Pathi

As you know, ARC has only one RPG system bonus gift: ARC-BA (Battlemaster), which is an a-1 (i.e., +3). ARC-RT (Ritual) can make a token-3 story-token, but that isn't usable for a bonus.

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.

Note you don't need BM to fight with it, BM gives you an advantage because you're trained how to fight with it…but you can fight without it. You're just not as fast or adept. (This was vital clarification made for mages that fought before the BM & BA were created)

Really? I didn't know that. I thought that you couldn't really use anything as a "direct" attack without at least ARC-BM (Battlemage, which existed from the beginning of the game, btw — I've had ARC-BA, Battlemaster, since the beginning myself). Battlemage gives no bonus, but Battlemaster does.

Arm's length: Would make that "an additional arm's length" to avoid confusion that the Term has to be able to be touched by the mage. (Meaning within range of being touched without moving, not HAS to be touched.) I am assuming the Terms can be affected outside of touching range, even if it's only an extra arm's length. (This actually flies in the face of past scenes, especially the Bug Invasion, where it seemed to be line-of-sight. I cannot confirm if this is in the rules as they currently stand, as I am typing this up from work.)

I wrote this up this way so that it gave a reason to hybridize ARC-SP (Space) with regular spells—that provides the rationale for attacks completely at range (if you can see the description, you'll know why).

I don't have a particular stance against ARC-EM, myself. But I think that without "metalanguage" to describe what the commands do, rather than have all these specific effects per-element, it really muddies the water as to what the hybrids can do.

The one write-up I do have a bit of a sentiment against is the scrying aspect of understand water. Our magic should have nothing to do with mirrors—it should solely be a water effect, but too much time has passed for that. I'd just like to turn the ship a bit back to a more watery basis.

For those of you who know I have a staffbit, I must stress that these are my opinions as a player and do not represent the opinions of staff.

"If it can be created at range, then a mage knowing just ARC-FI ARC-CR ARC-BM can attack with it."
*Note you don't need BM to fight with it, BM gives you an advantage because you're trained how to fight with it…but you can fight without it. You're just not as fast or adept. (This was vital clarification made for mages that fought before the BM & BA were created)

"My opinion is that since Pathi is supposed to represent "high magic", and its wizards renowned and perhaps feared, that being limited to only the effects mentioned are not in-theme. "
*Wholeheartedly agree.

*Arm's length: Would make that "an additional arm's length" to avoid confusion that the Term has to be able to be touched by the mage. (Meaning within range of being touched without moving, not HAS to be touched.) I am assuming the Terms can be affected outside of touching range, even if it's only an extra arm's length. (This actually flies in the face of past scenes, especially the Bug Invasion, where it seemed to be line-of-sight. I cannot confirm if this is in the rules as they currently stand, as I am typing this up from work.)

*I should point out I'm predjudiced against EM, because I feel that's micromanaging the "big powerful feared wizards" aspect into a point of dimishing returns. Someone who's good at water should be able to create fog without this…direct it, no, not without Air and control/SM, but they shouldn't need to spend the points to get this as well. They're not hybrids, they're states. Mud is earth with water in it, but you're not joining the water to the earth. Lava is a state of earth. Steam is water that's very hot and has vaporized, not a hybrid of fire & water. Rather, I'd prefer to see Elementalist refer to being able to affect two terms at he same time…one can multitask terms, with SM being for multitasking commands.

"It seems a bit incongruous that Create is used to create wind, which seems more like forming an elemental stream, and thus would be an effect of Control." Agreed!

"Again, stopping a wind seems more like an effect of Control. "
*I believe both could be applied here.

"The inability to maintain a bubble of air against an unfavorable environment was a ruling given as the result of a +submit. However, compared with the ability to control a globe of water or fire, I might request this be reconsidered as it is somewhat inconsistent."
*Again, agree

Fire: " They might be able to toss a book into a fire, and know it as if they had read it, but from ashes the wizard would only know that a book had been burned, its title, and general subject matter."
When did this change? We used to joke about Brand tossing books in the fire to read them. I love the idea of burning papers and books being a bad idea if you want to destroy them, if a Pathi's at hand.

OK, I've come up with the following:

Gift: ITM-AF - Arcanis Focus
Cost: 5
Powerbits: bonus-token token-3
Prerequisites: GP-ARCANIS/5 PICK+2:ARC-BA.ARC-EM.ARC-SM

An Arcanis adept is able to use a magical focus, crafted through a combination of Alchemy and Arcanis. The focus may take many forms, though all must be obviously carried, and when utilized, are obviously tied to the spell-casting (e.g., glowing, emitting a sound, etc.) in a mundane way. The adept becomes somewhat dependent on the focus, his powers increasing with it, but decreasing without it.

