Spellbinder (video game)

Spellbinder was originally designed by Richard A. Bartle in 1977. Originally made to be played as a tabletop game, it was successfully translated into several videogames.

A list of all of the games can be found here: http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/spellbnd.htm

This game provides examples of:

 * Anti Magic: Several examples. Counter Spell prevents any spell from working on the target the turn it is cast, except for finger of death. Interestingly enough, it also protects the target from any physical attack in the same turn. Remove Enchantment kills any monster it is cast upon, as well as removing and preventing the application of persistent spell effects on the target. Dispel Magic acts as a Counter Spell and Remove Enchantment for every single creature and warlock, but only applies a shield effect to the target.
 * Attack Reflector: Magic Mirror is this for spells.
 * Awesome but Impractical: Resist fire and cold in 2 player matches. It sounds awesome to cast one of these spells, then attack your opponent with Fire/Ice storm, or with an elemental. However, the four gestures you could have used to cast this spell could have been used for something useful, such as summoning a monster or inflicting wounds. Against a skilled player. In matches with more than one player, this is averted. Resistances are useful to defend yourself against a storm/elemental while hurting everyone else, or to defend yourself against that tactic.
 * Badass Finger Snap: Considering that some spells finish on a snap, this troupe applies. The best example is invisibility, where the last gesture is snapping with both hands.
 * Boring but Practical: For some people parachaining (repeatedly gesturing F).
 * Charm Person: This spell allows you choose the gesture of one of the target's hands.
 * Luckily My Shield Will Protect Me: The shield spell prevents all damage from monsters and Magic Missiles the turn it is cast, and only requires a P gesture.
 * Magical Gesture: The entire point of the game. Players input gestures into each hand. In order to cast spells, a sequence of gestures must be sequentially entered on one hand. The gestures, and their commonly referred to abbreviations, are clap (C), digit pointing (D), wiggled fingers (F), proffered palm (P), snap (S), wave (W). A gesture that needs to be preformed by both hands for a spell is referenced by its lowercase abbreviation. Two gestures, which are not used in any spells, are the null move (-), and the stab (>).
 * Time Stands Still: The time stop spell, which allows the target (if a wizard) to immediately take another turn, and have his spells cast in that turn ignore all defenses. If used on a summon, they get an additional, unresistable attack.
 * Summon Magic: