Currently I'm working on a fantasy setting where magical abilities, such as being able to cast spells, are based on having ancient magical ancestry. There may be a few other minor spell casters in the setting, hedge mages perhaps, but being a powerful caster is in the blood. Through the ages, the bloodlines have become diluted and magic has become rarer and less powerful in general.
I have one idea for a noble family descended from the union of a human and demon. This group is likely the most powerful magically because they have practiced incest for centuries to preserve the purity of their demonic blood - with numerous interesting downsides to go along with their powers. I like this villainous faction and have all sorts of ideas for their history that I think are cool in a dark sort of way.
I need more ideas though about other such magical bloodlines that aren't quite so dark. Could I go with admixtures of humans and other magical beings? Does it seem silly to have various other supernatural bloodlines with ancestors other than demons? I don't want to go the inbred direction with the others, so what would be an interesting way to present them? Aside from saying that some magical bloodlines are so diluted that they don't exist as identifiable bloodlines anymore, the genes just happen to produce someone with magical potential now and then. I could do that, and maybe I will, but I think it would be neat to have a few other bloodlines that were more defined than that.
There is the Deryni from the book series. Nearly a separate race. They all get some manner of power from the bloodline.
Lots of others on the non-dark side. D&D has the various sorcerer bloodlines for example and in some settings you can not learn magic unless you "have it in the blood" as it were.
Well, I know in D&D and Pathfinder, there are oodles of sorcerer bloodlines with flavorful rule sets. I was thinking more along the lines of thematic roles these bloodlines could fill. What place do the x-descended people have in the world?
Seventh son of a seventh son. Or similar. There are several extended families, each descended from a single great magician. The "families" are big enough that there are a few offshoots (bastards, lost orphans, etc.) that the coverage of those families in the whole population is still small, but wider than is apparent at first. These families don't produce magicians regularly. Every now and then, though, they do. Whether from a happy cross-marriage that drives the recessive genes into a high enough concentration in their children or something else. Going with the seventh son idea, maybe the dose is more concentrated the later the child in the order. Or perhaps that is just a correlation, and it is changes in body chemistry, such that a child born later in the parents life has a higher concentration, even if the child is the first. Maybe have a preference in these families to have large families for some long tradition. Maybe a long lost attempt to dilute the blood line enough to stop producing magicians that the reasons for have been mostly forgotten?
As far as neutral reasons for sorcerers in D&D, one of my campaign reasons is that travel through portals can make random changes to people. It's usually very weak, but in pregnant women, can make a bigger change on the mother, and a huge, life altering change on the unborn child. The minor effect isn't understood very well, and most people in the world don't even suspect it. The larger change has been observed enough that pregnant women avoid portal travel when possible and sorcerers are sometimes called "portal children". There is enough raiding through portals (and corresponding rescues too) that a few pregnant women still make and survive the trip every year, even so.
Quote from: ShieldWife;1128328Well, I know in D&D and Pathfinder, there are oodles of sorcerer bloodlines with flavorful rule sets. I was thinking more along the lines of thematic roles these bloodlines could fill. What place do the x-descended people have in the world?
Mainly Pathfinder. D&D has been far less prolific in that regard.
There's also
homo magi from DC Comics. Humans with native magical talent. That came up a part of the lineage of Zatanna, back in the 1970s.
One of the things I played with when I was running a Pathfinder sorcerer was that as you gained more and more power, some bloodlines would start to show themselves in various ways.
The draconic bloodline, for example, might manifest as leathery skin, draconic eyes (with slitted pupils), odd tendencies to sit on your share of the loot, and (my personal favorite), spontaneously casting form of the dragon while sleeping, and flying off to eat a deer. Waking up to find yourself covered in blood and deer bits everywhere would be quite the shock.
(Yes, I know, PF spellcasting totally doesn't work that way. Rule of Cool.)
Quote from: Ghostmaker;1128336One of the things I played with when I was running a Pathfinder sorcerer was that as you gained more and more power, some bloodlines would start to show themselves in various ways.
The draconic bloodline, for example, might manifest as leathery skin, draconic eyes (with slitted pupils), odd tendencies to sit on your share of the loot, and (my personal favorite), spontaneously casting form of the dragon while sleeping, and flying off to eat a deer. Waking up to find yourself covered in blood and deer bits everywhere would be quite the shock.
(Yes, I know, PF spellcasting totally doesn't work that way. Rule of Cool.)
