Sabriel (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bindsthedead) wrote2013-04-06 12:23 pm
bindsthedead) wrote2013-04-06 12:23 pm
Charter Magic and you, in Tushanshu! [In Progress]
Or where Sarah rambles on about Charter magic.
What is it? Charter magic is the major magical system of Sabriel's canon. Unlike magic in a lot of worlds, inherent talent isn't required to use Charter magic. Though certain bloodlines have much greater power in it than normal folk, a sufficiently trained Charter Mage can baptize anyone with a Charter mark, a faint mark on their forehead that symbolizes their connection to the Charter.
Who can learn it in Tu Shanshu? People who don't already have some kind of supernatural/magical power.
Also, only ten characters will be able to learn Charter Magic at a time. If one of them drops their slot will be reopened.
What your character will experience when they use it Using Charter magic means reaching into the Charter and drawing out symbols- simple spells may involve a single mark or a handful, and be quickly cast, but some powerful spells can include hundreds or thousands of marks. This explains it better than I can.
Consequences of screwing up or getting overambitious with Charter magic can range from singed fingers or an uncontrollable spell for normal magic to being exhausted for several weeks with a badly burned throat (And if the individual in question wasn't a massively powerful mage she probably would have died) or symptoms reminiscent of a stroke in another case of attempts at powerful spells going horribly wrong.
Also note that Charter magic is not a psychoactive thing. While emotions might make attempted spells go awry, stuff won't suddenly burst into flame because a character gets scared. (In other words, you can't use Charter magic unconsciously, it has to be a deliberate thing, though characters who practice enough could learn to use it on reflex.)
Another thing- Touching a baptismal Charter mark lets the mage touching it determine if it's genuine/uncorrupted (if it is, they can feel the Charter through it), and get a sense of how powerful a mage the person they're touching is.
Charter Mages can combine their abilities, if they're holding hands, allowing them to cast a spell with more power than any one of them could handle individually.
List of Charter spells [Incomplete]
Basic Spells Spells Sabriel will start your character off with.
Conjuring lights: An extremely simple spell. Conjures a light of variable intensity. The mark can be engraved into an object to make a permanent light, or simply used as a temporary flashlight. Make it bright enough, and you could temporarily blind someone with it.
Lighting a fire: uses two marks. A yellow flame forms on the tip of a character's index finger, not burning the skin, but easily setting any flammable materials it touches alight.
Drawing water out of the air: Character traces the marks for the spell in the air and cups their hands below it as pure water condenses and drops down into their hands. Most effective in humid environments.
Spell of the silver blades: Pretty self explanatory! Conjures three silver blades that fly forward with considerable force (enough to put fist-sized holes through a human body and reduce a piece of lumber to wood chips) and vanish once they hit their target. The incantation (often shouted) is "Anet! Calew! Ferhan!"
The Final Rites Not a spell that's likely to see much use here, but after hearing about the Jiangshi, Sabriel's likely to insist her students learn this. It's a spell that has one purpose- cremating a recently deceased body. It requires four marks- fire, cleansing, peace, and sleep.
Recording spell: Consists of three marks placed on a solid object. After tracing the marks, the caster places their hand on them, and sound is recorded for as long as they're touching the marks. After that, the recording cannot be altered in any way, and will be played back whenever a mage touches the marks. This spell will linger for as long as the marks are left intact.
More advanced spells And also suggestions for other stuff/ general suggestions for things characters might want to specialize in, learn more about, or things that have been described in canon but haven't had particular spells described.
Diamond of protection: Sabriel uses this spell a lot- it's good if you're staying in one place for a while and want to be shielded. four marks are drawn- one at each point of the compass. Once the four marks are completed, lines of light run between them, surrounding the area inside in protective magic- it's possible to protect a small campsite with a single diamond. It's impossible to enter from outside- or to physically or magically harm those within, and leaving the diamond from inside breaks the spell.
Battle Magic: Not just fireballs, lightning bolts, and other offensive spells, but also anything you'd cast quickly in a fight- shields, arrow-wards, and spells designed to blind and immobilize opponents are also considered part of this category.
