Malazan Empire: Use of magic - Malazan Empire

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Use of magic inconsistency?

#1 User is offline   Bauchelain the Evil 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 02:20 PM

Ok. In DG it was said that mages do not need spells to use magic and that those who did, like Pearl, were just being theatrical. In fact in all the other books we never saw Mages speaking when using magic but simply by entering in their Warren. Yet in TtH there are various scenes where Mages use spells.
Like when Ditch used magic in Dragnipur or when Quell opened the portal to Hood's Path.

So, what do you think?
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#2 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 02:29 PM

Uh what do you mean by spells? What did Quell and Ditch do again? Who says that mages don't need speaking in DG? A bit more information like quotes and page numbers are helpfull when making this kind of thread.

Do you mean they were making incantations? or what?

We've seen mages weave together rituals, we've seen ritual chanting, channeling, forceblasts, sacrifices, singing, dancing, etc. etc.

Magic can be used in any way or form. What ever mages or scholar supposedly denounced "spells" in DG was either full of shit or he was talking about a specific type of magic.
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#3 User is offline   Bauchelain the Evil 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 02:37 PM

Well it was Lostara Yil when seeing Peal doing magic. Ok, I know she probablyb isn't the most informed character on magic but then she says "to have seen enough about magic" and she has lived in a Rashan temple where she probably saw magic. And anyway In TtH there are lots of talks about"words of power" to control or acces a Warren which I don't remember reading about before.
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#4 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 02:46 PM

Maybe it's a TTHism :(

Can you describe what Ditch and Quell were doing more specifically? Were they muttering special words or what?

It sounds like magic in the Dresden files, connecting words with power makes it easier to control the purpose and flow.
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#5 User is offline   Bauchelain the Evil 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 03:08 PM

They simply muttered words, it's not specified which, and Ditch can use magic to see Kadaspala's tatttos and Quell opens a portal to Hood's Path.
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#6 User is offline   Zanth13 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 03:59 PM

I agree with what apt says, for the most part imo and what it seems to me is that magic users use and control magic in different ways...each person seems to learn it in a different way (a la candle boy) ... there are many paths to ascendency and probably many paths to warren control

as for words of power, I dont remember but maybe its just another way of focusing...
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#7 User is offline   D'rek 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 04:00 PM

ahem... "Awaken the Seven within me!!!" --QB.

View Postworrywort, on 14 September 2012 - 08:07 PM, said:

I kinda love it when D'rek unleashes her nerd wrath, as I knew she would here. Sorry innocent bystanders, but someone's gotta be the kindling.
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#8 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 04:10 PM

That is of course a GOTMism. A big one. Unless the mules are inside Quick...
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#9 User is offline   RangerSG 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 04:59 PM

The Letherii mages in MT and RG use rituals. The exact way those rituals work are never exactly explained. But there needs to be some means of providing concert for the number of mages involved to do what they are doing. So it's not hard for me to believe that some kind of incantation isn't involved.

Lostara is versed in normal means of magic and maybe even done some in her Shadowdance. But I think it's safe to say that there's lots of ways to do magic in the MalazWorld. Warrens and Holds work slightly different in themselves. Then there's witches like Samar Dev, who don't really work like anything we've seen. And then there's the wild "it's magic because I can't come up with a better way to describe it magic" of Paran and his card drawing. So I think it's safe to say that an individual mage doesn't have to use incantations to work magic. But if you're talking a concert of mages working together, incantations become natural, hence spells.

This post has been edited by RangerSG: 05 April 2009 - 05:00 PM

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#10 User is offline   dawnkiller 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 05:56 PM

View PostRangerSG, on Apr 5 2009, 11:59 AM, said:

The Letherii mages in MT and RG use rituals. The exact way those rituals work are never exactly explained. But there needs to be some means of providing concert for the number of mages involved to do what they are doing. So it's not hard for me to believe that some kind of incantation isn't involved.

Lostara is versed in normal means of magic and maybe even done some in her Shadowdance. But I think it's safe to say that there's lots of ways to do magic in the MalazWorld. Warrens and Holds work slightly different in themselves. Then there's witches like Samar Dev, who don't really work like anything we've seen. And then there's the wild "it's magic because I can't come up with a better way to describe it magic" of Paran and his card drawing. So I think it's safe to say that an individual mage doesn't have to use incantations to work magic. But if you're talking a concert of mages working together, incantations become natural, hence spells.


Just for the hell of it, there's a little in Return of the Crimson Guard about rituals and who uses them (that doesn't constitute as a spoiler): "Wickan warlocks and witches employed it regularly. . . .[and] Ruse was infamous for the complexity of its rituals." (RotCG p. 556). Some other snippets demonstrating what these rituals entail are "[a mage following] along in the invocation, nodding to himself at . . . [the] choices in groundwork for the merging to come" (p. 557), and for the mage focusing the ritual, "[he was] struggling to weave the commingled contributions of the participants into one seamless flow of channelled power to be held, coalesced and distilled, then released in one awesome revelation of willed intent" (p.558). It seems the hardest part about rituals is learning to fall in sync with the other mages.

