Describe your wizard

[assault]

It's a Swords and Sorcery game. If you were going to play a wizard, who would they be and what would they be able to do?

 

I'm not asking for builds - just plain language descriptions.

[Mr. R]

Note this is using Killer Shrikes totemic Magic System

http://www.killershrike.com/FantasyHERO/HighFantasyHERO/MagicSystems/TotemicShamanism.aspx

 

Hawna doesn't look like a typical shaman.  In fact she looks like she's someone's mother.  Which she is.  She actually has three grown children.  But just when she should be earning the rest she deserves, her husband was killed in an accident.  Now a widow she was a bit lost.  Then she made her first spirit link to a totem animal.  So at her age she became an apprentice to the clan shaman.  Slowly she gained acceptance of other totems and is now a full fledged shaman.  

 

Now what does she do with her life?

 

Hawna is a mature (at least 45-50) woman who has raised a family and buried a husband.  She dresses in traditional clothes (think horse nomad type society) unless it is formal where she will bring all the bling to bear.  Medium height (160 cm) and well figured (70 KG) with black hair streaked with grey (Ash blond dear and I earned every lock) and grey eyes!

[theinfn8]

Maybe something a little wonky. Part hedge mage, part con man. He uses artifacts from the previous age of wonder to fuel his magic, but portrays it all as coming from himself. Yeah, there's an element of skill in drawing out the magical energy and shaping it into a spell, but careless use will burn the artifacts out. Since no artifact will last forever, he is constantly searching for ancient artifacts to bank for future spellwork.

 

He is accustomed to a certain amount of prestige/fear that comes with being a "wizard" and is deathly afraid of the day that he will no longer be able to find an artifact for fuel. This clouds his judgement sometimes and puts him in difficult situations, trying to grab something on the way out when he should only be worried about outrunning the giant rolling boulder.

[archer]

I always default to con artist.

 

My wizard is a con artist. Most of his spells help him in some way of being able to accomplish pulling of the con and make people trust him. He's more into the spirit of pulling off the con rather than necessarily making money off of the con. He deeply wants to be popular and to leave each and every mark liking him at the end (rather than being out for his blood).

 

Young, healthy, charismatic (but in more of a subtle manner than a televangelist manner). Some combination of Acting, Charm, Conversation, multiple languages if that's needed to interact with NPC's in the campaign area, Persuasion.

 

A small Transform as a mending and repair (or breaking) spell which can be used on clothing, houses, and carts or just to keep himself looking nice. Or which save his marks enough time and effort to gain their gratitude. Or to break something so he can later repair it in order to gain gratitude. He uses this very liberally to help people because it always helps to have friends.

 

A reliable offensive spell. Probably fire based so it can be used for starting campfires.

 

Some Mental Illusions.

 

An Aid spell with variable result, usable on others. Gives him a way to assist his comrades or make his horse/cart move faster.

 

A ranged shielding spell usable on others, something more flashy than Aid if there's still points available for it. I've preferred something like Force Walls in the past but if magic is frowned upon or feared, it'd be more likely to be a boost to PD or ED.

 

If there's something campaign-specific, perhaps a spell to deal with that. Like a desert campaign would leave him needing a spell to create water and another to dissipate heat. 

 

Other than that, it's all interacting favorably with NPC's and trying to amuse his traveling companions.

 

He doesn't see himself as a nice person even when he's actually being a nice person. He sees himself as conning people into thinking he's a nice person. If he mends someone's clothing and they offer him a drink of wine, he's sees that as "I conned someone into giving me a drink of wine".

 

He wants to be remembered and to develop a favorable reputation.

[MordeanGrey]

My username, Mordean Grey, was a shadow mage who summoned shadows (actual creatures/demons from the shadow realms — think wispy, black shadows with red eyes — with unpredictable behavior that required a control roll) to do his bidding. The success of his summoning roll determined how large or powerful the summoned shadow demon was. It was easy to get small ones to use for simple physical tasks or sending messages, but the roll difficulty was harder if you tried to summon more powerful shadows. Also, failing critically might open a gate and let a big one through. (That was a problem on one occasion!)

 

He used powers with special effects related to shadows to wrap himself in a cloak of obscuring shadows that made him hard to see and provided magical armor protection. He could see in darkness and shadow step (teleport) short distances from one shadowed area to another. He also used a shadow sword that worked a bit like a dark saber. It ignored physical armor.

