Surrealism and Sorcerous Pursuits, Part One

"Each of us, in his timidity, has a limit beyond which he is outraged.  It is inevitable that he who by concentrated application has extended this limit for himself, should arouse the resentment of those who have accepted conventions which, since accepted by all, require no initiative of application.  And this resentment generally takes the form of meaningless laughter or criticism, if not of persecution.  But this apparent violation is preferable to the monstrous habits condoned by etiquette and aestheticism"
Man Ray, The Age of Light (1933)

It should come as no surprise that the number one threat to a sorcerer is another sorcerer.  Scholars oppose and thwart other scholars, adepts face-off against rival adepts, heretics and cultists fear their peers and fellows far more than any outsider.  In Riskail, as in life after Walt Kelly's Pogo, we are each our own worst enemies.  And that is with dopplegangers, feral reflections, autonomous simulacrae, disentangled shadows, clones, clobots, and virtual avatars clamoring for attention and vying to become the dominant expression of those personalities they have seceeded from or seek to replace.  A sorcerer can, and often quite literally is, their own most dangerous rival.  A sobering thought for some, a cautionary tale for others an unparalleled challenge to the most narcissistic and a tragic outcome for those wracked with self-loathing.  The old admonition to 'Know Thyself' is no trivial cliche in Riskail.

Consider that one of the earliest techniques most earnestly sought-out amongst some sorcerers (and a few others as well...) is the means and methodologies employed in crafting a sympathetic portrait of themself, one that they enmesh themselves with body and soul so that it takes on the corruption, taint, toxicity and negative traits that otherwise would cripple or kill them like a sorcerous empowered morality-filter.  These paintings are much sought-after by those driven to gain direct, personal experience at any cost, those who desire to sample forbidden things, and those who would defer the cost of their activities to another, later date.  But these paintings only defer the inevitable, they do not endlessly absorb the badness, ugliness, hurts and wounds suffered by their subject, they merely accumulate those things until such a time as saturation is reached and then there is a price to pay, a horrific price that will assuredly be paid.  Though there are those who think that thay are clever enough to find some way to escape the inevitable, to cheat their painting and remain forever young, incorruptible, vibrant and unmarked by any and all excess or wickedness.  None have ever escaped their fate, no matter how lengthy the reprieve their painting granted them.

A sympathetic painting reveals much about its subject, alas all too often far too late for them to do anything about such knowledge.  But it is a folly of youth and a vice of the young to seek cheap and easy immortality, is it not?

"An effort impelled by desire must also have an automatic or subsconscious energy to aid its realization.  The reserves of this energy within us are limitless if we draw on them without a sense of shame or propriety.  Like the scientist who is merely a prestidigitator manipulating the abundant phenomena of nature and profiting by every so-called hazard or law, the creator dealing in human values allows the subconscious forces to filter through him, coloured by his own selectivity, which is universal human desire, and exposes to the light motives and instincts long repressed, which should form the basis of a confident fraternity.  The intensity of this message can be disturbing only in proportion to the freedom that has been given to automatism or the subconscious self.  The removal of inculcated modes of presentation, resulting in apparent artificiality or strangeness, is a confirmation of the free functioning of this automatism and is to be welcomed."
Man Ray, The Age of Light (1933)

The realization of desire via the automatic or spontaneous release of limitless subconscious energies drawn from deep within the practitioner by way of various secret and aesthetic efforts rooted in ritual and art.  Not a bad definition of sorcery.  Surrealism has a great deal to offer any would-be sorcerer.

Dictionary: Surrealism, n. Pure psychic automatism, by which one proposes to express, either verbally, in writing, or by any other manner, the real functioning of thought. Dictation of thought in the absence of all control exercised by reason, outside of all aesthetic and moral preoccupation.  (after Breton's definition)

Encyclopedia: Surrealism. Philosophy. Surrealism is based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of previously neglected associations, in the omnipotence of dream, in the disinterested play of thought. It tends to ruin once and for all other psychic mechanisms and to substitute itself for them in solving all the principal problems of life. [Surrealist Manifesto; Breton, Andre; 1924]

The omnipotence of dream combined with the disinterested play of thought sounds vaguely Zen-like, until you read further into Breton's work.  Trust me: a little Andre Breton can go a long way.  Really.  The basic concepts and some of the techniques of Surrealism, especially after Breton managed to run-off any other contenders or claimants to the term in the Twenties, are absolutely fascinating both in terms of art and in manufacturing an approach to sorcery.  With all due respect and to paraphrase Aragon: There are other relationships besides the real that the mind can grasp and which are just as primary, such as chance, illusion, the fantastic, the dream. These diverse species are united and reconciled in sorcery, at least in Riskail.

Of all the various techniques experimented with and explored by the Surrealists, I feel that Automatism and Oneiristry are two of the most interesting from the stand-point of a sorcerer, so I'm leaning towards making them Class Abilities.  The rest of the Techniques below are derived from actual Surrealist techniques (see link above), but have been adapted to better reflect the needs and activities of a sorcerer in Riskail.  They're still a bit rough around the edges, but it's a start and I expect to revise and edit this list several more times before it's finalized.  Even then it'll probably get expanded or improved upon as it gets used by play-testers and other people.

A Sorcerer gets to select 1-10 of these techniques based upon their Wisdom, Intelligence or Charisma, depending on which attribute they designate for the acquisition of powers.  What I'm seeing here is that a sorcerer would get to pick and choose a few techniques that they cna then work with to help shape, influence, modify and adapt their spells.  Thus those subconscious powers are filtered through them, colored by their individual selectivity.  The list below is a bit larger than I expect to have once I've gone over everything and sorted it all out as to which ones make better spells or spell-components.  Most likely the Techniques will get boiled down to a few (like say 10) common ones like Automatism and Oneiristry, and a few (like say 20) Extraordinary ones like Sympathetic Paintings (see above).
(I'll post the pertinent tables after I get the whole Attribute to Chakra stuff wrapped-up and posted first.)

This is all a work-in-progress, so it's still sort of rough and definitely subject to change and revision.

