@Write
Can you add a little family background to your backstory? I think the writing on her discovery of magic and existential issues is beautiful, I'd love to have it balanced out by a little concrete stuff (like what growing up in the Abaneki tribe was like for her, her family situation, what they made of her interest in shamanism, ect) For example, Fæla is very interesting, because women in the Abaneki tribe are expected to learn arts and not any combat abilities. You've done this as runic magic is an artform, but her ability to fight with staves/her walking stick might of been looked down on, so i'd love to hear whether she hid that, embraced it, and how her family/the clan treat her generally. Furthermore, her family's/clan's involvement in a 10 year old venturing into the woods on what they believed to be death-mission xD Maybe you and @HowlsOfWinter could talk a little about this event? Since the men of the Abenki are known for their honor, I don't think they'd be cool with it, and it'd probably become a well-known event (along with her rise to shamanism being well-known for her age, could add interesting stuff to the Abaneki lore)
Human's don't know of the existance of Dark Gods and wouldn't use the term - that's more of an immortal realm thing. Humans have their own understanding of what an evil or good god is, and it changes based on their experiences, mood and the time period. Mortals aren't involved in the affairs of the immortal realm, and know very little about it (all their experiences related to Gods are their impact on the mortal realm) let alone the politics that leads to one God being classfied as a "Dark God" by immortal standards. This doesn't affect your CS much other then changing the wording :D
Magical Awareness - perfect, just asking for clarification. Does she track magical creatures only, or can she detect magical energy/imprints generally? It may seem like a slight difference but it would affect which rolls the skill is used on.
Walking Stick - again fine :D Not an actual comment really, just that swords can be used to cut firewood, but I get what you mean when you say " But a normal steel that isn’t edged wouldn’t completely destroy the walking stick. The one she currently has is oaken." in that it won't instantly be cut up in a fight. Just letting you know it's possible on a dice roll, since it's possible irl, that it would get broken.
Shaman - General - "Fæla has one of the most complete knowledges of the arcane in the world. Putting herself at great personal risk multiple times to attain the knowledge that she has gathered." - can you please add some information to her backstory regarding the great personal risk she went to to attain knowledge and what this has led to? Also for most complete knowledge in the world - again doesn't actually affect anything, just giving you information - "complete" is difficult to place due to a. the nature of magic currently (even gods wouldn't have a complete understanding of magic in this current time period, to put it in perspective) and b. the nature of human's understanding of it (e.g. tribal era, not much written down, most clans focusing on staying alive and avoiding dangerous magic then investigating it). To have complete knowledge would probably be very difficult for her age as she'd need to travel extensively (much of this information is not written down, and much of it, as you said, would be exceptionally dangerous to learn. e.g. a nearly complete knowledge would involve interacting with numerous magical creatures for long periods of time ect. to understand them, as well as studying magic itself as a force, without proper equipment to do so in this time period). One way to think of it is magic is currently in it's primordial-soup stage, it's chaotic and powerful and in everywhere and everything. Anyway, I know no one has any information on magic yet, for a few reasons (understanding it has major implications for the plot. How you as players would interact with magic after learning that knowledge would change drastically I imagine. As well as player's lack of understanding mimics the relationship of the average tribal person.) but with a magic-knowledge based skill you'd probably learn some things about the nature of magic.
I know at the end of the day it just comes down to a modifier to dice rolls so my above ramble doesn't matter much, so I hope you won't consider my enthusiastic reply in a bad light xD But yeah, just a few adjustments to wording and I'd love to hear more about her experiences learning about magic, as to be one of the best in the world would require an equal amount of trials, tribulations and discovery, which is quite impressive at her age.
Arcanist - right! So! I've been thinking alot about this and also listening to you and Melo on the subject. I think I've found a way to run it which I find comfortable as a GM.
Firstly, remove the set amount you can make - aka not 3 of 1 or 1 of the other. It is also possible to make more types of runes other then defensive/offensive, like normal runes irl. You could make runes inspired to gather information, both mortal and magick, to help plants grow, to improve lifestock fertility, ect.
