It's a Kind of Magic

When I was in junior high, my friends and I loved AD&D. We played all the time. We'd play as we walked home from school together, just talking about things, and then rolling dice and whatnot when we got to my friend's house if a battle came up or something else needed to be resolved.

But we were hungry for more magic. We came up with our own spell point system, based not so much on the need to avoid spell memorization, but because we wanted a greater amount of finesse to distinguish the power of spells. We realized, back then, that a magic missile spell was in no way equal to an affect normal fires spell, even though they were the same level. So we had affect normal fires cost a single point and magic missile cost 5. Anyway, I'm getting off the track....

So, when we saw an ad in Dragon Magazine for something called Spell Law, we were really excited. This book promised thousands of new spells and a spell point system and a critical system for spells (and a lot of other stuff). We pooled our money to pay for it -- I think it might have cost $12, but I no longer remember -- and sent off for it. We waited eagerly for its arrival, and eventually it came. It was all it had promised.

Thousands of new spells.

We were thrilled.

In fact, let me take this opportunity right now to thank Pete Fenlon, Coleman Charlton, Terry Amthor, and everyone else at Iron Crown Enterprises that worked on Spell Law. We just couldn't get enough magic, and Spell Law opened our eyes to games beyond AD&D. We'd played a little Traveller, and Villains and Vigilantes, but Spell Law made us realize that there were gamers out there like us, who loved magic in their fantasy games and wanted more. And more!

That realization -- that there just were no limits at all -- allowed my friends and I to create all sorts of new spells and magical powers. We drew ideas from books (Michael Moorcock was a favorite back then), comics (Dr. Strange, of course), movies, and our own twisted imaginations. Our games suddenly teemed with new magic. You'd almost think that we never wanted to use the same spell or magic item twice!

It should be a small wonder then, years later, that the first product from my own d20 imprint, The Book of Eldritch Might, was a book full of spells and magical things. I practically can't help it -- you'll find new spells and magic items in Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, too. I cram them in wherever I can.

Someone was telling me recently that the Game of Thrones series by George R. R. Martin was wonderful. It's a fantasy series, set in a fantasy world, but there is little or no magic. Now, I read plenty of sci-fi, mainstream fiction, and nonfiction. Most of that doesn't have magic in it, and that's okay. But a fantasy novel without magic? I'm sure it's very good, but I just can't get my mind wrapped around it. It's like a cheeseburger without cheese (and I love cheese).

Over the years, I've lost track of that battered old copy of Spell Law. I don't even know which of us has it any more. But I had it when I needed it, and that's what really matters.