Mage/Theme/Legacies/Walkers in the Mists

WALKERS IN MISTS

The grizzled man was a walking shamble of belts, pockets, and sacks containing equipment and supplies. So much for a sage, you thought, though his cloak and staff did a fine impression of replicating druidic heraldry. After you travelled with him, passing through mist-laden paths and hearing of his exploits, you realized that there was more to this old wanderer than his supposed vagrancy after all.

Nature Beyond Nature

The Walkers in Mists are an old Legacy, found mostly in cultures of Celtic influence where they are identified as the druids of both history and myth. Legends say that the Walkers taught humanity how to mark past trails and identify landmarks for future travel, freeing mankind from simply following the seasons and thus leaving them free to decide their own fate in where they live. They are also the ones attributed to have first used mundane items such as coins and dice marked with ogham letters in games of chance, in their own divinations and teaching even Sleepers the vagaries of fate

The Druids are marginallized in the modern civilized world. Their parent culture is largely gone, developed cities claimed the paths they traveled through, and their gamblings attract crime and corruption. Many Druids feel themselves loners in the fringes of society, to which the younger generation have been responding by embracing technology in their travels, reintroducing Celtic faiths to the modern world, and redefining civilization and cities just another part of the wilds in the greater scheme. So far, results have been mixed.

Origins

Parentage: Acanthus, Mysterium, Seers of the Throne

Background: Mages who travel frequently, especially in lesser maintained routes, are likely to come across a Walker. Those who step further to initiation are usually those of an imaginative or artistic bent, or those determined and Obsessed to seek the secret trods of nature. While the gambling subculture connect the Legacy with a wider potential recruitment ground, Druids reject those who fall into its corrupted, commercialist form.

Appearances: Walkers tend toward lean physiques shaped and tanned by travel, and their clothes match their outdoor activities, being geared for function. Modern Druids exhibit some level of flamboyance, mostly due to mixing bohemian and hippie fashions with that of older traditions they borrow from.

Doctrine

Prerequisites: Space 2, Survival 2, two dots in one of the following Skills; Science, Expression, Medicine, Streetwise, Occult

Initiation: The aspirant must leave behind her former life and join the mentor in his travels. The shaping of the soul is gradual, each bodily step on the path an equivalent step of spirituality. The final step of the initiation requires the pupil to step off the well-paved road of her mentor's guidance and head off to her own journey, something which the mentor must not tell and instead lure it out.

Organization: Every Walker is a nomad by default, and thus there is little to speak of a cohesive organization backing them up. Every crossing of paths, therefore, is a cherished occasion where each Druid recites their tutorial lineage up to a shared predecessor, and where the two discuss portents and imminent dangers. Bands of multiple Walkers are the stuff of legend, but rumors speak of entire Walking families who tend to the sacred paths and glades of the wild.

Theory: Nature displays its treasures for all to see, but only the diligent and dedicated may parse together its secret language and comprehend its mysteries. The Walkers in Mists turn to the unseen wilds where life and magic is born, and find Supernal enchantment in the outside world that many mages forget to look upon.

Magic

Ruling Arcanum: Space

Yantras: Ancient ruins (+1); game of chance divining the spell's outcome (+2); tools usable for both gambling and divining (+2); glade or garden (+1, +2 if cleared out by the mage themselves)

Oblations: Trailblazing; orienteering; playing games of chance with substantial costs; sharing knowledge of paths and roads with others

Attainments

First: Misty Edge

Prerequisites: Initiation
The Druid catches glimpses of the trails leading into hidden paths. Her Periphery now responds to the presence of Irises, except for Scars and Aberrances Also, her Mage Sight can always identify Thurae into the Mists, the Emanation of Unknown Destiny, for what they are.
Optional: Time 1
The vagaries of time no longer obstruct the Walker. He replicates the "Green Light / Red Light" spell to benefit himself, with Reach assigned to instant use.

Second: Peer into the Mists

Prerequisites: Space 2, Survival 3
The Mists manifest in nature, which the Druid may channel to look through and beyond. As an instant action, she may target a plant life within sensory range and project her perceptions to it, seeing the plant's surroundings as if she were standing there. This counts as remote viewing for purposes of spellcasting.
Any being with supernatural spatial senses may notice that they are being watched, and respond with a Clash of Wills where the Druid rolls Gnosis + Space. If the watched being wins, a scrying window showing the Druid briefly appears over the plant she is using, allowing the being to act accordingly.
Optional: Time 2
Nature remembers what has gone by, and so does the Mists. The Walker may target a plant life and relive its past, replicating the "Postcognition" spell. Reach is assigned to instant use and sensory range. Should the Walker use Temporal Sympathy in conjunction, he does not need a sympathy Yantra and counts as knowing the plant's sympathetic name.

Third: Mist Haven

Prerequisites: Space 3, two dots in a second Skill among the optional prerequisite Skills
A traveller needs a place to rest undisturbed, and in the wild a Druid can conjure havens out of the Mists. After a ritual interval spent examining green plant life in a location of her choosing, the Druid replicates the "Ward" spell. Reach is assigned to Advanced Duration and Advanced Scale.
By spending a point of potentia upon conjuring the Haven, the Druid may charge the area with one of the Space, Time, or Life Arcana, provided she has at least three dots in it. For its Duration and within its Scale, the Haven will behave like a Node charged with the invoked Arcanum. The Druid is considered to have already magically examined the area for Space and Time, instantly granting her the benefits.
Optional: Time 3
The Mists contain in it the undecided future, and a Walker may borrow that transcendence to replicate the "Divination" spell. Reach is assigned to instant use, sensory range, and asking more specific questions to receive more detailed answers.

