[✗] [Voidal Feat] Veilwatching

[ClassyDryad 2368]

Spoiler

OOC PURPOSE

In my opinion veilwatchers is one of the more interesting voidal discipline's to exist, acting as a sacrifice of self like many of the other feats but for purpose other than amassing power like the others (save for perhaps artificery.) However it has fallen by the wayside as its core function does not work well on the server. 1: Its mechanics revolve entirely around a mechanic unique to itself, requiring people making tears to produce forum posts or for ST to produce customized interactions to one specific voidal feat for it to have any purpose. 2: Inherently it has been seen repeatedly that announcing a tear creation on the forums leads leads to constant metagaming and bad faith interactions as people somehow manage to scour the exact placement of the tear, said tear sometimes not even surviving the day of its creation.

Rather than seeing a conceptually interesting lore get inevitably shelved and labeled as "bad lore" for the rest of time, I've decided to try and readjust its intentions so it can better exist on the server. Instead of having specific tailored visions made just for it (though ST is still capable of doing so whenever they actually want to) it instead serves as the voidal means of interacting with prophecy lore. I've also given it various scholarly adjacent spells to help fulfill the niche and expanded upon the cosmetic options it had previously. The lore has more of a drawback CRP wise now due to having one combative ability (which is in itself basically just Arcana Flow) but is nothing insurmountable by a mage who knows what they are doing (its a filter to prevent this feat from just being taken by EVERYONE who meets the requirement, and I mean if everyone takes it start stocking up on flash powder I guess.) The vision of this write is veilwatching is a sacrifice for knowledge, either for the betterment of whatever order of mage's you happen to belong to or for your own personal hunger for knowledge.

Existing veilwatchers may drop the feat without doing the ritual normally required if this passes. Also don't roleplay this as "ooooh nooo the void has shifted and changed our magiiiic!" its PROGRESS brought on the hard work of WIZARDS LIKE YOU. Yes, I am speaking to YOU John Voidcel, YOU. I will steal your pixels and make you D20. You know why? Because I can. That is right John Voidcel, your days are numbered, perhaps you will look back on this moment and wonder if things could have gone differently. Well I am here to say I have divined every possible outcome, and there was no way out of this John Voidcel. This was always going to happen. Your pixels will be mine John Voidcel and there is nothing you can do about it. I WILL DESCEND UPON YOU WITH RIGHTEOUS FURY AND DES-

Arts used are:

Jace's Origin by Ryan Barger
Dragon Eye by Rykyart
Divination by Willian Murai

Original lore (Credits to Meteor Dragon and Mori)

 

 

“This is the thing that troubles me, for I cannot forget Carcosa where black stars hang in the heavens; where the shadows of men's thoughts lengthen in the afternoon, when the twin suns sink into the lake of Hali; and my mind will bear for ever the memory of the Pallid Mask.” 

Robert W. Chambers, The King in Yellow

It is said with the fall of the great Ando Alur in Almaris, there existed two mage brothers who thought to prevent such a tragedy from ever befalling the mortal plane again. It is by their combined work that the Eminent and the Artificer forged a new discipline within the void: becoming the first veilwatchers to walk the land.

In time however, the Eminent strayed from his brother’s ideals and instead turned to use it to seek out power by striking the Veil wherever it was weakest. And so the brothers were caught in an eternal cycle, each undoing the other’s work.

 

Descendantkind is nothing if not adaptable however, and beneath the conflict of its founders the discipline has evolved to broader heights. The veilwatchers of today are often seen as sacrificial sages, trading sanity and power for the sake of the wisdom of their fellows in both matters of the world and the void.

 

== Magic Explanation ==

 

Veilwatching is a lesser discipline of voidal magic which involves the observation of fundamental energies of the world, allowing mages to glean the passage of future events and of greater threats to the integrity of reality. They do so by infusing their very sight with mana, though this does not come without consequence: for what can one expect when staring at the heart of nothingness?

 

1. Veilwatching is a voidal feat which requires at least [3] slots devoted to voidal magic. Should they fall below this threshold the lore enters dormancy and all features are lost until it is met once more.
2. Veilwatching is self-taught, with the “teacher” only required to facilitate the ritual. The aiding mage must mark the app with an applicable voidal FA to validate this.

3. Veilwatching can be obtained in conjunction with any other existing voidal feat.

4. Veilwatchers cannot become seers after being connected, and seers cannot obtain veilwatching, due to the discipline's inherent visual nature.

 

== Progression ==

 

[Tier 1] Mana Sight, Enhanced Linguistics: Acquired upon acceptance.

