A view of the thunder14 spell casted on a rock.


What is the Spell System and how does it work?


Last updated: Sep 22, 2005;

1 Introduction



In my stories (especially the most common case) and mind game (rare), spells are always being casted one way or another going off in every which direction. Yet, the system on how it works is easy to understand. A typical view of one spell, thunder14, is shown in the animation above.

This report isn't all that important, but very important if you are to understand my script and my mind game in general and, to some extent, my dreams.

2 Spell basics



2.1 Spell name organization



Spells have a series name and some have multiple levels of the same series. You've seen fire36, ice36, ultima6, normalize2, you name it, it's found in my stories and scattered throughout my site. What do they all mean? The answer is simple. Let's take thunder14 (which is shown in the animation above):

Thunder14
^^^^^^^**


The area marked by ^'s is the name of the spell series. The number is the level. Thunder14 is an attacking spell using thunder elemental properties. If the spell is only level 1, no number is shown. That is, thunder1 would actually be just "thunder".

2.2 Calculating damage from spells



Damage done is calculated by this seemingly long formula [mostly confirmed]:

( MAG ^ ( 1 / 3 ) × MAP × 2 ^ ( MLVL ÷ 2 - 1 ) × EDEF × .95 × CSC ) - DEF ^ 1.5 <= DMG <= MAG ^ ( 1 / 3 ) × MAP × 2 ^ ( MLVL ÷ 2 - 1 ) × EDEF × 1.05 × CSC ) - DEF ^ 1.5


In this wacky, very long range formula with lots of variables, MAG is what your magic stat is*, MAP is your magic attack power [which varies among spells; see the individual spell series report for the info], MLVL is the level of the spell used [For fire29, the level is 29; does not apply to the ultima series and certain nonattacking spells], EDEF is the elemental defense** for the target [value is 1 if nonelemental attack is used], CSC stands for "criticals and supercriticals"***, which are hits that deal more damage than normal, depending on how you hit the target. DEF is the target's defense, and DMG is the damage caused. This formula relates to the damage done in the target area. To find the net damage, just multiply your result by the percentage of the area of the target covered. That is, if you only affect 70% of the target, the net damage is 70% lower than the base damage. That's a lot of variables involved! To learn how to work out this formula either by hand or by calculator, refer to the FAQ page.

3 Spell effect animations



There are numerous spells and in my script, I mentioned something like a few trillion. The actual amount is kept secret until the new version of my script has been successfully registered to copyright. This table below describes all the spell's main basics on the individual series level.

The spell's names are a link for a good reason: you can actually watch the spell's effects in short AVI videos I've created. Because the process of unzipping the AVIs is awful and that they are very large in file size, they'll be replaced by animated GIFs instead, similar to the one at the top. All videos/animations are 160x120 in size and play at 10 frames per second and are of very low quality to help with compression to seriously shorten the download time. All videos, created from drawing a series of bitmap images with small changes in each, exactly as the image shown at the top, only with a slightly different effect with the target being a cubic rock. Also, you can learn a lot more about each spell including each individual level's effects in words, average damage they cause, the root value, and more.

4 AVI animation troubleshooting



4.1 How to unzip successfully



Though there are many videos to download in the future and available now, you might encounter a problem when trying to view it. It's often because you don't do the full process. Here's how you view the videos, if you wish to see them:

First, find the spells series you're interested in and click the link. Then, in the table, select the appropriate spell level group to download the video. Save it to your hard drive, otherwise, you can't view it. Most videos are no more than 25 KB, but when fully uncompressed, they become 10 MB, which wouldn't be that big of an issue given that most modern hard drives can store 80 gigs of disk space (meaning you can have nearly 8000 of these 10 meg videos). Second, open up Explorer [i.e. the "My Documents" directory], and go to the location in which you saved your file. Unzip the zip file. After you unzip it, open up the new folder that appears. Inside is another zip file often about double to triple the download size. Unzip that zip file. Doing so will reveal the AVI file which is the video. Double-click it and it'll start playing. If you can't unzip the zip files, you'll need to download a program that'll do so and Winzip is the best program to doing so. You can download the 21-day trial program here.

