Alexander Hughes
| Nature: Crusader | - | - | Demeanor: Machine |
| Character Type: Mage | - | - | Concept: Precocious Go-Getter |
| Player Name: RedWyvern | - | - | Clan/Tribe/Dynasty/Ect:' Order of Hermes |
Attributes
| Physical | Social | Mental | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Strength | 2 | Charisma | 3 | Perception | 3 |
| Dexterity | 4 | Manipulation | 1 | Intelligence | 4 |
| Stamina | 2 | Appearance | 2 | Wits | 3 |
Abilities
| Talents | Skills | Knowledges | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alertness | 1 | Animal Ken | 0 | Academics | 3 |
| Athletics | 1 | Crafts | 1 | Computers | 1 |
| Awareness | 2 | Drive | 1 | Cosmology | 0 |
| Brawl | 0 | Etiquette | 1 | Research | 1 |
| Empathy | 1 | Firearms | 3 | Investigation | 1 |
| Expression | 0 | Martial Arts | 2 | Esoterica | 1 |
| Intimidation | 0 | Performance | 0 | Medicine | 1 |
| Leadership | 1 | Stealth | 1 | Occult | 1 |
| Streetwise | 0 | Survival | 0 | Politics | 0 |
| Subterfuge | 0 | Technology | 1 | Science | 3 |
| Other Talents | Other Skills | Other Knowledges | |||
| Carousing | 0 | Meditation | 0 | Enigmas | 1 |
| Intuition | 0 | Hypnosis | 0 | Lore:Awakened | 1 |
Additional Abilities:
Advantages
| Spheres | ||
|---|---|---|
| Correspondence | 0 | |
| Entropy | 0 | |
| Forces* (Affinity + Mastery) | 3 | |
| Life | 0 | |
| Matter | 2 | |
| Mind | 0 | |
| Prime | 2 | |
| Spirit | 0 | |
| Time | 0 | |
| Backgrounds | ||
| Avatar | 4 | - Armor (see below) |
| Contact | 1 | - see below |
| Mentor | 5 | - Van Holt(see below) |
| Resources | 1 | |
| Status | 1 | |
| Misc | ||
| Arete | 3 | |
| Willpower | 8 | |
| Quintessence | 4 | |
| Paradox | 0 | |
Flaws (7): Child (1) Vanilla (1) Curiosity (2) Ward (3)
| Merits | |
| Precocius | 3 |
| Eidetic Memory | 2 |
| Natural Linguist | 2 |
| Lighning Calculator | 1 |
| Language: Spanish | |
| Language: Latin | |
| Flaws | |
| Child | 1 |
| Vanilla | 1 |
| Curiosity | 2 |
| Ward | 3 |
| Health Levels | ||
|---|---|---|
| Bruised | -0 | |
| Hurt | -1 | |
| Injured | -1 | |
| Wounded | -2 | |
| Mauled | -2 | |
| Crippled | -5 | |
| Incapacitated | - | |
Focus
Paradigm: Mechanistic Cosmos
Practice: High Magick + Alchemy
Instruments:
1.Circles and Designs
2. Writing and Inscriptions
3. Gestures
4. Voice
5. Language6. Thought Forms
7. Violence
8. Computers
9. Equations and Algorithms
Notes
Flaws: Child(1) - Alex is only 17 Vanilla - Alex hasn’t had much interaction with the parts of the internet devoted to wasting peoples time, and has spent most of his life studying and learning about how the world works on both a mundane and metaphysical level. Memes and innuendo will go right over his head. Curious - He’s intensely curious about mysteries and the unknown. Ward - Alex’s sister Liz. She’s currently attending the local high school, and is a pain in the neck that he loves with all his heart.
Backgrounds:
Mentor: Dr Van Holt Contact: Order of Hermes Status: Order of Hermes Resources: “Inheritance” that is the result of money deposited in a bank account by the OoH on Dr Van Holt’s behalf. Avatar: Alex’s avatar is an empty suit of roman armor, with shadows and/or cloth covering the areas where flesh might normally be. It communicates with him through riddles, metaphors, and wise sayings, leading him to figure out the Truth through investigation and deduction, and focusing his mind towards strategy and wit. It symbolizes his belief that power lies in knowledge and strategy, and his intense desire to overcome and to achieve.
Languages:
Languages are expensive! He should know a smattering of latin and spanish, enough to do very specific tasks in the appropriate contexts, but not be fluent, hold a conversation, or improvise.
