First magic style

[Gef]

Stalwart Brotherhood of Resistance to Evil (6)

While not a militant order per se, the brothers use a college of magic that sees its greatest utility on the battlefield, protecting soldiers on the front line while standing just a few ranks behind. That means that these deacons are usually sponsored by a militant order or one of the large orders dedicated to national saints (from which they are seconded to national armies). Resistance focuses exclusively on spells of Protection and Warning, but the founders held spells for mere comfort in some contempt, omitting the likes of Shade, Umbrella, and Warmth. In deacon parlance, “Faith” refers to protection and “Wisdom” to warning, and stylists often use the phrase “Faith and Wisdom” as a blessing and greeting.

Required Skills: Religious Ritual (Church of Man), Supernatural Awareness, Thaumatology, Theology (Church of Man).

Required Spells: Bravery. Treat all spells learned through this style as Protection and Warning.

Perks: Blocking Spell Mastery (Iron Arm), Combat Ceremony (Utter Wall), Extra Option: Stabilizing Skill (Religious Ritual for Protection and Warning), Huge Subjects, Reduced Footprint (Resist), Sacrificial Blocking Spell (Iron Arm or Reflect Gaze), Shortcut to Power (Bless), Shortcut to Power (Repel Animals works on all animals), Special Exercises (Moral Strength), Willful Casting.

Acolyte: Bravery, Scryguard, See Radiation, Sense Danger, Sense Evil, Sense Foes, Sense Observation, Shield. The textbook “The Wisdom to See” treats all topics of Occultism for those acolytes who read it carefully instead of just cramming the spells ($520,4½#).

Senior Acolyte (requires Bravery): Armor, Detect Poison, Know Illusion, Missile Shield, Mystic Mist, Protection from Evil, Scrywall, Watchdog. “Faith Protects” ($480, 4#).

Deacon (requires Clerical Investment and 3 spells from each lower level): Bright Vision, Freedom, Iron Arm, Magic Resistance, Reflect Gaze, Repel Animals, Resist Acid, Resist Cold, Resist Disease, Resist Fire, Resist Lightning, Resist Pain, Resist Poison, Resist Pressure, Resist Radiation, Resist Sound, Resist Water See Invisible, Turn Spirit, Turn Zombie. “Das Resistanz” covers all spells with “resist” in the name, with such a tight body of theory that the a single Reduced Footprint perk applies to all of them, though only with respect to each other ($960, 6#), and “Tyranny of Evil” which covers the rest is a primer for the skill Expert (Agony), the church’s lore of that ancient evil empire from which all horrors sprang ($840, 4½#).

Dean (requires 6 Resist spells, eligible for Religious Rank 1): Astral Vision, Enchant (style spells only), Force Dome, Repel Evil, Repel Hybrids, Repel Spirits, Spell Shield. “Refuge in the Lord” costs $800 and weighs 4#.

Senior Dean (requires Religious Rank 1, Force Dome, and Spell Shield): Force Wall, Pentegram, Spell Wall, Utter Dome. “Memoir of the Büfmeister” ($800, 3#).

Utter Mastery (requires all spells of the previous level): Bless, Utter Wall.

[Gef]

Who Whisper to Heaven in the Voice of Thunder (6)

Since the Church of Man bans telepathy, the thunder monks have a lock on telecommunication. Everyone wants a cut of that action, as long as they keep a log of any suspicious or coded messages they send. The effect on society is more like a telegraph than a telephone; you have to go to the monk’s office to send a message, and if he doesn’t know the recipient, he’ll send it to the nearest of his brethren for pick-up. Militant orders pay well for the service and also for masters who know the secret of making a blade cut through steel and bone as if it were flesh.

Those who whisper have an unhealthy taste for Elder Tongues, especially Geode, which they learn as required for certain spells only to be fascinated by their potential for magic in their own right, and of course thunder monks prefer the actual sound of power words to mere symbolic representation. Unfortunately for many a deacon career, Words of Power are proscribed by the Church of Man.

Required Skills: Religious Ritual (Church of Man), Thaumatology, Theology (Church of Man).

Required Spells: Sound, Voices. Journeymen must know Message.

Perks: Extra Option: Stabilizing Skill (Religious Ritual for Sound spells), Mundane Magic (Voices for Musical Instrument), Secret Spell (Vibroblade), Shortcut to Power (Echoes of the Past, Silver Tongue), Special Exercises (Moral Strength, Ultrasonic Speech as a Potential Advantage that only works with Sound Vision).

All Sound spells that don’t have out-of-college prerequisites, plus a new spell, Feel Sound, that works like the advantage Vibration Sense (3 to cast, 2 to maintain), with Keen Hearing as its prerequisite. In turn, it serves as the prerequisite for Delayed Message and Ignite Fire, which is a sound spell in this style. Clerical Investment and any spoken Elder Tongue (at any level) serve as prerequisites for Concussion, and in conjunction with Far-Hearing do the same for Message, displacing conventional out-of-college prerequisites. The secret spell Vibroblade requires Religious Rank 1, Ignite Fire, 10 other sound spells, and a spoken Elder Tongue; it causes an edged weapon to inflict +1d damage with armor divisor 2, lasting 10 seconds for 5 energy (3 to maintain), but it has a drawback: Roll breakage every turn for a cheap weapon, every maintenance cycle for a good weapon, and when the spell ends for a fine weapon, although in the latter case, the weapon degrades to good quality instead of breaking (Very fine weapons are immune). Unusual Training allows a thunder monk to modulate the sonar from the Sound Vision spell for communication with other brethren so trained.

[Gef]

Other Styles (6 each)

All of these styles require the usual skills of Religious Ritual (Church of Man), Thaumatology, and Theology (Church of Man), and they all offer the usual perks of Special Exercises (Moral Strength) and Stabilizing Skill (Religious Ritual for their respective colleges). Each teaches the spells of a single college, excluding transformation of man and spells with out-of-college prerequisites. Each requires half a dozen spells for deacons (journeymen) and a full dozen for deans (master wizards), who should also have Thaumatology 12 and Energy Reserve 30.

The Firm (Earth): Requires Shape Earth and offers Shortcuts to Power for Alter Terrain, Divination (Geomancy), Purify Earth, and Volcano.

Friends of Seire (Plant): Requires Identify Plant, offers a Shortcut to Power for Purify Earth, and teaches Forest Warning with Recover Energy replacing out-of-college prerequisites.

Hands of the Lord (Healing): Requires Lend Vitality and offers a Shortcut to Power for every spell with out-of-college prerequisites.

Monks of the Mess (Food): Requires Test Food, offers Shortcuts to Power for Distill and Divination (Extispicy), and teaches Seek Water, Purify Water, and Create Water as Food spells that serve for Cook in lieu of out-of-college prerequisites.

Mermonks (Water): Requires Purify Water, offers Shortcuts to Power for Geyser and Divination (Lecanomancy), and teaches Breathe Water, Clouds, Predict Weather, Swim, and Weather Dome with Recover Energy replacing out-of-college prerequisites; deans can learn arcane path of Weather.