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| Not all Magic in the world requires endless
hours of study and dedication to learn and master. Some kinds of
Magic people are just born with; its in their blood. |
| This is the intriguing premise of the
Aeldenaren Magic System, but as the idea of heredity implies
history, and history implies setting specific details, it is
difficult to do the concept justice in a generic fashion
intended to be usable for a variety of settings. |
| The core Magic System documents
intentionally leave the origin of Aeldenaren unspecified and
vague. However to fully realize this Magic System, a GM should
take the opportunity to tie the origins of the bloodline's Magic
to their own setting's past. |
| To help a GM get started with this, some
example implementations and variants of the root Magic System
are provided here. |
| Fae Blood |
| In the
World of
San'Dora setting, Aeldenaren is the magic of the
Haelfinan, an ancient and mysterious Race that are the settings Elf
parallels. |
| Only those with at least some Haelfinan
heritage can take any Gifts at all, and only pureblood Haelfinan can take
all of the Advanced Gifts. |
| This simple implementation instantly adds
flavor and roots to the Aeldenaren Magic System and is a classic example of
adapting generic material to suit a specific purpose. |
| Dragon Magic |
| Some settings feature powerful, sentient
Dragons with different subtypes that have a unique and powerful Magic
peculiar to themselves. Aeldenaren is perfectly adaptable to serve in this
capacity. |
| Further, if Dragons are able to assume
humanoid form, then some folks born among humanoid races might have "Dragonsblood"
in their veins, and might have one or more Gifts. |
| Certain bloodlines of Dragons might be
known for particular Gifts, or perhaps all Gifts are equally available to
all bloodlines as the GM prefers. |
| Extending this concept even further, the
Gifts might be expanded to include a set of Draconic Gifts pertaining
specifically to the archetypical Draconic breath weapons which would allow
the purchasing of custom and unusual attacks with a similar SFX as a
Dragon's breath weapon type; the following chart summarizes. These Gifts
supplement or perhaps replace the Gift of Killing. All Dragons should have
the Draconic Breath Gift(s) appropriate to their subtype. |
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FIRE |
This Gift allows Powers with a SFX pertaining to
breathing and resisting fire or heat. |
|
ACID |
This Gift allows Powers with a SFX pertaining to
breathing and resisting acid. |
|
FROST |
This Gift allows Powers with a SFX pertaining to
breathing and resisting frost. |
|
GASEOUS |
This Gift allows Powers with a SFX pertaining to
breathing and resisting gaseous substances. |
|
LIGHTNING |
This Gift allows Powers with a SFX pertaining to
breathing and resisting electricity. |
|
SONIC |
This Gift allows Powers with a SFX pertaining to
emitting and resisting sonic waves. |
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| SCIONS OF
THE OUTSIDERS |
| In some settings there is an involved cosmology
including the concept of various planes of existence, typically with some
"higher" or "lower" in relation to the assumed default world of the setting.
In such settings it is sometimes possible that residents of the higher and /
or lower planes tend to be more innately magical than residents of the
default plane, and further might visit the default plane and produce progeny
with the natives. |
| The offspring from such unions might very well have
special Powers and / or Gifts beyond those of normal folks. The Aeldenaren
Magic System is very easily adopted to serve such a use. |
| A GM might want to add some Gifts that are relevant to
scions of different planes of existence, or not as they like. It should also
be noted that the Gift of Rifting will likely be of key use in such a
setting if exploring alternate planes of existence is an element of the
campaign, which can either be enabling or game breaking depending on
specific circumstance, but which should be monitored in either case. |
| PSI |
| The basic mechanics of Aeldenaren is very easily
re-tasked to be usable as a form of innate / inborn Psionics rather than
Magic. The GM might want to refactor the Gifts a bit, or not, as it suits
their purposes. This could even be taken to the extent of defining custom
Gifts by Bloodline with a fairly arbitrary (and perhaps overlapping)
selection of relevant Base Powers. This could even be used to do something
like the comyn of Darkover. |