The Second Cataclysm (OOC, Open)

[Olthar]

Though, it might help the party if every proto-element is accounted for.

Fair enough. Fire still works with the idea I have for my character.

Make whatever character you want. I'm still expecting more players, anyways.

[The Verdantderm Lands]

This game was also described as Harry Potter-ish.

Muggles? Pure and mud-bloods? Houses?

Oh, may I change the character's degree goal to Aether, pkease?

[Kassaran]

Name: Cadus Mayne
Gender: Male
Age: 17
Appearance: The easy-going youth that seems to sleepwalk through life. His head is a sandy-brown mop of unkempt hair and his grey-blue eyes peer out from long, shaggy bangs. Most other hair has been drawn up behind his head in a ponytail. His frame is slender, having yet to fully finish maturing into the stocky frame of his brothers and father, but his muscles are lean from many hours of running and working to avoid being nagged on his off-days. He sports a tan that breaks at his waistline, his preference for wearing no shirt stemming from long days under the summer sun in rural Altomura. He can usually be found sporting his trademark wide-brimmed hat and a pair of brown trousers to accommodate whatever uniform he's been given. Oh, and his feet are absolutely horrid, so if he goes to take off his boots, run.

Personality: He's quick-witted and headstrong. Struck more often than not by flights of fancy and the strong urge to take a nap in the nearest high place possible. He often takes things in life for granted and in the frame of mind of someone who grew up on the wild frontiers of the world as a shepherd for a small homestead.

Life Goal: Dedicating himself at the age of fifteen to become a Necrotheurge, his interest in the generally forbidden art comes from a desire to find ways to re-purpose the magic and to rebuild it as a healing art. While his path may be long and arduous, he's slept on the idea quite heavily and has never before been so set on an idea.

Favored Element: Water
Elements Known: Water, Wood
Degree Pursuing: Blood

Backstory:

The third son of the five born to the Mayne family, his life was generally easygoing on his parent's farm, raised to tend to the cattle and the goats, his place as a shepherd was undisputed in the small town of Bellfellow, many miles deep into the Altomuran hinterlands near the much contested borders with the separatist states to the east. His life consisted of the typical peasant living, working hard through the day and learning about the stories of his people, the land, and how to read them from the various books his mother had brought from the central regions. His head grew in knowledge with each year, and as he watched his two older brothers grow, he knew he'd eventually be in competition with them for the farm. At least, that's what he'd grown to think up until they both left for the ranks of the Altomuran military, conscripted in a recruitment drive that passed through their neck of the backwoods.

Left behind by his brothers, and without so much as a note in explanation, Cadus became sad and withdrawn. It would be almost a year of skulking and moping before his magic would bring back the light to his eyes. Discovery at every turn as he began to Changings, he remembered watching his brothers discover their own elements all those years ago. To his joy and wonderment, he found himself slowly learning to manipulate not only water, but also the forces of life within the plants around him. As he began to learn how to use his powers on the sly, he used them for his own benefit. Cattle no longer suffered the wounds inflicted by wild animals that occasionally strayed too close to his flock, as he learned how to mend the torn skin and muscle with a flourish of the hand and a generous outpouring of water. Plants grew lush and verdant in his pasture, enticing his goats to remain nearby and not wander in spite of their curious nature.

It wouldn't be until his 15th birthday that his mother and father learned of his gift, while in the midst of a terrible autumnal storm, a portion of the roof of their barn caved in and injured several livestock. Brought finally to reveal his gifts to his parents, that he'd hidden to avoid being sent away to study for, he spent the rest of the night tending to each goat and cow which had been injured in the accident. When daybreak came, and the storm subsided in its fury, he lay asleep in the barn, with every last one of his flock alive with him. It wouldn't be long after before his peaceful and lazy lifestyle as a simple shepherd was ended and he was forced to study from an old leather-bound tome his mother had hidden away.

By this time, all of his brothers had taken after his father, a retired soldier from the wars of decades prior. Fire and Earth ran in their Elemental favor and left Cadus as the only heir of his mother's magic. A retired healer from the Altomuran military, and graduate from some distinguished school in the cities to the southwest, she had long since stored away her old grimoire. Emblazoned with the crest of her family, a noble family of low rank and status, it held within it the means for him to finally look in earnest into becoming the mage he always wanted to be. Stories from old childhood books spoke of a magic that looked beyond flesh and into the lifeblood of the natural world around him, and he spent hours poring over the old grimoire, looking to perfect his art as a healer and builder of life.

