Whitehack Magic 101: How do Miracles work???

This is a slightly related follow-up to my previous Whitehack 101 post on monsters.

Easily the most common subject of discussions and questions on Whitehack are miracles, the game's take on characters' "arcane negotiations with powerful forces in their environment" (aka just about any magic/science/psychic nonsense you can think of in an adventure game!).

This isn't surprising as it's a sort of open system, especially compared to having a set spell list which is the baseline for most old-school adventure games. To quickly summarize how it works:

1. Characters in the Wise class can note down wordings.
2. To use them, the player says what their desired effect is and the referee suggests the cost.
3. The cost is the HP that must be paid to enact the effect.
4. This cost can potentially be lowered.
5. There are a few limitations making high HP costs dangerous or even impossible if your HP is too low.

And that's pretty much it! But it's easy to see where questions can arise with this. Common points are usually:

• Are the miracle effects determined ahead of time?
• Is each wording a set effect? Can it be used for something else after we've set a cost?
• How much should a miracle cost? What's too low or too high?
  
• How much cost debate is too much?
• What kind of damage should combat miracles do?
• What the hell is the "traditional magic" table even about?

And much much more! I can share how I've been handling them and perhaps that can make others more comfortable engaging with miracles without bringing the game to a full stop to talk about HP costs.

N.B.: A lot of this isn't prescriptive and no advice will top what you and your table decide feels right, but hopefully these examples and such help clear up some things and provide guidance!

How does the Wise class compare to the others?

I've always introduced the classes something like this when first playing WH:

"Your class describes *how* you go about adventuring, not who you are. Some classes are more open to interpretation than others. The Strong is more defined, consistent, and efficient but not as flexible or potent as the Deft can be at times. The Wise is the most open and flexible class with limits that we'll figure out as we play rather than setting up at the start."

I tend to find that people appreciate that spectrum of flexibility. Some folks are all about the openness and creativity of the Wise. Some folks go full "deer in headlights" when there is no 'spell' list. Some folks like having a tactically efficient character for combat with the Strong (some of my players absolutely love seeing their tactics, cleaves, and slot abilities come together!), etc.

Miracle Working and You!

So for the Wise, the first thing is to kick aside the temptation to try and parameterize miracle effects, costs, and limitations ahead of time. If that route is more appealing, you may be better served just using a spell list rather than trying to reverse engineer a spell list from miracles.

At the table, miracles always have the same basic flow no matter what. Let's look at some more detail:

1. The Wise's player wants to do a thing (e.g., throw a fireball, turn invisible, summon a sword, etc.).
2. The referee makes a judgment call on how potent the effect is (e.g., is this powerful magic? Or is this something relatively mundane that can be achieved without magic?).
3. Ref checks if the wording and vocation check out (e.g., does the Pyromancer what to use Flame Sword to summon a magic weapon, or is the intended effect way off base?).
4. The referee then gives a suitable cost using this info and the HP Cost/Magnitude table on p. 40.
5. The player can try to lower it with some drawbacks (e.g., time, ingredient, lessened effect, etc.).
6. The player can then either back out, pay the original cost, or look at the reduced cost.

That's all! And while this may sound like a whole process and thing that will slow down play, it's important to remember that this isn't an invitation to turn into a debate club and stop the session for a mock trial. These are snap judgments meant to fit into the game, just like talking through any other action rather than an exact science that needs to hit a mechanically Correct Answer. In play it's more like:

Wise Player: I want to conjure floating wisps of fire to light up our party in the tunnel for a little bit.

Referee: Ok, you're a Pyromancer and you want to use "Summon Forth Flame"? I think normally it would be 2 hp, but with the wording/vocation on point and the limited time let's bump that down to zero!

Wise Player: Cool! I blow across my hands as small orbs of mystical flames appear around us. We'll have a little light for a few turns here.

And over time after you do this a ton, the table will have a pretty good collective idea about what kind of effects are easier or more difficult to enact. A style of magic that is wholly unique to your game!

But what if we mess up and miracles are too (insert concern here)??

It doesn't really matter too much in my experience. That's the nice thing compared to a traditional spell slot deal. Miracles are self-correcting. You can't really have one that is too disappointing or too potent, because the table can just take that into account for the next time it's used! It's not a set effect or spell that you'd need to adjust or tweak until it feels just right. If the previous cost didn't turn out to be suitable for whatever reason, that's just one more thing to consider the next time the wording is used.

Some solid tips are:

• Consider the game setting
• Start a bit high and see what happens
• Keep asking the table how they feel about the costs.

Get the table in the mindset that this flexibility isn't a hostile, adversarial thing, or an invitation for a debate. It's not trying to ruin characters or to enable the 'abuse' of rules. It's perfectly fine to say: 

"Tell me what you want your miracle to do and I'll suggest a cost. I'm going to start costs a little higher so we don't get too extreme, but we'll work out what feels right as we go. It's not set in stone, ok?"

Christian, Whitehack's author, also had some good ideas on this:

"I try not to figure out principles before hand, but let this settle over time with the specific group. That said, the rules already stipulate a kind of scale [...]. You don't need to overthink this. If you demand high costs, you will find that your players simply try harder to find arguments to lower the cost, spend more gold on goldberries/quicksilver/whatever and find more excuses to rest between adventure phases. It also depends on the world. In a world where magic is common, it is usually cheap and quick to use. But in a world where it is rare, people use rituals, time restrictions for when miracles can be performed and expensive ingredients."

Can I redo a wording? Isn't it a set effect once you use it?

No, miracle wordings are not set effects. They can be relatively limited, but never to the extent of the same singular effect every time. In fact, the choice of general wording vs specific wording actually factors into the cost! Is it going to be broad and costly but often useful (like “Shadows”), or to be specific and cheaper (like “Summon Creepy Sword”)?

How much damage can miracles do?

This will vary from table to table, setting to setting, etc. But I usually tend to keep miracle damage rather conservative. Remember that a normal person has 1 hit point! Because of the d6 hit die, even for HD 1 or HD 2 foes, a 1d6+1 miracle is a deadly thing indeed!

This can be flexible, however! Consider Original Dungeons & Dragons. What with it being Whitehack 'ancestor', it's similar in that HD and all damage used d6s and hit points aren't in abundance for anyone (including monsters and critters)! In vanilla OD&D, fireballs and lightning bolts were potent spells for 5th level+ magic users that did 1d6 per level of the caster, saving for half damage! Dragon breath did the dragon's current HP in damage, with a save for half! In the world of OD&D such things were terrifying but the game didn't break, even with HP in such short supply. Same thing with Storm Giants punching for 4d6 damage. They were obstacles to be tricked or avoided not slugged to death. This type of stuff works perfectly fine in Whitehack.

What the hell is the "traditional magic" table even about?

It just shows at what character level certain effects become available in the classic D&D editions like OD&D or B/X. It can be used to gauge effects in those types of classic settings, e.g., you wouldn't be able to interpret miracle wordings to cheaply teleport or kill someone instantly, etc. as a level 1 Wise. The HP cost for those effects should be high!

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What questions do y'all have about miracles? Any favorite bits, cool ideas, or pain points? It's definitely a take on magic that can *really* excel with the right table!