M. A. R. Barker on magic

[geoffrey]

[Though this concerns a quote from M. A. R. Barker, this thread does not deal with Tekumel in particular, but with fantasy in general.]

Consider the following quote from M. A. R. Barker's "Create a Religion in Your Spare Time for Fun and Profit" (originally published in Gryphon, Fall 1980):

'In reality, of course, “magic” would rapidly become the fiercely guarded private property of the most ruthless and influential forces in the society: the priestly hierarchy, the secular rulers, or a combination of the two. A good sorcerer, therefore, might find himself rather like a World War II rocket expert, whisked off by either the Russians or the Americans to a strange country, pampered and fed but worked very hard, and probably stamped “Top Secret” forever.'

That makes a lot of sense to me. Consider that no real-world government tolerates its private citizens owning nuclear weapons, or tanks, or fighter planes, or naval destroyers, or etc. Would a government in a fantasy world allow individuals to have fireball spells or wands of magic missile? Unlikely.

Could a single wizard, or even a small group of them, stand against a concerted effort by a government (with its armies, high-level fighters, high-level magic-users, etc.) to crush their resistance? Unlikely. Unless, of course, the government was weak, but then how could it exist in a world of mighty mages? Wouldn't such mages and/or clerics take over?

[Finarvyn]

That's almost the premise behind a lot of the Marvel universe, such as the X-Men. Some folks show an unnatural talent and then get hounded and the government tries to control them.

I suppose the alternate possibility would be more like in the Dresden Files, where Harry advertises his services as a Wizard but basically no one believes him.

[DungeonDevil]

That's pretty much the gov't's take on child prodigies -- esp. those from other unfriendly, or borderline-unfriendly states. They get whisked off to the Pentagon where they grow up in the sub-sub-basement under flourescent lighting under close surveillance. I doubt they live long in that environment. MUs in a fantasy campaign would likely be regarded in a similar manner: those who dominate a society would want to own them and dictate to them or else they would have to be destroyed. Any powerful PC -- not just MUs -- would be regarded as a threat to those who hold the status quo in the campaign, so they may find themselves up against, not just monsters, demons and the greater forces of evil, but also temporal rulers.

[kent]

Relatively few spells would be useful to a "government" or whatever the dominant social force is in a region. So control of magic would involve stifling and repression much like artists like Shostakovich were stifled under Stalin and lived in fear of disapproval from bureaucratic observers to the point of neurosis. Or if they are more like scientists then they may have plenty of funding but be restricted in what they can work on. State approved wizards, like state approved artists or scientists would be a lesser breed. Perhaps as a body they might be impressive in a limited domain with politically correct objectives but as individual adventurers they would be weaker than the cussed loner wizards.

In addition the process itself of corralling wizards to serve a regional power would drive those who valued their independence of thought and action to neighboring regions, which could be self defeating.

[inkmeister]

Very good topic.

I think the answer to this really depends on the nature of magic.

One reason I think it might not go as you (or Barker) say, is that there is a key difference between D&D magic users and rocket scientists/weapon engineers. That difference is that magic users can do their magic independent of most resources or other people. They pull elemental energy out of thin air. Also, unlike any real world scientist, wizards can turn invisible, teleport, fly, breathe underwater, and so on. A trained wizard will not be nearly so easily controlled as an EArth scientist. A big factor, however, is going to be who controls the flow of magical knowledge. If there is a large barrier to entry in the magical field, then maybe it will work out as Barker predicts, or otherwise a few elite wizards may control how magic is used throughout the world (heck, wizards may very well be the rulers). If the barrier to entry is not so severe, I would expect magic to work as technology does in our world - it will be widespread and relied upon for everything. Actually, I think D&D magic seems to lean this way. Even the way magic is defined is very consistent, fast acting, and so on... much more like technology than anything mystical.

But magic in a lot of fiction is not like D&D magic, and so in that case I think Barker's point of view makes a lot more sense. In fiction, magic often seems to be more about dealing with otherworldly entities, or using magical items, and also seems to be less instantaneous and predictable, so the individual wizard is less powerful and probably more dependent on others.

[greentongue]

"A trained wizard will not be nearly so easily controlled as an EArth scientist."
- A wizard does not start as trained and thus would be under control as soon as their abilities were discovered by the current ruling structure.
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[geoffrey]

Jun 4, 2013 11:48:09 GMT -6 greentongue said:

A wizard does not start as trained and thus would be under control as soon as their abilities were discovered by the current ruling structure.