Some of that sounds familiar. All of it sounds fun!
Roger Zelazny's AMBER series has a lot of that -- people of Chaos lineage (sort of like demons) with a big family tree of folks who often take a mortal spouse and have offspring. They have powers based on where they are on the family tree; older characters seem to have a lot of power, younger ones are a lot weaker.
Elizabeth Willey's ARGYLLE trilogy is similar to that in many ways, too.
Quote from: RandyB;1128338Some of that sounds familiar. All of it sounds fun!
I cribbed the 'spontaneous form of the dragon' thing from Shadowrun's description of people Awakening as drakes.
Other ideas based on bloodlines:
Aberrant: Nonlinear thinking (or even mild madness). Peculiar, inhuman features (eyes too far apart, nose not quite center). A slickness or rubbery texture to flesh.
Abyssal: Demonic features (horns, unusual teeth, unusual eyes). Unusual scent or coloration to skin.
Arcane: Magical patterns appearing on skin like tattooes. Glowing eyes.
Celestial: Good-aligned outsider features (there's so many of them, pick some). Scent of roses, herbs, and incense. Dim halo only visible from certain angles.
Destined: Honestly, not sure how you'd do this one.
Draconic: As above: slit-pupil eyes, leathery skin, personality quirks.
Elemental: Similar to draconic -- use physical traits similar to elemental critters like genies.
Fey: Scent of wildflowers or forest. Skin coloration changes, features becoming strongly fey (may result in being mistaken for an elf).
Infernal: Devilish features (horns, etc). Scent of brimstone and bitumen. Dark halo seen from certain angles.
Undead: Features becoming more gaunt and deathlike, scent of earth and bone.
Quote from: ShieldWife;1128324I need more ideas though about other such magical bloodlines that aren't quite so dark. Could I go with admixtures of humans and other magical beings? Does it seem silly to have various other supernatural bloodlines with ancestors other than demons? I don't want to go the inbred direction with the others, so what would be an interesting way to present them? Aside from saying that some magical bloodlines are so diluted that they don't exist as identifiable bloodlines anymore, the genes just happen to produce someone with magical potential now and then. I could do that, and maybe I will, but I think it would be neat to have a few other bloodlines that were more defined than that.
This is the ruling class in the Darkover mythology more or less spot on, if you substitute telepathy-verging-on-magic for more general classes of magic.
Full disclosure: Marion Zimmer Bradley has been posthumously accused of terrible abuse by her daughter, and was married to someone who was established as a creep during his lifetime, IIRC.
If you are comfortable separating art from the artist for the purposes of inspiration, then Darkover should give you a lot of what you're looking for. If you want to tl;dr the themes, just take a gander at some overview wikis, even the Wikipedia one covers a lot of what you're asking about: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darkover_series
If you want a deeper dive, I'd suggest "Darkover Landfall" (the genesis of the society, the origins of the gifts emerging in humans both because of the environment and because of breeding, and some of the metascientific foundations for the rest of the series); and "The Heritage of Hastur" and "Sharra's Exile" for stories of children further down the bloodline wrestling with their gift, its legacy, dealing with nongifted people, the appearance of outsiders, inbreeding for gifts and the resulting instability, the dilution of the bloodline, and the emergence of gifts in "outsiders". The inbreeding part is kind of a subtheme throughout (as goes with any bloodline ruling class), but other stories in the series handle it more explicitly, if that's your focus.
Quote from: Ghostmaker;1128345Fey: Scent of wildflowers or forest. Skin coloration changes, features becoming strongly fey (may result in being mistaken for an elf).
Depending on your definition of 'fey' it might also carry characteristics of 'goblin'... whatever you imagine those to be. I'd favor small size, weird color, extra limbs, too many/too big teeth, weird posture/gait, tendency to go invisible when surprised/scared/upset.
Quote from: ShieldWife;1128328Well, I know in D&D and Pathfinder, there are oodles of sorcerer bloodlines with flavorful rule sets. I was thinking more along the lines of thematic roles these bloodlines could fill. What place do the x-descended people have in the world?
Good question. In Deryni it seemed like they had a cycle of being outcasts, then nobility, then outcasts and so on. You could play around with that sort of cyclic rise and fall and figure out where they are on the wave.