[Tier 2] Arcane Pigment, Divination: Acquired after [2] OOC weeks from acceptance.

[Tier 3] Void Idol: Acquired after [5] OOC weeks from acceptance.

 

== Connection ==
 

In order to ordain a voidal mage into a veilwatcher, an assisting mage of great skill and a source of greater mana is required. The assisting mage must be of significant skill, requiring an Eminence, Voidstalking, Artificery, or Veilwatching FA in order to properly channel the arcana required without pointlessly damaging the eye of the prospective watcher. A greater mana source can be provided by three additional mages or a single mana obelisk, voidal tear, or voidstalker aura. Both connection and disconnection from veilwatching cannot be done forcibly, as a mage can shrug off attempts to settle or disperse the magic easily.

 

In order to safely perform the ritual, the mage granted the magic must be tethered down. The assisting mage then inserts magegold spikes into the mage’s eyes, or whatever surface might otherwise act as eyes in the case of bizarre creatures and replacements, before energy from the greater source is channeled through the magegold and infused directly into the soon-to-be veilwatcher. The magegold shall melt into the surface as the ritual complete’s, transmuting the gaze for as long as the bearer maintains the discipline. This process is extremely painful and leaves the veilwatcher physically exhausted for [1] OOC day as they recover.

 

In order to willfully cease practice of the discipline, a mage must have the energy drained free of their eyes. This requires three mages or a voidstalker to bind the veilwatcher down before placing a mana absorbent material (most commonly focus crystal) over their gaze. The mages must then draw the power out and into the material until the effects entirely vanish. All mental and physical effects will cease, but the former veilwatcher will be left with total blindness and a grim malaise for [3] OOC days.

 

== Physical Effects ==

 

Most apparent upon a newly ordained veilwatcher is their sight, which becomes utterly suffused with arcana akin to active arcanium. The eye is still visibly an eye- with a discernable pupil and iris (or at least something vaguely akin to them) should one look close enough. The eye also notably gleams brightly- not shedding any light in itself but remaining apparent even through any sort of obscurement or within the shadow of a pitch black cavern. The exact appearance varies from watcher to watcher, determined by a discipline either the veilwatcher or the assisting mage possesses, with these changes overtaking the aesthetics of any existing replacements or manifesting more as hazy points in beings that lack conventional eyes.

 

Spoiler

[Any] The simply glows brightly with the primary aura color of the mage, the color staining the entire eye.

 

[Fire Evocation] The eye appears as a swirl of flames, plasma, or ember-speckled smoke.

 

[Earth Evocation] The eye appears composed of luminous stone, crystal, shifting sand, or seeping mud.

 

[Water Evocation] The eye appears as a mass of swirling glowing water, icy mists, solid ice, bubbles, or sea foam.

 

[Air Evocation] The eye appears a swirling mass of glimmering air, mists, fog, or snow flurry.

 

[Life Evocation] The eye appears as bioluminescent flora or of a glowing eye of any faunal nature, such as the slitted eye of a cat or the wavy eye of a cuttlefish.

 

[Translocation] The eye bears a glowing iris that seems to snap to the position the mage wishes to look rather than changing positions naturally.

 

[Transfiguration] The eye appears as glowing metal or as a swirl of entrapped natural light, such as sunlight, moonlight, or starlight.

 

[Sensory Illusion] The eye appears as normal as possible, only bearing glowing irises.

 

[Artificery] The eye appears constructed in some manner, such as of shifting rune-marked paper or metallic ticking gears.

 

[Eminence] The eyes possessed a symbol ablaze in the mage's mana color in place of a pupil and iris, the rest of the eye stained in the the colors of the mage’s aura.

 

[Voidstalking] The eye appears as utterdark speckled with bright lights akin to stars, or as a tempestuous storm which crackles with electricity.

 

[Scion] The eye appears as a faintly misty haze of mana that forms trailing points of light that trail the scion’s physical movements, akin to the form of their soul-shadow.

 

These eyes are brought up to perfect clarity, capable of seeing as clearly as any descendant possibly could. Notably while these eyes might seem like a boon to most, they are actually notably inconvenient for the mage in question. These efficient eyes are sensitive to blinding lights, with any light based effect that blinds or blurs their sight blinding them for an additional [1] emote before its other effects go into place. The keen eyes similarly see perfectly fine through coverings that would partially obscure their vision- meaning things such as tinted lenses and veils offer no protection for the mage against light based effects. This piercing sight also purges away other visual effects, rendering alchemical lenses dysfunctional to the veilwatcher.

