How come Exiles only has black magic?
every game we have ever played, and the Conan movies all had both.
I guess the Devs are just evil.
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Movies arenât canon.
Conan Exiles is sticking to the original lore where sorcery is inherently evil.
If the next Age is the Age of Gods, perhaps we could get some religious alternatives to sorcery.
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I saw everything in the movie that is in game.
Just happened to watch it tonight.
Im sticking with the Devs are evil
Sorcery and Religion in the Exiled Lands are one in the same.
Even the followers of Mitra are only using their faith to create weapons to destroy or subjugate everyone else. Conan said it best:
I have travelled far and seen much. From the glittering ice of Asgard to the jungle expanses of the Black Kingdoms, I have been thief, pirate and mercenary. But nowhere have I seen gods as I see them in this land. These avatars that stalk and spread destruction in their wake. These are not gods. These are what men want the gods to be. Weapons.
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I believe that none of the gods with represented religions have any influence in the Exiled Lands, they are all just part of a charade being played by Nyarlathotep. All of the avatars are puppets and Nyarlathotep is the puppeteer. However, for the charade to continue to work, Nyarlathotep needs to keep presenting the religions as if they were real.
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The Funcom games are more based on the books, not the movies. But that aside: Where do the movies have âgoodâ magic?
Both the books and the movies seem to have some kind of benevolent divine intervention occasionally, but if that actually happens or is just a representation of peoplesâ beliefs is an open question.
Overall, the Hyborian Age is a dark place. Itâs not even evil, but almost completely amoral from a modern standpoint. If you hold Conan to modern standards, heâs a murderer, â â â â â â and slaver. Also, he probably didnât sort his trash correctly.
The sorcerers present in the movies and the books are even worse. Sorcery corrupts its user, and one can argue that it fails them all in the end.
That seems to be represented well in Conan Exiles flavor-wise.
If there is any âgoodâ magic in Conan Exiles, it can be found in alchemy. Mix then aloe plants together by hand, swallow them, heal your broken leg and that nasty stab wound in your belly - if that ainât magic, I donât know what is.
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The devs are, or at least used to be, Howard purists.
There are a relatively small number of stories that would be canon by those standards and the movies, while enjoyable, arenât exactly within those established bounds.
That having been said, there were mystics who did help Conan.
Mostly thru divinations and enchantment of arms, if memory serves.
Of course, there were more cases of evil magus vs evil magus with Conan in the middle.
But, beside the point, whatâs so evil about making an Ice Bridged, or Detecting Resources?
Thereâs plenty of meh to borderline benign magics, even more if we include the alchemy bench. Which we probably should include in the settingâs definition of Magic based on the novels, with stage magic being used to enhance actual fell dweomers.
But wheeling this all back aroundâŠ
Why only evil magic?
Because of the bracelet.
The Giant Kings (and possibly Toth Amon later) specifically included suppression of magic as part of the braceletâs curse. The magic available to those who are bonded is only whatever horror show Kurak cobbled together and he was not exactly a nice guy.
Regardless of oneâs own head canon about their characterâs innocence, most of the people in the Exiled Lands seem to be of the murder first, talk lat- nevermind, we donât talk to food or corpses variety.
What would the suggested source of benevolent magic be and why wasnât that prodigy taken by Toth Amon to be tortured for their secrets rather than wasted in the Exiled Lands?
So, in short, a sufficiently competent mage would never get braceleted. An incompetent mage would be unable to overcome the braceletâs curse.
Mek is a perfect example. Heâs not really competent, heâs vainglorious and politically inept, regardless of how powerful he was with magic, he was a dumb dumb head loser and we see how that worked out for him. His mind wasnât agile enough to protect him from Toth and keep himself secure in the Black Ring, much less crack the code on the Giant King bracelet.
This one isnât at all opposed to more utility and useful sorcery.
Honestly, it feels like half a spell book at best and sadly seems to be paused there.
But as for âgood magicâ, make it make sense in context.