When a rune is created, it is bound to your character's magic. The basic jist of this is that, once placed, the effectiveness is taken from your character's state and dedication to the magic - e.g. how long she spent forming the rune, any rare reagents she gathered to imbue it with, what her concerntration is like at key points in time, her lifeforce)
What this means: A rune you've flung together in one post isn't going to last as long or be as powerful as one you carefully created over weeks, travelled to the four corners of the realm to gather rare reagents for, and then got five people for 24 hours to cast together after fasting for a week and doing purification rituals. So, this means you can, as a player, invest the amount of time, effort and danger into a rune based on your situation. Helping a farmer's ewe give birth safely? probably not going to need more then a paragraph. Preparing for the final end RP battle? you can start preparing for it in advance, and decide what amount of danger you're willing to put your character in to do it. Anyway, next point.
Just as someone would get tired from battling, climbing, running, swimming, ect. and become worse at something, so are runes tied to a character's mental fatigue. While it is possible for a rune to decay (e.g. if you leave it alone for a month and come back, it has a high chance to be less potent then before) what I am more interested in is mental fatigue while actively using the rune. e.g. if you placed a warding rune around your camp at night, it would be considered active while it is working. Whereas if you placed a warding rune and then dismantled your camp and decided to camp elsewhere, that rune is dormant if you're not using it, therefore not taking energy to sustain. Kind of like an off/on switch - if the rune is "on", then it's taking some energy to maintain.
Fatigue depends on a few things - a hastily thrown together rune is less resource-efficient then one carefully thought about. Similarly, a powerful rune takes more to maintain then a simple one.
So here are a few example situations - if you're using a combat rune in the heat of battle, and your opponent nearly slits your throat, breaking your concerntration for the moment, your runes are less effective for the time it takes for you to get your head back in the game.
Another example - say you were nearly dying in a cave somewhere after being ravaged by wolves, and had a ward rune up. Normally in this situation, the rune would soon fail and you would be set upon by the wolves. However, if you character was dedicating the last of all their mental effort sustaining the rune while they awaited rescue, that's a very different take on the situation.
As for their effect, you can imbue a rune with a property (e.g. defensive, offensive, nature fertility, luck, ect) with some properties being more difficult then others (e.g. luck being harder). They work over an area of effect (larger areas taking more mental resources) and last a period of time, their effectiveness decreasing over time unless Faela does regular maintenance on them (which is easier/cheaper then making a rune from scratch, but still requires some effort and sometimes resources depending on the nature of the rune) Since every rune will basically be unique they'll each have their own roll tables based on how they were setup, Faela's situation ect. and because of this they are in some ways a chaotic form of magic, their use never always being exactly what you expect. But their reliability increases with effort used to create them.
I feel like I've missed a few concepts, but feel free to talk with me about this skill further. Also, I'll probably give you prompts when it comes to IC posts until you get used to the system (e.g how long are you spending preparing the rune? Are you getting any extra reagents to power it? Are you doing any rituals to prepare yourself for casting it? ect)
Abilities
Swift Hand: Decreases the amount of time it takes to create a rune, allows their creation to be more specific.
Hearsay: might be too potent for this power slot, if it has the dual effect of dispelling a magic effect as an aoe and then adding that magic to the world. Since she's a dark god you may either dispel as an AOE or dispel for oneself and reflect that into the world. I really like the effect as is for a dark god though, so maybe consider moving it to low-medium as it'd be good for a dark god to have. In fact: switch this with decree and you're good, I'd say.
Grand Jury: reminds me of one of my favourite childhood book, The Strange Power in the dark visions trilogy :DDD
Deposition: thou art a dark gode, you can buff this :D take off the concerntration element, dark gods can pewpew as they like, because they're dicks.
I feel like something is missing from this? You talk about piercing stuff to needing to declare a name... does that mean it's auto-hit kill? Otherwise I would just leave it as:
or if you specifically want to only hurt the people you have mentioned:
hmmmu. Seems relatively underpowered for this position?
Your options: a very detailed answer to the question. If the GM feels the question/answer is of little use, half the lifeforce cost is refunded.
