Possible Reboot

[Tassadar]

Re: OOC Thread

Hulk need character sheet.

 

[Incubus]

Character Sheets

Not sure if this'll be final format.

Spoiler

Character Name:

Player Name:

Race:

High Concept:

Trouble:

Stress (Use O for open and / for filled):

Physical: O O

Mental: O O

Social: O O

Consequences (list as Mild/Moderate/Severe/Extreme then P/M/S then Aspect, only add as used):

Mild

Moderate

Severe

Extreame

Aspects

Aspect 1. -

Aspect 2. -

Aspect 3. -

Aspect 4. -

Aspect 5. -

Other Aspects:

Skills:

Skill Cap: Great (+4)

Average (+1) Slots Used:

Average Skills:





Fair Slots (+2) Used:

Fair Skills:





Good Slots (+3) Used:


Good Skills:





Great Slots (+4) Used:

Great Skills:




Stunts and Powers (list ability, with cost in parentheses following, then a description of. Section each off with a bullet or -.):





Base Refresh: 6

Refresh Adjustment:

Adjusted Refresh:

Current Fate Points:

 

[Sinfulwolf]

Re: Possible Reboot

I'm in. Do a recreation of my old character.

 

[Tassadar]

Re: Character Sheets

HULK HAVE CHARACTER SHEET!!!!!

Yes, I am having fun.

Also, this isn't anywhere near finished yet, I just wanted to see if the Aspects were acceptable.

Spoiler

Character Name: Violet

Player Name: Tassadar

Race: Siren (Spellweaver)

High Concept: Smooth Talking Siren

Trouble: Made some Bad Deals

Stress (Use O for open and / for filled):

Physical: O O O

Mental: O O O

Social: O O O

Consequences (list as Mild/Moderate/Severe/Extreme then P/M/S then Aspect, only add as used):

Mild

Moderate

Severe

Extreme


Aspects

Aspect 1. - Cursed with ill luck by a novice sorcerer

Aspect 2. - Silver Tongued

Aspect 3. - Orphaned at a young age

Aspect 4. - Clean Freak

Aspect 5. - Found a pendant of a blue dragon on the beach, good luck charm

Other Aspects:

Skills:

Skill Cap: Great (+4)

Average (+1) Slots Used: 5 (5 points)
Average Skills:
Endurance
Empathy
Investigation
Perform
Athletics


Fair Slots (+2) Used: 4 (8 points)
Fair Skills:
Rapport
Presence
Conviction
Discipline


Good Slots (+3) Used: 1 (3 points)
Good Skills:
Lore(Occult Knowledge)


Great Slots (+4) Used: 1 (4 points)
Great Skills:
Deceit



Stunts and Powers:

-Ritual (Elementalism/Spirit Binding)
Description: “Ritual” covers the ability to do one particular application of thaumaturgy—such as crafting or wards—to the exclusion of any others. The application isn’t always a technique
so much as a subject matter: for example, some ectomancers have this ability, giving them a wide range of thaumaturgic abilities, but restricted only to spirits and ghosts.
Musts: You must define which single application of Thaumaturgy your spellcasting is limited to at the time you take this ability.
Skills Affected: Discipline, Conviction, Lore.
Effects:
Ritual. You are able to use Thaumaturgy as described on page 261, but your use is restricted to one particular application or thematic subject matter. You must define this limit when you take the ability. For an idea of the options, see page 272.
Item Slots. Ritual comes with two free Focus Item Slots (page 278). You can design the items that fit into these slots now, or later on during play. A single Focus Item Slot may be traded in for two Enchanted Item Slots (page 279). You may gain more Item Slots as one of the options on the Refinement ability (page 182)—but you may only buy Refinement for that purpose. All items
created for those slots must be in keeping with the single application you’ve chosen for your power.

-Wings: Feathered wings with black feathers, like those of a raven.
Skills Affected: Athletics.
Effects:
Flight. You can fly, eliminating or reducing certain kinds of borders (page 212) and enabling travel upwards into zones (page 197) that can’t normally be reached. Winged flight is governed by the Athletics skill, just as running is.

-Shapechanger: Seal [grants: Aquatic (-1)]
Aquatic [–1]
Description: You’re an underwater creature, with the benefits that come from that.
Skills Affected: Athletics.
Effects:
Can’t Drown. You never take stress or consequences from drowning (this is not the same as an immunity to choking or other means of suffocation).
Easy Swimming. You may ignore all waterbased borders while swimming, making your underwater “sprints” all the more effective.


Base Refresh: 6

Refresh Adjustment: -4

Adjusted Refresh: 2

Current Fate Points: 2


Junk! Like backstory and a picture, and all that other nonsense.

Spoiler

Having lost her parents, both mages of some renown, when she was a child due to mysterious circumstances, Violet grew up largely looking out for herself. Over the years, she picked up a variety of skills, not the least of which being the ability to lie through her teeth without even batting an eye whenever her convenience caused for it. She had learned a few bits of magic before her parents had been killed, and had practiced a great deal more with it in secret whenever she got the chance. Along the way to adulthood, she found herself in trouble more often than not, but her quick thinking and liberal uses of her wings and her shapeshifting had gotten her out of most of them without too many problems.

That's not to say she hadn't made her share of mistakes. Growing up, she had made a couple of bad deals. One of them early on had been to steal a grimoire of great power from a wizard at the request of his former apprentice. The problem was, she hadn't known that she was stealing, that the wizard in question was exceedingly powerful, or that the one who had promised her a potent magical amulet in exchange wasn't able to deliver. Fortunately, she had found out the former details quickly enough, but when she had confronted the sorcerer, he had promptly tried to curse her. Luckily, being an idiot, the spell hadn't worked out quite as well as he had hoped, and rather than fatal ill luck, Violet walked away with nothing but the occasional bout of strangeness that seemed to pop up at seemingly random times. Sometimes opportune, and sometimes unfortunate, she had gotten used to it.... Eventually.

The worst of them, however, had been to a

One day, while walking along the beach, she had spotted a gleam amongst the rocks, and picked out a strange necklace from among them. A painful shock had almost made her drop it, but nothing further came from the amulet, and she had spontaneously decided to keep it rather than pawn it. The dragon pendant, shaped of some strange blue stone, had hung from a silver chain that Violet had had to replace several times now, as they just kept breaking for some reason, but the thought of getting rid of it or not wearing it had never crossed her mind. She even wore it when she bathed, which she did often, as she had never dropped the habit of remaining clean at all times even after her parents had died. It had never showed signs of being actually magical, but she always suspected that it possessed some sort of power that she simply didn't know how to unlock.



Items:
4 Enchanted Item Slots
-2 used on a wind callers gauntlet, a device that allows her to channel the winds at will, albeit not with any real power behind them. (2 power wind evocation, attack, unlimited uses)
-2 used on a wind wall gauntlet, a device that allows her to call up a wall of wind between herself and any attack. She can only use it once in a while, however. (power = lore defense, 1/day)

 

[Incubus]

Re: OOC Thread

Also, this isn't anywhere near finished yet, I just wanted to see if the Aspects were acceptable.

High Concept: Diplomatic Ice Witch

This one seems fine.

Trouble: Goes it Alone

I'm sceptical about this one, mainly from a GMing perspective rather than a character building one. It means that as a GM, I can all but force your character to attempt tasks solo, even when this is a very bad plan. Also creates problems with party dynamics by always having someone going off on their own to do things.

Aspect 1. - Solitary

This one is a real problem, because it's basically the same as your trouble

Aspect 2. - Silver Tongued

Not too bad, could be more descriptive but otherwise works.

Aspect 3. - Naturally Talented

Naturally talented at what? Everything? I don't think so.

Aspect 4. - Clean

Again, not the most descriptive, which leads to it being vague in usage

Aspect 5. - Modest

As above really. Lemme dig up something from the book, it may hlep out everyone with selecting their Aspects...