His new lifestyle would soon be completely upended as an old family friend, a warrior of noble rank within the kingdom, paid a visit to the Mayne estate in Bellfellow. The dinner turned slowly more and more directed towards the eldest remaining son of the Maynes, and his receiving a more proper education in the schools of the south. As a decision was soon made, Cadus was excused from the dinner table and instructed to pack a bag with enough clothes for a few days' travel and his mother's old spellbook. Realizing he was soon set to be sent away with this Sir Eric of the Cobalt Blade, he spent the better part of the night debating what this meant for his life at the farm. The answer came quickly as he was awoken early in the morning before the sunrise and ushered out of the house. His mother and father wishing him goodbye, he bid farewell to the only home he'd ever known and traveled in the care of the old warrior off to the west, on the trip that would change his life.

While his journey would be long and difficult, under the guidance and tutelage of the retired war magus, he would slowly grow to hone his magic as an apprentice magician. His destination would be Sir Whifflebottom's Academy of Arts and Magic, the alma mater of his mother, in whose name he would pass the test and finally become a student at the most prestigious magic academy in the land.

[Constaniana]

If my character already knows 2/5 of the proto-elements, would it still be possible for him to learn a third? Not at the start of the RP obviously, but for his degree. I had settled on fire and water as his first two, but since Chaomancy isn't an offered degree I thought Auxatheurgy would be a good direction to eventually head.

[WhatsamattaU]

This game was also described as Harry Potter-ish.

Muggles? Pure and mud-bloods? Houses?

Oh, may I change the character's degree goal to Aether, please?

[WhatsamattaU]

If my character already knows 2/5 of the proto-elements, would it still be possible for him to learn a third? Not at the start of the RP obviously, but for his degree. I had settled on fire and water as his first two, but since Chaomancy isn't an offered degree I thought Auxatheurgy would be a good direction to eventually head.

I think, according to how things were worded, that you can elect to either have 3 first level elements, OR 2 first level elements and 1 second level element.

[Olthar]

This game was also described as Harry Potter-ish.

Muggles? Pure and mud-bloods? Houses?

Oh, may I change the character's degree goal to Aether, pkease?

Yeah, sure.

If my character already knows 2/5 of the proto-elements, would it still be possible for him to learn a third? Not at the start of the RP obviously, but for his degree. I had settled on fire and water as his first two, but since Chaomancy isn't an offered degree I thought Auxatheurgy would be a good direction to eventually head.

I think, according to how things were worded, that you can elect to either have 3 first level elements, OR 2 first level elements and 1 second level element.

Correct.

[Constaniana]

This game was also described as Harry Potter-ish.

Muggles? Pure and mud-bloods? Houses?

Oh, may I change the character's degree goal to Aether, pkease?

I don't think there's anything like that. Magic is a known fact to everyone, so there's no muggles. Some bloodlines are stronger than others at magic though. The OP said nothing about there being houses in the academy.

If my character already knows 2/5 of the proto-elements, would it still be possible for him to learn a third? Not at the start of the RP obviously, but for his degree. I had settled on fire and water as his first two, but since Chaomancy isn't an offered degree I thought Auxatheurgy would be a good direction to eventually head.

I think, according to how things were worded, that you can elect to either have 3 first level elements, OR 2 first level elements and 1 second level element.

I understood that, but I was talking about the long-term. When he's been there a few years would he be able to learn a 3rd proto-element after mastering his hyper element?

[The Verdantderm Lands]

Questions:

One, as a faith, how are you handling spiritualism?

Two, would slyphs, gnomes, salamanders, undines and dryads be thought of as Spirits or would they be extremely rare creatures/entities that might be mistaken for spirits, or do they even exist?

[Olthar]

Name: Cadus Mayne
Gender: Male
Age: 17
Appearance: The easy-going youth that seems to sleepwalk through life. His head is a sandy-brown mop of unkempt hair and his grey-blue eyes peer out from long, shaggy bangs. Most other hair has been drawn up behind his head in a ponytail. His frame is slender, having yet to fully finish maturing into the stocky frame of his brothers and father, but his muscles are lean from many hours of running and working to avoid being nagged on his off-days. He sports a tan that breaks at his waistline, his preference for wearing no shirt stemming from long days under the summer sun in rural Altomura. He can usually be found sporting his trademark wide-brimmed hat and a pair of brown trousers to accommodate whatever uniform he's been given. Oh, and his feet are absolutely horrid, so if he goes to take off his boots, run.

Personality: He's quick-witted and headstrong. Struck more often than not by flights of fancy and the strong urge to take a nap in the nearest high place possible. He often takes things in life for granted and in the frame of mind of someone who grew up on the wild frontiers of the world as a shepherd for a small homestead.

