[center][h3] Concerning Magic and Hunters [/h3][/center] [hider=On Combat] Tiers of power: [hider=Novice] Hunters: A little luck, a good plan, and the high ground brought you here. The long night is just beginning hunter, wet your blade, hone your instincts, and hope you don't become prey before your time. Witches: So you've cast a few spells? Have some control over your gift? Well done, but that's just the beginning. Magic is intoxicating isn't it? Find yourself a coven quick sorceress, lest you find yourself alone in the dark. [/hider] [hider=Acolyte] Hunter: Welcome to the long night, hunter. You can finally number yourself amongst the ranks of those that run towards danger instead of away from it. This is a dangerous road you walk, check your pride boy, if you want to live another night. Witch: True control is gained here. You're beginning to understand the basics of magical theory, but you're still mostly in the dark. Every old nightmare started here sorceress, but not many made it any further. [/hider] [hider=Disciple] Hunter: Well done, you've made it to the heights of what most hunters will ever accomplish. If you hung your blade up and started a family no one would blame you, the taverns know your tales by heart anyway. Maybe that's not enough for you? Is it because you're mad? Or does something pull at you? Blaze your way through the blood and dark hunter, you're beginning to understand. Witch: How many sacrifices did it take to get here? Do you control your own little coven now? Maybe you've retired from black magic and became a medicine woman? Old tomes no longer have anything of value for you, words are not power after all. Seek the old ways, the dark ways. Close your eyes against the bitter wind, push on witch. [/hider] [hider=Adept] Hunter: Your form is nearly peerless, and you know more about the beasts that stalk the night than most hunters alive. People recoil from you in fear. Why? Is your killer instinct really so obvious? False friends fade, and tavern tales turn to dark whispers. Did you really think you were just human? Maybe you still do, hopefully you'll never live long enough to find out. Witch: You're a walking nightmare. Spells pile up at the back of your long memory as quickly as the bodies of rivals and hunters do in your wake. You bloodline's gift speaks to you, offering up even more power readily. The outer planes echo with your power. No one makes it this far without delving into the dark arts, and they're called dark for a reason witch. Can you really stand any more? [/hider] [hider=Master] Hunter: Welcome scion of the hunter's moon. You're among the most powerful killers in the world. How does it feel at the top? Knowing you have more in common with the beasts you hunt than your mortal counterparts? Somewhere along the line something inside you spread its terrible wings, pushing you to transcend mortal capacities for violence. Are you awaited in heaven? Valhalla? Or does the pit eagerly watch for your fall? Stand alone against the deep dark hunter, no one else can. Witch: When did you leave your humanity behind? When did it become so easy to sell yourself for power? Welcome bringer of the great dark. Your descent is now complete, you've completed your magnum opus and left the world behind. Or did you? Why do you still linger here Wise One? Did you leave something behind? Maybe you didn't like what awaited you at the end of your long journey. Reality buckles against the weight of your transcendent will, what great work awaits you next? [/hider][/hider] I am reposting the different levels just as a reminder to kinda how your character should be based on your selection of their level. [hider=magical hoo-ha] 'Kay, I am going to start this post with my theories on Magic. Now I took this roleplay over from someone else and we didn't really discuss this as length. These are just observations compiled into what I think are the laws of the universe of this roleplay. (I know I am the GM and could change them, but I like the limits they place). Also I am not an expert on magic or physics (mathhhh on the other hand) Magic: Chaos centralized. At its core, magic is the acting force that works to derail the natural order of the world. Similar to anti-matter (I think) In terms of witches, no one can just become a witch. Everyone is born with a predisposition of their ability to affiliate with chaos. There are also different levels by which it affects each and every person. A weakly affected person is really the only person who has a true choice on if they become a witch or not. They could ignore it their entire lives, they do have an awareness to it, they just chose to ignore it, even if they don't know that they are. I kinda see that hunters generally are at this level of affiliated. It helps keep them aware of the situation--alive. Hunters without this vague sense of chaos either die very quickly or never face anything of importance. And it is kind of why they become hunters, because being around magic has a sort of rightness feeling to it. Even if they don't notice it, on some level it makes them happy but they don't know why. #drug Now for those who do become witches. Some are born to witches and they have the potential utilize from the second they are born and know no other way. Some are born with a particularly strong affinity for it in a none magical house hold. Depending on the culture they are born into they are either looked on as gods and worshipped or as monsters and killed. The fourth type: those that have the potential, but it takes a catalyst to bring it to fruition. -see wendango- Magic: It always has a cost. Witches are human in some sense. Maybe that human element was lost years ago, but humans were not meant to successfully endure magic indefinitely (Unlike demons). It has less to do with the body, which may experience some changes, usually good ones, and more to do with mind. Chaos eats at the brain and it might take years and years and years for signs to occur, but the more powerful the magic is, the quicker the insanity comes on. And I am not saying they go crazy, each witch is effected differently. Some become highly logical and slowly lose their ability to understand compassion and suffering. Connections to other living creatures becomes difficult. Some become reckless and impulsive and some lose the connection to reality and live in the moment because they are incapable of living outside of it: years last for a seconds and minutes can go on for an eternity. Taking on magic also has physical effects for the witch, while most of them are good--Making them more long lived is one of them-- there are some downsides. They become deadly allergic to lavender if it is consumed. A brand new witch might just get violently sick with a lethal dose, but anyone who has worked with magic for longer than week, dead. They also have a less sever--but not good-- reaction to silver, gold and wolves bane, but they don't have to eat it to be effected. I also see hunters, mostly older hunters, develop something similar to hay fever around these objects as they spend more time around magic. [b]Magic Drains and Powerful Magic takes time:[/b] Sure with practice, certain spells become much easier for witches, they get better about knowing exactly how much energy needs to be used to get the needed effect. But, witches are using chaos to fight the laws of nature, nature pushes back so it take energy to cause the catalyst that makes things happen. Like swinging a sword, combat magics drains. You become physically tired. I think of all combat magics as anything that can happen in an instant, it took no forethought or planning to cast a fireball and you pay for it physically. (power surges, healing, anything automatic) The above covers most types of magics I think we will see in the roleplay. But the other type takes time. Seers: It takes time and quiet to look into the future. Typically, if a seerier is going to battle, they spend days if not MONTHS looking to the future to see how it'll play out for it to be useful. Creature Creation: It takes time to unwrite the dna and recode. Hours for something simple, years for something difficult. Runes/summonings: Some of the harshness of the magic can be lessened by using magical tools, such as runes, but you have to have these things ready for them to be of any use. It also usually costs something too. Usually blood, which is highly energized. Hunters vs Witches. Witches have weaknesses, and they usually are all the same. Hunters know this and exploit them. Without their tools most hunters would die, but they have their tools and that is what makes them more equal to the witches. Hunters also are willing to work with each other as equals, which helps. Witches tend to develop hierarchies that most of them instinctually want to be at the top of, which makes them a little less fluid at the teamworking thing [/hider] Wellll, those are wayyy to early Ellion thoughts. I'd like to hear your guys. Because if we all want different rules of magic and can all agree to them, I am more than happy to make edits ^^.