Urbanomancy
by James Palmer
(jrp36@hermes.cam.ac.uk)
Cities are complicated things. Thousands upon thousands of people, acres
upon acres of concrete, the sewers beneath, the skyscrapers above, the
tangled ecology of rats and pigeons and the bloody feeding chain of the
streets ... all forming a huge, chaotic, living organism. Graffiti,
traffic, crime, McDonalds, riots, parks - they all come together, if you
look at them closely enough. Urbanomancers can see the patterns of the
city, probe them, and push them into new shapes. They know there's only
one city, the one we half-glimpse in dreams, the Archetypal City, that
Ascended in the sands of the Middle East five thousand years ago, and that
appears once in a century to swallow up foolish explorers. All other
cities want to be that City, and if you know what something wants, you can
control it.
Urbanomancers always know the mind of the crowd. They sense the thin gaps
between districts, the gaps you can fall into. They keep albino
alligators and mutated rats for pets. They know why time becomes a thick
as treacle late at night on the subway. They know what happens if you
knock on the small green door at 92nd and 4th. They read the names behind
the names. They can send you to Rat's Alley, and you really don't want to
see what's been made from the dead men's bones. No urbanomancer would
ever go to St. John's Wood at night.
The word "urbanomancer" combines Greek and Latin, which annoys grammarians
and old-school occultists. Most urbanomancers couldn't care less, and
think the correct term - "Polisurgist" - sounds dumb.
Urbanomancers are much like cliomancers, not much immediate use,
but quite deadly over time. An NPC urbanomancer (particularly a
councilman, who can rack up *tons* of significant charges) against a PC
group in his city would make for an interesting game. You can't find him,
you can't get out, you keep ending up where he wants you to go, cars keep
crashing near you ...
An additional thing: use of My Turf on an area including a cliomancy site
allows the urbanomancer to drain charges from that site as a cliomancer
would. However, a cliomancer who drains charges from that site also
drains - but doesn't receive - an equivalent charge from the urbanomancer
whose turf it is. Urbanomancers and cliomancers *hate* each other, and
fight very subtle and very long magickal wars.
Urbanomancy Blast Style: The city senses it doesn't like
you, and lashes
out. Bricks dropped by builders, a dog's bite, a sly knife in the crowd,
a car 'accident.' It's a useful style for casual attacks, but it only
works when the target is in the right place at the wrong time. If you put
a blast on a target when you're in the middle of a fight in his house,
it's not going to take effect until he drives to work tomorrow. Of
course, if your target's chasing you through a crowd, it might be a little
more immediately effective.
Stats
Note: Each urbanomancer may only ever be attuned to one
city, which must contain at least one hundred thousand people.
Generate a Minor Charge: Study the city for four hours.
This can be
anything from walking the back alleys and noting down the patterns of the
trash cans, to staring from your window at the faces in the crowd, to
going over the crime and fire maps (and seeing how they form a word ...)
Generate a Significant Charge: Interfere with the city in a
significant
way - i.e block a major intersection, cause a bomb scare, increase
policing in a crime-ridden area, organise a concert that attracts
thousands of people. Alternatively, get part of the city named after you
- a street, a building. Depending on how important it is, this could
bring you in anything from a charge a year to a charge a day, regularly.
Town planner is a *fine* job for an urbanomancer to have.
Generate a Major Change: Permanently change a large part of
the city.
Starting the Great Fire of London would qualify, or being responsible for
the addition of a subway system. Alternatively, get a city named after
you.
Taboo: An urbanomancer's magick fails completely outside
the city, but he
still retains his charges for when he returns. Being outside the city is
*uncomfortable*, however - it's like a chain-smoker trying to go without a
butt for a while. At first it's just unsettling. Then it gets
uncomfortable. Eventually it gets downright unbearable -- he *needs* his
city! Force of habit and "addictive" sensation get the better of the
Urbanomancer, and he becomes an outright basket case. Skill shifts of -10%
or -20% might be appropriate, depending on how long he's been away from
his city, and perhaps a Helplessness and Isolation checks might eventually
be in order.
