Technomancy

This is for those who do more than just your average card tricks. Artificers, Wardens, Diviners, Healers and more reprehensible types, welcome!
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IamLEAM1983
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Technomancy

Post by IamLEAM1983 »

- term refers to a Scribing offshoot that really came into being in the late 1880s but is now only really present online
- "Techno" refers to technical skills. "Mancy" refers to arcane skills. Mixture of both

Short History
- started out as clank mechanics and maintenance staff, anybody that touched anything produced by Naughton, Duesenberg and others
- includes some programmers today, along with more traditional hackers, hardware enthusiasts, some specialized Scribes in electronics
- they don't so much work with sigils and patterns, though, as they do with what you can make them do

How Does it Work?
- practitioners develop something "classic" wizards still poorly understand - a kind of empathy for technology
- in a very short time, your perception of what makes a computer, a laptop or a tablet a machine changes
- viruses are less malignant strings of code as they are genuine diseases you're the only one who can cure
- this empathy resonates with the stored via in the anti-failure measures that line the electronic components

- in practice, this means seriously attuned technomancers have a tremendous amount of power. They can create souls for machines to use
- the effects of this can vary. Even the most primitive insect brain has faster response times than a cutting-edge CPU - too much strain can kill the hardware
- dose it right, and you give birth to an A.I. over time.

- those aren't emergent, though. Not as slow and progressive as naturally occurring instances of Web-crawlers drawing lines and making conclusions
- they don't *emerge* - they break through the surface. It's like giving your computer its own Genius Loci
- like any child, they'll take after their parent. This gives technomancers a tremendous amount of flexibility - and responsibility

Spirits of Intellect
- born out of pure research and development, these "awarenesses" develop needs and emotions
- sating them responsibly is paramount. Not everyone does, though. Some of the viruses currently running around the Web are basically virtual attack dogs goaded into doing as much damage as possible to a client's enemies - or for petty and reckless fun
- this turns cybercrime units into virtual euthanasia squads, or shooting down a "smart"' car gone amok into a kind of murder

- the old guard with lasting Victorian Industrial morals is usually trustworthy. Not always old or immortal - it just depends on the mage's corresponding ethos. You can be an old-fashioned technomancer even if you're barely in your twenties. Of course, they worked with human souls. Those are technomancers used to tending to machines that *used* to be people. This implies care, consideration, politeness. As much empathy as being able to work a wrench or screw lugnuts.
- a lot of old-timey "wrench hackers" like to make small talk with the Clanks they service, while working. Like a physician chatting it up while giving you a physical
- old-fashioned types tend to show that dedication in other ways, too. Either they push harder as Scribes, or they fix vintage cars or old houses, for instance. Some might start with mechanical studies, but end up seguing into medicine - just to see how humans, anthros and clanks compare

- "newer" types are more detached. They feel their hacking rigs or DIY black boxes, but interpret that as data. They tend to misinterpret empathy as really nothing more than a really "guts-based" approach to I.T. and computers, as if instinct handled everything and the heart had nothing to do with it. There's always the occasional sensitive White or Grey Hat type, but Black Hats typically don't give a shit about what their empathy does to hardware

Obvious Danger
- the old guard's mostly safe. You don't work with clanks if you can't respect them as individuals who made a tough choice at some point in their lives. You don't get attached to chunks of hardware if you have a feeling you're going to end up abusing it

- the newer types are in some danger if they aren't careful. Push a virtual mastiff too hard and he'll bite you in a very real way. Just about the only thing aggressive constructs can do to slight their owners is take their own lives - unless their physical form is weaponized or armed. Either you lose the source of your livelihood - either that very same source tries to murder you out of repressed anger and spite. Some can lash out aggressively at others, and take out innocents in an attempt at rebellion. If anyone dies, that's on the technomancer's head.

Biggest Weakness
- they're so focused on micron-thin via conduits and on the abstraction of hardware as a chunk of feelings and motivations that they never develop a strong affinity for drawing via to them consciously. Unless you're an absolute natural and picked up another, more demanding School before venturing into this one, you won't ever be much more than that as a mage. Because they work with so small amounts of arcane power, Technomancers also don't tend to have their life spans lenghtened. They benefit from a sturdier bill of health, yes, but are still as mortal as anyone else.
- if a mage goes to Archmage level in one skill and studies Technomancy as another, the discrepancy between the two Schools is going to be very dangerous. You'll draw in excess via without being aware of it and risk shorting out your hardware, electrocuting yourself or turning yourself into a lich...
- a lot of people confuse them for hedge mages, because of that. It's not every day that you really get to showcase yourself as a kind of "machinery shrink"
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