Life Goal: Dedicating himself at the age of fifteen to become a Necrotheurge, his interest in the generally forbidden art comes from a desire to find ways to re-purpose the magic and to rebuild it as a healing art. While his path may be long and arduous, he's slept on the idea quite heavily and has never before been so set on an idea.

Favored Element: Water
Elements Known: Water, Wood
Degree Pursuing: Blood

Backstory:

The third son of the five born to the Mayne family, his life was generally easygoing on his parent's farm, raised to tend to the cattle and the goats, his place as a shepherd was undisputed in the small town of Bellfellow, many miles deep into the Altomuran hinterlands near the much contested borders with the separatist states to the east. His life consisted of the typical peasant living, working hard through the day and learning about the stories of his people, the land, and how to read them from the various books his mother had brought from the central regions. His head grew in knowledge with each year, and as he watched his two older brothers grow, he knew he'd eventually be in competition with them for the farm. At least, that's what he'd grown to think up until they both left for the ranks of the Altomuran military, conscripted in a recruitment drive that passed through their neck of the backwoods.

Left behind by his brothers, and without so much as a note in explanation, Cadus became sad and withdrawn. It would be almost a year of skulking and moping before his magic would bring back the light to his eyes. Discovery at every turn as he began to Changings, he remembered watching his brothers discover their own elements all those years ago. To his joy and wonderment, he found himself slowly learning to manipulate not only water, but also the forces of life within the plants around him. As he began to learn how to use his powers on the sly, he used them for his own benefit. Cattle no longer suffered the wounds inflicted by wild animals that occasionally strayed too close to his flock, as he learned how to mend the torn skin and muscle with a flourish of the hand and a generous outpouring of water. Plants grew lush and verdant in his pasture, enticing his goats to remain nearby and not wander in spite of their curious nature.

It wouldn't be until his 15th birthday that his mother and father learned of his gift, while in the midst of a terrible autumnal storm, a portion of the roof of their barn caved in and injured several livestock. Brought finally to reveal his gifts to his parents, that he'd hidden to avoid being sent away to study for, he spent the rest of the night tending to each goat and cow which had been injured in the accident. When daybreak came, and the storm subsided in its fury, he lay asleep in the barn, with every last one of his flock alive with him. It wouldn't be long after before his peaceful and lazy lifestyle as a simple shepherd was ended and he was forced to study from an old leather-bound tome his mother had hidden away.

By this time, all of his brothers had taken after his father, a retired soldier from the wars of decades prior. Fire and Earth ran in their Elemental favor and left Cadus as the only heir of his mother's magic. A retired healer from the Altomuran military, and graduate from some distinguished school in the cities to the southwest, she had long since stored away her old grimoire. Emblazoned with the crest of her family, a noble family of low rank and status, it held within it the means for him to finally look in earnest into becoming the mage he always wanted to be. Stories from old childhood books spoke of a magic that looked beyond flesh and into the lifeblood of the natural world around him, and he spent hours poring over the old grimoire, looking to perfect his art as a healer and builder of life.

His new lifestyle would soon be completely upended as an old family friend, a warrior of noble rank within the kingdom, paid a visit to the Mayne estate in Bellfellow. The dinner turned slowly more and more directed towards the eldest remaining son of the Maynes, and his receiving a more proper education in the schools of the south. As a decision was soon made, Cadus was excused from the dinner table and instructed to pack a bag with enough clothes for a few days' travel and his mother's old spellbook. Realizing he was soon set to be sent away with this Sir Eric of the Cobalt Blade, he spent the better part of the night debating what this meant for his life at the farm. The answer came quickly as he was awoken early in the morning before the sunrise and ushered out of the house. His mother and father wishing him goodbye, he bid farewell to the only home he'd ever known and traveled in the care of the old warrior off to the west, on the trip that would change his life.

While his journey would be long and difficult, under the guidance and tutelage of the retired war magus, he would slowly grow to hone his magic as an apprentice magician. His destination would be Sir Whifflebottom's Academy of Arts and Magic, the alma mater of his mother, in whose name he would pass the test and finally become a student at the most prestigious magic academy in the land.

Accepted.

[Olthar]

This game was also described as Harry Potter-ish.

Muggles? Pure and mud-bloods? Houses?

Oh, may I change the character's degree goal to Aether, pkease?

I don't think there's anything like that. Magic is a known fact to everyone, so there's no muggles. Some bloodlines are stronger than others at magic though. The OP said nothing about there being houses in the academy.

Yeah. My reference to Harry Potter in the ad post was more a general reference to the magic school aspect. This is not a Harry Potter RP, and those specific details aren't present.

I think, according to how things were worded, that you can elect to either have 3 first level elements, OR 2 first level elements and 1 second level element.

I understood that, but I was talking about the long-term. When he's been there a few years would he be able to learn a 3rd proto-element after mastering his hyper element?

