New Expansions - New Content - Post your favorites here

Mind Sculptor Destiny answers this. If they're lower level (And everyone's lower level than Twi, sadly,) "Word of command" fixes it. Commands? "Quit your job" and "Stop being Jealous of Friend 1" in that order. If they're equal, Psychic Speaking to 'convince' them to come out with their reservations on the situation is still magic.

There ARE ways to shut down magic, though. But I like to play devil's advocate. >.>

Mind-altering magic still counts as magic.

I agree
mind Altering Magic
or
Friend one: Use Magic to mess her over so she can't preform job
Friend two: Bitch slap with arcane force untill they stop being stupid

OR!

Magical Conjurations: Conjure an image of freind one, to allow friend 2 to practice what they want to say and how to get over jealously.

OR!

Imprison both in unbreakable magical cage, they either talk it out or kill each other.

OR!

Magic to make Ice-cream, cause Icecream solves everything.


>Politics
Magic to seek out clues for things like blackmail, recording conversations, creating false documents and such
Use it to get your paper work down really fast, and make copies of yourself to listen to numerous constituent complaints at once, Magic to make all the advertising and thus you don't need to use tax payers money(Making you more likable) Icecream!

Stairc -Dan Felder wrote:Funny, I don't think a Unicorn has any advantages over any other race. Unless you prevent other races from taking magic-flavor talents and don't allow them to reflavor the talents to be non-magical or potion-based.

Fair point. Now with that attitude in mind, give me an example of how you would reflavor the following for a non magic user, say Applejack, to use:
Forcefield
Ponykinesis
Inkbound Item
Light trap
Teleport
Phase Step
Just about anything else under Spellcraft.

"I have potions" and Genius Inventor Scifi Tech Wizard only go so far, especially in certain campaign settings. Even if you want to be that guy and and say "I am an Earth Pony that uses magic", its still a magic user using magic, trumping most everything else.

Now you're moving the goalposts, Fury. You didn't say 'resolve the problem nicely and neatly with a friendship lesson included.' You said solve it. It got solved. Not intelligently, or in a way that can't blow up, but problem solved. There may be better options than magic, and more subtle ways to do it, but the magic equivalent of a sledgehammer to the knees is still effective.

 What can't magic solve, though? Antimagic. Put an antimagic field around something, or just make it out of that Nth metal stuff in DC comics, and your mage is hosed.

Nppe, magic can solve that too, or you just make a strong wizard and then you just punch everything you can't solve.

You're not just using magic in those situations.
Sure, you can mind control someone into doing what you want.
They, or someone else, will find out at some point. After that... good luck.
Getting/making blackmail is easy, sure. But unless you use it well, all you'll do is get the people you're trying to blackmail angry.
Or worse, incite a revolution.

Magic alone is like a big stick, just like any other form of power or tech. Sure, you can use it to brute-force a problem. But that may create a few worse problems instead.
To use it well in a realistic situation, you'd need one or more of the other skills. I'd put persuasion, perception and history/academics/whatever on top of the list, but I could make a case for most of the others.
Casting fireball with no endurance? you faint from dehydration after a few casts. Teleporting with no acrobatics? You misjudge the distance or botch the landing, probably spraining a heel etc etc

mayyybe we should make the seperate skills it's own discussion.... we're kinda filling up the thread(s)

Fury of the Tempest wrote:Actually. No. I specifically said 'FRIENDS'. Which means something like mind control is automatically crossed out. As you DON'T MIND CONTROL FRIENDS.

This, and other reasons, is why Hayat's reasons doesn't work.

So. There you have it folks. MAGIC DOESN'T SOLVE EVERYTHING.

Mind Control Friend One's employer to fire and denounce friend one. There we go, magic solved the problem without having to use magic on one of your friends...

Fury of the Tempest wrote:Actually. No. I specifically said 'FRIENDS'. Which means something like mind control is automatically crossed out. As you DON'T MIND CONTROL FRIENDS.

This, and other reasons, is why Hayat's reasons doesn't work.

