Magical Teacher Professor Landry! - Patch 3.0

[Teal Mage]

Hello again Forum, it has been a while. I've been taking a break from this game for the past few months, and, after speaking with my players, have decided that I'd like to return long enough to at least finish up the last scenario. Interest among my old group of players remains strong enough to do that much, at least. After that - well, we'll see.

My break has given me some time to re-evaluate the old system and make some modifications - mostly in the name of streamlining, simplifying and, in general, de-systemizing. The game had gotten a bit too rigid before. Anyway, rather than rewriting the extremely long Second Set-up, this update's in Patch-note form. As this is mainly aimed at my old group of players, who are all familiar with the system, I don't expect that to be much of a problem.

If there is interest from new people who've never read this before though, uh, you should probably contact me through this thread. I'll expand on some areas and give you a run-down of where the game is now. Still, be warned, I'm near my maximum capacity of players I can handle. This was part of what prompted my break before, so I don't intend to make the same mistake.

General:

• Guns are lethal.
• Let’s not kid ourselves, there won’t be a one-week-per-turn rule. You’re lucky if the game moves once every two-weeks.

Amaranth & Ansidor:

• The precise number of students within the school is unknown – even to the faculty. Only Headmistress Amaranth herself might have the actual numbers.
• Students do not need to live on campus – they may live in Ansidor city, if they desire. However, campus-life is all-inclusive – the basic needs of all students are covered by Amaranth. The precise definition of “basic needs” is directly tied to a students grades – with the school’s rare A+ students living like kings. Off campus, the school doesn’t attempt to support students – they’re always welcome to come to the dorms, after all.
• Part time jobs are also available on Campus for students who want some money. Its perfectly fine to go job hunting in Ansidor too.
• All dorms are fully customized to the dweller. Most students will end up sharing a dorm with two other students – unless they’re declared a danger to the safety of others. The school does rarely puts Awakened and Sleeping students together in the same dorms.
• Landry probably has all your dorms bugged.
• Most supernatural groups are uncomfortably aware that Amaranth’s true motivations and purpose are not clear. Still, the school has been useful for a long time…
• There are sister schools to Amaranth scattered the world over. Each of them appears to have a different agenda.

Amaranth Sophia: The school's mysterious and shadowy Headmistress. While few students are actually able to describe her, most have in fact met her in some form or another - the Headmistress personally conducts interviews of all students to be admitted to the school, at some point in their lives. Or at least, so the rumors say. She is also rumored to wander the campus in disguise, observing classes and to have a shadowy network of janitor-spies. But such rumors couldn't possibly be true. Few people know anything about Amaranth Sophia - though they can see paintings of her predecessors in the hallway leading to her office on the highest floor of the tallest building in the campus's center. The family resemblance is uncanny.

The Guilds

• Due to changes within the mechanics of Awakening, the internal structure of the Masquerade, as well its approaches to enforcing the Masquerade, have been changed. What is most important for players to remember is the cardinal rule of “if it shouldn’t exist, don’t do it in public” remains in effect. Breaking it might lead you being killed.
• You may disregard the Guilds as they’re discussed in the Second Set-up. Supernatural Organizations aren’t terribly important to this game. The main thing to remember is that virtually every magic-user will be connected – in a loose and decentralized way, usually – to a larger supernatural organization. If you want to discuss your character’s connection to a Supernatural organization beyond their immediate master, I’m willing to do it on a case-by-case basis.
• Historically, the Wizards and Witches had entirely different – nearly opposed – approaches to magic. Wizards emphasized control, skill and practiced a large array of time-tested spells, usually revolving around ‘common’ elements – with Earth, Fire, Wind and Water being the most prominent. Witches emphasized risk-taking, power, creativity in spell-design and the use of unconventional elements (like love magic) in their practice. Now, because the historical reasons for these approaches are largely irrelevant, the two classifications exist on a spectrum – Witches on one end, and Wizards on the other. Most mages are somewhere in the middle.

