Night of the Werewolves XXVIII Game Thread

[Krill]

...How do we know there is not the goal of other assassins to get to the Tower, to sabotage our spell?

 

[Autolycus]

It is possible, but seeing that I don't have any definitive indications of guilt, I'm inclined to take my chances.

 

[Diamondeye]

Reaching Magister Cultuum​

Final Update

The delegation, reduced to less that half of its original size, had finally reached the tower, and after a short climb of the stairs, they entered the magnificent Ritual Chamber. By a single tome on a piedestal, Magister Cultuum stood.

His robes were the dark-green colour of the Alteration Tower, and gave no special impression. What gave a special impression was his presence. It was as if his mind filled the entire chamber, and his eyes glowed with a delight and obsession with his craft that was unparalleled even by the Caswellawn himself. This was a man who lived for his craft.

He welcomed them one at a time. First, Zombie Monkey, the Eye of the Caswellawn. The young man was clearly nerveous, and almost whispered the thanks he had brought from the Caswellawn.

Then, the Master of Divination, Winston Hughes, shook hands with Cultuum. He was treated as an equal despite the fact that Cultuum had summoned them all here. "I see you have taken good care of those under your wings," the Magister said. "Which is more than can be said about me. I look up to your dedication."
Winston bowed his head slightly in appreciation and let the next person enter.

Sepuku, the master of Elements, was also recieved as an equal. "I hear you have done your part in destroying those that would do us harm and bring our hopes to naught. I congratulate you," Cultuum said to him. Honored, Sepuku entered and let the huge Flesh Golem come through.

Cultuum hesitated slightly. "Thinking someone else could look after my tower is my mistake. I blame you not. The Ritual will take place, that is the most important." The Golem nodded, more out of discipline than of emotion, which it did not know of.

TheForestAuro, the Earth Archmage, now entered. His skin was still hard as rocks, and Cultuum bowed his head slightly instead of reaching out his hand. "You have reason to be careful. I am glad you made it all the way."

Autolycus then approached, holding his newly aquired Sapphire Crown. Cultuum simply nodded and told Autolycus that the reagents were to be used later, and that he could relax, for now.

The Entropy Archmage, Backwards Logic, entered. Magister Cultuum measured him sceptically before reaching out his hand. "Although you may not have realized it, your powers have been of great help in catching those that would struggle against our cause."

Then, Civplayah, the Shadow Archmage, entered silently, and to many people's surprise, Cultuum embraced the nondescript man. "You have been of great importance, Civplayah! I dare say it now, when your work is over and we are at the end of the road to a better future." Civplayah merely nodded discreetly, and entered, but a subtle smile played on his lips.

KingMorgan, the Sun Archmage, entered. Cultuum gave him his hand and said, "I am glad you survived. I gather you owe this to The Life Archmage. Be sure to thank him properly." The Sun Archmage moved along a little bit disappointed to let Oyzar enter.

"Keeping an eye out for everyone?", the Magister asked rethorically. "I'm glad you were able to create the Angel's Eye, but I am afraid we need to dissemble it for the Ritual components. It has served its use."

Hell_Hound, the Spirit Archmage entered. The Magister's face lighted up. "Ah! Hell_Hound! What was it you said, 'never lose hope'? I am glad you can live according to your own words! Hope is essential for this project to succeed."

There was silence. The Law Archmage, Frozen In Ice, entered hesitantly. "Come on in", the Magister told him. "I understand you have surrendered your sword, and I will not hold grudges. Though, obviously, you will not take part in the Ritual, seeing as you are against it." Frozen In Ice had no reason to deny, and entered to sit in a corner, guarded by the Flesh Golem.

Then, the Ritual started. The eighteen reagents, The Willow Flute, the Vial of Dragon Blood, the Flawed Gemstone, the Ebon Phylactery, the Copper Ring, the Golem Heart, the Rusted Blade, the Metal Spike, the Mithril Longsword, the Hero's Girdle, the Eagle Feather's Pendant, the Sapphire Crown, the Snake Fang Necklace, the Sinister Trinket, the Diamond Jewel, the Silver Mirror, the Scaled Cloak and the Ancient Bone Knife had been gathered, but several of them had been discarded:

The Ancient Bone Knife, a sinister weapon that had it its time claimed the blood of Kylorin himself, was not used. It would have strengthened winter's grip on Erebus and done no good to the war against the Illians.

The Sapphire Crown was discarded aswell, its nature corrupted by the sinister mind of its original owner. They were creating a better world for everyone, not just the ones in control.

The Ebon Phylactery was discarded; it had only been brought because ZPV had attempted to use the dire situation for his own good and complete the Lichdom ritual, but he had failed and the empty vessel's dark charms were not wanted in the ritual.

The Vial of Dragon Blood was discarded; it represented the impulsive and the strong, a combination that was not only unwanted but also commonly recognized as traits of the Clan of Embers orcs.

And, after much consideration, the Hero's Girdle was discarded with the same justification as the Sapphire Crown. Magister Cultuum said, "You have all proved your worth as heroes. Heroes are not created by magic, but by heart and by dedication. This, we cannot force upon Erebus."

Finally, the Ritual could be completed, and after a most exhausting process, a silvery globe expanded from the Ritual chamber to encompass first the entire tower, then Amure, then all of Erebus. It laid itself as tiny, dewy film on everything. Then, the Earth shook.

When they opened their eyes again, the World had changed. Very few changes had happened in the room, apart from the fact that Frozen In Ice was no longer tied up, but seemed not to remember his resent against the ritualists. He had sworn to uphold the Law of the gods and not change the world by magic, and in his world, Erebus had always been like it was now.

All the other members of the Delegation had also changed, although not as gravely. They were all wearing the cinnober-red robes of the Archmages of the Highest Circle, braided with golden thread. It was proof of their great deed, the favour they had done all of Amure.

Congratulations to all innocents for winning, and thanks to everyone who played and lurked!

You may now discuss the game and reveal contents of your PMs, although all PMs will be posted later in full.
Awards and all sort of post-game jilly-jally will be posted later!