Aspects are one of the major sources for igniting ideas and story hooks for your character. They’re the first thing a GM will look at on your sheet when trying to work out what sorts of stories to throw your way. This is powerful juju, and the best part is that you are in total control of it with the words you choose for your aspect. If one character has the aspect Quick and another has the aspect Sworn Enemy of the Secret Brotherhood of the Flame, which one do you think suggests more ideas for the GM? Your
aspects give you a “vote” in what sort of game you’re going to be playing in. Don’t let it go to waste. (If nothing else, you have just established
that the Secret Brotherhood of the Flame exists in the setting, and the GM will probably turn to you for further details.)

At first glance, the most powerful aspects would seem to be things that are broadly useful with no real downside—things like Quick, Lucky, or Strong—and you may be tempted to go with those. Resist that temptation! See, there are three large problems with broad aspects like these: they’re boring, they
don’t generate fate points, and they surrender your ability to help shape the story. Boring is pretty obvious. Consider a character who is Lucky and one who has Strange Luck. Both aspects can be used for many good things, but the latter allows for a much wider range of possibilities—and more compels (see page 100 for more on compels). Remember, every time an aspect makes trouble for you, you’ll receive a fate point. Strange Luck means that the GM can throw bizarre—even unfortunate— coincidences at your character, but you get paid for it. (If this doesn’t seem tempting enough yet, remember that the GM is probably going to do something bizarre to you anyway—shouldn’t you benefit from it and have some say in how it happens?)

The most powerful aspects are easy to spot: they’re the most interesting ones. An aspect you can use to your advantage, but which can also
be a disadvantage, has the most mechanical potency. What’s more, aspects that tie into the setting (connecting your character to a group or a person) help you fill in the cast of characters in a way that is most appealing to you.
Whenever you’re writing down the name of an aspect, ask yourself, “How hot is this aspect?” If it seems kind of lukewarm, then you might be missing the mark, and it’s time to turn up the heat. You certainly don’t have to do this with every aspect you take, but it’s a great way to stay involved in the overall story.

Here are a few “good—better—best” examples:

Tepid: Wizard.
Toasty: Wizard Private Eye.
Fuego!: The Only Listing Under “Wizard” in Chicago’s Yellow Pages.

Tepid: Strong.
Toasty: Troll-Blood Strong.
Fuego!: Strong-Man of the Winter Court.

Tepid: Dark Past.
Toasty: Reformed Evil Cultist.
Fuego!: The Ebon Shroud Cult Wants Me Dead.

In each of these cases, the “tepid” option certainly suggests its uses, but it doesn’t really jump off the page as something that suggests story. The “toasty” option is better since it’s more specific; both GM and player can see some potential story hooks in these, and they serve to differentiate themselves from their lukewarm predecessors. But in terms of rocking the house and suggesting story left and right, “Fuego!” is what you want.
The Only Listing Under “Wizard” in Chicago’s Yellow Pages could well
be a prime driver for why dark and complicated stories tend to take a full-tilt run at Harry Dresden’s head. Strong-Man of the Winter Court not only suggests that the character is very strong and faerie-blooded, but it also states a relationship with the Winter Court itself. That’s three sides to the aspect right there. The Ebon Shroud Cult Wants Me Dead both references the character’s dark past and complicates his present circumstances, with
there always being a chance that some heavies from his former cult will come knocking and go snicker-snack with his head. So when you pick an aspect, ask yourself: is this tepid, is this toasty, or is this “Fuego!”?

 

[Tassadar]

Re: OOC Thread

Alrighty, how about:

High Concept: Diplomatic Ice Witch

As this one was okay, I'll leave it as is.

Trouble: Prefers to Work Alone

That was actually part of the point of taking this particular trouble, really. Here's a slightly more modest rewording, but if it's really a problem for you just lemme know and I'll just come up with something else.

Alternative: Never Backs Down


Aspect 1 - Orphaned at a young age

Better?

Aspect 2 - Can talk her way out of anything

Thought I'd change the wording a little, see if that worked better.

Aspect 3 - Naturally Talented Magician

Nah, not at everything, that would just be silly. In hindsight, I probably should have included this. Alternatively, "Spellcasting Prodigy" or "Talented but Untrained Sorcerer," is sort of what I'm going for. Naturally good at using magic, but lacks any sort of training to fall back on.

Aspect 4 - Obsessively Cleanly (or Clean Freak)

Does this work, or would something more specific be better? Or, alternatively, something else entirely. That could work too.

Aspect 5 - Prefers to mind her own business

I didn't really like that last one anyway, it just sort of popped into my head at the last second and I was like; "Fuck it." This one is a little better.

I'd try for more specific things regarding the universe, but I know more or less nothing about it and don't want to make random things up. I'm trying to aim for tradeoffs rather than straight positive or negative.

 

[Chibichibi]

Re: OOC Thread

-rubs eyes- I might need to sit down on AIM with you on this Inky. My brain can't really process how to make a sheet right now.

 

[GargantuaBlarg]

Re: OOC Thread

Assuming we get far enough, is there anything preventing a character from getting the other casting talent thing later? If I took Channeling (Wind) now, would it stop me from getting Ritual (Plant-o-mancy-or-whatever) later on down the road.

Will race count as an aspect, or do I gotta write it down as one in order to do so? For instance, invoking "Siren" when I play music, or getting fate for when we meet a sailor and he tries to kick my scurvy ship-sinking ass. Do these automatically count, or do I use up one of my five to do this, as an option?

 

[GargantuaBlarg]

Re: Character Sheets

Honk. Not finished yet, of course~

Spoiler

Character Name: Keti Ulfhild

Player Name: Uh. GargantuaBlarg?

Race: Siren (Spellweaver)

High Concert: Flower-lovin' Hippy Siren Green-thumbed flower lover.

Turbo: Voice stolen by some witch with a grudge.

Stress (Use O for open and / for filled):
Physical:
O O O
Mental:
O O O O
Social:
O O O

Consequences (list as Mild/Moderate/Severe/Extreme then P/M/S then Aspect, only add as used):
Mild:
Moderate:
Severe:
Extreme:

Aspects
Aspect 1 - Outsider

Aspect 2 - That's a guy?!

Aspect 3 - Peaceful way of life

Aspect 4 - I need the open sky

Aspect 5 - Morning person

Other Aspects:

Skills: (Cap: Great (+4))

Average (+1) Slots Used: 4/4
Craftsmanship ; Empathy ; Lore ; Presence

Fair Slots (+2) Used: 3/4
Endurance ; Survival (the Herbalism skill!) ; Athletics

Good Slots (+3) Used: 2/3
Discipline ; Performance

Great Slots (+4) Used: 1/2
Conviction

Stunts and Powers (list ability, with cost in parentheses following, then a description of. Section each off with a bullet or -.):
Channeling (Air) [–2]
Description: “Channeling” is one of the many general names given to a lesser form of Evocation that is only able to use one particular element.
But more often such abilities are referred to by names such as pyromancy (fire evocation) and kinetomancy (kinetic force evocation).
Musts: You must define the element which your spellcasting is restricted to when you take this ability.
Skills Affected: Discipline, Conviction.
Effects:
Channeling. You are able to use Evocation as described on page 249, but your use is restricted to one particular element, which you must define when you take this ability.
Item Slots. Channeling comes with two free Focus Item Slots (page 278). You can design the items that fit into these slots now, or later on during play. A single Focus Item Slot may be traded in for two Enchanted Item Slots (page 279). You may gain more Item Slots as one of the options on the Refinement ability (page 182)—but you may only buy Refinement for that purpose. All items created for those slots must be in keeping with the elemental theme you’ve chosen for your power.


Wings [–1]
Description: You have wings of some sort— gossamer as a faerie, leathery and batlike as a demon—enabling you to fly.
Musts: Your wings are always present and visible unless you have an ability (sugh as the application of a Glamour) allowing you to hide them. You should define the appearance of the wings when you take this ability.
Skills Affected: Athletics.
Effects:
Flight. You can fly, eliminating or reducing certain kinds of borders (page 212) and enabling travel upwards into zones (page 197) that can’t normally be reached. Winged flight is governed by the Athletics skill, just as running is.


