Magic in Combat

[trentonian7]

Does your world have magical people? My story is set in a roughly medieval time period, though almost more Roman and definitely more Eastern European. While my kingdoms do have their own martial militaries, my world also has mages and I was wondering how exactly mages affect combat and warfare in your worlds.

 

[Philster401]

Your story sounds like mine i have 11 kingdoms each one uses one specific type of magic ei. Water, fire, wind, earth, ice, lightning, light, dark, nature,, chaos, and knights/ order or something. You can read my intro somewhere on here not that good but im getting off track. I haven't really thought to much about the exact details of how they effect combat yet, sorry.

 

[trentonian7]

Your story sounds like mine i have 11 kingdoms each one uses one specific type of magic ei. Water, fire, wind, earth, ice, lightning, light, dark, nature,, chaos, and knights/ order or something. You can read my intro somewhere on here not that good but im getting off track. I haven't really thought to much about the exact details of how they effect combat yet, sorry.

My magic isn't kingdom based however, and only certain mages have elemental abilities. The powers mages have vary and so does their strength. While there is a magical language, most spells are long incantations found only in old books and scrolls. For this reason, verbal spells are seldom heard- most mages draw instead on their natural abilities.

 

[Garren Jacobsen]

I'll start with my future fantasy book. My magic is broad. It can do a lot of different things at once. The way it affects combat is by making it more squad based and room to room. Nothing fancy really.

My other book has gravity and motion magic. Meaning that my mages control the gravitational pull on an object and the direction from whence the pull originates and can cause things in motion to move at faster or slower rates or change their direction entirely. These mages are the aerial shock troopers of my "good guy" army. They fly in from above fast and furious and cause untold destruction among the ranks and against their war machines. If they feel like their getting too overwhelmed they fly up faster than an arrow can fly after them. The best counter to these tactics is to lay traps with fake war machines and to utilize Wind Dancers (wind manipulators) to cut off the Force Mage flights. I try to keep things simple. Writing crazy realistic combat isn't my forte.

 

[ChasingSuns]

In my current story, there are several nations that use entire units of mages on the field. They are trained to conduct magic in unison for a bigger effect. There is one nation that has outlawed magic though. In battle, they use magic-dampening crystals and flintlock firearms. Firearms are considered to be dishonorable in the other nations, and therefore not used.

 

[MeanMachine]

Magic in my WIP's world is ubiquitous, both by being able to be used by everyone (not necessarily effectively tough, and it normally takes a lot of practice to be worthy of being called a mage) and by being used to power a wide range of machines and devices. Most armies have squads of dedicated magic users and specialized troops skilled both with spell and weapons.

A lot of spells used in combat are either quick and focused like a scalpel, or take longer to use and do a lot of damage, like a hammer. Magical protective spells are also commonly used, and can stop bullets and arrows, but they require a lot of power to maintain.

I guess that's about it.

 

[WooHooMan]

My setting is a mixture of North Africa with some Chinese trappings. As such, magic is based on African shamanism (building enchanted weapons) and Chinese mysticism (martial arts). There aren't any shooting fireballs or chanting incantations.

"Magic" is so rare that there is no word for it or unifying definition. Enchantments and mysticism are seen as two separate phenomena.
The most story-relevant magic is using the undead and artificially created beings to fight in wars. Two of the main characters are a zombie and an homunculus who are both soldiers.

 

[trentonian7]

Magic in my WIP's world is ubiquitous, both by being able to be used by everyone (not necessarily effectively tough, and it normally takes a lot of practice to be worthy of being called a mage) and by being used to power a wide range of machines and devices. Most armies have squads of dedicated magic users and specialized troops skilled both with spell and weapons.

A lot of spells used in combat are either quick and focused like a scalpel, or take longer to use and do a lot of damage, like a hammer. Magical protective spells are also commonly used, and can stop bullets and arrows, but they require a lot of power to maintain.

I guess that's about it.

Do you mean the spells move physically like a hammer?

 

[MeanMachine]

Do you mean the spells move physically like a hammer?

Wut? No, I meant the spells hit you like a sledgehammer, and can do a lot of damage, but aren't very precise and require a lot of energy to use. You know, AoE spells like big explosive fire-balls and such.

 

[Logos&Eidos]

In my opinion it will depended upon what exactly your mages can do.
If your mages are,highly mobile via flight and or teleportation ,can bring great destructive force to bare on large areas especially from long distances, have some method of surveillance and remote targeting.

Then warfare in your world is not going to look medieval it's going to be a lot closer to modern warfare. Any military with access to combat mages is going to have all the capabilities of a modern army and then some. Commando raids against strategic assets,such as alchemical plants,city barriers that protect against spell strike(artillery strikes) and block teleportation, lay-line taps. Are the kinds of battle that your world will have.

 

[Khama]

In my world combat magic is pretty tame for the most part. Majority of users can not do anything battle changing, but in certain areas it has influenced warfare to certain degrees. Like an example is several groups of a race that practice Vibration magic. The vibration magic is deadly if not countered, and instruments were made to amplify their abilities allowing such warfare to take place over longer distances. Thus, in these areas when magic users are present the beginning portion of the battle is one of vibrations where both sides are attempting to breach into the other. However, most of the time both sides tire each other out which allows the actual armies to then fight.

The armies themselves, who are influenced by this type of warfare, do not really use shields even though all of them have a shield. The shields are a measure to protect them as they close in or from surprise attacks, but beyond that? They are mostly useless since most of the blades can carve through them like butter(High quality steel that vibrates). Then armor only exists to soak up arrows.

Beyond that? Most other types of magic have been used as support for armies. Blasting a hole here or there, else amplifying the physical abilities of the warriors, but for the most part do not have great impacting events.