Option 2: You may ask three questions, one after the other. The knights will answer two questions with the truth, and one with a lie.
@BlackPanther is the hollowed tree a second dimension or just a place he hides stuff?
[@FilthyMudblood] I love that movie. Favourite Disney movie up there with Treasure Planet
@Angel Eyes how big is his world?
@RedXCross I love her mark!
Curious, has she had her coming of age ceremony since she's been travelling?
Yes a slaver. amazing backstory.
mmm. A dark god who appears before those who summon them? This will have interesting RP implications.
Great backstory again... very curious. Will have implications down the line ;D
I Know the Truth - increase to 30 seconds. I think if used against a player, they'd be tempted to just "um, ah" their way out of it. I'll keep an eye on it.
Also by lose the power do you mean they don't have access to it? Because that's a huge nerf, particularly for a dark god. I'd go the other way and say lifeforce is refunded if the question isn't answered, but if the question is answered there's an hour cooldown before they can use it again.
Mask of Secrets - perfect, just letting you know due to my non-existant time-travel powers i won't be able to tell you what lies are told in advance, but you'll get them OOC over PM or something when able. Do you have a timeframe in mind?
The Human Persona: You're a dark god now, my friend. remove the "must see the person perform something exactly before they can perform it." you instinctively know 'cos your the god that see's all, yo.
The Hero's Persona: short period? pfff you're a dark god. let me know how long you imagine this lasts. may mistake as righteous or noble? for this skillslot you can make them appear righteous/noble.
Reflection of the Self: Dark God. You're nearly undoubtebly that person. Like the debuff, though, very creative.
dark god, you can buff this a bit or just explain it a little more so I understand how powerful it is for a strong ability. Does it drive them mad or are they just haunted by their secrets? The second one is more interesting, i think. I would be tempted to make them as ugly as their lives/secrets. This is your strongest ability, after all, and making people hideous is fun.
Excellent CS! Let me know when you make the changes because it's pretty much ready to go up, honestly, and we can do RRA shenanigans.
@13org I love that picture sooo much, ohmyglob <3 here are my notes on your CS, please note I don't mean anything I say to be harsh, so I hope it doesn't come off that way :D
Gods are beyond space and time, so the mark is fine :D
So just to be sure, the Wulfing are now extinct? Are you sure that is what you wish? Their may be unforseen consequences, particularly if Nanna is known to have done it (even if her motives were just) this means at the Clan Gathering her and her breathren will probably stand trial, as the clans know little of the going ons of other clans unless they have regular runners bringing news. It's not bad to do, I just want to make sure it's what you want ;D
Also: did she sustain any injuries from her big battle? Has she travelled straight from the battle to the clan gathering? she is probably pretty fatigued and her items battle-worn/in need of cleaning or repair. Just some thoughts :3
as Geirskögul, The Morrigan and Miselean have similar domains, they'd know each other as Gods. perhaps you, @Dusksong and @Melo can get a dialogue going about how your Gods know each other and their feelings about each other?
I love how Nanna has traits like Geirskögul :D
Perfect Warrior: Dice Modifiers shall apply to "Agile and focused" and general combat :D (so she's always going to be better then someone untrained, but most of the modifier shall come in from dodging blows, maintaining her cool, ect)
Agility: this is slightly a double up of Perfect warrior, so maybe you'd like to put something else here?