= Redlines =

Spoiler

- The visual glow of a veilwatcher’s eyes remain constant and shine through any sort of clothing or armor which would act to cover them.

- Should the veilwatcher's eyes be replaced at any point, the new eye will be overtaken by the veilwatching aesthetic immediately upon gaining function.
- Visual protection against light-based blinding effects do not protect the veilwatcher, and such effects will blind the mage for additional emote before progressing as normal. They may still prevent such blinding effects by otherwise blocking line of sight (Ice/Fume/Earth shields, walking behind a pillar, etc.)

- Veilwatchers cannot benefit from alchemical lenses, as they do not see any of their effects when looking through them. Similar items from other sources will also prove ineffective.

- While the eyesight of the veilwatcher is improved, it is not improved to a superhuman degree. Consider it equivalent to perfect 20/10 human vision.

 

== Mental Effects ==

 

While most niche disciplines a mage can acquire result in consistent changes upon the mage’s psyche, the outright effects of veilwatching instead struck suddenly and sharply upon them at random: more akin to an attack than anything else. Veilwatchers will often claim this is the result of baleful or inquisitive horrors probing their mind, but the truth of this has yet to be proven. The nature of these attacks are unique to each veilwatcher but always involve severe hallucinations in conjunction with any of the following, or a combination of these:

 

- Maddened perceived understanding, as if all the truths of the universe lay within the watcher’s grasp.

- Cold despair, as if the world itself was moments away from an inevitable end.

- An out of body sensation as if their mind had been shoved from their form, leading to momentary and severe detachment with whatever they were doing.

- A sudden destructive inclination, often resulting in the veilwatcher attacking a bystander unexpectedly or destroying a random object.

- Loss of consciousness, akin to narcolepsy.

- Loss of instinctual motor functions, with the watcher mixing up hands and stumbling/tripping should they attempt to walk. May possibly forget how to breathe or blink.

- Unintentional usage of otherwise harmless magic within the limits of magics they possess.

 

These events will occur somewhat frequently on the mage, once per narrative month at the very least. The constant wear of these attacks strains on the mind of the mage, often but not always causing vivid nightmares, a sense of anxiety, weariness, or similar to set upon the mage.

 

== Spells and Abilities ==

 

 

[T1][Passive][Combative] Mana Sight

With arcana suffusing their very gaze, a veilwatcher finds themselves an involuntary witness to the many energies of the world. Many who still follow the discipline’s created purpose use this to track down greater threats to reality as it is known.

 

Spoiler

The mage can witness mana of any variety, viewing it as an eldritch hallucination/enwreathing glow/etc. About the source of the magic. Entities of a magical nature, casting mages, or magical artifice will all be witnessed by this effect. However, arts of disguise and transformation, requiring inward magical action, are not visible to the watcher.

 

- Does not know what type of mana they are looking at, or the properties associated with it. They simply know that it is magical.

- Magic users only glow when casting a spell, and CA’s only glow when “revealed” as what they are already.

- Does not function on disguises, transformational magics, or invisibility related effects other than those made by illusion (which appear to shroud the caster and the heads of their targets.)

- Structures (Mehirs, Soul Trees, Obelisks) will glow under this effect, with tears and monoliths glowing notably brighter.

- It is limited to what the mage can visibly see, meaning it does not function while blinded or past line of sight.

- Should lore reference unique interactions with Arcana Flow, they will also apply to Mana Sight.

 

 

[T1][Passive][Non Combative] Enhanced Linguistics

The piercing vision of a veilwatcher breaks through much that would otherwise hinder a mage from understanding more occult languages, allowing the watcher to embrace the role of a learned translator.

 

Spoiler

The mage is capable of reading, understanding, and eventually writing and speaking languages they might not otherwise be able to possess such as the tongues of inferi or dragonkin. This still requires they learn the language however, requiring [2] narrative years of effort, while languages that any being can learn are learned with half as much time and effort as they normally would. Speaking a language that a mage cannot normally speak is magically straining however, limiting them to single sentences at a time with breaks between.

 

- Lore restricted languages must be marked upon the Veilwatching FA, along with the identity of the individual that taught them.

- A mage must be taught the language  by a teacher, they cannot “put together” the language by hearing people speak it.

- For EVENT related languages, whether or not the mage can learn the language and what ways they can utilize it are up to the ET in question. This must be marked by the ET on their FA.

- A mage is limited to single sentences once per emote while speaking in a normally restricted language.

