Wrath of the Magi

[Grey]

You were born different.


You didn't know, of course. Not for the longest time.


You didn't know the outbreak that killed other babies could never have hurt you.


Or didn't know that other children do not have the ghost of their grandmother tell them bedtime stories.


Or didn't know other young women couldn't feel the weather change.


But not all Magic is subtle forever. Perhaps when the Lord's son threatened you, his own hounds set upon him in your defence. Perhaps, as you grieved, your wife tore herself from her coffin and stared at you with dead eyes. Perhaps lightning struck you, out in the fields, and left you wholly unharmed.


That was the beginning of the end. The rest of your people feared you, and named you an abomination, a diabolist, a demon in human flesh. If they didn't kill you, perhaps your Magic would kill them, and sooner or later an Inquisitor would come bearing God's judgement to strike you down.


And so you fled. Made the long, frightful journey away from the place of your birth to anywhere you thought you could hide. You thought that you were alone, but you have since met others like you - other Magi. Others with wondrous and terrible power, in a world that hates and fears them.


What will you do now? Can you hide forever, or will you fight back? Will you strive to ignore your mystical might, or embrace the power? Will you forge a new future, or uncover a lost golden age when your kind ruled the world?


The power is in your hands. Are you strong enough to carry it?

• Chronomancer
• Communer
• Conflagrant
• Cryolyte
• Guardian
• Heartwright
• Necromancer
• Seer
• Stormlord
• Shadow
• Torchbearer
• Conduit

• 
  
  
  You are a Pilgrim of the Glass Desert; circumspect, impartial, and wise. You carry the Staff and the Hourglass, and with focus can see the curve of space and time stretching before and behind you.
  
  
  You have always known exactly where you are. You have always known exactly what time it is. You are never late nor early, unless you will it so.
  
  
  As your power has grown, you've found you can cross a dozen paces in a single stride and peer into the past. You can bend and distort time around yourself, such that arrows pass you by when their course must have been true.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Warden of the Silver Tree; passionate, adaptable, and free. Blood drips from your Claws, and the Forest grows in your footsteps.
  
  
  You overflow with life. No sickness can blight you, no injury may halt you. Your flesh mends like melting wax and shifts form to overcome any obstacle. You can harm and heal with a touch, and become progenitor to creatures never seen before on the face of the world.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Vessel of the Golden Flame; righteous, unwavering, and mighty. In your right hand is an Axe to serve justice, in your left a Flame for guidance.
  
  
  Yours is a will that burns with fearsome intensity. Those who would seek to weaken your resolve or frustrate your purpose find it merely burns hotter. The valour in your heart spreads to your allies and elevates them in pursuit of their goals. Fire obeys your command, and where that command is 'burn', your foes will be reduced to ash.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Terror of the Emerald Sea; deceptive, fearsome, and cruel. You carry the Whip and leave Desolation in your wake.
  
  
  War is cruel. The crueler it is, the sooner it is over. You inspire fear in others; both those who would serve you and those you would destroy. You are as relentless and elemental as the ocean itself, and you will freeze the blood in men's veins. You are as subtle as death by hypothermia and unpredictable as the seas of Autumn.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Sentinel of the Bronze Mountain; steadfast, practical, and dependable. The Earth moves to support your steps, and you bear the Hammer not of judgement, but of a maker.
  
  
  You have always felt the earth beneath you, know its paths and pits and hills. You have felt the gemstones calling to you from the rock and seen the shapes hiding in blocks of stone. You shape soil and rock and steel with your bare hands. You build more than you break, but break you can if need be. You are a shield and protector. You are a friend and leader. A mountain is not a thing of a single piece, and yet is nigh unbreakable. So too you favour allies, and teamwork, and those who can use the tools you build with proper skill and respect.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Reader of the Ruby Heart; empathetic, creative, and subtle. A Quill in hand, and Locket around your neck, you can quiet rage and instill joy. You can nurture fear and feed sorrow.
  
  
  Your power at first permits you feel what others do, and push. To turn affection into love, or hate to distaste. To influence and sometimes implant emotion. But as your power grows, even thoughts are left open to you. Not merely to read minds, but change them - even make them, brand new, from nothing.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Bearer of the Leaden Skull; vivacious, whimsical, and considerate. You carry a Dagger, and on your lips is a Song. You can speak to the unquiet dead, and quiet them. You can raise the bodies of the dead and sunder the souls of the living.
  
  
  Far from morbid, you seek to celebrate and enjoy life. You are likely an artist and craftsman both, making beautiful devices of bone and clockwork which ghosts may inhabit; or terrible weapons of rotting flesh and ravening hunger.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are an Oracle of the Amber Eye; cunning, inscrutable, and charming. You carry a Scythe and Amulet, to pluck or sever the strands of Fate.
  
