Be On Your Guard (More GLOG Magician Schools, Arise Ye Wretched)

The previous post contained lies - or perhaps this one does. Conjuration was not merely split into Dislocation and Goety—it was, in fact, the Ur-School, singular in its power and purpose, and subjected to a sevenfold split to create the modern categories of Gnosticism.

Other coherent paradigms of magic exist: Necromancy, devised by Unræd and kept jealously by the Curators of Necropolex, harnessed to maintain the stalwart independence of the Necropoles; Illusion, secreted away in a dream to the otherside of the Hex, where it found wide popularity in the academies of Jiangskr and High Isshin-Daga; Dislocation, an art traditionally kept by diasporic clans of nomadic mountain-people who can be found in all the high places of the Hex, leaping from one peak to another.

Conjuration herself, Queen of the Arcana, long rumored to be the subject of clandestine investigations in dusty Panopticon basements, each new generation producing some sublime quicksilver genius who inevitably burns all her talents and potentials on attempting to reconcile the syntactic gaps in that which was broken.

Source: Delphin Casado

 

Necromancy

Words (Regular/SCHOOLMASTER):

1. Ice
2. Keratin
3. Ash
4. Bone
5. POISON
6. HOPE
7. BLOOD
8. DEATH

Implements: 

1. Skull - Animate [Word] to obey one-word commands, or release a drifting cloud of [Word].
2. Tome - Ask a question of [Word], or bind sentience into a mass of [Word].
3. Gun - Fabricate bullets from [Word], or lay a curse of [Word] with a shot.
4. Scythe - Mark something for death by [Word], or harvest [Word] from the dead or incapacitated.
5. GRAVE - Take [Word] into yourself to enhance power and vitality, or chimaerize two beings of [Word]. Immobile.

Praxis: Gain +[Templates] temporary HP upon waking, which are expended prior to any regular HP. When a living being dies within your Crown, gain 1 point of temporary HP, up to a maximum of [Templates]*2 at any given time. Your hair and nails count as Light weapons.

Illusion

Words (Regular/SCHOOLMASTER):

1. Mist
2. Glass
3. Smoke
4. Silk
5. MOON
6. MUSIC
7. AUDIENCE
8. MEMORY

Implements:

1. Veil - Vanish into [Word], or craft an uncanny disguise from [Word].
2. Fan - Redirect attentions to or from [Word], or banish illusions with [Word].
3. Torch - Conjure a silent image from [Word], or release a disorienting burst of [Word].
4. Censer - Fill your Crown with illusory [Word], or trap a single subject in a false world of [Word].
5. STAGE - Dude, fuck if I know. I'll come back and put something in here later. Immobile.

Praxis: See through illusions worked by beings with less HD than you. You can project a swarm of [Templates] mirror images around you. Targeted attacks against you have only a 1-in-[Templates] chance of success, increasing by +1 per failed attempt and +2 per successful attempt until success is guaranteed. 

 

Dislocation

Words (Regular/SCHOOLMASTER):

1. Dust
2. Rain
3. Birds
4. Paper
5. LIFE
6. TREASURE
7. DOOR
8. MIRROR

Implements:

1. Bead - When thrown, appear at point of impact in a burst of [Word].
2. Knot - Exchange locations with [Word] within your crown, or return to the location where the knot was tied in a burst of [Word].
3. Key - Allow unhindered movement through [Word], or open a passage between two instances of [Word] within your Crown.
4. Bolt - Split yourself into clones made from [Word], or teleport [Word] with a touch to anywhere within your Crown.
5. GATE - Teleport yourself to any [Word] you are aware of, anywhere, or open a doorway into an extradimensional Demiplane of [Word] the size of your Crown. Immobile. 

Praxis: Gain +[Templates] equipment slots, held in an extradimensional space and retrieved with a mudra. On your turn, take 1 Fatigue to materialize anywhere you could walk in one round, ignoring difficult terrain and hazards but not barriers. 

