Does anybody out there know why Dungeons & Dragons, and now Pathfinder, have tied the four classical elements (air, earth, fire and water) to four of the five energy types (acid, cold, electricity and fire)?
I am hoping that someone at Paizo can answer me this question. ;)
The D&D game generally builds upon the 4(5) energy types acid, cold, electricity and fire (and sonic). There is a longstanding tradition for this going back to the first printings of the D&D and AD&D rules.
The D&D cosmology also evolved as a paralel but was based upon the 4 elements of Greek philosophy. The two concepts lived side by side for a very long time. I think it was when 2nd ed. "Spells & Magic" and later 3E came out that the two systems where fused and bacame a new axiom in D&D/Pathfinder.
Some atemts have been made to deviate from this:
1) 2nd ed. Al-quadim which introduced sorcerers, which where actually wizards keyed to the elemental planes and who specialized in fire, water, air and earth (though the traditional AD&D energy spells where also involved here).
2) The different attempts at Orienal Adventures which built on the chinese philosophy of 5 elements earth, water, fire, wood and metal.
Basically, the answer is: "tradition".
Tradition has fused the 4 elements to the 4 energies.
I think it stems from a compulsion to make the Elements "equal", i.e. equal to Fire.
(and being hamstrung by having other differentiators already being spoken for by the Magic Schools, which was the more central differentiator to Casters, i.e. School Specialists - Elemental Specialists have never been a Core part of the game until Pathfinder's Elemental Bloodlines AFAIK)
Water = Cold, Earth = Acid, Air = Electricity all seem like tangential connections to me, seemingly only made to "equal" the Energy Damage of Fire, because without these tangential connection none of the other Elements lend themselves to doing direct Elemental damage. Why should freezing things be associated with Water Element? How is Ice more central to water than WARM water? Where is the Mordenkainen's Luxuriant Jacuzzi Spell?
Especially for the Divine Domains, it really seems like Cold should be it's own Domain, Acid should be part of Ooze, Electricity part of Weather, and have Water/Air/Earth focus on more core aspects of those Elements.
(You can always take Air/Weather, or Earth/Ooze, or Water/Cold if you like the combination)
I could even see a completely different Elemental correlation being just as valid, i.e. Cold = Air, Acid = Water (Ooze), Electricity = Earth (Metals). I suppose part of it was the opposition of Fire & Water, and wanting to extend that to the associated Elemental Damage: Fire/Fire vs. Water/Acid doesn't 'work' as well as Fire/Fire vs. Water/Cold.
But I doubt it will change any time soon :-)
The best bet is for "alternate magic systems" with more metaphoric "Elemental Schools" ala al-Qadim or Oriental Adventures, which don't even "need" to follow the strict Elemental/Energy Type correlations necessitated by 'Elemental equality' because each Element is also corresponding to non-Energy Type effects, i.e. Fire~Speed, Water~Mutability, Air=Formlessness, Earth=Fixedness, i.e. taking the place of Magic Schools. Something like this probably has a good chance of being done (by Paizo) for the Kelish Empire/ Tian Xia, and you can always just extend it to cover the entirity of Golarion if you prefer. In the mean-time I don't see a problem with running PRPG with al-Qadim's Elemental Schools (if you can dig up the books somewhere).
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Above post has it straight.
I would go further tho and claim there is a spiritual disconnect that means the current elemental derivatives lack impact.
Pitty that allignment, racial, class etc restriction is unpopular in the all is equal .. anything goes .. nothings special .. no imagining a world with contingent rules where magic and spririt and philosophy is tangible .. lacks gripping flights of fancy. Otherwise I think a system with basic elements and allignments could work to bring some connection thats lacking.
Fire - Unmutable - Evil (destructive/dictatorial)
Water - Mutable - Good (constructive/transformational)
Earth - Fixed - Law
Air - Formless - Chaos
I think a really compelling cosmology could be designed around this that would have strong ties to myth and history.
Oh! I really like that!
While I like core rules to be open and flexible with their cosmology (though I like alignments and don't understand why after more than two decades some players can't accept that idea of a game world where philosophy and morality have tangible manifestations) I think supplemental material should all be about options that lead to things being more specific. I may just have to steal your aligment/element correlation for a campaign world. Out of respect and admiration, of course.
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Air, IMO, would be better represented by Sonic. (the howl of the wind, the crack of thunder)
Earth as Acid I can *almost* rationalize, if I squint, by associating earth and stone with 'solidity,' which acid breaks down. The earth and stone is stealing away it's own solidity via the acid attack, and, before earth and stone, all other things run like liquid, becoming less solid than this archetypally solid element.
