# How common are the Unusual people in your setting?(Wizards,Psychics,etc.)



## Hainted (Jun 21, 2015)

I'm just curious because I've reached a point in my novel that this has come up. I'm dealing with superhumans, but it makes me wonder what a proper balance in the world for those who aren't the norm?

I tend to figure 1 in 100 have the potential and 1 in 1000 actually develop it. (Of course not everyone who develops it actually survives the initial activation, but...)This means in my fictional city roughly 3,000 could be superhuman but only around 300 actually are.

What's your numbers?


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## Saigonnus (Jun 21, 2015)

Well, let's see. Out of a city of nearly 15 thousand (most of whom can use magic) there is only one transmuter; however half-trained she is. She isn't of their culture, she was adopted when she was found wandering in the wilds. 

On the other side , i have a culture with no magical capability at all. (They have the ability to learn, it has simply fallen out if practice and use) 

One of the main characters is "woken up" by the goddess Aeshir when her power is being subverted at one of her divine sites. So, one in several hundred thousand in the culture that spans 1/4 of the continent or so.

In the final MC's culture, magic is common, but not really used in everyday life like culture 1 does. It revolved generally around healing, wards and other passive abilities. 


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## X Equestris (Jun 21, 2015)

Within my setting, about 1% of the population are born with the ability to use magic, and most of them are fairly weak. Perhaps one in a thousand would be able to use regularly in a military capacity.


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## WooHooMan (Jun 22, 2015)

Of a population somewhere in the several million range, there are exactly 10 magic-users.  Since you cannot be born with magic nor can it be learned, it's pretty unlikely there will ever be anymore than 10 but there will always be at least one.
Also, none of the main heroes are magic users but two secondary villains are.  
So, yeah, it's a low-magic fantasy setting.


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## Feo Takahari (Jun 22, 2015)

I don't have numbers, but most magic-users go their entire lives without meeting or even confirming the existence of other people with the same abilities. Two magic-users meeting in the same city is a Big Deal.


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## ThinkerX (Jun 22, 2015)

I gave quite a bit of thought to this.  Lessee...

Principle nation of the principle world has a population of around twenty million - a bit less than the old Roman Empire (30-40 million, time and source depending).  I wanted magic to be weak and rare (by most fantasy standards) but not unknown.

So...

By and large, psi ability (magic) is something you are born with.  There are exceptions, but they're rare - near death experiences and the like. More, magical talent doesn't always carry from generation to generation.  It can skip around and turn up in unexpected places.  But, real rough rule of thumb, about 1 person in 1000 will have enough magical talent to be worth training.

First, the 'standard mages'

Of these, around half go through life untrained, their arcane talent manifesting as being unusually lucky or having an uncanny sense of direction or some such.  Maybe 10,000 or so at any given time.  

Most of the rest - about 6000 or so - enter the ranks of the Church, where they join one of the four or five orders dedicated to magic.  

The remainder fall into three broad categories: Academics, Wanderers, and Hedge.  Academics are sometimes found in the courts of powerful nobles but more often within one of the four cities which boast academies dedicated to the arts magical.  Wanderers are often former Academics.  They roam the empire, working wonders for coins and a place to stay.  Hedges are purely local mages of mostly minor talent (often failed Academics).

In the course of my stories, the Empire was confronted with a foe that made free use of black magic, especially demon summoning.  As a desperation tactic, imperial officials scoured the land, tracking down everybody they could find with even a smidgen of magical talent and packing them off to specially established places for arcane training.  As the training was rushed (about a third the normal time) and the talent pool wasn't all that great...well most died, but there are a fair number of half trained mages wandering around now.

Godborn and Darkborn

The Spring and Fall equinoxes on my world are special days, charged with immense magical energy.  About one in ten of those born on these days have significant magical talent.  Godborn (Spring equinox) are likeable and pleasant, with innate talent for healing and protective magic.  They have the knack to 'hear lies,' making them useful in legal situations.  Darkborn (Fall equinox) are surly and self centered, with knacks for necromancy and hurtful magic, including demon summoning.  Godborn are usually recruited into the Church and trained as healers.  Darkborn are often killed at birth, or packed off to remote monasteries.  