Shapechanger: Seal [grants: Aquatic(-1)]
-- Aquatic
Description: You’re an underwater creature, with the benefits that come from that.
Skills Affected: Athletics.
Effects:
Can’t Drown. You never take stress or consequences from drowning (this is not the same as an immunity to choking or other means of suffocation).
Easy Swimming. You may ignore all waterbased borders while swimming, making your underwater “sprints” all the more effective.


Base Refresh: 6
Refresh Adjustment: -4
Adjusted Refresh: 2
Current Fate Points: 2/2

Stuff:
Total focus slots: 2
Driftwood Flute - +2 Discipline to Air spells

Rote spells:
1 - FUS RO DAH!
Attack
Conviction 4, Discipline 5
Uses Driftwood flute
Keti plays the song of storms, and shoots a crushing gale force blast out of the flute. Usually something gets fucked up right after that, but that's not part of the spell in particular.

Background
Keti lives alone, in a huge field of flowers near the shore, nestled between the seashore and the woods. He has a little shack right in the middle, under a tree, but mostly spends his nights sleeping right outside, under a little lean-to on the side, where he can better see the stars and feel te breeze - only retreating into the hut proper when it rains too hard to otherwise. Outside, his home is surrounded by a garden of edible plants and herbs, but beyond that it's mostly any and all kinds of wildflowers, mixing freely. Otherwise, he lives off the land - knowing what fruits from which tree is good to eat, which berries on which bush is poisonous, and capable of telling if a plant should be nearby or not. A stream runs through his field, stemming from a waterfall some ways inland from his home. This place is near... nowhere, really.


Setting him apart even further from fellows of his race, Keti is mute - voice stolen by an vengeful witch with a grudge against his parents - and is subsequently unable to sing, only capable of wordless shouts and other noises. He otherwise has the same musical aptitude as others of his race - perhaps more so, even, as he has the uncanny talent to pick up any instrument, even one he's never seen before - and sound quite alright with it. This inability, coupled with being surrounded by beautiful singing that he would never make, drove him to leave the school.

When he came to shore - right where he now lives - he found the vibrant flowers to be an immense comfort. Beautiful, like his people's songs... but unlike the ephemeral notes of music, they were constant... and even when they wilted, it was only to spring up from the ground again, bursting from nothing into all kinds of bright colors. Moreover... they were silent, as he was, making no more noise than the wind rustling through them.

And wordless shouts sometimes. Hurr.

In the years of his self-imposed isolation, he came to love flowers more than anything else. One day in the woods, though, he met a couple of wayfarers, who mentioned the Flower Festival to him... so of course, he fucked off to go check it out.


Hurf. I suppose this is technically fapfiction...

Description:

Spoiler

Of middling height, this delicate and feminine Siren is actually a man. Wavy, sunny blonde hair hangs from his head, almost-but-not-quite touching his shoulders and framing his face in a bushy tumble. He has large brown eyes and a dainty nose. Skin tanned from being out in the sun with his plants all day, Keti's body is quite feminine, being softer and possessing wide hips and subtle curves in many places. While originally white, so many plants have been woven or caught into Keti's wings that they are stained a light green, reminiscent of spring. Presumably the color would return to white, were Keti to stop, and allowed the tinged feathers to molt out.

Wears his seal skin wrapped around his waist, folded over and hanging like a gray, two-layered skirt, secured in place with a bit of rope. It's stained like his wings as well, except in this case it gets its color from the soil. While he owns a pair or two of wooden sandals, Keti prefers to go barefoot, feeling the dirt between his toes and under his feet. Undyed linen makes up the rest of his clothing; a simple cloth wrap works as underwear, and a shirt covers his torso and shoulders. Bizarrely, Keti's shirts have not succumbed to colorful staining, like his wings and sealskin have. Besides his simple attire, Keti often threads various flowers and plants through his hair, wings and clothes.

**EDIT**
Now with dress up game image!

Spoiler

Imagine that, but with more poof to the hair, a gray-skirt, and less tits. Presumably his smile would also be more serene and less smirk-like, and his legs would be slightly less delectable.

Thinking of nixing the idyllic house and living in a lean-to or something. That would be slightly less silly than just finding a house someplace/aggregating a lovely cottage over so-many years, and more nature-lovey, no?

Old post: http://www.ulmf.org/bbs/showpost.php?p=263391&postcount=62

 

[Incubus]

Re: OOC Thread

Typically your high concept will include your race within it.

And no, taking channelling will not prevent you getting ritual later, you simply need a chance to learn and to have the points to spend upon getting it.

 

[Incubus]

Re: Character Information

Magic

Magic is divided into two main categories, Evocation and Thaumaturgy. Channelling is a limited form of true evocation, while Ritual is a limited form of true Thaumaturgy. Those who use sponsored magic have access to both varieties, but are restricted to casting spells that fall within the portfolio of the sponsor. (Yes, this means the sponsored casters are more flexible casters at creation, but their magic will never get any broader, whilst those who take ritual and channelling can eventually upgrade them to a true magics)

In short, Evocation is fast magic (combat magic) whilst Thaumaturgy is more complex, delicate and time consuming stuff. Evocation is also grouped into different elements of magic, while Thaumaturgy is grouped into different styles/themes.

Evocation

Spoiler

As mentioned, evocation is fast and dirty stuff. Due to this, there are two major limitations. The first is that you have to have line of sight to the target of your evocation; evocation requires a lot of concentration, you're not going to be able to concentrate on trying to find your target. It also has a limited range before the energy dissipates and degrades, making it less potent and accurate. The other limitation is that evocations have very short durations; while certain spells, mostly defensive spells such as shields and veils, can last a little longer than instantaneous by remaining constantly powered, most spells are too draining to keep up, long lasting magic is the realm of Thaumaturgy.

How to cast an evocation

Step 1 - Work out what you want to do. Look at what elements you have access to, magic wise and determine what you want to do.

Step 2 - Describe the effect in terms of one of the following basic conflict actions: attack, block, manoeuvre or counterspell.

Step 3 - Decide how many "shifts" of power you want to put in the spell. You take mental stress for calling up power, the minimum you can take is 1 point of mental stress. The cost increases if you call up more shifts than you have conviction, at which point you take the difference (so calling up 3 shifts over your conviction skill would net you 4 stress.)

Step 4 - Make a discipline roll to cast the spell. The difficulty is equal to the amount of power you've called up. This roll is modified by any relevant focus items you have, and whatever aspects you want to invoke. If you meet or beat the difficulty, you cast the spell, if not, the margin of failure needs to be soaked up, either as Backlash (absorbing the energy yourself in the form of stress) or Fallout (the energies spilling out into the world for collateral damage).

Elements

Air - Air is the element of motion and freedom, and most of its key effects are motion-based: powerful gales to knock over foes or throw objects around, the movement of objects to the wizard’s hand, or shields of swirling air currents that push harm away. On the nastier end, it’s possible to make pockets of vacuum to suffocate or implode targets. It also can affect the quality of air around
the wizard—keeping smoke clouds localized, purifying the air in a room, or even calling up fog to conceal an escape. Movement can involve fine manipulation, which is why air magic is often called upon to pick locks and pull apart devices. Also, air is the primary medium for the transfer of sound, allowing for the creation of distractions by throwing loud sounds around, or creating “bubbles” where sound doesn’t travel for the purposes of privacy or stealth. Maneuvers that rely on movement, like pushing and pulling stuff around, are the strong suit of air magic. Air magic is most commonly used to put aspects such as Buffeted, Dust in Eyes, and such on targets, as well as Hard to Maneuver on scenes.

Earth - Earth is the element of stability, gravity, and grounding. Ultimately, everything rests on the earth, and its practitioners take advantage of this fact by calling up protective walls of stone, shaking the ground underfoot, and keeping themselves stable regardless of the surrounding circumstances. Earth is also the element that governs magnetism; earth mages often use this to their advantage, strengthening or dampening magnetic fields to achieve various effects. Earth’s strong points are in doing damage to—or reinforcing—ordered structures like buildings. Earth can put aspects like Unsure
Footing and Shaken on targets, and Weak Foundations or Tremors on scenes. It can also put strong gravitational effects on targets, flattening them directly or pinning them down with something like Three Times as Heavy.

