anime/manga inspired magic system base [Archive] - Wizards Community

anime/manga inspired magic system base [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
mercurywyrm
08-31-05, 01:38 AM I've been working on the basics behind a more unified and structured magic and class ability system. One that functions better with multiclassing. Some of the concepts behind it are derrived from things like Star Wars, Naruto, Ranma 1/2, Inu Yasha, Full Metal Alchemist, and other series.

The basics are thus:

The basic energy form of the universe is called Chi, chi is everywhere, in living and nonliving things, even in empty space, all energy is chi, most intangible things are chi, without chi, there can't be matter, and matter and chi are interchangeable, but there is a constant amount of chi in the universe.

Auras: All living things have an chi aura, this is their own life pattern, an aura is made up of all the chi within a living being, and for most living beings, when it can be seen, resembles a fire which burns from the creature's entire body, most characters of NPC classes that don't use magic have no control over their aura, to do any 'superhuman' feats or use legendary abilities, aura control is neccesary, controling your aura uses energy, but most aura abilities and controlling uses so little energy it doesn't matter, no matter what, there is no meter for aura energy, aura's are tracked through things like the individual types of energy a creature has, alignment, skills, class abilities, and feats, auras usually retain residual patterns from past supernatural ability use or experiences. Despite being called supernatural, such things are still part of the natural order of the universe.
Ki: Ki is the life energy of humans and nonmagical creatures, Ki is heavily based on the body's primary proccesses, internal temperature regulation, breathing, heartbeats, thought procceses, food proccesing, etc. Ki is manipulated by a living being who can control their aura to manipulate it, wheather that control is instinctive, or concious, trained or untrained. Ki can be drained by some inhuman things or by some powerful special abilities. Ki is used by a character to go beyond their basic levels of endurance who have no actual abilties to use ki for other things. A character's total Ki point storage is equal to their total ability scores added up + their total skill ranks in the physical skill (uses strength, dex, or con) they have the most ranks in + twice their BAB. 8 hours of sleep after a day in which a character drinks a proper day's worth of clean water, wasn't sick, and had three healthy meals spaced at least 3 hours apart restores 10 Ki points, most characters go around without their ki full most of the time. Ki points are used to do actions without taking penalties when fatigued, or to automatically succeed at checks for withstanding heat and cold, or to stay up late, whatever. If a character ever runs out of ki completely, they die instantly. Martially or skill focused characters tend to be most focused on Ki. Ninja and Martial artists tend to use ki directly a lot.
Reiki: This is spiritual energy, spiritual energy is harder to understand than ki, as it is very similar, and yet very different. All thinking creatures have Reiki, gods, demons, magical creatures, humans, animals, and sentient undead. Most ghosts and spirits are quite literally souls that haven't passed on charged with Reiki, but without a physical body or ki. A creature without all three mental ability scores may have ki, but not Reiki Spiritual energy is more mental, related to emotional strength, focus of will, and mental apititude. A character's total Reiki is calculated much the same as Ki, total ability scores added up + their total ranks in the mental skill (WIS, CHA or INT based) they have the most ranks in + twice their BSS(Base spiritual score, a new BAB like mechanic, used both offensively and defensively). Reiki is regenerated through sleep and meditation, 8 hours of uninterupted sleep restores ten points of Reiki, and characters who have ranks in meditation (WIS based skill) can meditate for an hour to restore a number of points of reiki equal to their skill check result. A creature who runs out of Reiki has no will, if a character ever runs out of Reiki they MUST make a spiritual check or gain some form of insanity, characters can't remain concious when out of Reiki, although they can be mind controlled easily.
Chakra: Chakra is Ki and Reiki mixed. Chakra is used by humans to do mortal magic. While Ki and Reiki have many 'magical' uses, only when mixed together to form Chakra and by folding the Chakra into patterns with ritual techniques can 'true' magic be done. Normal humans and most other PC races have to use special hand seals, words, draw symbols, make blood sacrifices, etc. in order to use Chakra. The art of magic is primarily known as ninjitsu or sorcery, and is primarily used by ninjas, and sorcerers. Magic techniques are usually known as Jutsus or Spells. Some supernatural creatures can store Chakra and certain patterns naturally, they will have a Chakra storage ability able to store an amount of Chakra without having to generate it as they use it, naturally generate Chakra naturally under certain conditions, and have certain 'spells' or 'justsus' that they can use at will without a ritual, examples of such creatures are Dragons, Kitsune, and Kappa.

There are other types of energy, but these are not availible for standard PCs who use the basic classes and races availible. They are energy types such as the inverse energy of ki that undead use as body energy, the inerently magical energy of the divine or demonic which is never separated into spiritual and physical, and the different 'classes' of body energy used by some creature types, for instance, creatures that breathe water instead of air have a different sort of ki than those that breate air, most creatures that aren't mundane animals or humans have different types of ki as well, such as dragons or hengaiyokai.