 

His powers were obviously stronger at night and in areas with heavy shadows.

 

He certainly wasn't a "good" guy, but he was a lot of fun to play.

 

[Duke Bushido]

On 3/5/2022 at 12:05 AM, assault said:

It's a Swords and Sorcery game. If you were going to play a wizard, who would they be and what would they be able to do?

 

I'm not asking for builds - just plain language descriptions.

 

 

What sort of magic level are you looking at?  That would help narrow down what information or suggestions would potentially be useful to you.  Lord knows my wizards aren't going to help you at all! 

 

It's funny- and thanks for this thread, by the way-- but until I read the responses, I thought I was the only one who did this.       I don't play "magic users" very often, and when I do, they tend to be druidic, shamanistic / totemic, hoodo / sympathetic or the rare clerical types of magic.

 

My wizards have always-- and I mean _always_-- been one-hundred-percent frauds.        Thanks, guys!  It's wonderful to be part of such excellent company.   

 

Now this that said, and without any idea of just what you're looking for magic-wise or even what might be allowable within the campaign, I will offer a few lines about my typical wizard, starting with a preface:

 

About the only time I play a self-proclaimed wizard is in low-magic settings where magic has a fierce reputation, and it _does exist_ in some form or other, but the idea of a single powerful sorcerer is more myth than reality, though everyone has heard the legends of and seen the left-overs of the handiwork of X, the sorcerer or the Wizard Y, who strode these lands for a thousand years before disappearing not a hundred years ago, blah-blah-blah.....  TL; DR: everyone believes that they exist, and are incredibly powerful; everyone has heard of one, but no one has actually _seen_ one.  They might even know a guy who knew a guy who saw one, but they haven't seen one themselves.

 

Wizards are incredibly rare, and almost one-hundred-percent of them are con men and grifters with phenomenal skills of oration, persuasion, and their incredible acting talents.  They tend to have high Presence (augmented by their other skills, of course), and even an extra die or two of Presence Attack (if that's something your group does).

 

They are extremely learned and knowledgeable-- while they may not have much formal education, they have all sought to learn as much as is possible about what the world-of-the-setting understands about science, and physics in particular.  This helps them immensely with their other, most necessary skills: Sleight of Hand and Stage Magic.  If possible, they even have a bit of skills at pyrotechnics.  They have vast knowledge of-- well, probably not actual magic or manipulating the forces from which the universe is made, but of what people believe such magic to be.  They have memorized a thousand (useless, but well-known to those who "know such things") spells and curses and phrases and terms to give even the Gods pause about the true nature of the mortal and immortal realms, and often even the king's own most learned men pale in knowledge next to a ...  >ahem<  'wizard,' and they will understand that the wizard knows this, as he can see through them.

 

Wizards They carry themselves with the grim seriousness of Diogenes himself, as if the whole of the future rests upon them and their decisions, and appear to always be greatly concerned about matters so far above the understanding of mere mortals that even the thought of accidentally interrupting their thoughts appears... unsafe.  but all of this--

 

It's all part of their armor.  It's part of selling themselves, and selling the con.  The opportunity to be near one so wise and learned is usually worth a meal or three, perhaps even lodging.  Watching him summon lightning (flash paper) to create a bird from thin air--   such a miracle!  And the off-handed way in which he does it, as if he can take no joy, and perhaps regrets whatever damage he has done to the fabric of the world for this incredible feat....

 

They are masters of philosophy, such as is possible in the world at hand, and will work any questions about magic into a long journey to discover the absolute truths of the universe, always with cautions that such thoughts and such actions should not be pursued, "for I was once as you, a thousand years ago, and as I wended my way through the words behind the creation of the gods and dined on knowledge from beyond the stars in the heavens, I found that each tiny burning mote of pure sorcerous ability cost just the tiniest bit of my happiness; my joy...  until there was nothing left but the quest for more and more absolute power, and in the end, even my soul was no hard price to pay for the power in my body, and the knowledge in my mind..   Away, you!  Away, I say, from such pursuits, lest the gods mark black against you, as they have done for me, and leave you to wander the earth forever, unwilling champion of their ten-thousand causes...."

 

And words to that effect. 

 

Again, they are gifted at sleight of hand and stage magic in a way that no modern magician could dare to dream, and are always absolutely prepared to perform instant miracles, as if on accident, unthinkingly.