Random Magick Domain: Anything that draws upon the
forces of the
city - not specific individuals, but groups, crowds, and so on. Gaining
information about the city.
Urbanomancy Minor Formula Spells
- Streetwise
- Cost: 1 minor charge.
Effect: You can divine any fact about either the city itself or the
groups
within it, but not about individual inhabitants. For instance, you could
learn where the entrances on a building are, what percentage of the
population would support Jeffrey Archer for mayor, or which gang controls
the area between Fortescue and Montgomery. You couldn't find out whether
John Appleby would support Jeffrey Archer for mayor, or where he lived -
though if you knew he was a member of, say, the Islington Freemasons, you
could find out where they met and work from there.
- Brick Chameleon
- Cost: 1 minor charge
Effect: The urbanomancer, as long as he remains still, appears to
be a
part of the urban landscape - a dustcan, lamppost, or whatever. Many an
urbanomancer has spent a panicked moment standing very still and thinking
"I'm a postbox, I'm a postbox."
- Spraypaint
- Cost: 1 minor charge
Effect: You can leave a message concealed in any part of the city,
which
can only be read by people meeting the qualifications you set when casting
the spell (e.g "Brenda Lawson" or "All members of the New Inquisition").
You must be in the area you intend to leave the message when you cast the
spell. For 3 minor charges, you can have the message find your targets,
which it will, provided they are in a city. (For example: Leo Theophilus,
a noted London Urbanomancer, wishes to contact Dirk Allen. He casts
Spraypaint, using 3 charges, and the ragged garbage around the park bench
on which Allen is downing a bottle is blown by the wind for a few seconds,
landing in the shape of words.)
The message may take many forms - sprayed and seemingly illegible
graffiti, chalk marks on the pavement, a song sung by passing children,
the scurrying sound of rats that suddenly resolves itself into words. The
message can be up to twenty words long. The downside to this spell is that
any Urbanomancer passing the area where you left the message knows
Spraypaint has been used there, and can spend a minor charge to read the
message himself. The message stays present for up to a week.
- Day Pass
- Cost: 1 minor charge
Effect: This allows the caster to use any public transport system
completely free of charge and as effectively as possible. Barriers open,
conductors fail to notice her, she makes all her connections, and so on.
It lasts for one journey. A minor variant of the spell lets the caster
avoid major traffic while driving.
- Face in the Crowd
- Cost: 2 minor charges
Effect: The caster disappeares into a (preexisting) crowd. His
features
do not change - he just becomes incredibly hard to spot, part of the great
teeming mass of humanity. All attempts to follow or detect him are at
-50% until he leaves the crowd.
- Vermin's Eyes
- Cost: 2 minor charges
Effect: The caster must be holding a rat, pigeon, or similar urban
animal
to cast this spell. He now sees through the eyes of that animal, and
exert control over its actions, as long as they remain natural for that
animal - for instance, he could direct a pigeon to a particular area, but
not have it attack somebody. This effect lasts until the caster cancels
it - but he can't switch back and forth between his vision and the
animals; as soon as he changes back, it's over.
- Break Your Mother's Back
- Cost: 3 minor charges.
Effect: This is the Urbanomancy minor blast. As described above,
the city,
through whatever normal-seeming means, attacks the target, if they're in
an appropriate situation.
Urbanomancy Significant Effects
- My Turf
- Cost: 1 significant charge
Effect: This establishes your magical dominance over a particular
area -
this can be up to a square mile of the city, but it must be defined by
clear boundaries, such as "Platt Fields" or "Kingsford." You
automatically sense any magick cast within that area, and can specify
other events to sense - i.e criminal activity, a member of the Sect of the
Naked Goddess entering, and so on. This spell has to be renewed once a
week, and can only be cast on one area at a time.
