Design Diary — The Sorcerer's Prentice

I'm reaching the point where Seven Part Pact, the core of it, barring any certain upheavals or revelations from playtesting (or feedback from certain developmental editors who will be assisting)......is done. I'll put out Draft 4 soon — it'll be very similar to draft 3.25.05, but with a big label on it saying "DONE FOR NOW!"

It's a terrifying feeling, and it's almost impossible to let go of my baby, especially considering all the work it has taken to get her this far. The temptation to keep designing, to overdesign her, is overwhelming. So rather than channel that energy into the core of the game, where it may damage core systems and destroy chunks of my darling that I value, I am instead allowing myself to work on the parts of the game that, while essential for the final version, allow me to take the lessons I've learned from working on the game and apply them. This means it's time to write some Ages.

For those unfamiliar with Seven Part Pact, the Ages are my tool for shaping the initial position of the game depending on the experience level of the group. The Age of Awakening, which focuses on the Pact's resurgence from decline, is a good introduction for a group of mixed experience and the Age of Dominion. which focuses on the height of its power, is a better fit for a more experienced group who want to start a campaign "en media res."

There are two other Ages I knew I wanted to make: a "tutorial age" that could be run in 3 hours at a con, or played by a group with zero experience across the table, and an "apocalyptic age" that could serve as a legitimate challenge for experienced players. The Age of Cataclysm is pretty easy to write: just take all the difficulty sliders and toggles I've built in and slide them up, and create more problems than any one Wizard can focus on. The tutorial age has been harder to draft.

The challenge I was facing was that I wanted the tutorial age to diegetically meet the players where they're at, and make it so you can know nothing about how the game or the world works at the start of play and have that make sense. This is a natural conflict with the narrative idea of wizards, who are etymologically "too wise for their own good." So how do I create that alignment, without players feeling like their characters are bizarrely out of their depth?

Thankfully, Wizards have to deal with this problem all the time! What must you do in order to learn how to be a wizard? Why, first you must be an apprentice, of course! So the tutorial age is structured around an idea that I've had shaking around in the back of my head since I started working on this: what if, instead of beings wizards who know everything and can do anything, you're their apprentices (or "prentices" as the game calls them) and you know as little about it as you wish to know, and you are capable of being as reckless or as wise as it suits you?

There are of course a few challenges with this idea, but many of those challenges contain their solutions as part of the tutorial. The ultimate model I came up with is a bit of a YA fantasy novel meets 90s collegiate comedy, as the Wizards of the Pact have left their prentices in charge, and they're just as likely to screw it up and keep it together. Adding in just a little bit of sauce to enable player-on-player conflict, and we've got a tutorial. I'll be looking for a group to help me playtest this either while I'm at UKGE or once I'm back, so if you haven't touched 7PP at all, let me know in the Creekside Discord.

As one final treat, here's one of the pregenerated prentices. It has a couple questions baked in, so I can show off the most exciting parts of character creation. Behold Sebastian!

The Sorcerer's Prentice

Your name is Sebastian. You are the star student of Spyrholm Academy and of your master, The Sorcerer. Magic lets you float above the ground at your will. You have an inquisitive temperament and a nearly photographic memory.

For each of the following statements, choose between two options and adjust your Elemental Circles appropriately. 

• You are the star student of Spyrholm Academy. Are you genuinely as intelligent as your teachers believe (+1 Fire) or a talented cheat and imposter (+1 Air)?

• As the Sorcerer's Prentice, you have access to the greatest and most powerful tomes of dark magic in this (or any other) age. Do you regard them with fear and suspicion (+1 Water) or gleefully devour their secrets, even as it frays at your sanity (+1 Air)?

• Since you began your studies with the Sorcerer, you have been isolated from the other students. Do you miss your old friends (+1 Earth) or understand the importance of your studies (+1 Fire)?

• Your master's mind is constantly in a thousand places at once, as he regards the secrets of the cosmos. Do you believe he is wise beyond measure (+1 Water) or a gibbering madman (+1 Earth)?

For each Elemental Circle higher than 0, you have a Companion:

• Your Fire Companion is your Familiar, an animal friend who inspires your magical practice. They might be an owl, snake, rat, or other creature. What's their name?

• Your Air Companion are the professors of the Academy, who taught you everything you know. What do you miss from their tutelage?

• Your Water Companion is your best friend, a fellow academic, and in some ways far smarter than you. How are you jealous of each other?

• Your Earth Companion is the Sorcerer's constructed servant, a magical creature that takes care of your living chambers. What human care do you crave from it, that it cannot give?

Someday you will be a man, as all wizards are, but within your heart you know:

• To be a man is to exert your will and power upon the world, but you have not yet had the chance to prove yourself, and you must leave a mark on history.

• To be a man is to practice wisdom and stern strength, but you weep in fear at how much you still have to learn.

• You are kept up at night by dreams of femininity, and you write pseudonymous letters from the perspective of the woman in your head.

• You're secretly a girl, but you disguised yourself as a man to join the Academy, and you cannot hope to reveal your deception now. "Sebastian" is not your real name.

You have the following possessions:

• The blue cape of a Sorcerer's Prentice.

• Three sets of clothes, at least: suitable for a student of Spyrholm, a wizard of considerable power, or an old-fashioned and stodgy nobleman.

• Any accessibility aids or mobility tools, such as: glasses, canes, wheelchairs, etc.

• This very Codex, filled with the notes of Sorcerers past.