Magic

• Magical disciplines beyond this primarily differ in regard to the elements of magic they have a preference toward.
• All reference to spell colours may be disregarded. Aura colour reflects something about the caster, not their spell-selection.
• Black auras are now clear – they cause a slight warping of the light around the user, to the Awakened. Those who possess them are referred to colloquially as Sleepers. Powerful sleepers have Black auras – like Professor Landry. Sometimes referred to as Dreamers, it is nearly a universal truth that Awakening a Black is a horrible idea.
• The magic of Sleepers and Dreamers functions the same as Black Magic – it’s a subtle, instinctive and beyond their control. It frequently corresponds to their talents, and usually involves some degree of reality bending and perception warping. It’s never overt.
• There’s no longer a half-Awakened category.
• White Magic occurs when someone is Awakened through inappropriate means – usually involving great stress. Because the Awakening was not proper, their powers eventually turn on them, denying their very existence and killing them. Consequently, while Whites are enormously powerful, their lifespan is very, very, short. Many of them are utterly wiped from history and the memories of those around them when this happens. The Awakened can also become Whites.
• White Magic users are no longer insane.
• Greys don’t exist anymore.
• Magic remains hard, but it is slightly more fluid. Its possible to use multiple spells at once – but similar to trying to draw a circle with one hand and a square with the other, it is extremely hard. Certain spells – notably “super-mode”-style buffs – are an exception to this, and usually contain explicit provisos against the use of additional spells while in this form.
• Free-casting is easier now – most spells work off a base elemental manipulation/creation ability, which, though slow and rather unimpressive without a spell to work from, is reliable. It just requires a fair amount of time to work. Spells are much faster and more powerful.
• Spells no longer are graded. They’re also slightly more flexible – it is easy to increase or decrease their power (but easier to decrease than increase), and a little creativity can go a long way with them.
• As magic is intimately linked to the user, spells may shift in rapid and dramatic fashions, or slow and gradual ones, as the character undergoes development. Spells which become vestigial – no longer see frequent use – may also cease to function. Characters are not always aware of when these shifts occur.
• Awakening requires a ritual of some kind now – for those who live in magical fringe communities, this can be as simple as growing to a certain age. Most of them still use an official rite of passage to formally complete this Awakening. For most Sleepers though, Awakening is often a long process of study, meditation, training and hard-work – it is a very difficult task which can often take years. Faster rituals are far more dangerous, and may fail in rather spectacular ways, though they exist. The Guilds place very strict rules over the circumstances in which people may be Awakened – and to save the life of the Awakened, or the Sleeper, is not one of them.
• The Guilds usually permits parents to Awaken their children.
• As a general rule, it is not possible for someone to Awaken on their own. Some outside force, usually an Awakened one (but not necessarily so) needs to intervene to assist them.
• …though if it were possible, expect such people to become Whites.
• Research suggests that there are more Awakening rituals than there are stars in the sky – and that there is no specific formula to any of them. Consequently, an Awakening ritual can take virtually any form. Even entirely mundane lives can easily led to an Awakening.
• Oh, also there are demons which hunt the Awakened at night. Sleepers and Dreamers are totally safe, unless they happen to be really close to the Awakened…

Will: Will is this world’s analog to Mana. Supernatural phenomena may be invoked by expending it – but there is a catch. Will is also what sustains the physical bodies of everything that exists and enables to act normally. While all beings possess some Will in surplus, using it to fuel magic means diverting it from its primary purpose; keeping you alive and functioning at your best. Doing a bit of this is safe, but the more this is done, the more side-effects the caster experiences. Fatigue, headaches, loss of coordination, hallucinations and, finally, hemorrhaging from the pores are the typical stages – the last of which can, become easily fatal.

• Will is now expressed as an abstract concept, not as a number out of 50.

* * * * *

Anyway, to the new Profile format! There is also some new information in here, so please read.