An Incomplete Survey of Surrealist to Sorcery Techniques

Aerography is a technique in which a 3-dimensional object is used as a stencil with spraypainting, aerosol pigments, tint-mists or other means. Nanopaints have been developed that allow the sorcerer to manipulate the paint in response to the movement of the object to create three-dimensional animations, reverse forms and to craft mockeries and replicas that are extremely convincing optically, yet are completely hollow and false-forms.


Automatism. Automatic writing, painting and drawing. Surrealist automatism is often scrupulously differentiated from mediumistic automatism, what was once termed psychography, but if you dig back into the roots of the movement and Andre Breton's own experiments, there is less and less of a distinction to be made that really matters in any significant way. The distinction is one that moderns insist upon as they tend to see the more mediumistic practices as the outdated and unfortunate relics of outre beliefs that are no longer in fashion. Whatever. Automatism is about contacting the unconscious, creating things spontaneously and without conscious or critical self-editing. One enters into a 'Wave of Dreams,' assumes a trance as Desnos was reputed to have done, and that allows them to get on with the work of revealing, uncovering clues and images that lie dormant within the materials used or within the subconscious of the artist involved.

Bulletism is literally shooting ink at a blank piece of paper or a suitably bare wall. The artist can then develop images based on whatever forms and shapes present themselves in the course of the shooting. Some sorcerers can string together random bullet holes with various media in order to fashion peculiar glyphs, sigils, or other forms that can then be used for a variety of purposes ranging from divination to spell-delivery mechanisms, to phantasmal frameworks and even spontaneous pseudo-golems. One sorcerer at least has also mastered the art of creating a negative sculpture by manipulating the implied space outlined by random bullet holes while in the midst of combat during a period of civil unrest. Another is reported to have mastered the means of using the form created by Bulletism to draw out already spent bullets from walls, doors and dead bodies and form them into a violent construct.

Calligrammes are text or poetry in which the words or letters make up a shape, particularly a shape connected to the subject of the text or poem, which are then released as short-term dream-fragments, feral figments, phantasms, shadow-glyphs or similar structures. A version of this technique is used to summon a variety of creatures, some of which appear to be made-up on the spot by improvisational sorcerers.

Collage is a method of assemblage that uses different forms to create a new whole. Where artists once used ribbon, photographs and newspapers to form the basis of their collages, sorcerers can work with anything including body parts, machine parts, shadows,colored lights or different types of liquids, so long as they possess the means to properly manipulate the media either manually or through telekinesis or otherwise. Frankenstein's mythic creation would e considered a cadaverous collage in Riskail.

Coulage is a kind of automatic or involuntary sculpture made by pouring a molten material (such as metal, wax or chocolate) into cold water (or other clear fluid) and as such it resembles the age-old practice of divination where an egg is dropped into a glass of water such as was toyed with in Salem just before the trials. In coulage, the material employed takes on either a random or a revealed/aleatoric form, based upon the specific properties of the materials involved. A sorcerer can make use of more than one material at a time or in succession, both for divination and for servitor-construction and other applications.

Cubomania is a method of making collages in which a picture, drawing, painting or psychograph is cut into squares and then reassembled into a fresh image. Other geometrical forms can also be used.

Cut-ups are a technique in which a particular text is cut up at random and rearranged to create a new text, or one could just as easily randomly number the lines of a text and roll dice to determine their order and sequence. Nostradamus employed this technique with his cryptic prophecies, so it has a very long pedigree. Converting an existing scroll or text into a cut-up work can drastically alter the effects and outcomes, often in wildly unforeseen ways. A variation on the cut-up technique is the game called latent news in which a text of one type or another is cut into individual words (or perhaps phrases) and then rapidly reassembled to create a new text altogether.

Decalcomania is a process of spreading thick paint upon a prepared surface and then—while it is still wet—covering it with further material such as paper, canvas or aluminium foil. This second covering is then removed before the paint fully dries, and the resultant pattern becomes the basis of the finished painting. One can also pour paints out into a tub of water and then drag paper or other materials across the surface of the water/oil to pick-up the paints/pigments, similar to

Drafting a Dream résumé takes the form of an employment résumé but chronicles the sorcerer's achievements, employment, or the like, in dreams, rather than in waking life. Most also have references, locales explored, etc. Obscure references are extremely easy to come by, but acquiring a reference that is more easily tracked-down by others or shared with a larger group, that is far more prestigious precisely because it is verifiable and provable.

Echo poems are poems composed by one or more persons, working together in a process in which each stanza is "mirrored" it in some fashion to create the following stanza and the last line most often serves as the title. In Riskail an echo poem is a type of spell that is composed forwards and backwards simultaneously, often via some form of automatism, and they almost always have some sort of mirroring effect bound up with them, either in terms of their components (mirrors) or repeatable effects.

Eclaboussure is the technique where pigments (oil paints or watercolors are good choices) are laid down and water, gasoline or turpentine is splattered over the paint and then the solvents are soaked up to reveal random patterns where the media was removed. This effect can be incorporated into a variety of glyph-making, visual spell-media, talismanics, etc. At least one forensic necromanceress has developed a means of applying this technique to the blood of innocent victims, the pattern revealed by the removal of the blood forms an image that explains or details the means of death and sometimes the killer.

Entoptic graphomania is the automatic method of drawing in which dots are made wherever one finds any impurities in a blank sheet of paper a wall or someone's skin, and lines (either curving or straight) are then drawn between the dots to reveal a pattern similar to the age-old methods of geomancy, only this pattern is directly tied into the material (or location or person) one is drawing upon, thus it can be more finely tuned to acquire more intimate information. This is sometimes used as a non-invasive form of interrogation.

Étrécissements (Anti-collage) Where collage adds pieces together to form a whole, Étrécissements are achieved by the cutting away of parts of images to carve out a new form from out of the old. This is sometimes taken up by the more sadistic sorts and then applied to various forms of reductive dermabrasion, flensing, flaying or outright cutting into muscle and bone. It can also be employed on inanimate objects and can be mistaken for skrimshaw in some cases.

Exquisite corpse or Cadavre exquis is a method by which a collection of words or images are collectively assembled. It is based on an old parlor game known by the same name (and also as Consequences) in which players wrote in turn on a sheet of paper, folded it to conceal part of the writing, and then passed it to the next player for a further contribution.

