Divination
Posted: Mon Jan 28, 2013 8:43 pm
- users are colloquially called Diviners because they get in touch with what people wrongfully consider to be divine: knowledge of the future, inaccessible knowledge of the past, goings-on of departed spirits, etc.
Basic History
- potentially the third oldest School, reaching back to earliest forms of funeral rituals
- people wanted to find out about their departed loved ones. They kept pushing, tried different things, until some early mages broke through
- anthropology suggests vision quests were probably some of the first forms of Divination
- later came out-of-body experiences where soul leaves its body temporarily...
- and then conscious divination, by coaxing some trustworthy ghosts and spirits into remaining close by
- History is chock-full of examples, along with mythology: Oracle of Delphi, Cassandra, Oedipus
- Roman and Greek civilizations had their priestesses, Celtic clans had their banfaiths - -practically every culture has a "witch doctor" template of sorts
- this School is disregarded today, largely because of the influx of supernatural Reality TV shows, televangelists, etc.
- people have trouble sorting the shysters from the genuinely talented articles
- largely because some of the affected stereotypes (crystal ball and Middle-Eastern trappings) can be genuine foci for the Diviner
How Does it Work?
- like Cantors, Diviners typically discover their abilities accidentally. Panicky and uncontrolled spirit walks are fairly common first occurrences
- or invasive visions superimposing themselves over waking reality
- actually, Diviners tend to need to learn how *not* to use their gifts, to lead a normal life, to avoid being trapped in constant prescience or in the past
- over time, you learn how to "open yourself up" in a more controlled manner. Also requires focus and patience
a) Conversing with the Dead
- you can't attach ghosts to yourself or pull them away from their Haunts, but you can come to them and convince them to lend you a hand
- essentially, you need to build up an ethereal Rolodex of deceased individuals living in the Shadowlands. Use them as your research clerks, when need be
- ghosts hate being bothered, so it's important that you work on this long before opening your business. Ghosts need to trust you, to appreciate working with you
- this means you need to be able to work *for* them, too. Different bargains can be reached
- patience and authority are both needed. Ghosts can lose themselves in their tasks. You need to be there to remind them of mortal time and of a sense of urgency
- there's always the outside chance and danger that you'll run into a ghost that's looking to abuse you. Very strong mental and arcane defenses are then needed
b) Seeing the Future or Witnessing the Past
- this is a little trickier. You need to partially leave your physical consciousness and look at the outside world the way a ghost does. You can then look "up", metaphorically speaking, and try and figure out how the upper layers of the Shadowlands are going to form. This isn't an exact science
- honesty is key. Bad psychics sell their visions as absolutes. Good ones make it clear their predictions are liable to be altered by any number of things
- generally speaking, the only exact things you can see in the future are small, minor and inconsequential. Like the results of a coin toss
- unless that coin toss has deeper and wider ramifications, obviously
- seeing the past is much easier. You just have to dive down into the Shadowlands and report what you see in the already recorded "layers" of the spirit world
- where this gets difficult is when you're required to see what happened in the past elsewhere on the planet, or what happened to an object you know to have travelled a lot
- going deep *and* horizontally traversing the Shadowlands to follow the object can be dangerous. You can sever your link to your body, which makes a ghost out of you and kills you
c) Leaving Your Body
- using mental rituals and an "unconsciousness aid", you can leave your physical shell behind
- traditionally involves sleep - but booze and blows to the head work, too... The more a Diviner works, the less he'll traditionally dream. A Wizard who specializes in Divination doesn't dream at all; he's instead free to travel the world in spirit form
- the more you do it, the more the link that goes to your body becomes resilient and elastic
- you essentially become a ghost, but your maintained link to your physical self stabilizes you. The Shadowlands can't twist you out of shape
- in that state, you see the world the way ghosts do, and can interact with it the way they do. You become subject to the same physical laws that govern ghosts
- this does have a drawback, though. The more flexible your spiritual link with your body, the easier it is to knock you loose
- practiced mediums can fall unconscious on cue, but strong emotions can also have the same effect
- *this* also has a positive side. Career mediums are hard to kill because their link to their body is like super-gooey Silly Putty with high integrity. Stuff that would outright kill most people will only render them comatose
- inversely, some mediums specialize in cutting those arcane ties loose. You can enchant a blade to have no real physical properties but cut through soul threads like butter
- the physical implement doesn't even *need* to be a blade. A wand is used by some cultures, you could enchant a wooden salad spoon to cut through soul threads
- this is largely people visit Diviners because loved ones can actually have trouble leaving peacefully
- refusal or denial isn't always involved. Arcane "malformations" of the life thread do exist
- a person might be naturally ready and willing to die, but be tangled up in his or her thread. Unable to leave body because of that
- reprehensible Diviners can actually cut the threads of someone who's hale and hearty
- these tend to be the most effective and difficult assassins to catch, because you don't even need to touch or assault the person
- all you need is to be close enough to slice at the thread in the Shadowlands
- this tends to physically manifest as the fairly terrifying and sudden stop of *all* bio-electrical functions in normal bodies, or a sudden ejection of the soul for clanks
Basic History
- potentially the third oldest School, reaching back to earliest forms of funeral rituals
- people wanted to find out about their departed loved ones. They kept pushing, tried different things, until some early mages broke through
- anthropology suggests vision quests were probably some of the first forms of Divination
- later came out-of-body experiences where soul leaves its body temporarily...