Paradigm Discussion:
In the beginning, there was nothing. But through a monumental act of Will, the universe was set into motion with certain rules. Rules which have been changing ever since, by acts of Will performed by those with the strength to bring it to bear. Those with enough discipline can change the world through Will alone - everything else is merely a trapping. As a member of the Order of Hermes, Alexander uses instruments to focus his Will and make it manifest in the world, to defy the rules set forth by the ruling paradigm. As a member of House Veriditius, he rejects the more archaic trappings of the Order, and focuses on how he can use the symbology and formulae of the Order to bring about his Will in the most effective manner possible - in this case, the important factors are about the precision with which he has described a process, and the amount of Will he has spent towards a task (ie, by spending time chanting a ritual). Mystically, like his house, he seeks to co-opt technology and use it with hermetic ideals.
Instrument Discussion:
Designs, inscriptions, and language are general purpose instruments. They can be used to describe virtually any specific effect, like how to create a fireball or transmute lead to gold, and thus bring them into existence through channeled Will. The complexity, size, length of the designs, inscriptions, writing, or chant are directly proportional to the complexity and power of the effect. When I’m referring to inscriptions, I’m generally referring to a
Gestures/Voice/Thought Forms are necessary in enacting rituals. They also serve as the triggering/targeting mechanisms for previously performed rituals or for inscriptions. Thought Forms are specifically essential to targeting effects - and can often use a an appropriate science / academics roll to direct the roll with great precision.
The Order of Hermes has suffered great losses at the hands of the Technocracy in recent years. As such, Alexander has been trained to use martial skills to take the place of his complicated (but slow) calculations in order to direct his inscriptions to deal out Violence. Essentially, rather than consciously calculating out the changes in the world he wants to enact, he uses muscle memory and training to direct his Will, having already made the appropriate calculations to infuse momentum into, for example, a punch or a bullet. In this case, the degree to which Alexander’s technique approaches perfection influences how well his magic does. As always, precision is paramount.
Computers and algorithms are a way of precisely describing the physical world how it is and how it should be, and using hermetic principles to describe the transition from one to the other. This is an evolution of hermetic ideal of numbers and numerology - math can be used to describe fundamental truths, but the logic of old numerology was off. Modern advanced mathematics can model and simulate anything, and in so doing, change it. Frequently encoded as an application that can be run from a smartphone. Uses a relevant science skill to describe / manipulate the world (physics for forces, biology for life, etc.), and basic computer science to implement. For example, a healing spell app might require the phone to take a picture of the wound, describe biochemical processes of healing as equations, mathematically describe an accelerated process of healing, and use hermetic symbols to describe how the extra energy is acquired to get from one to the other. Physics: Forces, Matter, Time, Prime, Correspondence Biology: Life Psychology: Mind Probability + Statistics: Entropy NA: Spirits (Spirits need summoning circles and the use of Enochian to command them)
If this were visualized in some sort of metaphorical cyberspace, a virtual adept would see hermetic circles being drawn in the computer code, virtual sprites chanting rituals made out of computer code, and a matrix like image of the world changing from what it is to what it could be.
Equipment:
Large:
Old Nissan
Small home with 2 bedrooms, living room, kitchen, bathroom, and hermetic workshop in garage.
Combat: Pistol with hermetic inscriptions to manipulate velocity - fire select determines if agg damage is added (with prime 2), and if it’s burst fire (forces 3 for greater aoe)).
Hunting Rifle (as pistol).
Not a flamethrower with inscriptions and custom paint job. Same as pistol, but with fire (and a fire source).
Taser. Same as pistol, but with electricity (and an electricity source). Holster included.
Fake grenades with inscriptions on the bottom. For making fireballs covert. Fairly convincing fakes, but if you handle them with any expertise, you’ll quickly discover that they’re not real grenades.
Kevlar lined long coat. Inlaid with inscriptions to trigger effects that deflect attacks and/or reduce incoming damage. The damage reduction effect has the side effect of keeping Alex cool in Florida weather. To be made into a talisman.
Coat Talisman, ideally, will have the following effects: Forces effect to deflect any incoming mass with a force per square inch over a certain level. Will not interfere with touching a wall, or shaking someones’ hand, but would interfere with a surgeon trying to use a scalpel. Minimum possible change to make it miss. Should be covert as long as it’s not abused / Alex is trying to dodge/move around.
Matter Effect to increase soak dice, and make it able to soak agg. Should be covert - it’s just good armor! Also, destroys matter based radiation.
