The number one thing I'd like to get clarified is: what is the permissible scope of magical effects? If you look at the ARC terms, each has more or less one effect mentioned per command. Is this supposed to be a restrictive set, or just examples of what is possible? If the former, this means that the might of Pathi's magic can be basically boiled down to 5 spells per element, which to me does not align with the theme of Pathi, which is "High Magic". Now, in literature there are certainly fantasy worlds where wizards are not prone to using it, Middle-Earth and Earthsea being examples. But I think with respect to this game, I think a more active wizardry is probably in order.

So, along the lines of this, if we keep the commands and terms design, I would propose that the commands give the basic flavor of what they do, e.g., control lets you move/fling the element, change lets you alter it form, within limits of the element (e.g., rock to sand or dirt, water to fog or ice(?)). The terms should then only document the per-command customizations (e.g., the alternate forms, creation limits, etc.).

But this flexibility also has issues, the main being, what are the limits of this color? When it comes to attacking someone or something, most probably wouldn't care what the color is, whether it's a fireball, flung rocks, a jet of water, etc. People expect this to be potentially damaging, and the form only dictates consequences. But often, magic is used for color, for example, I make ice cubes for my drink. Most wouldn't care about these. But then, what happens when color becomes a story effect? E.g., we need to cross a river or lake, and I postulate that since I can freeze water, I can make a path. I can legitimately see why this can be a problem, from being too convenient to being story-breaking.

In the end, this MUSH is about stories, IMHO. And we as players need to be cooperative with the storyteller (ST) and/or each other, even if it's an IC-adversarial situation. So, no power should just be allowed to "break" a plot—they can't take the time to cover all possible ins and outs as a ST, so while they should be flexible, so should we as players in the story also be flexible. Thus, my proposal is that we should use focus-invested power-tokens in conjunction with ST approval to use magic in a plot-affecting way. In the example I just gave, perhaps the ST might negotiate that it will take a little time to build that path magically, and during that time, the other players will have to fight to protect me. That allows the other players time to shine as well as me. By making this require a focus-invested token, I am given a "cost" so that I can only invoke such plot-effecting magic once in a while. And BTW, the ST is under no obligation to allow it, and it is up to them whether they think it rises to the level of needing a focus token at all.

In game terms, this means that the term gifts would be something like "token-3 power-token".

Next, I would like to mention that being an "adept" at Arcanis seems very point-intensive. Even "casual use" seems expensive, and maybe from a point of view of value, even more so. WHat I mean is this: to cast a single spell takes a minimum of 20 pts: BLD-PA (5), ARC-CT (5), ARC-commmand (5), ARC-term (5). AND if I want to actually attack someone with it, add in ARC-BM (5). If I want to have a bonus attacking, add ARC-BA (5). So that's 25-30 pts for a basic attack. Someone with a sword could do the same for 0-5 pts. In contrast, someone who is just attacking with fire could, I think, do it for 10-15: FIR-FR (5), FIR-WR (5), plus optionally FIR-WM (5).

I would propose to prune this tree a little. BLD-PA should grant ARC-CT so you need to only buy one. And ARC-BM should just go away, because you should be able to use spells for attack just like any other gift (I think it's uncommon to have a gift require another gift for attack purposes).

Next, there are not a lot of gifts with a bonus in ARC. The only one in the tree is ARC-BA. Now, I am not sure how many bonuses the "average character" has, but I only somehwat recently (talking in play time, since it really happened quite a while ago in real time) got MAG-SB, which is only applicable to magical duels. But regardless, IIRC, I was once presented with a +compare with someone who had 5 gifts with bonuses, one even at a-2 (BLK-SC), of which we don't have an equivalent. I'm being somewhat reticent to proposing more bonus gifts, but rather suggesting that balance of available bonus gifts should be evaluated. I might suggest that ARC-EM and/or ARC-SM could be given bonuses, and maybe even have the mastery gifts have an a-2 bonus.

If I totaled it up correctly, I have 100 pts in ARC gifts. Add in blood, MAG-SB, and the WAR magic gifts, and I have 125 points allocated, with seems pretty expensive. Again, I'm not sure what the average character has, so I'll just say that and we can compare :) Perhaps ARC-EM and ARC-SM could be 0 pts with the prereq that you need all the elements/commands, but not sure, especially if they are given bonuses.

In terms of new gifts, I would like to propose one where using a magical focus, e.g., the iconic wizard's staff, would give a bonus. The way I use mine, the crystal in the head glows when I cast a spell, so it makes it even more obvious from further away that I am doing so….