That is my thought as well. Check-out the starting ages for magic-users in the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide: 26 to 40, with 33 being the average. (Compare the starting age for fighters: 16 to 19.) That indicates many years (perhaps even a couple of decades) of training to become a 1st-level magic-user. Surely during that 15ish-year apprenticeship, the masters would groom and influence and vet their apprentices. Any who showed signs of becoming a loose cannon would be expelled from the apprenticeship, ensuring that most who graduated would be loyal minions of the state. The handful who slipped through the cracks would be out-numbered and out-gunned 50 to 1, and thus easy prey.

[kent]

Jun 4, 2013 20:16:05 GMT -6 geoffrey said:

Jun 4, 2013 11:48:09 GMT -6 greentongue said:

A wizard does not start as trained and thus would be under control as soon as their abilities were discovered by the current ruling structure.

That is my thought as well. Check-out the starting ages for magic-users in the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide: 26 to 40, with 33 being the average. (Compare the starting age for fighters: 16 to 19.) That indicates many years (perhaps even a couple of decades) of training to become a 1st-level magic-user. Surely during that 15ish-year apprenticeship, the masters would groom and influence and vet their apprentices. Any who showed signs of becoming a loose cannon would be expelled from the apprenticeship, ensuring that most who graduated would be loyal minions of the state. The handful who slipped through the cracks would be out-numbered and out-gunned 50 to 1, and thus easy prey.

I consider magic to be a high level intellectual discipline and anyone who has studied anything difficult with intensity knows you have gone far beyond rote learning and 'grooming' and 'influence'. You have to understand things for yourself and by yourself. Deep thinkers and intelligent people tend to be independent minded and to describe someone who is independent as 'a loose canon' is ludicrous.

You can't have it both ways. Either magic-users are like technicians who are produced in droves, require little brain power and don't need to study until their thirties, OR, they are the highly individualised clever characters we read about in the Dying Earth.

The way I see it if magic schools need to exist in your world they might plausibly serve to get a magic user to a point where he can find a master for one to one instruction and after some time with this master he becomes 1st level.

Socrates - Plato - Aristotle; not exactly clones either.

[thorswulf]

"My god gentlemen we have a wizard deficit. If the (insert evil power here) has them then we need them!" That seems to be reactive thinking I know, but it would have made a very funny, albeit surreal Bloom County cartoon strip....

[geoffrey]

Jun 5, 2013 6:54:12 GMT -6 kent said:

I consider magic to be a high level intellectual discipline and anyone who has studied anything difficult with intensity knows you have gone far beyond rote learning and 'grooming' and 'influence'. You have to understand things for yourself and by yourself. Deep thinkers and intelligent people tend to be independent minded and to describe someone who is independent as 'a loose canon' is ludicrous.

Kent, it sounds as though you have been more fortunate in your acquaintances than I. In the United States, virtually everyone sends his children to public school and basically accepts the views of the Democratic or Republican party (or is too apathetic to care). You know how many libertarian homeschoolers I know (in real life, not including via the internet)? Me. That's it. I know a handful of people who do not send their children to public school, but none of them thinks outside the world-view of the Democratic/Republican party. I know a handful of people who think apart from the Democrat/Republican party, but all of them send their children to public school. Sadly, I have never met a university professor who was an exception to this rule. In short, everybody I know is mainstream in his thinking, and regards those outside the mainstream as crazy (at best) or as threats (at worst). These people I know are clearly not independent thinkers.

I suspect that deep thinkers virtually never stray for long into established pathways. Plenty of intelligent people go to college, take a degree, get a high-paying job, vote Democrat/Republican, and put their children on those yellow buses, with nary a care in the world. But deep thinkers? They are primarily regarded as nuts and as losers because they do not subscribe to the system. They do not think that everything is basically right and OK (with perhaps a little room for slight changes on the edges).

In view of the above distinction (between "intelligent people" on the one hand and "deep thinkers" on the other), I think that intelligent people would be the graduates of D&D Land's magic schools. The deep thinkers would either drop-out or get expelled. The 1 in 100 of the deep thinkers who managed to become a magic-user would eventually leave the state's fold, be declared a menace/terrorist/criminal/etc. and exterminated "with extreme prejudice".

Consider politicians, military brass, administrators, and others in positions of power. Do they tend to be deep thinkers?

