Sandersonās takes without being completely reliant on him.
For those who arenāt familiar with the terms, fantasy writers often discuss magic systems in terms of a scale from the mystical and mysterious (soft) to the strict and rule-based (hard). Both (and the fuzzy areas between them) have their advantages and disadvantages, but they can operate pretty differently, and the two videos dig into qualities that can be particularly important for softer and harder systems.