4.2 From AVI to GIF



GIF has many advantages over AVI for these. However, there are some disadvantages as well. Consider this chart to see why:

FeatureAVIGIF
Download sizewins bigloses - usually 80% bigger, but at around 50 KB or so, it does matter some, but not that much
Hard disk storageloses - requires several megabyteswins very big - viewable when compressed - the same as the download size (from cache)
Steps needed to viewloses - it's long, painful, and confusingwins big - click the link and that's it
Frame rateswins slightly - up to 60 fpsloses - up to 10 fps, which is what I use anyway, though there are rare, odd exceptions
Allowed qualityNo winner - quality = file size = time - high quality means big file size and longer times needed to makeNo winner - the same goes for GIF - but allows up to 256 colors only, and it's quite rare I get much above even 32 anyway, still way below the limit
Processing on my endwins moderately - just save some BMPs and put them together - very quick and simpleloses - have to save the BMPs as GIF frames, then process the GIF frames to remove duplicates, if any. I still can't find any program that will batch convert BMP files to GIF keeping the original colors EXACTLY as they were*.


Table footnotes:
* For example, to help explain, the color I use for grass is 40C000. Most batch converters change this color to 33CC00 and it doesn't look as good. A color like 6080E0 would get changed to 6699CC having a very noticeable difference. The closest I've been is with Irfanview, but even that doesn't optimize the GIF files and the colors are still changed. Until I find such a batch converter, you'll be stuck with the AVIs and I won't make any more animations until then. I have to save the frames one by one. Open the BMP file, save it as GIF. Strangely enough, that works as it should. I then open the next BMP file and save it as GIF. For 300 frames, that's 1 hour's worth of doing this which makes me critically lose my interest in doing that. Most of my spell effects animations hover around 30 or so frames. My bigger animations often have over 100.

5 A small list of some spell series



5.1 Spell failure error notices



There's also a complete list of as many spell failures that I can think of ranging from having insufficient spell power and forgetting to set your target location to rare ones like the lack of sources and more. The complete list is located here with what causes them and how to fix it, or prevent it.

5.2 The list of spells



Spell series nameUse(s)LevelsAnimations made*
FireFire elemental attack on target36All available!** and ***
IceIce elemental attack on target36Ice 1-9 available
ThunderThunder elemental attack on target36Need to be redone
QuakeEarth elemental attack on target36Need to be redone
PoisonPoison elemental attack on target36No
WindstormWeak wind elemental attack on target9No special spell effects
TornadoStrong wind elemental attack on target9No
WaterWater elemental attack on target6Need to be redone
HolyHoly elemental attack on target6All that's needed
GravitateGravity elemental attack on target6No spell effects
DarkDark elemental attack on target6No
UltimaAnnihilating the target by antimatter collisions†6ultima 1-6
CureRestoring hit points to target1Needs to be slightly redone
HealRemoving weak bad status effects level 192 to 11No
Normalize(2)Removes all bad status effects/Removes all status effects, good and bad.2Normalize needs to be redone for more accuracy as it's quite inaccurate
DeleteRemove non-living things and convert them to the medium that surrounds them1Needs to be redone
CreateCreate something of the caster's choice1Effects vary
EditEdits the existing target to something else [does not include stats]1Effects vary
MoveTarget moves however the caster wishes1Effects vary
HasteDoubles the target's speed of motion by making the target's time go by half as fast1No
LifeRaising the dead1Needs to be redone
Life-cureRaising the dead and getting them in good condition1No
SlowCuts the target's speed in half by making their time go by twice as fast1No
StopStops the target's actions for 1 hour1No
MuteMakes a sound-proof barrier around the target so no sounds emit from it1No spell effects
Scan(2, 3)scans target's current and max hit points, current and max spell power, and elemental defenses/same as scan, but gets the entire primary status as well/same as scan2 but gets all stats except 5th, 7th, and 9th status bars.‡3No spell effects


Table footnotes:
* This column lets you know what spell effects animations, if any, have been created that you can see. Some spells, however, have no spell effects, so there will be no video for that spell. Others have effects that vary with each use. Also, because there's a serious bug with everyone of them except ultima6, these videos that were done need to all be redone, however, one video at 100 frames only takes an hour [except holy and dark as they might be three hours or so].
** Because the spell's effects are identical for some spells, the level range is given.
*** Some videos have something that has either been changed, or is too inaccurate. If the text becomes white, then the video has been redone and has been uploaded for you to download.
† Ultima6's nature involves using extreme force to shatter the atomic makeup completely. Read the spell's information for more on this.
‡ This involves a lot of Status System terms. To learn about the Status System, read all of this report for lots of details. If you don't feel like reading that huge report, read the summarized version instead.