Lastly, we were talking on the org a fair amount about investigation skill gifts. I believe it's the case that the quality of "supernatural senses" were limited due to the fact that this also generally breaks plots, from experience in other games. On the other hand, without such things, it becomes difficult to act as an expert at analyzing items or other bespelled things or people. Most of the gifts limit you to just knowing the type of power involved (magic, pattern, etc.). So, it is difficult to progress further without the ST making the explicit decision that ones general background and knowledge is good enough to get detailed information, despite the lack of a gift. My position is that I would prefer to have gifts say that this is OK, but like the comment above, I think such gifts should never break a plot—they are pure ST plot devices to divulge secrets for the players to act on. Otherwise, we have the situation where the players might be uncomfortable asking the ST for more detailed info, and the ST wondering if they should really do it. The result is more inconsistency than I prefer.

I don't think any new gifts are absolutely necessary here. Just changed descriptions for the magic sense and MAG-AM gift would be needed.

So, thoughts? I left out bits from our org discussion about artificing. I'll let those who have a stronger view on it speak if they wish. Also, I am a straight wizard of Brass, so I can't claim any insight to any who are Custos or Alchemists. So please chime in if you wish.

Also, most new Pathians are mages, not custos. I'd really like to see more custos - I'd really like to see more bonded pair *Pathians*. And I think a way to do that is to open up Pathi a bit. It's already possible to be a 'late blooming mage' - that is, take the ARC-CT gift outside of chargen. Unless you've saved up a LOT of points from chargen, such mages are always going to be behind the chargen (raised in Pathi) mages; it basically takes nearly a year to cast one simple spell, two years if you have to include all the prereqs. That's two OOC years, and that's enough Special time for chargen, I think. Probably more than enough. MUSH time is supposed to be faster than RL, not slower.

It may've been getting around that I've tried getting a not-from-chargen custos at least once, too. This, however, which you'd think would be easier than a not-from-chargen mage, is actually harder; the gift is chargen locked. I think this rather unfairly limits the role of custos to "alt designed specifically for one character", rather than allowing organic relationships to form.

We are, again, talking Years Of Training - but Custos is merely a five point gift. Which, past chargen, means five months RL time. Is this too short, for someone coming to the gift 'cold'? We could add prereqs - say magicsense is required, or a fight bit (meaning the Academy of Iron doesn't have to teach you to fight PERIOD, just add the necessary skills to fight as a CUSTOS). Or a fight-lore requirement, or a quest where one gets signoffs from the mage one wants to be custos to, some training scenes with the academy of iron, tests of ability… or some combination of all of the above.

I think the custos is a very neat idea, and I think Pathi would be served as a prop by allowing it a better chance to be demonstrated in RP. Right now when I bring the term up to someone who hasn't played a Pathian, I get "What's a custos?" in return.

The prop is unlikely to grow if we're just the Land of Squishy Mages. (Men In Skirts Division.) I think that the option should be there, particularly since there are often fighting-type characters around who find themselves wondering what to do, how to grow. We could make 'custos' an option (provided there's a mage around for them to be a custos TO) and Pathi as a prop could possibly gain some IC weight on the grid.

Thoughts?

If one goes the WAR gift route, WAR-AM (Artillery) and WAR-BM (Battlefield) can make token-3 and token-6 bonus-token story-tokens, respectively. However, I normally consider such to be "large area effects", so while I might use those in a particular situation for a bonus, the color that goes along with it is that it affects more than just a single target.

Of course, it is possible to get other bonus gifts, but those are not magic-related, but rather situational. So, I've been thinking about trying to design a (or some) new gift(s) that could be an a-2 class bonus (+6) and/or focus-based bonus. One might consider this to be a magical FGT-like gift, perhaps.

I was wondering if anyone had started along this path, so we don't duplicate efforts. Also, if anyone has any ideas about the color involved with these gifts, or the mechanics, I'd be interested in hearing them.

So, do we as a culture look upon dragons as simply the tool that taught us magic, or do we have a reverence about them? Some recent additions to GL-Pathi lore suggest the latter, I think.

I notice that some dragons are being run into at the moment. The above becomes an important cultural motivation if we decide to revere them, as we would probably look to protect dragon-kin. (In a previous post, I've even suggested maybe that it is the blood of dragons that is what allows for skill with Arcanis.) Pathi environmentalists, anyone?

And without being specific, if we revere dragons, and lament on their decline and almost extinction, we might have a long-standing feud with/dislike of a certain faction in Amber, so we should consider this carefully.

To learn Arcanis, OOCly you basically just need to get ARC-CT. ARC-CT has as prereqs:

• CHARGEN BLD-PA
• GP-ARCANIS/1
• GL-PATHI/3

GL-PATHI/1 has the prereq of GL-GC/4. Thus, technically it's not all that hard.

However, this leads to questions based on our actual background. Obviously, since we go out in search of people with "the gift", and since it seems that anyone with Pathi blood tends to have it as well, the capability to learn Arcanis is as much "genetic" as intellectual.