Yep. It's unusual (and difficult) for someone to master all five proto-elements, but two or three is common.

Questions:

One, as a faith, how are you handling spiritualism?

Two, would slyphs, gnomes, salamanders, undines and dryads be thought of as Spirits or would they be extremely rare creatures/entities that might be mistaken for spirits, or do they even exist?

First, religion in this world is much like religion in our world: people believe completely that it's real, but there is no actual evidence to suggest that. Whether it's true or not is uncertain, so it requires faith.

Second, mythical creatures are in that same realm of faith. There are people who firmly believe they exist, especially people in the rural areas, but there have been no confirmed sightings and no objective evidence. They may exist or they may not.

[The Verdantderm Lands]

Thank you.

[Saint Ryvern]

Where is the academy located in Altomura?

[Olthar]

Where is the academy located in Altomura?

I hadn't considered it, but it would logically be in one of the bigger cities, or possibly even the biggest city. So, let's say the north-west coast. This seems like important information, so I'll add something to the OP about it.

[Saint Ryvern]

Where is the academy located in Altomura?

I hadn't considered it, but it would logically be in one of the bigger cities, or possibly even the biggest city. So, let's say the north-west coast. This seems like important information, so I'll add something to the OP about it.

I had imagined it being deep in the countryside because of the Harry Potter comparison, so I’m glad I asked.

[Constaniana]

I don't think there's anything like that. Magic is a known fact to everyone, so there's no muggles. Some bloodlines are stronger than others at magic though. The OP said nothing about there being houses in the academy.

Yeah. My reference to Harry Potter in the ad post was more a general reference to the magic school aspect. This is not a Harry Potter RP, and those specific details aren't present.

I understood that, but I was talking about the long-term. When he's been there a few years would he be able to learn a 3rd proto-element after mastering his hyper element?

Yep. It's unusual (and difficult) for someone to master all five proto-elements, but two or three is common.

Questions:

One, as a faith, how are you handling spiritualism?

Two, would slyphs, gnomes, salamanders, undines and dryads be thought of as Spirits or would they be extremely rare creatures/entities that might be mistaken for spirits, or do they even exist?

First, religion in this world is much like religion in our world: people believe completely that it's real, but there is no actual evidence to suggest that. Whether it's true or not is uncertain, so it requires faith.

Second, mythical creatures are in that same realm of faith. There are people who firmly believe they exist, especially people in the rural areas, but there have been no confirmed sightings and no objective evidence. They may exist or they may not.

Cool beans.

[Reverend Norv]

Name: Hugh Fitzroy, Marquis of Archenfeld
Gender: Male
Age: 18

Appearance:

"I take after my father, who took after his father, and so on back to the Bastard of Archenfeld two hundred years ago, who is the reason we all look like Morningstars. Among other things, we grow strong and swiftly: I am already a man's size, tall and broad across the shoulders, and with the build of a knight of yore: trim in the hips, long in the shanks, with heavy arms and large hands. My hair is dark red, Morningstar red, worn simple and short and often a little unkempt, and my eyes are very bright blue: not like the sea, but like the flame of a crucible. I still have the dark tan - very dark for a nobleman - of the Dinican sun, and I carry a knotted white scar across my shoulders from the axe of a native warrior. I keep it covered; it is a dishonorable thing, for all that I was sixteen when I received it. No Fitzroy should ever show his back to a foe."

Personality:

"I don't think I've ever had the chance to develop much of a personality of my own choosing. I am what life has made me, save perhaps for this - that I am thoughtful and reflective enough to be aware of that fact. I was raised to meet a certain standard of what a Fitzroy of Archenfeld should be: decisive and confident under pressure, fearless in the face of danger, generous and inspiring to friends, a grim and unrelenting terror to enemies. I - do my best. Usually it's good enough, but I've often thought that the need to be all of those different things, all at once, is what has made my family so serious and self-disciplined. Leadership, especially in the Marches, is like pyrokinesis: lose your focus, and people will die. Responsibility is not a choice, and so neither is your personality. You become what you have to be.

"I think maybe that's why my father left on his insane venture, back when I was too young to understand. He couldn't be the Fitzroy of Archenfeld anymore, so he left to seek a newer world. And in spite of how it all ended, I'm glad of those years in Dinica. They taught me what it feels like to work with your hands, to know that you eat only because you have toiled for it. They taught me to see value in the humblest tasks. I don't think I would have learned that, otherwise. And Dinica taught me, too, what it feels like to live in fear of any sudden noise in the dark. It taught me something about war that all the glorious sagas of my Marcher ancestors never would. It left a mark, that: and not just on my back. I still don't like the dark."