Found Objects are randomly acquired objects of everyday provenance that take on special meaning according to the way they were found, acquired or discovered and thus are well-suited for the creation of spontaneous amulets and involuntary talismans or ritual objects.

Frottage is a method of creation in which one takes a pencil or other drawing tool and makes a "rubbing" over a textured surface. The texture so captured by the scraping of the drawing tool over the surface serves as the basis of an image to be used in various forms of divination, glyphistry, or whatever. Enough samples gathered in this way can be compounded into a servitor. It is also rumored that there are secret geomantic techniques for unlocking such rubbings as though they were keys to the surfaces so captured, possibly allowing for apportative effects.

Fumage is a technique in which impressions are made by the smoke of a candle or lamp on a piece of paper, canvas or other surface. One can then work with the image made thus or further work it into a more refined image through other techniques.  A variation on fumage could be 'umbrage,' whereby one works the shadow-stuff into new forms, literally the sculpting of shadows.

Games. In sorcery as in surrealism, games are important as a means of investigation and competition. The intention in most such efforts is to cut away the restrictions imposed by the rational mind and allow things to develop more freely in a more spontaneous, free-flowing and random manner. The aim is to break rigidly held patterns of thought and facilitate original outcomes that would not have been possible through other means.

Grattage is a technique in which paint is scraped off the canvas, but the technique can be used in a variety of other media or applications whereby a layer can be removed to reveal something of interest below.  A logical extensionof this technique would include removing layers of skin or flesh from a target, possibly at a distance by rubbing a blade over a textured rubbing already keyed to the target by a bit of frottage previously.

Heatage is an automatic technique in which the subject is heated (usually from below) to the point of distortion in a random fashion. Some sorcerers have mastered the ability to manipulate this distortion as though sculpting warm clay.

Indecipherable writing is intentionally made illegible in such a manner as to confuse and befuddle anyone attempting to decipher it without the appropriate key-word or phrase.  This could very well be the basis of a physical form of cryptography.

Involuntary sculpture are those made by absent-mindedly manipulating some minor everyday object such as rolling and unrolling a lottery ticket, bending and re-bending a paper clip, or manipulating a bar of soap so as to create new and previously unforeseen forms that can then serve as visual catalysts for divination, spell work or even the creation of minor constructs.

Movement of liquid down a vertical surface is, as the name suggests, a technique of making pictures by dripping or allowing a flow of some form of liquid down a vertical surface.  Not the most exciting of premises or ideas, but it could take on whole new levels of meaning and menace when coupled with a Pendulum, guillotine, or perhaps an iron maiden...

Outagraphy is a photograph in which the subject is cut out so that it becomes a negative space.  Does this remove the object, block its effect upon an area, or banish/collapse it into a void-space until re-summoned?

Paranoiac-critical method is a technique invented by Salvador Dalí which consists of the artist invoking a paranoid state (fear that the self is being manipulated, targeted or controlled by others). The result is a deconstruction of the psychological concept of identity, such that subjectivity becomes the primary aspect of the artwork.

Parsemage is an automatic method in which charcoal or chalk dust is scattered on the surface of water and then skimmed off by passing a stiff paper or cardboard just under the water's surface.  Any fine dust that will float via surface tension on oil or water can be used for this technique, and it might be usable for determining the course of events in a particular area such as a battlefield or ancient ruin.  Perhaps if one used the dust of a mummy or other undead, it would be possible to learn some of their secrets, gain access to their long forgotten lore and spells?  Dangerous, but you know someone will try it.

Psycho/Photomontage is making of composite picture by cutting and pasting any number of photographs, psychographs or other images.  Done automatically, this would be a highly visual form of divination.  It can also be applied to video.

Soufflage is a technique in which liquid (usually) paint is blown (often by a straw) to create an image.  This might be a good way to develop particular forms of sigils or glyphs, maybe even used ritually to incorporate breathe into the symbolism, perhaps in the case of animating origami, awakening calligraphy or creating ink-sprites.

Time Travelers' Potlatch is a game in which two or more players say what gift they would give to another person, usually an historical person, personal ancestor or a descendant. Then one player has to get the gift delivered to that person while the other player(s) try to stop them. Obviously this is not so simple a game as time travel of some sort is implied.

Triptography is an automatic psycho/photographic technique whereby a roll of film is used three times (either by the same photographer or, in the spirit of Exquisite Corpse, three different photographers), causing it to be triple-exposed in such a way that the chances of any single photograph having a clear and definite subject is nearly impossible.
 
There, now that we have a list of these things, I can begin to work out which ones make better spells or which of them only work as forms of divination or creative expression.  Several of these techniques can be combined or rolled-into one another as sub-sets of each other.  I'll also break out the games like Consequences and Time Traveler's Potlatch so that I can get the tables and rules worked out for running them as part of a sorcerous salon.  Then there's the whole joining/getting kicked out of a Movement, forming Cliques, and of course Manifestos, both as magical items and as weapons.

Plane Speaking

Planes.  Whether you subscribe to the theory that there are Seven Planes of existence, or Fourteen (seven plus a second set of opposite shadowy planes), or Thirty-One Planes (ala Buddha: Check out this handy reference at Buddha-Net), or some other configuration based upon Nineteenth Century esotericists, Theosophists, Science fiction, Enochian magic, Neo-Platonism, quantum mechanics, Gnosticism, newage quackery, or whatever else floats your particular boat.  Seriously, you can pretty much pick a number at random and find a system out there that will support your spontaneous channeling of higher wisdom in regards to how many Planes of Existence there might be out there. 

That last sentence in particular works best if you say it all breathless and as if it were supremely meaningful, like Shatner reciting from the Yellow Pages.  It'll help you keep a healthy dose of skepticism when treading into this particular territory.  Worse than any religious components or deprecated philosophies struggling to regain prominence, this area has money attached to it, and where there be money, there be pirates (both operative and speculative), intellectual sharks out to make a buck from the gullible & vulnerable, and rentable prophets of spurious dogmas as well.  It's quite the cavalcade of human frailties, foibles and follies.  Just remember that an open mind does not mean that you need to be a suggestible moron.  As always, when exploring the realms of philosophies and related pursuits, question authorities, demand proof or at least a receipt, keep your hands inside the car at all times and Caveat Emptor!

