If you’ve ever played a JRPG, you’re probably already familiar with the concept of magitech, even if this is your first time hearing the term. Magitech refers to the interesection between magic and technology. Does a fictional world have airships powered by mystic crystals linked to the deities that founded all of reality a millennia ago? Or do the people wear steampunk-looking bracelets that let them throw fire or move things with their mind? That’s magitech, baby, and we’re gonna talk about it!

What kind of inspirations have you drawn from for this facet of your worldbuilding?

Rae: JRPGs…heavily. Escaflowne. Magic Knight Rayearth.

Renie: Sci-Fi. Dune. Star Trek. Civil engineering work and tinkering with things. Magical Girls.

Thane: Final Fantasy. Jak and Daxter. The Edge Chronicles and its magic system.

Delphie: Final Fantasy 6. Super NES square games. JRPGs

Does your comic incorporate magitek, or play with the intersection between magic and technology and society? Tell us about how you’re using it in your own work, what it brings to your theme!

Rae: On Empyrean High has airships that uses something harvested from dragons to power it. It takes the approach of “humans can’t use magic but these creatures can. Let’s harvest that power.”

Renie: All magic is affected by the star power and the physics that it modifies. The way ships run, the transformation power, etc. Very rooted in actual science.

Thane: Chirault treats magic as an energy force that everyone can access (with training). From this, people have developed long distance communication methods, vehicles, etc. Wychwood’s “magic” is actually technology. It’s deliberately built and it’s use and rules were rules designed by people.

Delphie: There’s a god in charge of lucidity and decided technology was safer than uncontrolled magic. They implement a very strict rule system for using the tech and what happens when people break these rules to use the magic for whatever they want.

What advice would you give to creators who are just starting out and want to make use of these world building tools, or who are struggling with implementing it?

Have fun with it. Consider the source of the powers and the limitations and consequences of the magic and/or technology.

Rule of cool when needed. Find something familiar that you can base your magitech around. It allows people to relate more to the story and grounds your work. Like Crystals. Everyone seems to know that if a crystal shows up in a fantasy/sci-fi setting..it’s magical.

Know the journey that your magitech based culture grew with/around the systems. You don’t need to write it all down, but knowing how culture was affected by the magitech can help you understand where it is at in the world.

Think of how people would use it to make the world feel more lived in. Consider how mundane tasks and challenges would be affected by use of magitech.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed, start small by fleshing out a couple things and then you can build from there. There should be some internal logic to your story, but you don’t need to have everything figured out.

And don’t forget: Keep it Crystal Stupid.

----

Episode Release Date: June 22, 2022

Episode Credits

Rae Baade (@overlordrae) - they/them, empyreancomic.com

Renie Jesanis (@renieplayerone) - she/they, kateblast.com

Christina Major (@delphina2k) - she/her, sombulus.com

Ally Rom Colthoff (@varethane) - she/they, chirault.sevensmith.net wychwoodcomic.com

-----

The Intro "DO IT (feat. Shia LaBeouf)", and the Outro "It's Good To See You Again!!", both by Adrianwave, have been used and modified in good faith under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Licensed. Edits include: Fade IN/OUT, and a repeat added to the beginning of "It's Good To See You Again!!". For more information on this creative commons use, please reference https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.