Another game example is Dragon Storm. All the PCs share a bloodline with a dragon in the past and the storms eventually bring out their true form based on their other bloodline. The setting is at the absolute nadir. The bad guys won and have suckered the populace, and that includes the PCs up till reveal, into believing the eeeevil dragons and their shifter minions cause the storms that warp and mutate innocent people, beasts, and the very land into horrors.
A recent D&D one was the Eberron setting and the various Dragon Mark bloodlines. They play important roles in the world and only certain marks express in certain races.
Another one might be Aeon Trinity where the powers were expressed I believe into certain bloodlines. Though I think that was not played up much. Could be wrong. Its been a few decades!
Quote from: Simlasa;1128353Depending on your definition of 'fey' it might also carry characteristics of 'goblin'... whatever you imagine those to be. I'd favor small size, weird color, extra limbs, too many/too big teeth, weird posture/gait, tendency to go invisible when surprised/scared/upset.
That'd work too. I sometimes forget that 'fey' covers a LOT of ground between the ethereally beautiful and the bizarre.
The trick is to not overdo it though. You're not carrying a half-fey (or half-celestial, or half-whatever) template. It's the combination of that lineage and your sorcerous power that brings the blood to the fore.
Thanks for the input everybody.
I have a few ideas I like/have thought of while going through this thread. Focusing more on the social place of the bloodline than the powers at the moment.
I like the 7th son sort of idea. This can let me have a bloodline that is largely non-magical and that also brings in new blood, but still produces magical members from time to time. This could be interesting if the conditions are somewhat predictable and so everybody gets their hopes up when the conditions are close to being met. Lady Cassandra is pregnant and has six sons, the land looks on in anticipation to see if the next sorcerer scion is born. It could also alleviate the pressure for inbreeding to give the demon family their niche. I think this should be a noble family whose power is in part based on the magical abilities of those few members born with it.
Another idea that strikes me is a population which has over the years had magical blood introduced to it often enough that now that entire population is magical. Think perhaps a town that borders a faerie forest. One in a while a girl is seduced by a faerie lover and bears his child. This happens enough over the course of generations and the entire town shares some faerie lineage from multiple faeries and a relatively broad human gene pool.
I think that a nomadic group, maybe with certain characteristics of Gypsies, could be interesting as well. Maybe this group could be unique in that it picks adopts people of various magical bloodlines and so is more diverse in magical abilities and in human genetics as well.
I'd also like one faction to have a more heroic quality to them, which could be one of the above or something else. I'm not sure what the above bloodlines should be descended from aside from the people near faerie forests.
My inbred demonic family is relatively well developed and I'd like to bring a few others up to a level close to it. Some information on them below for those who are interested:
Spoiler
Many centuries ago Sycorax, a witch of terrible power, summoned forth her demonic patron, the Abyssal Lord Caoranach, and bore him half demonic children. These children had human qualities but also many powers of their demonic father. Sycorax taught her children her dark magic, and some say that their father whispered mystical secrets to them as well. As time passed, they too bore children with mortals, but found that their powers declined in the next generation, the demonic blood becoming more thin by the generation. Sycorax then ruled that to preserve the magical power of her descendants, her children and grandchildren would only have offspring with each other.
Sycorax herself is said to have been killed by an alliance of legendary champions, her demonic master banished back to the Abyss. Some believe that she still lives or may one day be resurrected, though only a handful of her most devoted followers or most paranoid enemies give this possibility serious consideration. Caoranach is worshipped as a god by the Sycorax family, who have taken their family name from their late matriarch, and pay him homage through rituals and sacrifice, seeking to once more summon him to the mortal realm. The family is ruled by a group of ancient Sycorax called the Progeny, Sycorax's surviving children.
The Sycorax have always born physical signs of the demonic ancestry. Some have skin as pale as snow and white hair as well, or no hair at all. Others have growing red eyes or eyes as black as night, even the sclera. Many have sharp teeth, clawed fingernails, or horns on their head. There are a number of rarer traits, each member of the family is different. Sycorax also sometimes carry other physical deformities, not from their demonic ancestry but from from so many generations of inbreeding. It is not only the bodies of the Sycorax that are abnormal, their minds are souls carry the taint of demonic blood. It is not uncommon for members of this family to have unwholesome desires or compulsions or suffer from madness. Many Sycorax are obsessed with perverse sexual acts, are addicted to the taste of human flesh, or hear malicious voices speaking in their heads. The Sycorax regard these perversions as gifts rather than curses and within the family, countless unspeakable acts are allowed or even encouraged.
