Sorcery
|
Divine Magick |
On Sorcery
Sorcerers, also called wizards, magicians, warlocks, witches, and what have you, are the most common type of spelluser in Tazlure. Aside from the priest, it’s practically the only type of magick user that’s readily available to new players; usually, by the time a player wants to be a runemage or a mindcrafter, they will have learned the ropes and tricks of Tazlure, and you won’t have to explain every little detail to them.
Basic Casting
For this section, I’m assuming that you understand the ideas behind energy and, more importantly, that energy can be perceived differently. Because of that, I won’t be going deeply into player characters’ seeing and working with this energy, other than a few pointers and suggestions. My main point here will relate mostly to the basic, technical process of the casting of a sorcery spell.
So, what does a sorcerer actually do when we say that he casts a spell? The process is, unfortunately, not really just that simple; there are a lot of things going on, and a lot of things the sorcerer must do to reach the successful casting of his spell. On the other hand, it gives both you, the moderator, and the player, wonderful opportunities for creative writing: the player can go wild in describing how his character sees the energy and feels about that, while you can have all sorts of fun describing what the actual spell eventually looks like, what its effect is, and (optionally) what it does to the player themselves.
Basically, the character goes through five stages before the spell is successfully cast. While that sounds really technical and possibly intimidating, it’s nothing to be worried about – the processes themselves are really simple and more like a sort of checklist, and really not as complicated as people sometimes think. First, the sorcerer has to concentrate and try to perceive the flow of energy around him. We call this stage ‘attuning’, and it allows him to not only sense energy, but also to reach out to it for spellweaving purposes. How the sorcerer perceives the energy varies from person to person; for more information on that, look back to the 102 course part on energy. After successful attunement, the sorcerer ‘centers’ himself. ‘Centering’ is a technique whereby the spellcaster brings his body into tune with energy, so that it may freely flow through him. This stage is essential, because an uncentered sorcerer cannot interact fully with energy. Since he is successfully attuned, he can touch it; he just can’t use it to weave spells with yet. After centering, the sorcerer must ‘ground’ himself. ‘Grounding’ prepares the body to channel energy. If a sorcerer isn’t properly grounded, he has trouble properly directing the energies that will form his spell; it might misfire or fail altogether. If a lot of energy runs through an ungrounded spellcaster, it can be painful, and possibly even knock him out. After grounding comes ‘shielding’. Unlike the previous three steps, shielding isn’t absolutely necessary. But a sorcerer who doesn’t shield himself is very, very vulnerable to any spell or magickal influence – after all, he or she has brought themselves deeply into tune with energy through centering and grounding. A ‘shielded’ sorcerer simply places a rudimentary mental defense that reduces their vulnerability to magick to its normal level. And then, finally, the ‘weaving’ process may begin: the sorcerer interacts with those types of energy that he chose for the spell, ‘weaving’ them together into a spell that is then cast. If the spell isn’t too powerful for the caster’s skill levels and he/she successfully attuned, centered, and grounded, then the spell automatically succeeds – there is no random factor, dice roll, or anything else that might influence that. Of course, a successful spell can still be stopped, but that depends on the environment (nearby magickal sinks) or on the defenses of the target.
Attunement
Attuning requires that the character can concentrate. He has to focus his mind, and let go of part of his rational self in order to be able to ‘feel’ the flows of energy. Many sorcerers take some levels in Meditation in order to be able to calm themselves and concentrate even during chaotic or hectic times, because otherwise, they are easily yanked out of their concentration. One a character is attuned (it takes only a few seconds if the character can concentrate) they perceive the energy in the ways discussed earlier – the strands, the colours, the smells or shapes, whatever fits the character. They can also reach out and interact with that energy, for example, pushing it away or pulling it closer. Do note that the sorcerer cannot yet use the energy for weaving purposes. Attunement may take as short as the blink of an eye if there is a lot of energy around; normally, though, it takes several seconds to prepare the mind for energy perception.
Centering
Centering can be a confusing concept, also because the name isn’t completely clear. Essentially, this is simply: bringing yourself in touch with energy. Once you’re centered, it can run through you; you are becoming one with it, feeling its flow instead of just perceiving or sensing its presence. The difference between attunement and centering is like swimming: attunement is being able to see water, while centering is actually getting into the lake. Centering takes about five to ten seconds.
Grounding
Grounding is straightforward. Since the sorcerer is centered, energy can run through his body, where his body is like a conduit. But mortal bodies aren’t natural conduits for energy (unless it’s mentalism energy, but more on that later), so the energy gets chaotic, unruly, hard to control. What’s more, there is friction between the energy and its conduit: as the energy courses through the sorcerer, they becomes worn out, confused, unfocussed, etc. This may result in a headache and eventually in unconsciousness; if the amount of energy was sufficiently high, brain damage or even death can be the result. This friction of the conduit, then, is removed by grounding. Excess, damaging energy can flow away, and the flow of energy through the caster’s body is much smoother. The energy, now no longer disturbed by friction, is also calmer and easier to handle; it can now be used to weave spells with. Grounding is like flicking a mental switch, and rarely takes more than two or three seconds.
Shielding
Shielding doesn’t require much more explanation. When centering and grounding have brought the sorcerer into a state of ‘one-ness’ with energy, he or she is severely susceptible to anything related to energy; lingering magickal influences such as curses or scrying spells can affect the weaver without any problem whatsoever, and even the slightest mental attack spell targeted at him or her will fly directly up the cortex and fry the brain. To prevent becoming a ridiculously easy target, a sorcerer can shield himself. It’s a very quick technique, ‘closing’ the entryways by which hostile magick can affect the character. Shielding does take an additional three to five seconds to perform, which has led some sorcerers who were rushing it to skip the process – and, sometimes, to end up as a pile of ash while their opponent took advantage of the weakness.
Weaving
Weaving is where it actually happens. The sorcerer can now perceive the energy, grasp it, and channel it: he can bring together the types of energy that he wants, and through himself force them into reality as a spell. The process of taking the energy and forcing it into reality as a spell is called weaving, and this is the part where things differ from time to time. Every sorcerer must attune, center and ground, and all do it in the same way, more or less; and every wise sorcerer also shields himself, also in the same way as the rest. But each sorcerer has their own ideas about what spells he wants to cast. This depends on what energies the character uses, and is familiar with, and it depends on his outlook on life, and what he thinks he can and cannot do with sorcery. The bottom line is: there is no rule about what strands go together, and how they go together, and what exact gestures and words should be used; the sorcerer uses that which works best for him or her. That, shortly put, is the process of weaving.
Once that’s done, the only thing you have to worry about is whether or not the spell was too strong for the spellcaster to be able to cast it. We’ll talk about that in the next section, though; no need to worry about it now.
Visualizing Sorcery
One last thing to think about is how it actually looks when a character casts a spell. Sometimes, the caster utters arcane-sounding syllables as part of the weaving process, to help them focus the spell’s energies; Pristine College, for example, teaches this, as do most schools teaching battle-magicks. Shouting, or even speaking, isn’t strictly required, though… it’s more a habit that wizards pick up. Remember that magick works largely because the character thinks it should work that way; if he/she thinks arcane syllables help, then they do. Gestures are universally taught as part of sorcery; every sorcerer uses gesturing in their casting. Sometimes, there are other things involved: some schools of magick might teach the use of foci like especially prepared crystals or staves, or might burden the character with the need to keep a spellbook and actually cast spells by reading them aloud from that book. Hell, if fancy strikes you, you might want to create a cabal of sorcerers who dance intricate patterns as part of their weaving routine, or must recite rhyming poetry related to the casting. Again, it’s up to you, and your creativity.
