I don’t know if others use this word the same way but if I say “cantrip” in a fluff piece I am referring to a spell that is useful but doesn’t have a direct battlefield application. The kind of spell you’d never see in a Warhammer Fantasy game but could see in a fluff piece. I’m going to cover what I think cantrips could do and open the floor to suggestions. This will help me and probably Spawning of Bob as we work on more fluff pieces. Hopefully it will inspire others too. Lore of Fire: Fire is not just a weapon, it’s a tool. I imagine Fire casters could light pipes, torches, cooking fires and the like easily. They could probably make everlasting torches. I like the idea of coldfire and dark fire from an old 2nd ed D&D supplement. Cold Fire produces light but no heat (so you can use a torch in a tight area without burning yourself). Dark fire produces heat but no light (so you can make a campfire without giving away your position. I imagine a fire caster could exist comfortably in the desert without getting heat stroke or sunburn (though they’d still get thirsty). A Slann could probably use a Fire cantrip to let his minions survive and remain fully active where cold blooded creatures cannot normally go. A Fire mage can probably entertain someone with pyrotechnics. Lore of Beasts: Beast cantrips might let one talk to animals or even control them. Ordinary animals could be attracted or repelled. A Beast caster is probably a master shapechanger. Transformation of Kadon isn’t the alpha and omega of shape changing. A Beast caster could duplicate a bat’s sonar, a wolf’s sense of smell, temporarily grow fins and gills for swimming, climbing claws. I like the idea of a Skink priest growing gecko pads to climb up a sheer surface but I haven’t found an opportunity to work it into a story yet. Lore of Shadow: I covered Shadow cantrips a lot in my most recent fluff piece. This includes telepathy and the ability to make real illusions called Shadow Constructs which can do more things than just damage things. Combining Constructs with telepathy and you can get a universal translator spell. Cosmetically manipulating shadows would be a breeze. Lore of Life: Healing applies more to just battle field wounds. Life mages can probably affect plant growth, diagnose all manner of ailments, ease childbirth, and increase longevity. Lore of Death: Hard to think of non-combative things. Might be able to do soft necromancy, getting skeletons to sweep your floors. Probably can diagnose ailments better than Life mages. Can probably similar diagnose weak spots in structures. Maybe slow down or speed up rot and decay. Perhaps ward off ghosts or reading the last few minutes of life from a corpse. Lore of Heavens: Divining the future is obvious. Either big cataclysmic events or small fortune cookie-esque things. Divining the future is always cloudy. Divining the past is possible too. Altering the weather or at least predicting the weather is appropriate. Lore of Metal: Transmuting elements is obvious. One could also enhance or speedup mundane metal working or crafts. I could see the construction of borderline sci fi creations like clockwork automatons. Lore of Light: Summoning lights is almost too obvious to write down. Detecting and warding off evil spirits is thematically appropriate. You might be able to set up booby traps or rewards based on the moral character of people encountering them. I’m thinking an Excalibur like Sword in the Stone that empowers a worthy wielder but zaps bad guys who touch it. Lore of High Magic: As the acme of magic, it’s cantrips would involve affecting other magics. It would also cover magical acts that are well established in folklore but don’t obviously tie into one of the eight lores such as telekinesis. Dark Magic would have very similar cantrips to High Magic though they would look different. Lore of Vampires: I’ve been working on Lore of Vampires cantrips in my Renliss stories. I invented the idea of life sight. Vampires can read the auras of living creatures and gage their vitality. I figure Lore of Vampires users can overcome all language barriers with the undead or even telepathically communicate with them. They can certainly manipulate the undead for things outside of combat though getting undead to do complicated tasks is probably difficult. Big and Little Waagh: It’s hard to come up with non-combat applicable spells for the Big Waagh. I figure they’d be big on flashy illusions to inspire troops or tell interactive stories. Perhaps even crude entertainment like concertos of armpit noises or enhanced belching. The Little Waagh would probably have cantrips that enhance stealth, allow targets of vengeance to be located and detect treachery. I imagine there would be a lot of overlap between cantrips of the Little Waagh and the Skaven lores. Lore of Nehekara: Basically whatever cantrips Death and Light have, the Lich priests can probably do. Of course they’d need their own cantrips to create and control their own Constructs such as sphinxes. Lore of the Great Maw: Spells that find and prepare food kind of make sense, but then you have to consider that the regular spells require sacrifices of food to function. The Ogres are probably light on cantrips. I think fortune telling from the entrails of slain enemies or reading the table scraps left after big meals might be involved. Lore of Slaanesh: Detecting and enflaming dark desires. Perhaps also detecting and reading virtues (to make plans to destroy them of course). Magic could be used to create euphoric effects similar to those from drugs. Madness could be created in targets. Lore of Nurgle: The ability to inflict contagions of course. Some of them may even be beneficial, at least to the debased followers of Nurgle. Lore of Tzeentch: Since Tzeentch is the father of Chaos magic (more or less) Tzeentch cantrips would be wide ranging and versatile not unlike High Magic (though they probably look different cosmetically). Finding and obscuring secrets is appropriate. Inducing or removing madness is appropriate.
