Ars Magica Liberalis

[bnewman]

I have an idea for an RPG setting, which is clear enough in my mind and based on material which is well-enough known that I might actually think of producing a sourcebook for it, especially if I get some help.

The short version is this: what if academics was magic?

The roots of this idea go back a long way. As philosopher Ken Wilber and my friends in the Sisterhood of the Owl reminded me last spring, Western civilization once had a Wisdom tradition of its own, comparable to those of the East — a tradition of contemplative, mystical insight, passed from teacher to student.

The same ancients had a clear notion of a good education, and when the traditions of scholarship in the West were restored — in the form of a clerical (if firmly exoteric) order of which most of you are members! — so was that notion. And, as the aptly-named quadrivium points out, the ancients believed that such knowledge was power in a sense that we might well call magical. Similar connections obtain between my chosen field of study and that other ancient tradition (clerical, scholarly, and mystical) in which I have a portion.

Concretely, this is the same old geek trope about an RPG of college life, with character classes for majors, and so forth, only writ large and taken seriously. I have a handful of particular ideas. (A few of these are based loosely on unpublished proprietary content and will have to be vetted and redacted before they can be publicly discussed.) The basic concept could be embedded in any of a number of RPG systems, Ars Magica being the most obvious, if only because of the appropriateness of the name. Mage: The Awakening, which I've seen described as "Ars Magica modern", could also work, with some modifications.

So, first, has this been done? I don't count Ars Magica itself because, as far as I know, it's a setting in which the Western esoteric tradition is real magic, whereas I'm talking about a setting where exoteric knowledge is real magic. And, second, anyone want to help me brainstorm this? I'm particularly hoping to hear from quadrivium, mnemex, and gaudior and friends, but anyone who wants to is welcome to contribute.

Comments

[tibicina.livejournal.com]

I don't know of it being done seriously. I've seen a variety of silly versions over the years, but they were all designed to be sort of complicated running jokes.

I'd be happy to help brainstorm.

You /might/ also look at Unknown Armies as a possible system.

[quadrivium.livejournal.com]

It sounds intriguing, although an example class would be helpful. :-) abovenyquist might be interested too.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I'm kind of confused; exoterica sounds a lot like science to me. Is this a sort of "set at a University with science-as-magic, or maybe science-like-magic" type deal?

It sounds like fun anyway. One of my favorite proposed D&D characters was a mage at university. I never got to write it up, but the idea was that the Universities would have a tradition of undergraduates stealing books from other universities, sort of like some Native American tribes stealing horses from each other? And the undergraduates of the targetted Universities would try to defend the books. Come to think of it, magic being what it is, the books themselves might cooperate, or not.

[batyatoon]

I am intrigued!

...and forcibly restraining myself from volunteering.

[theorb.livejournal.com]

The idea that universities are the continuation of the ancient western traditions of magic is one of those lovely bits of insight that is obvious once pointed out. You've got the funny robes, the leveling up, the ceremonies, the ancient tounge preserved for no good reason, all that jazz. (Yes, I'm not an acedemic.)
However, I don't think it's fair to say that different majors are like different character classes. Different schools of magic, certianly, but the difference between a phys major and a psych is not anything like the difference between a fighter and a mage. It isn't even the difference between a mage and a cleric. It's the difference between a conjurour and an elementalist.
If you want different char classes, you're going to have to start modeling business, the world of crime, and, you know, actually working for a living.

[carnap.livejournal.com]

I don't think I understand what you mean by "exoteric". Google and Wikipedia are not being very informative; I can't tell whether you mean something more like "science", more like "religion", or more like "common knowledge accessible to the everyday person".

[orawnzva.livejournal.com]

It means, basically, public knowledge either in the sense of objective as opposed to subjective (without using the term, Nagel's "What Is It Like to Be a Bat" is a pretty good account of this) or in the sense of generally available as opposed to secret.

I'm specifically not using it to mean knowledge that is advanced enough that most people wouldn't understand it, but could through a program of study of other exoteric knowledge.

[orawnzva.livejournal.com]

I was attempting to refer to academic knowledge generally, and specifically including the humanities, and therefore the idea is a bit further from the real world than just making science more magical. Something like, not only will science work a bit more like in Girl Genius, but also the humanities will work a bit more like in Earthsea.

[orawnzva.livejournal.com]

I suppose it depends on what the goal is and what RPG system it's being compared to. I was thinking of Ars Magica or the White Wolf systems where, within each product, characters are all the same type of being, and there are further subdivisions that are treated a bit like classes in terms of how they're presented in the rulebook. I imagine that most adventures would be set within the academic world, so the modeling of other skill-sets would be less precise (although, of course, if it's embedded within an existing system, the modeling of non-academic skills would be provided).

the difference between a phys major and a psych is... the difference between a conjurour and an elementalist

Isn't that just about exactly backwards?

An example class (just for you)

[orawnzva.livejournal.com]

Major: Classical Music
Medieval division: quadrivium
Modern division: humanities/fine arts

The classical music major learns a wide range of techniques for arranging sonic vibrations in particular frequency ratios (aka music) to produce effects in the minds of human listeners, beginning with but not limited to changes of mood. The typical course of advanced study tends to focus on the historical and cultural uses of music, and on the development of complex performances which are not portable enough to be of much use in adventuring. However, classical music makes an excellent double major, especially with oratory, mathematics, or psychology, and classical music majors with a high consilience score can use a second major in biology, physics, or engineering to explore the effects of musical sound on things other than the human mind...

[carnap.livejournal.com]

OK, now it makes more sense

[morgan-starfire.livejournal.com]

I don't know how relevant it really is, but I am reminded of A College of Magics.

(Which, while it's supposed to resemble a certain institution of higher learning, isn't quite a faithful reproduction. For example, I definitely learned and practiced magic while I was there; in the book, student magic is expressly forbidden on campus. *wink*)

[orawnzva.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that wouldn't really work in this setting, because the magic in this setting is academics — not just based on, or enabled by, academics, but identical with it — you the only way to forbid magic would be to forbid study.

I don't think putting a stop to student magic at your alma mater would work any better.