Conjurers

These are wizards, often of high rank or caste, who have elected to take a short cut:  instead of casting most spells themselves, they conjured a demon or spirit to work magic on their behalf.  Demons, however, have goals of their own and tend to be far better at negotiation than the humans summoning them, so often the wizards become puppets.  Apart from a few rudimentary spells, most conjurers learning stops about the time they summon their first demon.  Conjuring demons is illegal in the empire, carrying an automatic death sentence.


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## Miskatonic (Jun 22, 2015)

Well there are two separate realms, one of which lies hidden for at least half of the book, and that is basically where 99% of supernatural creatures reside. In the other parts of the world there are a fair share of magic users and some supernaturals but not nearly on the same scale. It's a sword and sorcery fantasy world so it goes without saying that there will be plenty of unusual people.


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## valiant12 (Jun 22, 2015)

My main character is born in a place where more than 90 percent of the people are magic users. Supernatural powers, especially powerful and destructive ones are super rare in the world as a whole and aren't distributed evenly among different nations.


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## Tom (Jun 22, 2015)

Oh, man. Hmm. Well, magic practitioners are actually pretty common in my world. I'd say maybe 1 in 100 people can become a wizard or warlock. Only 1-2% of the population, however, is born with innate magic, which is the ability to use magic without spells.


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## Gurkhal (Jun 22, 2015)

Depends on what you mean. In regards to Itzaya I'm leaning towards a form of demi-gods and they kind of go with the activities of the deities, so at one time it could be many while at another it could be few. But in general I would say that humans who break the normal limitations of humanity in some form or another is probably 1 in 1000 000 at most, could be fewer.


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## Garren Jacobsen (Jun 22, 2015)

Well for one book I've written there are two societies one of which is purely magical the other of which is purely non-magical. So...60-40 split in favor of the non-magic people. In another book magic is fairly rare to develop. I don't have hard numbers for this but of a country of millions maybe 1,000 or so. In another book everyone has access to magic, they just need a property interest in order to access the magic (so they need to be a lessee or owner of that piece of property). So a potential for 100% but actually 99.9% of people have magic.


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## evolution_rex (Jun 22, 2015)

I typically have most the characters in a story be real, as they're a lot easier to connect with me and the reader that way. Magic I use very rarely, with a select few wizards and witches. I like to keep the mystical elements mystical.


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## ChasingSuns (Jun 30, 2015)

In the current story I'm writing, it depends on which kingdom you find yourself in. Some have entire mage units in their military, while others are so against magic that users of it are hunted down and killed.


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## Gurkhal (Jun 30, 2015)

ChasingSuns said:


> In the current story I'm writing, it depends on which kingdom you find yourself in. Some have entire mage units in their military, while others are so against magic that users of it are hunted down and killed.



How does the ones that declines the use of magic in war survive against the ones who don't?


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## Saigonnus (Jun 30, 2015)

Gurkhal said:


> How does the ones that declines the use of magic in war survive against the ones who don't?



Perhaps with objects that absorb magic or nullify it in some way. 


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## God-Of-Toasters (Jun 30, 2015)

In Sarglath, it depends on the continent. In Rarglath, magic is everywhere as the Realm of the Gods interacts freely with those who seek them. This means that magic is used exclusively by those who are intensely religious, even though it simply consists of prayer. In Jarglun, magic and the occult manifest themselves in potions and charms as well as unholy rituals to those gods that pop their heads into the situation. The sorcerers are rare, although shamans and herbalists are quite common. In the Farlands, those who perform magic are also engineers and the more powerful of these command legions of Constructs. In all of these settings, you have to study all about this arcane lore, as long as the Gods permit it.


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## Addison (Jul 1, 2015)

There are two kinds of magical persons in my world. And when I'm doing this figuring I'm only doing mortals, humans, as fantasy races have natural magics by their race. 

So for humans there are two kinds: Learned and Natural. In a sense everyone is born a blank slate, they can go either way. It's up to their choices that determine how they develop. So a Natural is someone who is born with some amount of magic without ever learning. (Moving objects with mind, talking to animals, controlling elements etc) These naturals are about 1 in 100, maybe less. 
Learned are those who have great potential for a field of magic but they must develop these skills through rigorous training. The ratio for these people are about the same as Naturals. 
There are some careers that don't take magic like wands and incantations that normal people can easily accomplish. Caring for magical creatures, running an apothecary, harvesting magical ingredients, slaying monsters etc. In the crazy world I created these professions are more abundant than Naturals and Learned Casters. 