  
  You have always been lucky. And as your power grows, you can twist Fate in your favour and against others. You can see the infinite possibilities of every action and the ties that bind soul to soul. You call pull them taut, or cut them, and it is rare that you can be surprised.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Rider of the Sapphire Storm; capricious, energetic, and forceful. You wield the Spear and the Fan, and call the lightning to your service.
  
  
  You can feel the shifting of the air, the grandiose dance of the winds. You can taste the invisible fields that surround everything and manipulate primordial forces of the world. You can quell the thunder with a word and command the rain to fall. You can bend those forces which steel obeys and feel them curve around living things. You can build arcane machines that provide limitless power and weapons that would ruin kingdoms.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Watcher of the Ebon Night; secretive, independent, and purposeful. You are robed in Silk and record all in your Book.
  
  
  You are kin to the darkness. You see where others cannot. You cloak yourself in shadow and silence. You obliterate memories and steal secrets. You shape the dark into monstrous form and bind it to your will. You set elaborate webs of deception and cunning traps. You are a voice from nothingness, guiding those who would seek the truth to answers. Or at least, the answers you require them to find.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are an Illuminor of the Ivory Sun; magnetic, insightful, and ambitious. You carry a Bow and a Mirror, and inspire others to knowledge.
  
  
  You may bend light, to conceal or reveal. You project rays like the sun's own to sear and destroy. You are a beacon in the darkness and a guiding light to the lost. You unveil the path that others may walk it. Your radiance cannot be ignored.
  
  
  
• 
  
  
  You are a Diamond Soul. You carry no implements; you are the prism through which Magic is splintered empowered by your titanic Will.
  
  
  You can unmake the Magics of others. You can feel and taste them and blot out their power. And, if you would bear the terrible risk, you can call on any Pattern; The Golden Flame and Emerald Sea both, and all others. You can fuse the works of other Magi together and ward them against interference - even against your own power.
  
  
  

Crucible: Dark Age (setting and rules here: CDA Special Edit - revised) game. No more than six players, all Magi who have fled persecution and come together by chance, to determine their place in the world.


I expect strong personal ambitions for each character and if you can come up with connections between them early, so much the better.


Especially would love to have @Cirno @The Fuzz and @Silvertongued for this one.

 

[The Fuzz]

I must not play a Stormlord even though is objectively best Pattern.

 

[Cirno]

I like too many of them. Your writing makes it so difficult to decide, @Grey.


Hrm, what level of experience are these ambitious Magi at?

 

[_SweetCandy_]

This seems really interesting and I would love to be apart of it. Though I've never done a dice roleplay online, I've played some D&D in the past and get the basic rules. Only thing is I don't know how much this differs.


@meowemmacat you should take a look at this.

 

[Grey]

I like too many of them. Your writing makes it so difficult to decide, @Grey.
Hrm, what level of experience are these ambitious Magi at?

Depends. I would probably put you all at Logos 3 unless someone wanted otherwise, and in terms of XP probably not much more than 24 extra (in retrospect the 80 and 40 bands need adjustment).

This seems really interesting and I would love to be apart of it. Though I've never done a dice roleplay online, I've played some D&D in the past and get the basic rules. Only thing is I don't know how much this differs.
@meowemmacat you should take a look at this.

You be welcome to try! It differs quite a lot from D&D - primarily in that it's much simpler once you get the hang of it.


You know, I should link the setting doc in the OP. I'll link here for you, too.


Now, it's very important not to panic - it looks like a lot, but you don't need to read the whole thing. Just the introduction and any parts that interest you, to decide where your character comes from.


CDA Special Edit - revised

 

[Alexandra]

You know, I never got to release a plague in Exalted, and have yet to play a Communer.....

 

[Dusky]

Torchbearer.


Maybe.

 

[Blackadder]

And I am drawn into yet another of your games.


Cryolyte or Seer maybe.

 

[Alias]

I'm interested

 

[Cirno]

Idea for a cautious Heartwright. Can happily switch to another Pattern though. (I really like several of 'em.)


Aristom wavers. He seeks solitude and quiet in the hinterlands. He finds himself in villages and towns, where local drama offers anything but. He can't help getting swept into their stories. He prefers to stay hidden, work in subtleties if at all.


Observant folk unnerve him. His parents had been observant folk. Started watching him with fear and reverence. <Ally> freed Aristom by giving his parents something to really fear. Ari hasn't returned to his home town since then.

