wargaming was invented in prussia and used for military training; attracted attention b/c they beat france in a war in 1870
h.g. wells "developed codified rules for playing with toy soldiers, which he published in a book titled Little Wars." adorable!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wargame#W
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wow wait okay the full title of the book was
"Little Wars: a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books"
bruh now it's less adorable c'mon
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Wa
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ok now pulp fiction. this bit seems important: "During the economic hardships of the Great Depression, pulps provided affordable content to the masses, and were one of the primary forms of entertainment, along with film and radio."
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulp_maga
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this is starting to feel like a huge topic. here's an incomplete diagram of the influences we've traced so far. i am still mostly drawn to understanding the D&D bottleneck, as the place where pop magic switches tracks from stories to games
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there's something you kill about the nature of magic by forcing it to fit mechanically into a game, tabletop or video or otherwise. the way it's usually done magic becomes something dead you control, rather than something alive you have a relationship to
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One way to get at the distinction: is magic something you use (LH), or is it something you relate to (RH)? In Young Wizards (RH), magic often uses the heroes. It has intentionality, and also a moral component. Compare to e.g. Harry Potter, esp. HPMoR (very LH).
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surprisingly rowling's conception of magic in harry potter is also mostly "dead," with the exception of whatever harry's mom did to protect him from voldemort, despite the fact that rowling's influences were very literary / mythological; no games, no pulp
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Pot
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in harry potter a spell is a lever you pull to make a fixed thing happen in the world. you don't have to talk to any spirits or gods. spells can't backfire due to a lack of faith or weakness of heart. where did this come from? did magic work this way in narnia? i'm not familiar
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because I'm an asshole, I'm posting this:
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I think for the purposes of a crash course in magic Pale might be better?
but for some reason my gut said Pact. At the very least I feel like QC would vibe with Blake more
actually wait no Pale starts with Verona, right? QC would vibe with her uncomfortably well
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i tried reading pact and couldn't get into it :/ did seem like a better magic system than usual tho!
There's a reason the magic of Pact/Pale is better than usual, and, if you so choose, you can decipher that reason from the excerpt above.
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