Name: Your character’s name. I recommend it being a realistic one! Unless you’re from fantasy-land. …this is not impossible.
Race: Demon, Human, Half-Demon or Mixed Demon, followed by the specific type in brackets. More important for Demons than Humans, since this determines the mythos they can draw on for their Demonic Powers. Mixed Demons are beings whose parents are both demons of different species – Half-Demons are half-human.
Class: A thematic title encompassing your character’s abilities and magic. This is important!...but might take a few tries to get right. For non-humans, your specific race should probably be part of your class, as your race will have a large influence on your potential powers. Class will change as your character develops.
Age: How old you are.
Aura: What colour your character’s aura is. This is a personal decision, meant to reflect something about your character. Black and White can’t be taken, but their auras may be very close to both, if they desire. Auras are all solid colours.
Gender: Male, Female or Herm. We’re not dealing with sexual orientation, just your parts.
Appearance: Describe how your character looks. Height, build, hair-colour (and typical style), skin-tone, eye-colour, etc. Clothing will probably vary by day, but mention any themes if they exist.

Abilities: By far the most complex section of this. Abilities may be divided into two general classes – Abilities and Techniques. Abilities are the broad basis for your character’s techniques, and will often be extremely adaptable and broad. Techniques, on the other hand, are specific applications of the skillset reflected in the ability, usually with powerful results. Abilities may be magical (Ice Magic) or mundane (Swordplay), as may Techniques. Please note, however, that with Mundane Abilities, only remarkable skills need to be listed.

Some examples, with the Ability in Bold and the Technique in italics.

Ice Magic – The character can create and manipulate temperature and small quanities of ice, near themselves. The effects are rather minor and slow, without a spell to draw on.

• Ice Beam – The character fires a concentrated ray of freezing energy, encasing whatever it strikes in ice.

Swordplay – The character is remarkably skilled with a sword.

• Deathblossom – In a single instant, the character strikes everything within the range of their sword.

Please note that not all Abilities need techniques, and there is no real limit on Abilities (though I may say that a particular character has too many, and require you to scale back and focus more). Techniques on the other hand, being more powerful, should number between 5 and 7 – depending on how many Abilities a character has, and the strength of their techniques.

Players should probably include a single amalgamated ability describing their character’s background, and the abilities they may have picked up there, if their upbringing provided them with a particularly advantageous skill-set, rather than trying to list all their Abilities as short, one-line, sentences. In fact, where you can, please do amalgamate. Only Abilities with discrete Techniques really need their own headings.

For Demons (Full, Half and Mixed), they will also need to outline their racial skills and advantages in an amalgamated ability, which should also reference their weaknesses. Additionally, Demons possess a taint of some kind within their magic. The default assumption is that Taint is Life-elemental - which covers a very large totality of things. Some demons have a different sort of taint - death is a common alternative. Regardless, this taint explains why demons live longer than humans, have more mutable body-structures and are more resistance to disease - they contain more life in them than a human. Spells drawn from pure Life magic emulate aspects of living - growth, eating, dying, etc - and concepts associated with life, such as love and power. This means that everything they create with their magic will act as though it is alive - in some regard or another.

Most demons combine this taint with one element or another - such as Ice in Jo's case, and Ice and Death in Sean's case. Often, the proportion of this combination is as important as the number of elements involved (in Sean's case, Death dominates). Opposed elements - like Life and Death - do not cancel each other out, though. They simply make for a very unruly and hard to control form of magic.

Bio: A brief description of your character's history. Include why they're in Amaranth - if the reason's special - how they were Awakened (if they were), and justification for their abilities.

Classes: A list of your character’s extra-curricular clubs! Amaranth has a lot of them. They’re fully equipped and stocked with the intent of allowing geniuses and beginners to train and master their talents. Basically, anything’s fair game. Please note all students are free to use any number of facilities without joining the clubs, but the clubs offer lessons – and also affect your grades. Theoretically, students don’t need to be in any clubs, though. Also, new PCs won’t be in Professor Landry’s class (Love and Fightiology), they’ll being in Professor Silverstein’s class (Style and Stratagems). For now, anyway.

Relationships: Here's where you outline the NPCs you want created. By default, you're responsible for using them - though I reserve the right to take over them as the story dictates. Include a brief description of their powers, if they have any. If they enter combat, I may require a full bio. These may be friends, rivals, club-directors who your character has a special relationship with, enemies, parents…etc.

If you want examples, most of my pre-existing players have already had their bios approved, and I expect them to post them below. I might have some tweaks to make, but largely, they’re fine for models.

Students! Please post your bios so Teal can begin writing the new scenes!