[Summoning my SG, @loke ]
I'm playing an Herbam-focused Criamon (Betula) in the Wake of the Schism , as the name suggests the saga starts at the end of the Schism War in England as the war winds down and some who fled the "front-line" Tribunals begin to return for various reasons. We are only in the early stages of the game but our magi have met a group of non-Hermetic, non-Diedne Druids, some the 13th House were unable to assimilate forcefully or otherwise, and we interacted with them but their tradition is somewhat undefined far as we know. They have a burial ritual that, over time, fuses the spirit of the dead with the Genius Locus of the area which I plan to research in some manner. They seem to be pacifists and dislike both the Diedne and the rest of the Order due to the harm they have caused during the Schism War. The Path of Walking Backwards is too new in 1220 to have been around in 1013 or so. Due to this I have decided a player goal, later a character goal, will be to create a Criamon Path based on my maga's experiences (which I can't, exactly foresee) and insights gained from this non-hermetic magical tradition/school of thought.
Anyway, that's all the relevant background I think outside of whatever Loke may have up his sleeve and I was wondering if folks here might have some ideas around philosophy of a nature-oriented Criamon Path based on pacifistic "druidic" ideas. Brainstorming ideas around Avenues and Stations and their initiations would also be appreciated though I want those to seemingly be lead by the philosophy discussed and not "how do I justify this cool power." Any of the scant knowledge we have of historical druidic beliefs would also likely be appreciated even if perhaps suspect due to modern "new age" alterations.
A side question is how would you play some kind of revelation or whatever to make the experimental initiation process less mechanically grueling. Betula is not built specifically for that purpose and it's a rough mechanic.
We might use your ideas but the main thing for me at this point is to give Loke and me some ideas that we can pick and choose when this comes up in play. Thanks in advance.
Incorrect. Loke and I have defined it to a certain degree in private messages while I was creating Turold.
Hedge Tradition: Folk Witch
Subtradition: Druids of Nottinghamshire
Supernatural Abilities: Most are as folk witch (Animal Ken, Cursing, Dowsing, Flight, Healing, Second Sight). Shapeshifter is not available in the subtradition. They also have access to Nature (Forest) Lore from the HoH:MC Merinita chapter, and a special supernatural ability: http://rpg.schaathun.net/blog/Telepathy
Magical Defenses: As folk witch. Nature Lore gives Magical Fortitude vs herbam effects. Telepathy's magical defense is undefined right now since my character didn't pick it.
Special notes: There are probably no gifted in the Tradition (although there was one gifted in the past). Most of the folk witch rules (Kitchen, familiar, sabbat initiation) apply.
This is somewhat outside of your idea, as not a strictly Criamon path, but along the lines of the idea at the same time. If we learned their tradition lore, I suppose we could use either the sabbat initiation, or creating initiation scripts along the lines of their tradition. And by initiating forest lore, we could likely "Walk the path" of a druidic forest as described in the Rhine tribunal book. Incidentally, down the road, this might interest more than one character in the covenant.
Drinking a potion made through experimentation with a negative side effect of warping the user you gain enough Warping Points to enter Twilight. Either the experience is positive (by SG fiat), resulting in Insight, xp points in relevant cult lore or whatever, or you roll to comprehend (meaning it's not instantly positive), but you can still discuss a small benefit with the SG even if comprehension fails.
While you had this much liberty with Turold, I think the total number of virtues available to these (pseudo-)druids should be the same as for canon folk witches. Shapeshifter was removed to give room to telepathy. One more should be removed to give room for forest lore. Healing is already in play, but either cursing or flight could go, I think.
@loke , @temprobe , to be clear I'm less interested in replicating their powers than thinking on how their pacifistic yet worldly (by which I more mean "not gnostic-like" than the broader meaning of the term) philosophy and religious practices might meld with the fairly gnostic (as I understand them) ideas of the Criamon. That said, their power of Telepathy may speak to a certain worldview along the lines of "the connectedness of all things" and that may be fruitful.
@RafaelB , That is in line with one thought I had already of receiving a script, whole cloth, via a Twilight experience which my maga then needs to perform or find an exceptional guide (mystagogue in the Criamon parlance) to help her with as opposed to merely gaining a virtue from the Twilight rather than needing to go through the Script Experimentation process. Sidestepping the Initiation process is to be avoided in my view. Could also be mechanized as a significant bonus to one or both rolls of the experimentation process (not the experimentation table roll but the others which add Cult Lore in the total) for only this one use attempt as opposed to a sympathy bonus which will improve the script. Seems to make a lot of sense with the Criamon mindset. We also see in a couple canon cults, The Children of Hermes (Mysteries p124) and Fortunata's Principal's Lore (Legends of Hermes p17) and the fluff around those, that they can take scripts from other cults or historical groups and change the to be effective for their cult and, in the case of Fortunata's research into ancient spirit magics, Hermetic Mystery Virtues along the same lines as things those ancient cults could do. Of course this is a bit different than what is written about Abdkypris doing by taking sufic teachings and incorporating or melding them with the non-Abrahamic views of the Criamon to create the Path of Walking Backwards. But none of these processes seem mechanized in a way that's not merely "SG fiat" or "hand wavy" or "pure fluff" and I guess I'm hoping for something that's a bit less "Well it's probably going to fail and now I have spent a ton of time on quests and gained a bunch of flaws with Ordeals and it doesn't work to create a workable script anyway.