So I'm creating a magic system based on the number six. May have to change that, but I kind of like the word Hex, which pertains to the number six. Here is what I have so far, and I really would like to know what you think and whether or not a better, preferably more simpler way to do it. So the source of the magic is in a dust that's pretty rare and non renewable. You absorb the magic from the dust and now you can use magic. There are six parts to the magic system. Heat: Making things hotter and colder. (I obviously need to do more research in how heat effects things to make it awesome.) Gravity: Making things lighter and heavier. Acceleration: Making moving bodies go faster and slower. (Imagine how awesome that is when combine it with the gravity portion of the magic. Make something heavy and something fast, it's pretty punishing. There's actually a scene where the main character is throwing cards through a door to try and kill someone.) Sound: Quieter and louder. Pretty self explanatory. Light: Making things brighter, or completely reflecting the light to turn something entirely invisible. It can also change colors, which isn't as cool, but hey. The final, I where I'm having trouble. I thought about time, speeding things up and slowing things down, but I would like some other ideas.
Six is a good start. Anything divisible by three, or three itself is very common with magic. From the rule of three, to the three phases of the neo-pagan goddess, there's tons threes which can be easily boosted to six. As for finding your missing element, I'd suggest looking to physics, which already seems to be your theme. Perhaps consider potential energy vs. kinetic as a basic understanding of your magic system? Best of luck!
It's also because "Hex" refers to magic in German. (Specifically, witch magic.) And it is, for the most part, a pseudo-German world. (Though you do have Polish with the House of Belkoshik and Viking with the House of Helmsheim.) Ironically, the only thing not really German is having this system of magic, because the magic described in German fairytales is very witch-like with curses and enchantments, which I did not opt to do in more favor of something more American.
Consider alchemy then? The give and take both goes with physics and your material I believe? It's also very open to modern interpretation.
I love the idea of not totally relying on a somewhat already established system of magic. Time sounds a little bit complicated to write, and a lot of people have decided to use this in their writing lately. However, if you can give it a special spin go for it. Maybe you should think about using Stars. Not in a manipulative sort of way, but observing them. Lots of cultures claimed to predict the future through stars. This can be an uncontrolled aspect of your magic system.
You might consider 'density/mass' rather than gravity, since your other magic types seem to rely on changing properties of the object they're affecting rather than like, how other forces of nature affect them. Similarly you might use 'friction' rather than 'acceleration'. I was thinking 'time' and then got to the bottom of your post, hahah. Dammit. Maybe growth? Primarily if not solely affecting living things, the ability to age or de-age them. Seems a lot like time though, I'll admit, just a bit more specific. Since you have things relating to sight (light), sound, and feel (heat), maybe something pertaining to scent or taste? Sorry I'm not too helpful there. Your magic system sounds very cool and interesting though, I gotta say.
So does a person need more dust to keep using magic? My problem is a lack of possible limitation or stated limitation. I assume the idea here is people with these abilities will face off in a fight? I don't see much in terms of a dynamic fight. I mean. First most people would say a faster person wins. Speed allows you to dodge attacks and make attacks a lot easier. Though if your gravity version can make one weightless or to heavy to move this makes speed worthless. It turns it into a instant win dynamic. Which has no sense tension. I assume there are limitations or you plan to think up limitations but without them here the base is hard to rate. Me personally I think there are two main classes of magic. 1. A spell book. Magic is a very exact thing that must be learned exactly(Harry Potter for example.) 2. Magic is more a theme and has rules to which bind it but no list. (Can't think of a reference at the moment.) Yours seems to fall into that catagory though. Which if so I must ask why you have chosen the six aspect that you have? Not to fault them but they seem to miss out a lot of common concepts. No durability, No strength, or Elemental manipulation. To name a few common ones. Also compared to gravity and well most of what is on this list. Sound and light are pretty weak. Both here are more like debuff abilities but gravity is much worse in terms of debuff and none of the abilities seem to have a way to counter each other. I mean a temp user can set the gravity users clothes on fire I assume? It makes it feel very Rock Paper Scissor -ish. Does that help?
You're absolutely right. There are some limitations and that was actually one of my original problems. You do need more dust and the stronger the spell, the more you need. Dust is more like rare earth elements. Technically rare earth elements are as common as... well, dirt. But to find concentrations and amounts that can be mined is difficult. Most of the dust is held in a city called Merkwald which is actually run by the church which originally created the magic, but later banned, but not really banned, it. (Kind of more like, "Yeah we have a law against magic we don't really enforce, unless we decide we don't like you, then we'll enforce it.") Second limitation is that you can't just absorb magic dust and be good if you don't use it. It's toxic. So absorbing it and not using it is dangerous and absorbing too much is dangerous. Considering more dust is needed for bigger spells, it means some feats are literally impossible. The body naturally expels it in about half an hour. Third limitation. It requires a complex system of spells to use and it takes practice to use them. I wanted a discipline not just magic. So you can absorb all the dust you want, but you can't use the spells, it doesn't do you any good. What's worse, is most of the original spells were lost centuries ago, so it certainly isn't the glorified system of magic it once was. (Long story.) The main character only memorized about 5 spells by the end of the book and mostly in one part of it. While she does have a book of spells that contains many more, she has to still look them up to use them. (It's going into rewrites very soon, and since the magic is such a small part in scope of the entire story, it's really not going to change much in terms of plot and character development.) Forth limitation: You can turn yourself into all sorts of things, but it won't make your body stronger. The gravity can make you heavy, sure, but your bones and organs won't stand that pressure. You can make yourself faster, but your joints won't necessarily take it. Fifth limitation: There is an art of counter spells. Yes, a person has to know what spell you're using to use a counter, but it also means that practitioners has to learn to write their own spells (which isn't easy either) and keep it entirely a secret. So no, while they don't counter each other, they do counter themselves. Yes, a temp user could set a gravity user's clothes on fire... if they could get the spell off in combat and if the master user doesn't know the spell to counter it. Which, considering there were only twenty standard spells left after the purge by the church, is not too hard to figure. True, a person can write their own, but that's not easy either. That's why directly attacking a skilled user with your magic, is a good way to die. Oh. Well they're the ones I use the most because when writing, I found them the most useful. Because Hex is such a cool word and it means "six" and it's also an old German term for magic.