Not all deformities are prized among the Sycorax. Sometimes a Sycorax is born crippled or infirmed, perhaps too feeble minded to provide a benefit to the family. Such children, when their flaws become evident, are offered up as sacrifices to Caoranach. The Sycorax elders control marriage and breeding within the family and they work to perfect their line, using primitive eugenics to bring forth the best traits of both mortal and demon, with the flaws of either. Their success has been mixed, though some Sycorax believe that eventually their family line will become perfect, others call this hubris and belief that only Caoranach can uplift their family.
Despite their evil practices, the Sycorax family have a very strong, if twisted, sense of honor. When they make a vow, they keep it with the fanatical dedication to rival or surpass even paladins of light. Perhaps this goes back to demonic pacts that infernal creatures are compelled to abide by, or perhaps it has simply become the Sycorax tradition because it is the only way such monstrous creatures can peacefully coexist with each other. In any case, those familiar with the family's history in the empire know of Sycorax honor and are willing to work with them if there is pressing enough need.
Within the family are a number of factions, usually united by bonds of blood, but some degree of rivalry and self interest exists. One prominent group within the Sycorax are the Black Priests - priests who dedicate themselves to the worship of Caoranach, plucking out their eyes to allow themselves to gaze into the Abyss and upon their dark god and ancestor. Another faction within the family are the Sklavi, an almost entire female line of the family who take their name from their father Sklavi, one of the Progeny who kills all of his sons and consumes their souls to strengthen his magic while taking his daughters as wives.
Because most citizens of the empire fear the Sycorax, they prefer to stay within their own domains or keeps, rarely venturing out into the world of mortals unless their is pressing need to do so. The less humans interact with them, some of the elders reason, the less reason they may have to hate and fear the family. They then have difficulty making contacts in the mortal world and so have lagged behind other Great Houses in that regard. They are also very conservative in many ways, keeping their same old traditions and after year while the outside world changes around them. The Sycorax often have a distinct accent, that some may recognize as a dialect of an ancient language that was once spoken in the empire.
The Sycorax have a number of abilities based on their demonic ancestry. They are all exceptionally strong and resilient to injury. The Sycorax can see in the dark, even in absolute darkness of a cave or sealed room. All members of the Sycorax family can rapidly regenerate from injuries, even regrowing missing limbs over a course of days or recovering from wounds that would fell a mortal. Their resilience and regenerative abilities can be overcome with blessed weapon or the holy miracles of priests of light, even the touch of a blessed item or holy water can cause them injury. They are also vulnerable to fire, heat, and light. The Sycorax are not fond of daylight and prefer night and darkness, their powers are weaker at night and their eyes not as keen in the light of day.
The Sycorax family colors are black and red. Black for the darkness of the Abyss, the dwelling place of their dark god Caoranach, and red for the unholy blood which flows in their veins and is the source of their power. The sigil of the Sycorax is the Dark Star of Caoranach, a nine sided black star on a red field.
Sorry, a bit dark and TLDR, but is gives a bit of perspective for something the other bloodlines compare and contrast to.
Magical bloodlines is a recurring theme in some fantasy animation both anime and occasionally from the US. Sometimes the focus will be on that one family member either has no power, or is very dormant.
Others play with the opposite. A bloodline that is normally dormant. But expresses ever so often. Sometimes playing with the idea of some organization or cult, or even family, trying to breed one that expresses finally. Or expresses powerfully.
Something to consider that is a factor in Eberron is wether or not marrying/breeding outside your own bloodline is allowed or not. In Eberron it is prohibited as the offspring tends to express some corrupted form of mark.
But in other media sometimes trying to merge bloodlines is a goal as it generates even stronger powers.
A recent anime was watching had an interesting approach. That various bloodlines tend to express an affinity for one type of magic. And it is increasingly rare to have someone with an aptitude for more than one. And another that flips that and pretty much everyone expresses one power, usually small. But some rare few have nothing. Probably inspired by the Xanth series where everything has one power.
Quote from: Omega;1128696Magical bloodlines is a recurring theme in some fantasy animation both anime and occasionally from the US. Sometimes the focus will be on that one family member either has no power, or is very dormant.
Others play with the opposite. A bloodline that is normally dormant. But expresses ever so often. Sometimes playing with the idea of some organization or cult, or even family, trying to breed one that expresses finally. Or expresses powerfully.
