History VideoGame / Spellbinder

Spellbinder was originally designed by Richard A. Bartle in 1977. Originally made to be played as a tabletop game, it was successfully translated into several videogames.

* SummonMagic:

* [=Anti-Magic=]: Several examples. Counter Spell prevents any spell from working on the target the turn it is cast, except for finger of death. Interestingly enough, it also protects the target from any physical attack in the same turn. Remove Enchantment kills any monster it is cast upon, as well as removing and preventing the application of persistent spell effects on the target. Dispel Magic acts as a Counter Spell and Remove Enchantment for every single creature and warlock, but only applies a shield effect to the target.
* [=AttackReflector=]: Magic Mirror is this for spells.
* [=AwesomeButImpractical=]: Resist fire and cold in 2 player matches. It sounds awesome to cast one of these spells, then attack your opponent with Fire/Ice storm, or with an elemental. However, the four gestures you could have used to cast this spell could have been used for something useful, such as summoning a monster or inflicting wounds. Against a skilled player. In matches with more than one player, this is averted. Resistances are useful to defend yourself against a storm/elemental while hurting everyone else, or to defend yourself against that tactic.
* [=BadassSnap=]: Considering that some spells finish on a snap, this troupe applies. The best example is invisibility, where the last gesture is snapping with both hands.
* [=BoringButPractical=]: For some people parachaining (repeatedly gesturing F).
* [=MagicalGesture=]: The entire point of the game. Players input gestures into each hand. In order to cast spells, a sequence of gestures must be sequentially entered on one hand. The gestures, and their commonly referred to abbreviations, are clap (C), digit pointing (D), wiggled fingers (F), proffered palm (P), snap (S), wave (W). A gesture that needs to be preformed by both hands for a spell is referenced by its lowercase abbreviation. Two gestures, which are not used in any spells, are the null move (-), and the stab (>).

!! This show provides examples of:

* [=AwesomeButImpractical=]: Resist fire and cold in 2 player matches. It sounds awesome to cast one of these spells, then attack your opponent with Fire/Ice storm, or with an elemental. However, the four gestures you could have used to cast this spell could have been used for something useful, such as summoning a monster or inflicting wounds. Against a skilled player.

* [=MagicalGesture=]: The entire point of the game. Players input gestures into each hand. In order to cast spells, a sequence of gestures must be sequentially entered on one hand. The gestures, and their abbreviations (which is what they are commonly referred to as), are clap (C), digit pointing (D), wiggled fingers (F), proffered palm (P), snap (S), wave (W). Two gestures, which are not used in any spells, are the null move (-), and the stab (>).


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!! Episodes of this series provide examples of:
* The guidelines for listing show-level tropes apply to this list, too. Alphabetical by trope title.
* List of tropes that are only seen in a single episode or a small handful of episodes.
* Tropes ''about'' episodes, like BottleEpisode, are prime examples.
* This list may also include tropes relating to a secondary or tertiary character or location.
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Spellbinder was originally designed by Richard A. Bartle in 1977.

* [=AwesomeButImpractical=]: Resist fire and cold in 2 player matches. It sounds awesome to cast one of these spells, then attack your opponent with Fire/Ice storm, or with an elemental. However, the four gestures you could have used to cast this spell could have been used for something useful, such as summoning a monster or inflicting wounds. Against a skilled player. It should be noted that resist fire has a couple of situational uses.
* [=MagicalGesture=]: The entire point of the game. Players input gestures into each hand. In order to cast spells, a sequence of gestures must be sequentially entered on one hand. The gestures, and their abbreviations, are clap (C), digit pointing (D), wiggled fingers (F), proffered palm (P), snap (S), wave (W). Two gestures, which are not used in any spells, are the null move (-), and the stab (>).