Class Feature Friday: Spellscar Mystery (Oracle Mystery)
Magic is many things, but only a fool thinks one of those things is predictable. The consequences of misused magic vary between systems and settings, but it should come as no surprise that it rarely ends well.
One of the more common tropes with misused, primal, or otherwise unbound spellcraft is the idea of magic lingering like a radiation, polluting the region with raw unrealness, changing the denizens and landscape, as well as posing a hazard to visitors. Whether it is primordial or the result of some great mistake, there is no doubt that these zones have a very real impact on the world around them.
Enter today’s entry: the spellscar mystery. Whether affected by one of these zones or by a single wild magic event, these oracles bend reality around them like no other, channeling the strange forces of primal magic as they see fit. Perhaps a god of magic ordained that they have this power, or perhaps the primal forces themselves granted it. None can say for certain, save that their power blurs the line of arcane and divine.
The various spells granted by this mystery focus mainly upon manipulating magic itself, dispelling and disrupting the magic of others in various ways, as well as sapping at the energy of the living, perhaps their most devastating spell, however, inflicts a zone of wild magic, turning all magic within dangerously erratic.
Raw magic sometimes spontaneously brings inert matter to life, and some oracles of this mystery can do just that, creating elementals to serve them for a short time.
Evoked in its raw form, their magic can also be directed into powerful blasts and bolts.
The chaotic nature of primal magic makes all forms of energy a potential hazard. As such, these mystics often develop a weak, blanket resistance to all types.
Just like in the body of the oracle itself, the primal magic they wield often lingers, leaving behind a scar or burn that glows with light until the time when the victim tries to use their own magic, discharging as a primal event.
Their connection to magic gives them insight into its workings, allowing some to break down and dispel other spells with ease.
Similarly, many of these oracles emit a faint field of magic-distorting magic, which allows them to resist most magical effects with greater ease, though it is by no means perfect.
Certain other spellcasters can alter the words of a spell to evoke different energy types, and so can some of these mystics, but they do so by transmuting the forces at work directly, eventually even mastering how to change spells into damaging sound, or even mystical force.
Wild magic, is by its very nature uncontrollable, but some of these oracles can subtly shift the possibilities, not controlling the outcome, but influencing it to be more favorable, if possible.
Others still can actually trigger primal events on their own, granting them a dangerous and unpredictable tool.
Many of the oracles even have a natural form of magical inertia, resisting hostile spells that target them.
Finally, at the zenith of their power, these oracles become avatars of primal magic, and can generate primal events as a side effect of their spells, rather than replacing it, gaining both the benefits of their intended spell, but also potential other effects from the event. This also takes effect for the primal events they set off by mistake, rather than deliberately.
Do you love random effects and being a magic-manipulating anti-mage? This archetype was made for you. The ability to trigger random effects and dominate other casters alone is devastating, but add in magic-manipulating abilities worthy of an arcanist, and you’ve got a pretty strong and fun mystery. I recommend a build that balances evocation with abjuration for that reason, and practice activating primal events wherever a little disruption is required. Also, try to build with good saves and resilience too, so you can survive events that don’t work in your favor.
Something that I find interesting is spellcasters’ reactions to antimagic fields. For any master of the spellcasting arts, feeling powerless is very intimidating, but for spontaneous caster such as sorcerers and oracles, it might be downright terrifying to have what is essentially a part of themselves suppressed. That being said, antimagic field is actually a spell granted by this mystery, meaning that these mystics are very aware of the harrowing nature of the effect.
The green radiance deep in the canyons of Planet 04091 is a telltale sign of rare arcanium crystals. Securing them is the mission, but it is complicated by the natives, whose close proximity to the glow has given the native samsarans strange control over wild magic, and they do not brook intruders into their sacred grounds.
Born during a control weather spell gone wrong, Adva does not let her lame leg hinder her. She shows promise as an oracle of the weather, but while her spells seem to focus on the sky, her other magic seems twisted, her lighting strange and multicolored, her rainstorms interspersed with strange precipitation.
The mongrelmen of Manafire Mountain live in relative peace withing the ethereal atmosphere surrounding the mountaintop, but there will always be those seeking to exploit them and their mountain, and the very glow they worship has given them a gift to aid them against slavers and prospectors, turning the chaotic magic around them into a weapon against foes.