 

 

[T2][Active][Non Combative] Arcane Pigment

The greatest works require the greatest of paints, and for a veilwatcher there is no greater medium to work with than their knowledge itself. Watchers are capable of condensing arcana into various mediums to form inscribed creations.

 

Spoiler

With [1] emote of [Connect/Cast] a veilwatcher can condense their arcana into a medium, either the moisture in the air to form an ink for finger-writing or into existing ink/oilpaint/chalk/pastel/etc. This ink dries the moment the mage ends their connection, requiring them to apply it as it is made and rendering creating vials of arcane pigment impossible. Painting with their very knowledge, the infused medium takes on a charged form depending on what magics the watcher possesses, varying between them at will as they work.
 

Spoiler

[Any] The pigment appears as raw, glowing mana of any of the mage’s aura colors akin to the core spell imagination or arcanism of old.

 

[Fire Evocation] The pigment appears as some form of fiery evocation, such as flames, ash, embers, smoke, plasma, or lava.

 

[Earth Evocation] The pigment appears as a form of earthen evocation, such as stone, crystal, shifting sediments, or raw metallic ores.

 

[Water Evocation] The pigment appears as watery evocations, such as solid ice, swirling water, wintry mists, bubbles, sea foam, grey raincloud, or brine.

 

[Air Evocation] The pigment appears in a manner of airy evocation, such as shifting currents of barely visible wind, fluffy clouds, colorful mists, condensed fog, or snow flurries.

 

[Life Evocation] The pigment appears in a manner of organic evocation, such as fresh dripping blood, moss, floral clusters, fungal roots, squirming flesh, or ever circulating swarms of mites.

 

[Translocation] The pigment can shiver or change position as random, or appears to hold depth into another painted scene which is impossible for the surface it is made on.

 

[Transfiguration] The pigment is clear, but traps natural light it is exposed to when it dries, allowing for pigments composed of sunlight, moonlight, starlight, etc.

 

[Sensory Illusion] The pigment retains its normal appearance, but is capable of changing form, color, and moving in pre-determined ways.

 

[Artificery] The pigment holds the form of multiple other pigments the mage can produce, shifting between them ambiently, depending on the angle, at the will of a mage connected near the item, or when triggered in some determined way.

 

[Eminence] The pigment retains its normal appearance, but when willed by a connected mage or tapped by a voidal material the paints blaze alive with the mage’s aura, glowing brightly and releasing the visual form of the mage’s aura.

 

[Voidstalking] The pigment appears as utterdark, growing no brighter on exposure to any form of light, a nebulous display akin to the night sky, or as another pigment the mage can produce save for occasionally leaking some form of evocation past or present.

 

[Scion] The pigment appears like general arcane pigment, but leaves periodic “images” of itself trailing after the original when its position is moved. It may instead retain its normal appearance, but produce a glowing image of mana up to 3 inches off the surface.

 

Notably, the entire surface of an object cannot be painted over with the pigment as doing so will cause the arcana to amass and return to the outer void. This will occur should more than [90%] of a surface be covered. Nor will covering a large portion of an object make it appear as something else, as it is very clearly marked upon the object. And while it can be painted or tattooed onto living things, the anima of the body will fight the eldritch presence and eventually dispel it after at most [1] narrative year. It can, however, be painted onto mundane surfaces that would normally not accept the type of medium being utilized.

 

While primarily used by veilwatchers to construct void idols, an object inscribed to cover at least a fourth of its surface will attain some ability to retain mana, allowing it to act as a cosmetic substitute for open voidal materials, such as in the creation of yisar, or for arcane focuses.

 

- Arcane pigment is a cosmetic alteration to an object, meaning it cannot cause any harm to others, cannot conceal the properties of what it is marked on, and can be applied to enchanted objects (though nothing that would outright reject magical influence like thanhium.)
- Objects created using arcane pigment are player-signed.

- Usable mediums are limited to things a mage can write or paint with.

- The entire object cannot be covered, as it will destroy the magical nature of the pigment.

- Acting as a substitute for an open material is cosmetic. Painting a rock to act as a yisar egg will not confer any bonuses to the ritual, and painting an object to house a grand enchantment will still have said enchantment break when the object is struck.

- Cannot be painted on arcanium (which absorbs the arcana) or on anything which outright rejects any magical influence (like thanhic steel.) Paint applied to living flesh will eventually vanish after at most a narrative year.

- The pigment can be destroyed by abjuration effects or by rubbing it with aurum.

- While a mage can use liquidated forms of other energies or reagents as a pigment (such as nightglow, rakir, liquid lifeforce, etc.) the arcana will destroy any magical or alchemical properties the material used possesses due to its universally antithetical nature.

