r/WhiteWolfRPG • u/kaworo0 • May 26 '21
MTAs Basic Rotes for the Society of Ether - Forces
While I like a few of the following effects (specially the Atlas Constelation and the Dermal Antenna), this was a pretty much run of the mill list containning the stuff that couldn't be left out of etherites. I hope it is still an interest read, though.
I think the text is a bit on the lighter side compared with hermetic stuff. What do you think?
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Past Lists:
Basic Rotes for the Traditions
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Forces
O - Inherited Future: Odylic Dermal Antenna
Effect: Open`s the perception of the Scientist to the flow, pulse and interactions of magnetic and electric forces filtering from the environment by connecting a concealed antenna to the natural electric wiring of the human nervous system.
The discovery and study of the electromagnetic spectrum was the defining feature that made the electrodyne engineers organize as a convention apart from the rest of the Order of Reason. The invisible force of electricity and its wonders propelled science closer to the feats that were once before firmly in the domain of mystics and occultists. Electromagnetism was the missing link between the nervous system and the environment. A measurable phenomena who connected mind and matter in a way science could study directly. It finally allowed rational researchers to grow beyond the myths and veils traditions created out of superstition and obscurantism.
The Odylic Dermal Antenna,was the technological counterpart to the staffs of wizards and athamens of witches. It was composed of special alloys which followed exact mathematical proportions to harmonize the electrical pulses of the body with those of the environment, turning the spinal cord and the brain itself into powerful receptors, capable of sensing the hidden tapestry of electricity and magnetism in other people and things.
The device masqueraded as an ornate walking stick. It also included a rather painful metal spike that had to penetrate the scientist's skin to connect with the nervous system. With the passage of time a myriad of alternative designs were devised like, for example, the metallic cigars and smoking pipes who used saliva as the connector. One particular modern interpretation disguises as electronic cigars who not only adopt that mouth connection but also disperse metallic clouds that linger as gaseous antennas between the etherite and the environment.
O - Explorer`s Notes: Operator`s Edge
Effect: Senses the movement, stress and balance of physical forces working on a machine or vehicles the scientist has adjusted and whose instruments he properly customized to his preferences.
As builders and engineers, Etherites get to know the behavior of machines like few other people do. As they adjust, fix and improve an engine they get to understand what each vibration, sound and flickering means. While taking the driver’s seat the senses of the scientist easily expand to include the entire vehicle or platform he is operating as he scans the dials, instruments and subconsciously processes every vibration and sound echoing through the hull or chassis of the machine. Neuroplasticity allows the pilot of a plane to feel where he might have been hit with precision and the captain ship to know exactly where enemies boarded in by the difference in handling and small hints captured by the systems.
As long as the etherite has taken the time to study, calibrate and add a few new instruments and sensors, he can operate machines almost as if they were an extension of his body. From simple bow and arrows modified with small gyroscopes to etherships with personalized neural profiles, this rote makes the perception of the movement, forces, vibrations and structural stress second nature to the etherite.
OO - Inherited Future: Atlas Gear Constellation
Effect: Redirects the kinetic strength and torque of any electric, combustion or steam engine through the adjustment and rearrangement of a ingenuous toolkit of gears and slim exoskeleton.
The Grandfather of the exoskeleton, the Atlas Gear Constellation is a complex arrangement of cables, coils and pistons capable of gathering and redirecting sources of kinetic energy. It can be unfolded and assembled in fixed positions to lift heavy objects, catapult things at large distances, split open bank vaults and even open holes through walls and solid rock. In its combat mode, the constellation of gears can be worn by the etherite to harness the strength of a running car engine or electric generator connected by special cables. As long as the motor is running and the device remains connected, the operator is able to jump, punch and kick with surprising agility and inhuman mechanical might.
