Character name: Samata Mahto Character canon: Original Canon point: End of the first act. There are riots in the streets, the government is in flames, and Samata is realizing she just accidentally overthrew the regime. Physical Description: Here's a picture of her I commissioned. 26 years old, 5'6", dark skin, longish black fluffy hair. Someone from Earth would guess she was from India, based on her appearance. A bit overweight. Her left arm has been cut off at the shoulder, and replaced by a prosthetic that looks like it was put together by an amateur with only one arm but is none the less somehow fully functional. Tends to dress in a sort of 1700s style. Anything you can imagine Benjamin Franklin wearing, Samata would probably also wear. She moves with a lot of energy. About the Character: First thing to understand about Samata is that her story was originally conceived of as a D&D campaign. So, keep that in mind going forwards:
Samata's world was godless for much of its history. It wasn't until the Istavan, the god of law, order, and arcane magic stumbled upon it. He took steps to hide the world away from other gods out there so that he could have a whole world to himself. He inspired prophets, launched crusades, summoned monsters, and in only a few hundred years, his worshipers were basically the only organized religion in the world.
He didn't stop there, though. Istavan rearranged the world. He saw a world full of vibrant cultures and people bouncing ideas off each other and he hated the chaos of it all. SO he split all the various races apart. All the humans would live HERE. All the elves would live over THERE. All the orcs would live THERE. And so on and so forth. People were relocated, cities destroyed, geography reinvented. In the end, there were a bunch of different lands that only had one sapient race living in them, with the spaces between them patrolled by hordes of monsters that would slay anyone who tried to leave their designated spot. Occasionally, small groups of badasses would slip through, but never in large groups, and they would have to contend with the local churches of Istavan, which would be politely unwelcoming and help them go on their way as soon as possible with the very discrete but real threat of violence should they overstay their lack of welcome. THEN he rewrote the history books. Now, the common belief is that during the great crusades, it was the enemies of Istavan who summoned the monsters, and Istavan who heroically forced them away into the outlands where they couldn't hurt anyone.
Istavan was also a god of arcane magic, so during the crusade he granted sorcerous power to his generals and commanders. The descendants of those military officers are now still on top of society. The magic in their blood gives them amazing power, which the church preaches (accurately, as it turns out) is proof of their divine favor and right to rule.
And so, finally, we get to Samata. The daughter of two wealthy wine merchants, but still a commoner, Samata grew up with every advantage a non-sorcerer could have. She had a voracious appetite for learning and solving puzzles, so when she wanted to become a scholar, they sent her to the capital to study at the University. There, she did what any young adult living on their own for the first time does and just had the whole college experience. She studied diligently, yes, but she also went to parties and got drunk and crammed for exams at the last minute and fell in love and had a messy breakup...the whole thing. She graduated perfectly normally, with a degree in "natural philosophy" (we would call it physics, mixed with magical theory and just a dash of theology.), and was probably on course to become a professor herself. It all went wrong on the night of her graduation, at a party.
Walter Eberhart was a sorcerer. And not just any sorcerer. He was fabulously wealthy and of a particularly influential family that paid a huge amount of the university's budget. Also, he could project phantasmal blades through the air with his mind. All that meant that he had never really had to exert himself in life, and mainly spent his time amusing himself. Tonight, he was slumming it at a dingy tavern that some students were throwing a party at. While drunk, Walter loudly declared to his friends that he was going to open a bottle of wine by chopping the top off with magic. In his drunken stupor, it took him three tries. The first blade missed, but didn't hit anyone. The second blade blinded a party goer and also chopped off Samata's left arm at the shoulder. The third one actually opened the bottle. All three went through the front wall of the building and knocked it down, injuring several people outside as they were hit with debris. FORTUNATELY, medical attention was quick and no one died. Walter's family called in some connections, and he was able to get off with a minor reprimand before the whole thing was swept under the rug.