I hoped you enjoyed the game, everybody!


-DE

 

[Autolycus]

My PM:
NotW: Water Archmage
Character: Water Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Scaled Cloak
Ability: None
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: Aquire the Staff of Elemental Mastery

Background:
You can't claim much experience among the veterans of this delegation, because you have only just been appointed the Archmage of the school of water magic, and you have yet to gain a so masterful insight into your school as most of the other mages have in their respective schools.

The only thing you have is youthful ambition. You are sure that surviving and succeeding this troubled ritual will be good for your career - but even better would be getting hold of the Staff of Elemental Mastery from the Master of Elements.

Once again, I was a relatively generic innocent. I'm glad I didn't try to get Sepuku lynched, because he was crucial to the mission. Item goals are tough when you don't want to kill the owner.

 

[Renata]

Congratulations, innocents.

Character: Air Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Willow Flute (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Stormbringer: Your strength is increased by 2 for as long as the party is outdoors.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: Aquire a weapon

Background:
The students of Air magic often spend their times outside, where the true power of air is present. Many of them, inspired by Tali, the wind god, become travelling mages or even leave the circle of mages to travel Erebus as adventurers.

That is your secret wish, and you were making preperations for this when you were called upon to join the seventeen other archmages for this ritual. You will ofcourse not disobey an order as important as this, but you are still angered that you are forced away from your final preparations.

Among the things you need for your new life is a proper weapon. If you could somehow aquire one, the time wouldn't be completely wasted.

Another relatively generic innocent here, just a strength bonus that would not apply on the last day of the game anyway. Which is one reason I was happy make such a nuisance of myself.

 

[Backwards Logic]

The Entropy Archmage, Backwards Logic, entered. Magister Cultuum measured him sceptically before reaching out his hand. "Although you may not have realized it, your powers have been of great help in catching those that would struggle against our cause."

I thought I was dead? Not that I'm complaining or anything...

Wonderful game DE! It's nice to see something jump outside the traditional mold of NOTW.

 

[Diamondeye]

Spoiler Air Archmage :

Character: Air Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Willow Flute (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Stormbringer: Your strength is increased by 2 for as long as the party is outdoors.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: Aquire a weapon

Background:
The students of Air magic often spend their times outside, where the true power of air is present. Many of them, inspired by Tali, the wind god, become travelling mages or even leave the circle of mages to travel Erebus as adventurers.

That is your secret wish, and you were making preperations for this when you were called upon to join the seventeen other archmages for this ritual. You will ofcourse not disobey an order as important as this, but you are still angered that you are forced away from your final preparations.

Among the things you need for your new life is a proper weapon. If you could somehow aquire one, the time wouldn't be completely wasted.

As Renata figured out, her ability would not count for the final day.

The Mithril Sword, Rusted Blade, Ancient Bone Knife and Eldrich Staff would all have counted as weapons for fulfilling the motivation.

Her item was a Ritual Reagent and used for the Ocarina of the Balseraph recipe.

Spoiler Body Archmage :

Character: Body Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Vial of Dragon Blood (Consumable, temporary strength bonus)
Ability: Mass Haste: Your presence passively speeds up the party. If you survive the first half of the journey, you will have shortened it by a day/night cycle.
Recipe: None
Strength: 2
Motivation: You must be the strongest character alive when the game ends.

Background:
Body magic is often frowned upon as one of the "lower" forms of magic. But who is it that say such things? Is it the students of body magic?

No, is it the old and grey students of the "high arts". They might be able to conjure beings from other planes or make trees grow faster, but will they ever be able to root up a full grown tree or outrun the finest steed in all Amure?

You know they won't. Not without your help, at least. Because you know of a haste spell that will help the party reach the tower faster. Of course, affecting so many people at once is hard, so the difference seems not noticeable. Which might improve your odds of surviving whoever is trying to stop the ritual and their killings.

Both arcane and divine students of the school of Body Magic do have uncontrollable ambition, though. Luckily, yours is completely innocent: You want to be the strongest.
Your item, the Vial of Dragon Blood, can provide a temporary boost to your strength (or the strength of others) upon drinking, and is not needed for the ritual. But perhaps it would be smart to wait and see if it will be needed later. Either for putting down the bad guys or to forge something to help you survive.

Love managed to buy the innocents one day with his ability.

His item was consumable for +3 strength temporarily (2 day/night cycles), and was used for Lich Phylactery, Golem Heart and Crown of Mastery. It was not needed for the Ritual.

Spoiler Chaos Archmage :

Character: Chaos Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Destruction - see team PM for details.
Item: Flawed Gemstone (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Wonder: Any time you are the victim of an attempt at a lynch killing or attack, a random player is chosen as the target instead (this random player can be yourself, if you are unlucky)
Recipe: Ocarina of the Balseraph: Combine Flawed Gemstone, Willow Flute and Sinister Trinket.
Strength: 3
Motivation: Create the Ocarina of the Balseraph and use it on at least one other player.

Background:
Many people think that only mad adepts go ahead and study Chaos magic. They may be right. Your faculty has a way with its students; turning them into baboons, mutating their bodies and twisting their minds. Many students of Chaos Magic are killed or driven insane sometime in their studies or later in their career.
But not you; unlike many of your fellow students, you realized that the key to mastering the subject of Chaos Magic is not to attempt to control it - that is impossible - but to let yourself float along in the stream of Chaos.
Which is exactly why this Ritual must be stopped. The Alterationists led by Magister Cultuum has taken their nitpicking too far; they treat the world as a machine and are now attempting to fit it in to suit their pathetic and artificial illusions.

To stop the Ritual and assure that it will not be attempted again, the Fire Archmage has concieved a devious plan to take control of the Ritual and use its power to destroy the Tower of Alteration, and you fully intend to coorporate. What better way to not only stop the Ritual from taking effect, but actually further Chaos?
But even this is not enough to satisfy you; you know how to forge an Ocarina of the Balseraph, an artifact of the masters of Chaos, which can mutate anyone who hears its tunes from a short distance. You intend to spread even more Chaos with this device, should you obtain the needed Ritual Reagents to create it; apart from your own Flawed Gemstone, a Willow Flute and a Sinister Trinket is needed.