What's interesting is the comment about the complexity of Ruse rituals. Ruse is the warren of the sea, which is famously unpredictable -- I wonder if the complexity is necessary because it takes extra effort to instill some kind of order onto it? If nothing else, the preparation probably qualifies as what constitutes as a "spell". I seem to recall that the Edur women use them as well, and Hannag Mosag's cabal (even though that seems more like a group channeling of Chaos). We've also seen a few rituals that needed physical props as well -- I seem to recall Nil and Nether, I believe in DG, sacrificing a horse.

Bauchelain isn't wrong in that some manifestations don't require anything more than "unveiling" one's Warren, like Quick Ben and Beak seem to practice -- hell, Blend appears to be using Meanas without even knowing it -- but yeah, there's a lot of variety. I think the inconsistency is intentional, considering how many comments to the tune of "No one should be able to do that!" the characters make. I think the common denominator is that the larger a working, the more people/focus/tools are required -- not that some mages couldn't do it without, but it would physically suck them dry. I think I remember mention of that happening to more than a few Denul mages, particularly during the time the warrens were tainted.

I wonder what "words of power" are, but maybe they're related to things like the names of lost gods we saw in MT. It's an old saw that if you have something's true name, you have power over it. Maybe some of the invocations are for people who are appealing to specific gods, like various priests?So it's less about the words, and more about the power they invoke.
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#11 User is offline   Grief 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 06:29 PM

If memory serves, Tattersail or another mage in GotM uses words of power, and doesn't Tattersail have some sort of book?

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Grief, FFS will you do something with your sig, it's bloody awful


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#12 User is offline   Dolorous Menhir 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 06:45 PM

Some examples of vocal spells that spring to mind.

GotM - Quick Ben spoke a word of recall to escape the Shadowkeep after his visit.
MoI - there's a scene towards the end when the BB's ambush some forces from Coral. They use a water-spell on an opposing mage so that his lungs and throat are filled and he is incapacitated. I think I remember something similar discussed in MT, but with sand.

Well, that's only two, but I'm sure there are more.
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#13 User is offline   Silencer 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 07:24 PM

I think Apt's right here - a large part of it is focus. So, depending on the skill of the mage, the way they were taught, and the difficulty of the spell, plus whether or not other mage's are helping, all help decide whether or not it is necessary to use words.
Hell, Tattersail was in the cadre, and they were facing off against Rake, so they'd want to make sure they were putting in as much effort as possible, and not leave it up to chance.
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#14 User is offline   D'rek 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 10:12 PM

Maybe to some extent it's just a decision, ie QB using a word of recall to pull his spirit back to his body. Perhaps he could've done it differently so waving his arms frantically recalled him instead, but he chose to go with a word and it doesn't really matter all that much...

View Postworrywort, on 14 September 2012 - 08:07 PM, said:

I kinda love it when D'rek unleashes her nerd wrath, as I knew she would here. Sorry innocent bystanders, but someone's gotta be the kindling.
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#15 User is offline   Grief 

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Posted 05 April 2009 - 10:21 PM

Also, waving your arms about is going to alert whoever you're escaping from, so probably wasn't best choice.
I reckon it's how someone learns to channel the warrens, how they imagine/visualise them, like with the candles though.

Cougar said:

Grief, FFS will you do something with your sig, it's bloody awful


worry said:

Grief is right (until we abolish capitalism).
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#16 User is offline   D'rek 

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Posted 06 April 2009 - 03:31 AM

View PostGrief, on Apr 5 2009, 05:21 PM, said:

Also, waving your arms about is going to alert whoever you're escaping from, so probably wasn't best choice.
I reckon it's how someone learns to channel the warrens, how they imagine/visualise them, like with the candles though.


I reckon you're right. If you learned in a temple/school then you'd presumably use whatever techniques you learned there, and if you go to e-school, then they mail you a textbook, hence Tattersail's book...

View Postworrywort, on 14 September 2012 - 08:07 PM, said:

I kinda love it when D'rek unleashes her nerd wrath, as I knew she would here. Sorry innocent bystanders, but someone's gotta be the kindling.
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#17 User is offline   Smashy 

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Posted 06 April 2009 - 08:37 AM

I agree with the training notion, but what if specific Warrens require a different way of doing things? For example the row boat guy (can't remember his name) from NoK, wasn't he humming or singing while rowing out in the sea?
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#18 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 06 April 2009 - 08:59 AM

Singing. But he was a pretty special guy. He was putting together a ritual powerfull enough to repulse a massive force of Stormriders and he was leeching of the power of the entire adept population of Malaz City if not the whole island.
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#19 User is offline   Smashy 

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Posted 06 April 2009 - 09:13 AM

View PostAptorian, on Apr 6 2009, 08:59 AM, said:

Singing. But he was a pretty special guy. He was putting together a ritual powerfull enough to repulse a massive force of Stormriders and he was leeching of the power of the entire adept population of Malaz City if not the whole island.


Holy shit, I never realized that that was what they were doing(Tay and old lady), giving this guy power. Thanks for enlightening me.
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#20 User is offline   Grief 

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Posted 06 April 2009 - 10:17 AM

And of couse the Tanno Spiritwalkers.

They channel magic in a different way than usual, but it still holds great power.

Cougar said:

Grief, FFS will you do something with your sig, it's bloody awful


worry said:

Grief is right (until we abolish capitalism).
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