- Alone in the Crowd
- Cost: 1 significant charge
Effect: The target of this spell becomes a pariah for a week.
Nobody
attacks him or openly mocks him, but everybody subtly avoids him. If he's
in a crowd, people will keep a distance of at least a foot. Conversations
will be kept as short and sharp as possible. The only exceptions are
close friends. Isolation and Helplessness checks are probably in order for
the target.
- Wrong Turn
- Cost: 2 significant charges
Effect: This ensures that the target of the spell will, next time
they
travel in the city, end up where you want them to, provided it's a public
area. This can be just by your house, in the middle of the worst part of
town, whatever. As usual, crowds, traffic, and coincidence force this
upon them. The only way it can be avoided is by the casting of a
different travel spell - resisting it otherwise just makes the effects
more obvious, and possibly more painful - being hit by a car and taken by
ambulance to just outside the caster's house, for instance, where the
ambulance then breaks down.
- All Cities Are One City
- Cost: 2 significant charges
Effect: This lets you travel instantly from one city to another,
without
losing charges. You must be in the middle of a crowd to cast this spell,
and close your eyes. When you open them again, you'll be in the middle of
a crowd in a different city. Obviously, there must be a crowd in the
other city for you to appear in - so be aware of time zones and the like.
- Napoleon of Notting Hill
- Cost: 3 significant charges
Effect: This causes any individual to rise to a position of
power and
respect within his district. This will happen within three months. The
exact position cannot be chosen by the caster, but will depend upon the
individual - it could be community spokesperson, gang leader, borough
representative, head of the Neighbourhood Watch. You can cast this spell
upon yourself. The target can quite happily go further on her own
merits once given the initial boost, of course.
- And the Crowd Goes Wild
- Cost: 3 significant charges
Effect: This starts a riot. There must be pre-existing tension
over
some issue - possibly created by Urbanomancy, admittedly - for the riot to
explode around. You can specify the area in which the riot starts, and
the targets against which the mob will direct their wrath, which must be
appropriate to the tension you drew upon to cast the spell. The riot will
form within half-an-hour of you casting the spell, after which point it is
completely out of your control.
- Ragged Warriors
- Cost: 3 significant charges
Effect: The longer you stay on the streets, the more you become a
part of
them. Long-time homeless begin to lose their identify, merging into the
patterns of the city, and becoming susceptible to urbanomantic control.
This spell lets the urbanomancer send his mind out from his body to
control one of these poor wrecks completely, who must be on his Turf at
the time of casting or otherwise sensable by magick. The urbanomancer
cannot control his own body at the same time, and must cancel the spell to
return. On the other hand, for every additional significant charge spent,
an extra homeless person can be controlled at the same time.
For example, Julius, a corrupt councilman and urbanomancer (let's
stereotype for a moment here ...) is seriously annoyed by some intrepid
PC's, who are breaking into his Turf one night. Spending six significant
charges (impressive), he leaps into four people, and gaunt shapes emerge
from the alleys around the group, clutching broken bottles.
There are two downsides to this spell. Firstly, the people controlled are
obviously not going to be fine physical specimens. The caster can use his
own physical skills, but they'll be limited by the Body of the targets,
which will likely be 20 + d10 or so. Secondly, it's an extremely evil and
disturbing thing to do. It's a Self-6 check just to cast, Self-7 to
control more than one individual and Self-8 and Helplessness-10 for the
targets if they realise what's going on.
In some big cities, there are homeless who have lost all their
individuality to this spell, and who just sit there, rocking gently, until
one urbanomancer or another decides to use them as a tool.
- Traffic Accident
- Cost: 3 significant charges
Effect: This is the Urbanomancy significant blast.
Urbanomancy Major Effects
Cause somebody to become mayor of a city, start riots in several cities
across the world, lower the crime rate across America, form a new building
in the middle of a city which nobody notices wasn't there before ...