Your own body is already twisted by mutations, but this has only made you stronger. You doubt everyone who are exposed to the powers of the Ocarina will be that lucky, but anything can happen. That is the nature of Chaos.

This was fun designing, hard to balance. The way I determined the ability's function was by using a RNG that picked a number that would either be connected to a player or to a dummy that would also make it target the Chaos Archmage. From the beginning, there were no dummies, but Backwards Logic used his ability, creating the first dummy (hitting J-Man instead), the first lynch multiplied the dummies by three, but was still redirected (to CCRunner). Sepuku's poisoning made the amount of dummies nine, and hit one of them, resulting in ATPG's death.

His item was needed for Ocarina of the Balseraph and Mirror of the Sun, and was a Ritual Reagent

His constructed item would have allowed him to mutate someone, working by d20:
1-10: -2 str.
11-15: -1 str.
16-19: No effect.
20: +1 strength and Wonder ability.

Spoiler Death Archmage :

Character: Death Archmage

Victory Condition: Lichdom: You must create the Lich Phylactery in order to win.
This victory condition is not mutually exclusive with the innocent victory condition.
Item: Ebon Phylactery
Ability: None (see Background)
Recipe: Lich Phylactery: Combine Ebon Phylactery, Vial of Dragon Blood, Hero's Girdle and Sapphire Crown
Strength: 1
Motivation: The innocent victory condition must be reached in addition to your own.

Background:
You are among the Amurite masters of Death Magic, a dwindling group of archmages dedicated to the studies and performance of Death Magic.
The school of Death Magic is heavily frowned upon in most nations, but the Amurite have always been open towards the study of all the schools of magic - even Death Magic.
It is, however, still gravely frowned upon to undergo the ritual of Lichdom that many of the masters of this school end up completing, refusing to die of old age and thus prolonging their, if not life, then existance.
And you too plan to do this. Unfortunately, it requires certain components that are very hard to come by. First of all, it requires an Ebon Phylactery, an item you have already crafted. Apart from this, you need three other rare components that you know other mages have brought to the Ritual of Alteration that is the real goal of this journey. Recieve them at any cost.

It is not that you don't want the mission to succeed - you do, it's just a second priority. Your own life (or death) is what is most important to you, and you are not sticking out your neck for some crazy project of Cultuum's if you can avoid it.
Besides, you doubt that you can do much to help out, anyway. Your powers have been rapidly waning, whether it is because of your old age or the affliction of an external power. The Lichdom Ritual will be a way to end this. Physically, you are not worth alot either, and your Phylactery is not needed for the Ritual of Alteration to be performed.

The Death Archmage was the weapon that the Preservers used for killings. Had he survived for a bit longer after being freed from the mindcontrol, he would have become a vigilante killer. He would also have overthrown Chand's spell if he had completed his Lichdom.

His item was needed for his own recipe and the Golem Heart, and was not a ritual reagent.

Spoiler Earth Archmage :

Character: Earth Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Copper Ring
Ability: Stoneskin: Daytime ability: During the day, you can enchant a player, effectively boosting his strength by 1 and counting as an (additional) support vote. The effect is traceable to you.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: The Master of Elements must survive

Background:
An earth mage is calm and never rash. It is the nature of their school, and most of them are examples of this. The school of earth magic is also quite influenced by the philosophy of Kilmorph followers, and the hard-working among them are often rewarded.

You have been through a fair share of hard work - but nothing you couldn't handle, of course - to earn the place as the archmage of your school. Of course, you are not arrogant and realize that even your impressive curriculum vitae pales compared to that of some of the others in this delegation.

You have a special respect towards the Master of Elements, who is obviously an even harder-working man than you, being the Tower Master of your entire part of the delegation and magical universe. You deem that you owe him your loyalty in return for his undivided loyalty to the schools under his Tower.

Perhaps your spells can be useful for saving him, should he get in trouble - you do master the stoneskin enchantment to perfection, and this would be a good occassion to put it to good use.

His item was a ritual reagent needed for the Angel's Eye.

Spoiler Enchantment Archmage :

Character: Enchantment Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Golem Heart (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Theft: Each night, you can attempt to steal an item from one of the other players.
Recipe: Golem Heart: Combine Vial of Dragon Blood, Ebon Phylactery and Hero's Girdle.
Strength: 1
Motivation: Create a second Golem Heart and give it to the Flesh Golem.

Background:
As an Enchantment Archmage, you have an affinity for items - especially magical items. And this place is filled with them!

But, you also have a much finer and intricate knowledge about golems. And you did not require much time before you knew there was something wrong with the Flesh Golem accompanying you. A minor defect, most would call it: It has no heart.

Unfortunately, the single Golem Heart you possess is required for the Ritual of Alteration, but you know of a way to forge a second out of three reagents that are not necessary for the Ritual.

You have made it your personal quest during this last part of your journey to find these items - by theft if necessary - and forge a heart for the poor golem.
A complete golem would of course also be of use against the killers that are planning to bring down the ritual, and with it's heart restored, it would be able to feel. You are pretty sure it would feel thankful towards whoever has helped it.

Kind of wasted since SiP was killed early and never stole an item.

His item was needed for the Ritual, could be used by the Flesh Golem as a heart, and could have been used for the Heart of Fire.

His recipe could create another Golem Heart. Only the created one would be able to be split into parts again, though.

Spoiler Entropy Archmage :

Character: Entropy Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Rusted Dagger (Ritual Reagent, +1 strength)
Ability: Wither: Each night, you can reduce the strength of a target player by one. This strength will be regained at night if the person is not withered again (in which case the whithering substracts another strength point). Withering characters at strength 0 will kill them.
Recipe: None
Strength: 2
Motivation: The Law Archmage must survive, but the Chaos Archmage must die.