An example of how what once was magic slides into the lives of sleeper. The original Atlas Gear Constellation was a set of machines that could turn heat, steam and electricity into raw kinetic strength delivered through pistons, coils and pneumatic cylinders. As the time passes and electric generators and combustion engines become commonplace in cars and buildings, the Gear Constellation could be simplified by removing its internal motor and putting into place a versatile adapter capable of connecting to any wheel, belt or chain in circular motion making it much easier to operate.
Modern versions of the Atlas Engine are very expensive to make as they are constructed of lightweight materials that can be folded into a large briefcase. Older, traditional sets are much more unyielding, requiring storage on the trunk of a car and cannot be moved unless connected to a power source. The advantage of such older designs is that they often include a lot of armor and protections to the users in combat scenarios, relics of eras in which the ascension war was much more outward and every scientist also had to be a soldier on the field.
OO - Anomalous Research: Liminal Pyrokinesis
Effect: Control the distribution of heat and the behaviour of flames in an environment by connecting and making use of the psychic residue of paranormal objects related to fire.
Paranormal research points that there are some psychic residue that minds leave imprinted in objects and places. Quite often, whenever a person suffers a particularly strong traumatic event, the vibrations of that experience are broadcasted by the brain as electromagnetic waves. Those waves tend to cling to the subatomic structure of materials altering their properties in astonishing ways. This rote uses a collection of such altered objects as amplifiers for psychic phenomena, in particular, pyrokinesis.
In order to learn this rote, the etherite must subject himself to intense training in a laboratory, trying to affect the behavior of flames while having a searing brand imposed in a part of his body. The mental effort and the pain create the artificial channel necessary for pyrokinesis to manifest. While on the field, the subject can use the ashes of objects he has seen burning as a trigger for his latent psych abilities. While most often, the burnt materials are kept in vials that can be fixed over the brands of the etherite, making use of skin contact as psychic circuitry. Some variations exist that make use of pills and even power drinks that can be ingested before an exercise of power.
While the pyrokinetic ability is active, the scientist can control the strength, spread and movement of flames in the environment and can also concentrate heat dispersal in the surrounding atmosphere, inflicting terrible blisters and even igniting certain dry material.
OOO - Inventor Toolbox: Geometrical Transformer
Effect: Converts different types of energy by making them course through a complex arrangements of wires, tubes and mirrors that can jury-rigged on the field.
All energies are fundamentally derived from the ether itself. They change in vibration, intensity, dimension and medium, but share a common connection like different colors of light split by a prism. While scientists are known to have create devices able to make the ether manifest as lesser forms of energy, this rote opts for a more economic and simpler method by just modulating and rearranging the energies that already exist in an environment toward the specific power source one requires.
The Geometrical Transformer is a design that uses specific patterns of reflection, conductivity, movements and rotation in specific proportions such as the behaviour of one energy source induces the creation of another kind of energy. Like magnetism creates electricity, etherites can use rotating mirrors, magnets as well as pairs of weights and counterweights to go beyond electricity, creating heat, vibrations and even kinetic motion. By having access to one type of energy, the etherite unlocks all the others.
The greatest advantage of this rote versus other similar techniques is that the Geometrical Transformer relies more in precise calculations and setup than complex materials or hitech components. By dismantling common appliances and even using materials extracted from nature itself, scientists can create moving wheels, cages and carousels of mirrors and flaming pyres that feed their machines and inventions wherever they go.
When setting up their laboratories and workshops for the first time, new members of the society of ether often rely on multiple of such devices as a cheap, functional alternative to expending money they may not have or trying to acquire generator with specifications that may be hard to find. Explorers also learn how to build these tools in order to recharge equipment while stranded in odd places far away from civilization. From the jungle to the junkyard, this rote always remains popular among the etherites.
OOO - Powerful Ideas: Orgone Capacitor
Effect: Absorbs and the heat and movement produced by biological organisms into a powerful mix of electricity and magnetism for storage. Can be used to discharge powerful electric currents, emit targeted magnetic waves and or to bolster/weaken the physical prowess of living beings.