Forces effect to reduce incoming damage dice by making the conservation of energy its bitch (and looking like it’s just a good insulator / flame retardant) Maintain temperature at 72 degrees. Should reduce effectiveness of cold/fire based attacks. Destroys harmful EM radiation. Redirects electricity into anywhere else - ie makes Alex into a perfect electromagnetic insulator or acts as a Faraday cage. Transmutes kinetic energy over a certain point - basically by making it dissipate harmlessly. A blade strike might feel like a full body hug, and a crushing hammer blow might cause Alex to fly back a few steps rather than crush his organs.
Countermagic pendant. Locket around Alex’s neck. Contains inscription that is used in performing countermagic.
Utility: Backpack with internal hermetic inscriptions. With Prime2 / Matter 2, can be used to create simple objects out of nothing and pull them out of the backpack.
Scroll Case. Contains Hermetic diagrams with which to perform complicated spells.
“Brass knuckle” Gloves (gloves with pentacle on them). Same as pistol, but for punching.
Nike Shoes - spells inlaid into the shoes can be used to cast a spell that makes the wearer better at movement (ie athletics, dodge rolls) by manipulating momentum and the effect of gravity. Can be used to run/jump/climb far faster than human normal. Takes practice to use, but Alex has that practice. Can also be used to allow the user to fly.
Android smart phone. Contains custom apps that can be used to perform hermetic spells.
Background and History
Alex, and his younger sister Liz, were raised by their mother, Samantha Hughes. Single parenting is always hard, but their Mom did her best while also making a decent living as a tenure track associate professor at the University of California, San Diego. They didn’t have much in the way of extended family, but despite that, and despite her busy life, Samantha raised her kids with a great deal of love and affection, and their home was a happy one.
But when Alex was 11, his mother was diagnosed with an aggressive brain cancer. For nearly a full year, he watched as she underwent chemotherapy, and slowly deteriorated, until she finally passed away. When this happened, the rage and frustration Alex felt boiled over in the form of a great outpouring of energy - it short circuited the hospital electrical system and blew out the windows on his side of the building as he cried out in pain.
This, of course, did not go unnoticed. Very shortly after this, he was found by the Order of Hermes, who, in a flurry of improbable legalese, adopted the orphaned children and took them to a safe house in New York. This was all incredibly confusing for Alex and Liz, but eventually he was placed in front of a man who introduced himself as Dr Frederick van Holt, a member of what he called House Verditius. Alex, Dr Van Holt said, was special, and Van Holt had decided to make him his apprentice. He answered all of Alex’s - and Liz’s - questions, and so began their induction into the Order of Hermes.
The next 3 years were spent attending the Straussen Academy in upstate New York, with nightly lessons in magic supplementing the already grueling courseload of the Academy. Nevertheless, he graduated early, and, much to the bitterness and jealousy of his peers, became a fully fledged member of the order at the age of 17. Now, at his mentors bequest, he has ventured south to Starke, Florida, to investigate unusual supernatural occurrences happening down there and report them back to Dr VanHolt - while, of course, continuing his own hermetic studies.
Elizabeth Hughes: Liz is a lot like a younger, more sensitive version of her brother. Just as smart and studious as he is, she has a curious nature, and is intensely jealous of his magic, vowing to overtake him some day. But, as she has not awakened naturally, she must still work hard in order ot gain access to the deeper mysteries. If she was generated with the same stat array as a retainer, she would likely be Phys 1/3/2, Social 3/4/3, mental 4/2/2. With a similar level of intelligence, but without the back breaking workload, she spent much more time engaging in petty academy politics than her brother. However, with Alex’s assignment to Starke, Liz has been taken out of the Academy, and is taking distance learning classes from the academy and finding out what interesting things to do in Florida that doesn’t involve getting mauled by the supernatural.
Dr Frederick Van Holt: Dr Van Holt is a member of the upper echelon of House Verditius. A member of House Thig before the merger and a friend of Sharad Osei, he was a strong proponent of the merger between House Verditius and Thig in 2002 - even going so far as to learn to adapt his magick to more closely match the joined houses - which, admittedly, wasn’t a huge stretch. Now, he’s on to new projects, taking advantage of the combined might of the House, pushing to take more risks and achieve even greater ambitions, as befits the second largest house in the Order. Alexander is not privvy to Dr Van Holts plans, but he knows that Dr Van Holt has a lot of schemes and plans in motion, and firmly believes in the Houses long term goal of inextricably insinuating Hermetic principles into the curve of scientific discovery and advancement.