Discussion Main / FunctionalMagic

Honestly, I feel like this page should be deleted. It falls into the People Sit On Chairs issue: if magic is in a story, it's obviously going to "actually work". If magic didn't do anything, why would you include in the story?

Is this a trope? This seems to be just "Magic". "Magic that works" would be all magic that is actually magic and not someone faking it with technology or smooth talking.

I'm changing the part about "Wiccan magic" in Charmed and Buffy. First off, though Willow invokes goddesses like Hecate and Aradia, it's not clear whether she's actually drawing power from them or indeed if they even exist in the Buffyverse. Secondly, though Charmed used to be PARTIALLY based off of Wicca, NONE of the actual religious aspects are actually a part of the magic, and if it is, then we don't see it on the show (Idk about the novels). A better example would be the Clerics from D&D and the Paladins and Priests in World Of Warcraft.

The quote isn't right for this page. I've seen it everywhere, and honestly, it's starting to piss me off. Especially here, of all sites, where the whole "sufficiently analyzed magic= technology" thing already has it's own trope/page. More than one, if I remember correctly. It should have a different one. Something more broad, like the definition, "the power of apparently influencing the course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces.". Minus the "apparently", part, of course.

Does anyone have a reference to where the Girl Genius picture came from? I've looked through the entire series and I've yet to see it anywhere. Anyone have any answers?

Could we include Silent Hill in this? There's specific instances where characters use herbs such as Aglaophotis in order to perform an excorcism.

Also, specific rituals cause specific effects, such as the immolation ritual Dahlia used to impregnate Alessa.

Alessa also has an Inherent Gift, which takes the form of reality warping. Heather also has a premonition at the beginning of Silent Hill 3 (her accurate dream about the amusement park).

The Otherworld also is heavily implied to be a form of Force Magic. And if you pay attention, it seems that everyone has some powers in the Otherworld, as they ever so conveniantaly find weapons, ammo, clues and magical health drinks laying around. This is probably because of an extension of their will to survive.

Finally, this is a stretch, but the first aid kits, health drinks, and ampoules could be considered a kind of Devic Magic. In real life, a health drink is not going to miraculosuly stitch up your wounds, and neither is a first aid kit for that matter.

I know most consider it to be Psychic Powers, but with rituals, devices and certain herbs having power, it's unlikely that it's all purely mental.

Force magic needs to be removed of redefined. "Tapping into one or more magical forces" is universally present whenever the caster himself isn't the source of magic. Device magic would even fall under the current definition if more than one entity can simultaneously use a "device". This also applies to Theurgy since its source is fundamentally a "device" as well.

Removed natter from Nanoha:

• Considering that there have been at least two apocalypses already, and given the way it works, it's not just possible but downright probable that it's all a case of Magic from Technology, even the parts that appear to work without technology. Genetic engineering, you know.
  • Although that could be possible through a misunderstanding or Lost Technology, but it is highly unlikely. The characters in Nanoha explicitly state it is the opposite, technology was abandoned because magic is more powerful and more stable, resulting in that universe's MagiTek ships and the like. Plus, why would the sand monsters in A's have been genetically engineered to have Linker Cores?

I don't think "Device Magic" counts as a type of magic, though "enchantment" might. Magic devices can made and used many different ways, and the fact that magic uses a device tells us nothing about the underlining system.

... Might i suggest the WEB COMIC - Erf World - has an interesting matrix of magic-types and sub/ cross -types . . . the names of the near-Vancian magic -schools DO initially all seem whimsical — really, like ALL of Erf World's "wonderland"- may look, at first. ... The deadly serious, in-depth characterisation and narrative soon belie the visual of a "Babes-In-Toyland" -whimsy, though the surrealism is studied, as the graphic novel proves to have more a calculated style that plys a tale full of the protagonist's Point Of View ... especially, he is constantly puzzled by pointlessly-Punning Synchronicities or Semblances {{that only he sees-}} mostly in charactures and signifiers parodying scraps of his world, focussing in elements of Mana/ or Magical- Relativity ... {{-all is Punny and tangentially familiar, but mostly surreal, in the eyes of the key Xanathos-speed- Chessmaster / fish-out-of-water - Protagonist, who was a master-wargamer, drawn from Earth to serve rather than direct the tactical play of a fuedal lord's forces - in a real-alternate world version of his own obsessively crafted Fantasy-Role-Playing Games ... - The at-least-slightly- Parallel- Worlds naturally echo with these arbitrarily ironic twists of refference, but in Erfworld, that is all-but-only appearant to the Hero [and an lone useen "techno-wizard-of-Oz -behind the curtain" - character, who seems to also spot the virtual ironies], Erfworld is only weird to One Who has both realities to compare —

—- Might i suggest [a meme to hunt down or sketch up], that The Authors imply & understand - that the Accessable Alternate Universe must have some kind of tangible Common-Ground, and, too, conversely, - a Traveller would never be a comfortable as a contrasting square-peg- figure in a round-peg-hole ground — that that tensioned un/familiarity seen by Our Hero - may be typically liminal to meaning, the strangeness a sublime but saturate fractal friction or resonance, the "Universal-Culture-Shock" a blatant clang of jarring dischord, or subtle synaesthetic, saturate fringe of alienating semi-similarity across every experiential facet or texture of Awareness, in any other Alternity, perhaps... ... O Ops, possessed by persiflage, 'till grabbed by an ear, by a surge of poetics, should be feet-up & dreaming . . .

Sorry, - that's all some fave theme to rave on, like quantum-logical phase-squared imaginary-values in "All-Possible-Worlds"-type Logical Philosophy ... an irrational surreal-realism in [guise of-] (SF&)F ... more of my neverending essay, as a philosopher ...

(-the Meme/s i'm hoping to Trope here, in part, reducing to Occam's-Razor-ish axiomatics, -like: that there is: —> a Minimax of inevitable Truth & fact -in any Fiction, which is never entirely/ only/ always/ but: Imaginary nor False — and must be so, in order to mean anything —- as i like to over- elucidate, myself, obviously, heh...)

Say, it'd be aces, if anyone who might, would comment, here, if just to point a newbie to Tropes & Tropists of alike logos- legos, do tell ... - i'm just post-halloween-party puttering, here, ... winding down an insomnia, and thus rambling more than usual, pardon me, *yawn* *heh*, btw...

- Uncle Sumer -

a thread on restructuring the magic section so that the word magic does not redirect to this page.