Exampled of Ki use: Manifesting a strong battle aura (this is an ability similar to barbarian rages in the standard game), boosting your speed or strength beyond normal levels, shooting KI blasts (ex. Ranma 1/2 techniques of the Moukou Takabisha or ShiShi Houkoudan, Dragonball Z techniques like the Kamehameha wave or destructo disk), enhancing the physical structure of a weapon (Ranma 1/2 techniques such as Kuno's ability to use a normal wooden sword to cut through trees and concrete like a hot knife through butter, Ryoga's technique to enhance normal cloth bandannas to be tough enough to cut through steel and used as boomerangs), and boosting your healing rate or endurance.
Examples of Reiki use: Spiritual attacks (YuYu Hakasho's Reigun and Spirit Sword techniques, Inu Yasha Miroku's warding techniques and Kagome's Miko skills), manipulating Chi around you (Ranma 1/2's soul of ice, full body defense shooting star cloth, demon god assault bomb techniques), resisting mind control, maintaint concentration beyond normal levels, etc.
Examples of Aura control: Using Reiki, Ki, or Chakra, suppressing your aura to hide your presense from those who sense auras (Ranma 1/2, Dragonball Z, Naruto), folding objects into your aura for subspace storage (Ranma 1/2 Hidden Weapons technique, how many anime/manga characters seem to be able to pull something out of nowhere), creating a presence (some characters, such as Kasumi in Ranma1/2 seem to create a certain presence, for example, Kasumi has a calming presence that makes people unwilling to attack her and try to avoid making her upset, or Happosai a sickening and perverted presence, things like a calming presence don't work unless the character using them is calm at the time, this ability is basically spreading your own emotions to others around you, but weaker characters tend to be cowed by angry presences, or pure or non-perverted characters tend to be sickened by perverted presences, etc.), reading or sensing energy and auras around you, etc.
Examples of Chakra use: Jutsus (Ninja illusions, transformation abilities, elemental techniques, shadow skills, summoning techniques, etc.), Spells (Yo, this is basically point based D&D sorcerer here), dragon breath weapons, Alchemist techniques (Full Metal Alchemist transmutation tricks, not D&D stadard chemistry/alchemy), etc.
Vaalingrade Ashland
08-31-05, 02:21 AM I can't believe I'm doing this, but...

Maybe you should take a look at the Psionics system. Basically, there's one power source, but a number of different methods of using it. Dropping in the desired spells in place of the powers isn't that hard.

BESM d20 does this in a much more complicated, but wholly satifactory way.

My world (in the sig) is based around an anime flavor and I have a spellike ability based caster you may like.
mercurywyrm
08-31-05, 03:46 AM Maybe you should take a look at the Psionics system. Basically, there's one power source, but a number of different methods of using it. The problem with this solution is that taking levels in classes that don't grant power points doesn't work out well for special powers, the system I'm going for, grants more power to do amazing things to martial characters, taking levels in martial artist which is the sort of monk/fighter equivalent I'm planning, will still benifit you as a ninja or sorcerer because you'll end up with more ki to make Chakra from.BESM d20 does this in a much more complicated, but wholly satifactory way.
The flavor is totally wrong here and isn't so broad ranged. The basics behind this system put all magical or supernatural things under a unified system, which remains effective even while multiclassing, powerful justsu/spritual powers/ki techniques/aura control techniques, aren't learned as fast when multiclassing, but the scaling and use of the abilities are all based on spritual(reiki), body(ki), and mixed/magic(chakra) energy as well as base BSS and BAB, are shared by all classes. So say, being a Ninja1/Martial Artist1/Shintoist1, will leave you likely as an effective spellcaster as Ninja3 under my system, whereas under the BESM d20 system, being say, a magical girl1/monster tamer1/ninja1, will leave you with a mix match of weaker abilities and far less effective than say, magical girl 3.

