Scheming Princess Quest

[redaeth]

We are gifted in the Magical Arts, though not to the extent of our brother. Legendary is something we can accomplish. If we stick to a single discipline throughout our training time.

 

[Pipeman]

When your brother is trying to kill you and you have a schedule too tight to take much advantage from whatever intel Clairvoyance gives you, having a magical discipline that has direct effects as well is not a bad idea.
Not to mention that Clairvoyance while useful has plenty of limitations of its own, requiring sympathetic items for scrying purposes and being more than a bit unreliable when divining the future.

The concrete benefits of being able to talk with all the poeple our bloodthirsty brother is going to kill is signficant, since even those that don't have dirt on him directly should hate him enough to part with useful things, and the option to call up some of our ancestors is not to be underestimated when you come from a long line of powerful mages.

As for the social benefit with our uncle, given how much control he has over our actions and how we are after this going to sit at zero fatepoints for the time being, getting him to be more willing to let us do our own stuff or at least more benevolent is incredibly important and cannot be delayed, especially if we want to beat our brother to that goal so we can get a headstart on the scheming.

And that's not even going into the fact that our brother will most likely take note of a Clairvoyance focus and look into counter measures rather quickly.
Meanwhile the intel applications of Necromancy are hidden both behind its other applications (like just not staying down when posioned or stabbed) and the ostensible motivation being our grief.

 

[TMIoverload]

It's entirely possible to do scheming, plotting, and politicking via Necromancy. First off, yes, other nations have Necromancy banned. What that means is that the Princess can act as a beacon/idol for Necromancers. They're a group that would be executed in any other nation. Think of how much more invested they'd be in having someone to represent them higher-up and looking out for their interests so that they have at least one place they won't be executed in. Second, undead can be used for a lot of things that would otherwise be dangerous, which we can potentially leverage for popular support among the lower-class, even if they dislike the idea of Necromancy. Peasants are selfish blighters, and if having a Necromancer in charge means that the mining work becomes less dangerous because undead are doing the brunt of the more dangerous work, the undead do back-breaking manual labor that would likely kill them to work at the same pace, and when the Barony is called to provide soldiers they get to keep their fathers and sons because we brought an army of undead instead of conscripting them... well, these are things that can change minds.

Beyond that, Clairvoyance was noted to be vague and comes with riddles. If we summon the soul of an assassin and force them to confess, well, that's hard evidence.

 

[redaeth]

I'm convinced, switched to Necromancy from my old illusion choice. Pity no one else picked Military Strategy. We could be a hell of a general.

 

[Darkened]

When your brother is trying to kill you and you have a schedule too tight to take much advantage from whatever intel Clairvoyance gives you, having a magical discipline that has direct effects as well is not a bad idea.
Not to mention that Clairvoyance while useful has plenty of limitations of its own, requiring sympathetic items for scrying purposes and being more than a bit unreliable when divining the future.

Click to shrink...

The info gathering magic is still going to be the best for info gathering. Any limitations necromancy has there will be far far more overt. Also, how do you know what clairvoyance requires for limitations, as far as I know we have a single word about sympathy, which doesn't tell us anything about how hard or easy it will be.

We also know that the legendary level seems to do away with that limit.

The concrete benefits of being able to talk with all the poeple our bloodthirsty brother is going to kill is signficant, since even those that don't have dirt on him directly should hate him enough to part with useful things, and the option to call up some of our ancestors is not to be underestimated when you come from a long line of powerful mages.

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So, we won't have time to use clairvoyance but we WILL be able to go raise the dead whenever despite not knowing the necessary time involved.

As for the social benefit with our uncle, given how much control he has over our actions and how we are after this going to sit at zero fatepoints for the time being, getting him to be more willing to let us do our own stuff or at least more benevolent is incredibly important and cannot be delayed, especially if we want to beat our brother to that goal so we can get a headstart on the scheming.

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The potential social benefits that are by no means a sure thing whatsoever. He might beat the shit out of us just for voicing this idea for all we know.

And that's not even going into the fact that our brother will most likely take note of a Clairvoyance focus and look into counter measures rather quickly.
Meanwhile the intel applications of Necromancy are hidden both behind its other applications (like just not staying down when posioned or stabbed) and the ostensible motivation being our grief.

Click to shrink...

So

If we go clairvoyance we have no time to use it and our brother will instantly learn to counter the entire discipline.

If we go necromancy we'll be able to use it all we want and our brother WON'T take steps to make sure the dead stay in their graves.

If we take your premise that everyone will love us for doing something that's reviled and that our brother will be an order of magnitude more competent when we do clairvoyance than necromancy, then yeah, it seems like a good idea.

In practice, if you're killing people to hide info and you know your biggest enemy spends most of her time talking to ghosts? You find ways to avoid that. First, by just getting rid of what we need to work, or going to the church and making sure all his duels end well. Given how little we know about necromancy, it's entirely possible that most people aren't even callable.