right so, this post is getting long, but I'll PM you the ability stuff when I'm ready? sorry about the wait, I've been writing this one post a while and need a little break xD
Can you add a little family background to your backstory? I think the writing on her discovery of magic and existential issues is beautiful, I'd love to have it balanced out by a little concrete stuff (like what growing up in the Abaneki tribe was like for her, her family situation, what they made of her interest in shamanism, ect) For example, Fæla is very interesting, because women in the Abaneki tribe are expected to learn arts and not any combat abilities. You've done this as runic magic is an artform, but her ability to fight with staves/her walking stick might of been looked down on, so i'd love to hear whether she hid that, embraced it, and how her family/the clan treat her generally. Furthermore, her family's/clan's involvement in a 10 year old venturing into the woods on what they believed to be death-mission xD Maybe you and @HowlsOfWinter could talk a little about this event? Since the men of the Abenki are known for their honor, I don't think they'd be cool with it, and it'd probably become a well-known event (along with her rise to shamanism being well-known for her age, could add interesting stuff to the Abaneki lore)
Human's don't know of the existance of Dark Gods and wouldn't use the term - that's more of an immortal realm thing. Humans have their own understanding of what an evil or good god is, and it changes based on their experiences, mood and the time period. Mortals aren't involved in the affairs of the immortal realm, and know very little about it (all their experiences related to Gods are their impact on the mortal realm) let alone the politics that leads to one God being classfied as a "Dark God" by immortal standards. This doesn't affect your CS much other then changing the wording :D
Magical Awareness - perfect, just asking for clarification. Does she track magical creatures only, or can she detect magical energy/imprints generally? It may seem like a slight difference but it would affect which rolls the skill is used on.
Walking Stick - again fine :D Not an actual comment really, just that swords can be used to cut firewood, but I get what you mean when you say " But a normal steel that isn’t edged wouldn’t completely destroy the walking stick. The one she currently has is oaken." in that it won't instantly be cut up in a fight. Just letting you know it's possible on a dice roll, since it's possible irl, that it would get broken.
Shaman - General - "Fæla has one of the most complete knowledges of the arcane in the world. Putting herself at great personal risk multiple times to attain the knowledge that she has gathered." - can you please add some information to her backstory regarding the great personal risk she went to to attain knowledge and what this has led to? Also for most complete knowledge in the world - again doesn't actually affect anything, just giving you information - "complete" is difficult to place due to a. the nature of magic currently (even gods wouldn't have a complete understanding of magic in this current time period, to put it in perspective) and b. the nature of human's understanding of it (e.g. tribal era, not much written down, most clans focusing on staying alive and avoiding dangerous magic then investigating it). To have complete knowledge would probably be very difficult for her age as she'd need to travel extensively (much of this information is not written down, and much of it, as you said, would be exceptionally dangerous to learn. e.g. a nearly complete knowledge would involve interacting with numerous magical creatures for long periods of time ect. to understand them, as well as studying magic itself as a force, without proper equipment to do so in this time period). One way to think of it is magic is currently in it's primordial-soup stage, it's chaotic and powerful and in everywhere and everything. Anyway, I know no one has any information on magic yet, for a few reasons (understanding it has major implications for the plot. How you as players would interact with magic after learning that knowledge would change drastically I imagine. As well as player's lack of understanding mimics the relationship of the average tribal person.) but with a magic-knowledge based skill you'd probably learn some things about the nature of magic.
I know at the end of the day it just comes down to a modifier to dice rolls so my above ramble doesn't matter much, so I hope you won't consider my enthusiastic reply in a bad light xD But yeah, just a few adjustments to wording and I'd love to hear more about her experiences learning about magic, as to be one of the best in the world would require an equal amount of trials, tribulations and discovery, which is quite impressive at her age.
Arcanist - right! So! I've been thinking alot about this and also listening to you and Melo on the subject. I think I've found a way to run it which I find comfortable as a GM.
Firstly, remove the set amount you can make - aka not 3 of 1 or 1 of the other. It is also possible to make more types of runes other then defensive/offensive, like normal runes irl. You could make runes inspired to gather information, both mortal and magick, to help plants grow, to improve lifestock fertility, ect.
When a rune is created, it is bound to your character's magic. The basic jist of this is that, once placed, the effectiveness is taken from your character's state and dedication to the magic - e.g. how long she spent forming the rune, any rare reagents she gathered to imbue it with, what her concerntration is like at key points in time, her lifeforce)
What this means: A rune you've flung together in one post isn't going to last as long or be as powerful as one you carefully created over weeks, travelled to the four corners of the realm to gather rare reagents for, and then got five people for 24 hours to cast together after fasting for a week and doing purification rituals. So, this means you can, as a player, invest the amount of time, effort and danger into a rune based on your situation. Helping a farmer's ewe give birth safely? probably not going to need more then a paragraph. Preparing for the final end RP battle? you can start preparing for it in advance, and decide what amount of danger you're willing to put your character in to do it. Anyway, next point.