It's a fairly desperate hand-waving justification for a decision that I don't agree with, but I can tolerate it.
Water would be far better represented by Acid, 'though. The tides tear down all things, wearing away matter and turning stone to sand.
I'd much rather skip the silly associations (except Fire with Fire, obviously) and have Air, Earth and Water spells that create wind, stone and waves, doing knockback / bull rush effects, blinding people, making slippery areas, hurling boulders, summoning up scouring sands, etc. rather than clumsily kludge together Acid, Electricity and Cold spells as being 'elemental.'
If anything, a Fire-based caster should probably have access to Cold spells as well, as the Fire manipulator is going to be the best suited to steal heat away from an area, causing all within to suffer Cold damage...
Yeah, I really look forward to a better rationale that leaves this old attempt in the past.
I'd much rather skip the silly associations (except Fire with Fire, obviously) and have Air, Earth and Water spells that create wind, stone and waves, doing knockback / bull rush effects, blinding people, making slippery areas, hurling boulders, summoning up scouring sands, etc. rather than clumsily kludge together Acid, Electricity and Cold spells as being 'elemental.'
Exactly.
I think the problem is that since the old-school Aristotelian elements were bunk, any attempt to explain energy using them is also bunk. Fire almost gets away with it but is the least elemental of all.
Frankly, it's more like the "elements" were phases of matter. Earth=solid, water=liquid, air=gas, fire=exception(but mostly because what was being observed were the secondary characteristics like emitted heat/light).
So yeah...using the "four elements" to explain stuff doesn't make sense because they never actually made sense. Same with the "five energy types."
I hand-wave it away because I really can't do anything else. You either introduce a ton of extra complexity for questionable gain (oy, "air damage" makes my head hurt) or you hand-wave it away and say magic violates modern physics. Which, duh, it's magic.
I also don't think too hard about what, precisely, mithril and adamantine are. Are they individual elements, like iron, gold, platinum, titanium, or aluminum? Are they alloys, mixing several other metals and/or nonmetals together, like steel, brass, bronze, or electrum?
Stupid science, all ruining our games.
Ooh, some good ideas here.
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Frankly, it's more like the "elements" were phases of matter. Earth=solid, water=liquid, air=gas, fire=exception(but mostly because what was being observed were the secondary characteristics like emitted heat/light).
Solid, liquid, gas and plasma. Pretty much the modern elements of earth, water, air and fire.
Connecting energy types to earth, water and gas is, IMO, a kludge. Even calling cold (and acid!) an 'energy type' is a matter for hand-waving and eye-rolling.
Ah, elemental/energy connection, for backwards compatibility sake, I spit my last breath at thee.
Agreed. But for the moment, there is at least one role-playing game system that doesn't tie the four classical elements with four out of the five energy types. Malhavoc Press' Arcana Evolved setting. In that setting, you could have weapons and armor enchanted with elemental qualities. So you could have a magical sword that does Air damage in addition to Slashing damage. Or you could have a suit of Full Plate Mail armor that could protect you from Earth damage. You could even pick up the Elemental Resistance feat and be able to resist damage (about 5 points of damage) from one of the four elements.
Actually, I thought that was even worse. What is "Earth damage" if not plain old bludgeoning damage? Why doesn't a stone club do "Earth damage"?
If I were looking to rework it, I'd maybe make Air=slashing, Earth=piercing and Water=bludgeoning. Or maybe say that you can pick slashing/piercing/bludgeoning as you wish. Fire would still be fire, of course.
If one dislikes the energy/element system it really is not that hard to change.
A GM needs not do it all at once, just set the guideline and apply it on a case by case scenario as new spells and powers are used in the game.
You can easily change all elements to their enrgy conterpart or vice versa. Such as "stone arrow" in stead of "acid arrow" (where the continuous damage stems from the arrow burrowing into its target.
When I was making my campaign world, I built up all the elemental planes as near dimensions (like the astral plane), so each is a reflection of the real world made of the element in question. Then, there were 'demiplanes' where the planes touched. So where fire and water touched was the demiplane of steam, where fire and earth touched the demiplane of lava, air/fire = plasma, water/earth = mud, wood/fire = ash, etc. Then tacked on some other demiplanes for flare (metal, crystal).