Fire - Fire is the element of consumption and destruction, and it is the first resort of those who wish to deal massive carnage to their foes. Besides the classic image of the fireball-throwing wizard,
this element allows for a more subtle range of effects, allowing a wizard to apply or remove heat from an object or area and to melt small objects like locks or other barriers. Fire maneuvers normally call upon the ubiquitous On Fire aspect, which can be placed on targets or scenes.

Water - Water is the element of entropy and change. Its chief power is changing the state of things, as water tends to do: eroding, dissolving, disrupting, decaying, dispersing, disintegrating.
While many people wouldn’t consider water to be a very damaging element, you have to think about the kind of insidious damage water does: dissolving stone, rusting metal, warping wood— even pummeling or slicing if it’s a high-pressure jet of water. It can also flood, suffocate, assist in chemical reactions, and so on. Water is often lethal to many different kinds of machines, shorting them out or causing them to jam (like firearms). Plenty of dangerous substances— battery acid, quicksand, drain cleanser—have liquid properties that a water evocation might manipulate (perhaps with a little extra difficulty for using something unusual). Wizards tend to use water maneuvers to break down matter in various ways. Water can place aspects like Drenched and Hard to Breathe (water strategically moved to suffocate) on a target, as well as Slick and Partly Dissolved on a scene.

Spirit (Light/Dark) Spirit is the element of the soul, the purest expression of will. In a way, it’s the most basic of the elements—the translation of the wizard’s raw desire into energy—and its presence tends to transcend different traditions of magic, being a core element in every one. Spirit effects tend to manifest as raw kinetic force and light, allowing the wizard to create or snuff light in an
area, summon shields of force, strike a foe with raw kinetic power, and even bend the energies around people and objects to make them appear invisible. A special kind of block called a veil is the
special province of spirit magic. Unlike a normal block, the power invested in a veil serves as the difficulty for using skills or other magic to detect anything that’s concealed by the veil
(see Veils on page 276 for a deeper treatment of the topic). Beyond that, spirit maneuvers tend to be oriented around light (Blinding Light on a scene or Lit Up for targeting someone), but kinetic strikes can also knock enemies offbalance and create physical havoc. Depending on a wizard’s temperament, he often tends to be good at the “blunt, direct” side of spirit evocations (force effects) or good at
the “sensitive, subtle” side (veils and other soft effects). This is really true of any element, but it’s particularly strongly expressed in the case of spirit—the element most closely tied to thought.

Focus Items

Focus Items
Finally, there are focus items, the most common tools of the evocator’s trade. Most wizards rely on focus items to reduce the risks inherent to evocation. These vary widely in terms of what they can be, and they depend highly on the wizard’s particular paradigm of magic. For example, Harry Dresden has a lot of the traditional, medieval English wizard thing going on, so he has a rune-carved staff and wand (blasting rod) as his primary focus items. A wizard with a Far Eastern bent might have prepared scrolls with mystical calligraphy on them. A wizard of a religious bent might brandish a symbol of his faith.
The main purpose of a focus item is to make it easier to control the release of energy in an evocation. In a way, it’s a method to add extra control to the construct in the wizard’s mind. If he can envision the energy traveling down his arm into a rod and the rod is an actual object, it’s easier than if the construct is entirely mental. Using a focus item will give you at least a +1 bonus either to Conviction (making it safer to summon one more shift of power) or Discipline (making it easier to control the spell). Typically (and traditionally), a focus item can be used only for one element. However, it is possible
for a focus item to be more powerful, adding a bigger bonus or being useful for various types of evocation. A highly personal focus item may also be one of your aspects and could provide additional bonuses via invocation. See “Crafting” on page 278 for more information about focus items.

Rote Spells

Over time, a wizard uses a particular evocation often enough that it settles into mental “muscle memory,” and its use becomes reflexive. When this happens, the spell is considered to be a rote spell. Your wizard may know a number of evocation rotes equal to the numeric rating of his Lore skill. So, a wizard with Great (+4) Lore knows up to four evocation rotes. A rote spell is defined as one specific application of evocation in a single element, such as a
fire attack, a particular air maneuver, or a spirit block. It always manifests in exactly same way each time, has the same power level, places the exact same aspect, etc. Any change in the parameters of the spell disqualifies it from being rote.

The big benefit of knowing a rote spell is that you don’t have to roll Discipline to control it. It’s assumed that you can control the spell energy at a level equal to your Discipline score, allowing you to act as if you’d rolled a zero on the dice every time. You still need to make a Discipline roll to target the spell, however; there’s just no chance of accidental failure. Focus items add
their bonuses automatically if they are tied in to the rote, but there’s a caveat: if the wizard does the rote with the focus item, then that item is a requirement for the rote every time he wants to use it. (This is why Harry gets so nervous about entering combat without his staff and blasting rod—he loses the benefits of the rote spell and has to roll each spell as a normal evocation.) Aspect invocations and other such trickery may be used after the fact, just as if you had rolled a zero and then wanted to invoke something.

Finally, keep in mind that you can have a rote that’s more powerful than you can control with a Discipline roll of zero, which would basically cause automatic fallout or backlash when used unless you can invoke some aspects to make up the difference. This is clearly not for the fainthearted, but it might be useful as a sort of “last resort plan,” making sure you can put the heavy damage out there in a moment of dire need.

Mundane Effects

Sometimes, you might want to produce an effect that doesn’t really do anything but add color to a scene. The most common example of this is a light spell, which very seldom does anything but provide the fact that there is light to see by and then fades neatly into the background.

Minor effects like these are usually assumed to be within the scope of evocation maneuvers; however, they rarely require a roll or cost any
stress, especially when incorporating a focus like the wizard’s pentacle or staff. You might consider them “pre-school magic”—what wizard apprentices
would learn as their very first spells. Any minor effect like this can be cast without a roll and will last for a scene for free. At most, a fate point might be required if the minor effect counters a scene aspect that might be inconvenient.

Prolonging Spells

Sometimes, it behooves a wizard to maintain a spell effect for an indefinite length of time, especially when the effect is a block or maneuver. Normally, you’d assign shifts of power to make the spell persist longer than an exchange. However, this makes the lifespan of very powerful effects depressingly short. Alternately, you can actively funnel more energy into an evocation to maintain it, but this takes up your standard action for the round.
This is functionally equivalent to rolling another spell. Summon one shift of power per additional exchange you want the spell to last, and make another Discipline roll to control it. This takes up your action and deals mental stress as per the usual rules for a normal evocation; the advantage is that you don’t have to sacrifice the efficacy of the original spell—it keeps the rating of the original roll. If successful, the spell effect stays active for that length of time.

Redirecting Spell Energy

Sometimes, you might commit energy to an evocation, only to discover that circumstances warrant a different effect than the one you originally chose. This happens most often with blocks—you put up a shield of some sort that
you’re maintaining, only to find out that what you really need to do is attack or maneuver. It’s true that you could simply cast another spell, but there are times when a wizard needs to economize his resources—like when a demon is about to eat his face.

In those circumstances, you have an option— you can reuse the spell energy from an effect you currently have active, spending the shifts on another evocation without having to roll another spell. This is subject to some limitations:

-The spell must have been maintained from a previous exchange into the
current one.
-The spell must not have been used already for its original function in the
current exchange.
-You must be able to describe how the energy could plausibly be redirected.

Presuming these things are the case, you can use the current power value of the spell to act as a different kind of spell. If the new kind of spell requires a roll for targeting (like with an attack or maneuver), you may roll Discipline. This immediately cancels out the previous effect, as the spell energy can no longer be used for that purpose.

 

[Copper]

Re: Possible Reboot

Well, I'll look things over and see if I'm in or not, but as of right now, yes.

 

[Copper]

Re: OOC Thread

"Examples from the book," heh. At least I know which system you're using now.