Healing: Pretty self explanatory. Charter Magic can't heal people completely, or instantly, but it can bring people back from life-threatening injuries, heal broken bones, close wounds, and pull poison/drugs out of the body, as well as help prevent infection.
Item enchanting: Ranges from imbuing weapons with spells that let them hit things ordinarily weapons can't damage, (like spirits) or inflict serious damage to the undead to making swords sharper and arrows more likely to hit their targets to large projects like creating servant constructs or powerful magical weapons and devices. Charter magic can mesh with clockwork and possibly steam, but trying to wed it to electronics won't work.
Binding/wards: Used in canon to imprison monsters or restrict their powers- or keep them out of places. Often seems to involve long chains of symbols, or 'Master Marks' that are so powerful they can kill or seriously harm the caster if used without proper precautions. Bindings seem to be one area of Charter Magic that often uses physical components- specially enchanted swords and wands used to channel the spells, and containers made of specific materials to trap creatures in. Wards are used to keep monsters out, and to protect the people inside from magical and physical attack.
Memory Alteration/Mind Magic: Charter Magic can be used to suppress memories, and insert a plausible fake one in place of what was suppressed. Suppressed memories can be returned though, either due to the spell being removed, or because the person truly needs to remember what was suppressed. Charter Magic can also force people to fall asleep, and seems able to calm down agitated people, but this isn't an area that the books really go into.
Weather magic: By using whistled Charter Marks, mages can control the direction and intensity of the wind, as well as create (and presumably disperse) storms, although this seems to be partially reliant on having enough moisture in the air to work with.
Illusion/disguise magic: Lets an individual appear to be someone else. This is an illusion/glamor, not true shapeshifting. There are also references to spells that conceal people, or let them remain unseen.
Also note- an individual mark may be used in several different spells- for example, both the final rites, the spell to start a fire, and several battle magic spells all use the mark for fire, but it's used in different ways.
Characters baptized/slots taken (Characters in Parenthesis have a slot reserved but have not been baptized in-game yet.)
1) (Leonard McCoy)
2) Clara Oswald
3) OPEN
4) OPEN
5) Marius
6) OPEN
7) Hayley Stark
8) OPEN
9) OPEN
10) OPEN
What is it? Charter magic is the major magical system of Sabriel's canon. Unlike magic in a lot of worlds, inherent talent isn't required to use Charter magic. Though certain bloodlines have much greater power in it than normal folk, a sufficiently trained Charter Mage can baptize anyone with a Charter mark, a faint mark on their forehead that symbolizes their connection to the Charter.
Who can learn it in Tu Shanshu? People who don't already have some kind of supernatural/magical power.
Also, only ten characters will be able to learn Charter Magic at a time. If one of them drops their slot will be reopened.
What your character will experience when they use it Using Charter magic means reaching into the Charter and drawing out symbols- simple spells may involve a single mark or a handful, and be quickly cast, but some powerful spells can include hundreds or thousands of marks. This explains it better than I can.
Consequences of screwing up or getting overambitious with Charter magic can range from singed fingers or an uncontrollable spell for normal magic to being exhausted for several weeks with a badly burned throat (And if the individual in question wasn't a massively powerful mage she probably would have died) or symptoms reminiscent of a stroke in another case of attempts at powerful spells going horribly wrong.
Also note that Charter magic is not a psychoactive thing. While emotions might make attempted spells go awry, stuff won't suddenly burst into flame because a character gets scared. (In other words, you can't use Charter magic unconsciously, it has to be a deliberate thing, though characters who practice enough could learn to use it on reflex.)
Another thing- Touching a baptismal Charter mark lets the mage touching it determine if it's genuine/uncorrupted (if it is, they can feel the Charter through it), and get a sense of how powerful a mage the person they're touching is.
Charter Mages can combine their abilities, if they're holding hands, allowing them to cast a spell with more power than any one of them could handle individually.
List of Charter spells [Incomplete]
Basic Spells Spells Sabriel will start your character off with.
Conjuring lights: An extremely simple spell. Conjures a light of variable intensity. The mark can be engraved into an object to make a permanent light, or simply used as a temporary flashlight. Make it bright enough, and you could temporarily blind someone with it.