Pointless Confession Number One: I have never liked, nor have I ever used the so-called 'standard cosmology' first promulgated by Gygax and then peddled like pseudo-esoteric crack by those who came after.  It's rubbish, pure and simple (in my personal opinion).  If you like it and have had wonderful experiences with it, that's cool, but not of any interest to me.  When I speak of Planes of Existence, I'm referring to concepts derived from sources far older than an RPG and in some cases even older than Shatner, comic books or the Yellow Pages.  Not that those sources are necessarily more credible, just more interesting to me.  It is my blog after all.

Ahem.  Back to the Planes. 

 One of my favorite phrases used to describe the nature of Planes is "...a fractal ontological spectrum of innumerable divisions..." that a wonderfully helpful author/scholar named Kheper uses on his website discussing the correlations of Blavatsky's model of the planes to Max Theon's model (and includes Gurdjieff as well).  Blavatsky is heady stuff and best taken in small doses.  Her use of Sanskrit confuses Sanskrit scholars, her references to various Eastern concepts often diverge substantially from the supposedly quoted sources so that it confuses the experts of those traditions being quoted.  This is not to say that she was any sort of a fraud, not at all. I am not inclined to judge her but rather much like H. P. Lovecraft and a number of authors before me, I like to wander about the various constructs and conundrums that good old Madame HPB tossed out there and see where they can take a story--or a game.  Kheper's analysis of the Seven Terrestrial Planes at the link above will give you a wealth of information to sift through.  Oh, and there are diagrams.  Lots of diagrams.  Gotta love weird, esoteric diagrams.  Once I get the chakra-to-attribute diagrams I am working on finished, I'll be able to expand upon them to show the next level of complexity in terms of chakra-to-planar level correlations.  Then I can plot out the portions and parts of the astral-body and some other cool stuff.  That'll be fun.  Really.  I promise.  It'll be in color, too.

Any how.  Before getting too much farther down this particular maze of madness and mysticism, we need a good definition of what a 'plane' actually is, otherwise this is all rather pointless and not of much use to anyone.  Okay.  So a 'Plane of Existence' is best summed up, at least for our purposes, as being both a location and a state of consciousness simultaneously.  Mind and matter are interconnected, just as space and time are intertwined, and as a person dwells upon certain concepts or acts out various irrational desires or rational principles, they are already aligning themselves with various and sundry planes both positive and negative.  The more 'evil' one acts/thinks, the more evil that begins to harmonize with them on the subtle levels and they become attuned to those sorts of expressions, they sink to those levels, they literally already are living on those planes in some respects.  Likewise with 'good,' however you care to define it.  One's state of mind determines which planes they have access to, and where they are drawing energy from.  There is an implicit, intrinsic moral geography or topography that comes along part and parcel with the notion of planes of existence.  Planes are states of Consciousness as well as places that can be traveled to or visited.  That makes them freaky on so many levels.  As soon as you even touch the concept you are confronted with Freewill, Meaning, Perception, Souls, Spirits, and the deep waters of philosophy, religion and the emergent doctrines of quantum psychology and so on.  The beauty is that there are no right or wrong answers aside from matters of personal conviction, established faith and a lot of conjecture that frankly amounts to so much fiction.  What it all boils down to is we really don't know all that much about Planes beyond the various (often conflicting) notions that we've inherited from (almost always) apochryphal/dubious sources.
(Philosophers are still debating just what the hell COLOR is or is not.  Check out this paper on 'Color Primitivism.')

A better question might be: "What do we want planes to be like in our setting?"  Approaching the material from that angle will convert all of the perplexing, convoluted crapulous creeds and spurious claims into grist for our respective mills.  We can pick and choose whatever sounds appropriate and cool and leave the rest for other folks to play around with later. 

For my Riskail setting, I am approaching the concept of Planes as being layered around each world-core like the sections of an onion.  Each level outwards shifts a bit farther away from the central nexus in terms of how it relates to time, space, energy and consciousness.  Each planar layer has a particular vibrational rate or frequency that can be tuned-into like with a crystal radio set, or that can have an influence upon areas or persons sensitized to its particular vibration via rituals or mechanisms.  And, as I alluded to above, I am making the Chakras as well as Attributes integral aspects of the Planar Layers which are directly related to specific chakras which can then be further refined or attuned to these energies for various sorcerous applications.  Likewise Consciousness has serious ramifications in regards to the planes, not just in terms of which ones your character has access to, but by configuring consciousness in specific ways one gains access or blocks access to / from a variety of planes, unlocking both oneiric and etheogenic approaches to exploration of realities behind / beyond the conventional, accepted facade -- and that is so frikkin' Lovecraftian it hurts.  But in a good way.  I'm also building a set of diagrams, not quite so clunky as Blavatsky's or Theon's multitude of sub-planes, at least not right off.  Pictures make things easier to understand, and hurt the brain less than an over-abundance of cryptic, obscure and polysyllabic words that quickly slide into meaninglessness due to their inherent level of abstraction. (What?)

What makes the whole thing hang together in a useful way is that it serves as a terrestrial-style system of correspondences that facilitates comparison, description and manipulation.  For example, the various layers of a character's Aura are effectively membraneous interference layers between their chakra and the plane(s) that are aligned / attuned / resonant (cognate?) with their chakras.  Thus, as a character does things to themself, or suffers various effects, their connection to various planes will shift and change, allowing for all sorts of mechanics such as invisibility, clouding people's minds, glamoury, illusions, phantasms, communing with elders of another time and pace (Kashmir), and much, much more.  On a related note, I had thought that I could jettison that hoary old chestnut Alignment, instead it appears that I might have to re-think alignment as an attribute akin to Strength, Wisdom, etc. Maybe. This idea of a moral component to space-time is not just for fantasy role-playing any more.  Scientists and other authors writing about quantum mechanics are talking a bit about this sort of thing as well.  Books are being written, fist-fights have broken out; it's fascinating stuff, and I neither accept it nor decry it, I'm just here for the free beer.  It's weird. But I like weird.  Watch your step if you decide to go exploring in those caves and waters.  It gets pretty treacherous fairly quickly.  Beware the Wandering Opinion Table.