Background:
Very few people understand Entropy properly. And many unenlightened people often confuse it with Chaos magic. Such people disgust you. Clearly, the difference is so large that it cannot possibly be ignored: Where Chaos is merely the mess that mortals refer to when they can no longer grasp what is going on, Entropy is the ultimate dissolving of laws and artifical order. The raw strength of nature, and the power of which the balance between the powers of the Gods is arranged by.

Of course, no human can fully master such powers. Entropy mages can often rust metal items, making them useless, and some of the best - like yourself - can even wither persons. You suspect this might be the proper way to treat whoever is walking around killing people. And the damned Chaos mage now that you're at it.

But you also realize that Entropy needs something to balance it. Without Law, there would be no Entropy. And that would make your many years of study worthless. You would rather that the Archmage representing the Law school survives.

His item was needed for the ritual as well as for the Arms of Junil.

Spoiler Eye of the Caswellawn :

Character: Eye of the Caswellawn

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Eldrich Staff (+1 Strength, will disintegrate to save the wielder from dying)
Ability: Keen Eye: Each night, you can attempt to learn the Recipe that another player knows.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: The Tower Masters must survive.

Background:
Being the personal emmissary of the Caswellawn is not an easy task - you know this after doing the job for many years. You have to live for the job - the interests of the Caswellawn are your interests. And in crisises like this, the interests of the Caswellawn concern his personally appointed Tower Masters. You must make sure that these three Tower Masters Survive.

Personally, your only magic capabilities are some lowly spells that would count as mere cantrips in this company, but you have a keen eye for magic crafting, and would easily be able to extract the magical recipes from others with a little bit of nightly spying.

This ability will allow you to copy the recipes of others, revealing what reagents you need and to create what item - but not necessarily what that item does.

Also, the Caswellawn has foreseen that the trip might not be a peaceful picnic, and has equipped you with an Eldrich staff that is enchanted to be a capable combat weapon, and imbued with a spell that will save its wielder, should you be so unlucky as to attract the wrong kind of attention to your own person.

He stole one recipe during the game, and I don't even recall which one

His item was what saved Sepuku from an attack one of the first nights.

Spoiler Fire Archmage :

Character: Fire Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Destruction - see team PM for details.
Item: Metal Spike (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: None
Recipe: Heart of Fire: Combine Metal Spike, Golem Heart and Diamond Jewel.
Strength: 2
Motivation: The Alteration Archmages must die.

Background:
Your element is Fire, and you master it fully. You are among the best mages of the Amurites, and of one of the proper schools as well, Elementalism.
For too long have the Alterationists felt that they were superior to other, more concrete faculties, and this attempt at a Ritual of Alteration, dragging the Archmages and Tower Masters of the other magic schools to their Tower in order to prove their superiority is making you sick.
You seem to be one of the only people here who realize that the Ritual will not only fail to save the Amurites, it will weaken the core values of the nation; hard work and natural talent. One cannot simply wish for a better world and then go ahead and forge it like this, it is a malevolent arrogance against both the Gods and men of Erebus!

So you seek to change the ritual. Take it over and turn it on the foolish Alterationists. Bind the force of it in destructive power and use it to incinerate the Tower of Alteration!
Of course, if you can manage to get rid of the three Alteration Archmages somehow, it'd be an even more decisive victory.

You have the knowledge to forge an item of great destructive power, the Heart of Fire, by combining three of the reagents that are needed for the Rituals. One of them is already in your possession; what looks to be a simple Metal Spike is really a fragment of a still living Azer, and it pulses with a lively glow. Apart from this, you need a Golem Heart and a Diamond Jewel in order to forge the Heart of Fire.

Show these pesky Alterationists the true power of Fire as you bring their tower crashing down around them!

His item was needed for his own recipe and Arms of Junil, and was a ritual reagent.

His recipe would make his VC easier to reach.

Spoiler Flesh Golem :

Character: Flesh Golem

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Spell Scroll
Ability: Golem: You are immune to the nightly killings as well as standard poisons, but you cannot use items, and your vote has no effect.
Recipe: None
Strength: 4
Motivation: Find someone who can gift/create you a Golem Heart so that you can be complete.

Background:
"A minor defect". The mage who told you that had probably never tried to live without a heart. You almost wished you had enlightened him in how it feels.

But you didn't, because you couldn't. You were built so for a purpose. To do as you were told. A purpose that usually involved killing all sorts of thugs and dealing with the nasty criminals that not even the non-magic Amurites would come close to.

Now, a golem without a heart has very few feelings. But these feelings in you are mainly directed at loathe of your past jobs and the way you've been treated. And a disregard for not being whole.

In order to break out of the servant role, you need to be independant. And for that, you need a Golem Heart. You know there is one, somewhere in the delegation, that carries such an item. But perhaps it is necessary for the Ritual? In that case, you'd have to find some other way of obtaining it.

You also carry a spell scroll, donated by a good-willing mage who had not realized that you do not yet possess a divine spark. Until you are whole, you cannot use it. You can, of course, gift it to someone else who could use it.

The scroll never came into play, sadly. It was a one-shot kill like the one Sepuku used.

The Golem would have been killed by the Tear of Agares, had it been used on him.

Had Krill gotten a heart, he would have become vulnerable to everything and lost 1 strength, but gained effect on his votes and had an ability to kill someone during lynching.

Spoiler Hand of Valledia :

Character: Hand of Valledia

Victory Condition: Ritual of Destruction - see team PM for details.
Item: Tear of Agares (Poison)
Ability: Stealing: You can steal an item from another player each night.
Recipe: None
Strength: 2
Motivation: The Eye of the Caswellawn must die.

Background:
You have been sent with the group of Archmages by the direct order of Valledia the Even herself. But not to help them complete their Ritual of Alteration.
Oh no, Valledia has other plans: For too long have the mages yielded far too much power in the Amurite nation - and Palace. So you have been sent to - with the help of two of the Archmages - alter the Ritual so that it will instead destroy the Tower of Alteration.
Not only will this disrupt the mages' plans of using the Ritual to gain power - which both you and Valledia realize is their real goal - but you will strike a decisive blow against the arrogant magocracy.