• If separated from the focus, an Adept will know the general direction and distance to it.

• A focus is a considerable item of power, and is resistant to breakage by mundane means. Great force or arcane means must be brought to bear to accomplish this.

• A focus, if made of a controllable element (earth, air, fire, or water), may be granted some minor color effects. For example, an stone staff may balance itself in an upright position, one made of water may be collapsed to a sphere, etc.

• "Normal" spells take less effort to cast. The difference is mostly a color effect, and only becoming relevant after extreme extended use. If a mage loses his focus, or tries to cast without it, however, the effort is much greater (which is also just a color effect)

• At the cost of extra effort, an adept may achieve an enhanced effect — maybe twice the normal for just color effects. In combat, "squad-level" area effects may be negotiated, but this is still just color — it cannot be used to attack more than one "significant" characters simultaneously, nor does it afford a bonus. However, it may be used against a grouping of "unranked" NPCs (and a single "significant" individual).

• At the cost of extreme effort, or prior preparation, an adept may concentrate an extended effect into one, concentrated spell. This is represented by a 3-focus token that may be consumed for a bonus. The target must be primarily a single individual, though effects on minor characters and/or color in the immediate vicinity may be negotiated on a case-by-case basis.

• With Arcanis Ritual, an adept may prepare a ritual and store it within the focus. This allows the adept to cast the ritual in battlefield situations (though it is not instant), and thus may negotiate its applicability in RP or on the flagpole. However, such usage is dependent on prior preparation, or at least sufficient undisturbed time (no combat, no travel) in order to store the ritual. Therefore, the use of such an ARC-RT token should be inspected to ensure that its creation meets this requirement.

OK, some rationales:

• A number of characters have Arcanis, but no focus. Therefore, I rationalized it by saying that this is an advanced skill, for adepts (where that means two out of Battlemaster, Elementalist, or Spellmaster).
• It's mainly color. Perhaps fancy color in the ability to attack more than one mook at a time, but that is probably something that's already possible.
• I'd try to keep it at a 5-point level. The extension of the ARC-RT to war magic status is certainly an enhancement, but not overly so, particularly with the caveat that the token must be "prepared". So, the major in-game benefit is probably the bonus token. Given how expensive Arcanis is to get to an adept level, I'd really like to keep the point cost down.

Sure, it's rare, but why is it rare? That's where the color comes in. After a few thousand years, the blood of dragons could be found anywhere, so it's not limiting in the sense that we don't let non-Pathians have it, but it still is the hook for the ability.

If you look at the blood gifts, they do tend to limit a jack-of-all-trades aspect. Generally, you have to pay a lot extra points to get more than one line, so it's not unprecedented. If I recall, the Cibola one is completely exclusive of all others, in fact.

But to me, having the blood of dragons is a great story hook that is sitting out there to develop at some time.

However, there's a bigger question that is going to come up. Is Arcanis really something that someone can "pick up" in the time frame of the game? This will matter if an existing PC wishes to learn it outside of chargen. I know I have generally talked ICly about the years of study, and how we generally only take the young. For playability, I can see allowing advancement in almost all of the gifts, but what about the base ability of ARC-CT? It would seem to make sense for it to be a chargen-only ability, but I can see why we might let this slide too.

<Sen here>

My feeling is that it isn't necessary. What play and literature I've seen implies that the talent is fairly rare, and as is, GMs aren't going to hand someone ARC-CT without some sort of RP backing it up. Adding descent from dragons as a requirement is ultimately going to limit the play option of someone with a bizarre background that precludes dragon descent (son of a god, born of a river, grown in a vat, etc), but (IMO) doesn't really seem to add any significant color.

A month later, I saw the post.

I don't feel that a gala/ball/masquerade/chit chat party is Pathi flavored. More leaning towards Kynan's idea. On the other hand, we could have events for set purposes. Randomness does not feel Pathi. We could drug some special fire units Corwin have during the party and borrow a bullet or two. :P

I would think we might be more into toga parties! :)

Water encased earrings are good, Lucia always wear a pair.

On the other side, the commune is such a bother. I guess we have secretaries who sit near a mirror/water pool all the time getting calls on our behalf.

We did decide that it was something in the blood which allows for actual skills with Arcanis, which makes it an inborn talent. If dragons are the source, then it does make sense that we went around collecting possible dragon spawns and take them to their rightful home, which is Pathi.