The Age of Sorcery sold itâs work around. That being a whole bunch of Eldritch Horror invocation and the efforts of non-humans besides. Even then, the dark sorceries seem⊠thinâŠ
But where would these marshmallow lasers and very berry barriers come from? Where is the source of the good magic? None of the (sham) divinities present would give anything of the sort. They are a formalized system of blood magic, trading the remnants of sacrificed people for power (not much anymore, mind you).
Dev morality is irrelevant, or more along the line of Orange and Blue, in this case.
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Priest prayers that act like potions, healing, anti poison, cure corruption, maybe mitigate incoming damage. But no offensive spells.
Bad and evil are not the same thing.
Nope that rabbit hole is too deep for me. Half a second weâll be talking Cthulhu.
My riddles of steel dlc and your pre order bonuses disagrees
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But religious weapons are weak.
Religious armor is weak.
Religious healing is weak.
There were some weak gods in the game.
From the very beginning I had the feeling that these were false gods, impostor gods.
What is âgoodâ and what is âevilâ also depends on the pov, since there is no generally valid definition.
Whatâs a sin for a religious person, doesnât bother an atheist in the slightest.
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Sheesh this is some heavy discussion. I just was playing and realized I had to drag people to the sacrificial stone to get the soul essence. Couldnât help but get the feeling it isnât exactly great for MY soul to be practicing this in any fashion real or game. Probably should have forseen this being that there was a whole wheel of pain and everything - the game is beautiful graphics and I love building but that part just rubbed wrong. Sure, we have to go somewhere to realize we shouldnât go there â Portraying possible reality and history is a way to educate people / hone our morals. I find it difficult to be okay with what is necessary to continue sorcery on the game â I hope other people realize this - not just within games, but in reality⊠Violence / cruelty is not cool - people who have been hurt in some fashion certainly would know this. I donât believe the Devs are evil, they are recreating fiction AND reality then again I could be wrong. But life is hard. However I saw a long time ago that empathy, compassion and unity was the way - everything else is just Bs.
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Life and death are hard, I think doing anything in the name of death is bad news for our spirits - we should love life - the other way is the wrong way. I hope we can figure out how to do that, tho
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I see whats going on⊠Hope you guys know that Blackthorn is on top of the bank.
The ability to separate fantasy from reality is important. I donât run around nude in real life killing everyone I meet.
As for the heavy a lot of the lore directly ties into Lovecraftâs mythos which is dark.
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You donât? Whatâs wrong with you?! 
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Those are merely cosmetic items that are a tribute to other works. Conan Chop Chop isnât canon either, and yet we have chibi Chop Chop figurines.
Man, this is so wrong on so many levels I am not even going to try and point the horde of problems in your post.
Let me just point ONE thing.
If, in your mind, you canât completely separate npcs, that are not sentient thus are emotionless, have no families, social ties or any possibility to be really harmed (since they are not conscious entities), you should stay away from games where the human form is depicted. Even those that seem more benign.
This crucial difference must be completely interiorized. If itâs not, adult gaming is not for you.
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Youâre definitely on the right track. 
Iâd like to put something into perspective however. Just in case youâre feeling uncomfortable with some of the activities that can be taken in the game or that you might feel compelled to do. This isnât an attempt to correct you or to try to dissuade you from your tastes. Just a perspective that might help going forward, one that isnât meant to change your path.
Iâve said in other threads that we have our reality and our fantasy. This applied to the visuals of our characters and how they were dressed and treated. But it also applies to what sort of violence our characters engage in, or have happen to them.
First I want to bring up two very popular movies that have a very awesome element in common. Conan the Barbarian from the 1980s, and Star Wars: A New Hope. The common thread is the portrayal of the villain in each. Darth Vader and Thulsa Doom are iconic villains. Played by the legendary James Earl Jones.
James Earl Jones is an awesome inspiration. Iâm not going to go into too much detail, but he was a young kid who grew up with a stutter, and to combat that, he basically did the one thing that stuttering should have disqualified him for, reading poetry and acting. He also served in the US Army. But his success in his acting career needs no explanation.
Anyway. He is a pretty awesome guy, and while I canât say that I know him personally, he seems rather nice and supportive. I havenât heard very many complaints there. Heâs played some very good characters, but Thulsa Doom and Darth Vader are probably his most popular.
