Ahrima
11-20-12, 01:03 AM
(Despite reading through the character creation guide I was confused on the matter of Skills and Abilities, please pay particular attention to that area. Any suggestions or changes are welcome.)
Name: "Zaun"
Age: 60
Race: Human
Hair Color: Gray
Eye Color: Soft, sky blue.
Height: 5'8"
Weight: ~142lbs
Occupation: Thaumaturge
Personality: Well, you'll just have to find out.
Appearance: Even through thorough examination, Zaun would not strike anyone as unusual or out of the ordinary. He is often seen wearing a simple brown hooded cloak to bide back the weather, with well-kept clothing underneath. A white button-down shirt tucked into basic black pants. Often times he is seen with a black vest, and a red or black scarf around his neck. If possible his clothes are kept in the best condition, and thoroughly clean. His hair has grown gray from age, and is parted off to one side, falling just above his eyes. Along with his obvious advanced age, his skin is in incredibly frail, and it looks like he hasn't gotten much sunlight in his life. Otherwise very average, although noticeably tidy and clean.
Taru's Appearance: At all times Zaun is seen with a small gray clay golem. It appears to be a mostly featureless bulky man, standing about one foot tall, made of semi-soft clay. The clay seems to be in the stage between being malleable and completely solid. The golem has a large magical circle inscribed onto his 'face' in black, and has no other facial features. He only has two fingers and one thumb on each hand. When sleeping he is capable of curling up into a small ball that, at close inspection, seems to be smaller than his total mass when standing. The resulting size is relative to a tennis ball on Earth. When one looks into the magic circle for a face, they may get a slight inkling of sentience staring back.
Skills:
Art: Very capable in handling a pencil, and thus can sketch anything he can remember in a realism style, or jot down most things tumbling around his brain. Used often when planning experiments, and is used to speed-drawing. Generally uses a hyper-realist style, but cuts the corners on shading.
Book-Smarts: Can skim through a book to find the juicy bits as well as the best of them. Countless years spent doing nothing but research in a library has made this an innate skill.
Science: Has a notable understanding of how the world around him works.
Magical Theory: Research into Alchemy and ritualistic magic has given him a thirst for knowledge in the inner-workings of the supernatural, thus is capable of taking apart and understanding many magical phenomenon, although it takes time and experimentation.
Alchemy: Capable of mixing reagents and natural components together to make various potions and cures. Often used to create pain reliever for his frequent head-aches.
Linguistics: Zaun has studied numerous languages and can pick up on languages quickly. He is also quite skilled at cyphers, both take time to translate, and without a "Rosetta Stone" even the simplest of languages can be permanently foreign.
Higher Education: Has all of the knowledge and understandings of having gone through ten years of college learning in a reputable academy.
Lore: After reading hundreds of stories that only contain tiny snippets of information on what he is looking for, he has many fables and parables internalized.
Abilities:
False Immortality: Through the final Transmutation Zaun performed to reach Althanas, he created a flawed immortality. Unfortunately it has frozen him in his current physical state, never aging, but also his blood disease cannot progress to kill him. However unless the false immortality is cured, he also cannot be cured of his illness. He can still be damaged in any way a human can, and can easily die. This truly only affects the way his age and the cessation of his deteriorating health.
Thaumaturgy: This is where Zaun truly shines, and the culmination of his research shows. With his various understandings of the inner workings of the mundane and supernatural world he is capable of, when given access to the raw materials required, create marvels that could be considered miraculous. Unfortunately, due to the circumstances of his arrival to Althanas, he has forgotten a lot of the recipes he had used to create some of his previous marvels. Golem creation is currently out of his hands, although he does seem to be able to repair scrapes and scratches on Taru if he has access to clay and water. Through some experimentation he has managed to create small amounts of Red Water again, which if ingested allows his body to recuperate faster from injury or illness. Although the speed only cuts one or two days off the total time. Even in his prime he could never master 'True' transmutation of any kind, but could sometimes use various materials to improve upon a substance.