By contrast, if we go clairvoyance we can develop the entire magic focused around doing this, which probably won't be no-sold completely.

It's entirely possible to do scheming, plotting, and politicking via Necromancy. First off, yes, other nations have Necromancy banned. What that means is that the Princess can act as a beacon/idol for Necromancers. They're a group that would be executed in any other nation. Think of how much more invested they'd be in having someone to represent them higher-up and looking out for their interests so that they have at least one place they won't be executed in. Second, undead can be used for a lot of things that would otherwise be dangerous, which we can potentially leverage for popular support among the lower-class, even if they dislike the idea of Necromancy. Peasants are selfish blighters, and if having a Necromancer in charge means that the mining work becomes less dangerous because undead are doing the brunt of the more dangerous work, the undead do back-breaking manual labor that would likely kill them to work at the same pace, and when the Barony is called to provide soldiers they get to keep their fathers and sons because we brought an army of undead instead of conscripting them... well, these are things that can change minds.

Beyond that, Clairvoyance was noted to be vague and comes with riddles. If we summon the soul of an assassin and force them to confess, well, that's hard evidence.

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To restate.

While every nation has necromancy banned, we can act as an idol for a group of criminals and rejects hated everywhere in the world and somehow get them to help us despite the fact that when they do every other country has serious problems with us not extraditing their criminals for execution.

We can use undead instead of armies because raising a zombie workforce anywhere ever ends up building popular support, particularly when its hated. We can do this to increase production while getting all the coal minors fired. For which they will love us while starving because they're not mining coal.

We are gifted in the Magical Arts, though not to the extent of our brother. Legendary is something we can accomplish. If we stick to a single discipline throughout our training time.

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Proof?

Legendary is something we might accomplish. In practice, looking at our father (who was probably just as gifted) it was "Yeah, he got pretty close at the height of his power."

You're arguing we can completely exceed the boundaries of what's been done into what might be possible by the age of 18 while dealing with an obstructing guardian and a brother who wants us dead to take up our time.

Maybe we are that good. But I'd not like to bank on grabbing legendary anywhere before the absolute end-game here.

And even if we do, I doubt we'll be able to do true resurrection without any catch whatsoever. Our parents are probably staying dead for the count.

 

[redaeth]

What others might call impossible is merely extremely difficult for you.

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This part. I admit I'm extrapolating so that 'impossible' equates 'legendary' but I strongly believe it to be the case. Our brother of course is probably going to achieve Legendary Evocation or something in half the time though.

 

[inverted_helix]

[X] Darkened

Honestly wasn't planning to vote in this section since I didn't care much but I see Necromancy as going horribly horribly wrong.

Also I have a suspicion that even in the off chance we managed to resurrect our parents: 1) We'd no longer have a vacant throne to inherit, and 2) They might favor our brother for the throne still, since he's the first born and the one that it belongs to.

 

[TMIoverload]

To restate.

While every nation has necromancy banned, we can act as an idol for a group of criminals and rejects hated everywhere in the world and somehow get them to help us despite the fact that when they do every other country has serious problems with us not extraditing their criminals for execution.

We can use undead instead of armies because raising a zombie workforce anywhere ever ends up building popular support, particularly when its hated. We can do this to increase production while getting all the coal minors fired. For which they will love us while starving because they're not mining coal.

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First, our nation already doesn't ban Necromancers. As a result, we have Necromancers already within' our nation. Necromancers who are probably constantly wary that our Kingdom will bow to foreign pressure and brand them as criminals. If they're not raving lunatics, damn straight I expect their support.

Second, it's more in addition to armies, and we're part of a feudal society. That means that losing their job does not automatically mean they don't eat if we decide they get paid the same for less dangerous work. Undead can also be used in ways that create jobs too, as clearing forest and tilling new fields is pretty damn hard labor. We're part of nation that allows Necromancy, and while I've sure the peasants are wary of it, as something not illegal and Necromancers not being something a random schmuck should fuck with they don't really have a say in the matter. We can show them why Necromancy isn't outlawed in our kingdom, and potentially make them damn happy that when our Barony gets called on to provide an army, their families won't be sent marching to their death.

 

[Pipeman]

Honestly wasn't planning to vote in this section since I didn't care much but I see Necromancy as going horribly horribly wrong.

Also I have a suspicion that even in the off chance we managed to resurrect our parents: 1) We'd no longer have a vacant throne to inherit, and 2) They might favor our brother for the throne still, since he's the first born and the one that it belongs to.

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I don't think it'll be all that relevant myself, but, given that "The Witch's Curse [20]" had "(Adds a new potential winning condition)" as one of its primary benefits, I highly doubt that.
Besides, resurrecting them would give us a lot of browny points, especially with our father, you know, the king that was absolutely devastated at the loss of his wife, as the actual king he is not nearly as bound by tradition as the regent when it comes to declaring the successor and it at the very least removes the quite literal deadline we're facing at our 18th birthday.
Not to mention that we at least for now lack a dark secret, unlike our brother, who's dalliances may very well lead to a civil war or rebellion against the crown if uncovered and the impact of which is significantly lessened if we become heir, seeing how he can't be accused of stringing along half a dozen of women with the promise of becoming queen when he's not actually crownprince. He'd still have to be punished harshly of course, but sad as that is it's for the sake of the kingdom.