6 How spells work



6.1 The physics behind the spells (a concept)



The physics behind almost all of the spells is in the effects of the shockwaves that are used for changing atoms around. Do note that this is untested and may or may not be physically possible. This is just a concept on how these spells likely work. Understanding the concept of having shockwaves changing atoms is quite complicated, but somewhat easy to understand. They are very related to sound waves. If you combine two identical sound waves where the high points match the high points of the identical wave, you'll get a louder sound. If you were to combine the same two, but having the high points as the low points on the other wave, you'll cancel out the sounds making them almost inaudible. This same concept works for these shockwaves. Also, another thing you'll need to understand is the effect of distortion caused from speed. If the sound source was coming toward you, the waves "compress" and you hear a higher frequency. If the sound source was headed away, the waves "expand" and you hear a lower frequency. This same pricipal works with the shockwaves, only with an added twist. The first wave is sent at a given speed, then the second wave is sent at a slightly faster speed [typically of a much lesser degree as distance increases] with the "wave" somewhat expanded, just enough so that when the front of the second wave meets up with the front of the first wave that the two waves greatly amplify each other as the concept of blending two identical soundwaves with highs to highs. This sudden amplification causes a burst in the targetted area and forces atoms to change around. How this is done is by special encoding in the shockwave.



6.2 The spell effects



Each spell has it's own special effects. If the shockwaves, as described above, are sent out toward the targetted area, Like sound waves, if all were identical, you couldn't hear a piano or cello [nor tell the difference]. Sound waves have their own unique patterns. The same goes for the shockwaves. Only shockwaves are far more sophisticated than sound and light waves. Shockwaves must be quite precise, otherwise certain failures can occur, especially the distorted failure as explained on number 14 here. Describing the encoding of a shockwave is trying to imagine the sound produced when visually seeing the sound wave. It's next to impossible without some very good thinking skills and strong knowledge with sound. When a shockwave for fire18 is sent out, it has it's own encoding. Like sound, items that are nearly identical have small differences. The same goes for a shockwave. The shockwave for fire18 is almost the same as level 10 to 17 fire. There is a much greater difference, but still with a lot of similarity between fire 18 and fire 9, which have somewhat different spell effects, but the principal of changing atoms to hydrogen atoms and giving the hydrogen atoms a small spark to make the fire remains the same. The shockwaves, however, are quite a bit different for a fire spell to an ice or thunder spell, though fire has more similarities to thunder than does ice as thunder is one great big spark and fire has a miniature spark. Ice has no sparks at all. For complicated spells, like the ultima series, the shockwaves are sent out so finely tuned for nearly 1.8 seconds [estimated, have no source to judge on, so accuracy is very weak]!

6.3 The weird pros and cons



Because of the nature of these shockwaves, spells have an odd disadvantage to other methods of attacking. Spells are far more effective at long range than short range whereas it's the opposite with other methods [more effective at short range than long]. The reason why they're more effective as you can keep adding more shockwaves as the distance increases to further amplify the effect. You couldn't get a bullet to reach the moon, but the shockwaves can reach it in about 1.4 seconds, which is somewhat slower than the speed of light [Light takes 1.3 seconds to reach the Moon from Earth.]. The shockwaves on the Moon could easily end up being ten thousand times as powerful as something just 20 miles away but only 1% as powerful when just 1056 feet away. It's linear to distance as, the more distance you have, the more shockwaves you can send and more shockwaves means greater amplification for a more powerful effect. Yet, spells don't work in locations in space from the insufficiency of a source, which causes a unique failure notice not possible elsewhere. Through an AP-costly ability to convert light particles [photons] into matter, spells can then work anywhere, though they take much longer to juice up, increasing in length as you get more distant from light sources, especially in the intergalactic regions of the universe.

7 About "spell failed" notices



This concept is much harder to understand. First, it takes an ability costing in the high nonillions of ability points to learn† and ‡. After something goes wrong, typically a failure in the name of immunity to an effect due to defenses of the target and/or the type of target, some of those shockwaves, in a far weaker version return to the caster and, with the special "view failures" ability, you can see that the spell failed because the target is immune to the effect you're trying to place on it. Sometimes, immunity has a special reflector on that type of attack, which is why some of the shockwaves get returned to the caster. There are cases in which the shockwaves never get sent out, usually due to insufficient spell power or the lack of a specified destination where the shockwaves intersect. The special ability of "view failures" is not required for these occasions.

8 How to cast a spell



First, nothing will happen with you as you seriously lack the supernatural abilities (and the phenomenal amount of energy) required to even cast any spell, but the process is quite simple. This image below shows you graphical representation of the four steps involved.