Lighting a fire: uses two marks. A yellow flame forms on the tip of a character's index finger, not burning the skin, but easily setting any flammable materials it touches alight.
Drawing water out of the air: Character traces the marks for the spell in the air and cups their hands below it as pure water condenses and drops down into their hands. Most effective in humid environments.
Spell of the silver blades: Pretty self explanatory! Conjures three silver blades that fly forward with considerable force (enough to put fist-sized holes through a human body and reduce a piece of lumber to wood chips) and vanish once they hit their target. The incantation (often shouted) is "Anet! Calew! Ferhan!"
The Final Rites Not a spell that's likely to see much use here, but after hearing about the Jiangshi, Sabriel's likely to insist her students learn this. It's a spell that has one purpose- cremating a recently deceased body. It requires four marks- fire, cleansing, peace, and sleep.
Recording spell: Consists of three marks placed on a solid object. After tracing the marks, the caster places their hand on them, and sound is recorded for as long as they're touching the marks. After that, the recording cannot be altered in any way, and will be played back whenever a mage touches the marks. This spell will linger for as long as the marks are left intact.
More advanced spells And also suggestions for other stuff/ general suggestions for things characters might want to specialize in, learn more about, or things that have been described in canon but haven't had particular spells described.
Diamond of protection: Sabriel uses this spell a lot- it's good if you're staying in one place for a while and want to be shielded. four marks are drawn- one at each point of the compass. Once the four marks are completed, lines of light run between them, surrounding the area inside in protective magic- it's possible to protect a small campsite with a single diamond. It's impossible to enter from outside- or to physically or magically harm those within, and leaving the diamond from inside breaks the spell.
Battle Magic: Not just fireballs, lightning bolts, and other offensive spells, but also anything you'd cast quickly in a fight- shields, arrow-wards, and spells designed to blind and immobilize opponents are also considered part of this category.
Healing: Pretty self explanatory. Charter Magic can't heal people completely, or instantly, but it can bring people back from life-threatening injuries, heal broken bones, close wounds, and pull poison/drugs out of the body, as well as help prevent infection.
Item enchanting: Ranges from imbuing weapons with spells that let them hit things ordinarily weapons can't damage, (like spirits) or inflict serious damage to the undead to making swords sharper and arrows more likely to hit their targets to large projects like creating servant constructs or powerful magical weapons and devices. Charter magic can mesh with clockwork and possibly steam, but trying to wed it to electronics won't work.
Binding/wards: Used in canon to imprison monsters or restrict their powers- or keep them out of places. Often seems to involve long chains of symbols, or 'Master Marks' that are so powerful they can kill or seriously harm the caster if used without proper precautions. Bindings seem to be one area of Charter Magic that often uses physical components- specially enchanted swords and wands used to channel the spells, and containers made of specific materials to trap creatures in. Wards are used to keep monsters out, and to protect the people inside from magical and physical attack.
Memory Alteration/Mind Magic: Charter Magic can be used to suppress memories, and insert a plausible fake one in place of what was suppressed. Suppressed memories can be returned though, either due to the spell being removed, or because the person truly needs to remember what was suppressed. Charter Magic can also force people to fall asleep, and seems able to calm down agitated people, but this isn't an area that the books really go into.
Weather magic: By using whistled Charter Marks, mages can control the direction and intensity of the wind, as well as create (and presumably disperse) storms, although this seems to be partially reliant on having enough moisture in the air to work with.
Illusion/disguise magic: Lets an individual appear to be someone else. This is an illusion/glamor, not true shapeshifting. There are also references to spells that conceal people, or let them remain unseen.
Also note- an individual mark may be used in several different spells- for example, both the final rites, the spell to start a fire, and several battle magic spells all use the mark for fire, but it's used in different ways.
Characters baptized/slots taken (Characters in Parenthesis have a slot reserved but have not been baptized in-game yet.)
1) (Leonard McCoy)
2) Clara Oswald
3) OPEN
4) OPEN
5) Marius
6) OPEN
7) Hayley Stark
8) OPEN
9) OPEN
10) OPEN