'Common' Recipes: [Format: Name; Reagents; Time to make; tools to make; description]
Cinnabar**; Possible raw material, can be mined, used in other recipes; A few hours; Refined with a Crucible
Elixir; Cinnabar, Water*, Any herbs with healing properties; ~30 minutes; Crucible, Mortar & Pestle; Elixir is capable of healing one's wounds at a rapid rate. It simply speeds up the body's natural abilities to recover. At best it will decrease the total recovery time by a few days. However if made with concentrated Cinnabar then it can be applied directly to a grievous wound to do minimal healing but close the wound instantly to help the patient survive. Extremely painful if applied topically instead of ingested. Tastes bad.
Golem Salve; Clay, Water*, (Optional) Source of magic; Less than 5 minutes; No tools required; A weak salve that when applied to a Clay Golem can help it quickly recover from minor injuries. In larger amounts it can recover a golem if it has been accidentally heated into being solid.
Alumentum; Coal or wood, Water*, Heat source; 10-20 minutes per; Crucible; A strange substance that burns three times as long as coal with the same level of heat given off. Useful for baking objects, campfires, or ensuring that a house burns down. Incredible flammable, and can light fire from extreme heat without requiring a spark. If stored in an air-tight bottle it will not light.
Evertide; Water*, Ocean Salt, Raw Fish; Several hours; Crucible, Mortar; Creates a very small gel-like substance that naturally forms itself into a small sphere. When squeezed it produces water. The ball will last a week before it dries up on its own, however it will provide nearly endless amounts of water up until that time. It seems to be converting natural magical essence from the air into completely pure water. If the ball is dropped into a small body of water (large pond) it will purify the water inside in under a minute, but will also be consumed.
Focus; Cinnabar, Gold, Wood; Several minutes; Workbench; Creates a wand or object that passively draws in the natural atmospheric magic of the area. Can be used to infuse raw magic into a creation or formula. Doesn't have any combat applications without great creativity. Must be touched to the object and 'willed' to fill the object with magic.
Dangerous Recipes
Temporary Teranium; Iron object to manipulate, Water*, Cinnabar; 10 minutes; Mortar; A solution that when applied to Iron or an Iron object will temporarily transmute it into a magically potent metal called Teranium. It is 1 tier sharper and stronger than Steel, however it will only last a few hours. The more the object is used the shorter the duration will become. Once it returns to its previous form it cannot be transmuted again for a full day. If transmuted during a full moon it will last several hours longer than usual, and the duration will not be affected by use.
Nitor; Torchbug Dust, Coal, Water*; 30 minutes; Crucible; A unique reaction that relies on at least a tiny level of atmospheric magic. Fortunately, most places have at least a basic aura, and when in such an area the flame will never extinguish on its own. It can be put out with water, but will burn without oxygen. Same level of heat as normal flame. Can be kept in bottles for safe storage.
Infused Wood; Wood, Cinnabar, Water*; 10 minutes; Crucible; Enchants the wood to be magically potent. Not truly "used" by itself, but is a reagent is most all crafting using Thaumaturgy.
Wand of Fire; Infused Wood, Nitor, Cinnabar, Evertide, Teranium, Water*; 1 hour; Workbench, Crucible, Focus; Creates a focus that can expel Nitor. It creates a minor flame-thrower like effect, with a range of around 10 feet. The Nitor that it expels is however somewhat magically drained, and will only burn as long as normal fire. The fire is also now requiring air to continue burning. The wand will last for 5 minutes of sustained use, or forever if not used. One note is that the Teranium is stabilized if used to create a Wand of Fire, and the enchantment won't wear off. After being used up it can either be completely replaced, or recharged using Nitor and a Focus. Each time it is recharged it loses half a minute's worth of capacity.
*A note on any entry that includes Water. Due to the nature of Alchemy and Thaumaturgy, the purer the water the more powerful the solution. However, any water can be used. The less pure or clean the weaker the end-result. Dramatic differences are noticeable, the effect given is the most powerful possible.
**If Cinnabar is ingested in a water or powder format it will give the user small physiological improvements (1.5x human speed, strength, etc) for the duration of one hour. However at the end of the duration the user will become incredibly ill and nauseous for several minutes. Even the strong-willed will have a hard time keeping their composure. Over-use of Cinnabar can be lethal. The increase to capabilities will only affect someone who is already at average. It cannot increase already super-human beings.
Notable Flaws
Age: He is in his late years, so many parts of his body had begun to deteriorate. His bones are incredibly brittle and weak, his skin is scaly and fragile, all of his senses are dimming, and without his glasses he is nearly blind. Fortunately Alzheimer's hasn't set in yet.