Worked out good so far. I've wanted to go back and divorce spells from elements, but it's a lot of work. The first part was easy, I just allow all energies to be damage types on the weapons, so a blazing (fire) or sonic (air), crackling (electricity), frosted (cold), acidic (acid), gravitic (earth), etc to just do energy +1d6 damage. Resistance can be for any energy type (acid, fire, sonic, electricity, cold, gravity, etc). For earth I used gravity, the special effect basically being you gained 3G's of weight when hit for a split second, so your body is damaged by that. My players don't realize that's a valid energy just yet though (although I'm sure my resident Kobold will read this and figure it out).
The only problem is with the switch to pathfinder, fixing the elemental bloodlines and spells is going to be a pain.
When I was making my campaign world, I built up all the elemental planes as near dimensions (like the astral plane), so each is a reflection of the real world made of the element in question. Then, there were 'demiplanes' where the planes touched. So where fire and water touched was the demiplane of steam, where fire and earth touched the demiplane of lava, air/fire = plasma, water/earth = mud, wood/fire = ash, etc. Then tacked on some other demiplanes for flare (metal, crystal).
Worked out good so far. I've wanted to go back and divorce spells from elements, but it's a lot of work. The first part was easy, I just allow all energies to be damage types on the weapons, so a blazing (fire) or sonic (air), crackling (electricity), frosted (cold), acidic (acid), gravitic (earth), etc to just do energy +1d6 damage. Resistance can be for any energy type (acid, fire, sonic, electricity, cold, gravity, etc). For earth I used gravity, the special effect basically being you gained 3G's of weight when hit for a split second, so your body is damaged by that. My players don't realize that's a valid energy just yet though (although I'm sure my resident Kobold will read this and figure it out).
The only problem is with the switch to pathfinder, fixing the elemental bloodlines and spells is going to be a pain.
Those "demi-planes" go back to AD&D 1st. ed.
They are called para-elemental planes and are places where mephits come from.[EDIT: How about just rock(or mercurial) in stead of gravity - Just like mercurial swords in the arms and equipment guide did additional damage due to their higher mass and increased momentum from the liquid core.]
Those "demi-planes" go back ti AD&D 1st. ed.
They are called para-elemental planes and are places where mephits come from.
LOL,
And I played 1edition exactly three times, and the elemental planes never came up. :) I guess it's not exactly original, but I liked it. :)
Solid, liquid, gas and plasma. Pretty much the modern elements of earth, water, air and fire.
Heh, I avoided mentioning plasmas to avoid the technicality that fire isn't actually plasma, really. As I understand it (being a number of years removed from any formal education in science) plasmas are pretty much only observed under wicked extreme heat/when triggered by lasers/in celestial bodies.
(oy, "air damage" makes my head hurt)Sounds like the phrase who's never driven through the aftermath of a hurricane, trust things get damaged that never get hit by a single piece of debri
I'd say battering winds deal bludgeoning damage and leave it at that. Secondary effects, like exposure to cold (rain/wind chill and all that) would deal cold damage, but the air itself straight bludgeoning. With debris, maybe slashing and/or piercing.
Edit: I'm not sure how warm it is during a hurricane. I live in Colorado, so when I think of horrible wind storms they tend to be blizzards. Plus there's about 18 inches of snow outside my door right now, so it's kind of on my mind. When it's cold, being wet=hypothermia. If there's no risk of hypothermia during a hurricane, then the cold damage bit may make no sense.
There was a fairly drawn out discussion between Sean and myself on this topic (I can't find the thread now, but some else's google-fu may be greater than mine.)
Otherwise I think a system with basic elements and allignments could work to bring some connection thats lacking.
Fire - Unmutable - Evil (destructive/dictatorial)
Water - Mutable - Good (constructive/transformational)
Earth - Fixed - Law
Air - Formless - Chaos
I think a really compelling cosmology could be designed around this that would have strong ties to myth and history.
In our Pathfinder AP games, we have a quartet of religions (who are left ambiguous around whether they're independent deities or merely manifestations of other Golarion deities) based around a similar concept to this:
Sedexus, The Ice Queen, Lady of Order, Matron of the Veil – Greater Deity
Lawful Neutral
Portfolio: Winter, Earth, Law, the Dead
Holy Symbol: Hexagon
(The earth is relatively static and unchanging compared to the other elements, thus lawful, and the dead are buried in the earth. Winter is the end of the year's life and is the time of year when there is little travel or change in the world, linking back to Law.)