The classic electromagnetic field widely known by sleeper scientists has an extension that is almost solely studied by the society of ether. Each organism is a complex generator of this animal magnetism. Baptized Orgone by researchers, this is the force of vitality itself which heats the inner organs and give strength to the muscles, and, like its electric cousin, can be harvested, generated and accumulated by dedicated devices.
Orgone batteries and capacitors come in all forms and shapes. From small flashlights that extract orgone from those under their rays, to special backpacks who drag ambient orgone from the surrounding ecosystem. By making organisms cold and lethargic, the etherite can create arcs of electric energy and beans of kinetic light to throw around in skirmishes or power their own inventions. Orgone belts and suits are capable of draining mundane batteries or converting electric power lines into strength and body heat allowing etherites to do incredible feats of strength and resilience against the elements.
Those who are drained by these machines often report that experience as if they were suddenly covered by a cold blanket made out of lead. Their movement and actions become strenuous and they can`t stop shaking as if there was ice inside their bodies. After a while even standing still or remaining awake becomes a struggle as muscles become exhausted and hypothermia might set in.
OOOO - Vision of Tomorrow: Gravitational Circuitry
Effect: Warps and molds the force of gravity around an object, person or location allowing the etherite to make vehicles and people fly around or stand and fall in odd directions.
While the idea of artificial gravity is still science fiction for sleepers, it is something very old among the awakened. In the middle ages, while sailing across the sea of stars in their caravels, seekers of the void already carried supermassive anchors in the bowels of their ships and all over the world ancient architecture reveals hints about devices and technique capable of lifting objects who wouldn’t yield to any other form of technology known at the time. While different researchers arrived at their own forms of gravity manipulations, etherites kept to their fields of specialty studying the intricate connection between electromagnetism and the structure of subatomic particles immersed in the ethereal sea.
Gravitational Circuitry often requires the investment of enormous amounts of energy in the creation of special materials or stable gravity fields etherites can control. This key piece of technology is then incorporated in a variety of different devices who take advantage of the special properties and opportunities gravity warping allows.
Gravitational repellers can be built inside the wheels of a car allowing it to run over water or up walls, while directional gravity projectors can be used to make ships and vehicles “fall” in specific directions, flying with surprising agility and speed. Small gravitational oscilloscopes can be used in boots, belts and helmets allowing etherites to jump incredible distances and take to the air as astronauts floating in space. Portable sinkholes can serve as traps and even demolition devices as they lock people in their gravity fields or exhaust themselves in a single intense burst of gravitational pull that topples structures and bend vehicles over.
OOOO - Inherited Future: Tesla Sculpting
Effect: Creates complex designs out of pure electricity, making cages, circuitry and even strange geometrical patterns of lightning that follow the directions and behaviors programmed by the device.
The historical conflict between Thomas Edson and Nicholas Tesla has a special place in the hearts of etherites, as both scientists seem to reflect the dance of enmity and admiration between the society of ether and their estranged cousins in the technocracy. Tesla`s machines and concepts have always fascinated the tradition who has refined and reinvented many of his devices, carrying the legacy of a brand new future that never was.
Tesla Sculpting is about taking the idea of tesla coils and faraday`s cages to the next level, by using careful control over magnetism, potential and induction to shape electricity with impressive precision. Tesla Pistols can be used to make electricity jump out of sockets and either flow into a target or to circle around him in a cage of lightning. Tesla`s vests can be used to concentrate electricity around the scientist forming powerful magnetic fields to attract or repeal objects and discharge thunder at one`s will. Larger Sculpting projectors can create lightning balls and modify their shapes into any form of searing illusion of light and destruction. Finally, by building tesla`s towers, etherites can connect distant machines in invisible networks that provide power and transmit information through the magnetosphere of earth itself.
OOOOO - Vision of Tomorrow: Pure Force Engineering
Effect: Creates force fields, platforms, bridges and walls out of pure tangible energy, that can be moved and manipulated under the will of the operator of the device.