 

They are also extremely resourceful, and adept at coming up with plans and schemes on the fly: there's more than one reason they like studying physics, tactics, philosophy, and whatever passes for psychology in the setting.  A well-timed strike with the butt of a walking stick to dislodge a keystone in a stone arch bridge-- while igniting a tiny bit of paper and pumping his arms and elbows in tight to himself, sending a puff of air through his cloak that momentarily ruffles his hair in a windless cave all while chanting the Ancient curses "Get off this path!"-- leads to the collapse of a bridge, across which a mighty enemy strode....

 

and it was _magic_! 

 

 

 

I have absolutely no idea if that helps or not, but man does it feel good to know I'm not as horrible a person as my fantasy GM thinks I am.  Or at least, I'm not the only guy in the club. 

 

 

 

 

[Chris Goodwin]

Superhero, not swords and sorcery, but hopefully you'll find this at least amusing... 

 

Background

Guglielmo DiCarlo (Guillielmus DeCarola in Latin) was a wizard who lived in Europe in the 1450's.  He was a great student of alchemy, science, medicine, art, architecture, swordsmanship, and the occult; he amassed a great library of books collected over time, as well as of his own writings.  He was about to be named as the head of his chapter of a secret society, when a small cabal within the society decided that he was too proud of his works, and too open of a practitioner, so that he should be killed.  He had some advance warning, and was able to preserve the majority of his work.  His final act was to cast a spell that would make him appear dead, but would preserve his life until some point in the future.  He left coded notes for his allies in the society to be able to cast the counterspell, and release him from preservation, but sadly his remaining papers and effects -- significant in themselves -- were taken and hidden away.  

 

Over the next almost 600 years, his remaining papers, effects, and so on, were located and placed in various university libraries, museums, and so on.  In the beginning of the 21st century, students of history noted the signatures among the papers, realized that they were all related to one another, and eventually all of the extant materials were brought back together in a museum in Los Angeles.  

 

After the first Dream (note: the in-game rationale for the first supers), and subsequent appearance of various super powers including magic, more prominence was given to the "DiCarlo" as it was called.  The California Science Center in LA chose the DiCarlo as the subject for one of its "CSC After Dark" shows.  The "After Dark" series is an over-21 only event that serves wine and beer, and often dips into subjects that wouldn't normally be suitable for its family audience.  The museum granted hands-on access to copies and replicas of DiCarlo's work and -- crucially -- an attempt at working out the "DiCarlo Cipher".  

 

So it was that a number of slightly tipsy museumgoers inadvertently cast the counterspell to release him from suspension.  Upon completion of the spell, the Museum's lights dimmed… but nothing else happened.  (Not yet, anyway…)

It took several hours for the suspension spell to end, after which the museum had closed for the night.  DiCarlo awoke, expecting to be surrounded by either assassins or his friends within the Societas Philosophae.  Realizing that he was alone in a strange place, he discovered the copies of his work.  He was able to cast a spell to locate the originals, also on site, and after a judicious scrambling of the deciphered work, he reclaimed the rest of his materials (leaving the copies) and left the museum.  

 

He accidentally triggered the alarm, of course, resulting in the appearance by two recently empowered superheroes, along with a nonpowered friend of theirs who happened to be a descendant of the DiCarlo family.  (Though, had he been aware of the alarm system, it's possible he might have had the right spells to defeat it!)

 

Personality/Motivation

As a doctor, he wants to save people's lives.  He's often found himself tending to rich women with stomach problems, and often their idiot sons who drink too much wine at night and wake up to coffee and swords at dawn.  (He might note that he's been an idiot son a few times in his life.)  As a sorcerer he thinks he's discovered the secrets to the universe, and part of him really wants to share them.  As a swordsman himself he hates it when he has to fight, but sometimes needs must.

 

As an artist, scientist, and so on, he just wants to learn more.  The invention he really wants to build more than anything is a two wheeled riding conveyance; he's already got the spell to power it ready to go, as well as the designs for it, in his library.

 

Quote

"I don' care what you call me.  Dottore DiCarlo or Strego DiCarlo or Signor DiCarlo or hey DiCarlo you piece of !@#$, you just spell my name right."

 

Powers/Tactics

DiCarlo is a wizard of great skill and knowledge, and not-insignificant power.  The majority of his spells are either defensive or utility in nature, though he does have a few minor offensive abilities ("a spell to render an attacker unconscious through the use of controlled lightning" is one of his favorites).  Most of his spells rely on or make use of physical principles discovered and developed independently over the past 600 years, or are otherwise replicated by technology created in the meantime.  ("A spell for brightly lighting a dark area," "a spell for rapidly extinguishing small to medium sized fires," "a spell for imparting rapid motion to a coach lacking horses" are several of his favorites.)  