Gedhris,
Neutral Evil
Portfolio: Autumn, Air, Evil, Dreams
Unholy Symbol: Autumn leaf
(Unfortunately, I actually don't remember most of Gedhris's doctrine.)
Orogara,
Neutral Good
Portfolio: Summer, Fire, Good, Self-Fulfillment, Protection
Holy Symbol: Rising sun
(The link between fire and summer is obvious. Fire is good because, without fire, civilization would never have risen; the hearth-fire is a central concept throughout ancient mythologies and the deities of the hearth are universally kind and protective. Self-fulfillment because fire is the spark of life, and fire always tries to be the most it can be. Fire being the spark of life also links back to Summer, as that is when the world is most alive.)
Anwyr,
Chaotic Neutral
Portfolio: Spring, Water, Chaos, Travel, Growth
Holy Symbol: Three water droplets
(Water is chaos because it is always in motion, always wearing down everything it touches, never satisfied with where it is or anything around it. This links to Spring because Spring is when the land breaks free of the shackles of Winter and begins to do its own thing again. Travel is obvious, both in that water is always moving and in that water is one of the most important travel venues. Growth because the entire point of chaos is to grow and change.)
The intent was to provide a quartet of religions (emphasis on the religion -- each of these deities has several different sects of varying alignments that worship them and interpret their doctrine in different ways for different purposes) that were all diametrically opposed to each other on exactly one axis and neutral to each other on all the others. For example, Sedexus's Lawfulness and Earth portfolio don't conflict with Orogara's Goodness and Fire portfolio, but they do conflict along their Summer vs Winter portfolios. This allows all sorts of plausible shifting alliances among the churches and ensures that no two churches are ever permanently allied (there's always some direct ideological differences that can't be reconciled).
Interesting. I came up with a somewhat similar set of deities for a homebrew game:
Air = Chaotic Good = morning = spring = East = elves
Fire = Lawful Evil = afternoon = summer = South = hobgoblins
Earth = Lawful Good = evening = autumn = West = dwarves
Water (Ice) = Chaotic Evil = night = winter = North = orcs
There was a fairly drawn out discussion between Sean and myself on this topic (I can't find the thread now, but some else's google-fu may be greater than mine.)
I think I remember that thread as being pretty interesting, with SKR revealing that he once worked up his own alternative, but then demurring when it came to show and tell. :)
Personally, I prefer the chinese 5-element theme, with water, wood, fire, earth, and metal. Instead of a 2-pole system (fire vs. water, earth vs. air), you get a rock-paper-scissors deal. In addition, you get the 'augmenting' from complementary elements to add another layer.
It's an old Taoist philosophy, and it's (one of) the originations of the '5-pointed star within a circle' image (circle of creation, star of destruction).
Translating these elements to damage types may be odd though. Electricity is considered a subset of 'metal', whereas wind is part of 'wood', as is acid/poison. Fire doesn't really need any change, and ice or cold damage can still fit under 'water' (Though it really should be separate for the purposes of the star). But what to do with earth? Something that would be considered weak to acid/air, but strong against ice/water? I liked the 'mercurial' damage mentioned above, perhaps that would work.
Redesigning some spells/monsters shouldn't be too difficult to fit this cosmology. Summoning a 'metal elemental' would be fun.
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Personally, I kind of think that Positive and Negative energy should be right there with the Energy Types, (combined they are the 5th Element). It always really irked me that you could take Energy substitution for fire, but not positive or negative energy which would be thematically awesome for clerics.
(...)
The best bet is for "alternate magic systems" with more metaphoric "Elemental Schools" ala al-Qadim or Oriental Adventures, which don't even "need" to follow the strict Elemental/Energy Type correlations necessitated by 'Elemental equality' because each Element is also corresponding to non-Energy Type effects, i.e. Fire~Speed, Water~Mutability, Air=Formlessness, Earth=Fixedness, i.e. taking the place of Magic Schools.
(...)
A few year back, I worked on an alternate magic system (not for D&D) based on the old Tarot of Marseille. If I remember, the guideline were something like this (going from memory):
Fire = Staves = life = (sanguine) emotions = mutability = metamorphosis
Air = Swords = domination (of men, beasts and of nature) = the mind
Water = Cups = healing = divination = (phlegmatic) emotions
Earth = Coins = stability = minerals = protection = permanency
reminds me of a chart from Bill Whitcomb's "The Magician's Companion"(...)