Life Goal: "Burghers and merchants and scholars get to choose what to live for. It's a luxury not available to men of my station. My purpose in life is to guard the frontier, serve the Queen, and do justice to my lands. It was chosen for me before I was born. I'm here to hone my skills so as to meet it. It's a heavier burden than my father could bear. I pray it will not be beyond me as well."

Favored Element: Fire
Elements Known: Fire, Air, Lightning
Degree Pursuing: Teletheurgy

Backstory:

"I have had a very strange life, I realize now; a life that left little time for childhood. It's given me a lot of good stories, if nothing else. I'll tell you a few of them now.

"I am a Fitzroy of Archenfeld. We are a noble family, Marcher lords of the hills along the Mulmurth border. Two hundred years ago, a bastard of Henry III Morningstar won a great battle against the rebel Grand Duke near Archenfeld, and in gratitude Henry acknowledged him and granted the borderlands to him and his heirs in perpetuity. A poisoned chalice: sentencing generations of us to a lonely watch on those rocky hills, amid the heather and the bracken, the last guardians of a lost war that our country would rather forget. You've heard of the family, I'm sure, if only because the Marquis of Archenfeld is usually sixteenth or seventeenth in line to the throne.

"I spent my earliest years there, in the ancient castle at Archenfeld. I remember tutors: languages, history, swordsmanship, riding, law. Every Fitzroy since the Bastard of Archenfeld has been a pyromancer, most of them powerfully gifted, and I am no exception. That was a part of my education too: always keep control, never let loose, always be channeling and focusing and directing, always be deliberate and purposeful. I saw little of my father; he spent his time overseeing fortifications on the frontier, sitting in judgment in the local court, listening to his spies on the other side of the border. I do remember a little of my mother, though. She was large and gentle, and she would make sparks dance on her fingertips to make me laugh. She died when I was seven. I still don't know exactly how.

"The next year, my father took me and two hundred soldiers and six hundred farmers who wanted a better life in a land where the earth would grow something other than bracken, and he received a royal charter to establish a colony on the coast of Dinica - at our family's own expense, mind you. Insanity, I know now. Maybe a death wish. Some combination of my mother's passing and the endless, thankless work of guarding the frontier, of being the Fitzroy in Archenfeld, with all the obligations that went with that. At any rate, we sailed together for eleven days, and then dropped anchor at the mouth of a river. Overlooking the spot was a narrow strip of grassy highlands, and then the endless jungle beyond. We built our settlement on the heights, and called it Eleanoria, after the queen.

"I don't know how to feel, looking back on it. It was unspeakable hubris, and it cost all of us everything, and to bring a child along was wanton cruelty. But on that voyage, and in those first years after we arrived, my father spent hours with me for the first time in my life. He was funny, and excited, and taught me himself instead of leaving me to tutors. I was nine, ten. I thought that Eleanoria was the best thing that had ever happened to us.

"And that's the strange thing. I should have been miserable. We were all sick, all the time, with those diseases wafting out of the swamps. My first real, adult use of pyromancy was to help manage fevers. The settlers worked constantly to try to make our crops from home grow. Gods, we worked so hard that I was out there as a boy, up to my knees in mud to help with the planting - me, the seventeenth in line to the throne of Altomura! I learned the value of that work, the common work that keeps us fed. Not that it worked, though: by a few years in, nothing we planted would grow, and we were living off the breadfruit that we traded for with the native tribes. Only ever trade, you see: when we sent foragers out into the jungle, the tribesmen set on them with blowpipes and poison darts and spears, and slaughtered them.

"I grew up fast. Yes, that's fair. There was real danger, real hardship, real responsibility from a very young age. I met those challenges because I knew, even at ten or twelve, that the alternative was unthinkable. But - I think that this is true, that it's not just my memory playing tricks - I was happy. That's what I remember. Feet in the dirt, sun on my back. Empty belly half the time, but my father loved me and the people took care of me. Danger all around, but I could lay my hands on a fevered brow and make it cool. Purpose. Simplicity. Clarity. That's what I remember.

"I don't think that was all a lie. It wasn't enough, in the end. But it was real while it lasted.

"When I was fifteen, the natives started raiding Eleanoria itself. Frightening, at first, but no one was killed: chickens carried off before dawn, poisoned needles left scattered in the tall grass. Then torches hurled at outlying buildings in the night. Then we found Raymond Lyfeld and his wife hacked to death with axes in their bed. My father led a group of soldiers out into the jungle and left me in charge of the colony. I set a watch every night, and every night a man was wounded or killed. My father returned a week later with eight of the thirty men with whom he had set out. I said that we should get the ships ready. He refused. Later, I told Gilbert Stanbury to do it anyway.

