Our_Lady_in_Twilight
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- May 13, 2025
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Soft magic by preference. Off the top of my head I'd say a reasonable rule of thumb might be to invent rules and caveats only so far as they create interesting dramatic conflict.
For example, the wheel of time has fairly soft magic, such rules as exist tend to be things like 'don't use magic or you'll risk going mad' or 'male and female magic is inherently different - male magic is tainted by evil, therefore we must be suspicious of male channellers'. It uses the magical rules to directly heighten the storytelling potential of the setting - even without reading you can see how these two caveats can create interesting dramatic scenarios for the reader.
Brandon Sanderson's Mistborne is a much harder system. Each magical effect directly maps to ingesting a different metal or alloy. And the ending of the first book is directly and ingeniously predicted by the emergent interaction between these metallic powers that reveals itself in the reader's mind as the climax plays out. In this case the hard magic system feels totally justified.
However, when not cleverly baked into the story, I find the hard magic systems add needless weight of complexity (and I'd include some of Sanderson in this actually, even as the progenitor of the concept I find that he's quite hit-and-miss). If its not relevant to the story it can just come across like you've created a massive spreadsheet of how to produce any and all magical effects and insist on burdening the reader with it.
In short, I'd argue that a heavily rules based system is fine if it's done cleverly, and if it's necessary for dramatic or narrative effect. Elsewise err on the side of showing just the tip of the iceberg.
For example, the wheel of time has fairly soft magic, such rules as exist tend to be things like 'don't use magic or you'll risk going mad' or 'male and female magic is inherently different - male magic is tainted by evil, therefore we must be suspicious of male channellers'. It uses the magical rules to directly heighten the storytelling potential of the setting - even without reading you can see how these two caveats can create interesting dramatic scenarios for the reader.
Brandon Sanderson's Mistborne is a much harder system. Each magical effect directly maps to ingesting a different metal or alloy. And the ending of the first book is directly and ingeniously predicted by the emergent interaction between these metallic powers that reveals itself in the reader's mind as the climax plays out. In this case the hard magic system feels totally justified.
However, when not cleverly baked into the story, I find the hard magic systems add needless weight of complexity (and I'd include some of Sanderson in this actually, even as the progenitor of the concept I find that he's quite hit-and-miss). If its not relevant to the story it can just come across like you've created a massive spreadsheet of how to produce any and all magical effects and insist on burdening the reader with it.
In short, I'd argue that a heavily rules based system is fine if it's done cleverly, and if it's necessary for dramatic or narrative effect. Elsewise err on the side of showing just the tip of the iceberg.
