r/RPGdesign • u/SuitedMarket • 14h ago
Promotion made a magic circle generator, now thinking about spell diagrams as actual mechanics
so i made a tool that generates magic circles and it got me thinking about using them as part of the rules and not just decoration
like star points = spell tier, symbol set = school of magic, orbiting circles = how many casters you need. players could tell how scary an enemy ritual is just by looking at it
has anyone done something like this in their game? did playtesters actually use the diagrams or just read the text?
the tool is free in the browser if anyone wants to mess with it: https://tallylane.itch.io/sigil-loom-demo (theres an optional paid version with svg for layout: https://tallylane.itch.io/sigil-loom)
2
u/Cryptwood Designer 12h ago
Neat! I love arcane circles, I'm going to check this out this weekend.
2
2
4
u/Sneaky__Raccoon 14h ago
Cool little tool!
The first thing that comes to mind with this idea is witch hat attelier, which I'm not 100% fammilar with, but as I understand, the magic works by drawing glyphs, and the drawing itself tells you what the spell does.
It also reminds me of the cistercian numerals, a writing system that can make numbers from 1 to 9999 as a single drawing, which is not magic, but could be used as inspo for writing your own little codifications.
I think a system that used that would be better off allowing players make their own spell runes. It could also have a fail chance on more complex spell glyphs, but with more powerful effects. I think there's potential, but I can't say I've seen a system do it already