 

 

[T2][Active][Non Combative] Divination

While it is unknown by the exact means a veilwatcher obtains connection to the threads fate, whether by exposure to the veil, receiving whispered echoes from beings within the outer void, or by some means unique to each watcher: watchers may glean the passage of future events. 

 

Spoiler

Through a freeform ritual, which could include gazing into an orb, inspecting the sky, rifling through internal organs, or watching the actions of strangers a mage may receive prophetic insight, allowing them to view prophecy posts. Unlike most forms or receiving prophecies this is an active spell which randomly selects a prophecy they have not seen (from within the last OOC month) to view. Due to this, veilwatchers will often find themselves needing to constantly consult their divinations in order to ensure they are up to date on possible future events.

 

- Veilwatchers with Divination may view prophecy posts, so long as Divination is utilized.

- Veilwatchers can only view one prophecy per use, and only a prophecy they have not yet seen within the last OOC month.

 

 

[T3][Active][Non Combative] Void Idol

Through years of experience inscribing with their pigments and experiencing divined hallucinations, a veilwatcher may enchant their own visions upon objects.

 

Spoiler

Through a freeform ritual a veilwatcher may mark an object with arcane pigment while holding a vision they would like to impart upon an object with their designed message. The object in question must have at least a fourth of its surface inscribed in pigments to function, and will then display its vision to any who look upon the pigments. These visions are visual and auditory in nature, both not applying any sort of forced effect on the target’s emotions, nor obscuring their surroundings enough to prevent the witness from reacting to danger. At any point and by any means the witness may reject the vision and end it early, such as by averting their eyes, closing a book, or so on.

 

- Void Idol is a player-signed enchantment, meaning it is not compatible with other enchantments. It cannot be placed on anything arcane pigments cannot be placed on.

- Void Idol can be placed on structures, requiring signs to state what it is.

- Void Idol visions must be either detailed on the object, within a book if placed upon a book item, on a nearby lectern, linked to a forum post detailing the vision, detailed on signs, or state to contact the mage who created it.

- The vision is the same each time it is witnessed. It cannot harm anyone, does not leave them unable to react to danger, and does not function during CRP.

- Cannot cause “mentalism” effects on the target, limited to visual and auditory hallucinations. Said hallucinations do not have to be believable unlike those produced by sensory illusion however.

- Depicting a player character in a vision requires OOC consent from that player.

- A rational individual can assume that anything witnessed in the vision may be fake, as it has been tailored by whoever made it.

- An Idol may be destroyed through physically breaking the object, abjuring it through antimagics, or by rubbing aurum across its pigment inscriptions.

 

[Vertigo_Round 335]

Classy lore, instant upvote

[PrimnyaQuorum 4007]

mrow

 

I am obviously biased, having posted Sentries myself. However....

 

What does language, or mana scribing, have to do with the Veil? Veil Watching is inherently tied to the existence and nature of the Veil, but I can't find when I read this how it's actually tied to the Veil beyond the name. 

 

For offering essentially nothing combative beyond the average human's sight, you suffer a permeant tell that more often than not will just be used as an excuse to meta more info, a +1 to all blindness durations for seemingly no reason, and some psuedo-insanity. Furthermore, taking three mages to disconnect from an optional feat is outrageous; being or unbecoming a veilwatcher has never been a particular issue.

 

 

[ClassyDryad 2368]

1 hour ago, PrimnyaQuorum said:

mrow

 

I am obviously biased, having posted Sentries myself. However....

 

What does language, or mana scribing, have to do with the Veil? Veil Watching is inherently tied to the existence and nature of the Veil, but I can't find when I read this how it's actually tied to the Veil beyond the name. 

 

For offering essentially nothing combative beyond the average human's sight, you suffer a permeant tell that more often than not will just be used as an excuse to meta more info, a +1 to all blindness durations for seemingly no reason, and some psuedo-insanity. Furthermore, taking three mages to disconnect from an optional feat is outrageous; being or unbecoming a veilwatcher has never been a particular issue.

 

 

Because your magic vision lets you bypass magics that prevent you from understanding it/being able to witness energies constantly lets you manipulate them better, if you read the OOC purpose you would know I am pushing it more towards void scholar lore and away from Void INTERPOL lore because that design just hasn't worked well. The added weakness is a filter against minmaxers. And you literally do need three mages to disconnect a veilwatcher currently what do you mean its never been a thing? The perm tell is also in the original lore so like maybe reread it again first? (EDIT: I realized this might sound passive aggressive. Its not, just saying to double check the original lore since you might be internalizing stuff you did in your own lore now.)

