Here's what I know-
- Magic is skill based. You train in a Skill, and have access to spells levels based on your character level(/how trained you are, which function calls to your ChLv)
- You acquire your spells by spending skill points on Esoterica (I'm not sure whether you buy spell lists or individual spells)
- When you cast a spell, you roll the relevant skill, DC is based on spell level
- Attack spells then require a roll to hit your target. Because there are two chances for, say, Flame Burst, to fail, compared to a standard weapon attack, attack spells can do a bit more damage than a weapon from an otherwise comparable character.*
- Spells are resisted with Character Level/Hit Die. Maybe a relevant stat can be added, like, maybe your saves are Level+(Str/Dex/Wis) Mod. Not sure on that yet.
- Attack Spells are resolved like attacks. So you roll to cast, roll to hit, target rolls to avoid, and armour subtracts damage.
I've got Binding, Divination, Healing, Necromancy, Runes, Transmutation, Trickery, Wild Lore, and Skaldry.
Binding works by creating a connection to individual creatures, and then bringing them to where you are, but it also covers banishing creatures bound by others.
Divination includes detection spells, seeing the future, remote sensing, and getting specific questions answered.
Healing is self explanatory, but also covers enhancement.
Necromancy handles draining vitality, inflicting disease and poison, and of course, raising the dead.
Runes is more of a style or fluff of magic than a discrete school of effects. A Rune Mage who knows the Lagaz rune can control tides, inland bodies of water, and plant growth; one who knows the Hagalaz rune can call hail, and destroy and rebuild structures; and so on.
Transmutation alters inanimate material and bestows or removes traits from animate forms.
Trickery covers illusions (creating whole fictional scenes), charms (changing people's thoughts) and glamours (altering the appearance of targets).
Wild Lore handles elemental, animal and plant magic, and shapeshifting.
Skaldry does buffs and debuffs with status effects and sonic damage.
So, the things that jump out at me immediately-
Raising the Dead and Binding Demons are fairly similar in effect, you're telling someone else to fight you battles for you, and that requires getting people to fight for you. So both of those require the spell caster going around and doing arcane things to build their potential army. Binders make contracts and Necromancers bottle souls, and then they can call forth their infernal soldiers. The easiest way to cap this is to say you can command up to your HD in flunkies, these can be demon soldiers or skeleton minions or swarms of Hel Fish or whatever.
So, for Binding, there's still Banishing, but does that necessarily need to be a limited resource thing? Would it be problematic to just say that you can attempt to banish something as much as you want, it's just really difficult?
For necromancy there's still the poison/disease and the vitality draining schools. Come to think of it, Vitality Draining could actually be the way you build points to do another form of Necromancy, or just give you hp/sp/something.
Divination could easily be at will, the only limitation being time and concentration. Reading entrails takes both, detecting for gold takes little time, but only works while you concentrate.
Healing can be prep magic. You sit down and mix salves and poultices, stick them in your bag, and pull them out when needed. This keeps the characters from just resting back to full after every encounter, especially if healing magic is primarily an enhancer to natural healing, rather than a replacement. Your limit is time, ingredients and encumbrance.
Runes could be mentally fatiguing to use, but otherwise at will. So something like a cool down, I guess. You can just throw around Hagalz magic until your brain is about to throw in the towel and just let it rest for a few hours, or you can refrain from using Hagalz magic unless absolutely necessary, but always have it available, as it's easier to recover your mental faculties when you've used less of them.
Transmutation could be physically or spiritually taxing on the subject. So the iron chain you carry can only be altered so much before it shatters under the strain of the magic, and you can only mold someone so much until you've stretched their essence too thin. This would mean that transmuters can work a little of their magic on the entire party more easily than they can all of their magic on a single target.
Trickery doesn't inherently suggest a resource mechanic.
The shapeshifting function of Wild Lore is probably best on a charge resource, and such a resource mechanism would not harm the other uses of Wild Lore, so that works.
Skaldry is supposed to be bard magic. The musical/poetry theme suggests that a model where skalds combine individual effects into larger compositions would be very flavourful, and creates a Rage Meter/Warm Up model which isn't Hulk flavoured.