Samata was outraged, but no matter who she turned to for justice, the fact remained that she was now missing an arm was less important than the fact that Walter Eberhart was a highly influential sorcerer while she was just a commoner. She fell into a deep depression for a while, but Samata wasn't the kind of person who stayed down for long. She enrolled in post-graduate courses and basically vanished from the world for a while.
When she came back, she had a prototype of a new kind of prosthetic. It natural current of ambient magic through the world powered it, and the odic force (a new kind of energy she herself had discovered during this project that is generated by every living thing) let her move it as if it were part of her own body. She had become the world's first cyborg. But that was only the start. Samata also realized that with proper understanding of the odic force, any person could manipulate magic. It wasn't the intuitive powers of a sorcerer, it was something new entirely. Samata made up a word for this new kind of magic: Wizardry.
Samata was the world's first wizard. The first person who could use magic despite not having any genetic talent for it. She immediately started offering lessons to anyone who would put up with her. When the church of Istavan noticed what she was doing, they started condemning the practice of wizardry as subverting the will of god. Instead of stopping, Samata hired a body guard and kept going. The church sent assassins, Samata survived the attempts...
From here, the story gets more blurry, as this is around where the aforementioned D&D campaign would have started, but the general flow of events would have been something like this:
- Samata gets the other party members to join her cause and takes her classes underground - The amateur wizards stop being weird academics and start becoming a full on revolutionary movement of commoners tired of being bossed around by sorcerers. - There is fighting in the streets and Samata realizes she is in WAY over her head - Rather than back down she doubles down and ends up overthrowing the government - Samata and crew start venturing into the domains of the other sentient races and dismantling Istavan's power structures there while being chased by his increasingly irate and powerful minions. - Samata discovers that there are other gods out there in the universe and start attracting their attention to her world, so as to give Istavan some divine competition. - The campaign comes to a dramatic finale on Samata and her friends facing Istavan himself as the end boss. - Epilogue: Samata founds the first school of wizardry and becomes headmaster.
As you might have picked up from all this, Samata is a woman who does not know when to quit. She gets angry and passionate easily, and when she's angry or passionate she tends to stop thinking about little things like consequences or common sense. She'll pick fights with people way out of her weight class and get in arguments or go on rants in the middle of important situations. She will eventually realize when she's made a spectacularly bad decision, but by then it usually is too late to back down, and her only way out is through, as it were.
She is also a woman who enjoys living large. Though she adores learning, she would find a life of quiet contemplation and study dreadfully dull. She's not an athlete by any stretch of the imagination, but if she doesn't get a chance to get up and DO things every once in a while, she gets antsy. She craves parties, dancing, good food and drink, drunken bad decisions, and generally the feeling of letting tomorrow by someone else's problem.
All this firey temper and passion isn't always immediately obvious, however. Istavan has crafted the people of the world into a fairly conservative society, so that's the one that Samata was raised in. She was brought up to speak properly, and to observe social customs, and to generally not rock the boat. When she's not dealing with people she knows well and feels comfortable with, she tends to try and keep her body language more restrained and demure just out of habit, and tends to speak very properly.
Character abilities: Prosthetic arm - Samata's left arm is a mechanical prosthetic she built herself. She can take it off if she wants (and usually does at night). While plugged in, it tricks her body into thinking it still has an arm and responds to her will the same way a regular arm would. The one she has now is the Mk 2 version. The Mk 1 was the initial prototype and proof of concept. She currently has half finished plans for the Mk 3. The Mk 2 is still kind of heavy and awkward, but with access to a workshop and plenty of time, she could upgrade it to be more lightweight and responsive in time.
Wizardry - Samata is the first wizard there ever was in her world. Sorcerers inherit their power genetically, and naturally siphon the magic in the environment around them into their bodies which they can use to fuel their abilities, allowing them to instinctively use what are basically a few distinct superpowers (Usually 2-3 different but related abilities. Firebreath and immunity to fire, for example). Wizards, on the other hand, don't draw that magic into themselves, but instead just manipulate it directly while it's still in the environment around them through careful rituals, or spells. Each spell takes anywhere from five minutes to an hour to cast, depending on the complexity, but it's also possible to finish 99% of the work, then leave it hanging and just do the last 1% real quick when you need it to finish the spell.
