Need help with a nature themed magic system

[NiightLiight]

Hey all, I am slightly obsessed with creating magic system now, so I am curious about what a nature based magic system would be like without implimenting the four elements thing. What would be a cool magic system that is life and nature themed?

[TheSurvivorofDeath]

Welcome to the club. Nature magic is a very broad thing, which leaves a lot of room for creativity. You could do manipulation of plants, like growing them and changing them and maybe killing them. You could do a life force deal, like extracting the life of living things to do magic. You could do healing magic, animal communication, transmutation, all kinds of things. You could even do all of those and more.

[J. Magi she/her]

Ooo this could be fun!

For me, when I'm developing a magic system I like to consider the thematics behind powers, as well as their functions. The great thing about plants, and flowers specifically, is that they hold a lot of traditional and mythological meaning. It could be really fun to consider, and would add a level of depth to the world building alongside being a cool magic system.

Some thoughts along that vein:

-Healers having powers based around herbs that are well known as medicinal. Maybe, they ingest their herb, magically amplify it within themselves, and then transfer the amplified affects to a patient. An example from off the top of my head would be a lavender mage. Lavender is known to help people sleep, and give them good dreams. Maybe our lavender mage uses the plant as a magical medium for putting people to sleep (this could be for medicinal purposes, or could be used on enemies as well!). Or, going further, they could access the 'dreamscape' and interfere with people's dreams using lavender. 

-Several different kinds of flowers mean love. Maybe, love potions from different flower mages could have different affects. A rose mage's love potion would give the 'victim' romantic love, a forget me not mage's potion would focus on devotion, a baby's breath mage's love potion would be more innocent, etc. 

-A poppy mage being feared as the grim reaper because of their association with death. (whether or not they really have power over that could be up to you)

-The flower Amaranth symbolizes immortality. Does the flower really grant people immortality? Do mages who use the flower gain immortality? Maybe the flower is rare, and people search for it because they believe it will give them long life.  

-Himalayan blue poppy's are associated with psychic skills, which could obviously be used for telepathy and empathy type powers.

This wiki page has a lot of good meanings for flowers, but is lacking for other plants. Research for this sort of thing isn't hard, and generally you can find good stuff with just a quick google.

Obviously, this is just one way of taking things--and the way I personally would do things. I focused more on the 'separate plants' side of things, but you could also do different biomes, animals, natural phenomena, weather, etc. Nature is a really good topic because you can do so much with it! 

Edited June 23 by J. Magi

[NiightLiight]

7 hours ago, J. Magi said:

-Healers having powers basic around herbs that are well known as medicinal. Maybe, they ingest their herb, magically amplify it within themselves, and then transfer the amplified affects to a patient. An example from off the top of my head would be a lavender mage. Lavender is known to help people sleep, and give them good dreams. Maybe our lavender mage uses the plant as a magical medium for putting people to sleep (this could be for medicinal purposes, or could be used on enemies as well!). Or, going further, they could access the 'dreamscape' and interfere with people's dreams using lavender. 

Ohhh I can see lots of ways this could be really cool and make sense, so people don't just magically heal but they can take the "essence" of the flower and amplify it, which limits their powers nicely where they need plants in order to heal. Maybe they could do basic healing, but needs certain plants to heal bigger things. 

7 hours ago, J. Magi said:

Several different kinds of flowers mean love. Maybe, love potions from different flower mages could have different affects. A rose mage's love potion would give the 'victim' romantic love, a forget me not mage's potion would focus on devotion, a baby's breath mage's love potion would be more innocent, etc. 

-A poppy mage being feared as the grim reaper because of their association with death. (whether or not they really have power over that could be up to you)

-The flower Amaranth symbolizes immortality. Does the flower really grant people immortality? Do mages who use the flower gain immortality? Maybe the flower is rare, and people search for it because they believe it will give them long life.  

-Himalayan blue poppy's are associated with psychic skills, which could obviously be used for telepathy and empathy type powers.

This opens up many new ideas where different flowers can have powers based on their symbolism and cultural symbolism. Additionally, I think I can make some cool worldbuilding out of this where people may regard plants differently from one culture to another, or even a civilization that regards colors and pigments from flowers to be the most sacred thing or smth like that (Warbreaker?). 

I am thinking that maybe people that ingest different flowers can gain that power for a certain amount of time, and maybe when consuming a lot of a certain type of flower can pernamently changed someone, like how in allomancy someone can become a salvant if they burn a certain type of metal too much for too long. 

Spoiler

Like how Vin became (or almost became) a pewter savant, or how Spook became a tin savant.

Thanks! I love the idea of using the symbolism of plants as magic  

10 hours ago, TheSurvivorofDeath said:

Welcome to the club.

Haha once I started with magic system creating now I can't stop with the what-ifs. Its really fun to create magic systems. 

[J. Magi she/her]

6 minutes ago, NiightLiight said:

This opens up many new ideas where different flowers can have powers based on their symbolism and cultural symbolism. Additionally, I think I can make some cool worldbuilding out of this where people may regard plants differently from one culture to another, or even a civilization that regards colors and pigments from flowers to be the most sacred thing or smth like that (Warbreaker?). 

 

Going even further with that, you could play with how someone's perception of a plant affects how they use it. Can someone of one culture use the meaning of another? How does the different meanings affect how mages from different places see each other and interact? There's lots of cool places you could go with it!

[TheSurvivorofDeath]

2 hours ago, NiightLiight said:

Haha once I started with magic system creating now I can't stop with the what-ifs. Its really fun to create magic systems. 

I feel that. I’ve made so many magic systems I don’t have anywhere to put half of them. I’m going to have to build stories and worlds just to do the magics justice. And by the way, you don’t have to make all your magic in the same world. Different worlds lets you have wildly different magics with no need for a definitive common thread. Makes it much easier to get truly creative.

[NiightLiight]

21 minutes ago, TheSurvivorofDeath said:

Different worlds lets you have wildly different magics with no need for a definitive common thread. Makes it much easier to get truly creative.

Yeah