"That night, we heard something. Drums, beating in frenzied unison for hours, out in the dark somewhere beyond the treeline. Massed chanting. We smelled fire: burned meat, the alcoholic stench of the local fruit wine poured over hot coals. I saw shadows move on their own, out amid the trees, like wisps of living smoke. Those of us who were still alive stood in the dark, and waited.

"They came for us two hours before dawn, in the blackest watch of the night. Hundreds of them, and the shadows moved among them. Two volleys from the crossbows, and they kept coming. All the horses were dead, so we couldn't maneuver. We were running almost from the moment the first of them reached us, running for the ships. All but my father. I remember him standing alone, darkness all around, wreathed in fire and lightning like a second sun. A warrior got in my way, and I grabbed him, and the power coursed through my hands unbidden, and his flesh turned to ash in my fingers. The ships were just ahead. I felt pain sear across my back, blinding and bone-deep, and then Gilbert Stanbury grabbed me, and when I opened my eyes again we were on the ships and moving out to sea, spears still hissing overhead, and behind us Dinica was a vast black shape in the night, with one tiny, white-hot star of fire and lightning, pulsing on and on until it finally went out.

"That was how I lost my father. Two years ago now, almost to the day.

"We went home. I was the marquis now, they told me. I made Gilbert my regent. I studied: law, accounting, strategy. I wrapped myself in furs and shivered through the winters in my father's stone study, looking out the tower windows toward Mulmurth. I took responsibility where I could: hearing a case here, touring a border fortress there. I felt like I was playing a part meant for someone different; someone older, wiser, someone who hadn't seen the sun on the broad green leaves of the jungle. I played the part anyway, though, because I am the Fitzroy in Archenfeld now. So when it came time to go to Sir Whifflebottom's - ah, what a name! - like seven generations of my family had done before me, I did.

"I played my part, and I am still playing it. Someday, I hope, it will stop feeling like a masquerade; someday, if my life will not change itself to suit me, I will change enough to suit it. And until then? The lessons of my childhood: always keep control, never let loose, always be channeling and focusing and directing, always be deliberate and purposeful. It is enough to tame fire and lightning. It must surely be enough to tame myself as well."

[Olthar]

Name: Hugh Fitzroy, Marquis of Archenfeld
Gender: Male
Age: 18

Appearance:

"I take after my father, who took after his father, and so on back to the Bastard of Archenfeld two hundred years ago, who is the reason we all look like Morningstars. Among other things, we grow strong and swiftly: I am already a man's size, tall and broad across the shoulders, and with the build of a knight of yore: trim in the hips, long in the shanks, with heavy arms and large hands. My hair is dark red, Morningstar red, worn simple and short and often a little unkempt, and my eyes are very bright blue: not like the sea, but like the flame of a crucible. I still have the dark tan - very dark for a nobleman - of the Dinican sun, and I carry a knotted white scar across my shoulders from the stone axe of a native warrior. I keep it covered; it is a dishonorable thing, for all that I was sixteen when I received it. No Fitzroy should ever show his back to a foe."

Personality:

"I don't think I've ever had the chance to develop much of a personality of my own choosing. I am what life has made me, save perhaps for this - that I am thoughtful and reflective enough to be aware of that fact. I was raised to meet a certain standard of what a Fitzroy of Archenfeld should be: decisive and confident under pressure, fearless in the face of danger, generous and inspiring to friends, a grim and unrelenting terror to enemies. I - do my best. Usually it's good enough, but I've often thought that the need to be all of those different things, all at once, is what has made my family so serious and self-disciplined. Leadership, especially in the Marches, is like pyrokinesis: lose your focus, and people will die. Responsibility is not a choice, and so neither is your personality. You become what you have to be.

"I think maybe that's why my father left on his insane venture, back when I was too young to understand. He couldn't be the Fitzroy of Archenfeld anymore, so he left to seek a newer world. And in spite of how it all ended, I'm glad of those years in Dinica. They taught me what it feels like to work with your hands, to know that you eat only because you have toiled for it. They taught me to see value in the humblest tasks. I don't think I would have learned that, otherwise. And Dinica taught me, too, what it feels like to live in fear of any sudden noise in the dark. It taught me something about war that all the glorious sagas of my Marcher ancestors never would. It left a mark, that: and not just on my back. I still don't like the dark."

Life Goal: "Burghers and merchants and scholars get to choose what to live for. It's a luxury not available to men of my station. My purpose in life is to guard the frontier, serve the Queen, and do justice to my lands. It was chosen for me before I was born. I'm here to hone my skills so as to meet it. It's a heavier burden than my father could bear. I pray it will not be beyond me as well."