What do I mean by 'terrestrial' which I mentioned above?  Good question.  Sometimes it is better to begin with what is known before diving into the unknown.  We awaken into an awareness of our selves, our bodies and our surroundings.  Usually in that order, but that could be debated ad nauseum as well.  When we awaken into sentience, becoming thinking / feeling personalities who can answer questions on a Myers-briggs test Instrument in order to discover our personality-type, then we are becoming cognizant of our non-physical / abstract attributes (what OD&D would refer to as WIS, INT, maybe CHAR--that one likewise gets a bit of a debate going).  When we become aware of our bodies, we start dealing with breathing, eating, pooping and the physical attributes (STR, DEX, CON...).  Then we start to figure out that there is a world beyond our own asshole, unless we're a born politician sociopath or are crippled with an acute form of narcissism (which really is its own reward when you think about it).  The world around us, our environment, affects us in numerous ways.  Think burning stove, running water, and barking dogs and you'll be on the right track.  Those three developmental steps form the basis of how we perceive, relate and express our understanding of ourselves, each other, and the immediate world.  It is also the basic set of concepts that then leads into such stuff as chakras (attributes again), auras (chakra-planar interfaces), ectoplasm / phantasm (the sticky-gooey media in-between chakras and planes), and the terrestrial forms of divination, geomancy, interior decorating, and coping with ley-lines, etc.  Then there are the celestial / astral influences such as astrology, luminiferous aethyr / astral light, the ethereal zones, and so on.  It all stacks one upon the other like a bunch of weird Legos (tm) , and it all inter-locks just like the little Danish plastic blocks.

You start out small and simple and then slowly build up the complexity as things progress.  Now the notion of seven planes tied to the colors of a rainbow sounds pretty appealing, over the thirty-one bizarre-sounding ones with all the sub-levels and crap, huh?

Nah.

Go big, or go home.

But whether there is only one plane or a billion, the scheme for explaining these things needs to be accessible, readable, something that can be grasped both conceptually and figuratively so that they can be used in a setting, story or adventure.  They make lovely furniture / backgrounds if you want to get all Zelazny-like, which is a great way to handle an infinite number of planes swirling between two primary poles, one of which is Chaos.  (scroll down to 7: Mike Says.)   Zelazny also pioneered the conceptual conceit of having physical laws shift in smallish increments from adjacent plane to adjacent plane so that what worked for gunpowder in on place might only be good for polishing shiny rocks in another.  That alone can spawn numerous random tables for handling a wide range of planar effects, or serve as a plot-twist worthy of the worst groaner of a Star Trek plot in which the PCs gain a massive load of fire-power (personal-scale Vulcan Gatling Guns ala Predator anyone?) only to find out that the dirt in their bullets isn't particularly flammable despite having gained some seriously intoxicating effects.  Of course, that only works if you're not a dick and let them find some other substance to re-load their ammo with, or you let them discover an alternative like trees that produce pods that have strange bio-crystalline cores that focus a wielder's WIS into a blade of shimmering force that cuts through titanium like a Ginsu, or something like that only actually cool.  Taking an Amber-style approach gives you those kinds of off-the-wall opportunities.

Moorcock has been developing his version of the Multiverse for decades and anyone not immediately familiar with Elric or Moorcock should probably stop reading this stuff and go read a book.  Even if you don't like the guy or his work, his fiction is very influential and worth taking a look at just to see how he handles planes if nothing else.  Consider the Vadhagh ability to shift from one to another of the Fifteen Planes: "Once it was easy to move through the Five Planes at will.  With a little more effort the Ten Planes could be contacted, though, as you know, few could visit them physically.  Now I am unable to do more than see and occasionally hear those other four planes which, with ours, form the spectrum through which our planet directly passes in its astral cycle." Corum from The Knight of Swords.

Now we're getting someplace.  A set number of basic, common-access planes (directly tied to the chakras to facilitate various forms of clairvoyance / clairaudience, etc.), that are all arranged into a spectrum (shades of Ken Wilbur!), and all part of a vast planetary-level astral cycle (HPB again).  I like this approach.  It is clean and a good place to start from, without getting too bogged down in endless reams of useless details.  It also presents a nice way to integrate mechanics into the underpinings of the setting, which makes things more integral, to borrow a Wilbur-ism.

Another fictional approach to Planes is Farmer's World of Tiers series.  This time though, the planes are synthetic and the work of super-science, not mystical mumbo-jumbo, and we all know that weird science and rocketships always trumps magic and unicorns, except when the scientists start creating unicorns like in Stasheff's stories, but that's a digression for another day.  Farmer did some fun stuff with his artificial planes, and it's too good an idea to waste, so I'm bringing my friends the Temjurri, a faction from the old Bazra campaign / stories from way back into Riskail.  The Temjurri are plane-makers, hardcore scientists every bit as weird and powerful as any wizard.  So now we have artificial planes in Riskail, planes that are designed, built and made-to-order by an elite cadre of technologists and engineers from an obscure secret society who are reputed to lock away their enemies in pocket-spaces the way that Montresor walled-away Fortunato in Poe's classic tale.  Cool.  Weird science, artificial planes, secret societies of engineers who hold the secrets to forgotten or forbidden technologies, a wonderful tie-back to Poe for the sake of atmosphere, and we're in business.

Another approach to the subject of Planes is Rudolf Steiner, not known for fiction but rather an intriguing guy in his own right. Steiner was an old school occultist who literally and truly did have run-ins with the Nazis who both feared him and hated him like no other metaphysical adept.  He was like an Austrian George Washington Carver only he was more ignored and his work tended to be less commercially applicable, except for his unique form of agriculture still in use, his unique approach to music (Eurythmy), architecture, education (ever hear of Waldorf?) -- oh just go take a look at the guy.  He wrote more books than just about anyone and when he got bored with that he started whole new schools, founded alternative economic systems, got entangled in politics and started his own band of not-secret society called Anthroposophy.  This guy's life reads like he was a real-life Doc Savage and The Shadow rolled into one, only more academically inclined and less likely to punch you or pull a Colt .45 from under his cape and blast you into kingdom come...but then again, I won't take that bet.  Maybe he donned a mask, fedora and opera cape and did just that and never got caught.  If anyone could do it, he'd be the one to pull it off.