Blood Disease: During his late years he had contracted a lethal blood disease that randomly flares up. The only visible sign is heavy coughing due to blood leaking into his lungs, and will cause him to hack up some of that blood. Normally this disease would kill him in a few weeks, but due to the flawed immortality he gave himself, he is permanently stuck in the later stages of the illness. It is incurable. Flare ups are more common when excited or winded.
Arrogance: Face it, he knows more than you.
Equipment: Only the clothes on his back came with him to Althanas.
Taru the Golem; Taru is a small clay man he created to come with him as his servant and good friend. It is incredibly intelligent, fiercely loyal, and is constantly aware of Zaun's conscious and unconscious thoughts. However, it is not capable of speech. It is unfortunately made from not completely-fired clay, and is incredibly susceptible to heat. If heated too much he would turn into solid pottery, but it would not kill him. Zaun could fix this, over time, with access to fresh water. Despite the clay nature, he is waterproof. Other than being able to do small chores, it has no actual abilities to speak of.
History:(giving a summary instead of a detailed narrative to avoid 'spoilers'. More will be revealed over time.)
Zaun was a well known, if not well-liked, alchemist and thaumaturge on Earth. In his final days he discovered a 'long obscured' ritual to cross-over to the afterlife to obtain immense knowledge of the inner-workings of the universe. The travel would be made fully living, and in done correctly, would deposit the ritualist back into his circle unscathed and enlightened. Having recently contracted a blood disease that threatened his life, he prepared for the ritual with little regret and much hope. Of the preparations was a rite to strip oneself of all worldly possessions. He concocted a brew that would, over the course of two hours, remove him of all his memories. It gave him just enough time to create the portal and complete the rites. Unfortunately, everything seemed to go right up until the portal to the after-life opening. At that moment the first golem he had ever created, Taru, unexpectedly hurtled into the circle and prematurely thrust his master through the portal. The first moment he was aware of his new life was on the beaches of Corone, sitting next to a strange tiny clay man, not knowing who he was or where he was.
A small white card sat in his hand that said, "You are Zaun, seek Immortality."
(feel free to rip it apart)
Name: "Zaun"
Age: 60
Race: Human
Hair Color: Gray
Eye Color: Soft, sky blue.
Height: 5'8"
Weight: ~142lbs
Occupation: Thaumaturge
Personality: Well, you'll just have to find out.
Appearance: Even through thorough examination, Zaun would not strike anyone as unusual or out of the ordinary. He is often seen wearing a simple brown hooded cloak to bide back the weather, with well-kept clothing underneath. A white button-down shirt tucked into basic black pants. Often times he is seen with a black vest, and a red or black scarf around his neck. If possible his clothes are kept in the best condition, and thoroughly clean. His hair has grown gray from age, and is parted off to one side, falling just above his eyes. Along with his obvious advanced age, his skin is in incredibly frail, and it looks like he hasn't gotten much sunlight in his life. Otherwise very average, although noticeably tidy and clean.
Taru's Appearance: At all times Zaun is seen with a small gray clay golem. It appears to be a mostly featureless bulky man, standing about one foot tall, made of semi-soft clay. The clay seems to be in the stage between being malleable and completely solid. The golem has a large magical circle inscribed onto his 'face' in black, and has no other facial features. He only has two fingers and one thumb on each hand. When sleeping he is capable of curling up into a small ball that, at close inspection, seems to be smaller than his total mass when standing. The resulting size is relative to a tennis ball on Earth. When one looks into the magic circle for a face, they may get a slight inkling of sentience staring back.
Skills:
Art: Very capable in handling a pencil, and thus can sketch anything he can remember in a realism style, or jot down most things tumbling around his brain. Used often when planning experiments, and is used to speed-drawing. Generally uses a hyper-realist style, but cuts the corners on shading.
Book-Smarts: Can skim through a book to find the juicy bits as well as the best of them. Countless years spent doing nothing but research in a library has made this an innate skill.
Science: Has a notable understanding of how the world around him works.
Magical Theory: Research into Alchemy and ritualistic magic has given him a thirst for knowledge in the inner-workings of the supernatural, thus is capable of taking apart and understanding many magical phenomenon, although it takes time and experimentation.