My system essentially focuses, as far as supernatural goes, on building up both the physical stamina, and the mental discipline, to use magic, and at least two levels in any class is guarrenteed to build up both mental disipline and physical stamina. Actually, for the sake of making the game scale faster, I might make the level scaling faster, so that you go up by levels in classes by 2s compared to normal D&D, so that 20 level characters in my new system, will be like 40th level characters in normal D&D. That way I guarrentee both BAB and BSS go up each level for any class, and I give the game a more high powered feel like many anime/manga have.
Vaalingrade Ashland
08-31-05, 03:52 AM In that case, have you seen UA's Gestalt class system?
Gilean
08-31-05, 11:00 AM Contact Xeviat-DM. He has revised magics to be like psionics (the augmentation part) and uses mana die, like HD but grants mana (spell) points.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
mercurywyrm 08-31-05, 01:38 AM	I've been working on the basics behind a more unified and structured magic and class ability system. One that functions better with multiclassing. Some of the concepts behind it are derrived from things like Star Wars, Naruto, Ranma 1/2, Inu Yasha, Full Metal Alchemist, and other series. The basics are thus: The basic energy form of the universe is called Chi, chi is everywhere, in living and nonliving things, even in empty space, all energy is chi, most intangible things are chi, without chi, there can't be matter, and matter and chi are interchangeable, but there is a constant amount of chi in the universe. Auras: All living things have an chi aura, this is their own life pattern, an aura is made up of all the chi within a living being, and for most living beings, when it can be seen, resembles a fire which burns from the creature's entire body, most characters of NPC classes that don't use magic have no control over their aura, to do any 'superhuman' feats or use legendary abilities, aura control is neccesary, controling your aura uses energy, but most aura abilities and controlling uses so little energy it doesn't matter, no matter what, there is no meter for aura energy, aura's are tracked through things like the individual types of energy a creature has, alignment, skills, class abilities, and feats, auras usually retain residual patterns from past supernatural ability use or experiences. Despite being called supernatural, such things are still part of the natural order of the universe. Ki: Ki is the life energy of humans and nonmagical creatures, Ki is heavily based on the body's primary proccesses, internal temperature regulation, breathing, heartbeats, thought procceses, food proccesing, etc. Ki is manipulated by a living being who can control their aura to manipulate it, wheather that control is instinctive, or concious, trained or untrained. Ki can be drained by some inhuman things or by some powerful special abilities. Ki is used by a character to go beyond their basic levels of endurance who have no actual abilties to use ki for other things. A character's total Ki point storage is equal to their total ability scores added up + their total skill ranks in the physical skill (uses strength, dex, or con) they have the most ranks in + twice their BAB. 8 hours of sleep after a day in which a character drinks a proper day's worth of clean water, wasn't sick, and had three healthy meals spaced at least 3 hours apart restores 10 Ki points, most characters go around without their ki full most of the time. Ki points are used to do actions without taking penalties when fatigued, or to automatically succeed at checks for withstanding heat and cold, or to stay up late, whatever. If a character ever runs out of ki completely, they die instantly. Martially or skill focused characters tend to be most focused on Ki. Ninja and Martial artists tend to use ki directly a lot. Reiki: This is spiritual energy, spiritual energy is harder to understand than ki, as it is very similar, and yet very different. All thinking creatures have Reiki, gods, demons, magical creatures, humans, animals, and sentient undead. Most ghosts and spirits are quite literally souls that haven't passed on charged with Reiki, but without a physical body or ki. A creature without all three mental ability scores may have ki, but not Reiki Spiritual energy is more mental, related to emotional strength, focus of will, and mental apititude. A character's total Reiki is calculated much the same as Ki, total ability scores added up + their total ranks in the mental skill (WIS, CHA or INT based) they have the most ranks in + twice their BSS(Base spiritual score, a new BAB like mechanic, used both offensively and defensively). Reiki is regenerated through sleep and meditation, 8 hours of uninterupted sleep restores ten points of Reiki, and characters who have ranks in meditation (WIS based skill) can meditate for an hour to restore a number of points of reiki equal to their skill check result. A creature who runs out of Reiki has no will, if a character ever runs out of Reiki they MUST make a spiritual check or gain some form of insanity, characters can't remain concious when out of Reiki, although they can be mind controlled easily. Chakra: Chakra is Ki and Reiki mixed. Chakra is used by humans to do mortal magic. While Ki and Reiki have many 'magical' uses, only when mixed together to form Chakra and by folding the Chakra into patterns with ritual techniques can 'true' magic be done. Normal humans and most other PC races have to use special hand seals, words, draw symbols, make blood sacrifices, etc. in order to use Chakra. The art of magic is primarily known as ninjitsu or sorcery, and is primarily used by ninjas, and sorcerers. Magic techniques are usually known as Jutsus or Spells. Some supernatural creatures can store Chakra and certain patterns naturally, they will have a Chakra storage ability able to store an amount of Chakra without having to generate it as they use