Just as someone would get tired from battling, climbing, running, swimming, ect. and become worse at something, so are runes tied to a character's mental fatigue. While it is possible for a rune to decay (e.g. if you leave it alone for a month and come back, it has a high chance to be less potent then before) what I am more interested in is mental fatigue while actively using the rune. e.g. if you placed a warding rune around your camp at night, it would be considered active while it is working. Whereas if you placed a warding rune and then dismantled your camp and decided to camp elsewhere, that rune is dormant if you're not using it, therefore not taking energy to sustain. Kind of like an off/on switch - if the rune is "on", then it's taking some energy to maintain.
Fatigue depends on a few things - a hastily thrown together rune is less resource-efficient then one carefully thought about. Similarly, a powerful rune takes more to maintain then a simple one.
So here are a few example situations - if you're using a combat rune in the heat of battle, and your opponent nearly slits your throat, breaking your concerntration for the moment, your runes are less effective for the time it takes for you to get your head back in the game.
Another example - say you were nearly dying in a cave somewhere after being ravaged by wolves, and had a ward rune up. Normally in this situation, the rune would soon fail and you would be set upon by the wolves. However, if you character was dedicating the last of all their mental effort sustaining the rune while they awaited rescue, that's a very different take on the situation.
As for their effect, you can imbue a rune with a property (e.g. defensive, offensive, nature fertility, luck, ect) with some properties being more difficult then others (e.g. luck being harder). They work over an area of effect (larger areas taking more mental resources) and last a period of time, their effectiveness decreasing over time unless Faela does regular maintenance on them (which is easier/cheaper then making a rune from scratch, but still requires some effort and sometimes resources depending on the nature of the rune) Since every rune will basically be unique they'll each have their own roll tables based on how they were setup, Faela's situation ect. and because of this they are in some ways a chaotic form of magic, their use never always being exactly what you expect. But their reliability increases with effort used to create them.
I feel like I've missed a few concepts, but feel free to talk with me about this skill further. Also, I'll probably give you prompts when it comes to IC posts until you get used to the system (e.g how long are you spending preparing the rune? Are you getting any extra reagents to power it? Are you doing any rituals to prepare yourself for casting it? ect)
Abilities
Swift Hand: Decreases the amount of time it takes to create a rune, allows their creation to be more specific.
Hearsay: might be too potent for this power slot, if it has the dual effect of dispelling a magic effect as an aoe and then adding that magic to the world. Since she's a dark god you may either dispel as an AOE or dispel for oneself and reflect that into the world. I really like the effect as is for a dark god though, so maybe consider moving it to low-medium as it'd be good for a dark god to have. In fact: switch this with decree and you're good, I'd say.
Grand Jury: reminds me of one of my favourite childhood book, The Strange Power in the dark visions trilogy :DDD
Deposition: thou art a dark gode, you can buff this :D take off the concerntration element, dark gods can pewpew as they like, because they're dicks.
The Third Knight: Fæla taking the place of the third knight summons her holy lance, able to pierce even steel, trees and most things. However Fæla must announce that she intends to take someone’s life if she is to kill them with this spear to them in person, otherwise it will not strike them, instead going right through the target’s body. Once she has announced that she will take this person’s life she is stuck moving at a rather slow rate, being forced to walk.I feel like something is missing from this? You talk about piercing stuff to needing to declare a name... does that mean it's auto-hit kill? Otherwise I would just leave it as:
The Third Knight: Fæla taking the place of the third knight summons her holy lance, able to pierce even steel, trees and most things.or if you specifically want to only hurt the people you have mentioned:
The Third Knight: Fæla taking the place of the third knight summons her holy lance, able to pierce even steel, trees and most things. Fæla must announce the names of those she wishes to kill or injure with this weapon, else the weapon will not strike them but go right through the target’s body.Cross Examination: Fæla is able to activate this ability, which will summon her two knights to her side. She is able to ask a single question and they will give her their best answer closest to the truth that one could possibly be. If the truth is known by anyone they will give it to her. If not, they will give her the best answer one could possibly give / receive.hmmmu. Seems relatively underpowered for this position?