And this message is all the more likely to go through to the Caswellawn if his own emmisary, the Eye of the Caswellawn, is killed.

Of course, Valledia did not truly send you empty-handed, such as your allies among the mages think; with you, you have a tiny vial of one of the most potent poisons in all of Erebus; known as the Tear of Agares. This poison is in fact so potent that it acts only as a catalyst in the death of the target; whoever imbimbs it will die and quickly turn to ashes, leaving the poison behind where his body once was, for anyone to see.

Specification: You must send in poison orders at day, at least an hour before nightfall. The poison item will remain in the game but will be up for public vote the following day. Your allies have no knowledge of your ownership of the poison.

Another thief that didn't steal a single item.

As you can see, I altered the Tear of Agares since I had not been clear to those who got it from ATPG when to use it. Not that it made much of a difference until Oyzar made his item.

Spoiler Ice Archmage :

Character: Ice Archmage

Victory Condition: Assassination: Reach Magister Cultuum alive and with your Ancient Bone Knife in possession.
This Victory condition is mutually exclusive with the innocent victory condition.
Item: Ancient Bone Knife (+1 Strength)
Ability: Endurance: You are immune to all causes of death apart from lynching.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: The Flesh Golem and Hand of Valledia must die.

Background:
Many people, both mundane and educated, believe that Auric Ulvin is the only inheritor of Mulcarn's domain of Ice. They are wrong.
Your soul used to belong to one of Mulcarn's strongest soldiers, way back in the Age of Ice. You were there when Kylorin defeated Mulcarn with the Godslayer, in the corridors of the Letum Frigus. But more importantly, you were there after. When the screams of the dying god echoed the corridors, you hurried towards his chambers to find him in a hectic struggle with the Father of the Amurites.
You promptly drew your weapon, a crude but sharp Bone knife, and slit the throat of Kylorin from behind. As you threw the lifeless corpse of the archmage aside, his blood soaking your clothes and reddening your hands, you realized you had come too late. The God of Ice was dying. As your undying loyalty commanded, you stayed with Mulcarn as life and power left his body. Around you, other Illians arrived, panicking and horrified. You remained kneeling beside your dead master as chaos erupted around you. You remained there even when the other Illians fled. You felt a tiny shard of the power of the God of Ice in your veins.
After what must have been many years, you left the corpse of the fallen God behind you and staggered out into the corridors of the Letum Frigus. For ages, you roamed the snaky tunnels, no goal in mind, with an infinite patience. You honed your newfound abilities of Ice Magic for when your time came again. And it has now.

The legacy of Kylorin, the pesky Amurites, seek to complete a ritual that will change the world in its very base. You know that this is a direct violation of the Stasis that your Master and your People revered, and you found your way to the surface and was quickly accepted for your great gifts at Ice Magic. Apparently, the ages spent in darkness had waned your Illian looks, and you quickly rose to become the best Ice mage the Amurites had ever known - for reasons obvious only to you.

You are here to stop the Ritual of Alteration, and while others might try to do this through subtlety or deceit, you know what must be done. The Master of Alteration, Magister Cultuum, must be killed. To do that, you have your trusty Bone Dagger, Ancient now by any standards, but still sharp and still with the taste of Archmage blood in memory.

Although this is your ultimate goal, you feel a personal desire to survive the encounter even after your role is played out. If the keen guards, The Flesh Golem and the Hand of Valledia, were killed, you are pretty sure you could survive the assassination. But it remains only a personal motivation; you know and accept that this quest may claim your life.

Read the background! It is probably one of the characters I was most proud of designing, but I was well aware that it would be a hard and paranoic role. Seon was actually rooted out without being directly scanned, I think.

 

[Diamondeye]

I thought I was dead? Not that I'm complaining or anything...

Wonderful game DE! It's nice to see something jump outside the traditional mold of NOTW.

I took it by the OP which I had not updated. You were dead

Sheesh, I've made a few of these blunders, I hope it's okay. It was a had game to mod with 24 items and almost as many abilities -_-

 

[Autolycus]

It was interesting to me how many people were still focused on killing people the last two days, when it wasn't necessary.

 

[Nictel]

Can I now ask who the hell found us out and cost me my fourth in a row victory?!

I do like how I sort of completed my personal victory even though I was pretty much doomed.

 

[Diamondeye]

Spoiler Law Archmage :

Character: Law Archmage

Victory Condition: Preservation - see team PM for details
Item: Mithril Longsword (+2 strength, Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Authority: You command an additional vote in all votings; this is automatically calculated, but will not be visible unless it sways the result of the voting.
Recipe: Arms of Junil: Combine Hero's Girdle, Metal Spike, Rusted Blade and Silver Mirror.
Strength: 2
Motivation: The Entropy Archmage and the Master of Necromancy must die.

Background:
You are the personification of your sphere of Magic; goodhearted and righteous, but decisive and blunt when action is needed - such as it is now.
The arrogant Magister Cultuum seeks to change the world by the means of a magical Ritual of Alteration. This is against everything you stand for! The world of mortals must work by the laws of the gods, not be directed by psychotic schemes plotted by sinister mages. You want to see an end to this ritual, and in order to do so, you are willing to make compromises.
Such as allying yourself with the wicked Mind Archmage and the Nature Archmage, a member of the Tower of Alteration itself.

You carry with you a Mithril Longsword, obviously for when it is time to stop the ritual - whether the top of the tower is reached or not.
But you also know of a way to forge an even greater weapon, the Arms of Junil. With this weapon in your hands, your strength would be manydoubled. Only, in order to construct this magnificent item, you need four items currently owned by other Archmages. Collect these, and the benefit will be great.

You also command the natural authority of a Law Archmage, and your voice is not easily overheard. Even though your main goal of this travel is to stop the Ritual, you cannot help but feel that this would be an excellent opportunity to decimate the ranks of evil; more accurately, you see no reason as to why the Master of Necromancy or the Entropy Archmage should survive this trip. See to it that they don't.