Conjuration

Words (Regular/SCHOOLMASTER): 

1. Fire
2. Water
3. Earth
4. Wind
5. Wood
6. Metal
7. Darkness
8. SUN
9. STAR 
10. LIFE
11. SPIRIT
12. MEMORY
13. THOUGHT
14. DIVINITY
    

Implements:

1. Staff - Create a sphere or wall of [Word]. 3 Slots.
2. Sword - Divide or parry [Word] with a strike. 2 Slots.
3. Grail - Distill a potion of [Word], or cause one who drinks from the grail to be wracked with [Word] at your will. 2 Slots.
4. Pentacle - Call forth a being of [Word], or exchange to compel a favor from [Word]. 1 Slot.
5. Mirror - Trap or deflect [Word] while the mirror is aloft. 2 Slots.
6. Orb - Get a vision of nearby [Word], or something in nearby [Word]. 4 Slots.
7. Key - Allow unhindered movement through [Word], or open a passage between two instances of [Word] within your Crown.
8. WELL - Call forth an unlimited font of [Word], or realize a Wish via [Word].

Praxis: Creatures of your [Word]s must Save to knowingly harm you.

Q&A Section

A brief Q&A, featuring a mix of questions I was actually asked by people on Discord and questions that I've made up to give myself an opportunity to elaborate on things.

Q: Are Implements the same things as normal objects? Like, can a Transmuter just pick up any old hammer and do Transmutations with it?

A: No :). In the modern day, Implements are machined according to precise numerological ratios and inlaid with gold circuitry to make them proper vessels for magic. You can't buy a new one at a supermarket, but specialists can probably sell them to you for about 100g a pop.

Q: Can you learn new Words? 

A: Yes, but it's hard as hell. Some kind of Quest for Power or other major undertaking is needed in order to alter your school's guiding logic enough to accommodate new inputs. 

Q: How about Implements?

A: Ditto. The Gnostic trades flexibility for reliability. If you want to be picking up new spells all over the place, go play an Occultist.

Q: So how do magic spells actually work? Mechanically?

A: Because of the wide variety of possible [Word] inputs, I figured less is more when writing Implement descriptions and neglected to write a proper GLOG-style spell description. You know how to write these, plop down some [Sum]s and some [Dice]s and so forth and get to casting!

Q: Does a particular Word/Implement combo always result in the same spell?

A: I've actually been thinking about this, and rolling it around in my head, especially in the context of the "hotrod spell" bandwagon that was going in the GLOGosphere in times of yore. While I'll leave how permissive you want to be down to the individual GM, I'd say that, at minimum, you should allow different Magicians to cast different variants on the same spell—one guy's Sphere of Fire can be a classic Fireball, another a rolling orb, a third a lingering firestorm, and so forth. If you allow one Magician to devise multiple variants of the same spell, you should probably require each interpretation to be tied to a different Implement. It'd be neat if, for instance, you could gank another magus and steal her Implements to gain access to the specific hotrod versions of spells that she knew.

Q: Blah blah blah I have questions etc etc

A: Too bad, I'm bored of this format. Go DM me on Discord or something.

3+1 Neat Catalysts

Modifiers are a subset of Catalysts that must be integrated into Implements and modify all spells cast with it. They are typically non-consumable, but must be used every time the Implement is called on, and cannot easily be exchanged.

1. Attuner -  One of the most ubiquitous Modifiers - a 1-slot attachment to an Implement that attunes it to a single Word, making it unable to channel any other Word but granting all spells cast a +3 to [Sum]. The form and composition of the Attuner is specific to the Word and the Implement it modifies.

2. Multi-Threader - A complex 2-slot splitter matrix that allows a spell to be cast with two Words at the price of halved [Sum]. 

3. Silencer - A 1-slot aetheroresonant baffle that causes spells to be silent or invisible, at the cost of -3 to [Sum]. Decoheres on a Mishap, causing the release of all stored light and sound in a blinding and deafening flashbang burst.
   

You ever think about how a tower is basically just a really big wizard's staff? Me neither, I think my delightful girlfriend actually pointed that out. Anyways:

+1. TOWER - Increase the radius of your Crown by an order of magnitude for every story beyond the first.