A timely discussion. I am writing some very wizard heavy stuff right now (11 mages of varying ability - not counting baddies they encounter.) My wizards were hiding in plain view in a non wizard friendly society. My fire guy was a blacksmith, my shadow dude was a thief. Their talents gave them an advantage in their mundane occupations but did not excite too much attention. I want to give them all (non BRB) signature spells for combat. I've thought a bit about the nature of the lores to help me out here. The following is a spoilers removed bit of exposition which I've almost decided I don't need. (This follows my usual writing technique of write whole boring chapters then decide a) the story doesn't need them or b) That some character can summarise the whole lot in two paragraphs of dialogue): "In addition to their aspect, each lore has a character. The lore of heavens affect s those things which are not bound to the earth. It is a summoning lore, that is rain or lightning can be drawn from the ether. The lore of metal, is a lore of transformation. Materials, even flesh can change their nature and properties under its power. The lore of shadow is primarily one of illusion. As shadow tricks the eye into seeing what its not, so the adepts of xxx can trick all senses." "How is that helpful in combat? " "Aside from allowing a shadow mage to be where he appears not to be, and an illusory weapon can still kill, if it's target believes himself to be dead. Fire is another summoning lore, beasts has the character of binding as well as transformation, this time working on living creatures. The lore of life effects healing and increased vigour through transformation. Light and death are an interesting pair. Both cleanse in their own way, sometimes by transformation, sometimes by direct effect. Both are more reflective of f the characterr of the wielder. " Are not death wizard's evil?" "They can be. Certainly wizards of disorder seem to be more often adept in the lore of death, but tell me friend, what is your profession? " "soldier and mercenary captain" "Are you not a wizard of death in your own way? Having straightened that out (a bit) I have been trying to replace "He did a magic spell" with: "He cast his summoning / transformation / illusion / binding with deadly effect" or "he performed his alchemy on my hat. Again." Other words to do with magic . In my opinion: casting is ok for everything, but I can't use it every time. cantrip is probably the same as a chant or incantation - probably involves use of magic words. Avada Kedavra. spell I just don't like, but I can't seem to avoid because it is so generic weaving isn't bad for something requiring gestures - in my mind = illusions or binding ritual - a particularly powerful casting which requires time or multiple modalities (symbols, magic powders, extra time) to cast. For magical defence I think: To dispel - a enemy spell is nullified before it can be cast Counterspell - a quick counter. "I made my flesh into stone. Your swarm of bees don't bother me!" requires foreknowledge of the attackers spell and quick wits. Now for my real question - Why the wizard staffs? Logic says they would be good for channeling, but they look super cool when they are used to cast. If a secret wizard did without a staff, would he need another object to help him cast? If his staff / McGuffin got broke, would that hamper him? Help me Old Ones!
Wizard staffs are symbols of status. A wizard with a staff looks awesome. As a result, wizards carry them, regardless of whether or not they actually help. They are a way for other people to know "hey, this guy is a wizard. Maybe I should avoid him to keep from having my head explode". Obviously, this is more relevant to some cultures over others. Empire wizards have staves because they are very image conscious: the elves have staves, so I need to have a staff as well! Elves have staves due to a misunderstanding when they first learned magic. When they were first taught, a branch was used to demonstrate how proper mental rooting helped ground the mage so that the magic they were channeling didn't overwhelm them. The elves took this to mean that a staff was ALWAYS required to root, rather than taking it as the metaphor it was meant to be. Slann don't need staves. They learned magic directly at the feet of the Old Ones. They understand all the ins and outs of magic instinctively, and know how to steady themselves in this realm when casting (though mistakes can still be made). Ogres don't think they need staves, as they never had friendly contact with elves to begin with that would give the impression that they did. Their magic comes from their tie to their god, and they use entrails and various bits of viscera as their casting medium. They don't need it, but they think they do. In reality, they cast their magic through the same tie that causes their eternal hunger. In the case of all the non-Slann, non-demon casters, their channeling instrument is necessary only because they believe it is. They have always been told that they needed it, so they believe they do. As a result, they end up shutting off their own connection to magic when they have their channeling instrument taken from them. Magic requires belief and focus. If you lose one, you lose your ability to cast.
How close they are to dying, removing pain (Giving them a painless death) countering the big battle spells of lore of death and life, diagnose how serious an individual injury is etc.