 

[Grey]

Yes, good, more character concepts.

 

[Dusky]

I daresay I'll have something tonight. I can certainly pitch her character just with a c&p job, but I should probably actually get her backstory out of my head onto the screen.

 

[Stickdom]

Hnnng, Grey-Senpai delivers yet again. I'm sorely tempted to make a Chrono or a Torchbearer, but I've never had much luck with Crucible in the past. I always get lost in the sauce of all the numbers and keeping track of what to roll at what time has always made me a little flustered. How die-heavy are we going, @Grey? Do you expect rolls every other post or are you going to give us a heads-up as to when we should need to roll?

 

[Grey]

I try not to make people roll more than absolutely necessary, so it shouldn't happen much.


I'd like a broad spread of Patterns if possible but I'll live with doubling up.

 

[Blackadder]

Karl has never viewed his gifts with anything described as negativity. The son of a village bailiff in a distant village, on a certain level he was the closest thing to the prince of the manor. With the lord more than happy as long as the taxes were paid and order maintained, he and father were the powers that mattered in the reasonably prosperous township.


Of course, when he discovered he was a Cryolyte, everything changed. His father wouldn't turn on his own son, but the priest was a damn devout and already was about to send desperate messages. So Karl was packed off with some supplies - keeping the Inquisition away, but giving Karl a chance for his life.


- By the way, it strikes me that Karl would be the perfect person to have dragged Aristom away from home.

 

[Stickdom]

I try not to make people roll more than absolutely necessary, so it shouldn't happen much.
I'd like a broad spread of Patterns if possible but I'll live with doubling up.

In that case, I'll probably throw my name in the hat. Upon reading the lore some more/again, I'm still torn between Chronomancer or Torchbearer, though since we're going for wide-spread diversity, I am considering dropping Torch (so Dusky can have it :3) in favor of Guardian. I've found I have a love of enchantments, so whichever I choose will probably major in a school that augments such, whether it be breaking the time with a Chrono or forging the perfect weapons with a Guard. Erg, I hate being so indecisive

 

[Grey]

Just to streamline this for everyone, you essentially have the following options:


1. Band together for mutual protection and avoid persecution.


2. Band together to fight back against the status quo.


3. Band together in conquest.


Subcategories to these would be:


1. Uncover the mystery of the Magocracy; why it fell, what wonders it developed, and remnants of its heyday.


2. Establish a settlement, supporting ordinary settlers with your Magic.


3. Set up a spy ring to thwart slave/prisoner caravans.


And of course, if each character is pursuing a personal project, rivalry, or ambition that would be ideal.


So basically, it's good if you guys decide what your group wants to accomplish, and build characters and relationships around that.

 

[Stickdom]

Alright, taking Grey's last post into account, I've made a decision:


Novice (read as: Naive) Chronomancer discovers legends of past Magocracy via research and archaeology, fueled by uncontrolled/visionary glimpses into past. Develops obsessive interest in magical devices and their cultural uses, and recreating the kingdoms of old. Sets off to becoming wandering explorer and recreate the ancient ways through any means they can get their hands on.


Just a rough character concept that will define the rest of their background and future motives. Grey, perhaps, has suggestions or changes to make it for the setting better, for instance, I'm uncertain as to whether Chronomancers get visions of the past or if there is any common knowledge of the Magocracy other than legends and myths, so any guidance on how to form it to the setting is appreciated. As I said, just a basic concept, so it's fluid at this point and subject to many changes.

 

[Alexandra]

Alright, taking Grey's last post into account, I've made a decision:
Novice (read as: Naive) Chronomancer discovers legends of past Magocracy via research and archaeology, fueled by uncontrolled/visionary glimpses into past. Develops obsessive interest in magical devices and their cultural uses, and recreating the kingdoms of old. Sets off to becoming wandering explorer and recreate the ancient ways through any means they can get their hands on.


Just a rough character concept that will define the rest of their background and future motives. Grey, perhaps, has suggestions or changes to make it for the setting better, for instance, I'm uncertain as to whether Chronomancers get visions of the past or if there is any common knowledge of the Magocracy other than legends and myths, so any guidance on how to form it to the setting is appreciated. As I said, just a basic concept, so it's fluid at this point and subject to many changes.

Chronomancers can absolutely see into the past; it's an active magic roll, and you cannot affect anything, only watch. You could do a bunch of scrying to find out about the Magocracy, journey to learn from ancient ruins, and/or try and meet other scholars who are fascinated by the era....they might have books


It would make sense for your character to be in the Frontier if you're into magical history; the landscape is full of ancient ruins, semi sentient patches of forest, and Communer-made monsters who have had generations to breed and evolve. Lots to discover.


