How to think of interesting magical powers?

[fantastic]

When so many magical or other powers have been used in other books and other stories. How can you still think of new, creative and interesting powers?

I am not asking you to do it for me. I just wonder how to think of it.

How do you do it?

 

[Ophiucha]

No harm in tried and true powers. It may be common, but necromancy is still cool.

Coming up with new powers is tough, but exploring less popular myths or avenues of worldbuilding is a good place to start. Sewing is not common, for instance. Only a couple of writers have done anything with it, so it wouldn't be hard to come up with something new. Lots of mythology to draw inspiration from, too.

Alternatively, "dig deeper" into pre-existing types of magic. Water magic is popular. Milk magic, less so. Arguably just a 'subgenre' of water magic, but you could make it your own.

 

[Miskatonic]

No harm in tried and true powers. It may be common, but necromancy is still cool.

Coming up with new powers is tough, but exploring less popular myths or avenues of worldbuilding is a good place to start. Sewing is not common, for instance. Only a couple of writers have done anything with it, so it wouldn't be hard to come up with something new. Lots of mythology to draw inspiration from, too.

Alternatively, "dig deeper" into pre-existing types of magic. Water magic is popular. Milk magic, less so. Arguably just a 'subgenre' of water magic, but you could make it your own.

Necromancy is great and it comes in a wide variety as well.

The type of magic you have in a story depends on how powerful you want characters to be. Are they just firing an elemental projectile that's relatively small or one that can level an entire city in the blink of an eye? How much does the magic take out of the user? Can they only cast x number of spells a day without risking injury or possibly death?

You can scale the magic power however you'd like, choose a variety of sources the magical power is drawn from and augmented, whether it is bound to an object like a staff or sword, if it's an ability people are born with and can't be learned by those who weren't born with the ability, etc.

 

[Garren Jacobsen]

One thing that could make magic interesting isn't the powers per se, but the implications of that power of the person/world. Think about something as well used as element magic. What if you people lived on a cliff like the Anasazi? How would they treat people who could manipulate earth or air? How would they treat metal benders and pyromancers? What if your people believe in killing people face to face. So they can see who killed them, would an assassin who can manipulate shadows be shunned but still utilized?

What about having the ability to turn lead into gold what would that to do the economy?

Asking these questions makes magic interesting.

 

[Penpilot]

Jumping off of what B.S.A. said, it's not necessarily the powers that are interesting. It's how you use them. Take for instance The Flash. He's a dude that can move fast. Whoopie. But what does he do with that ability?

He can vibrate his molecules so fast that he can pass through objects. In a fight he can run away from his enemy so fast that he can circle the globe and hit his opponent in the back of the head. He can power a treadmill that allows him to cross dimensional barriers.

Look at Shazam. He and Superman are near carbon copies of each other. With one difference being Shazam's powers are magic based. He transforms by saying Shazam and calling down a magic lightning bolt. Superman has a weakness to magic.

So when they fought each other in a comic, Shazam beat down Superman by getting really close and saying Shazam, over and over, thus calling down the magic lightning bolt that put the smack down on Superman.

I'd say worry less about originality of powers and concentrate on originality of usage.

 

[Saigonnus]

A way one might accomplish at least to take something that already exists and change it up a bit. Instead of a fireball, how about making it cold instead? That is a simplistic example, but you get the point.

Change how it works and how it looks and it will probably be different enough that it will be interesting.

Something I did was to consider something modern, how a device operates and translate that to magic. For example, take the taser. Electrical darts shoot out to stun the target. Simple.

I took that concept and made it ice cubes that embed in a targets flesh and explode if the wizard so desires. Can deal a large amount of damage to someone. Ice missiles for the win!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[fantastic]

Well, there is also a different question. What if your character has certain power some other popular character has as his trademark power? Would people accuse you of copying it?

 

[Penpilot]

Well, there is also a different question. What if your character has certain power some other popular character has as his trademark power? Would people accuse you of copying it?

Yes and no. It mostly depends on how you use it. Because honestly Superman has the lion's share of powers. His heat vision is akin to Cyclops's optic blasts. His strength is like the Hulk's brute strength, Flight-endless heroes with flight, etc.

If you look at the DC universe there's The Flash (Barry Allen, Wally West, Jay Garrick), Kid Flash, Impusle, Johnny Quick, Jessie Quick, Professor Zoom, Max Mercury, Inertia, etc. All these characters have the exact same powers.

The Marvel Universe has Quicksilver, The Whizzer (Yeah that a real hero name), Speed Demon, Blurr, Makkari, Meanstreak, Speed, Transonic, etc. Same thing, all speedsters.


All these characters have basically the exact same power. If you avoid all the archetypical powers heroes can have then you're left with the oddball ones.

Eg. The hero named the Riser, who has the ability to make bread rise. The Sucker. He can suck a golfball through a hundred feet of garden hose, but not the other way around. He never blows... EVER.

 

[Saigonnus]

I would agree with that. It will also depend alot on the character themself, and the world they inhabit; how similar they are to this other well-known character and world.

If they are not similar at all, I wouldn't worry about it. Just make sure you don't use it in a situation similar to what happened to the character.!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[skip.knox]

How to think. Hm. Interesting question.

I have not invented a magic system. Instead, I am creating hypotheses that sometimes become axioms, but I do it within the context of specific stories. I'll give an example.

In one story, I have a sprite who has been brought to an island to open a locked door. The lock is magical, quite elaborate, and the magic has gotten mangled so that the wizards on the island can no longer open it. So they hire the sprite.

As I walked Quinn-the-Sprite around the place, I soon had him sensing that the magical forces on the island were mucked up. So, presto: sprites can sense magic.

And, at least provisionally, other races cannot.

I'm not making this an axiom yet because I don't know if I want to live with the consequences of it in other stories. But the one unchangeable fact (once I publish the story) is that sprites sense magic.

I doubt I would have invented that in the abstract. If I had thought about it from a world-building angle, I would probably either have had all magicians detect magic, or none of them, or do so only via a spell. I seriously doubt I would have selected sprites.

The above is a windy way of saying that you can invent powers as you create stories. Come up with what the situation needs. Make adjustments. Live with it.

 

[K.S. Crooks]

I like to decide on a category, such as controlling fire, then I think of all the ways a person has to handle fire. Everything from stating one to, changing the intensity, to putting it out. I then think of the power in terms of another category. What if fire was like water or stone, what else would be able to be done. The main thing for me is the limitations of the magic/power. When it cannot be used or have an effect. If a character can fly, perhaps they cannot fly over water because their power works by counteracting a solid surface. I think the limitations are a great way to differentiate one characters form another with the same powers.