Something to consider that is a factor in Eberron is wether or not marrying/breeding outside your own bloodline is allowed or not. In Eberron it is prohibited as the offspring tends to express some corrupted form of mark.
But in other media sometimes trying to merge bloodlines is a goal as it generates even stronger powers.
A recent anime was watching had an interesting approach. That various bloodlines tend to express an affinity for one type of magic. And it is increasingly rare to have someone with an aptitude for more than one. And another that flips that and pretty much everyone expresses one power, usually small. But some rare few have nothing. Probably inspired by the Xanth series where everything has one power.
Yeah, that is a good issue. With the inbred family, I think that they should prohibit out-breeding to maintain their purity. Other bloodlines may be more liberal about that, though the degree which they allow that will also reduce their magical potential. I'm thinking that crossing bloodlines should be exceptionally rare and frowned upon by most factions.
I think I'd like to mix and match dominant vs dormant. The demon family above almost all have powers. Other bloodlines should be more dormant.
Its more a factor to consider if a prohibition is actually needed or not. Does mixing bloodlines produce unstable freaks every time like in Eberron? Or just has a high chance? Or chance at all?
Or flips that. What is you have to marry outside your bloodline as otherwise THAT generates freaks.
Or consider this problem too. Is the bloodline getting stronger? Remaining about the same? Or getting weaker with each generation?
Or how reliable is the bloodline to carry over to the next gen? Is it only the seventh son sort of deal? Or is every kid expressing power? And so on.
I'll just throw in that a magic lineage need not be a blood lineage. It could be a soul lineage, where each mage is a reincarnation of some former mage. There might even be a finite number of mages that transmigrate through different incarnations. Similar to how Lamaism works in the real world: representatives from the wizard's college would show up at your doorstep to "test" a new baby they suspect is a wizard.
Quote from: ShieldWife;1128324Currently I'm working on a fantasy setting where magical abilities, such as being able to cast spells, are based on having ancient magical ancestry. There may be a few other minor spell casters in the setting, hedge mages perhaps, but being a powerful caster is in the blood. Through the ages, the bloodlines have become diluted and magic has become rarer and less powerful in general.
I have one idea for a noble family descended from the union of a human and demon. This group is likely the most powerful magically because they have practiced incest for centuries to preserve the purity of their demonic blood - with numerous interesting downsides to go along with their powers. I like this villainous faction and have all sorts of ideas for their history that I think are cool in a dark sort of way.
I need more ideas though about other such magical bloodlines that aren't quite so dark. Could I go with admixtures of humans and other magical beings? Does it seem silly to have various other supernatural bloodlines with ancestors other than demons? I don't want to go the inbred direction with the others, so what would be an interesting way to present them? Aside from saying that some magical bloodlines are so diluted that they don't exist as identifiable bloodlines anymore, the genes just happen to produce someone with magical potential now and then. I could do that, and maybe I will, but I think it would be neat to have a few other bloodlines that were more defined than that.
Ley lines, being conceived in a place of power, a lineage has found this is true and have the couples mate ritually in such places to have magical offspring, this allows for the constant input if fresh mundane blood without diluting their power.
Someone already pointed to fey/human offspring, to justify this Patricia Briggs postulates in her books (yes I do buy her books sue me) that the Faeries have always been slower to breed so they sometimes take human partners, such mongrels are looked down by some of the fey of course and continued dilution of the bloodline does diminish the powers, plus the offspring can just be born without any real power beyond being graceful, beautiful or something to that effect. She also makes extensive use of the glamour.
In her books witches are genetic, several bloodlines existed you can sidestep the inbreed problem by having the families keep a record and to marry across families and with mundanes. This of course needs to be monitored or the families could go extinct as far as being magical.
If Demons exist do divine beings exist too? If so would such beings breed with humans? This could be the source of fresh magical blood for some lineages, have the more powerful breed with a divine being. or with the direct offspring of such a being.
Quote from: GeekyBugle;1129123Ley lines, being conceived in a place of power, a lineage has found this is true and have the couples mate ritually in such places to have magical offspring, this allows for the constant input if fresh mundane blood without diluting their power. . .
If Demons exist do divine beings exist too? If so would such beings breed with humans? This could be the source of fresh magical blood for some lineages, have the more powerful breed with a divine being. or with the direct offspring of such a being.
You don't even need to necessarily breed with the celestial being. I believe PF1 states proximity can result in such power taking root.
