Eldmar/Spellstone

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Spell Stone

Artifact: level 2

History:

The Spell Stone is a relatively simple device, created during the First Age by a Twighlight Sorceress named Salamar. They were created for use by her bodyguards and the commanders of the Dragon Blood led forces at her disposal. They were used extensively by those very same Dragon blooded when they rose up against her. The secret of making these devices was lost with the death of Salamar, but with her recent reincarnation, hazy memories of the methods of constructing this item have begun to surface in her dreams.

Description:

These items can be made from high quality gemstone – resources 4 each or from alloys of the 5 magical materials, they do not require the user to be attuned nor does it provide any magical material bonus. Being attuned to the Stone reduces the cost to activate the magic of the stone and prevents it from being used by another essence user. Attunement costs 3 motes (committed).

Each Stone is created to store a single specified spell. The basic construction of each stone is the same, however there are slight differences in the ingredients used depending on the spell to be stored – e.g. Death of obsidian butterflies requires a pinch of Obsidian to be mixed into the alloy. These ingredients are generally quite straightforward to acquire and constitute a resources 2 purchase.

The Stone will store a single spell of the Emerald circle costing no more than 20 motes of essence, the motes used in casting the spell to be stored are not considered committed and can be regained by the caster normally. Once stored the spell must be activated within 1 month per point of permanent essence of the caster, or the spell will fade away. Once activated, the stored spell is gone and the Stone can not be used again until the spell has been recast and stored in the Stone.

Activating the Stone is a simple action and costs 3 motes if attuned or 6 motes if not attuned. It must be held in the hand or placed within a Hearthstone socket, and only one such stone can be activated per turn. Once released the spell behaves as it normally would as per the description in the relevant source book, as though the user had cast the spell at the time of releasing it.

Comments

I'd say these are more powerful than artifact 2... But I'm not sure. They do have a few drawbacks, so it -might- be appropriate. But, in general, I approve of the concept, and this is a pretty cool version thereof!
-- Darloth

• • Initially in discussions with my ST and myself this was supposed to be a level 3 artifact, however when you compare it to the Spell Chord (also a level 3 artifact for the basic version) which allows the user to store 3 Emerald spells without an upper limit as to the amount of essence, and allows you to 'capture' a number of spells cast against you up to the number of spare 'knots' for later use (at no essence cost) which is an improvement on the counter magic spell. I think that the Spell chord is a far more potent artifact, so thats why I made it a level 2 artifact, but thanks for your comments. I am still quite new to making artifacts, predominantly in our game we stick to the cannon stuff. Eldmar

You make a few extremely good points there. The spellcords have always been powerful, but yeah, if we're accepting them (and I generally do, for some reason) this is art 2. Anyway, new or not, nice toy ^_^
-- Darloth

I like it as well. A nice extension of the Spell storing cord rules. Do Celestial and/or Solar versions exist? Also, to be clear, when you make a stone, you make it with a given spell in mind? (Such as Obsidian Butterflies) thus preventing it from being used with other spells? -- GregLink

Yes, the idea was that each stone could only hold one spell that was specified during the creation process and that it would not be able to store any other spell. The idea was that they were intended to be given away partly as a badge of rank - the higher ranking officers would have more stones with different types of spells, and for specific purposes, ie low level officers might have a counter magic stone, whilst an elite strike force might have bones of stone / skin of bronze, a scout might have a transport type spell stone. That way they can be keyed to specific tasks that the individual is reponsible for. I thought that the special ingredients would be just a touch of flavour to explain it - ie for a skin of bronze stone use some powdered bronze in the construction, and also gives some credibility to the low cost to activate the spell inside.

As for Celestial and Solar level versions, I suppose it is plausible. The character was a Solar level sorcerer in the First Age, when we came up with the artifact Eldmar (second age) only had Terrestrial circle, so it made sense to limit the spells to Terestrial circle. Unfortunately the Character died a few weeks ago, so we probably wont be seeing any higher circle stones in our campain. Eldmar

(In case you can't tell, I ask because I like, so please, don't take offense) So the only last question I have relates to the traditional 'spell light show' display. When one activates a spell from the stone, does it make a huge light show? My hope is no, as it also would provide a nice way to allow that same strike team and/or scout to activate sorcery without the entire countryside knowing it. My hope is that the limitation that it can store only one spell is enough of a restriction to account for this. -- GregLink

• • No I dont mind you asking, part of the fun of this place is getting other peoples feedback so that next time you can make it better / easier or whatever. You are right about the whole light show thing, I think its a big drawback with sorcery, so when you initially cast the spell into the stone you get the light show but later when you activate it you dont. This gives your user an advantage in that as you point out, the people in the area around the user doesnt know a spell has been activated. Eldmar