Spell Research - While her spell list is rather limited at the moment, she can research new spells that do more or less whatever she wants. The more complex the spell or the more powerful the effect, the more expensive and time consuming the research is. Simple spells take a week or two to figure out. More powerful spells can take months, if she can figure it out at all. Once it's finished being researched, it goes in the spell book and she can reuse it as needed or teach it to others.
Magic item creation - With some effort, a lot of research, and a lot of silver (silver conducts magical energy well), Samata can make magical items that will function more or less indefinitely as long as there is ambient magic in the world. A few examples are listed on her spell list, which is also linked above under "spell research". Inventory: - The clothes on her back: underwear, knee breeches, stockings, shoes, undershirt, overshirt, fancy jacket. - Hat: Tall and pointy with a wide brim. A prototype of the archetypal wizard hat. - Mechanical arm: Attaches to the stump of her left arm and reacts to nerve impulses to move. Powered by the ambient magic in the atmosphere. Held in place by leather straps that wrap around her torso. Slightly heavier than her normal arm, resulting in her tending to lean to the side slightly if she's not paying attention. - Flying carpet: About 3 feet by 5 feet. Stitched with arcane symbols made of silver wire. Tapping the appropriate symbol will allow you to steer the carpet through the air. - Spectacles of magic sensing: Made from ordinary reading glasses, but with extra lenses attached on levers (think the special decoder glasses from National Treasure). When in place, the extra enses let you see the flow of magical energy through the world even if you normally could not. Magic items and people with magic powers are visible as distortions in the flow of magic. - Gloves of energy redirection: These metal gauntlets are covered with magic symbols written in silver, and connected by an insulated wire long enough that it won't restrict your movement. It is designed so that you can flip the wire behind you and it won't get in your way. While wearing the gauntlets, you can block attacks with one hand, and the force of the attack will be transferred along the wire and projected out the other hand. - Spellbook - Notebook + quill + ink
no subject
Character canon: Original
Canon point: End of the first act. There are riots in the streets, the government is in flames, and Samata is realizing she just accidentally overthrew the regime.
Physical Description: Here's a picture of her I commissioned. 26 years old, 5'6", dark skin, longish black fluffy hair. Someone from Earth would guess she was from India, based on her appearance. A bit overweight. Her left arm has been cut off at the shoulder, and replaced by a prosthetic that looks like it was put together by an amateur with only one arm but is none the less somehow fully functional. Tends to dress in a sort of 1700s style. Anything you can imagine Benjamin Franklin wearing, Samata would probably also wear. She moves with a lot of energy.
About the Character: First thing to understand about Samata is that her story was originally conceived of as a D&D campaign. So, keep that in mind going forwards:
Samata's world was godless for much of its history. It wasn't until the Istavan, the god of law, order, and arcane magic stumbled upon it. He took steps to hide the world away from other gods out there so that he could have a whole world to himself. He inspired prophets, launched crusades, summoned monsters, and in only a few hundred years, his worshipers were basically the only organized religion in the world.
He didn't stop there, though. Istavan rearranged the world. He saw a world full of vibrant cultures and people bouncing ideas off each other and he hated the chaos of it all. SO he split all the various races apart. All the humans would live HERE. All the elves would live over THERE. All the orcs would live THERE. And so on and so forth. People were relocated, cities destroyed, geography reinvented. In the end, there were a bunch of different lands that only had one sapient race living in them, with the spaces between them patrolled by hordes of monsters that would slay anyone who tried to leave their designated spot. Occasionally, small groups of badasses would slip through, but never in large groups, and they would have to contend with the local churches of Istavan, which would be politely unwelcoming and help them go on their way as soon as possible with the very discrete but real threat of violence should they overstay their lack of welcome. THEN he rewrote the history books. Now, the common belief is that during the great crusades, it was the enemies of Istavan who summoned the monsters, and Istavan who heroically forced them away into the outlands where they couldn't hurt anyone.