His item was needed for the Ritual, and gave 2 strength.

His recipe would have given another 4 plus ignoring the strongest opponent's strength. It would have been wicked, had it happened.

Spoiler Life Archmage :

Character: Life Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Hero's Girdle
Ability: Resurrection: If anyone from the Tower of Divination are targets of assassination attempts, you will attempt to bring them back from death.
Recipe: Angel's Eye: Combine Diamond Jewel, Scaled Cloak and Copper Ring.
Strength: 1
Motivation: Ten innocent players must survive

Background:
A passionate guardian of all life, you have focused your studies to keep what is good alive. And through a long life of study and practice, you have certainly become adept at this. You can, in fact, ressurrect even archmages such as those around you, as long as they have only just died - before their lifeforce wanes. Your powers stretch to protect the entire delegation from the Tower of Divination, of course barring yourself.

Your ressurrection spells will reveal to the person you save who their saviour is, and can save them from both the nightly kills as well as traditional poisoning. If you manage to craft the Angel's Eye, however, you doubt there is anything in this tower that could overpower your spells.

You come to this ritual with only good intentions, and you have made it your personal goal to see that as many of the innocents survive as possible.

His item was needed for the Lich Phylactery, Arms of Junil and the Golem Heart, but not for the Ritual.

His recipe, the only one to actually be used, enhanced his healing abilities to protect the entire party from the standard killings or his own tower from the Tear of Agares, Staff of Elemental Mastery, and even lynches if he wished so.

Spoiler Master of Divination :

Character: Master of Divination

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Amulet of Protection
Ability: Divination: Each night, you can scan another member of the Tower of Divination Delegation for their nightly action(s).
Recipe: None
Strength: 2
Motivation: At least three members of the Tower of Divination Delegation must survive.

Background:
Being the master of Divination requires a certain skill at several schools of magic, but first and foremost it requires responsability, and loyalty towards the Caswellawn. You possess both of these in measure.

You consider it your task, in the face of this threat, to bring as many of the Diviners as possible home alive.

But you are also aware that the villains might be hiding in own ranks - which is where your natural flair for Divination becomes useful. Each night, you can detect - in smallest detail - what another member of your delegation is doing. You will recieve information about what that person does, whether he is crafting an item, giving others or recieving from others an item during that night.

Other than that, you had enough foresight to bring with you an Amulet of Protection, which will protect its bearer (currently yourself) from most lethal attacks - once.

Not much to say here, really

Spoiler Master of Elements :

Character: Master of Elements

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Staff of Elemental Mastery (two uses; can either kill a person at day or protect the vote leader at the expense of the second in votes)
Ability: Lore Master: You can identify what items a reagent can be used to craft. This can be done even without close examination (you don't need to hold the item yourself, just see it). You can also identfiy what a constructed item can be used for.
Recipe: None
Strength: 2
Motivation: The Tower of Elements must be the most numerous at the end of the game

Background:
Being appointed as a Tower Master by the Caswellawn himself is one of the greatest honors a mage can recieve. It requires a more general knowledge than simply mastering one school of magic fully.

One of the reason you were appointed was your impressive Lore Mastery - few Amurites hold as extensive knowledge about magical items as you, and you are surely able to use this knowledge to get some sort of overview as to what is currently happening.

You also hold a Staff of Elemental Mastery, which is mostly a ritual item, but is enchanted with the various elements and can unleash them in either of two forms: Either a violent and lethal storm that will kill any unprotected person, or a gentler version that will simply redirect attacks from one person to another. Both of these effects are so noisy that you will not risk utilizing them at night, and the staff only holds enough energy to use each of the effects once.

Your loyalty in this no doubt intriguing struggle lies primarily with those of your own tower, the Tower of Elements. Make sure that your Tower colleagues are not diminished.

Perhaps one of the most well-used abilities this game. I can't count the item reveal PMs I've written

Spoiler Master of Necromancy :

Character: Master of Necromancy

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Necromancer's Eye
Ability: Necromancy: When a member of the Tower of Necromancy dies, you will raise his corpse as a zombie. This zombie counts as granting you one strength.
Recipe: None.
Strength: 1
Motivation: Be the only tower master to survive.

Background:
The members of the Necromantic schools of magic have all pledged their loyalty to their faculty and their Tower, but few realize what this means when you are indeed a member of the Tower of Necromancy. Should a member of the Tower of Necromancy die while still being in active service, it is customary that the Tower Master raise him from the dead.

Now, normally this usually isn't too bad, but in this situation, you simply do not have the required ingredients or time to raise those who might fall properly. You can, however, raise them as mindless zombies to help you - and hence the innocents - keep the situation under control.

Now, since raising the dead is normally frowned upon, you will of course only do this at night, even if they should have fallen in the evening by the lynch mob, or in the middle of the night by the hand of the killer.

Some might ask how you know who dies and when, but there is a simple answer to that: You have in your possession an amulet, the Necromancer's Eye, that informs its wielder not only of the dead in the vicinity but also of the quality of the dead - every time a player dies, you will be told who and how much strength that player had in life. This amulet can only be used by necromancers.

There is of course a reason why you are the master of the Tower of Necromancy: Ruthless ambition. You have nothing against using your friends and collegues as zombie minions should they die, and you have nothing against using this precarious situation to your advantage. You are hoping that you could rise in the ranks if you were the only Tower Master to survive.

Interesting ability and item, too bad he died as the first.
The item would only work for those of his tower, and provided them with info on the strength of those who died - even if they were revived almost immidiately after, by Oyzar (as it happened with KingMorgan).

Spoiler Metamagic Archmage :

Character: Metamagic Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Eagle Feather's Pendant (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Spell Mantle: A passive ability that renders you immune to all magic influence by others.
Recipe: Crown of Mastery: Combine Eagle Feather's Pendant, Sapphire Crown and Vial of Dragon Blood
Strength: 2
Motivation: At least two players from each tower must survive.