So. There you have it folks. MAGIC DOESN'T SOLVE EVERYTHING.

Not sure how "You don't Mind control friends" stops the "Stick them in a magically reinforced box until they talk it out" or how it stops "Summon large amounts of ice cream" or how it stops my get friend two to work out how best to talk to friend one" plan. Explanations please?

Also
I did give non-blackmail stuff
Such as talking to people more efficiently, saving tax-payers money to promote yourself, being able to make your self sound different(More charming, voice louder at pep rallies, able to better carry a stage whisper). Hmm what else do politicians do... oh yeah.
Lie.
Magic makes getting away with lies so much easier, also you can give free toy ducks(Magically made out of dirt, sticks, whatever) to small children which again makes you more likable and thus more likely to be voted in, cause who doesn't like ducks?

Bronymous wrote:

Stairc -Dan Felder wrote:Funny, I don't think a Unicorn has any advantages over any other race. Unless you prevent other races from taking magic-flavor talents and don't allow them to reflavor the talents to be non-magical or potion-based.

Fair point. Now with that attitude in mind, give me an example of how you would reflavor the following for a non magic user, say Applejack, to use:

Forcefield - Tech based forcefields.  One showed up in G1 actually
Ponykinesis - This is intriguingly difficult.  There's X-Men style mutant powers and Avatar style element manipulation but those stretch the "not magic" pending on the setting.  Perhaps you control a swarm that carries things for you.
Inkbound Item - The tattoo portion makes this weird because otherwise it's just a master thief's regular day
Light trap - Portable black hole or an anti-light crystal
Teleport - Super speed.  The game's current form of TP require's line of sight so you can easily swap this out for speed.
Phase Step - Ninjas

ZamuelNow wrote:
Forcefield - Tech based forcefields.  One showed up in G1 actually
Ponykinesis - This is intriguingly difficult.  There's X-Men style mutant powers and Avatar style element manipulation but those stretch the "not magic" pending on the setting.  Perhaps you control a swarm that carries things for you.
Inkbound Item - The tattoo portion makes this weird because otherwise it's just a master thief's regular day
Light trap - Portable black hole or an anti-light crystal
Teleport - Super speed.  The game's current form of TP require's line of sight so you can easily swap this out for speed.
Phase Step - Ninjas

Got non-advanced Tech based version(Though stealing some of the above)

Forcefield: Really Tightly woven net(This is iffy, but you could probably BS this and no I don't count rope as Tech)
Ponykenisis: I like your swarm idea(or you have a fishing line that you can use to grab/move things)
Inkbound Item: Hide it under your tail, problem solved
Light Trap: Instant darkness powder, Filling the room with a storm cloud
Teleport:(You got me, Superspeed is the only other one I can think off)
Phase Step: Be the worlds best contortionist/Ninja

Bronymous wrote:"I have potions" and Genius Inventor Scifi Tech Wizard only go so far, especially in certain campaign settings. Even if you want to be that guy and and say "I am an Earth Pony that uses magic", its still a magic user using magic, trumping most everything else.

Tech, so in a tech limited campaign, then what? Magic.
Psychic powers, maybe, but that's splitting of the finest hairs.
So a thief with magic tattoos to keep his haul from being taken?
Portable black hole is tech, again. I'll give you Anti light crystal, barely, because some non mage could have just found one of those, I suppose. But if you start using magical or enchanted items in place of spells, then you fall under enchanter, which is magic.
Maybe superspeed, but there are already physical, nonmagic intensive super speed talents.
Ninjas cant phase through walls, unless they're magic.

EDIT:
net is at least a better try
as is swarm or fishing line
Inkbound forces you to turn the thing into a magic tatoo as part of the talent. magic tattoo under your tail is still magic.
Instant darkness powder, maybe, if you cantell me how it's not magic, tech, or alchemy. I think weathercrafting has been ruled to be unusable indoors, so summoning a stormcloud would again require alchemy, magic, or tech.
Speed answer is the same
Contortionists also cannot phase through walls. And Octopus at least needs a crack, so if its a solid hunk of rock with no gaps, that's out too.