 

[TMIoverload]

Wasn't going to vote but changed my mind.

[X] Necromancy [10]
[X] Yes [0]
[X] None [0]
[X] The palace gardens and grounds [0]

 

[Darkened]

First, our nation already doesn't ban Necromancers. As a result, we have Necromancers already within' our nation. Necromancers who are probably constantly wary that our Kingdom will bow to foreign pressure and brand them as criminals. If they're not raving lunatics, damn straight I expect their support.

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And you expect this support to matter? If you have a marginalized group in an autocratic system, that group isn't really where you want to go to for support. Especially when they're likely small and disconnected and everyone hates them.

Second, it's more in addition to armies, and we're part of a feudal society. That means that losing their job does not automatically mean they don't eat if we decide they get paid the same for less dangerous work. Undead can also be used in ways that create jobs too, as clearing forest and tilling new fields is pretty damn hard labor. We're part of nation that allows Necromancy, and while I've sure the peasants are wary of it, as something not illegal and Necromancers not being something a random schmuck should fuck with they don't really have a say in the matter. We can show them why Necromancy isn't outlawed in our kingdom, and potentially make them damn happy that when our Barony gets called on to provide an army, their families won't be sent marching to their death.

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Generally if you don't have a job, you don't eat rather than get thrown money for free. You're also assuming that one magician can replace an entire workforce and army at a national level. This is probably inane and would take more time than we have just to make undead, much less convince the actual authorities to adopt the policy, establish regulations and systems for controlling them, etc.

And all of that is secondary to the fact that we A: Won't start knowing necromancy, B: Won't actually have the authority to do any of this until we actually met our victory conditions anyway. Maybe 3-5 years of necromancy lets us do that, after which we take the next 3 years to ignore the social game and go build a zombie run economy and secure basic income.

At this point our brother will thank us very nicely and assume the throne then have us killed because this has taken all our time and hasn't actually helped us advance noticeably toward our victory conditions.

Given that "The Witch's Curse [20]" had "(Adds a new potential winning condition)" as one of its primary benefits, I highly doubt that.
Besides, resurrecting them would give us a lot of browny points, especially with our father, you know, the king that was absolutely devastated at the loss of his wife, as the actual king he is not nearly as bound by tradition as the regent when it comes to declaring the successor and it at the very least removes the quite literal deadline we're facing at our 18th birthday.

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Assuming we can even resurrect them both years and years after their deaths without difficulty, that this will be accepted and that the things which were killing them before won't continue to be problems. I mean, our father couldn't take it without our mother and suicided in all but name. If we can bring him back but can't do that for mother dearest, ntohing is solved. And I can't seem to tell what fate befell our mother. Was it illness? Accident?
Bringing back a cancer patient only to find that we still can't cure their cancer won't help.

And again, our father, who was every bit as talented as we seem to be magically, was just 'close' to the legendary level at his peak.It's legendary because it doesn't happen.

Banking everything (you're tanking our social prospects with this) on the assumption that we might hit the legendary magic and that it might come with few enough strings attached that it will work seems like a huge gamble.

Ending the curse would have been a big epic quest. Maxing our necromancy stat is just going to classes all the time.

The issue of the regent also is a complete toss-up. He might find the gesture touching, or he might find the thought of tearing someone from the after life utterly repulsive. He might find it a childish fantasy that further proves how unworthy we are.

We're also doubly screwed with this vote, since you're voting to tie us politically to a necromancy arch-mage without knowing anything about him save that necromancy's probably shady as hell and it won't win us many friends anywhere.

Not to mention that we at least for now lack a dark secret, unlike our brother, who's dalliances may very well lead to a civil war or rebellion against the crown if uncovered and the impact of which is significantly lessened if we become heir, seeing how he can't be accused of stringing along half a dozen of women with the promise of becoming queen when he's not actually crownprince. He'd still have to be punished harshly of course, but sad as that is it's for the sake of the kingdom.

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This is equally exploitable with the regent.

 

[inverted_helix]

Not to mention that we at least for now lack a dark secret, unlike our brother, who's dalliances may very well lead to a civil war or rebellion against the crown if uncovered and the impact of which is significantly lessened if we become heir, seeing how he can't be accused of stringing along half a dozen of women with the promise of becoming queen when he's not actually crownprince. He'd still have to be punished harshly of course, but sad as that is it's for the sake of the kingdom.

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Honestly I really don't see this secret as really impacting his right to rule that much. Honestly it was the weakest out of the lot of them.

Many Kings had multiple lovers, even amongst nobility. Quite a few are famous for the sheer number. It really isn't that big a deal. It's halfway expected. I'm expecting he'd get a pat on the back for doing a good job more likely than any punishment.