  1. First, make a fist like the first part shows while standing in a very upright position. Then move this fist up to your forehead in tact [without getting it unhooked].
  2. When the fist touches the forehead, a greenish glow [color code 70C040††] appears around you standing no more than 1/32 of your height for 2 seconds [that is, if you're 64 inches tall, the glow's spikes will be no more than 2 inches tall]. After the greenish glow fades away, undo your fist and drop your left hand to the side hanging down.
  3. With your right hand, move it back then jerk it forward quickly with the palm facing directly in front of you [step 4], even if the target is behind you. After the spell’s effects end, continue as normal [unless the spell is repeated from casting it multiple times consecutively]. It should take about 4 seconds to do this entire process before the spell’s effects start. Sometimes, a message saying "spell failed: reason for failure" appears after the spell’s effects end in a 404040-colored 3/4 transparent box with white [FFFFFF in color] text staying there for 3 seconds. For more details on this, refer to the spell failures list for the complete list and how to resolve the error. For mass-selecting [selecting multiple targets], the process is exactly the same, but the spell’s effects are played on the targets individually for some spells, but once for others. What I mean by this is the life spell would make only one angel appear, but when the cure spell follows, the effect is played on all targets.


9 Obtaining a spell yourself



9.1 The energy requirements are beyond phenomenal



Humans could certainly be able to get these spells, provided that they can harness close to or exceeding a terajoule of energy and pay over $10,000 for electricity costs per spell. Even the simplest of fire or thunder spells could easily end up taking 400 units of spell power, or roughly 800 gigajoules of energy. That's a phenomenal amount of energy! How much is it? Think of a 60-watt lightbulb. This 60-watt lightbulb has an infinite life and burns constantly with numerous forms of energy backup to keep it running. To use up 1 unit of spell power (2 gigajoules or 555 5/9 kilowatt-hours), this lightbulb would have to run for 9 hours, 15 minutes, and 33 1/3 seconds. To use up enough energy to be able to use a simple fire spell, at 400 spell power, you're looking at running the lightbulb for a little over 3703 days, 16 hours, 53 minutes, and 20 seconds. That's nearly two extra months past ten years. If electricity costed 6˘ per kilowatt-hour, you'd have to pay the electric company $13,333.33 for the electric bill to gain the power to cast a simple fire spell. That's just crazy! An electric bill for over $13,000 is ridiculous, but that's what would be needed for the simplest of fire spells. Humans, by the way, hardly carry anything in the way of a single unit of spell power. A tiny fraction at best is all you can expect. You definitely won't have zero, or you'd be dead.

9.2 Using technology



As you probably know, technology is advancing at an accelerative rate, increasing faster as time goes on. Suppose we can harness the energy from atoms more wisely and very efficiently. Once we can do that, we could have some better extent and availability for spells. Spells, as of today and likely for the next 15 years would be highly unlikely to harness. Then, we have to figure out the shockwaves or whatever mechanism is used behind the spells which could then mean another 3 to 10 years of additional research into this. Technology for spells is certainly out of reach for this time era.

10 How much spell power?



Spells consume spell power, plenty of it, some far more than others, sometimes, the spell power consumption can be mysteriously higher or lower than normal, but there's reasons for it. Most spells don't fall much below a billion spell power for a root value, however, if you have a high SPR stat, this is of minimal worry as it'll take quite little. If you want to know how much spell power a spell takes, first, find the spell series in the table above and click the link to bring up the spell's level-specific and general spell series details. Find the spell level you want to know about and look for it's root value. Then, identify what your SPR would be when you want to cast that spell. Given those two variables, you can find out exactly how much spell power you'd consume given this newly found formula:

SPC = RV × (SPR ÷ 1,000,000,000)


Formula confirmation status: disproven

This formula has two variables. RV is the root value, the spell power used when SPR is 0. SPR is, of course, your spirit stat. For certain spells, like move, edit, etc., another variable is required. Just multiply your answer in this formula by what is said about the spell's information [see level-specific details table]. A high SPR reduces the spell power cost. At the max, 999,999,999, spell power consumption is almost zero, only a very slight bit is used, only 0.1% of the root value. That's all there basically is to the Spell System. Just click the name to learn more about that spell. If you'd like to know how I make these videos and what I do to make these videos behind the scenes, go here.