Istavan was also a god of arcane magic, so during the crusade he granted sorcerous power to his generals and commanders. The descendants of those military officers are now still on top of society. The magic in their blood gives them amazing power, which the church preaches (accurately, as it turns out) is proof of their divine favor and right to rule.
And so, finally, we get to Samata. The daughter of two wealthy wine merchants, but still a commoner, Samata grew up with every advantage a non-sorcerer could have. She had a voracious appetite for learning and solving puzzles, so when she wanted to become a scholar, they sent her to the capital to study at the University. There, she did what any young adult living on their own for the first time does and just had the whole college experience. She studied diligently, yes, but she also went to parties and got drunk and crammed for exams at the last minute and fell in love and had a messy breakup...the whole thing. She graduated perfectly normally, with a degree in "natural philosophy" (we would call it physics, mixed with magical theory and just a dash of theology.), and was probably on course to become a professor herself. It all went wrong on the night of her graduation, at a party.
Walter Eberhart was a sorcerer. And not just any sorcerer. He was fabulously wealthy and of a particularly influential family that paid a huge amount of the university's budget. Also, he could project phantasmal blades through the air with his mind. All that meant that he had never really had to exert himself in life, and mainly spent his time amusing himself. Tonight, he was slumming it at a dingy tavern that some students were throwing a party at. While drunk, Walter loudly declared to his friends that he was going to open a bottle of wine by chopping the top off with magic. In his drunken stupor, it took him three tries. The first blade missed, but didn't hit anyone. The second blade blinded a party goer and also chopped off Samata's left arm at the shoulder. The third one actually opened the bottle. All three went through the front wall of the building and knocked it down, injuring several people outside as they were hit with debris. FORTUNATELY, medical attention was quick and no one died. Walter's family called in some connections, and he was able to get off with a minor reprimand before the whole thing was swept under the rug.
Samata was outraged, but no matter who she turned to for justice, the fact remained that she was now missing an arm was less important than the fact that Walter Eberhart was a highly influential sorcerer while she was just a commoner. She fell into a deep depression for a while, but Samata wasn't the kind of person who stayed down for long. She enrolled in post-graduate courses and basically vanished from the world for a while.
When she came back, she had a prototype of a new kind of prosthetic. It natural current of ambient magic through the world powered it, and the odic force (a new kind of energy she herself had discovered during this project that is generated by every living thing) let her move it as if it were part of her own body. She had become the world's first cyborg. But that was only the start. Samata also realized that with proper understanding of the odic force, any person could manipulate magic. It wasn't the intuitive powers of a sorcerer, it was something new entirely. Samata made up a word for this new kind of magic: Wizardry.
Samata was the world's first wizard. The first person who could use magic despite not having any genetic talent for it. She immediately started offering lessons to anyone who would put up with her. When the church of Istavan noticed what she was doing, they started condemning the practice of wizardry as subverting the will of god. Instead of stopping, Samata hired a body guard and kept going. The church sent assassins, Samata survived the attempts...
From here, the story gets more blurry, as this is around where the aforementioned D&D campaign would have started, but the general flow of events would have been something like this:
- Samata gets the other party members to join her cause and takes her classes underground
- The amateur wizards stop being weird academics and start becoming a full on revolutionary movement of commoners tired of being bossed around by sorcerers.
- There is fighting in the streets and Samata realizes she is in WAY over her head
- Rather than back down she doubles down and ends up overthrowing the government
- Samata and crew start venturing into the domains of the other sentient races and dismantling Istavan's power structures there while being chased by his increasingly irate and powerful minions.
- Samata discovers that there are other gods out there in the universe and start attracting their attention to her world, so as to give Istavan some divine competition.
- The campaign comes to a dramatic finale on Samata and her friends facing Istavan himself as the end boss.
- Epilogue: Samata founds the first school of wizardry and becomes headmaster.
As you might have picked up from all this, Samata is a woman who does not know when to quit. She gets angry and passionate easily, and when she's angry or passionate she tends to stop thinking about little things like consequences or common sense. She'll pick fights with people way out of her weight class and get in arguments or go on rants in the middle of important situations. She will eventually realize when she's made a spectacularly bad decision, but by then it usually is too late to back down, and her only way out is through, as it were.