Meanwhile we're going to have practiced Necromancy which will negatively impact foreign relations with basically everyone.

 

[redaeth]

I actually expect the Blood Knight to be the greater threat to his eventual rule. A proclivity for slaughtering people is a much greater threat.

It gets rulers labelled "The Mad" or "The Bloody" and generally sees revolts following.

 

[Pipeman]

The info gathering magic is still going to be the best for info gathering. Any limitations necromancy has there will be far far more overt. Also, how do you know what clairvoyance requires for limitations, as far as I know we have a single word about sympathy, which doesn't tell us anything about how hard or easy it will be.

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Of course it's probably going to be more optimized for that purpose, but it still has significant limitations that are all the more problematic when considering the fact that your main strength doesn't directly affect anything.
You'll still have to find a way to acquire the appropriate items for your scrying purposes and you have to interpret all the cryptic stuff you're divining and the doesn't directly help with that.

We also know that the legendary level seems to do away with that limit.

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Legendary magic does away with pretty much all limits, so that's not saying much.
We know little about the full capabilities and scaling of any of these disciplines but when the blurb outright says you need sympathetic itmes for scrying, I expect sympathetic times to be something you have to take into considerations for a good deal of time.

So, we won't have time to use clairvoyance but we WILL be able to go raise the dead whenever despite not knowing the necessary time involved.

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I'm not saying we won't have the time to use Clairvoyance, I'm saying we won't have the time to act on it.
We'll have a significant amount of time of our schedule dedicated to learning and practising the magic we choose, but using Clairvoyance to gather intel is not the same as getting the opportunity to go out and follow up on the opportunities you spied.
Meanwhile, time spent learning to summon the undead and practicing necromantic spells is time during which one might create specters to guard yourself, learn a spell to let your soul cling to life in spite of the poisoned tea in your gut or acquiring the ability to drain the life out of a would-be assassin.

The potential social benefits that are by no means a sure thing whatsoever. He might beat the shit out of us just for voicing this idea for all we know.

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And yet we need to do something, if we want to get any signficant freedom whatsoever before our brother does.
It's a gamble, yes, but so was everything else we did so far from risking a magically talented brother in amagic kingdom to spending points on our family's tutors.
If we want to get our hands on that throne we need to actually take steps that might improve our situation and given that so far our uncle is personally avoiding the shit out of both of us and doing his best to see us as nothing but tools to be dispassionately used for the sake of the nation, forcing him to deal with us as his grieving niece is an important step towards improving that, because even if he deals with us in an unpleasant manner we need to get past that barrier of him refusing to even look at us before we can do anything else.

So

If we go clairvoyance we have no time to use it and our brother will instantly learn to counter the entire discipline.

If we go necromancy we'll be able to use it all we want and our brother WON'T take steps to make sure the dead stay in their graves.

If we take your premise that everyone will love us for doing something that's reviled and that our brother will be an order of magnitude more competent when we do clairvoyance than necromancy, then yeah, it seems like a good idea.

In practice, if you're killing people to hide info and you know your biggest enemy spends most of her time talking to ghosts? You find ways to avoid that. First, by just getting rid of what we need to work, or going to the church and making sure all his duels end well. Given how little we know about necromancy, it's entirely possible that most people aren't even callable.

By contrast, if we go clairvoyance we can develop the entire magic focused around doing this, which probably won't be no-sold completely.

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No, if we take clairvoyance our aims for it are immediately obvious and something he can focus on to combat.
If we take necromancy any other aims are first clouded by the much more obvious grief motivation, any measures he takes to counter intelligence gathering via necromancy, will not be measures taken against the other applications of necromancy and any efforts against necromancy in general are going to run into the issue that as the only nation in which necromancy is legal it is probably the focal point for necromancers world-wide and as a nation focused on magical research trying to restrict the study of magic is not going to win him much favour with most mage houses either.

I'm convinced, switched to Necromancy from my old illusion choice. Pity no one else picked Military Strategy. We could be a hell of a general.

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Theres a good chance our uncle is going to include that anyways, especially if we learn the magic that includes minion creation.

 

[TMIoverload]

<snip>

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One necromancer can't do those things, but as I said, I expect support from other Necromancers. Delegation is important for any ruler. We also don't need to completely replace anything, just do enough that the benefits are noticeable. And remember, we're both a magical kingdom and the only place where Necromancers aren't banned. Even if they're not public about it, I expect we have a fair number of them, as they're the only school of magic that has no other place they can go. Actually managing the support of the majority of an entire School of Magic could be big, and enough people don't completely hate Necromancy that it's still legal here despite foreign pressure.

You also seem to be operating under the idea that Necromancy kills any benefit we'd gain from Charming and Inspiring, instead of those two mitigating or removing the downsides of Necromancy.

Honestly I really don't see this secret as really impacting his right to rule that much. Honestly it was the weakest out of the lot of them.