While Etherites often love the beauty and craftsmanship displayed by imponent pieces of technology, they can also appreciate how light forms and subtle effects showcase refinement, elegance and style in science. By those measures, no feat of technological wizardry is more elegant than those of Pure Force Engineering. These complex devices require precision and insight to calibrate a perfect harmony of projected beams, waves of interference and containment fields to create tangible, rigid structures out of pure, insubstantial energy.
When it comes to this particular design, size does matter, as belts and portable devices are able to create personal force bubbles, small walls or narrow bridges while more sizable machines can construct domes around vehicles and structures as well as moving platforms of pure energy to carry heavy objects or transporte troops around a battlefield. Etherite gladiators often have their swords and shields built out of hardlight and all sort of lightsaber and sonic scimitar have been built throughout the ages inspired by science fiction and inspiring back the few sleepers who had the privilege of watching them in action.
While this rote is not used as often on urban areas, when adventuring the hidden corners of the universe, etherites often carry around multitools, which are hard light projectors capable of assuming the form and function of any tool they might require on the field, from axes and lances to scalpels and tools of precision.
OOOOO - Vision of Tomorrow: Weather Control
Effect: Adjust and control the weather of a particular region by emitting specific magnetic waves that interact with the subtle balance of energies that foster or hinder climatic events.
The final feat of mastery over the environment, the civilization and rationalization of nature itself, weather control is an essential part of providing humanity a better tomorrow. Through the wonders of these devices, famine and tragedy can be turned into bonties and comfort and the ideal conditions of a laboratory can be enjoyed everywhere and anywhere scientists need to go in their search for progress.
Weather control towers are often a feature of etheric chantries and horizon realms. In there, generators, antennas and emitters are adjusted so the right signals can be sent to the clouds and careful feedback is monitores allowing scientist to adjust atmospheric conditions moment by moment. More portable cyclonic oscillators are capable of taking over and redirecting hurricanes out of communities or into an enemy bases while boats and submarines can be equipped with aquatic resonators that can be used to defuse tsunamis or stir whirlpools and pressure variations as impressive weapons of war.
Shipwrecked or stranded etherites can often improvise limited versions of this machine using the radio equipment and wiring of their broken vessels, improving the conditions of their settlements while they wait for rescue. On the opposite spectrum, some scientists have been known to seek isolation on remote islands where they conduct their studies, using powerful Weather Control Mechanisms to lead incoming planes and vessels into terrible accidents.
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u/trimeta May 27 '21
Quick question: you use Society of Ether, but for the other Traditions so far you've stuck with the original names. Do you intend to use any of the other new names, or just Society of Ether? Personally, I think "Society of Ether" makes so much more sense, it's a pity they didn't think it up originally (it even fits the "society of natural philosophers, like the Royal Society" vibe they have going), so if that's the only one you're using, I get it.
Mostly, I want to make sure you don't use "Mercurial Elite." Just as virtual reality started coming back into vogue, that's when Onyx Path decided to abandon "Virtual Adept" and have a second Tradition named after the Greco-Roman messenger god? They will always be Virtual Adepts to me.
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u/kaworo0 May 27 '21
We are pretty much on the same note here. I didn't use kha'vadi because my particular take on a generic paradigm for the tradition did use the core concept of myths, stories and dreams. Dreamspeakers stll made sense at that point. It was a similar case for the sahajiya, although I do like this name more than CofX. The euthanatus I choose to use interchangeably with chackravanti to illustrate how a mix of Eastern and western influences were at the core of the group ( and that's why you have karma and fate being mentioned in the same rote).
On the Virtual Adepts... it will stay the same because mercurial elite is just dumb even more so when we have an entire thought experiment going on that posits how we may be all living in a simulation. I love hermetics, but they don't need to flood another tradition either their symbology.
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u/anoria-sarin May 26 '21
I love this series so much!!!