Power through knowledge.
The harpy soars through the air, gathering electric energy on her feet. Below, her friends are battling a Mortisaur. Gunshots ring, but the monster seems unimpressed by the ballistic weapons. With a thunderous boom she fires the bolt into the rampaging monster. Sparks explode off its body and it stagers from the sheer power of the spell.
Golden veins snake over the elf’s pale hands. The bullet hole in her friend bleeds everywhere and his death is near. As her hands close in, tendrils of yellow energy snake into his body and flows through it in crisscross patterns. He grunts from the unpleasantly hot sensation and a moment later the wound closes. The bleeding stops and the warrior picks his weapon back up. He gives the elf a nod and charges back into battle.
Green energy glistens on the orc’s skin as he charges forward. The gun emplacement fires shot after shot, but the bullets simply ricochet of the forcefield with barely visible flashes of green light. A bit of green light flares around his legs and with a dull phoom the massive man is flung into the air. The gunner can only look up in horror as the mass of magically protected muscle flies towards him. With a splat he is crushed under the orc’s weight.
Mages are magic-users, defined and united as a class by the spells they cast. There are six different elemental energies. Force, Lightning, Frost, Light, Fire and Life. Through complicated martial and mental techniques mages convert their own vitality into these elemental energies. Few things require as much knowledge, as much mental acuity, as much discipline as magic and each lore is different in the physical attributes and the mental techniques it demands of its wielder. Only the greatest can hope to master more than one.
Scholars of the Arcane
The promise of incredible power entices many. With the flick of a wrist a fire mage can summon a bolt of fire, as hot as the sun, and hurl it at a foe. These fancy movements barely hint at the years of training, the grueling sacrifices and the terrible danger it takes to gain such awesome power. Learning magic is not just something you do. It is a way of life. Your lore defines everything about you. Mages live and die by their spells. Everything else is secondary.
Those who received the body of a mage are experts in the element they command and will play a great role in building this new world.
Knowledge is Power
Most mages in the other world are trained from a young age. Before you learn the proper ways to safeguard yourself, spellcasting is dangerous. One wrong move and a spell might misfire, unleashing its destructive potential on its caster. Fully fledged mages have learned how to wield arcane power safely, but most still carry the scars of their early attempts. Aside from the danger, using a spell is complicated. In order to use it in combat, it needs to become second nature. The endless study of mental and martial techniques leaves little time for else. There is no room for anything but the most basic weapon drills or the development of other skills of any kind. In the end though, what will a mere man do when faced with a master of magic? If he has any sense, he will get out of the way.
Building a Mage
Whether by choice or pure chance, you have inherited the body of one of the world’s finest. Even a novice mage has years of training behind them. They are the peak of mental and physical condition, for only the strongest can turn their own life force into feats of magic.
As a mage, your single most defining attribute is the lore you command, but first you must decide whether you want to focus on mastering a single lore, or two at once. Even learning to channel a type of energy is a significant investment, yet the ability to combine spells from different lores can lead to awesome combinations. Once you have decided what path you will take, you will have to choose a lore. The Lore of Force feeds of your strength. Those who practice it must be athletes of the highest caliber. The Lore of Light requires precise movements and as such for a lightning mage dexterity is the only meaningful skill. Those who practice the Lore of Frost must have bodies as strong as a mountain, for only the strongest constitution can command the cold. The Lore of Lightning must be wielded with a mind that can understand its complicated nature. It can only be invoked by the most intelligent. The Lore of Fire is unpredictable. Only those who can go with its flow have the Wisdom needed to guide it. Finally, to command the forces that govern life and death, one must have an iron will. Only those with the charisma to make their will real can make full use of the Lore of Life.
Through your patron you have been given a shortcut to great power. As you gain experience you will unlock the spells they trained into their ingrained memory and what took them years you will gain much faster. Magic is a force of nature. Like a gun it can be used for the greatest of evil and the best of good. Will you stand above your fellow mortal, beautiful and terrible? Will you fight for an ideal, or will you simply protect those you hold dear and build your own small patch of paradise with them? The choice is yours.
Mage Features
Primary Ability Scores: Determined by the lore(s) you can cast. (Refer to the chapter on spellcasting for details)
| Level | Proficiency Bonus | Features | Spells Known | Spell Level |
| 1st | +2 | Spellcasting, Arcane Aptitude | 4 | Novice (1) |
| 2nd | +2 | Metamagic | 6 | Novice (1) |
| 3rd | +2 | — | 8 | Apprentice (2) |
| 4th | +2 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat, Metamagic | 10 | Apprentice (2) |
| 5th | +3 | — | 12 | Adept (3) |
| 6th | +3 | Metamagic | 14 | Adept (3) |
| 7th | +3 | — | 16 | Expert (4) |
| 8th | +3 | Ability Score Improvement or Feat, Metamagic | 18 | Expert (4) |
| 9th | +4 | — | 20 | Master (5) |
| 10th | +4 | Spell Volley | 22 | Master (5) |
CLASS FEATURES
As a mage, you gain the following class features.