Background:
Metamagic to the other schools of magic is like the head is to the rest of the body. A metamagician like yourself commands the elements just as easily as he commands necromancy or other schools of magic. But he does not conjure it, he merely commands what is already near him.

As such, you do not fear the magics of others, protected by your spell mantle that nullifies any incoming magic effects, be it deathly contraptions or any tricks that will reveal information about you.

Furthermore, you also know how to craft one of the really powerful metamagic items, an item known as the Crown of Mastery, that will allow its wielder to direct all magic cast one night on a special target, no matter the protective spells that the target is surrounded by. Doing this drains the crown, and it only slowly recharges, so you guess that a second usage of the item will not be relevant on this short journey.

With all this power, you also feel a kind of responsability towards the archmages of the different towers. You would like the circle of archmages to retain at least a bit of difference, if possible.

Item was a ritual reagent as used for his own recipe as well as the Poison Trinket recipe.

Spoiler Mind Archmage :

Character: Mind Archmage

Victory Condition: Preservation - see team PM for details
Item: Sapphire Crown
Ability: Mind Control: You are dominating the Death Archmage to perform your team's kills. If he dies, you will instead use your ability to ease the overthrowing of the Ritual - see team PM.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: The Death Archmage must survive.

Background:
You are a master at swaying and dominating the wills and minds of others, a feat that only the best of the archmages of your school can handle. You are also, arguably, the owner of a mind both much more powerful and certainly quite more twisted than the average Amurite, your many years in duels of wills having often brought you a hairsbreath from madness.

But you are not mad. You are one of the only people who see clear; who see what this ritual really is about. And it is not about helping the common Amurites, or even any Amurite but the Caswellawn and that selfish egoist Cultuum, the Master of Alteration.

Which is why you have begun taking measures to prevent the Ritual of Alteration. You have found two other allies who are also against the Ritual to aid you in your goal. And furthermore, you have found an archmage who seems very vulnerable to your mind-controlling abilities: The Death Archmage, especially when he is asleep, has a very poor resilience against your mental attacks. You are using this to make him your tool of destruction; it is through him your team perform the nightly kills.

You are of course willing to sacrifice him, should it be necessary, and you can assume control of someone else, should he die, but not for a prolonged time, so you prefer to keep the Death Archmage alive. Your quest gets easier that way, as well.

Item was not a ritual reagent, but needed for the Lich Phylactery and the Crown of Mastery.

Killing any part of the mindcontrol would render the team without nightly kills (apart from poison from Sprig's recipe).

Spoiler Nature Archmage :

Character: Nature Archmage

Victory Condition: Preservation - see team PM for details
Item: Snake Fang Necklace (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Savagery: If you should happen to be sentenced to death by a majority of votes, you will take with you into death random enemies, their strength equalling your own.
Recipe: Poison Trinket: Combine Snake Fang Necklace, Eagle Feather's Pendant and Sinister Trinket.
Strength: 3
Motivation: The Sun Archmage and the Earth Archmage must survive.

Background:
You have lived a long life, and has been among the best mages of the Nature Sphere for many years. You believe this to be a consequence of your personality; you are very much in harmony with nature and natural surroundings, and carry within you a deep respect for everything alive.

But you know also of the savagery of nature - only the strongest survive in the wilds, and you are certainly among the - physically - strongest people in this delegation. And you intend to put that to good use; the Caswellawn and the Master of Alteration, Magister Cultuum, has drawn upon them your justified rage by arranging this ritual. How can you humiliate and ignore the balance of nature more than by simply rearranging the world by measure of a magic ritual?

It is for this reason that you have joined up with the two other archmages attempting to stop the ritual, for it must be stopped at all costs. Personally, your contribution to this cause relies mainly in your beast-like strength and unparalleled Savagery in combat. But you also hold a recipe that can help your team, allowing the forging of a Poison Trinket that will enable you to take out those who oppose you one by one.

You do feel some regret, however, that many of those around you now will have to die for you to succeed, after all, they are merely heeding the word of their Caswellawn in being part of the ritual. If at all possible, you would like to spare the Sun Archmage and the Earth Archmage, seeing as they resemble your own connection with nature the best.

Too bad he died like that, the ability would have been a hard-hitter otherwise.

The item was a ritual reagent and needed for his own recipe.

Spoiler Shadow Archmage :

Character: Shadow Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Sinister Trinket (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Subterfuge: Each night, you can examine another character to learn of their victory condition.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: Track down enemies from at least two teams and have them killed.

Background:
Shadow mages are often overseen in the presence of others mages. Rarely, this is against their own will. Most often, it is exactly what they want.

Because shadow magic is all about hiding your own secrets whilst extracting those of others. And you are an expert on that field. So much, in fact, that you are able to sneak into the minds of others while they are asleep to identify their deepest motives.

This subterfuge will be of great use, but it is magical, and as such, magic immune targets will not give any result. But you figure that there aren't a lot of those anyway, and everyone who has anything to hide are heavily suspicious anyway. Except for yourself, of course. You're just doing your job.

Here's your prophet

His item was needed for the Ocarina of the Balseraph and the Poison Trinket; all in all killing this character early would have been a huge boost to the baddies. It was also a ritual reagent.

Spoiler Spirit Archmage :

Character: Spirit Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Diamond Jewel (Ritual Reagents)
Ability: Hope Reading: At night, you can determine a target player's Motivation.
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: Make sure at least three of the motivations you scan are fulfilled.

Background:
You are always the last to lose hope; in fact, you cannot recall that you have ever, truly lost hope. So even in these hard times for the Amurites, you were certain that some solution would be found. This Cultuum's Ritual of Alteration could be such a solution. And even as it dawns on the delegation that there is a murderer among them, you are certain that it will end well.

You are, in fact, so infused with hope that you can often feel what other people hope for; not what they hope to eat for dinner or what Somnium cards they want for their birthday, but their deepest, innermost hopes, their personal motivations behind their actions. You realize that these people, Archmages most of them, may prove resilient to this type of mind-reading, but you are certain that you can, if you spend some hours of your night, at least discern their personal motivations, if not their ultimate dedications.