May require some more thought, examples, and attention than I'm willing to give at the moment (It's 8 in the morning, after all), so we'll have to see if I dust Atair off or not.

 

[Incubus]

Re: Character Information

Magic cont

Thaumaturgy

Spoiler

Thaumaturgy lets you make the most of time, preparation, and materials—without those, it just can’t be done. Therefore, there are two primary practical limitations. The first is a matter of time. Thaumaturgy is a slow art, with the fastest of spells taking a minute or more, and many taking much longer than that. Patience is necessary; speed is being traded for versatility and potency. The second is a matter of symbols. In order to affect a target at great range (whether in physical distance or some other dimension), some sort of link must be established to that target via symbolic representations, the incorporation of recently-separated bits of the target (blood, hair, a family keepsake), and so on. Without these physical materials on hand to represent the target in absentia—as well as for anchoring
the purpose of the spell to the ritual—a thaumaturgic spell simply has nowhere to go and nothing to do.

How to Cast Thaumaturgy

1. Determine the desired spell effect. This will determine the complexity of the spell in shifts.

2. If the complexity of the spell is equal to or less than your Lore, assume you have everything you need to cast the spell and you require no additional effort for preparation. If the complexity of the spell is greater than your Lore, your wizard must enter a preparation stage during which he researches the spell further, assembles the necessary components, acquires additional sources of power, and finishes the spell construct. You must make up the deficit between your Lore and the total complexity of the spell. There are multiple techniques for doing this at the table.

-Invoke aspects: Every aspect you can invoke to narrate a part of preparation adds two shifts toward the deficit.
-Make declarations: You can declare a mini-scene relevant to preparation, where you use a skill and create a temporary aspect to tag. When successful, this is worth two shifts toward the deficit. If the effort fails, the spell isn’t automatically a bust, but no forward progress is made, either.
-Accept or inflict consequences: For every consequence you are willing to take or inflict on others for the sake of preparation, add the value of the consequence in shifts toward the deficit: so, a mild consequence would add two shifts. (Blood sacrifice is a dark but very potent path many a black magic practitioner can take.)
-Skip a scene – For every scene you can participate in during a session and choose to skip in favor of preparing the spell, you can add one shift toward the deficit.

3. When the complexity deficit is met, you can move into actually casting the ritual. The casting process is identical to the process for evocation. Choose an amount of power to funnel into the spell and roll Discipline to control that energy, with any uncontrolled shifts potentially becoming backlash or fallout. Unlike evocation, so long as you continue to make your Discipline rolls, you can continue to funnel power into the spell in successive rounds of casting. When the power in the spell equals the complexity, you’ve successfully cast it.

Types of Thaumaturgy by function:

Summoning and Binding - As you'd expect from the name, this involves summoning supernatural entities, typically spirits or demons. It's a delicate art where a good half the preparation is typically setting up a summoning circle or the like powerful enough to contain the entity, the other half spent learning enough about the being to be summoned that one can do so. An important thing about summoning is that the creature summoned always has its own agenda. Once summoned, the creature may attempt to escape or it may find itself feeling more social, either way it's advised not to release them until the desired bargain or the like has been completed. Both spirits and demons are bound by their promises and bargains, they are simply incapable of breaking the word of an agreement, although many are masters of creatively worded agreements. Alternatively, one can attempt to bind a creature, a dangerous process where you subjugate them into a servant, but while this may seem cheaper than cutting a deal with the being, they tend to resent such one sided relationships and will actively work to free themselves from it. One might find them breaking free from their bonds at an inopportune moment if the binding isn't renewed regularly and they're definitely the sort to hold a grudge.

Conjuration - Conjuration is the art of creating objects of seeming substance out of nothing. When it comes down to it, though, this is a shell game. None of the things that conjuration creates are
actually real; they’re made of mana and once the energy that’s telling that mana to be something leaches out, it dissolves—first into goo, then into nothing at all. Here, the complexity of the conjuration is a matter of detail and scale (both quantity and size), as well as the believability of the creation.

Divination - Divination can take several forms, all basically falling under the general header of “gathering information.” The most common example from Harry’s casefiles is his tracking spell, but there are several other forms that fall within the scope of divination: direct scrying, forecasting and prophecy, telepathy and psychometry, and various other kinds of sensory magic. With divination spells, the main things to consider are how much information you want and how hard it would normally be to get that information. That’s why Harry’s tracking spell is ultimately pretty easy to pull off—all he gets
is a general sense of the target’s location, but no other information. This makes it a simple action which nearly always has a low complexity. Things become more complicated when you actively monitor the target in some way. First, if the target is behind some kind of supernatural protection, you have to overcome that. Second, even unaware targets have a natural defense against being “read” or seen against their will—basically a defense roll, just like targets get if you take a swing at them in a fight. This commonly defaults to Conviction or Presence, depending on the context of the scrying. So you will want to beef up the complexity fairly high to overcome these obstacles, naturally leading to some prep scenes devoted to finding good links to the target and whatnot.

Veils - Veils are spirit evocations (page 255) that bend attention, light, and energy away from prying eyes. They typically require ongoing concentration to remain in place. Evocation’s veils also tend to be fairly personal in scale—covering the caster himself and maybe a few of his allies. However, it is possible to use thaumaturgy to set up a long-term veil, concealing something for days without ongoing concentration. The complexity of a large veil is equal to whatever difficulty the wizard wants others to beat in order to detect whatever’s behind the veil; as usual, more is better. As with evocation, this is a block action with a base complexity equal to its strength. Veils often block detection in both directions. Perceiving things outside a veil while you are within it faces a similar block, at half the veil’s strength. Increase the complexity of a veil by 2 in order to create a veil that doesn’t impede looking out at all. (For an evocation veil, this increases the power requirement of the spell by 2.) In addition, bigger veils mean a higher complexity. Concealing the caster himself or a small group is within the scope of an evocation veil and requires no adjustment (think of it as limited to around the size of a Volkswagen Bug). Thaumaturgical veils are not usually mobile and are constrained by barriers that scatter magical energies (such as a river; running water). Count up the number of zones a larger veil
covers, and add that to the complexity of the veil. Casting a veil as a ritual means the wizard doesn’t really have to worry about maintaining it; if he wants it to last past the next sunrise, he’ll need extra duration shifts as noted in “Duration and Enhanced Evocation” (page 265).

Wards - A ward is basically a very potent version of a block using thaumaturgy instead of evocation. It’s intended to protect an area—usually a home or sanctum—from physical or magical intrusion. Most wizards need stronger protection against occupational hazards such as hostile demons, malicious magic, and hungry monsters. A ward’s basic function is reflecting energies back onto their source. Someone who collides with a ward at a brisk walk might experience something equivalent to a hard shove, while someone running full tilt into a ward would most certainly get knocked to the ground.
Magical force gets the same treatment—a powerful spell cast on a good ward usually ends up being very bad for the intruder. In addition to this basic function, wards can be rigged to contain other magic that gets triggered when the ward encounters significant force. The most common of these is a magical “landmine,” where a large evocation effect (such as a fire burst) is encased in a sigil behind the
ward. The ward releases its energy when the containment provided by the ward is breached. Other effects are possible, though; the enchantment known as a wardflame can be attached to a ward as an early detection system, showing the wizard when something is coming his way by causing nearby candles to burn bright blue (or some other light-show). The base complexity of a ward is directly
related to its desired strength, so you should aim for this to be pretty high: 8 shifts (Legendary) is a pretty good target to shoot for if you’re moderately good. This represents the ward’s capacity
for reflecting attacks. When something hits the ward, compare the shift values. If the ward prevails, hit the attacker with an effect of the appropriate type for equal shifts. If the attack surpasses the block strength of the ward, then the ward is breached; apply whatever shifts get through to the target just like bypassing a block (page 210). Alternatively, the attacker may apply those shifts directly toward getting rid of the ward itself; each shift will reduce the value of the ward by one until it’s gone. While a ward is technically still around at Mediocre (+0) strength, most lack the energy to hold themselves together at that point; a ward needs to be reduced to –4 to be completely nullified. By default, a ward lasts until the next sunrise unless you add complexity to make it last longer, which is explained in “Duration and Enhanced Evocation” (page 265). In addition, any spells you wish to include as part of the ward construct add their complexity values directly onto the ward. It must all be cast as one spell. If you want a layered defense, you’ll have to spend a bit of time setting it up. Specialized practitioners focused on wards are able to embed other effects in their wards— such as wardflames or landmines—even if they cannot create those spell effects independent of a ward.