ICly, I think it makes sense (and would be cool) if we could stipulate that in order to learn Arcanis, you need some blood of dragons. Does that mean it should be a required thing to have BLD-PA? I'm not entirely sure. I'd be willing to let that slide, but perhaps with an IC note that generally speaking, you can't just teach someone Arcanis. PCs get to "have the blood" if they want, but that is not true of the general (NPC) population. In other words, someone can't go out and start an Arcanis University in Amber, and expect that to work…

If so, I was thinking along these lines:

• ITM-MF Magical focus

The idea is to see if maybe this is a 0-pt item, as it's fancy color with both minor pluses and minuses. On the plus side, it makes magic a little easier: less tiring, a bit more powerful (maybe up to 2x the effect). However, this is largely color, and doesn't have a direct effect. On the minus side, a focus should be obvious, and casting magic should include a visible effect (e.g., glowing). This is a small added downside to Arcanis, since it already has to be audible.

• ARC-FA Focus amplification
  • Powerbits: bonus-token token-3
  • Prerequisites: ITM-MF ARC-BM (maybe ARC-RT)

Using effort combined with a ITM-MF, the effect of a spell can be amplified, giving a bonus. The visual effect with the focus should be posed in quite a pronounced way.

• ARC-SS Stored spell (name still a bit TBD)
  • Powerbits: token-3
  • Prerequisites: ITM-MF ARC-RT

The idea here is to make spells that are somewhat less powerful than a ritual, but that could be prepared beforehand and stored in the focus. Or maybe, that could be cast with minimal preparation in the field. These would not have story-scope like full rituals.

Comments?

Thanks in advance :)

An appropriate candidate would probably need to be a Pathi resident, or have been one for much of the recent past.

Anyone interested, talk to me or Brand.

Finally, I think we need to clarify if metals are allowed. I guess the caveat is that things like making gold was to be avoided. But on the other hand, controlling/changing metals seems to not be too out of bounds?

• The caveat on using Create to provide breathable air in a closed area would seem to be negatable using Destroy (and to a lesser extent, Change—by concentrating the bad elements into a small area).
• Can Create + Control be used to provide breathable air in a somewhat open space, like underwater or in a low-pressure environment (like a high mountain, or smoky/poisonous outdoor area)? I would vote yes.
• I think it's pretty clear that no method of using Air can allow true flight. However, by using Change's density control, it would seem that one could use that to safely fall from most distances? And if that is the case, an iffy-er proposition would be to allow a very weird method of running and psuedo-jumping across a chasm.

The first is simple — add a capability similar to that of Air and Earth. This is probably not so much a change as just something it should be able to do, in comparison with the other gifts.

The character may see through water as if it were air, and able to enhance their vision to see over great distance. It also allows them awareness of anything that is touching the body of water — for this to function, the water must be reasonably contiguous and whole — a lake or a river — unless the character is also an elementalist.

The latter would allow viewing through fog or steam, for example.

The second is somewhat problematic, as it would be a change. The current method of scrying/communing requires a reflective surface that is currently reflecting the image of the subject — plus that image has to be reasonably clear and whole. Practically speaking, that has to be a mirror—people are rarely in a position to see themselves over a pool of water. Mirrors give the wrong "feel" to me, as there is an entire class of magic surrounding it. Also, think about how ovten you can reasonable think of seeing yourself in a mirror during a day — the caster might have to attempt this for hours on end. And on the other side, if the person is in a reflection, there's no IC way to refuse. Now we can get around those by simply using RP convenience. The caster just happened to try when the person just happened to be in front of a mirror, and not when it might be inconvenient for them. Of course this can have some amusing consequences at times, but that seems to be outweighed as you come to realize just how unlikely it happens to be. And consider if you are travelling — would anyone but a Pathi set up a mirror during rest stops just in case? Remember, it is not enough to have a mirror near — the person must be able to see their image, because that is what the caster would see.

So, I would propose that it makes more sense to bring this ability to its roots—namely, water. When the caster speaks the name of the person over their scrying pool, that call emanates from the closest water object in plain sight to the person called. This is audible, and the volume somewhat proportional to the size of that object. They answer that call by speaking the name of the caster. Only then does the image form in that water, and the conversation started.

This doesn't change the ability power-wise, but I think it fits better into RP. I suppose for continuity we don't need to get rid of the mirror definition, if that is a big problem. But we would commonly rely on the water linkage instead. So, instead of us having mirrors all over the place in our homes and buildings, we would have scrying pools. As we travel, perhaps many of us wear an earring from which hangs a small globe of water. And so on. It also provides an IC way for the person called to refuse — just don't say the caster's name.

However, I just realized that this does change one thing: You can no longer rely on starting a conversation with someone who OOCly agrees, but ICly would not. Perhaps we could define a method to do this, something that fits more in with the concept of "scrying" rather than just "communicating".

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