Happy Writing.


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## Logos&Eidos (Jul 1, 2015)

I don't have exact numbers but I had to make all the magic users of my setting rare. They were never common place however in order to get the flavor of the world right, a Dieselpunkish Space-Fantasy, the magic either had to be weaker or rare so that weird and super-science could take prominence.


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## ChasingSuns (Jul 1, 2015)

Gurkhal said:


> How does the ones that declines the use of magic in war survive against the ones who don't?



There are a couple of reasons why they are successful. One is the fact that the mages in the mage units aren't as powerful as they could be. Their officers are a bit more powerful, but the soldiers are only taught certain basic spells and techniques. The nation that hates magic also utilizes certain magic dampening materials, and they also use flintlock firearms. Most kingdoms on the continent don't use firearms because they are considered to be uncivilized and dishonorable.


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## Gurkhal (Jul 3, 2015)

ChasingSuns said:


> There are a couple of reasons why they are successful. One is the fact that the mages in the mage units aren't as powerful as they could be. Their officers are a bit more powerful, but the soldiers are only taught certain basic spells and techniques. The nation that hates magic also utilizes certain magic dampening materials, and they also use flintlock firearms. Most kingdoms on the continent don't use firearms because they are considered to be uncivilized and dishonorable.



Ok, then I get it.


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## Kazzan (Jul 4, 2015)

A few hundred ascendants and around a thousand magic users troughout the three continents that make up the known world of my setting. 
Ascendants are mortals that have been given immortality by the high gods along with some other benefits. Mages are people who use rune magic and rituals. Magic can be taught but is difficult and generally unliked by the masses.


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## Nihilium 7th (Jul 4, 2015)

In my current WIP there are quite a few variations "magic" users (seven types survive in the current era). My world is about three times the size of earth with about fifty percent more people occupying it. Even so the amount of magical people currently alive in the world could all live on the islands of Japan (It would be a tight squeeze though). Although, the amount of each type vary and a large number of them live in untamed parts of the world


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## Mythopoet (Jul 4, 2015)

100% common. There are no "usual" people (in the real world sense) in my world. Every single sentient being living in my world is descended from a god of one type or another. So everyone has what we would consider "supernatural" abilities (though in this world they are natural) but the "supernatural" nature of the people gets diminished a bit in each succeeding generation. So the farther you are from the original gods the less "unusual" you are.


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## Sonichen (Jul 24, 2015)

My main characters are all unusual people or creations taken to the extreme.


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## AlexanderMiracoure (Jul 26, 2015)

New person on the thread here, but I'd love to give some input. Personally, to me it matters by what is meant as the un-norm, which often is defined differently for each race within my world. For example, every elf is raised a wizard and born with the capabilities to use magic, so to them magic is a rather normal things; while to men, who were not granted easy access to the magical planes, generally trend to dislike and even fear magic, and the few found to use it are shunned. But even then, there are exceptions within the different races of men (those on this continent versus that continent).


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## The Stranger (Aug 21, 2015)

i have both psychics and mages in my world but they have different rules. Basically, anyone can become a mage, but it requires a lot of studying and research to truly master it, and so usually only the wealthy or privileged learn it. psychics are kind of different, they are born with their powers and must learn to control them or be driven insane by them, which is why The Psions Guild finds them and takes them to their facilities as soon as they begin to manifest powers.


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## JohnWhitefield (Aug 21, 2015)

New to the thread here, but putting in my view on it from my own personal experiences. 

In my most recent world, I've tried to create a balance between high fantasy and low fantasy in terms of the inclusion of magic. It exists, but it isn't stuffed full of mages in every city and nation, but there aren't few 'mages' either. I don't have any exact numbers on it (allows me to be somewhat flexible with it), but in essence, magic has enough of a presence in the world that people know of it, and most that don't have it, fear it to a certain degree. 

There is also a way for people who weren't born with the power to learn it, although the ritual is difficult and highly secret, so much so that there is only a few select cults around the world that knows how to do it, and they keep the secret to themselves. The world also as a very specific order that watches out for mages, trying to monitor those who grow too "power-hungry" and often manage to imprison them in a specific prison. 

Always found this way to work well for me, as I tend to treat magic as a primal gift that is a challenge to control, rather than having it be super-easy with a very select ruleset. Don't want to have mages running around like D&D wizards, casting spells on whims with staffs and being classified into 'types' such as Frost or Fire.