Crafting - While crafting things like focus items and potions is considered a type of thaumaturgy, it isn’t something that has a very active presence in these game mechanics. Crafting magical items is,
by and large, a very boring process that quickly lends itself to bean-counting, resource management mini-games. Even the simplest focus item requires weeks or months of the wizard sitting in his study, gradually aligning the item with the proper energies through repetitive motion and thought—not really stuff you want to spend time describing or talking about. To avoid that boring repetition, the game
handles crafting through the application of stunts. Wizard characters get a number of “slots” for different kinds of items, under the assumption that there is a practical maximum of items that a wizard can make and maintain at one time. That number rises via character advancement (and the purchase of the Refinement ability—see page 182), allowing the wizard to either possess more items or create
stronger ones. There are two basic kinds of magical items: focus items and enchanted items.

Focus items enhance and facilitate the magic of the user in a particular way, while enchanted items store energy and release it again in some predetermined manner, sort of like a “spell in a box.”
Harry Dresden’s usual kit of magic items includes three focus items (staff, blasting rod, and shield bracelet) and a few enchanted items (his duster, the kinetic force rings, and the occasional
potion). Potions and their ilk are a kind of fire-andforget enchanted item. They store energy, but once consumed, the energy is used up and the item is effectively destroyed.

Transformation and Disruption - Thaumaturgy that fundamentally, lastingly changes the target—whether it’s the target’s body, mind, emotions, or even luck—falls into the category of transformation and disruption. Often, this is dark stuff—curses, mind control, destructive shapeshifting, and death magic. Regardless of what the spell changes, this is a violent act to the target: people and things are very good at being what they are, and this sort of magic forces them to be what they aren’t. As such, these forms of thaumaturgy rely on the same mechanical principle—most of them inflict consequences or temporary aspects on a target. Entropic curses inflict aspects that reflect bad luck and other kinds of misfortune. Emotion magic inflicts aspects related to emotional states (lust, anger, fear, etc.) that the victim can fall prey to. Mind control is just that—the aspect, when compelled, forces the victim to act in a certain way. In rarer cases, a curse might actually be fully transformative, changing the shape
or nature of a being permanently. Because these forms of thaumaturgy function via consequences, a wizard needs to make sure that the spell is complex enough to overcome any resistance the target might be able to raise (defense rolls, stress tracks, etc.), as well as add enough shifts for the desired level of consequence (0 for a temporary aspect, 2 for mild, 4 for moderate, 6 for severe, 8 for extreme). Anything that is fully transformative must be powerful enough to achieve a “taken out” result on the target, which can be extremely complex (see “Contests and Conflicts,” page 265)

Transportation and Worldwalking - Transportation magics are all about getting the wizard (or someone—or something—else) from one place to another. Teleportation is rare if not completely absent—though a clever wizard can certainly make it seem like that’s what he’s done. Instead, there are spells which impart speed or other kinds of motion, and those which rip holes into or out of the Spirit World.
Spells (including potions and enchanted items) that impart speed focus on the idea of creating a simple action effect of a high Athletics roll used to sprint (page 212), allowing the wizard to cover a great amount of distance in a short amount of time. Milder, longer-term speed benefits can be imparted as maneuvers, giving a target an Unexpectedly Fast aspect that he can tag and invoke to boost needed rolls, but this sort of subtle magic is less often used—when there’s a need for speed, there’s a need for speed. Running so fast can be hard on the body— steering isn’t always easy at that speed, and some
bodies aren’t designed to move that fast without something giving. Mild and moderate physical consequences may be an appropriate part of using a spell or potion to boost speed, representing the body pushing past safe limits. While it’s theoretically possible to create a spell which would allow one to fly, the ability to fly (whether on a broomstick, a carpet, or some other conveyance) does not come with
an instruction manual, and thus does not come with the expertise to control the ability once it’s available. Most wizards avoid trying, and those who do usually quickly discover what the human body was not meant to do.

Finally, teleportation-like effects can be achieved, but these are even trickier to guide than flight. With flying, at least you still have eyeballs to see where you’re going; when you’re a flowing stream of energy looking for somewhere else to be, where you end up is where you end up. For instance, Harry Dresden’s quasi-teleportation escape potion from the Storm Front case worked, but it wasn’t exactly what he wanted— it turned him into the wind for a few seconds, only got him to outside his apartment door, and left him a bit nauseated to boot. While the destination might be somewhat random (unless
a specific destination has been symbolically linked into the spell’s construction), thankfully the chances of ending up inside a solid object are fairly slim—energy likes to head toward the place of least resistance, and that’s usually in an open space. At the end of the day, the question to ask about teleportation is this: given all the effort necessary to build a good teleportation spell that only transports you a short distance, why aren’t you just walking?

All this said, many wizards regard the above methods of transportation to be crude methods, used for short-term purposes. Real transportation is done by way of worldwalking—the practice of opening portals into and out of the Spirit World. Things are connected more by conceptual distance than by physical in the Spirit World, so a well-trained worldwalker can make it from New York to Shanghai much faster than any jet. The problem, of course, is that the geography of the Spirit World is fluid—not to mention chock full of dangerous things. Someone with a good guide or training can make it through relatively quickly and safely—use Lore as the skill of navigation in the Spirit World.

Opening a way into or out of the Spirit World depends almost entirely on the strength of the barrier between the Spirit World and our world in a given place. Opening the way is a simple action against the target strength—it must meet or exceed the strength in order to open up. Typically, the strength of the barrier between the Spirit World and our world is Superb (or better)—evidence to the contrary, things from the other side don’t leak through to our world every day. At least, not in general, not in most places. But our world (and the Spirit World) is rife with soft spots, places where the barrier is
thinner and weaker. In these places, many supernatural creatures can cross into and out of the Spirit World as a casual effort—as simply as you might walk from one room to the next—so long as the place has a strong affinity for the creature in question (plenty of White Court vampires use strip clubs and the like). These places are home to such soft spots—as are places where ways have been opened frequently or recently— dropping the strength of the barrier to Great, Good, or even below.

Closing a way you’ve opened is a simple matter of will. Keeping it open is where things get interesting. Most ways will close themselves naturally within a few minutes—often much faster. Reality likes to heal those holes. If a way has been opened in the middle of a conflict (or just prior to one), the way faces an attack by the barrier’s strength at the end of every exchange: the GM rolls, using the barrier’s strength as a skill, with a target difficulty of the spell’s strength. If the result exceeds the spell’s strength, the way closes. The surest way to keep a way open for the maximum number of minutes is with a
spell strength equal to the barrier’s strength plus 4 or 5. Keeping a way open longer takes real effort—you can move the duration up the time chart (starting from a few minutes) one step for every additional point of complexity you add to the spell. That said, it’s often better to let the natural order reassert itself as soon as possible. As with our world, there’s a bad element out there that will see an open door as an invitation to go where it’s not welcome.

 

[Incubus]

Re: Character Information

Thaymaturgy cont.

Spoiler

Types of Thatmaturgy by Theme:

For those who learn only a single type of Thaumaturgy initially, another option from learning a variety of magic by function is one by theme. While there are plenty who learn by style, becoming crafters, warders etc. there are just as many who learn a wide variety of Thaumaturgy as it interacts with a single subject. The following are also options that give a wider variety of spellcasting limited to only certain applications.

Biomancy - Biomancers are spellcasters who work upon the body; things such as healing as well as many applications of transformation and transportation style magic, all their magics directly affect living creatures in some way. They may also create items that enhance (or in theory, disrupt) the body's natural functions.