I like the idea that we revere dragons and lament on their decline, it would create some conflicts other than us vs BR npcs with the rest of the mush. Though we'd need to backpeddle some things with many prop cos.

I'm not sure how many of us have the UP-Dragon lore but I'm sure you all have GP-Arcanis, so you know that the language of Arcanis is supposedly that of the dragons, the language of creation in our myth and legend. And Dragons are now exceedingly rare.

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.

I was thinking about this today…

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…

As you've seen, I carry around a staff, like any good wizard :-) I think Pliny does too. I originally intended to have some gifts around that, but I had plenty of points to spend without it…. But what do you think, are staves/wands/etc. a very Pathi thing, among the masters?

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?

I was thinking that one way to get the Pathi back in the public eye would be to throw a gala or ball of some sort. Granted, I wouldn't want to put it anywhere near the one with Twisted Grape, so not to look like we are competing or anything. I would like to know your thoughts on the matter. I was thinking possibly about the 21st or 22nd of March.

Thanks in advance :)

In devising this page, I took in the following facts:

• Pathi is isolated — no outsider traders would be allowed access
• Pathi traders are wizards who both know how to Walk, and want to — this has been stated to be a low number
• Pathi has no access to transit powers that would allow for easy shipments of goods
• Pathi traders use small, single-crewed ships — no large cargoes

Thus, I can come to no other conclusion than that Pathi has to be self-sufficient for day-to-day living. From there, I simply used Greece as a template for what they produced. This is somewhat logical too, as ancient Greek city-states did not trade heavily, and so their agriculture was largely self-sufficient.

Pathi needs someone to be the full-time Ambassador to Amber. I never intended to keep the job.

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.

Control can be used with other elements to form them into unnatural shapes (I read Water as allowing you to make columns, etc.) If that is extended to air, there is no particular requirement to conform to natural laws. Thus, forming a bubble of air at a depth does not necessarily require an equal pressure. Of course, it doesn't have to be allowed either, which is why I question it.

Change specifically allows you to:

… change the nature of air itself, thickening it, making it harder to pass through. This is not much more than an inconvenience for most, but it allows the creation of barriers that are effective against light projectiles.

For that to be true, it would have to slow a projectile (I'm guessing that means even a streamlined one like an arrow) considerably. That's what gave me the idea that it might control a fall.

Just some more thoughts.
With respect to metals; I would argue that once it's been purified from its 'base' form of raw dirt, stone, and ore, it's probably out of the purview of the gift.

If you have battlemage, I think you can probably swing various sorts of offense and defense stuff with Earth, provided you do the chanty bit. There's a show, Avatar: The Last Airbender, that has some neat visuals that might be appropriate for an earth-wielding arcanis battlemage. Though, less martial-artsy and more mage-y, I guess. I would venture we can create and throw rocks, summon up small clods of earth to parry blows, trip our opponents, etc. No need for proper shields. :)

mud to stone: Well, change is sort of like stone -> clay -> stone, which is about as cool. If you blend earth + water, then destroy the water, you've got hard, dry dirt, which isn't quite stone, but still kind of hard?

• sounds accurate, but tedious. Consider when you will be stuck in a closed-air environment, though?
• I would venture yes to the mountain scenario (low-pressure itself isn't necessarily 'kill you' conditions). No to the water: you'd have to equal pressure with the water, and that sounds bad at real depth. Maybe you could swing the 'part the waters' routine with air with create+change air, but water already provides that. I dunno about surviving at below-pool depth. That really sounds more like the aquatic adaption stuff.
• terminal velocity is 120mph-ish. Gale force winds are about 50mph-ish. Maybe it could help in a long fall, combining change + create air? Maybe that's how Bleys survives.

• Create: I wonder if the volume could be increased a little? Allowing about a cubic foot or so would let you make a small shield (roughly two feet square/diameter by a quarter inch). Should lighter, less-dense materials (dirt/dust) be allowed greater volumes?
• Control: I presume that contact must be maintained to control something (i.e., no telekinesis)? However, I think it should be allowed to toss earth, the speed determined by size/mass. This would be one of the ways a Battlemage uses Earth. A small stone, bullet-sized might be allowed to act like one. But at baseball-size, only about as fast as an extreme fastball (100 mph), etc.?
• Destroy: If Create is increased, allow the same change here?
• Change: Other elemental gifts allow the mage to purify/alter the element. So, allow mud to stone, etc.?

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?