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## Cambra (Aug 22, 2015)

Approximately 10% of my elves have _appreciable _magical abilities (it would be approximately 5% among humans as a comparator), but only 4% have a level deemed _significant_... Some of the others can be trained in specific uses (access to such training called "applicability" and "lethality", is closely controlled by the city state...).


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## CrystalCHTriple (Mar 4, 2016)

Wizards are common in my world and I am not sure which criteria of psychic applies. The only psychic ability present is psychokinesis, and they are uncommon, part of the five or so percent of people who possess unusual magical ability. Most people have to be taught magic like any other skill and have to be tuned to external sources of mana, e.g. crystalline mana, for spellcasting that exceeds the demands of their innate reserves; those few do not need to be attuned, and moreover, can withstand raw crystalline mana where others would get sick and possibly die, although they can only stand so much either.


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## AndrewLowe (Mar 4, 2016)

Everybody with an supernatural ability in my WiP is very reserved about it.  My story takes place in a modern world, so it's hard for anybody to realize that there's actually much beyond what they believe to be the pinnacle of human ability.  Narcissism is a large theme in my current work.  While I have characters ranging from telepaths to hedge-witches to alchemist assassins to a prescient mathematician, few realize that anything supernatural exists beyond what they know.  Even a powerful magician is as oblivious to the powerful telepath as a commoner.  Every character believes that their glimpse of power in a repressive world is unique.  A witch in a world without witches believes that witches are the coolest damn thing since Elvis.

Rough number...  Of 8 billion people, maybe 100,000 worldwide recognize that any sort of "fantasy" abilities exist, while only 30,000 actually wield them more proficiently than a knife (as in, it can be used to violent effect).


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## NerdyCavegirl (Mar 4, 2016)

Oh man, "unusual" could apply to the whole world....Well the world population is about 250 million people, 50% humans, 35% elves (which evolved from humans rather than being an elder race), 15% firekin, and an unknown but tiny percentage of other non-primate humanoid species. About 50% of humans have some degree of energetic sensitivity but little practical magic ability, 25% display clairvoyance and/ortelekinetic abilities. Percentages jump to 75% sensitives and 50% practical mages for elves, then 100% and 75% for firekin, not sure what that all equals for the total population.


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## indonesiancat (Mar 4, 2016)

I haven't really read too much into how I'm going to distribute magic. I figure that it should be slightly more common than I have made it, simply to balanace out the world somewhat.

As it stands right now, my narrative is written from the perspective off a mercenary who lives in a barbarian village with his sister. In this village, there are only two people who know magic, one off them is the Jarl, the other is her highest advisor. In this village and it's surrounding farmsteads, there are about three thousand inhabitants. 

So obviously, a magic user is very likely to find him/herself in a very esteemed position in an average tribe. However, out of the tribes they have fought previously, only like, 2 off them have used magicians. Out of all the characters I've introduced, I would say that only 1 in  like 45 has magicial powers. Which is actually incredibly inbalanced, simply because non-magic users are potentially, considerably faster, stronger and more skilled than in the real world. And also because many off these people who are in the stronger tiers, frequently wears armours that make them immune to magical quantities. Also, I am not 100 % sure how I'm supposed to place these magic users into different tiers. I have to do a bit off thinking on that.


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## Drakevarg (Mar 4, 2016)

I've been kinda curious about this myself in the past. One statistic I've looked into in the past is the rate of schizophrenia in the general population - a fairly significant and presumably uncommon mental condition. I was kinda surprised to find it's as high as 1 in 200. But I've used that as sort of my baseline since. Over time I've worked mages and the sort out of my setting entirely, but lycanthropes and vampires and so on are still present so it still has relevance.

I also look at global population for context. For example, during the timeframe I'm currently focused on for my setting - about 700 years prior to the story's "modern day" - the global population is under 100,000 as the world is still limping from a near-apocalypse two centuries prior. At 1 in 200, that would mean that there are 500 supernaturally-empowered peoples in the entire world at this juncture. Quite a few if you gathered them all together for a convention in one building, but spread across a word? Enough to be heard of, but few enough that you're unlikely to find one unless you go looking for them.