No.

One last comment on the magic vs non-magic thing, and I'll give it a rest.

What really ticked me off this whole time was that ultimately, Magic can be used to do everything Non-magical ponies can do in the setting. We have not had one Earth Pony to my knowledge that was able to do things that Unicorns couldn't. (And I count being able to use magic as a substitute for strength.) Further, reflavoured tech isn't a suitable balance to keep Earth Ponies up to par, because a suitably intelligent Unicorn or Pegasus could make those same techs. And likely have even more uses for them with magic.

So as a final statement, I say this. Once more, I am now driven to create an Earth Pony who is capable of being on par with any Unicorn. No tech, no magic, and no anti-magic because anti-magic is either magic itself or tech. Force of will, dedication, strength of body and soul. These will be the factors I use to take on the arcana, and anything else in my way.

New topic of conversation! I was wondering if there was a way to make the Harmony system compatible, at least in a separate sister game sense, with Evil characters. A Discord system, if you will.

I apologize for the derail. Though I guess that may point towards needing a pure submission thread and a discussion thread about the submissions. Or more discussions actually taking place in their various sections.

Mind
If you're looking for Discorded system some are floating around
But mostly, chat to your DM if you want one and see if it fits the setting/won't be majorly disruptive. (I played a sorta evil character my first ever game, it was great.)

Some people say evil characters don't fit in this system. There's no basis for this, beyond "I don't think it should", and generally most people will be ok with an evil character as long as they don't destroy the campaign.

Also, keep in mind that Genetic Engineering is an abusable thing, and generally anyone of any race can do anything because of the "well why not?" attitude towards character creation. So it's not so much Unicorns vs non unicorns, as EPs, pegasi, donkeys, Griffons, Zebras, etc., can all use magic too if they want.

But other than that, yes, magic users are and will be for the foreseeable future more capable then noin magic users.

It's funny, because even with the old race-divides... Earth Pony was actually the strongest. They had the best racials and the best utility talents. It's also completely doable to make a character that's powerful as heck in non-combat (which being magical doesn't affect) while, if one must, eschewing any scrap of technology (not sure why technology belongs to unicorns though) or potion-based ways of doing magic-esque stuff (not sure why this belongs to unicorns either, just look at Zecora). I mean, a max-yeehaw build alone is simply awesome.

I'm running a max yeehaw build right now. It's boring. I do nothing. DM had to actually fabricate objectives to use athletics in just for me, and even then I had to fend off the magic guys with a stick.

And like I pointed out, we're saying "unicorns", but we mean "magic users", no matter what they dress it up as.

A maxed-Yeehaw build is great
Untill you have a member in the party who can turn lead into gold and cast freeze spells/explode crap with there mind, essentially making anything you do with Brawn based stunts pointless.

Sorry Fury
I forgot
We aren't allowed to have opinions, be able to bring up our thoughts. I'm sorry.

But seriously, get a character with 20 Arcana, Freaky knowledge in hmmm lets say affecting living creatures and slowing creatures down(hey if I can take Fishing those two should be specific enough) and Sorcerers Supreme.

You are now rolling 30 to stop someone who is outrunning you. Change the FK to Manipulating fire and shaping elements 30 to destroying something. FK in Biology: brain and Fear rolling 30 to essentially become the scarecrow(To be fair you could do this with a high Heal/Mechanics(For potion making but so much more efficient with magic)


So feel free. What can a high Stunts based character do that a Mage with FK can't do better?

Punt the mage into orbit, maybe? Or shrug off magical effects with Endurance, which the Mage will have to combat with more magic?

To be frank, fury, I'm trying not to bitch and moan. I'm stating (as I work on my Cutie Mark in the background) that I find the things Earth Ponies can do limited in the mindset of most players. I intend to change that with an example, and hope that he is well received. If not, I'll understand, pack in the character, and move on.

Also, trying to move conversation along to avoid arguing. All arguments have been made, I think I was pretty much the root cause of all this, and apologize. Want to move on now.