Fourth: Paths Through the Mists

Prerequisites: Space 4, Survival 4
The Druid is no longer bound to physical roads, for she knows Nature's hidden paths. After a ritual interval of walking towards a destination in mind and spending a point of potentia, she can arrive in her chosen destination as per the "Co-Location" spell. Reach is assigned to sensory range and restricting the co-location as a two-dimensional portal. This Attainment is automatically used with Sympathetic Range. If the Druid either lacks a sympathetic connection to her destination or lacks a sympathy Yantra connecting her to it, she instead arrives at the last location she used the Mist Haven Attainment to conjure a Haven.
Optional: Time 4
Time is but another road, and a Walker is free to sidestep obstacles by simply walking around them. This emulates the "Temporal Stutter" spell, where the Walker appears to walk into thin air and disappear, only to reappear moments later. Reach is assigned to instant use.
This requires the Walker to move at least a step, but he is free to reappear in any location he could have walked to for the Duration. While the Walker can take others with him, he must grab or be grabbed by them if they are not Walkers themselves. Withstand still applies for the unwilling.

Fifth: Inviting the Mists

Prerequisites: Space 5, two dots in a third Skill among the optional prerequisite Skills
After walking within both Nature of the Fallen World and Supernature of the Mists, the Druid's soul resonates with the Mists, allowing her to invite it into the Fallen World. When she incorporates her soul stone into a Demesne, it becomes an Arcadian Verge with a Thura into the Mists at its center, inhabited by the same half-substantial beings of the Mists. The Druid may freely assign a Key to the Thura at the moment of its creation or any time she wishes. Destroying the Thura collapses the Demesne as well.
Optional: Time 5
The Walker's very eyes swell with the Mists, and his gaze coalesces that fog of destiny into a coherent future. This emulates the "Prophecy" spell with Reach assigned to instant use and expanding for use in Social Maneuvering.

To Walk in the Mists

• Each Emanation is a singular geography that hosts unique laws. The symbolism of the Mists is that of unknown destiny, the rolling fog that conceals the future but reveals it to those who can navigate it. The following is a non-exhaustive list of the unique laws and aspects the Mists display.
• Mages do not need to be casting at sensory range when they use the Sympathetic Range or Temporal Sympathy Attainments. This includes spells cast sympathetically outside the Emanation.
• Anyone, even non-mages, in the Mists can attempt to shape their future fate out of the destiny-fog. Follow the rules for Building Equipment as per Chronicles of Darkness. The dice pool is a Finesse Attribute + a Skill, both relevant to what kind of future the shaper has in mind. Mages can choose to roll Gnosis + Fate or Time. For Sleepers, assuming they were able to function somehow, this always becomes a Jury Rigging action without its benefits of saved time. The built future is essentially a Plan, granting its equipment bonus to any dice pool rolled by anyone involved that would help realize the future.
• The half-substantial Anachronisms of the Mists will occasionally entertain themselves by appearing in front of them as their potential future versions. Each Fae comes with the intention of having the visitor accept the future they embody, regardless of whether the future is desirable. Treat this as Social Maneuvering, upon which the Fae always have perfect impression. On final success, the Fae will overwrite one of the visitor's long-term Aspirations with its offered future, against which no Supernal magic or Attainment below archmastery can protect against. Resolving the Maneuvering by going with the flow awards an Arcane Beat instead of a normal Beat. Resolving it by offering an alternative allows the Fae to impose a Condition that need not be beneficial, with twists of intent allowed.
• When exiting the Mists, the visitor may find himself displaced in time. He may find that days, weeks, even months and years have passed while he was in the Mists. This displacement never drops the visitor in the past. The only way to prevent this is to Build a future before exiting, or accept one of the potential-Fae's offered futures.
• Lastly, mages and Sleepwalkers may attempt to carry some of the Mists back to the Fallen World, typically in a bottle. When released over or imbibed by a subject, the subject's most likely future abruptly changes to a completely different one. This overrides even supernaturally imposed futures, save for truly powerful ones such as the work of archmasters.
• Among the Awakened, the Walkers in Mists are renowned for their facility with the Mists, and have taken the Emanation as their namesake. In addition to the above, a Druid in the Mists gain access to the following features.
• Walkers can spend a point of potentia to obviate any Key placed over a Thura into the Mists.
• Along with Time, the Space Arcanum is considered the Emanation's signature Arcanum as well.
• Using Sympathetic Range and Temporal Sympathy no longer cost potentia.
• When entering the Emanation, a Walker may choose to instead "wrap" the Mists around their Nimbus, allowing her to walk in both the Fallen and Supernal. She can observe and travel parallel to the Fallen World, and those in the Fallen World cannot perceive her unless they use Time Sight. She cannot cast spells at or affect subjects in the Fallen World in any way. This is a taxing experience, however, and she suffers dice penalties and limited time before having to spend Willpower as per Active Mage Sight. Running out of Willpower in this form shunts her back to the "physical" version of the Mists.
• By spending a point of potentia and meditating, the Druid can exit the Mists without passing back through a Thura. Entering the Fallen World this way turns him Twilight, but attuned to Space instead of the typical ephemeral Arcana. This still leaves him vulnerable to temporal displacement, if he did not meet the criterion for avoiding it. Lastly, while Space-Twilight is nearly vacant, Legacy records speak of occasional spirit-like beings of radiant glass, impeccable metal and humming electricity flittering around, and with them extra-spatial paths that even the Awakened were not aware of before seeing the strange beings move through them. Few records agree on just what they are, only that they seemingly aren't Supernal nor Abyssal in origin.