Enchantment

Overview

An enchantment is a persistent, beneficial magical effect, usually produced by a ritual, or less commonly by an eternal.

Targeting

• Formulaic rituals that create enchantments must be cast on a target
• A target can only ever be under a single enchantment at once

Any given target may only be under a single enchantment. If a new enchantment is created on a target, it completely removes the earlier enchantment. Most rituals can only be cast on one type of target; this will be specified in the ritual description.

A ritual enchantment commonly targets:

• A character: These are among the most common sorts of enchantments. Splendid Panoply of Knighthood and Fan the Flame of New Life are both enchantments that affect a character.
• A resource: These rituals usually enhance a personal resource owned by a character who is present when the ritual is performed. Examples include Rampant Growth and Streams of Silver are both enchantments that affect a resource.
• A campaign resource: These rituals usually enhance campaign resources like an army, which is controlled by a character present when the ritual is performed. Examples include Knights of Glory as an enchantment that affects a campaign resource.
• A region, territory, or empire: Some powerful rituals, such as Regrow the Land's Heart or Hallow of the Green World, target everything in a very large area. Such enchantments are usually indiscriminate - Hallow of the Green World targets every herb garden in the Empire regardless of who owns it. Enchantments that affect an entire Empire are often called Imperial enchantments.

It is possible for someone to benefit from multiple enchantments, even though they can only be targeted by one. For example, if Hallow of the Green World is cast then it targets the Empire - and the Empire can only be the target of one enchantment at once. But the effect benefits every herb garden in the Empire - a herb garden that is currently targeted by its own enchantment will gain the benefits of both enchantments.

Contagion

• Some enchantments can target a resource if the owner or controller is present

Most rituals require the target of the ritual to be present when the ritual is delivered. Some rituals make use of the magical law of contagion to affect a structure that is far away. This is most common with personal and campaign resources; the target for these rituals can be the character who owns or controls the resource. Although these rituals are expressly designed to target the resource through the character linked to it, the resulting enchantment is on the resource, not on the character.

For example, Bound by Common Cause affects an Imperial army. To cast it, the current general who controls the army must be present throughout the ritual. This ritual creates an enchantment on the army, the general acts as a conduit allowing the ritualists to enchant the army - they are not enchanted themselves.

Territory Enchantments

It is not possible to create arcane projections that enchant a nation with the magic of a realm, nor possible to do so on a specific region. It is possible to create enchantments on a territory level but any enchantment of this kind must create some kind of physical change in the world. An enchantment might cause plants to bloom or gentle rains to fall, it might cause tremors, storms or angry tides. There might be lights in the sky or the stars might disappear - any physical change that could happen naturally can be caused, but it must do something. This requirement is for a narrative physical effect not a rules effect - territory enchantments cannot provide additional benefits to resources by enchanting the territory.

This is especially important for rituals that try to "flood" a territory with magic. If you draw on magic from a realm, you must try to direct it to achieve something. The roleplaying effects of most rituals are side-effects of the presence of magic - any ritual that tries to provoke roleplaying effects at the territory level will only work if the magic is trying to make a physical change in the world. Creating a Summer ritual that encourages the inhabitants of a territory to be bold in their actions is possible - but only if is a consequence of the presence of magic attempting to do something else. Roleplaying effects on this scale are a consequence of the use of ritual magic to create an effect in the world, they cannot produce a roleplaying effect and nothing else.

It is possible to "invite" an eternal into a nation, allowing the eternal and its heralds to influence the territories, but that always requires the prior agreement with the specific eternal who will provide the arcane projection. Such agreements rarely last longer than a season and often involve clauses on the heralds leaving the nation.

A ritual that enchants a territory will usually have a magnitude of around eighty. Anyone creating an AP must name the territory in the projection - it is likely that if the effect is codified then the limitation on the territory will be removed - as with Regrow the Land's Heart. The normal outcome of such an magnitude 80 enchantment on a territory is that it will produce the game effect and be mentioned in the interlude and have an entry in the next wind of magic. Such magic is unpredictible however and in rare cases they may produce unlooked for effects or benefits.

Duration

• Encounter duration enchantments last until after the next major encounter
• Season duration enchantments last until the start of the next Empire event

The majority of enchantments are either 'encounter' - a duration that lasts for a single quest, skirmish or battle or 'season' - expiring at the start of the next Empire event that Profound Decisions runs.

• Encounter: Rituals that last for an encounter expire after the end of the next quest, skirmish, or battle the character goes on. They automatically expire at the end of the current event if they have not been used beforehand. Occasionally a quest may not involve any combat and our team will specify that the quest has not expended the use of any encounter enchantments. If a ref informs you that a quest did not expend your encounter duration rituals, (and only if directly informed by a referee), then they were not expended, even if used during that quest.

• Season: Rituals that last for a season expires immediately before the start of the next Empire event run by Profound Decisions. This means that the target could also be benefit at any sanctioned events that take place before the next event, if the event organisers allowed. Any season or encounter rituals that are cast at player events will end before the start of the next Profound Decisions Empire event.

It is possible to make an enchantment permanent through the use of ilium.

Identifying Enchantments

• Detect Magic can detect the presence, realm, and magnitude of an enchantment on a target
• More powerful divinations can reveal the nature of the enchantment

The detect magic incantation will tell the caster if a target is under an enchantment; the realm that enchantment comes from; and the magnitude of the enchantment. Further information requires deduction or the use of more powerful divination rituals.

Removing Enchantments

• A new enchantment replaces any existing enchantment
• A permanent enchantment cannot be replaced

The most recent enchantment is the only one that applies to a target. A magnitude 50 enchantment affecting a target is removed by a magnitude 2 enchantment that affects the same target. The only exception to this rule is that an enchantment that has been made permanent with ilium is not replaced by a new enchantment. The new enchantment fails, regardless of its magnitude.

It is not possible to simply "will" an enchantment to end - it must be replaced with another enchantment.

Further Reading

• Overview
• Magic Items
• Herbs & Potions
• Spellcasting
• Rituals
  • Formulaic Rituals
  • Arcane Projections
  • Battlefield Rituals
  • Enchantments
  • Curses
  • Ilium
• Ritual theory
  • Laws of magic
  • Limits of magic
  • Divination
  • War magic
  • Eternals and rituals
  • Spring magic
  • Summer magic
  • Autumn magic
  • Winter magic
  • Day magic
  • Night magic
• Regio