Writing a Fantastic College Series

@Sharysa: Yeah, making Crowley U a trade school sounds like a good idea. I think I'll go with that. I also like the idea of certain kinds of magic being more commonplace to the point of being mundane. Who knows, perhaps by the time the protagonist was in high school, some minor magic courses had been added to the curriculum and that set her on the course that led to her enrolment at the titular college.

@The Man From Outside: Those are all great ideas for courses, and I'll be sure to find a way to include them in the story. I certainly wouldn't have thought of magical equivalents to library science and architecture without you bringing it up, so I thank you.

But as for the use in shapeshifting in Esoteric Literature and Occult Library Science, while I love the Discworld shout-out, I'm a bit on the fence, because I've been thinking for a while that The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body would be full effect in the series, so shapeshifting can be a very risky form of magic to use... unless maybe apes are neurologically similar enough to humans that changing into one would be "safer" than say, turning into a cat (I don't enough about animal neurology to know for sure right now, so I could be wrong).

And since we're on the topic, an idea I've had for a while now is that one field of magic NOT offered in the school's courses is full-blown Dungeons & Dragons style combat magic. While some minor offensive spells are offered in self defense courses, shooting fireballs and lightning bolts from your hands is something one has to get military training to learn, for the same reason why you can't buy cruise missiles and antiaircraft guns at a gun show.

@Maple: Thanks. I'll be sure to post more as I think of them if you want me too, my list is a little science heavy so I'll try and think of some humanities subjects.

As for shapeshifting being affected by The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body, it is a relatively advanced field of magic that has only been researched for a decade or so. The way I see it is that at the moment human magic is still working out how to deal with mass conversion and neurological transfer issues, but it is getting easier to avoid accidentally lobotomising yourself. Apes would be the easiest because they can still communicate, are of similar mass to a human and the IQ hit is manageable, although I don't think that shapeshifting would be used by beginner students anymore.

Perhaps final years working with uber-dangerous texts would be taught to shapeshift on a buddy system, one to shapeshift and study the text and another behind regular but high level security to make sure they don't get stuck. Essentially I think that shapeshifting is dangerous and subject to The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body at the point in time your story takes place but in 15-25 years will be as safe as Dn D shapeshifting, more or less.

Also, on the subject of combat magic, what about schoolyard level 'combat' spells (The harry potter style minor hexes and jinxes)? I know that they won't be 'taught' as such but they would probably exist as students DIY them from scratch or Mac Guyver them from other spells and then pass/sell them on.

edited 16th Jul '15 3:52:50 AM by TheManFromOutside

An interesting way of getting around the nastier side effects of shapeshifting! I also like the suggestion that students would make and trade 'homebrew' spells in their spare time (it certain gives me an idea for one of the protagonists' hobbies, that's for sure).

As for courses without an active spellcasting component, I've already decided that the school offers an anthropology course specializing in the cultures of non-human races, and a course dedicated to magic ethics, but I eagerly await to see what you come up with.

Maybe a course in magical linguistics? Like, why does a certain combination of words work to set off the spell, and are they related, or things like that.

This is assuming that the spells here work that way, of course.

Hell, normal magical history would be fascinating in addition to anthropology. We think flying-ointment was the result of people getting high and BELIEVING they were flying on broomsticks, but in this world, do they gain flying powers without getting high? Or do they get high AND gain flying abilities? Is modern flying ointment developed to keep you from getting high thanks to safety regulations?

Plus, what about American folklore (colonial-era and onward, not necessarily Native American) and how it relates to its cultural ancestors?

Here are some more possible courses:

• Shamanisim and Druidic Studies - Nature and spirit based rituals combined with low level healing alchemy and herbology. Art/humanity field. Despite what you may think, SDS is a serious subject that deals extensively with natural and spiritual magics. Both are hard to control due to their very natures and so students must understand that this is not an 'easy' option. New age mystics need not apply and those that inevitably do often receive at least one free round of concussive dentistry from the serious students for perpetuating the stereotype, before they invariably get kicked out for doing something dangerously stupid.

• Xenopology - A study of the various new races and cultures. Humanity field. More popular than you might imagine, xenopology studies the cultures that have been revealed in the awakening with a focus on their non magical aspects.

• Arcano-Xenopology - A study of the magical traditions of the various new races and cultures. Humanity field. As regular xenopology but with a focus on magical traditions and history rather than culture.

