Unmute !

Top 10 best anime fight scenes, number 1 : [August 27th 2020]

Based on the above tweet by Dana Terrace!

are either of these stories good? cause they sound really interesting

On the one hand, it's true that the way Dungeons & Dragons defines terms like "sorcerer" and "warlock" and "wizard" is really only relevant to Dungeons & Dragons and its associated media – indeed, how these terms are used isn't even consistent between editions of D&D! – and trying to apply them in other contexts is rarely productive.

On the other hand, it's not true that these sorts of fine-grained taxonomies of types of magic are strictly a D&D-ism and never occur elsewhere. That folks make this argument is typically a symptom of being unfamiliar with Dungeons & Dragons' source material. D&D's main inspirations are American literary sword and sorcery fantasy spanning roughly the 1930s through the early 1980s, and fine-grained taxonomies of magic users absolutely do appear in these sources; they just aren't anything like as consistent as the folks who try to cram everything into the sorcerer/warlock/wizard model would prefer.

For example, in Lydon Hardy's "Five Magics" series, the five types of magical practitioners are:

Alchemists: Drawing forth the hidden virtues of common materials to craft magic potions; limited by the fact that the outcomes of their formulas are partially random.

Magicians: Crafting enchanted items through complex manufacturing procedures; limited by the fact that each step in the procedure must be performed perfectly with no margin for error.

Sorcerers: Speaking verbal formulas to basically hack other people's minds, permitting illusion-craft and mind control; limited by the fact that the exercise of their art eventually kills them.

Thaumaturges: Shaping matter by manipulating miniature models; limited by the need to draw on outside sources like fires or flywheels to make up the resulting kinetic energy deficit.

Wizards: Summoning and binding demons from other dimensions; limited by the fact that the binding ritual exposes them to mental domination by the summoned demon if their will is weak.

"Warlock", meanwhile, isn't a type of practitioner, but does appear as pejorative term for a wizard who's lost a contest of wills with one of their own summoned demons.

Conversely, Lawrence Watt-Evans' "Legends of Ethshar" series includes such types of magic-users as:

Sorcerers: Channelling power through metal talismans to produce fixed effects; in the time of the novels, talisman-craft is largely a lost art, and most sorcerers use found or inherited talismans.

Theurges: Summoning gods; the setting's gods have no interest in human worship, but are bound not to interfere in the mortal world unless summoned, and are thus amenable to cutting deals.

Warlocks: Wielding X-Men style psychokinesis by virtue of their attunement to the telepathic whispers emanating from the wreckage of a crashed alien starship. (They're the edgy ones!)

Witches: Producing improvisational effects mostly related to healing, telepathy, precognition, and minor telekinesis by drawing on their own internal energy.

Wizards: Drawing down the infinite power of Chaos and shaping it with complex rituals. Basically D&D wizards, albeit with a much greater propensity for exploding.

You'll note that both taxonomies include something called a "sorcerer", something called a "warlock", and something called a "wizard", but what those terms mean in their respective contexts agrees neither with the Dungeons & Dragons definitions, nor with each other.

(Admittedly, these examples are from the 1980s, and are thus not free of D&D's influence; I picked them because they both happened to use all three of the terms in question in ways that are at odds with how D&D uses them. You can find similar taxonomies of magic use in earlier works, but I would have had to use many more examples to offer multiple competing definitions of each of "sorcerer", "warlock" and "wizard", and this post is already long enough!)

So basically what I'm saying is giving people a hard time about using these terms "wrong" – particularly if your objection is that they're not using them in a way that's congruent with however D&D's flavour of the week uses them – makes you a dick, but simply having this sort of taxonomy has a rich history within the genre. Wizard phylogeny is a time-honoured tradition!

10/10

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Harrison Ford is jesus confirmed????

reasons to love harrison ford

1. hates donald trump 2. got his ear pierced at claires because why not 3. legit asks people to beat him up in action scenes EVEN NOW AS AN OLD MAN 4. is arguably one of the most iconic star wars characters yet couldnt give less of a crap abt star wars 5. the universe tried to kill him (or at least permanently incapacitate him) twice in 2015 and it only mildly inconvenienced him 6. flies helicopters in search and rescue missions 7. was in his 40s for the majority of the indiana jones series which is insane when you think about all the stunts involved 8. quote “the director yells cut and harrison cracks open a beer and then builds a fucking shed” 9. arguably sexy 10. points angrily and its super effective

fuck this

hey @the-familiars-union can i join you

You’re all probably wondering why I’ve gathered you all here…

It has come to my attention that I have too many apprentices (followers). The doors have been locked, all your magic has been sealed, and there is only one way out.

In order to leave, you must kill at least one other person here. You might be wondering “how? You just said we can’t use magic.” Well, fist fight. There’s also some weapons scattered around this enormous room.

Have fun!

Reblog In 5 seconds for good luck

a ravnican tag yourself with illustrations by yours truly

Okay so in house of Ashes I think that basically the “vampires” are actually intelligent and formed a civilization but then the parasite came and that’s the reason they’re so violent. That also explains why they were able to build a spaceship/city but didn’t invent guns because the parasite can’t use them so they didn’t. Also explains why they are so physically adept since the parasite made them that way.

I don’t know if this is a common theory but I haven’t seen anyone else say anything and I wanted it out there

Edit: check the comments