Favored Element: Fire
Elements Known: Fire, Air, Lightning
Degree Pursuing: Teletheurgy

Backstory:

"I have had a very strange life, I realize now; a life that left little time for childhood. It's given me a lot of good stories, if nothing else. I'll tell you a few of them now.

"I am a Fitzroy of Archenfeld. We are a noble family, Marcher lords of the hills along the Mulmurth border. Two hundred years ago, a bastard of Henry III Morningstar won a great battle against the rebel Grand Duke near Archenfeld, and in gratitude Henry acknowledged him and granted the borderlands to him and his heirs in perpetuity. A poisoned chalice: sentencing generations of us to a lonely watch on those rocky hills, amid the heather and the bracken, the last guardians of a lost war that our country would rather forget. You've heard of the family, I'm sure, if only because the Marquis of Archenfeld is usually eighth or ninth in line to the throne.

"I spent my earliest years there, in the ancient castle at Archenfeld. I remember tutors: languages, history, swordsmanship, riding, law. Every Fitzroy since the Bastard of Archenfeld has been a pyromancer, most of them powerfully gifted, and I am no exception. That was a part of my education too: always keep control, never let loose, always be channeling and focusing and directing, always be deliberate and purposeful. I saw little of my father; he spent his time overseeing fortifications on the frontier, sitting in judgment in the local court, listening to his spies on the other side of the border. I do remember a little of my mother, though. She was large and gentle, and she would make sparks dance on her fingertips to make me laugh. She died when I was seven. I still don't know exactly how.

"The next year, my father took me and two hundred soldiers and six hundred farmers who wanted a better life in a land where the earth would grow something other than bracken, and he received a royal charter to establish a colony on the coast of Dinica - at our family's own expense, mind you. Insanity, I know now. Maybe a death wish. Some combination of my mother's passing and the endless, thankless work of guarding the frontier, of being the Fitzroy in Archenfeld, with all the obligations that went with that. At any rate, we sailed together for three months, and then dropped anchor at the mouth of a river. Overlooking the spot was a narrow strip of grassy highlands, and then the endless jungle beyond. We built our settlement on the heights, and called it Eleanoria, after the queen.

"I don't know how to feel, looking back on it. It was unspeakable hubris, and it cost all of us everything, and to bring a child along was wanton cruelty. But on that voyage, and in those first years after we arrived, my father spent hours with me for the first time in my life. He was funny, and excited, and taught me himself instead of leaving me to tutors. I was nine, ten. I thought that Eleanoria was the best thing that had ever happened to us.

"And that's the strange thing. I should have been miserable. We were all sick, all the time, with those diseases wafting out of the swamps. My first real, adult use of pyromancy was to help manage fevers. The settlers worked constantly to try to make our crops from home grow. Gods, we worked so hard that I was out there as a boy, up to my knees in mud to help with the planting - me, the tenth in line to the throne of Altomura! I learned the value of that work, the common work that keeps us fed. Not that it worked, though: by a few years in, nothing we planted would grow, and we were living off the breadfruit that we traded for with the native tribes. Only ever trade, you see: when we sent foragers out into the jungle, the tribesmen set on them with blowpipes and poison darts and stone axes, and slaughtered them.

"I grew up fast. Yes, that's fair. There was real danger, real hardship, real responsibility from a very young age. I met those challenges because I knew, even at ten or twelve, that the alternative was unthinkable. But - I think that this is true, that it's not just my memory playing tricks - I was happy. That's what I remember. Feet in the dirt, sun on my back. Empty belly half the time, but my father loved me and the people took care of me. Danger all around, but I could lay my hands on a fevered brow and make it cool. Purpose. Simplicity. Clarity. That's what I remember.

"I don't think that was all a lie. It wasn't enough, in the end. But it was real while it lasted.

"When I was fifteen, the natives started raiding Eleanoria itself. Frightening, at first, but no one was killed: chickens carried off before dawn, poisoned needles left scattered in the tall grass. Then torches hurled at outlying buildings in the night. Then we found Raymond Lyfeld and his wife hacked to death with stone axes in their bed. My father led a group of soldiers out into the jungle and left me in charge of the colony. I set a watch every night, and every night a man was wounded or killed. My father returned a week later with eight of the thirty men with whom he had set out. I said that we should get the ships ready. He refused. Later, I told Gilbert Stanbury to do it anyway.

"That night, we heard something. Drums, beating in frenzied unison for hours, out in the dark somewhere beyond the treeline. Massed chanting. We smelled fire: burned meat, the alcoholic stench of the local fruit wine poured over hot coals. I saw shadows move on their own, out amid the trees, like wisps of living smoke. Those of us who were still alive stood in the dark, and waited.