• Xenology - Like biology, but with non-humans. Science field. One of the most varied courses in terms of content and difficulty. Runs the entire gamut of creatures and beings revealed in the awakening. Biologically based beings are considered the easiest to study; elementals and similar beings are as difficult to study and as headache/madness inducing as quantum mechanics.

Also, how big is this place? What are the facilities they have like? Are there any clubs? What is the political situation of this place? Stable? Under pressure from racists on both sides? Attacked by supervillans every other day?

YAY FOR SHAMANISM BEING AN ULTRA-SPECIAL COURSE.

Please refer to "plastic shamans" at some point. The kind who might have some knowledge of actual shamanism, but use it for money and/or duping uninformed Westerners.

I've been thinking on whether spells in this universe work on a Language of Magic or Words Do Not Make The Magic. On one hand, having an inherently magical language would, as you said, make for a perfect course in this setting, and it would also explain why runes and glyphs are such an important aspect of enchanting objects and Geometric Magic.

On the other hand, I always liked the explanation in The Dresden Files that any words could work for a spell whose effect you associate with those words, but that mages use dead languages so that they don't cause a ragin inferno every time they say the word, "fire".

But now that I think of it, I think a Language of Magic works better for the academic setting, so that's what I'm going with now.

Again, great course ideas, Outside! Your thought about studying elemental biology being ridiculously complicated makes me want to have a djinn character as a student just so they can get confused about how their classmates are agonizing over a subject most djinni learn in basic health class.

As for the school itself, I'd say it's around the size you'd expect from a major scientific school like MIT, and the facilities look like those you'd expect at the aforementioned MIT, but with a more magical bent, ranging from libraries of magical grimoires to workshops for golem-making. The clubs range from those you'd expect at a normal college, to some really crazy shit like a Humongous Mecha duelling club, clubs for the aforementioned trading custom spells, and anything else a college student with access to actual magic would dream up.

As for the place's political situation, I imagine racial extremists on both sides give the school a lot of flak for its species integration policies, as well as all manner of religious protesters that have not yet gotten over the fact that magic is part of everyday life now.

Yes, I imagine there would be a LOT of people who would turn a magic for personal gain, whether they be magical equivalents of charlatan doctors, to businessmen that turn magic into very profitable businesses. But I imagine shamanism would be very risky to use to personal gain, depending on which spirits or natural forces one calls upon. Some spirits would be indifferent to such a situation, while others would quickly teach their summoners the hard way that shamanism, like reality warping, is not a toy.

edited 26th Jul '15 1:50:30 PM by MapleSamurai

Reflecting back at the last post (partially because I wanted an excuse to revive this thread), I've realized that the school's facilities are one of the things I've thought about the least regarding my story, so I'd like to ask if anyone has any ideas in regards to that?

Hi Maple. One idea could be the High Energy Magic building A.K.A 'The Cube'. It is literally a five story tall, windowless cube made of a 6 yard thick concrete wall and roof lined with six feet of lodestone-studded lead with all the necessary wards and shields on top of that (and most of the unnecessary ones too). None of the characters have been inside and no one knows anyone who has. A few final years look shifty when asked but all deny having being in there, or even it's purpose.

Another is the Hell Pit bar. Completely unsanctioned and unlicenced, all attempts to have it shut down have failed due to the fact that it is never in the same place twice in a row. The university gave up trying to shut it down by the second year, although the local cops still try when it appears off uni grounds.

Despite the name, nature and illegality of the place, the bar is run by Steve. Steve is an angel, halo and all. He is the nicest, kindest, funniest, most gloriously perverted person you will ever meet. Think Bob the Skull, give him the body of an angel and turn the Mr. Vice Guy tendencies up to 13. Entire dwarven frats (and sororities) have been singlehandedly drunken under the table and he goes through lilim (and any other willing participant, sex/species is irrelavent) like a nerd goes through kleenex, all the while being the most considerate person on the planet. It's like having Mr Rogers cubed combined with the ultimate UK uni SU hero be your bartender.

Just think about what you'd need for spells and then build facilities accordingly. If you need herbs for spellwork, then a college-run garden would be great for cutting down the cost of ingredients, or maybe they work with some nearby farmers to the same end.

If you need a scrying area that's nice and dark to cut down on external distractions, you can soundproof a couple of larger windowless rooms, then paint them all black to cut down on light.

edited 29th Jul '15 3:39:50 PM by Sharysa

For the Language of Magic issue you couldn't go for Option B presented as Option A. So in reality any language can be used for magic, but you teach (read: deceive) all the kids that only these dead languages are magical. Since they've both learnt that this special language does the magic and that everyday language can't do magic there's sort of a double layer safety net in line with the Dresden idea. By the time the students are competent enough to use English to spell cast they also realise that's a terrible idea and stick to the dead languages.