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## TheKillerBs (Mar 4, 2016)

Probably about a 50-50 split between "ordinary" humans and the other races. I say "ordinary" because everyone has the ability to do magic, although not everyone actually learns how. The number of magic users depends a lot on culture and race; in most human cultures it's between 0.1-1%, and for the Sidhe it's almost 100%.


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## Vaporo (Mar 4, 2016)

A lot of the magicians in this thread seem to get their powers heriditarily, and I've noticed similar magic systems in a lot of books. It's starting to feel cliche, for me.

For my story, one thousand identical "Gifts" of magic were given to humanity by one of the gods, and another hundred similar Gifts later. So, regardless of world population, there are never more than 1100 magic users in the world at a time. Although many of them never even realize that they have a Gift, and far fewer ever master it to any significant extent. So, there's usually never more than fifty or sixty people who are actively using magic. A magic user meeting another magic user by random chance is extremely rare, and most efforts to find and train magic users have failed simply because they could never find enough people to train.

Technically, anyone could learn to use magic even without a Gift, but learning can literally take a lifetime of training before even being able to perform the most feeble of magics. The Gift is really just a shortcut for accessing specific kinds of magic without having to learn how to put your mind in a specific state. Though, some people luck out and just get hit on the head hard enough that their mind goes into to a state that allows them to use magic. This is actually slightly more common than having the Gift, but often results in abilities that are so mundane that they can barely even be called magic.


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## AndrewLowe (Mar 5, 2016)

Vaporo said:


> A lot of the magicians in this thread seem to get their powers heriditarily, and I've noticed similar magic systems in a lot of books. It's starting to feel cliche, for me.



Damn...  That's a good point.


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## adamcbassett (Mar 5, 2016)

My current project adds an organ to human anatomy. It's called an ember and it sort of looks like a peach pit, set deep in a person's chest. Everyone has one, and thus everyone has the potential for magical capabilities, but it's easier for sone based on the shape, size, and ridges in the ember. This is why some families are more capable than other with respect to magic, though it's not limited to them alone.

What they can actually do is limited to the basic elements. Fire, earth, water, and air manipulation, with aether as the trigger usually. A few can bend the aether, though it's the most difficult to work with, but it allows fairly unique results like healing and telekinesis.

About 50 years before the story somebody figured out that grinding up an ember into dust and ingesting it temporarily increases both physical and magical ability. It's illegal, but anyone who can access the dust can go from magicless to moderately skilled or skilled to overflowing with strength in a few minutes.


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## MeanMachine (Mar 28, 2016)

In my WIP, practicing magic is so common place that _not_ being _able_ to do magic would be what's unusual. 

There are people, however, who are descendants of "The Ancients", and who have what is called "The Gift of The Ancients", which translate to a longer life expectancy (a couple centuries, give or take a few decades) and an ease at performing magic (they still need a lot of practice to make it useful, tough.) Other than that, they're pretty much normal people in the world, tough they tend to stand out. Many are involved in governments for example, with two of the three Empires in the world being ruled by people recognized as being "Gifted" (One of them a couple who both have it). 

Still working out on how to give this a semblance of balance (how many people like this is there) and some ground rules (is given through straight genetics as we understand it, or is it randomly occurring in people descended from the Ancients?)


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## AJ Stevens (Mar 29, 2016)

It's quite varied in my world.

I have pockets where magic is used by everyone. These include alien races that typically use their magic for non-destructive means (preservation, warding, travel, etc), and the armies of the gods, comprised of elemental constructs that can all use magic on some level. However, I would add that there are relatively few users with substantial power within those pockets.

Within the mortal races, magic is fairly rare, and used primarily in a military sphere. A city of reasonable size may have anywhere between 10 and 50 magic users of varying strength, which would put the ratio at around 1 in 1000. Much like reality, magic is feared by those who have little to no experience or understanding of it. So, while city dwellers would be relatively used to seeing and hearing about it, a mage in a village up in the hills would be big news and a cause for fear.

I'd also add that magic isn't genetic or hereditary in my world. The gods have access to souls before they are born, so souls are attuned to the gods, usually in an attempt to increase influence in certain parts of the world. Attunement is often, but not always, seen as a gift, and as such, loyalty to the god in question can follow. It's not wholly different, I suppose - users are born with the gift - but it's not random either.


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## Ray M. (Mar 29, 2016)

I like to keep the unusual in my worlds rare enough. I dislike settings in which it's openly paraded daily; it loses its magic, so to speak, if it's very common.


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