The best bet is for "alternate magic systems" with more metaphoric "Elemental Schools" ala al-Qadim or Oriental Adventures, which don't even "need" to follow the strict Elemental/Energy Type correlations necessitated by 'Elemental equality' because each Element is also corresponding to non-Energy Type effects, i.e. Fire~Speed, Water~Mutability, Air=Formlessness, Earth=Fixedness, i.e. taking the place of Magic Schools.
(...)
A few year back, I worked on an alternate magic system (not for D&D) based on the old Tarot of Marseille. If I remember, the guideline were something like this (going from memory):
Fire = Staves = life = (sanguine) emotions = mutability = metamorphosis
Air = Swords = domination (of men, beasts and of nature) = the mind
Water = Cups = healing = divination = (phlegmatic) emotions
Earth = Coins = stability = minerals = protection = permanency
Also happens to be the basis of the Tarot cards ^.^
Yay for druidic symbology!
Personally, I prefer the chinese 5-element theme, with water, wood, fire, earth, and metal. Instead of a 2-pole system (fire vs. water, earth vs. air), you get a rock-paper-scissors deal. In addition, you get the 'augmenting' from complementary elements to add another layer.
It's an old Taoist philosophy, and it's (one of) the originations of the '5-pointed star within a circle' image (circle of creation, star of destruction).
Translating these elements to damage types may be odd though. Electricity is considered a subset of 'metal', whereas wind is part of 'wood', as is acid/poison. Fire doesn't really need any change, and ice or cold damage can still fit under 'water' (Though it really should be separate for the purposes of the star). But what to do with earth? Something that would be considered weak to acid/air, but strong against ice/water? I liked the 'mercurial' damage mentioned above, perhaps that would work.
Redesigning some spells/monsters shouldn't be too difficult to fit this cosmology. Summoning a 'metal elemental' would be fun.
Long been a fan of the Wu Hsing elemental system myself, Stal. You also see it used among Onmyoji magicians in Japan, but from more of a buddhist than taoist viewpoint.
Its model of multi-level interaction appeals more to me than the oppositional hellenic model. I also like that it flows easily from the Yin-Yang-Yuan model.
WotC tried to draw on this system with the Wu-Jen class but honestly I feel it fell very flat from it's basis.
Have you played or looked at Qin: the Warring States. It does very good job of integrating the Wu Hsing into several aspects of the game (attributes, magic, etc).
So far, from what I have seen the games that excel at elemental magic are usually those like Qin and L5R the incorporate them as an integral aspect ot the game from the beginning and beyond just magic.
-Weylin
Awesome. I never knew the names of those models, thanks for that!
No, I haven't had a chance to pick up either of those games yet... (sadly, my exposure to tabletop rpgs has been limited to d20 products and, obviously, DnD in all its glory)... but I will definitely give them a look should I ever come across them!
I do agree, the OA's attempt to use the Wu Hsing system was a flop... Can't fault them for trying, though. As it is, I might start a campaign that utilizes this stuff more intently later on. First, however, I should probably finish the one I've been stirring around for about 18 months now... >.<
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Solid, liquid, gas and plasma. Pretty much the modern elements of earth, water, air and fire.Heh, I avoided mentioning plasmas to avoid the technicality that fire isn't actually plasma, really. As I understand it (being a number of years removed from any formal education in science) plasmas are pretty much only observed under wicked extreme heat/when triggered by lasers/in celestial bodies.
True, but we can get away with calling a fireball plasma, 'cause who'se gonna know? It's not really traditional fire, as in a chemical reaction, because the fireball spell doesn't mention needing anything to react *with.* :)
It's *magic* fire!
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Solid, liquid, gas and plasma. Pretty much the modern elements of earth, water, air and fire.Heh, I avoided mentioning plasmas to avoid the technicality that fire isn't actually plasma, really. As I understand it (being a number of years removed from any formal education in science) plasmas are pretty much only observed under wicked extreme heat/when triggered by lasers/in celestial bodies.True, but we can get away with calling a fireball plasma, 'cause who'se gonna know? It's not really traditional fire, as in a chemical reaction, because the fireball spell doesn't mention needing anything to react *with.* :)
It's *magic* fire!
Why am I reminded of all those long threads revolving around how lightsabers work?
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I can even see Sonic as better for earth than Acid.
If you think of it like vibrations and almost bludgeoning, it makes a lot of sense. Plus, Cold could be partial aspects of both Air and Water depending on the form.
Air - Electricity and Cold
Earth - Sonic
Fire - Fire (and heat)
Water - Acid and Cold