Many Kings had multiple lovers, even amongst nobility. Quite a few are famous for the sheer number. It really isn't that big a deal. It's halfway expected. I'm expecting he'd get a pat on the back for doing a good job more likely than any punishment.

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A lot of people have been promised they're going to sit on the throne. Some may have started planning for it. This is not insignificant, especially since these people have power, and given that this is a magic kingdom, that power may not just be political.

 

[redaeth]

Theres a good chance our uncle is going to include that anyways, especially if we learn the magic that includes minion creation.

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The Fate Points would be more to ensure that we actually have a gift for heading an army instead of just learning the stuff in school.

 

[Pipeman]

Honestly I really don't see this secret as really impacting his right to rule that much. Honestly it was the weakest out of the lot of them.

Many Kings had multiple lovers, even amongst nobility. Quite a few are famous for the sheer number. It really isn't that big a deal. It's halfway expected. I'm expecting he'd get a pat on the back for doing a good job more likely than any punishment.

Meanwhile we're going to have practiced Necromancy which will negatively impact foreign relations with basically everyone.

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The secret is that he's promised several of them marriage.

Playboy [10] – He secures his popularity in the oldest way. This is fine, but he has made promises to the matriarchs and daughters of several noble families. At the same time. It is blackmail, but dare you use it? Such a thing would tear the kingdom apart.

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There's a reason this option was together with Mark of the (Old) Gods the second most expensive one.

 

[inverted_helix]

The secret is that he's promised several of them marriage.

There's a reason this option was together with Mark of the (Old) Gods the second most expensive one.

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Henry married over half a dozen women and had many of them killed. This didn't really impair his rule.

I actually expect the Blood Knight to be the greater threat to his eventual rule. A proclivity for slaughtering people is a much greater threat.

It gets rulers labelled "The Mad" or "The Bloody" and generally sees revolts following.

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Very untrue. The bloodiest rulers in history have oftentimes been very successful. Take a look at Genghis Khan for instance. He is legendary for both how many children he sired and just how apocalyptically bloody his reign was. He conquered more territory than anyone else in history.

Rebellions against bloody dictators fail pretty much all the time. Also they are much more rare than you think. We like to believe that humans will rise up against oppression, but they're much more likely to keep their head in line so they don't lose it.

Most revolts occur when there isn't as much killing involved.

 

[redaeth]

Very untrue. The bloodiest rulers in history have oftentimes been very successful. Take a look at Genghis Khan for instance. He is legendary for both how many children he sired and just how apocalyptically bloody his reign was. He conquered more territory than anyone else in history.

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Slaughtering your enemies is very different then slaughtering those you are meant to rule. And we'll be there to push things along. We are Inspiring and Charismatic and Mature. People will follow us if we say the Mad Prince must be stopped!

We just have to get good enough allies together first to make sure it isn't doomed.

 

[Tetsurō]

[X] Darkened

 

[redaeth]

Since I was bored I decided to try and sort the stuff we can learn into Regency Approved and Regency Disapproved Categories. IE Stuff our Uncle will have us learn and stuff he will not. He is Overbearing, Liberal and Does Not Favor us. Meaning he will attempt to mold us into the perfect backup heir with no regards to gender. His Liberal views also means our brother will be there for most of our classes.

Our Brother, being a Playboy most likely will skip the ones he finds boring.

Regency Approved:

Ladylike Subjects – A princess is generally expected to be able to navigate a dance floor, manipulate a noble, orate a speech, learn an instrument, strike up a conversation or strike down an adversary, whether through words or proxy. Choose wisely.

Courtly Behavior [10] – The ability to move in court circles without committing social blunders. Lessons in etiquette and noble customs. A princess without Courtly Behavior will find the nobility less forgiving of her other faults.
History [10] – Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it, the historians say. You don't know about that, but it does give you a good idea of what has or hasn't worked in the past. These include the broad strokes of famous military maneuvers as well as social reform and the way economies and nations rise and fall.
Economics [10] – You will learn in detail how to administer funds, raise taxes and enter negotiations over money. The kingdom is relatively prosperous, but a good grounding in economics will could only help you keep it that way… or to skim off the top with no one the wiser.

Liberal Subjects – Many of these subjects are nearer and dearer to your uncle's heart, and therefore likely for him to include in your schedule even should you not request instruction in them.

Horse Riding [10] – Horse riding gives you a way to move quickly or outrun bad news, and would allow you to look fantastic at the head of an army. Slightly scandalous compared to travel by automated coach.
Athletics [10] – A way to keep fit for a princess who dislikes dance. In addition, being flexible and able to run like the wind may come in handy in various ways.
Military Strategy [10] – Learn to lead and direct an army, and triumph over your foes.
Logistics [10] – Logistics is the study of how to move large groups of men. How to set up camp, keep an army supplied, pay and equip them. More useful for a general than a princess, but there is some crossover.
Combat [10] – You may learn the sword, the bow and the firelance. To wear armor and redirect a blow. If all else goes wrong, being able to fight may save your life more than any silver tongue.