[greentongue]

Jun 4, 2013 20:16:05 GMT -6 geoffrey said:

Deep thinkers and intelligent people tend to be independent minded and to describe someone who is independent as 'a loose canon' is ludicrous.

Someone who is independent as 'a loose canon' by definition.

Uncontrolled power is dangerous. It must either be brought under control or eliminated.

As with the Democrat/Republican example, the accepted world view will help define "the box" that most people will comfortably remain in. Those that are rare and have a knack for magic are likely to already be indoctrinated in the standard world view. Making them feel special and bringing them into the leadership structure will go a long way towards bringing them under control.
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[geoffrey]

Greentongue, those are Kent's words, not mine. It's easy to get the tags mixed around when quoting from a post that quotes someone else.

[greentongue]

I would expect a Priest to Sorcerer progression with the gifted few separated out and paired with a mentor.
Priests would learn by rote memorization of spells/prayers that worked.
Sorcerers would learn what was "behind the curtain" and the actual workings of magic.
I would expect them all to receive religious training with Sorcerers likely to be a bit more open minded,
more focused on function than dogma
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[waysoftheearth]

Jun 5, 2013 12:06:54 GMT -6 greentongue said:

Uncontrolled power is dangerous. It must either be brought under control or eliminated.

Or ignored. Or shunned, or marginalized, or mitigated by "protective measures". Or ingratiated, or supplicated, or otherwise catered to. There must be other options too.

Which option is appropriate really depends a lot on the setting. There isn't always a centralised authority capable of controlling or eliminating. There isn't always a centralised authority at all!

I think it's a very campaign specific concern. In most psuedo-medieval settings, even tiny regions such as knightly fiefdoms are virtually a "law" unto themselves. Individual knights and lords are the local "powers", and they probably don't do a lot of cooperating. Most of them probably don't even know what is happening 20 miles away until days or weeks later.

On the otherhand, there might be "knightly orders" about with specific missions (such as kill all sorcerers), but even these have limited influence (and resources), and for every anti-magic order there is just as likely to be another pro-magic order set against them.

Thinking thru some of these things certainly goes along way toward creating a campaign backstory

[kent]

Geoffrey, we are talking at cross purposes without definitions although I doubt our definitions would resemble each other. A deep thinker for me is likely a mathematician, a theoretical physicist or an artist. Something of those orders. Politics is not a subject that attracts intelligent people, nor is there any reason to believe there are rational solutions to be found for the equitable treatment of hundreds of millions of people all at once.

I draw a distinction between radicals and extremists, which include lunatics, and the independent thinking that goes on inside and outside universities in abundance. Independent thinking means one is free to make up one's own mind without coercion or intimidation. Independent thinking does not necessitate reaching fringe opinions which are opposed to the prevailing view.

I have made the point above that if magic is an arduous intellectual discipline, suggested by the starting age for MUs, then it is better for MUs to be independent minded and free to develop their own ideas than to be coerced by a government into researching whatever the monolithic bureaucracy decides. The latter would produce inferior MUs and it seems to me only second rate MUs would stand for it , the better MUs fleeing such a state.

[greentongue]

Jun 6, 2013 12:57:43 GMT -6 kent said:

Politics is not a subject that attracts intelligent people,

That is a separate topic of which I suspect you have a strong opinion.

I have made the point above that if magic is an arduous intellectual discipline, suggested by the starting age for MUs, then it is better for MUs to be independent minded and free to develop their own ideas than to be coerced by a government into researching whatever the monolithic bureaucracy decides. The latter would produce inferior MUs and it seems to me only second rate MUs would stand for it , the better MUs fleeing such a state.

Producing inferior and only second rate MUs is not a problem if your opponents have no better. Besides it might make them easier to control while seeming to support them.
For game purposes, the players are likely the "independent minded" MUs that will not be second rate.
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[geoffrey]

Jun 6, 2013 12:57:43 GMT -6 kent said:

A deep thinker for me is likely a mathematician, a theoretical physicist or an artist. Something of those orders...

I draw a distinction between radicals and extremists, which include lunatics, and the independent thinking that goes on inside and outside universities in abundance. Independent thinking means one is free to make up one's own mind without coercion or intimidation. Independent thinking does not necessitate reaching fringe opinions which are opposed to the prevailing view.