Diabolism - Diabolism refers to spellcraft involving a demonic component. This is usually very bad news, but a specialization in demonic thaumaturgy can also be used to effectively combat
the influences of demons—locating demons, purging the possessed, constructing wards that are especially potent against demons, binding and banishing demons that have gotten loose. Bear in mind that demons are the servants of the Accursed (willingly or otherwise) so while those who've learned this to combat them are acceptable, I'd be very reluctant to have someone who specialises in demons for other purposes in the game as a player character.

Ectomancy - Ectomancy is the practice of spellcraft involving (generally non-demonic) spirits, focused especially upon ghosts. Conceptually, ectomancy has much in common with diabolism and necromancy,
but it mostly stays within the safe zone in between.Ectomancers tend to get noticed by ghosts and often find themselves haunted by those who are looking for a way to speak to the living. Many ectomancers develop a natural ability to see—or at least acutely sense—the presence of ghosts, simply using Lore as the perception skill. In application, ectomancy can access all of the functions of thaumaturgy as applied to (or by) ghosts and spirits. Ghosts can be summoned and bound into service, sent away or used to kill via disruption, used as a ritual component to enchant items or divine nformation, and so on.

Entropomancy - Entropomancy goes by a variety of names— malocchio, maladicto, katadesmoi—and in all cases it amounts to essentially the same thing: the refined art of inflicting curses on targets,
driving their lives toward greater disarray (and at its extreme, death). So long as the magic follows the principle of “things fall apart,” entropomancy has an affinity for it. This sort of magic doesn’t have to kill its target—it can just make things suck for them. At its weakest, the curses inflicted by a malocchio are transitory: maneuver-equivalent, inflicting temporary aspects ranging from Bad Luck to
Two Left Feet to Comes Off Like A Jerk. The problem, of course, is that magic is tied closely to what you believe you are, what you believe you’re capable of doing. Entropomancers face regular temptation to make the next curse a little worse, because they already believe in their hearts that they’re the sort of people that make sure other folks have a bad day. Sure, you could hit someone with a curse that makes him stumble at just the wrong moment…but why not have him stumble in front of a car? The classic is the full-on entropy curse that gives entropomancy its name. This is a dark seething invisible
force that follows the victim around and encourages the environment to kill him a lot—falling power-lines, cars full of bees, frozen turkeys plummeting from an empty sky. It’s not a very precise or very quick way to do it, but dire entropy curses do tend to get the job done, often as bizarrely as circumstances will allow.

Necromancy - Ah, necromancy. The art of death magic barely needs an introduction. Whether used with good intentions or bad, reaching beyond the borders of life is bad news, no matter if it’s reanimating
a dead body as a zombie, calling back a departed soul moments after death, or engaging in human sacrifice to harness the power of death. Zombies and the like are a case of summoning and binding an animating spirit— usually a really stupid one that just knows how to follow instructions—into the flesh of a dead man, then convincing that flesh to get up and start walking again (this typically requires the
inclusion of something to stand in for a heartbeat, like a drum or a bitchin’ set of subwoofers and the latest gangsta rap on loop). Where the flesh is weak, ectoplasm suffices, conjured in sufficient quantities to give the body the musculature it needs to move.

Photomancy - Photomancy is the art of manipulating light and imagery with magic. The most obvious application here is with veils, but disguise and illusion are also along for the ride. Focused light can also
produce heat-based effects; on the evocation side, photomancy tends to manifest as a manipulation of fire. Disguises and illusions created by photomancy operate much like veils, save that they’re
oriented on fooling someone rather than simply hiding from them. This is a block action against visual detection of the disguise, though if an illusion or disguised individual behaves in a way obviously out of character, the block isn’t going to be much help. Less obvious applications of photomancy include bending light away from an area (a maneuver, to place a Shadowed aspect on a location, for example) and divinations that seek out a particular image and/or cause something you’re seeking to glow. Focused practitioners that use photomancy exclusively seem to have no aptitude for manipulating ectoplasm—meaning their illusions never have any physical substance to back them up unless they’re wrapped around an actual physical object. More broadly talented wizards often incorporate a little bit of ectoplasm into their photomantic efforts, creating illusions that can actually interact with the environment.

Psychomancy - Practitioners that read and manipulate minds are called psychomancers (or sometimes neuromancers). Psychomancy is neither well documented nor condoned, though it seems every
now and again some new wizard comes along with a talent for it, trained or not. There are some grey areas that can be explored, mostly safely. Psychomancy might be used to draw the thoughts out of the brain of a dead man—no living person nor active mind is violated in such a case, and the borders of life are not crossed. Empathically reading the emotional state of someone isn’t a violation of his thoughts so much as an application of psychomancy to boost your ability to perceive such information (done as a divination).

And then there’s the legal but dangerous area of wielding psychomancy against yourself— supercharging your brain for an all-nighter or to improve your reaction time, digging into your own memories to pull out information you didn’t realize was there, removing your ability to feel fear, and so on. But synapses and minds are fragile—when you can plug right into your brain’s pleasure-center and press the big red
MORE button, or accidentally destroy your ability to feel inhibition, it’s not long before you’re indistinguishable from a meth-head. Just because you’re doing it to yourself doesn’t make the act any less violent. Some alternative forms of psychomancy specialize in a particular range of thought— phobomancy focuses entirely on fear, for example. These variants are encountered almost as often as psychomancy itself.

 

[Incubus]

Re: OOC Thread

Ok, with magic written up, I think I've written up everything I need to for character creation. Although I may need to dig out some notes about the setting and situation...

So basically, it's time to ramp up character creation. Any questions, clarifications or concerns, post them and I shall answer.

 

[Incubus]

Re: Character Information

Character Advancement and Milestones

Spoiler

Milestones are moments in the game where something has happened to justify some kind of advancement. Milestones largely occur according to the GM’s discretion, and the frequency of their occurrence will do a lot to establish the overall tone and feel of a campaign—frequent milestones allow the characters to grow rapidly and give a sort of “epic” feel to the campaign as the opposition scales in response; infrequent milestones make things feel more grounded and established. Milestones fall into three categories—minor, significant, and major. There are some guidelines for when each happens, along with what characters
can do during each type of milestone.

Minor milestones usually occur at the end of a session of play, or whenever one significant piece of a story is resolved. A minor milestone allows the characters to evolve in response to the story that’s been unfolding before them. When a minor milestone occurs, you may choose one of the following:
- Switch the rank values of any two skills, or replace one Average skill with one that isn’t on your sheet.
- Change any single stunt for another stunt.
- Purchase stunts or powers, provided you have the refresh (permanent fate points) to do so.
- Rename one aspect.

Minor milestones are ideal when you want to switch the focus of your character’s existing abilities or change something on the character sheet, like a skill or the wording of an aspect. Maybe something happens in the story that makes part of your character’s sheet seem inappropriate, or you’ve simply discovered that your choice of skills, aspects, and stunts don’t match
your expectations in play. Obviously, these changes should be justified as much as possible, either within the story (“Hey, my character’s contact died, so I think I want to make his Joe the Reliable Contact aspect into Vengeance for Joe, okay?”) or as a result of play (“So I thought I wanted this guy to have a Good (+3) Presence, but I’m not really using it much—it’d be more fitting if he had a lower Presence and a higher Rapport, so I’m going to switch it out with my Fair (+2) Rapport.”). If the skill you’re switching out is at Average (+1), you may change it for a skill that isn’t on your sheet. Be careful when switching a character’s peak skills (his highest ones), though—this can significantly change the character, which is not the purpose of a minor milestone. Keep it in character, so to speak.

A significant milestone usually occurs at the conclusion of a scenario or a major plotline (or once every two or three sessions). Significant milestones are about advances of experience, as the characters have learned new things in dealing with problems and challenges. When a significant milestone occurs, your character gets all of the following:
- One additional skill rank.
- One of the benefits of a minor milestone.