Magic – Magic is in your blood. Over the years you've picked up some minor cantrips through simple exposure. The creation of light or sound or fire, some telekinesis. With the basics of the arcane known to you, you may advance your knowledge with more focused study of the magical arts or even become directly apprenticed to one of the Royal Retainers, to learn a style of magic at the feet of one of the world's best.

Evocation [10] – Unlike Nature magic, Evocation focuses on the creation of natural phenomena at the user's will. Balls of fire, arcs of lightning, and so on. The flashiest and most immediately deadly form of magic, evokers are terrors on the battlefield. Their ability to defend with their magic is poor, however, and evokers tire more quickly than most magic users.
The legendary application of Evocation is a matter of scale rather than type; where normal evokers might decide the course of a battle, a legendary evoker decides the course of entire wars.
Your uncle is quite fond of 'battle-magic' such as this. He will take a hand in your evocation classes personally.
Nature [10] – The manipulation of the natural world. Crops grow faster, water may dance or drown under your command, and communication with animals is possible.
The legendary application of Nature magic is to gain command of the world around you down to the smallest detail. Within the sphere of your influence, you would be almost impossible to surprise and nearly as difficult to defeat.
Clairvoyance [10] – Clairvoyance allows one to divine the future and scry upon the present. Scrying requires a piece or sympathetic item of the item you wish to see. Information divined about the future is often cryptic, confusing or even occasionally – infuriatingly – in rhyme.
The legendary application of Clairvoyance is a matter of breadth and scope; a miracle of multi-tasking. Legendary clairvoyants are capable of seeing… everything.
Illusion [10] – Magic which may fool the senses of others. Twisting light, shadow and sound, an illusionist can produce convincing visions of things which do not exist, or hide things which do. Between two practitioners all else being equal, illusions do not defeat Clairvoyance magic.
The legendary application of Illusion is true creation; illusions with heft and weight and even minds of their own. Your father's talent was on this level, or as close as you have ever seen anyone come.
Necromancy [10] – Magic which interacts with the dead; the communication, summoning and binding of souls. An unpopular branch of magic banned everywhere except Caelis Valera.
The legendary application of Necromancy is the recombination of body and soul – true resurrection without blemish or flaw.

Regency Disapproved!
Ladylike Subjects – A princess is generally expected to be able to navigate a dance floor, manipulate a noble, orate a speech, learn an instrument, strike up a conversation or strike down an adversary, whether through words or proxy. Choose wisely.

Medicine [10] – Your physician is not a priest; he will teach you the mundane arts of dressing wounds and other battlefield medicine, as well as the common symptoms and cures for poisons. He will attempt to impart his creed of 'First, do no harm' as well, but that's a little more hit and miss.
Theology [10] – Taking a greater interest in religious matters will highlight the contrast between yourself and your brother. The priesthood will look charitably on you, and pious nobles are also somewhat popular with the common folk. Even visions from God might be possible for a pious royal, or at least, religious folk believe so…
Your uncle has no love of the New Church, but women make up a disproportionate number of followers of the Goddess, and therefore he will not contest your course of study as much as he might otherwise have done.
Music [20] – Learn the harp, the flute and how to sing. Music lessons will make you popular at festivals and are looked well on by the church. Salons with music are also in vogue among the nobility at the moment.
Dance [20] – Given the number of balls and festivals that will be thrown in your honor, learning to dance may be wise. Your suitors will increase in number, and dancing is a good way for a ladylike princess to remain fit.


Liberal Subjects – Many of these subjects are nearer and dearer to your uncle's heart, and therefore likely for him to include in your schedule even should you not request instruction in them.

Law [10] – You will learn the law of the realm. Typically, royals employ barristers and lawyers to handle such things. However, you may have certain precedents to look up that you wouldn't want people finding out about before the proper time. Law gives you a thorough grounding in what the kingdom finds most important, and helps in the event of nobles trying to slip advantageous rulings past a young ruler.
Engineering [10] – Knowledge of mathematics, of building and architecture. From monuments to war machines, you can understand them and even build them. These include war golems popular in the army of Caelis Valera.

Magic – Magic is in your blood. Over the years you've picked up some minor cantrips through simple exposure. The creation of light or sound or fire, some telekinesis. With the basics of the arcane known to you, you may advance your knowledge with more focused study of the magical arts or even become directly apprenticed to one of the Royal Retainers, to learn a style of magic at the feet of one of the world's best.