In terms of the college facilities the first couple of questions to be asked are: did the college exist before magic was revealed (whether as a hidden magical college or a mundane college)? And what's their budget like? (Though magic is going to mess with budgetary concerns)

Hmmm... the High Energy Magic Building could make for an interesting storyline. I'll keep that in mind.

As for Hell's Pit, while I certainly didn't expect to get a whole character from this thread, Steve is just too awesome to not use. And I also might have an idea for the bar itself: while the teachers SAY they want it shut down when the higher-ups are listening, you're just as likely to find a teacher frequenting that bar as the students. Outside the bar, however, teachers and students abide by an unwritten rule: "You didn't see me, and I didn't see you".

Thinking about what one needs for magic and figuring out what facilities would accommodate that will certainly make this part of planning the story a lot easier. Thanks, Sharysa!

That's certainly an interesting way to approach the Language of Magic issue. Another idea I had is that magic (or thaumaturgy, at least), is part Language of Magic and part Geometric Magic. The spellglyphs one draws (or traces in the air) are where the magical energy comes from, while the words one speaks act as a "trigger". More powerful spells require more complex glyphs, with lesser spells requiring nothing more complex than an encircled square, while the most powerful of spells require the drawing of ridiculously intricate arrays which are basically impossible to draw with gestures alone.

As for the school itself, it was founded a few years after the Awakening, when magic had become sufficiently analyzed by the scientific community for such a college to exist in the first place. As for the budget, that's also something I had not thought about until now, but since I basically view Crowley U as what is basically a magical MIT, I imagine it would have a better budget than a "normal" magic school.

In other news, I'll be moving tomorrow, so don't expect to see me anywhere on this forum until at least the end of the weekend.

edited 30th Jul '15 7:46:30 PM by MapleSamurai

Hi Maple. How's the new house?

Just had an idea for another building and a new 'class' of 'monster' to go with it. Since Crowley U is a magic school with a non-zero risk of a full scale attack from within and without, I imagine the campus security being more like the ACU from Jurassic World than a team of rent-a-cops or PCS Os on secondment with the equipment to match.

Therefore the security buildings look like regular university security posts are actually connected to an individual, self-contained underground bunker system consisting (At least, the more important/central the security post the bigger its bunker net) of an armory, a ready/rec room and a barracks for at least three full teams (One is on duty, one off duty and the third is on-call).

This means that if a student goes psycho and gets into the eastern security point they don't have access to any of the other security bunkers and that every single security point, from central control to the carpark barrier booth is a Clown-Car Base.

All but five or six security guards are human but by no means does this mean that they are a Redshirt Army. All are highly trained, competent professionals and trying to pick a fight with them will go down like a regular uni student trying to fight a nightclub bouncer or two, regardless of any powers that student may have.

Worse (or better depending on how you look at it), the constant dealing with violent/drunken/delinquent/combination of the three and others supernatural beings has started to turn members of security...strange. Guards that have been around awhile start to become more competent than any human has a right to be. They start developing sixth and even seventh senses for various things and events. Some acquire an encyclopedic knowledge of ways to take on and take down supernatural beings, despite never taking any training, reading up or even encountering subjects beforehand. Other examples include the gaining of minor powers without training and the development of Pre-TSD.

While this is going on guards so affected start 'losing humanity'. Their mental processes and psyches change and adapt to their work but in doing so they start skiing down uncanny valley. The endstage results in a 'Monster of Man' where enough humanity has been lost (not necessarily all of it) and powers gained that, while the guard is biologically and morphologically human, they are all but a supernatural being.

Will continue in the morning after coffee.

I'm liking the new place so far. We've only just started moving my stuff into my new room, since we had to put a new floor into it early into the move.

As for your newest idea, I like what I see. It will be interesting to explore the security officers' transformations (and possibly the cause), but in any case, Crowley U will certainly need their help to survive what I plan to throw at it.

But since I'm getting ready to turn in for the night, I'll just drop an idea right now and elaborate on it on a later date: Magical Girl Warrior RCMP.

Hi Maple.

There are different types of 'Monster of Man', but all have similar baseline powers/traits, such as their voices changing to a creepy monotone or sounding like three of them are speaking at once, or what is known as 'The Fear'. The Fear is a level of uncanny valley creepyness that affects the normally valley-proof monsters as well as human students. The humans get the sense that something is terribly wrong and that they should get away. Whereas monsters and supernatural creatures know deep down that humans are relatively squishy and should definitely not be able to tear their genitals out through their noses, but these ones can do so with their bare hands.

