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Starr Shine? said
I was reading a fanfic where people are trapped in a video game with magic and one of the magic types is song magic.

The author created this system for how song magic interacts with the other kinds of magic. I’m posting here cause I wonder what the more musically inclined folks think about it. The author did say it was a work in progress.

Reveal Spoiler

The basis for how Song Magic synergizes with the rest of the magic system is based on an affinity called resonance. There are three types of resonances: Key Resonance, Tonal Resonance, and Harmonic Resonance.

Every element except Illusion has a direct Key Resonance with two specific major keys that are opposite each other on the Circle of Fifths—and, by implication, a resonance with their relative minor keys as well. For example, Holy Magic has a direct resonance with C Major and F? Major, which also gives it resonance with A Minor and D? Minor. These keys each have a stronger resonance with Benign, Recovery, Malign, and Utility effects, respectively.

Furthermore, the sharpness and flatness of a key has an effect on how that key interacts with non-resonant elements—a concept called Harmonic Resonance. Sharp keys such as F or G have only a modest resonance with their own element, but do not interact with non-resonant elements. Flat keys like E?m or Cm have a potent resonant effect on their own element, but a negative resonance with other elements called dissonance. The enharmonic key pairs F?/G? and D?/C? have no Harmonic Resonance.

A frequency analysis of the notes in each key signature will show that each element most strongly resonates with a particular note. That is, when all the notes used in the four keys that are resonant with an element are counted, there will be two occurrences of every note in the chromatic scale—except for one note, a different one for each element, which occurs twice as often.

To continue the example of Holy Magic: when the occurrences of each note in the keys C, F?, Am, and D?m are summed, there are two occurrences of every note in the chromatic scale—except for the natural B, which occurs four times. Holy Magic is therefore said to have Tonal Resonance with any B note—more strongly with a natural B, less strongly (but stronger than with a non-resonant note) with the notes a semitone higher or lower (C or A? in this example).

In short, spells experience Key Resonance whenever a song is being played in a key that resonates with the element used in the spell, and experience Tonal Resonance when the tempo and resonant notes of the song most closely match the stress patterns of the incantation.

As with the spell system, none of this is necessary to know in order to be effective. If you look at the pronunciation guide for spoken Majutsugo and try saying some incantations out loud, you’ll notice that they have a very specific kind of cadence to them. What some ALO bards may begin to notice is that when they’re in a party, occasionally their party members’ spells and techniques will crit more often, use less MP, or otherwise gain effectiveness in what seems to be an unpredictable way. This is the result of not only playing a song that resonates with the element used in the spell, but—in the case of magic spells—playing it so that the stronger or more elementally-resonant notes match the stress points in the rhythm of the incantation as much as possible.

Incidentally, the completely system-assisted “beginner” mode of Song Magic and the spoken pace of the pronunciation guide in a player’s spellbook are in the exact same tempo—so if someone is exactly following the leading lights on a beginner’s instrument, and a mage is precisely imitating their pronunciation guide, resonance should naturally occur if the song and the spell are elementally compatible.

So where does Illusion come in?

Illusion Magic mimics the resonant patterns of whatever key is in use. It does not resonate specifically with any single key signature, nor does it have harmony or dissonance with any. It does, however, have a resonant note: natural F, which is the only natural that does not strongly resonate with any other element. Illusion’s resonance with that note is considerably stronger than the resonance of the other elements with their notes, so while Illusion will not experience Key or Harmonic Resonance simply from a compatible key or chord progression, any spikes of effectiveness from Tonal Resonance will be much more noticeable, and there is no risk of dissonance.

Link

How did they determine those resonances?

(belated) thanks to ewe2 — often I forget I posted something and then the thread disappears from the main page…

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT: