I'm not sure, but I'd check back in 2520 and 3958. As a general rule, if your numbers don't work the first time you're probably off by a factor of 2 or pi.
According to wikipedia, contemporary Neojoachimists claim the Age of the Spirit came in 1960, a belief which is not especially odd by the standards of those that have been associated with Joachim. Of course, I hadn't noticed that we were living in the new dispensation of universal love, so make sure to check back in 2520.
Kudos, Erik, on working such a colorful historical figure into RoP:I.
Edit - 'cause it's polite to spell names right.
There are three types of tainting. They all have increased chances to botch. The two more taineted types can give you more power when using it to vis boost. If you use it to enchant an item the item will be corrupted by it. I don't remeber all of the specifics but I remember liking how the rules matched the story for each type of tainting.
The example use of methods and powers shows our poor diabolist being just shy of scoreing himself a new minor virtue. Yet if our reckless diabolist had exerted the forthought to sacrifice a black cat in his ritual he would have needed a to roll a two rather than a six.
A character in his position that was being run by a player would certainly grab puissant diablere and incantation (making further initiations fairly simple if he doesn't botch). With confidence and vis being available to a character through sin and corruption of holy things respectivly I can easily imagine a character of this sort undergoing a meteoric rise in power.
I can see why these are the ones that the magi need to look out for.
I also reread the Ars Goetia rules on the weekend and I see that they have limits in regards to how high their scores can be boosted by ablation based on the might of the spirit that they're steaking power from. That makes them much less powerful than I had originally believed.
Thanks for the update. Mechanically speaking, how does diabolism work? My impression is that it works a lot like the holy powers in RoP:D; is that true? Also, what, exactly, is the difference between infernalism/diabolism simpliciter and Ars Goetia?
The infernal has methods and powers much like holy MePo's in RoP Divine. A Diabollist is a type of mythic companion that has access to the diabolism power. The ceremony ability is in here as well (I assume more or less unchanged, haven't read it yet). There are many infernal traditions presented in the book just as there were many holy traditions presented in RoP Divine.
Are Goetia is a set of magic rules for manipulating spirits. The ars goetia abilities advance in the same manner as arts. It is stated that hte summoning ability in ars goetia is not specific to the infernal and that the rules can be used for magic based and faerie based spiritualists as well. The three complimentary abilites of Ars Goetia (ablation, binding, and that other one that I can't remember) are stricly infernal.
Erik, thank you for answering my question. Your answer, however, raises another question: What is the difference between Ars Goetia and theurgy? Both, as I understand it, seek to summon and bind spirits of some sort in order to accomplish the objectives of the theurgist/sorcerer. One (Hermetic Theurgy) may require the Gift while the other (Ars Goetia) might not, but it sounds like the difference between the two is merely the type of creature being summoned and bound.
To put it another way, if I wanted to create an Hermetic diabolist, could I use the theurgy rules? Should Quaesitors, then, be inherently suspicious of known theurgists? (I recall some text in 4th ed Mysteries to the effect that the transition from theurgy to outright diabolism was notoriously easy.)
In any event, I'm very much looking forward to getting both books.
Hermetic magic unaided can summon and control spirits.
Hermetic theurgy lets the magi summon spirits that cast spells for the magus, or invoke the names of powerful spirits to augment their magic
various hermetic spirit magic abilities let a character power magic items with spirits and have a spirit familiar.
The art of summoning allows summoning of spirits, hermetic magic can already do this (although there is a virtue that relates this abilitiy to rego so that learning one gives you insight into the other and there is also a spell mastery ability that lets you add your goetic arts scores to your hermetic totals with the relevant spell)
The art of ablation allows you to tear up spirits and use their power to improve yourself (giving confidence points, might, resistance to ageing, some ot he spirit's powers etc.). there is not a theurgic virtue that does this as of yet.
The art of binding allows you to merge a spirit with your being and obtain many benefits from the process (but lets be blunt here....YUCK!!)
I don't remeber the other goetic art but I suspect allows the sorcerer to command a spirit. This is a trick that I imagine could be done with rego magic as well (and it could be that I'm completely wrong about the nature of the last sorcerer trick). This is different than hermetic theurgy which summons an agreeable and highly specialized spirit that knows how to cast a specific spell or spont a specific technique form combonation (but similar in some ways to invoking daimoins who have far ranging powers and with whom you need to make deals).
So they are in fact different. Goetic arts are an exotic tradition.
That's a very good point, Erik. Yet somehow, my mind balks at Richard sacrificing an animal-- it doesn't seem part of his nature to me. He's more misguided than corrupt, so perhaps he wouldn't do something that seems like outright diabolism? I'm sure a player character diabolist would take any bonus he could, but as an NPC I'd pull his punch a little. Although, really, I don't know if Richard could justify what he's doing as good. He must have a sense that he's incredibly evil, even if he believes he's working towards a greater good.
Muahahahaha. Do you think it's likely that a player character might give this a try? I'm sure they could wreak some incredible havoc before they get caught and brought down. In my experience, players usually don't want to take their characters down that dark road, though, unless it's a character that they aren't very invested in. What are your thoughts?
I'm glad Ablation caught your attention. That's one of my favorite powers. Binding is still pretty scary, too. There's a bunch of other routes to immortality here, in addition to the ones in your other posts. Incantation/Consumption has a maleficium ("Cast away ... in mortal bowl"), Incantation/Diablerie and Ablation can get you a Might Score, and Binding can keep you from aging at all. The consequences are all pretty rough, though -- Ablation's probably the least scary, but it still makes you a lot of enemies.
Given that from this description Goetia seems more like an infernally-tainted magical technique rather than a direct infernal power, I wonder which incentive/temptation there might be for my Diedne/Merinita theurgist character to learn Ars Goetia at all. There seems not to be anything it can do that a combination of Vim Techniques and Merinita/theurgy/spirit magic mysteries couldn't do... except maybe predatory use of Ablation and Binding to eat spirits for power. That mainstream Mystae hermetic magic cannot do, probably because the first Merinita or theurgist to propose a technique to eat spirits and faeries fr power would be summarily executed. Summoning and commanding are one thing. But elder magi do transform in spirits and faerie. It would be tantamount to cannibalizing one's relatives.
Is that the deal ? Ablation and Binding ? Or is Ars Goetia easier to learn than Mystery Virtues ?
Another question: I was expecting to see the infernal version of Faerie/Holy Magic, you know the realm-aligned version of hermetic magic that works as well in infernal auras, does get its proprietary set of R/D/T and its signature special feature. Ars Goetia does not seem to compare. What's the deal ? Is the mentioned Chtonic Magic Virtue fulfilling this role ? How it works ?
The goetic ars are not any more hermetic than the methods and powers. They're an exotic tradition like the Kabalists or Students of Ars Notoria (I'm sure that last one is spelled wrong it looks like the notorious art rather than the notary art).
That being said, if you have both hermetic magic and Ars Goetia there are ways to add your goetic magic scores to your arts. Goetic arts rise in level using the same xp progression as hermetic arts. It's 110 exp to get rego 10 and summoning 10 it is 210 to get rego 20. That's a pretty big advantage
Chthonic magic does fulfill this role. You get the suite of infernal R/D/T's you blend with infernal auras and you get (more or less) magical focus "everything"
Hmm, that's might indeed be rather useful even to a non-diabolist theurgist, esp. if they wish to delve into demon-hunting. Is it a normal Virtue, right ? Minor or major ? Are there some guidelines for initiating it in the book with a non-infernalist script ? From some previous comments I got that the super-focus only activates when you perform some nasty act, right ? Can you have it in combination with faerie magic ? Is having it considered a sign of diabolism in the Order, or it simply casts you under suspicion, like Tainted with Evil and Diabolic Past ?
It's all about temptation. All it takes for you to get that extra power boost is a piddly little sacrifice. Noone will ever know. And you are working for the Greater Good, right? So what if you take advantage of it from time to time? It's not as if one can spend his whole time hunting demons, right? It's just a small compensation for your efforts.
Now, now, now, diabolism is such a harsh word. You wound me.
I guess that if you go clamoring that you are consorting with the Infernal, someone might take exception, but if you don't tell them, unless they investigate your magic and unless you slip up (or are made to slip up, those demons are sometime so unreliable), they won't necessarily notice.
With Tainted with Evil, it is plainly written on your face that you are not to be trusted. With Diabolic Past, some people probably know about you, even if that knowledge is not widespread.
And, hey, inconvenient witnesses can still make handy sacrifices.
Again, Erik, thank you for your patience in addressing so many questions.
*ReVi can summon and control (all sorts of) spirits. (Though, I'm not aware that guidelines are given anywhere on how to do that.)
*Theurgy can summon and control (friendly, magical) spirits in order to make them cast spells for you or boost your magic.
*Spirit magic can summon and control (friendly, magical) spirits in order to power magic devices or as a familiar.
*The art of summoning can summon and control (all sorts of) spirits in a decidedly non-Hermetic manner.
The theoretical distinction between these categories is pretty fine. The real distinction seems to be practical - the Mysteries are tuned to summoning spirits to accomplish specific objectives while the Hermetic magi and sorcerers are (potentially, at least) more general. That makes sense to me. Now, of course, I'm wondering exactly how much an Hermetic magus could do with ReVi...
I do like that the writers of RoP:I seem to have put in a number of hooks to tempt PCs. It's always good (in a story sense, at least) to give players the rope with which to hang themselves.