Holy [10] – Magic which destroys demons and the undead, and the most powerful defensive magic available. Healing and the curing of poison or disease are also within its purview. This magic is granted by a god, however, and can be revoked.
The legendary application of Holy magic is the true manifestation of the Goddess; heathens are smote, the weak succored, and the just and righteous rewarded.
Holy (Old Gods) [10] – Though the New Church would disapprove, there are methods to learn the ways of the Old Gods. It is a magic of ritual and bargain with beings as old as the world. Dangerous, for in the offering Old God magic calls on beings which care nothing for human lives. But it is an old and powerful magic, one which your family wielded with prowess in older times. For the royal embodies the kingdom, and the god embodies the land…
The legendary application of Old God magic is to become a 'rider', to call an ancient being into you through incantation, or sacrifice, or even dance. For as long as the rider's strength and will lasts, she is all but undefeatable.
Enchanting [20] – Enchanting is the process of imbuing an object with magical properties. Minor forms of any magic the enchanter knows is simple enough, but powerful enchantments require vast amounts of time and expensive reagents. Another use of Enchanting is that one material may be used to grant it's properties to another, permanently.
The legendary applications of Enchanting are found in every epic tale, legendary weapons and armor which will last millennia as the treasure of their nation.
Alchemy [20] – The art of potions, poultices, salves and tinctures. Potions to heal illness or alter the human body, the creations of poisons or acids.
The legendary application of Alchemy is a stone which transforms things into their purest possible state, be that lead into gold or a man back into his most youthful and potent form.

Note : Alchemy and Enchanting are subjects our Uncle sees no point in us learning per WoG. Those are the two subjects we know for sure will not be on the curriculum. Similarly for Holy Magics. He will not object to those but neither will he push for their inclusion. I'm guessing the rest of the magics will be on the curriculum due to us being in a magic kingdom.

 

[Bobs Beard]

Here's another potential huge benefit of necromancy.

Guile, if a mage's corpse is used to make an undead, are there ways to preserve their spellcasting in any way, shape of form?

Because if the answer to that isn't a unilateral 'no', Necromancy is the only option to give you unquestioningly loyal mages from other disciplines as a force multiplying option, rather than 'well you can sway them to your side/hire them', both of which aren't absolute about the loyalty acquired.

One cannot overstate how valuable absolute loyalty is in forces you may frequently need to give mucky jobs and send into danger - doubly so when you don't need to pay them!

And gee willickers, we live in an area with the highest concentration of magic users around - if any graveyards are getting heavy influx of new dead mages, it'd be this place.


So yeah, Necromancy (Barring an answer from the QM I'm clearly not expecting) is da strongest.

 

[Guile]

The vote as it stands: Necromancy and Clairvoyance are tied neck and neck, while Courtly Behavior is up two. I probably won't update until tonight, so there's still a little time to go one way or the other. The apprenticeship to an archmage, no free time, and the palace grounds/gardens are all but locked in.

Spoiler

Military Strategy [10] 1
Combat [10] 2
Law [10] 1
Necromancy [10] 6
Courtly Behavior [10] 8
Clairvoyance [10] 6
Nature [10] 1
Evocation [10] 1
Yes [0] 9
No [0] 6
None [0] 7
A little [10] 1
The palace gardens and grounds [0] 7
The palace libraries [0] 3
At our barony [10] 1

Now, quite a bit of discussion while I was away.

It's entirely possible to do scheming, plotting, and politicking via Necromancy. First off, yes, other nations have Necromancy banned. What that means is that the Princess can act as a beacon/idol for Necromancers. They're a group that would be executed in any other nation. Think of how much more invested they'd be in having someone to represent them higher-up and looking out for their interests so that they have at least one place they won't be executed in. Second, undead can be used for a lot of things that would otherwise be dangerous, which we can potentially leverage for popular support among the lower-class, even if they dislike the idea of Necromancy.

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To restate.

While every nation has necromancy banned, we can act as an idol for a group of criminals and rejects hated everywhere in the world and somehow get them to help us despite the fact that when they do every other country has serious problems with us not extraditing their criminals for execution.

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First, our nation already doesn't ban Necromancers. As a result, we have Necromancers already within' our nation. Necromancers who are probably constantly wary that our Kingdom will bow to foreign pressure and brand them as criminals. If they're not raving lunatics, damn straight I expect their support

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You can indeed be very popular with the assorted freaks, weirdos, creepy death cults and scholars that make up the Necromancy branch. If... that's a good thing? You get the alliance of some of the raving lunatics, too; which is sort of the problem...

And you can create an army of the restless dead, yes... but it's a lot of work, guys. Necromancy in this setting is specifically the manipulation of souls, not bodies. If you want an attack zombie, you can track down and stick an animal soul in a human body, make a few metaphysical connections, bam! Done! And as their creator, they probably won't turn on you and rend the flesh from your royal bones.

They're not terribly good at following orders, though.

More complex things take time.

We can use undead instead of armies because raising a zombie workforce anywhere ever ends up building popular support, particularly when its hated. We can do this to increase production while getting all the coal minors fired. For which they will love us while starving because they're not mining coal.

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Luckily, you have a test group barony to test these things out in!

Legendary is something we might accomplish. In practice, looking at our father (who was probably just as gifted) it was "Yeah, he got pretty close at the height of his power."

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If magical talent were a number, then yours would definitely be a bigger talent than his, and your brother's bigger still.