Those characters are very evil (though Vader does show redemption eventually). But they are iconic characters and some of the most beloved in their franchises. I mean everyone here remembers his speech about the Riddle of Steel right before he crusifies Conan. It sends chills up your spine and builds a ton of tension in a very important part of that story.
This doesnât make Jones a bad guy. It makes him an excellent actor. It also doesnât make us bad people to enjoy his performances as a villain. Antagonists are some of the best parts of any story, they drive the story.
When playing video games, we usually assume the title of the protagonist. The story happens around us. But being the protagonist doesnât always mean you are the hero. Sometimes you are the bad guy. Though this role is relatively new in video games. Well I wonât say new, but its kind of on the rare side.
I remember when the Horde in the Warcraft series were unredeemably evil. Sometime during Warcraft 3, Blizzard decided to retcon much of their lore to make the Horde a bit more morally ambiguous and having the possibility of good characters. It wasnât always that way. The reason they did this was so that players could play Orcs and Trolls and not be âthe bad guysâ. While they left room for individuals to choose good or evil. Overall the Horde wasnât the same as it used to be. They just didnât think players wanted to play âbad guysâ.
Prior to WoW, I played Everquest. In Everquest Ogres, Trolls, and Dark Elves are playable. You can choose dark gods to follow and you can engage in quests where you harm, maim, torture, and kill. I can say one thing. Blizzard was wrong, many people have no issue playing the bad guys and its even quite a bit of fun.
Does this make those players bad people? Oh absolutely not. Just in Conan Exiles, enjoying someone get split apart in a fatality or dragging them to an altar to be cut open doesnât make them bad either. If you read a book where a character harms another. The author wasnât a bad person for writing the scene. Think about that for a moment.
An author is not a bad person for having bad things happen to their creations. Within their own universe they created the author is always righteous in their choices they make for those creations. Those characters exist to be harmed by those villains to advance a plot and to tell a story.
Just like our characters. They are actors in a setting that we get to direct and play out. We get to have a bit of fun and engage in fantasy. Doing so does not reflect our empathy or desires in reality.
I enjoy much of the violence and the nastiness that Sorcery brings. And I would like to point out that I have personally been subject to violence. I was at Ft Hood when the shooting happened in 2009, I lost a few people in my Battalion. I was part of the rotation going through the SRP center, and I thank God for not being present in the building when it happened. I was also stabbed by a roommate a few months later. That incident was interesting because when it happened, I could have retaliated, probably even seriously harmed or killed him, and having been assaulted, with a pool of my blood on the floor, no one would have judged me. But I couldnât bring myself to do that. Merely went to my side of the room and called the charge of quarters to get medical attention. @sjforest you probably understand why I made that decision, it wasnât out of fear or anything like that. I didnât understand it at the time and it took me many years to figure it out.
The point being, is you can love life, have compassion and strengthen oneâs soul, meanwhile doing absolutely horrible things to pixels on a screen or letters in a book. Obviously there is a point of moderation as overindulgence can lead to other issues, but that goes for just about everything in life. Reading a book once in a while or spending an hour or two on a video game should be perfectly fine.
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You would definitely made a lot of people happy, thatâs for sure.
⊠Sorcery, not black magic.
For white magic you have it from the very beginning of the gameâŠ
Lotus potions
Elixirs
Entertainers
Buff foods
Cleansing brew.
Sorcery on the other hand has both defensive and slightly offensive spells.
Sorcery allows you to fly, ice bridges, feather falling, detect resources, harvest resources, reveal corruption. Even the wall of fire is defensive.
Then when you corrupt your attributes you gain immunity to many things.
Your thralls can split dmg each other, healed by your presence and hit harder and frenzy.
So thereâs not black and white magic, just sorcery.
The problem with every update is that people judge from the surface. I can guarantee you that nobody has totally revealed all the secrets sorcery hides.
And itâs pity, we judge devs for things we havenât completely understand!
Maybe they shouldnât be so smart, we donât deserve them i say.
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