"They came for us two hours before dawn, in the blackest watch of the night. Hundreds of them, and the shadows moved among them. Two volleys from the crossbows, and they kept coming. All the horses were dead, so we couldn't maneuver. We were running almost from the moment the first of them reached us, running for the ships. All but my father. I remember him standing alone, darkness all around, wreathed in fire and lightning like a second sun. A warrior got in my way, and I grabbed him, and the power coursed through my hands unbidden, and his flesh turned to ash in my fingers. The ships were just ahead. I felt pain sear across my back, blinding and bone-deep, and then Gilbert Stanbury grabbed me, and when I opened my eyes again we were on the ships and moving out to sea, spears still hissing overhead, and behind us Dinica was a vast black shape in the night, with one tiny, white-hot star of fire and lightning, pulsing on and on until it finally went out.

"That was how I lost my father. Two years ago now, almost to the day.

"We went home. I was the marquis now, they told me. I made Gilbert my regent. I studied: law, accounting, strategy. I wrapped myself in furs and shivered through the winters in my father's stone study, looking out the tower windows toward Mulmurth. I took responsibility where I could: hearing a case here, touring a border fortress there. I felt like I was playing a part meant for someone different; someone older, wiser, someone who hadn't seen the sun on the broad green leaves of the jungle. I played the part anyway, though, because I am the Fitzroy in Archenfeld now. So when it came time to go to Sir Whifflebottom's - ah, what a name! -
like seven generations of my family had done before me, I did.

"I played my part, and I am still playing it. Someday, I hope, it will stop feeling like a masquerade; someday, if my life will not change itself to suit me, I will change enough to suit it. And until then? The lessons of my childhood: always keep control, never let loose, always be channeling and focusing and directing, always be deliberate and purposeful. It is enough to tame fire and lightning. It must surely be enough to tame myself as well."

You are far, far too good to be in this RP, but I'll accept you anyway.

I do have a few corrections to make for your backstory, though. Dinica is not that far away from Altomura, so a boat trip would only take, at most, two weeks. Second, the Fitzroys, as bastards, would be closer to ~16th/17th in line. Third, the people of Dinica do use metal weapons. The statements about the rest of the world in the OP are written from biased and unreliable perspective.

[Reverend Norv]

Fixed those points. Glad to be aboard!

[Olthar]

I've added a spoiler in the OP about the history and location of SIr Whifflebottom's Academy of the Arts and Magic. If anyone thinks it needs more information, please tell me. I'm also going to start adding information about NPCs to the second post. (The player list has been moved to the third post.)

[The Verdantderm Lands]

Cool.

[The Verdantderm Lands]

A couple of thoughts about some spells:

AIR Spell, Silence (Defeat Sound, Soundproof).

LIGHT Spell, Colibe (COherent LIght BEam (something like a laser beam), more controlled but not as damaging as lightning).

[Olthar]

A couple of thoughts about some spells:

AIR Spell, Silence (Defeat Sound, Soundproof).

LIGHT Spell, Colibe (COherent LIght BEam (something like a laser beam), more controlled but not as damaging as lightning).

There aren't specific spells like in D&D. It's more just general abilities that can be used in any way you can think of.

Air already controls sound, though as an advanced technique.

Light does not deal direct damage. It is purely a support element.

[The Verdantderm Lands]

A couple of thoughts about some spells:

AIR Spell, Silence (Defeat Sound, Soundproof).

LIGHT Spell, Colibe (COherent LIght BEam (something like a laser beam), more controlled but not as damaging as lightning).

There aren't specific spells like in D&D. It's more just general abilities that can be used in any way you can think of.

Air already controls sound, though as an advanced technique.

Light does not deal direct damage. It is purely a support element.

Okay.

I thought I might explore variations. This way, if I said ahead of time that a spell protected against a sonic attack or made an area soundless, then there wouldn't be someone arguing about it.

Can Light and Fire make a laser beam?

Would knowing hyper-element qualify someone to know advanced proto-element techniques?

[Olthar]

There aren't specific spells like in D&D. It's more just general abilities that can be used in any way you can think of.

Air already controls sound, though as an advanced technique.

Light does not deal direct damage. It is purely a support element.

Okay.

I thought I might explore variations. This way, if I said ahead of time that a spell protected against a sonic attack or made an area soundless, then there wouldn't be someone arguing about it.

Can Light and Fire make a laser beam?

Would knowing hyper-element qualify someone to know advanced proto-element techniques?

Light and fire don't combine.

Think of each element as a unique, individual skill. Learning how to play basketball doesn't make you a better hockey player. To gain advanced proto-element techniques, you need to spend time studying and practicing that proto-element.