He did have about twenty years of practice on you, though.

I don't think it'll be all that relevant myself, but, given that "The Witch's Curse [20]" had "(Adds a new potential winning condition)" as one of its primary benefits, I highly doubt that.
Besides, resurrecting them would give us a lot of browny points, especially with our father, you know, the king that was absolutely devastated at the loss of his wife, as the actual king he is not nearly as bound by tradition as the regent when it comes to declaring the successor and it at the very least removes the quite literal deadline we're facing at our 18th birthday.

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Father: "Thanks, daughter! Now we can rule over the kingdom forever as undying immortals!"
Uncle: "All hail our new lich overlords! On pain of a most painful death!"

It definitely wins you brownie points; it pretty much changes the game, in fact. But as with most things, it comes with its own issues.

The Fate Points would be more to ensure that we actually have a gift for heading an army instead of just learning the stuff in school.

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This is true. Classes you spend fate points on are also more likely to get events than their cheaper counterparts.

Henry married over half a dozen women and had many of them killed. This didn't really impair his rule.

Click to shrink...

Your brother is definitely hoping for the harem ending.

Our Brother, being a Playboy most likely will skip the ones he finds boring.

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Uncle: He can try.

You're definitely more right than not, but I spot at least one class that's making the Regent-approved list that you haven't noticed.

 

[Guile]

Here's another potential huge benefit of necromancy.

Guile, if a mage's corpse is used to make an undead, are there ways to preserve their spellcasting in any way, shape of form?

Because if the answer to that isn't a unilateral 'no', Necromancy is the only option to give you unquestioningly loyal mages from other disciplines as a force multiplying option, rather than 'well you can sway them to your side/hire them', both of which aren't absolute about the loyalty acquired.

One cannot overstate how valuable absolute loyalty is in forces you may frequently need to give mucky jobs and send into danger - doubly so when you don't need to pay them!

And gee willickers, we live in an area with the highest concentration of magic users around - if any graveyards are getting heavy influx of new dead mages, it'd be this place.


So yeah, Necromancy (Barring an answer from the QM I'm clearly not expecting) is da strongest.

Click to shrink...

The issue is more about the knowledge of the soul in charge coupled with the magical talent of the body it's housed in.

If you get there quickly enough you could almost certainly find and stick the right soul back in the right body for maximum gains (or rather, minimum losses). This is likely to frighten a lot of people for various reasons, though.

 

[redaeth]

You're definitely more right than not, but I spot at least one class that's making the Regent-approved list that you haven't noticed.

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Probably Law, or Medicine, or Engineering. Hmm, if I had to guess I'd say Law. If Alchemy and Enchanting doesn't fall into approved I can't see Engineering or Medicine doing so either.

Or Holy, for the defensive magics, even if it does rely on a god.

 

[Arkeus]

Probably Law, or Medicine, or Engineering. Hmm, if I had to guess I'd say Law. If Alchemy and Enchanting doesn't fall into approved I can't see Engineering or Medicine doing so either.

Or Holy, for the defensive magics, even if it does rely on a god.

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I'd say Holy (Old God), because it sounds like a ridiculously badass combat magic that our family were experts in centuries ago.

 

[redaeth]

I'd say Holy (Old God), because it sounds like a ridiculously badass combat magic that our family were experts in centuries ago.

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If our uncle worshipped the Old Gods it'd make sense to why he didn't like the new ones.

 

[Guile]

If our uncle worshipped the Old Gods it'd make sense to why he didn't like the new ones.

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It would, wouldn't it?

Of course, he might just not like a bunch of civilians and foreigners trying to muscle in on his country.

 

[Bobs Beard]

The issue is more about the knowledge of the soul in charge coupled with the magical talent of the body it's housed in.

If you get there quickly enough you could almost certainly find and stick the right soul back in the right body for maximum gains (or rather, minimum losses). This is likely to frighten a lot of people for various reasons, though.

Click to shrink...

Good thing that battle often produces fresh corpses, and if the enemy has mages you probably are fielding them too - seems less restrictive than it could be, which is great!

In fact that still sounds way more functional, in terms of 'absolutely loyal mage minions that fear nothing', than any other magic style's presumed options.

Say, how's that assumption track, with those who enjoy debating cross-magic-style esoterics? Court hangers-on, lords, mages, whoever: I'd assume the Princess would have heard something in regards to that.

 

[Pipeman]

Your brother is definitely hoping for the harem ending.

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You know, I'm actually starting to like the guy a bit even though we've never met him.
Probably because he more or less fits the archetype of a quest protagonist rather easily.

Ridiculously talented mage with the looks and charm to get into anyone's pants who probably enjoys getting into fights a bit too much for his own good and aiming for the Harem End regardless of how impossible, impractical and dangerous it might be.
Now if he only hadn't given up on the Imouto Route and come to the conclusion that he needs to kill us to achieve the dream of a steadily expanding magical empire ruled by a Mage-King who has an equally steadily expanding harem that we all share.