Saturday, 1 April 2017

English and French Mages

Rote Primer book




Long Form Spell Books

By Edmund L. Scholz 
Copyright 1989

There are dozens of types of Long Form Spell books, but all the books share one think in common, they are not written in magical script,  nor are they written in a secret language. They are books in common, elven or any language explaining how to cast a given spell. Since magical concepts are like science and math, with deep meaning hidden in short forms, acronyms and what not; and magic shortens this even further these books tend to be several volumes just to explain one spell. 

Rote Primer book: This is a small book in long form, but only as a reminder to a magic user who has learned his spells the long way. A magic user who has done this can use this spell book as a regular spell book, and some spells only are a few pages in length. This is the most common spell book. A read magic will totally fail in gain a spell from this book as the spell is lacking any theory at all, and is complete. However a magic user already knowing the spell not in long form could over time learn the rote form (20 weeks - intelligence, minimum one day) using this book, and then use that spell from the book. Alternative they could write the missing long form pieces in anotherr book and use the two books together to memorize their spells (this only taking days, vs. weeks but you need the materials.)

Basic Rote Long Form: The most common of the long form books. Any magic user able to read the language and understand the level of spell of the book can learn all the steps to cast a spell. The spell steps are never explained, their is no theory - so pages are wasted explaining how to account for rain, snow and changes in location  as the mage can not adapt to even simple modifications. As such some rote book only allow spells to be cast from specific locations and situations and none other. Material components for example if varied will have a very small change of working, if any. The books, because they are so basic tend to be long, or if they have limits to the spell fairly short. The books do save some space skipping theory.  They are about a 100 page (50 leaves)  per segment of casting time.
 A magic user with such a book at start oftne has leaned the theory on his own. The book will allow other magic users to learn and cast the spell, but is is useless in he study of any magic other than the spell written within. However, research will allow it be converted to magical script, or a small rote form.

 Jargon Long Form: Jargon Long form books are not a magical script, but they assume knowledge of magic and the terms used. In modern terms rather than saying yellow ochre they say "FeO(OH) · nH2O" Or instead of midnight they say the witching hour. IT makes it near impossible for a magic user to use the book without knowledge of the Jargon; read magic will de cifier the Jargon usually, and sometime comprehend langauges. Jargons are usually based on a place and mentor; for example elves from Celene thend to use one Jargon, and Baklunish mages from Zeif anohter. Given a comphend langages nad magic user training these books can be guessed at or reconstrcuted. They are much shorter, usually being about a book a spell, and if the spells are related and short maybe even a few spells in one book.