 

It should be noted that the written procedures of some of DiCarlo's spells are shorter than their titles!

 

Appearance

DiCarlo is 5'8" tall, with brown shoulder length hair and brown eyes.  He bears a strong resemblance to Inigo Montoya.

[assault]

Liking the replies so far.

 

I suppose I should add one of my own, but this shouldn't be taken as an indication of what I am looking for. It's based on an old character of mine from from a sadly short lived game, way back in the 80s, with some more recent frills.

 

Runcible Teach is an astrologer and soothsayer. He also works as a tutor to the children, mainly sons, of the gentry. A gifted mathematician, he also had a brief military career as an architect and Master Gunner.

 

A philosopher and scholar, he rarely uses flashy magic, aside from making disturbingly accurate predictions of the future.

 

This has led to him being accused of being a charlatan. But on those rare occasions when push has come to shove...

 

One of his more distinctive possessions is a rather strange looking hat. If he is pressed,he will mutter something about flying monkeys from the Moon, which tends to cause people to doubt his sanity 

[Hermit]

Gishkim has a lot of descriptors thrown his way; to some he is  called Gishkim of the Bones (A title he grumbles at), Gishkim Crypt-tongue (A fairer name in his viewing) and Gishkim Veil Render. Most assume he is of greater age than he is. His life experiences had his hair go shock white at age twenty five, and now a worn man in his forties, he looks even worse. Baggy eyes from too little sleep, worry lines and other signs of a life of stress have added years. .

 

 One would think his skin would be paler, but in truth it has been tanned, almost leathered by the sun. Gishkim likes the sun, he claims it's how he feels warm again. Some call him a Necromancer, and perhaps he is, but Giskim protests; he did not first call to the dead- they called to him. He learned what he learned out of self defense, and still they barely leave him be.

 

He does not create skeletons, or zombies or the such, no would he even if he could. However, if a young man is sentenced to die in a farce of an 'honorable duel' against a far more skilled foe, Gishkim can search the mists beyond the veil and call forth a warrior spirit to lend the boy his strength and skill so that he has a chance. Are you seeking a treasure?  Gishkim can help you find the spirit of one who helped bury it. Are you being haunted by an unruly shade that seems to have it out for you? Well, Gishkim can either try diplomacy, or send it screaming back into the stones where the elder dead sleep.

But there's a price, there's always a price. The scruffy bearded spiritualist lives in a world of yammering newly dead, fallen ancients who have so many demands, and all that is between. If he must bear this burden, he expects to be compensated for it, and treated with respect (though he is more used to fear). Rumor has it that  cheating him of either can lead to him to decide that maybe, just maybe, some poor wench or fellow who died unjustly deserves your body and life more than you do. Of course, it IS just a rumor.

 

[Scott Ruggels]

Malkewiscz of Kolkur is a heavy set man apparently in his 50s with a salt and pepper beard, and a very solid gaze. He has a piercing, commanding voice, that he uses to dramatic effect when lecturing students, apprentices, or Nobles in his presence. He dresses in the dark robes of an academician, with a stole around his neck covered in characters few can read. He is a man of great courage, but of cold  fury when angered.  He can be very diplomatic, and patient, but has little patience for frivolity. He has devoted himself of the pursuits of the mind, so magic, a bit of engineering, history, and politics occupy his time.  He teaches the National Magic style well, and most of the senior military mages of the Kingdom have been his students, But he has studied the traditions of other lands, and has mastered a few, such as transformation magic.  When using the National Magic style, is shapes are precise, and geometric, The colors bright and clear, and the lines of force, direct and straight.  But the other styles are subtle, indirect, and quiet. About his only indulgences are food, and  High quality writing utensils. He is observant, but not pious, careful not to offend the higher powers.  It's not clear how old he is, but he's been in Kolkur since before it was a Northern possession. Three or four generations of students have described him looking as he does now, never younger, as if he had met the Victorious Dangar Ice Hand in the streets of Kolkur as a  50 year old human, politely pledging himself to Icehand's banner.  With him as the senior Academician, at the University of Kolkur, he has shaped it into a very focused institute of learning, and Magic in the northern provinces.