[xo31 3989]

Beautifully formatted and written however I fear this does not fix the current issue with veilwatching which is that it doesnt really do anything besides Make your Eyes Glow and most of these abilities are kind of nothing-burgers (no offense i still think its well written)

[ClassyDryad 2368]

3 minutes ago, xo31 said:

Beautifully formatted and written however I fear this does not fix the current issue with veilwatching which is that it doesnt really do anything besides Make your Eyes Glow and most of these abilities are kind of nothing-burgers (no offense i still think its well written)

I mostly agree (prophecy is in itself inherently a nothingburger) but I do not think an void feat open to every mage should really be something you HAVE to get. Its mostly roleplay tools, just more actually usable ones without needing ST to custom make interactions for you.

[Wonderland_Boy 1082]

1 hour ago, ClassyDryad said:

The mage is capable of reading, understanding, and eventually writing and speaking languages they might not otherwise be able to possess such as the tongues of inferi or dragonkin. This still requires they learn the language however, requiring [2] narrative years of effort, while languages that any being can learn are learned with half as much time and effort as they normally would. Speaking a language that a mage cannot normally speak is magically straining however, limiting them to single sentences at a time with breaks between.

Finally... a way to learn those weird languages without becoming a seer,inferi or azdrazi T-T

[kuebiko 686]

I'm a little confused about the nature of this rewrite. It wasn't too long ago that we had a thread dedicated to an open discussion about the state of veilwatching and how it was lacking - but I don't think this rewrite fixes any of that. I think writing a paragraph about your intentions with the rewrite, and explaining why certain changes were made would be useful for readers.
 

It's strange that two of the "new" abilities for veilwatchers are essentially seer abilities (divination, linguistics). Veilwatchers should have the ability to see prophecies but they should be voidal in nature, or have to do with the veil, mana, wizardry etc. Some of the listed abilities don't delve into the identity of veilwatching at all. Not only that but why are all of the unique veilwatcher abilities gone in this write? Afaik there were no issues with communication and veil view besides underutilization. (Both are COOL and have LOTS OF POTENTIAL...) (Veil-viewing in particular made for some cool character interactions) (Communication is also a really ******* cool ability if ST were to utilize it)

Out of all the past abilities the only one that really needs modification is Event Horizon, and it should remain part of veilwatching since well, the whole point of veilwatchers is that they look over the integrity of the veil and void. But it's not present in any form here. I think it should return but with less clarity in locating tears as per current veilwatching issues.
 

Also, under the mental effects I think it's a bit lacking. Veilwatching currently has the associated effects of separation anxiety and sleep paralysis, which I find are both fitting to the nature of the feat.

 

I highly recommend revising this, contacting @Morigung-oogfor assistance, and reading through this thread: 

 

[PrimnyaQuorum 4007]

3 minutes ago, kuebiko said:

I'm a little confused about the nature of this rewrite. It wasn't too long ago that we had a thread dedicated to an open discussion about the state of veilwatching and how it was lacking - but I don't think this rewrite fixes any of that. I think writing a paragraph about your intentions with the rewrite, and explaining why certain changes were made would be useful for readers.
 

It's strange that two of the "new" abilities for veilwatchers are essentially seer abilities (divination, linguistics). Veilwatchers should have the ability to see prophecies but they should be voidal in nature, or have to do with the veil, mana, wizardry etc. The 3 listed abilities don't delve into the identity of veilwatching at all. Not only that but why are all of the unique veilwatcher abilities gone in this write? Afaik there were no issues with communication and veil view besides underutilization. (Both are COOL and have LOTS OF POTENTIAL...) (Veil-viewing in particular made for some cool character interactions) (Communication is also a really ******* cool ability if ST were to utilize it)

Out of all the past abilities the only one that really needs modification is Event Horizon, and it should remain part of veilwatching since well, the whole point of veilwatchers is that they look over the integrity of the veil and void. But it's not present in any form here. I think it should return but with less clarity in locating tears as per current veilwatching issues.
 

Also, under the mental effects I think it's a bit lacking. Veilwatching currently has the associated effects of separation anxiety and sleep paralysis, which I find are both fitting to the nature of the feat.

 

I highly recommend revising this, contacting @Morigung-oogfor assistance, and reading through this thread: 

 

 

I can bite on some of these bc I rewrote veilwatchers through my sentrys submission

 

Communion, alongside other ST abilities don't work in practice; they're a liability for ST during events and in general to be subject to the whims of random voidmages who they often say no too because, frankly, there are few if any ST who want to deal with horrors. Likewise, veil-visions tear vision aspect was just never used well, and never can be since such an interaction relies on ST to ensure fairness all around.