I have made the point above that if magic is an arduous intellectual discipline, suggested by the starting age for MUs, then it is better for MUs to be independent minded and free to develop their own ideas than to be coerced by a government into researching whatever the monolithic bureaucracy decides. The latter would produce inferior MUs and it seems to me only second rate MUs would stand for it , the better MUs fleeing such a state.

Perhaps, kent, our positions are closer than I originally thought. I was not envisioning a fantasy world in which magic-users were "coerced by a government into researching whatever the monolithic bureaucracy decides." Rather, I am envisioning a fantasy world in which all magic-users learn their magic in a system of magic schools that is ultimately controlled by (but not micro-managed by) and answerable to the government. In other words, I'm not imagining a scenario in which a mundane government functionary is telling high-level magic-users which magical experiments to conduct, and how. Instead, I'm imagining that the government controls who has access to magical training and in what circumstances magic spells can be cast. For example:

War? Then the magic-users all find themselves drafted into the war effort.

Rogue wizard setting-up shop outside of the approved magic education system? Then he's brought back into the fold or eliminated.

A known rabbled-rouser wants to attend the magic academy? Application denied.

[geoffrey]

Jun 6, 2013 18:19:04 GMT -6 greentongue said:

For game purposes, the players are likely the "independent minded" MUs that will not be second rate.
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I agree. Your words remind me of the first sentence on page 29 of the AD&D Players Handbook: "An assassin character need not be a member of the Assassins Guild of the town or city he or she dwells in, but all non-player assassin characters are members of such guilds."

Applying that to magic-users, one could posit a setting in which virtually all non-player magic-users are products of the state-approved magic academy, and basically loyal to the academy and to the state. If the PC magic-users were not likewise, they would find themselves without access to the magical learning and help of the academy. They could also find themselves regarded as threats and hunted by agents of the magical academy.

[klamath]

I don't know. It seems to me that Barker's original idea only makes sense with two givens: (1) magic works as it does in most RPGS--it is basically combat-oriented, highly effective, and limited to certain 'classes' or people with some sort of special background and (2) you have a very strong state system, as in his analogy with the Cold War.

Neither of these need be the case, of course. In real-world societies, combat magic is pretty rare (for obvious reasons) and though many societies have magical specialists of one kind or another, it's also common for many people to know some small-scale magic that is useful in their everyday lives. So magic cannot be so easily locked away.

Further, strong state structures are not the norm in the sorts of societies we tend to simulate in RPGs. Governments, even strong ones like the Roman empire at its height, have remarkably limited power over day-to-day life and local affairs; they rely on the cooperation of local elites to get things done. Projecting our image of what a state is, and what it does, into an RPG with a pre-modern setting is misleading.

Finally, the logic is too neat; real life is much messier. I could make a strong argument along similar lines that if a world power in the 21st century had a top-secret program to spy on phone and internet records, they would never entrust knowledge of it to a contractor who might well blow the whistle. But if fact one such government apparently did so.

[geoffrey]

Assuming D&D magic basically works as it is presented in OD&D, I think that the best analogy is military-grade stuff in the hands of civilians. How many U. S. civilians possess functional nuclear weapons, tanks, F-15 fighters, Stealth aircraft, naval destroyers, etc.? Basically zero. Just as the government would not regard with equanimity a citizen in Nevada with an operational F-15, so a fantasy government would not be blase about a magic-user with a spell-book full of spells such as fireball and invisibility.

[Deleted]

Jun 11, 2013 11:49:48 GMT -6 klamath said:

(2) you have a very strong state system, as in his analogy with the Cold War.

This.

Feudal "government" was so loose as to be virtually incomprehensible to modern people. Though I thought Phil's article was amusing, it made no difference in how I run magic in D&D.

[terje]

If there where powerful sorcerers would they not be able to take control over the state (if worldly power interested them) and with the use of magical means of long distance communication and mass destruction (and construct soldiers, and surveillance, and...) they should be able to replace any tribal or feudal society with a centralized government. Of course, the leaders of such a magicocracy would not want competing sorcerers outside the state and would therefore need to enforce a strict and hierarchical guild-system or some other kind of government monopoly of magic.

But of course, things may look different if magicians are very rare, very common or do not have any interest in mundane affairs.

[greentongue]

Since the core setting is Tekumel, I have to assume the organized religions would be the leaders of such a magicocracy. I see the Imperial family as the figurative rulers that moderate between these religious factions almost like parliamentary system.

This would allow the Imperials to 'sponsor' powerful sorcerers who were independent of the organized religions.
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