Alchemy: Capable of mixing reagents and natural components together to make various potions and cures. Often used to create pain reliever for his frequent head-aches.
Linguistics: Zaun has studied numerous languages and can pick up on languages quickly. He is also quite skilled at cyphers, both take time to translate, and without a "Rosetta Stone" even the simplest of languages can be permanently foreign.
Higher Education: Has all of the knowledge and understandings of having gone through ten years of college learning in a reputable academy.
Lore: After reading hundreds of stories that only contain tiny snippets of information on what he is looking for, he has many fables and parables internalized.
Abilities:
False Immortality: Through the final Transmutation Zaun performed to reach Althanas, he created a flawed immortality. Unfortunately it has frozen him in his current physical state, never aging, but also his blood disease cannot progress to kill him. However unless the false immortality is cured, he also cannot be cured of his illness. He can still be damaged in any way a human can, and can easily die. This truly only affects the way his age and the cessation of his deteriorating health.
Thaumaturgy: This is where Zaun truly shines, and the culmination of his research shows. With his various understandings of the inner workings of the mundane and supernatural world he is capable of, when given access to the raw materials required, create marvels that could be considered miraculous. Unfortunately, due to the circumstances of his arrival to Althanas, he has forgotten a lot of the recipes he had used to create some of his previous marvels. Golem creation is currently out of his hands, although he does seem to be able to repair scrapes and scratches on Taru if he has access to clay and water. Through some experimentation he has managed to create small amounts of Red Water again, which if ingested allows his body to recuperate faster from injury or illness. Although the speed only cuts one or two days off the total time. Even in his prime he could never master 'True' transmutation of any kind, but could sometimes use various materials to improve upon a substance.
'Common' Recipes: [Format: Name; Reagents; Time to make; tools to make; description]
Cinnabar**; Possible raw material, can be mined, used in other recipes; A few hours; Refined with a Crucible
Elixir; Cinnabar, Water*, Any herbs with healing properties; ~30 minutes; Crucible, Mortar & Pestle; Elixir is capable of healing one's wounds at a rapid rate. It simply speeds up the body's natural abilities to recover. At best it will decrease the total recovery time by a few days. However if made with concentrated Cinnabar then it can be applied directly to a grievous wound to do minimal healing but close the wound instantly to help the patient survive. Extremely painful if applied topically instead of ingested. Tastes bad.
Golem Salve; Clay, Water*, (Optional) Source of magic; Less than 5 minutes; No tools required; A weak salve that when applied to a Clay Golem can help it quickly recover from minor injuries. In larger amounts it can recover a golem if it has been accidentally heated into being solid.
Alumentum; Coal or wood, Water*, Heat source; 10-20 minutes per; Crucible; A strange substance that burns three times as long as coal with the same level of heat given off. Useful for baking objects, campfires, or ensuring that a house burns down. Incredible flammable, and can light fire from extreme heat without requiring a spark. If stored in an air-tight bottle it will not light.
Evertide; Water*, Ocean Salt, Raw Fish; Several hours; Crucible, Mortar; Creates a very small gel-like substance that naturally forms itself into a small sphere. When squeezed it produces water. The ball will last a week before it dries up on its own, however it will provide nearly endless amounts of water up until that time. It seems to be converting natural magical essence from the air into completely pure water. If the ball is dropped into a small body of water (large pond) it will purify the water inside in under a minute, but will also be consumed.
Focus; Cinnabar, Gold, Wood; Several minutes; Workbench; Creates a wand or object that passively draws in the natural atmospheric magic of the area. Can be used to infuse raw magic into a creation or formula. Doesn't have any combat applications without great creativity. Must be touched to the object and 'willed' to fill the object with magic.
Dangerous Recipes
Temporary Teranium; Iron object to manipulate, Water*, Cinnabar; 10 minutes; Mortar; A solution that when applied to Iron or an Iron object will temporarily transmute it into a magically potent metal called Teranium. It is 1 tier sharper and stronger than Steel, however it will only last a few hours. The more the object is used the shorter the duration will become. Once it returns to its previous form it cannot be transmuted again for a full day. If transmuted during a full moon it will last several hours longer than usual, and the duration will not be affected by use.