And of course, you would gladly help others in achieving their goals. The best way of solving a problem is sticking together and helping each other, after all.

His item was a ritual reagent and needed for the Heart of Fire and the Angel's Eye.

Spoiler Sun Archmage :

Character: Sun Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Silver Mirror (Ritual Reagent)
Ability: Revelation: Each night, you can scan a person to find out what items they possess.
Recipe: Mirror of the Sun: Combine Silver Mirror, Scaled Cloak and Flawed Gemstone.
Strength: 1
Motivation: The Shadow Archmage must die.

Background:
Even people less enlightened than you can see that the Ritual of Alteration is endangered by the mysterious killers among you. In fact, your otherwise impressive abilities at Sun magic and its handy insight are of limited use in this situation.

You can detect what items other players hold, but you cannot reveal their motives. Archmages, golems and even the rest of the party seems more resilient to magic than the average human.

But luckily, you know a way around that. An item that will reveal the deepest secrets of any person it is used upon. This item known as a Mirror of the Sun, an imbued version of the reagent you are bringing, a simple Silver Mirror.

You have already grown suspicious of the Shadow Archmage. Surely, being adept at Shadow magic would be handy if one were to sneak in on a guardsman as experienced as the captain of the Shield of Kylorin?
In any case, he - and the school of Shadow Magic in itself - unnerves you. Better to be rid of him fast. Better to be safe than sorry.

The recipe would be a complete stats scanner - wickedly useful.

The item was a ritual reagent and needed for his own recipe as well as the Arms of Junil.

Spoiler Water Archmage :

Character: Water Archmage

Victory Condition: Ritual of Alteration: Reach Magister Cultuum in order to perform the ritual.
Item: Scaled Cloak
Ability: None
Recipe: None
Strength: 1
Motivation: Aquire the Staff of Elemental Mastery

Background:
You can't claim much experience among the veterans of this delegation, because you have only just been appointed the Archmage of the school of water magic, and you have yet to gain a so masterful insight into your school as most of the other mages have in their respective schools.

The only thing you have is youthful ambition. You are sure that surviving and succeeding this troubled ritual will be good for your career - but even better would be getting hold of the Staff of Elemental Mastery from the Master of Elements.

This was one of the last characters I designed, and perhaps the most boring. Sorry, Autolycus

It's item was needed for the Angel's Eye and the Mirror of the Sun.

 

[Diamondeye]

Can I now ask who the hell found us out and cost me my fourth in a row victory?!

I do like how I sort of completed my personal victory even though I was pretty much doomed.

Civplayah completely steamrolled your team. First ATPG, then you. CC died by RNG when they tried to kill ATPG. Really bad luck.

 

[Autolycus]

Were the two evil group objectives traditional werewolf?

 

[Renata]

Can I now ask who the hell found us out and cost me my fourth in a row victory?!

I do like how I sort of completed my personal victory even though I was pretty much doomed.

Credit must go to Civplayah. He was the prophet, and caught ATPG on night two. (He didn't send in an order night one, IIRC; and I don't know why he scanned ATPG.) He decided to trust me with the results, which caused a lot of heartburn for a while, because he was trying to hide that he was the prophet himself, and as a result said some inconsistent or illogical things that had me really suspicious of him. So the whole time I was getting grief in public for not revealing the source of my information on ATPG, I was sending furious PMs to civplayah demanding he tell *me* the truth. It was ... interesting.

I was already suspicious of Nictel for other reasons, but when Pizza voted him that day's item before I went public, that pretty much sealed Nictel's fate. He was scanned the following night.

And interestingly, CCRunner was likely doomed even if the RNG hadn't made it happen fast. Winston Hughes had caught an inconsistency with regards to his claimed item. (Winston also wound up finding out about civplayah without first being scanned, through a bizarre chain of events, so there really was a lot of luck involved that things worked out so well.)

 

[Krill]

Looking at the charactor PMs, this looked like an awesome game. Just a pity I had no reason to do anything once the guy who could fashion a golem heart died, is all.

TBH not a lot I could do either. Although if we had the rule where I would have won even if I died, I could have done a lot of extra stuff...but then the wolves would have needed strengening...

 

[Autolycus]

Congrats to Winston on bringing all but one of his people through alive, and that one a baddy.

 

[civplayah]

Here's my scans.

First night, I didn't scan.
Second night, I scanned ATPG because I thought he would be a good ally because of his experience
Third night, I scanned Nictel because ATPG voted for him to have an item
Forth night, I scanned Autolycus
Fifth night, I scanned Oyzar
Sixth night, I scanned KingMorgan
Seventh night, I scanned Krill

I'll do an AAR later so I can explain things, I have about 300 PMs that I need to clear out of my inbox. This is the third time I'm a prophet in the three NotW games that I've played. I guess the RNG likes me.

 

[Winston Hughes]

Congrats to Winston on bringing all but one of his people through alive, and that one a baddy.

That was more luck than judgement on my part. I owe oyzar, Hell_Hound and civplayah for making it happen like that.

Sixth night, I scanned BL

So why did you tell us that you'd scanned KingMorgan? If we'd known BL was scanned then he would have survived.

 

[Frozen In Ice]

Great game Diamondeye, and nice job innocents. You guys had it won fairly early it seemed. And now I see that it was oyzar that saved KingMorgan as I had always wondered about that. By that point I was hoping to get lucky and hit the prophet, and never would have guessed it was civplayah. After you guys got Chand Ijust focused on surviving to the end, as I had no shot.

Anyway, what did you post DE that one time that you posted the wrong update? I'm really curious about that.

 

[civplayah]

Sorry, I did scan KingMorgan.
Can you post the link mason quicktopic?

By that point I was hoping to get lucky and hit the prophet, and never would have guessed it was civplayah.

Yeah, that's what I was trying to do. I didn't really post in the thread much at the beginning, and kept low at the middle and end.