11 Pros and cons about spells



Like a cannon compared to a bow and arrow, there are pros and cons between them. The same goes with spells and today's most common weapons (usually guns). Here are the pros and cons between the two. The ratings are based on the 0-10 scale using the half-step technique. From 5 to 10 is an advantage (5 is neutral) and from 0 to 5 is a disadvantage (5 is neutral). Exactly 0 or exactly 10 are impossible (due to division by zero). For the spells column, the left side is the rating for beginners and the right side is the rating for masters separated by a single /. The others are based on from being an advanced user at using it.

FeatureSpellsGunsOther conventional weapons (the best ones for the group)
Range8.6/9.92 - virtually unlimited, depending on your vision or other special abilities you may have. Casting spells on, say, the nearest star is possible, but you'll have to wait for about 9 years or so to see the effects. It could even be at the other end of the known universe!1.6 - a few miles at best3.8 - a few thousand miles and only on the Earth
Accuracy0.3/5.9 - can be a few hundred miles off with ease for beginners, but, due to the speed of the shockwaves, the accuracy is still quite bad even for masters, but is comparable to some minor extent.8.5 - strong9.1 - strong
Damage capabilities9.96 extreme on entire target and only that target not affecting neighboring objects, even millimeters away, unless, of course, you target it7.3 high, but in a small area9.2 extreme, but also effects other nearby objects
Armor penetration9.3/9.992 you cannot defend yourself through armor with spells no matter how good it is - just select the one inside as the target and cast away. Only energy shields can prevent it and no such thing exists that's powerful enough (as far as I know).0.8 very weak6.2 acceptable, but can later be outdated
Usage requirements0.012 a phenomenal amount of energy, amounting close to (and over) a terajoule, something hard to harness9.4 Just gunpowder, a bullet, and the gun itself4.2 (in terms of bombs) just the casing, a lot of explosive, and something to carry the massive object
Effects1.2/8.7 Beginners would get lots of boring "spell failed" errors which are nothing more than text on a semi-transparent background - comes in many kinds of effects, though sometimes time stops, and some spells don't have anything at all4 just a loud bang and sometimes, though rare, hits can sometimes be funny (such as hitting a can on the bottom causing the top can to fall over and end up stacked three high on top of others already on the ground8.2 Big explosions and sometimes shockwaves or other interesting effects
Effectiveness in war0.018/9.98 can wipe out an entire army in just 4 seconds - a beginner could misuse the spell and wipe out all armies in the world (and the planet itself)0.6 takes one bullet per enemy, but sometimes it takes more3.6 can take out an entire army in a small given area, but it's not always effective and affects those and other objects around it
Effectiveness for the public0.013/9.82 can allow instant restoration of diseases and injuries and can revive the dead; can also be used to put on shows - beginner misuse could end up destroying the planet0.7 only useful for a limited number of applications, especially law enforcement0.7 same as with guns, not useful, except for law enforcement
In rescue operations9.89 can be used to eliminate the hazards completely or do the rescue entirely in four seconds without much in the way of limitations in terms of the number you can rescue, especially raising the dead0.03 - rarely of any use0.15 - rarely of any use
In the scientific community7.1 could allow for some research into the origins of the universe and/or Solar System, displaying special effects at greater quality than any projector could do, etc..6.4 - can be useful for studies for developing better versions6.5 - can be useful for studies for developing better versions
Space exploration9.7 - can supply ones needs indefinitely as long as you have atoms, but not useful in the space ship (teleport spells are better than a spaceship anyway, much faster)0.03 almost no use, except maybe to gain a small amount of speed0.5 useful only for gaining small amounts of speed.
In the business world1.1 super fast mass production (duplicate spell), but extremely high energy costs, often higher than it takes to produce something the normal way - only useful for otherwise expensive stuff like jewelery3.5 good for sales and businesses can make a decent profit, but only affects a small number of businesses2 hardly useful at all, except for sales mainly to the military or something
If in evil hands0.023 can be extremely devistating to anyone or anything from anywhere with no real warning time2.1 not all that devistating0.8 can be very devistating to a particular place, but some warning time can be given.


Footnotes:
* Magic is the power of using special abilities. To learn more, go to section 2 here.
** The 10 elements are explained in detail on This page.
*** Critical hits and supercritical hits are explained in the Status System report on under the damage estimation formula in section 5 here.
† A nonillion is a one followed by 30 zeros. To see this and other large number names from the millions and billions you know to the centillions and beyond, refer to the FAQ page.
‡ Ability points are ability-learning "points" that are rewarded from clearing events. To learn more, read section 1 here.
†† This is one of those hexadecimal color names I use frequently. To find this exact color, refer to this small, detailed report.