Nitor; Torchbug Dust, Coal, Water*; 30 minutes; Crucible; A unique reaction that relies on at least a tiny level of atmospheric magic. Fortunately, most places have at least a basic aura, and when in such an area the flame will never extinguish on its own. It can be put out with water, but will burn without oxygen. Same level of heat as normal flame. Can be kept in bottles for safe storage.
Infused Wood; Wood, Cinnabar, Water*; 10 minutes; Crucible; Enchants the wood to be magically potent. Not truly "used" by itself, but is a reagent is most all crafting using Thaumaturgy.
Wand of Fire; Infused Wood, Nitor, Cinnabar, Evertide, Teranium, Water*; 1 hour; Workbench, Crucible, Focus; Creates a focus that can expel Nitor. It creates a minor flame-thrower like effect, with a range of around 10 feet. The Nitor that it expels is however somewhat magically drained, and will only burn as long as normal fire. The fire is also now requiring air to continue burning. The wand will last for 5 minutes of sustained use, or forever if not used. One note is that the Teranium is stabilized if used to create a Wand of Fire, and the enchantment won't wear off. After being used up it can either be completely replaced, or recharged using Nitor and a Focus. Each time it is recharged it loses half a minute's worth of capacity.
*A note on any entry that includes Water. Due to the nature of Alchemy and Thaumaturgy, the purer the water the more powerful the solution. However, any water can be used. The less pure or clean the weaker the end-result. Dramatic differences are noticeable, the effect given is the most powerful possible.
**If Cinnabar is ingested in a water or powder format it will give the user small physiological improvements (1.5x human speed, strength, etc) for the duration of one hour. However at the end of the duration the user will become incredibly ill and nauseous for several minutes. Even the strong-willed will have a hard time keeping their composure. Over-use of Cinnabar can be lethal. The increase to capabilities will only affect someone who is already at average. It cannot increase already super-human beings.
Notable Flaws
Age: He is in his late years, so many parts of his body had begun to deteriorate. His bones are incredibly brittle and weak, his skin is scaly and fragile, all of his senses are dimming, and without his glasses he is nearly blind. Fortunately Alzheimer's hasn't set in yet.
Blood Disease: During his late years he had contracted a lethal blood disease that randomly flares up. The only visible sign is heavy coughing due to blood leaking into his lungs, and will cause him to hack up some of that blood. Normally this disease would kill him in a few weeks, but due to the flawed immortality he gave himself, he is permanently stuck in the later stages of the illness. It is incurable. Flare ups are more common when excited or winded.
Arrogance: Face it, he knows more than you.
Equipment: Only the clothes on his back came with him to Althanas.
Taru the Golem; Taru is a small clay man he created to come with him as his servant and good friend. It is incredibly intelligent, fiercely loyal, and is constantly aware of Zaun's conscious and unconscious thoughts. However, it is not capable of speech. It is unfortunately made from not completely-fired clay, and is incredibly susceptible to heat. If heated too much he would turn into solid pottery, but it would not kill him. Zaun could fix this, over time, with access to fresh water. Despite the clay nature, he is waterproof. Other than being able to do small chores, it has no actual abilities to speak of.
History:(giving a summary instead of a detailed narrative to avoid 'spoilers'. More will be revealed over time.)
Zaun was a well known, if not well-liked, alchemist and thaumaturge on Earth. In his final days he discovered a 'long obscured' ritual to cross-over to the afterlife to obtain immense knowledge of the inner-workings of the universe. The travel would be made fully living, and in done correctly, would deposit the ritualist back into his circle unscathed and enlightened. Having recently contracted a blood disease that threatened his life, he prepared for the ritual with little regret and much hope. Of the preparations was a rite to strip oneself of all worldly possessions. He concocted a brew that would, over the course of two hours, remove him of all his memories. It gave him just enough time to create the portal and complete the rites. Unfortunately, everything seemed to go right up until the portal to the after-life opening. At that moment the first golem he had ever created, Taru, unexpectedly hurtled into the circle and prematurely thrust his master through the portal. The first moment he was aware of his new life was on the beaches of Corone, sitting next to a strange tiny clay man, not knowing who he was or where he was.
A small white card sat in his hand that said, "You are Zaun, seek Immortality."
(feel free to rip it apart)