Actually, on the topic of the Frontier; PSA - that will serve as our initial setting, probably housing our base of operations.


Frontier Overview Copypasta;


"The Frontier is located to the east of Kelen, a vast and untamed region stretching from the land bridge to Lama in the south, to the end of Hell's Teeth in the north. The Frontier is bordered to the west by Kelen, and to the east by the Sunward Sea. It is a sparsely populated region, the forests and hills full of ruins, monsters, and towns lost to the dangers of the Frontier. There are a number of sponsored expeditions to the Frontier made by Hrothgard and Kelen, by Houses and Baronies, forming small outposts and towns, and even a city. The vast forests make it prime logging territory and excellent hunting ground. The hills are rich with minerals, and the Sunward Coast is suitable for fishing – not that many settlements extend quite so far. The Frontier also hides many ruins from the Magocracy and Empire, a rich bounty of magical artefacts and lore for those brave or foolish enough.


The Frontier is also a place of warfare – Mercenary companies hired and led by noble representatives fight one another in these wild, secluded lands to solve disputes at home. Or to settle personal grievances. The longer one spends in the Frontier, the less one remembers the ways of Kelen and Hrothgard. While not unified, the more time passes the more it becomes a country of its own."

 

[Stickdom]

Chronomancers can absolutely see into the past; it's an active magic roll, and you cannot affect anything, only watch. You could do a bunch of scrying to find out about the Magocracy, journey to learn from ancient ruins, and/or try and meet other scholars who are fascinated by the era....they might have books
It would make sense for your character to be in the Frontier if you're into magical history; the landscape is full of ancient ruins, semi sentient patches of forest, and Communer-made monsters who have had generations to breed and evolve. Lots to discover.


Actually, on the topic of the Frontier; PSA - that will serve as our initial setting, probably housing our base of operations.


Frontier Overview Copypasta;


"The Frontier is located to the east of Kelen, a vast and untamed region stretching from the land bridge to Lama in the south, to the end of Hell's Teeth in the north. The Frontier is bordered to the west by Kelen, and to the east by the Sunward Sea. It is a sparsely populated region, the forests and hills full of ruins, monsters, and towns lost to the dangers of the Frontier. There are a number of sponsored expeditions to the Frontier made by Hrothgard and Kelen, by Houses and Baronies, forming small outposts and towns, and even a city. The vast forests make it prime logging territory and excellent hunting ground. The hills are rich with minerals, and the Sunward Coast is suitable for fishing – not that many settlements extend quite so far. The Frontier also hides many ruins from the Magocracy and Empire, a rich bounty of magical artefacts and lore for those brave or foolish enough.


The Frontier is also a place of warfare – Mercenary companies hired and led by noble representatives fight one another in these wild, secluded lands to solve disputes at home. Or to settle personal grievances. The longer one spends in the Frontier, the less one remembers the ways of Kelen and Hrothgard. While not unified, the more time passes the more it becomes a country of its own."

Well, I knew for certain they could glimpse the past, since that's in both the RP and Rulebook descriptions of the Chronomancer. I think my question was misworded, but I now find the answer to my original question to be irrelevant, since it wouldn't affect anything but his origin story, which is easily remedied with some simple changes.


EDIT: Question I forgot to ask, is it guaranteed that we're starting in The Frontier? I also assumed that we'd be there most of the time, since it's outside of the long arm of the Kelene Inquisitors, I was just wondering if anything had been said about the starting point being elsewhere.

 

[Blackadder]

Karl definitely would be an option 2/3 type, and subcategory 1 would be good in his mind for info and assets.

 

[Alexandra]

Karl definitely would be an option 2/3 type, and subcategory 1 would be good in his mind for info and assets.

Same here, except including subcategory 3 with a view to ending magical persecution entirely.

 

[Blackadder]

Same here, except including subcategory 3 with a view to ending magical persecution entirely.

You really want to release that plague, huh?

 

[Alexandra]

You really want to release that plague, huh?

Absolutely yes!


Heh.


I've moved slightly sideways with the idea. More magical entomologist than plague-bringer. Creating things that burrow, fly and crawl to spy and sneak, with a view to subtly undermine a political structure; secrets, information, blackmail, economic disruption....that kind of thing.

 

[Stickdom]

I'd say my character would definitely be a category 2, since their motive is to bring back the Magocracy to some extent, leading to the inevitable sub 1 motivation. They probably won't care what anyone else does, as long as the group is active and mobile, they'll tag along to glean whatever forgotten information they can scavenge.