Of particular note here is getting one additional skill rank to spend on a new skill slot, because it can be a little confusing. The costs are the same as in Character Creation (page 65), so one skill rank buys an Average slot, which you can then fill with any skill you want. If you want a bigger slot, you have to bank a few significant milestones’ worth of advancement first. When you’re upgrading an existing skill, you need only pay the difference in cost—if you have an Average slot, you can upgrade it to a Fair slot by paying one rank.

Important: Remember the rule from Character Creation that says you can’t have more skills at a given rank than you have at any lesser rank (page 65)? That still applies here. As an example, suppose you have a skill layout of one Great, two Good, three Fair, and four Average. Imagine that these are represented as building blocks stacked atop one another, each level representing a rank.

A major milestone should only occur when something has happened in the campaign that shakes it up a lot—either when a few scenarios have concluded, or a long, large-scale plotline wraps up. When these happen, the characters jump up a scale of power. When a major milestone occurs, your character gets all of the following:
- You can “clear out” an extreme consequence slot, allowing it to be used
again.
- An additional point of refresh(permanent fate point level).
- New stunts and/or powers.
- All the benefits of a significant milestone.

These milestones signify a major change in the power structure of your campaign— your characters are going to be dealing with a whole new tier of obstacles from here on out. More refresh means more supernatural powers, refinement in magic and new abilities. Even just the bump to a skill that a stunt provides can radically alter the nature of a character’s effectiveness. This is a really big deal; it means that the PCs are directly able to take on more powerful threats and have a wider variety of resources to draw on to face those threats. (To use a boxing analogy, an advancement of power is like stepping up to the next weight class—you might be the most skilled boxer in the world, but if you’re a featherweight, there’s still only so much you can do against a less-skilled heavyweight.)

Another option the GM has for a major milestone is to increase the skill cap by one rank. This allows the characters to raise their skills up into larger-than-life levels, transcending all previous expectations of human (or inhuman)
capability. This can be combined with the normal refresh award as often as the GM wishes. By default, one skill cap increase should probably come every two or three major milestones, happening a few times per campaign at most. A campaign where the skill cap increases with every new major milestone gain will get to Epic (literally) levels very quickly.

 

[Chibichibi]

Re: Character Sheets

Spoiler

Character Name: Soren

Player Name: Chibichibi

Race: Lamia > Lamia Scholar

High Concept: Youngest Lamian Valedictorian

Trouble: Doesn't know when to quit

Stress (Use O for open and / for filled):

Physical: O O O

Mental: O O O

Social: O O

Consequences (list as Mild/Moderate/Severe/Extreme then P/M/S then Aspect, only add as used):

Mild

Moderate

Severe

Extreme

Aspects

Aspect 1. - Skilled Sketch artist

Aspect 2. - Is embarrassed when talking to women outside academics or art

Aspect 3. - Radically honest

Aspect 4. - Keeps a journal of everything

Aspect 5. - Listens to Momma

Other Aspects:



Skills:

Average (+1) Slots Used: 4

Average Skills:
Resources
Discipline
Alertness
Rapport


Fair Slots (+2) Used: 3

Fair Skills:
Archery
Conviction
Endurance

Good Slots (+3) Used: 2

Good Skills:
Lore
Performance (Drawing)

Great Slots (+4) Used: 1

Great Skills:
Scholarship

Stunts and Powers:
Tireless

-Addictive Saliva (-1)
-Channeling Fire (-2)


Base Refresh: 6

Refresh Adjustment: -4

Adjusted Refresh: 2

Current Fate Points: 2



Focus Items:
2 inch Quartz Spear (+1 conviction and +1 discipline with fire)

Rote Spells:
Heat leech

Items:
Crossbow (WS 3)

old post! Has pretty pictures and backgroundy descriptiony stoof stuff : http://www.ulmf.org/bbs/showpost.php?p=263236&postcount=31

 

[Caulder]

Re: Character Sheets

Praying I got this right.

Spoiler

Character Name: Drago Protious

Player Name: Occam's Razor

Race: Harpy

High Concept Crow-born Harpy

Trouble: Xenophobic

Stress (Use O for open and / for filled):

Physical: O O O O

Mental: O O

Social: O O

Consequences :

Mild- Bruised Wing

Moderate

Severe

Extreame

Aspects

Aspect 1. - Barbaric

Aspect 2. - Hotheaded

Aspect 3. - For the Wife

Aspect 4. - Naked and proud

Aspect 5. -

Other Aspects:

Skills:

Skill Cap: Great (+4)

Average (+1) Slots Used: 2

Average Skills:

Might
Investigation



Fair Slots (+2) Used: 2

Fair Skills:

Archery
Intimidation



Good Slots (+3) Used: 2


Good Skills:

Fists
Survival



Great Slots (+4) Used: 2

Great Skills:

Endurance
Athletics


Stunts and Powers:

Archery - Firearms

Wings (-1)
Claws (-1)



Base Refresh: 6

Refresh Adjustment:

Adjusted Refresh: 3

Current Fate Points: 3

Equipment:
Harpy-forged Handcannon (WS 4)

Original sheet with descriptions and stuffs: http://ulmf.org/bbs/showpost.php?p=263235&postcount=30

 

[Sinfulwolf]

Re: Character Sheets

Spoiler

Character Name: Meaghan Nienna

Player Name: Sinfulwolf

Race: Vampyre

High Concept: Passionate Vampyre Warrior

Trouble: Emotions can cloud rational judgement

Stress (Use O for open and / for filled):

Physical: O O O O

Mental: O O

Social: O O O

Hunger: O O

Consequences (list as Mild/Moderate/Severe/Extreme then P/M/S then Aspect, only add as used):

Mild

Moderate

Severe

Extreme

Aspects

Aspect 1. - Vicious enough in combat to make a gladiator wince

Aspect 2. - Lustful enough to make a succubus raise an eyebrow

Aspect 3. - Spontaneous and fast thinking

Aspect 4. - My will is my own!

Aspect 5. - Alluring body

Other Aspects:

Skills:

Skill Cap: Great (+4)

Average (+1) Slots Used:
Average Skills:
-Intimidation
-Fists
-Might
-Alertness

Fair Slots (+2) Used:
Fair Skills:

-Presence
-Survival
-Athletics

Good Slots (+3) Used: 2
Good Skills:
-Endurance
-Rapport

Great Slots (+4) Used: 1
Great Skills:
-Weapons



Stunts and Powers (list ability, with cost in parentheses following, then a description of. Section each off with a bullet or -.):
-Fangs (-1)
-Cloak of Shadows (-1)
-Blood Drinker (0)
-Inhuman Strength (-2)



Base Refresh: 6

Refresh Adjustment: -4

Adjusted Refresh: 2

Current Fate Points: 2

Spoiler

Description: Tall and thin like the majority of her race, Meaghan regardless has the build of a warrior, her body showing the hard lines of muscle amidst her curves. Her dark scarlet hair is worn loose and wild, falling down to her shoulder blades, bangs hanging before her sharp facial features.

Her fashion sense is much akin to many other Vampyre warriors. With black form fitting breaches with crimson stitches up the sides of the thigh, black knee high leather boots and a black bustier laced up the front with crimson leather cord, and scarlet boning.

Background: Meaghan was born into the city of Dracholt to a soldiering father and a prostitute mother who left Dracholt to explore the world before eventually ending up in an Elven city never to be seen by Meaghan or her father, Agalt, again.

Agalt was never overly angry with his lover for leaving, only for leaving him with a daughter to raise alone. Without much knowledge in anything else Agalt trained her to be a warrior and it didn't take long for her to savour the adrenaline of combat, the intensity of bloodshed.

As her life continued, Meaghan embraced the passionate lifestyle of her kind, her blood lust growing, her sexual appetites expanding.

When rumours reached Dracholt of the rise of the accursed once more, whispers ran rampant through the streets. Meaghan could hear whispers of returning to the sides of the dark ones, others thinking of fighting for all of Vira. Knowing that if the rumours were true, that the victory of the accursed would destroy all the passion that thrives in life, Meaghan set off from the city, hoping to find a way to stop whatever was coming.