- and then conscious divination, by coaxing some trustworthy ghosts and spirits into remaining close by
- History is chock-full of examples, along with mythology: Oracle of Delphi, Cassandra, Oedipus
- Roman and Greek civilizations had their priestesses, Celtic clans had their banfaiths - -practically every culture has a "witch doctor" template of sorts
- this School is disregarded today, largely because of the influx of supernatural Reality TV shows, televangelists, etc.
- people have trouble sorting the shysters from the genuinely talented articles
- largely because some of the affected stereotypes (crystal ball and Middle-Eastern trappings) can be genuine foci for the Diviner
How Does it Work?
- like Cantors, Diviners typically discover their abilities accidentally. Panicky and uncontrolled spirit walks are fairly common first occurrences
- or invasive visions superimposing themselves over waking reality
- actually, Diviners tend to need to learn how *not* to use their gifts, to lead a normal life, to avoid being trapped in constant prescience or in the past
- over time, you learn how to "open yourself up" in a more controlled manner. Also requires focus and patience
a) Conversing with the Dead
- you can't attach ghosts to yourself or pull them away from their Haunts, but you can come to them and convince them to lend you a hand
- essentially, you need to build up an ethereal Rolodex of deceased individuals living in the Shadowlands. Use them as your research clerks, when need be
- ghosts hate being bothered, so it's important that you work on this long before opening your business. Ghosts need to trust you, to appreciate working with you
- this means you need to be able to work *for* them, too. Different bargains can be reached
- patience and authority are both needed. Ghosts can lose themselves in their tasks. You need to be there to remind them of mortal time and of a sense of urgency
- there's always the outside chance and danger that you'll run into a ghost that's looking to abuse you. Very strong mental and arcane defenses are then needed
b) Seeing the Future or Witnessing the Past
- this is a little trickier. You need to partially leave your physical consciousness and look at the outside world the way a ghost does. You can then look "up", metaphorically speaking, and try and figure out how the upper layers of the Shadowlands are going to form. This isn't an exact science
- honesty is key. Bad psychics sell their visions as absolutes. Good ones make it clear their predictions are liable to be altered by any number of things
- generally speaking, the only exact things you can see in the future are small, minor and inconsequential. Like the results of a coin toss
- unless that coin toss has deeper and wider ramifications, obviously
- seeing the past is much easier. You just have to dive down into the Shadowlands and report what you see in the already recorded "layers" of the spirit world
- where this gets difficult is when you're required to see what happened in the past elsewhere on the planet, or what happened to an object you know to have travelled a lot
- going deep *and* horizontally traversing the Shadowlands to follow the object can be dangerous. You can sever your link to your body, which makes a ghost out of you and kills you
c) Leaving Your Body
- using mental rituals and an "unconsciousness aid", you can leave your physical shell behind
- traditionally involves sleep - but booze and blows to the head work, too... The more a Diviner works, the less he'll traditionally dream. A Wizard who specializes in Divination doesn't dream at all; he's instead free to travel the world in spirit form
- the more you do it, the more the link that goes to your body becomes resilient and elastic
- you essentially become a ghost, but your maintained link to your physical self stabilizes you. The Shadowlands can't twist you out of shape
- in that state, you see the world the way ghosts do, and can interact with it the way they do. You become subject to the same physical laws that govern ghosts
- this does have a drawback, though. The more flexible your spiritual link with your body, the easier it is to knock you loose
- practiced mediums can fall unconscious on cue, but strong emotions can also have the same effect
- *this* also has a positive side. Career mediums are hard to kill because their link to their body is like super-gooey Silly Putty with high integrity. Stuff that would outright kill most people will only render them comatose
- inversely, some mediums specialize in cutting those arcane ties loose. You can enchant a blade to have no real physical properties but cut through soul threads like butter
- the physical implement doesn't even *need* to be a blade. A wand is used by some cultures, you could enchant a wooden salad spoon to cut through soul threads
- this is largely people visit Diviners because loved ones can actually have trouble leaving peacefully
- refusal or denial isn't always involved. Arcane "malformations" of the life thread do exist
- a person might be naturally ready and willing to die, but be tangled up in his or her thread. Unable to leave body because of that
- reprehensible Diviners can actually cut the threads of someone who's hale and hearty
- these tend to be the most effective and difficult assassins to catch, because you don't even need to touch or assault the person
- all you need is to be close enough to slice at the thread in the Shadowlands
- this tends to physically manifest as the fairly terrifying and sudden stop of *all* bio-electrical functions in normal bodies, or a sudden ejection of the soul for clanks