The three main types of Mo M are Hellsings, Psyche-os and Blunts.

Hellsings are crazy prepared, charles atlas superpowered hunter-types with an encyclopedic knowledge of the supernatural and its weaknesses and an obsessive compulsion to squirrel away as many supply caches as physically possible. Vampires and other traditional monster hunter targets fear them the most.

Psyche-os are humans that have gone bestial, acting more like a ghoul or werewolf than a human. They have enhanced senses and the addition of a few new ones, such as thermal or thaumic vision. Minor to mid level passive psychic powers are the norm. Aforementioned ghouls and were-creatures are most wary as no human should be that much of a super persistent predator.

No one knows much about Blunts, save that magic- based creatures and wizards of all stripes start shutting down in terror when they get close enough.

Hi Maple.

I was wondering if there were any major antagonist factions and if so, what are they? I just have an image of WBC-style protesters from both sides turning up to protest only to start beating each other up at the gates; with the students watching, taking bets and commentating as if it is a spectator sport over the school radio station.

One of my ideas for an antagonist faction is what at first seems to be a WBC expy... that turns out to be a Knight Templar Anti-Magical Faction led by the main character's big sister.

edited 19th Aug '15 7:24:43 PM by MapleSamurai

"White Blood Cell"?

"World Boxing Council"?

The less said, implied, attributed to, or thought about any third (religion-coopting) option, the better. I'd avoid it entirely, if only to avoid an outdated Ripped from the Headlines vibe. Try the Oathkeepers instead (look it up - they're somehow worse)?

Wow, I have NOT been paying proper attention to this thread! At the risk of being accused of thread necromancy, let's see if I can start it back up again.

I've been putting some more thought into said antagonist faction so it's not just "evil(er) WBC", and decided to mix my more recent ideas with the villains of a previous story idea I had that never went anywhere. Once I've got the idea fully fleshed out, expect me to drop it at the Villain Critique Thread for some feedback.

Also, I've finally written the first draft of this story's first chapter and am looking for feedback. If anyone's interested in reading it for critique, you can PM your e-mail so I can send it to you.

Just another idea I had regarding this story: specifically, the culture of my world's genies.

I got this idea when I thought about the Islamic story of Iblis. Basically, Allah commanded the djinn to be subservient to Adam, and the djinn's leader Iblis refused, as he saw his kind to be superior to humans. So I thought, "what if Iblis's refusal to serve humans became a pivotal part of genie culture" and this is what I came up with.

First of all, while Iblis is seen as Islam's Satan in the story as in Real Life, genies see him as the hero of their race who said no to human oppression, essentially being the genie equivalent of Rosa Parks. But as with all religious and cultural doctrines, Iblis's refusal to serve humans has been interpreted in many different ways, but the two main philosophies that have sprung from his teachings are as follows.

The first of these is the more extreme of the two: that genies should never be subservient to humans in any shape or form, and that even genies who receive paid employment from a human boss is a disgrace to geniekind. An even more extreme sect of this philosophy is the belief that Iblis meant for humans to be a Slave Race to the genies, which is an influential enough mode of thought that slavery is still legal in the Genie Realm, with humans abducted from Earth being the most common slaves.

The second interpretation of Iblis's teachings is that genies should be the equals of humans. This philosophy is less influential than the former in genie society, but is steadily gaining ground, opening the possibility of diplomatic relations between the genie and human worlds, and also of the emancipation of human slaves.

But even beyond the two philosophies, there is an odd minority in genie society: Muslim genies. It seems strange at first that an genie would follow a religion whose God demanded their servitude, but most Muslim genies interpret Allah's command to Iblis as meaning to serve Allah together with humans... but a more extreme sect of Islam-practising genies take it at face value, advocating Happiness in Slavery under humans. While most Muslim genies are seen as an odd minority at best and race traitors at worst, this extreme sect is rarely seen as anything more than a Creepy Cult, even by other Muslim genies.

In any case, genies of both philosophies hate the "wish-granting genie" trope. However, the animated Aladdin film is seen as Fair for Its Day for acknowledging that the Genie is essentially a slave, and for the movie ending with him being freed. I Dream Of Jeannie, however, is seen as equivalent to "Bob the Happy Slave".

Just in case anyone's still interested in the story, I have the first two chapters posted on my Deviant Art account here.

Enjoy!