She is also a woman who enjoys living large. Though she adores learning, she would find a life of quiet contemplation and study dreadfully dull. She's not an athlete by any stretch of the imagination, but if she doesn't get a chance to get up and DO things every once in a while, she gets antsy. She craves parties, dancing, good food and drink, drunken bad decisions, and generally the feeling of letting tomorrow by someone else's problem.
All this firey temper and passion isn't always immediately obvious, however. Istavan has crafted the people of the world into a fairly conservative society, so that's the one that Samata was raised in. She was brought up to speak properly, and to observe social customs, and to generally not rock the boat. When she's not dealing with people she knows well and feels comfortable with, she tends to try and keep her body language more restrained and demure just out of habit, and tends to speak very properly.
Character abilities: Prosthetic arm - Samata's left arm is a mechanical prosthetic she built herself. She can take it off if she wants (and usually does at night). While plugged in, it tricks her body into thinking it still has an arm and responds to her will the same way a regular arm would. The one she has now is the Mk 2 version. The Mk 1 was the initial prototype and proof of concept. She currently has half finished plans for the Mk 3. The Mk 2 is still kind of heavy and awkward, but with access to a workshop and plenty of time, she could upgrade it to be more lightweight and responsive in time.
Wizardry - Samata is the first wizard there ever was in her world. Sorcerers inherit their power genetically, and naturally siphon the magic in the environment around them into their bodies which they can use to fuel their abilities, allowing them to instinctively use what are basically a few distinct superpowers (Usually 2-3 different but related abilities. Firebreath and immunity to fire, for example). Wizards, on the other hand, don't draw that magic into themselves, but instead just manipulate it directly while it's still in the environment around them through careful rituals, or spells. Each spell takes anywhere from five minutes to an hour to cast, depending on the complexity, but it's also possible to finish 99% of the work, then leave it hanging and just do the last 1% real quick when you need it to finish the spell.
Spell Research - While her spell list is rather limited at the moment, she can research new spells that do more or less whatever she wants. The more complex the spell or the more powerful the effect, the more expensive and time consuming the research is. Simple spells take a week or two to figure out. More powerful spells can take months, if she can figure it out at all. Once it's finished being researched, it goes in the spell book and she can reuse it as needed or teach it to others.
Magic item creation - With some effort, a lot of research, and a lot of silver (silver conducts magical energy well), Samata can make magical items that will function more or less indefinitely as long as there is ambient magic in the world. A few examples are listed on her spell list, which is also linked above under "spell research".
Inventory: - The clothes on her back: underwear, knee breeches, stockings, shoes, undershirt, overshirt, fancy jacket.
- Hat: Tall and pointy with a wide brim. A prototype of the archetypal wizard hat.
- Mechanical arm: Attaches to the stump of her left arm and reacts to nerve impulses to move. Powered by the ambient magic in the atmosphere. Held in place by leather straps that wrap around her torso. Slightly heavier than her normal arm, resulting in her tending to lean to the side slightly if she's not paying attention.
- Flying carpet: About 3 feet by 5 feet. Stitched with arcane symbols made of silver wire. Tapping the appropriate symbol will allow you to steer the carpet through the air.
- Spectacles of magic sensing: Made from ordinary reading glasses, but with extra lenses attached on levers (think the special decoder glasses from National Treasure). When in place, the extra enses let you see the flow of magical energy through the world even if you normally could not. Magic items and people with magic powers are visible as distortions in the flow of magic.
- Gloves of energy redirection: These metal gauntlets are covered with magic symbols written in silver, and connected by an insulated wire long enough that it won't restrict your movement. It is designed so that you can flip the wire behind you and it won't get in your way. While wearing the gauntlets, you can block attacks with one hand, and the force of the attack will be transferred along the wire and projected out the other hand.
- Spellbook
- Notebook + quill + ink
Samples: toplevel on the TDM and another thread