Quick and dirty fictional example: During the siege of Malibar City, the arcane defenders summoned and called numerous extraplanar reinforcements to supplement their conventional forces against the undead hordes. Some were banished, but others were destroyed -- but the celestial energies that made up their existence could not be easily snuffed out. More than one surviving guardsman would later sire a child with strange talents if they had been standing too close to an archon or angel that had been slain.
It's like radiation, if high rad counts made you sire/give birth to X-Men instead of giving you cancer and fucking up your DNA :)
Quote from: Ghostmaker;1129264You don't even need to necessarily breed with the celestial being. I believe PF1 states proximity can result in such power taking root.
Quick and dirty fictional example: During the siege of Malibar City, the arcane defenders summoned and called numerous extraplanar reinforcements to supplement their conventional forces against the undead hordes. Some were banished, but others were destroyed -- but the celestial energies that made up their existence could not be easily snuffed out. More than one surviving guardsman would later sire a child with strange talents if they had been standing too close to an archon or angel that had been slain.
It's like radiation, if high rad counts made you sire/give birth to X-Men instead of giving you cancer and fucking up your DNA :)
I like it
Quote from: Omega;1129032Its more a factor to consider if a prohibition is actually needed or not. Does mixing bloodlines produce unstable freaks every time like in Eberron? Or just has a high chance? Or chance at all?
Or flips that. What is you have to marry outside your bloodline as otherwise THAT generates freaks.
Or consider this problem too. Is the bloodline getting stronger? Remaining about the same? Or getting weaker with each generation?
Or how reliable is the bloodline to carry over to the next gen? Is it only the seventh son sort of deal? Or is every kid expressing power? And so on.
I think that there should be a tendency to get weaker with each generation, at least with outbreeding. With inbreeding and primitive eugenics, like that practiced by the Sycorax, magical talent can be preserved but with the cost of other problems arising.
The 7th son idea would make sense for a family which doesn't practice inbreeding, where magic is an either/or situation and a fully powered magic user arises every son often even if the bloodline isn't pure. That could also lead to the issue of 7th sons with ancestry from that family popping up in random places if they can trace their lineage back to a member of that family and an affair with a commoner.
Prohibitions on reproducing with normal humans would exist to prevent weakening of bloodlines and perhaps prohibitions on children with other magical bloodlines might exist either because abominations result or merely people who don't fall under the control of the families.
Quote from: Zalman;1129109I'll just throw in that a magic lineage need not be a blood lineage. It could be a soul lineage, where each mage is a reincarnation of some former mage. There might even be a finite number of mages that transmigrate through different incarnations. Similar to how Lamaism works in the real world: representatives from the wizard's college would show up at your doorstep to "test" a new baby they suspect is a wizard.
That could be cool too. I'm not quite sure how that might work in combination with the lineage idea, maybe in combination with the 7th son concept. If random bastards or their descendants start manifesting 7th son powers, the family could go investigate those people. Maybe the reincarnation is tied to the 7th sons.
I keep saying 7th sons, but it doesn't have to be tied to birth order or being a son.
Quote from: GeekyBugle;1129123Ley lines, being conceived in a place of power, a lineage has found this is true and have the couples mate ritually in such places to have magical offspring, this allows for the constant input if fresh mundane blood without diluting their power.
Someone already pointed to fey/human offspring, to justify this Patricia Briggs postulates in her books (yes I do buy her books sue me) that the Faeries have always been slower to breed so they sometimes take human partners, such mongrels are looked down by some of the fey of course and continued dilution of the bloodline does diminish the powers, plus the offspring can just be born without any real power beyond being graceful, beautiful or something to that effect. She also makes extensive use of the glamour.
In her books witches are genetic, several bloodlines existed you can sidestep the inbreed problem by having the families keep a record and to marry across families and with mundanes. This of course needs to be monitored or the families could go extinct as far as being magical.
If Demons exist do divine beings exist too? If so would such beings breed with humans? This could be the source of fresh magical blood for some lineages, have the more powerful breed with a divine being. or with the direct offspring of such a being.
Ley line conceptions would be in interesting way of gaining magical blood as well. I wouldn't want something that could be reproduced too easily or formulaically though. Maybe the location where conception occurs has to involve some danger, a certain time of year, or maybe only enhances ancestry which is already present. I was thinking of having a faerie blooded group which are tied to an enchanted forest where faeries dwell. Maybe when they conceive too far from this forest their power can't be fully passed down.