HIT POINTS
Hit Dice: 1d6 per mage level
Hit Points at 0th Level: Racial Base Hit Points + your Constitution modifier
Hit Point Increase: 1d6 (or 4) + your Constitution modifier every mage level.
Vitality
Vitality Dice: 1d10 per mage level
Vitality at 0th Level: Racial Base Vitality + your highest spellcasting modifier (determined by your lore)
Vitality Increase: 1d10 (or 6) + your spellcasting modifier every mage level.
PROFICIENCIES
Armor: Light
Weapons: Simple Weapons
Saving Throws: Your Spellcasting Ability Score, Intelligence or Wisdom
Skills: Choose two from Arcana, History, Insight, Investigation, Medicine, and Religion.
Spellcasting
As a mage you focus solely on casting spells that your patron trained and committed to ingrained memory.
When you gain your first level, you choose the lore your patron practiced, if it wasn’t already determined randomly. Choose from the Lore of Force, Light, Frost, Lightning, Fire or Life. Your lore determines what spells you have access to. The chapter on spell casting provides detailed descriptions of each lore and the spells they have access to. Refer to the spell list of your lore to see what these spells are and what effects they have. At first level you learn the Channel spell of your lore and 4 Novice spells. Whenever you gain a level, you may choose 2 new spells from your lore of a level you have access to. Your track (subclass) determines the rate at which you unlock new spells. Refer to the table of your chosen track to see when you gain access to higher level spells.
Whenever you gain access to a new spell level, you automatically learn the corresponding Channel spell, which does not count against the number of spells you may choose. Any spell you learn is committed to your memory and can be cast at any time, as long as you have the needed vitality.
For example, you are a Fire Mage and just gained your third level. You now know the Channel Fire I and Channel Fire II spells. In addition to that you know 6 novice spells and may now choose 2 spells that may be of novice or apprentice level. After that you know the two Channel and 8 more spells that you may cast at any time, as long as you have the vitality specified in the spell’s description.
Vitality
Casting a spells requires energy. Your Vitality describes this energy. All spells have a vitality cost that must be deducted from your total. If you reach 0 Vitality, you fall unconscious and the spell you were casting fails. (See the general rules on Spellcasting for details).
Arcane Aptitude
Mages can train their magical abilities any way they want. They can either choose to focus on learning new techniques that grant access to more powerful spells, or learn how to cast spells from a new lore. Whenever you would gain acces to a new level of spells, you can instead choose to gain access to a new lore of magic or increase the level of spells you can cast in that secondary lore.
For example, Sam choose the Lore of Fire at level 1, but he also wants to be able to cast spells from the Lore of Light. When he reaches 3rd level, he would gain access to apprentice (2nd level) spells from the Lore of Fire, but instead he chooses to gain access to novice (1st level) spells from the Lore of Light. He learns the Channel Light I spell and can now learn novice level spells from both the Lore of Light and Fire. When he reaches 5th level, he may either gain access to apprentice (2nd level) spells from the Lore of Fire, or the Lore of Light, or choose a third lore to learn.
Metamagic
At 2nd level, you gain the ability to use the additional knowledge you have about your lore to modify spells on the fly. You gain two Metamagic options of your choice. You gain another one at 4th, 6th and 8th level.
You can apply only one Metamagic option on a spell when you cast it, unless otherwise noted in the option’s description.
Ability Score Improvement or Feat
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th level, you can increase one attribute score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two attribute scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can’t increase an attribute score above 20 using this feature. Alternatively you may choose a feat from the Feat list.
Spell Volley
Starting at 10th level you have mastered your magical lore. You can simply manifest a magical effect on a whim and while this way of casting is inefficient, it allows you to unleash an unparalleled amount of firepower in an instant.
When you cast a spell, you can triple its cost to ignore its casting time and somatic component. The total level of spells manifested this way cannot exceed your spellcasting ability score. Projectiles manifest next to, or in front of you in your space and are launched at a designated target (You must make a separate attack roll for every attack). Using this ability requires an action.
For example, a fire mage with 20 Wisdom may use his action to instantly manifest and fire 10 firebolts in a turn.
