Verdan Arcanis – Technology and Magic I

The presence of magic has had two effects on the development of science and technology. It makes it MUCH easier to test things and to sort out what’s going on on an immediate, local, level. You want to look at something very small? A simple charm will do it. Rough spots in a prototype, minor [...]

Verdan Arcanis – Historical Development

Mankind’s early Eurasian history on Verdan resembles events on Earth relatively closely up until around the Age of Discovery. Yes, Verdan has some magic, and even relatively minor magic has an impact – but where fewer children died of minor illnesses, contraceptive charms meant fewer were born. Where genuinely functioning curses were hurled at rulers, [...]

Verdan Arcanis – Basic Magic

With the Star Wars game winding down thanks to some exceptionally clever maneuvering by the players, it’s time to start setting up the next one – and, thanks to a series of player votes, it’s going to be the Baba Yaga system with a quasi-victorian setting with some magic where much of the world is [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice Session XXXIX – Gates of the Third Circle

Hala’s little reverie hadn’t taken up much time – although she would like to know what caste her bondmate was… After twenty thousand years there was no easy way to find out much about who’d had your exaltation in the first age – or who your bondmate was. Lytek was about the only reliable source, [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice Session XXXVIII – Out of the Umbra

Sadly, despite Mr Montagues calling them in, the Nocturnals hadn’t been able to help out with the analysis much; there was just no way of knowing what WAS “normal” for a young primordial! Nobody even knew how they came into being outside of “they appeared in the Wyld”. Still, Jose had been quite relieved when [...]

Variant Eclipse Shapeshifting – The War Forms

The query here is how to build a shapeshifter who more closely resembles the version found in the Player’s Handbook II – or, for that matter, Pathfinder and several other sources. The basic version of Eclipse shapeshifting involves a serious transformation into another form – taking on both it’s abilities and limitations. Turn into a [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice XXXVII – Investigating Charles Mansen

Over the next several weeks there was much frantic Sidereal scrambling to fit surveillance on Charles in between their usual duties – and immense amounts of frustration with the results of that surveillance. It was embarrassing enough that the blasted schoolmaster seemed to have some charms that let him know when ANYONE was up to [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice XXXVI – Titanic Misperceptions

A couple of weeks after Mr. Clearwater and Cipher Child had visited Charles – and about the same amount of time before the Bureau of Heaven would be announcing the results (someone HAD to be expediting that) there was a knocking at Charles’s door… (Charles) “Hello! Could you let yourself in and come upstairs? I [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice XXXV – Fishing in the Land of the Lost

Charles was musing… When someone stored stuff elsewhere, and got killed, the stuff was usually lost forever. OK, sometimes a new incarnation – whether of soul or incarnation – would manage to pull something out, but that was rare, and it wasn’t uncommon not to have a “next life” anyway. Most of the stuff would [...]

Exalted – Aden Shining Dream, the Third Circle

Manse Servitors equate to first circle demons, and Manse Guardians to those of the second circle – but to impersonate a third-circle demon you need something more. Fortunately, Charles has found a solution: “Aden’s” “third circle souls” are, in fact, manses of awesome power – designed to generate a set of avatar’s with the power [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice XXXIV – Fiduciary Divine

While Charles was busily building more manses to impersonate (or perhaps become) his “third-circle souls”, working on the Stargate project, mapping the earth’s dragon lines, running rescue missions, and otherwise keeping busy, several investigations were gathering steam – with some of the investigators coming up with scenarios that even he hadn’t thought of yet. Similarly, [...]

Exalted – The Behemoth Cloak (Artifact ****)

OK, lets face it. The normal artifact armor in the basic Exalted book… sucks. The technomagic power armor is better, but quite a lot of players don’t want to be Iron Man or have to deal with the maintenance and repair of their armor even if they vary it’s looks. For them here’s a much [...]

Pen and Paradise Episode 2: Skyrim Continued

Pen and Paradise Episode 2: Skyrim Continued   Allow me to explain a little more about what I have in mind for the thieving model. Right now, stealing is no challenge. Anything people don’t see it instantly up for grabs. You can steal battleaxes, statues, and full plate armor as long as everyone’s backs are [...]

Exalted – Let’s Take This Elsewhere!

At least in our Exalted game the question of “How secure is Elsewhere” is coming up. To answer that, the first place to look is in the basic book, where “Elsewhere” is introduced. Charm Concept: Elsewhere Elsewhere is a place where things exist but do not interact or decay. Things that characters store Elsewhere are [...]

The Chronicles of Heavenly Artifice – Higher Souls

Thanks to a helpful suggestion from Vaalintine (and the resulting in-character moment of inspiration), Charles has found a reasonable way to fake having some third-circle souls for Aden; he’s building some high-powered manses to take that role. That ties in with his geomantic focus, his associations with building things, his love of manses – and [...]

Federation-Apocalypse Session 201c – From the Mouths of Babes

Felan, meanwhile, was busily angling for becoming a junior coalition member in charge of creches… After all, the others had placed a – quite astounding – level of trust in him. Having a group of hatchlings come to their dominant parent to say “We want to get rid of this kid! Give the dominant kid [...]

Federation-Apocalypse Session 201b – Draconic Circumstances

Markov was momentarily bemused when his coalition-allies asked about how he’d gotten his hatchlings so organized and useful. That was mostly Felan and his statues of course – and the fact that they had some extra powers that were useful in themselves – but that would call for rather more explanations than he wanted to [...]

Eclipsing Wealth, Part II

For today, we have an Eclipse question…. The rules let me have the internal equivalent of pretty much any magic item, whether through Innate Enchantment, Inherent Spell, or Spirit Weapon… but the only mechanism I can find for specifying external enchantments is really clunky. Equipage, with the Signature ability, lets you specify a an expensive [...]

Legend of the Five Rings – Kasumi Neko, Cat Clan Samurai

The Cat Clan plays a very minor role in Rokugan; it’s tiny, obscure, has no major school of its own, and mostly operates under cover. Their general role is to appear as the mysterious shadowy figure who passes on some important information to the more active and combative types – such as most PC’s. They [...]

Pen n’ Paradise 1 – Skyrim

Pen n’ Paradise 1 – Skyrim Welcome to the first episode of Pen n’ Paradise. Before we go any further, understand I’m not pleased with the audio quality and wish to pick up a new microphone. If anyone can reccomend a reliable model, feel free to do so in the comments. This experimental series will [...]