Handy Link: Forgottenbooks.org is a good place to go snooping for weird, old out-of-print books that can be mined for all sorts of ideas and Steiner's Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment can be downloaded as a free e-book here.  Be Warned: Anyone interested in this stuff could lose many hours of their life digging through the many obscure treasures gathered at this site.  I am a big fan of this site.  Highly recommended.

Steiner offers up a lot of intriguing concepts that many a less talented and often times more venally-motivated author has gone on to present as their own revelation from the ethers.  He firmly and devoutly espoused the doctrine that any human being willing to do the work could reap the benefits of the spiritual sciences.  He was one of the earliest proponents of self-development, and in many ways could be seen as a godfather to the whole self-help movement.  The Guardian on the Threshold is one of those cool bits of esoteric lore that keeps turning up all over the place, from Alice Bailey to Joseph Campbell and on to hordes of earnest newage gurus trying to sell you on their cosmique revelations channelled directly from Sirius or wherever.  (sphincter?)

Despite the snake-oil peddlers, the Guardian of the Threshold is too good an idea to not use it, especially when planes are directly tied to both consciousness and locality.  PCs will need to learn techniques and / or rites for gaining the permission / means to cross the threshold(s) between them and the other planes, perhaps a pilgrimage to other planes is required in order to activate Arbitrary Powers or one needs to contact a plane to arrange for a sponsor on the otherside in order to gain access to the plane or planes in question.  Ancient secret societies guard antiquated devices said to awaken dormant powers of perception within a subject (victim), allowing them to negotiate with the Guardians directly and possibly giving them a way to go get strange cool powers as a result.  Sacred sites might facilitate this sort of experience, especially certain ley-line junctures / nodes, or one of those stock ruined temples with the vaguely pre-Columbian motif and cyclopean (non-Steiner) architecture could have literal thresholds constructed within them that are activated by rituals and sacrifices of silly-putty so as to allow a dedicant to shift across into other planes.  Assuming they get past the three-headed parakeet that guards the mauve portal to Ygulix, or whatever other dread form the Guardian takes.

Steiner is awesome.  You could spend decades just reading his stuff, but I wouldn't recommend it unless you're prone to insomnia.  A genius, yes, but a popularizer of his concepts suited to today's reading public?  Not hardly.  Thankfully there are scads of hacks authors who rip-off re-discover his works and foist share them with the world, or at least those enlightened souls with credit cards.

Steiner is also a good example of how something as seemingly simple at first blush as Planes can get way out there in three or less clicks.  Planes are an integral part of the magic system, at least in my setting.  They also tie directly into the core mechanics of attributes which makes the whole process of developing a ton of spell-effects and Arbitrary Powers incredibly simple and straightforward, which I will cover in a future post.

The idea is to make the magic / sorcery coherent.  I refrain from the use of a word such as 'authentic,' because after decades of intense personal study, I can tell you that there is very little of any actual authenticity in these areas beyond stuff that has lingered long after the expiration date has lapsed.  If it wasn't for inspired forgeries, conceited frauds, or conniving mountebanks a lot of this weird and wonderful stuff would never have happened in the first place.  But that doesn't discredit it any more than applying the same standards to religion would produce any other results.  We're dealing with the geography of imagination and the mechanics of mythologies.  Authenticity stems from an opinion, a particular point of view, and frankly the magic of a made-up setting either in fiction or in an RPG needs be no more authentic than the systems used to handle quasi-medieval combat, and no less.  Mayhem is an abstract thing in the OD&D-derived corpus, for the most part.  Attempts to make it more realistic are of limited utility, in my experience, as they tend to be promoted most vigorously by those who wish to super-turbo-charge their characters and who do not wish to see anything even close to what they are promulgating being done for the magic system of the game.  Somehow some schmuck waving a length of steel is supposed to be superior to someone who wields the powers of a hundred planes and can cast lightning bolts.  Sure, it's a common enough conceit in a great many of the old Sword & Sorcery stories.  Plenty of times you read about some illiterate git in a fur kilt laying the bloodiest of smack-downs on the massed ranks of the local members of the Conjurors, Sorcerers and Wizards Local 113 (a special sub-section of the union of electrical workers possibly).  Maybe that works for you, and that's wonderful if it does.  It doesn't work for me.  I want magic to be fun, usable, and not a bogus weeny-copout kind of train wreck that just makes wizards top dog.  Fighters and others get their due just as well, and the basic mechanics coming together from all this can serve the less wizardly-inclined and even the anti-psychic null-zone-emitting types as well.  But I want more than just fireballs and a list of boring spells for my magic-users.  If thieves get special skills, then so should sorcerers (and fighters, but that's another post).

There needs to be some way to prevent magic-users from taking over everything.  Just like there needs to be a way to keep the fighters from taking over everything, or any of the other classes.  No problem.  As they develop their powers (just like a warrior develops techniques with weapons, or styles of fighting...), they have to deal with repercussions and consequences that come with their decisions, initiations, attunements and actions.  Every time they resort to certain proscribed rites of nastiness, that affects their aura, contaminates their chakras, and affects which planes they have access to. In some cases they can lose the ability to contact certain planes altogether.  The other-planar entities that they decide to contact or consort with likewise affect them on this deep level.  Entering into the service of higher-order entities, be they mythic angels, synthetic archetypes, obscure demigods or the embodiment of abstract principles has a direct and very powerful effect on the character that goes beyond just what color underwear they wear or what brand of sword they prefer when looting a castle.  It closes some options off even as it opens others up.  And that is exactly the sort of approach I want in Riskail.  Your choices as a player matter, not in a punitive sense, though some actions carry penalties just like hacking off an arm might impair one's ability to play piano, but in an empowering sense.  I want options, not restrictions.  Player skill can (and should) have a direct and dramatic effect on character attributes, giving the best of both approaches in one fell swoop.  Maybe.  Depending on how well I can get the diagrams all colored in, I guess.  We'll see.