1. Okay. Plenty of medias have magic limited by possession of an item. 2. Here a bit of trouble I have. How long does it take to absorb? The trick with stuff like this. Is you need it to be the best without being too good. Here is an example of possible accidenly making your magic weak. Because if it is so rare and hard to use. It seems people are hardly ever going to be using it. I mean if guns exist guns seems stronger. If guns don't exist. At least swords are easy to use. 3. This actually makes it worse. Because the issue is countering. If a fire user can only be countered by another fire user. Then it becomes a who has more wins kind of battle. Practically instantly. I mean if I got fire and gravity and you got fire only. I win. lol. Also the aspects themselves don't lead to too much countering innately. Imagine if you had the four elements instead(not suggesting it. Just making a point) Fire is powerful! But easy to counter. Water, Earth and Wind can all smoother fire. But then again Fire can still burn through all of those elements. A water user can still be burned. A earth user can still push through water. Does this make sense? There is not really any way to counter fire with gravity or vise versa. Being my issue. 4. Actually my point. Is what is stoopping me from making you so heavy your bones break? 5. Kind of covered this in 3. Well by comprasion I mean. Screaming real loud is kind of weak next to setting the guy on fire. lol no no. not why did you pick six. Why did you pick gravity and ext. over other options. Like strength or durability. Also so you are using the spellbook method of magic? How on earth does anyone learn it from a book if the magic dust is so rare or restricted? And toxic to asorb? I figured it was going to be a bit more innate
Why not use mass? Making things bigger or smaller. I don't know exactly how you'd use it since I don't know how exactly the magic is used in your story. But since everything else is about manipulating (heavier/lighter, darker/brighter), I figured that'd be another addition. BTW, I disagree with Wynn. I think your limitations are great. Magic is so easy in books these days. Having a select group of people who try really hard to master an art is refreshing. Also, I think the light power sounds divine. Don't count out the ability to change color! I know they can make themselves go completely invisible, but you could also just use camouflage.
Oh I wasn't saying the limitation of learning spells is bad. It just seem very hard to learn. So I was question for context of how people do learn. If the material is rare. Though in context if these are more arts of magic with exact spell lists and people tend to learn a little of all of them. Then my arguement of how they clash is also invalid. I just hadn't seen that position being made. Maybe I made an error myself. This context also fixes my problems with light and sound. Before I was thinking of these arts as exclusive to one person. Or one person had only one or two. Being able to be very quiet or very loud seems rather weak next to setting someone on fire. I still think it does but if they are arts people tend to all learn aspects of. Then it is a buff or debuff and they have value. No arguments there.
Honestly, I couldn't care less about what other people do. How long does it take for you to drink water? If you need more water, it takes longer, I imagine. How we still make keyboards, motherboards, micro chips, iPhones and others. (Those are all made from rare Earth Elements. Just so you know.) I've been a martial artist for 20 years. You don't try and tell me how easy a sword is to use. It isn't. So? Yup. It wouldn't work for a story that depends so heavily on the repeating theme of hierarchy structure. Yours is a system of complete balance. Balance is the LAST thing my book deals with. The entire story, from its political and social structure, to its economic inequality is about imbalance. Those who are more powerful oppressing those that are weak. And to make this perfectly harmonized system of magic really starts to undermine that. Yes, there are characters who are more powerful than others that could just crush your bones and be done with that. And exactly what I was going for. It's a bit of both. In a college math class you know some formulas that you use all the time like the area of a circle, and you have a book for the ones you don't use all the time, like converting kilos into pounds. Because those are lame. That's why you read the book.
On the first point. I wasn't saying it was bad. lol I was saying it has been done so obviously it works. lol Looking back I see you were asking more about a sixth then overal opinion. So my bad if you didn't want it. Also I wasn't saying your system needs to be balanced. Just that it lacked balance. If that is your point. Then good job. lol So most of my points were on balance and why it isn't balanced. But if that is what you were going for. They are thus invald. A sixth. I say magnet-like replusion. Because I see a system of pairs. Light/Sound Tempature/Speed Gravity/??? Since gravity is a force of attraction. My suggestion is repulsion. lol