it, naturally generate Chakra naturally under certain conditions, and have certain 'spells' or 'justsus' that they can use at will without a ritual, examples of such creatures are Dragons, Kitsune, and Kappa. There are other types of energy, but these are not availible for standard PCs who use the basic classes and races availible. They are energy types such as the inverse energy of ki that undead use as body energy, the inerently magical energy of the divine or demonic which is never separated into spiritual and physical, and the different 'classes' of body energy used by some creature types, for instance, creatures that breathe water instead of air have a different sort of ki than those that breate air, most creatures that aren't mundane animals or humans have different types of ki as well, such as dragons or hengaiyokai. Exampled of Ki use: Manifesting a strong battle aura (this is an ability similar to barbarian rages in the standard game), boosting your speed or strength beyond normal levels, shooting KI blasts (ex. Ranma 1/2 techniques of the Moukou Takabisha or ShiShi Houkoudan, Dragonball Z techniques like the Kamehameha wave or destructo disk), enhancing the physical structure of a weapon (Ranma 1/2 techniques such as Kuno's ability to use a normal wooden sword to cut through trees and concrete like a hot knife through butter, Ryoga's technique to enhance normal cloth bandannas to be tough enough to cut through steel and used as boomerangs), and boosting your healing rate or endurance. Examples of Reiki use: Spiritual attacks (YuYu Hakasho's Reigun and Spirit Sword techniques, Inu Yasha Miroku's warding techniques and Kagome's Miko skills), manipulating Chi around you (Ranma 1/2's soul of ice, full body defense shooting star cloth, demon god assault bomb techniques), resisting mind control, maintaint concentration beyond normal levels, etc. Examples of Aura control: Using Reiki, Ki, or Chakra, suppressing your aura to hide your presense from those who sense auras (Ranma 1/2, Dragonball Z, Naruto), folding objects into your aura for subspace storage (Ranma 1/2 Hidden Weapons technique, how many anime/manga characters seem to be able to pull something out of nowhere), creating a presence (some characters, such as Kasumi in Ranma1/2 seem to create a certain presence, for example, Kasumi has a calming presence that makes people unwilling to attack her and try to avoid making her upset, or Happosai a sickening and perverted presence, things like a calming presence don't work unless the character using them is calm at the time, this ability is basically spreading your own emotions to others around you, but weaker characters tend to be cowed by angry presences, or pure or non-perverted characters tend to be sickened by perverted presences, etc.), reading or sensing energy and auras around you, etc. Examples of Chakra use: Jutsus (Ninja illusions, transformation abilities, elemental techniques, shadow skills, summoning techniques, etc.), Spells (Yo, this is basically point based D&D sorcerer here), dragon breath weapons, Alchemist techniques (Full Metal Alchemist transmutation tricks, not D&D stadard chemistry/alchemy), etc.
Vaalingrade Ashland 08-31-05, 02:21 AM	I can't believe I'm doing this, but... Maybe you should take a look at the Psionics system. Basically, there's one power source, but a number of different methods of using it. Dropping in the desired spells in place of the powers isn't that hard. BESM d20 does this in a much more complicated, but wholly satifactory way. My world (in the sig) is based around an anime flavor and I have a spellike ability based caster you may like.
mercurywyrm 08-31-05, 03:46 AM	Maybe you should take a look at the Psionics system. Basically, there's one power source, but a number of different methods of using it. The problem with this solution is that taking levels in classes that don't grant power points doesn't work out well for special powers, the system I'm going for, grants more power to do amazing things to martial characters, taking levels in martial artist which is the sort of monk/fighter equivalent I'm planning, will still benifit you as a ninja or sorcerer because you'll end up with more ki to make Chakra from.BESM d20 does this in a much more complicated, but wholly satifactory way. The flavor is totally wrong here and isn't so broad ranged. The basics behind this system put all magical or supernatural things under a unified system, which remains effective even while multiclassing, powerful justsu/spritual powers/ki techniques/aura control techniques, aren't learned as fast when multiclassing, but the scaling and use of the abilities are all based on spritual(reiki), body(ki), and mixed/magic(chakra) energy as well as base BSS and BAB, are shared by all classes. So say, being a Ninja1/Martial Artist1/Shintoist1, will leave you likely as an effective spellcaster as Ninja3 under my system, whereas under the BESM d20 system, being say, a magical girl1/monster tamer1/ninja1, will leave you with a mix match of weaker abilities and far less effective than say, magical girl 3. My system essentially focuses, as far as supernatural goes, on building up both the physical stamina, and the mental discipline, to use magic, and at least two levels in any class is guarrenteed to build up both mental disipline and physical stamina. Actually, for the sake of making the game scale faster, I might make the level scaling faster, so that you go up by levels in classes by 2s compared to normal D&D, so that 20 level characters in my new system, will be like 40th level characters in normal D&D. That way I guarrentee both BAB and BSS go up each level for any class, and I give the game a more high powered feel like many anime/manga have.
Vaalingrade Ashland 08-31-05, 03:52 AM	In that case, have you seen UA's Gestalt class system?
Gilean 08-31-05, 11:00 AM	Contact Xeviat-DM. He has revised magics to be like psionics (the augmentation part) and uses mana die, like HD but grants mana (spell) points.