Planes.  Getting back on track.  Planes are an opportunity to provide forms of experience, adventure and even some excitement that can really enrich a game.  Being able to project psychically into a realm of strange creatures on a vision quest, or stepping across a threshold into a realm where the rules of physics are off-kilter, or learning the secret art of drawing forth the dreaded Purple Flames of Kumashton and single-handedly wiping-out the voracious swarm of link-beetles about to devour the party body and soul--that's what I want from Planes in Riskail.

Make Your Own Magical Orders (Table)

I have uploaded a Table to make it easier to generate the names of Random Magical Orders to Scribd.  You can find it here, or down below.  It's free and it's yours to use, if you have a use for it, I just ask that you give me a mention if you do use it.  I'd also like some feedback, if anyone is inclined to offer any.

How To Use the Table:
Roll 2D6.  The first result is how many columns of the top table you get to select from, the second result is how many columns of the bottom table you get to select from.

Roll as many D20 as you got results for the Top and then the Bottom tables.  You get to pick whether you go with the ascending or descending order: or you can flip a coin.

Toss the words together, move them around as you see fit and experiment with swapping them around.  The idea is to generate the seed kernel of a decent name for a magical order.   You can slip a "The" and sometimes a well-placed "of the" can make all the difference.  If it comes out sounding pretentious, hubristic or over-the-top ridiculous...that might just be exactly what is called for.  Trust the dice, but use your imagination.  If you don't like your results, change some of the words or pick from different columns.  There is plenty of room for expanding the current double-matrix into something far more complex and filled with half a million sub-tables...but that's a lot of work for a little pay-off.

Let me know if it is useful or if it sucks.  I'm already working on a different approach that's a bit more formalized.

RiskailMagicalOrderTable_Mk1

Underlying Principles for Riskail: Sorcery and Magic, Part One

Note: This is Excerpted from an ongoing Work-in-Progress, much like the entire blog.  It is only intended to illustrate the specifics of the Riskail setting, nothing more, nothing less.

On Confronting the Cadeuceus
Sorcery and Magic are two intertwining pursuits that criss-cross and overlap one another in myriads of ways and yet are fundamentally quite different from one another for all their similarities, parallels and points of resonant congruence.  How so?  Let me explain...

Sorcery is the inspired, intuitive response to the irrational, rooted in perception, mired in personal perspective, and anchored deeply within the peculiar convolutions and topology of the very core-identity of the sorcerer.  It is a sometimes ecstatic, othertimes tragic, always idiosyncratic process of direct, personal and transformative revelation, metamorphosis, and transformation that partakes of the imagination and experience of individuals who dare to become other than they were, those who seek to experience and express genius through their transgressive arts that place them into communion with a super-reality both beyond and beneath the confined and constrained frame of reference we share as a common-property inheritance of tropes, symbols and archetypes that are all available for the edification, modification, and transmorgrification as they so choose.

Sorcery is a liberal, organic and hallucinatory sort of liberating process.  It embraces enigmas, promulgates paradox, and answers only to passions and drives unleashed from the depths of the unconscious and even then it is a fickle mistress, with a will and a volition of its own.  One does not command sorcery, nor is there any established authority save the personal accomplishments of those who have struggled with the madness and the alienation as they have navigated the infinite territories betwixt the ever-shifting poles of desire, delirium, the ever-fecund and erotic attraction of creation and the nihilistic and egoic revulsion of destruction.

Sorcery is by its very nature transgressive, dangerous, unstable and quixotic.  It is a personal path with few peers and many rivals, it can bring admirers and imitators, but in the end it requires personal sacrifice, your own unique take on the mythos you choose to guide your efforts, and your own interpretations of the vast panoply of spells that make up the vulgar apparatus, social cantrips and public domain corpus that is part and parcel of all sorcerer's heritage and the collective ground from which they all start.

A sorcerer learns principles, concepts and allegories, and they focus upon techniques, they explore established styles and join Movements based upon Manifestos, or they form short-term collaborations or covens with like-minded fellow-travelers until the inherent stesses and pressures of their respective explorations and the demands of their unique and personal visions tear such associations apart.  They gain skill, invest their experience, and gain or lose prestige and notoriety based upon what they produce, the clever re-interpretation of common spells or the hard work of creating a body of new spells leading up to their Masterpiece which sums up the totality of their experience, acts as a talismanic conduit of Power connected to some source that only they could reach or that they approached in an entirely new manner.

Hacks and lesser-talents brood upon the works of the Masters, frequenting museums and private collections in order to find some way to tap into the Power and the sources of inspiration behind the works of those who have passed before them, imitators and copy-cats, some create exquisite forgeries while others become so immersed in the style and idiom of their chosen guides that they become living extensions of the sorcery of the Great Masters, some going on to surpass those they imitated, others becoming so ensnared in the intimate details of another's vision that they lose themselves and sometimes become possessed by the very identity they sought to emulate.  There are those unscrupulous curators of run-down collections of obscure works who deliberately encourage this sort of thing in the hopes of cashing-in on the rebirth of formerly celebrated geniuses, but for the most part this sort of thing is considered tacky and distasteful by the mainstream of Polite Society.  But of course there are the occasional notable exceptions.

Sorcerers assemble their personal arsenal and repertoire from the fragmentary and sometimes conflicting bits and pieces of vaguely disreputable arts such as psychism, animism, spiritism, and the thoroughly uncanny techniques of trance, hypnosis, mesmerism, meditation, and psychoanalysis amongst other antique and often obscure forms of esoterica and the occult.  They study art as it was applied and the critical-lies of how it was interpreted, making no distinction between Truth or Fiction as it all dissolves into personal interpretation within the vast cultural ecology of phantasmagoria, psychology and divination.  All the fetishes and charms, Visceral Runes and Abstract Glyphs derived from all of human experience and expression are theirs to explore and experiement with and to expand upon.  Oneirism and somnambulism, amongst the other techniques of dream-work form the basis of most sorcerer's beginning explorations, quite a few of them will go on to locate and acquire their first spell-book at the Open Market that only exists as a shared-dream many have visited before and many more will experience afterwards.