Quote from: Ghostmaker;1129264You don't even need to necessarily breed with the celestial being. I believe PF1 states proximity can result in such power taking root.
Quick and dirty fictional example: During the siege of Malibar City, the arcane defenders summoned and called numerous extraplanar reinforcements to supplement their conventional forces against the undead hordes. Some were banished, but others were destroyed -- but the celestial energies that made up their existence could not be easily snuffed out. More than one surviving guardsman would later sire a child with strange talents if they had been standing too close to an archon or angel that had been slain.
It's like radiation, if high rad counts made you sire/give birth to X-Men instead of giving you cancer and fucking up your DNA :)
That sounds cool. I imagine that if demons exist that angels or something like them might exist too. I have trouble seeing them reproducing with humans enough to create such magical bloodlines, but it happens in the Bible so I guess it's canon ;)
Tying the origin of such bloodlines to deaths of magical creatures or really some other kind of magical event where mystical energy is released could allow for these bloodlines to arise without sex between a human and whatever.
Quote from: ShieldWife;1129460That sounds cool. I imagine that if demons exist that angels or something like them might exist too. I have trouble seeing them reproducing with humans enough to create such magical bloodlines, but it happens in the Bible so I guess it's canon ;)
Tying the origin of such bloodlines to deaths of magical creatures or really some other kind of magical event where mystical energy is released could allow for these bloodlines to arise without sex between a human and whatever.
Recall the shenanigans Zeus got up to whenever he went on mortal booty calls.:D
But yeah, good-aligned celestials (save for azata) might be hesitant about 'doing the deed' with mortals no matter what the situation. This allows for celestial bloodlines to take root.
Azatas get a pass for being chaotic good -- so long as all parties are consenting, they'd happily join in. Even azatas aren't going to just -abandon- any offspring though, and would certainly look in on them from time to time.
Which leads into another fun story hook: what does a sorcerer do if his still-existing ancestor comes a-calling? An elemental-bloodline sorcerer whose power derives from a fling with a genie might find himself caught up in said genie's machinations and plans. A celestial-bloodline sorcerer might find a ghaele or lilliend on his doorstep one day, encouraging them to help battle the forces of darkness.
Quote from: ShieldWife;1129460snip
Ley line conceptions would be in interesting way of gaining magical blood as well. I wouldn't want something that could be reproduced too easily or formulaically though. Maybe the location where conception occurs has to involve some danger, a certain time of year, or maybe only enhances ancestry which is already present. I was thinking of having a faerie blooded group which are tied to an enchanted forest where faeries dwell. Maybe when they conceive too far from this forest their power can't be fully passed down.
snip.
Which is why I said ritually, it's the combination of the ritual and the ley lines, of course a couple with magical ancestry (either or both) could very well conceive a magic user even if they themselves don't know (because they lack powers) of their ancestry by conceiving in a ley line in the appropriate time or inadvertently fulfilling (kinda/sorta) the ritual during conception in said places.
Maybe it's only on certain point of the ley lines, maybe those points need to be found and enhanced and protected.
Maybe it's only those powerless but with magical ancestry.
In many hermetic traditions sex/conception has a powerful place in their rituals.
Quote from: Ghostmaker;1129553Recall the shenanigans Zeus got up to whenever he went on mortal booty calls.:D
But yeah, good-aligned celestials (save for azata) might be hesitant about 'doing the deed' with mortals no matter what the situation. This allows for celestial bloodlines to take root.
Azatas get a pass for being chaotic good -- so long as all parties are consenting, they'd happily join in. Even azatas aren't going to just -abandon- any offspring though, and would certainly look in on them from time to time.
Which leads into another fun story hook: what does a sorcerer do if his still-existing ancestor comes a-calling? An elemental-bloodline sorcerer whose power derives from a fling with a genie might find himself caught up in said genie's machinations and plans. A celestial-bloodline sorcerer might find a ghaele or lilliend on his doorstep one day, encouraging them to help battle the forces of darkness.
Or the ancestry makes them more likely to accidentally find themselves in such situations, either by making them trouble magnets or by making them attracted (not in the sexual way) to people/places that their ancestor would either help or destroy.
As for sources of said ancestry the world is full of mythologies that provide interesting choices: Only descendants of Coyote/Spider (Or their equivalent in other lore) can be chaotic/choose your other option), etc.