 

Theoretically, the Veil has ties to the beginning of existence; there is no real reason why prophecy's of any kind wouldn't ripple across the veil in turn. A primarily goal of my rewrite was to remove the good & bad/Voidal EPA status quo of veilwatching and clarify its roots are more of an accepted tasking for a non-sentient thing that supercedes most deities in scale and magnitude. 

[ClassyDryad 2368]

20 minutes ago, kuebiko said:

I'm a little confused about the nature of this rewrite. It wasn't too long ago that we had a thread dedicated to an open discussion about the state of veilwatching and how it was lacking - but I don't think this rewrite fixes any of that. I think writing a paragraph about your intentions with the rewrite, and explaining why certain changes were made would be useful for readers.
 

It's strange that two of the "new" abilities for veilwatchers are essentially seer abilities (divination, linguistics). Veilwatchers should have the ability to see prophecies but they should be voidal in nature, or have to do with the veil, mana, wizardry etc. The 3 listed abilities don't delve into the identity of veilwatching at all. Not only that but why are all of the unique veilwatcher abilities gone in this write? Afaik there were no issues with communication and veil view besides underutilization. (Both are COOL and have LOTS OF POTENTIAL...) (Veil-viewing in particular made for some cool character interactions) (Communication is also a really ******* cool ability if ST were to utilize it)

Out of all the past abilities the only one that really needs modification is Event Horizon, and it should remain part of veilwatching since well, the whole point of veilwatchers is that they look over the integrity of the veil and void. But it's not present in any form here. I think it should return but with less clarity in locating tears as per current veilwatching issues.
 

Also, under the mental effects I think it's a bit lacking. Veilwatching currently has the associated effects of separation anxiety and sleep paralysis, which I find are both fitting to the nature of the feat.

 

I highly recommend revising this, contacting @Morigung-oogfor assistance, and reading through this thread: 

 

1. The OOC explanation is in the upper spoiler, you can read it there.
2. As stated in that (and as an inherent problem with veilwatching) voidal only prophecies requires ST to custom target specifically veilwatching which makes no sense for a feat (I think the one time it happened the ST gave up on it very quickly.)
3. Seer doesn't own language and prophecy related lore. There are multiple ways to do both across a large number of sources.
4. Communication is the ultimate nothing ability, a voidal horror flat out just does not need you to be a veilwatcher to communicate with you and ST has rejected attempts to use it proactively. It COULD  be good if ST allowed it to be used but as it stands they won't so its wasting space.
5. Veil View can be done through Conduit lore, which is open to literally everyone. I changed it to Void Idols to make something a bit more unique and interesting to this lore. Its also more flexible because it can be used for all manner of visions beyond just "A tear has opened in lego city" or looking at the veil.
6. The problem with event horizon cannot be fixed by making the location any more or less clear. The moment people make such a post swarms of people with dwarfvision will scour the map and find the tear essentially immediately. IF someone wants to have this sort of interaction anyways there is literally nothing stopping them from making a prophecy post about it, but I do not imagine they will as this has sort of been abandoned already :( .
7. I made the mental effects more so sporadic because it gets a bit exhausting to try and keep track of mental effects across 1 morbillion different lores and people sometimes just don't roleplay them anyways. Not to mention said negative effects sort of just tread on each other all the time and these are more unique and will probably actually be viewed as more significant in rp if anything.
8: Of unique abilities in veilwatching, 3 are functionally improved (mana sense now works broadly, event horizon works on things that actually exist, veil view is now not a reskin of conduit), eyeball healing is gone because its clunky, communicating with horrors is gone because it's sort of meaningless, and you get two new abilities (no mention of my fav pigments :( )

 

[kuebiko 686]

1 minute ago, ClassyDryad said:

1. The OOC explanation is in the upper spoiler, you can read it there.
2. As stated in that (and as an inherent problem with veilwatching) voidal only prophecies requires ST to custom target specifically veilwatching which makes no sense for a feat (I think the one time it happened the ST gave up on it very quickly.)
3. Seer doesn't own language and prophecy related lore. There are multiple ways to do both across a large number of sources. Also the void itself is
4. Communication is the ultimate nothing ability, a voidal horror flat out just does not need you to be a veilwatcher to communicate with you and ST has rejected attempts to use it proactively. It COULD  be good if ST allowed it to be used but as it stands they won't so its wasting space.
5. Veil View can be done through Conduit lore, which is open to literally everyone. I changed it to Void Idols to make something a bit more unique and interesting to this lore. Its also more flexible because it can be used for all manner of visions beyond just "A tear has opened in lego city" or looking at the veil.
6. The problem with event horizon cannot be fixed by making the location any more or less clear. The moment people make such a post swarms of people with dwarfvision will scour the map and find the tear essentially immediately. IF someone wants to have this sort of interaction anyways there is literally nothing stopping them from making a prophecy post about it, but I do not imagine they will as this has sort of been abandoned already :( .
7. I made the mental effects more so sporadic because it gets a bit exhausting to try and keep track of mental effects across 1 morbillion different lores and people sometimes just don't roleplay them anyways. Not to mention said negative effects sort of just tread on each other all the time and these are more unique and will probably actually be viewed as more significant in rp if anything.
8: Of unique abilities in veilwatching, 3 are functionally improved (mana sense now works broadly, event horizon works on things that actually exist, veil view is now not a reskin of conduit), eyeball healing is gone because its clunky, communicating with horrors is gone because it's sort of meaningless, and you get two new abilities (no mention of my fav pigments :( )

 

thank u for the explanation! Sorry I totally missed the opening spoiler since i saw the music went "oh its music" then scrolled. I'm so used to the explanation being listed at the bottom of the post. 

[PrimnyaQuorum 4007]

18 minutes ago, ClassyDryad said:

5. Veil View can be done through Conduit lore, which is open to literally everyone. I changed it to Void Idols to make something a bit more unique and interesting to this lore. Its also more flexible because it can be used for all manner of visions beyond just "A tear has opened in lego city" or looking at the veil.

 

This isn't true at all

[ClassyDryad 2368]

32 minutes ago, PrimnyaQuorum said:

 

This isn't true at all

Not literally, but if you are a veilwatcher you can use conduit to show people prophecies you have seen, or show them the veil via dreamscape. Functionally its the same thing, but with more options on what you do and better guidelines. The only difference is that you theoretically could fudge the vision but I do not think ST likes people being able to prove they witnessed a prophecy.

Edit: I don't want this to get the top of the topics off void chatter about mechanic specifics so if you (you John Voidcel reading this) have further questions or thoughts on if what I am saying is incorrect hit me on discord rather than flooding this chat.

[Wolfy-D 483]

In my opinion (Wich I am sharing because I don't see many people saying good things about it) it's great lore, super understandable minus like maybe 2 or 3 things that I ended up under after the second read, and if it gets accepted I might take it.

[Venomous_Pup 2978]

Truthfully, I think a lot of the abilities here need to be scrapped/reworked because, imo don't really make any sense in terms of why they would grant things using the Void as an energy source, learning languages through the Void only seems like something that would make sense with the old ass cognat lore, realisitcally maybe they can learn Moonspeech but idk how ST would feel about that. The whole matter of Prophecy feels in the same way, where it doesn't make much sense. I think ultimately what makes this piece feel distasteful is that it lacks unique interactions like the old one does in terms of Communication from the currently accepted thing, in which opening your vision to the Void makes it more susceptible to Voidal Illusions and so forth, which compartivley just makes it seem like this is a more buffed verison of Veil Watching and able to shrug off any downsides as the abilities I mentioned above which border on Seer means there might be very little trade off if you had to pick between Seer and Veil Watching. I think Mana Sight shouldn't be passive and inline with other abilities and lore that require activation, and perhaps as a trade-off for never needing the alchemical lens, the range is limited and can't leverage alchemical lenses given the conflicting nature (or at least, more clearly outlined).  

Ultimately, as you'd covered in the OOC purpose, the core function of Veil Watching makes it difficult to maintain. From what I heard, there have been plenty of Voidal Tears already made this map, yet I don't think any of them have gotten a post. While I do think the concept of Veil Watching is solid and deserves a place in the server lore, I think a complete redesign from the ground up would serve the community as a whole better. Given that this is knowledge that is passed down from two conflicting brothers, maybe it might be worthwhile to pursue means within the Veil Watching lore piece to help would-be Tear Makers, such as being able to make faux-veil tears every so often and in a Ritual with x amount of other magi to throw people off with the ability to divine the happenings of the Veil, I 100% agree with what Squak said on the post about it basically solely serving as a 'meta game radar', it needs more substance and some back and forth that encourages attempts out counter play. Perhaps there needs to other lore pieces laid out that Veil Watchers can leverage before an attempt of a rewrite or restructure.

Edited February 9 by Venomous_Pup
Fixed a word that wasn't correct.