Sorcery is an art.  First and foremost it is based upon first-hand experience.  It is personal, immediate, and intoxicating even to the point of becoming deadly addictive.  The primary media is the Self, the main avenue of expression is one's own life and the works they produce.  One does sorcery, one is not a sorcerer by any title or position held; it is an active pursuit that is both improvisational and open to personal interpretation, indeed it requires creativity and invention to even exist.  A sorcerer seeks attunements to gain access to media to employ within their spells, often traveling far and wide to gain personal contact with specific locales in order to connect with them on some level allowing the sorcerer to call upon that particular frame of reference to empower and influence their spells in a sympathetic synchronization that is both demanding and rewarding should they make good choices.  Likewise some sorcerers explore the fine art of unlocking the secret powers lurking within randomly found objects or the parts of animals, plants or structures.  They employ divination, create their own tarots, and hunt out their own sets (or forgotten forms) of runes.  It is a dangerous path fraught with intellectual violence, deliberate misinterpretations and wild accusations that prowl the sensoria of those engaged with it like feral beasts scenting out vulnerable and gullible prey to corrupt, twist and destroy through their insidious, corrosive influence. 

Sorcery is the province of witches, shamans, mystics, visionaries, mediums, dowsers, geomancers, soothsayers, enchanters, wild talents, rune-carvers, mechanical animists, tricksters, illusionists, fantomists, binders, prophets and above all artists.  It is the ultimate open-source community involved in reality-hacking as an artform.

So much for Sorcery.

Magic is the science of consciousness, formulaic and founded upon repeatable results, hard-won collated masses of data, the accumulated body of research and experiment over generations by a hierarchical and balkanized community of secretive and conservative custodians of rituals and legacies only accessible by way of rites of initiation and the study of doctrine, dogma and laws only revealed after dire oaths and terrible vows which carry unthinkable consequences should one break their promise or seek to go back on their duly given and recorded word.  Magic, beyond the simplest Outer Court rituals cheaply available on any newstand or by way of any scroll-peddler or bookseller,  is a body of work available only to those who receive an invitation, after they have proven themselves worthy in the eyes of some Order, Lodge, or School. 

Magic is walled-off, deliberately hidden and preserved for the properly prepared whilst held in reserve and obscured from the sight and knowledge of those not ready for its challenges, burdens or responsibilities.  One must appreciate the context of magic, the traditions of the groups that preserve it and promulgate it, and deliver the initiations that open one's way into it.  Each step, every level along the great pyramid of initiation brings with it a new challenge as well as a renewed, often strengthened connection to the particular Powers that serve or guide the group.  Power comes in time, in response to proven effort, diligent study, and repetitious application.  Each candidate will have at least made some progress working through the Seven Classical Grimoires, or else they will not get far along the path of magic as each successive step is dependent upon the one before it.

Guides, mentors, and challengers, hierophants, chancellors, marshalls, and very honored fraters and sorores, your brothers and sisters within the Order, Lodge or Circle will help you, test you, challenge, provoke and assess your worthiness even as they instruct you, educate you and assign various tasks to you.  It's all part of the process of becoming a wizard, a mage or philosopher with great knowledge, power and responsibility.

Magic is a form of technology, and it is highly proprietary in its dissemination and application.  Memories, dreams and reflections are the stock in trade of a candidate who is expected to earn their place at the threshold to the mandala-esque boundaries of their chosen Order.  Once initiated, brought across the threshold and plugged-into the accumulated lore, specific Power and particular legacies of their group, they are commited to the path.  Most find it a fair bargain.  The others are rarely ever heard from again.

One gains access to the teachings of their group, learning the fundamentals and receiving training in the work of assembling egregores, conjuration of the spirits and other entities aligned to their group, the doctrines underlying all magical practice, and the requisite rituals and spells only available from the group.  They are connected into the collective energy of the organization, their aura primed and bound and set with seals that identify it as belonging to the Order.  They are granted the right to access the shared metaconscious groupmind that informs the group, serves as their commonly-shared point of access and reference, and the repository of all their memories, knowledge and learning.  Perhaps at one time these things were in some form artificial, but they are quite valid and real and dynamically active and involved in the affairs of their respective groups as could be expected of any living organism, collective or singular.

The private histories of the various Orders are built up over generations by all the diaries, journals, records and reports submitted by each member over the course of their involvement with the Order.  By its nature it contains controversies, conflicts and the failings of all forms of communication.  But amidst all that, there are secrets, insights, revelations and often neglected theories or lines of reasoning that can lead to whole new areas of research and experimentation, buried spells, forgotten or deprecated forms of rituals, even the keys to sub-sets of the Order that operate as clandestine cells of even more secret societies within the already esoteric and arcane Orders.  And the more one digs, the more one uncovers the politics, dealings, and truth of the past and the previous generations even as they get co-opted, recruited, and drafted into the lingering conspiracies, simmering rivalries and sometimes explosive disputes that are going on all around them.  They will be asked to choose a side eventually.  Perhaps they will choose wisely, but they will choose none the less.

Magic is a mass of consequences, implications and knowledge both undefiled and thoroughly bastardized, bowdlerized and corrupted.  It is a powerful modality for effecting change both in terms of one's inner conscious-landscape and in the world at large.  Secret knowledge such as the geometry of mythology, the mechanics of planes and resonant spaces, the topology of emanatory spheres, metaphorical and practical astrology, hyper-mathematics, reformed hermeticism and more.  If it is esoteric, bound by secrecy, and best not left to the uneducated, the ignorant or the profane then it is encapsulated, shrouded and held in trust by the Orders lest it be cast like dangerous pearls before pigs.  Consider the implications of psychoactive nuclear weapons, or the ancient secrets of constructing timebombs or the horrendous machines capable of mindlessly devouring entire planets.  Those things are replicatable, repeatable, the product of arcane sciences, and they must never fall into the hands of those who do not clearly appreciate their natures or the consequences of their use.  Thus the Orders remain silent, guardians of things best not left in the hands of the uninitiated.

So much for magic.