Your options: a very detailed answer to the question. If the GM feels the question/answer is of little use, half the lifeforce cost is refunded.
Option 2: You may ask three questions, one after the other. The knights will answer two questions with the truth, and one with a lie.
@BlackPanther is the hollowed tree a second dimension or just a place he hides stuff?
[@FilthyMudblood] I love that movie. Favourite Disney movie up there with Treasure Planet
@Angel Eyes how big is his world?
@RedXCross I love her mark!
Curious, has she had her coming of age ceremony since she's been travelling?
Yes a slaver. amazing backstory.
mmm. A dark god who appears before those who summon them? This will have interesting RP implications.
Great backstory again... very curious. Will have implications down the line ;D
I Know the Truth - increase to 30 seconds. I think if used against a player, they'd be tempted to just "um, ah" their way out of it. I'll keep an eye on it.
Also by lose the power do you mean they don't have access to it? Because that's a huge nerf, particularly for a dark god. I'd go the other way and say lifeforce is refunded if the question isn't answered, but if the question is answered there's an hour cooldown before they can use it again.
Mask of Secrets - perfect, just letting you know due to my non-existant time-travel powers i won't be able to tell you what lies are told in advance, but you'll get them OOC over PM or something when able. Do you have a timeframe in mind?
The Human Persona: You're a dark god now, my friend. remove the "must see the person perform something exactly before they can perform it." you instinctively know 'cos your the god that see's all, yo.
The Hero's Persona: short period? pfff you're a dark god. let me know how long you imagine this lasts. may mistake as righteous or noble? for this skillslot you can make them appear righteous/noble.
Reflection of the Self: Dark God. You're nearly undoubtebly that person. Like the debuff, though, very creative.
The Weight of an Image
A target is suddenly faced with the weight of their lies and secrets, as all their reflections and their vision of themselves becomes twisted and terrifying. This image shatters if they are willing to give up their secrets, otherwise, they are cursed to look at what their lies have done to their soul.dark god, you can buff this a bit or just explain it a little more so I understand how powerful it is for a strong ability. Does it drive them mad or are they just haunted by their secrets? The second one is more interesting, i think. I would be tempted to make them as ugly as their lives/secrets. This is your strongest ability, after all, and making people hideous is fun.
Excellent CS! Let me know when you make the changes because it's pretty much ready to go up, honestly, and we can do RRA shenanigans.
@13org I love that picture sooo much, ohmyglob <3 here are my notes on your CS, please note I don't mean anything I say to be harsh, so I hope it doesn't come off that way :D
Gods are beyond space and time, so the mark is fine :D
So just to be sure, the Wulfing are now extinct? Are you sure that is what you wish? Their may be unforseen consequences, particularly if Nanna is known to have done it (even if her motives were just) this means at the Clan Gathering her and her breathren will probably stand trial, as the clans know little of the going ons of other clans unless they have regular runners bringing news. It's not bad to do, I just want to make sure it's what you want ;D
Also: did she sustain any injuries from her big battle? Has she travelled straight from the battle to the clan gathering? she is probably pretty fatigued and her items battle-worn/in need of cleaning or repair. Just some thoughts :3
as Geirskögul, The Morrigan and Miselean have similar domains, they'd know each other as Gods. perhaps you, @Dusksong and @Melo can get a dialogue going about how your Gods know each other and their feelings about each other?
I love how Nanna has traits like Geirskögul :D
Perfect Warrior: Dice Modifiers shall apply to "Agile and focused" and general combat :D (so she's always going to be better then someone untrained, but most of the modifier shall come in from dodging blows, maintaining her cool, ect)
Agility: this is slightly a double up of Perfect warrior, so maybe you'd like to put something else here?
right so, this post is getting long, but I'll PM you the ability stuff when I'm ready? sorry about the wait, I've been writing this one post a while and need a little break xD
